Gay Restaurants

[Kikujiro]

Soba: yes, and in some states in the US, for example, the 'unnatural' acts are illegal between het as well as gay couples, whereas in others it's the same-sex context that makes them transgressive.

Also, the relative specificity or lack thereof in various legal codes (check out Texas on the link above for fascinatingly graphic specifics about what they don't want to see happening) is another interesting gap to explore.

[SobaAddict70]

Fire Island has at least two communities (Cherry Grove and the Pines) that are in the Provincetown category when it comes to their gay-obviousness quotient.

Just a nitpick, Steve...

It just happens that WE become the majority during a certain time of the year, technically the period between late April and early October. The rest of the time, the Grove and the Pines are deserted, not to mention equally divided between people of all types and the usual wildlife.

Soba

[elyse]

But only in those two towns.

[nightscotsman]

This discussion reminds me of one of Michael Moore's stunts on his old show "The Awful Truth": He got a big-ass Winnebago, painted it bright pink, loaded it with homos, then drove it to every state with active anti-sodomy laws so they could perform "unnatural acts" in front of the state capitol building (picture the outside of the RV, rocking dramatically and rhythmically). They called it the "Sodomobile".

[Adam Balic]

The irony is that all these unnatural acts (btw, the definition "unnatural sexual intercourse" is poorly defined within the context of the legal language) are also done by a not insignificant proportion of the world's het population.  One group's nature is another group's abomination, but that's another topic for another message board.

Ok, back to food.

Soba

Yes, in the Tasmania case, hetrosexual couple were showing their surport for their gay friends and family by turning themselves into the police and demanding to be arrested as they had just had 1) Oral sex, 2) Anal sex or 3) that stupid kurma sutra position where the chap lies on his tummy and the lady sits on his bottom facing his feet and he bends his penis backwards until penertation is acheived.

[Malik]

Soba: yes, and in some states in the US, for example, the 'unnatural' acts are illegal between het as well as gay couples, whereas in others it's the same-sex context that makes them transgressive.

Also, the relative specificity or lack thereof in various legal codes (check out Texas on the link above for fascinatingly graphic specifics about what they don't want to see happening) is another interesting gap to explore.

The Texas law (and a lot of similar laws) may not last much longer. A lot of these laws are on the books but not enforced, and thus do not get challenged in courts. But there was an arrest made in Houston a few years ago on this sodomy law: police mistakenly burst in to an appartment, found two guys having sex, and arrested them for violating the sodomy law. The case has since been challenged through the legal system, and was recently heard in the Supreme Court. According a recent article in the Economist:

More than four years later, this sorry little incident has become one of the most important anti-discrimination cases to be brought to the Supreme Court for decades. In a hearing before the court this week, the state of Texas defended its law against a powerful challenge from lawyers for the Lambda Legal Defence and Education Fund, a gay-rights group which has taken up Mr Lawrence's and Mr Garner's case. The outcome will decide the fate of similar laws in 12 other states, but will also have wider effects. If the court rules broadly against the law, it could establish a basis to challenge bans on same-sex marriage (which exist everywhere except Vermont), and to make illegal most other kinds of discrimination against gays.

Back to the original topic of gay restaurants, there are some restaurants in the Castro here in San Francisco that have a majority gay crowd. One that comes to mind is Mecca, which has pretty good if a bit overpriced California cuisine. There's a large bar at the center of the restaurant where the crowd seems mostly gay (at least on the couple of occasions I went), but the dinner tables around it are pretty mixed.

[SWoodyWhite]

There's another side to this question that's been buzzing around in my mind for the last couple of days. It has to do with how we learn who we are.

Most of use, I think it's safe to say, learn how to behave in public from our parents and other family. We learn when it's appropriate to scream at the top of our lungs, and when not to. We learn not to hit each other, and how to say "Please" and "Thank-you." And we learn a great deal of these things at the table. When we are old enough, we then get to go to restaurants, where our manners go on display, and if we're good enough we get to go again!

We also learn other things at the table, such as what our cultural heritage is. We learn what foods are served at certain times, such as holidays, and what those foods mean. We learn about our families by the dishes passed down from one generation to the next.

What, then, are we to make of a group that doesn't learn it's history and social mores from it's parents?

I have yet to meet anyone who is gay or lesbian who grew up in a gay environment. There may be a few out there, but I haven't come across them socially yet. While I knew I was gay from an early age (even without yet knowing the words), my real education on what it means to be gay didn't start until I was an adult, and interacting with the world as an adult. Even now, close to fifty, I'm still learning; it's not an instantanious process by a long shot.

What I've found is how often that education takes place, even now, at the table. Bars are too loud, late at night too steamy for real conversation. But at the table, be it at a restaurant or a shared dinner or a party (and there's always food at a party), people talk. They share their experiences, discuss politics and art and relationships. It was at the table that I really learned what and who I was, and how to stand up for myself.

In my first post on this thread, I went into some of the history of gay restaurants, but it is very clear from the following posts that gay restaurants still exist, even though gay people aren't banned from other establishments. I would suggest, therefore, that gay restaurants are where gay people gather to dine and interact socially. As with any other restaurant, the social experience is a major part of the whole, at times more important than the food itself. It's easier to find these restaurants in areas where the gay population has reached a certain critical mass, such as P'town, the Castro, and West Hollywood, but they can exist elsewhere as well.

And good news! It appears they're not just serving Continental-style 50's food these days. (Although someone, somewhere, is bound to decide to launch a new gay restaurant with exactly that kind of menu, just to be retro!)

[SobaAddict70]

Now if only a gay restaurant or failing that, a restaurant with a gay chef/staff, with high-end culinary aspirations would come on to the scene.

Vox tried to be, but the most it could garner was (I think) one star from the NYTimes. Service was a little too familiar, or at least according to Grimes.

Soba

[richw]

I think my experience of restaurants parallels that of the rest of the responses here; I can go pretty much anywhere in South Florida with my partner without attracting any unexpected reactions.  There used to be a place on South Beach, just off Lincoln Road, called Jeffrey's, that was well-known as a "gay date" restaurant-- you could stare soulfully into each other's eyes, hold hands or steal the occasional kiss without raising any eyebrows.  The same folks own a place called Magnum off the 79th Street Causeway that I've heard has the same ambiance, but I have not visited it.

There are certainly restaurants where we've seen a primarily gay clientele, but that's been in gay-friendly neighborhoods such as South Beach and Wilton Manors.  There used to be a place on US1 in WM called Nickels where we went often for brunch, and the clientele ran 50-50.  But I believe it's a neighborhood thing more than anything else.

Neil

Wilton Manors definitely seems to have 'gay restaurants'. I have visited Galanga in Wilton Manors a few times and enjoyed it. As a heterosexual male, it certainly feels like I am in a 'gay restaurant' when I dine there. Have you been there, Plax? The sushi is surprisingly good for a sushi/thai combo restaurant.

Rich

[plax]

Hey, Rich, thanks for the recommendation, but I'm not much of a sushi fan and the Picky Eater won't touch Thai. But I'll keep it in mind if anyone asks for a good place.

[Kikujiro]

For the historically-minded, I came across a review of a couple of gay restaurants in London circa 1987, including the above-mentioned Roy's. There seem to have been at least three centred around Earl's Court. Here's a sample of what the late-80s gay diner might have enjoyed.

At Roy's:

Deep-fried Lymeswold cheese with cranberry sauce

Fresh orange, lychee and melon melange flavoured with Cointreau

Pasta shells, sweetcorn, bacon and prawns, baked in a cream sauce, topped with cheese

Sauteed mussels and leeks with creamy orange sauce

--

Beef & vegetable casserole

Sirloin steak (supp.)

Aylesbury duck in honey and lemon sauce

Rack of English lamb

Billingsgate Pie

Vegetarian Pie

--

Choctop Sticky Whopper Show Stopper

Banana Bavarian Vanilla Bavarois

Scarlet's a Strawberry Tart

2 courses £10, puds £2.85

Meanwhile, down the road at the more aspirational Van B's -- table lamps, louvred wooden panelling, French chefs; waiters probably not in drag:

Avocado on a crepe with vegetables and cream sauce

Sea terrine served with basil sauce

Snails on puff pastry with hazlenut butter

--

Palate cleanser: lemon sorbet, peppermint oil

--

Poached salmon with Hollandaise

Confit of duck with walnuts and Calvados

Stuffed chicken breast in a cream and green pepper sauce.

Puds unspecified. £13.75 for three courses. A Chablies 1er cru would have put you back £17.75; Beaujolais Villages, £9.75.

[tryska]

3) that stupid kurma sutra position where the chap lies on his tummy and the lady sits on his bottom facing his feet and he bends his penis backwards until penertation is acheived.

wow.

learn something new everyday.

i'm surprised Atlanta didn't chime in on this thread, so i'll get right on that.

Off the top of my head i cannot think of any place - bar/club/restaurant that has turned away straight people. (even the leather bars, as long as you abide by dresscode)

But restaurants which i guess would be considered "gay" are:

einsteins, joes on juniper (both owned by the same group) - burger joints.

red chair, nickiemotos (do drag queen hostesses count? - if not then maybe not).

there are others, but i don't eat gay so much as i drink and dance gay.

[mongo_jones]

given the way kids these days adjectivize the word "gay" i'd say the olive garden would count.

[carswell]

Bruce and I are planning on moving cross-country sometime soon to Rehoboth Beach, DE, known as a heavily gay resort town.  We're moving to Delaware to be closer to his family.  We're moving to Rehoboth for the community.  But I can't think of a single restaurant in Rehoboth that would not welcome a straight family or couple, the same as they would welcome a gay couple or family.

This just in from Rehoboth Beach, where my sister spent a recent weeked with her hubby and daughter. She learned a new euphemism for gays (à la "friends of Dorothy") when she asked the owner of their B&B — a straight-laced retired military officer — for dining advice and mentioned that Lala Land looked interesting. "Oh, no," he warned, "that's for people from D.C." She surpressed a laugh and enjoyed making him squirm by replying, "Well, great. We're from D.C., too!"

[Squeat Mungry]

About five years ago I travelled to Portland over Christmas with three het couples and one gay male couple, one partner in which was starring in a play there. One night we decided we wanted to fine dine, and asked the hotel receptionist about a posh-looking place across the street. She replied that it was considered one of Portland's finest restaurants (sorry, but I can't remember the name of either hotel or restaurant), but then asked, in a very serious and concerned tone, "You do know that that is a 'gay establishment'?" We hadn't, but all nine of us burst into laughter, which seemed to bewilder the poor girl until one of us explained, "We're from San Francisco! It couldn't possibly matter less to us!"

After that she cheerfully booked a table for us, and that evening we enjoyed some very fine traditional French food and service.

Cheers,

Squeat (located half a block away from the afore-mentioned and aptly-named Mecca)

[phaelon56]

Presumably, if a bar or restaurant proclaims itself as a gay establishment, that would mean that non-gays aren't welcome.

I doubt that such is the case. It wouldn't be unusual for a hetero person with no gay friends or little to no exposure to gay culture to feel a bit uncomfortable or out of place but I suspect it would be the rare exception when an establishment itself is intentionally making the straight person feel unwelcome.

A few years I popped into a neighborhood bar I was unfamiliar with to see an R 'n B band I'd heard of but had never seen perform. The bar had changed hands in the years that I'd been away from the area and now drew an almost exclusively black clientele. Despite the fact that my best friend was (and is) black, as by chance was the woman I'd been dating for years, I felt very uncomfortable and out of place. No one really paid me any attention other than a few initial glances my way when I first arrived. The sense of feeling unwelcome was all self-induced. When I commented on the experience to my friend and my GF they said "Now you know how we feel" (except in their case, on many occasions when they were the only black person in an establishment, they really were made to feel unwelcome).

Surprisingly enough, my current place of residence (also my hometown), has a restaurant that is very specifically targeted at a gay clientele, although all are welcome.

"Dubbed the No. 1 lesbian restaurant in the country by Girlfriends magazine, Tu Tu is as much resource as restaurant."

Tu Tu Venu

I'll try it one of these days soon and report back in the NY Forum - my only reason for not going there is that they never advertise, it falls under the radar and I forget to try it out (not to mention that only one restaurant in town has the iced coffee with condensed milk that I crave and I keep going there repeatedly).

[naguere]

Celebrating my 63 Birthday on March 13th this year at St John in London with my four sons and partners, a male from another table swept past my back and muttered 'Faggot', or was it 'Faggit' close to my head.

I attended to it, but it wasn't friendly and my rabbit got cold.

St John may be gay friendly but that misguided fellow was not..

Edited June 15, 2004 by naguere (log)

[carswell]

In my first post on this thread, I went into some of the history of gay restaurants, but it is very clear from the following posts that gay restaurants still exist, even though gay people aren't banned from other establishments.  I would suggest, therefore, that gay restaurants are where gay people gather to dine and interact socially.  As with any other restaurant, the social experience is a major part of the whole, at times more important than the food itself.  It's easier to find these restaurants in areas where the gay population has reached a certain critical mass, such as P'town, the Castro, and West Hollywood, but they can exist elsewhere as well.

Montreal used to have a number of de facto gay restaurants spread around the city. In the late '70s, for example, there was Au Jardin, a vegetarian restaurant on the Plateau, and TipTop, That Great Canadian Cafe and, if I recall correctly, the Limelight (not the disco of the same name) in western downtown plus others in the Mile End and nothern Plateau neighbourhoods. In the years since, the booming gay scene has become concentrated in the so-called Village east of downtown, where there are restaurants galore. What's interesting is how many of them are mediocre or worse and yet do a land-office business. Is it because of the captive audience (ghetto mentality)? Dining taking a back seat to convenience (proximity to bars, saunas, shops, community organizations and home)? Your theory that good food is not necessarily the raison d'être of such places? Probably all of the above. There are also parallels to be drawn with the city's hetero see-and-be-scenery strips like St-Laurent north of Sherbrooke and Crescent between Ste-Catherine and Sherbrooke: a handful of decent dining spots in a sea of dreck.

[tryska]

crescent is trendy now?

back in my day, crescent was where the yanks hung out and got pissy.

[carswell]

crescent is trendy now?

back in my day, crescent was where the yanks hung out and got pissy.

Point taken. St-Laurent is certainly trendier; St-Denis between Sherbrooke and de Maisonneuve is probably the better east-end analogue to Crescent. On the other hand, the arrival of Newtown (Jacques Villeneuve's upscale-ish resto/bar on Crescent and de Maisonneuve) and Rosalie (a bistro one block over on Mountain, the latest venture of Globe's Dave McMillian) and the sprucing-up of many of longstanding establishments have added lustre. And it was party central for last weekend's F1 celebrations. Still, there's no Hard Rock Cafe on St-Laurent and no movie stars on Crescent, so you're more right than wrong.

[tryska]

*lol* i guess the more things change, the more they stay the same.

[foodie52]

Celebrating my 63 Birthday on March 13th this year at St John in London with my four sons and partners, a male from another table swept past my back and muttered 'Faggot', or was it 'Faggit' close to my head.

I attended to it, but it wasn't friendly and my rabbit got cold.

St John may be gay friendly but that misguided fellow was not..

I'd let Fergus Henderson know about that. It's inexcusable. They have a website : I bet there is an email address.

[LynDel]

In Boston there is Club Cafe, trying to find their website, but here's one description:

Club Cafe and Lounge, in the Back Bay/South End area, is among the smartest spots in town for gay men and lesbians -- even when they're dining or partying with their straight friends. In addition to a stylish restaurant, there's a piano bar up front and a video bar in the back

Here's the website http://www.clubcafe.com/ClubCafe.asp

[JennyUptown]

I for one am so glad for Rehoboth becoming known as a gay travel destination. If the town had stuck to its roots (Bible thumping families having revivals on the beach), we might have nothing to eat but Thrasher's french fries and Grotto pizza. I truly credit the much-more-upscale-than-most-of-the-visiting-families gay crowd for the influx of high-end dining and great shopping too.

Just my 2c.

Dear old Dad has adjusted for the most part (we've only been going there for a decade or so), but there are times when he still think he's being eyed up on the beach or flirted with by waiters. Bless his mid-60s, hairy chested heart...

[Comfort Me]

Now that's a new one on me...I've been to any number of restaurants in the largest Chicago gay neighborhood (nicknamed "Boys' Town", on the North Side), but I can't -- for the life of me -- recall any that cater only and exclusively to that clientele. For that matter, I've never seen any restaurant turf out a customer who (a) had a reservation (if that was required), (b) showed up on time, ( c ) behaved nicely, (d) spent lots of $$$, and (e) tipped well. I have a real problem imagining any restaurant in these spooky economic times who would turn away a customer who wanted to spend some dough during working hours.

How naive am I? Or am I simply observing what FG saw as the "real Midwestern value system", having been born and raised here in Chicago?

They don't cater only and exclusively to the gay community, because in Cook County that would be illegal -- we had a fairly comprehensive human rights ordinance which prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation.

But there are restaurants which have a predominantly gay clientelle or theme. I'm thinking, just off the top of my head, of the Kit Kat Supper Club on Halsted, with female impersonnators/servers who put on drag shows while they wait table, and of Cornelias on Cornelia.