🚀 go-pugleaf

alan@elroy.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Alan S. Mazer) writes:

>My fiancee and I had an interesting experience which perhaps someone could
>shed some light on.
>
>Just for the heck of it, we went to a Rusty Pelican.  Never been there
>before.  Had a long wait, on a Sunday night.  The restaurant was packed to
>the gills.  But the service was slow and just poor.  They took forever with
>everything, ignoring empty water glasses and waiting 10-15 minutes to fill
>them once we asked for more.  The calamari appetizer was battered to the
>point that you couldn't taste much.  Champagne (it was a special occasion,
>her birthday) was okay, but overpriced.  Clam chowder (a favorite of mine)
>had very little flavor or clams.  Steak was tough and without flavor.  (I
>should have been clued in by the fact that they brought me A1 sauce.)  Did we
>just hit this place on a bad night or is it always like this, and if the
>latter, why is there such a wait for a table?  For the money ($50?) there are
>other places we could have gone for a much better dinner.

I can't tell you if your experience is typical or not of a
Rusty Pelican, but to be honest I wouldn't have gone to one
in the first place.

In general I've found that the food in chain dinnerhouses,
with very few exceptions, is unmemorable at best.  There are
even some restaurants which are technically not a chain but
which have a "chainy" kind of feel.  That's to say, they
emulate the habits and practices of chains.  In the end the
experience feels sort of anonymous and plastic.

By far the most interesting restaurants to me are ones 
where an individual or small team with a vision of one kind
or another has opened up something that is one of a kind.
Some of these places are expensive, but not always; most of
my eating out is in ethnic places that aren't pricey at all.
If you keep an eye on this newsgroup long enough, you'll see
a lot of places that are much more interesting to eat at
than a Rusty Pelican!

As to why so many people would go there, I guess it's sort
of like some kinds of top 40 music.  Sure it's pablum, but
it's all that some people know ...

Frank
frank@jplpost.jpl.nasa.gov

In article <1992Dec18.182054.16156@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> alan@elroy.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Alan S. Mazer) writes:
>My fiancee and I had an interesting experience which perhaps someone could
>shed some light on.
>
>Just for the heck of it, we went to a Rusty Pelican.  Never been there
>before.  Had a long wait, on a Sunday night.  The restaurant was packed to
>the gills.  But the service was slow and just poor.  They took forever with
>everything, ignoring empty water glasses and waiting 10-15 minutes to fill
>them once we asked for more.  The calamari appetizer was battered to the
>point that you couldn't taste much.  Champagne (it was a special occasion,
>her birthday) was okay, but overpriced.  Clam chowder (a favorite of mine)
>had very little flavor or clams.  Steak was tough and without flavor.  (I
>should have been clued in by the fact that they brought me A1 sauce.)  Did we
>just hit this place on a bad night or is it always like this, and if the
>latter, why is there such a wait for a table?  For the money ($50?) there are
>other places we could have gone for a much better dinner.
>
>On the positive side, we also just went to Dodsworth in Pasadena.  Food was
>good and the service wonderful.  Hadn't been there in several years.
-- 

Alan:  Was this the RP off the 2 fwy near the 134?  If so, I had a bad
dining experience there also.  I had a *very*marginal Ahi - I think
it was called "Ruby Red" or some such.  It seemed ok, but before we
left the place I had some pretty severe gastro-intestinal distress.
The other members of the party (6 of us) said their food was just ok;
no one became ill as far as I know.  Our service was good, but the
waiter was really hustling.  Like you, it is a pet peeve of mine
when I spend big bucks for a dinner and it takes an act of God to
get a refill. I wish I'd brought a canteen :-)
 
I'd eaten at that particular RP only one other time, and the food
seemed better. Maybe it's this particular one of the chain that's
bad?

-- 

Nancy J. Feagans     (818) 306-6423
Jet Propulsion Lab   nancy@jpl-devvax.Jpl.Nasa.Gov
"Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious."

I once had a group dinner at a Rusty Pelican in San Diego (or so
I think - my memory might be a bit Rusty here ;-)). The food was
just so so - something a large group of people with not so 
adventurous tastes might find acceptable, like Red Onion or
Olive Garden or Sizzler, nothing more.
Specially in Pasadena where there are so many good restaurants,
why did the OP chose RP for a birthday treat? Try the Raymond
Restaurant if you need a great romantic place in town to 
restore your confidence in restaurant food.

-- 
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Siddharth Dasgupta (sdg@wag.caltech.edu) (818) 397-2725
Materials & Molecular Simulation Center, Beckman Institute, CALTECH,Pasadena
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

It seems to me that their quality and service may vary widely,
based on location.

My wife and I were in Tempe AZ two weeks ago, and had two
quite satisfactory dinners at the Rusty Pelican on Baseline Rd.

The food wasn't *great*, but it certainly wasn't bad either.
I had the backyard barbecue salmon with corn relish, and
swordfish with spicy sesame sauce - my wife had scallops,
and salmon poached in white wine sauce.  In all cases, the
fish appeared to be quite fresh, and was cooked properly.
I didn't try the chowder, but I though that the crab bisque
was pretty good - creamy and velvety smooth, just spicy enough.
I almost went for that ruby red ahi, but decided that for sushi
I had better stick to Ai's.  Good blueberry cheesecake for 
dessert.  I saw some pretty good-looking mud pies go by too,
but wasn't feeling that ambitious.

One other thing I liked was that they allow you to mix and match
fish/sauce/cooking method.  So, if you want something not on
the menu (fish X in sauce Y cooked by method Z), they will make it
for you.

They were busy (esp. Saturday night), but not crowded.  Service
was very good - they use wireless handheld terminals to enter
orders, and can tell you immediately if they are out of something
(my swordfish was a substitute for out-of-stock thresher shark).
I ordered a frozen margarita, no salt,  before dinner, and another 
waitperson brought it to the table while the original waitperson 
was still taking our orders!  Somewhat disconcerting.  Had no trouble
getting water glasses refilled, or anything of that sort.

The RP in Glendale is bigger, more crowded, and seems to be a bit
more of a pick-up joint than an upscale family restaurant.  We've
only eaten at that one once, a year or so ago, but I don't recall any
problems with the food or the service.

-- 
Bill Weisman/JPL Information Processing Center/464 W. Woodbury Rd., Altadena CA
billw@jato.jpl.nasa.gov                      UUCP: ...!cit-vax!elroy!jato!billw
          "You can have my encryption algorithm when you pry my cold 
             dead fingers from its private key."  -- J. P. Barlow