Author: marga (Page 109 of 120)

Last night I had meant to serve braised pommegranate pork but, alas, I miscalculated how long it would take it to braise and started too late – so we decided to eat out instead.
We were shopping at Kmart (no longer, now that I know that they feed the Republican machine) and decided to go to Mi Tierra Restaurant & Taqueria ’cause I wanted something quick and cheap and it was right there (well, across the street, right next to Best Burger in the DeeDee’s outside shopping mall).
The little restaurant is tiny and has a limited menu of burritos and tacos, with a few fajita plates thrown in for substance. It seems to be a family operation, and when we dined there were two women working both the counter and the open kitchen. There isn’t much ambiance to speak of, but the place has been decorated with orange walls and Mexican paintings and other decorations. It’s fine for a quick bite.
Mike ordered a regular chicken burrito ($4) and I ordered a carne asada super burrito ($6.50), without rice and beans. They were both the same size (large) but mine came with guacamole and cheese (not sour cream).
I liked my burrito well enough, though I didn’t appreciate that it came with lettuce (the ingredients weren’t listed). The meat was in low proportion to the other ingredients (salsa, cheese, guacamole sauce and particularly lettuce) but what was of it tasted good. Mike didn’t like his. He felt the chicken and the other ingredients were not well integrated so when he bit into it he either got hot ingredients or cold ingredients. He also felt there wasn’t enough chicken.
We also ordered a quesadilla for Michaela ($3.50) which comprised of just a tortilla filled with cheese, nothing else. Here again we felt there wasn’t enough cheese in proportion to the tortilla. The two fountain drinks we got ($1.45, no refills) were fine.
In all, I can’t imagine a reason why I’d go back to Mi Tierra, but the food wasn’t bad, just not good enough.
Mi Tierra Restaurant & Taqueria
14393 Washington Ave. #D
San Leandro, CA
510-352-4883

Saturday we took Mika to Chuck E. Cheese in Hayward. We’d been there before but this is the first time we actually ate there (that’s the great thing about Chuck E. Cheese, they don’t make you eat to play and the tokens for the paid games are pretty cheap – about 20 cents each). I was surprised that the food wasn’t bad. We got a pepperoni and sausage pizza and we both liked it, the crust was in the thin side and somewhat sweet. It didn’t have much cheese, and what it had had toasted, which wasn’t bad. The toppings were good.
We also had their apple dessert pizza ($3), which was supposed to have a streudel dough but it actually felt pretty bready (like pizza). The apple topping was very sweet but good. I liked it.
We hadn’t brought any coupons so it was expensive, but you can often get coupons in the Sunday newspaper or at their website
Chuck E. Cheese
24039 Hesperian Blvd.
Hayward, CA
(510)265-0590

Mike has been in an editing frenzy (he only owes me 3!!!!) so there are several new restaurant reviews up at my website, http://www.marga.org/food/rest/:

the parents play.
Mika spent last week with her grandparents, and we took advantage of it to go out to “nice” restaurants, “nice” being a code word for “child unfriendly” ones. We did hit a few child-friendly restaurants as well. I’ve been a good girl and written reviews of all of them, which will be on my website as soon as Mike returns them.
We started last Monday by going to Bistro Liaison in Berkeley, which had been in my list for a while. It’s a nice, loud and friendly spot in downtown Berkeley serving classic French food at moderate prices (entrees under $20). The food was good, not great, but we enjoyed ourselves.
Tuesday was our night for hitting San Francisco. We considered going back to Piperade, but decided instead on Bocadillos, a tapas bar by Piperade’s owner Gerard Yrigoyen. It was a disappointment. The food was good, but not outstanding and not particularly innovative – nowhere nearly as good as Piperade’s. We didn’t like having to wait and the barstools were not the most comfortable of places. In the future I’ll leave places like this to the younger crowd.
Wednesday was “Lost” night, so we decided to stay in and have dinner (Zachary’s by the fire. We did have lunch together at East Village, a dim sum place. The food was OK, though not great, but I loved their pork buns.
Thursday we joined Regina and Boris for dinner at Neumanali – a posh restaurant in Hayward. The food was good, the service clearly deficient. I wrote a letter to the management about it and I still haven’t heard back.
Finally Friday we had a low key evening, dinner at taqueria Canc

We went down to LA Friday night to visit my family and drop off our daughter for the week. On the way we stopped at a couple of roadside restaurans. We ate mostly at home (an asado, some milanesas) but we did have one lunch out at Thai West, our favorite Thai restaurant in that area. Reviews for all these places are now online.
Buckhorn Family Restaurant at Santa Nella, located at the TravelCenter center gave us bland food, fries fried in old oil but friendly service.
Pea Soup Andersen’s, this roadside institution in Santa Nella also features bland food but at higher prices
Thai West a neighborhood Thai restaurant in Chatsworth has consistently good food at modest prices