Gaters Kebab Hot

Location: Fremont, CA
Cuisine type: Middle Eastern, Mediterranean
Atmosphere: austere, crammed cafe style
Meal: lunch
Overall score: 6.4

Nina

A tiny, narrow restaurant in a Fremont strip mall, Gaters Kebab has a very authentic feel due to the aroma in the air and the crowd sourced pictures of food that cover the walls. It seems like customers in the know just call ahead and order carryout, which is a wise choice since there are only 3-4 small tables in the whole restaurant, and the atmosphere is not the most ideal for a quiet, peaceful meal.
The dish I picked from the menu was a mixed plate that promised chicken and lamb steak chunks, along with rice, greek salad and hummus. At the counter I was told that they were out of lamb, but could serve me chicken and lamb shawarma instead, which would essentially replace the steak quality meat with slices from the gyro pillar of meat. I agreed and was glad to see I was also being charged less (shawarma had its separate entry on the menu as it turns out). I picked the spicy option, which was actually quite great. The sauce had a rich flavor, with enough heat to give it a kick, and the tzatziki sauce that came on the side was a great compliment. That said, there was a little too much filler rice on the plate, and the greek salad was so acidic I couldn’t eat too much of it. I noticed that there wasn’t any hummus on my plate (even though I had a few pita triangles), and when I asked about it I was given a vague excuse that the menu had changed and then handed a sauce-sized container with a spoonful of hummus. That bite, however, was quite amazing. They make their hummus in house (as evidenced by the enormous pot of chickpeas that they were boiling on their burner) and the consistency was smooth, the flavor fresh and rich (a little more sesame kick than usual, but well balanced) and the texture creamy.
Overall, this is a decent place for a quick bite to eat, though next time I would definitely go for takeout and order a sandwich rather than a plate to take advantage of the delicious pita instead of a large amount of rice.

Food 6
Drinks N/A
Atmosphere 6
Service 7
Value 8

Ben

This is pretty typical gyro place, fast and cheap. The food is decent, would recommend going with one of the steak cuts rather than gyro meat for the quality, unfortunately they were out when we were there. The hicken gyro was a little dry, processed. The vegetables were all pretty fresh, tzatziki and hummus were both good. The baklava was decent. Overall a pretty standard gyro place. The service is a little gruff, reminds me of Turkish doner places.

Food 6
Drinks N/A
Atmosphere 4
Service 7
Value 8

Kumako Ramen

Location: San Jose, CA
Cuisine type: Japanese, Ramen
Atmosphere: hole-in-the-wall cafe, plain decor
Meal: lunch
Overall score: 7.67

Nina

For a quick Saturday lunch we headed to Japantown in San Jose, which we found out with surprise is very close to our place. The neighborhood had a small town feel, with wide, clean streets, and small storefronts with various Japanese owned/run businesses. We walked past a series of restaurants, specialty stores and grocery stores before arriving at this small cafe style restaurant. The interior was fairly dark, but it didn’t convey a romantic atmosphere as much as a feeling of austerity. The wooden tables were worn and darkened by time, and the bar seating had a direct view of the food preparation area. The kitchen was very basic and modest, with a large vat of simmering water used to warm up the ramen noodles, and a few burners and pots used to prepare the meats and veggies.
We ordered a bowl of edamame as an appetizer since we weren’t sure how long it would take to get our food, and I was glad we did since we had time to snack on the entire bowl before we got our ramen. However, I was very disenchanted when I saw the preparation of the edamame (they poured a handful of frozen pods from a bag into a plastic container and microwaved it with a bit of water for a few minutes), and disappointed that it ended up overcooked and mushy.

My entree was a roast duck ramen. The flavor of the broth gets 10 points, it was rich and flavorful, and I would pick it over pho broth anytime. The plate had a great appearance, with a small bundle of green sprouts, mushrooms, bean sprouts and scallions distributed around the bowl, and topped with appetizing chunks of duck. The meat was a little hard to eat, since there was almost as much bone as there was meat in each of the pieces, but the flavor was undeniably well developed and quite enticing. The portion size was appropriate and the dish struck a great balance between the various ingredients.
This place is a solid choice, though I would definitely prefer if they made more of their food from scratch and without the use of microwaves.

Food 7
Drinks 7
Atmosphere 7
Service 8
Value 8

Ben

A dimly lit little restaurant in Japantown in San Jose. A tasty but not overwhelming broth, and a good portion of pork in the curry pork ramen I ordered. I liked the ramen a lot, in the way of a comfort food - tasty, addictive and easy to keep eating. There’s a good amount of options of broth types and all meats one would expect, and hot / sweet sauces to tailor the flavor. I liked the cozy bar running along the few tables, and a TV in the top corner of the bar contributed to a relaxed, homey feel. There were two cooks and 1 waitress working at the time, all entirely visible from the bar, so you could see the whole process of your food being prepared. It does lose a bit of the romance to see edamame poured from a frozen bag into a bowl and microwaved before putting in front of you, but the ramen was cooked fresh from prepared broths. They had a decent bar with some beers on tap and bottled and a spirit selection as well as sakes. The prices were reasonable as well. This is a place I would likely visit a lot if I were within walking distance.

Food 8
Drinks 8
Atmosphere 8
Service 8
Value 8

Khana Khazana

Location: Sunnyvale, CA
Website: www.khanakhazanaca.com
Cuisine type: Indian
Atmosphere: casual cafe style seating, limited buffet
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 7.1

Nina

Khana Khazana is one of the many small strip-mall restaurants so prevalent in the South Bay, but it so happened that it was convenient place to stop for a quick weeknight dinner on this particular day, with a nice Groupon Now deal to go along with it. As it often happens when we have these types of deals for small restaurants, we have a hard time meeting the minimum spend between the two of us. Khana Khazana had a modest buffet on display for really quick grab-and-go meals, but also a much more comprehensive menu with a wide variety of ingredients and preparations.
We ordered a meal with three curries (chicken, chickpea and paneer) with roti and chilli chicken (a Chinese Indian fusion dish), carrot pudding for dessert, and also goat curry to go. While the curries were good but not spectacular, the chilli chicken was delicious, with a good balance between sharp spice, rich flavor and moist chunks of meat. The pudding was a little too sweet for me (which is rare), but that’s not really unusual for Indian dessert from my previous experience.
Overall, this place is a reasonable choice for a quick meal in a clean and cozy cafe setting. However, due to the prevalence of small restaurants like this in the area and to the lukewarm enthusiasm I feel about their food, I wouldn’t go too far out of my way to go back.

Food 7
Drinks n/a
Atmosphere 6
Service 9
Value 8

Ben

An Indian fast food place, with 6 dishes on the bar which can be purchased right away in combinations of 2 or 3. We ordered the combination of three curry dishes (chicken, chickpeas, paneer) with roti, and they were decent. The chili chicken (a fried, Chinese/Indian dish) was flavorful, but the best dish I had was the freshly prepared goat curry. The carrot dessert was also decent. The place is pretty small and narrow, and is really more built to be a take-out stop as they don’t really have any service but a water pitcher and self-serve plates / silverware. The value is decent, and (surprise) the freshly cooked food was a lot better than on the bar. However, for what it is - it is a good quick stop for some decent, low cost and fast indian food.

Food 8
Drinks n/a
Atmosphere 5
Service 5
Value 8

Falafels N More

Location: San Jose, CA
Cuisine type: Mediterranean
Atmosphere: casual, fast-food
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 8.3

Nina

This is one of the small cafe/restaurants in our neighborhood. We stopped by just as they were closing, which had its advantages as we quickly found out. I just wanted to try some falafel, but since they have to fry them in batches and they had some out already they have us twice as many as would normally go in an order. The falafel were delicious, a little too perfectly shaped to have been hand rolled, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the mixture wasn’t prepared in house. The outside was crunchy and golden, while the inside was smooth and moist, perfect combination. We also ordered a side of dolmas, which are the mediterranean grape leaf wraps - these were light and exceptionally creamy, balanced out by an acidic tanginess from the vinegar and olive oil mixture they were drizzled with. Finally came even more perks related to stopping by at closing time - they threw in free fries and a Greek salad, so we ended up with a pretty good dinner for a very low price. I wouldn’t count on closing time bonuses always working out so well, but even outside of that this small, clean family restaurant had good food, very friendly service and great value for a light meal on the go.

Food 8
Drinks N/A
Atmosphere 6
Service 9
Value 10

Ben

A Mediterranean place where you order at the counter. They have a good mix of classic gyros / wraps / classic middle eastern foods. We ordered some Dolmas and falafels. They were closing down, and the owners were very friendly and emptied the kitchen for us (giving us about 3 orders of falafels and dolmas, as well as a lot of free french fries and greek salad). The dolmas were a pickled, cold, and filled with creamy rice mix (not my favorite). The falafels were great, moist, very flavorful and meaty composition. The fries were good, and the greek salad looked good as well. Overall, our small experience was pleasant, the owners are very nice and the food is tasty and affordable for a quick meal.

Food 8
Drinks N/A
Atmosphere 7
Service 10
Value 9

Rutherford Grill

Location: Rutherford, CA
Cuisine type: American diner
Atmosphere: family atmosphere, pub style decor
Meal: lunch
Overall score: 7.4

Nina

By the third day in Napa we were suffering from a mild case of wine fatigue. We had tasted so many different wines at so many different places, that all we wanted was to stick with one wine, in one bottle, and sit down and have a meal. Rutherford Grill was nearby and stood out with a particularly nice offer - no corkage fee if you brought in your Napa Valley wine of choice. Great, we had a bunch of them in our trunk, collected from the various wineries we had visited. We picked a Beringer reserve chardonnay and went in.
The restaurant looked like a polished, more homey version of a classic chain diner. Seating was either around the bar or on tall, heavily padded booth benches, and we picked the latter. It took a good 15-20 minutes for us to get someone’s attention to even get our glasses of water. Even though it was busy, it was not quite busy enough to justify this kind of delay - once we placed our entree order it wasn’t too bad, so that made up for the initial wait to some degree.
We shared a skillet cornbread for an appetizer, and I have to admit the initial impression was great. Even though it was a bit undercooked in the middle, the rest of the bread was crunchy on the edges, smooth and creamy on the inside, with some added texture from the corn kernels mixed throughout.

For my entree, I ordered a butternut and white cheddar enchilada with roasted squash and swiss chard. Reading off the ingredients, I was actually really excited, especially when I read that the garnish was a sunny side up fried egg. Too my great disappointment, the actual dish was nothing like I had pictured in my head. The actual enchilada was only a small part of the plate, and while the filling was probably butternut squash, I didn’t find any of the nutty warmth that I usually associate with it in a dish. I couldn’t really detect any white cheddar on or around the enchilada (there might have been some inside, but it was hard to tell), but it was covered in two different sauce that weren’t particularly flavorful and didn’t really go well together. It came with a side of vegetable rice (the vegetables definitely came from a mixed frozen bag) and strangest of all, this pickled vegetables and feta side that did not fit in with the rest of the dish and was too acidic for me to eat much of. Overall, I ate very little of my dish (but drank all of my wine to wash it down) and I was quite disappointed in the food I got. I don’t think I would come back to eat at this restaurant unless I want a cheaper meal than the fancier fare in Napa, and in that case I would go for a more obvious and safe choice such as a burger and fries.

Food 5
Drinks 10 (no corkage fee)
Atmosphere 7
Service 7
Value 6

Ben

A rustic feeling, bustling restaurant in the middle of wine country Napa valley. With no corkage fee, it is definitely an inviting stop in a day of visiting various vineyards. The prices are not too bad, with both of our dishes around $15, though their full entrees get up in the $30s. I had a burger with canadian bacon, hickory sauce, cheddar and onion, with a giant, creamy cornbread in skillet. The burger was tasty but not particularly memorable (maybe even a little dry), as was the cornbread (though it got extremely heavy after about ¼ of it). They do have an extensive list of entrees that looked quite appealing as well, accommodating a range of customers looking for just a burger or for any range of steaks / seafood. The service was all energetic and friendly, and definitely accommodating to the fact that almost everyone takes advantage of their offer of free corkage. The place is definitely extraordinarily popular, with a fun atmosphere, good location, and creative and extensive menu (and a wine menu to be proud of as well). While the food we had on the particular day wasn’t great, I can see the potential when cooked in a more inspired way... Also, as a side note, we had a kind of weird seating experience. We asked for a table, were given a waiting time and waited on seats right outside the door. We then saw another couple come in after us, share the one small stool inside while waiting, and then be escorted to seating by a sleepy-looking hostess... when we walked in she seated us without any comment.

Food 7
Drinks 10 (no corkage fee)
Atmosphere 9
Service 8
Value 8

Morimoto Napa

Location: Napa, CA
Website: morimotonapa.com
Cuisine type: Japanese, fusion
Atmosphere: modern chic, organic decor
Meal: dinner
Overall score: 8.6

Nina

I’ve been watching Morimoto’s displays of culinary artistry on Food Network for several years, and he never ceases to amaze me. To my delight, I found out that he (somewhat) recently opened a restaurant in Napa, and positive reviews have been pouring in about this place. Clearly, it was a must-see for me. The restaurant was fairly unassuming inside and out, with a subdued elegance and organic decor. The only exterior mark that something special was hidden inside were this tall, narrow banners with a long M and chef Morimoto’s logo. On the inside, the building had the modern style unfinished look - with bare cement floors and exposed air ducts along the ceiling, and the plain, natural decor (most notably grape vines) along with the dim lighting made for a very relaxed and cozy atmosphere, yet refined and sophisticated at the same time. There were two sections to the restaurant - the front part, with plain tables of various sizes (from intimate two-seaters to large group settings) and the sushi bar, was the more casual one, and as such had a shorter wait time. I never saw the other side of the restaurant since it was further in from the door, so I can’t really comment on it.

The waiter was very gracious and responsive, we had water on the table and had placed our drink order within mere minutes of sitting down. We went for something special to mark this special occasion of trying out a celebrity restaurant for the first time - the Morimoto Ginjo Premium Sake. The presentation was outstanding - the opaque glass little carafe came in a matching ice bowl, along with two matching glasses, with the assembly decorated with a few straw segments and a dendrobium orchid. Even more impressively, the sake lived up to the expectations set by the first impression. Though often I find sakes flavorless and even unpleasantly grainy in flavor, this one was more fragrant, more light and more complex in flavor than any sake I’ve ever had before. I enjoyed it slowly while we waited for our entrees.

And wait we did - as we were warned from the beginning, it took quite a while to get our food from the time we ordered, since we skipped appetizers and went directly for the entrees. I first tried the seafood toban yaki, which reminded me of a classic Louisiana seafood boil, minus the cajun spices and with a Japanese twist - it was served in a light, flavorful and rich red miso sake broth. The portion size was generous, the variety of seafood involved was impressive, and the presentation format was quite striking. The dish came in a super sized tagine-like bowl, and the cover was removed by the server after being placed in front of me, such that the complex flavors of the steam that had built up inside would entice me from the beginning. I had a bit of everything (lobster, king crab legs, mussels, clams, diver scallops and cod), and enjoyed each one of them since they retained enough of their own flavor to remain distinctive, yet absorbed enough of the broth to be rich and exciting. The only slight disappointment came from the shrimp, which tasted just a bit overcooked, and had a tougher texture than I would have liked.

Ben’s dish, which I enjoyed half of after passing him the second half of my toban yaki, was a bowl of chirashi sushi. The presentation was very plain (mildly flavored rice covered in an assortment of pickled vegetables and fresh seafood), though artfully assembled and well balanced. The fish (salmon, tuna, shrimp and salmon roe) was exquisite, with a creamy texture, clean flavor and appealing freshness.

Finally, my favorite part of any meal came around - dessert. The waiter saw my eagerness and proceeded to reassure me that all desserts are delicious, so regardless of my choice I would be sure to enjoy it, and then to make light-hearted jokes such as instructing the server who actually brought the dessert to describe it thoroughly to pass my scrutiny. Interactions aside, I was very happy with my choice. We shared the ice cream sandwich dessert, which consisted of three small and distinct individual chocolate based sandwiches, which I will describe in detail (of course).

The first was a light and crisp flavored white chocolate, lemon and verbena ice cream sandwiched between two very thin green tea cookies. Second, and probably my favorite, was a pair of sesame and brown sugar cookies holding a milk chocolate and sesame chocolate - I loved the richness and mild nuttiness of this one, and there is no better cookie than a sesame caramelized thin crust. Finally, there was a dark chocolate banana cardamom ice cream squeezed between dark chocolate cookies as thin as all the other ones. The cardamom flavor was a tinge too dark and earthy for me, but it did not really deter from my enjoyment of the dessert overall.
Even though this dinner was a little pricier than our usual fare, it was well worth it both for the experience (atmosphere, presentation) and the refined and elegantly paired flavors in each and every dish. Since a visit to Napa is in a sense a special occasion of its own, it would be in itself a good excuse to visit this establishment again :)

Food 9
Drinks 9
Atmosphere 9
Service 10
Value 8

Ben

Morimoto is the new feature in downtown Napa, at the end of the upscale restaurants along the riverside. It has a rustic, down-to-earth feel when you enter, but the flare and style one would expect. The opening room is large and well-lit with full windows, a sushi bar and a dozen or so tables. The menu is pricey, though not more than we expected due to the name and location. We ordered and shared two dishes: a seafood toban yaki, a mixed seafood (lobster, crab, mussel, clam, scallop) in red miso broth; and chirashi sushi (mixed sashimi over rice with pickled vegetables and salmon roe). The sushi was of exceptional cut and quality, and generously portioned, and my favorite of the two dishes. The toban yaki was also very flavorful, but not extraordinary, as it was challenging to perfectly cook a wide array of seafood. We ordered a sake (300 mL for ~$40) which was decent for a sake (I have to say there is an objective reason why, internationally, grape based wines are way more popular than rice based wines...). We had an excellent dessert - “ice cream sandwiches”, three neatly stacked halved squares of 3 different flavor mixes (white chocolate lemon with green tea, sesame milk chocolate with brown sugar, cardamom banana dark chocolate). While all the food was delicious, the most clear tell of the quality and pedigree of the restaurant was in the presentation. All of the dishes, and the sake, were gorgeously presented. The seafood and sushi had a rich, colorful, and luscious feel, while the sake in ice bath and jade looking glass carafe and cups was very elegant, and the ice cream sandwiches had a very crisp modern look. The menu is definitely long, creative, with many exciting options. I would highly recommend visiting with a large group, in order to try a bit of several different dishes.

Food 9
Drinks 7
Atmosphere 8
Service 9
Value 7