I've never done a post title in all caps before, but this one deserves it. Living in Seattle, it's easy to forget that there are other places in the country besides the Pacific Northwest which are awesome, and California is definitely one of them. This month, I'm rediscovering Northern California from the home base of my parents' house in my hometown of Sacramento. So far I've been to Oakland twice, visited friends in Portola Valley, driven through San Francisco twice (haven't had time to stop yet), and meandered along miles of gorgeous coastline on Highway 1. The Pacific Ocean was my main destination last Sunday. I left the home of friends in Portola Valley (northeast of Mountain View), traveled north, then west, until finally a ribbon of blue was in my sights; I was on a mission. Well, two missions - the first was just to see the open ocean, which we don't really see from Seattle since we're looking at the estuary that is Puget Sound; the second was to go to Sam's Chowder House and eat a lobster roll.
My friend Jeremy, who used to surf these parts when he was a Californian, gave me a tip on this place and told me to splurge on the lobster roll, the ordering of which begs the question, when is a sandwich worth $26.50? The answer is, when it's the lobster roll from Sam's Chowder House. When I first arrived at the joint on Sunday, it was just before 11am, and being Father's Day, there was a huge line out the door -- about 50 people were standing there waiting to get a table. It was hot and I wasn't actually that hungry, having eaten a late breakfast before leaving my friends' house in Portola Valley, so I decided to drive to the beach access down the road a little further and walk back along the coast to the restaurant. I ended up going for a really long walk, then walking back to the restaurant, at which point I was finally a little peckish, the line was gone, and I was shown directly to a table facing right out the windows. I barely glanced at the menu, gave my order, and was served this:
