In the realm of places in North Hollywood that are in walking distance, there is one place I have avoided for a while. It’s called Eclectic Cafe and the reason is not because I’ve heard bad things, but I’ve heard expensive things and “expensive lunch” is not often a term that finds itself in my vocabulary. Nonetheless, I recently had reason to eat lunch there and was curious what I would find.
For a nice little Sunday brunch with the grandparents in Beverly Hills, we headed to an LA icon. This icon is Nate ‘n Al and it’s been hanging out in Beverly Hills since before the hillbillies. Started in 1945 by two good old fashioned Detroiters named Al Mendelson and Nate Reimers, Nate ‘n Al brings the comfort of Detroit delis to Southern California. Supposedly. But I would be the judge of that.
The Federal Bar in North Hollywood just opened last month and it wasn’t a moment too soon. North Hollywood has desperately needed some bar variety, because you can only go to Big Wangs and Pitfire Pizza so often. Plus, The Federal Bar is not simply a bar, it is a gastropub featuring a tasty-looking menu just waiting for an unvegan visit. The visit came on St. Patrick’s Day, when my coworkers and I were in dire need of a beer and didn’t want to wait in line anywhere. We were amazed to find The Federal Bar had a surplus of seats available and sat down to see what it was all about.
You know what’s great? Sausage. You know what goes great with sausage? Beer. So what does Steingarten, a recently opened restaurant/bar in West LA, have to offer? That’s right, sausage and beer. But not just any sausage and beer, sure they have your generic bratwurst, buckwurst, Polish and Italian sausages, but similar to Wurstkuche, they like to get exotic. With rabbit, venison, alligator and elk, these are truly some sausages to be reckoned with and not for those with a weak stomach.
On another fantastic trip to Disneyland, this one filled with wheelchairs and electric scooters from scooter sleuth rather than roller coasters, we ended up at Cafe Orleans for lunch. More upscale than your average Disneyland restaurant, Cafe Orleans is located in the heart of New Orleans Square, not far from Pirates of the Caribbean. Serving up French-influenced food, they had a good-looking menu with a couple unvegan options.
Taking advantage of a special from Living Social, the girlfriend and I headed to Cobras & Matadors in Mid-City for a bit of a date night. The place specializes in tapas and is BYO with a slight corkage fee. We forgot the booze, so had to make up for it in food instead. The deal was for 70 bucks worth, so that meant we had a lot of tapas to eat. As usual, I eyed cheeses and meats, and was happy to be eating small plates because so much looked good.
Everyone knows The Cheesecake Factory for their namesake. And those people are also probably aware that The Cheesecake Factory is a full-on restaurant with a restaurant about as massive its portions. Sadly, when I went to Cheesecake in Beverly Hills, my stomach wasn’t treating me as well as it usually does. So naturally, as an unvegan, I turned to fried chicken. Yeah, that’s right.
When you look into where to get your college education, do you think about athletics? How about graduation rates? Quality of professors? Sure, all of those things are important, but what about food?
By virtue of being both from Detroit and being named after my favorite animal, the Detroit Tigers are worthy of any hero-ship you can dream of. But a story published by The Detroit News has given the best baseball team in the world another reason to be heroes.
One day outside of my work, a new truck appeared. It was called Bera’s Custom Cheese Steaks and since the best cheese steak I’ve ever eaten came from a food truck, I thought Bera’s was definitely worth a try. They have a surprisingly robust menu for a cheese steak truck, ranging from Thai Chicken Steak to Stromboli Steak. But as good as some of these looked, I was thinking more about the “Custom” in their truck name.