Sunday, February 23, 2014

Norm's Famous Charbroiled Hamburgers, Whittier





 Norm's Famous Charbroiled Hamburgers
14244 East Whittier Blvd
Whittier, CA 90605
562.693.8616


As I've mentioned more than a few times, I do enjoy a good burger, and when I was back in Pasadena, their seemed like a ton of great places-The Hat, of course, but Lucky Boy, Jim's (but there are a ton of Jim's burgers, all with similar signage, but really widely varying quality), Hi-Life, and a few others that are starting to fade into the mists of time.

These stands all seem to share certain attributes, first and foremost, grease is not a bad thing. They all seem to date from the 50's and a time before chains like McDonald's and Jack in the Box, and the burgers are big and sloppy. Places like this exist in older areas of the county, Pasadena, Long Beach, South Gate, and Whittier. They are clean, with an aging charm, and the cleanliness and charm reflect a pride in what they do. 

So in Whittier recently, I drove by Norm's, which from the drive by seemed to fit the bill of a quality independent hamburger stand. With my always adventurous daughter, it was lunch and time to have a burger.

The menu had a wide variety of items including a wide selection of breakfast options. Most of the breakfast items seemed to fall in the $5-6 range, and included eggs, bacon, omelletes and breakfast burritos, and when we walked in, a few people were finishing the breakfast items. They looked good.

But my little girl wanted a burger, so that's what we had. She went with the cheeseburger, while I opted for the pastrami burger. We split some fries, and both had small shakes, which came to just under $20. Norm also had sandwiches, salads and Mexican food, with most everything between $4-6.

We sat in the small, clean dining room (though the trashcans were overflowing), and glanced around the walls, filled with pictures of many years supporting various local endeavors, and some interesting pictures and signatures from Bill Clinton (though I could find nothing on the internet to show that he'd actually eaten there. Clinton did like his burgers, though). The food came up quick.

Good size (it says 1/4 pound on the menu), with lots of fresh lettuce, tomatoes and sauce. Mine had the pastrami. Fries were crispy on the outside, and soft in the middle, lightly salted, and tasty. But the treat was the actual hamburger patty.

Hard to write a food review without having adequate adjectives to describe what I'm eating, but the best thing I can say is that the meat tasted meaty, moist and juicy, and the word that came to mind while chewing was that it was a bit stringy, but in a good way. It just seemed like the beef tasted more like beef than I was used to in a hamburger, similar to the way they taste when I make them at home. 

On top of that, the shakes were super thick, to the point where sucking the shake through the straw caused the straw to fold in on itself. They were really good.

I'd eat at Norm's again.






Monday, February 10, 2014

Checking out other Blogs

At New Year's, I once again committed to posting once a week, and really haven't been. I've been a bit busy, and haven't been out exploring the way that I normally do. I'm sure that if I don't fall too far behind, I'll be able to double up and make it.

But I have been checking out other blogs, and try to respond to any blog that I read where the blogger is still posting. It's amazing how many blogs are floating around out there, no longer loved and maintained. 

I came across 500 Reasons Why the 80's Didn't Suck, which in this particular post expressed a great deal of love for the Damned's Black Album. My response was reasonably well thought out, so I linked it here. I've read a handful of his other reviews, too, and the blogger is a thoughtful guy, slightly younger than me, so with a slightly different perspective.


Sunday, February 9, 2014

La Super Rica/Crush Cakes


La Super Rica
622 N Milpas St, Santa Barbara, CA 93103
(805) 963-4940


About five years ago, I read three different articles in the LA Times, Westways and Sunset listing La Super Rica as  a
place that must be visited, and since my kids were in Zoo Camp, I went to check it out. It's good. 

Generally, though, I want tacos and go to Lilly's (Friday, Oct. 28, 2011), which is cheap and fast, but yesterday I felt like Mexican Food. Being near La Super Rica, I headed in. 

LSR has a tapas menu, everything needing to be ordered a la carte, and I usually order two or three items. On this trip, I had the frijole super rica (pinto beans with little bits bacon and chorizo), alambra de filete (tri-tip with peppers, onions and bacon), and from the specials menu, a taco de hongo (mushrooms in a cream sauce on two tortillas). My daughter ordered the arroz a la Mexicana (Mexican brown rice) and lamito suizo (grilled pork and cheese between 2 tortillas). Both of us ordered Mexican soda (they do serve beer).

Looking in the kitchen area, everything is clean, and they are pressing out corn tortillas by hand. 

We got there at 11 AM, and for the first time ever, I didn't wait in line.  Generally, there's a fast moving line extending well out the door, and as the day progresses they run out of various specials.

The dining area is an enclosed patio, with heaters for the rare cold days. Since we were there so early, there was plenty of seating, but having been to LSR later in the day, I know that sometimes the entire dining area is filled.

The food came pretty quick, and it was all delicious. The meat was moist and full of flavor. I really like their pinto beans, and usually add a little of the meat from my other dishes. Fresh tortillas are generally more moist than those from a package, and you can taste more of the corn, which is the case here.

My order
I tried my daughter's food too, and liked it as well, the cheese especially.

My daughter's
If you happen to be a Katy Perry fan, this is the place she name checks in one of "This is How We Do," and apparently it's not unusual to see performers from the Santa Barbara Bowl eat here before their show.

The cost for my daughter and I was just over $20.





Crushcakes
1315 Anacapa Street
Santa Barbara



Later the same day, needing something sweet, my daughter and I headed to Crushcakes for a cupcake. Cupcakes are all the rage, and Crushcakes is in a funky little shop across from Alameda Park that I like just sitting in. It feels happy, and I like the art they have on the walls, and I imagine a world where I can spend all my time drinking coffee and eating cupcakes in cafes around the world.

On this visit, I had a peanut better cupcake with a cup of the house coffee. And for the first time, I was a touch disappointed. The $3 cupcake was a tad dry, and the house blend of Intelligentsia coffee was bitter. I've been in a few times before, and have enjoyed both the location and the food.

But I was back in Santa Barbara a second time, and again needed a cupcake. This time, with the rain cleaning the outside world, I had the coconut cupcake and the Gallo blend of Intelligentsia, and both were much better. The cupcake was moist and the coffee, though strong, wasn't bitter. 

Everyone can have an off day.







Sunday, February 2, 2014

Netflix-Sharknado and Black Fish

For reasons unclear to me, my family has been all about ocean movies this week, and the spectrum is pretty wide-Sharknado and Black Fish.

The good thing about Netflix is the streaming video feature. My daughter hears about both Sharknado and Black Fish, looks them up and the next thing I know, we're having an ocean film festival.




So let's talk about Sharknado first. It's bad on so many levels that I have to think that John Heard demanded his character be killed early so that he wouldn't have to suffer in the film. I don't know if it's intentionally bad, like Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, or just bad because it's just bad.

I knew I was in trouble from the beginning, when my daughter pointed out that tornados form over land and hurricanes form over water. That being said, it was bad from the title and only got worse as the movie progressed forward. Not to spoil the plot, let's just say that sharks fall from the sky and eat people.

I'll never get those two hours back. But at least I didn't have to pay a rental fee. The worst part, though, is I'll probably watch the sequel-and I've already downloaded the theme song from eMusic.

Black Fish, though, had a profound effect on me. I'll never go to Sea World again, in spite of the morbid curiosity that I really want to satisfy by eyeballing Tilikum, the killer Killer Whale that the movie is about. I totally respect everyone that is boycotting Sea World Orlando (Heart, Barenaked Ladies, Joan Jett, the Beach Boys, Trace Adkins, Trisha Yearwood, Pat Benatar and REO Speedwagon, according to Wikipedia). The LA Times reports that Disney Pixar creative team is changing the storyline of Finding Dory after seeing Black Fish shortly after the films release in August.

It's like Supersize Me and Fast Food Nation (the book, not the movie, which was pretty lame), the one-two punch that got me to stop eating at McDonalds. I understand why places like Sea World-or any zoo in the world exists. People want to experience nature and can't get to nature where it exists. So we set up places where people can interact with nature safely. And places like Sea World do provide insight into the animals housed there. But should animals be kept in captivity for my amusement?

A healthy whale swims thousands of miles in his normal life probably isn't that happy in a tank, regardless of the tank size. I don't know how much awareness an orca actually has, but if they can experience happiness, they most likely won't be experiencing it with a trainer on their back.

I just read Sea World's rebuttal, and I'm not overly convinced by what the park considers misrepresentations.

Netflix both and make your decisions on their quality.