Today’s focus is on non-chain restaurants around Daly City. Although I live in this foggy working-class Bay Area city, I don’t often go out to eat. When I do go out I try to eat at neighborhood places. And no, I don’t consider Applebee’s a neighborhood place.

Whenever I get a hankering for some Pho or other cheap Vietnamese fare, I make my way over to Pho 99 Noodle House off of Skyline near the Ranch 99. There isn’t anything spectacular about it but the pho is decent, service is efficient, and the parking isn’t impossible (but it isn’t easy either).

For solid Italian food I like Joe’s of Westlake. I believe this may be a part of a chain of Joe’s. Perhaps related to the Original Joe’s in downtown San Francisco, and the Joe’s in downtown San Jose. Nevertheless it ain’t Olive Garden or Macaroni Grill. Joe’s is a grill I suppose. The place is typically packed. I prefer to sit at the counter near the stoves so I can watch the skilled chefs prepare the food. They have a huge broiler and it’s fun to watch the cooks crank out steaks and chops. It’s like watching Iron Chef live. Great fun.

I’ve only been to Fil-Am Cuisine once but I enjoyed it. The food is incredibly cheap and the sanitation is incredibly questionable. Nevertheless you can buy a good size meal for less than $6, including bbq skewers. If you ever drive on Mission st and see a lot of smoke and smell something really good, it’s usually coming from Fil-Am (short for Filipino-American)

Before I got cable in my apartment, I would frequent The Globe Tavern for a few beers and to watch basketball. I haven’t tried the food at the “tapas” restaurant in the back but the bartender, I can’t remember her name, is very nice and treats her regulars very well. The regulars are mostly blue-collar looking folks, possibly veterans of some kind. It’s quiet and very enjoyable. Bottled beers are also pretty cheap at maybe $3 each I think. It’s entertaining to watch some sports and watch the neighborhood people interact.

Gabriana’s Pizza is in a little strip mall next to a laundromat and “Ramirez Produce Market” which has that has good prices on bananas and yams. I haven’t tried Gabriana’s but I always mean to test it out. I usually do laundry at night and Gabriana’s is typically pretty empty. It would seem pretty convenient to put my wash in, put in an order for a pizza, and then eat while waiting for things to dry. Also to note, sometimes there are some questionable folk hanging out at this strip mall — at various times I saw a guy eat a piece of bread out of the garbage, another guy was sneaking up on me to ask for a quarter, and some young hoodlums were drinking 40’s and asking me for change. This only happened when I was doing laundry in the afternoon. No one bothers you in the evenings.