Wandering around led us to a restaurant called McCormick & Kuleto's. We walked in on the top level and the bartender directed us to the bottom level where a hostess was waiting at the main entrance to greet diners. We were seated quickly and it appeared like we were one of only 2-3 tables in use at the time.
We got drinks served but after that our service level went downhill. I couldn't imagine what was keeping our waitress when I could see when anyone was attending to the few other tables in use. We finally got to order and I went with the Dungeness Crab & Shrimp Roll. I'm not normally a chowder eater but figured with the sandwich and fries I'd have enough if I didn't like the chowder. I was a little surprised when Dad chose to order the Grilled Chipotle Chicken Sandwich as he thinks even plain barbecue sauce is too "spicy." We had another long wait for our food to arrive and surprisingly it was the fries that were an issue as both dishes featured stale hard fries.
Dad reported the bad quality of the fries that were so hard they snapped apart like a broken carrot when the hostess wandered by and that brought over a manager. He also didn't like the quality of his sandwich. The manager apologized and had our waitress get Dad a fresh plate of fries. The new fries were 10 times better than what they first tried to serve us. I was asked about my sandwich which was tasty. I actually ended up eating all of the chowder so I could barely finish the sandwich. Otherwise I would have made a point about them not offering to get me fresh fries as well. The manager took Dad's entire dish off our bill. Not sure if we got charged for refills or that's just one expensive Diet Coke Dad drank. I got a chuckle out of the code she punched in for the refund:
We returned to the Ghirardelli shop to check out the candy making factory area Dad remembered from his previous visits decades ago. It was interesting to walk through the shop first and see tons of products and package sizes we never see in stores at home. It was amazing though how highly priced a lot of the products were getting close to triple digits for the larger packages and many of the coffee bean packages. The small shop of products we had to walk through first reminded me of the old but super tiny wand choosing shop our whole tour group crammed into at Universal Hollywood's Harry Potter attraction. The shelves of product offerings continued on as we had to squeeze past tables of people eating in the café. Finally at the back of the café, we discovered that the "factory" was just a few unmanned machines in the back that they leave running as a display feature for people to take pictures.
Afterwards we ended up just walking back to our hotel and rested for a while in the room. Neither of us were really in the mood come dinner time to seek out a full sit down dining restaurant to visit. We scoured the room looking for any literature about recommended area dining as past hotels have had a nearby restaurant list or a tried and tested offering of take out and delivery spots. Coming up empty, Dad went downstairs to ask the concierge. He came back up with a takeout delivery menu from a pizza place and after browsing it, we decided to walk up the road to Subway and save the menu for tomorrow night. It turns out that the Subway we'd seen on that airport ride to the hotel is actually part of a small outlet mall that you have to walk through a parking garage to get into. Dad's not fond of having to bring back food to our hotel room when there isn't a table and chairs to eat at so we dined in Subway. Our two cups for refillable fountain soda combined cost less than Dad's one soda at lunch. I had to look up once home what it meant when our receipt had an added $1.08 for the SF Health Mandate (5%). Turns out they pass a small percentage of the cost of providing employees health care onto each customer's bill. I love finding unique additions to recognizable fast food places we visit in our travels but this time we went with tried and true favorites: Chicken Bacon Ranch for Dad and a BMT sub for me:
I promise there's more on there besides tomatoes and pickles.
We weren't quite ready to retire for the night back at the hotel so we wandered over to the Walgreens a few doors down. After browsing the aisles for snacks and settling on a couple items, we headed to the cashier. He rang up our items and left them sitting on the counter after we paid. We asked about getting a bag and he replied "Are you willing to pay an extra cost for the bag tax?" We declined and scooped up our few items to carry out ourselves. I offered to stick the items in my coat pockets for the walk back to the hotel and just as Dad is replying "I could stick them in my coat pockets too" he realizes he no longer had his coat. Thankfully the Subway we'd just dined in was only a couple storefronts away and we rushed back to find Dad's coat still draped over the back of the chair where he'd taken it off to eat his sub. Thankfully we hadn't gone back to the hotel before we noticed it was missing and super thankful that Dad didn't have the habit of keeping his wallet in his coat pocket.
Back to the hotel with now both our jackets and snacks, we settled in to watch some primetime TV before falling asleep.
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