Gore Bay - Rocky Raccoon Cafe

After the Manitoulin Chocolate Works, C drove us to Gore Bay. There was a restaurant she'd heard of that she wanted to check out, the Rocky Raccoon Cafe. I thought the building was cool - octagonal with a cupola on top and a deck that went all the way around the second floor.

Despite the folksy sounding name (and one of the worst songs ever by the Beatles; sorry, I'm just not a Ringo fan)...

the Cafe offerings looked promising. Turns out that the owner is from Tibet and his culture is reflected in the Pan Asian touches. This is probably one of the few restaurants on the island offering ethnic food. Most of the places here, don't get me wrong now, are mom and pop eateries serving your regular diner type food. This place had a touch of the exotic.

I love how raccoons look, especially their masklike facial markings. I like the scene from "Elf" where Will Ferrell comes across a raccoon in the forest and tries to befriend it. The raccoons rears up on its legs, hisses and attacks him when the Elk tries to "hug" him!  Back to the painting, I wonder what that white animal is?

No one was here when we were there, except for the workers.

That's part of my hair and eye (cut off). Bert and I checked out the back deck. Gore Bay is a town but is also part of Lake Huron's North Channel. To refresh your memory, Manitoulin Island is the largest island in a freshwater lake in the world (in Lake Huron). During the summer, the town is busy with tourists and boaters who dock here.

A nod to the owner's heritage:

Also seen in some of the decor...

Hey, I wonder what that last one's about?  We didn't order it but should have!

We actually didn't eat lunch here but a quick snack. C got an appetizer for her daughter while several of got some smoothies...

The steps leading up to the cupola...

which had a beautiful view of Gore Bay...

TC's mango lassi:

C's vegetable samosas for her daughter. The sauce was tamarind.

Cool line of flags...

Off to another part of the island...

Tibet Nepal House

We had spent a good two hours plus at the Pacific Asia Musem so it was time for lunch at a place recommended by none other than Wandering Chopsticks, Tibet Nepal House(see Yelp reviews here).

It was only two minutes away from the museum.

Mmmm...I'll have to try this next time! [update  2/7 - it looks like we WILL since we will make a trek to Pasadena during the President's Day weekend]

These were their buffet offerings ($8.99 for lunch buffet):

Hereis the entry way - it looks like the little statue is going pee.

The restaurant is pretty spacious but narrow...

There were these decorated footprint papers hung on the ceiling rafters....

The dude above was our waiter. Although there was a set lunch, he didn't seem like he wanted to sell us the set lunch, but rather, the buffet.

One of the steam tables....

And another one here...I liked the cabbe dish on the bottom right (it had these round black spices; perhaps it was mustard sees)

I didn't get the tandoori chicken. Even when I'm in an Indian restaurant, I tend to not eat it because I don't like eating chicken whenever I'm out. I was told by lunchmates that it was pretty good though!

One of our plates...wait, this was mine. See the fried things at 12 and 1 o'clock? Those were fried eggplant slices! I could have eaten a whole plate of that, but of course refrained, lest I look like some fucking greedy bastard who has no shame at the buffet table.

The Prof's plate...

TORC's plate...

The Prof's 2nd plate with lentil soup...

Here's a closeup of one of those decorated footprints...

On to Mignon Chocolate!