I feel out of sorts today, so it’s a good time to fashion a piece for The Malibu Times.
It’s unhealthy to harbor guilt or resentment, don’t you find?
Consider my relationship to the apple turnover. You can purchase a nice one for $2.50 at the Malibu Kitchen, and either take it home or enjoy it with a cup of coffee al fresco on a hard chair adjacent to the parking lot. True, it’s difficult to find the apple inside and when you do arrive at it you get a kind of cinnamon surprise, much like something you’d expect to find wrapped in cellophane next to the Twinkies. On the other hand, I discovered a superb turnover, flakier and with more of what we’ve come to recognize as apple, baked fresh daily at Ralphs for 99 cents apiece. Similarly, you can either take it home or enjoy it while seated on an uncomfortable chair adjacent to that parking lot. Yet, I continue to breakfast at Malibu Kitchen. Why? One reason is a better class of parking lot. I’d rather sit facing Planet Blue (outrageously priced children’s wear) and Ron Herman (outrageously priced young women’s wear) and listen-when Malibu Kitchen’s genial host, permits-to some of the most exquisite music this side of Birdland than stare at a beige wall lined with 60 shopping carts. Once, just once, I purchased a turnover-okay, a matched set-at Ralphs, disguised them in a paper towel, ran them over to Cross Creek and enjoyed them at Malibu Kitchen with organic coffee. I apologize. You really can’t have it all. Go for the bear claw. There, it’s out of my system.
Jody Stump was right. Ms. Stump, a biweekly contributor to these pages, strongly suggested in her column a couple of years ago that Nobu restaurant was, in addition to being a sanctuary of snobbism, a clip joint. And sure enough.
First of all, I don’t eat raw fish. My hundred-year-old mother taught me if it feels good in your mouth, swallow it; if not, spit it out. Don’t mess with Mr. In-Between. But my friend, Doctor Michael Jones, Malibu’s new and gifted gynecologist, loves the stuff and so does Suzy the Significant, so we went. Doctor Michael arranged with the chef to throw together some chicken nuggets for me with a splash of teriyaki and a curlicue of ginger. Nineteen dollars. Add the price of a breath of hot saki and for an additional 50 cents you can get a brand new oil filter at Charlie’s 76. Subsequently, after a dash of this and a dash of that, Suzy’s and my check came to $97. For a snack. Oh, I know the philosophy. You get to watch the artist behind the counter slicing and stuffing and wrapping. Let me tell you, my grandmother was every bit as charismatic Zen-chopping garlic and parsley or peeling an entire potato with a paring knife in one long uninterrupted paper-thin strand, as was my grandfather boning a squab without once removing the knife. Culinary artistry is part of my heritage, and I’m use to standing by the stove free of charge.
Malibu’s prices are outstanding and continue to grow, and there’s nothing any of us can do about it.
Did anyone choose to stay in the area New Year’s Eve rather than risk the crazies on the freeway? Next season do check out those special holiday menus they create to make it easier in the kitchen. It seems to me that to add fifteen dollars to a menu item that can be purchased at the regular price either the day before or the day after the holiday defies the true spirit of holiday gouging. Since it’s all about saying thanks and happy holidays to your regular customers, I suggest they go about it the way big city restaurants do. Rather than pulling from the regular menu, which to me constitutes a smirk after the smack, I suggest they create some brand new items for the holiday menu. And then charge an exorbitant price. Either that or return to the regular price and give me the option of bringing my own paper hat.
Maybe I’m just old-fashioned and this is the way of it today. That’s certainly possible. Case in point, I went to Coogies coffee shop for the first time ever last week. I’m embarrassed to admit I’ve been punishing them for nearly 20 years for their part in the closure of the Colony Coffee Shop. Which is a classic Malibu non sequitur. I’m not always a logical person. The food is just fine, and their outstanding feature is the service. I apologize.
I could do an entire column on the tiny square-inch plastic containers they shove jam into these days at coffee shops, the single-wrapped butter pat and the itty-bitty packages of salt and pepper. All of which we pay for. Avoid these annoyances and enjoy the best breakfast in the county at Bobby’s Coffee Shop, north side of Ventura Boulevard just west of Fallbrook. It’s like traveling back into the 1950s. Trouble is you have to leave Paradise to get there.