Chris "chrislee" L.'s Profile

I'm not a fair judge of Republic Ramen.

I have had amazing ramen too many times now and when I go to a shop specializing in ramen, if it's not pretty great, then I can't help but hate it. They have "tonkotsu ramen" on the menu too so that alone sets expectations.

I ordered the "tonkotsu ramen" and hated it. Broth was weak with no depth of flavor. Noodles had no chew. As much as I hoped to love it, I was completely let down.

To be fair, I don't believe there is any decent tonkotsu ramen in Arizona.

I just don't see why this shouldn't be a concept that can be executed adequately here. For me, with the ramen I've had and love, it definitely wasn't.

Again, I'm not a fair judge of ramen. I'm mean and nasty about it. It's like sushi or uni. Once you elevate your expectations by having the stellar stuff, the mediocre doesn't cut it anymore.

And where I can eat American style sushi when I adjust my expectations (happy for crunch rolls and California rolls), can't do it for ramen.

If you're not passionate about ramen though, it's fine to ignore me. If you don't have amazing authentic ramen to hold it up to, it's probably fine.

We're big fans of Rocket Rooter and Roger.

We saw Rocket Rooter get recommended on Yelp and even though we live quite a way away called them to see if they'd help us. They do service our area & have been out out to help us multiple times.

We had another emergency today and they were able to make it out and take care of everything very quickly.

It's very cool to have a great plumber that you know and can depend on. With some of the other service big shops, it's luck of the draw and the quality of service is totally dependent on who shows up.

Roger is a great guy and if you are looking for someone reliable that you can get to know and depend on, he's your man. His rates are also very affordable.

Have nothing but great things to say about Rocket Rooter and recommend them without reservation!

Kappou Gomi is amazing. This is EXACTLY what I want. EXACTLY... I would *kill* to have this restaurant in Arizona. I think that the only reason that this place wasn't hours deep in wait and priced through the roof might be that it's a bit of a hike from downtown?

It was phenomenal though. First of all there is a huge, huge menu and it's pretty tough to determine what to order. They have each fish listed with 7-10 different preparations. Then there is a specials menu and a beer and sake menu. I was pretty overwhelmed so I put myself in the hands of the lovely older ladies that were manning the restaurant. You never see the chef as he's actually in the kitchen. They soooo did me right.

I ended up ordering or having 4 dishes ordered for me.

I got the bonito sashimi. That was fantastic as the presentation comes with the fish's head and tail. I don't know if I've seen a more beautiful fish in recent memory. Looked pristine and fresh as could be. The bonito was beautiful. Served with a light ponzu with fresh grated ginger and chopped scallions. Wonderful dish.

That was followed by one of my favorite dishes in recent memory. One of the ladies asked of unagi sunomono sounded good. I much prefer to put myself in the hands of those who know so while it sounded good but really not terribly exciting, I said sure. I had no idea what was to come. It came out as a shallow bowl of vinegared vegetables (sliced cucumber, daikon, lotus root) and peaches. There was also a bit of a creamy sauce with the sliced cucumbers. There was a good amount of the sunomono dressing. There was also a square sheet of gelee over the unagi and another one beneath it. The dish was nice to look at but it didn't really give any indication of what was to come. When I dug in, the combination of flavors and textures and temperatures was amazing. The sweet, fatty, warm unagi was beautiful with the cool vinegared vegetables. Just perfect juxtaposition. I ate it up to the last bit and almost embarrassed myself by drinking the remains of the dressing. I'll be thinking about this dish for a long time.

That was followed by a dish called grilled golden yolk tako. It was basically lightly grilled octopus that I believe was sauteed in egg yolk and oil and then presented in a hollowed out apple. It was lovely and I way dug the egg yolk, oil broth. I was again hard put to not put the apple to my lips & drink the last of it.

The sole disappointment of the night was that they were out of uni. I actually tried to order this dish with uni but they had sold out. I can't even imagine what this would have been like with uni.

Did I mention that Kappou Gomi rules?

Ok on to the next dish. My final dish, as the ladies were recommending that I kind of follow a traditional pattern was ochazuke. Ochazuke or chazuke if you're not familiar with it is basically a simple dish where you pour tea over rice and add some savory toppings. While this version was called ochazuke (with the cha connoting tea) the tea was actually replaced with a gorgeous bonito broth. You could have it with a selection of ume, cod roe, salmon, salmon eggs and maybe a couple other items. I opted for the ikura (and I guess I'm smart because it was perfect). It also came with some fresh wasabi and some other condiments. Inside the bowl was some shaved nori, some pickled radish, some other herbs and something that looked like bee pollen? This dish was amazing. The flavors were super subtle but they were so clean and everything went together just perfectly. I've had so many meals where the chef puts together combinations that don't better the ingredients. I've had many where the chef really does elevate the ingredients and then I've had a few dishes here and there where it's absolutely perfect. This was perfect. Same with the unagi sunomono.

I think most of these dishes with the exception of the sashami were $10 or under. The value here is off the charts.

This place is a freaking gem and it has immediately jumped into the very top of my favorite restaurants anywhere.

The ladies were lovely as well. I think it helped that I was completely open minded and grateful. I can see how some of the posters here might have differing opinions but if you're very open to trying new things and you're nice and polite enough (as the ladies do seem a bit charmingly shy at first) and you let them lead you, I don't see how you cannot absolutely love Kappou Gomi.

If you're looking for your standard sushi place or the same dishes that you might be a fan of elsewhere, it's not that.

Absolutely transcendent meal for me...

I will not come back to San Francisco and miss coming here.

We were on the east side of town as we were heading out to the Sunset Crater to do some hiking and exploring. We didn't want to brave downtown & saw the Wicked Arizona's Coffee kiosk on the side of the road & decided to chance it.

It turned out to be great! We got 2 doppio breves and both were very good. The ladies there know how to pull a good shot and were as nice as could be. They also did have soy milk for the kids (Silk).

Wouldn't hesitate to return (as we did) if we were on that side of town and needed something. We do enjoy Macy's for the coffee and the atmosphere but it can also come with a side of attitude. Not so at Wicked Arizona's Coffee.

This is by far our favorite place to eat in Flagstaff.

We had another stellar meal tonight at the Tinderbox Kitchen. I don't know if they're really glad inside when they see us coming with the kids in tow but if not, they hid it well.

We had an outstanding server and the food was killer from start to finish. We led with a wonderful charcuterie platter which had a great sampling of meats such as duck sausage, the farmer's terrine, house cured pastrami and duck ham. We were fans of all of them as well as the cheese, horseradish mustard, chutney, pickled vegetables and grilled bread. We also had the BBQ pork belly confit, creamy blue cheese grits and mustardy nectarine salad. That was also a big hit with the whole family with the 10 month old particularly liking the blue cheese grits. Then we rounded out the starters with a lovely beet salad with frisee, arugula, pepitas, miso-blue cheese dressing and bacon brittle. Another great dish. We had this dressing with some green beans on our last visit and I think it had been the universal highlight so we had to go back. It worked just as well here.

For entrees, we had lamb sausage links with manchego bread salad and cucumber-yogurt dressing. I absolutely loved this dish. The sausages were wonderful with the lamb notes and they paired beautifully with the salad. Inspired work here. We also had steamed Prince Edward Island mussels with house pancetta, garlic, chiles and grilled bruschetta. This was wonderful as well and we did indeed ask for a spoon at the end so as not to waste the broth.

I think our biggest surprise though came at the end. We ordered 3 dessert courses. Sorbet for our dairy allergic 7 year old, duo of chocolate and peanut butter mousse and some kind of molten chocolate cake or something. Now I'm sure everybody has had 1001 terrible versions of the molten chocolate cake (and theirs wasn't called this) and it's completely passe. Well this was amazing. Totally unexpected and one of the finest desserts we have had in a long while. Simple but beautifully executed and just yummy. We were also blown away by the Earl Gray/lemon sorbet. The Earl Gray punch to the sorbet was awesome.

So another meal at TBOX and another excellent experience.

The difficulty of deciphering Yelp ratings.... I'm often reliant on Yelp when traveling and more so when I haven't done a bunch of research ahead of time. Last night we went to a 66 rating 4 star Mexican food spot and hated it.

With 1/3the ratings, Tacos Los Altos was what we were looking for. Authentic food, tasty, fresh ingredients.

From the homemade aguas frescas to the tortillas to the salsas (really liked at least a few), we were quite happy with TLA. This makes me think of a berto's type place done with extra care and better ingredients. Clean, casual, quick (with a drive through). Would not hesitate to return to TLA and it's a far, far better option than the many fast food outposts that abound.

Feel like a negative Nancy but didn't really get the hype for Diablo Burger. Enjoyed it but it definitely didn't feel like a 122 review 4.5 star place. I wouldn't be bitter to go back and eat there but I wouldn't go out of my way either.

I admit that I do like the whole buy local thing but I was hungry and didn't really read too much to get the full story. My experience of DB was purely of the food.

We did The Blake and a custom "Aussie" burger. First of all, don't get too crazy with toppings. The Aussie burger was a bad order. The smaller English muffin didn't support all of the toppings. It basically exploded. So order off the menu or be judicious with your extra toppings.

Liked The Blake better and it was a well composed burger. Don't get the "best burger & fries in AZ" comments but it was fine. I can think of a variety of places whose burgers I prefer (in Phoenix mind you though).

Fries were good too but nothing mind blowing.

I see some folks have some problems with staff attitude but we had no issues with that at all. In fact, I liked the vibe of the place. I like the community tables even though our 4 year old was definitely suspect of the strangers at our table.

Guy Fieri, you suck! Feel bad about our take on Salsa Brava because the people were so nice but it just was not good (for us).

So...Americanized Mexican food, really nice people, fresh ingredients.

But the food? Maybe it was all Guy's fault. I don't know. Or maybe the food has fallen drastically in the couple years since his visit but we really didn't find one hit when we were there.

It was probably my own poor order but I went with the dish Guy did on the show. Stuffed sopapilla with carnitas and cilantro cream sauce. So I was thinking cilantro cream sauce a la La Condessa in Phoenix. This was more like fettuccine alfredo??? There was definitely a very dominating element of garlic in it. The sopapilla went soft pretty quickly. Just nothing about it impressed.

The Mrs. got a roasted pork burrito with green chili sauce. She said it tasted like Texas BBQ meets Mexican food. There was an overpowering smoky taste to it. Also the green chili was pretty much absent. The server even said that it was green chili for sure. You could tell when you put it next to the red chili. So you need to put it next to the red chili to see the difference? Um, need to work on your green folks.

The kids had Navajo tacos that were pretty soggy & tasteless.

Sangria was recommended and not good either.

The salsa bar is the other thing that gets mentioned in the reviews a lot. It was fine. No issues with any of it but nothing mind blowing. Spice was pretty weak as well.

The portions were huge though so if that's your thing, this is your place.

I must say again that the staff were great. Just such a bummer that we wasted a meal. We were also eyeing Tacos Los Altos about a mile further down the street. We drove by afterwards and from appearance it looked to be way more in our ballpark.

Great experience with the service shop!

I was on vacation with my family (including 3 little ones) and had been having some issues with starting up the car. Called back to the Kia dealership in AZ that had just recently serviced our vehicle & got some advice. Then a couple days later on the day we were due to drive back to Arizona, the check engine light came on. I wasn't comfortable driving that distance with a possible problem so searched out the nearest Kia dealership. It happened to be Kia of Fullerton.

I spoke to the first person that came up and he left to get someone for us. We had another man come up as well and I talked through the issue with him. The first guy came back and let us know their master technician would be with us soon.  After a bit, their master technician, Josh, came up & we went through the scenario. He took the car back and did a diagnostic and then waved me over and showed me the parts in question and fully explained the error codes to us. He also documented them for us and said we'd be good to get back to Arizona. And that was it.

I think it is normally a $90 charge for a diagnostic but in this case, they just came up to us, took our vehicle right away, checked it out, detailed all the information and sent us on our way. For free. I can't express how thankful I was for the interaction. Peace of mind, no waiting, no ruining our last day in LA, no fake diagnosis or expense. Just friendly reassuring service.

And while the master technician was checking out the vehicle, one of the other folks led the wife and kids into the waiting room and gave them control of the TV and showed the kids where the legos were to help spend the time.

I know I definitely didn't hope for such a great result when that light came on and not even when we pulled into the dealership but I couldn't have been happier.

Thanks, Kia of Fullerton!

I've had a number of meals here and never been disappointed. It's definitely one of our go to places.

They do a nice breakfast burrito and a great burger. Fries are also quite nice.

While we often do take out (with it being right next to Gangplank), I also like the ambiance of the cafe. It's got kind of a cool, old style feel.

Staff is super nice as well.