Whatever happened to "family-style" restaurants

[tryska]

ummm...how does family-style differ from a buffet?

[Toliver]

ummm...how does family-style differ from a buffet?

With Family-style, the food is brought to you in large serving bowls to pass around to everyone at the table whether they are with your dining party or not. With Buffet, the food is set out on steam tables and everyone walks through and serves themselves.

It's called Family-style since it's most like an actual family dinner where you pass the bowls & dishes of food around for everyone to help themselves.

The weird thing about the Basque family-style dinners is the courses. One course will be something ordinary like french fries and the next course will be pickled tongue. Then out will come the bean soup or salad and the course after that will be oxtail soup. An ecclectic mix, to say the least.

[tryska]

ooohhh....i see. seems ripe for table-side calamities actually.

[marlena spieler]

[

The weird thing about the Basque family-style dinners is the courses. One course will be something ordinary like french fries and the next course will be pickled tongue. Then out will come the bean soup or salad and the course after that will be oxtail soup. An ecclectic mix, to say the least.

I know, toliver, this was one of the first things i noticed as a child when we went to these places. i loved this aspect! and always wondered what on earth was going to be next. one place we used to go to had the most divine dish of ordinary humble vegetables, mostly cabbage and chickpeas, but cooked in a stock rich with prosciutto-bone flavour. funnily enough, my family, jewish-enough-culturally, who would never go near anything that appeared to have pork in it, just loved this dish.

as for me, porky-girl, i loved every drop of juice, every morsel of vegetable.

and when the fries hit the table, i was in heaven.

oh, and there were usually set menus for different days. some were great, big stewying meaty things, ravioli day was a big hit in our family, but then.......some of the days were really awful. you had to play it just right. and then: gluttonous bliss!

and the long tables were fun!

x marlena

ps anyone know of any places like this in northern california that are still going strong?

[lala]

Here in the Northwest, there are a few of these places, in old logging camps. I ate at one in lower Oregon (Brookings? Gold Beach?) that was famous for this. Home-style food, mainly meat and potatoes, pies for dessert. While the food wasn't inspiring, it was interesting to get a sense of the history of the place.

[andiesenji]

x marlena

ps anyone know of any places like this in northern california that are still going strong?

I haven't been for two or three years, but as far as I know, Basque Norte in Chico is still in business.

(Another town I visited just for dog shows, Chico, Yuba City and so on for the "Walnut circuit".)

Imagine trying to sleep in a motor home under a walnut tree when the nuts were falling. As bad as a hailstorm but not as damaging......

I just called my friend who was there last year. It is somewhere on Esplanade...

[Toliver]

anyone know of any places like this in northern california that are still going strong?

Marlena,

Regarding the Basque food, you're right about the daily menu changing, now that I think of it. The evening I went to Pyrenee's Cafe, with a large group from work (I think there were 30 of us), the main dish was the oxtail soup, though it wasn't really very soupy. Many in our group were uninitiated to the Basque cuisine and declined the oxtail soup once they found out what it was. That meant more for me!

I am currently living in Bakersfield where Pyrenee's Cafe still offers family dining (though I haven't been there in years) which is probably too far south for your parameters. You can also eat in the bar.

It was in the bar that I first tasted ginger beer, which is a story for some other day.

Pyrenee's also has a well known Bakery that provides bread for many restaurants and grocery stores.

The first time I had pickled tongue here in town, I was reminded of the old joke: "I don't eat anything that can taste me back." You will still find pickled tongue at various buffets around town...even some of the chinese buffets offer it!

edited to add: If anyone wants some Basque recipes, these are from the Kern County Basque Club: Click Here

Edited June 10, 2004 by Toliver (log)

[andiesenji]

My friends and I usually go to the Wool Growers because it is easy to find from the fairgrounds.

I can't recall the other restaurant we frequented, all I can think of is Makita, but that isn't it.

[Toliver]

My friends and I usually go to the Wool Growers because it is easy to find from the fairgrounds.

I can't recall the other restaurant we frequented, all I can think of is Makita, but that isn't it.

I believe you're thinking of Maitia's. They used to have quite a large restaurant on Union Avenue but closed it and moved to a strip mall in the booming Northwest area. I haven't been to the new restaurant but the word I've heard is that something got lost in the move and it's not the same anymore.

Between you and me, while Woolgrower's is the number one restaurant for Basque food here, during the last meal I ate there we were joined at the table by a couple of cockroachs (I guess they heard the food was good ) and I've never been back since.

Speaking of family-style restaurants, does anyone remember the restaurant chain called The Big Yellow House? They were popular about 15 or 20 years ago but are no longer around. What made them distinctive (besides all the restaurants looking like big yellow houses ) was that they served the food family style. Unlike some of the other restaurants mentioned previously, at the Big Yellow House you didn't share your food with strangers, meaning your party was seated and when the food was brought out, you passed it around to the people at your table. I remember there were always long lines waiting to get in and we never seemed to get enough food to pass around, which says something either about us or the stingy-ness of the restaurant (which may be why they're no longer around).

Another quasi-Family-Style restaurant was the Hungry Hunter chain (which has since "disbanded", if you can call it that, to become similar restaurants but operating under different names). While your main course was yours and yours alone, the starters were usually shared. The soup (if ordered) was brought out in a mini-cauldron that you passed around the table and served yourself. The salad came out in a big bowl which you also passed around. With the salad, they also brought a small condiments tray with the fixin's for the salad (bell pepper, green onion, bacon bits, etc) that you could pass around, too.

And now that I think of it, the Olive Garden currently offers quasi-Family-Style dining in regards to their bowls of salad and their baskets of garlic breadsticks that usually come with every meal.

[andiesenji]

Speaking of family-style restaurants, does anyone remember the restaurant chain called The Big Yellow House?

The one in Summerland, north of Carpenteria is still open.

You can see it from 101 travelling north.

We often go there after one of the dog shows in the area.

[marie-louise]

anyone know of any places like this in northern california that are still going strong?

The Steamboat Inn in southern Oregon does this-but you have to stay there. We passed through on a road trip a few years back-it's on a road called "The Waterfall Highway." It was a nice place to stay. The funniest part was everyone kept asking us, "What did you catch?" and it took US a while to catch on that we were the only non-fishermen staying there!!! We had no idea what they were talking about... We met some really nice people over our meal, but they really just wanted to talk about the day's fishing.

Those places in Occidental do a variation of this. You order an entree and then all the other courses are brought out family-style, but just to your table.

A third variation is what the delightfully romantic La Boheme in Carmel does: since it is prix-fixe meal, they serve each course family-style, but again, just to your table and it in beautiful dishes, artfully plated. Scroll down .this page to see an example.

While the idea of a communal meal sounds fun, the idea of eating food that's been passed back and forth among 60 diners makes me wonder if this is a good idea sanitation-wise

Edited June 13, 2004 by marie-louise (log)

[andiesenji]

While the idea of a communal meal sounds fun, the idea of eating food that's been passed back and forth among 60 diners makes me wonder if this is a good idea sanitation-wise

It was only passed back and forth among 20 people, and I have had sit-down dinners for more than this without any worry about sanitation.

The Greek place of which I wrote, had three long tables set up, each seating 20 people. Each of these three tables were served identical dishes, which were all of their regular dinner items and sides with occasionally a specialty item added.

It was a very popular place.