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| - I guess I never made it to Chelsea's until yesterday because the location is slightly off the beaten path and tucked away on 40th St. Being such a big fan of LaGrande L'Orange (LGO), it was great to find some of the same food at Chelsea's. If you want a quieter, more intimate experience than LGO, this is a great choice.
The patio is completely tree-covered and the birds were chirping and squawking as loudly as they could around lunchtime. It was like a real-life version of the Tiki Room at Disneyland. Arcadia is probably one of the only places in the valley where you'd find a patio like Chelsea's with as many trees. Just beautiful!
We ordered Pumpkin Soup and Vegetables. Both were delicious...brussel sprouts and broccoli.
The brussel spouts were served slightly chilled and were blanched. They were a nice alternative to the usual grilled brussel sprout option which has been "a thing" since 2012.
I was very impressed with the broccoli preparation. In addition to the top of the broccoli, they cut uniform rectangles from the stalk and used that too with some shavings from the stalk. This gave the dish several different textures. When I cook at home I cook the broccoli stalks.* I genuinely appreciated the use of the whole vegetable in the dish at Chelsea's.
I remember watching an episode of Chopped once where all they got to cook with was the pieces of food and vegetables that are usually discarded (celery tops, the ends of the onion, etc.). I thought of my grandparents (Italian immigrants) and how they valued food and used every last little bit of it for soup or even for compost.
At any rate, I will most definitely go back to Chelsea's and try more menu items. I'm giving it a 4 instead of a 5 because I think the portions could be larger for the prices. However, since this is the more upscale version of LGO, I'm sure their overhead is bigger and they have chef instead of cooks. The service was very good.
I wouldn't exactly call this a "family restaurant" but having kids on the patio would be fine. I did notice stacks of booster seats off to the side of the patio, so they might actually have a lof of kids there from time to time. There was a small family sitting across from us. The children were about 4 and 6. The little boy was learning how to use a fork and jabbed his chicken in one whole piece. It was very charming to watch his little cave man attempt to be civilized.
*If you want to try cooking broccoli stalks at home, cut them and put them in a steamer or pressure cooker (InstaPot) to make them more tender. Then, if you grill them, they'll be much easier to eat. The same is true for Chard stalks, although they are more bitter than broccoli stalks. You can add some reduced balsamic vinegar to tone done the bitterness.
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