Southern California: Zankou Chicken and America's #1 Barista
Zankou Chicken
1296 E. Colorado Blvd.
Pasadena, CA
A couple years ago I was planning a trip to Southern California and did some quick internet research to find some good cheap places to eat. I read something about a Mediterranean fast food chain called Zankou Chicken. During that trip I did enjoy food from such favorites as The Apple Pan and Cha Cha Cha, but I never made it to ZC. This past New Year's holiday I was driving around LA and noticed a Zankou Chicken but didn't stop there. Finally about a week ago, the right moment came up while checking out Southern California internship locations. I was in Pasadena and it was lunch time so I went to Zankou Chicken. Maybe I was just really hungry or lucked out and went when the stars were particularly aligned. This place was outstanding. Located across the street from Aaardvark’s vintage clothing store, Pasadena’s Zankou Chicken location had such non-Bay Area features as a gigantic dining room, generous free samples of about 4 menu items, a hallway leading to the back/restroom as large as a restaurant in itself, and a weird black wall of vinyl strips separating the kitchen from the dining room. A large map of Los Angeles on the wall indicated several ZC locations.
The food was much better than expected. The ¼ white meat chicken plate ($5.98) came with incredible portions of chopped tomato, pickled something (beets? radishes?), hummus, pita bread and a curious plastic container of a white sauce/spread which turned out to be their garlic sauce. I didn’t know what I could possibly do with so much tomato and pickled vegetables until I started combining it with the garlic sauce. The chicken was juicy and flavorful. Everything was fresh. The tri-tip shawerma ($4.59) was pretty outstanding itself. Wrapped in foil, this pita sandwich seemed unfortunately small compared to the huge box containing the chicken plate. Upon consumption, there was no problem with the size. They had stuffed so much fresh grilled garlic beef into the thing, it was solid goodness. We just sat there kind of shocked eating for such a long time working to finish it all. The table next to us had some serious eaters. I saw some guy get a giant combination plate that appeared to contain just about everything on the menu piled sky high.
This was one of the best lunches I’d had in a while. It made me wonder what we have in San Francisco that would be comparable. I thought about Good Frickin’ Chicken on Mission. My friends and I like that place, but compared to Zankou Chicken, it cowers in terms of flavor, quantity, and price. Can’t someone open a ZC location here in the Richmond District??
Coffee Klatch
806 A, Arrow Highway
San Dimas, CA
Reading about serious coffee shops, you’ll come upon mention of barista competitions. Espresso machine operators are given a time limit to produce a certain number of specific drinks plus their own specialty. The first I had heard of this was when I had read about how great Café Organica near Panhandle Park in SF was. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about so I headed out there to find a note on the door saying it was closed so the guy who ran the place could train for the barista championships. Later I checked to see how he did in the California regional competition. It turned out he didn’t do so well. He was beat by a couple of the baristas of SF’s Ritual Coffee Roasters. Strangely the number one barista was a girl from a coffee shop in San Dimas in Southern California. She went on to beat all the hot shots in the Pacific Northwest in the national competitions. San Dimas? The only place I had ever heard of the town was in the movie Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.
Last week I was in the Pasadena area so I took the opportunity to make the short drive to San Dimas to try Coffee Klatch, home of America’s #1 barista. To my surprise it was in a suburban shopping center between a Hollywood Video and a Dress Barn. Again, to my surprise, it appeared much like Turlock’s House of Java. It could have been any coffee shop in middle America. The store was decorated in red, white and blue for Independence Day. Large signs hung on the wall proclaiming that it was the location of the country’s #1 barista. A cop was there, a mom and her kid, and one bored guy with a laptop. It wasn’t very crowded. The teenage girls working there seemed friendly but I don't think the champion was working that afternoon. The coffee menu board listed lots of silly mochas such as the queasy-sweet “banana split” mocha my friend tried. I ordered my standard espresso drink, one that shouldn’t cause nearly as much confusion and variation as it does - the “small double Americano with extra room.” (just two shots of espresso in a little bit of hot water to which I add some half and half) They flubbed the “extra room” detail as many coffee shops often do. (I don’t like it so diluted. I’m not drinking coffee because I’m thirsty) The Americano with a little bit of room at the top of the cup for cream came in a cup with a long thing written on the side of it bragging about the #1 barista. The crema formed at the surface of the coffee did have the unusual tiger-striped pattern I’d read about. It was ok. It had a subtly different nutty flavor than what I’m used to. I liked it but it was so mild, I couldn’t focus on it. This could have been excellent had it not had so much water mixed with it. It wasn’t bad, but it just wasn’t close to the best I’ve had. So we sat there, kind of confused watching as a couple middle aged men came in and ordered coffee from the sorority type girls working behind the counter. I thought about the hard core coffee shops in San Francisco like Ritual where the baristas look like artists and the hipsters and yuppies line up out the door. I think all those people would be pretty shocked to see the home of Heather Perry, the one who beat them all.
A couple days later I was in San Jose so I thought I’d try this new place downtown called Emocha that uses Blue Bottle beans. That’s another story all together, but whoever that guy was he made an Americano that put Coffee Klatch’s to shame.
1296 E. Colorado Blvd.
Pasadena, CA
A couple years ago I was planning a trip to Southern California and did some quick internet research to find some good cheap places to eat. I read something about a Mediterranean fast food chain called Zankou Chicken. During that trip I did enjoy food from such favorites as The Apple Pan and Cha Cha Cha, but I never made it to ZC. This past New Year's holiday I was driving around LA and noticed a Zankou Chicken but didn't stop there. Finally about a week ago, the right moment came up while checking out Southern California internship locations. I was in Pasadena and it was lunch time so I went to Zankou Chicken. Maybe I was just really hungry or lucked out and went when the stars were particularly aligned. This place was outstanding. Located across the street from Aaardvark’s vintage clothing store, Pasadena’s Zankou Chicken location had such non-Bay Area features as a gigantic dining room, generous free samples of about 4 menu items, a hallway leading to the back/restroom as large as a restaurant in itself, and a weird black wall of vinyl strips separating the kitchen from the dining room. A large map of Los Angeles on the wall indicated several ZC locations.
The food was much better than expected. The ¼ white meat chicken plate ($5.98) came with incredible portions of chopped tomato, pickled something (beets? radishes?), hummus, pita bread and a curious plastic container of a white sauce/spread which turned out to be their garlic sauce. I didn’t know what I could possibly do with so much tomato and pickled vegetables until I started combining it with the garlic sauce. The chicken was juicy and flavorful. Everything was fresh. The tri-tip shawerma ($4.59) was pretty outstanding itself. Wrapped in foil, this pita sandwich seemed unfortunately small compared to the huge box containing the chicken plate. Upon consumption, there was no problem with the size. They had stuffed so much fresh grilled garlic beef into the thing, it was solid goodness. We just sat there kind of shocked eating for such a long time working to finish it all. The table next to us had some serious eaters. I saw some guy get a giant combination plate that appeared to contain just about everything on the menu piled sky high.
This was one of the best lunches I’d had in a while. It made me wonder what we have in San Francisco that would be comparable. I thought about Good Frickin’ Chicken on Mission. My friends and I like that place, but compared to Zankou Chicken, it cowers in terms of flavor, quantity, and price. Can’t someone open a ZC location here in the Richmond District??
Coffee Klatch
806 A, Arrow Highway
San Dimas, CA
Reading about serious coffee shops, you’ll come upon mention of barista competitions. Espresso machine operators are given a time limit to produce a certain number of specific drinks plus their own specialty. The first I had heard of this was when I had read about how great Café Organica near Panhandle Park in SF was. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about so I headed out there to find a note on the door saying it was closed so the guy who ran the place could train for the barista championships. Later I checked to see how he did in the California regional competition. It turned out he didn’t do so well. He was beat by a couple of the baristas of SF’s Ritual Coffee Roasters. Strangely the number one barista was a girl from a coffee shop in San Dimas in Southern California. She went on to beat all the hot shots in the Pacific Northwest in the national competitions. San Dimas? The only place I had ever heard of the town was in the movie Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.
Last week I was in the Pasadena area so I took the opportunity to make the short drive to San Dimas to try Coffee Klatch, home of America’s #1 barista. To my surprise it was in a suburban shopping center between a Hollywood Video and a Dress Barn. Again, to my surprise, it appeared much like Turlock’s House of Java. It could have been any coffee shop in middle America. The store was decorated in red, white and blue for Independence Day. Large signs hung on the wall proclaiming that it was the location of the country’s #1 barista. A cop was there, a mom and her kid, and one bored guy with a laptop. It wasn’t very crowded. The teenage girls working there seemed friendly but I don't think the champion was working that afternoon. The coffee menu board listed lots of silly mochas such as the queasy-sweet “banana split” mocha my friend tried. I ordered my standard espresso drink, one that shouldn’t cause nearly as much confusion and variation as it does - the “small double Americano with extra room.” (just two shots of espresso in a little bit of hot water to which I add some half and half) They flubbed the “extra room” detail as many coffee shops often do. (I don’t like it so diluted. I’m not drinking coffee because I’m thirsty) The Americano with a little bit of room at the top of the cup for cream came in a cup with a long thing written on the side of it bragging about the #1 barista. The crema formed at the surface of the coffee did have the unusual tiger-striped pattern I’d read about. It was ok. It had a subtly different nutty flavor than what I’m used to. I liked it but it was so mild, I couldn’t focus on it. This could have been excellent had it not had so much water mixed with it. It wasn’t bad, but it just wasn’t close to the best I’ve had. So we sat there, kind of confused watching as a couple middle aged men came in and ordered coffee from the sorority type girls working behind the counter. I thought about the hard core coffee shops in San Francisco like Ritual where the baristas look like artists and the hipsters and yuppies line up out the door. I think all those people would be pretty shocked to see the home of Heather Perry, the one who beat them all.
A couple days later I was in San Jose so I thought I’d try this new place downtown called Emocha that uses Blue Bottle beans. That’s another story all together, but whoever that guy was he made an Americano that put Coffee Klatch’s to shame.