Main Street Waffle, Huntington Beach, CA UPDATE (Now Closed)

So what's the first thing you eat after getting out of the dentist?  When I was a kid I remember my mom would take my sister and I to a little bakery around the corner from the dentist where she would buy us each a cookie.  Of course this was back when you had to wait a good 30 minutes after leaving the dentist to eat anything.  In addition to that  the cookies weren't all that great.  Dry, and bit overly sugary if I remember correctly.  I always got a chocolate chip cookie, but it tasted a bit more like a sugar cookie someone had put food coloring in to look like a chocolate chip cookie.  Still to this day I always feel the need for something sweet after I get out of the dentist's office.

Fast forward many years later and I still am lucky enough to have the same amazing dentist that works Saturdays, only he's moved locations.  "Hurray" was my first thought, as that meant I would no longer have to eat disgusting overly sugary chocolate chip cookies, but what would I have after sitting in a chair and having my teeth worked on for a good half hour to an hour.  Taking a little walk while my wife was getting her teeth cleaned I crossed the street and found myself wandering through a strip mall.  It was there that I found what I was looking for, something sweet but filling, and bit more grown up tasting.  That is how I found myself over at Main Street Waffle in Huntington Beach.

Now the idea isn't new.  Waffles are the new bread, and can put a nice twist on quite a few traditional sandwich combinations.  I'd had one or two before coming here.  The last time being a bit over the top in my opinion (giant chunk of chicken on top of egg on top of ham on top...).  I wasn't expecting anything amazing, but I was hoping for good, just a good waffle sandwich.  So my wife joins me and after taking a quick look at the menu I grab the special, your basic chicken and waffle sandwich, and my wife got the breakfast waffle sandwich.

After ordering at the counter my wife and I take a look around the place.  It's nice, clean, and the atmosphere is relaxed.  The servers are quick to grab me some ice so I don't have to wait for the archaic drink dispenser to deliver it.  My wife and I grab a seat in the middle of the room and chat while we wait.  I don't think ten minutes passed before our food was served.

I was delighted to see a more normal sized piece of chicken between the waffles.  The chicken wasn't anything to write home about but it was definitely good, not over-seasoned, and cooked perfectly.  On top of the chicken was a medley of pinkish cabbage that went well with the chicken.  On the side was a small container of chipotle mayo, and it was the best thing, better than syrup, that you could put in my sandwich.  The waffles weren't anything special but they were cooked just long enough to be sturdy but not rigid.  By themselves the ingredients to my waffle sandwich were not all that great, but together, with dash of chipotle mayo, everything worked.

I, of course, stole a bite of my wife's breakfast waffle sandwich and it was exactly what I was expecting, breakfast you can eat with your hands.  Unlike my sandwich it needed a bit of syrup to bring out its full potential, but again it seemed spot on as far as waffle sandwiches go.

While it won't win any awards Main Street Waffle has a decent staff with good, filling food.  I'd go there again if only to try a few of the other sandwiches.

Fat Sal's Deli, Pacific Beach, San Diego, CA

The Front Door No One Uses

 Sometimes you just feel the need for something that's bad for you.  You know what I mean, something that goes beyond the bounds of unhealthy and slips into down right disgustingly decadent.  Something that you don't want to know how many calories went into it, or how it will make you feel afterwards.  Something with the word "Fat" in the title, which is how the wife and I wound up at Fat Sal's Deli.

Packed until we got there, must have just missed the lunch crowd.

I usually don't go to downtown Pacific Beach as it is a royal pain to find parking.  This time I didn't care.  I'd just run a good eight miles, half it uphill, and my body was screaming for something bad for me, which is after all half the reason I exercise anyway.  After crusing around for a good ten minutes to find a parking spot my wife and I walked up to Fat Sal's.  Though it label's itself a deli you won't find any blocks of chicken or ham to be carved.  Everything is done in the back and most of the ingredients aren't the type you'll find in a deli anyway.

A large opening in led into pretty much brand new tables bolted to the ground and a long legged stools to sit on.  We walked up to the cash register in the back, made our order, and then ambled on down to a recently vacated seat near the front, the perfect spot for people watching.  About 20 minutes later our sandwhich came out.  Now this is where it gets good and decadent.

How can something so small looking be so bad for you?

I had decided to go with the Fat Sal.  It was an "extra wide" garlic bun filled with roast beef, mozzarella sticks, onion rings, fries, brown gravy, and mayo.  Wow that's a mouth full.  It was stuffed, literally with everything that was bad for you.  I took a big bite and managed to get a piece of roast beef, mozzarella stick, and onion ring.  I got to admit when I list of ingredients online I wondered if they could really make it work, but after the first bite I realized they had.  It was actually pretty good.  The only thing I didn't like about it was the lack of roast beef.  It was like they sacrificed a delicious cut of meat in order to put the cheaper fried food into the sandwich.

The Fat Sal

My wife settled on the Fat Anthony which had chicken fingers, mozarella sticks, fries, marinara, on top of ham, genoa salami, pepperoni, provolone, sweet peppers (thought she always holds the peppers), shredded lettuce, tomato, and red wine vinaigrette.  Half of that belongs to another hero sandwich in and of itself.  I took a bite of hers and though it wasn't bad but I liked mine better.  I put it down to not being a big fan of marinara in a sandwich.

The Fat Anthony

After we had finished eating we ambled out fat and happy, only to see "supposedly" Fat Sal just outside hustling a few departing patrons to "foursqure" and "Facebook" the hell out his place.  Normally that would be a big turn off for me, but this time it was nice to see an owner really pushing his business to succeed.  "Fat Sal" managed to do it without being a total jerk about it.

Outside of the sandwiches being good but not great, I really liked Fat Sal's.  It had a nice open PB atmosphere, the tables were clean, and the people were nice.  I'll probably head back there the next time I feel the need to eat something that I have no question is horrible for me.  I can't wait to try the Fat Juanita.  ... ouch...  I just hope my heart can handle another round.  It hurts a bit just thinking about it, but hey no one lives forever.

Fat Sal's Deli
956 Garnet Avenue
San Diego, CA 92109
(855) 682-4373
http://www.fatsalsdeli.com/

Gordon Birsch, Mission Valley, San Diego, CA

I am always looking for someplace to take my parents to eat when they come down to San Diego.  The only problem is that while somewhat adventuresome they are somewhat hesitant to go to the many hole in the wall locations I prefer to visit.  It is a bad habit they picked up from going to so many chain restaurants.  While there are a few expensive locals I like to hit every once in a while I wanted something that looked nice but wouldn't break the bank, and most importantly had good food, but wasn't part of some gigantic chain.  After consulting with my wife, a native of San Diego, she finally mentioned a placed that I'd been thinking about going, and then she sealed the deal by saying, "... and they have great garlic fries."

Gordon Biersch is a great big brewery/restaurant located in Mission Valley.  While it is a chain, it is not a big chain with only five in California so far and a few scattered throughout a couple of other states, and the menu looked pretty good.  Upon walking up to it I was a bit worried I was walking into a TGIF, but once you enter the double doors at the front you get more of a low key sports bar feel to it.  No obvious flare on the walls, and the front of house is friendly and respectful.  After we had been led to our seat I took a look at the menu, and was unsurprised to see a fair amount of bar fare.  There were the obligatory sliders, egg roles, and wings you'll find at any restaurant, and further down a variety of burgers, tacos, pizza... actually you name it they probably had it, and of course beer.  My usual feeling when seeing so many different things on a menu is that when a restaurant has a lot of different items on it they don't have the time or expertise to do any one of them well.  Still I have been proved wrong in the past, and as I said there was beer.

After perusing the menu my wife surprised me by not ordering a burger, instead she got the California Cobb Flatbread, and I ordered a New York Steak Sandwich with garlic fries.  Then I did something else totally out of character for me.  I ordered a beer.  This is not to say I don't like beer.  After being in San Diego for so long it is hard not to have formed an appreciation for the cold sudsy drink produced in large quantities in this area.  It was just not something I did very often.  The reason being that I am, as my wife puts it, a light weight when it comes to alcohol.  Still there are certain occasions when the taste of a nice cold beer is not just wanted but needed, and as this was a brewery I thought I would give it a try.  My wife and I each ordered a Hefenweizen, which was delivered shortly to us from the bar.

Now unlike food, which I tend to, and will below, examine in detail due to having tasted and examined a wide range of flavors and styles, beer is probably one of the things I know little to nothing about, but I know what I like, and I really liked this beer.  For those of you that know even less about beer than me, a Hefenweizen tends to be one of the slightly lighter fruitier beers, or as the menu states it had, "...subtle notes of banana and clove."  All I know is that it is the type of beer I prefer, and in this instance it was delicious.  Now, if this was due to the workout I'd just finished, or the warmness of the day I can't say.  All I know is I liked it a lot, enough to go back and have another, but on to the food.

After I'd drunk enough to become slightly inebriated, about fifteen minutes or so, the food came out, and on first seeing it there was certainly a great deal there.  I'm used to getting maybe half of a steak when I order a steak sandwich but this time they sent out what looked like an entire steak.  With relish I took my first bite and was surprised to taste they had not seasoned the steak, not even a little.  On occasion I will come across a steak that doesn't need any seasoning, a good rib-eye perhaps, but this was not one of them.  I won't say the steak was bad.  It came out medium-rare, cooked pretty much exactly how I like it, but out side of a hint of salt and pepper it tasted like a big piece of meat.  The fried onion string, garlic aioli (of which I barely tasted), and spinach (which I now love on a my burger/sandwiches) helped, but just enough to make it taste good, not amazing.  The dish though was saved by the garlic fries, which by some miracle had, just the right amount of garlic on them.  When I say just the right amount I mean a little more than a normal person would enjoy, as I really really like garlic.

Looking over to my wife's flatbread I saw that the grilled chicken, bacon, avocado, tomatoes, cheddar, blue cheese, and baby green looked a little lacking.  Still after point behind her and saying "Hey is that your cousin?", I stole a piece of piece of it for testing purposes.  After a deft smile of contrition I had a bite, and tasted something leaning towards healthy.  It wasn't a bad flatbread, and here I am doing my best not to add the word pizza as it does not apply in the least to this dish, but it was hard to find a bite that had all the ingredients in enough abundance to really add flavor to the bread.  Oh, the bread was pretty good, but it looked like the chef did not bother to throw on enough to really make it great.  Still I finished off the piece and then proceeded to drink more amazing beer, which in the end made the meal pretty good, especially as I had a gigantic piece of steak to get though.

Okay, maybe not the best meal in the world, but I will say that the service was phenomenal, and again the beer was amazing.  For the beer alone I'll go back there to try something different, hoping that the unseasoned steak was just a mistake done during a slow lunch, and at the very least I now have another place I can take my parents.  Gordon Biersch is just entertaining different enough to fall outside the trappings of a chained restaurant, and just clean and well lit enough to be suitable for the less adventurous of my family.  Until then, cheers, and I'll have another beer.

Gordon Biersch
5010 Mission Center Rd.
San Diego, CA 92108
(619) 688-1120
http://www.gordonbiersch.com/locations/san-diego-ca

The Rubicon Deli, Pacific Beach, San Diego, CA

It is rare that I will ever rave about a sandwich. My grandfather was a master sandwich maker, though he never went pro, and my family speaks of him with an awe reserved for NFL players and Nobel Prize winners. He would pile meat upon cheese upon bread, always applying the prefect amount of condiment (mustard/mayo/ketchup), until there was what could only be described as the perfect sandwich, not too dry, not too wet, and with a balance of flavors and aromas that would inevitably make the mouth water. Unfortunately no one else in my family was able to imitate such genius, and as such I have never had a love for the simple art of sandwich making, until very recently.

While I have no love of sandwiches I do have a weakness for pastrami. As a child my mother would fry some up in a pan and toss it down in front of me. No mustard, no bun, just greasy cuts of deli meat which I would quickly devour. So when I stumbled across the Rubicon Deli on my way home from a particularly long run it crossed my mind that perhaps it was time to rediscover my joy of pastrami, be it in sandwich form or not.

A week later my fiancé and I managed to find a parking spot on Mission Street, a miricale as it was just a bit past noon, and went inside. The interior is what I would call fast food trendy: Bright colors, hard seats, and pictures of surfers on the wall, but definetly clean and inviting. Having slept late I was in no mood for dithering so I got in line and went strait up to the counter to give my order. I knew instantly what I wanted, the Half Pound Dom Pastram, and despite my normal aversion to pickles I found myself holding my tongue and getting them in the sandwich. My fiancé knowing that I am a bit of an ass when I'm hungry quickly ordered the Achin' for Bacon. We also got chips, no french fries at this place, and a drink. Sorry no fountain drinks here, you can either get something from their fridge, which ranges from milk to Mexican Coke, or they have iced tea, sweet tea, which I recommend as it isn't too sweet, and lemonade with free refills. Then we sat down.

I was only halfway done with my chips when the food was brought out. Feeling a bit self conscious about the sheer amount of food I'd consumed over the holiday I decided to order only a half, but as you can see the Rubicon's half is more than most sandwich places' full. I took a bite, waiting for the acidic taste of pickle to overcome the taste of pastrami, but something strange happened. I could taste pickle, but there was a decided lack of brine in the bite. I took another bite , this time making sure to grab a hunk of pickle as I did, and it was the most amazing thing. The pickle tasted good, really good. The pickle added to the overall flavor of the sandwich as opposed to overpowering it. The pickle was so good it actually distracted me from the pastrami for a second, but only for a second. My next few bites were filled with confidence and it became a bit of a challenge to slow down and enjoy the combination of pastrami, swiss, sauerkraut, pickle, onion, and yellow mustard on garlic cheese bread. I paused halfway through to take a bite of my fiance's sandwich. In it was turkey, bacon, lettuce, tomato, mayo, and avocado on pesto flavored bread. Personally I would have added a dash more mayo, but her sandwich was great, with a hearty portion of turkey and bacon in the middle.

I finished off my sandwich and the rest of my fiance's, wolfed down the chips, which also tasted great, and was left with a little chocolate chip cookie. I don't want to sound like a cookie snob, but I like my chocolate chip cookies with a bit more give, or flavor. This in store made chocolate chip was definitely head and shoulders above the stuff you find in the stores, but I still found it a bit dry and lacking in flavor. Still, I'll never complain too much about a free chocolate chip cookie, no matter how small it might have been.

Walking out the front door to a street filled with surfer types and late risers I smiled. Now that was a great sandwich, one even my grandfather would have enjoyed.

-Dedicated to the memory of Robert Brandon

The Rubicon Deli
3819 Mission Blvd.
San Diego CA, 92109
858-488-DELI

http://www.therubicondeli.com/