In Little Havana, Paul Ryan pledges hard line on Cuba – Florida – MiamiHerald.com
In Little Havana, Paul Ryan pledges hard line on Cuba – Florida – MiamiHerald.com.
The staggering amount of pandering in a political campaign should come as no surprise, but it still does.
Congressman Ryan, doing as he is told by the party bosses, was in Miami kowtowing to the old Cuban refugee community, grubbing for a few more votes and quite a few more dollars. This small band of the influential former Cuban elite has held US policy captive for more than 50 years now, effectively enabling Castro by providing a target for him to unify his country against.
Ryan wasn’t always a slave to this particular special interest:
Ryan, a Wisconsin congressman, has voted against the embargo at least three times. The Midwest tends to see trade opportunities in agriculture with Cuba.
You would think that a Congressman should be doing what is best for his district and his constituency, but the hunger for votes in South Florida trumps his sworn duty–what’s a little trade improvement compared to electioneering?
Chef good, manager bad
Dinner last night at the Dead Fish, in Crockett. We’ve eaten there before, most recently last week, and enjoyed it enough to return for more delectable goodness.
Well, I still like the place, but they sure found ways to test my appreciation.
The Dead Fish is a lovely, very successful restaurant perched on a bluff overlooking the Carquinez Bridge and the straits it spans. The view is magnificent, and virtually every table faces the window and the panorama. There is a large patios with outdoor seating, well served by heaters, which also includes tiny curtained-off ‘rooms’ which provide an extraordinarily romantic atmosphere. The Dead Fish is owned by the same group that operates the Stinking Rose in the City, so they should know a thing or two about operating a high-volume destination establishment.
Last time we ate with Gail’s nephew Chris and his sweetie, Janice. They live quite close and frequent the Dead Fish, and started the meal with two orders of the Crab Crostini, a phenomenal appetizer consisting of toast, crab, smoked salmon, avocado and a drizzle of oil.
When we went back last night, with Barbara and Margaret for our monthly dinner, I wanted the same starter, but two orders is too much. There are 3 pieces in an order, for some reason they must teach in restaurant school. Most dinner groups are an even number—-two or four. Why 3 pieces?
So I asked the waiter to give us an order of 4 pieces. What’s the big deal? I don’t mind paying for the fourth piece, I just want one for each of us.
At the Dead Fish, though, the customer is not always right. The adamantly refuse to make that accommodation. An order is three pieces, no more and no less. No exceptions. He offered to bring out two orders, but that was too much for the delicate appetites of my tablemates, so we just took the one order and cut it up and made do. An inelegant solution, to be sure, but they left me little choice.
On the dinner menu, they offer a pasta dish with chicken, asparagus, olives and pesto. Sounds great, but in a house famous for its crab, why eat chicken? So I ordered it with crab instead—this was a change they were willing to make. And the dish is fabulous. Wonderful. Huge, juicy chunks of crab in a bowl of fettucine. I loved it.
The ladies all had the crab enchilada. This is signature dish of the Dead Fish, and highly recommended. The dish comes with two very large and rich enchiladas–two people could easily share this plate, and roughly have of what we ordered came home with us.
I wish I could offer you photos of the food, but the some designer got to the owners and installed bizarre halogen lighting with yellow/green filters, and there was no way I could get a good picture. The lighting is odd from a business standpoint, because it makes the people look sickly and the food just look weird and unappetizing.
Service, except for the inflexibility part, was very good. Each server uses an electronic ordering device, so when I asked for another iced tea he just clicked on his pad, the order came up in the pantry and a runner brought the fresh flagon of iced tea out in a matter of seconds. I was impressed.
Prices are mostly reasonable–the crab enchiladas were $18.95. You can spend big if you want–the slab of prime rib with crab is $57, but that would easily feed at least two, probably three people.
Overall, I like this place and will undoubtedly go back. But I’m still cranky about their rigidity about the appetizers, and I want to sit on the patio where the view is best and there isn’t that weird color thing from their outré lighting.
The opposite of green
It took this much packaging to send me a new credit card
I got a new credit card from Citibank. It’s a fancy, premium card that gives me more mile on American Air, so I’m pretty happy.
I’m not happy, though, with the packaging. See all that? In order to send me 4 credit cards, which would fit well into one #10 envelope, they sent two packages, inside of which were fancy black cardboard sleeves, inside of which were fancy black cardboard boxes, inside of which were, you guessed it, #10 envelopes, inside of which were 2 credit cards.
I guess they are trying to impress me with all this, but I’d be more impressed if I could get them on the phone without having to give my 16 digit number two or three times.
There is just no excuse for this sort of excess–even if they need to impress the customers, why does it take two packages for 4 credit cards? It just doubles the chance of one of them getting lost in the shuffle.
The Forties still live
Last night was the annual Gala for the Ruth Bancroft Garden, so that’s where we were.
The Garden looks better all the time. Charlotte Bloom continues to commute from Chicago every couple of months for a few days of applying her genius touch, Andrew and Brian handle the day to day care and feeding of the world class collection of succulents. Rye runs the joint. If you haven’t been there, and you like plants, you have missed a rare treat.
This year is the fortieth anniversary for the Garden, so the theme last night was the 1940’s. The decor in the dining tent was spectacular–old photos, movie posters, even a perfect sailor suit from WWII.
What I’m here to show, though, are the clothes that people found. It was an incredible evening for some very old couture, and I want to share it with you.
If you click on the first photo, you’ll see everything nice and large on your screen, and be able to read the captions.
A Greek to beware of
Gail wanted a gyro for lunch yesterday, so we decided to try Opa!, a new place on North Main in Walnut Creek. It didn’t work out so well.
The facility is attractive, but it’s really a bar/restaurant and very loud. There are televisions all over with sports on, the is music and there are the modern acoustics designed to make the place seem loud and happening. They do this, one would assume, because people like it. “People” may like it noisy, but I don’t.
The menu is quite extensive, and looks interesting, with a wide range of Greek/ Mediterranean specialties. But we came for gyros, and gyros we ordered.
Life can be disappointing, as all adults know, but this was ridiculous.
The lamb/beef mixture that is at the heart of the gyro should be moist and tasty, not dry, hard, and tasteless. The tzatziki sauce should flow over the fixings, not be as stiff as well-chilled cream cheese. There should be more filling than bread. There should be all these things, but not at Opa!
The iced tea was one of those dreadful flavored varieties although they don’t have the decency to tell you in advance.
The French fries look good yet were curiously tasteless. Even the feta cheese they put on top of the fries didn’t help.
Service was good, and the manager took the cost of Gail’s gyro off the bill, but we were not at all impressed.
The problem, I suspect, is that there is no budget for a chef/manager to be standing at the rail checking every dish to make sure it is perfect. You get what you pay for, and a $12/hr cook just doesn’t have the same standards as a trained chef.
It’s too bad, because I think I’d like to try some of their dinner items, but that won’t be happening.
Third time’s the charm
Real restaurant reviewers, as opposed to dilettante bloggers, always try a place two or three times before writing it up. For a change, that’s what I’m doing with Barbacoa in Orinda.
Situated behind the Orinda Theater in Theater Square, I had seen this new restaurant being built, and was anxious to try it. Too anxious, it turned out, because we first ate here when they had been open only 12 days, and weren’t really ready. After that meal, I sent a note to the manager, and he made sure to reply and ask us to return as his guest for another shot.
The second trip was much better, but you can’t really ethically write about a free meal, so I had to wait until tonight, when Gail and I went back just because we wanted to. I’m pretty glad we did.
The heated outdoor terrace
Barbacoa is a beautifully designed establishment, with a full bar, a dining room indoors and the outdoor terrace, fully equipped with heaters to take the chill off the evening air. The decor is Mexican, natch: bright, colorful and upbeat. I wish the music wasn’t so loud, but I guess that’s what people want. The lighting indoors is more atmospheric than illuminating–I don’t have any food photos because it was just too darned dark.
And that darkness confuses me, because this is the kind of place to bring the kids (or grandkids) for dinner. Indeed, the joint was full of them. I’d think you’d want more light for the little perishers to see and color and play, but I”m not a restaurant designer.
On to the food. It’s good. Not your standard Mexican combination plate, either. The food here is cooked on a wood fired grill, as the name might suggest. They offer 7 different kinds of taco, and I had 5 of them. Their tacos are small, and all but one are served on little, soft, corn tortillas. The chicken taco is in a fried shell. If you order the house special “barbacoa” taco, beware of the habañero salsa–this stuff is made from the exceedingly hot peppers soaked in kerosene then set on fire. Well, that’s what it seem like to me. Gail ate it and kept smiling, but she’s tougher than I am.
Gail had the pork tamale, and pronounced it excellent.
The hit of the menu is a side dish–the corn and zucchini pudding. This stuff is like dessert in the middle of the meal, with all the self-righteous virtue of eating your veggies as a bonus.
Our server was excellent: very well trained, willing, swift, smooth and capable.
Prices are reasonable. Orinda is the high rent district and the people are looking for good, not cheap. You can get cheaper Mexican plenty of places. You come here for really good Mexican in a high class atmosphere.
It’s been a bit of a journey getting to this point, but I’m glad I did. The management here is clearly intent on providing you with a good experience, and have the good sense to listen to their customer and respond. They won me back after a poor first impression. When you go remember I did the hard part for you.
Shoes.
In Office Max today. Saw these shoes and had to share.
I ate mushrooms. I didn’t die. Yet.
Okay, so everybody knows by know that I don’t like mushrooms. Not the sight, smell, taste or texture of the miserable fungi. Some people try to get me to eat them by saying they have not taste–then why bother with them? Lisa thought it would be persuasive to tell me that taste like the earth–but I stopped eating dirt before I was 2, so that wasn’t persuasive.
There is one type of ‘shroom that I can tolerate–the chanterelle, a little quirk that came in handy tonight because we had dinner at Greens, at Fort Mason in the City, and it’s a vegetarian/vegan restaurant so having the rib eye was out of the question.
Greens was founded in 1979 by the San Francisco Zen Center, which also maintains Green Gulch Farms in the Marin headlands to provide fresh, organic produce to the restaurant.
Here’s the good news: the food is good, and clean, and healthy.
Nice table setting, but it’s better because I found some light. Greens is lovely, but the ‘dramatic’ lighting leaves an awful lot of dark around.
I can’t pass up tomatoes and mozzarella–if it comes with burrata, so much the better.
A caprese salad of heirloom tomatoes and burrata–a pretty perfect combination.
We don’t eat much pizza. When you own a pizza parlor it’s easy to get overloaded. The one Greens serves is a worthy exception to the rule.
Pizza Margherita for the gourmet set
Here’s where the mushrooms come into play–I ordered the linguine, which comes with chantarelles. Bravely risking my life and liver, I dove in and enjoyed the meal. Fresh corn, fresh tomatoes, fresh basil, wonderful eggy linguine, a few strange fungus, it was a delightful.
No, I won’t be changing my mind on mushrooms in general, but I’d order this dish again.
The dreaded mushrooms in my excellent plate of linguine.
Vegetable lasagna
Go out to dinner with two grand-daughters and you’ll be ordering dessert for certain.
Butterscotch pot-de-creme
Lemon tart
Before Greens, the few vegetarian establishments were far from gourmet. Greens has raised the bar, and still remains perhaps the best vegetarian/vegan restaurant in the country. You can have an excellent meal without meat, and (so far at least) the mushrooms won’t kill you.
A panoramic view of the Delta–notice the complete lack of boats on this perfect day.
I don’t own a boat, and that’s fine with me. I think I’d like to go out on the water once or twice a year, and that just doesn’t justify the year round expense.
Because this is so obvious to me, I’m always surprised to see how many people do own boats, and don’t use them. Today, Gail and I went for a drive on the Delta, passing one marina after another filled with large, expensive boats just sitting there. The sun was out, the temperature was in the low 80’s, there was a light breeze from the southwest, it was a marvelous day being enjoyed by essentially no boaters at all. I’ll never understand it.
A drive on the Delta is nothing without a meal, so we pulled into a likely looking spot–Joe’s Sports Bar at the Lighthouse, just outside of Isleton. I don’t think there really is a lighthouse, there isn’t much in the way of crashing wave and dangerous rocks in the Delta, but the name is romantic.
The name is painted on the floor–I guess if you get falling down drunk you should know where you are.
The deck overlooking the water.
Joe’s is the kind of friendly, informal place you would expect to find on the water. It’s a sports bar, and today was the first Sunday of the football season, so there was a game on the screens that were hung by every table. Unfortunately, the volume was turned up waaaaay to loud, but that’s the way the sports fans like it, I guess.
The food at Joe’s was pretty good, too. Gail and I both had the grilled fish tacos:
Grilled fish tacos and fries–the perfect Sunday drive lunch.
I liked my taco, even with the particularly spicy barbecue sauce they put on it. The fries were crisp, no limp. If they had a decent sweetener for my iced tea I’d give Joe’s a perfect score, but since all they had was Sweet-n-Low, which is a foul-tasting powdered poison, they lose a star.
Our drive was great. The Delta is beautiful, and the houses and boats and marinas are all intriguing. Joe’s is a good place, if you don’t mind the volume of the game, and you bring your own sweetener.
Always carry a camera
Walking out of Nordstrom today, I spotted one of the most beautiful cars I have ever seen. A Chrysler Town and Country convertible. Most opinions are that it’s from the late ’40’s–if you can be more specific, leave a comment.
In the best of all possible worlds, I would have had my entire camera bag with me, ready to take dozens of perfect photos of this magnificent piece of mechanical sculpture. In the real world, though, I had my iPhone. The pictures are pretty good, and I think you’ll like them. Click on any photo to see a large size gallery.
Totally Unauthorized 