We had dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings bar and grill in West Covina on Monday, January 4, 2010, the first business day of the new year.  It’s a new branch of a national chain that was started by a group of people from Buffalo, NY.  We had first seen signs for it in late November or early December 2009.  It’s on Workman Ave. right off Citrus Ave. and right near the border with the city of Covina in a shopping center built during the past couple of years.  We drive by it when we go to church that, incidentally, involves crossing the Covina/West Covina border twice since the church is in Covina.  We learned from their website that Buffalo Wild Wings is a national chain and the next closest branch is in Chino Hills.  The West Covina branch had its grand opening on Tuesday, December 22, 2009.  We had considered going then, but had a family dinner at Pho Super Bowl scheduled for that day (see earlier review).

Our next plan was to try Buffalo Wild Wings on Wednesday, December 30 or New Year’s Eve Eve.  Since it had opened we had noticed that the parking lot for the shopping center was always full or nearly full.  However, I had to go to work early on Thursday, December 31, so I didn’t want to have to wait too long to get a table.  After I got home from work on Wednesday we drove to Buffalo Wild Wings.  The parking lot was crowded as usual and we had to drive around it a bit to find a space.  We noticed people waiting outside and there were also people waiting on benches inside.  It looked like they had been given pagers to let them know that their table was ready similar to the ones used at the Cheesecake Factory.  There was also a counter where people picked up take-out orders.  I thought, well, that’s a possibility if the wait is always too long.  We asked the hostess how long the wait was and she answered, “One hour.”  At least she was honest until other places that tell you 20 minutes that turns into an hour or more.  We left, but not before picking up a take-out menu.

We learned from the menu and the Buffalo Wild Wings website that they have many different kinds of sauces to choose for the wings and other dishes.  They have levels of spicy from mild to medium to hot to “Blazen” (I think that’s the term).  There are also some varied, exotic, and ethnic flavors such as teriyaki, honey barbecue, Asian spice, and Caribbean Jerk.  The menu includes wings both traditional and boneless that can be cooked with any of the sauces.  There are sections for appetizers and chicken tenders including “naked” tenders that are grilled rather than breaded and fried.  There’s a section for flatbreads that are like pizzas made with flatbread, barbecue sauce, cheese, and usually a meat such as chicken.  They also serve burgers, ribs, sandwiches such as pulled pork, and much more than just wings.  They have many different beers on tap including ones I hadn’t heard of such as Miller Genuine Draft Light.  For nondrinkers they serve some interesting flavors of lemonade: mango, berry, and huckleberry.  They also have desserts.  We also learned from the menu that they have bar trivia games.  Now that was something we had to try.

We planned to try going again on Monday, January 4.  We figured it might not be as busy on a Monday, but if it was still was busy we could afford to wait an hour for a table.  Traffic was slow on Citrus Avenue that evening because roadwork had closed the left lane at Arrow Highway.  The parking lot looked busy but when we drove in we noticed there were many spaces in between the cars that were there.  We parked fairly close to the door to the restaurant and reached it before 7 PM.  This time there was no one waiting outside and even fewer people waiting on the benches inside.  The group in front of us was seated right away.  The hostess told us she could seat us as soon as a table was cleaned.  She gave a choice between being seated in the bar or the dining area.  We chose the latter and within a few minutes she seated us at a booth along the south wall of the large dining area.

We couldn’t believe our luck: practically no wait for a large table that was well located.  The dining room has TV’s all around it mostly showing sporting events such as Monday Night Football and the BCS Fiesta Bowl between Texas Christian University (TCU) and Boise State.  Between the screens on the walls were various sports memorabilia: cards, posters, photographs, banners such as those listing the years USC and UCLA were college football national champions, and Kobe Bryant’s Laker jersey.  The restaurant looked more than half full.  We couldn’t see the bar area that was slightly elevated from the dining area.  The sound of the televised Fiesta Bowl played over the speakers.  My wife saw some posters just above the windows that advertised 50 cent wing Tuesdays and 60 cent wing Thursdays.

The server soon came by and gave us menus.  They had additional items that we hadn’t seen on the online menu or the take-out menu including Flatbread Flips that were like tacos made with flatbread and an additional dessert.  We read over the menus and placed our orders.  The first item the server brought was my wife’s huckleberry lemonade.  Then they brought our Buzztime (www.buzztime.come) trivia portable game console, a blue box with a small keyboard and monochrome digital display.  We read some of the instructions and learned that there were other games such as sports games and that players could register as club players and accumulate points.  We hit the start button to play the game and it said, “Get ready to answer” the next question.  But when it said, “Answer now”, no question appeared on the console screen.  We tried just guessing.  The instructions said the questions were multiple choice and to hit 1-5.  We didn’t do very well guessing when we didn’t know the question.

It took a little while for our food to be ready and the server brought us our entrees before our appetizer.  She said they had made our appetizer but then had accidently dropped it on the floor.  She offered to have them make another at a reduced price but we declined because our entrees looked like enough food.  I had the Smokestack Flip that consisted of pulled pork with honey barbecue sauce, fried onion rings, coleslaw, and jalapenos all inside two halves of a flatbread “taco”.  It came in a basket of chips with salsa on the side.  The sauce was spicy despite being low on the heat scale, probably due to the jalapenos.  But combined with the onion rings and coleslaw it was very good.  The pork was fully cooked only slightly chewy.  It was surprisingly a good amount of food.  The chips and salsa were just OK but this isn’t a Mexican restaurant.  My wife enjoyed her buffalo chicken flatbread that was like a small pizza with chicken, cheese, and spicy garlic sauce.

While we ate our entrees the server brought us our appetizer.  We had originally ordered four “naked” chicken tenders with medium sauce.  They brought us four tenders grilled with what looked like pepper and no sauce.  The server said they were compliments of the manager since they had dropped our original order.  We tried a few and they were still good without the sauce: fully cooked, juicy, and with smoky flavor.  The rest we took home and had in a salad the next day.  After we finished our entrees my wife ordered a dessert from the menu insert that had also shown the flatbread flips.  It was Sweet Cinnamon Bites: bits of sweet cinnamon bread pudding around a large scoop of vanilla ice cream that also had cinnamon sprinkled on it.  She enjoyed it and found that the ice cream was the kind that didn’t melt too quickly.

My wife noticed that on a flatscreen TV above the window they were showing photos of the trivia players with the highest accumulated points.  We then realized that the trivia questions appeared on these screens and not on the game console.  We saw our user ID, “VERDNT” in 5th or 6th place with zero points.  It was the latter half of a trivia game where players get more points the sooner they answer the question.  As time passed the wrong answers would disappear leaving only the correct one.  We got a few questions but didn’t place higher than 4th or 5th.  We didn’t know if the other players were at the West Covina branch or at other branches across the region and the country.  We were more ready for the next game, Countdown Trivia.  It was similar to the prior game in that we got more points for answering sooner starting with 1,000 points and dropping to zero.  But it was different in that the wrong answers did not disappear.  Instead, three clues gradually appeared: the first two eliminating wrong answers and the third indicating the correct one.  There were three rounds of five questions each.

We did well in the first round getting right answers to most of the questions quickly.  Soon we were just a few points off the lead and then we took the lead.  In either the first or second round we lost the lead but soon got it back.  The questions covered several categories including music, movies, and history.  We missed a question about the Mint in Philadelphia being the first government building built after the U.S. Constitution was signed.  We also missed one about the Lakota Sioux being the Indian tribe featured in the movie Dances with Wolves.  We noticed one player wasn’t getting any questions right.  Maybe they were like we were in the beginning and hadn’t yet seen the questions on the screen.  We were the only ones to quickly get the question about the U.S. fighting the British during the War of 1812.  By the third round we had a good lead over the others.  We got one about the meaning of Aud Lang Syne and with 2-3 questions our lead was unreachable.  We had to think to get the last questions and we weren’t able to get our score above 10,000.  We still placed first with a score of 9,745 and the screen showed that our score was second on a list of recent high scores.  I think the maximum score is 15,000.

We left Buffalo Wild Wings at about 8:25 PM and if we had had to wait an hour for a table we would have probably been still waiting for our food at that time.  Instead we had finished three courses and played a full game of Countdown Trivia.  We’ll be back because we haven’t tried their wings and there are many other sauces to try.  They also have music trivia on Saturdays at 6 pm.

We went to Pho Super Bowl with Mom and Dad (my parents-in-law) and our sister and brother-in-law on Tuesday, December 22, 2009.  Mom first heard about Pho Super Bowl from her niece (our cousin).  She also saw that it got good reviews on yelp.com.  She then tried it herself with some friends.  To get there from the house we drove north on Ramona, followed it to where it became Mission Drive, and then turned left on Main Street.  That intersection is a bit confusing because the east-west street is named Main Street to the left (west) and Las Tunas Ave. to the right (east).  We then turned left into a shopping center with a big sign for Pho Super Bowl.

Pho is pronounced “fuh” and is Vietnamese rice noodle soup.  Pho Super Bowl is a small to medium-sized restaurant with yellow walls and framed photos of scenes from Vietnam on them.  They seated us at a table for eight and gave us menus.  We learned from them that the “Super Bowl” in the restaurant’s name referred to one of the two sizes of bowls of pho that could be ordered and not to the NFL championship game.  The other size that can be ordered is Regular.  Every menu item has a corresponding number and there are two pages of all the different phos.  However, there didn’t seem to be much variation among them.  Most contained steak either rare flank or well-down flank, and/or brisket.  They also had chicken, pork and vegetarian pho.  The menu had many items beside pho.  There were sections for appetizers, rice dishes, vermicelli dishes, and on the back page were listed drinks and desserts including many teas and some sundaes.

We placed our orders by telling the waiter the numbers corresponding to each choice.  On our table were carols with utensils: forks, spoons, deep plastic soup spoons, and chopsticks.  They brought us our drinks first.  I ordered the soybean milk so I could compare it to the soy milk that I often drink.  It tasted like it came right from the beans and didn’t have any added sweeteners or flavors.  That doesn’t mean it tasted better than soy milk, though.  But it quenched my thirst.  They also brought the pot of tea that Dad had ordered for us.  Next they brought our appetizer of two orders of egg rolls.  They were medium size and came with garnish of rice noodles, shredded carrots, and lettuce.  There were some small bowls of sweet clear sauce for dipping.  The egg rolls were crunchy and flavorful but also very hot in temperature.  The first one I bit into burned my mouth.

They then brought our entrees.  Each one looked like a lot of food.  Even my regular bowl of pho didn’t look much small than another’s super bowl.  They also brought plates of vegetables to add to our pho such as bean sprouts.  I added a few but I guess I was supposed to let them cook a bit because they tasted too raw.  I was too hungry to wait.  The pho broth had a lot of flavor and was slightly sweet.  I’d only had pho once or twice before.  I think the last time was as a lunch special at Garland Café.  At Pho Super Bowl I got the number 14: pho with well-done flank steak and golden brisket.  The meat was in strips among the rice noodles and flavored by the pho broth.  Some strips of meat had quite a bit of fat.  I ate most of the broth before trying the noodles so it wouldn’t be too messy but I still got some oily drops on my shirt.

Mom enjoyed her pork chop with rice.  It looked flattened tender and she said it tasted good, not too salty.  My wife thought her Cornish game hen was OK but not as good as when Mom makes it.  She also felt that the butter rice that came with the hen didn’t taste particularly buttery.  As we finished our entrees the waiter gave us complimentary tapioca pudding for dessert.  It was made with coconut milk and tasted OK.  I still suffered from some digestive irritation that kept me awake through the night and made the next day a struggle.  I can’t think what could have caused it.  It didn’t feel like I had dairy.  Perhaps it was the soybean milk, the raw bean sprouts, or the tapioca pudding?  In any case, when it comes to Super Bowls, I’ll stick with the NFL championship game.

When we first moved to Azusa near Covina we noticed that there was a Ralphs market on the west side of Citrus Avenue just south of Puente Street.  It was one of the closest supermarkets to us and we went there many times.  They had a good selection of stock such as beef stock or chicken stock.  But we also noticed that whenever we went there, it was fairly devoid of other customers.  There is a large Ralphs a few miles away in San Dimas.  In spring 2008 we heard that the Citrus Avenue Ralphs was closing.  They had a going-out-of-business sale lasting about a month.  We got some spices at greatly reduced prices, though their expiration dates were earlier than usual, some within the year.  After the Ralphs finally closed in May 2008, the building remained empty for a while.  They replaced the Ralphs sign along Citrus Avenue with a blank sign.

In late summer or early fall 2009 we saw signs that said a King Ranch Market was moving into the space vacated by Ralphs.  I hadn’t heard of King Ranch Market before though I had heard of other ranch markets such as 99 Ranch Market and others local ones named after the street or neighborhood.  At one of my former workplaces my coworkers at the time and I used to get lunch from a local ranch market.  They had good tacos made with corn tortillas and beef.  This new King Ranch Market in Covina opened in mid-November 2009.  I think they’re a small chain market.  According to their website they have locations in Nevada.  Their mascot is a colorful cartoon lion.

After King Ranch Market opened we starting thinking about when we could visit.  It was hard to find time given our schedules, weekend chores, and tendency to always have something going on during the weekends and even during the week.  Finally, on Saturday, November 28 we got an opportunity.  We had done our food shopping for the week but when we started gathering together the ingredients to make dinner we realized we neglected to get bay leaves needed for the recipe.  Since it was still a bit early for dinner we decided to try getting them at King Ranch Market.  It didn’t take long to get there and when we did we noticed that they served many hot prepared foods in the part of the store that used to be the bakery in the old Ralphs.  They also had baked goods in the aisle nearby including cookies and pan dulce.  With all their prepared foods and tables for dining in we could come there for a meal sometime.  While there we noticed their large selection of meats and sausages, the largest slabs of chicharron we had ever seen, their extensive aisles of both regular and ethnic food, and their produce section with apples for under $1 per pound.  We found the bay leaves and several other things.  They had six different kinds of apple soda including our favorite, Sidral Mundet.  We purchased three including two-liter bottles of Sidral Mundet and Sidral Aga.  The other three kinds we didn’t get were made with HFCS.  We also got some Caprice shampoo (champu?).

We figured we could go to King Ranch Market for dinner during the week because they’re close by, they have an interesting selection of prepared foods, and they’re relatively inexpensive.  We had originally planned to go on Thursday, December 10 but we heard it was going to rain so we went on Tuesday, December 8 instead.  We left home before 7 pm and as we drove through downtown Covina we saw something interesting on the marquee for the Covina Center for the Performing Arts.  Usually we see announcements for current and upcoming shows such as the recent announcement for a Christmas show and an Elvis-themed show in January.  But this time it looked like they were having technical difficulties.  All that appeared on the north side of the marquee was a MS Windows “New Folder” icon and, on the south side, an arrow pointing to a computer mouse.  Well, now we know that the marquee is controlled by a Windows computer.

It always felt oddly familiar and unfamiliar to park at King Ranch Market.  There were many other people there also ordering prepared foods, though they had carts and ordered their food to go.  We examined everything they had: both in a display case with signs next to the actual menu items and a more organized menu above and behind the counter.  There were so many things to choose from: carnitas, pork ribs, large pork bellies, beef tripe, traditional tamales wrapped in yellow corn husks, larger Central American tamales wrapped in green leaves, beef in red sauce, beef empanadas, pupusas, half chicken meals, fried plantains, chili rellenos, pozole by the bowl.  I’m sure I’m missing some things.  The menus also listed food made to order: many different types of tacos made with small corn tortillas; and tortas or sandwiches made with Mexican bolillo bread.  The tortas could be made with crispy chicken (torta de pollo), pork, ham, breaded steak, head cheese, and avocado.  There was also the torta Cubano that contained multiple fillings.  After spending a long time thinking over all the choices we placed our orders at 7:15 pm.  We paid at the register near the display case and our total was only around $12.

It took about 15 minutes for them to make our orders and it looked like the employees taking the orders were also the ones making them.  They had to prepare at least one other order before ours.  We waited at the high tables near the counter and when they were ready I think an employee just called out that two tortas were ready.  They came on one tray and I grabbed some extra napkins from a box near the cash register.  We then went to sit at the table of more traditional height that was a bit farther away from the counter than the high tables.  I’m glad I got the napkins because our tortas were very messy.  They had toasted the bolillo bread so it was crunchy on the outside.  I had the crispy chicken torta though it was a bit of a misnomer since the chicken was grilled rather than fried to a crisp. But it was still very good and tasted like it was soaked in a tangy, spicy marinade.  There was lots of mayo and guacamole in the torta.  I had told them to hold the sour cream and they complied, though initially I thought the mayo was sour cream.  It contained a slice of tomato and large chunks of spicy jalapeno pepper.  There was spicy salsa that included chunks of carrot.  It was a great combination of flavors, though it would sometimes fall apart.  They had cut it in half and I liked it better than the torta from Super Tortas.

My wife had the torta Cubana that was made with a toasted bolillo and contained breaded steak, ham, pork, head cheese, avocado, cheese, and salsa with carrot.  She enjoyed it very much and it didn’t seem as messy as mine.  Maybe she was just more careful.  The tortas amounted to a lot of food and we didn’t need any dessert or anything else.  Except a sink; I wanted to wash my hands before we left but they didn’t seem to have a public restroom.  Other than that, we were completely satisfied as we drove home.  

I tried doing some food shopping at King Ranch Market on the following Saturday, December 12.  I found everything I needed except the kielbasa sausage.  The only kielbasa they had was Hillshire Farms brand that had MSG.  Their other cooked sausages only came in boxes of 2.5 pounds, much more than we needed.  I ended up just getting Farmer John brand Polish sausage at Fresh & Easy.  King Ranch Market was very crowded that day and I noticed that their shopping carts were wider and longer than those at most other stores.  It was raining hard outside.  When I left I noticed people waiting outside the store with all their shopping bags.  I thought they may have been waiting for the rain to subside but later my wife mentioned that King Ranch offers shuttle service and they may have been waiting for that.  King Ranch had only been open for two months and we had already been there three times.

On Thursday, December 3, 2009 we went to dinner at Fisherman’s Wharf restaurant in San Gabriel with our parents (my in-laws), sister, and brother-in-law.  My wife had bought for a few dollars a gift certificate from restaurant.com that gave $25 off a bill of $50 or more.  We had studied the menu online and had actually known of Fisherman’s Wharf for over a year.  It opened around the same time as a similar restaurant in the same commercial complex, Captain Crab.  We had first seen Captain Crab while riding the 487 MTA bus from Downtown L.A. to Mom and Dad’s.  Not long after seeing it we read a review in the San Gabriel Valley Tribune that covered both Captain Crab and Fisherman’s Wharf.  They both serve crab, shrimp, and crayfish steamed and marinated in big plastic bags.  The difference between them is that Fisherman’s Wharf serves many other dishes that don’t require messy shelling to eat.  We went to Captain Crab for my birthday (actually the day after my birthday) in 2008 and enjoyed it (see earlier review).  But while Captain Crab’s menu is only a single sheet of paper, Fisherman’s Wharf’s menu goes on for several pages.

We went to dinner fairly late on that Thursday.  I know it was after 7:30 pm, closer to L.A. Dinner time than to Covina dinner time.  When we got to the commercial complex on Valley Blvd a mile or so east of New Ave, the street level parking lot was full.  In the middle of the lot was a ramp going down to underground parking.  The first level below also looked full but the next was completely empty.  We parked there and took the stairs back up.  When we opened the door at the top of the staircase we weren’t sure where we were exactly.  It turned out we were to the west and a bit south of the main commercial complex.  We soon found our way to the restaurant that was further inside the complex and not as visible from Valley Blvd as Captain Crab.  It had lit signs both in English that said “Fisherman’s Wharf” and Asian characters.

The interior of the restaurant was very large and had a pervading nautical theme with ship’s rigging ropes separating the sections, wooden picnic-style tables, miniature barrels with “Fisherman’s Wharf” logo on them to use as seats, and even a poster for the movie Jaws.  There were at least two flatscreen TV’s both showing the NBA Nuggets-Heat game, the latter team coached by the Filipino-American coach Eric Spoelstra.  Over speakers they played the Holiday music on KOST 103.1.  We were seated right away and they gave us menus that were even more extensive than the ones posted online.  They had more sections such as Jasmine’s Favorites and Fried Specialties in addition to appetizers, soups/salads, Bay State favorites that included the cooked crab and shrimp shell-your-own options, pastas, and beverages.  Two of the Bay State favorites, the crab and shrimp, could be ordered cooked with lemon pepper, Cajun-style, fried, or with garlic butter.  On the front of the menu was a limited-time deal where if your order was $25 or more you could get 1-2 pounds of crab or shrimp for $1 per pound.  This was much lower than the regular price of $7-$9 per pound.  Unfortunately we couldn’t get that deal because we used our $25 gift certificate.  The dessert section included a waffle option we hadn’t seen before.  The beverage section was a list of Asian teas, mostly green teas.  Like the online one, the menu had a little cartoon fisherman next to each of the recommended orders.

Our orders came fairly quickly.  First came the pound of lemon-pepper shrimp in a plastic bag.  The shrimp were large and tasted very fresh.  They actually didn’t require much shelling and the lemon pepper sauce was very good in its own right.  Later our brother-in-law got some more sauce to have with his and our sister’s rice and other dishes.  Next came our individual entrees.  Our brother-in-law got the shrimp risotto that our server recommended.  Our sister got the orange roughy that I believe had a cartoon fisherman next to it on the menu.  Mom got the shrimp fruit salad that included honeydew, cantaloupe, grapes, apples, and kiwi in addition to the shrimp.  She felt that the kiwi was a bit sour and that the shrimp wasn’t as fresh as the lemon pepper shrimp we had ordered.

My wife enjoyed her curried fish cutlet with rice.  The fish was in two large pieces that were breaded, fried, and coated in green curry sauce.  In addition to rice it came with cooked vegetables including broccoli, carrots, and zucchini.  It was a lot of food.  My beef and onion rice was also from the “Jasmine’s Favorites” section of the menu.  It looked very impressive.  The beef was in strips mixed with the onion and green (spring?) onion.  The white rice was arranged in a circular mound and had a fried egg on top.  My wife thought the dish looked like the Lomo Saltado she had at Dos Burritos in September 2009.  But the beef in my dish wasn’t like that in Lomo Saltado.  It was spicy and had a strong flavor of ginger.  It was still very good and also a lot of food.

After we finished eating we went to check out the back section of the restaurant.  It was a large room decorated very differently from the main restaurant.  Part of it seemed like a dance floor.  It had sleek modern furniture in white and other primary colors.  They kept it dark inside with colored lights shining on the walls.  One wall had outlines of buildings depicted on it.  At least one of the “buildings” had what looked like a small prop balcony sticking out from the wall.  Along another side were rooms for singing karaoke.  They had black and white zebra pattern on the walls and one of them had a giant armchair that made anyone who sat on it look like a kid.  I speculate that it was big enough for basketball player Yao Ming.  We learned from a sign on the wall that this room was called the DNA Lounge.

Even with the $25 gift certificate, the bill including tax and tip came out to just over $50.  But the culinary and overall experiences were worth it.  We took the elevator back to our cars.  It was right outside the restaurant and went to the northwest corner of the underground parking.  Fisherman’s Wharf seems to have something for everyone: freshly cooked crab and shrimp, both surf and turf Asian dishes, pastas, nautical-themed restaurant and trendy modern lounge, karaoke and oversized armchair included.

On Tuesday, November 24, 2009, my wife and I met up after work to get dinner and attend a Wolfmother concert (see earlier review).  For the dinner portion of the evening we went to Pastagina.  It's a chain eatery that I'd seen in mall food courts such as the Beverly Center.  In Downtown L.A., Pastagina had a small, sit-down eatery in the building that also included the Ralph's Fresh Fare and the Market Lofts in the South Park neighborhood.  This building is attached to the apartment building where we used to live in Downtown L.A. a few years ago.  That was before there was a Ralph's, Market Lofts, and Pastagina.  They were still under construction back then.

On Tuesday I left work at the usual time and walked to my sister- and brother-in-law's home that's in South Park near Staples Center.  My wife drove down from her work and parked in the parking garage for my sister- and brother-in-law's home.  We actually arrived at the parking structure at about the same time.  We visited with our sister- and brother-in-law a bit and left sometime after 6 pm to have dinner.  Pastagina was a standalone shop among many other businesses on either side of the Ralph's Fresh Fare/Market Lofts building.  We just walked up Hope Street to get there.  It was a very small eatery with only 5-6 tables and 6-7 more seats at a counter near the window.  The décor was very simple: walls colored orange below and white above where they hung photographs of pasta, chefs and related images.  It had a high ceiling with exposed piping indicating a loft style and consistent with the Market Lofts condos in the floors above.  The floor consisted of large gray stone tiles.

The entrance to Pastagina led right to the register counter.  The small open kitchen was right there behind the counter to the left.  High on the wall behind the counter was a large menu with all the pasta selections along with salads, soups, beverages, and desserts.  It listed the first two options, tomato and basil and primavera as vegan.  Customers could choose between about 15 different toppings including the seasonal "Special of the Month" and five different types of pasta including spaghetti, penne, fusilli, and multigrain angel hair.  Pastagina's specialty is that they have the technology to make freshly cooked pasta to order in a fairly short amount of time.  I believe that they were a fairly new chain.  The cashier handed us a take-home menu that listed the locations: Beverly Center, Little Tokyo, Irvine, Grand Avenue (Downtown L.A.), and Market Lofts where we were.  It said they'd be opening locations in Westwood, Santa Ana, Koreatown, El Segundo, and Cypress.  The take-home menu also lists catering options.  My wife noticed one difference between the take-home menu and the posted menu: the take-home menu said that the primavera topping had cheese while the posted menu said it was vegan.

The dessert options consisted of many different kinds of gelato displayed behind a large glass counter to the right of the cash register.  We placed our orders and the cashier gave us a plastic number.  We sat down at a small table and as we waited we noticed that they played salsa music over the speakers.  It only took 10-15 minutes for our orders to arrive and it looked like the cashier did all the cooking.  I think she called our number and I went to the counter to get the orders.  They both came on one tray in wide, shallow bowls with the Pastagina logo on the rims.  Each order came with a small piece of bread that looked like a miniature French or Italian loaf.  I had ordered the primavera and specified "no cheese" to ensure they followed the posted menu that listed it as "vegan" and not the printed menu that said it came with cheese.  They followed my instructions.  The primavera was very good with the pasta cooked perfectly, just slightly al dente.  I chose fusilli pasta since I hadn't had that for a while.  It came with tomato sauce and vegetables including asparagus, peas, carrots, and red bell pepper.  They were cooked just right, retaining much of the crunch and flavor.  Despite being a vegan dish it was a decent amount of food.  The accompanying bread was also good, tasting fresh.

My wife enjoyed her seafood pasta on multigrain angel hair.  It was also free of dairy so I could have had it.  The sauce included shrimp, calamari, and baby clams along with diced tomatoes and garlic.  My wife had the tropical coconut gelato for dessert that she also enjoyed.

While we ate other parties came in, placed orders, and usually got them to go.  The restaurant had one restroom for patrons only who had to borrow the key from the cashier.  It's hard to find a free restroom in Downtown L.A.  The ones at Macy's Plaza shopping center cost 25 cents to use.  Anyway, we left Pastagina at 6:45 pm, well satisfied and ready for the concert.

In late March 2010 we wanted to eat at the Market Lofts Pastagina before going to the Tears for Fears concert.  Unfortunately we found Pastagina to be closed down and we ate at Ralph's Fresh Fare.  In early May 2010 I had hoped to eat at the Pastagina I had seen in the Beverly Center after my doctor appointment.  But I found it also to be closed down.  I hope the chain hasn't closed down completely.  At least we enjoyed it very much during our one chance.

We hear about new restaurants from many different sources: newspapers such as the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, magazines such as Inland Empire, and recommendations from family and friends.  And sometimes we just drive a place that looks interesting or like it might be good.  We drive back and forth down Citrus Avenue through downtown Covina many times so we can always tell when new businesses have opened or are in the process of opening there.  By driving by we learned about Olamendi’s Zona Rosa (see earlier review), and the Young Performers’ Institute Live the Music musical revue at the Covina Center for the Performing Arts (CCPA).  At the northwest corner of Citrus Avenue and College Street there’s an old building that used to house a camera shop.  They have since either closed down or moved to one of the side streets.  For several months in the late summer and early fall 2009 they had been renovating the place as a new restaurant: 3 Vinos.  It was hard to miss with a large blue sign below the clock on the top corner of the building.

My mom visited us over the weekend of November 7-8, 2009.  Before she came she told me she wanted to take us out to dinner for our birthdays, both of which had taken place the previous month.  We decided this was a good time to try 3 Vinos since it was close to where we lived and had opened within the past few weeks.  We could see the blue lights of the bar inside from the street.  We checked their website but it didn’t say much other than hinting that their food was Latin and giving a couple of songs on their play list.  These included “La Vida is un Carnaval” sung by Celia Cruz and “Bombalero” by the Gypsy Kings.  Well, we had enjoyed Latin food at many other places.  We knew this usually meant food from Spain or Latin America other than Mexico.  But it also meant something different at every Latin restaurant we had visited so we were curious to find out 3 Vino’s take.

On the afternoon of Saturday, November 7, we went to church in the evening.  On the way there we drove by Gladstone High School where my mom’s cousin teaches.  We drove down Azusa Avenue past the North Woods Inn and our gym.  We drove by our credit union and still arrived at church early.  After church we drove north on Citrus into Downtown Covina, turned right on College Street and parked in the public structure there.  We went up to the second level where we could park in the blue-lined parking spaces for 3 hours for free.  Curiously there were no other cars in the structure despite all the angled spaces along Citrus being full.  We took the elevator down to street level, crossed Citrus Avenue and College Street and entered the restaurant.  We hadn’t made a reservation so we weren’t sure what to expect.  I don’t think the website had given a phone number.

Upon entering we noticed that the restaurant was a large space with high ceilings and dark hardwood floors.  The interior walls were brick, probably part of the original building’s structure.  The lighting was slightly dark.  In the middle was a large bar that wrapped all around and had blue light emanating from the counter.  Above it were flat glass double panes filled with water and lit with blue lights in which air bubbles decoratively floated to the top.  The left (south) side of the place was filled with large flat black leather couches.  I guess it was more of a lounge section.  The tables of the restaurant were on the right (north) side of the space.  After we entered a waiter said he could have a table ready for us in five minutes.  We sat down on one of the leather couches and studied a menu that the waiter had given us.  3 Vinos’ take on Latin Food seems to include Cuban (e.g. Cuban Sandwich), Spanish (paella), and South American (e.g. Loma Saltado from Peru).  The menu has separate sections for appetizers, soups/salads, sandwiches, meat, chicken, seafood, and desserts.  The appetizers, soups/salads, and sandwiches cost between $6-$22 and the entrees cost between $12-$25 with some of the steak entrees being more expensive.  The desserts were also expensive at around $8-$9.

We ended up waiting for about 20 minutes from 6:55 pm to 7:15 pm.  We figured if we had to wait too long we could just go to Mr. Pollo where they also serve Loma Saltado.  A hostess asked us whether someone had taken our name.  Soon after that the waiter we first talked to seated us on the north side of the restaurant.  He had given us the choice of indoor or outdoor seating but we felt it was too cold outside.  Our small table for three was towards the back near the speaker.  Throughout the time we were there they played loud Merengue music.  Some music sounded like Merengue remixes of songs.  Above the bar screens showed the USC football game and later the Arizona game.  Most every table was filled and people were all dressed up.  After we had come in, many other parties entered and waited in the lounge area in the black leather couches, many of them ordering drinks at the bar.  When the waiter came by we pretty much knew what we wanted to order since we had studied the menu while waiting in the lounge area.

They first brought us waters to drink and some rolls with green spread on the side.  I didn’t taste the spread but it looked a bit like pesto.  They brought my wife’s orders first, I think because she ordered a soup and an appetizer rather than an entrée.  She first received the Caldo Gallego soup that had beans, Spanish (i.e. pre-cooked) chorizo, and other meat that looked like bacon.  Her appetizer, Patatas Bravas, consisted of many long wedges of potato slices covered in a spiced red sauce along with other sliced vegetables such as bell pepper and tomato.  I tried one of the potato wedges and found it good and filling.  My wife had noticed that one potato dish on the menu had “papa” in the name and another had the word “patata”.  She looked them up and found that they both translated to “potato”.  She enjoyed both her orders even finishing all the potatoes.

We probably should have asked the waiter to bring all out orders at the same time.  My mom had never tried the Peruvian dish Loma Saltado before.  My wife had it at Dos Burritos many weeks before and at least one other restaurant.  She insisted that my mom try it.  It’s definitely not something that could be found in Juneau.  When the waiter brought it to her he even said it was delicious.  It looked good: strips of beef along with slices of peppers and tomatoes in a dark sauce and all on top of a bed of thin French fries.  There was also some rice, black beans, and a few fried plantains on the side.  She enjoyed it though all together it was a lot of food.  She let me try some and I especially enjoyed the fries soaked in the flavorful sauce that had a hint of soy.  This reflects the Asian influence on Peruvian cooking.

I ordered something we had never seen on a menu before: Pollo Fricasee, a Cuban-French dish.  That’s an interesting combination.  It came in a shallow bowl with the rice in the middle with white meat chicken, tomatoes, potato, and slices of green olives in an orange-colored sauce.  The sauce had a vinegar-citrus taste and was actually the best part of the dish.  It was all very good when mixed together.  It came with a small bowl of black beans on the side and some fried plantains.  My wife had the beans.  The plantains were sweet and made a great dessert.  It was a lot of food but I was able to finish.  When the waiter collected my empty bowl he joked, “It looks like you didn’t like it.”

When we first sat down at our table we noticed some instrument cases against the wall nearby.  They looked like they held conga drums.  As we ate dinner some more people brought instrument cases that looked like they held guitars.  I guess they would have a live band playing later on.  It looked like there was a small stage set up in that corner or that one could be set up.  We didn’t get a chance to find out.  When we left the place was much more crowded than when we arrived.  There were even some employees outside possible checking ID.  We walked around downtown Covina a bit.  Most of the shops were closed but both bookstores were open.  We looked around the Covina Bookstore and bought the new Trader Joe’s-inspired cookbook.  They were serving cookies at the other bookstore, the one that sold used books.  We passed 2-3 jewelry stores, all closed with their display jewelry stashed and hidden from view.  Also closed was the shop Vintage Dreams where my wife had bought the dress and hat that she wore at Lola’s 1920’s-themed birthday party in April 2009.  The Covina Center for the Performing Arts was closed but we did see posters for the upcoming show there, Gilbert and Sullivan’s “HMS Pinafore”.  After walking around we returned to our car in the parking structure on College Street that was still empty except for some skateboarders and drove home.

Well, we never figured out what the three vinos actually were.  I’m guess that one was for Malbec wine from Argentina, another could be wine from Spain and the third wine from Cuba, if it comes from there.  I’m glad we waited out the 20 minutes for the table even though they said it would only be five minutes.  I got to try Cuban Ficasee, possibly my only chance.  The food is expensive but it’s worth it once in a while.  I wonder what other places might spring up in downtown Covina.

We went to 3 Vinos for the second time on Sunday, December 6, 2009.  Not long before that some 3 Vinos employees were passing out fliers near the Covina Metrolink parking structure.  The fliers announced the Sunday brunch at 3 Vinos between 11:00 am and 2:30 pm.  On the 6th we went there after power pacing (a.k.a indoor cycling or spinning) class at the gym.  This time we parked in a public lot behind the restaurant.  We weren’t sure if our workout clothes were too casual and when we entered we saw a sign on the hostess’ desk that said, “Dress Code Enforced”.  But the hostess let us in and allowed us to check out the buffet before deciding whether we wanted to try it.  This time they had seating on both sides of the bar.  I noticed some instruments mounted decoratively on the wall on the right side.  The food looked good so we had brunch.

A server let us choose between Mimosas and orange juice to drink.  We chose the latter.  The buffet had so many interesting foods: steamed yucca, fried rice (reflecting the Asian influence on Peruvian cooking), white rice, picadillo (ground beef in sweet tomato sauce with potato and olives), pork chops, chicken in tomato sauce, and ropa vieja (shredded beef in red sauce with green pepper).  They also made omelets to order and had many ingredients on display.  They sliced beef to order and there were some traditional American breakfast foods: bacon, sausage, eggs, and pancakes.  They had two soups: caldo gallego and pozole.  There were lots of desserts including strawberries, sugar cake, and fried plantains.  I enjoyed the fried rice, picadillo on white rice, ropa vieja, and fried plantains.  My wife had some of those and also the pork chops and sugar cake.  The place was about half full.  The flier had advertised live music during brunch and we saw some musicians start to set up but then they sat back down.  We didn’t get to hear any live music for the second time.  But the food continued to satisfy.  No sophomore jinx for 3 Vinos.

We celebrated my birthday three days early on Friday, October 2, 2009 with dinner at the Palace and a Loggins and Messina concert at the Greek Theater. The Palace was part of the Dine and Ride package where we parked our car at the restaurant and rode a shuttle van to the Greek Theater. We set that up through dineandride.com about one month before. For Dine and Ride to the Greek there was a choice between 2-3 restaurants in the Los Feliz area including the Dresden, a German restaurant. We chose the Palace, a Chinese restaurant, because I figured less of the food would have dairy. The website did show the special menu that came with the Dine and Ride package and I could eat just about everything but the ice cream for dessert. We got a Dine and Ride package because our experience is that traffic going to the Greek Theater can get very slow. When we saw the Prairie Home Companion live show there in 2002 we sat in traffic for over an hour between Los Feliz Blvd and the Greek. When we got there, the main lot was full and we had to park way up the hill near the Griffith Observatory. We missed 45 minutes of the 2-hour show. For Loggins and Messina, we did not want this to happen again.

Our payment to Dine and Ride covered the food, shuttle ride to and from the Greek, parking at the restaurant, and all the taxes and gratuities. We had to get our tickets to the concert separately. After paying for our Dine and Ride package, their employee, Mark, sent an e-mail saying to be at the Palace at 5:30 pm on Oct. 2. When that day came around about 3-4 weeks later we used MapQuest to get directions. I checked the Dine and Ride website that now said that Dine and Ride was sold out for the Palace-Greek for Oct. 2 and 3. When I first put the addresses into MapQuest, the directions included going on the I-5 and Los Feliz Blvd. We wanted to avoid both these routes because they get lots of traffic on weekday evenings, especially when there’s a concert at the Greek. We adjusted the directions until they worked out to something more feasible.

We left at 4:15 pm and drove west on the 210. There wasn’t much traffic going west. Most of it was going east. We took the 210 to where part of it becomes the 134 in Pasadena. From the 134 we got on the 2 south in Glendale that also didn’t have much traffic. We were making very good time. From the 2 we took exit # 14B that led to Fletcher Drive. We turned left on Fletcher, drove on a bridge across the Los Angeles River and turned right onto Glendale Blvd. We took Glendale Blvd to where it forks into Glendale Blvd and Rowena Ave. We kept right to take Rowena Ave and saw that the Silver Lake restaurant, Flor Moreno, had a different name and that Blair’s, the former Thai-American Café was still there. We turned left on Hyperion Ave. and passed the Trader Joe’s and Gelson’s where we used to shop when we lived in Downtown L.A. We turned right on Griffith Park Blvd just passed the Gelson’s and then turned left on St. George St. with John Marshall High School on the left corner. St. George St. had a few hills. It led to Franklin Ave. where we turned right. This part of Franklin was less busy, narrower, and more residential than the major streets of the area such as Los Feliz Blvd. We crossed what looked like a bridge with steeples on the corners and then crossed Commonwealth Ave., an extension of the street I lived on during my first stint in Los Angeles 13-14 years ago. There were lights at all the major streets including the one where we had to turn right: Hillhurst.

We turned right on Hillhurst and drove about a half mile north. The Palace was on the right side of the street just past the intersection with Ambrose Ave. We got there at 4:55 pm, over a half hour early. The Dine and Ride e-mail said to go to valet parking adjacent to the restaurant. But we didn’t see any valet in the parking lot just south of the restaurant. We parked in the lot in a space labeled “Old Man Parking” by informal graffiti on space’s tire stop. I called Mark B, whose name was given in the Dine and Ride e-mail to call if we had questions. He actually answered and said it was probably too early for the valet and just to park in the lot and secure the vehicle. There weren’t very many cars in the parking lot. The Palace was all in one building that looked to be about two stories tall. We climbed a few steps and entered a large front door with lion face knockers. The door opened right to the hostess. We told her we were Dine and Ride and showed her the confirmation e-mail. She seated us at a very well-located corner booth with a view of the entire restaurant. A waiter gave us the specialty menu that was exactly like the one we saw online.

The Palace advertises itself as serving “Authentic Chinese Food”. It’s a large restaurant with lots of seating including tables upstairs. The décor consists of black and dark red walls, dark red carpet, and black furniture. There’s a large fish tank near the entrance, a bar in the back with at least two flatscreen TV’s, and artwork of Chinese scenes on the walls, all done by what looked like the same artist. There’s also a gold-covered Chinese dress high on the wall behind a clear covering, decorative fans, tapestries of Chinese women in red dresses, and hanging from the ceiling are banners for each of the twelve Chinese year animals. There weren’t very many people there since it was three hours before the usual L.A. dinner time of 8 pm. On our table were decorative Chinese plates, chopsticks, and, we were glad to see, forks. My wife picked up a take-home menu from the hostess’s desk and noticed that it listed many dishes that weren’t on the Dine and Ride specialty menu, including some things we might like to try sometime.

The waiter first asked us whether we would like anything to drink. The Dine and Ride menu allowed us to order a glass of beer or wine. We said we just wanted water but the waiter insisted we could order a glass of orange juice in place of the beer or wine. We did that and it came in tall glasses with ice and it tasted sweet and refreshing. I couldn’t remember the last time I drank something other than water at a restaurant. We told the waiter our choices from the Dine and Ride specialty menu and our food started arriving soon after.

First, they brought our starters: vegetable egg noodle rolls and Chinese chicken salad. The former came in four separate sections and with a small tray of spicy mustard sauce and sweet dipping sauce. The egg roll sections were crispy. My wife preferred the mustard sauce and I preferred the sweet sauce. Though I’m not sure it was authentic Chinese food, the Chinese chicken salad was still very good. Both the lettuce and the small white noodles were very crispy. The dressing was the right combination of tangy and sweet. As we ate our starters, we noticed other Dine and Ride patrons come in and be seated by the waiters. We could tell because they mentioned Dine and Ride when they came in or they only ordered things from the specialty menu. There was a large group of eight that arrived over the course of an hour in groups of two or three. There was also a couple at the corner on the other side. They were mostly Caucasians that looked 5-10 years older than us.

Next the waiter brought our soup: one each of the two kinds: hot and sour and egg flower. The hot and sour tasted like its name but it was still flavorful and delicious. It had noodles and chicken in it. The egg flower soup only had egg in it but was still flavorful. After we finished our soups, they took our plates and bowls and brought our entrees along with new plates. There was the honey walnut shrimp with shiny walnuts and sweet white honey sauce; the roast duck Mandarin, all shiny brown with two small drumsticks; and there was a plate of sautéed vegetables compliments of the restaurants. They all came with two small bowls of rice. The vegetables consisted of baby corn, carrots, broccoli, peas in pods, zucchini, bamboo shoots, and fried tofu. They were all good, especially the pieces of tofu. The duck was also prepared with bamboo shoots and mushrooms all in a rich and flavorful brown sauce. The duck itself was crispy and had great flavor even without much sauce. The best entrée was the honey walnut shrimp with the walnuts sweet and crunchy, the shrimp cooked just right and the sweet white honey sauce was great for “dipping area”. It was a lot of food, but all very good.

As we ate we watched ABC News with Charles Gibson on the screens in the far corner near the bar. They showed Rio de Janeiro winning the bid for the 2016 summer Olympics and the disappointed people in Chicago. We were actually able to finish most of our entrees. For dessert, we had a choice of green tea, plum, and vanilla ice cream. My wife tried the green tea and plum flavors and preferred the green tea. We finished dinner at 6:30 and the hostess said our Dine and Ride shuttle would pick us up at 6:50 pm. While we waited we looked over a brochure given by the waiter that had all the Chinese New Year animals. We noticed that it recommended that someone born in each year marry someone born either four years before or four years after. We thought that this wouldn’t be very easy to do given that many potential spouses meet in high school or college where the greatest age difference is three years between freshmen and seniors.
At 6:50 pm two shuttles showed up, one nearly full and ready to leave and other empty. Each van held about 14 passengers. We boarded the empty van since we could sit where we wanted. The drive asked us who was playing at the Greek Theater. We said, “Loggins and Messina,” and he said, “It’s gonna be great!” We asked where we should catch the Dine and Ride shuttle after the concert and the driver said he or another van would stop at the same place he dropped us off: right in front of the Greek Theater. We couldn’t ask for much better service. With our dinner at the Palace, our evening was going very well and the main event was yet to come.

The Sandwich Joint opened in early to mid 2009 in the ground floor of the Medici apartment building across the street from the building where I work. It has a big, prominent, oval-shaped sign above the door. Other than the café in the building where I work, the Sandwich Joint is the closest eatery. On Thursday, September 24, 2009, I decided to try it.

When I exited the building where I worked I noticed that most people just jaywalked across the street to get to the Sandwich Joint. I walked west all the way to the intersection, crossed the crosswalk, and then walked east to the place. I entered and the cashier’s counter was just right there waiting. The cashier looked at me as if I should know what I wanted and how to order. I needed to study the large menu board above and behind the counter. First, I had to choose a sandwich from the 14 possible choices. They were all the standard kinds except the prosciutto. Next, I had to choose the bread between French baguette, multi-grain baguette, and croissant. Then, I had to choose toppings. The cashier didn’t say there was a limit to the number of toppings I could choose. Last, I could choose between having the sandwich hot or cold. The menu also had a list of the standard salads, drinks, and coffees.

The prosciutto sounded interesting, but, at $7.95, it was more expensive than the others. I picked the pastrami on a French baguette with a side of chips and my bill still came out to over $8.00 with tax. For toppings, I chose onions and peppers and I had them toast the sandwich. While they made my sandwich, I sat down and waited. The place is very small with four 2-person tables and a counter with 3-4 stools along the large arched window. There seemed to be many chairs, most of them stacked in a corner. The indoor colors were consistent with the outdoor sign: bright pastels such as yellow, red, and white. The floor was the concrete floor of a loft. It had high ceilings and there was the high exposed piping of a loft on the ceiling, though it was painted over in flat pastel yellow. There were many paintings on the walls, all of them by different artists, some of dark city scenes, others of musicians against bright backgrounds. Near the counter with stools was a shelf of reading material for patrons including a book of 50 years of Sports Illustrated covers and some art and travel books. It didn’t take much for the place to fill up because it was so small. I sat at the only open 2-person table near a group of four who had pushed a couple of tables together.

After about five minutes the cashier who had taken my order brought my sandwich to me. I had to get my chips from a shelf near the counter where I ordered. I think I just grabbed some original Kettle chips (from Salem, Oregon). They also had Dirty Potato Chips from Kettle. On the cashier’s counter there was a plastic display case containing the “Pastries, Etc.” listed on the menu. At that time the case only contained a croissant and a cookie. My sandwich was very large and I really didn’t need the chips for accompaniment. The pastrami wasn’t fried like it is at The Hat or for the “Metro” sandwich from the café in my building. The pepper and red onions on it were raw. It was alright, a lot of food, and not quite as good as the Metro sandwich. It was a bit bland and probably could have used some mustard, though I didn’t see mustard as one of the choices, just mustard vinaigrette. As I finished my sandwich, a few more people came in and ordered, some eating in and others getting their food to go. After finishing my sandwich, I left feeling very full.

I think the Sandwich Joint is trying to establish its own individual character that sets it apart from the chains such as Subway, Quizno’s, and Togo’s. It has done that with its setting but I’m not sure it’s quite there yet with the food. I usually just pack a lunch for work and I’ll continue to do so.