Month: September 2004

berkeley food #7: la val’s pizza

2516 Durant Ave.
Berkeley, CA
510-845-5353

Despite the name, I didn’t have the pizza. It’s only so often that I can get in the mood for a food so greasy as that, and since we just had some last Friday, I couldn’t bring myself to order it. Val’s seems to be a local tradition of sorts, with multiple locations. The one I visited, again, was on Euclid since it’s close to Soda hall where I’ve been spending so much of my time.

I ended up ordering the pasta combo special, which offered me any pasta on the menu with garlic bread and drink for $5 (plus tax). So for my $5.43 I got shrimp linguine. It was alright. Served kind of tepid, drowning in oil. The shrimp were thrown in along with some tomatoes and an absolute boatload of olives (why?), all seemingly as an afterthought. There was no cohesion to the dish. It was linguine which happened to have other stuff in it. The garlic bread was good though meager, and clearly prepared well ahead of time. I’d say the highlight of the meal was the lemonade-sprite cocktail I mixed as my drink–I haven’t had anything but water recently in order to keep costs down.

In short, this was a fast-food Italian place and pretty unimpressive. I’ll probably go again to try the pizza, but otherwise no thanks.

As a footnote, I really have been doing things other than just eating lunch while at Berkeley. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll work up the gumption to give a full report.

berkeley food #6: stars veggie

1805 Euclid Ave.
(510) 548-8895

A lot of interesting veggie food here. The place seems to focus on fake-out meat, like Mongolian beef or philly cheesesteak. I ended up getting the “ham” and cheese crepe and a vegan carrot-cake muffin. The crepe was made while I waited, and the staff seemed very enthusiastic and dedicated. The place was tiny–maybe 8ft wide, so most of the seating was in the back. I settled in with my book and ate. The crepe was great, very fresh, though it was a little sweet which leads me to believe they use the same crepe mix for sweet and savory. I don’t know whether this was a faux pas or a stylistic decision, but I do know that in the joy of cooking, they specify that for savory crepes no sugar be added. Still, it was good if slightly greasy. On closer inspection the veggie ham looked more like pork shawarma meat than anything else; it was kind of salty, which is in character for ham, and the tomatoes and lettuce that flanked it were fresh and crisp.

It was, however, tiny. My stomach was barely primed by the time I finished it, and even after the carrot cake (which was very good for vegan, but no match for real), I was left with hunger pangs. Leslie can attest to my ravenousness last night when I got home. We decided from now on I should bring some backup calories on my culinary adventures in the form of powerbars or somesuch.

I may give this place another visit, but it would cost me $15 to fill up on their crepes. Maybe the rice bowl would be more substantial?