"A committee is a group of the unprepared, appointed by the unwilling, to do the unnecessary." ~ Fred Allen
(No official web-site.)
Place: People's Café (I really don't know whether it is supposed to be avec ou sans accent aigu, but, seeing as there is no official web-site to correct me, I am going with my preferred choicé); Phonicular contact: (415) 553-8842
Location: 1419 Haight Street (between Masonic Avenue and Ashbury Street)
Hours: open at 8:30am(???) on the weekend (I really have no idea, as, once again, there is no official web-site to consult and there were no signs stating their actual hours of operation anywhere to be seen; I just know that they were opening up and setting up when I arrived around 8:30am this morning)
Meal: Greek Scramble ~ spinach[1a], roasted mushrooms[1b], onions[1c], & Feta cheese[1d] (served with choice of hashbrowns or house potatoes and a choice of toast); and a large glass of "Fresh-Squeezed" watermelon[1e] juice
(The reason for today's mini-EweToobular concert is that tomorrow is the 80th birthday of Leonard Norman Cohen. While I really love his lyrics, I am not particularly enamoured of his actual singing ~ much like that Robert Zimmerman fellow. So, I figured one song by Leonard himself and a cover of probably his biggest hit would suffice.
Unfortunately, I could not get the second video to embed correctly, so it will need to be either listened to separately, or just cut and paste the URL to another tab. This cover version by Puddles might not be the best of all available, but how many others are sung by a creepy, seven-foot tall clown with a golden voice?)
I figured I would give it another go and try to eat at People's Café (see last Saturday's 'blog-entry for an explanation) this morning. As luck would have it, they were actually opened (or just), and I was able to check them out. People's Café is a typical San Francisco coffeehouse type joint. I am not sure just how long they have been in operation, I am pretty sure they have been in the same location on Haight Street for at least thirty years. I have eaten there for lunch and/or dinner a few times in the past, but this was my very first breakfastary visit.
It's a medium-sized place with seating of nineteen tables for two (or a combination of tables for four and two if pushed together). I liked that the tables are Coffee bean-laden. Now those are some real Coffee tables, Cosmo! I sat at one of the four or five tables that are by large, sliding windows right on Haight Street. This way you don't have to feel as if you are eating alone, as there are always many of them "street Hippies" walking by and camped-out just in front of the place. There was even one overly loud and obnoxious virago that came running past screaming unintelligible expletives ~ perhaps she was recently released from the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic around the corner.
the Wild Parrots of San Francisco Interlude
On my way back to my car after breakfast, I saw a small pandemonium of about ten to twelve Wild Parrots flying over the Panhandle.
Like most coffeehouses, you order and pay first at the counter, get a number (mine was "10" today), and they bring the food out to you when it is ready (because if it wasn't ready when they bring it out to you, what are you really paying for?). People's Café offers a pretty decent variety of both breakfast dishes and burgers, sandwiches, and salads. A few of the other ideas that looked pretty good to me: Fresh Herb Scramble (tomatoes, fresh basil, Parmesan cheese, & zucchini ~ I had to ask if this scoundrel, Herbert, was the cook); California Omelette (avocado, salsa, sour cream, & melted Jack cheese); plus, Huevos Rancheros (available in either "Veggie" or "Meaty" ~ with braised pork loin; these were their actual terms, by the way, not mine) or Breakfast Burrito (also available as "Veggie" or "Meaty" ~ with chorizo sausage).
Later this afternoon, I am heading over to "A Taste of Greece", San Francisco's only Greek festival (where I plan on getting my annual fix of Καταΐφι and other sundry γλυκά ~ you may not walk in there as a diabetic, but they make sure that everyone leaves with a complimentary shot of Insulin). So that was one of the reasons I went with this choose this morning, to get in the mood for more good Greeky stuff. This was a decent enough scramble; it had lots of spinach and Feta in it, both of which I like and expect in a Greek Scramble or Omelette. I went with sourdough for my toast choice and house potatoes (I always like it when there is a choice of potatoey sides).
The watermelon juice was not an already-made Aguas Frescas served from a big cistern (which I was fully expecting), but actually made fresh from watermelon chunks (in a juicer, not really "squeezed", though).
For condimentary supplementation, I noticed that People's Café had Tabasco® Brand Pepper Sauce (the standard red), Tapatío®, and Huy Fong Foods Inc® Sriracha "Rooster" Hot Chili Sauce. While that is a pretty decent selection, I still used some of my own Born to Hula presents Devon Allman's All Natural Hot Sauce Chipotle Blues (Thanks, Kerry!) on the potatoes and some El Yucateco® XXXtra Hot Sauce Salsa Kutbil-ik® de Chile Habanero (Thanks, Brian!) on the scramble mess.
Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Greek Scramble ~ 6.2; the Wild Parrots of San Francisco ~ 8.5
1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer(s) of the day:
Here are the Greek words for each ingredient:
a. spinach = "σπανάκι" (pronounced "spanAki")
b. mushroom = "μανιτάρι" (pronounced "manitAri")
c. onion = "κρεμμύδι" (pronounced "kremmEEthi")
d. Feta cheese = "Φέτα" (surprisingly enough, pronounced "Feta"; technically, the word "φέτα" in Greek simply means "slice", and that is the proper way to serve this cheese, in a nice, thick slice)
e. watermelon = "καρπούζι" (pronounced "karPOOzi")
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