Restaurants
La Taquería Vegiee 2036 Avenida Ocampo, Downtown Tijuana The word “vegiee” is misspelled, but the vegan attitude at La Taqueria Vegiee is fully pronounced. Vegetables pretend to be meat and seafood at this 100 percent …
Tacos El Rorro The thing about Rolando, El Rorro’s owner, is he gets his shrimp from the ocean, not fish farms. These little guys have exercised, lived real lives of chase, chomp, and run. Not …
Craft Kitchen It’s another of the sheet metal, recycled-wood, chalkboard-beer-menu kind of places that are popping up everywhere. The menu features shrimp, lobster, mahi mahi, and tuna tacos ($5 each), but I like the two …
Canvas sign blurs by. “Matua’s… Islander Grill.” Wha? There’s no eateries in this part of the Barrio. What’s up? I pull the cord on the 901. Sixteenth and National. Whole city of homeless tents stretches …
"Shiny beans,” says Dave. “Sure sign.” He’s talking coffee beans. And he should know. He’s managing this new coffee place-café here kitty-corner to the Firehouse museum at Cedar and Columbia in Little Italy. “Uh, sure …
King Mu of Zhou dreamed of tasting the peaches of immortality. The brave charioteer Zaofu offered him his chariot to carry him there. Eight horses pulled the chariot. One of them ran faster than birds …
Fredcel is located in the oddest place for a Filipino restaurant — in Cherokee Point, at 3876 38th St., behind the Family Dollar store. “Pare (dude in tagalog), we made [and sold] about 6,000 lumpias …
Cool evening. Aboard the 934. Swinging east along Palm in I.B. Cruising past 10th, 11th, Florida. I’m craning my neck. “Know any good places to eat along Palm?” I ask the driver. “Like, good, but …
Nuts make you talk. Nuts make you cry. I’m chewing Thai nuts while Phon, Cheri, Lynn, and I talk on about the king of Thailand. King Bhumibol Adulyadej. He died six months ago, but for …
"Never?” “Never.” The three of us stand, jaws on the floor. Cameron, me, Lavonn. “Trust me,” says Eoghan, “Michaela has never eaten a hot dog in her life. Me neither.” We’re standing on a deck …
Gaslamp. Monday night. It’s a concert, for one. Sarah the street violinist has got me glued to her spot on the sidewalk at Fifth and F. Because, hey, she’s playing Umm Kulthum’s “Enta Omri” — …
“Well, look around you,” she says. “It’s real. Close your eyes and we could be in Tehran.”
"Siempre doy gracias al cielo de ser/ Tan afortunado! The Queen of Chiquibaby belts it out with Joan Sebastian. (“I always give thanks to heaven to be/ So fortunate!”) Everybody belts it out with her, …
"Attack of the Killer Pancake. Now Showing.” It’s this movie-house marquee in a painting that hangs above the welcome desk. I’m in this very ’60s coffee house. All stone, glass, and wood. Just got in …
Hmm. Chilaquiles. Coffee. Beer. Beer. My Sunday brunch. Not just me. Guy on my right is downing a pint of “Dank & Sticky IPA,” think he says. Couple on my left is full-chomp into steaks, …