After 23 years, San Pedro’s preferred pub is a group.
When you walk inside, the lighting is dim, and the din of communication waxes and wanes, depending on how near it’s to the weekend. On any night of the week, ask the bartender what’s new on the top shelf, and you may generally get an excellent primer on what’s proper and why. If you’re no longer familiar with Northern European cuisine, the waitstaff can educate you, and you won’t feel silly for asking. Service at The Whale & Ale comes from an area of knowledge; that is, any other way of pronouncing it comes from restaurateur Andrew Silber.
“The foremost aspect … is customer support,” he defined with functional simplicity.
“When I study the eating places I visit, almost universally, the food is quite top-notch or amazing,” he said. “Not many eating places continue to exist if the meals aren’t excellent. What sets them apart is how you’re treated while you get there. And you remember vividly places that give you superb service.”
Andrew, who has properly traveled, is fluent in three languages and knowledgeable about high-quality eating and hospitality. It’s a safe guess that if there’s a culinary adventure available, he would understand how to discover it. For all the variety in Southern California eating, Northern European cuisine is a rarity amid the limitless Asian and Latin American cuisines. Educating the local palate without turning off diners is a mission.
“Most human beings, even though they haven’t traveled to Northern Europe, recognize what fish and chips are,” Andrew defined. “Many of them recognize what shepherd’s pie is or bangers and mash because they’ve examined Sherlock Holmes or seen it on TV or something. They, as a minimum, have a vague idea of it. And people who don’t ask us.”
However, Andrew stated that every other, albeit (in his words) “minor” mission, is humans’ belief of a pub.
“With a pub, there are all styles of sorts,” he stated. “It might be a bar with five stools, and that’s it. There are some pubs which have three feast rooms and an eating suite. For folks who haven’t visited England or toured around England, a few may also have a misconception about pubis. And the danger then is that they display up and end up upset.”
Andrew recalled the old pub, Tommy’s Yacht Club, where one of the significant sights turned into an oscillating liquor cupboard behind the bar.
“When we first opened, I assume humans in the location thought we would be like Tommy’s Yacht Club. It had a long bar with plenty of alcohol and beer and not much else. So many people didn’t realize there was food (at The Whale & Ale)—an entire menu and no longer just chips.”
In the past few years, some bars that offer food have taken on the moniker “gastropub,” signifying the advent of gourmet bar meals. Some locations meet the expectations, even as others fall quickly. When asked about the proliferation of “gastropubs,” Andrew stated that regardless of the seeming recognition, it hasn’t stuck on yet, but that the time is coming when it will.
“Real gastropub meals are something like steak and kidney pie, adding foie gras or asparagus purée, and making it fairly jazzed up. So, it’s quite innovative.”
Andrew opined that the emergence of the gastropub became a response to pub food’s overall terribleness following World War II. At the same time, England suffered excessive shortages and rationing that persevered long after the last shot was fired in that battle.
“When I was born in 1954, the warfare was over nine years,” he said. “We still couldn’t get bananas. We had to get ration books and coupons to shop for them.”
The gastropub made a point of turning that recognition around. It is a thrilling kind of history.
A derivative of an all-boys private college in Kingston, London (the equivalent of high school) where he majored in French and Russian, Andrew knew from the very beginning he desired a lodge control profession. This preference probably came from staying in one hotel after another, even as he traveled drastically with his father.
His father was an architect and structural engineer, and his mom became a social worker. He knew early on he didn’t need to comply with either in their paths. But the one’s years of staying in resorts across Europe, from Switzerland to France, served as inspiration.
While there aren’t many cooks whose careers he follows, Andrew has been following Dustin Trani’s profession, which he describes as just first-rate and now not just because he’s from Pedro.
New Orleans celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse is credited with revitalizing Creole-Acadian cooking on StarChefs.Com, along with Chicago’s Chef Charlie Trotter.
He and his spouse don’t move on holiday frequently, but after they do, it’s normally a four-day ride to locations like Palm Beach, Indianapolis, Portland, or Seattle “so that we should see more of the US.”
“In Seattle, there’s an eating place called the Pink Door that became top-notch, and every other place is called Union,” Andrew stated. “San Francisco has so many first-class eating places. However, my favorite right now could be Bix.”
Andrew observed San Francisco’s Piccolino and a Wolfgang Puck restaurant in the same city, Postrio’s.
When longtime Executive Chef David Juarez changed into The Whale & Ale, he and Andrew might take weekend trips to San Francisco to consume there because it turned into a laugh thing to do. Andrew cited that David changed into enthusiasm about meals and how they were received, which is what it’s far. And why a chef comes out with those combinations, flavors, and textures.
At The Whale & Ale, you can always anticipate leaving an incorrect cheer and properly inform your subsequent vacation spot on your culinary adventure.
