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.
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.
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