Friday, July 31, 2009

2009 July 31 - Café Rolle (Sacramento)

2009 July 31 - Café Rolle (Sacramento)

{Click on any photo to view the full size image}

Today we head to Sacramento to Café Rolle for lunch. We stopped there for dessert once before.
Miles and Ora live half way to Sacramento so they will be driving up separately and meet us at Café Rolle.

Gobo is headed to Lake Tahoe and Patti has other obligations so there will be three old timers leaving from Elsa's, Grandma, Elsa and me plus a new member, Marlene, who we have all called Linda since Grade School.
Grandma and Linda will ride in the back seat

Now Grandma, Patti, Linda and I went to the same Grade School and have known each other from the first grade or so. Although obviously Grandma is much older than the rest of us.

Anyway the three ladies were high school cheer leaders along with some others. I thought that with Linda now joining the Lunch Bunch that I would post these scans from an old year book.
Grandma

Linda

Patti

Elsa is gonna ride shotgun and I am driving my little Toyota Corolla.




We leave Elsa's and head to Hwy 99. As we are headed up the road just north of Lodi is a general aviation airport that promotes sky diving. The parachutists all look like they are going to land in the middle of the highway.

After being delayed a few minutes because of an accident on the highway as we got into Sacramento, we arrive at Café Rolle. They are extremely busy. The Food Channel has recently been rerunning the episode of Diner, Drive-Ins and Dives that they were featured in.


Miles and Ora arrive a couple of minutes after us and we read over the menu

It turns out that we will have about a 45 minute wait, but with everyone being retired we have the patience. Plus the temperature has not gone over 90° yet.


While the girls wait on the patio Miles and I drive the four or so blocks to Reeds Gourmet Meat Co. It turns out that all retail orders are done ahead of time and then you go to the little office to pick up your meat order. Since we still will have a wait for our lunch table, I decide to go ahead and order four flat iron steaks, their minimum steak order is four steaks.

Then we head back to the restaurant. After a bit more of a wait the waiter has put together a table for four and a table for two. It is a very small café and all of their tables are either two or four.

We had split a couple of appetizers of paté de foie gras, but I forgot to take a picture.

Miles' hot ham and cheese with a piece of my hot smoked salmon. The ham is more like a prosciutto.

Elsa and Ora had the roast beef sandwich

Grandma and Linda had the cold lamb sandwich

All the leftovers were on one side of the table, not my side. :-)


William Rollé smokes his own salmon


He also makes his own paté

The kitchen area is open to view

Besides putting making the sandwiches and salads, William also waits an occasional table

The girls trying to steal the little chef

Miles and Ora have headed off to visit Miles sister who stays at her home in Sacramento for a few weeks each year. She will be returning to her home in Guam this coming Monday.

I drive back to the Meat Shop and pick up my four individually vacuumed sealed steaks.
Two of the four steaks

Now it is over to Ettore's European Bakery.
Elsa and I had a Key Lime Tart while Grandma and Linda had cookies








They still use this ancient bread slicer

Elsa and I buy some bread to take home. I buy a baguette. This is the bakery where Café Rolle buys its sandwich baguettes.

Heading back home I miss the turn to get onto Hwy 99 south, so we make one more stop at the Japanese bakery, Osakaya, where I get a half dozen pastries.

ps:
Around 7:30 PM I got hungry and pan grilled one of the steaks with fried onions, some peas and a bit of lightly toasted baguette. The steak was excellent.


~end
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Sunday, July 5, 2009

2009 Jul 5 - Walnut Grove Bazaar

2009 Jul 5 - Walnut Grove Bazaar

{Click on any photo to view the full size image}

Today is a last second trip to the 55th Annual Walnut Grove {CA} Buddhist Church Bazaar.

Walnut Grove is a small Delta River town {population 7,049} 30 miles south of Sacramento.

Most of the members of the Church no longer live near Walnut Grove but have moved to Sacramento or the Bay Area. The Bazaar used to be a big event always held over the Fourth of July weekend. In the past few years the Bazaar only runs from 1:00 to 7:00 PM on Saturday and Sunday.

For more on the history of Walnut Grove, CA:
Life in Walnut Grove {click on this link}

A sign post along the levee road

A sandwich board along the same road

Notice the nice faux lighthouse of the house in the background

Down the levee and at the far northeast end of town is the Buddhist Church which was established 82 years ago.




A list of sponsors who had made donations for the Bazaar

I used to attend this Bazaar in the late 1950's and early 1960's when there were real black jack tables and crap tables. The Bazaar used to run until the wee hours of the morning. Also there were many different food booths.

This year there was only the chicken teriyaki stand and the hot dog, Nachos, shaved ice and soda stand. Also there was a window where you could get onigiri {rice balls}, tsukemono {pickled cabbage}, chow mein and chiraishi {sushi rice with a few items mixed into it}. But by early Sunday afternoon they were sold out of both the chow mein and the chiraishi.

Cooking the chicken teriyaki



Not bad $6 for 1/2 chicken teriyaki

The signs for the chow mein and chiraishi have been taken down since both were sold out


The hot dog stand. Next door is the beer wagon with only Bud and Asahi on draught.

Bingo is now their big money maker

The Bingo players

Some games for the kids are still around but very few pre teens were around.





Anyway Elsa and I are the only Lunch Bunchers to make this trip of some 25 miles from Stockton. We each had an order of chicken teriyaki {1/2 chicken}, 3 rice balls each and two orders of pickled cabbage. Plus a soda.



The Bingo seating area

The eating sitting area



On the way out of town just one block south of the Church is the building that used to house the Japanese Language School. It is the newer of the buildings that first started in 1927. There has not been school held here for years now, but the building is used for community events and meetings.

The sign dedicating the building

~end
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PS: For the Stockton Buddhist Church; their Bon Odori will be held on Saturday, July 18, at 7:00 PM. And their Bazaar on August 1-2, 2009.
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