45722 Fri May 05 01:03:02 -0700 2006 8 1 San Francisco Bay Area 0 226462 Rodeo. My favorite town. Here and there on Chowhound there have been one line mentions of great chicken in Rodeo. There were never any details. Yesterday while eating at La Strada in San Pablo, the older gentleman at the next table … who had just had heart surgery … mentioned one of the first restaurants he went to once he could get out of bed was Ricky’s for the fried chicken. I though, wow, that’s gotta be good chicken. When I mentioned it casually in a La Strada post, J T pinned down the location to Rodeo and said “yes, their fried chicken dinner is that d... good.” You have to love Chowhound for being a place where there’s instant feedback like that for a restaurant in a small town like Rodeo with a population of … what …ten? So it was the fried chicken dinner tonight at Ricky’s with a crème de menthe parfait ($3.75) for dessert. This is a very large half chicken simple dredged in flour and deep fried until the coating is crisp enough to shatter with each bite. It is nicely done because despite the large chicken pieces, the meat is both completely cooked and juicy. It comes with potato wedges. A large Idaho potato is quartered, dredged in the flour and deep-fried. While my heart still belongs (literally) to Nellie’s, I really can’t think of a better fried chicken in this part of the East Bay. Dinner comes with a half loaf of, I’m guessing, Maggiora Italian bread and a bowl of cold butter pats. Soup AND salad come with dinner. Salad was the usual dish of mainly iceberg with a carrot stick, celery stick and one black pitted olive. Choice of soup was minestrone, split-pea or cream of broccoli. The cup of thick split pea was probably canned, but they added nice large cubes of ham to it. A bucket of fried chicken with potato wedges can be ordered to go ... $11.75 for 8 pieces, $16.75 for 16 pieces. Given how HUGE the chicken is, this is a major deal. My 1/2 chicken dinner had 4 pieces and I had lots of leftovers. They also have two other types of take-out chickens available – - Garlic chicken - Chicken Italiano which is baked to order chicken with herbs and spices. The menu says to allow 45 minutes for this chicken. Other eat-in chicken dinners are - Chicken Cacciatore - Chicken livers sautéed in wine with mushrooms and onions Never in a million years would I have guessed this is a restaurant. It looks like all of those non-descript bars with a fading sign to mark its location and the requisite cocktail glass on the sign for this type of establishment. In fact, even though I had the address, I passed it by twice. Ricky’s is an Italian restaurant and bar that has been in Rodeo for over 28 years. Prior to that, the owners ran a restaurant in El Cerrito called The Silver Dollar. Even had I been curious enough to walk in the door, the sign is over the bar ... the type with a pool table where all the regulars turn to check you out as you walk in. The restaurant has an unmarked entrance or can be entered to the right of the bar. Hard to believe but Ricky’s made a wood-paneled room with acoustic ceilings look cozy and inviting. There are wooden frames around each table. The frames are covered with white twinkling Christmas lights. The ceiling lights are dimmed with most of the light coming from the twinkling lights or lamps scattered around the room. It is hard to tell the plants decorating the room are artificial. The plates were the type your grandmother might have, those plates that look like blue willow plates but are red with flowers. There are a few red sauce Italian dishes on the menu. The most interesting seems ‘Ricky’s homemade cannelloni”. Pasta is spaghetti, ravioli, lasagna or pasta with pesto. Meatballs are available. There’s Veal Scaloppini and Veal Parmesan. There is a handwritten specials menu. Tonight sweetbreads, eggplant parmigana, BBQ pork ribs, oysters and chipotle-lime tilapia were on the specials menu. There is NY steak, T-Bone, Top Sirloin, medallions of beef, steak parmesan and grilled pork chops. They also have beef liver and onions. Seafood selections included calamari steak, sole almandine, breaded catfish, batter-dipped & grilled sole and breaded grilled halibut steak. Dinners are in the $12 - $16 range. The half chicken dinner was $13. On Tuesday night there is a special where chicken is $7 if you eat in the bar. The parfait was three scoops of ice cream drizzled with a generous amount of crème de menthe and topped with canned whipped cream and served in an old-fashioned tall tulip-shaped metal dish. There is also a kahlua parfait and root beer parfait. Chocolate mousse, cheesecake and strawberry delight round out the dessert menu. I’m not even sure if they have draft beer, which is odd for a bar and the beers run to Miller’s and Bud. My bottle of Miller’s came with a frosted glass courtesy of the Miller’s Beer Company and printed on it was “It’s time for a big old macro-brew”. It was that type of place. Nothing fancy and old-fashioned. Ricky’s seems proof that a diet of fried food and alcohol might not be as unhealthy as is suspected. Appetizers included deep-fried prawns, calamari strips, mushrooms, raviolis and zucchini. If anyone in the restaurant was under 50 I’d be surprised. And most of those 50 year olds had their parents with them. I was there early though, so that might explain the customer profile. It was a family type of place with a constant hum of conversation and laughter. On the back of the menu was printed: “A customer is the most important person in our business. You are not dependant on us. We are dependant on you. You are not the interrupter of our work day but are the purpose of it. Our service is not a favor. You favor us by letting us serve you. Bring us you needs. It is our privilege to handle them. – Judy and family” Ricky's Corner 18 Parker Ave Rodeo, CA 94572-1119 Phone: 510-799-5222 It is located one block down from the Rodeo Sport, Bait, Liquor & Taxidermy store. On the other side of the street. In fact, it is not really on a corner, but between a sport store and an air conditioning repair shop. Call to double check, but I believe the hours are: Lunch Tues-Fri: 11 am – 2 pm Dinner They open at 5 pm and close around 9 or 10 pm depending on the day of the week. Not sure if they are open on Monday. Fri May 05 01:03:02 -0700 2006 0 rworange 1 226519 Many thanks for a very nice (and detailed) write-up. I have relatives in the central valley and have taken numerous detours along the way to try out the areas local fare without much fanfare. I look forward to trying Ricky's in the near future for what appears to be a fantastic fried chicken dinner. Kudos again for the heart-felt (literally ;) report. Good Chowhounding! a sante, Curtis Fri May 05 13:10:21 -0700 2006 226462 0 Curtis 2 226554 Thank you. I just want to be clear that Ricky's is in the East Bay near Vallejo and the Carquinez Straight. It is more on the way to Sacramento than the Central Valley. It is an easy off the freeway though using the Hercules, Willow Avenue Exit. Willow Avenue turns into Parker. The other day when I was looking for information about another resturant, I came across this link that has restaurant menus for odd locations like Suisun City, Roseville, Vallejo, etc. It is far from comprehensive and the site seems to be abandoned around 2004, but I might be wrong. However, it has some leads for places that are out of the way and the bonus of being able to look at some of the menus. I'd call any place as a SF restaurant on there that interested me is no longer in business. The doggy bag reviews by the site owner's dog Ginger are hilarious. Being a dog, there isn't a doggy bag Ginger didn't like. Carrow's gets three and a half bones. The brief food reviews, other than Gingers, are not that unbiased since the site charged restaurants to list their menus online from my understanding. I love the doggy bag concept. I would change it so that the more in the doggy bag, the worse the restaurant. However, there was one restaurant where Ginger was dismayed, since the her owner ate what was in the bag because it was that good. Link: http://www.dinerboard.com/index.phtml Image: http://image.maps.yahoo.com/mapimage?MAPData=RNRXQ_hyzy1PrbLxz24yyDMC6P9uUkCdUszPzAJ73FzRM6Egnvy53jc_4OpZxICVSHP8wT288KcNogXeeT2FMPfcjzlgv4doWwzQo1y_eKpRquvn Fri May 05 14:23:33 -0700 2006 226519 0 rworange 1 226597 funny - my rodeo friend never mentioned ricky's. instead, we would always go to blackie's fried chicken in pinole. moist, cooked-to-order, [relatively] greaseless fried bird. accompanied by yummy vanilla rolls. haven't been there since rodeo guy moved to the peninsula a few yrs ago. hope blackie's is still there. thanks for the tip on ricky's, though. will have to check it out when i'm in the area...if i don't find my way to blackie's first! blackie's fried chicken 600 tennent ave, pinole 510/724-4851 Fri May 05 18:14:31 -0700 2006 226462 0 audrey's tattoo 2 226604 Sadly, Blackies closed last year. I might have liked Blackies chicken a little more than Ricky's because the Blackies chicken had the skin removed prior to coating and frying. The original owner of Blackies sold it over a decade ago. It continued on with two more owners and then folded in 2005. Every now and then I drive by to see if someone bought it, but it is still empty. Link: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/34741#157510 Fri May 05 18:46:04 -0700 2006 226597 0 rworange 3 226607 ahhh, so sad. thanks for saving me a trip! Fri May 05 18:51:50 -0700 2006 226604 0 audrey's tattoo 1 226861 Hmmm, well maybe I will go. I have several friends in Rodeo who tried Ricky's a few times and vowed never again. I believe the words they used were grey, slimey and a few others. But that's fine, I'm willing to have a go myself. It isn't far from Richmond. Have you been to The Embers? Mon May 08 14:27:21 -0700 2006 226462 0 Dr. Biggles 2 226873 From the little else I've read elsewhere on the web and my experience with the salad, soup and dessert, I would guess that the thing to stick to here is the fried chicken and either go with take-out or to minimalize a financial hit, go for the seven dollar Tuesday special. I might someday try the take-out garlic chicken and the Chicken Italiano. Tho it might not seem that way, I'm not that into fried chicken. Most places I try it once just for comparison sake. If the garlic chicken or the Italiano turn out to be good, well, that would be something. Quite honestly, for 'ambiance' in the Rodeo area, I'm more likely to eat at The Waterfront after braving the peacocks roaming around outside. Especially (and only) on a nice warm day, sitting on the outdoor deck overlooking the wetlands and lazily watching the oil tankers glide into the refinery. Lovely in the evening when the refinery lights twinkle like stars. Breakfast in Rodeo can be exciting too. But that's a story I'll tell you some day in person. Rodeo can live up to its wild west name. BTW, in nearby Crocket, the Mexican restuarant has new owners. Haven't checked it out yet. Yes, I've been to The Embers. I like it for what it is, an old fashioned coffee shop with hearty plates and good basic food. Still haven't explored their BBQ items. Maybe the hamburger this year for the Fourth of July. In terms of a basic dinner, not counting fried chicken, I would think that The Embers would be a better choice than Ricky's. Do check out the liquor store behind The Embers where the back cooler is like a treasure chest filled with bright gems of every color and brand of flavored wine and booze like Boone's farm. There are flavors of Boone's farm I never knew existed and 'boutique booze' previously unknown to me. I just go to admire the display as I've grown fond of my liver. Do you have any recs for The Embers? Have you tried the ribs? Link: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/34479#155782 Mon May 08 14:58:48 -0700 2006 226861 0 rworange 3 226882 Wow, sitting here sweating from lunch. The Spicy Beef Vermicelli soup from Ba Le. VERY good. Unfortunately I don't have any recs for The Embers. I have had their ribs and as you said, it's good for what it is. I go cause I can park and walk in and it's fun for the family to go. There's something on their menu to watch out for, something along the lines of a Pork Medalion dinner. All it is, is pork medalions swimming in their sauce in a huge platter. My brother inlaw was very unhappy. Sounded fine to me, heh. Biggles Mon May 08 15:24:06 -0700 2006 226873 0 Dr. Biggles