What is a trip to Palm Springs without a little Cheeky's?

Cheeky's has easily become our breakfast place while visiting. The service is attentive and the food is great. Let's not forget about the flight of bacon ($4):

Each time we go it's been different strips. This time it was: extra thick, apple cinnamon, pepper, jalapeno, neuske's. We agreed we liked the jalapeno the best.

Rich had the soft scrambled eggs with English white cheddar and prosciutto ($10). It also came with a side of toast. I tried the buttermilk and fresh corn pancakes with blueberries and bacon ($10). It was 2 large pancakes with corn kernels mixed into it. For some reason, I was envisioning the pancakes to be made from cornmeal but I think I read the description wrong. They charged me $1 to add blueberries, which was disappointing since there didn't seem to be anywhere near $1 worth of blueberries in the pancakes. The pancakes themselves were great though -- fluffy, moist and delicious. I love that they also provide real maple syrup.

It's a semi-expensive breakfast at about $30 for both of us, but until we find a better alternative, we'll stick it out here.

Jake's: Living up to the Hype

On Saturday night, we decided to try out our surprise favorite from last year, Jake's Ready to Eat. Last year we thought the combination of good service and value made this a win. But had we hyped it up in our minds and would it live up to our expectations again?

Jake's isn't a big restaurant and although our first reservation time slot wasn't available, they were able to reserve a table for us within 15 minutes of the time we originally wanted. This time, we sat on the outside patio, next to a heat lamp and covered by a tent to keep the rain out. With the dim candle on the table and green hedge of a backdrop, it made for a pretty and relaxed atmosphere.

The amuse-bouche was a beet skewer with goat cheese. Two of my favorites!! Rich was generous and let me have his portion. Excellente.

They added a few new items to their menu since the last time we were here, including an option to get a three course meal for $29. A select number of entrees were allowed for this option. Since I was already planning on getting a salad and one of the entrees, this made more sense economically. The organic mixed greens salad was good (no cheese!) and for my entree, I had the fettuccini a la vodka ($16) with heirloom tomatoes. It was very heavy and rich, but also really delicious. I couldn't finish the entire dish.

Rich had the (surprise!) filet mignon ($26) with mashed potatoes and asparagus. He enjoyed it and said he thought it was better than the filet he had the previous day at Chop House.

For dessert, I was allowed to choose anything on the dessert menu. It was a toss up between the toffee banana crunch cake and the coconut cake, but the waiter said the coconut cake was better (hands down). Rich had a giant brownie ($6) which he said was good, but preferred a less cakey brownie. The coconut cake was very good. It was HUGE (3 layers) and moist with delicious cream cheese frosting. None of that gross buttercream stuff. I only wish there was more coconut flavor in the cake itself.

We were stuffed by the time we finished and they still surprised us by bringing out two bites of a pecan tart, just like last year. The owner (guessing?) also came by to ask how everything was. The service was awesome. We love Jake's.

Another weekend in Palm Springs

We were in Palm Springs again last weekend, trying a few new places as well as a couple of favorites from last year.

First up was the Chop House restaurant for Rich's steak fix. It is right across the street from LG which I found funny but there seemed to be a good number of patrons at both establishments. The decor is dark and reminiscent of a traditional steakhouse. We were seated on the patio which was less stuffy than inside and plenty warm with the overhead heat lamps.

I started with the organic beets salad (without the gorgonzola cheese). It was on the small side for a hefty $9 with maybe only 4 slices of beets total for the entire 1-2 cups worth of salad. It was fine, but I could have easily eaten a double or triple portion.



Rich had the regular (8 oz) filet mignon ($31). He said it was good, but not knock-your-socks off good. It was good enough that he finished his plate though! All of the menu items are a la carte, which in my opinion, just makes dinner more expensive. He had a side of french fries ($5), and was disappointed they didn't carry any potato options he would have liked (i.e. roasted potatoes).

For my "entree", I had two side dishes, the brussel sprouts hash ($7) which was caramelized onions, mushrooms, shredded brussel sprouts and truffle oil and the wild mushroom ragout ($8) which contained a mix of shitake, portabello, chanterelle and button mushrooms. They were a bit too oily for me, but the flavor was very good.

 For dessert, we tried the NY style cheesecake ($7) which we both thought was dry and not very good.

Overall, it was a decent but expensive meal. We'd probably go back if we had to, but would rather search out other options.

Cheeky's Part Deux

Since we were back in PS, we decided to go back to Cheeky's for Sunday morning brekkie. We found this place last year and remember it mostly for the bacon flight!

We had gotten there slightly before they opened at 8 am. There were already people lined up but they had a sign-in sheet which made things easy. We had a nice outside table again. The weather was warm, the sun wasn't in my face, and it was great for people-watching. :)

We started with coffee and tea ($2.50 each). I love the interesting dishware.

Of course we had the flight of bacon ($4):

From top to bottom, it's Jalapeno, Applewood, smoked, Xtra Thick. The side piece is maple. I had a few bites of each. Maple and jalapeno were my favorites.

R was banned from getting the Eggs Benedict. So he opted for the pecan brioche French toast ($10):

I had a few bites and it was very rich but he enjoyed it. 

I love the maple syrup "house":

Even though San Diego does Mexican mighty well, the huevos rancheros ($10) were calling my name.

Those are 2 poached eggs over tortillas and peruano beans. Not a healthy choice, but absolutely a delicious choice.

A very good breakfast before our drive home.

Jake's Ready to Eat

We were looking for a fun place to have dinner that wouldn't break the bank. We were also dressed in hiking clothes so a $$$ place wasn't going to cut it. There seemed to be no shortage of high-end fancy smanchy restaurants in Palm Springs but we found one listed as $$ instead of $$$ or $$$$! Jake's it is!

The atmosphere is casual but comfortable. There is a larger outside patio which looked romantic and a handful of smaller tables inside. We arrived slightly before 6 pm on a Saturday evening and even though the place looked empty, the host asked whether we had a reservation because he was booked for the entire evening. Luckily he found space, and they were able to seat us inside. The service was awesome... not pretentious, attentive and always friendly. They seemed genuinely concerned with whether we were enjoying our meal.

Shrimp cocktail was offered as an amuse-bouche:.

Tasty! Out came our server to deliver a warm dinner roll shortly after.

I started with the Mixed Organic Greens salad with lemon vinaigrette ($6.50). It had a nice variety of vegetables and everything was fresh, but of course, I could have easily eaten 3 plates of this. :)

R had the filet mignon with blue-cheese (are you surprised?). It came atop roasted garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus ($24). It was so delicious he ate everything cleanly - even the vegetables!

Because they couldn't make the Tower of Eggplant without cheese (apparently it is pre-assembled), I opted for the sea bass. It was crusted with hazelnuts and came with garlic mashed potatoes and not enough broccolini ($21). Although it was rich, it was perfectly cooked and excellent.  And even though it may look like a tiny portion in this picture (and I did think so when I first saw the dish), I was surprisingly full after I was done.

After gaping at the display case when we went in, I was determined to have a dessert. I mean, look at them!

This picture doesn't really do them justice (R took the picture - hah!).  The cakes are HUGE layer cakes and the brownies and bars (lower shelf on right and left) are as big as my face!  Okay, not really... but close!

It was tough choosing, but the peanut butter lover in me had to go with the peanut butter cupcake ($5):

It was a giant-sized, moist chocolate cake filled with a little peanut butter and topped with peanut-butter buttercream and roasted peanuts. Although I LOVE peanut butter, I shortly realized this probably wasn't the wisest choice as I also detest buttercream (too sweet!), and am generally not a cupcake fan. I can't really complain because there was nothing wrong with it (wasn't dry or flavorless), but I should have chosen something else!

R had the "hostess" cupcake ($5):

His response: Mmmmmmmmmm.

To top things off, they gave us a couple of complimentary bites of pecan bars:

I definitely left with a happy, full belly. This place is phenomenal AND good value. A similar dinner would have cost us much, much more.  We will be back.

Cheeky's

I wanted to find a yummy breakfast place to go to as a treat for hiking the previous day. Cheeky's had good reviews online and I was intrigued by the "flight" of bacon. We got there around 10:30 am on Sunday morning and easily had a prime outside seat. BTW, the weather is perfect in the desert right now. Water was promptly provided in a large sealed glass bottle, opened at our table and poured into iced glasses. Fancy.

Their menu changes weekly. I ordered the maple sage sausage hash, parsnip, carmelized onion, apple and poached eggs ($9.00), he ordered the Blondie's egg benedict with hash browns ($13) and a coffee and orange juice. The juice was freshly squeezed and also served out in a what looked like a lab beaker.



We split the flight of bacon. We should have had the waitress tell us which pieces of bacon were which because we weren't able to tell based on taste. Not that they weren't tasty -- they were definitely crispy (a bacon-MUST) but none had enough overwhelming flavor that we could easily determine the flavor. After looking back at the menu online, I'm surprised because none of them overwhelmingly tasted like jalapeno or espresso, and yet, that's what we had! The complete flight was:
- Nodine's Smokehouse
- Applewood
- Jalapeno
- Maple Crusted
- Espresso bacon

But like I said, I have NO idea which ones the jalapeno and espresso ones were.



I liked the hash. Carmelized onions, apple sausage, crunchy parsnips and different types of potatoes with a perfect poached egg on top. I swirled my potatoes into the egg yolk. Mmmmm.



He said he liked the eggs benedict but that the addition of the cheddar scone might have made the meal too heavy. You mean eggs benedict can be light?

Service was attentive, food was good, and we were pleased.