It’s me and Ivo again this morning, a rare two-breakfast weekend! We’re on the bike today.

We visited the Forest Hills Diner at 9399 N Florida Ave on 8 July 2012. This used to be the Pine Grove Family Restaurant but changed ownership last year.

Excepting for the sign, it’s pretty much the same place. We’re calling this a new restaurant from our serious pancake statistical analysis approach, though.

This is our 99th unique mom-n-pop location in the Tampa Bay area. We’re so dedicated that we even wore one kid out on pancakes. I had to bring in the emergency backup kid to keep going.

There’s a kid’s menu, and drinks for kids are free with purchase of a kid’s meal.

Ivo suggests that maybe he’ll just take what he wants, seeing as how he’s got a knife and all.

This is the look you get if you say, “Ivo, are you playing with a knife, you silly little boy?”

Inside is pretty much unchanged since we were last here at the Pine Grove in 2010. Very large place.

We’re having coffee this morning! Which is a great improvement over yesterday morning’s no-coffee problem.

Knock knock!
Who’s there?
Ivo!
Ivo who?
Ivo you!

That’s how you make Ivo laugh.

Here’s breakfast! Kid’s one scrambled egg and bacon also came with hash browns and toast. It was quite a lot of food for three bucks.

Decent pancakes, size-wise. And these were really tasty, too. Fresh blueberries did the trick for me.

This breakfast is so good that we’re even wearing it.

And this look is the result of me saying, “Hey Ivo, guess how much a college education for you is going to cost me? Nothin! Join the Army! Hah!”

Two big breakfasts, coffee, kid’s coffee weighed in at 12 clams. Not too bad. Notice how I need new business cards, that say “Andy and Ivo” instead of “Andy and Marek” … we’re going to just call this what it is, a player change in mid-game.

Ivo took care of business, as he does. This time he even signed the charge slip for me since I spent our breakfast cash yesterday.

New readers may think I make this up. But off my 2yo goes to find someone to run his credit card, while I sit back and drink coffee.

Why, you ask? Because when I pay the bill no one ever offers me a lollipop. But here is Ivo, with a big one.

That pop, by the way, didn’t make it home (well, it did, but in Ivo’s tummy).

Parked outside the diner is this sweet, stock Dodge. I saw it had a club lock on the steering wheel. It’s a nice, straight old car, but why would anyone try to steal something that looks so, well, old? Kids these days probably wouldn’t even know how. Then I noticed the dual pipes underneath.

And the hood pins up front. There’s something lurking under that unassuming old-timer.

The Forest Hills Diner was a very nice experience. Folks were friendly, chow was good, and the price was about right. We’re pleased to give Forest Hills a Tampa Bay Breakfast four pancake rating.