The Ghirardelli chocolate factory is actually in San Leandro, not very far from where we live. I can’t imagine what it would be like to live nearby, it smells like melted milk chocolate from across the street. The factory has a little factory store where they sell chocolate squares, bars, broken pieces (like at Trader Joe’s), etc. at apparently lower prices than at the market. I’m not sure because I haven’t actually done the price comparisons. Right now and until Saturday (Oct. 30th) they are having a sale on their chocolate squares, they are $2.50 a pound, half of what they usually are. We’re planning to give them out for Halloween.
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This is a list of dishes that I want to make sometime soon. My memory is terrible so this list should help me remember the dishes and inspire me.
Bread Pudding
Pork & Tomatillo Stew (Craigslist )
Estifado (Craigslist )
Mac & Cheese Casseroles (Saveur)
Canneloni a la rossini
Beef stroganoff
Chicken/Veal Marsala
I hadn’t been to the farmer’s market in quite a while. Generally, Mike and Mika go there on Saturday mornings letting me sleep late. But I was awake today so I tagged along. I discovered that there was a new stand I hadn’t seen before, staffed by two African-American older ladies and selling seafood gumbo, cobblers, cheesecake, pecan pie and the like. I wanted to try something, of course, and I settled on the bread pudding. I LOVE bread pudding but as Mike doesn’t, I seldom feel inclined to make it.
Unfortunately, this bread pudding wasn’t very good. It was too dry and while it came with a sauce, there wasn’t enough of it and it hadn’t permeated the pudding enough. As a result, the pudding didn’t have much flavor. It was a large portion and it satisfied my hunger but not my desire for good bread pudding. I guess I’ll have to make my own after all – maybe a savory one. Anyone has a great recipe?
We went Halloween costume shopping at K-mart today and on the way there I noticed Best Burger in the shopping mall across the street. We hadn’t been there before so I mentioned to Mike that we should try it sometime. He figured there was no time like the present so we decided to go there for dinner.
Best Burger occupies a corner in an outdoor mall. It’s a clean, light, but otherwise non-descript restaurant with wooden booths and tables and chairs. Orders are taken at the counter, you are given a number which they call when the food is ready. In addition to burgers (single, double, junior, bacon) they serve hot dogs and a variety of other sandwiches (fish, chicken, linguica, pastrami, etc. – $2-5.25). We found the food to be a bit pricier than at Nation’s and not as good.
Mike ordered a cheeseburger ($3.75) which he proclaimed to be “fine”. It wasn’t as juicy as Nation’s and he wasn’t crazy for the shredded lettuce. The other toppings were pretty scant. It seemed to have a thousand islands type sauce and it reminded me of a Big Mac.
I had the New York Steak sandwich ($5.25) and it wasn’t bad but not great. The steak was tender enough and cooked medium-rare as we ordered, but it wasn’t very flavorful. It came in a supermarket-type sandwich bun, with sad looking shredded iceberg, tomato, thin rings of red onion and pickles. The sandwich was a bit small, but I was quite full by the time I finished it. I’d eat it again, but wouldn’t go out of my way to get it.
We ordered fries ($1.75) which were OK though a little on the soggy side and onion rings ($2.75) which were overdone but otherwise fairly good.
We ordered a grilled cheese sandwich ($2) for Mika which was made with American cheese and tasted accordingly. She didn’t have any. Her vanilla milk shake ($2 for a small) was also disappointing, it tasted very artificial.
In all, we found the food adequate for a quick stop when you’re hungry and in the neighborhood but not worth your while going out of your way to get it.
Best Burger
14393 Washington Ave. #J
San Leandro, CA
510-357-0808
I wanted to make chicken & dumplings the other day but I didn’t specify in my shopping list that I wanted regular chicken and Mike got me skinless, boneless chicken breasts instead. Not ideal for chicken & dumpling purposes, to say the least. So I want to use them for something else. Just grilling them seemed boring, but given the very limitted ingredients I had at home the possibilities were limited. So I decided to make chicken salad.
Now, I’ve eaten chicken salad before but I had no idea how to make it. Unfortunately, for this one task, the internet was kind of useless. I found tons of recipes for gourmet or strange chicken salads, but not one well-rated recipe for a simple, supermarket variety chicken salad. Still by looking at the other recipes I learned enough to improvise.
So I grilled two chicken half-breasts, sprinkled with cajun seasoning, in my George Foreman. When done I put them in the food processor with 3 stalks of celery and chopped it all. To that I added some chopped walnuts I found in the cabinet (I don’t want to imagine how old they were) and enough mayo to hold it together. I added some salt (probably a bit too much) and some lemon juice and ta-da. It was pretty good, though I still like the chicken salad at Albertson’s better. Mike really liked it, though and even Mika had some. So yeah, I’ll probably make it again.
Why, why, why, do soooo many restaurants in the Bay Area serve San Pellegrino as their only choice in bubbly water. San Pellegrino is sooo salty that I can only drink it when I’m otherwise dying of thirst. It’s my friend Lola’s favorite, so I buy it from time to time, but I’d never order it myself. Would it kill restaurants to offer both a highly mineralized water and a low mineral water? Or just some plain soda water, please!
I really have a bone to pick with GraceAnn Walden, who writes the Inside Scoop for the San Francisco Chronicle. In this week’s column she writes about how Zagat’s ratings may be compromised by online voting. Her evidence for it? The results. She just cannot understand how a restaurant such as Zuni’s Cafe or Masa’s, who are given top ranking for food, are not in the top 10 for popularity and how Zachary’s Pizza is. I don’t read her column often enough to know if she’s just a food snob, a pizza hater or one of those few people in the world who do not like Zachary’s (yes, they exist, there are even a couple of those among my friends), but she only had to talk to a few of Zachary’s fans to understand the “mystery”.
Yes, Masa’s and Zuni’s have great food (well, I haven’t been to Zuni’s, but I’ve cooked from its cookbook and the food was great) but so does Zachary’s. And while you may go to Masa’s once in a blue moon, you can visit Zachary’s much more often. Indeed, while I don’t often think of Zachary’s as my favorite restaurant – I can honestly say that I can’t think of a restaurant that I would miss more if it was to close than Zachary’s.
I know I’m not alone on this. People keep voting Zachary’s as their favorite pizza joint year after year. Their pizza is unlike any other, the stuffed pizza is more like a cheese pie than any other pizza I’ve ever eaten, and for devotees, like us, there is nothing better. Indeed, I’m amazed that Zachary’s hasn’t made it higher in the popularity list – I can only imagine this is because many of those surveyed are people from other parts of the Bay Area who haven’t had the pleasure of trying it.
A larger issue with the article is the whole attitude that Zagat’s guide somehow isn’t good enough because it rests on people’s impressions of a restaurant rather than critic’s opinions. The arguments made are, in themselves, valid. There is the possibility for ballot stuffing, you can create different accounts and rate a restaurant you haven’t gone to or as a restauranteur you can ask your customers to go and vote for you. But neither is very convincing. While it’s possibly to change the vote, why would anyone bother? The potential for backlash is unlikely to be worth it for a restauranteur, specially the ones that are so succesful as to get to the top of the list. Indeed, the largest evidence that this is not happening is that the top-10 restaurants that she mentions are indeed very popular restaurants, which receive great write ups not just on Zagat but at other restaurant review websites and at discussion fora in general. At least that’s the case for Bay Area restaurants. Obviously Ms. Walden doesn’t think the opinion of anyone but herself matters, and she didn’t bother to check what people are saying about these places.
Her attitude is more clearly conveyed in parragraphs such as the following:
“When a two- star restaurant that is “good” beats out places rated by professional critics as “excellent” or “extraordinary,” you can hear restaurateurs scream from coast to coast.”
But who decides what a two-star restaurant is? Michael Bauer? Why must he and other critics be the sole arbiters of what’s good? In my own ratings I gave Zachary’s an Excellent and Masa’s (under prior management) a Very Good. Why? Because you have to rate a restaurant against itself (what it wants to accomplish) and others of the kind. There is no better pizza in the bay area than Zachary’s. There are better restaurants than Masa’s (the French Laundry being the clear case).
Her contempt for the dining public is most apparent when she says “If the Zagat results are truly vox populi, then perhaps in the future, the top restaurants on Zagat’s popularity list will be McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s.” It’s not that she’s necessarily wrong, if you look at the ratings in dine.com, a non-foodie oriented restaurant review website, you’ll find that in some communities the top-spots in the ratings are achieved by fast-food joints. Indeed, in San Leandro Nation’s, the burger chain which I’ve rated as Very Good, has achieved top honors. But Ms. Walden fails to understand that this merely reflects the quality of other restaurants in the area and, as I mentioned, the fact that restaurants must be judged vis a vis their peers and themselves. As burgers go, Nation’s are great, in San Leandro there is no better place for burgers. And it’s cheap, which makes it much easier to forgive its faults. Horatio’s, the steakhouse which got the second highest honors, is also quite good – but given its prices you can fairly expect better. This issue of value has probably never occurred to Ms. Walden as she doesn’t pay for her own meals – and apparently doesn’t talk to anyone who does – but it’s certainly in the mind of all of us who need to decide where to spend our dining dollars.
All this said, I neither like nor use Zagat’s. For one, it’s a paid website and I don’t feel any need to pay for information I can find for free elsewhere, and for two, I’m much less interested in ratings than in actual reviews and Zagat’s reviews are always too brief to be of much value. There are many better review websites out there. You can find links to many of these here.
Nalu’s Bar & Grill is the poolside restaurant of the Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort, where we stayed during our foray in the Kohala coast. It has a very convenient location, right next to the pool, but it also offers a great view of the beach at sunset. The menu offers a small variety of sandwiches (priced in the low teens) as well as a few salads and appetizers (most under $10). They have a full bar specializing in mixed drinks (about $7) and a children’s menu is also available (most dishes about $5-6). We had lunch there twice and drinks a couple of times.
The quesadilla appetizer served with a side of sweet sour cream and homemade guacamole was quite good, it was served on a bed of mixed greens. I rather enjoyed it, though it was a relatively small portion (what can you expect for about $8). The BBQ pulled pork sandwich was fine, though the shredded pork tasted exactly like that sold by Lloyd’s in tubs at the supermarket. I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if that was their source. Given the price (about $12, I think) we expected more. The fries were OK. I liked their blue cheese hamburger better, it was well made, the blue cheese was nicely melted and it was served in an actual hamburger bun. I’d order it again.
The children’s meals came very appropriately in a plastic bucket with a small shovel – great for children to play at the sand pool or the beach. Mika had the peanut butter & jelly sandwich once, which was very large (great for her, as she could avoid eating the crust) and came with very cute happy face fries (they were yummy too), and the chicken tenders another time, which came with regular fries, and were OK. Unfortunately, as it’s often the case, they didn’t have any real healthy alternatives in the kid’s menus.
In all, we liked Nalu’s, the food was surprisingly good for its captive audience.
Nalu’s Bar & Grill
Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort
69-275 Waikoloa Beach Drive
Waikoloa
Hawaii’s Big Island, Hawaii
11 AM to sunset
The Grand Palace Chinese Restaurant is one of five restaurants at the King’s Shop – having tried two others, it was a logical choice. It wasn’t a particularly good one, however.
The small restaurant is rather nondescript, it does have a small fish tank that kept Mika amused, however. Its very extensive menu includes most of the standard dishes served at Chinese restaurants in the US, and has a particularly large seafood section. Most dishes seemed to average around $10. Portions weren’t very big, which is not an issue when you are staying at a hotel and don’t want leftovers anyway.
We started with an appetizer of fried wontons, these were crisp and not too oily and came with your standard sweet & sour sauce. They were by far the highlight of our dinner.
I ordered the beef with ginger and green onions and wasn’t too pleased with it. The main problem was the consistency of the meat, it was obviously a cheap but of meat that had been pounded and probably MSGd into a tender but too weird consistency. Indeed, it was not unlike the beef you often get with chow mein, but it just didn’t work as the star of the dish. The taste was OK but unremarkable.
We also weren’t thrilled with the BBQ pork chow mein we ordered. Now, chow mein is not an easy dish to get wrong, but here it was too insipid and the ingredient actually managed not to blend well. Another disappointment.
Service was competent, but the food not good enough to make it worth going.
Grand Palace Chinese Restaurant
King’s Shops
250 Waikoloa Beach Drive
Waikoloa
(808) 886-6668
11:00 a.m. – 9:30 p.m.
We stopped at the Big Island Steak House for lunch the third day of our visit to the Kohala Coast. We were staying at the Marriot across the street from the King’s Shops, where the Big Island Steak House is located, and after two days of having lunch there we wanted something different. It was an OK, though not great, choice.
The Big Island Steak House is a pretty informal eatery, with all inside seating, though some tables overlook the lagoon. It’s a pleasant place, though the informality, which is not reflected in the prices, seems to colour both the service and the kitchen. Our appetizers, for example, came way after we’d finished our main course. Still, everyone was very nice (and tolerant with Michaela), so it was easy to forgive.
The menu includes standard diner/steakhouse fare, concentrating on seafood (of course) and burgers and sandwiches for lunch. Most sandwiches/burgers were about $8-12.
Mike and I decided on the appetizer platter, and Mike had a pulled pork sandwich while I had a burger with blue cheese and mushrooms. Mike liked his sandwich, the meat was of much better quality than what we’d had at the Nalu’s pool-side restaurant at the Marriot. My burger was a disappointment, however. I had asked for it medium-rare but it came well-done, which of course meant it was dry. It was served in a Portuguese bun, just like the pork sandwich, and the sweetness of the roll didn’t work at all with either the burger or the blue cheese. Indeed, I can’t imagine what they were thinking in putting that burger in that bun. The burger’s alleged toppings were also quite scant. The accompanying fries were of the large, thick variety, and they were OK.
We were actually pretty full by the time our appetizer plate came, which wasn’t a bad thing as none of its offerings were that great. The baby-back ribs were covered by a very spicy sauce that was too pungent for my taste. The buffalo wings were too thickly floured and were otherwise tasteless, the dipping sauce was OK though too messy. The egg rolls were also a failure, they were filled with very bland veggies. The coconut shrimp, however, was (in Mike’s words) awesome, very tasty. You may be better off just ordering that as an appetizer.
Big Island Steak House
King’s Shops
250 Waikoloa Beach Drive
Waikoloa
(808) 886-8805
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