Mother's Day Lunch @ Que Huong 2014

Happy Mother's Day to my beautiful mom...

(circa 1961 at the Teacher's Ball, Zaragoza, San Vicente, Philippines)

My mother graduated from the University of Santo Tomas (a Catholic university which predates Harvard) in three years and at age nineteen, was the youngest school teacher in her province...

She is wearing a traditional Philippine terno, a gown with "butterfly" sleeves in her favorite pattern, "polka dots" which she considers "lucky". This is one of my favorite photos of my mom because it shows her fun and carefree side...

Here was my breakfast in bed, specially prepared by Bert and TC...

TC is like a chip off of the old block (Why, that would be ME!), making me a mix-CD (not a mix-tape like when I was a teen in the 80's!)...

I love that she took the time to select these songs from  her favorite groups for me (Sleeping with Sirens, Pierce the Veil, All Time Low, and Muse)! So very thoughtful!

For lunch, we kept with "tradition" and went back to one of my favorite restaurants, Que Huong (after a one year hiatus, where we went to K-Pasta last year).

It's always festive in here...

It was nice to see Jay and his staff again. He's always so nice and remembers us from our past visits.

TC's watermelon smoothie with jelly:

This was a nice change that she enjoyed. I liked that the jelly was multicolored and flavored as well.

Bert and I had iced Vietnamese coffees, made quite strong (by request). Whatever coffee they used, it was pretty $#%@ good!

I'm totally wired as I type this. I don't know if I'll be able to sleep tonight, haha.

Our lunch: Grilled fish with vegetables, herbs, rice paper and vermicelli, along with Battered Shrimps with plum sauce, and the de rigeur Fish Sauce Wings.

Yes....that's all I have to say!

As for the grilled fish special, this was a "SMALL" fish too!  The last time we were here, we told our waiter we would try their special fish dish and today we kept our promise!

It was a grilled catfish that was presented on a lettuce lined platter, covered with fried shallots, herbs and peanuts and served with salt, pepper and mam nem sauce. The platter included bean sprouts, slices of unripe bananas, cucumbers, pineapples, pickled carrots and radish, plus mint, tia to (purple perilla), rau ram (Vietnamese coriander), diep ca (fish mint), and lettuce leaves.

This mam nem had a bit of sweetness to it, which was a pleasant surprise.

I ended up eating my fish "deconstructed" rather than rolling things up in lettuce or the rice paper. It was just easier for me to do that so I wouldn't have to touch my food, although Bert was nice enough to make me a little spring roll filled with the fish and herbs. If I was wearing my thrasher clothes, then no problem, but I was wearing a dress, and I am a messy Melvin when eating, ha ha.

Everything, as always, was delicious.

Here are some "mother"-related music videos to celebrate Mother's Day:

"She's a Bad Mama Jama" by Carl Carlton:

Dayum! Now THAT'S a Jeri Curl!

My favorite trio of guitarists Eric Johnson, Joe Satriani and Steve Vai playing their cover of Frank Zappa's "My Guitar Wants to Kill Your Mama":

I wish G3 (as they were collectively known) would get back together so I can see them in concert!

"Tie Your Mother Down" by Queen:


"Mama Weer All Crazee Now", a Slade cover by the Runaways featuring a young Joan Jett and Lita Ford:

Although I'm not a fan of this particular song (especially since it has "honky tonk" piano), I still think these chicks rock! Joan Jett still does! She is one of my idols!

And of course, I have to have this one in here, "Stacy's Mom" by Fountains of Wayne, giving a nod to the infamous pool scene from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High, featuring supermodel and total MILF Rachel Hunter (former wife of Rod Stewart):

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there as well as your mothers!

As Vanilla Ice would say:


Previous Mother's Day lunch at QH:
2012 and 2011

Dessert would be our next stop over in Kearny Mesa...