Samuel Horne’s Tavern, Folsom, CA
I stopped watching television when they cancelled Happy Days. It wasn’t an act of protest on my part; it wasn’t as if I were somehow offended by ABC’s decision to replace this iconic series with Three’s a Crowd in 1984. But I suppose that, at least subconsciously, I saw the end of Happy Days as the final nail in the Prime Time coffin. The Brady Bunch was already long gone, due to sagging ratings that even Cousin Oliver couldn’t fix. Then One Day At a Time was cancelled, partly a result of Mackenzie Phillips’ obvious drug addition. And then Happy Days literally jumped the shark and now it, too, was gone. The TV landscape became embarrassing and intolerable, featuring the likes of Foul-Ups, Bleeps, and Blunders and Amazing Stories.
Besides, I had recently graduated from college and I had (it seemed to me) more important things to do. Like try to earn a paycheck. And court my would-be wife. And on top of all this, I couldn’t afford cable.
So I haven’t watched TV for over four decades now, with one exception: When I’m on a plane, I binge watch Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Office. It’s my guilty pleasure that I allow myself while I’m squeezed into a window seat on Southwest for several hours.
And all this came to mind when I was having lunch at Samuel Horne’s Tavern in Folsom, CA, and spotted a (fake?) coffin in the hallway leading to the restrooms. Leaving aside the actual story behind this coffin, doesn’t it feel like a plot point in a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode, where Larry discovers a coffin on his way to the men’s room, repeatedly asks awkward questions of the staff, and ends up creating some huge drama based on a misunderstanding about a dead patron?
We’ll come back to TV shows when we get to the trivia section, below, but first let’s talk about the pretzels I ordered at Samuel Horne’s Tavern. Samuel Horne’s feels like a comfortable English public house. The two founders had some experience with the general concept, as one had worked for Guinness and the other already owned an English-style pub in Sacramento. Samuel Horne’s is narrow, with lots of dark wood, a big bar, and cozy booths. And, of course, an unexplained coffin.
So I went up to the counter and ordered the “three oven baked pretzels with pub cheese and spicy mustard.”
Me: “I’ll take an order of pretzels, please. With the beer cheese.”
Guy at the Counter: “Certainly sir. But you should know we serve pub cheese, not beer cheese.”
Me: “What’s the difference?”
Him: “Beer cheese is served warm and soft, and is made with beer. Pub cheese is served cold, there’s no beer, and it’s cream-cheese based.”
Me: “Hmm. It doesn’t sound that good.”
Him: “It’s not.”
I appreciated his honesty and forwent the pub cheese. Then, when the pretzels arrived, I had another surprise: These pretzels were shaped like bread sticks.
Now, it does seem to me if you’re going to serve unconventionally-shaped pretzels you should alert the customer ahead of time. Just like the counter guy did with regard to the pub cheese. But I’m a professional and soldiered on.
Friends, not only did these pretzels look like breadsticks; they tasted like them too. They were far too fluffy and bready to deliver the Full Pretzel Experience. The mustard qua mustard wasn’t bad, but it really didn’t add much to the pretzel. I mean, imagine the taste of a breadstick dipped in mustard. That’s what this was.
At this point, with 30 pretzels under my belt (literally), I feel I’m in a position to quickly dispense with a pretzel this handicapped. So I’ll just say: 2 stars.
PRETZEL TRIVIA
Earlier I mentioned that the only TV I watch is at 30,000 feet, when I binge once-popular but now-defunct shows. One of these is The Office, which, I think most of my readers know, is a mockumentary based on a British series of the same name.
Earlier this month, when I was flying home from PoeFest, I watched Season 3, Episode 5 of The Office which, crucially, features something called Pretzel Day. Watch this clip which pretty much explains all:
So now you know the back story behind the ubiquitous meme that pops up when you Google “Pretzel Day.”
