Park Chow

Originally, my plan for the day was to grab some lunch at Park Chow since it was relatively close to our day-long visit to the California Academy of Sciences.  However, Viv thought it would be too long of a walk over which meant we were stuck eating at the on-premises cafeteria.  It wasn't bad though, but I normally can't stand default restaurants.  So when we finally ended the day (at closing...  the humanity!), we did finally visit Park Chow for dinner.

Viv and I decided to get some greens in our pathetic travel diet in the Cobb Salad.  Yup, we got our greens alright, mixed in with crispy bacon, blue cheese and chicken (my kinda salad...).  This was more substantial than it appeared since there was a bevy of lean white meat (albeit quite dry and chewy).  There was ample dressing and crumbled blue cheese for flavor.  For her main, Viv had the Fusilli of Chicken & Sausage with mushrooms, tomato & cream.  She decided on the medium portion and it seemed to be enough.  With al dente spirals of pasta, the texture was on point.  Flavor-wise, it was mild with a bit of fennel and tang.

For myself, I had the Steak Frites which looked somewhat small, especially crammed onto a tiny plate.  For aesthetics, they could've piled on more fries underneath the steak.  The fries themselves were thin and very crispy.  As for the steak, it was more-or-less medium rare.  However, it wasn't tender per se, but not overly tough as well.  My son ended up with the Organic Egg, Ham, Tomato & Gruyere Sandwich. Since his eating habits are unpredictable, we got the rosemary mayo on the side.  Although the sandwich didn't look like much, it was relatively substantial with a bevy of "corned beef"-textured ham and gruyere on crunchy toast.

My daughter had the kid's Cheese Pizza and it was more or less a standard version.  The crust was light and slightly chewy where it could've benefited from more charring and overall color.  With that being said, the tomato sauce was mild and the cheese was plentiful. After we were done, we agreed that the the meal was average at best.  Nothing particularly wrong with the food, but for the price, we expected a bit more.  Turns out that we didn't miss much at lunch then.

The Good:
- Kid-friendly
- Excellent service
- Comfortable casual atmosphere

The Bad:
- Average eats
- Kinda pricey