Phantom Gourmet: In A Pickle In Waltham
WALTHAM - Located on Moody Street in Waltham, In A Pickle is a breakfast and lunch spot where your most indulgent, most outrageous, most over-the-top food fantasies come true. Tim Burke opened the bright, 100 seat restaurant about three years ago, and along with manager Ariela Parrilla, they serve up some seriously sinful ways to start the day.
"When people come in here, they're looking for something with their sweet tooth," Tim said.
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Nothing is sweeter than In A Pickle's Pancakes. The fat stacks are packed with all kinds of goodies, like the Cookies N Cream Oreo Extreme Cakes, stuffed with Oreos and sweet cream cheese, and topped with powdered sugar and chocolate whipped cream.
"It's like an Oreo cookie, but with pancakes. That's why we put the sweet cream cheese in there for the filling. It melts just enough where you can get the nice sweet taste, and then with the cocoa whipped cream on top, it just finishes it off nice," Tim described.
Chocoholics will definitely want to try the Death By Triple Chocolate Pancakes.
"It's a lot of chocolate. It's like overwhelming, but people seem to really love it," said Ariela.
If a little fruit might make you feel a little less guilty, order the Apple Pie Stuffed Pancakes, dripping with house made Dulce de Leche.
"You taste the apple on there. I love the Dulce de Leche. It's just a nice, milky, sweet caramel," Tim explained. "Just talking about it's making me really hungry right now."
Believe it or not, the pancake parade doesn't stop there. In A Pickle also has a lineup of flapjacks infused with all your favorite candies, like Snickers, M and M's, and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.
"Heaven in a bite," Ariela declared. "It's like chocolate, and then the peanut butter gets all soft, and you get the taste of the pancake too. It's a good combination."
Out of all these sweet stacks, the best might just be the Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Pancakes.
"It's just like having raw cookie dough, and I think everybody loves raw cookie dough," said Tim.
There's plenty more sweet stuff rounding out the breakfast menu, like the incredibly popular Nutella Stuffed French Toast.
"It's just one of those things, that people see Nutella and they're all over it," said Ariela. "We have the triangles of French Toast, we stuff the Nutella inside the middle. We put whipped cream on the side if people want that."
If whipped cream happens to be what you love, the Loaded Waffle is a must order.
"We're friendly with our whipped cream here. We like to put a lot of whipped cream on stuff, to make it look nice. Not only that, a lot of people like whipped cream with the sweet stuff," explained Ariela. "Our loaded waffle, it has the four triangles, a big Belgian Waffle; we throw all different types of fruits on it; and then we have whipped cream on the top. It is definitely another big seller of ours."
In A Pickle's outrageous eats continue at lunch with sandwiches like the Doritos Jalapeno Popper Panini.
"It's designed to taste just like a jalapeno popper," Tim said. "So it's got cream cheese, cheddar, Monterey Jack cheese, Doritos, and we put roasted jalapeno peppers in there as well. And it all just seems to come together, and with that crunch of the Doritos in there, it tastes just like a jalapeno popper."
If your appetite is big, and you don't mind getting a little messy, try the Jersey Sloppy Joe. But be warned, this isn't your standard sloppy.
"I'm originally from New Jersey, and our Sloppy Joes are a lot different than Sloppy Joes anywhere else," Tim explained. "Our Sloppy Joes consist of usually rye bread, roast beef, Cole slaw, Swiss cheese, and Russian dressing. We put that on a triple decker, the thing is huge."
By now you should have a good sense of what the food is all about at In A Pickle. But what's with that strange name?
"It's absolutely not about pickles. It's a life situation. It's about being in a jam. It's about being in a tough time, and I just figured it correlated with food and had a good ring to it," Tim said.
While the name may be borrowed from that old saying, the restaurant does serve pickles. They just don't happen to be that good.
"We have pickles, they're not the best quality," Tim qualified. "They're not something we brag about because, like I said, it's a life situation. So, we do have pickles, but it's not our signature item."
So while the pickles may be subpar, everything else here promises to put a smile on your face, and that makes Tim smile too.
"When you can be a part of that, and see what your reaction is, and see that your work actually does provide some type of joy, or satisfaction, it's satisfying. And you work harder, you work better, and it's fulfilling - as corny as that sounds. It's just something that I love."
You can find In A Pickle at 265 Moody Street in Waltham, and online at in-a-pickle.com.
Watch Phantom Gourmet on Saturdays and Sundays at 10:30 and 11 a.m. on myTV38.
