A(nother) Breakfastary Roadtrip:
the (Spanish) Kitty-Cats, CA[1]
https://www.lomabrew.com/
Place: Loma Brewing Co. & Loma Coffee Bar[2]
Location: 130 N Santa Cruz Avenue, Los Gatos, CA
(in the ♥ of Los Gatos)
Hours: (brewery/restaurant) open for "Brunch" Tuesday - Sunday at 11:30am (however, they had special hours today and tomorrow and were open at 10:00am);
(Coffee bar) serving breakfast Wednesday - Sunday at 7:30am (well, I had arrived there around 8:30am and was told that they really don't start serving any kinda hot food items until 8:00am usually)
Meal: (me) Breakfast Flatbread ~ bacon (Really, Kevin?! Ain't that kinda non-כַּשְׁרוּת?), spinach, caramelized onion, Mozzarella, mushrooms, garlic, oregano, sunny side egg, salsa roja;
(Dave) McLoma Sandwich ~ chili Beer brined ham, sharp Cheddar, folded eggs, housemade English muffin, tropical fruit cup;
to drink:
(me) two cuppas Ethiopia Guji Heirloom and a 13-ounce glassa Youks Kolsch[3];
(Dave) a Cappuccino (made with Youk! - Loma Espresso Blend) and also a 13-ounce glassa Youks Kolsch
(... 'cause everyone knows that the "[Greek-Jewish] King of Swing" is better'n any ol' "Sultana of Squat" [aka "the Babe-beano"].)
An old Air Force buddy of mine (Thanks, Karl! [Even if he is one of "those" D*dgers fans.]) had sent me a recent news-article[4] last week on defacedbook that former RED SOX star-player Kevin ("Youk's on First? Idunno's on Third!") Youkilis had opened a local brewery/restaurant in near(enough)by Los Gatos.
I figured I would have to check it out sometime in the future... well, apparently today is the future, Doc Brown.
Just so as to not make it a totally solitary trip "all the way down there", I invited another old Air Force buddy Dave (who lives about thirty-five minutes south of Los Gatos and was closer to it than me, anyway) to join me there for breakfast. As it turned out, the new brewery is in the same location as the old Los Gatos Brewing Company, which, coincidentally enough, Dave used to work at way back in 1994-1995 (Dave is very old!). I think that the last time that I was actually down Los Gatos-way was to meet Dave there for lunch, too. I think it was probably back in 1998 or 1999 (Dave is very old!).
Any true red-blooded RED SOX fan of the past twenty years worth his salt, is well-aware of exactly who this Yoooooouk! guy is. Quick bio: After playing nine quality seasons with the GOOD GUYS (and winning two World Series Championships with them in that span ~ which is one more World Series Championship than the D*mn Y*nkees have won in the entire Millennium so far!), Kevin played one more season of MLB with the Chicago South-siders in 2012. Of course, as all faithful and knowledgeable RED SOX fans know, Youk took the entire 2013 Season off... He is a 3-Time All-Star (2008, 2009, & 2011); Gold Glove Award (2007) recipient; and a member of both the Cape Cod Baseball League Hall of Fame and the Boston RED SOX Hall of Fame. (I think that I read somewhere that Youk's brother-in-law is also some kinda sports-player; I think he plays Soccer in Massachusetts or sumpthin'... )
Just in case the Big Guy was there this morning hisd*mnself, I made sure to arrive at the restaurant clad head-to-toe (literally) in RED SOX items of clothing: (head-) RED SOX baseball cap (natch') (I went with an old one of mine that is exactly twenty years old this week/month; I bought it back in 1999 during the All-Star festivities in Boston in a sports-shop across the street from Fenway Park; which is one of four
RED SOX caps that I own); (to-) RED SOX long-sleeve t-shirt (I have way too many different RED SOX t-shirts to really count); and (toe) RED SOX socks
(I own three different pairs). I do own two different RED SOX jackets/windbreakers, but I did not want to "over-do" it, so I was just wearing a nondenominational red-and-blue sweatshirt. (I do not own a pair of
RED SOX skivvies, or I mighta also been wearing those this morning... I would just not have been able to show them off to anyone at the brew pub/Coffee bar.)
As Dave and I were the first idiots to walk in just as they were opening (right on the nose, Mr. Durante!) at 10:00am, we had our choice of seats. It is a fairly large restaurant and there are many tables that can seat two-to-eight people. The place filled up pretty quickly, too.
As for the food, I have never met a Breakfast Pizza (Flatbread, whatever) that I did not like. Of course, in honour of Kevin Youkilis' Jewish heritage, I made sure to have them 86 the dead, decaying porky-butt bits from my meal. It was a single-serving Pizza (Flatbread, whatever), but it was just about all that I could do to finish it. (Actually, I "forced" Dave to try a slice of it.)
The McLoma Sandwich looked much tastier than (and was easily twice the size of) whatever that clown Ronald McJ*ter could ever come up with ("... up with could come... "? Nah! That just don't sound right.). The "folded eggs" sounded confusing in the menu, but it was just flattened scrambled eggs ("folded" in between the slices of English muffin). Plus, they make their own (over-sized) English muffins fresh daily. When I had first arrived this morning, they had just finished baking up a batch of these English muffins. I was even thinking of ordering this one myself (again, just making it kosher-likeⓊ).
Loma Brewing Co. had just Tabasco® Brand Pepper Sauce (Original Red Sauce) and Huy Fong Foods Inc. Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce for use as condimentary supplementation. I did not really feel like schlepping any of my own hot sauces "all the way down there" this morning, but, as it turned out, their salsa roja was flavourful (and picante) enough, anyway.
Why the two cuppas of Ethiopia Guji Heirloom? I bought one cuppa when I first got into town. I purposefully got to the place an hour before I was planning on meeting Dave there so that I could walk around Los Gatos for a bit and the second cuppa was for-with breakfast. Plus, 'cause I decided to buy a bagga (it is either a 12 oz or 1-pounder) the Ethiopia Guji Heirloom to take-with-home, I got the second cuppa as a freebie! (They were not being extra nice to me, that is just what they do for anyone buying a bagga.) The Coffee was very good. Ethiopian Coffee is one of my favourites.
I would really have liked to have tried several of their Beers, but, sadly, I did have to drive the hour-or-so back home in the afternoon and thought it best to just try the eponymous brew that I did. It was also very good. I have been a fan of Kölsch-style Beers since living in Deutschland. Dave and I were both stationed together in Berlin-town back in 1983-1985 (Man, that Dave is really old!).
Before breakfast, while waiting for Dave to finally show up, I walked around the area a bit and happened across a local gelato-joint a few blocks down the street from the brewery. I was amazed that they were open for business before 9:00am. Of course, I had to sample a few of their flavours... Well, after breakfast ("Brunch", whatever), I went back over there and got a small cup with two flavours: half-cuppa Sambuca and half-cuppa Horchata.
All in all, this morning turned out to be a very good one breakfastarily for me:
Coffee! Beer!! Pizza!!! Ice Cream!!!!
The only two items missing from the Five Major Food Groups this morning were Potatoes and Chocolate.
(Hmmmm?! I wonder if'n I should try some Chocolate-dipped French Fries for dinner?!)
Glen Bacon Scale Rating:
Breakfast Flatbread ~ 6.7;
(I did not bother asking Dave what he might rate his McLoma Sandwich; he seemed to have liked it well enough to clean his plate; so I would guess it was upwards of a 6.5, too);
Ethiopia Guji Heirloom ~ 7.4;
Youks Kolsch ~ 6.9;
Ice Cream ~ 7.0 (cumulative; the Sambuca-one was probably a 7.2 all on its ownsome)
Kevin Edmund Youkilis ~ .281
(I would just like to point out that Glen Bacon ~
he of the above named "Scale" ~ is also a long-time RED SOX fan.)
___________________
The "town" of Los Gatos is about fifty miles (well, according to Google Map, it is 54.1 miles) south of my apartment in San Francisco and about one hour travel time down there (almost 'zackly ~ I left my apartment at 7:30am and arrived at 8:30am [well, I would have arrived then if I had not missed my exit off Highway 17 and then had to back-track for about five minutes...
but still... )
I found this titbit of information pretty interesting. Both Olivia de Havilland and her kid sister went to Los Gatos High School.
2. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day, número uno:
I do not know why the joint is called "Loma" (I asked one of the baristarettes, but she did not know either), but the word "Loma" en español simply means "hill" or "knoll", Chuck.
(Perhaps, "Loma" has an entirely different meaning in Romanian or Greek.)*
*(Ha! This cunning linguistic stuff kills me.
Just on a lark [there were no Wild Parrots of San Francisco nearby], I Google Translate-d "Loma" under "Detect Language" and it came up that "Loma" in Finnish also means "holiday" and "Λόμαξ" [pronounced "LOmax"] in Greek-speak actually means "hilltop". It did not list anything under Romanian, though.)
3. Stupid, useless cunning linguist/pseudo-brewista pointer of the day, Nummer zwei:
Kölsch is a style of Beer originating in Cologne, Germany. "Kölsch" simply means "from Cologne" auf Deutsch.
4. https://www.si.com/mlb/2019/06/25/kevin-youkilis-boston-red-sox-loma-brewing-company
