Flavor Boulevard

Pulled-pork sandwich, beans and sweet tea. Image courtesy of bnibroc.

Big Pine has few options for dining out, but what it has leaves little to be desired.

“Adam’s Favorite Pulled Pork” sandwich ($8.25) with cole slaw is the definition of juicy pulled pork on a burger bun, despite the scorching 105 F heat in the desert that sucks the life out of our dry throats. It’s become our favorite, too. (To maintain some hydration, we got a glass of sweet tea with special High Sierra crushed ice. Highly recommended.)

The store is easy to spot, right on Highway 395/the main road that goes through Big Pine. What I like about small towns like this is how their menus breathes personal connections: Adam’s pulled pork, Granny’s potato salad, Joe’s yard bird. Adam probably certainly knows everybody in town.

Address: Coppertop BBQ
310 N Main St
Big Pine, CA 93513
(760) 970-5577

We dive into the briskets and ribs at Martin’s Place for my birthday in 2011. That’s their 86th year. I was born in ’86. I like to think Martin’s and I share some common destiny to cross path, beside the appreciation of good ribs.

There is one flimsy door to the side of the red brick building, facing the supposed parking lot, which is just a flat pebble-and-dust land free to park wherever convenient. Crack open the flimsy door, we turn the knob of another, more solid door to the interior, and with it being our first time, we awkwardly stand there looking at the few customers who are in for an early lunch, not sure whether we should wait or just pick a table ourselves. The only hostess of Martin’s Place points us to a table next to a window with broken blinds.

The menus stand ready by the side of sugar, salt, and hot sauce. At first she seems a bit indifferent to us, the opposite of her cheerful friendliness to the likely long-term acquainted patrons at the other tables, but as I tell her that it is our first time here and I would like her to recommend a dish among their various delicious sounding options, she starts smiling more. Somehow I get the feeling that Asian families don’t often visit this family-owned beef stop between Bryan and College Station.

The BBQ dinners with choice of beef, pork, or sausage, and two sides cost $7.25, pickles and bread available upon request, but the bread is simply two white slices. A bigger appetite for meat would be met by the BBQ plate alone, ranging from 1/4 ($4.25) to 1 pound ($10.50) each.

Like at most Southerners’ country cooking joints, vegetable sides are not exactly vegetables, and it all comes down to picking fried (onion ring, okra, tots, corn, fries) or non-fried (cole slaw, beans, potato salad, sliced jalapeno, cheese). I go both ways: a house (German) potatoes and a fried corn nuggets.

The house mashed potato is sweet and creamy, highly recommended. The ribs, not as falling-off-the-bone tender as those from Potatoe Patch, are much more filling than they look. Two ribs out of three and I find my hand rubbing my belly.

How does a place so underkempt and lacking of attentive and giggling service stay in business for 86 years, when its beef does not quite give the most tongue-catching experience? The only answer must be its small town charm, fostered by its loyal patronage of the locals that does not need any advertisement about supporting local business. Maybe it’s my Texas self taking over, but I like it beyond reasons, like any other little country sites in the middle of nowheres.

Happy First Birthday to Flavor Boulevard! 🙂

Address: Martin’s Place
3403 South College Avenue
Bryan, TX 77801
(979) 822-2031

Don’t know about you, but after I empty out my bank shopping in Union Square, it doesn’t sound right to pick up an $80 tab at one of those restaurants with a uniformed man at the door greeting every passerby and making us feel bad for not dining with them. So as much as I wanted to have frog legs and duck tongues or something not-so-homey of sort, we ducked into this rabbit hole in the wall called Bangkok Noodles & Thai BBQ, under Hotel Union Square and next to some equally tiny sport clothing shop.

It is truly, truly, a hole in the wall. But nobody seemed to mind. We had to walk sideway to weave pass the single line of sitting and standing people from the door through a short hall (if the thing between the wall and the divider to the kitchen can be called a hall) to get a table for two. This cookery is the epitome of land conservation. There’s just enough space for one foot at a time between the rows of tables. When the place is packed, like the time I was there, strangers practically sit together, conversations are separated only by the soy sauce and Sriracha bottles.

We just needed a good fill. Mudpie went with khao pad sapparod, fried rice with chicken, shrimp, cashew, raisin, tomato, and a few toothsome wedges of pineapple, a rather reliable combination that’s not so different from Danang Krungthep‘s kao pad namh, just a whole lot milder. I chowed down three sweetly marinated and juicy grilled pork chops with white rice, a very simple salad, and a tangy sauce.  Not much is new with Thai barbecued pork, besides it really resembles Vietnamese com suon nuong. Lip smacking good meat fo sho, tho. I even gnawed the bones.

All the while, it was some frenzy time. The cooks and the waitresses shouted to each other across the room in ear blasting Thai, hurried feet scampered all over, people slurping and chatting and toothpicking and flirting, and you’re constantly alert that a bowl of soup or fish sauce could fly down your shoulder with a slip of the tray. But there’s absolutely nothing to complain about the food. In fact, I was grateful to find this livelihood in the wall.

Address: Bangkok Noodles & Thai BBQ
110 Powell St (At the corner with Ellis St)
San Francisco 94102
(415) 397-2199

Take a look at the complete menu, the priciest plates are just $8.25.