Eat hearty, eat arty: gyros hit Coronado
Salah learned his art in Baghdad and Damascus. Check it out as you chomp cheap
Salah Jamel learned his art in Baghdad and Damascus. Now he’s bringing it to life in Coronado. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/mar/04/41086/ I come across him inside Pizza and Greek Grill (933 Orange Avenue, Coronado, 619-435-4059). http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/mar/04/41085/ As I come in, he’s just painting …
Animalized! First Bar Downtown delivers $1 IPAs, sensational sprouts
Happy hour deals in the finest bar you’ve never heard of.
I thought I knew downtown. But here I am walking up First Avenue from Broadway, heading past the Bristol Hotel for the trolley when something at the bottom of a sign on the sidewalk stops me. You could miss it …
Ali Baba’s in Sorrento Valley: Fast company, fast fish
Ed discovers a bar in the middle of nowhere, packed with the IT in-crowd
I guess it’s because I’ve been dreaming, looking over the bridge rails of Los Peñasquitos (“The Little Cliffs”) river, watching the white heron watching for fish in the sunlit pool among the reeds. When I come in here, I’m thinking …
Little Italy Waterfront happy hour: Free is good
And this HH is specially hard to beat when it includes free crab legs
Good news you forgot you knew: I was on Kettner around six in the evening ''t'other day and heard the crowd before I saw them under the black awning. It was the happy hour crowd at The Waterfront, this town’s …
Chiquibaby's, Logan Heights: Tostada and Karaoke
Neighborhood bar brings out the (Mexican) musician in you. And the appetite
The little cream stucco building shines out into the dark. From across Dewey Street you can hear the crack! of pool balls, laughs, and somebody singing a ranchero song. A few cheers and claps, and then another one starts. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/26/40768/ …
Broadway bargain: Taking Time Out for a quesadilla
Surprising food and drink deals at language students’ downtown hangout
This place right next to the Converse language school for foreign students is great to hang out at, partly to get an international feel, mostly to catch the bargains they always seem to have for the often hard-up students. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/25/40632/ …
Santee Anny’s: The burger at the end of the line
Do South Koreans make the best burgers in California?
“We would kill for winters like this,” says Rick. He’s from New York City. “You call this cold?” The truth? Hell, yes. Specially up here in the high sierra of Santee, at nine o’clock at night. The killer-chill breeze bites …
Stout downtown: It’s hockey time. Eat your poutine!
Ice hockey season brings the annual pilgrimage of puckista fanatics
Why does Stout always look crowded these days? Ice. And we’re not talking immigration. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/20/40481/ ’Tis the season for San Diego fanatics to do what it takes to find a screen, a stool, a stout (preferably Guinness) and hopefully a …
Aphrodisiac? Sexy pupusas at I.B. Farmers’ market
El Salvador's Gastro-Embassy's right by the pier...
Aphrodisiacs at a farmers’ market? That’s what they say about pupusas with the loroco flower buds in them. Seems loroco only grow in Central America. So I keep looking wherever I see the word “Salvadorean” pop up. And here, paydirt! …
Tent City Intensity: Harry D’z BBQ sets I.B. nostrils a-twitch
Harry’s reinvented the BBQ sauce, and the nation's most SW farmers' market is richer (in aromas) for it
Was at my favorite farmers’ market. It's the one in IB (Imperial Beach Pier Plaza, 10 Evergreen Avenue, Imperial Beach, 619-397-1917) where the market’s tent city springs up right by the ocean.You see tents, surfers, dolphins, Coronado islands, ocean, Japan, …
Acoustic in Middletown: Unplugged beer comes to oldest brewery!
Expect noise. Acoustic Ales Brewing Experiment about to rock old Mission Brewery
Actually it was the nose, not the noise. Started twitching as I walked up Washington from the trolley. That sexy, sweet, rich malty smell can mean only one thing: someone is brewing inside the old Mission Brewery Plaza courtyard again. …
Gaslamp: Oceanaire on the cheap
Happy hour opens the gates to another swank eatery
Above: Bartenders James and Ron rock this place So the search for Chinese at Red Pearl Kitchen (see blog below) didn’t work out so well. But what it did was open another door, The Oceanaire Seafood Room (400 J Street, …
Gaslamp: Red Pearl Kitchen's woks go cold
Hollywood-style Chinese eatery closes just before Chinese New Year
Heading by the Mardi Gras party downtown. Folks are rattling around with a ton of beads round their necks. Russian girls on their pedicabs are doing great business. But, like, $50 to get in? Gimme a break. Me, I'm thinking …
Free tea! And $4 hummus: Darband in Center City
Persian food and games at Cedar and Fifth
Ah. So this is the place where the tea’s free. I’ve been climbing up Fifth heading for this place, at Cedar, near where Balboa Park starts. And here it is, double the size from what I remember, Darband Fifth Avenue …
Stand Bayou? Lincoln Park has Louisiana frogs a-fryin’
At last! Red Rooster’s specialty: Toad in the Hole-in-the-Wall…
Yes! Just frog-marched myself back to Euclid after discovering Frank in his hole-in-the-wall Louisiana food kitchen last week. He's behind Market Creek Plaza in Lincoln Park... http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/07/39738/ His business: Red Rooster Catfish, 404 Euclid Avenue, in the rear of the …
Downtown’s Local: Simple soup’n suds
If in doubt, tortilla soup will fill you out
Downtown can be daunting if you just want a pick-me-up but don't want the big deal of a full-on meal. One of the coziest... http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/07/39727/ ...places if you just want a quick bellyfiller is The Local (1065 Fourth Avenue, downtown, …
Lemon Grove: Best California steak?
For forty years, people have been trekking here for the steak-avo-cheese sandwich
Oh man. This steak of Alfredo's is da bomb. Has avocado, pepper jack, and a raft of sautéed onions. I'm in lunch heaven... http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/06/39673/ ...Got vinegar on the fries, and Lori pouring endless refills in my $2 cawfee, and even …
Richman’s food, poorman’s prices: Late luncheon at the Westgate downtown
Hidden bargain at the palace built for Richard Nixon
They say this Westgate Hotel building was built to accommodate Richard Nixon and a hoped-for Republican National Convention back in 1972. For sure, it shouts ’60s architecture, the New Rome, with all those 30-foot columns. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/06/39622/ What you don’t notice …
Voyou: Great little wine bar but…
Looking for best bang for Le Buck at Hillcrest's French wine bar
I’m not the first to burst into this cubby-hole of cool. Ian Pike gave a connoisseur’s four-course breakdown last year that says it all. That said, I came in here, spent a short time, and left wanting to love it …
Lincoln Park: Red Rooster’s got catfish, if you can find it
It’s a hole in the wall, but the word is out: for catfish, frogs’ legs, call Frank
You’d never find Frank in a thousand years, if you didn’t know where to look. Like, get off the Orange Line trolley at Euclid Avenue, walk through the shopping center with all the domes and towers... http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/feb/02/39433/ ...turn right, cross …