2010 Jul 10 - Alder Market Basque Night

2010 Jul 10 - Alder Market Basque Night
Stockton, CA

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It is 5:00PM on a Saturday evening. The Lunch Bunch is breaking tradition for another early dinner. The Alder Market has started a Saturday evening Basque Menu. There are just three of the Lunch Bunch, Patti, Elsa and me. But Joe, Elsa's husband has decided to join us.
Joe reading the menu in front of the Alder Market


Patti and Elsa are messing with the mannequin as usual


We have not had Basque dining in Stockton since Villa Basque closed its doors over 20 years ago. In the hey day of Basque restaurants in Stockton we had five open at the same time.

We are the first to be seated as our reservation is for 5:00PM which is when they open.
This is shot from the bar looking into the dining area


Now this is not a Basque restaurant, but rather a Basque family style meal served in a white tablecloth restaurant. It does not have the raucous atmosphere of a Wool Growers in Los Banos or a Noriega's in Bakersfield.
Tonight's dinner items


The Relish Plate


The Oxtail Soup was wonderful, tender oxtails in a deliciously flavorful soup



The Beef Tongue was also very, very good. We had seconds.



Pickled Pig's Feet served warm in a savory sauce was extremely tasty and all gone



Augustina's Potato Salad was okay



The assorted sausages were a nice touch


I missed taking a photo of the Alder Torta which was excellent.
The Chopped Salad was not one of my favorite, but I don't care for brocolli



I was looking forward to the Roast Leg of Lamb. It was a disappointment. A lot of gristle and not very tender.



The vegetables were prepared very well and very tasty


The Chicken with Creamy Polenta was passable. Creamy Polenta is not a favorite of mine either. I prefer regular old polenta.


Then the young lady, not our waitress brought out the dessert tray. While they were very tempting we had already exceeded our calorie intake for a meal by plenty so we all passed on dessert.


Very tempting desserts

The oxtails, torta, beef tongue, sautéed vegetables and pigs feet were excellent. As was the Genova French bread. The rest was good except for the Roast Leg of Lamb. Maybe it was a bad leg of lamb with a lot of gristle.

Of course whenever we ate at the old Ospital's Villa Basque we would go on Pig's Feet night and have the waiter wrap our main course to go. We would just "pig out" on the pig's feet.

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2010 Jul 01 - Jayakarta Indonesian

2010 Jul 01 - Jayakarta Indonesian (Berkeley)

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Today five (5) Lunch Bunchers are being met by two guests for lunch. One is a classmate of ours and the other is a motorcyclist friend of mine from MA.

Elsa is driving Ken, Patti and me to Grandma's home where we will then drive to the Pittsburg BART station and another trip to the Downtown Berkeley BART station. From there we will walk the two blocks to the Jayakarta Restaurant.




Entering Grandma's neighborhood

Grandma's better half the redoubtable David is a Cracker Barrel type and does not like any Asian food, much less Indonesian.
I give David a bottle of Cracker Barrel sugar free syrup that I picked up on my trip to Maggie Valley, NC



Kibitzing about Grandma's quilt

We drive squeezed into Grandma's little car to the Pittsburg BART station.
Walking the long corridor


This is the BART train that we will be taking. That is Hwy 4.

We have to transfer trains to the Richmond line at the MacArthur station.
A short wait for the train to take us to Berkeley


Walking down Shattuck Avenue the main street of Berkeley


The old Kress Five and Dime is now a Book Store


A little way down University Avenue is the restaurant


Entering this little restaurant


Manjo from MA arriving from his son's home in Sunnyvale


Silvano our classmate needs to be in San Francisco after lunch so he drove to Berkeley

We ordered family style only doubling up on the Nasi Goreng Jayakarta with salty fish, which is an Indonesian fried rice.
Nasi Goreng Jayakarta with salty fish


The Empal Balado the beef was a bit tough, the only disappointing dish


Mie Goreng {fried noodles}


Oseng - Oseng Tempe - fried tofu with string beans


Sop with oxtail, a soup

We also had:

• Terung Belado - fried egg plant
• Ayam Kalasan - bbq chicken
• Babat Goreng Kecap - fried tripe
• Roti Prata - an appetizer of pan fried Singapore bread served with a curry dipping sauce.

We had very little left over. Just some fried rice of which we had a double order


Silvano and Manjo seemed to enjoy the meal

We say our good byes to Silvano and Manjo as they both have other obligations. The ladies decide to do some shopping so Ken and I head over to the Gelato shop.
This is the same shop where we had gelato after the Angeline's lunch


They make a very good gelato

The ladies get to the gelato shop a bit later and Patti and Elsa each have a gelato as Grandma takes a bite.


Finishing their gelato

We back track our morning ride on the BART and return to Pittsburg.
Exiting the Pittsburg BART

But the ladies are not finished shopping. We stop at a shopping mall in Brentwood.
Squeezing out of Grandma's little car

We do finally get back to the house and I get to take a squash home with me.
Holding up my veggie

An end to another Lunch Bunch trip.

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2010 Apr 28 - Farmer's Catfish House

2010 Apr 28 - Farmer's Catfish House (Modesto, CA)

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Today we head to the country just west of Modesto, CA for an early dinner at Farmer's Catfish House at 4:00 PM. I was suppose to ride one of my motorcycles today and stop at Linda's, but I had to deliver a package to the UPS Service Center and it was raining, heavily at times. But I drove over to Linda's while the other four met at Elsa's and drove down together.

This was my first visit to Linda's although I had passed by often on various motorcycle rides. They live about four miles west of the Modesto city limits surrounded by almond orchards.

The view across their Koi Pond

Swimming pool and deck

Grandma told Linda to smile when she opened the door because I was bound to take a photo

Linda and her better half Bud

I had made a scouting trip the Saturday before to take photos for the Lunch Bunch.
It really seems to be way out in the countryside

Part of the menu. Note the short open days and hours.

This is the part that the Lunch Bunch will order from

As is the normal case Linda and I are late to arrive. It is usually the one that lives the closest that is the last to arrive. In this case Linda lives a bit under five miles away, whereas Miles and Ora live over 50 miles away.
Linda, Elsa, Patti and Miles

Ora returns

A really strange combination of appetizers are the first part of all of Farmer's dinners. French fires, coleslaw and hush puppies. It was all very good. We also ordered the fried okra and fried gator.
Fries, hush puppies, fried okra and coleslaw

This is what is left of the fried gator after the first pass

A three section tin plate for the appetizers

While Elsa was eating she noticed that her sleeve had been chewed up by one of her many dogs.

And here is the video of her explanation:


Then the main course arrives on a separate plate with rice pilaf, Portuguese beans and a slice of French bread.
Here is the fried catfish filet

Here is the char broiled catfish filet

Here is the fried whole catfish

The crawfish enchilada

Linda holds up Elsa's whole fried catfish

The food is good, the place is kinda funky. It is a fun place.

And since we are there before 6:00 PM we get peach cobbler and ice cream as part of our $7 or $8 meal.

People arriving as we are getting ready to leave

Here is what the place looked like in the 1930's. It was a gas station and general store.

Although it seems like it is way out in the boonies here is a map showing its proximity to the biggest Mall in Modesto.  It is less than 2 miles from Hwy 99.


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I had wandered by this place many times but never went by when it was open. The Lunch Bunch even broke tradition and had a really late Lunch since Farmer's is only open from 4 to 9 on Wednesdays through Saturdays. The food was fresh and tasty, maybe a bit over spiced on some items. The Senior meals are a real bargain. Our total bill was under $75 for the six of us.

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