King's Fish House, Best seafood without the Ocean

Located 45 minutes east of Los Angeles, Inland Empire residents don’t have to venture far for good inexpensive seafood cuisine.


One of southern California’s best seafood restaurants is located at the shopper’s paradise of Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga, called Kings Fish House. This is not just an ordinary fish house. They set the standard for what one would expect from a fish house at an ocean side location, but without the fishy-ocean smell.


Their menu is filled with everything seafood including popular oysters from all regions that are rich in oysters from places like Baja Mexico, North Island- New Zealand, British Columbia, Totten Inlet- Washington, Nova Scotia- Canada, Damariscotta- Maine, Duxbury Bay- Massachusetts, and Carlsbad- California. Want to try all of them? Then order the Oyster Sampler platter with options of six, nine, or a dozen oysters.

Don’t like oysters, then try their to-die-for sushi. Their master sushi chef’s can prepare delightful plates of sushi, sashimi, and chose between 14 different specialty cut rolls like the Royal Salmon roll with crab salad, raw salmon, bonito flakes, green onion, and sesame seeds with a tasty ponzu sauce or the Trojan Roll that has spicy tuna on the inside and sashimi tuna wrapped on the outside with citrus tobiko.

At King’s Fish house, one can also enjoy a traditional seafood meal from their lunch and dinner menus. They have 16 hearty appetizers including oysters, fish tacos, and King’s crab cakes. For the main course, chose from a wide range of King’s famous charbroiled section, like hard to find items like wild British Columbia Red Rockfish or Farm raised Mississippi Catfish. King’s of course has succulent crab from Canada and Alaska and lobster from Maine and Australia.



Their drink menu is just as impressive as their dinner menus. With an impressive 60 wines in their drink menu, they are not short in selection for wine lovers. Included are 12 different martinis, eight specialty cocktails, and 23 different domestic and micro-brewed beers.



There is really so much to name and mention from their menu, it is hard to give credit to it all. To see the menu for yourself, go to: King’s Fish House

Sakura of Toyko Japanese Restaurant

Sakura of Tokyo Japanese restaurant of West Covina, CA isn’t five star quality Japanese cuisine, but they make up with atmosphere and price.

Their menu is chalk full of photos for nearly every item to help unfamiliar visitors makes it easy to decide on what to order. I personally have a problem when restaurants place photos in their menus. This implies they feel their customers are not intelligent and won’t order what they aren’t familiar with. Granted, this tactic may work in middle class suburban cities, but this sort of practice is insulting and unnecessary.

Another issue I have with Sakura’s of Tokyo is the Japanese chef’s are not even visible. Sakura of Tokyo has a sushi bar, but it isn’t in use. It is merely a bar used not for customers to eat at and see the chef at work, but it’s used for decoration with who-knows-what. Instead, they are behind closed doors, which is not typical in most Japanese restaurants and sushi bars. Normally, one would expect to see at least one chef preparing sashimi and sushi behind the counter. This is normally a demonstration of pride and dedicationin of work that wasn't present here.

As for presentation, I was a bit disappointed in the food craftsmanship I am normally accustomed from a respectful Japanese restaurant. With that said, their food isn’t as bad as I portray. Granted a presentation of sushi rolls has expectation of beauty and grace that Sakura of Tokyo does not implore, but it doesn’t mean it’s not good. Just be prepared for their specialty rolls to fall apart if you plan on using chopsticks.

Upon reading the previous customer reviews from other websites, Sakura’s big seller is their bento boxes. Their bento boxes are the majority of their menu options with over 30 variations. Most of their meals come with teriyaki sauce over strips of chicken or beef, tempura shrimp and vegetables, and ginger salad, and white rice. These combination plates usually come with sushi roll of the popular California roll or other options of sashimi (raw fish over rice). All customers begin with a complimentary miso soup.

At the rear of the menu are their specialty rolls. This is where most of my disappointment came from. Their selection of specialty rolls are very minimal with only about five different rolls and five wraps and the rest was sashimi. I ordered the rainbow roll and the caterpillar roll. Within five minutes the orders came out. Usually, these types of orders are handcrafted with precision and take time to prepare. This felt rushed and the presentation from chef demonstrated little effort. I wasn’t impressed.

Even though I wasn’t impressed for the night’s production of food, I wasn’t disgusted. It still was rather enjoyable, it wasn’t overly priced, and their staff is very friendly and fast service made the atmosphere worth while.

Experience Tulipano Italian Restaurant

Located in an unsuspecting area for a fine Italian restaurant, Tulipano Italian Restaurant sits in a run down shopping area near an adult book store and a laundry matte. While this restaurant may not appeal to one from the outside, the inside is quite the contrary.

Tulipano is a local family owned business. The owners and former natives of Naples Italy, Vincenzo Carrano and brother Eduardo Carrano have owned and operated Tulinpano since 1993.
Inside is elegance of style with formidable grace of service with the presentation of excellent food preparation. Paired with over 40 different wines from Italy, California, and Argentina, the entrée selection is unsurpassed with meals like Linguini Pescatore, Ravioli De Salmone Affumicato, Pollo or Scampi Caprese, Fileto di soglisola Ai Funghi, Risotto A Piacere, and Scampi Alla Vodka.

All the dishes prepared are made from fresh ingredients including the vegetables and side pasta dishes, tomato sauces, and delightful deserts. Before each meal, a complementary plate of tomato bruschetta over slices of toasted baguettes and a side of fucasha bread with a side of oil and balsamic vinger.

The main course is an absolute must for Italian enthusiasts. Together with a live guitarist to lighten the atmosphere, the warm courtesy from each of the servers, the gracefulness of host Vincenzo will welcome the female guests with a traditional kiss on the hand and a respectful hand shake to the gentlemen, the guest experiences will be one to remember.

For more information, go to: Tulipano Italian Restaurant

My Vist to BJ’s Restaurant Brewery

I had a craving for a full meal, so I went to BJ’s Restaurant Brewery last night. I’ve only been to BJ’s on one other occasion prior. At that time I wasn’t impressed. I had only ordered the appetizer samplers plate that came with Spinach & Artichoke Dip, Angus Beef Sliders, Avacado Egg Rolls, Crisp Potato Skins, Santa Fe Spring Rolls, and Mozzarella sticks. I also ordered a glass of the Harvest Hefeweizen. The Hefeweizen is a wheat beer that is used with Bavarian weizen yeast to produce its flavor. It’s a fruity beer, so it isn’t uncommon that you will find people enjoying a glass of this beer with a wedge of lemon. All in all, the meal was okay, but what can you expect from a meal entirely of appetizers? I felt like I didn’t give BJ’s a true test of its dining potential, so I wanted to return at a later date.

I had a chance to return to BJ’s, so I wanted to enjoy a full dinner service, but this time I wanted a glass of wine instead of a popular beer that BJ’s is known to have in their menu. Since most of the meals are rich and full of flavor, I decided to order a glass of Bearboat Pinot Noir. This wine was not a vinyard that was familiar to me, but I knew I was interested in ordering the Angus Beef Open Sandwich and Pinot Noir is a selection that normally goes well with roast beef.

The Angus Beef Open Sandwich is a "knife & Fork" sandwich that comes with a slice of toasted garlic bread with a hearty sized portion of roasted beef, a mound of mashed potato, covered with brown gravy, with a bed of mixed vegetables, while my dinner date ordered the Blackened Chicken Potato.

As little as a potato may sound at first, it is not so little in portion at all. In fact, the potatoes that BJ's uses for this dish is incredibly large in proportion. Most likely these potatoes are grown in Idaho where the potatoes there are known to get as large as a game hen. This stuffed potato was filled with blackened chicken, steamed broccoli, fire-roasted red peppers, jack and cheddar cheese with a side of creamy alfredo sauce. I tried it and it was quite flavorful, but a bit rich.

Had I known the portions of food were so large, we wouldn’t have started with the spinach dip with tortilla chips, or we could have shared a single meal, because my date and I aren’t big eaters. Fortunately, we were able to take leftovers home to finish another day.

BJ's does have a full array of delicious looking deserts, but we were too full to even think of ordering anymore food. However, I did get to see one of the deserts from the couple sitting next to us and they were kind enough to let me photograph their desert called a Pizookie.

At the bottom of this mouth watering delight begins a large chocolate chip chocolate cookie, with two scoops of creamy chocolate ice cream, and finally topped with a bar of the famous Ghirardelli chocolate, which is known as the “Triple Chocolate Pizookie”. I asked the couple if the Pizookie was as good as it looks, “Yes, you have to try it some time,” said the girlfriend.

My overall visit at BJ’s was satisfactory. The service was excellent, but I wasn’t overly impressed with the food. The prices of the meals were favorable considering the food we ate was pre-cooked, the mashed potatoes aren’t made from scratch, and nether is the gravy. The chicken and the vegetables tasted frozen, but it still turn out to be a good meal.

If you are on a strict calorie diet, I don’t recommend BJ’s, but for an occasional casual night out, it is worth the trip, especially if you are looking for a place to hang out with a group of friends and want to enjoy a good beer and pizza and enjoy a good sporting event. They have large wide-screen televisions throughout the restaurant and one large screen inside the bar area. I shall return to this venue again.

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