During our tour of Stanford University’s campus we stopped for lunch at Ike’s Place. Ike’s is a San Francisco Bay area sandwich shop. Our tour guide pointed out that the Stanford location is a very popular spot and it often has a line out the door when classes are in session.  Fortunately  for us classes were not in session, so there was no line to order. We were pleasantly greeted by one of the cashiers, who seemed more interested in having a conversation than taking our lunch order. According to their story, “When you come to Ike’s Place it is our goal to make you feel like the unique individual that you are.” That mission was definitely accomplished.

Spiffy Tiffy

After our conversation with the cashier along with a long look through the lengthy menu, I finally decided on the Spiffy Tiffy sandwich with  halal  chicken, mushrooms, avocado, pesto, provolone, and pepper jack ($6.96 for half, $9.99 for whole). In addition all sandwiches come served with  Ike’s Dirty Secret Sauce, lettuce, and tomato.  Mustard, jalapeno, red onions, pickles, and banana peppers are also available free of charge. You also have a choice of  French,  Dutch crunch, sourdough, wheat, or gluten-free. I went with sourdough.

The sandwiches are all served toasted and are stuffed full of ingredients. I decided to get the full sandwich, but normally half would have been plenty for lunch. The flavor was excellent and all ingredients were fresh. The addition of pesto to the sandwich added a nice flavor throughout and I liked the secret sauce.  I also had a bite of my wife’s  Menage A Trois sandwich which comes with  halal chicken, real honey, honey mustard, BBQ, pepper jack, swiss, and cheddar. This is listed as one of the most popular sandwiches, and I can see why. The flavor combination was outstanding!

If I a student at Stanford Ike’s would definitely be on my weekly lunch rotation. I would absolutely visit again on a future visit to the area.

As I already mentioned, the primary reason for our trip to northern California was for the wedding of my friend Joe. Their ceremony and reception took place at the Thomas Fogarty Winery  in Woodside, California. It was a lovely spot for a wedding and the weather was fantastic. The winery and vineyards sit high in […]

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I still have a lot more photos to post from our northern California trip, but I also wanted to start on one of the many restaurant reviews I also have planned. On our first morning in Palo Alto we quickly searched for a restaurant that we could walk to for breakfast. My wife found Hobee’s in the  Town & Country Shopping Center just across El Camino Real from Stanford University. From the front of the restaurant it appears to be very small and most tables I could see were filled. In actuality all you can see from the front is a small room but there is a much larger room in the back, which is where we were seated.

Cal Browns

In one quick glance at the menu I knew exactly what I was getting. I don’t eat omelets or eggs, so I was immediately drawn to the section of special hashbrowns. There I found a listing of six different loaded hashbrown offerings. I went with the Cal Browns, which are topped with chicken apple sausage, mushrooms,  tomato, green peppers, Tomato-Basil sauce,  Parmesan, Jack and Cheddar cheese ($7.95). You can optionally have the special hashbrowns topped with an egg for an additional $1.50. The hashbrowns are “country-style” chunks and not shredded, but that actually works better with all the toppings that were served with it. I loved this dish and wish that more restaurants would offer something similar.

The Pruneyard Ommie

My wife went with the Pruneyard Ommie, which was stuffed with turkey bacon, mushrooms, spinach,  red onion, Swiss cheese and topped  with Sundried Tomato pesto ($9.75). Though I did not try a bite, I’m told it too was very good. All omelets are served with a choice of their world-famous blueberry coffeecake, toast, or hashbrowns. Wisely she chose the blueberry coffeecake, which was just as awesome as it sounds. It came served warm with a monstrous scoop of butter on top. Though many items at Hobee’s are geared towards a healthy crowd, this is not one of those items. However I would not recommend skipping it.

Blueberry Coffeecake

Our service was quick and friendly. The food was great. I would definitely not hesitate to visit again, or to try one of their seven other locations, if I were to travel back to the San Francisco Bay area again in the future.

Kim’s roommate throughout most of college, Amy, has a brother named Troy who attended Stanford University and now works on campus. Troy offered to give us a tour of the campus on our free day in Palo Alto. Since the campus is so large, 8,180 acres to be exact, he arranged for a tour via […]

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In case you’ve been wondering where we have been hiding, we have been bouncing around Northern California for the last week. We just got back to Cincinnati late last night, so I haven’t had much time to get through many photos yet. However here are a couple of photos from the wedding of my friend Joe and his wife Lindsey.

You may kiss the bride.

Family Shot at Thomas Fogarty Winery.

We met on the Internet.

Thanks to npr you can now listen to the soon to be released album from The Avett Brothers  titled  The Carpenter. I’ve given it a couple listens and so far I’m really digging the lead single “Live and Die.” If I had to pick a second favorite at this time I’d go with the upbeat “I Never Knew You” though I think in time many of the softer songs will really grow on me. Songs like “The Once and Future Carpenter,” “Pretty Girl From Michigan,” and “Down With the Shine” could easily become my favorite track with more listening. The album is due out September 11th, the same day as Dave Matthews Band’s  Away From the World and two weeks before Mumford & Sons’  Babel. September is shaping up to be an excellent month for new music.

With all the fun going on down at Williamstown Lake this past weekend, it’s amazing that we still found time to do a little work on the lake house. I was too busy to make it down last weekend, but my future brother-in-law started working on the baseboards and trim in the rooms where I put down new flooring. He came down again on Saturday and we worked together to finish this project. All of the trim is done except for the main living room / kitchen area. We still have some major work to do in the kitchen, so we are waiting to put down the finishing touches.

Completed Room

Slowly more furniture is being added to the house. Two weekends ago bunk beds were brought down for one of the smaller bedrooms for the kids to sleep on. I also think we have two full size beds coming down over the next few weeks. Ideally we won’t have adults sleeping on cots for too much longer. The spare queen size bed that Kim and I brought down has already given us a nice place to sleep for the three nights we’ve stayed at the lake.

Home Away From Home

After work on Friday I headed to Covington for dinner at Lime Taqueria. I had a LivingSocial coupon that was expiring the next day and I needed to use it before leaving town for the weekend. I looked up the address ahead of time and realized it was basically in the MainStrasse village. As many times as I have been to that part of Covington, I never once noticed Lime.

Outside Lime

Once I parked outside the restaurant I realized why I had never noticed it before, the signage doesn’t stand out at all, and the building looks more residential than commercial. The inside of the restaurant is the complete opposite with bright lime green walls and plenty of wood accents throughout. It is a very small space but still has enough room for a few tables inside, as well as outside on the front porch.

Inside Lime

My wife, son, and I were greeted by the lone employee upon our entry. I told him about the coupon we had, which was for  2 burritos, chips and dip, and 2 iced teas all for only $9. He took our order and said he would bring the burritos out to us when ready. We decided to have chips served with queso (normally $3) and sat outside so that our son could run around while we waited for the food.

Chips and Queso

The serving of chips and queso was large enough to share between two. I don’t think the chips were made in-house, but they were fresh and the queso was pretty good. I would have much rather tried the guacamole, but it wasn’t an option with our coupon.

Jerk!

My wife chose the jerk chicken burrito with smoked tomato sour cream and cucumber watermelon salsa (normally $6.50). She seemed to enjoy the cucumber watermelon salsa, but it did very little for me. Both of the ingredients are pretty bland themselves, so it didn’t do much for the burrito. The chicken was good, but I definitely could have used some added flavor. The beans, rice, and sour cream just didn’t do enough.

Burrito

I ordered the BBQ pork burrito with pineapple salsa, pickled red onion, and ancho sour cream (normally $6.50). I thought this burrito has a little more flavor than the jerk chicken, but again it could have used more spice. The pineapple salsa was better than the cucumber watermelon combination. Though not as large as burritos from Chipotle, they are still of pretty decent size.

The staff member that I met couldn’t have been nicer, and I like the idea behind the restaurant. However, I don’t think I’ll return for more burritos unless I’m already in the area and looking for something quick to eat.

This past weekend was the second annual Paddle Williamstown. Between the hours of 7am and 1pm on Saturday motorized traffic on Williamstown Lake was restricted. We spent the night down at the lake so that we could get up early Saturday and join in the festivities. Trey woke us up a little before 8, and we were out in kayaks before 9. Kim’s uncle Joe has a few kayaks that we all enjoyed throughout the day, including a two-seater that we rode with Trey.

Beautiful Morning

Trey Kayaking

Joe On The Water

Paddle Williamstown

Though our miles of kayaking were quite a bit of work, it was a beautiful morning out on the lake and we had a great time. We spent the rest of the weekend down at the lake with trips on the pontoon boat, swimming in a relatively secluded cove, and even a little tubing.

Trey Boating

Uncle Mike’s 70’s Glastron Boat

Happy Birthday Chris

Power Nap

Ready To Go

Tubing Time

I took my turn on a tube for the first time in nearly ten years. I forgot how much fun that can be. Only downside to the weekend was losing my wedding band while flying on the tube.

…what should be on your to-do list? This time next week I’ll be on a plane to San Francisco for my first ever trip out that way. A friend of mine is getting married at a winery in Woodside over the weekend and we will be staying a few nights nearby in Palo Alto. Once the festivities are over, we are heading north to San Francisco for half of the week, basically giving us two full days to explore the city. Besides the obvious attractions, are there any other sights to see that I may have missed?