Old Trieste, San Diego, California – CLOSED

Posted on August 2, 2013 by The Jab

Acting on a tip by Peter Morruzzi, last May I met some friends at Old Trieste, a 50-year-old Italian restaurant in San Diego. After my visit it has become a new favorite for me for the good food, but also for the wonderful old-fashioned service and elegant original decor and atmosphere. Thanks, Peter!

Old Trieste was opened in 1963 by Ramiro ‘Tommy’ Tomicich, who was born in Trieste, Italy. In those days the dress code of dresses for ladies and jackets and ties for men was strictly enforced. Over the years Tommy hosted celebrities and politicians including Frank Sinatra, Anthony Quinn, and Dr. Seuss. In 1998 when Ramiro ‘Tommy’ Tomicich passed away his son Larry Tomicich took over running the restaurant that he has worked at since he was 13 years old. Larry greets you at Old Trieste when you walk in the door – talk about good ol’ fashioned service!

Owner and maître d’ Larry Tomicich. Image from Old Trieste’s facebook page.

The interior is lovely and appears mostly original from 1963. There is a curvy bar with great low-back vintage bar stools covered with sparkly blue Naugahyde, a dining room surrounded by booths with white tuck ‘n’ roll (all the tables are booths!), white linen tablecloths, vintage framed art on the walls, and chandeliers. The walls even have original wood paneling tiles, alternating with decorative mirrors with inlaid gold patterns (that were so popular in the 1960s), and red drapes.

Old Trieste dining room. Image from Old Trieste’s facebook page.

The menu is classic Italian / Continental fare. All tables receive the house special appetizer of fried zucchini. Specialties include veal and filet mignon, each offered in several different preparations, chicken livers Treistina, cannelloni, and seafood. Dinners come with pasta and soup or salad. I had the house special of chicken cannelloni and medaglione Romano (steak medallions with a mushroom sauce) and both were excellent. My photo came out very dark (I prefer dark restaurants) but here it is anyway because I want you to see that they still use vintage restaurant ware (from Syracuse China?).

You really need to visit Old Trieste on your next visit to San Diego if you like a classy, old style restaurant experience with perfect service in a vintage dining room that takes you back to another time, before cell phones and the internet (wait, this blog is on the internet!). Seriously, get dressed up, go to Old Trieste, and wish them a happy 50th anniversary!

Old Trieste
2335 Morena Blvd, San Diego, CA 92110
(619) 276-1841
Open Tue-Fri 11:30am-2:30pm, 5:30pm-9:00pm, closed Sunday and Monday

Origin of the Doggie Bag

Posted on July 29, 2013 by The Jab

Apparently the first doggie bags were used in San Francisco during WWII to prevent food waste, then spread around the country under different names such as Snack-Sac and Doggie Pak.

29 June 1943, Associated Press:
SAN FRANCISCO – The newest device of the Society For Prevention of Cruelty to Animals:
The Pet Pakit.
It’s a carton cafe owners give to patrons on request. The diner scrapes leftovers from his plate into the box, to take home to his pet.

It was considered uncouth to take home restaurant leftovers for anyone but Boswer in most restaurants until the 1970s. And some upscale places still discourage the practice.

CLOSED – Bella Vista, Woodside, California

Posted on July 24, 2013 by The Jab

UPDATE – On August 10, 2013, the Bella Vista closed.

In my last post I profiled a classic Continental restaurant in San Diego, The Imperial House. Let’s continue the Continental cuisine focus by visiting the historic Bella Vista restaurant, in the fog-shrouded redwood forest south of San Francisco, just north of the quaint little town of Woodside. Several years ago I was on a weekend excursion with my girlfriend along Skyline Boulevard when we happened upon the Bella Vista. We were fascinated but it was closed so we returned later for the full fine dining experience. I don’t know why but I didn’t return for many years until a couple of years ago I dined there with friends and it exceeded my expectations for food and service, all with incredible views of the South Bay Area. I just went back with a friend last week and we had a marvelous meal, though the view was just of the fog.

image by G3Miller on Panoramio.com

The restaurant started life as roadhouse in 1927, though details of it’s original name could not be found by your intrepid researcher. However, I did find out that it was called the Bella Vista Sky Lounge in the 1940s and 1950s, after what is now the main dining room was added to the original restaurant (which became the cocktail lounge and adjacent banquet room). A review in the San Mateo Times’ Bright Lights column by Lloyd Johnson in 1959 had this to say:

After our last Wednesday evening
Bella Vista Sky Lounge “12′
courser” with owners Nick and
Yvonne Sanisel, we can see why
“Stu” Adams of Bardelli’s and
the Giants’ Horace Stoneham make
the trip up the mountain
to 13451 Skyline boulevard.

Besides being almost at the
top of the world, the club’s food
is clear out of it. Frog legs saute
Bella Vista prepared with wine
was our selection. Add assorted
hors d’ouevres, tossed green salad
and turtle soup to the above,
plus dessert and coffee, and this
“buck” was well spent. Yep,
there’s a cocktail lounge and
banquet space, plus a panoramic
view that’s second to none.

In 1965 the restaurant was renamed simply Bella Vista and owned by Bob and Jetty Hogan, who sold it the present owners, the Ward family, in 1977.

Bella Vista cocktail lounge, image by Bella Vista’s Facebook page

You enter the restaurant through the cozy cocktail lounge with a fireplace (which wasn’t lit on my recent visit on a Tuesday night), past the bar and into the dining room set among the redwoods with incredible views. When you make a reservation ask for a view table if possible, or at least the main dining room because there is another back dining room which may not have the same views.

Bella Vista dining room, image by http://bvrestaurant.com

The menu is traditional Continental, with emphasis on French classics, some Italian dishes, and American classics like Oysters Rockefeller and Steak Diane, which is prepared and flambéed at a station in the dining room (not tableside, but the steaks are displayed at the table before preparation). Other flambé options are a Steak au Poivre Flambé (Pepper Steak) and Cherries Jubilee. The dessert menu also offers four varieties of souffle, which are the same souffle with different sauces.

Waiter preparing Steak Diane

Steak Diane

Our meals came with very tasty side vegetables: a potato dish, some pureed carrots, and excellent green beans that tasted like they came out of a local garden. I had the huge lamb shank, which had ultra-tender meat that fell off the bone, served with a delicious rich red wine sauce. I didn’t even need a knife. My friend had the steak Diane, which he said was very tender and cooked to perfection (medium rare).

Lamb Shank

Service was excellent. The waiters wear tuxedo jackets and bow ties, and know the menu. The presentation was classic and classy, with white linens, a single fresh rose in a vase at each table, and the restaurant’s custom plates.

Going to this restaurant is not only like stepping back in time, but it also makes you feel like you are on a vacation to the redwood forest, yet it’s only about a 40 minute drive from San Francisco and a 50 minute drive from Oakland via the San Mateo bridge. The food is great, yet pretty expensive but the views and atmosphere of the restaurant make it worth a splurge.

Video tour with an interesting historic photo:

An excellent recent review in the San Jose newspaper.

Bella Vista

13451 Skyline Blvd, Woodside, CA 94062
(650) 851-1229
Open Tues-Sat 5:00pm-11:30pm, closed Sunday and Monday

Imperial House, San Diego, California

Posted on July 12, 2013 by The Jab

UPDATE: The Imperial House is no longer a Continental restaurant as it was in 2013 when I posted this. It has been a fine dining steakhouse for several years. Thankfully, the decor has not changed. For more info please visit Imperial Steakhouse.

San Diego’s last holdout for classic continental dining in a perfectly preserved dining room, the Imperial House opened in 1969 (it is still owned by the same family) in a mid-century apartment building overlooking Balboa Park in the Banker’s Hill neighborhood (my old neighborhood). It was great returning there recently to dine with friends from San Francisco who were in San Diego at the same time as me. My last visit to the Imperial House to dine was back in 2003, though I have visited the bar a few times since then.

On entering the restaurant from their private driveway (I wish more restaurants had one…it seems more classy than entering from a sidewalk), you are greeted by original maître d’ Felix Galindo, ‘the man who rolls his R’s’, who escorts you past the medieval armor in a glass case into the beautiful dining room of red booths and high-backed chairs, tables with starched white linen tablecloths, chandeliers, wood walls with framed paintings, and Olde English style windows overlooking Sixth Avenue and the park.

The menu is classic Continental, including French and American specialties such as mock turtle soup à l’anglaise au sherry, filet mignon Oscar, roast rack of lamb jardinière, chateaubriand bouquetiere for two, and steak Diane, which is prepared tableside. Also prepared tableside are flambé dishes like spinach salad flambé, bananas flambé, cherries jubilee, and café diablo for two. Steak and seafood entrées round out the menu. You might start with an appetizer such as escargot bourguignonne or oysters Rockefeller.

Escargots Bourguignonne

We had too much Mexican food for lunch (which is always great in San Diego, by the way) so we didn’t have room for main dishes, but instead opted for appetizers, salads, and dessert. We had both the spinach salad flambé and the Ceasar salad, prepared tableside.

Felix Rinaldi prepares Caesar salad dressing by hand.

For dessert we had bananas flambé (bananas Foster) with dark rum, brown sugar, butter, banana liqueur, cinnamon, and some 151 for pyrotechnics. Served over vanilla ice cream of course. Delicious!

The entire meal experience was lovely, with some pop vocal classics playing softly in the restaurant (Dino, Sinatra, etc.). However, I would ask for a table in the back if entertainment is in progress in the bar because in the front of the dining room it may be possible to hear noise from the bar. The service was perfect, with the waiters dressed in black jackets and bow ties (as seen in the photo). There are dinner specials nightly through the week, such as prime rib on Friday and Saturday, as well as a swell $60 3-course dinner for two including a bottle of wine.

There is a happy hour in the bar with free hot food on Tuesday through Saturday. On Thursdays through Saturdays there is a popular piano player (Rick Lyon) performing classic rock songs to a synthesized backing track, and they serve food in the bar late on Fridays and Saturdays (10pm-12am). They also have a popular dinner theater called Mystery Cafe, which is performed in a room behind the bar (not in the main dining room).

Imperial House
505 Kalmia Street, San Diego, CA 92101
Phone: (619) 234-3525
Open 4:00pm-10:00pm Tuesday thru Thursday, 4:00pm-1:30am Friday and Saturday
Dinner hours are limited so call first (I assume they are approx. 5pm-10pm Tue-Sat).

Brennan’s, New Orleans, Louisiana

Posted on July 2, 2013 by The Jab

UPDATE: When I first posted this Brennan’s had just closed. The restaurant reopened in late 2013 with a completely redone interior. It looks very elegant, with respect for the past traditions of Brennan’s and New Orleans. In 2016 I revisited this landmark restaurant. Meanwhile, Ted Brennan and family, previous owners, are opening Ted Brennan’s Decatur, with executive chef Lazone Randolph, former chef at the old Brennan’s for many years (as seen in the video below), with a more traditional menu than the new Brennan’s.

New Orleans has an incredibly rich history, and no shortage of historic restaurants, some dating back well over 100 years (Antoine’s – 1840, Tujague’s – 1856, Commander’s Palace – 1880, Galatoire’s – 1905, Arnaud’s – 1918, Broussard’s – 1920). Sadly, one of the more recent of the city’s famous classic restaurants, Brennan’s, closed last Thursday, June 26th, 2013, after 67 years in business.

Brennan’s, New Orleans, December 1964 by Michael Berch on Flickr.com

Brennan’s was opened on Royal St. in 1956 by Owen Edward Brennan, who took over the Old Absinthe House in 1943 and opened the adjacent Vieux Carre restaurant on Bourbon St. in 1946. But unfortunately he died of a heart attack in 1955, only months before his new restaurant was scheduled to open. The Brennan family assumed ownership, opened Brennan’s restaurants in Houston and Dallas, purchased Commander’s Palace in 1969, and opened three more restaurants. This growth caused a rift as some of the family thought the quality could not be maintained at the original Brennan’s in such a large corporation. So, in 1974 Owen’s widow Maude and her sons Pip, Jimmy and Ted assumed control of the original Brennan’s, with daughter Ella taking over the remaining six restaurants (of these only Commander’s Palace and Brennan’s in Houston are still open).

Vintage Brennan’s breakfast menu

Brennan’s has been famous for “Breakfast at Brennan’s” since the 1950s. It is such a tradition that I had to do it once, so on my last visit to New Orleans in 2010 I decided to take the splurge. The traditional Brennan’s breakfast is lavish. I started with a Brandy Milk Punch, one of their specialty cocktails. My breakfast consisted of turtle soup (a famous New Orleans’ dish), Eggs Hussard, a Brennan’s creation of Poached eggs atop Holland rusks, Canadian bacon and Marchand de Vin sauce, all topped with Hollandaise sauce, and their specialty French bread, brought warm to your table. For dessert (yes, dessert was part of Breakfast at Brennan’s) I had another Brennan’s creation – Bananas Foster.

Bananas Foster at Brennan’s, photo by The Jab in 2010

Brennan’s survived Hurricane Katrina, when they lost their enormous wine collection, but it may not survive the recent takeover. The restaurant was sold at auction recently to Ralph Brennan, a restaurateur and cousin of Ted and Pip Brennan. The restaurant was evicted last week, so it closed with no warning to the employees, many of them having been with the restaurant for decades.

It may eventually reopen as Brennan’s. It may have better food, which frankly wasn’t very exceptional when I went (for the prices). But as I’ve tried to stress in my blog the food isn’t the most important thing when eating in classic restaurants: the time travel experience is paramount, the food secondary. Hopefully whatever Brennan’s becomes it will continue to serve the original Bananas Foster (which was the best thing I had there). Le Continental will keep you posted.

I hope this isn’t a portend of the demise of more of New Orleans’ historic restaurants. When I was there in 1999 most of the high-end restaurants were the historic ones. As far as newer ones, there was Emeril’s and Dickie Brennan’s Palace Cafe (we ate there on that visit, as well as Commander’s Palace). But there weren’t nearly as many gourmet restaurants then as there are now. It seems like it would be hard to compete with new places if you are running an old-fashioned, expensive restaurant with rich French/Creole food in a large space with multiple rooms. In my visits to Tujague’s and Galatoire’s in 2010 it didn’t seem like any younger tourists or locals were eating in those places.

Brennan’s
417 Royal St, New Orleans, LA 70130

Le Continental

dining and drinking with The Jab

Author Archives: The Jab

Old Trieste, San Diego, California – CLOSED

Origin of the Doggie Bag

CLOSED – Bella Vista, Woodside, California

Imperial House, San Diego, California

Brennan’s, New Orleans, Louisiana

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