Eating out

We eat out a lot when we are here in America. After a long day of the show every day of the week, we don't really feel like going home and cooking - neither in this house we've leased nor when we were living in our caravan in Quartzsite. So we learn to eat out in America.


The restaurants in the little town of Quartzsite differ greatly to those in the city of Tucson. Quartzsite, afterall, only has to cope with hundreds of thousands of people for a couple of months of the year. The rest of the time it is a sleepy desert town. Consequently, there are seasonal restaurants employing casual staff who are often the snowbirds passing through town. We were often served by elderly ladies in their seventies glad to be able to earn a little extra cash on their travels; one lady served us who didn't know what a Cabernet Savignon was. Glenn said it very slowly and carefully for her to repeat to the barman and she repeated it back to Glenn perfectly, including his Aussie accent! Very funny. She laughed too.

As we were in Quarzsite for three weeks we did a circuit of the restaurants in town where we found food that was palatable. There are many Mexican restaurants in this part of the US so we had to include one or two. They use corn and beans a lot and often it's a plate of slop, but palatable slop as long as we didn't eat it every night.

We never did find a restaurant in Quartzsite that served fresh vegetables with a meal - not one! It was always canned corn, canned green beans (yuk) or canned lima beans. Except of course, the Chinese restaurant who always include fresh vegetables but we only tolerated that place twice.

It was China's answer to Fawlty Towers. On walking in there is a sign that says, "Please be seated" so we looked around the large dining room and made for a two-seater table. Just as we began to sit a little old Chinese waiter shouted at us from the other side of the room, "Not there!" We looked at eachother. He repeated, "Not there! Over there!" He pointed to a four-seater on the other side. The people around us half smiled and I'm sure some rolled their eyes. During the evening he marched around the restaurant as if he loathed every minute of being there, slamming bill folders on tables as if he couldn't wait for us to leave. Hilarious.

One of the make-shift restaurants in Quartzsite consisted of a shed with tables the length of the building where they served meals in styrene boxes complete with plastic cutlery. It was fish and chip night the time Glenn insisted I 'experience' that particular place. I felt out of place as I wasn't wearing a cowboy hat. Everyone else was!

The photo above is a restaurant run by an English guy and it's a sort of pub/fish and chip place. When we sat down, and it was heaving with people, he was telling the foursome next to us a joke. They laughed but I am sure that with his strong northern English accent they hadn't understood a word he'd said.

He's tried to give the place 'character' by adorning the walls, ceiling and bar with interesting memorabilia. There are car number plates, T-shirts, beer signs, eg. Budweiser, Killians Irish Beer, Boddingtons, Bass, etc; then there are signs such as John Deere, etc etc etc. There was also a 'Have a Go' wheel around which were stop points labelled, "nipples", "sex", "bowl of beans", "mat", "slick"; all foreign to me!! I wouldn't want to play that particular game.



Tucson, of course, is a city of half a million and has hundreds of eating places. We found Mexican, Italian, French, American family restaurants, Sushi, etc etc, you name it, it's all there. Took this photo in the carpark of a restaurant we ate at the other night. Don't think I'd take any chances there!!

'Servers' work hard, checking on their customers often and giving good service because they earn such a small wage and therefore depend on tips. We still didn't find many fresh vegetables served except at one of those 'serve yourself' type where multitudes of people are breathing and coughing over the serve-yourself bars and where I try to take food from underneath or the very back, in hopes it has less germs!

We went to a Bar and Grill place one evening and I went to the "Restrooms" as they call them in the US and as I was zipping up my jeans I looked up. Suspended from the ceiling just outside the cubicles so visible to all that may have been seated was a full size TV. Hey, if I'd only known!! I could have sat there and watched a whole basket ball game!! Forget the dinner!

At an Italian place, named after a famous sculptor, I went to the restrooms and the decor was artistic, tasteful, and generally a lovely room to relax in. Especially as Pavarotti was playing over the speakers! I would have stayed longer but they had those automatic flushers! No hanging about in there!

We are very fortunate at our show location that we have Grace and John right next to us working their kiosk (shown in the photo below). Our show is the only location they do where they supply lunches, hot and cold, and they actually do it for the vendors rather than the public as there is no food outlet in the local area. They are lovely people and really look after us, checking what we like and don't like and trying to keep everyone happy. I give her a box of my favourite tea bags so she can supply me with cups of tea all day.

They travel most of the year, going from town to town; rodeos, fairs, shows, running this kiosk and living in their RV (recreation vehicle).

Just around the corner was their "competition".

Needless to say, their "rivals" made absolutely no dent in their takings whatsoever. I had to take this photo covertly just in case they were armed, as so many people are here. I think the plastic roses are a nice touch, don't you?