When Chris and Janine Jones soft-opened their soft-serve frozen yogurt stand, Dexter Creamery, on May 5, Chris says, “we were slammed–750 customers in one day.” Some of the traffic may have been due to Cinco de Mayo celebrating and some a result of a very canny marketing gimmick of hiding fifty gold-painted rocks around Dexter like Easter eggs, promising the finders a free froyo, but it’s impressive nonetheless for an uncommonly chilly day.
Chris grew up in the dairy business in Great Falls, Montana, where his father worked for Meadow Gold milk: “Elsie the cow, remember?” Great Falls was “similar to Dexter,” he says. “You could walk everywhere. I’d walk to Meadow Gold every day, pick up my dad at work, and get my free ice cream bar.”
After bouncing all over the U.S. working in IT for big companies like MCI, Jones “locked myself in a closet for three years and wrote some software” specifically for small businesses. Intuitive Technology, as his company is called, allowed him and Janine to move where they wanted. They wanted to be near her hometown, Dearborn, and chose Dexter because “we fell in love with the quaintness. We like that we’re close to lakes and water. The schools are great.” (Their kids, Amelia and Christian, are three and one.)
Frozen yogurt delivered from a spout is this generation’s frozen dairy treat. “It’s a healthy alternative to ice cream, and a good match for Dexter. Ours has active yogurt culture, probiotics, less fat,” though that can all be easily offset by smothering it with toppings–there are sixty, and about fifty of them do not involve fresh fruit. The Joneses don’t make it from scratch: it comes from an Ohio company. “We looked at a lot of mixes, chose the one that tasted best and has the best selection of flavors”–the predictable vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry but also peanut butter cup, cake batter, cookies and cream, and–Chris’s favorite–cinnamon bun. There are dairy-free flavors, gluten-free flavors, peanut-free flavors, and “soon we’ll have a no-sugar flavor.”
They are cooking up something from scratch though: “ice pops, made from all organic ingredients. I make them myself upstairs” in flavors like strawberry cheesecake with graham cracker crust, key lime pie, and all-fruit combos like strawberry mango.
Chris and Janine stripped the space down to its bare brick walls. Perched on a high ledge that runs the length of the building is part of Chris’s collection of milk bottles from Michigan dairies. “That one’s a ‘cream top,'” he says of a glass bottle with a bulge at the top–it’s from Muskegon’s pre-homogenized-era Briggs Dairy. Some of the smaller bottles, he says, were intended to do double duty as baby bottles. Others, all shapes and sizes, come from places like the Belding Jersey Farms in Belding, Kahres in Lansing, and the West Side Dairy in Owosso.
And of course, the 800-pound cow in the room needs a mention. Doesn’t Dexter already have a beloved creamery? What about Dairy Queen across the street? Jones shrugs and says pleasantly: “There’s room for both of us.”
Dexter Creamery, 8106 Main, Dexter, 619-7700. Daily noon-11 pm. dextercreamery.com
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Bacon and eggs are once again being served at Dexter Crossing, but now the eggs are “cage free.” The Alpha Koney there, which closed several months ago, has reopened as the Barred Rock Cafe. New owner Greg Stamatopoulos says it has long been a dream of his to upgrade a diner. He already has one in Tecumseh–the City Limits, which he bought from his father in 2012–but “it’s popular the way it is.” Casting around for another diner that might welcome his inventive recipes and a little artisanal farm-to-table spin, his first thought was Ann Arbor, but he dismissed it as too expensive. Then he noticed that a lot of the friends he grew up with in Ann Arbor had moved to Dexter.
In addition to classic breakfasts, the Barred Rock is serving poutine with sausage gravy, candied bacon, avocado toast, pulled-pork eggs benedict, banana Nutella pancakes, and Oreo or graham-cracker-dusted French toast with chocolate sauce. There are sweet and savory crepes made with his own batter, and not on the grill–he has “a special crepe maker from France.” He also recommends his breakfast nachos: “fresh corn tortilla chips baked with salsa and topped with cheddar jack cheese, diced onions, tomatoes, sour cream, cilantro, avocado, and two farm-fresh eggs.” For the Mexican-savvy who are asking, “What’s the difference between this and chilaquiles,” the answer is nothing–he just decided “breakfast nachos” was more pronounceable. For lunch, he promises “really good sandwiches, great burgers, pulled pork, and brisket” smoked especially for him by a butcher up north. Stamatopoulos, thirty-three, is an enthusiastic cook and eater: “The whole reason I work out is so I can eat more.”
One day, the Barred Rock may be serving honey from his own bees. Stamatopoulos recently graduated from the Ann Arbor Backyard Beekeepers’ “bee school” and has a few hives of his own, but he’s under the mentorship of another beekeeper, and getting enough honey to stock a restaurant is a long way in the future.
His family also owns an eponymous store (Stamatopoulos & Sons) in Ann Arbor’s Colonnade shopping center where they sell small-batch, single-varietal olive oil, some of which comes from their own olive trees in Greece.
Barred Rock Cafe, 7049 Dexter-Ann Arbor Rd., Dexter, 253-2100. Daily 6 a.m.-3 p.m. barredrockcafe.com
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Elmo’s Ping Pong Palace is now open, and its calendar, hopes owner Elmo Morales, will eventually bloom with lessons, workshops, tournaments, and other events. For now, it’s open on Thursday nights and anyone, of any age, can grab a paddle (donations much appreciated but optional). If you’ve forgotten, or never knew, how to play, Elmo or someone will give you some quick instruction and round up a partner. To most people, it’s lighthearted recreation, but Elmo will most likely remind you that it’s an Olympic sport, and these bright blue Joola tables are the “official table of the Olympics.” He’s made it a goal to grow an Olympic champion from this area by 2036, and, coming from one of the founders of the Dexter-Ann Arbor Run, this could be more than idle talk. “And my goal is to be around to see it,” quips a Thursday evening player, seventy-nine-year-old Paul Cousins.
On a night in May, the couple of dozen people batting around balls appeared to be spread out between ages five-ish to eighty-ish, including sprightly septuagenarian Ramesh Narula, who brought his own paddle and pitches Elmo on the idea of teaching acupressure here, and filmmaker Donald Harrison, who engages him in a discussion of spin. “It’s a big deal in tennis,” says Harrison, “but it’s twice as big in table tennis,” showing how to make the ball bounce in counterintuitive directions. “If I’m playing a spinner I can’t win,” sighs Elmo.
Elmo’s Ping Pong Palace, 7069 Dexter-Ann Arbor Rd. (Dexter Crossing), Dexter, 604-5989. Thurs. 7-9 p.m.
