Category Archives: Travel

Diner

Posted on by LeAnne Notabartolo

Nighthawks by Edward Hopper

On the east coast, in just about every small and large town you can find a great diner. In many cases, you do this simply by looking for the shiny aluminum building that looks like an old rail car. In fact, when I was a kid I thought they WERE old rail cars that had been re-purposed into diners. Here in the wild, wild west it is a little harder to determine what’s a diner and what isn’t without going inside and looking a the menu.

The appearance of diners has changed as we all have, and as I have moved around the world, my view of what makes an appropriate diner has changed. I remember as a kid walking into diners and salivating at the rotating case full of desserts. When I was younger they always seemed HUGE and tasted just as good as they looked. As an adult they still seem HUGE and frequently taste as good as they look, especially the pie. When we lived in Maine and I was pregnant, I would drive an hour in each direction to a small town, Houlton and the Elm Tree Diner – they had a chalk board with more than 20 different pies every day, no case ever built has been large enough to hold their daily offerings. I went specifically for the raspberry, most often times taking a whole one home after eating a slice with my lunch. It is seriously the best pie I have ever eaten, hands down!

Also in Maine, in Presque Isle, there is a small family owned joint that we enjoyed nearly weekly when we lived there, the Riverside Inn. Of course there weren’t too many eateries when we lived there (1991 – 94) and this place was family owned, clean and made the BEST bread. The first time we went there, the waitress asked if we wanted “home made toast”. I thought to myself, “All toast is home made,” and ordered whole wheat. BIG mistake – the “home made toast” is their house made white bread, thick sliced. griddled, and slathered in butter!

When traveling, I love to hit a good diner for breakfast before starting the day’s drive or before the day’s events. In Escondido, CA, there is the Centre City Cafe – I think it is an old Denny’s building. They have the best of everything, including chipper waitresses and great breakfast. While there this past weekend, I was nearly GIDDY with my eggs as they were perfectly cooked – whites solid, yolks runny!!

On Long Island, there is a GREAT diner on Merrick Rd in Seaford – the Seaford Palace Diner – with a line out the door most days. Of course Mom took me there. They specialize in fish of all things and their daily special is FANTASTIC!!! It’s a complete meal from soup to nuts for about $15, and it is enough to feed 2 people, no joke! They don’t take reservations and you have to sign in to get a table. Plan on waiting! The problem with diners on Long Island is there are SO many, it’s hard to decide where to start first. It seems like all my favorite diners in NY, both upstate and on “the Island” are all shiny metal boxcars.

Here in Vegas the closest thing I have found to a diner is Blueberry Hill. They are open 24 hours a day and have all the basics you expect and some even have a lounge with cocktails (go figure – it’s Vegas!). Alas, none of them is the shiny aluminum “rail car” of my youth. While the breakfast at The Original Pancake House is great, they aren’t open 24 hours, so they don’t qualify as a “diner” in my book. (Moment of truth – I love the corned beef hash at The Original Pancake House on Charleston).

A true diner has reasonable prices, a VAST menu and decent food and is open 24 hours a day. It doesn’t have to be fancy, just properly prepared, good, working class basics. To my mind a great diner has to have a few things on the menu and they all have to be made really well:
• Breakfast – 24 hours a day – with eggs cooked correctly
• Soup of the day, made from scratch – I prefer Cream of Mushroom or Cream of Chicken
• The perfect Club Sandwich and/or a great BLT
• A “Blue Plate” Special – usually comes with drink and dessert too.
Click here for a little info on the origins of The Blue Plate Special – thanks Fred Harvey!

As I continue to write and publish this blog, I am trying to find my own voice and style. I love the movie references, how about you? Apparently several people didn’t realize to read the entire article with the previous format that you had to click on the title or pic. So…back to the drawing board on format. How do you like this one? Your thoughts?

This week’s Food Memories include a fun dinner at Stone Brewing with the San Diego family, fried chicken fingers at Three Square Bingo while dressed as Zorro, and quiet meals with my main squeeze at home.

Diner – Steve Guttenberg, Mickey Rourke, and Kevin Bacon

Enjoy this week’s pics.

Me and Lynn Moonen dressed up for Bingo – yes that is me as Zorro!

The San Diego Contingent met us in Escondido for some fine fare at Stone Brewing

San Francisco

Posted on by LeAnne Notabartolo

San Francisco – Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald and Spencer Tracy – 1936

I went to “the city by the bay” for the first time on a paid, earned trip a few years ago and I fell in LOVE! I could spend all day in China Town alone, eating my way up and down the streets between moon cake bakeries and dim sum houses. The tea vendors make me swoon with the lovely smells, artistic pots and blooming teas.

If you have never been to San Francisco, let me just fill you in on the fact that it is an amazing dining city and you can get great food for very reasonable prices. Of course there are the tourist traps that you HAVE to go to (like Boudin Bakery and Fisherman’s Wharf), but there are also some really great places that tourists rarely venture into.

Thursday evening I was treated to first class service and spectacular food at Chef Hubert Keller’s Fleur de Lys in Nob Hill. Hubby John was speaking for a med event and I ate, solo, in the bar area. Not lonely at all. Because I didn’t have to pretend to be charming, and I didn’t have to make conversation with anyone, the food was nearly a spiritual experience for me. I never thought that dining alone (with my husband in the next room) would be such an epiphany for me. I was able to focus SOLEY on the food and truly smell, feel and taste it without the distraction of another soul. I did have prosecco with dinner and I shouldn’t have. My head screams whenever I drink any kind of wine. I know better, but it was so delicious! Here is the amuse bouche of desserts they brought me after the OTHER food I had consumed

This trip we skipped my favorite dim sum “palace” – the erroneously named City View has no view at all. What it does have is amazing dim sum and I had to search to find it and we were the only Caucasians in the joint. (Moment of truth: I secretly LOVE when I go into any ethnic restaurant and I am the only, or one of a few, Caucasians in the building. To me that means I found something close to authentic.).

Everything we ate was great, and I FINALLY got to visit a place I heard about on NPR’s The Splendid table with Lynne Rossetto Kasper. It was mentioned on the Road Food segment of the show and it’s called Sam’s Grill. It’s apparently an institution. I suppose that’s why they can get away with their prices for just average food. Or maybe it was what I ordered. I had built this place up so much in my head (and of course ate there AFTER Chef Hubert’s place) that I think maybe anything would have not lived up to the hype. Another go around? Probably.

Also good to try – Nihon sushi and whiskey bar. I never thought whiskey would be a good pairing with sushi, but once again I was wrong. I have seldom seen in one place so much variety in a whiskey collection and the sushi was pretty damn good too.

The icing on this trip was dining with Sisters in Law Bonnie & Gretchen, Nephew Colin, Friend Debbie and Cousin Christine at Bonnie & Gretchen’s. DYNAMITE! FOUR dozen Hog Island oysters, fresh from the farm, plump juicy shrimp with assorted dipping sauces, rare, sliced rib-eye and a gorgeously colored tossed salad. I hadn’t shucked oysters since culinary classes, but once I got in the groove it was a breeze! And let’s not forget the wine. I rarely drink wine because I get screaming headaches from it (see prosecco mention above). I think I found a cure: beer and cider with lunch, Cakebread Rose and Pinot Noir with dinner, eat Zyrtec like candy and finish off the night with Bulleit Rye Whiskey. No hangover or wine headache!

My Food Memories from this week are amply described above and this week’s pics are from the San Francisco weekend.

Until next week, go out and make your OWN Food Memories!

State Fair

Posted on by LeAnne Notabartolo

As some of you know, I grew up in a rural area in the Hudson Valley in upstate New York. I have few good memories of my childhood. Because I knew I wanted to be living in a concrete jungle, I was miserable there, surrounded by trees, poison ivy, farms, etc., but there are a few things I remember fondly like Autumn (as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago in my tribute to Sully) and the COUNTY FAIR. Yes, it’s in capital letters because it was a BIG event. We looked forward to it every year. The Fair was where I saw Chubby Checker and my first demolition derby. There was always entertainment, usually of the country music variety (miserable, remember?) and the High School Queen competition that I don’t remember my High School ever winning, now that I think about it. The 4H always had demonstrations ranging from sheep shearing and wool spinning to horsemanship competitions and of course the baked goods competitions. The most amazing thing for me, as per usual was the food!

What is it about food at fairs, carnivals and amusement parks? What makes that food so special and causes such visceral memories? Why is it every time I walk into an amusement park I want a corn-dog?

Each outdoor venue has special food and Food Memories attached to it. Let’s start with the Fair. Each year I waited in line like hundreds of others for the BEST Italian Sausage and Peppers and Fried Dough (aka Elephant Ears, Zeppoli). Always at the same location on the midway, always the same restaurant doing the cooking. I’d save babysitting money and chore money so I could buy what I wanted and I treasured using MY OWN money for treats. The smell of the grease and feel and look of the powdered sugar coating everything I touched are burned into my brain forever.

While living in San Antonio I went to tons of fiestas! The folks in San Antonio don’t need an excuse, they will make a fiesta out of ANYTHING. One of my favorites happens in April, right before the BIG Fiesta week long event of parades, concerts and galas. It is called NIOSA (Night in Old San Antonio) and one of my dearest friends Nanette works for the event. We made it a Girls Night Out once a year and hit all the food booths and entertainment we can stand. They have these amazing drinks made from fruit called “aguas frescas”. Imagine something cold like lemonade, but made with OTHER fruits instead of lemons. My favorites are the watermelon and mango with juicy little bits of fruit floating in a sweet and cold fruit flavored “ade”. One of the more interesting things I ate there is “Calf Fries” and they are, you guessed it, sliced, fried bulls balls. Other than being a little chewy, they were quite tasty! In addition to the “Calf Fries” there are TONS of great food items, smoked turkey legs, brisket sandwiches, bratwurst and cold beer and the ever popular “meat on a stick”. You know, teriyaki, fried chicken, corndogs, etc. Delish!

Since we are on the topic of sticks…Earlier this year I went to Disneyland with some friends. It was a Grown-Ups only, no kids or husbands allowed event. After breakfast we all agreed everything we ate had to be on a stick! Corndogs, Kebabs, caramel apples and ice cream shaped like Mickey’s head all ensued, as did the hilarity and nonsense. We literally walked by food vendors that had nothing on sticks. We even kept sticks so we could pop them into pretzels to stay in theme. It was a great day!

This past weekend my son came home from college for the first time and we went to the Renaissance Faire. This event is not complete for me without three things. I need to see the jousting and I need to eat a Scottish Meat Pie (or 2) and a smoked turkey leg. There is something about being dressed like a serving wench or merchant’s wife and tearing into flesh on the bone that screams medieval times to me!

What are your favorites? What Food Memories are burned into your soul and taste buds that you try to relive and recreate? Go find them and enjoy them!

I hope you noticed that I changed the look of the blog. Please feel free to comment and let me know how you feel about it. I thought it was an easier way for you look back and see some of the other posts and pics. Thoughts?

This week’s pictures: Friend Doreen with meat on a stick, my JUGs (Just Us Girls) with El Rey and my pals at Disney with Mickey shaped ice cream!

This week’s Food Memories include a bizarre dinner with friend Lynn at Rumor, Homemade Mac & Cheese with son Jack and friend Greg, Scottish Meat Pies with my main man and take out fried chicken with Jack on the way home from a cocktail party (his choice of snack).

Until next week go out and make your OWN Food Memories!

State Fair – Jeanne Crain and Dana Andrews

On the Road….

Posted on by LeAnne Notabartolo

For some people, when they travel, they look for the familiar in a land that is unfamiliar to them. SOOOO many Americans seek out McD’s in Europe, believe it or not (I will admit they have the cleanest toilets in certain areas of Europe – been there, done that). I, on the other hand, decidedly do NOT – I strive for the new and different!

I recently returned from one of my favorite cities, Chicago; I attend a conference there every July. If you have never been there, let me tell you it is great….in the summer! The winters there are too cold for me, but the summer there is special. Downtown has lovely planted garden areas, it’s a great walking town AND there is fab food everywhere you go. I have been to Chicago every year for more than 10 years for this conference, and each year I try to find someplace new to eat. This year was no exception. While I am delving into the city, and striving for the unfamiliar, there are several attendees at the conference routinely doing the same things every year, sticking to the familiar and tried and true. Why is that?

I think I have it figured out! Let’s use Chicago as the example. For people in rural areas, they don’t have a lot of the “trendy” chains – like Cheesecake Factory – so they want to go there, because “everyone they know” says it’s great. People from certain metropolitan areas don’t have Chicago specialties – like Giordano’s pizza and Portillo’s Italian Beef – so they want to go there. Still others find comfort in routine, when everything else they are experiencing can’t be controlled or they over load on foreign concepts, they stick with what they know. And then of course there are the “unadventuresome” – yes, I just made up that word – you know, the burgers & fries, steak & potato, mac & cheese people (because they know what it tastes like).

As I am none of the above, where does that leave me? I do have fave places that I find in every city I go to, and Chicago is no exception, and I try to hit those places while I am there, but I don’t need a routine and I rarely eat in national chains (not at all if I can avoid it – that topic may be my next blog…hmmm). I am nothing if not an adventuresome eater. Because I am unwilling to eat the same things on the road that I can eat at home, and I am unwilling to settle for second rate, I often find myself dining solo. The masses don’t see the boldness of new, unknown choices as a beautiful thing – for some it is scary, some are just plain cheap, and still others would blanch to see “bone marrow” on the menu!

So this trip I found TWO new places and had wonderful things in each and good company for both meals. Sometimes I CAN encourage people to stretch that comfort zone…

This week’s Food Memories include Nutella Crepes for dessert at Crepe Bistro on Wells, a ridiculously good Shrimp Burger at Public House on State St., and a solitary, but not lonely, lunch at The Purple Pig.

This week’s pic is from last year – me with the Sour Cherry Pie from Ed Debevic’s in Chicago. Until next week, go out and make your own Food Memories.