Cindy's in Eagle Rock

Cindy's must choose: is it a restaurant that sometimes serves as a movie set, or is it a movie set that happens to serve food?

Cindy's, which is so often used as a location for shooting movies and television shows, is a classic, old-time, roadside diner -- or at least, a decent simulation of one. Sometimes it feels like the food is part of the simulation as well.



I'm almost tempted to not even mention the food at Cindy's. It's exactly what you might expect: something between junior high dining hall fare, hospital cafeteria, and airline food. Okay, that's a little rough. I think the pancakes are okay, but I like McDonald's pancakes. The omelets are serviceable, as are the home fries. The minestrone soup I had there the other day tasted like it might have come out of a can, but in that delicious, irresistible way: I scraped up every bit. I had a veggie burger at dinner, and it seemed like the burger had been taken out of a bag and thawed out. The cole slaw the veggie burger came with was tasty -- in a shameless, artery-hardening way. Juices here are that unnatural color of concentrate drinks associated with the space program during the early cold war.

But eating at Cindy's is, if you're being honest with yourself, more about the aesthetic experience and atmosphere than anything else. You feel like you're on a road trip in the early 60's or in an early Tarantino movie. (Though the diner scene in RESERVOIR DOGS was filmed at another Eagle Rock diner -- Pat and Lorraine's.)


Pancakes. They've improved a bit in the last year or so. They're a little fluffier these days.

There's an important thing to keep in mind as you're grousing about the boring, institutional food served at Cindy's: this is what the people who come to Cindy's actually like. Cindy's target demographic skews toward the elderly side of Eagle Rock's population. Cindy's is open for dinner, and the dinner crowd here filters in around 5 p.m. (It's like the fourth book of the Rabbit Tetralogy.)


Minestrone soup. This is the kind of place where your soup crackers come in plastic wrappers.

The young often want the old-school charm and authenticity of our fair neighborhood without having to actually deal with the older residents who have imbued our neighborhood with that charm and authenticity. And it's true, the generational split sometimes comes to the fore, as it did in the submarining of the proposed (and feared) "Fat Dog Lounge" on Colorado in the location that eventually became the less offensive Cardio Barre.

We, the (relatively) young, see ourselves as winged messengers of progress, enlightenment, and advancement. We imagine the possibilities for transformation and change are wide open, endless before us. And we come bearing our feeling of entitlement. We like to talk about how Eagle Rock would be so improved, so much cooler if we eliminated the "eyesores," if we just cleared out or razed this place or that.


Cole slaw with a side of veggie burger.

There are two different moods -- two different worlds, really -- at Cindy's. There's the morning, which is like the morning at diners like this all across America: full of hope, possibility, the bright orange of the booths perfectly setting off the brown of the famously weak coffee. People are opening fresh copies of the paper, the sun is just coming up, the windows are full of bright morning light, everything is ahead of you.

And then there's Cindy's at night. If you've only been here for breakfast or brunch, I recommend that you stop by here some evening for dinner. (Given the usual dinner crowd, dinner ends around 6:30 or so.) It's much quieter, and there's a hushed, contemplative mood. The diner's sign stands out of the early darkness like a gas station sign in an Ed Ruscha painting. An elderly couple sits in a booth in the orange fluorescence of Cindy's on a Monday evening for dinner at 5:45, wordless.



In the bright light of Cindy's at night, the American night -- the black emptiness outside -- feels massive. The day seems to have passed so quickly. What opened with such hope and possibility now comes to a hushed ending. One sits in silence, eating something forgettable, but familiar, and comforting. And one hopes for just a few more bright mornings, where one is grateful even for the weak brown coffee.



Sitting in Cindy's at night, with the booths largely empty, the staff beginning to put things away and prepare for closing, the future doesn't feel quite so huge and expansive anymore, but the American night feels terrifyingly boundless.

This is a place our older neighbors cherish. It's been around forever. It's not hip, and it's not on Jonathan Gold's list, but it's a neighborhood institution. We shouldn't pretend to understand until we've sat a while in our older neighbors' places. Day's end comes sooner than we imagine, for all of us.



But morning always comes, and Cindy's will be open at the crack of dawn for breakfast -- they'll have some of their weak coffee, ready for you.

Lemongrass in Eagle Rock

Spring Rolls

Lemongrass has very clean bathrooms. For some of you, that right there might tell you everything you need to know about this place (viz., Vietnamese food that's not ultra-authentic, and not served in an appropriately grimy location). But give it a chance, despite the spotless and tastefully decorated bathrooms.

It's kind of a mint-green nineties vibe in Lemongrass, with an unfortunately designed counter that has no overhang -- so there's nowhere for people sitting at the counter to put their knees. (You have to see it to understand. It's not a big deal, but I always notice this when I come here for some reason.) There are some Buddhas perched on shelves, some paintings of women in áo dài (those long single-piece dresses), wearing ón lá (those conical straw hats), black-and-white photographs of Vietnam, etc.

The menu is pretty simple, with the Vietnamese standards: spring rolls (decent), bánh mì (Vietnamese sandwiches - pretty good), bún (noodle) dishes (okay), rice dishes (I like the cơm tôm a lot), some so-so vegetarian dishes, and, of course, phở.


Beef Phở

Mrs. Octopus is Vietnamese and is generally pretty picky and sparing with her praise for Vietnamese places around L.A. She thinks Lemongrass is okay. It'll do the job for her. She tends to have the phở bò chín nạc (well done beef) here, though, in L.A., she thinks the beef phở at Phở Cafe in Silverlake is better. Surprisingly, she thinks the phở gà (chicken) is better at Gingergrass (Silverlake). (More suprisingly, she hasn't yet been to the famous Golden Deli in San Gabriel (beef phở is the specialty there).) She generally doesn't get too excited about Lemongrass, but there have been weeks where we've been here three or four times: sometimes Mrs. Octopus just has to get phở into her system very quickly. I think it might be a medical condition for Vietnamese people.


Lemongrass Chicken

Lemongrass is an easy and pretty reasonably priced option, and I find myself defaulting to this place all the time. The food seems pretty healthy, and I don't feel gross or greasy after eating it. I'm sort of addicted to a new special they have, the Lemongrass Chicken, which is in some kind of crazy tasty lemongrass salty sauce. I can't get enough of it.

Food isn't terribly expensive here, though Mrs. Octopus and other Vietnamese people tend to get upset when bánh mì costs more than three dollars (or two dollars) -- it's like $7.95 here. Lunch specials are cheap at $6.95. Dinner for two will probably cost between $25-$30. The owners are Vietnamese, and Mrs. Octopus suspects that the primary cooks in the kitchen are Vietnamese. There were many weird issues with service in the early days, but those issues seem to have been ironed out. They have a number of beers available, including some Vietnamese beers.

This place is fine if you don't feel like trekking out somewhere for *the best* Vietnamese food you could possibly find. That is, it's totally perfect for dinner on a Tuesday. It's not the kind of place you would go out of your way for.

Now, if you ever do feel like making a trip down the 405 to Little Saigon down in Orange County, here are some fantastic places Mrs. Octopus's parents have taken us to: Canton Restaurant (fish porridge and dill turmeric fish); Phở Dakao (phở gà); and Lee's Sandwiches (bánh mì).

Finally, a short Vietnamese lesson. Vietnamese, like Chinese, Thai, and other languages in Southeast Asia, is tonal. Vietnamese has six tones: flat, rising, descending, short descending, high breaking-rising, and mid dipping-rising (like an interrogative tone). The word phở has this last tone. Also, the "o" is not hard, as in "boat", but soft, as in "book". It sounds like "fuck" but without the "ck", and as if you were asking a question, sort of like "fuh?"

Panang in Eagle Rock

Are Panang's weirdly tenacious enthusiasts just wrong? Are they trying to make some kind of point? Are they woefully misguided or are they spitefully gleeful in the chaos of Panang?

These are the questions I would ask myself as I drove or walked by Panang all these years: who were these people eating inside Panang, the Thai, Chinese Sushi Restaurant?

Someone at Panang has a real problem making decisions. Why leave anything out? There are something like 145 items on the menu here -- and that's not including the sushi options. They offer Thai, Chinese, Thai-Chinese, Sushi, Korean, Vietnamese, and Mongolian. I actually felt a little offended that they didn't offer Indian.

Sad to say, I wasn't brave enough to venture beyond the Thai offerings. Some people say that Panang is a great Thai restaurant, perhaps the best Thai place in L.A. Those people are wrong.

My confrontation with Panang has been epic. I've been there multiple times over the past few weeks, trying to give it a fair chance. It's sent me into a crisis, questioning the purpose of this entire foolish project to review everything in Eagle Rock. My time with Panang has been my darkest hour in my current incarnation as neighborhood blogger: I had finally come to a place that could suck all inspiration from me.

I can be a champion of perfectly fine food, and I've even tried to make a case for mediocre food: it has its place. But Panang is just crappy. Their menu is like a gigantic outlet by the highway in some far-away place: a huge selection of shoddy, low-quality junk. I tried the pepper chicken. I asked them to make it super spicy. They made it sweet. I came in for lunch and the waitress put me at a table behind a plant and then promptly forgot that I existed. The papaya salad tasted old and smelled funky. I had the basil chicken and asked for it spicy. It came twenty minutes later sweet and insipid. I ordered a pad thai to go: it was like something out of a frozen-food bag. It wasn't terrible, but I wouldn't go out of my way to eat it again.

The pad thai cost $7.83 the guy at the counter said, surrounded by porcelain chickens and dolphins for sale. (There is a bizarre miniature shop of Asian knickknacks and useless crap at the front of the store. By the register there is a basket full of Halls and raisins. Why not have some raisins with your cough drops?) Then he said it was $8.73. I didn't really care. I gave him a $20 bill and he stared at it, befuddled, like it was part of the Dead Sea Scrolls. He fumbled with some change in the register. Then he looked around, apparently for a calculator. I told him that the change would be $11.27. He considered this, looking at me with a combination of confusion and deep suspicion. After about another minute or so of fumbling with the change drawer, he gave me, very slowly, and somewhat reluctantly, $11.27.

That's just how this place rolls. It's like a cross between a Kafka story and a Jeunet and Caro movie. You should go -- once -- just to experience the deep, oddly moving weirdness of the place.

That this place continues to stay in business is probably a testament to habit, lack of curiosity, laziness, and sheer bad taste. This place sucks.

But it'll probably still be here after all of us are dead.

Colombo's Italian Steakhouse in Eagle Rock

Colombo’s is the kind of place a middle-aged man takes his ninety-year-old father on a Friday night, gets a table near the baby grand at the front of the dining room, and asks the piano player to play “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore,” telling the piano man that it’s his dad’s favorite song. As the piano player plays the song, the good son sings along, at full tilt, as his father, ancient, irreparably shriveled, mouths along – his eyes glittering with happiness.

It’s the kind of place where, on a slow Columbus Day Monday night, the musical trio serving as the entertainment for the evening call out to friends in the dining room to come up and take a turn on the mic, on the piano, or on the drums. Their friends make their way up to the stage, hugging their other friends in the dining room and the musicians in the trio.

It’s a strange place -- something between an office from the 70’s, an Edgar Allan Poe story, a SOPRANOS episode, and a pirate ship -- with red leather booths, black wrought-iron chandeliers, huge rococo paintings in massive gold frames hanging on a wall of fake wood paneling. A half-wall of more fake wood paneling and dark tinted glass separates the dining room from the bar.

And it may be the very soul of our fair neighborhood.


Salmon with black pepper crust

I’m not going to try to sell you on Colombo’s food. The food here is decent Italian steakhouse fare. No real surprises. It’s perfectly fine. I’ve had the pasta and the fish here (a nice pepper-encrusted salmon special on Columbus Day), and it’s always been okay. (Apologies again that my no-mammal rule precludes a verdict on the steak.) It’s not super cheap – you’re likely to spend around $50 for dinner for two, with drinks and appetizers.

But the food is not really the point of Colombo’s. You don’t come here to be blown away by the kitchen’s artistry or creativity.

You come here, order some pasta or some steak, maybe a baked potato and a cocktail, sit back, and absorb the groovy scene: couples on dates, weathered regulars, families crowded into booths sharing lasagna, musicians checking out their friends’ sets, and the occasional amazed thirty-something neighborhood blogger, all listening to the sets, watching as people get up from dinner to sing an old jazz standard, take a turn on the drums. Everyone’s welcome, and everyone belongs.

When you are feeling down, come here, and get a bit of joy, of people singing and playing old standards in a little dining room in Eagle Rock, warming up the dark, empty L.A. night. There’s no other place like this in the neighborhood. It’s a warm little society, but one that’s always welcoming, ready to accept you in its plush red-leather embrace. It’s live from Eagle Rock, every night. You’ll know the songs, and you’ll want to sing along. Take someone you love.

Pollos a la Brasa in Eagle Rock

This is America: a slightly chubby kid comes walking into Pollos a la Brasa, waving his hands in the air, calling out "¡Hola!"

The Peruvian-American boy was saying hi to family friends he saw inside the restaurant. Everyone seems to know everyone else at Pollos a la Brasa, which is hidden away in the nondescript mini-mall next to Blockbuster on the north side of Colorado. It's a tiny, tight little world of Peruvian-American immigrants.

The boy and his family came over to their friends and told them all about other mutual friends or family they had just visited in the hospital: someone had just had a baby. The boy's father pulled out a Blackberry and showed a picture of the baby. The father of the other family asked, "¿Es un chico?" The kids cried out "¡Que lindo!" and "How cute!", slipping back and forth between English and Spanish. The boy used his sister's arm to show how big the baby was, demonstrating with his hands and saying "Así."

Pollos a la Brasa doesn't look like much inside (standard-issue molded yellow bench-table sets like Zankou) -- until it's filled with Peruvian families looking for a taste and feel of home, everyone greeting each other.


Saltado de Pollo

And what are they eating? Almost everyone was having papas, in one form or another. (The west coast of South America is the original source of all the earth's potatoes. Peru currently has several thousand varieties of potatoes.) Peruvians appear to be really into carbs.

The most famous dish here is apparently the Saltado de Pollo. (Don't be mislead by the comments on Yelp that suggest that "saltado" has anything to do with salty. "Saltado" is the past participle of "saltar," meaning to jump, or skip. I'm not sure what "saltado" has to do with this dish, but it's not the word for "salty." That word is "salado.")


1/2 Chicken with rice and beans

Saltado de Pollo is a strange dish. Sauteed pieces of chicken, with onions and tomatoes, and a soy-sauce-based sauce, covered with slightly soggy sliced potatoes that tasted a little like french fries -- though less crispy. It sounds weird, but tastes great. I do wish the dish had been a bit spicier, but I'm always saying that. (The waitress accommodated my requests for something a bit more picante by bringing me a bunch of sliced jalapeños.) The dish tastes vaguely like Chinese food -- if Chinese food came covered in slightly soggy french fries. Again, weird, but good.


Gigantic Peruvian corn

On my recent visits, I also had the rotisserie chicken, which was fantastically tender and moist, served with a big portion of white rice and some tasty beans. (Chicken is the specialty here, as the name suggests. "Brasa" means something like barbecued, rotisserie, spit-roasted, etc.) The chicken is complemented by aji sauces, red and green. The green aji tastes a bit like some kind of Chinese mustard; the red is a bit spicier. Both are lovely. The chicken here compares favorably to the famous chicken at nearby Zankou. It's a bit juicier here, whereas Zankou's chicken has slightly crispier skin, and drier meat.

I also had the giant Peruvian corn, which was, honestly, too gigantic for me to finish. Each kernel on the cob was about the size of my thumb. It was too awesome-looking not to try. The kernels were so big that you have to eat them individually. Weirdly enough, the corn tasted a bit like potato.

I've also had the seafood ceviche here, which is tasty and refreshing -- though I am admittedly not a huge ceviche fan.


Inca Kola, the Golden Cola

It's expected that you'll want to wash this all down with an Inca Kola, which touts itself as "The Golden kola". This stuff doesn't really taste like cola as we are used to it. There's something slightly fruitier about it, but in a very subdued, syrupy way. It's a little like a very light cough syrup. It's tasty enough, but most American palettes would probably be happier with the imported Coca Cola (made with cane sugar, not corn), available in the restaurant's fridge.

None of this is terribly expensive (or incredibly cheap). Expect to spend about $25 for dinner for two. Lunch specials are great here, at $5.95

On my last visit at dinnertime, the dining room was full of families out together for dinner. Parents speaking to their kids in Spanish, kids answering back in English, occasionally in Spanish, at the prodding of their parents. The TV on top of the soda fridge was showing Univision's nightly news broadcast with Jorge Ramos -- who, if you have not seen him deliver a newscast, just exudes this otherworldly calm and competence.


Jorge Ramos on Univision

The broadcast was doing what appears to be a nightly survey of the Spanish-speaking world, steadily bouncing across a giant map of South America, from country to country. Ramos finished the update on Colombia as the image zoomed up away from Colombia and then zoomed south, and settled in on Peru. Ramos gave a short report on the trial of former President Alberto Fujimori. A young mother in the restaurant turned to her two children and pointed up at the television. "¡Mira! ¡Mira!" she told them. "Eso es Peru." Her kids looked up at the TV and watched the disgraced former prime minister standing in court, as they picked up more forkfuls of Pollo de Saltado.

Peru's very far away for those kids. Pollos a la Brasa won't take them there, but it's probably as close as one can get in Eagle Rock.

The Capri in Eagle Rock

Eagle Rock is inhabited by a wide variety of ethnicities and socioeconomic groups, but it is best known as an eclectic gathering of hipsters and the creative class. Eagle Rock is known for its bohemian vibe, mix of class levels, and neighborhood feel.

A core of counter-culture writers, artists and filmmakers has existed in the town since the 1920s and is being supplemented by the recent influx of hipsters. The town was well known during the late '50s, '60s and '70s for its sizable hot rodder culture, which is now almost defunct.

From the Wikipedia entry on Eagle Rock

Vegetarian pizza.

How did I know that The Capri was objectively the motherflippin' bomb, besides my own immediate, gushing love for the place? My French friend, who is now in NY (peace out homme!), offered it the highest praise possible, for him: "It's very good, for what it is."


Birra Moretti available on tap, and in pitchers.

And what is it? A hermetically sealed time capsule of a time when Eagle Rock was about hot rodders, teens with Lucky Strike boxes rolled up under their white t-shirt sleeves, their hair slicked back, when contraception was contraband. A beer-and-pizza hangout run by middle-aged, red-haired twins, one jovial, and one less so. In short, sort of like AMERICAN GRAFFITI meets TWIN PEAKS.



Let me just spill it: this is one my new favorite places in Eagle Rock. The pizza is probably better than the pizza at Casa Bianca and Brownstone, the better known places up on easily accessible, mainstream Colorado Boulevard. The Capri, in contrast, is pretty much on the downlow, a blast-from-the-past interior of green booths, red checkerboard tablecloths, Italian and American flags, and portraits of Occidental College football teams of yesteryear, all hidden behind a complicated metal facade facing Eagle Rock Boulevard. (There were no pictures of Oxy's JV basketball teams from the past -- if there had been, we might have looked for a picture of our 44th president in Tiger orange, kneeling with a hand on a basketball.)


Beef lasagna

The Capri is that mystery place next door to Auntie Em's that's not open when you're at Auntie Em's for brunch that you've always been sort of curious about but never remembered to try.

There are odd touches all around. During my visit, I was fixated on one black and white picture of the twins, as young teens, it appeared, standing and apparently yelling at someone sitting in a chair. Other pictures showed them with minor L.A. celebrities. As we were admiring some of these photos, one of the twins (I couldn't tell them apart) called out to us: "I'm the good-looking one."


Obama in the California sunshine at Occidental College in the eighties. He probably had some good times at The Capri. His future was so bright, I wonder if he wore these sunglasses at night.

I had the vegetarian pizza (onions, mushrooms, olives [sans bell peppers, per the request of my good friend Col. Mortimer] plus garlic) and it was delicious. The crust was neither thin nor thick, but medium. And during my visit, it tasted and felt just right. The other people at the table had shrimp scampi (reported to be tasty), beef lasagna (ditto), and baked ziti (ditto, from my picky French friend).

In a sign of the times, and a nod to the inexorably changing nature of the neighborhood, the beer on tap (and available in pitchers) is no longer Budweiser (U.S.A.! U.S.A.!), but the delicious Birra Moretti (Viva Italia!).


The twins on a sign in front of the restaurant. They weren't wearing shorts or tossing pizzas when we visited.

It was the last weekend in L.A. for my French friend, and his first time to The Capri. No doubt, he was feeling some advance nostalgia for our fair city. I could see why The Capri made an impression on him. The Capri is a place that oozes nostalgia. It's that idyllic, archetypal All-American hangout: the guys drive their '57 T-bird over, hang out with a few pitchers of, um, birra, and a few pepperoni pies, and celebrate the bracing Californian pursuit of happiness. (Sadly, there would probably be a drag race on Colorado involved sometime afterward.) It's probably the kind of place the guys over at Tritch Hardware used to hang out at when they were young.


Baked ziti

It's a place unspoilt by modishness or current fashions (putting aside the birra), untouched by the marauding hordes working their way down Jonathan Gold's 99 list.

But it's not just a super old-school nostalgia this place invokes. It reminds me of Friday nights in Connecticut, when my mom would take my brother and me to the pizza place next to our barber shop before my dad got home. We would get root beers and pizza with onions and mushrooms. It was a delicious reward for making it through another week of social studies, long division, hallway bullying, and soccer tryouts. It was Friday night in America, and we were free to do whatever we wanted. My mom would drive us through the town, playing Hindi music loud on the Caprice Classic's stereo, on the way to the pizza place.

And that's what I remembered, as I took my first bite of the pizza at The Capri: my own American youth. It's a place you'll want to come back to.

OK Chinese Food in Eagle Rock

Not every hole in the wall will be a gem in the rough. Sometimes, it’ll just be a piece of coal: not pretty, not memorable, but functional, if potentially noxious. As tempting as it is to want to love dingy little cheap dives, they can’t all be great. Some of them will suck, or be just OK.

The aptly named OK Chinese Food , in the La Fuente mini mall on Colorado (near Eagle Rock Blvd.), falls into the latter category. There are no attempts at anything too memorable here. It’s essentially a seedier version of Panda Express, without the uniforms or the brand consultants. Certainly, no one was consulted on the name choice.

The dishes on the steam trays are mostly forgettable, warmed-over, MSG-delivery-vehicle goop. (The spicy chicken and mushroom chicken that I tried were meh.) But at the far end of the steam trays is OK Chinese Food’s pièce de résistance: the pepper chicken wings. (Don't get too excited.)


Pepper Chicken Wings, Spicy Chicken, and Chow mein: $5.27. Sometimes, you get what you pay for.

The wings are widely celebrated among OK Chinese Food’s numerous enthusiasts, and the wings are probably the only reason to endure the grim service and atmosphere of OK Chinese Food. The service here is usually joyless and distracted. The interior is pretty much classic crappy mini-mall Chinese place (complete with yellowing ads for Boba Tea, empty jugs of unidentifiable liquid scattered on the floor behind the counter, thousands of plastic bags stacked and ready for deployment). It’s probably fair to say that OK Chinese Food is not too concerned with running a “green” operation.

The wings were not as spicy as I would have hoped. The woman at the counter, who wanted to be done with me, told me they were “just a little spicy.” I couldn’t really detect any spice. The wings were certainly salty, and would probably be more accurately named OK Salty Fried Chicken Wings. They're heavily battered and deeply fried. The effect is not too different from KFC Hot Wings (from what I can remember of those) but saltier. The wings are good, but I don’t see how or why they could have inspired the mini cult following OK Chinese Food appears to have.

The plus side: they are not stingy with the portions. They will stuff the styrofoam take-out tray with food till it’s near bursting. You can get a very big, if not exactly wonderful, meal here for about $5. And you will probably finish it all, once you are in thrall to the chemical dictates of the MSG. You’ll probably feel a little guilty and unhealthy afterwards. OK Chinese Food gets a B from the Health Department; it’s certainly not immaculate, but you probably won’t get sick. High praise, I know.

Mini Melt Too Comics in Eagle Rock

First, we need to clear up the record: Mini Melt Too Comics says they did not, as many suspect, and as this blog has suggested in the past, run Another World Comics out of business. So don't be mad at them about that.

The story I was told by the friendly Mini Melt Comics employee the other day went like this: Another World Comics was there next door (in the blue building that is now empty, to the left of Mini Melt), but the Mini Melt people had it on good authority (i.e., the owner of the paintball store to the right of Mini Melt) that Another World was closing down. So Mini Melt moved in a few years ago (the Mini Melt Mothership is in Hollywood), and, soon after, the owners of Another World, as foretold by the paintball guy, decided to give up their shop, or "retire" as the Mini Melt guy put it.



But then, in a bizarre and unforeseen move, Another World's landlord decided to keep Another World going, taking over the store, and continuing to operate it. The Mini Melt guy noted that the landlord had had no idea about comics and was doing silly things like "having wine tastings" at the shop. That actually sounded like a fantastic idea to me, and I suggested that Mini Melt could do a joint event with Colorado Wine Company. The Mini Melt guy said they had issues about space in the narrow confines of their shop.



After a few months of running Another World, the landlord apparently got bored, and just suddenly shut it down. After that, there was some talk of a pot clinic called "Green Goddess" moving into the space (they even put up a sign), but then that fell apart.



Mini Melt is a fun place. It can't help but be. It's a comic store. The staff there is appropriately geeky and serious about their comics. They try hard not to make you feel silly when you ask a question that demonstrates that you are unschooled in the history and lore of comics. But make no mistake, the staff here is serious about their comics.

Apparently, their customers are, too. Some customers have apparently complained that Mini Melt's comic archives aren't deep enough to satisfy their demands for completion. I've always found the selection perfectly adequate for my relatively minimal needs. But, yes, Mini Melt is no Forbidden Planet at Union Square (my old favorite NYC haunt). It's not a huge place. But if you need a Gremlins figurine, a Count Chocula action figure, a Green Lantern t-shirt, a Robotech motorcycle in the box, the latest issue of THE INCREDIBLE HULK, or a five-foot tall Godzilla, this is the place to go in the neighborhood.



Of course, I haven't been reading a lot of comics since Optic Nerve and X-Statix ended their runs a few years ago. Also, I've sort of felt that comics have gone a little too Believer Mag lately. When the hipsters started showing up at comic conventions, it was sort of over, I think. (I'll save for another post the offensiveness of hipsters horning in on and appropriating nerd/geek chic and culture without paying the dues of pain, mockery, abject uncoolness that true nerds and geeks must endure.)

But can I tell you why I love comic book stores like Mini Melt? So before a Star Trek marathon I held at my place a month or so before the recent STAR TREK movie (that right there is, what we call in the legal business, an admission against interest), I went to Mini Melt to buy some Star Trek stuff. I asked if they had a U.S.S. Enterprise. The guy behind the counter said they had one, but it was out of the box, dusty, and didn't have the stand. I took a look at the toy, haggled over the price a little, and then paid for it.

The cashier asked me if I wanted a bag or if I wanted to "just fly it out of here." I said I would just fly it out on impulse drive. As I walked out of the shop and onto the sidewalk, holding the Enterprise in my hand, a pick-up truck stopped at the curb in front of the shop. The two guys in the truck looked out at me, and one asked the other "Is that Star Trek, man?" The other guy told him it was. Then the first guy leaned out the window and yelled out to me: "Hey man! Is that Star Trek?" I said yes, and held the Enterprise closer for him to inspect. He took a look and yelled out "I love that shit, man!" I said "I do, too," and then they pulled away, exulting about Star Trek. The Star Trek marathon at my place the next day was, obviously, off the hook.

Elvira's in Eagle Rock

Continuing our "gem-in-the-rough" or "incredible-hole-in-the-wall" theme (while recognizing its overuse), we turn our attention to Elvira's in Eagle Rock.



Elvira's is, of course, sign-less, wedged in between Domino's and a dry cleaners. You could go years in the neighborhood and never notice it. That is in fact what I did.


Vegetarian taco

Often, the hole-in-the-wall restaurant story involves a depressing, crappy-looking exterior, which, if the restaurant-goer is intrepid enough to ignore it, gives way to reveal an entirely unexpectedly chic and stylish interior. (See, for example, Pho Cafe in Silverlake.)


Chicken taco

Elvira's doesn't fit this template. You walk into this place and it feels like you've just walked into one of the cheaper restaurants in Tijuana. Actually, the place hardly feels like a restaurant. Random items are scattered about. There's a bubble gum machine, random post-it notes with numbers for random people, decorative butterflies on the wall, old calendars, old pens, a boom box on a chair, plastic bags filled with mysterious contents, etc. Inexplicably, there's a giant mural of a tropical beach scene on one wall. It feels like Elvira leased this space and made it her second home. Random items she might need are lying around.


Elvira taking catering orders in the dining room.

There are tables for eating in (glass tabletops over maroon tablecloths), but most people that come here seem to order para llevar. (The business model here is better understood when you realize that most of Elvira's business comes from catering.)


Chicken taco

But it's worth sticking around once in a while, to chat with Elvira. She's a lovely woman, who clearly enjoys interacting with her customers. Often, she will make your order herself. The place is so intimate that you're inevitably drawn into some small talk with Elvira and her staff, especially if you speak a little Spanish. (If you do, Elvira will happily start chatting you up, with obvious delight.)



The food here doesn't taste like restaurant food. It tastes like food you might have if you were invited over to someone's house -- someone who had been making Mexican food in her own kitchen for decades. On my recent visits, I had chicken tacos and a chicken burrito. They were simply -- humbly -- presented, but they were delicious.

The term "homemade" is tossed around irresponsibly, but it truly fits here. Elvira's dishes are lovingly made, with a homey (and homely) aura of authenticity that one doesn't quite find at Elvira's spiffier competitors. The chicken in the tacos and the burrito was shredded and cooked to a tender, juicy perfection that melted in my mouth. The tacos (less than $2) were generously sized, as was the burrito, which made up an entire meal in itself ($4.95).

This is the kind of place you might come to when you are feeling homesick, miss your mom, or just need a good meal that tastes like home.

Thai Spirit in Eagle Rock

The internet is a realm of reckless superlatives. Something must be the best ever, the most fantastic, totally mind-blowing, or crazy to get our fickle attention above the din of the information carnival. This, I think, tends to lead to unfortunate exaggeration, excessive reliance on superlatives, unnecessarily and unjustifiedly provocative positions and statements, etc. It's as if we're shouting to be heard, and, realizing that we are always one click away from being ignored, must do backflips, show some serious cleavage, and set off large explosions to get anyone's attention.


Lunch special vegetable soup.

Thai Spirit will likely not be the best Thai (or Thai-Chinese) restaurant you will ever visit.

However, it is an indispensable place, and one that deserves to be visited often. It has what is probably, dollar-for-dollar, the best lunch value in the neighborhood, and very solid Thai-Chinese offerings. Crucially, for my purposes, they are not afraid to make things really fucking spicy here -- if that's what you ask for.

And let's be honest for a minute: not every meal you eat must be life-changing, or incredible. Despite the proliferation of food blogs and restaurant review sites, not every meal has to be impeccably researched, cross-referenced, and legitimized by critical opinion as the best. Sometimes, you just want to go somewhere close, easy, and decent.


The lunch special salad.

I'm embarrassed to admit that I ignored Thai Spirit for years. I committed the cardinal Los Angeles sin: I judged the book by its cover. I figured that the dingy, crappy looking hole-in-the-wall next to Yum Yum Donuts and the tire place was probably as crappy as it looked. It was if I had learned nothing from years of discovering -- yes -- mind blowing places in crappy looking strip malls in the Valley, in Hollywood, in Glendale, etc. And I will concede here that the whole "hidden gem in a shitty strip mall" trope is an overused and played L.A. theme -- but it's often still true.


Papaya salad. Spicy.

So finally, when my little brother, visiting from out of town, tried Thai Spirit on his own, and reported that it was actually pretty good, and really generous with the portions, I tried it, and I was very glad that I did.


Garlic pepper chicken. Extra spicy.

Again, I am not trying to tell you that Thai Spirit will leave you speechless or trembling with gratitude. I am here to tell you that it's a very solid Thai-Chinese restaurant. And that for $5.95 you can get an excellent lunch that includes: (1) a fine salad with a Thai-like dressing (or egg rolls); (2) a delicious vegetable soup that you will scoop up every last drop of; and (3) a very large serving of whatever you order that you will be hard pressed to finish by yourself in one sitting.


Spicy basil noodles.

Dinners here are fine -- good. They seem to do a brisk delivery business in Eagle Rock, as the phone has been off the hook whenever I've been there at dinner. All the standards are fine here. The papaya salad was refreshingly spicy and fresh. The basil chicken and spicy basil (flat) noodles were very good. Again, not life-changing, but very fine. Washing it all down with a cold Singha (served in a frosted mug, in a very thoughtful touch), I was feeling totally copacetic, ensconced in one of their weird little Thai-temple booths. (It felt a little like the scenes between Fred MacMurray and Shirley MacLaine in the Chinese restaurant in THE APARTMENT.)



Everything will be fresh, and they won't be sparing with the seasoning. I was very impressed on my first visit when I ordered the basil chicken and it came out with loads of fresh basil. And as I mentioned above, if you ask, they will make stuff super spicy.


Spicy basil chicken.

This is the kind of place that could become your neighborhood comfort food spot. I have fond memories of going out to eat Chinese with my folks back in Connecticut on Christmas (it was us and the Jewish folks at the local Chinese place), when everyone else was at home with their holiday hams drinking eggnog and watching IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE. Thai Spirit is the kind of place you'll want to come back to. Close to home, cheap, tasty, friendly, not too busy -- sort of your own secret place (especially if you're hiding in one of the temple-booths). Everyone needs a place like that.


Having a hard time deciding between the Singha or the Thai iced tea.

Colorado Donuts in Eagle Rock

Toasted coconut donut.

It's a cold world. Who cares whether you live or die? Who cares if you continue to fall, ever further, into the abyss?

Let's take a moment to appreciate Colorado Donuts (Colorado & Townsend). If, as I have, over the past year or so, you have run Doomsday scenarios through your mind, trying to figure out how long you could last on your savings, if you sold all your books, sold your car and started riding the bus, if you pawned your musical instruments and sporting equipment, etc., perhaps you factored in the cost of keeping yourself alive. Well factor this in: you can eat a decent meal at Colorado Donuts almost anytime for $3.25.



Yes, this place sells donuts and crullers and things like that. And they are fine. They are good. They are like the donuts at any of the thousand other donut shops in L.A. (Does L.A. have the greatest number of donut shops per capita of any U.S. city? Has anyone studied this?) That's not what I'm here to discuss.


Turkey sandwich on French bread.

Colorado Donuts offers the best value for a meal of any place I know in Eagle Rock. For $3.25 to $3.50 you can get a freshly made sandwich on French bread, a croissant, or a bagel, with turkey, tuna, ham, etc., topped with cheese, mayo, mustard, peppers, lettuce, onions, etc. And it will be a good sandwich. The croissant sandwich in particular is surprisingly good and rivals sandwiches you would get for twice the price elsewhere. It won't be a gourmet sandwich on "rustic" bread with "rustic" ingredients like "free range" turkey or "heirloom" tomatoes, but it will be satisfying, it will be freshly made, and it will be cheap.

You and your significant other can eat dinner (with tap water) for about $7.50, total. And it's healthier and tastier than Taco Bell or other crap in the price range. And it'll be made for you right there, by the unfailingly friendly people at Colorado Donuts. They are there late, every night, after other food options in Eagle Rock close at their absurdly early Florida-retirement-community hours, ready to happily make you a cheap, fairly healthy and satisfying sandwich.

Sure, this is a place that has a wall of scratch offs that regulars spend hours wasting their dwindling dollars on. Sure, walking into the place can make you feel like you are showing up at the unemployment office to register for benefits. Still, there have been nights where the warmth of Colorado Donuts and the people working there (an Asian family) have -- after I've come from driving through the empty, soulless streets of a dystopic late night in Los Angeles -- made my eyes misty with gratitude.



There is always hope. It's some comfort to know that you can survive on perfectly decent $3.25 sandwiches while you rebuild, maintain some dignity, and have some warm human contact with people who will remember you, remember the way you like your sandwich, and who will offer you a genuine smile with your food at your darkest hour -- when you most need it.

Long live Colorado Donuts.

Auntie Em's in Eagle Rock

Auntie Em's apparently used to be a different type of place, under the same name. As one of the waitstaff explained to a nearby diner last night, Auntie Em's used to be the kind of place that served "ham sandwiches" on "wheat and white bread." (The words "white bread" were used several times in this description, with no apparent effect on the listening diners.) Then, a few years ago, the owner decided to go in a different direction, "brighten up" the interior, and change up the menu. The waitress noted that every now and then, older neighborhood residents would come in and complain that "everything had changed," and that they no longer had "American cheese," or "ham sandwiches on white bread."


Tossed cobb salad

Today, Auntie Em's is definitely no longer a place that serves ham sandwiches on white bread. It's a place where the staff appear to be required, as a condition of employment, to have either arm tattoos (arm tattoos are the hipster khakis) or non-traditional piercings, and where the waitstaff and cooks likely swap Judith Butler and Naomi Klein books after closing. It feels very much like a place run by recent Bennington or Oberlin grads who sneer at traditional career paths, corporate agriculture, and white bread. You might notice that the place isn't antiseptically clean, hairnets are not worn in the kitchen, etc. That's all fine with me (though if I were feeling cynical I might say something about how the ostentatious dishabille stems from a deep belief that white hipsters from the suburbs are never really "dirty" and can't really get you "sick" and that most Americans are unhealthily obsessed with "cleanliness.") But these being educated hipsters running the place, nothing will actually be dirty. It's just sort of an image that the place puts forth.


Gazpacho.

Enough about the hang-ups and bugbears of your reviewer. Let's talk about the food. The food here is almost always excellent. Mrs. Octopus and I have visited many times, usually at brunch. (We've started to go to brunch here less often, as the place has become a total madhouse at brunch time in the past few years, with yupsters from all over the Eastside piled many deep on the sidewalk waiting for a table, holding their hip babies, interesting dogs, and copies of the Sunday New York Times.) But when you do finally get a table, brunches are always satisfying. The pancakes are delicious, as are the open-faced sandwiches. Mrs. Octopus is a fan of the applewood smoked bacon open sandwich; I have enjoyed the Cajun turkey sausage open sandwich (which has a pleasing and surprising kick). The coffee is good, though there's a sort of chaotic system of self-serve for the coffee in a back corner, which can sometimes get a little tricky when the place is crowded.


Seasonal salad.

The pastries and baked goods are probably the highlight of any trip to Auntie Em's. You will be told that you must try the red velvet cupcake, and you probably should just to say you have -- though my view is that the red velvet cupcake here is a bit overrated. The coconut cupcake is probably better. Moreover, I don't think the cupcakes are necessarily the best pastries they serve here. Try something off of their seasonal pastry menu. On my last visit, I had a delectable strawberry fig crisp, which was sort of like a crumble of stuff over a very fresh, purply, gooey strawberry-fig concoction. It was fantastic.


Strawberry fig crisp.

I'm becoming a fan of going to Auntie Em's for a late lunch or even dinner. They're open till 7 most nights, and you'll hardly ever find much of a crowd here after 2 or 3 in the afternoon. After the crowds have left, the place feels much more relaxed. It's just you and the waitstaff and their impeccable Ipod playlists, and you can take your time and really enjoy the food, which really is made with some care and thought. I've had their massive salads at lunch and dinner lately. The seasonal salad (squash, bell peppers, other stuff) and tossed cobb salad (avocado, chicken breast, butter lettuce, blue cheese, egg) are huge and delicious. You'll finish them feeling totally satisfied and slightly healthier.

The daily soups are also worth trying. On my last visit, I had an interesting gazpacho, with chunks of heirloom tomatoes, onions, cucumbers floating in a very light tomato base.



Of course, because this is no longer the kind of place that serves ham sandwiches on white bread, it's not exactly cheap. This is the kind of place where a gussied-up B.L.T. (the B.L.A.S.T. -- applewood smoked bacon, lettuce, tomato, avocado, sprouts & mayo on a rosemary roll) will cost you about $10. Expect to spend around $20 per person for brunch or lunch (if you're getting coffee, soup, pastries). I know, I know, it's worth it for "real" food that isn't processed dreck, and that's made with some care. And that's true. But let's be honest: despite the "Auntie Em's" old-school, down-to-earth pretensions, this isn't food for the masses. It's sort of pricey food that's meant or hopes to be "down-homey" and "back to basics" in a way, though it's priced for yupsters and their ilk. That's just something you accept about it (and yourself). (You can see that I'm still working on it.)

Review of the Eagle Rock Peace Vigil/Peace Through Justice, or Who Are Those People Holding Signs on Colorado Every Weekend?

Flo, Nina, and Norm of the Eagle Rock Peace Vigil/Peace Through Justice

The now-familiar forum doctrine provides for three categories of access according to the type of public property involved. The first category, the traditional public forum, consists of streets, sidewalks, and parks that ... "have immemorially been held in trust for the use of the public ... for purposes of assembly, communicating thoughts between citizens, and discussing public questions."

Kaplan v. County of Los Angeles, 894 F.2d 1076 (9th Cir. 1990) (quoting Hague v. Committee for Indus. Org., 307 U.S. 496 (1939)).

I was sitting outside Swork today, in the absurd heat, trying to write a "Review of the Station Fire": I was trying to describe the plume silently expanding and roiling against the clear, dull blue sky just to the north of Eagle Rock. I was marvelling at how people continued to walk and drive by without once looking up at the massive, growing plume, when I noticed the people standing in front of the Shell on Colorado and Eagle Rock Boulevard, holding signs, encouraging passing cars to honk.


Plume from the Station Fire, Aug. 29, 2009

I've been wondering for years about the people in L.A. who stand out on corners around the city, holding signs in support of various causes (most often, Peace), trying to get passing cars to honk. I watched a lone guy with white gloves (the better to get drivers' attention) work the corner in front of the Vista last week. As I walked by him, I heard him saying to himself "C'mon, Lexus, c'mon, Lexus." He exulted when the passing Lexus gave him a short honk, and then set his sights on an approaching Honda.

Who are these people? Why do they stand on these corners? What do they seek to accomplish? I'd been meaning to find out for a while. So today I went and talked to them.

On the corner in front of the Shell and a cell-phone stand, I met Flo, Nina, and Norm (pictured above), three of seven "core" members of a group that calls itself the "Eagle Rock Peace Vigil" -- though Nina did note that she prefers to refer to the group as "Peace Through Justice" because, in her words, "there can't be peace without justice." (I mentioned that I had heard that theory before.)

They said that their group had come together semi-spontaneously nearly seven years ago, united in their opposition to the build-up to the war in Iraq. That was the original purpose of the group. But like MoveOn, which was originally formed to fight against the Republicans' push to impeach Bill Clinton, the mission of the ERPV changed over time.


The white-gloved guy with the "Spread Love" sign working the corner in front of The Vista.

Today, they had a number of signs expressing opposition to Prop 8 (Norm was holding one of these), Flo had a sign promoting peace, and Nina was holding a couple different signs. One was against Prop 8, and one referred to a "Seamless Transition To Civilian Life!" (the sign, she explained, was in support of greater support services for veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan).

They explained that they were loosely affiliated with other vigil groups in Highland Park and Glendale, that some of them went to schools from time to time to talk to students about the risks entailed in enlisting in the military.

I decided to ask them about the issues. They all appeared to be opposed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and wanted to bring the troops home right away. Norm began to explain that Iraq had been launched through 9/11, and then began to review a familiar set of pet theories about 9/11.

Each of the three seemed to have slightly different priorities that brought them to the corner. Norm said he was most concerned about gay rights and gay marriage, and wanted to see Prop 8 overturned. Flo said she was most concerned about peace, but also health care, and global warming, she added, after I had written down "peace" and "health care." Nina said she couldn't point simply to one thing (she said she was concerned about the reasons why all of these interconnected issues couldn't be addressed at once), but, when pressed, said she was most concerned with climate change and peak oil. She said she was most concerned about the need for us to decide whether we would choose to return to more sustainable "indigenous" ways of life to avoid catastrophic climate change, or whether catastrophic climate change would force us to return to indigenous ways of life.

All three of them seemed to approve of President Obama's performance so far, though Nina said she couldn't give a yes/no answer on whether she approved. She said that she thought the reality was that "U.S. presidents serve the interests of large corporations and are at the mercy of those corporations." She also said that if Obama did all of the things he really needed to do for the country, his life might be in danger from those who opposed him.

All three seemed to think Eagle Rock was relatively welcoming to their views. Norm mentioned that Eagle Rock seemed less conservative than Glendale, which he thought was "very conservative." The cops had not really ever hassled them, they said, though the cops did "watch them" when they were involved in larger events. In any event, Nina said "they knew their rights." They said sometimes people came up to talk to them, and sometimes people yelled at them. Before the war, Norm said, people would yell things like "We need that oil!" at them. People had also yelled things like "Commies!" (which Nina said she did not perceive as an insult), "Get a job!", "Get a haircut!", and "Go back to San Francisco!"

I asked them if they were trying to recruit people to a cause, sign them up, etc. They said that they were just trying to get their message out and raise awareness about issues like the war, health care, gay rights, climate change, etc. It struck me that they weren't really used to people coming up and actually talking to them and were a bit more focused on getting passing cars to honk for them -- but I may be wrong about that.

Finally, I asked them how they felt about the Station Fire, the plume of which continued to expand ominously over Eagle Rock as we talked. They didn't seem too worried. Norm said he "was more concerned about the effects of the fire on the environment."

The easiest thing in the world to do would be to caricature ERPV as a bunch of foggy-headed, KPFK-listening, Chomsky-reading, 9/11-conspiracy-theory-believing libtards who need people to honk at them for some weird type of self-validation. But that would surely be too simplistic and unfair. Undoubtedly, the people in ERPV have their own motives and needs that drive them to stand out in public in the heat on weekends (usually Saturday afternoons) holding signs, trying to get people to honk. (Norm told me that they weren't allowed to actually hold signs saying "Honk for Peace" because that would be encouraging unnecessary noise.) Perhaps it's a symptom of the loneliness and atomization of our city and the lack of true public space or public interaction -- a behavior produced by the need to establish a connection of any kind, even if only a honk of a car horn.

But people like the ERPV are keeping alive an old and venerable American (and Anglo) tradition of expressing grievances in public spaces. Sure, the internets, the blogs, Twitter, etc. are great, but what changes politics, governments, hearts and minds, often comes down to bodies in the street.



As this blog has morphed over time from a political blog into a blog about Eagle Rock, focusing mostly on food and shopping reviews, I've often had moments of saying to myself -- WTF? The most important things I can write about now are Belgian Fries at The Oinkster and sneaker shops? There are tens of thousands of Americans fighting in two hot wars right now. Every year the earth gets hotter, storms become more intense, the polar ice melts away, and oceans continue to rise. There are 45 million people in the U.S. living without health care. There are thousands of homeless living on the streets of our city. Meanwhile, we all go about living our lives, starting food blogs, complaining about the weather, going to Depeche Mode concerts, shopping for new sneakers and eyeglass frames.

I do tend to agree with ERPV in part on some issues (I definitely do not agree with them on everything -- I left most of my conspiracy-theorizing behind in my early 20's), but, regardless of any disagreement I may have with them, mostly I admire their willingness to stand out on the corner every week, expressing their views to the public. I admire their determination to redirect our attention from the tunnel vision of what we see ahead of us through our windshields to the massive fires burning in the world (the wars people are dying in every day, the coming disaster of climate change, the health care crisis, etc.), that most of us are all too willing to ignore as we go about our business as usual.

Fatty's in Eagle Rock

So I had this entire review of Fatty's already written out in my head: erratic hours, weird interactions with the sometimes awkward staff, the elimination of the very pleasant brunch and lunch hours, etc.


View through the repurposed garage door.

But to paraphrase, no plan of attack survives contact with the subject of the review. We went to Fatty's again the other night, and despite my reservations and enumerated grievances, they pulled me back in.


The Garlic Feast.

Fatty's was the first restaurant in Eagle Rock Mrs. Octopus and I ever went to together. It was a sunny Sunday in April, were were house hunting, and we stopped at Fatty's for brunch. On that visit, Fatty's felt new in just the right way: the repurposed garage door, the racks of magazines (including Lacanian Ink [?]), the open ceilings, the Christmas lights. I felt like I was in Madison, Berkeley, or Northampton. It warmed my cold, socialist New England heart. Over coffee at the end of that brunch, Mrs. Octopus and I decided we were going to try to move to Eagle Rock.


Potato skins.

Things changed. Fatty's soon eliminated brunch, with little explanation. On every visit, we pleaded with the management to bring back lunch and brunch. They explained that they were trying to go in a different direction. It soon became apparent that Fatty's was trying to make very clear to everyone that it wasn't some kind of laid-back neighborhood hangout. Rumors circulated of the staff and management telling Oxy students and idling screenwriters that they couldn't nurse a single cappuccino for hours. Fatty's quickly became a relatively expensive, upscale dinner-only place, with an extensive wine collection, and a reputation for prickliness.


A view of Fatty's new garden.

The transition was fitful. The hours kept changing. The owners and management had scenes with the staff. The menu went through various incarnations. Staff would announce early closures with no notice, even if you had called ahead.

I was ready to hate Fatty's forever, to write them off as the worst kind of libtard monsters, but--but, they've won me back ... sort of.



Everything was excellent on our last visit. It was if the entire place had changed after a painful and ugly metamorphosis. There was a massive new purple neon sculpture hanging above a long table (just behind the welcome station). It was kind of awesome. There was a cool long hallway opening into a tastefully appointed new garden. As I sat at our table in the center of the main dining room and admired the elegant exposed ceiling, the new neon sculpture, the tasteful lighting throughout the restaurant, I realized that Fatty's is in fact the loveliest space in Eagle Rock.

And to tell the truth, the food has never been the problem here. Fatty's is one of the best vegetarian restaurants I've been to. Granted, I'm not a vegetarian or vegan, but I was a vegetarian for several years, and I'm not a big carnivore: I've been to all sorts of vegetarian restaurants. Most serve insipid, boring, tasteless pabulum.


The Zeppelin pizza.

Fatty's, on the other hand, works small wonders with their vegetarian fare. Their Sloppy Joe (veggie ground meat) is deservedly famous. I've known people to finish off the Sloppy Joe and wonder if it was meat or not. I have a strong, undeniable monthly urge for the Garlic Feast (a sort of DIY bruschetta with toasted bread arranged around a mass of diced tomatoes and raw garlic, sprinkled with dry jack cheese). I'm also a fan of the Fatty's Salad (a massive meal-sized heap of greens, cherry tomatoes, red onions, toasted pecans, golden raisins and cheese). Mrs. Octopus likes their pizzas, and is partial to the Margarita and the Zeppelin. (The Zeppelin features an intriguing mix of cheddar, provolone, and brie).

I may like their appetizers best. I could eat about 100 of the stuffed dates (baked dates stuffed with dry jack cheese, wrapped in veggie bacon). We've had the potatos skins (filled with corn, black beans, green chili, red bell peppers, onions, chipotle cheddar, and salsa) a few times, and they are very satisfying, though they could stand to have a little bit more kick. Perhaps a slightly spicier salsa?

I've never been blown away by dessert here. We've sampled most stuff on the dessert menu and everything is fine, not earth-shattering. It's just not really a dessert place, in my view (though I know many people who are big fans of the dessert menu).

They have an extensive selection of wine (and a decent selection of beer). Indeed, they currently market themselves as "A Vegetarian Food and Wine Restaurant". Translation: you probably won't be eating here much if you're trying to pay off student loans or credit card debt, or save for a down payment. Fatty's is expensive. They've purposefully turned themselves into an expensive restaurant. Dinner for two, with appetizers, drinks, dessert, etc., is probably going to cost you $65-80. It raises the question: to whom is Fatty's aimed? My current guess is the standard yupster class one finds at CoWineCo, tenured Oxy faculty, Oxy parents taking their cultural studies-majoring children to dinner, and people who drive in from Pasadena and Silverlake in their Audi sportwagons.


The Pinky (wedding cake, with strawberries and lots of strawberry frosting, topped with frosting).

What can you do? This is part of the struggle our neighborhood is currently going through with its identity. Are we a Tritch Hardware and The Bucket kind of place? A Dave's Chillin' & Grillin' place? Or are we about Mia Sushi's valet parking and Eurotrash vibe? Both, maybe? I don't know. It saddens me a bit that Fatty's has decided to jettison its more laid back brunch and lunch identity in favor of a full blown embrace of the trappings of bourgeois latte-liberalism, but I can't really judge Fatty's owners. They obviously have an image of what they want for the place in mind, and maybe they are making more money this way.

Save up and splurge here every now and then, and feel better as you go to the bathroom and pass the portrait of the happy pig on the wall. You're a good person.

Don't Mourn for Ted Kennedy -- Fight for the Cause of His Life

Brownstone Pizzeria in Eagle Rock

Casa Bianca this, Casa Bianca that. Every night (except Sunday and Monday) you'll see the people lined up, patiently waiting, sitting in white plastic chairs, standing around, waiting up to an hour, on the corner of Colorado and Vincent, for that famed Casa Bianca pizza.



Others would see Casa Bianca and its citywide legend as an intimidating force that could never be defeated. Did not Casa Bianca own the pizza market in Eagle Rock (putting aside Pizza Man and Capri for the time being)?

Brownstone Pizza saw Casa Bianca's outsized reputation and its overflow of demand as an opportunity. Brownstone had the temerity to challenge the supremacy of Casa Bianca on Colorado. And as an eight-year resident of New York City, I'll tell you this: Brownstone is giving Casa Bianca a run for its money. There's more than one pizza game in town, and Brownstone is not to be slept on.



They've got a thin New-York style crust at Brownstone. The crust is crispy and light, with just the proper amount of thickness. The pizza dough has a great flavor that I haven't found at any other L.A. pizza place, and haven't come close to since I left the East Coast. The amount of sauce and cheese is just right. The slices are neither too hard nor too floppy. There can be a tendency for things to slide when the pie is hot, with extra cheese or a lot of toppings and you're bringing it home in the car -- but with the standard cheese, margherita, pepperoni, vegetarian, etc., the pie will almost always be excellent.

The owners at Brownstone realize they're still making a name for themselves and that their main competition has a nearly sixty-year head-start on them. But the people at Brownstone are savvy. They've teamed up with the good people at Colorado Wine Company, next door. It's easy to order a pie from Brownstone, go into CoWineCo for a nice glass of wine or beer, get your pie, and enjoy it in the sweet lounge area at the back of the wine store. Of course, Brownstone has a decent selection of beer available in their store.

Another possibility: call ahead, pick up a pie at Brownstone, and take it down the street to The Black Boar. The Black Boar will let you bring in whatever food you want. They've got nice big tables at The Black Boar that would work great for a few pints and a huge extra-large pie from Brownstone. Result: easy and convenient good time in your neighborhood. If delivery to the pub could be arranged, I might never leave the 90041 again.



I can't help but root for Brownstone. They're the new kid on the block, and they're offering the neighborhood an excellent product. I've never been disappointed. Keep waiting in line at Casa Bianca if you want, by all means. But know that just a few blocks away, a great New York-style thin crust is available in just a few minutes, with no waiting around. Heck, you can even have a glass of wine and chat with the friendly folks at CoWineCo while your pie cooks.

Inexplicably, Brownstone closes at 9 p.m. -- just when some people are working up an appetite. Brownstone, stay open later! We will come and eat your pizza late! I guarantee you that.

What a neighborhood. Count your blessings.

A Catalog of Collapse: The Shuttered Storefronts of Eagle Rock, Summer of 2009

Shuttered storefront on Colorado, next to Tobacco Planet. I don't remember what it used to be.

recession: the decline in aggregate economic activity following the peak of a business-cycle expansion; officially defined as real GNP falling for two consecutive quarters. It is usually associated with rising unemployment of people and resources.

- Hughes & Cain, AMERICAN ECONOMIC HISTORY

The former site of Regeneration, the unlucky national face of hard times in Eagle Rock.

I recognize that, in doing these reviews, I often come off as a shameless Eagle Rock booster. And it's true: I have unbounded optimism for our neighborhood.

Still, the signs of economic distress, the very tangible effects of the Great Recession, are all around us. A closed storefront is startling at first, but then fades into the unnoticed landscape, and is forgotten.


The former site of Another World Comics, and planned site of Green Goddess, a proposed medical marijuana site that appears to have been scrapped.

I am posting these photos of closed storefronts throughout Eagle Rock at what I hope is the bottom of the downturn, our inverted Brenschluss point, where our downward trajectory flattens out and we begin an upward arc.



And if we are in fact at that bottom point of the cycle (n.b. here how much the theory of economic cycles has in common with the ancient image of the wheel of fortune), then these pictures are not solely images of decline and economic devastation -- though, make no mistake, each closed storefront represents a world of anxiety, fear, crushed hopes, loss of security. Recognizing the pain the owners of these closed businesses have endured and continue to endure, it is unavoidable that we also recognize that these images may also be seen as images of possibility and opportunity.


This appeared to be a former kitchen remodeling store on Eagle Rock Boulevard. The documents posted on the door are eviction notices.

I don't want to sound like I'm on the new Warren Buffet cartoon for kids, but it's true that it often makes financial sense to be fearful when others are greedy -- but greedy when others are fearful. (The other standard thing to note here is J.F.K.'s observation about the Chinese character for "crisis" contains the character for "opportunity" or something.)


The remaining shell of Blue Heeler Imports, a store that specialized in Australian imports. Nothing at all against Australia or its products, but this always seemed like a tough business proposition.

These spaces are currently available in Eagle Rock. These are empty spaces that will be filled with new ideas and new ventures. Perhaps someone reading this site right now has been nursing a fantastic idea for a small business in Eagle Rock. Now is the time.


Empty storefront on Colorado near Caspar.

But there I go again. Despite my opening attempts at getting back to objectivity, I've returned to my boosterism. I can't help it. Despite all of these depressing images, I do feel that better days are ahead.


Empty storefront in the Colorado Plaza mini-mall. I don't remember what the last business was in this space. I think a couple things have opened and closed in this space in the past few years.

The fire that consumes the forest often helps give rise to new growth.


Space for lease near Colorado Wine Company.


Former site of 808 Video, in the Colorado Plaza mini-mall. Most video stores' days are probably numbered.


Dead office building at Colorado and Hartwick.


The muffler place has not shut down (I thought it had, with the fence and the way it looked). It just looks like it's shut down.


Even the foundational, no-nonsense businesses in the neighborhood, like this tire place on Colorado and Glen Iris, have suffered.


This space used to house a music store. I remember walking in when I first moved to the neighborhood, asking if they had any tenor saxophones for sale. They didn't at the time, but asked if I wanted to order one. I thought about picking up a banjo there instead.


The former site of SW Hill Country, a store devoted to Western wear. This place was symptomatic of boom thinking, in my view. Only in an economy where people had more frothy disposable income from "endlessly" rising real estate and stock prices than they knew what to do with would a place like this even think it had a chance to survive.


Has this black-and-white building on Colorado next to 50/50 Grind ever been anything? It looks like it's abandoned.


I think someone tried to open up a bodega in this small little space on Colorado last year or the year before. It apparently didn't work out. This space looks like it would work as a taquería , maybe.


The scuba shop in Eagle Rock did not survive.


Store-sign palimpsest above Elvira's (very much still in business).


The Machu Picchu of the Bubble Times in Eagle Rock: the failed and abandoned condo development project near the entrance to the 134 -- a lasting monument to the boom mindset. As an aside, it's interesting how the gentle curve drawn by the the tall pillars holding up the hill suggests the sine curve of economic cycles.

Larkin's Joint in Eagle Rock

[The master] did not always provide utensils. Without these, cooking was a simple process, as a former slave recalled: "When the corn is ground, and fire is made, the bacon is ... thrown upon the coals to broil.... The corn meal is mixed with a little water, placed in the fire, and baked. When it is 'done brown,' the ashes are scraped off, and being placed on a chip, which answers for a table, the tenant of the slave hut is ready to sit down upon the ground to supper." The majority of masters provided iron pots, for cooking vegetables and fat pork and "grits," and frying pans for preparing bacon and corn pone."

- Kenneth Stampp, THE PECULIAR INSTITUTION

One wonders what Marx would've made of a place like Larkin's Joint (Colorado & Loleta). In thrall to the vampiric dictates of Capital, slave owners kept their slaves alive as cheaply as possible, often feeding them offal meats (i.e. pigs' feet, oxtail, ham hocks, chitterlings (pig small intestines), pig ears, tripe, skin). Lard, hard to come by, was reused again and again. The offal meats were made palatable with deep frying in lard. The slaves brought their own vegetables with them (okra), and made do with what was at hand (dandelions, tops of turnips). The origins of soul food are misery and pain.

What does one make of this history of pain? Food is almost always a refuge -- and that's what we think of soul food. But we often forget the nightmarish origins of this original comfort food: the need to survive, to make do on the unsightly scraps left by the master, the need to cook one's own meal with rudimentary tools after a day of hard labor. Each greasy bite of soul food is a taste of a sordid, shameful past.


Chef Larkin Mackey (LA Weekly photo)

What does one do with this? One elevates it to art. One reclaims it and makes it beautiful. One makes it into an expression of self and possibility. One absorbs the pain of the past, and uses it as fuel to construct the future, a future framed by the past, but with no borders, and no frontiers.

Larkin's is the most futuristic restaurant in Eagle Rock. As Saint Augustine wrote, praesens de praeteritis (the past is ever present), and nowhere is it more true than at Larkin's, where each meal is, in some way, a history lesson, full of pain and hurt, if you dig deeply enough, but at the same time, an exuberant expression of American possibility. This is America. This is a country built on the backs of slaves and the organized extermination of Native Americans. But this is also a country where Chef Larkin Mackey, a native Californian, can take his training in French and Asian cuisine, the Latin influences of his home state, and create neo-soul food. This is a country in which a Muslim born in Connecticut can marry a Buddhist and love his adopted neighborhood in Los Angeles with all of his heart. America was born in pain and violence, but aspires toward the new, toward a transcendental unity.


The top step of Death.

Soul food will never be good for you. It is soul food -- it comes from profoundly humble origins of hoarding lard, of prizing pork and bacon, of frying the unrecognizable parts to make them palatable. The dumbest thing in the world is to come into Larkin's and complain that the food is "heavy."


Dining room.

The fried chicken here is among the best I've ever tasted. The catfish is perfect -- almost too perfect -- the cornmeal hitting all of the notes of comfort, heartiness, and texture that you didn't think possible in the plastic world of everyday food. The jambalaya is spicy and rich, a massive platter too large for any one diner. The weekend brunches are even better than the dinners, in my view, with glorious pancakes, and fantastic herbed omelets and scrambles. And cornbread. Always cornbread. Mmmm. Take a Lipitor and wash it all down.


Southern caviar (black-eyed peas, other stuff), w/ fried pita


Jambalaya!

There have always been issues here. The top step on the front steps is a death trap. I've tripped over it myself about half a dozen times. They've got a "CAUTION" sign up there now, but they need to spend the money to just fix it.

The restaurant is nearly invisible. Our waiter -- we always seem to have the same guy, and he's awesome -- said they've thought about a neon sign or some other kind of sign, but they've decided they'd like to try to stay on the downlow a bit. When I mentioned that a lot of people in the neighborhood didn't seem to really know about Larkin's he said something like "And we don't want everybody to know about it."

With all due respect, this seems dumb. Larkin's, with its not-cheap fare, is obviously hurting. (Side note that it's remarkable that people have no problem putting down serious cash for French food at Beaujolais, but balk at paying for soul food, though it's prepared with exquisite care and thought here. Vive la différence?) Larkin's no longer accept credit cards - it's cash only, which is absurd for a place where some of the entrees run to $20. They say they're working on a franchise place downtown and their energies are focused there.

Whatever. We want Larkin's to survive and thrive. It's a crucial part of Eagle Rock, and we'd be poorer without it. Put up a sign. We see the goofy chalkboard with the "WE'RE OPEN" sign from Staples. Put up a real sign, be visible, and put away the pretensions about wanting to be a secret club for only the initiated. Your food deserves to be appreciated by a wider audience.


Catfish, like ham, is actually not kosher.

Larkin's says that it strives to be a modern day "juke joint." "Juke" derives from "jook" or "juk" from Gullah, and before that from West African languages, "in a Wolof word 'jug,' meaning to lead a disorderly life, and a Banbara word 'jugu' meaning a wicked, violent, or naughty person." (See also "jukebox".) "Juke joints" were apparently originally social rooms built for slaves to socialize, evolving into roadside shacks that featured gambling, drinking, dancing, and, occasionally, prostitution. We've got a "juke joint" on the corner of Colorado and Loleta now. Chef Mackey is taking that term and, Humpty Dumpty-like, bending it to his will. His "juke joint" is a place to remember, to savor the past, and to embrace the future.

We are all Tashtego, Daggoo, and Queequeg now, riding in the same whaling boat. Know the past, embrace the new. Eat at Larkin's.

Eagle's Landing in Eagle Rock

On days when I stayed home sick in elementary school, I would often spend much of the day under a blanket, on the couch, watching PBS. Most of the daytime programming on PBS seemed to have been imported from Canada. There were all these programs starring kids with Canadian accents addressing teen issues like drunk driving, peer pressure to do drugs, and depression. One of those shows has stuck with me: it was a program about the perils of keeping suicidal thoughts and ideation to yourself. In the show, this kid has a full-blown fantasy about his own funeral: he watches as the girl who spurned him weeps standing by his open casket, saying how sorry she was that she never got to tell him how much she really did love him. He yells at the bizarre scene, shot in mostly darkness with garish green and purple lighting: "I bet you're sorry now!" (In the end, the kid shared his feelings with his friends, who, being Canadian, were thoughtful and articulate in helping him back toward health and happiness.)



That all doesn't have much to do with anything. Eagle Rock has a new coffee shop, Eagle's Landing Coffee House (Townsend & Yosemite), in a location convenient for residents who live south of Colorado. Eagle's Landing reminded me of the Canadian public television programs because it's run by a non-profit organization and 50% of its profits go to support the R.O.C.K. ("Reach Our Community Kids") Teen Center, which is physically connected to the coffee shop.

The R.O.C.K. Teen Center features a few big couches, several computer terminals, free wifi, a pool table, and some gaming systems. When you get your coffee at the coffee shop they let you know that you're welcome to hang out in the Teen Center, which they refer to as the "Community Center" (presumably so you don't feel creepy hanging out there if you're above 19). You just walk through the open doorway. The R.O.C.K. space can apparently be rented out by anyone. There are scheduled meetings during the week for Narcotics Anonymous, a bible study, the Eagle Rock Multi-Cultural Society, and a teen-tutoring and mentoring group.

The R.O.C.K. Teen Center was originally founded in 1996 by a pastor from Eagle Rock Baptist Church who organized several neighborhood churches to get behind the idea (hence the bible study, presumably) to create a safe space for Eagle Rock teens. It's unclear what the religious organizations' connection might be to Eagle's Landing coffee shop, though I assume there's still some involvement. The kids at the counter mentioned that the coffee shop was run by a non-profit organization -- I'm guessing it's connected to the 501(c)(3) created by the churches when they founded the R.O.C.K. Teen Center.


The R.O.C.K. Teen Center.

The coffee shop itself is perfectly serviceable, nothing extraordinary. I had an iced coffee, which was fine. The coffee menu had all of the standard options, and there were some pastries available as well. The seating inside the coffee shop was pretty rudimentary, though the blue couch did look comfortable. The kids working at the counter seemed very earnest: the place felt like a non-profit coffee shop run by idealistic college students.

One unfortunate detail: when I was there, the two kids at the counter were watching WALK THE LINE on the big flat screen above the soda fridge and ice-cream freezer. They had the volume up really loud. I was the only customer there and they saw that I was writing in a notebook, but they didn't seem to consider turning the volume down. No big deal, probably just another sign of my advanced age and crotchetiness. But still, Eagle's Landing is probably not the place to try to read Proust or compose your screenplay about escaping a difficult teenhood in the suburbs of Salt Lake City with your dream to one day make it to a happening place like Eagle Rock. It probably works better as a place to quickly grab a cup of coffee in the morning or on your way somewhere else. Unless you feel like walking over into the teen center and perusing the reading material (the bible in several languages, SAT prep books, magazines, some other random books) or playing SPIDERMAN on the Xbox.


Coffee shop interior.

Regardless of your religious leanings (I'm on record as an agnostic Muslim -- whatever the hell that means), another coffee shop is not a bad thing for Eagle Rock, especially one at a location not on Colorado or Eagle Rock Boulevard. I assume there's no obligatory religious indoctrination that goes hand-in-hand with kids using the Teen Center. The place doesn't have that kind of feel about it. There were some kids at the Teen Center when I stopped by, reading quietly, checking their email, playing video games and pool. I don't really care who or what organization runs the place: kids do need a safe, quiet place that's always open to them, and the Teen Center gives them that. I'm going to try to support this place. I encourage you to do the same.

Early Look inside The Black Boar in Eagle Rock (formerly The Chalet)

As you may have heard by now, or noticed, if you've driven or walked down Colorado in the past week or so, The Chalet is no more. It's been replaced by an English-style pub called "The Black Boar". The new place does not officially open until Thursday (8/20/09) but your intrepid neighborhood blogger has done some reconnaissance on your behalf to bring you these grainy, low-resolution images, giving you an idea of what is afoot inside The Black Boar.



First, the big news: the pub has three flat-screen TVs. When I walked in on Monday evening to check the place out, all three TVs were tuned into a Manchester United vs. Birmingham English Premier League game (without the sound on, thankfully). I spoke to the bartender (a very friendly guy who I believe also worked at The Chalet), who explained that they had purchased a big soccer cable package and would be showing a lot of soccer, in addition to rugby, baseball, and football. I forgot to ask, but assume they would also show basketball for big games, finals, etc. He also said that they would plan to turn the TVs off at 10 p.m. every night.



I believe the Chalet had four beers on tap. The Black Boar has eight: Hoegaarden, Downtown Brown, Old Speckled Hen, Harp, Fuller's ESB, Fuller's London Pride, Murphy's Stout, and Strongbow, I think my dark cell-phone-camera pics don't show the full line-up. All beers are $5, I believe. They've got a number of bottled beers. I was a little concerned by the presence of PBR on the bottled menu. The controversial PBR is well documented as the douchey hipster beverage of choice. I don't think anyone (aside from dangerously inebriated college students) has ever argued that the evil swill tastes good; certain people just seem to think it looks good to be seen drinking it. Picking PBR undermines any argument that one is stocking only the best beers. < / gratuitous_editorial >

They don't have food at this point, but apparently they are cool with people bringing in food. Tacos from CaCao, a burger from The Oinkster, or slices from Brownstone with an Old Speckled Hen to wash it all down? YUM.



The jukebox is where it was before, and apparently has 75% of the same music as it had at the time The Chalet closed. The walls still have the same stone look. The carpet has been taken out; there's now a hardwood floor. The booths have been replaced by rustic-looking wooden tables. Pub tables, I assume. There are lots of candles everywhere, and hanging lanterns and old-English-pub-style hanging candelabras or whatever. Rustic rustic pubby pub. The wall decor is now English-pub-style decor (bulldogs, English things, etc.). As before, a (fake?) fire glows in the fireplace.



The Black Boar was not fully open at the time of my visit, so I couldn't gauge the crowd. There were a couple friends of the management or bartenders hanging out. The discussion focused on the pot dispensary that had opened up next door and the gangbusters business the pot dispensary was doing. Someone at the bar mentioned that the dispensary had a "Wolfgang Puck" baker or chef on site to make goodies and snacks for the dispensary's customers as they treated their ailments in the dispensary's groovy lounge. (Review of new pot dispensary coming soon!)



This was just a very initial taste of the new place. I have to be honest, I mourn a bit for The Chalet. The Chalet was impeccably done, with a great theme, and a warm, cozy ambiance. It's funny that I now pine for a place that sought to simulate a place from yesteryear (old-time ski lodge) now that it's been replaced by yet another simulation of a different idealized past (the archetypal English pub with a weird, vaguely ominous name involving a lion, bear, boar, dog, or pig). Nothing lasts. That lovely old neon "Chalet" sign may be in a dumpster somewhere, or a recycling bin, or perhaps lit up and hanging in some lucky teenager's bedroom. Hold onto your old Chalet matchbooks! They're a piece of Eagle Rock history now.


All beers, on tap and in bottles, $5.

Everything changes, including the places we love. I'm going to give The Black Boar a chance. It's still our neighborhood local, as it was when it was The Chalet, and when it was Toppers before that, and as it will be when the next makeover comes around. Perhaps all will seem right in the world when I wake up at dawn next year, walk down to The Black Boar, and have a pint with some friends as I watch the World Cup.