Classic Trip: Tucson, Arizona 2011 - Part 2

After spending a day in Tombstone it’s time to see Tucson proper.  The weather that had been threatening finally called in its debt and rain started coming down as we got back into the city.

Seems that’s how it goes for us, plan on a sunny getaway and we’ll get cold and rain.  Plan a trip to the snow and we’ll get a heat wave.

Watch the Video!

In the morning, we have a nice breakfast at the hotel…seriously, they have a great hot breakfast buffet…and make our way to downtown Tucson to see what we can find.  It is downright cold this morning.

Pulling into downtown, flakes start to fall.  That’s right…it is now snowing in downtown Tucson.  In the desert.  In Southern Arizona.  Just a few miles north of the border.  Where lawns don’t exist but Saguaro cacti do.

It looks like our bathing suits are just going to take up space in the luggage for this trip.

We find a spot to park on Congress Street on the east side of the city center.  It’s cold and snowy so we duck into the lobby of the beautifully restored Hotel Congress to get all our jackets, mittens, and hats on.  

The manager comes up to us.  He just wants to point out the accessible routes to all the areas of the lobby and invites us to come in and take as much time as we want to get warm.

That’s how hospitality is done, folks.

It is indeed an inviting place to sit for awhile, have a cup of coffee, and warm up in the tile walled room.

Out back, we cross the street to the old, restored Tucson train station.  Here you’ll find Maynard’s Restaurant and Maynard’s market.  We wander the aisles of the small store where you’ll find an upscale selection of food, wine, and beer plus some reasonably priced sandwiches and other prepared food to go.

Letty and I get a cup of weak coffee and it’s back out into the cold, cruel world.

Back on Congress Street, we stop at the Chicago Store.  It’s a large music store with just about any instrument you’d want to find.  It’s also like a musical pawn shop where local musicians can sell their instruments and budding musicians can buy them.  I get just a couple of items that I needed for our audio studio back home.

We continue to walk around in the light snow flurry but, although there seems to be a big surge towards restoration of the area, it’s still got a ways to go to be lively.

Back in the van, we head up First Avenue for lunch.  Today, it’s at BK Tacos.  You might have seen this place on the Food Network or the Travel Channel.  The specialty here is the Sonoran hot dog.  This starts with a bacon wrapped hot dog…a truly evil and delicious combination…and then piles on beans and salsa.  Most people also load up on the shredded cheese from the condiment bar.  It’s known as a chili dog on steroids…a pretty apt description.

The dogs are very good.  I also have a couple of their good al pastor tacos along with some creamy guacamole and hot sauce from the condiment bar.  It’s good enough to order seconds.

Tonight we’re going out on the town.  Specifically to a show at the restored Fox Theater on Congress Street back in downtown. 

When I was researching this trip, I saw that country singer Mark Chesnutt was going to be in town so we stopped in and bought tickets on arrival.  The wheelchair seating is in two boxes on either the left or right side of the orchestra and only 8 rows back from the stage.  Their actually very good seats.

At show time, the place is only about a third full so it was far from a sellout.  The first act, Mark Connors…a local singer, was not great.  The headlining Mark, Mr. Chesnutt, was great and...if you’ll pardon my French for a second...kicked ass.

The partially filled auditorium made up for the lack of bodies with the full-throated cheers and screams at Mr. Chesnutt’s act.  Security was tight, though, no pictures other that what we could grab with our phone or download a public domain copy could be had, so I apologize for the lack of photos.

The next day we wind down a bit, go shopping at some of Tucson’s many pawn and thrift shops, and spend the evening reminiscing at the hotel’s happy hour before settling in for one more night. 

We need to be well rested for that all day drive back to L.A.

Darryl

Copyright 2011

All Rights Reserved.

THE LEGACY OF LEFTOVERS: Fried Steak Tacos

Last week, I made some really good Mexican style rib eye steaks on the barbecue. They were delicious but I made more than we can eat. This week, I'm using those leftovers to make a quick dinner here at home instead of going out to spend too much money on fast food.

I have about eight ounces of steak in this container. 

I'll chop it up into thin, small pieces.

That chopped steak will go into a skillet for 3-4 minutes over medium heat. Just to warm it up, not so much to cook it anymore. That will be set aside for a minute when done.

I'll take 8 corn tortillas and warm them up in the microwave on high for 30 seconds. I'll put 1/8 of the steak into a tortilla, sprinkle on some shredded cheddar or jack (or better yet, a blend of the two), some hot salsa, and fold over.

In a 12" skillet, I'm putting in 3 tablespoons of olive oil and bringing up the heat to medium for about 4 minutes of preheating.  Two of the filled tortillas will go in. Hold the tortilla down with a wooden spoon to keep from unfolding for about a minute, until the cheese melts enough to glue it together.

About 2-3 minutes on each side, until slightly browned and crispy. Put on a paper towel on a plate and cover until all the tacos are done.

They're now delicious, crunchy, and ready to eat.

Darryl Musick
Copyright 2018 - All Rights Reserved

Road Food - Tacos of Southern California

The Heavenly Taco Goodness of Los Tacos de Huicho

Today, we put the spotlight on one of the greatest fast foods in existence...

One real benefit to living in Southern California is all the really good, authentic ethnic food we have here.  From Chinese to Kosher delis, Japanese, Thai, and more.  One thing no one can miss is the saturating abundance of Mexican food we have around here.  For those of you who have seen our Napa Valley Part 1 video, you'll notice Tim called Los Tacos de Huicho the best tacos we've ever had...including Mexico (which is very true).  Here is my real-life scale of taco goodness, with 10 being best and 1 being worst.  Let's start at 1...

1 Tacos Puebla.  Pasadena, CA.  Bland meat.  Overcooked when it shouldn't be...undercooked when it should.  Awful tortillas that have an undercooked, doughy texture.

2 Tacos Don Chente.  El Monte, CA.  I'm gonna piss someone off with this one.  Pretty restaurant.  Clean, happy feeling place.  Good looking desserts.  I want it to be good...why can't I stand their tacos?

3 Tonny's.  Pasadena, CA.  Many people love this place.  It's just average to me.

4 Jack in the Box.  Nationwide.  They must put crack in those two-for-99cent tacos.  I don't know why we like them...but we do.

5 Taco King (not to be confused with #6).  Azusa, CA.  Another decent taco stand in the city.  Good, but just above average.

6 King Taco (not to be confused with #5).  Locations across the Los Angeles region.  The best taco chain.  Great carne asada, good al pastor, decent carnitas, and lame roasted chicken.  Their red sauce will make your lips feel like they're falling off.

7 Rudy's. Monrovia, CA. A sit down, full service restaurant. Most food it better than average but Rudy now has a large taco de tripas on the menu that's out of this world good.

8 Pepe's.  Alhambra, CA.  Nobody makes a hard-shell taco like Pepe's.  Just dripping with juicy goodness and layered with cheese, throw a dollop of their great sauce on and enjoy.

9 El Picoso.  Azusa, CA. (Similarly, almost related, is El Picosito in Duarte, CA) Tacos de papa.  I've tried many places and pretty much choke on these potato tacos.  Not here.  Delicious, fried pockets of tortilla filled with just the right amount of potato.  Also, pretty much the best tripas south of Bakersfield plus good enchiladas and rellenos make this place stand out.  Note:  Many of their best dishes...such as the tacos de papa...are not on the menu.  You just have to know they make them.

10 Los Tacos de Huicho.  Bakersfield, CA.  How to they do it?  I've been here dozens of times and it's always delicious.  Have worked my way about half-way through their menu and have yet to find anything that is not absolutely delicious.  Although everything is top-notch here, their specialty is al pastor.  One of the few places left that do it right, roasted on a vertical spit just oozing with juice.  Tripas...I realize some of you are put off of this offal meat...are crispy, tasty little critters in their delicious fried tortillas.  The creamy, bean and meat goodness of their sopes rest on a just crispy enough shell.  The fish tacos are fresh and will blow those of you who like Rubio's away.  They even make some of the best french fries we've ever had.  The salsa bar holds their perfect red and green salsas, plus the holy grail of salsadom...their spicy, creamy, guacamoloe salsa (see picture above).  The price of a taco here is only 99cents...everyday!  The only down side is their bar, which makes some pretty lackluster margaritas.

Darryl

Kern County and Bakersfield, California

“Y’all must be crazy”

Yep, that’s what a lot of you are going be saying when you see where were going. The truth is, we’ve been to over a dozen countries and most of the states, but when we finally left the freeway and started exploring, Bakersfield turned out to be one of the most fun and interesting places we’ve been.

OK, so if I haven’t lost you by now, please read on while I plead my case…

Watch the Video of this trip!

For a couple of years after 9/11, the travel industry was on the ropes. You could get airfares and hotels for a song. Eventually, the economy turned somewhat and many in the industry tried to recoup the losses…tried very, very hard in some cases.

In the most intense period of Tim’s college days, we had very little time to spare during the school year and even less money to do it with (college tuition is a back-breaker!). We had a weekend between semesters where we could get away. Unfortunately, most of the usual suspects were charging usurious rates for basic rooms…over $300 a night in Pismo Beach at the same hotel we’d previously stayed at for $69 the year before.

I’m a music fan, and I also like good country and western music. I’d always wanted to see Buck Owens’ Crystal Palace but just never got around to Bakersfield to see it while he was alive but I’d found a great deal on a two-room suite there so we planned an overnighter. We had a ton of fun watching Buck’s son Buddy lead the Buckaroos while we dined on some fabulous steak. While we were there, we started to see the city in an ever more favorable light and went back again when we had some more time.

It finally happened. Instead of seeing it as a hot and dusty pit stop on Highway 99 on the way to somewhere more exotic, we fell in love with Bakersfield. Give it a try and you might just start looking at it with new eyes too…

It’s an easy two-hour drive over the Grapevine to Bakersfield when the weather is nice. When it’s not, this can be the drive from Hell. It’s the week after Easter, so along the way we stop in Gorman to view one of nature’s most majestic displays; a mountain covered in brilliantly colored wildflowers. About a half-hour east of here in Antelope Valley is another…miles and miles of fields covered in California Poppies. There is an official state reserve here, along with a much larger area of unofficial blooms.

After taking a little time to literally stop and smell the flowers, we continue on to the down side of the pass into the Central Valley. Thirty minutes later, we make our first stop in Bakersfield, a margarita in the dark and cozy bar of Mexicali on 18th Street.

The friendly bartenders here make one of the best margaritas in the city using Mountain Dew  (actually, it's ReaLemon as I just recently found out - Ed) as the sour mix. They also have a wide variety of margaritas to try but we’ll have to come back sometime when we don’t have to drive.

Just a couple of blocks away is the Holy Grail of tacodom, Los Tacos de Huicho. It’s a good place to walk to and eat off the margarita.

Huicho’s has nothing bad on the menu. Their specialty is al pastor, a pile of marinated pork rotating on a spit with onion and pineapple juices blending with the meat’s own juice as it is slowly cooked to perfection. I have eaten this meat everywhere from Guadalajara to Santa Rosa…no one comes close to the delectable perfection of Huicho’s. It’s also one of the world’s best bargains at only 99 cents (now $1.09 - ed) per taco.

There is also an excellent carne asada, cabeza, tripas (cow milk gut), fish, and shrimp. Besides the tacos, you can get your meat served in burritos, mulas, huaraches, gringas, and sopes. The tacos come plain…just the meat and tortilla. You then take them to the condiment bar and load them up. I like to sprinkle on the onions and cilantro, followed by the spicy red or green salsa, topped off with their creamy and spicy guacamole salsa. That last one is extremely rare north of the border but is pretty common in Tijuana. It’s just heaven.

Tim also wants to tell you that they make some of the best fries he’s ever had too. The only down side is their bar. It’s pretty much a fast food type of place, but they have a full bar in the back that makes some really uninspired mixed drinks. The beer’s good, though. Huicho’s is located just east of the intersection of Union Avenue and 18th Street.

After less than twenty dollars, all three of us are stuffed. It’s time to find our hotel.

There are several good choices here, most reasonable to cheap. The Best Western (now a Red Lion hotel - ed) next to the Crystal Palace is good if you’re going there. It has nice rooms, a friendly staff, and…being right next door to the Palace…is drinker friendly. I saw a two couples by the pool there once preloading with around 30 bottles of booze before they walked over. Hey, whatever floats your boat…as long as you’re walking and not disturbing me (they behaved, actually they were very nice people).

If you do find yourself drinking to excess there, all you need to do is walk across the parking lot to your room. The full breakfast in the on-site coffee shop that’s included in your room rate will help heal that hangover.

Two blocks away on the other side of the freeway is our current favorite, Springhill Suites. Located in a hotel ghetto between Rosedale Highway and the Kern River, it’s a quiet location and all suites. The staff has come to know us and puts us in the same accessible room on the second floor, overlooking the pool and the river beyond. It’s not as nice a view as it sounds…an oil-rig supply company sits between the hotel and the river.

The room is very nice and spacious. It includes a wet bar with microwave, coffee maker and refrigerator. A large bathroom with a transfer seat in the tub. There are also suites with roll-in showers but they are on the first floor and my wife prefers to be upstairs. A hot breakfast is served each morning off of the lobby. Above all, it is quiet, even when the hotel is full of kids’ sports teams. Rooms here go for over $100 but many discounts are available and I always pay around $80 per night…check their website for current offers.

After unpacking and a little rest, we head over to the Crystal Palace. We have 6:00pm reservations for dinner and a show. Along with the dinner, there is a $5 cover charge for the show. A wonderful steak dinner here will set you back $31. It’s a huge amount of food; 20 oz. steak, salad, squaw bread, biscuits, green beans, and your choice of a side. Plenty big enough for two, the split plate charge is just $8. There’s also sandwiches and pizzas from $9 to $12. A soup and dinner-size salad menu runs from $5 to $13. A full bar is also available. Dinner for three, including a couple of drinks for each of us and the show, comes in around $70 plus tip.

The main band is the Buckaroos, Buck’s old backup band. Every other weekend, Buck’s son Buddy Alan Owens flies in from Phoenix to play with his father’s band. Although he’s Buck’s son, Buddy was mostly raised by his step-father, Merle Haggard (another Bakersfield star), who married his mom after her original marriage broke up. It’s a rockin’ good time as the band plays not only Buck Owens material, but Merle’s too…while Buddy provides some personal back stories to go along with them and folks crowd the dance floor down front. He also mixes in quite a bit of classic rock into the mix.

Buck Owens is legend in this town, so the Palace also doubles as his museum. Hundreds of artifacts from his career sit in display cases lining the joint but the place of honor goes to his Buckmobile, a custom 1972 Pontiac with rifles on the hood and silver dollars mounted on the dash that is permanently mounted over the bar. Buck won the car in a poker game from Nudie, the guy who made all the glittering suits Owens wore during his career.

After the Buckaroos finish, Steve Davis and Stampede take over as the house band. They’re also very good but after two or three songs, it’s late for us and we head back to the hotel. If you only have one night here, an evening at the Palace gives you a good, very fun, distilled version of what this city is all about. It’s family-friendly too, so don’t be afraid to take the kids.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia

nickchapman under CC-BY license

In front of the Crystal Palace is the iconic Bakersfield sign that used to welcome travelers into town, stretched over Union Avenue in downtown. It was in bad shape and slated to be demolished when the town’s adopted musical hero, Buck Owens, stepped in to save it. It is now completely restored and crosses Stillwell Avenue next to the steakhouse and night club that Buck built.

Up the river a ways stands more signs. At the Kern County Museum, an effort is being waged to save the iconic neon signs that were a part of this city. You can see some them in the back of the museum grounds, such as the sign that pointed out the annex of the Bakersfield inn…one of the anchor points of the sign Buck Owens saved. Others are awaiting their restoration, like the TEJON letters of the old Tejon Theater marquee. More signs never got the chance…few more iconic signs existed like the block-long Rancho Bakersfield motel sign, long since demolished when the motel became a rehab center (which has since met its own fate on Golden State Avenue).

Along with the signs, acres of old, restored buildings dot the grounds like an old town. A jail, an undertakers office, many houses, an old hotel, a gas station. You could…and probably will…spend many hours exploring them.

Of course, Bakersfield is a huge oil town providing 64% of the oil produced in California. A visit here needs to include the Black Gold exhibit explaining the history and process of the local oil business. A theme-park quality motion simulator ride takes you beneath the ocean floor to find oil deposits. You can operate an antique derrick. Inside, exhibits show how oil does not sit in huge pools under the earth. Rather, it must be pressed out of the rock. No matter how you feel about the oil industry, this thorough look at it is fascinating.
Out front, another rescued icon, the Beale clock tower stands guard.

After the museum, we head north on Chester Avenue to our next stop. Over the Kern River in Oildale is Bakersfield Speedway, a 1/3 mile dirt oval nestled on the edge of town. We get here before 5:30pm and are able to take advantage of their happy hour, $1 dollar Bud and Bud Lite beer. OK, it’s not my favorite…in fact, it’s kind of like drinking water…but for a dollar, it’ll do.

We find a spot in the wheelchair accessible front row at turn four and watch the cars take practice laps. When the powerful, open-wheel modified cars come out, a shower of mud chips hits us every time they come around the corner. It’s time to rethink this and we move up to the top row, which is also accessible by a ramp that is a little steeper than we’d like.

The view and the comfort are much better from up here. A note: the seating here is nothing but concrete benches. Fans bring their own lawn chairs to sit in.

Racing gets started at 6:00 with heat races, starting with the mini-dwarf cars. These are tiny, lawn mower powered jalopy replicas driven by kids as young as 5 years old. They are very competitive and a lot of fun to watch. Next are the hobby stocks, local garage built cars, then the modifieds and finally the super late models, which are the fastest and loudest cars they’ll be racing tonight.

The top two cars from each heat race gets to compete in the next event, the trophy dash. Six cars from each division compete in short races to get a nice trophy and a picture with the trophy queen. The main events start right after the trophy dashes, with long races for the right to be the night’s champion and to claim the prize purse, usually several hundred dollars. The final race we see tonight features a last lap, neck-and-neck battle to the checkered flag. It’s thrilling and a lot of fun.

There's a lot more to come, be sure to come back for Part 2 of our road trip to Bakersfield where it's baseball, wildlife, fine ethnic cuisine, and a look at the nightlife of the city.

Darryl
Copyright 2010 - Darryl Musick

NAPA VALLEY, CALIFORNIA - Part 1

It’s a long, long drive from our base in the San Gabriel Valley (just east of Pasadena) to our destination of Santa Rosa. Eight hours of driving, not including stops. The final reckoning is ten hours.

Watch the video of this trip!

Up to the final days, it was touch ‘n go as to whether we’d even go here. The final week of the year can have terrible weather up north. Our alternate destination was Tucson but checking the weather forecast, the temperatures were the same either way with just a slightly greater chance of rain up in the wine country.

Our choice was sweetened by tacos. Tim lobbied hard to go to Napa for one reason…the lunch stop in Bakersfield would be at Los Tacos de Huicho. Huicho’s is known in our family as having the best tacos on the face of the earth. Yeah, we’ve looked hard…both north and south of the border…and have still yet to find a better taco. We’re still looking, but the crown still firmly resides on this neon-green outpost of carne asada, tripas, and al pastor sitting on a grimy side street in a forlorn industrial neighborhood.

The al pastor is rotating on a vertical spit as the cook slices of chunks of moist, juicy meat. The tripas, crispy little bits of intestine, are fried up. Battered fish filets are dropped into the deep fryer for my wife’s fish tacos. When we get our order, we prep our food with chopped onions, cilantro, green or red salsa, and Huicho’s ungodly good creamy guacamole salsa. Deep fried jalapenos are sitting at the end of the salsa bar…take as many as you’d like. At 99 cents per taco, the best food on earth comes cheap.

Bladders drained, gas tank filled, it was back on historic highway 99 north to Santa Rosa. Our room is at another historic location, the Flamingo Resort built in 1957. It was built to be a mirror image of the Flamingo hotel in Las Vegas. This restored property has the look and feel of a late 50’s or early 60’s Vegas hotel. It wouldn’t look out of place to see Frank, Sammy, and Dean lounging around the Olympic size pool.

Our room is a large, 500 square foot, second floor unit in the newer executive wing out back. It features a king size bed, queen size sofa bed, a large bathroom with a roll-in shower, and a view over a small farm that has somehow escaped the city’s rampant development.

One of the themes of this trip is to test the abilities of Guy Fieri in picking places to eat.  Our family is a fan of his show Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives on the Food Network and my wife is always saying we should check his listings before we go on a trip.  Well, Fieri is from Santa Rosa so what better place to put him to the test.  We're going to have dinner at his restaurant, Johnny Garlic's, and test a diner, a drive-in, and a dive from the area he's had on the show to see if they are as good as they look on TV.  Either it will be, or I'm gonna be taking one for the team here. 

First up is a diner...

Hank's Creekside Cafe is just a short block from the hotel.  It's a tight fit, but we get the chair inside and order up our food.  Service is quick.  We get eggs benedict, french toast, pancakes with some bacon and eggs.  It is all very delicious.  The first couple of tables are wheelchair accessible but tight.  There is one parking spot in front of the door that's handicapped.

The next morning, after that delicious breakfast, we drive over the hill to Calistoga at the top of Napa Valley. A sign points the way to Chateau Montelena, one of many wineries in the area, that was featured in the movie “Bottle Shock” with Alan Rickman and Bill Pullman.

A big, vine covered stone building sits impressively on the hillside among a web of ramps leading into the winery, tasting room, and the small lake with its Japanese Gazebo used by picnickers. Drivers with a disabled parking placard or license place can park at the top of the hill, next to the tasting room.

Famous for its chardonnay that beat the French wines at a Paris tasting in 1976, the chateau capitalizes on that fame, charging a sky-high tasting fee of $20…refundable if you buy at least $100 worth of wine. No, those souvenir glasses, cookbooks, and the signed DVD of “Bottle Shock” don’t count. There is no rule against sharing, however, so we did the tasting and shared our five samples between the three of us. One relative bargain was a package featuring a copy of the movie, signed by winemaker Bo Barrett (portrayed by Chris Pine in the movie) and a bottle of their cabernet for $35.

Tim at the Chateau Montelena Lake, Notice the Chair Cam (watch the video)

We take some time to explore the grounds, which include a small lake with a pagoda gazebo on an island you can use for picnicking.

Stay tuned for part two, were we find a better tasting bar, a drive-in, and a dive.

Darryl

Copyright 2010, Darryl Musick

All Rights Reserved

Something Offal Comes This Way...

Ready to get out of your comfort zone? Offal refers to the parts of the animal most people would rather not think about.  Kids remember having to choke down some of mom's liver or kidney.  Beyond that, it can get even scarier but it can be very tasty.

I had my epiphany with offal on a camping trip with my future wife and future inlaws when my brother-in-law's then girlfriend's (now his very lovely wife) dad set up a barbecue at our site.  He proceeded to unravel a large piece of cow intestine in a spiral on the grill.

"I'm not eating that," I whispered to Letty.

"At least try it," she insisted.

Quite a bit of back and forth later, I relented and told her I would try just a little bite. Screwing up my courage, I did and guess what?  It was terrific. I couldn't get enough.

I now search out a good tripas taco whenever we're someplace I'm likely to get some good Mexican food.

I've learned to not pass up on foods that might be off-putting to me. I've found some great foods and, yes, a few stinkers along the way trying things like pig's intestine soup, blood sausage, brains, heart, snails, and tripe (as in menudo).

Recently, we had this dish.  If you're ready to jump off the safe ledge, give it a shot.

Tacos de Cachete

INGREDIENTS

2 pounds cachete de res (beef cheeks, ask your butcher)
4 tablespoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon pepper
1 small onion (chopped)
1/2 pound cilantro (chopped)
Corn tortillas

In a stock pot, boil the cachete, garlic, salt, and pepper for three hours on low heat. It should be soft enough to easily chop up with a knife when done.

Heat up a comal (or a flat griddle) on medium heat.  Heat up some corn tortillas, about 30 seconds on each side. Place the tortillas folded up into a clean dish towel.

Chop up the meat, place a bit with the onion, cilantro, maybe a little guacamore, and your favorite salsa into a warm tortilla and eat as a taco.

Tuesdays with Letty: Osuna's Mexican Grill, Glendora, California

Back before Christmas, my doctor ordered me to take a Diabetes management class. It was a four-week regimen (cut down to 3 because the nurse instructor wanted to skip Christmas week) at our health plan's Glendora office.

Letty and Tim wanted to come with me (the 2 hours on Tuesday nights cured them of that and the last two classes I attended solo) so we went a little early so we could grab a bite to eat first.

The office is located in a small shopping center where the main tenant, Fresh and Easy Market, went under and the rest of the shops, if not empty, struggle to hold on.  Across the parking lot from the class were a couple of restaurants...Subway (not a favorite) and Osuna's.

We gave them a shot and were rewarded with delicious food that only raised my blood sugar by 40 points.

Fast forward to a couple of months later and my wife wants to pick up some items at Costco so I tell her we can do that on our Tuesday night out. On the way we're trying to decide where to eat first.  Driving along the 210 freeway, mentally mapping out what restaurants are at which exits, I remember that night at Osuna's at the Grand Avenue exit and say "why not there?"

Why not indeed? 

We have the place to ourselves, just the owner, the cook, and the owner's young son for company. When the boy comes up and asks us if we'd like to buy some cookies, I ask if he's selling them for school.

"I'm selling them for money!"

A young entreprenuer in the making.

It's an Ensenada themed place and since that Baja city is known for it's fish tacos, that's what Letty gets, along with a carne asada sope.  I opt for the Taco Tuesday special of two al pastor tacos along with a sope of my own.  They're all good and delicious, maybe an 8 out of 10 compared to the best we've had.

A solid place for a nice, casual dinner.

Osuna's is at 1311 S. Grand Avenue in Glendora, about two blocks south of the 210 freeway.

Darryl
Copyright 2016 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

This Week's Sunday Menu: Prime Rib Tacos and Chorizo and Eggs

Going Mexican this weekend with chorizo con huevos and prime rib tacos.

The breakfast is so easy I have to even call it a recipe. It's basically put chorizo in pan, cook, add eggs, and done.

The dinner takes a little more preparation but is still very easy. We're marinating some very good meat, carne asada style like they do in the carnecerias, and grilling on the barbecue.  I used the tiny tortillas (I bought to make chilaquiles with) so these are very much street style tacos but with prime rib instead of flank steak.

Two very tasty and very easy meals. Click on the links for the recipes

BREAKFAST: Chorizo con Huevos (Chorizo and Egg)
Almost too easy but very tasty and authentic.

DINNER: Prime Rib Tacos
Marinade is the key. After that, it's just grill, chop, and eat.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

Taco Time: Prime Rib Carne Asada Tacos

While carne asada tacos usually use marinated flank steak, I'm using a rib steak cut off of a prime rib...basically a bone-in rib eye.

Marination is the key to this one.  Also, chopping the meat into little pieces, like they do at the taco stand, makes this one steak extend to feed three people easily.

INGREDIENTS
1 rib steak, (or rib eye or New York steak) about 1 1/2 pounds
2 cups orange juice
1/2 onion
1 teaspoon minced garlic
3 small, hot, red chile peppers
cilantro

First put the steak into a sealable plastic bowl just big enough to fit it in.  Sprinkle little kosher salt and pepper on each side.

In a blender, puree the orange juice, chiles, garlic, and 1/4 onion (save the other quarter for later).

Pour the resulting mixture over your meat, completely immersing it. Seal the bowl and put in the fridge. Marinate anywhere from 6 to 36 hours...the more the better.

Finely dice the remaining onion and add chopped cilantro.  Put into a small bowl.

On a grill, cook the meat to your preferred doneness...I like medium rare. (See our Rib Eye Steak Recipe for tips on cooking to the right degree of doneness)

On a cutting board, chop up the meat into small pieces, the smaller the better. Put into a bowl.

Heat up some corn tortillas, fill with some meat. Add the onions and cilantro mix. Put in your salsa and maybe even a little guacamole if you have some.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

ROAD FOOD: Finding Good Food on the Road

Dragon fruit, Munich

Welcome to the start of another new year here on The World on Wheels.  Let's start off with an appetizer.

Chili Cookoff.  Coachella, California

For us, one of the main highlights of traveling is food.  We always look for great places to eat, especially local favorites that we can’t get at home.  A bowl of she-crab soup in Charleston, a dirty-water dog in New York, and barbecue in Kansas City are a few examples.

Picnic, Amador County, California

The question then becomes, how do you find a good place on the road?

Lunch.  Nimes, France

A friend of mine from Croatia gave me some advice when I was heading to France.  “When you are driving through the countryside!...”(you must understand my Croatian friend always talks as if there is an exclamation point at the end of each sentence) ”…when you see a restaurant on the side of the road, pull over!  It will be the best meal you’ve ever had!  It is like this throughout France!”

Dinner.  Grasse, France

And, in France, that is not far off of the mark but in other places you’re really taking your chances if you just dine somewhere at random.  One time, while staying in Asheville, North Carolina, we went out at night looking for dinner.  It was nearing 9:00 and most places were closed.  We saw a barbecue place on the road to Spindale and thought “hey, North Carolina is supposed to have good barbecue.”

Pizza, mussels, and wine.  Monaco

It was open, we had dinner, and would have enjoyed it more if we went to bed hungry.

Grilled meat in Kansas City

OK, so what to do…

Happy hour.  Sutter Creek, California

First, while on the road, the Rachel Ray trick of asking locals can find you some good places.  The happy hour bartender at the Homewood Suites in Seattle let us know of the neighborhood bar around the corner that served a mean bacon mac ‘n cheese.  Buckley’s is now one of our must visit places in the Emerald City. 

Buckley's.  Seattle, Washington

At a training class in San Francisco years ago, one of my classmates that lived in the city told me about Capp’s Corner in North Beach where I’ve had some of the most memorable Italian meals I’ve ever had…sometimes served by an ex-stripper named Magnolia Thunderpussy (really!).

Los Tacos de Huicho.  Bakersfield, California

Next, before I head to a destination, I’ll look online for highly rated restaurants in the area.  Two sites I use religiously are Chowhound.com and Yelp.com.  I’ve found some really good restaurants using those two such as Passionfish in Pacific Grove (near Monterey) that blows everything else around it away.  A passing comment on Yelp led us to our all-time favorite road stop restaurant, the incredibly good Los Tacos de Huicho in Bakersfield, California which serves the most incredible al pastor tacos you’ll ever find at only 99 cents each.

Biergarten.  Munich

Lastly, TV shows can sometimes lead you to great food destinations.  Although most travel and food shows just lead you to all the usual suspects, I like to follow Anthony Bourdain’s suggestions and I also have to give a shout-out to that bleached-out goofball, Guy Fieri.  Although he can be hard to take in large doses, we’ve yet to find a bad recommendation from his Food Network show, Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives.

Smoked jalapeno poppers.  Plymouth, California

It can really help to do a little research and make a list of restaurants you’d like to visit before you get to your destination.  Your stomach will thank you.

Dessert.  Seal Beach, California

-Darryl

Copyright 2011 - Darryl Musick

All Rights Reserved