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By Pete Tittl
Thursday, Feb 02 2012 05:03 PM
I know I've praised the happy-hour specials and food at Tahoe Joe's in the past, but KC Steakhouse (2515 F St.) is giving the southwest restaurant a run for its money with a menu of winter early bird specials, available Monday through Saturday 4:30 to 6 p.m. through the end of this month. For $13.50, you can choose from top sirloin, filet, lemon chicken breast with mushroom sauce, scampi, blackened chicken with beurre blanc sauce, blackened scallops on a bed of spinach fettuccine alfredo or the homemade fried chicken. We visited and sampled the chicken and the filet, and both were incredible values. The chicken was the best I've had since The Pantry closed: two chicken breasts with ribs, a fierce batter shell, protecting chicken meat that was still moist. My companion's 6-ounce filet was tender and flavorful, definitely prime beef. These meals include the beans, salsa, bread, soup or salad and either garlic mashed potatoes or cowboy potatoes. I'd put it right up there with that Uricchio's Monday night special ($15.99; by the way, Uricchio's, which offers the deal only occasionally, will discontinue it after tomorrow. Get in quick.).
Grand opening watch
We've got a lot of new places with Grand Opening banners, including La Mina Cantina at the corner of Brimhall and Coffee Road ($2.50 happy hour specials of draft beer, margaritas and appetizers), The French Quarters Southern Cooking at the corner of Stine and Planz (open Wednesday through Sunday) and The Original Hacienda Grill at its new location, 2600 Buck Owens Blvd. (happy hour specials from 3 to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday). Get there before I do -- and let us know what you think.
New, different -- and free
The Orchid Thai Fusion Cuisine (9500 Brimhall Road) has a piano bar with a happy hour from 3 to 6 p.m Monday through Thursday, featuring $3 house wine, $2 domestic beers and martini specials. Also opening soon in the Rosedale area will be Red Stone Pizza and Grill in the old Great Harvest Bread location on Hageman.
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BY PETE TITTL
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Contributing columnist
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When you think of Mexican restaurants, you seldom think of great wine lists. In fact, other than Red Pepper in the northeast, I'm hard pressed to remember a local Mexican restaurant that puts much thought at all into their wine offerings.
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Today's column comes at a most inopportune time. I know it's January. I know that the No. 1 New Year's resolution made by most Americans is to lose weight. But when a place like Sugar Twist opens, well, to heck with the calendar.
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If there's one local restaurant niche that has grown ultra competitive in recent years, it's sushi. It takes the courage of a samurai warrior to open and operate one of those restaurants in Bakersfield, no matter how trendy the food has become in recent years.
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Ambience is too often ignored in new restaurant planning, but not at Toro Sushi. This tiny sliver of a restaurant on Coffee Road between Rosedale Highway and Hageman Road has a captivating, relaxing mood if you can overlook a somewhat clumsy entrance area (the understaffed restaurant seldom has a hostess there to greet you, and there's no sign present telling you whether to wait or seat yourself).
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I've always been the biggest cheerleader for culinary diversity in Bakersfield, and I take it hard when those bold trailblazers who fight to offer us something more than meat and potatoes fail. A couple of years ago a Chester Avenue Cuban food buffet opened with an enthusiastic owner, but within months he had to put aside his bid for diverse cuisine and revert to burritos and tacos. Too many people didn't want something different.
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There will always be those who insist Bakersfield is a culinary backwater, with no adequate restaurants despite my many years of laboring to convince them otherwise. If I was limited to just one restaurant to make a case that we are not a wasteland, I would send them to Valentien Restaurant & Wine Bar.
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The NFL is a big boost to the restaurant/bar business. Sure, you can get "NFL Sunday Ticket" if you have DirecTV, but nothing beats the Sunday ritual of cheering for your favorite overpaid millionaires in the presence of fellow jersey-wearing fans.
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You do not need to leave Oildale to get a great meal. But who knew that the cuisine was good enough to make the north-of-the-river burg a destination for food lovers? Anyone who has ever eaten at the Highland Cafe, that's who.
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I've wondered for a while why, in a city with as many churches as Bakersfield has, no restaurant offers gospel music. If you go out of town to any of the House of Blues restaurants they'll usually put it on the bill on a Sunday, as kind of a church service for the unchurched, or maybe just an extended worship time.
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One national news story I caught recently highlighted the economic troubles of midpriced restaurant chains like Applebee's and Chili's. Seems like they're losing a lot of business in this economic downtown to restaurants like Chipotle Mexican Grill.
