Today's · memoirs

I never thought I would become a food snob, but I'm totally with you. Once you try the good stuff, you're ruined for life.

For a fraction of that price, in Italy we could have had a transcendental pizza.

I know the feeling. My pizza palate was ruined when I started making it from scratch, myself. Even using the herbed crusts from TJs was a vast improvement.

There are some excellent restaurants in Chico. None of them are chains. That said, I recently had breakfast at Morning Thunder. Popular place. But, only one step up from Denny's, imnsho. Cafe Coda, otoh, has *much* better food. It's actually flavorful.

I've heard of them both - where are they?

Cafe Coda is at 265 Humboldt Ave which is one block east of The Little Red Hen if you know where that is. Right near where Main St becomes Park Ave, near the intersection of 9th St.

Morning Thunder is almost on the corner of Vallambrosa & Memorial Way, one block from Mangrove, right by the cemetary. It's at the front of a very upscale strip of shops wherein you will also find Teaz Me and a wine & cheese shop (mmmm, wine tastings).

Oh, OK, I know (approximately) where those are. Teaz Me must be - a tea shop? And a wine & cheese shop? I fear for my debit card & my bank balance.

Teaz Me is an "Asian fusion" food & tea bar. It's a chain. Literally, one orders food & tea at a counter and then sits on bar stools at high tables to eat. If you stop at the Chico Natural Foods Co-op to ask where any of these places are, they will know.

I fear for my debit card & my bank balance.

Indeed!

Oh that's disappointing. When you order something like that you mind says divine!

I asked my friend from Amsterdam what is the down side of the regulated prostitution and drugs - she said the only one she can think of is that unsavory types of people come to live in the country from accross the border to indulge.

Oh, for sure - that was pretty clear! The residents are mellow, but the tourists could be real jerks, thinking that the green light is on for them to be idiots.

That particular chain is highly variable. I would never consider a vegetarian pizza from a chain.

Yeah, I'm done. Although Gayle claims that Godfather's Pizza in Oregon is good.

I'm not convinced. I always called Godfather's "Godfather's, Pizza you can't digest" -- very undercooked crust, very flabby pizza, greasy yet without adequate flavor.

On the other hand, Pizza Schmizza has by-the-slice, and they're a local chain to the Hillsboro area.
Easily as good as the "street slice" from New York.

The place that I wish was still here, was the Oregon Pizza Company, which closed in the late 1980s.
They had some truly awesome, amazing pizzas.

I've never heard of a pizza chain that uses King Arthur, so I don't know who it is. I had pizza in Ethiopia in a little Italian place and it was divine. (Italy invaded Ethiopia before/during WWII, so there were lots of Italians there) I also had the best Chinese food I've ever had there.
The trick is to find a place you like and stick with it. One thing we have learned with our restaurant of the month jaunts is that local restaurants that aren't chains usually are much better than the chain stores.
What I can't figure out is why so many people go to the Gulf Coast on vacation and eat at chain restaurants. All the new restaurants going in down in Destin are chains, while the local places are slowly disappearing. That's sad.

That would be Round Table - maybe it hasn't reached where you are.

And YES! I don't know why people go to food meccas - like the Napa Valley, NYC, New Orleans - and eat at TGIFridays.

Most other cultures live to eat. We eat to live.

Chain pizza places blow! I'm done with all of them.

It's time for a trip to Chico to Celestino's.

Thanks for the tip...I will avoid a chain pizza in Florida.

I always remember holidays by what I eat or do not.

Clearly, I need to travel more. I want good food too!

That is so disappointing, although the ingredients on the pizza sound like it would be tasty.

When you travel do you ever pick up any recipe books? Maybe you can cook the food like they do.

I have done that, but when I'm in Europe, the ingredients are in metric (grams, etc.) so I have to wing it a little bit when I'm figuring out how to translate. But I do get good results if I sit down and work out the measurements.

And the other problem is that the ingredients available here are simply not as good as the ingredients there. When we were in Italy I made a pasta dish and some fried eggplant that were simply out of this world. When I got home I did the SAME THING with ingredients here, and it was only so-so.

The eggplant we bought there was smooth, creamy, and virtually seedless. I've never bought any here, even from the farmer's market, that came close. And the cheeses, milk, proscuitto there were just different products altogether.

Well that is a shame. It is too bad we can't get the same quality of food that they get. Perhaps that explains why the restaurants foods only tastes so-so.