Recently in Inland Valley Eatin' Category

This week's restaurant: Pupuseria Cuscatleca (whew!), 990 E. Holt Ave., Pomona.

I noticed this restaurant's sign (I'm going to avoid typing the name a third time) some weeks back while taking Holt into Pomona for a council meeting, and finally returned for a meal at lunchtime the other day. It's in an older, one-story building directly across the street from the Pala Motel. (It appears the restaurant relocated from 1380 S. Garey.)

The interior is L-shaped and the entrance is at the bottom right of the L. In other words, when you walk in, your view of the back half of the restaurant is blocked by a wall. I took a seat near the door and have no idea what you see if you sit toward the back along the left wall. Just one of those quirks of a space that may not even have been designed for a restaurant.

As the name implies, the restaurant has pupusas. I've had those in Upland. They're Salvadoran and are like a corn pancake filled with a thin layer of meat, cheese and beans. The colorful menu downplays the pupusas and plays up seafood dishes, many of which looked pretty good from the photos and descriptions. But I decided to stick to the pupusas.

I ordered two, with pork -- my options were two or three -- and frankly one would have been plenty for me; they're good but filling. There was a pleasant cabbage and carrot salad on the side. I also had an agua fresca of pineapple. I couldn't see them make it, of course, but I could hear the blender whirring behind the wall. The frothy juice drink was served in a goblet and hit the spot on a hot day.

The server, who may be the owner or co-owner, was very nice to the visiting Anglo who probably stuck out like a sore thumb. There's an A in the window and the place (see how I avoided typing all those syllables again?) serves breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Not sure what the individual items cost but the bill came to $6.50, which wasn't bad for a satisfying lunch.

The other day I noted here that Claremont's Back Abbey has a $13 hamburger, one that may actually be worth the money.

At ONT I discovered the $10.40 breakfast burrito.

That would be at El Paseo, the Mexican restaurant in the concourse. I was there around 5 a.m. (yawn) before my flight to New Orleans, hoping to grab a bite. El Paseo at that point seemed to be the only restaurant open. The juice place next door, my usual stop before a flight, is out of business.

I saw the price for the burrito at El Paseo and decided I didn't need food that badly.

(I'm going to presume that rent at the airport is sky-high and that the prices reflect that. But that doesn't mean I'm going to pay it.)

It could be an amazing breakfast burrito, of course. And is there a reason I would pay $13 for a burger, but not $10.40 for a breakfast burrito? I guess it does sound strange.

My reasoning is, I don't really like breakfast burritos -- my hazy, pre-dawn recollection is that that was the only breakfast-ish item on the menu, hence the only reason I considered it -- and I didn't want that much food. Whereas I like a good hamburger and for the ambience at The Back Abbey, I was willing to pay. Seeking a quick meal at the airport, I wasn't.

Thankfully, ONT's Carl's Jr. opened before my flight and I had a breakfast sandwich and OJ for under $5. Their breakfast burritos were all around $3. You could probably get three for $10.40.

Anyone want to share tips or memories of meals at ONT? Hungry passengers will thank you.

This week's restaurant: The Back Abbey, 128 N. Oberlin Ave., Claremont.

The Back Abbey opened earlier in June behind the Laemmle theater in Claremont's Village Expansion. The building, which dates to at least the 1920s, was an ice house that chilled citrus bound by rail for other states. The small, distinctive structure was saved when the Expansion was being planned and sat, window-less but full of promise, until early this year when renovations began.

Well, it's a neat little building and the Belgian pub that occupies it is a great addition. A friend and I went in for dinner a few days ago. It has a lived-in look, dark and rustic. The metal rafters are exposed and the hanging lights look industrial. There are tables inside, and one long high table with bar-style chairs, good for individuals, plus seating outside.

The beer menu apparently doesn't exist. The food menu is on a chalkboard posted high above the bar. It consists of salads, burgers and bratwursts. It's upscale bar food.

I had the Back Abbey Burger (at $13, possibly the most expensive burger in the Inland Valley) and my friend had the Grilled Vegetable Burger ($11), a portabello mushroom with eggplant, feta cheese, zucchini, red bell peppers and another item or two I got tired of craning my neck to read off the menu. It proved far more interesting than a Gardenburger.

My burger came on a brioche bun and had mustard aioli, microgreens, caramelized onions and a type of bacon whose proper name I couldn't read. Well, it was a heckuva burger, but very rich, in more ways than one. It was very tasty but didn't sit well. Incidentally, the presentation and price, not to mention the setting, invite comparisons to Father's Office in Santa Monica and Culver City.

The half-order of fries I can recommend unreservedly. They come in a paper cone with three dipping sauces. The sauces are OK; the fries are amazing.

As for the beers, the Abbey has some 30 Belgian beers on tap. This is apparently A Big Deal in the beer community, Belgian beer being considered among the best and having it on tap being a rarity. There's no beer list, annoyingly, so you may be hard-pressed to know what to get. My friend tried a couple and liked them. Beer doesn't appeal to me and a sip of one didn't change my mind.

But if you're into it, Back Abbey is almost like a wine bar for beer. It's very non-909 and Claremont's lucky to have it. The clientele ranged from 20s into the 60s that night, and it will be interesting to see this fall if Claremont Colleges students adopt the place and its $7 to $9 beers or whether it remains more of a beer snob/foodie hotspot.

About my only criticism is that it's very LOUD. It's not TVs, it's not music, it's just conversation that makes the interior almost as noisy as a nightclub. I don't know if there's anything to be done about it, other than timing your visit to off-hours.

You can read reviews on Yelp and on the M-M-M-My Pomona blog.

This week's restaurant: Ojiya, 4183 Chino Hills Parkway, Suite J, Chino Hills.

I ate at Ojiya last week but saved the review for this week. It's yet another of the sit-down restaurants in Chino Hills that the masses seem unfamiliar with. But it got good reviews on Yelp, so I met up with a couple of CHills friends for dinner.

Ojiya is in a strip mall -- it's a couple of doors from Peking Deli, a Chinese restaurant reviewed favorably here a while back -- and once you're inside you forget you're in a strip mall. It's a cozy interior with touches of bamboo and with a serious-looking sushi bar. I felt like I was in Little Tokyo.

I ordered various nigiri sushi items, especially ones I rarely see elsewhere: Spanish mackerel, seared salmon, fatty albacore and large scallop, plus my baseline dish, the salmon skin cut roll. (I don't remember the individual prices but they added up to about $24.)

I'm confident in saying that Ojiya is the best sushi I've had in the 909. Then again, there's still Rockuan, another Yelp favorite in Chino Hills that is still on my list.

My friends enjoyed their food, a chicken teriyaki bowl and a salmon teriyaki/crunch roll combination plate. Our only complaint was the green salad of iceberg lettuce was boring. At least it was only $3 for me, and free for them with their meal.

We met up, by the way, at 6:30 p.m. on a weekday, and the place was mostly empty. It quickly began filling up. By 7:45, when we left, the dining room was full.

This week's restaurant: Famous Dave's, 11470 4th St., Rancho Cucamonga.

This is a Minnesota-based barbecue chain that recently opened a location across from Ontario Mills. The large-ish dining room has a high ceiling with rafters, wavy tin trim and silly signs, such as, in neon, "Eat like a pig."

I like barbecue as much as the next person, but I'm not one of those people who know the difference between the styles of St. Louis, Texas, Memphis and wherever. What I can tell you is that I went in for lunch on Tuesday and ordered the Dave's Favorite Burger ($8.99) with a side of slaw. How could this Dave resist?

The burger took a while but the server said that's because the beef is ground only when ordered. It's not this Dave's favorite, but it was a darn good burger, a fine pile of beef chargrilled medium well until crunchy. Too much barbecue sauce, though. Oh, and the slaw was above average, dry and crisp.

My friend had a pulled chicken sandwich ($7.49), quite tasty, and a side of sweet potatoes with brown sugar on top. I'm not a sweet potato fan but I could have eaten more than the bite I sampled.

Is Famous Dave's better than Lucille's, the chain at Victoria Gardens? Is it better than the local places, like Joey's or Red Hill BBQ? Ask an aficionado. But I'd eat at Dave's again. Or any of those places, for that matter.

Weird trivia: Famous Dave co-founded Rainforest Cafe and is a former assistant secretary of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

This week's restaurant: Los Michoacanos Baja Grill, 639 E. Holt Blvd. (at Miramonte), Ontario.

I've stopped at Los Michoacanos a couple of times before Ontario council meetings for a quick bite. It's a broad storefront on East Holt. Walk inside the large space and there's an open kitchen on the left, a money-transfer counter on the right and, through a wide walkway behind them, a carniceria in the back half.

The first time I had very acceptable carne asada tacos. This week I ordered two chicken tacos and a horchata ($4.84). The counterman, who had raced up from the carniceria, seemed delighted by my order: "Have you tried our chicken before? It's marinated in orange juice, cilantro and black pepper. You'll love it."

And I did. Chicken is often bland, but this chicken was full of flavor and did indeed taste of orange juice. They could be the best chicken tacos I've ever eaten.

Perhaps because I was the only customer, the counterman picked up the remote and changed the channel of the TV on the wall from a telenovela to "Family Feud." First time I'd seen John O'Hurley, best known as J. Peterman on "Seinfeld," as host, and he was no Richard Dawson in the charisma department, although he, or at least his suit, had startlingly wide shoulders.

Still, for the question "things fans wear to a football game," when a player guessed "face paint," Hurley brightened. "Face painter -- just like the 'Seinfeld' episode," he declared. And it was a correct answer.

Before Monday's Pomona council meeting, I had a bite at Tijuana's Tacos on West Holt at Wisconsin. Good tacos. The beverage part of my repast was a first: a Mexican Coca-Cola.

I'd always heard a Mexican Coke is more potent. It comes in glass bottles and is often found at your more authentic taquerias. Seeing the Coke in the lineup of bottled sodas on the counter, I took the plunge. Even though a 16.9-oz. bottle cost $1.99.

Well, it wasn't a life-changing experience or anything, but the Mexican Coke did go down smooth. A little Internet research shows it's a popular drink up here among soda fanciers of all ethnicities, who are excited it's now sold at Costco. They say the taste is similar to the Cokes some of us grew up drinking because it's sweetened with cane sugar, not the current sweetener, the nutritionally and environmentally dreaded high fructose corn syrup.

Anyone else want to weigh in on Mexican Coke vs. American Coke?

This week's restaurant: Barboni's Pizza, 7270 Victoria Park Lane, Rancho Cucamonga; also 9792 19th St. at Archibald.

I'm a flexible diner, rarely so gripped by desire for a particular cuisine that I can't be waylaid by something else. Case in point: I was in northern Rancho on Thursday at lunchtime and figured I'd head east on Base Line past Day Creek to Nodaci (?), an out-of-the-way sushi bar I'd once seen a sign for. So, I'm there at the quaint Victoria Park neighborhood center, walking under the awning toward the sushi place, when I see the B in the window.

While I'm not totally opposed to eating at a B, it did give me pause, especially for raw fish. Barely breaking my stride, I veered a few feet to the right and into Barboni's Pizza.

This is a new-ish second location for Barboni's, with the original location on 19th. According to the menu, they've been in Rancho Cucamonga since 1986, which makes them practically historic. I'd never been there. The menu is slightly broader than most pizza parlors', with more than a dozen pastas, all said to be prepared fresh daily.

I ordered the half lasagna lunch special ($6), which comes with a salad, garlic bread and drink, and took my seat. The dining room is spartan, well-lit and set up for families and sports teams, with most of the seating picnic-style on long tables with benches. A women's softball game played on the flat-screen TV that dominated one wall.

As for the food, I wasn't blown away, but for a six-buck lunch it was pretty good. A simple salad of shredded lettuce and mozzarella was improved by the oily Italian dressing. The lasagna came out bubbling in a teardrop-shaped dish. And I mean bubbling aggressively. It continued bubbling for 1:15 (I timed it, fascinated). My expectations dropped. But the sauce had some kick to it and in the end I wasn't displeased.

Service was indifferent even though at 1:45 p.m. I was the sole customer.

Like a lot of places I visit, Barboni's is a neighborhood restaurant, not one worth driving across the valley to try. But if you're in the neighborhood, they may be worth investigating. Even if you thought you were in the mood for Japanese.

This week's restaurant: Swasdee Thai Cuisine, 14720 Pipeline Ave., Suite B, Chino Hills.

One reason I kept going to events concerning development of The Shoppes (ground breaking, media tour, second media tour) is that each one was in the late morning, perfect timing to eat lunch afterward in Chino Hills. (The developers provided food each time but I skipped it.) Not that Chino Hills is a culinary mecca -- the city is just so far from our Ontario office that it's a rare treat to be there.

And the city does have some good places to eat. Residents there are always complaining about the lack of sitdown restaurants, but their city has more than they think. It's just that most are ethnic eateries, non-chains, and maybe for that reason they're not quite what the average person is looking for.

All I know is, my list of places to investigate in Chino Hills is a half-dozen long, and that's pre-Shoppes. On Thursday I went looking for one of two sushi bars I've read about and couldn't find it -- drat those giant shopping centers and five-digit addresses -- but while exiting Chino Hills Marketplace on the Pipeline side, I looked across Pipeline and saw a sign for Swasdee Thai. Well, any port in a storm. I drove directly across the street and into the business park.

Swasdee (the word is said to be a greeting in the Thai language) is a brand-new restaurant in a brand-new building, open "one month and one week," the server told me. The interior has a sleek, mod design with comfortable booths and a small bar. The lighting is dim, the glasses are fluted. Definitely a swankier environment than Mix Bowl.

The menu is upscale too, as are the prices. Appetizers are $6.95 to $15.95; entrees range from $7.95 to $13.95. I had Drunken Noodle ($8.95) and a Thai iced tea ($2.25). Important note: With some of the noodle dishes, the price is without meat; adding chicken, pork, beef or shrimp is $2 more, and seafood is $3 more. So my noodles with chicken actually cost $10.95.

A little pricy. Still, I have to say, my food was a cut above. Drunken Noodle was a bowl of broad, flat noodles with generous cuts of carrots, onions, tomatoes and chunks of chicken, all mildly spicy. The serving was large enough to take home half.

Across from the entrance just feet from the door was a second building with Roscoe's Famous Deli, and based on the names on the door it's owned and operated by the people formerly behind Heroes in Claremont.

So there's yet another Chino Hills restaurant to try, not to mention two sushi bars, two more authentic Chinese eateries and who knows what else. As we left The Shoppes Thursday morning, the city's spokeswoman suggested a tour sometime of the under-construction City Hall and I'm certainly amenable to that.

As long as we schedule it for around 10:30 a.m.

For our annual Living Here magazine, I was asked to write a piece about restaurants and a shorter piece recommending five non-chain eateries.

Alas, the magazine (due out any day now as a DB insert) proved smaller than expected because of lagging ad sales and both my pieces were bumped. Oh, the humanity. So the main piece became today's print column and the sidebar is published below. Waste not, want not.

Note that I spread the five choices around geographically. So while these are not (as Nick Hornby would say) my all-time Top 5 restaurants, they're five that I've patronized multiple times over the years and enjoyed, for one reason or another.

Donahoo's Golden Chicken
1074 N. Garey Ave., Pomona (also 1117 N. Grove Ave., Ontario)
The Donahoo's box lunch is to fried chicken fanciers what the bento box is to Japanese food fans, an all-in-one conglomeration of tastes. The box consists of either two pieces of chicken or six chicken strips, perhaps the Inland Valley's best fried chicken, plus a pile of bland thick-cut fries (crinkle-cut at the Ontario location), a fist-sized roll and a small container of cole slaw. A plastic fork is tucked into a side flap. It's to-go only. If you're at the Pomona location, take your box a few blocks east to Lincoln Park and have yourself a picnic.

Fredy's Tacos
1821 E. Fourth St., Ontario
Located in the Ralphs center at Vineyard and Fourth next to a panaderia, Fredy's serves up small, Mexican-style tacos with plenty of onions and cilantro on corn tortillas. A humble place with mighty food, Fredy's draws laborers, journalists and Ontario police. Dine in and listen to ranchera music from the jukebox or watch a telenovela on the TV.

Angelina's Cafe
9135 Archibald Ave., Rancho Cucamonga
Hidden in a business park, Angelina's proves to be a cozy place with high tables, mustard-colored walls and a welcoming atmosphere. The food, mostly sandwiches and salads, is modest and reliable. There's a daily special to spice things up a bit. I like the old-fashioned spaghetti and meatballs, served in a portion large enough to take home half. The burgers are pretty good, you can get a salmon caesar salad for $8 and they make their own potato chips.

Flo's Cafe
7000 Merrill Ave., Chino, and 5650 Riverside Drive, Chino
Flo's is a down-home place, so popular there are two locations. They have the same menu, meaning that your choice of Flo's can be based on where you are at the moment, either physically or psychologically. Downtown Flo's is slightly downscale Coco's; airport Flo's is old-school coffee shop with airplanes, and sometimes flies, outside. I prefer airport Flo's but I visit the other in a pinch. Whatever you order, even if it's biscuits and gravy at breakfast, only the uninitiated make the mistake of not saving room for the homemade pie, cobbler or pudding.

San Biagio's N.Y. Style Pizza
1263 W. Seventh St., Upland
They have pastas here, baked and served in an aluminum tin, and sandwiches too, but the main event is the pizza. It's made in the New York style, a thin crust topped with tomato sauce and a sprinkling of mozzarella, plus whatever toppings you like (a purist would say none). You can order by the slice or get a whole pie. Slices are thin enough you can fold one in half and pretend you're in Brooklyn, even though you're really in a shopping center in Upland. Owner Biagio Pavia doesn't speak a lot of English but his enthusiasm is contagious. He speaks the universal language: a thumb's up or a high-five, accompanied by a big smile.

This week's restaurant stretches the definition: Costco, with locations at 11800 Fourth St., Rancho Cucamonga, and 9404 Central Ave., Montclair.

When a few budget-conscious friends invited me to lunch at Costco, I wasn't sure what to make of it. I'm not a Costco member and I didn't even know you could eat there. But they said anyone can eat at the cafe, which is on the patio, and that the $1.50 hot dog and soda special couldn't be beat.

So a group of us met at the Rancho location across from Ontario Mills. You line up, place your order at a window from the very basic menu depicted in giant blow-up photos on the block wall above, get your food and sit at the one of the plastic benches on the utilitarian, hose-it-off-before-closing-time patio.

I got only the 1/4-lb. hot dog and 20-oz. soda, $1.62 with tax, to relish the novelty of the cheapest lunch I've had since Del Taco halted its three tacos for 99 cents deal.

The hot dogs and Polish sausage are Hebrew National, all-beef. I had the Polish and asked for the off-menu sauerkraut, one friend's tip.

The dog didn't live up to the hype and didn't taste like anything other than a hot dog, but for the price, it was outstanding.

Curious about the $1.99 pizza slices, I visited the Montclair Costco a few days later. This time I got the frozen yogurt chocolate and vanilla swirl ($1.35) as well as a combo slice, and no drink. Total: $3.61. While these prices, and the 59-cent soda with free refill, are eye-poppingly low, my guess is that with its high volume and low overhead, Costco still makes a profit.

The pizza slice was only average, which still made it better than some pizza I've paid more for. The swirl was tasty but as it came in a 5-inch-tall plastic cup, there was enough for a whole family.

It would take only three more visits for me to try every type of food on the menu: the chicken caesar salad, the turkey wrap, the berry sundae, the berry smoothie, the ice cream bar and the most mysterious item, which is called the chicken bake. It seems to contain chicken, cheese and bacon, all deep-fried into a hot dog-like form. It's oddly compelling.

Social critics will grind their teeth at hearing that at $3.99, the salad and turkey wrap, the healthiest items, are the most expensive other than a full pizza, thus encouraging us all to stuff our faces with hot dogs and chicken bakes.

The two Costco cafes are identical except in Rancho there were ropes to funnel us through in one line, whereas in Montclair we lined up at individual windows, like we were at a ballpark. Also, in Rancho the patio has overhead heaters. Perhaps corporate HQ thinks Montclair has a naturally hotter climate.

Both locations are good for people-watching if you take an academic interest in the type of people who shop at Costco. In fact that thought was just crossing my mind in Montclair when a mother with two children in tow passed by pushing a shopping cart containing one item: a crate-like box of diapers with the number 264 on the side.

This week's restaurant: Angel's Place, 2325 D St., La Verne.

This was shaping up to be a poor week for new-to-me restaurants. First there was a lunch at Larry's Burgers, in the wonderfully named Larry's Plaza on Holt Boulevard in Montclair. I knew this could be trouble when I passed a haunted looking woman at the pay phone who had a bare midriff and several unsightly rolls of loose belly skin. Moments later I saw the B grade in the restaurant window. My burger combo actually wasn't bad and the clientele made for amusing people-watching...but I'm not going to hurry back.

Then there was Bowl House on Third Street in La Verne, where my curry chicken bowl was the least appetizing I've ever had. It almost looked like bone-in chicken, big fatty pieces of it, skin-on.

To salvage the week, on Thursday, a day off, I impulsively decided to try Angel's Place, a Greek restaurant I'd spotted on my Bowl House misadventure. Angel's opened in October, replacing Nick's Place and a dry cleaner.

Breakfast, lunch and dinner, mostly Greek but with some American favorites judiciously sprinkled in. Pastrami, burgers and steak sandwiches? Hmm.

But it's got a casual, cheerful atmosphere and table service to boot. I had a chicken souvlaki sandwich ($5.99) and a side salad ($4). A bit too liberal with the tzatziki sauce, but it was a good sandwich: chicken and diced tomatoes on pita bread.

One quibble: The staff could be more clear on whether the side choices are free or not. I was asked "french fries, no fries or salad" but had to pay extra for the salad, and pay the same price for the sandwich as if I'd had fries. I'd have had fries and a salad if I'd known I was essentially paying for both.

People on Yelp are conflicted about Angel's Place. I liked the feel of it and the staff was friendly. Several items on the menu, especially some of the salads, piqued my curiosity. It may not be as good as Athen's Gyro House in Upland, but I expect I'll go back.

Walking downtown La Verne before Monday night's council meeting, I was startled to see that Dippin' Dots is opening an ice cream, or whatever it is, parlor at 2310 D. St. just above Third. The sign on the door says the opening is 10 a.m. today.

The name Dippin' Dots is familiar to L.A. County Fairgoers: The so-called "ice cream of the future" chain has had a stand outside one of the exhibit halls for years. The product itself is served as a pile of round frozen pieces the size of BBs, hence the "dots."

Dippin' Dots is also sold at Rancho Cucamonga Quakes games and at movie theaters in Chino and Chino Hills, according to its website's store locator.

In its page on Dippin' Dots, Wikipedia notes that the ice cream of the future hasn't quite become the ice cream of the present. I'm pleased to learn the company was founded by a fellow Illinoisan, though.

This week's restaurant: Brandon's Diner, 8689 Base Line Road, Rancho Cucamonga; also 870 E. Foothill, Upland, and 10271 Magnolia, Riverside.

Brandon's is a hugely popular breakfast spot, and maybe lunch and dinner spot too. For whatever reason I'd never been there. An online review at the Dinerwood site (an LA guy, he's also reviewed BC Cafe) caught my eye a while back, so last Saturday, a friend and I went in for breakfast. Even at 10:30 there were five small groups waiting for a booth, but the wait wasn't long.

Inside, Brandon's is surprisingly old-school: tile floor, booths, a long counter with swivel seats and signs with regular daily specials. The kitchen is in the back, not behind the counter. They have the full complement of breakfast items as well as sandwiches, Mexican food and dinner plates, plus beer and wine.

I had the half French toast combo with two eggs and two sausages ($7.45); my friend had Polish sausage, two eggs, home fries and two French toast halves ($7.95).

The French toast was very good, thick and dusted with powdered sugar. They also have a French toast variety with the name Cinnamon Revolution, which seems to promise a spice insurrection in your mouth. ("Vive le Cinnamon Revolution!")

The sausage links were plump, some of the best I've had. However, my over-medium eggs arrived over-easy.

My friend's Polish sausage, split and grilled, was tasty, and the scrambled eggs very nice when flavored with the two (!) kinds of salsa brought to the table. However, she described her watery coffee as perhaps the worst she's ever tasted. "This is like gas station coffee," she said, before quickly deciding that even gas station joe is better.

So Brandon's isn't perfect. That said, we enjoyed our meal and the atmosphere, and also the people-watching.

The clientele was diverse -- whites, blacks, Latinos -- and included a Goth couple, the woman in white gloves, the man in Kiss-style platform boots, striped pants and a belt buckle that read "666." Goths tend not to smile so it was hard to tell if they were enjoying themselves. They certainly livened the place up for everyone else.

This week's restaurant: Dragon Inn, 8031 Archibald Ave., Rancho Cucamonga.

This place was recommended by Robert Karatsu back when I was asking about decent Chinese restaurants in the Inland Valley. Since then I discovered the exemplary Good Time Cafe and Peking Deli, both in Chino Hills. But I met Robert for lunch Thursday at Dragon Inn to give it a shot.

It's on the northeast corner of Foothill and Archibald. Belying the faded yellow paint on the exterior, the interior is quite nice, with Chinese prints on the walls, wooden chairs and smartly dressed servers. A short bar has a computerized register and that whole area resembles a Starbucks.

Right inside the door is a framed Jonathan Gold review of Chu's Mandarin in Rowland Heights, which he praised for its hand-pulled noodles. The connection? Mr. Chu owns Dragon Inn, in existence seven years, as well as Chu Chinese at Fourth and Milliken, which I've tried and liked. Chu's Mandarin, however, closed several years ago. But at least Dragon Inn has a good pedigree.

I ordered Szechwan Chicken Noodle ($6.95), figuring with its reputation I should get a noodle dish, and Robert got what he said was his usual, Shrimp with Broccoli ($12.95). His dish was average, mine was very good. Or am I biased? The spaghetti-like noodles were soft and chewy, in a slightly spicy sauce with bell peppers and mushrooms.

The menu is dumbed-down, as expected -- cream cheese wontons, anyone? -- but some interesting dishes surface, such as chow fun. Try a noodle dish and experiment with an appetizer or second entree.

This week's restaurant: Viola's Deli, 17715 Arrow Ave., Fontana.

It's rare that I visit Fontana for anything. We don't officially cover Fontana anymore, that duty being left to our sister paper The Sun, and downtown Fontana is so far from our Ontario office (15 miles) that it's impossible to get over there on a lunch hour.

After Pomona's State of the City luncheon, though, Fairplex CEO Jim Henwood, of all people, was telling me about a little deli in Fontana. A native New Yorker, Henwood said Viola's Deli made cold subs in Big Apple style: shredded lettuce and olive oil tucked inside a tube of cold cuts and cheese, the whole thing inside a roll laid flat for just moments on a grill. (I think I'm remembering this right.)

So I began looking for an excuse to go to Fontana. Conveniently, the new library, which I've been hearing about for two years, is opening and as a library fancier, I intended all along to check it out. Arrangements were made for a tour at 1:30 Wednesday, which allowed me to combine the trip with -- yes! -- lunch.

Naturally, Viola's was my choice. I was joined by reader Tom Leak, a Fontana resident and real sandwich maven, who treated, which was awfully nice of him. Good ol' Fontana hospitality.

Viola's is at Alder and Arrow, across from the Fontana courthouse and a little east of downtown. Viola's shares a small building with a law office. The deli is an unprepossessing place with a counter and a dozen two-chair tables.

I got a capocolla sub and Leak had the oli. (He's not sure what the oli is but he liked it.) Mine was as Henwood had described it, and very tasty.

Cold or hot subs are $4.29 (small) to $5.35 (large). Viola's also makes brownies, cakes and cookies; one of the lunch specials gives you a sub, soda and piece of cake. I'm thinking of applying for work at the law office.

Another menu item may be coming. A handwritten sign on the counter polls customers: "Would you prefer a steak, chicken or turkey pot pie?" Based on the hash marks, turkey and chicken are in a dead heat, with steak lagging far behind with three votes. It's too late for California to decide on Hillary or Barack, but the Viola's pot pie election is on.

This week's restaurant: Malott Commons, the Scripps College dining hall, 10th and Columbia, Claremont.

I was going to write a favorable post about Omana's, a Juanita's-like taco stand at about 1000 W. Holt Ave. in Pomona, near St. Joseph's church, where I had a good burrito before Monday's council meeting. (At Omana's, not at St. Joe's.) Tacos are $1 to $1.25, burritos are $3 to $3.50 and plates are $4, so you won't spend much dough. My carne asada burrito had meat, beans and salsa. It was ruder than most neat American-style burritos, but quite good.

However, I was invited to lunch Thursday at Scripps by Judy Harvey Sahak of the college's Denison Library. Claremont Colleges' food won a deserved rave from a visitor and blogger from Occidental College. I ate last year at Pomona College's Frary dining hall and was impressed.

Harvey Sahak bragged that the Scripps food service is the best of any of the colleges and told me I had to try it.

Well! It's all you can eat, and I can't even tell you all the stuff they had, they had so much. Let's see: a good salad bar; four kinds of soup, including sourdough bread bowls; an array of gourmet-style hamburgers, deli sandwiches and paninis; four varieties of wood-fired pizza by the slice; a pasta dish called eggplant roll-a-tini; barbecued beef brisket and cornbread; meatball stromboli; and vegetarian dishes cooked to order.

I had cream of asparagus soup, pizza with tomato, salad, meatball stromboli (a sandwich in a pita-like bread) and a slice of beef brisket. For dessert, frozen yogurt. Plus an iced tea. Harvey Sahak insisted on treating. Price is $5 for colleges folk and $7.50 for anyone else, not that anyone checks ID. Anyone can eat at the college dining halls, and while they don't exactly publicize that fact, they don't discourage the public.

Best dining deal in town. And the food is a long way from mac and cheese and mystery meat.

In a satisfying boost for my ego, I was even recognized by a couple of readers, a college employee and her mom. All in all, a pleasant outing.

Omana's is still cheaper, but not by much.

Had lunch Wednesday at Shalimar Garden, a combination Pakistani/Chinese restaurant at Holt and Main in Pomona. (The building, which began as a Bob's Big Boy, has gone through many permutations.) Referring to the twin cuisines, reader Bob Terry advised me: "Be sure to let us loyal readers know how the tandoori eggrolls are, or the orange peel lamb."

Of course the cuisines aren't really mixed. I had a beef dish whose name I don't recall (it was No. 14) and it was pretty good. There was only one other customer there, not a good sign. My waiter, who's Chinese, said when a customer orders off the Chinese menu, he goes into the kitchen to make it himself.

Other combination restaurants I'm aware of: Giuseppe's, an Italian/Middle Eastern place in San Antonio Heights; Golden Wok, which has burgers, donuts, Chinese food and Louisiana fried chicken, in Pomona; and Walter's in Claremont, with Afghan, American and Italian food.

Bon appetit!

This week's restaurant: Good Time Cafe, 2923 Chino Ave., Suite H4, Chino Hills.

Attentive readers will remember the debate in this space about the lack of real Chinese food in the Inland Valley. Since then I've written about a find in Chino Hills, the Peking Deli. Well, here's a second Chino Hills Chinese place that's just as good.

Good Time Cafe occupies a wide, shallow storefront in the 99 Ranch Market center at Peyton Drive and Chino Avenue, just a bit south of Pomona. As the sign on the door promises, it serves Taiwanese-style cooking. The menu boasts 192 items, including an astonishing 47 appetizers. Granted, some of them are only for the hardy -- pig blood rice cake, anyone? -- but there's plenty for the rest of us, and dozens of soups, noodle and rice dishes, seafood and meat entrees, vegetarian items and a category called potage, a kind of porridge.

Oddly, unlike the rest of the menu, names of the menu's 22 beverages are untranslated from the Chinese. Better ask for help there.

I had Tainan's Peddler Noodle, dried rather than as soup. It had noodles, ground sausage and a tea-simmered hardboiled egg, a dish made in what I'm told is the style of street food in the Taiwanese city of Tainan. It was delicious and filling. This $4.95 entree came with a free pot of hot tea. Total outlay with tax and tip: $6. You can't beat that with a chopstick.

Service was friendly, the dining room was immaculate and a flat screen TV broadcast Chinese language news. To sum up, yes, I had a good time at the Good Time Cafe.

And I'm looking forward to my next meal here, even if it's unlikely to be No. 176, fried kidney with sesame oil.

Had lunch Thursday at the Corner Butcher Shop, at Fruit and Foothill in La Verne, a new, yet old-fashioned, butcher shop that also serves sandwiches. My pulled pork on a French roll, plus cole slaw and a Faygo soda ($8.40), were good stuff. (In-joke for Claremont Courier readers: Martin Lomeli wasn't eating there.)

From there, after a couple of errands, I dropped into 21 Choices Frozen Yogurt at Foothill and Mountain in Claremont. Only my second time in the place, but whenever I pass by, there's either a line out the door or people are walking toward it from the parking lot as if hypnotized. (The 21 Choices in the Village Expansion, which has been under construction for probably a year, albeit with little to show for it, now looks like it could actually open. Someday.)

I ordered one of the daily specials, vanilla bean ("98 percent fat free"), and had the counter girl add strawberries. She plopped out the yogurt onto a cutting board, added fresh strawberries and began chopping the whole thing up with a cleaver.

A customer watched all this, asking the counter girl what flavor of yogurt it was, saying it looked good and asking me if I'd had it before (no). The counter girl told her that chocolate with strawberries was very popular.

The customer then said to me excitedly, "You know what would be really good? Strawberries with marshmallow." I scrunched up my face, indicating that I disagreed violently, and also that in my opinion she may have lost her marbles, and paid my tab ($3.95).

On my way out, I heard the customer order vanilla bean yogurt.

This week's restaurant: Casa Blancas Mexican Food, 300 S. Indian Hill Blvd., Claremont.

You may know Casablanca, the Mediterranean restaurant in the Claremont Packing House. But do you know Casa Blancas, the Mexican restaurant three blocks south at Arrow Highway?

I stopped in there two weeks ago for dinner before seeing a movie at the Laemmle. That was "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days," the Romanian abortion flick that, while worth seeing, was such a downer it may qualify as the feel-bad movie of the year.

Casa Blancas was previously a Green Burrito, with a couple of iterations in between. Thus, my expectations were low. The interior, however, had a lot of colorful tile, and the menu seemed promising.

At the counter, I ordered two grilled shrimp tacos and a Jarritos soda ($7.56 with tax). The salsa bar had been converted into a trough of ice filled with bottled Mexican sodas, not only Jarritos but Mexican Cokes. Nice, although too bad it's not a salsa bar. The tacos were the smallish, real kind, served on corn tortillas and loaded with cabbage. They were quite tasty. The soda proved a good pairing.

Casa Blancas was a pleasant surprise, likely the most authentic Mexican restaurant in Claremont (not that there's a lot of competition, granted). It's a good place for a quick, cheap bite in an often-pricey town.

And if you're curious, I did try two new-to-me restaurants this week: La Verne Pizza Co., where I had an adequate if unexciting pepperoni slice and salad, and Rok the Wok in Upland, where I had a below-average chicken teriyaki bowl. I'd rather highlight a worthwhile place, even if it's a couple of weeks old.

This week's restaurant: Hilltop Jamaican Market and Restaurant, 1061 E. Holt Ave., Pomona.

Their business card says Hilltop's, the signs say Hilltop. I'll go with Hilltop. Anyway, I've passed by this place for years and, while forever meaning to investigate it, always came up with excuses not to stop. Hilltop is in a narrow storefront in an aging building and the curb is painted green. The neighborhood is slightly dubious. But finally I stopped for lunch last Wednesday.

Hilltop turned out to be much more restaurant than market. There are a half-dozen tables and on the walls are amateur drawings and paintings. No customers were present at 1:30. The market consisted of a corner with shelves stocked with shakers of jerk seasoning, packets of curry powder and cans of breadfruit slices.

At the counter, I asked the employee for a recommendation. "First time?" he asked. He suggested oxtail stew. The small plate is $10 and came with rice, plantains, cabbage and fry bread. I got a ginger beer from the refrigerated case. He didn't charge me for the drink. "I gave you a discount," he said.

I have no basis for comparison but certainly enjoyed my meal, eating every bite except for some rice. In fact it was so filling I didn't even need dinner.

Hilltop also sells fried chicken, curry goat, curry chicken and fish patties, which the paper menu reports are sold in restaurants in L.A. and at the Bob Marley Festival in Long Beach. My guess is that takeout, catering and perhaps wholesale are a bigger part of their business than the dining room.

But for the adventurous, I recommend the place, mon.

This week's restaurant: Three Forks Chop House, 580 W. 1st St., Claremont.

To celebrate my 11th anniversary at the Bulletin, a friend treated me to dinner at Three Forks, a Montana-themed steakhouse in the Packing House and perhaps the valley's most expensive restaurant. Hey, anything to avoid having to fork out (three fork out?) that much dough myself.

Three Forks was the first 909 restaurant to be reviewed in the L.A. Times in recent memory. Ol' S. Irene Virbila gave it 2.5 stars out of 4 and for her, that's a positive review. There was amusement over the photo, which included a man in very casual attire at the bar, on a local blog; someone said dismissively that they wouldn't pay those kind of prices to sit near a man in a tank top. The review, which is posted outside the restaurant, has other problems: S. Irene manages to use the word "rustic" four times, including twice in the same sentence, to describe the tart, the sausage, the food in general and the atmosphere.

The restaurant has a website but no prices are listed on the online menu.

We sat outside near a heat lamp. We shared the charcuterie platter ($18), a plate of cured meats, olives, brie and something called ramp. I had the filet mignon, 10 oz. ($46), and she had the lamb chops ($39).

What arrived first was an amuse bouche -- they don't typically serve these things at the burrito stands I frequent -- of, it was explained, "crab and cucumber with vinaigrette aged 12 years...excuse me, a vinaigrette reduction...to spark the appetite." Whichever, the bite-size dollop had a pleasant mix of flavors.

Now bring on the meat!

The appetizer was quite good, although the ramp and olives were nothing exciting, and any more than two people would not have found the size adequate. The lamb was tender. The filet mignon, which I asked to be cooked medium, may have been overdone (that was my friend's opinion; I'm no expert), a bit chewy on the inside and charred on the outside. But, as one who accepts what he is given in life, I accepted it and enjoyed it.

For dessert, we split the lemon tart for two ($12), which was excellent, very lemony, although not of the size you might expect from a dish billed as being for two.

Take points off the meal for a few aspects: the "artisan" bread that came with the meal wasn't as good as that at Le Pain Quotidien a block away; the service was fair but not outstanding; and the view, of an industrial plant across the street, isn't what you would call inspiring.

Total bill, by the way: $144.51. Gulp.

That said, the experience was a cut above Fleming's, the steakhouse in Victoria Gardens, if a cut below Ruth's Chris in Pasadena. Would we go back to Three Forks? On a rare occasion, sure. Perhaps to try the farmers market dinners on Sundays, which sound intriguing.

Plus, you never know when you might want the Three Forks specialty, a reduction of your bank account. And a dose of rusticity.

This week's restaurant: Monaco's Pizza, 7325 Day Creek Blvd., Suite 101, Rancho Cucamonga.

Monaco's is in the Henry's Market center at Base Line Road, just up the road from Victoria Gardens. The interior has an upscale look: There's a greeter's station, backed by frosted glass, and the decor includes faux-marble tabletops, dark wood chairs and wine bottles behind glass.

The menu has a page with the restaurant's backstory. I didn't finish reading it before the waitress arrived but did manage to glean that the same family ran Red Devil Pizza prior to this restaurant.

We ordered the seafood linguine ($16) and the cheese ravioli ($9.50). They came with dinner salads, which were basically iceberg lettuce, cheese and olives, with dressing in a small plastic container, as if we'd ordered the food to go. This salad would cost $3.50 if ordered separately.

Now, this is essentially the same salad you get at San Biagio's in Upland, only San Biagio's is an unpretentious place where you order at the counter. The Monaco's salad is kind of a weak for a place with upscale pretensions. The entrees, however, were perfectly acceptable, if not up to the level of the decor.

I went back on my own for lunch to try the pizza. I read a bit more of the Monaco's story, such as the family's arrival here around 1960 and someone's (the mother's?) employment at Nordstrom, but once again had to order before I could get very far. I ordered a small pizza with anchovies and mushrooms ($14). Pretty good stuff, with generous, quality toppings and a moderately thick, slightly crunchy crust.

My friend Bob, who lives in the neighborhood and recommended the place, especially likes the pizza. If I lived nearby I'd probably go there more frequently. (For one thing, maybe then I could finish reading the family's story.) But Bob agrees the food is more casual than the decor.

Today's restaurant: Peking Deli, 4183 Chino Hills Parkway Suite F-G, Chino Hills.

Diligent readers will recall this blog's lament about the paucity of non-Americanized Chinese restaurants in the Inland Valley. My hope was that Chino Hills, with its proximity to Diamond Bar's Asian population, might have something a bit more interesting. A friend recommended a place, and some Internet research turned up a second.

We tried the second one -- we'll go back for the first -- on Tuesday. That was Peking Deli, which is in a strip mall off the 71 Freeway at Pipeline. It's a simple storefront operation with table service. Nothing fancy, but comfortable.

The menu has 118 items, and while it includes such American staples as orange chicken and pork fried rice, there are plenty of dishes one doesn't encounter in the 909. As another friend said after scanning the takeout menu later, "This is totally Taiwanese style."

There are two dozen soups, not just hot and sour and egg flower but seafood tofu, shredded pork with preserved pickle, and salted duck. Cold appetizers don't even have English translations but include beef brisket, duck leg, tripe and pig ear. (Try ordering pig ear at Panda Express and see what happens.)

We had pork fried rice cake ($5.25), dry noodle with Peking sauce and sesame sauce ($4.50) and beef with spicy sauce ($8.75). My friend liked the latter two best; I preferred the rice cake. It's not like the diet-food rice cake but rather slices of soft, chewy rice that resemble bamboo shoots.

All the customers but us were Asian, a good sign. Peking Deli has been in business four years and survives on word of mouth, our server told us. But she was delighted to learn that the restaurant had been well-reviewed on Yelp.com.

The only downside to the place is that it closes at 8:30. They didn't kick us out, but within two minutes of our departure, the lights were out.

I hope to go back sometime -- after first sampling that other Chino Hills Chinese restaurant.

An anonymous (why? why?) reader sent the following e-mail to yours truly and three colleagues on a food topic perhaps best showcased here:

"I would like to make a suggestion for a food article. I presented this idea to a staff writer about 4-5 years ago and they just filed it away. [Of all the nerve. -- DA]

"I am an avid fan of Bento Boxes. Definition of what these are follows:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bento

"My main interest, however, is where these are available in the Inland Empire -- more so around the surrounding Ontario airport areas. I know of a few that I patronize regularly. It's a lot of good healthy food for an average price of $6. Most Japanese establishments have this available. Some in the fine dining category may not.

"The ones that I am aware of in my general area (around Ontario Mills where my office is at) are:

"Robin Dono Sushi, 4th & Milliken, Ontario, CA (fine dining)

"Also having lived in Orange County, I patronized places that offered these bento boxes daily. There are more of these venues in O.C. so it's a common find.

"I hope this can be considered as an article. If you know of the staff writer that can perhaps do this for the Daily Bulletin, please forward this email. I'm sure they would enjoy these bento box lunches as I do.

"Thank you."

I'll leave it to the features staff whether to write an article about bento boxes, but at least your plea has been heard here at the blog. Anyone want to add to the list of bento box purveyors?

Oh, and let me add that Kazama Sushi is now in Claremont's Village Expansion, where it opened last week. Another sushi restaurant has taken its place at Grove and Foothill.

This week's restaurants: Sho Sushi and Route 66 Subs, both at 373 E. Foothill Blvd., Upland.

Both restaurants in a yellow strip center at Third Avenue (I think -- the street signs are missing) notable for a Green Burrito, Digital Color World and Check 'n Go.

At lunch Tuesday I entered Sho Sushi and took a seat at the sushi bar. I had most of my usual sushi items: salmon skin cut rolls, spicy tuna cut rolls, salmon sushi and albacore sushi. I'm inexpert at these things but would judge the sushi to be average -- not excellent but not bad.

Sho seems to be known for "all you can eat." I simply ordered my items off the menu and when the bill came, it was "all you can eat," $19.95. Mentally adding up what I'd ordered, it came to slightly more than that, about $23, so I guess it worked to my advantage, barely.

Sho Sushi, by the way, used to be owned by the people who now own King's Teriyaki on East Holt in Pomona, where I wrote about getting napkins imprinted with the Sho Sushi logo.

Thursday, figuring I'd polish off the strip center, I had lunch at Route 66 Subs. (I've been to a Green Burrito before and that's good enough for my little restaurant survey.)

The interior has a black-and-white motif with Route 66 and car-related decor. I got the Maserati, which is an Italian Trio sub (ham, mortadella and capicolla, I believe), 8-inch size, plus macaroni salad and a Coke, for $9.42. The sub was fine and filling, the salad pleasingly peppery.

They gave me a sub card -- a free sub on your eighth visit -- and you can sign up for e-mail coupons that will also net you a free meal on your birthday.

I'm not a sub guy, and when I am I go to Grinder Haven, but this was a nice little place. On my way out, after almost an hour of eating and reading, the guy behind the counter, who had taken my name with my order, called out, "'Bye, David." So he gets points for trying, and maybe I will go back sometime.

Where are the 24-hour restaurants of the Inland Valley? Most seem to be in Pomona.

Leaving aside Coco's, Denny's and their corporate cousins, here are the places I know about in Pomona:

* La Fuente, 987 S. Garey Ave. at 10th Street.

* Grandma's Donuts, East Mission Boulevard just east of Garey (can't find them online or in phone book).

* The Jelly Donut, 2097 N. Towne Ave. (A sign says it's "Open 24/24." Someone tell Jack Bauer!)

* Golden Wok, 1725 N. Garey Ave.

* Taqueria de Anda, 1690 S. Garey at Franklin.

So Pomona has a lot of night owls. What about the rest of the valley?

* Rancho Cucamonga has Corky's Kitchen and Bakery, 6403 N. Haven Ave. just above the 210. Apparently they do good business in the middle of the night. The fresh-baked pie is awesome.

* Ontario has Fork in the Road, 4265 E. Guasti Road, at the Travel Centers of America West truck stop. The food is surprisingly good. Fork was featured in a segment of the Food Network's "Road Food" in 2006.

Surely there are more 24-hour joints, especially in Ontario. Anyone want to fill in the blanks, or tell stories about 24-hour dining?

This week's restaurant: Salad Farm, 9090 Milliken Ave., Rancho Cucamonga.

Salad Farm opened recently in the small center on Milliken at Seventh Street that also houses Gandolfo's, a NY-themed deli (already visited). The 'Farm is part of a very small L.A.-based chain that appears to have just five locations thus far.

You order at the counter and they make your salad right then and there for you. The menu shows 28 salads, from $5.95 to $8.50, plus panini sandwiches, baked potatoes, soup and quesadillas. A helpful photo menu depicts virtually every item.

I had the Greek salad with chicken ($8.45), and it wasn't bad. It was also enormous and I don't know who could finish it. It came with two pieces of pita bread.

It's a similar concept to So Fresh Salads and More in the Claremont Village Expansion (also visited before), and perhaps slightly better -- at least at Salad Farm I didn't have to wait, I got what I ordered and the amount of dressing was reasonable.

This week's restaurants: El Perico Ranchero, 1401 E. Foothill Blvd. (at Grove), Upland, and El Cerrito, 7201 Archibald Ave. (at Base Line), Rancho Cucamonga.

Yes, we're riding the El this week and we're nowhere near Chicago. El Perico Ranchero was pointed out to me by one of you readers recently when I wrote about Mexican restaurants in Upland. I'd overlooked it. So I rectified that omission by dining there for lunch on Tuesday.

It's mid-range Mexican with table service and some seafood on the menu. I had the chile verde ($9.95). The plate itself was hot, which always makes me suspicious that the plate is prepared in advance and stuck in the oven. The chile verde, though, was very good. And there was a lot of it. I don't know who can eat all that; I could barely finish half. I took the rest home and got a snack out of half of it Wednesday night. I had the other quarter Friday night. That's a lunch that keeps on giving.

On Thursday I hit El Cerrito after a visit to 4-Color Fantasies, the comic shop across the street. Entering El Cerrito was disconcerting because it looks like half a restaurant. All there was to see was a long, narrow space with booths along each wall. No employees or even kitchen in sight. I sat myself and saw the kitchen is tucked away through a doorway on the left. The lone employee I saw during the meal was pretty busy.

I had three soft tacos with chicken, beef and steak ($2.25 each). They were big too and loaded with cheese. I should have asked if they were Mexican style (small) or American style (big). Oh well. They were fine for what they were. The menu was fairly extensive, just like El Perico's, but I wasn't in an ambitious mood, so this is a feebler than usual account, sorry.

Maybe next week, instead of eating at another El place, I can do the opposite: a Le place.

Fat Tuesday, the end of Mardi Gras, is today, and reader/foodie Charles Bentley has a question:

"I was wondering if you have any suggestions for local eateries to enjoy some Mardi Gras cuisine?

"But if you know someplace local – especially a good spot that makes good crawfish etouffee – I would dearly love to know about it. Plus points if they have nice beignets like at the Café du Monde!"

Crescent City Cafe was the restaurant by Montclair Plaza that had to relocate to make way for a Chili's but ultimately couldn't survive in its Ontario location as New Orleans Express.

With them gone, the best I could come up with was Kelly's Cajun Grill in the Ontario Mills food court. The Inland Valley surely must have a soul food restaurant or two, but I'm unaware of them.

Anyone have any suggestions?

Monday I ate at two new-to-me restaurants, Richie's Diner for lunch, Harry's Pacific Grill for dinner, both at Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga.

I'm familiar with the Richie's in Victorville, an occasional lunch stop when I lived and worked there in the mid-1990s. That one, if memory serves, had a virtually all-white interior and was fairly utilitarian. The food was OK but nothing exciting. The VG one is more a modern take on a diner, outfitted in browns and gray, with comfortable booths and classier touches. It's a little disconcerting to see a wall niche with bottles of wine not far from a lineup of classic bottled sodas and emblems of old-school gas station pumps, but it mostly works.

I ordered the California tuna melt ($8.95) on sourdough with slaw as my side and a Pepsi with vanilla flavoring ($2.19), which came in a metal cup. A tuna melt is my baseline sandwich. This one really was a melt -- sometimes the cheese isn't melted at all -- and was one of the better examples I've had. It came with avocado, probably a treat for most people, but to be honest, I've never really liked avocado. The slaw was good too.

All in all, Richie's beat expectations.

Dinner that night was at Harry's. I've been to Honolulu Harry's, owned by the same chain, but this is virtually nothing like that. It's a more upscale experience, without the tropical gimmickry (which is fun, by the way).

I had the Paniolo skirt steak ($17), which was said to have been marinated 24 hours, with fries; my friend had the Asian Pacific Pescado ($16), which came with baby broccoli, kalamata olives, fresh tomatoes and white wine reduction.

What was Asian or Mexican about the fish's preparation wasn't clear, but it was flavorful and served on a bed of scalloped potatoes. My steak was tender and juicy. Even my fries were good. Harry's atmosphere hit that sweet spot where you feel you're in a nice place but it's not so stiff that you're intimidated.

So, two meals, two winners. If only all days were like this.

Although I did write about Chinese restaurants and noted therein my lunch at Foothill Bistro, I didn't have room last week on this blog for an official Restaurant of the Week. And I ate at four new-to-me places too.

Belatedly, here's where else I ate:

* Crepes de Paris, 7876 Monet Ave., Victoria Gardens: This was a pleasant surprise. They sell crepes both savory (entree-style) and sweet (dessert), plus salads, hot and cold sandwiches, French onion soup and coffees. I ordered a chicken-spinach crepe ($9.95) and, while it appears I ended up with a chicken-mushroom crepe, it was large and tasty and, the place being crazy-busy and the staff shorthanded, I had no complaints. There are cheerful French cartoon drawings on the wall. A better-than-average dining option, especially if you're tired of the same old same-old.

* Beard Papa, Food Hall, Victoria Gardens: Founded in Japan in 1999, Beard Papa outlets have been springing up in L.A. To see one in Victoria Gardens lets us know the 909 is hipper than it's given credit for. Their cream puffs are made on the spot and cost $1.95 ($2.25 with tax). The shell is lightly crunchy and the custard filling is creamy good.

* Central Burgers, 10340 Central Ave., Montclair: I went here before a Montclair council meeting. This location was Andy's Burgers No. 2 until fairly recently. This is one of those burger places (like Jim's in Upland and Terry's in Rancho Cucamonga) that has a surprisingly broad menu. For breakfast, eight omelets, eggs, bacon, hotcakes; 13 types of burgers, plus a patty melt and chili size; burritos, tacos, quesadillas, taquitos and tostadas; tuna, fish, steak, chicken and gyro sandwiches; five salads; steak dinners ($6.55!); and even a cup of chili ($3.25) and a cup of rice ($1.75). I had a burger combo ($4.37 with tax) and enjoyed it while watching "King of Queens" on the dining room TV.

So that rounds out last week's dining. I'll get to this week's dining soon -- hopefully before next week.