A couple of Fridays ago we had our happy hour at The Linkery in North Park. A farm to table restaurant, you are pretty much guaranteed the freshest of produce.

The menu is changed daily, focusing on the fresh produce they have on hand. Our Friday night menu offered a wonderful selection of beers, wines, fresh salads, homemade sausages, flatbreads, etc. We had a great time sitting and reading the long list of farmers and artisans that provide all the produce that go into the menu while we drank and ate.

We had the bacon and a pepperoni flatbread, with an andouille sausage on the side. The pepperoni flatbread had a little bit too much jalapeno for my liking so Alex ate the whole thing. The bacon flatbread with the goat cheese and caramelized onions was delish. They messed up our order just a bit so offered us carrot cake for dessert for free - we were happy to accept. Very moist, very sweet.

All in all we liked this place. Casual atmosphere, very friendly staff, fabulous menu, and a really great idea for a neighborhood restaurant. We will definitely go back.

West Coast Tavern is located in the lobby of The Birch North Park Theatre. The theatre, originally built as The North Park Theatre in 1928, has been a movie house, vaudeville venue, and church. In 2004 it was renovated and is once again a movie theatre as well as opera house

The Tavern offers a fabulous section of small plates. Alex and I arrived early as usual and pretty much had the place to ourselves. We started out with west coast fries, and the bacon, blue cheese flatbread with arugula and carmelized onions - a great combination of toppings. A Cupcake Sauvignon Blanc (me) and a Guinness (Alex) rounded out the first course nicely. Up until this night I had always favored the fries at The Prado, but I thought the west cost fries were much better - thin, crispy, with just the right amount of salt and herbs.

We continued with ground lamb sliders and charred green beans. The sliders had a topping of feta cheese, rosemary aioli, and caramelized onions, while the green beans had a sprinkling of chopped wild mushrooms and a roasted garlic vinaigrette. All of it was mouth-watering good.

By this time others had started trickling in and we were definitely beginning to get the "Hey, it's Friday" feeling - don't you just love that?

Rocky's Crown Pub is the most perfect neighborhood bar with the best burgers in San Diego. Unfortunately, it's not located in our neighborhood. Alex and I had to drive to Pacific Beach (PB) to meet Charlie and Danielle for burgers and beer on Monday night but we're glad we did.

Rocky's is a bar (not a restaurant) and really, really, small so getting a seat can be touch and go. The service can be a bit slow but if you're hanging out having a beer with friends it really isn't that big a deal. The menu is basic - burger or cheeseburger; 1/3lb or 1/2lb; onions (grilled if preferred), tomatoes, and green lettuce. Fries can be ordered on the side. A decent, but small, beer list. You need to be 21 to get in and they take only cash - no credit cards.

The burgers are amazing. Thick, and full of flavor, the juice dribbles down your chin when you take the first bite - Mmmmmm! One of the rumors going around is that the beef is mixed with butter before being cooked - way to go Rocky's. The only downside to Rocky's for me, is their fries. They are just very so, so.

More fabulous reviews and a few pictures can be found at http://www.yelp.com/biz/rockys-crown-pub-san-diego and
http://mmm-yoso.typepad.com/mmmyoso/2006/12/its_burger_week.html

Rocky's consistently ranks as # 1 or 2 for the best burgers in San Diego. At the moment they are my #1 choice. Will keep you updated as I burger-taste my way around town.

Gio's is the new trendy spot in La Mesa to see and be seen. Tonight, after the farmer's market, we stopped to have a glass of wine and to see what the menu has to offer. Gio's has been open only a short while and they have not yet put up their sign. Looking at the building from across the street it looks very open and light. The front windows in the bar area roll up giving a great view of the street which is especially great on Thursday nights for the La Mesa Village Car Show.



Gio's serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner, with a great wine selection. What's not on the menu is their wine and cheese plates, which is what we had. You can order a flight of wine from a particular region with a selection of cheeses and meats. The regions they cover are Latin America, Europe, France, Australia, and domestic. We had the European selection and asked for all white wines that fit in with our mood that afternoon - light and summery.



The platter was beautifully presented on a bamboo cutting board. There was a great selection of cheeses which were mostly English, some fresh fruit, and a selection of salami (salamis? Bookwomen, what would you say?).

Here's a view of the bar from our table

Gosh! What a huge disappointment Trophy's was last Friday for our weekly happy hour. Charlie, Alex, and I were out as a family and decided on Trophy's because of it's sports theme - we thought Charlie would enjoy it. Happy hour is Monday thru Friday, 4-7pm and we arrived around 5pm. The place was pretty empty which is odd because it's in the middle of a shopping mall (Grossmont Plaza). Other bars in the mall are quite busy during happy hour.

First off, the happy hour menu was not particularly interesting and the only beers on special were Bud and Bud Lite. Although the online happy hour menu offers 7 items, the actual bar menu only offered 5. We ordered the cheesy fries which I thought were great, the french dip sliders and the mini cheese quesadillas. The filling in the sliders was dry and somewhat chewy and the au jus did not help much. The quesadillas were just boring. Still hungry but with no options that appealed to us on the happy hour menu we moved to the main menu. Charlie and I decided to split the lobster bisque and the Sante Fe quesadilla and Alex went for the soup (mushroom/artichoke) and sandwich (hot pastrami) combo. The bisque was returned after one taste each - not good. The quesadilla was loaded with chicken, green chiles, black beans and jack cheese and was pretty good - very filling. Alex's soup and sandwich were mediocre at best. I'm not into sports and the food was not very good so it's doubtful I'll ever go back.

I would like to point out that our server was very friendly and did not charge us for the bisque.

Tonight we went to Kensington Grill for Happy Hour. This restaurant offers fairly easy parking nearby especially if you get there early as we did. Kensington Grill is one of four restaurants owned by the same group. It's very stylish with muted lighting to make for a nice dining experience. It's not too cramped for eating with decent sized tables. Waiters were dressed in all black, contributing to the trendy atmosphere.

We sat at the bar and had beer, wine and appetizers from the happy-hour menu. The bartender was knowledgeable about the wine on the list but we were disappointed with the beer selection. The appetizers were well presented and substantial for the price (happy-hour prices). We started out with the ribs and mashed potatoes (which came with a very flavorful chipotle sauce), fish tacos (which were good, though not as good as the fish tacos at the Brigantine, which we consider to be the gold standard), and a quesadilla of the day which included mozzarella and proscuitto. It was all really great. We arrived at 5pm, and when we left at 6:45 the restaurant and bar were pretty full. We both thought as we were sitting there that it would be a great place to bring my east-coast in-laws the next time they visit, who enjoy fine dining. (We consider Alex's parent's choice in restaurants to be the gold standard for fine dining, but we usually don't have the money to go to the kind of places they like.) So we definitely plan to go back for dinner.