Posts Tagged: tommy panos
Keeping the Flame Alive on Fourth St
We were so excited we started eating before I got the camera out!
Dinner tonight was at Zut! on Fourth St in Berkeley–to celebrate Rocky’s birthday. I’ve lost track of how many restaurants have been in this spot, and while it was, of course, remodeled yet again, Zut! really reminds me of the one that got it all started here: Fourth Street Grill. There appears to be some old wood around the banquette we sat in, and I wonder how much if any of the interior was there when it was the Grill.
Sarah and I were practically kids when we first started coming up from Fresno to visit my cousin Tommy in the Bay Area. Often, Tommy would insist on taking us out to dinner, and often it was Fourth Street Grill to which he would his maniacally maneuver 6 series BMW. It’s been over 20 years since those dinners, so I don’t remember all the food details. But I’m pretty sure that was the first time I had Caesar salad with whole leaves, always perfectly coated with tangy dressing and grated parmesan. Perhaps the I’ve ever had. And wonderful little french fries, and the best roasted chicken ever, and fabulous burgers, and…
Tommy loved, LOVED to share good food with his peeps. Nothing made him happier than to take friends and family somewhere and turn them on to his latest discovery of culinary excellence. There were many other wonderful places we went, but Fourth Street was always high on the list of places to go. Thinking about the satisfaction and excitement he felt whenever we ate together makes me miss him so much, all over again.
Tommy would have been content; tonight’s meal was outstanding. Even before our appetizers arrived, we were all loving the bread, and Theo declared it the best bread EVER. Then came the beet salad with feta and mandarin and mint. Fabulous! Next came a bowl of crispy fried smelt with mayo for dipping. They disappeared almost immediately. Although I have to say that to me they didn’t quite live up to what we often got on our last trip to Greece. But I’m not complaining. They were pretty darn good.
Then our entrees came. Theo had a giant cheeseburger off the kids menu ($10), and since he doesn’t really eat french fries, he had Caesar salad on the side instead. I had to QA it, and while it was not a rival to the old Fourth St Grill Caesar, it was very good. Rocky had seared Ahi with grilled sunchokes, young chickories, treviso, blood orange and dates ($23). It was beautiful, perfectly cooked and ample. Sarah had the halibut with roasted brussel sprouts in lemon, brown butter and capers ($24). Her only complaint was that there was no starch on the plate, but we got a second round of bread to take care of that. She ate every bite on her plate. I had the rotisserie chicken with horseradish mashed potatoes and escarole ($17). It was fabulous. The escarole was perfectly cooked and had just the right acid tang to be the perfect foil for the creamy potatoes. The chicken was very slightly smokey, wonderfully moist and delicious. But it was both whole halves of a poussin! I would have had to eat through the pain to eat it all. I might have, if I didn’t know we were committed to dessert. Instead, I brought half home for lunch tomorrow. Yum!
Finally, for dessert, we shared a couple of things. Chevre cheesecake with gingersnap crust and blood orange. Outrageous! And also mandarin sorbet with Greek frozen yogurt–like the best 50-50 bar you’ll ever experience. And they made a special little chocolate sundae for Theo.
And before I forget, a nice surprise of the evening was the wonderful Greek wine. The 2008 Santorini, Asirtiko/Athiri, Sigalas ($34) was bright with a hint of gravel, had nice fruit, and was perfect with all the food.
All in all, a wonderful evening sharing good food with the family.
Everyone’s Dead
Tommy and Parents
That’s a terribly morbid title for a blog post, and I don’t really mean to be morbid. But it just struck me that everyone in this picture is gone now. My Thea Sophia passed away from cancer in about 2002. Then her boy, Tommy killed himself in 2008. Then my Uncle Peter, Theo Pano, passed away a year ago. So now it is just Tommy’s sister, Aglaia, and their brother George, who has down’s syndrome.
Today is Tommy’s birthday. He would be 54 years old. It has been over three years since he passed away, and I still miss him. A lot. And I still feel guilty and think about what more I should have done to try to prevent such a thing from happening. It’s not like a think about it all the time. But when I do think of it, it’s the same ton bricks it was when I first got the phone call. Why didn’t I take his melodramatic pronouncements more seriously? Why wasn’t I more insistent about what was not his business to worry about? I know that there’s no answering such questions.
Sometimes I think about these things I’ll never have again, or the people I”ll never see or hug again. It is like each loss is a loss of a little part of my own self, my history, my story, my being. Of course, the life process goes on incorporating new things into the story, making new meanings from our of day-t0-day lives. But these just get us by. Their deeper value now lies in their being the raw material of certain other’s lives, of the next generation. Children live in the present; they burn right through it. So, there is no way to see at this moment how this present is being incorporated into the memories that will form their consciousness. But it is happening. And someday, 30 years from now, my son may wonder in turn about how to hold to what’s left of the people and things that are his story, his memory. I only hope he has fewer regrets.
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