Pars Persian
Food in the AV sucks.
Pizza is a really sketchy affair. They have poultry products they call Buffalo wings, but really don't have any wings here.
The grocery stores are all unionized, which means a total lack of quality control, job pride, and customer service.
In complete reversal of the situation in New York, the most acceptable place to shop for groceries is friggin Walmart; I have to think this is due to the union/vs quality factor, since Walmart is the only non-unionized store here, I think. Costco is also pretty good, and they tend to compensate employees better than Walmart.
Most of the restaurants are TGI Tuesdays and Olivebees, all with the same, tired menu of mostly frozen and processed items dropped in a deep fryer just before serving; fast food with alcohol and table service. And there are the sirloins they hope you buy, because the profit margin on the sirloins is good, and most suburbanites think "sirloin" means something good. It doesn't.
My favorite locally-owned place so far has been Goldfish, a sushi place. It's okay. We've taken my Mom and Dad and Kelly's Kelly there, all people who don't care much for sushi, Goldfish's specialty. They all found interesting things to eat there and seemed to like it, but finally the last time I was there, I realized that the sushi wasn't really that great, at least not the way I've learned to like sushi.
In my perfect sushi world, the rice is cold and really sticky, so sticky that all of the sushi or sushi roll comes with the rest, with nothing falling apart. Every time at Goldfish, the rice has fallen apart. Also I like my raw fish to be REALLY cold, otherwise I feel like maybe it's not a great idea to be eating some raw fish.
I'm sure this is a product of my uneducated palette, but the best sushi I've had that meets these criteria above is from grocery stores with fresh-made sushi stands. In these, the sushi is made all day, but then placed directly into a fridge, re-cooling everything after preparation. Wegmans did this really well, as they did everything else really well. The Vons on Palmdale Blvd has one that's really good, too. And I go there often enough that the woman who makes the sushi knows me by name (I suck and have forgotten her name).
So, when we want to treat ourselves, we either make out own pizza, grill a steak, or for me, I go to Vons for some sushi and a spicy tuna roll. We rarely bother going to a restaurant.
But Kelly noticed a new restaurant was due to open up in the, I don't know what the call it, the fore-plaza to the Walmart / Sams Club shopping area; the strip mall between the road and the Walmart's main parking lot.
We stalked it for a few months, then finally it opened about a month ago, so Kelly took me there yesterday for my birthday.
Well, we finally have a place to eat. It's about the size of Bangkok in Liverpool, maybe a little smaller. The owner came to our table a few times, he had no "Rock and Roll!" charisma, but was nice and very competent in his position. The menus were stylish, had been edited, and had only the whole dollar value, no decimal places!
The food was fabulous. Kelly had a salad with a fantastic dressing we couldn't figure out (citrus? vinegar?) with no oil, and a ground meat kebab (think gyro meat) and a tenderloin kebab combo, with a side of jasmine rice and a grilled tomato.
I had stuffed grape leaves and the rack of lamb, which was split into each steak and cooked in a tandoori oven / grill, with a side of jasmine rice and a grilled tomato.
The lamb was amazingly tender and had a complex herb flavor. The rice was perfect too.
Kelly and I have a somewhat deep personal and relationship with middle eastern food. The two semesters in college after the one that Kelly and I started dating, I had a roommate named Ismail, who was an Iraqi Kurd whose family had managed to escape Kurdistan in the early 90s and establish themselves (after spending five years in a camp in Turkey and two years in a tent in Guam) in Binghamton, NY.
Ismail was a sweet soul, the oldest of 14 children, eternally happy and optimistic, brilliant in his civil engineering profession, dedicated to his family, and his religion, and he LOVED Kelly, meaning he loved her with me and loved that I was dating her.
"She is not like these other girls, she is not in the clubs drinking and having all the sex."
He and I had long, late night conversations about politics, Islam, Iraq, and many other things. I learned to have so much respect for him and his family. One of my biggest regrets in life is turning down the invitation to go home with him for a weekend. It was an unusual and awesome honor that I squandered.
He went home every weekend and came back Sunday evenings with huge Tupperware containers full of flat bread, stuffed cabbage and grape leaves, baklava, and other "package foods," things rolled or stuffed into dough or leaves.
It was awesome. Kelly and I and our other two roommates, Nat and Jason, were ALWAYS in the dorm apartment Sunday evenings.
So that was 2002. Ismail graduated in 2003 and left his new home country as a US citizen, with an engineering drgree, on his own free will to support the American effort in Iraq, something he talked hours with me in support of in the year leading up to the US invasion. So he went there and became an interpreter working with the US Marines, and was killed when his convoy was ambushed as they were moving in to start the first big assault on Fallujah in the spring of 2004.
Ismail Zebari was a proud US citizen and patriot, a proud and devout Muslim, a proud Kurd, and a proud Iraqi patriot, and he died defending all those ideals. He was also possibly the nicest and most sincere person I've ever met.
And as sad and infuriating as his death is, he's the only person I know of who wanted the US invasion, supported it in words and action, and had a real stake in what happened. So his death should be less unsettling than some kid from Iowa who had nothing at stake in Iraq.
So the middle eastern cooking classes I've taken and Kelly's and my fascination with middle eastern cuisine spawns from our hero worship of our friend Ismail and a desire to recall the innocence of our pre-Iraq invasion dorm suite optimism and our sweet, sweet friend.
Pizza is a really sketchy affair. They have poultry products they call Buffalo wings, but really don't have any wings here.
The grocery stores are all unionized, which means a total lack of quality control, job pride, and customer service.
In complete reversal of the situation in New York, the most acceptable place to shop for groceries is friggin Walmart; I have to think this is due to the union/vs quality factor, since Walmart is the only non-unionized store here, I think. Costco is also pretty good, and they tend to compensate employees better than Walmart.
Most of the restaurants are TGI Tuesdays and Olivebees, all with the same, tired menu of mostly frozen and processed items dropped in a deep fryer just before serving; fast food with alcohol and table service. And there are the sirloins they hope you buy, because the profit margin on the sirloins is good, and most suburbanites think "sirloin" means something good. It doesn't.
My favorite locally-owned place so far has been Goldfish, a sushi place. It's okay. We've taken my Mom and Dad and Kelly's Kelly there, all people who don't care much for sushi, Goldfish's specialty. They all found interesting things to eat there and seemed to like it, but finally the last time I was there, I realized that the sushi wasn't really that great, at least not the way I've learned to like sushi.
In my perfect sushi world, the rice is cold and really sticky, so sticky that all of the sushi or sushi roll comes with the rest, with nothing falling apart. Every time at Goldfish, the rice has fallen apart. Also I like my raw fish to be REALLY cold, otherwise I feel like maybe it's not a great idea to be eating some raw fish.
I'm sure this is a product of my uneducated palette, but the best sushi I've had that meets these criteria above is from grocery stores with fresh-made sushi stands. In these, the sushi is made all day, but then placed directly into a fridge, re-cooling everything after preparation. Wegmans did this really well, as they did everything else really well. The Vons on Palmdale Blvd has one that's really good, too. And I go there often enough that the woman who makes the sushi knows me by name (I suck and have forgotten her name).
So, when we want to treat ourselves, we either make out own pizza, grill a steak, or for me, I go to Vons for some sushi and a spicy tuna roll. We rarely bother going to a restaurant.
But Kelly noticed a new restaurant was due to open up in the, I don't know what the call it, the fore-plaza to the Walmart / Sams Club shopping area; the strip mall between the road and the Walmart's main parking lot.
We stalked it for a few months, then finally it opened about a month ago, so Kelly took me there yesterday for my birthday.
Well, we finally have a place to eat. It's about the size of Bangkok in Liverpool, maybe a little smaller. The owner came to our table a few times, he had no "Rock and Roll!" charisma, but was nice and very competent in his position. The menus were stylish, had been edited, and had only the whole dollar value, no decimal places!
The food was fabulous. Kelly had a salad with a fantastic dressing we couldn't figure out (citrus? vinegar?) with no oil, and a ground meat kebab (think gyro meat) and a tenderloin kebab combo, with a side of jasmine rice and a grilled tomato.
I had stuffed grape leaves and the rack of lamb, which was split into each steak and cooked in a tandoori oven / grill, with a side of jasmine rice and a grilled tomato.
The lamb was amazingly tender and had a complex herb flavor. The rice was perfect too.
Kelly and I have a somewhat deep personal and relationship with middle eastern food. The two semesters in college after the one that Kelly and I started dating, I had a roommate named Ismail, who was an Iraqi Kurd whose family had managed to escape Kurdistan in the early 90s and establish themselves (after spending five years in a camp in Turkey and two years in a tent in Guam) in Binghamton, NY.
Ismail was a sweet soul, the oldest of 14 children, eternally happy and optimistic, brilliant in his civil engineering profession, dedicated to his family, and his religion, and he LOVED Kelly, meaning he loved her with me and loved that I was dating her.
"She is not like these other girls, she is not in the clubs drinking and having all the sex."
He and I had long, late night conversations about politics, Islam, Iraq, and many other things. I learned to have so much respect for him and his family. One of my biggest regrets in life is turning down the invitation to go home with him for a weekend. It was an unusual and awesome honor that I squandered.
He went home every weekend and came back Sunday evenings with huge Tupperware containers full of flat bread, stuffed cabbage and grape leaves, baklava, and other "package foods," things rolled or stuffed into dough or leaves.
It was awesome. Kelly and I and our other two roommates, Nat and Jason, were ALWAYS in the dorm apartment Sunday evenings.
So that was 2002. Ismail graduated in 2003 and left his new home country as a US citizen, with an engineering drgree, on his own free will to support the American effort in Iraq, something he talked hours with me in support of in the year leading up to the US invasion. So he went there and became an interpreter working with the US Marines, and was killed when his convoy was ambushed as they were moving in to start the first big assault on Fallujah in the spring of 2004.
Ismail Zebari was a proud US citizen and patriot, a proud and devout Muslim, a proud Kurd, and a proud Iraqi patriot, and he died defending all those ideals. He was also possibly the nicest and most sincere person I've ever met.
And as sad and infuriating as his death is, he's the only person I know of who wanted the US invasion, supported it in words and action, and had a real stake in what happened. So his death should be less unsettling than some kid from Iowa who had nothing at stake in Iraq.
So the middle eastern cooking classes I've taken and Kelly's and my fascination with middle eastern cuisine spawns from our hero worship of our friend Ismail and a desire to recall the innocence of our pre-Iraq invasion dorm suite optimism and our sweet, sweet friend.
I think the secret ingredient was rose water.
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Nice essay you've got here, Chuck. You have all these different things you're talking about, but it still makes a nice little circle.
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Yeah, I read it finally and I don't see the circle, it's really just a long thought stream written down, but I don't have the time to work things out to make sense or even to get the typos out. If I did that I'd post about one entry a month, and actually less than that because if I spend too much time on something, I start to hate it and I'd probably never publish.
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I haven't read it yet and don't really want to, I think it's really three essays if I wanted to flush it out rather than just post something.
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Wow! Your friend was amazing and I got a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye upon reading of his death. Your tribute was beautiful.
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It is awesome that you honor him on a regular basis like you do. You are both really good friends to have.
: )
I'd love to eat there the next time I'm in town. : )
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Hot enough for you out in Palmdale?? I was looking at the weather and it says "97 degrees" "Feels like 97 degrees"
I don't know why I find that amusing, but I totally do.
It's a good thing its a "dry heat"!! Ha ha.
You always have your sprinklers - or the lazy river at Dry Town. : )
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The back yard here tends to be about 5 degrees cooler than the Palmdale forecasts. I think it's a combination of a little more eleation and a little more mountain air that slips into the Antelope Valley via the Leona Valley, which is the Elizabeth Lake road valley right in front of us. The greenery in my yard may cause some evaporative cooling all day too.
Anway, the themometer here has had a daily high of 89 since Sunday, but today it got up to 93. It's 91 now. Anything under 100 is tolerable here.
Kelly and I went for a walk the other night and it was proably 79 and breezy and it actually felt chilly to us.
I wish I would have taken you on the drive if you just turn left out of our development and in two miles you're in the Angeles forest, and the drive that goes up and oer the hill back into the Anteloe Valley from the Leona is awesome. It's like a 20 minute round trip from here and it rivals some of the scenery we saw on the trip up north.
Hurry back here, we missed so much!
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Jesse beat Dad, Mom AND Bill into the lake this year. He went swimming on Wednesday.
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Welcome to the AV!
Googled Pars Persian to see if it was open. Way excited about lunch now. Thanks!
Andrea Mills, D.C.
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How cool. Kelly keeps trying to get me to take her back to Pars, which I'm not resisting, I'm just too busy this month. Soon though, very soon.
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I know I'm a little late to the game on this one, but is Bangkok in Liverpool like Brigadoon?
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Bangkok was the best restaurant in all of the Syracuse area. It was small and unassuming, family owned, and the second generation, particularly the founding couple's adorable 20-something daughter, worked there. She ran the floor and they ran the kitchen, but the father would come out on the floor one an hour and say, either "welcome to Bangkok" if he didn't recognize you or "welcome home" if he did. Either way, he'd complete the conversation by saying an enthusiastic, "ROCK AND ROLL!" It's sort of his trade mark. The food was always really good, and everything was fresh. They got to know s a bit and it felt like home. So in a way it is our Brigadoon, in that all the pieces for that type of restaurant may exist here, we just have to discover it, or it has to just appear on day.
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Thanks I have been looking for middle eastern foor out here! and reviews or a site for the new place!!
This helps..
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Chuck & Kelly
I just want to thank you and Kelly for coming to Pars Restaurant and the comments that you made on behalf of the first and the only Fine Persian Restaurant in the heart of Antelope Valley. We are proud to be out here and serve the people of Antelope Valley and surrounding areas. As you may be aware -Persian Cuisine is prepared traditionally, appeals to many different nations and cultures in the world, especially those with a pallet for tasteful dishes.
Persian Cuisine is renown for being prepared in the most healthy manner, slow cooking, using herbal spices (not Hot), such as "Safaran", are used - as Persian's believe that every ingredient should keep and deliver its own taste and goodness. Persian Dishes are not supposed to be greasy, as also the Rice is prepared in a manner to be healthy and not sticky. That is what Persian Cooks should be able to deliver and serve, and Pars Restaurant will just do that “Best Persian Cuisine in the most elegant Persian Style". We at Pars Restaurant hope to be able to serve you and Kelly and all other people in the community for the years to come. As an added spices to our Restaurant we have added Live Persian Entertainment featuring Jamsheed every Wednesday and Arabic Dance every Friday so our neighbors can experience a relaxing evening with us in a friendly atmosphere. We hope to see you soon.
Sincerely,
Mark,
Pars Restaurant Manager (owner)
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Oh yeah... THAT is cool.
I'm SOOOO dining there the next time I'm in CA.
Other restaurants should take note. I don't believe I've ever seen such a thing in my life. You're going again this weekend, right?? : )
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Um, actually, we're sitting here at home waiting to go to Pars as we speak. Cool coincidence. I'm hungry.
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We shall expect to be taken there in May!!!!!!
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pick dates.
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Chuck I agree with you 100% I have never had such a delicious food in my life. By the way, Pars has the best mojitos in town. I recommend the Lamb Rack!
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I've never had a mojito there or anywhere else, oddly. I'll have to give that a try next time. The lamb rack really is incredible at Pars.
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I went to the restraunt this friday night. It was really packed so I was glad I got a reservation. The servers were real polite and my food came out fast. The zereshk polo with chicken was delicious. It's like different flavors dancing around on your tastebuds and the chicken just melts in your mouth.
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Forwarded this to some friends, appreciate your advice
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