No. 115: The Wiener Factory in Sherman Oaks - Please see "The Frankfurter Chronicles" (The Newsletter with Relish).
No. 116 - Tony's Gourmet Hot Dogs in Fairfield - Please see "The Frankfurter Chronicles" (The Newsletter with Relish).
No. 117 - Joe's Crab Shack in Mission Valley:
I'd wanted to try this place for at least a year now despite what the Boy said about it from a visit with fellow co-workers a couple of years ago.
He really wasn't impressed but we'd been hearing their radio ads frequently, had recently seen something on the TV Food Network about crabs and hadn't had my yearly quota of Dungeness or Crab Louie yet so...
The first thing they do is bring around the large, shallow salad bowl (it needed more dressing), bread and corn bread (no butter).
I had the King Crab legs, grilled shrimp on a skewer, fries, corn on the cobbette and iced tea (I passed on the Crab Louie when I questioned them about how they do it*), while the Boy ordered the appetizer platter with chicken fingers, boiled shrimp, potato skins, crab dip & chips), and a Sprite and the wife tried the Fish & Chips (the fries were cold so we had them bring us a basket of hot fries), and a hot tea.
The food was mainly deep fried, something I no longer appreciate as much as I used to but even the wife had to admit that the King Crab legs were wonderful (she didn't used to like crab at all but she's slowly coming around to appreciate good crab).
Her fish was pretty good (I had a bite), my shrimp on a skewer weren't too bad and the Boy really liked the Crab & Cheese dip.
Which reminds me of a pretty fun piece of seafood humor from the late 60's, the cover of one of my underground comics (we also collect them):
A giant crustacean of some sort, in a 3-piece suit, is seated at a restaurant table and asks the waitress "Pardon me miss, do you serve crabs?"
She replies "Keep yer shirt on, toots, we'll serve anybody..."
And there was a whole lot of merchandising going on; mainly lame posters for even lamer T-shirts advertising the place, apparently an almost national chain with locations almost everywhere except The Great Pacific Northwest (why bother?) and New Mexico, for some reason.
Remember when businesses used to give away stuff to promote their products?
So do I and now they expect YOU to pay THEM for wearing their advertising (it just ain't gonna happen)...
We would describe the decor as Early Chevys with the bare concrete floors, open ceilings, recycled wall materials, tables topped with linoleum and an insert for a bucket to throw discarded crab shells, etc into), a roll of cheap paper towels instead of the more expensive paper napkins and the music was too loud, the lights were too bright ( the fact that I wasn't feeling too well at the moment didn't help either).
Service: Our server touched the rim of my iced tea glass when she brought it to the table, a couple of sets of silverware wrapped in paper napkins were dirty and I had to ask for another salad plate as I could feel the gritty residue leftover from the dishwasher on it.
Our server was ahead of the curve with the refills, however.
The total was $53 and coin, make it an even $60 with tip, nice try but we won't be back - we were expecting something far more sophisticated, for some reason, something such as that Stone Crab concept (Joe's Stone Crab or something like that) down in Miami...
*A personal rant: I'm pretty much of a purist when it comes to my Crab Louie, ever since being introduced to San Francisco's wonderful Swan Oyster Depot in the gay district (Polk Street), in approximately 1972.
Swan's was a tiny little place (a counter with maybe 10 seats), was open only 5 or 6 months a year and specialized in local crab, oysters, etc.
After having it there, I can't seem to find anything even close to it anywhere else.
They served it on a wedge of lettuce, with maybe a sprinkle of chopped green onions or chives, topped with a generous portion of fresh crab and their own Thousand Island dressing. Unfortunately, I was told that they went out of business several years ago and recently discovered they're still there...
I do it at home mostly, nowadays as most places don't seem to understand that in this case, LESS is MORE and they inevitably throw it on a bed of several different greens with all sorts of garnishes, alternative dressings, etc, all obscuring the beautiful simplicity of the dish..
No, no no!.
Add a good glass of very cold and very dry Chardonnay, a little sour dough bread and butter on the side and it's a totally sublime meal...
No. 118 - Philly Frank's Cheesesteaks in San Marcos - Please see "The Frankfurter Chronicles" (The Newsletter with Relish).
No. 119 - BJ's (Restaurant / Brewery / Brewhouse):
Moon had visited one of their NorCal locations but we'd never been there and since he was taking us out for my birthday, it was his choice.
We started out with a few appetizers, chicken pot stickers with a light soy sauce for dipping and I sampled one of their beers, a Hefeweizen (not bad but a different after taste) and I ordered an iced tea and a calzone with pepperoni and mushrooms. I wouldn't order it again. There really wasn't anything wrong with it so much as it just wasn't anywhere near the best I'd ever had either...
The Boy had the blackened Cajun chicken sandwich with bacon & cheese, fries, side salad and a Pepsi and the wife had the halibut fish tacos with some hot tea. The bleu cheese salad dressing was too sweet and his fries were cold. He said he'd probably never order that again either.
The wife said they were some of the best fish tacos she's ever had (and she's eaten them everywhere since she first discovered them), the fire roasted salsa and guacamole were also pretty good (we all tried them)
The total was $59 and coin, I tossed in the $6 tip.
See their web site here:
There's a link for a faxable menu but it also says it varies by location so we can't tell you exactly what the names of the dishes we ordered are...
No. 120 - Point Loma Seafood:
We first saw this place on a Travel Channel program about San Diego that Chris Masterson called us up to point out early Sunday morning.
It's a bit out of the way for us (Point Loma) and their major claim to fame is that they hickory smoke their own fish. The wife didn't think she'd like it (but was forced to admit that she did) and it's more of a fish market than restaurant (there's also a fish processing operation in the back).
Seating is mainly outside but they added on a fairly drafty dining room (the roof is made out of canvas) with tables next door.
I had the jumbo shrimp cocktail, a sour dough bun and a 12 oz Heineken draft and the wife had the halibut with slaw and french fries.
See my rant above about Crab Louie, which is also why I didn't bother to order it here (and they were inflexible about the wedge of lettuce)...
The fries were generic frozen fare (and cold), the butter was hard little cubes wrapped in foil and the place wasn't very clean, even though a couple of attendants stood around talking while the condiment bar was a disaster, 10 feet in front of them (and a pigeon almost flew into my head while we were eating, so close it actually felt like it was going to land there), but it does have a great view of the marina, right next door.
The total was $26.50 (Jeff in Santee warned us that it was pretty expensive for what you get) and we probably won't be back ever unless it's for some of their smoked fish to prepare at home (it even looked good to me and I don't care much for fish).
