Cowgirl Cafe 2

Cowgirl Cafe II
2859 Hamner Ave, Norco, CA 92860
(951) 371-5465

Ok this place is AWESOME! It's on my favorites list and i've only been there once. Maybe it deserves to wait longer to get on that list, but i'm eager to put this on there.

This place is located in the little western town of Norco (short for North Corona) in the Riverside area. Norco has large sidewalks built for horses, and you can regularly see cowboys riding past. In fact we saw a large gang of men in sombreros riding by, something like the 3 amigos only authentic and cool, but with 20 or more people. Anyway, where do you see that these days? Norco is a great little town, feels like an old west town in today's modern age. It's the neatest little place on the 15 freeway.

Anyway there is an original Cowgirl Cafe in Mira Loma that I will try if i'm ever out there, but we have a friend living near Norco so we'll probably only ever visit this one.

This place is amazing. Only open for breakfast and lunch, they have dishes called the "Kitchen Sink" which includes all breakfast items except, the kitchen sink, so it's an all inclusive buffet like dish that manly men have trouble finishing. It offers great value food, large portions and hometown taste. They serve all drinks out of various mason jars - SO COOL, and the ambiance is very, well, country like.

You will wait for a table, especially on Sunday mornings, but it's totally worth the wait. The staff are friendly, nice and accommodating.

I ordered the half platter of biscuits and gravy, with a side of home fries. I am not a huge fan of bell peppers but the way they make those home fries, oh so yum! And those biscuits and gravy - GIANT portion and oh oh oh oh OH so yummy. Maybe I was hungry, maybe, but that place had such a great hometown southern feel to it. Friends got a variety of other things, BLTs, Sausage and eggs, french toast, and all said it was delish. The place is a local favorite so you know it's great.

I got to eat a few bites of their breakfast burrito as well - YUM YUM YUM! That's all I have to say.

Go eat there! This place is so divey and local that I couldn't find a photo of it online - crazy huh? But alas whenever we go back i'll take a photo and post one here :)

Good eats, no, GREAT eats! :) It's places like this that this blog is made for! Mmmmmmm Thank you Norco!

Max's Chicken

Mmmmmm mmmmmmm delicious. We went with friends to a Filipino chicken place called Max's Chicken. It's a popular chain in the Philippines, and they have a location in Glendale California next to the Galleria, so we decided to try it out. The first time we went there, many many years ago, the service was terrible and the food pretty bad as well. So I was willing to give it another shot. I became a bit more nervous when I saw a pizza being delivered to the restaurant. I mean, where do you see pizza being delivered to a restaurant? But the place was packed on a Friday night and there were many groups of people there willing to wait for a table, so I was hopeful.

As we were seated, we walked by lots of packed tables with lots of yummy looking dishes. There's also a karaoke/sports bar within the restaurant so I may have to go there for my next birthday. We had excellent fast service from a nice friendly waiter, so obviously they had very much improved since the last time I went. Anyway here's what we ordered.

Max's whole fried chicken - OMG delicious! We had leftovers and on the car ride home it smelled like peanuts so I think their secret is they cook it in peanut oil - so beware if you are allergic? ask. But yes the food was amazing yum! Definitely better than Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles - and I may even say it quite possibly is better than KFC and El Pollo Loco, some of my favorite chicken places.

Lumipa Shanghai - that's the meat lumpia aka little taquitos that Filipinos are famous for and yes every white person I know loves them. Filipinos love them too - but the most popular white boy food. The ones at Max's were yum!

Lumpia Ubod - vegetable lumpia with peanut sauce all over it and filled with hearts of palm and other veggies in a cold crepe like wrapper. One of my favorite foods, but the one at Max's was "ok". Not bad, still alright, but not great.

Pancit Palabok - it's a noodle dish topped with an egg sauce, pork cracklings, green onion, shrimp and shrimp sauce, etc. It's a traditional Filipino favorite, and my personal favorite type of pancit. I actually really enjoyed it, but it does need a squeeze of lemon to make it tastier.

Garlic Rice - OMG! :) As a Filipina, rice is amazing and so yummy and I hardly ever cook garlic rice at home so when I do have it, I have to mmmmmmmmm. So I really enjoyed the garlic rice. May not be for everyone, but it's definitely one of my all time favorite foods. Max's made good garlic rice - very good :)

So that's my review of Max's chicken. Great service, great food, and prices about average. We're definitely going back there soon, and we'll try other things so the bloggers can get a nice view of all the different dishes. Mmmmm.

Wine Country Trattoria

Wine Country Trattoria
Disney's California Adventure
(714) 781-3463 for advanced reservations

This restaurant is one of our favorite places to dine in the Disneyland parks. Not only does it allow drinking, it encourages it with a wine tasting bar off to one side! The waiters are as jovial as most Disneyland cast members. And the food at the Trattoria is (in my opinion) much better than grabbing a burger elsewhere, for not that much more in price.

My hubby ordered the meat lasagna and loved it. I've also had the alfredo chicken lasagna (pre-veggie-ism) and adored it too. And of course, with tiramisu on the menu, I had a light bowl of soup to save room for dessert. The poblano corn chowder was spicy, much like tortilla soup. I think this was also served around the park, but for the same price, I got a better atmosphere and yummy breadsticks to dunk in it! The tiramisu was perfect - creamy and rich. We cleaned the plate spotlessly.

Instead of paying $13 per glass of wine, we opted to upgrade a little and for $32 bought a whole bottle. It was a great, bad idea. It was a better deal, but I think we both agreed that we really didn't need that much to drink. (Then again, now I can say I rode the Tower of Terror and had the courage to raise my arms on the big fall!)

One thing to note: I'd suggest calling the Disney Dining line a day before your park visit to make reservations. Although we've never been turned away from the Trattoria as walk-ins, it might be difficult to book the usual 5-8 pm dinner hour.