Field House American Sports Pub

1310 Fulton Ave.
Sacramento, CA
(916) 487-1045

Brought to you by the gents behind Shady Lady (SL), Field House is a sports take on their usual swanky yet easy food and cocktails. It's a great addition to the other underwhelming Howe & Hurley area and if you live in the area, you better be supporting them!

They have a shorter list of their signature cocktails that are not quite as well polished as the Shady Lady versions, but again, best in the area. The onion rings and homemade BBQ sauce are truly amazing. The burger was good, the fries were pretty much perfect and the skewers come with that amazing chili water sauce stuff they serve with their pork rinds at SL. The tomato soup and grilled cheese were the perfect comfort food for this under-the-weather drunk.

Over all, I would pick Shady Lady every day, but Field House is a bit more approachable and the best thing going in the area. Nicely done gents, yet again.

Flaming Grill

2319 El Camino Avenue
Sacramento, CA 95821

One of our sometimes drunks Ben, has been trying to get us here for a very long time! They have burgers with options like elk, buffalo, ostrich, wild boar and such. And their beer menu could rival anything in midtown.

It's out on El Camino in building, or "building" that looks sort of like a gas station that has been added on to with canvas sides, concrete walls and a lot of red paint. It's super janky but don't let that stop you.

They owner is very personable, knowledgable and willing to talk you through the variety of menu items. The meats we ordered ranged from python, ostrich, elk, antelope, wild boar and sirloin. All the burgers were well dressed, cooked medium and on a freshly made bun. As burgers go, this was damn good.

They have other non burger options but really, if you come out here, stick with what they rock. Burgers and beer.

Kilt Pub

4235 Arden Way
Sacramento, CA 95864
(916) 487-4979

This place is tucked away in a strip mall in the middle of the Arden Arcade neighborhood which makes is sort of hard to get to if you don't live close by. Is it worth it? I think so! It has a very lovely pub feel with kids running around, older folks having a pint and young upstarts finding their way past Guinness to al the other goodnes in the beer world.

The biggest downside is that the parking sucks and it's usually very busy. Come earlier in the week, earlier in the day or after the dinner rush.

The food was good, with sandwich options, a steak pie special and they even let me order the kid's fish and chips which was a perfect girl sized portion.

Bottom line, if you live near here, why are you ready this blog - go now! And if you don't live near here, it's worth a trek out to check out some of their unique beers.

Sacramento Mobile Food Round Up

After the raging success of the Sacramento Mobile Food Festival back in April (we were there, 3 hours lines and crazy good food), the Sacramento food trucks has formed an alliance that plan to do a round up every week, outside city limits. Just our luck...it's on Thursday!

We headed out to Mel Rapton Honda, the host location for the week, and got our grub on. Collectively, we tried most of the menu items. The stand out winners were the ninja mini burger (pea shoots, siracha aioli, lotus chip), and the rosemary garlic olive oil tater tots from Drewski's.

The lines were only a few minutes long, wait for food about 10 minutes so it's convenient and delicious! They have more trucks lining up to join so hopefully they will keep it up.

We brought some of our own booze, because Thursday is only half of the name. Then we walked over to the Haggin Oaks golf course to find more. Lo and behold, they had a bar! Full of golfers and booze. This might be the only time I've been at a golf course except for country club weddings. Trust the drunks to find the drinks.

Mini Burger Truck, Drewski's Hot Rod Kitchen & Mama Kim's on the Go



Mini Burger and their sweet potato tots.



Crack dusted tater tots from Drewski's. Well, it's rosemary and garlic oil on them.



Wow, golfers look a lot like...golfers!!



What a bunch of dorks. Can't even take a picture...

Ernie's Interlude

2926 Eastern Ave
Sacramento, CA 95821
(916) 487-0349

We have a new lowbrow initiative! We are bringing back the dive bar! Well, it never really left, we are just trying to work one in once a month. First stop, the 'Lude!

Really sweet drinky decor? Check. Old guy hitting on everything with boobs? Check. Strong drinks? Check.

You get the idea. Best old guy pick up line: I'm a fire Marshall, are you on fire?

Priceless.

Gatsby's Diner

2598 Alta Arden Expy # 3

Sacramento, CA 95825
(916) 977-0102

We happened upon this place back in September of last year and had a great time chowing on some of the juiciest burgers in town. They closed early and we ended up spending some quality time with the chef and server.

Since then that douchey blonde guy on the Food Network aired his show featuring Gatsby's and they are packed with people! When I called in the reservation for 14 they remembered us and were excited that we were coming back. Even going so far as to yell out greetings when we walked in.

Even better, when we showed up and needed a table for 18 and there wasn't a single other open table they still were cool about it and helped us out. Burgers for 18? Damn we are just trouble.

This place is one of the few that will actually cook your burger to order even if you like it still mooing a little. So when chef told us they would all be medium well (since it was such a large party), we were kind of disappointed. I understand why they do that since it's one guy cooking and keeping track of almost 20 burgers is sort of impossible, but it still sort of sucked. When I finally got mine, it was a perfect medium so no complaints here.

The burger was just as juicy as we remember. Some folks were split on whether these are better than the Hideaway in Curtis Park or not. Either way, they are tasty. They only have bottled beer so they started running out part way through dinner, but lo and behold, someone made a beer run and Blue Moon was available by the time we got our food.

Our advice? Definitely check this place out if you like burgers. Just don't bring 17 of your friends with you.

Gatsby's Diner

Gatsby's Diner
2598 Alta Arden Expressway
Sacramento, CA 95825
(916) 977-0102

The date today is 9/02/10... 90210. For those of you alive in the early 90s, that means Brandon, Brenda, Dillon, Steve, Andrea and the whole Beverly Hills crew! In honor of this date, we decided to find a place as close to the Peach Pit as possible. Unknowingly, we picked Gatsby's Diner, which does not fit this at all...but ended up the most wonderful mistake!

It has an old depression era fell, but has left over Teppanyaki grills in the middle of the room. They use them so well that you don't immediately realize they are leftover from some place else. They grill all their burgers out in the dining area which gives the whole place a burgery smell. I feel bad for vegetarian in this place, but as a carnivore, hell yeah!

We were joined by two of the #BeerTweetup folks that we shall call Nixie & ExtraBrian (as in "Now. With Extra Brian!"). We might change their names, but that's what they are so far. They weren't easily offended, talked geeky, were funny and seemed to not abhor us. We like them. They even donated to the travel fund. That is some classy shit.

Back to the food. Beer and wine and burgers is what you should order here. The burgers are fabulous. Juicy, large, flavorful... oh, wait...what was I talking about. Right, burgers! They were delicious. The house cut fries and potato chips were also good and the green goddess dressing is a solid choice.

The best part of the place? The staff. Chef Jerad & (self-named) Uncle Steve were not only gracious, but funny, candid and just damn fun to talk to. We were there later than anyone else and instead of getting the stink eye, they told us stories about how Guy Fieri came out to tape Diners, Drive-ins & Dives, their family history and signed our journal. Again...some classy shit.

Go here, go often and enjoy some really fantastic food made by folks who love making good food and meeting the people who enjoy it. It's hard to find a place like this so appreciate it.

Journal tidbits:

"The stuff in Darla's head is not dinner appropriate." - Nairb

"I are scientifical." - Nixie

"I'm unyankable." - Nixie

"I'm NOT unyankable!" - Chef Jerad