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Bill Knapp's Restaurant
Bill Knapp was a traveling salesman in Cleveland, Ohio, who loved to cook. Since he traveled constantly,
he was always on the lookout for a good place to eat, and he had an idea for a new type of restaurant
chain. In 1947, he moved his family to Battle Creek, Michigan where he took a job with Shaefer Bakeries.
In the evenings at home, he began developing dishes for his new restaurant, and in 1948 he and four local
investors pooled their funds and brought his idea into existence. The first Bill Knapp's Restaurant opened
in 1948 on Southwest Capital near Columbia in Battle Creek and was a hit. Soon opening a second Bill
Knapp's Restaurant at 34 W. Jackson Street downtown, by 1955 he had three restaurants in Battle Creek
and new ones in Lansing and Kalamazoo. By the time he retired in the 1990s, there were 69 Bill Knapp's
Restaurants in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Florida. However, Knapps's was slow in changing with the
times. The chain realized it in the late 1990s, and tried to change its image, but it was too late. The
makeover itself caused a further loss of its core customers, of which many were retirees. The chain closed
its doors in 2002.
The only recipes from Bill Knapp's that I have been able to locate are here:
Bill Knapp's Recipes: biscuits, honey ginger chicken, au gratin potatoes, chocolate cake, apple-cranberry salad, broccoli quiche, bean soup, teriyaki chicken
I have not been able to find these:
- Chicken fricassee
- chicken and biscuits
- Chicken tortilla soup
- Ham croquettes
- pumpkin pie
- pancakes
- actual fried chicken recipe
- white cake
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