The Why – Part One
we’re chewing up dots and chasing flashing monsters without asking the question of who’s behind the joystick, where that quarter came from or even what those dots mean
The Five Worst Reasons to Open a Restaurant
First off, owning a restaurant is a lot like owning a car or a house. You’re gonna say you own it, but in fact, you’re probably just making the payments. And more importantly, at least at the outset, your shop will own you just as much as you supposedly own it. That is a fact.
Getting The Edge On Your Local Watering Hole
Your knight in shining armor, doing battle with The House, is your friendly neighborhood bartender.
Love And Loss At Santa Anita’s Turf Club
Out of courtesy (and readership) I generally try to keep my writing OC-focused but once in awhile an out-of-county topic jumps onto my radar. One of my very first pieces here at The Weekly was about Laguna Beach’s Frank Panza, the beyond-legendary bartender at Santa Anita’s Turf Club. That room has hosted the best of […]
Grandma Lola’s Old Fashioned Recipe – Still The Best
It seems the Sazerac and Old Fashioned are the Gamera and Godzilla, respectively, of the cocktail Monster Island, locking horns in a duel for supremacy while Godzuki, the lowly Manhattan, looks on (although it’s on my go to list). There is lively debate about which came first and who reigns as the oldest and classic […]
For The Love Of Logan
I don’t know if you’ve ever been inside a B-17 bomber but it’s an experience for sure. It was called a “Flying Fortress” for a reason. Bristling with .50 caliber machine guns on the outside, it was a formidable aircraft that could hold its own against most anything that flew. Being in one, however, feels […]
Frank Panza – Last Of The Great SoCal Bartenders
Waxing sentimental is definitely my default setting and Santa Anita plays to it in spades. It’s not the chandeliers upstairs, the dusting of new snow on the backdrop on the San Gabriels opening day or even the fact I grew up nearby on a street named after Johnny Longden, the jockey who wrecked his horse […]
The Rise of Ryes
“Beer is for women, wine for men and rye is for heroes” – Bismarck Even the utterance of the word “prohibition” is enough to curl me up like a dead spider, dried and contorted with a blank stare and grimace on my face. This chapter in the history of our great country had to be […]
The Why
“Because to each one of us is given just so many years, and hence just so many opportunities to enjoy just so many meals, a poor meal is an opportunity lost forever” – Neill Beck, The Farmers Market Cookbook, 1951 I talk about it all the time in the kitchen and it drives people nuts. […]