cd's place: rock and roll's delicious rumble with breakfast, lunch, & dinner

Nearly everyone resembles regulars at Boyertown's CD's Place—whether you casually waltz in for brunch, or if you are embracing your obsession with above-par diner food displays. The small town café, peeking from a corner of North Reading Avenue, comfortingly resides in one of three once-notorious “cup” ice cream stops assembled in Berks and Montgomery counties in the early 1940s. However, if you speed indoors, the illusion of a soda, milk-heavy spot is shattered—but only for something better.

Chris Dietz, owner & chef of CD's Place, unleashed his breakfast, lunch, and dinner café to the local dining scene eight years ago, come February, offering closeby empty stomachs simple, comfort cuisine that doesn't cut corners to affect the integrity of his food. From slapping fresh, never frozen slabs of beef and scrapple on his flat-top, to preparing his own 20-ingredient rub for his jerk chicken, Dietz tackles all the eatery's tasty concoctions himself, all while socializing and talking shop in an always-booming dining room.

Confessing that he knows over 90 percent of his everyday clientele, the local haunt also celebrates other small businesses doing simple stints, including supporting Bally-based Butter Valley Harvest, which provides the owner with fresh produce, even through winter. While he regularly trots specials that do include locally-produced goods, the standard CD's Place menu marvels in some of the area's best brunch bites, including the generously-sized Jamaican omelet that packs the New Hanover-native's jerk chicken cozily aside sautéed onions and the dutch-inspired three-egg beauty, the country-style potato, and onion roundup.

Of course, Dietz would be amiss to omit appropriate accompaniments for your morning platters, including his crinkled cottage fries, homefries, all necessary meats (bacon, scrapple, etc.), toasts and, if you live in hungry man's delight, short flapjack stacks, and even full stacks, done in regular, blueberry, or chocolate chip. His endless array of fresh, from-scratch soups, sandwiches, wraps, burgers, and baskets will please all variations of personal taste preferences, and we hear that his “slaw dog,” made with mustard, onion, and the namesake, is a favorite amongst many.

The mouth-watering, guilty pleasured lineup is what keep patrons repetitively revisiting, but the dining room flooded with memorabilia from Dietz's other obsession—music—is what keeps CD's cushioned on being named one of the best decorated hub's in town. With black-and-white photograph-lined tabletops sourced from his own album collection, ticket stubs, concert posters, musical instruments situated on the walls, and even, a rock-and-roll mural painted by his daughter, Aleah Dietz, the whole eye-catching package of the past “cup” shop is successful in being a necessary, must-visit addition to the borough of Boyertown.

Find CD's Place at 237 North Reading Avenue or online at www.cdsplace.com (he does catering, too).

Hours of operation are as follows—Tuesday & Wednesday, 7 a.m. – 2 p.m.; Thursday & Friday, 7 a.m. – 7 p.m.; Saturday,  7 a.m. – 2 p.m.; Sunday, 8 a.m. – noon.

( This post also appeared in print and on news, not blues. Enter a contest to win a $20 gift certificate to CD's Place, by clicking here. )

the punchy plate-sized pancakes of Annamarie's

Morning means one thing in Royersford — Annamarie's healthy appetite for punchy pancakes that exceed the perimeters of your plate.


It has been over 15 years since Annamarie Chestnut began offering the graceful, guiltless portions we love to grub at early hours on Main Street. Prone to preparing almost too much to stomach per patron, Chestnut's homey neighborhood eatery promotes community and comfort, all on the pleasures of your plate.


Her staff sports t-shirts that read, "order what you want, eat what you get," and it's obvious that such a motto is what they follow at the friendly and casual establishment.


Opened in 1994, Chestnut has always continued to offer new combinations and additions to her ever-changing menu, including her latest, Vuotto Bacon Pancakes. Swirling gigantic bacon chunks into her beloved flapjacks was an idea of her customer Chris Vuotto, which ended up a crowd-pleaser and appropriately became an active part of Annamarie's wipe-board menu as of this month.


Capable of pumping your pancakes with everything but the kitchen sink, including fresh fruits like bananas and blueberries and candies like butterscotch and chocolate chips, Annamarie's also offers her visitors an edible challenge. If you are able to eat three entire pancakes, which usually costs a guest $5.95, at one sitting, you will get them for free.


"Only 15 people were able to complete the challenge in 15 years," Chestnut revealed, with Pauline Yip being the first girl to tackle and conquer the challenge just this year.


The owner, a graduate of Johnson & Wales University in Providence and also, a graduate of Spring-Ford High School in 1993, additionally concocts creative french toast selections that sweetly are adored by many, including her sampling of Bananas Foster, German ApplePeanut Butter Crunch. and


Annamarie's show-stoppers continue to be endless and they don't end with mid-morning carbohydrates either. For example, native to her area, Chestnut prepares a dapper scrabble, onion and provolone super-sized omelet that almost makes any humble egg seem like a show off.


Other offerings of her outrageous omelets undeniably capture the essence of the local community's creativity, too. To note, she's always willing to name a concoction after its originator. Recently, she's been serving a taco omelet upon a regular customer's request, as well as a tantalizing egg mix with turkey.


Annamarie's eatery is cash only and serves breakfast all day, aside time-appropriate offerings of lunch options.


Annamarie's Place, 347 Main St., Royersford, 610-948-0590, Tues. - Fri., 6 a.m. - 1:30 p.m.; Sat., 6 a.m. - 12 p.m.; Sun., 7 a.m. - 1 p.m. 

Also published here.