Buzz "This Might Sting a Little Bit" F.'s Profile

I was in the neighborhood, hungry as a bear coming out of winter torpor, debating whether or not to break my recent moratorium on buying my lunch at local eateries.  Driving down Placer street, I spotted Wilda's on my right and decided to give 'er a try.  

I ordered the hot pastrami sandwich. Must...... fight....... desire....... to....... return........ tomorrow.......... for............anoth er.

The space where Wilda's Grill is located has turned into kind of a start-up incubator for downtown lunch joints. It's tiny, and the place was packed when I rolled in at about 1:30 -- I can't imagine what it was like at noon. Soon enough the owners will have to decide how they're going to deal with the pressure to move to bigger digs. Expand, or stick with the hipster food cart (sans wheels) model? If they move, maybe I'll open a Mexican/Korean-fusio n place there next.

Nap time.

I'm holding a star in reserve for later use -- we stopped in to have drinks after having dinner elsewhere, and haven't eaten in the restaurant yet.

The lounge area is intimate and tasteful.  The crowd is middle-aged and Redding-upscale -- some of the town's Usual Suspects were noticeable around the bar.  We ordered a round of drinks -- whiskey sours for most of us, which I recommend.  The bartender mixes his own sweet and sour, and it's good.  

One of my buddies -- whom I'll refer to as "Gaylord" to protect his anonymity -- ordered some kind of a peach martini with fruit and dry ice in it that was an absolutely gorgeous bubbling sweet girl-drink concoction of utterly pretty fabulousness!  All six of us, including Gaylord and his wife, lifted our glasses to my toast:  "September 24, 2011.  The night Gaylord, in the lounge at Clearie's, finally came out of the closet when ordering his drink. Seriously, it was about time."  Feeling liberated, he drank three of them.

Back to that one star I'm holding in reserve......we looked at the dinner menu and they have a sweetbreads and mushrooms entree.  I can't wait to give it a shot.  Actually, I WILL wait, because I've been advised to give Clearie's another couple of weeks to get their back-stage act together, or be willing to tolerate some very long waits, but I'm REALLY looking forward to ordering those sweetbreads.

I don't make it a practice to hate on Starbucks.  Among its other attributes, Starbucks gives its employees benefits, perhaps the most valuable of which to the young employees (though I doubt most of them realize it) is a 401(k).  And when you need to get your head right, Starbucks is always there.

So I'm not pimping Sue's Java Cafe because it's the anti-Starbucks.  Sue's isn't one of those anti-establishment coffeehouses where you walk in and all the sullen hipsters give you that look that says, "How dare you impose your totally uncool presence on us."

Sue's has new owners, but changes have been slow in coming.  Same house-roasted coffee, which is great.   The staff has always been friendly, and remains so.  The menu could use some periodic revamping, but the food is generally tasty and fresh.  Good soups.  

The new owners have expanded on the policy of hanging the works of local artists on the walls.  They could stand to be a bit more discriminating -- some of the art looks as if the artists dipped their heads in paint and then smeared and banged their heads against the canvasses.   If that sounds "interesting" to you, I have an unclothed emperor whose clothes you might want to praise.

Updates:  The artwork on the walls at Sue's has improved considerably, but the 401(k) plans of those Starbucks employees are circling the drain.

So I'm half way through my chile relleno yesterday, and I'm thinking, "Buzz, maybe it's you.  Be fair.  Have you lost your taste for Mexican food?"

Normally, Mexican food is among my favorites -- or I should say, in the plural, that the amazingly diverse cuisines of Mexico are among my favorites.  And Redding is bank-full of Mexican restaurants, with the flood of choices on the rise (Taqueria Los Gordos is relatively new, but it's the sister restaurant to the one on Churn Creek Road).  

So maybe it's just me, but I thought this was mediocre.  The chile relleno was overly breaded for my tastes, the rice and refried beans were stock plate-filler, and the salad was nearly white iceberg lettuce topped with a nearly white slice of white-flavored tomato.  It didn't exactly send me to the moon.

In Redding, given the competition, if you have lunch at a taqueria like this you should at least expect to walk out the door having spent around $10 or less.  I went over that amount by several dead first presidents.  

On the upside, the place was spotlessly clean and the service was efficient.

I'm giving Old School a solid B (4 stars), but they're getting a "teacher's pet" bump because I always have a soft spot for the new kid.  Old School hasn't been open long, and they're hopefully on their way to finding and nurturing their natural aptitudes.  I really want them to earn better-than-average grades in the space where the infamous "Chef Jeff" failed.

Old School is located in the historic Pine Street School building (National Register of Historic Places #78000791) in what was the gymnasium -- hence the name of the joint.  I like what they've done with the decor -- they tore out the carpet to expose the old maplewood gym floors, and the motif is public school.  

We've been here three times during the soft opening, and they're still using an interim, smaller menu.  Here's the report card:

    French Dip Philly Sandwich:  A
    English Pub Fish & Chips:  A
    San Francisco Crab Louie Salad:  B+
    Portabella & Three-Cheese Ravioli: B
    Bacon "Juicy Lucy" Burger:  C+
    Shrimp Carbonera Risotto:  C-

Very good French dip sandwich and fish & chips, as was the crab Louie (I'm not sure it was fresh Dungeness crab, as another reviewer hinted, and neither was our waitress).  The hamburger wasn't bad; it just wasn't as good as, say, the burgers at Maxwell's.  The shrimp risotto was disappointing -- undercooked, chewy, mounded from a too-thick sauce. Too bad, because it was tasty.  (Risotto shouldn't mound up like a pile of mashed potatoes, as Anthony Bourdain schooled Josh Homme on "No Reservations" while whipping up a risotto dish for the band in Homme's Mohave Desert boy's club.)

Old School fields an excellent draft beer selection at the bar.  Unfortunately, on the occasions when we've ordered pints, we've received the wrong beer on 3 of 6 orders. Last time we were in we ordered two IPAs and were delivered two porters.  Other than that, the servers has been attentive and eager to learn.

Old school shows promise and has a potentially bright future, but it needs to focus a little more in class and work hard if it wants to earn all A's and get into Stanford.