Sweet Tomatoes

We had family visit this weekend so this morning we decided to drive up to have brunch at Sweet Tomatoes in Tigard. Sweet Tomatoes has been a favorite of ours for years. It is an all-you-can-eat soup and salad bar restaurant that always has fresh ingredients, tons of variety with soups, baked potatoes, muffins, breads, pasta, fruit and lots more. It’s a great place to take kids to because they have so many different options to choose from and if one item gets vetoed it’s easy to find something else that they will like. This is another restaurant that I’m an e-club member of. I almost always have a "buy 1 meal + beverage get 1 meal for free" coupon.

There are so many things to love besides the food – easy access from I-5, these little ingenius roller carts that you can place your baby in while you’re dishing up so that you can be hands free, the friendly staff who will offer to carry your tray to your table if you have your arms full of toddler, a super clean restaurant, their labeling of potential food allergens and whether an item is vegetarian or not. I personally have a sensitivity to MSG and sulfites, which are very rarely labeled. I can't remember ever seeing another restaurant labeling sulfites so they instantly go to the top of my list simply because of this.

Today was the first time that we’ve ever had brunch there. When we arrived with our guests I realized that one of the coupons I’d printed was the wrong one, but the manager allowed us to use our "buy 1 meal + beverage get 1 meal for free" coupon twice, which saved us $16.00! In addition to their soup and salads, they also had fixings for breakfast burritos, potatoes O’Brien, biscuits and gravy, cinnamon chip biscuits, breakfast focaccia and all kinds of other things.

When we found a booth, we started to search for a high chair and to our surprise an employee was already heading our direction with one. I usually run my hands over the chair first (if I forget to bring my high chair cover) to see if I might need to wash it, but I honestly could not find a speck of grime or stickness.

Bug ate salad, kidney beans, chicken noodle soup and scrambled eggs with ham and potatoes plus a little bit of Jell-O all for free since she is still under 3 years old. Their pricing for 3-5 year olds is $2.99 and for 6-12 year olds it is $4.69.

Once completely stuffed, we rolled ourselves back out to the car and dd took a nice nap on our way home to enjoy the rest of our lazy Sunday.

Marie Callender's

Due to the economy, my husband has been laid off the better part of the last 6 months. Going out to eat is a rare treat so when we do got out we need to find the best deals possible for all of us.

Joining e-clubs that are available at some restaurants is great because they offer coupons and birthday deals. Marie Callender’s offers some of the best deals that we’ve found so far. I often get coupons for buy 1 get 1 lunch for free from them. An everyday deal though is that with the purchase of 1 adult entrée and drink, kids eat for free.

A few weeks ago we decided to take advantage of this while we were out running errands at that end of town (we do a lot of our shopping at Morrow and Sons on Silverton Road because of fantastic prices!).

Trying to stick to a budget, we ordered water with our meals. Our helpful waiter reminded us that if at least 1 of us purchased a drink that Bug’s meal would be free so we happily obliged. Their menu offers the typical kids’ menu options. Bug asked for “noodles,” so we decided to try the “Curly Noodles with Alfredo Sauce,” which comes with a slice of bread and desert options of a sundae, a slice of apple or chocolate cream pie. I would have liked to have seen maybe some steamed veggies or some fruit to go along with the meal though.

We usually add their all you can eat soup and salad bar, fill up and take our meals home. This also allowed us to get some things for Bug to crunch on while we waited for our orders. Bug snacked away at salad and slurped on soup while coloring a paper that could be entered for a chance to win a bike.

I was very pleased when Bug’s food arrived and the waiter informed us that it was warm and not hot – this is the first restaurant that we have been to that made a point of keeping the temperature of her food safe – this won huge points with me. The noodles got a big thumbs up from Bug.

To top off our nice lunch experience, the waiter brought Bug a balloon, which always makes her happy as can be.