Drawing A Bead On "The Best Caesar Salad in the South Bay"

This is quite a bit better than "runner up."  Yesterday the (formal) South Bay Writers Workshop/ (informal) Thursday Writers had their annual holiday luncheon at  Café 1511, corner of PCH and Avenue H in Redondo Beach.  They had the perfect place for us and it's called The Garden Room.

A curving booth facing a small one for three people and one wheelchair guest.  Previously, all of our choices (yes, we vote) put us at a long tables making conversation and conversing difficult.  To properly circulate, you have to get up - bench seating means you have to be Very Careful not to knock the person next to you onto the floor or mis-step and shove them into their food.  We have been trying for years to find a round table.  

Be that as it may and it is.  In other good news, they offer various beers and wines including a coup de champagne and thought it was not served in a flute, it was even better their way - a white wine glass and a hefty pour!  Ditto with the other wines.    Another point in their favor - swift, very good service for the 13 of us present.  As far as I know, everyone got home safely even if they had to roll from their car to their front door.  Portions are as generous as the wine.   So much for the bad luck of 13 at table.

I know this personally.  Our first visit I tried the poutin - French Fries with white Cheddar cheese curds and brown gravy - and it would have served a family of four and this was the small size!

So I thought I'd try them on a Caesar salad with house dressing and crispy bacon.  It was delicious - icebrg lettus well chopped and a lot crisper than Romaine which has such thick stems that if you're me, you waste dining time cutting the leaves off of the lettuce stems.  The bacon being crispy enough - always a concern; gah to nearly raw bacon - and it was.  Crispy.  And croutons which I never eat anyhow.   I shared them with the others as a petite hors d'oeuvres.  They went over well.

At $11.99 yes, it was pricey but well worth the money.  Their house dressing had just  the right amount of mixed flavors and the bacon provided the vitamin B.  No dithering about the menu next time we visit - a glass of champagne and a Caesar salad.  Perfection is nearing …