Beto's Grill: Camarones Al Mojo De Ajo

TSGV RATINGS:
Eye Candy: 5/5 Stars
Smelloscope: 4/5 Stars
Taste Test: 4/5 Stars
Wallet Breaking: $$$
Recommend-ability: 4/5 - Mouth Watering Goodness

It wasn't only two or three years ago when I first stepped foot into Beto's grill. An out-of-state friend came and visited me and was in the mood for Mexican food. I personally rarely suggest Mexican food myself. I remember a time when I was younger when I occasionally craved a taco. But since that craving was rarely fulfilled because my mother disliked Mexican food, it never grew on me.

Beto's Grill Menu

I literally live three blocks from Beto's Grill for nearly fifteen years. I've seen this festive looking mom and pop joint every time I drove down Las Tunas Blvd. The first time I had a fried Tilapia and I immediately fell in love with the place. Though I still don't go as often as I should, every so often I would suggest to meet up there, and today I had a lunch meeting there with George, a member of the board of director of my High School Alumni Association, in which I'm the president of.

George does frequent Beto's, so I asked for his recommendation. He said his wife loves the shrimps, so I got the Camarones Al mojo De Ajo. I don't even know where to begin in understand what that is. The direct translation fortunately was provided in parenthesis under the Spanish name, Shrimps in garlic butter sauce. I initially was debating whether to get this one or the chipotles. I asked the lovely waitress how spicy was the chipotle sauce. She said though she enjoys a bit of spiciness in her dish, she finds is a little spicy. So opted out of that and went with the garlic butter version.

Camarones Al Mojo De Ajo - $13.95

 Am I glad I did. This dish was beautiful to look at. The shrimps were split in half with the tail still intact. The dish was garnished with some colorful squash, carrots and red onions, giving it a vibrant color. The tomato rice added even more color. Finally the 2 slices of lime contrasted the rest of the plate with a little green. This was a perfect summer dish, festive and light.

Holding my nose close to the dish, I could smell the shrimp covered with butter. I would have given this dish a perfect 5/5 for both smell and taste if it was just a bit hotter. It felt as if the plate sat on the counter just a bit too long and it got slightly chilled. Since it wasn't hot enough, the smell wasn't as strong as I wanted. It also took the taste slightly down. I like my grilled food fresh off the grill, not five minutes after it's been grilled.

Nevertheless, the butter, garlic and salt combination was perfect. It was never too buttery, nor too salty. There were actual chunks of garlics over the shrimp, but yet their flavors never over powered the dish like those I would find at The Stinking Rose. When the shrimp entered my mouth, I got a bit of the salt off the shell and the taste of the butter gradually blossomed inside. The lime juice gave the shrimp a little bit of the freshness necessary to counter the heaviness of the butter. The crunchy vegetables contrasted with the soft shrimp meat. The shrimp themselves were also fresh and grilled to a slight brownish color, just enough to give a little hint of the flavor of the grill without blackening my mouth. Everything about this dish just worked together for me. The best part was the generous portion of shrimps. I didn't feel like I needed more by the end of the dish. It had just enough to satisfy my taste buds and not too much to sicken me.

There are some nice hidden Mexican food gems in the San Gabriel Valley despite being dominated by the Asian cuisine. And the clientele of Beto had a few Asian families as well as various ethnicities. Asians do actually eat non-Asian foods, contrary to what some of my friends would believe. And now no one can say that I only eat Asian food.

Beto's Grill
510 E Las Tunas Dr
San Gabriel, CA 91776
(626) 287-0399

Camarones Al Mojo De Ajo - $13.95

Face Cafe: Plain Steamed Rolls

TSGV RATINGS:
Eye Candy: 4/5 Stars
Smelloscope: 3/5 Stars
Taste Test: 5/5 Stars
Wallet Breaking: $
Recommend-ability: 4/5 - Mouth Watering Goodness

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a Cantonese Cafe fanatic. I can't seem to get enough of my own heritage. Perhaps a lot of it is due my childhood nostalgia. Nevertheless, Cantonese Cafe is probably one of the most affordable cuisine to be obsessed over.

There is one big drawback for Cantonese Cafes in the San Gabriel Valley, their lack of consistency. One day a dish may be fantastic, but a few months later, it may turn up disgusting. It's happened to me so many times. My favorite has also moved from one cafe to another. Lately I seem to have moved on from the few that I've been deeply into the past couple of years. Fortunately for Face Cafe, it's moved slightly upward on my list of cafes after they increased their health inspection grade, not that it means much to me to begin with.

Originally I was going to blog about my Chicken Steak and Pork Chop, but that dish was highly disappointing. I remembered it to be much better the last time I had it. No cafe seem to be able to keep the quality of that duel right. Fortunately my parents decided to order the plain steamed rolls as a part of our meal.

(Plain Steamed Rolls - $2.95)

Steamed rolls are made of vermicelli noodle wraps. There's nothing inside these rolls at all. They are steamed and then served with two or three sauces. Face Cafe's version came with the standard three sauces: Soy, sweet soy paste and sesame paste. All three were mild in flavor, perfect for the steamed rolls.

The presentation of the rolls were nicely organized. There really isn't anything fancy about it, but it's not a fancy dish. It's a simple common man's food, street food at its best. I had them literally from little carts off the streets of Hong Kong when I was a child. There isn't a whole lot of smell to them either, since they are plain. The sauces emitted a light aroma if one stuck their nose close enough. It's a bit difficult to smell when the restaurant is filled with so much stronger smelling foods. But I suppose no smell is a good smell when it comes to steamed rolls.

The rolls themselves were very smooth, just the way I like it. They were freshly made and very soft as they should be. It can be a little tricky picking them up cause they could break in half if you squeeze too hard with your chopsticks. You can dip each individual piece in one, two or all three sauces and they all taste just fantastic. The portion was also big enough to satisfy my whole family of 4's craving. I didn't feel like I didn't have enough by the end of the meal which can be rare when it comes to steamed rolls.

Good steamed rolls are hard to come by. A lot of dim sum restaurants serve semi-hardened rolls that ends up on the dry side. Face Cafe did a great job keeping them moist and soft. When they finally end up inside my mouth, they just kind of melted and then slipped down my throat smoothly.

I personally think steamed rolls are among the best simple foods out there. But I have taken a friend once who found the texture disturbing. I suppose the slipperiness of it could seem wacky if your mind took you to that place. But if you like soft textured foods, this plain steamed roll will certainly satisfy your cravings. It may not be the absolute best steamed roll I've ever had, but it's certainly good enough for me to go back for more.

Face Cafe
301 E Valley Blvd
Alhambra, CA 91801
(626) 282-8899

Plain Steamed Rolls - $2.95

Half & Half Tea House: Strawberry, Pudding, Honey Boba Milk

TSGV RATINGS:

Eye Candy: 4/5 Stars

Smelloscope: 2/5 Stars

Taste Test: 5/5 Stars

Wallet Breaking: $

Recommend-ability: 4/5 - Mouth Watering Goodness

I live literally two blocks away from Half & Half. Though it wasn't until recently did I go there on a semi-regular basis, mostly because my friend Kenneth is a big fan. I remember having gone there more than a year ago and thought it was totally overrated and overpriced. But I realized that was because I ordered food and the wrong drinks. That is not the reason to go to Half & Half. The one and only reason to go to this tea house is not for their tea at all, but for their milk.

It's a bit ironic for a restaurant to be named a tea house when their best and most popular item isn't even their tea. Perhaps that's why it's also named half & half for their milk products. Sure technically the place is really famous for their boba, but if it's not placed in their milk but in their tea, it's really no more impressive than what one can find at Tea Station.

(Strawberry, Pudding, Honey Boba Milk - $4.35)

Today I ordered my usual, Strawberry, Pudding, Honey Boba Milk. It was still around eighty degrees out at eight-thirty at night. I needed to get out of the house and a cool drink to chill me. The milk is blended with the ice while the strawberry syrup, pudding and honey boba sat on the bottom of the cup. Seeing a white drink always pleases me on a hot summer night, as it almost feels like I'm about to consume some snow. Although the drink really has no smell to it, I gave a smelloscope rating of 2 stars rather than a 1 because feeling the ice old drink on the top half while the bottom was still warm is a fantastically chilling yet comfortably warming experience.

Like all boba drinks, this one came with a boba sized straw to allow for the boba and the pudding to be sucked up with the milk. The first time I had this drink, I made the mistake of mixing everything together before consumption, turning the drink into more of a strawberry flavored iced milk drink. Later I realized that they syrup was meant to be drank in its dense form, and the flavors and the textures of each of the components of the drink are to be experienced separately but still in conjunction with one another. This is NOT a drink to be mixed.

In some sense this is a dessert all on its own accord eaten through a straw rather than with spoons or forks. The alternation between the sugarless iced milk, the ultra sweet syrup, the honey sweetened boba and the mild flavored pudding creates a freakish cluster of taste inside the mouth, all balancing one another. It is never too sweet as a whole to feel heavy, but the tongue was indulged in some super dense sweet sensation in the process. The pudding kept my tongue working to dissolve them, while the boba gave my teeth something to do in the process. There was something for every part of my oral senses in this drink.

Certainly for those who still cannot get over the idea of having things in your drinks will never find this treat enjoyable. But if you are open to such an experience, this is certainly a drink you mustn't pass up and try at least once. I personally prefer the San Gabriel store because I like the tall cups rather than the bowl-like cups in the Monterey Park store. The San Gabriel store also has a dine-in option where you could enjoy your drink and even some food. I however wouldn't give the same review for the food at Half & Half than this drink.

The drink is on the high end in pricing for a boba drink. But if you treat it more as a dessert, it's rather reasonable. Just be certain you work off the enormous amount of energy you would consume with this drink. Also be weary that Half & Half has the notorious reputation to be the new king of slow service in the San Gabriel Valley. That is not an easy "accomplishment" as service at drink places has always been horrifically slow to begin with. My suggestion is to get here earlier in the night before their peak hours of 9pm to 12am every night.

Half & Half Tea House

120 N San Gabriel Blvd, Ste H
San Gabriel, CA 91778

(626) 309-9387
Strawberry, Pudding, Honey Boba Milk - $4.35