We don’t generally go out for breakfast but today we decided to give another Albuquerque restaurant a go. Although I am sure that my selections for breakfast fare are bad for me, I persevered to continue my quest for the best chicken fried steak in the nation. Currently, Jake’s in Bend, OR, and Dean’s in Clackamas, OR, are the undisputed leaders in serving this very tasty but possibly unwholesome meal selection.
I started by accessing the internet using our terrible phone and phone service provider, both of which seem to work in this locale but few others. I was able to find a website that purported to illustrate the 15 best places in Albuquerque to get chicken fried steak. Murphy’s Mule Barn led the list but, in the interest of fairness, we selected a place called Tim’s. This place was supposed to have large, fat person-sized portions of this tasty meat dish. We hopped into Charlotte’s cab and drove the 25 miles or so to Tim’s.
Right after arriving in Tim’s parking lot, I began to suspect something was fishy because there were signs out front indicating the place offered free hugs. I do not cotton to free hugs from strangers since 1. I don’t know them and I do not normally touch people I don’t know. 2. Hugging offers an opportunity to savor the B.O. and stinky heads of strangers. 3. Hugs instead of food are not what we were seeking.
We were promptly assigned a waiter who turned out to be a tubby little twit that grinned maniacally as he approached. The other waiter had big wood platters in his earlobes that closely resembled round plastic laminate tabletops. When queried on what we wanted, I explained that we had found this restaurant by perusing the web and they were way up on the list of restaurants that served chicken fried steak. He revealed at this time that they no longer served chicken fried steak because it had been removed from the menu two weeks prior by the manager. Things went downhill from here.
The twit was a competent waiter but the food we ultimately ordered after dealing with my heartbreak was mundane and nominal. I had a bone-dry breakfast burrito and Peggy had a Reuben that she described as “unsatisfactory.” The fried potatoes were okay but, all in all, the food was unremarkable.
We left only partially satisfied (no longer hungry) and decided to wander over to the part of town where the annual Balloon Fiesta was supposedly taking place after visiting the bottom station of the Sandia Aerial Tramway. We accidentally took the longest route through town due to some road selections based entirely on ignorance and, after circling the balloon launching area several times, finally achieved our goal. Unfortunately, the weather in Albuquerque has not been ideal for ballooning so there was absolutely nothing to see except a big empty sky.
Balloon watching found to be boring and hard-to-see, we then drove to the National Museum of Nuclear (nucular if you are W.) Science which is right across the street from the local Costco. Because of my geezerism, they knocked $2 off the regular entry price for my ticket. Peggy is not ancient so she had to pay full price of $12.
The museum starts with a lot of reading of nifty plaques on the walls with text explaining who was the funny-looking guy in the adjacent picture. They are not real forthcoming on nuclear theory or physics. After reading a bunch, you enter the more entertaining parts which have models of reactors, replica Fat Man and Little Boy atomic bombs that were used to barbecue about a quarter million Japanese, cannon-fired atomic shells (hope they don’t fall short), rockets, bomb control units, a Packard military limousine(?), interactive experiments, weird tubes that used to emit ionizing radiation and an outdoors section where they have some fighter-bomber and bomber aircraft along with a selection of missile systems. They also have some exhibits about alternate forms of energy like solar, geothermal, coal, gas and wind.
This museum was a great place to spend a few hours when the weather outside was being uncooperative and would probably be just as good on nice days. The docents were sharp, the exhibits were interesting although sometimes terrifying, the aircraft are fun to look at and the price is very reasonable.
We went back home and are returning to our policy of not eating out unless seized by a desire to be disappointed. Peggy is a much better cook than most of the chefs in the places we have visited. The remainder of the chefs might get a tie but I’d bet they can’t do it regularly.