I got there first but let me tell you I almost missed the location. Wished I had a GPS device but you see the restaurant is hard to find. You pretty much have to look for a small wood structure that says "Stanley Square". I recommend parking in front. Otherwise there is plenty of parking on the side, too.
Once inside it is small and quaint. As a new owner, Katie is still renovating the place but as she said, "we have added a few feminine touches."
The place seats around 48 people and when you walk in you see the ordering counter, looking into the kitchen. There is a wine cabinet as well as pastries bin with cookies and other sweet stuff.
So I just sat around waiting for my friend and did my thing--reading a book. My friends come in a little later and we all started on the menu. Besides thin-crusted, hand-tossed, pizzas there are sandwiches, calzone/strombolis, pastas, and salads.
We (three of us) ordered the Med. "combo" pizza, which is just enough for three IMO. For appetizers we got garlic bread and spicy buffalo wings. We also ordered drinks--beer/soda.
So the appetizers arrived shortly after our orders. Then the pizza arrived...all within 10 mins. (Bare in mind it wasn't that busy so timing may vary).
My first impression of the garlic bread...FRESH. And yummy! The cheese weren't too much and the garlic/cheese combo tasted well together. It is what you would expect eating at an Italian restaurant...if you were in Milan/Roma. It is that authentic.
The buffalo wings were okay. I wished it was crunchy like the buffalo wings I had in college, but it was fresh and hooooot! I mean temperature hot. So eat them with a fork if you can. My friends would maneuvered to grab-and-bite in one felt swoop. Nice!
The pizza was the reason we were there. And let me tell ya it was very good. The thin crust baked just right with enough meat (the combo) and marinara sauce, yet still has that NY thin crust quality to it. I think we could have ordered the large and that would have really pushed us over the edge...but the medium (16 inch) was just right.
Interspersed with our pigging out of the yummy pizza, Katie would come by to check up on us, asking us how everything was.
So in a nutshell if I would rate Gumba, this being my first time eating there, I would give it a
. (View Yelp review | View menu.)
Gumba's Italian Restaurante
21678 Stevens Creek Blvd Cupertino, CA 95014
(408) 255-2423
Food quality:
Service quality:
Affordability:
Dress: casual
Ambiance: very homey. bathroom is extremely clean.
Special party: reservations for party; tends to be on Saturdays so it may be busy on those days. FREE delivery (within 1 mile). Catering service.
I highly recommend this place.
My second day at the Web 2.0 Expo and this time around, it is much better, I think. Some of the classes were very informative, one in particular offered a lot of practical ideas. I wished I had more time to hang out and just check out all the companies and their products now that I have an idea of what they do, but alas I have to meet up with a friend for a GS Warriors game vs. Dallas tonight.
Arrgh...wireless connection is so slow right now since everyone is out on their session break and these routers are probably being hit pretty serverely. FREE comes with a price, yes?
Not sure if I have time to come back tomorrow but then again...Weds. are "work at home" days.
I'm beat!
Ajax, RSS, EC2, SaaS, AWS, RFP...If you know what that means, you belong here with me. Here meaning the Web 2.0 Expo in SF.
At times I'm wondering what am I doing here? I haven't done anything in Ajax yet although if you're developing for the web or interested in ui design, Web 2.0 terms like Ajax and those above are like the in language. To be truthful, I'm not quite sure what those lingos mean either, but I'm sure I'll be using in someday.
Anyways, the free t-shirts from the Expo are pretty nice, and of course all those darn neat-o "Beta" demos. It's so sexy these web 2.0 products!
In any case this has been a pretty exhausting day and I'm ready to just go home and sleep.
There's a show on The Food Network called Throw Down with Bobby Flay. It's actually quite good. But the one that I enjoy the most has to be the effervescent Rachel Ray and her hilarious..."umm..." follow with her eye rolls.
Back to Throw Down. In the episode that I watched a well know hamburger maker was challenged by Bobby. Basically he showed up at this person's house un-announced and challenged her to a "throw down." Anyway I have no point and don't remember where I am going with this except to say that the Throw Down concept can be adapted to so many things.
Nothing Venture Nothing Gain-Knot2Us
My smallgroup Knot2Us will start up again this Thursday night. I invite anyone looking for a smallgroup (after Fall Launch) to come and throw down with us...whatever you have on your plates that night, leave it—come throw down with our Christian smallgroup community. We'll take the challenge to bring you to a relationship with Christ!
We made it back from Napa without any incident, having boozed up pretty hard. We hit up three wineries: V.Sattui, Sterling, and Mondalvi. Of the three Sterling was probably the most memorable since I have not yet been there. It was such a beautiful day, too.
Here are Dabruceski's photos on his smugmug site.
Lastly, our work website has undergone a total makeover. It is now mostly semantically marked up with CSS only. Gone are the HTML table markups. Yay! I'm excited about it!
But I don't think I would move there just yet. It's hard to say based on being there for only a few days but what Seattle offers the Bay Area already has...nice weather (at least while we were there), clean air, and an active lifestyle.
At times I felt like I was driving through parts of San Jose, Saratoga, San Francisco, Oakland, etc. About the only thing that was amazing and made me do a double take every time was seeing Mtn. Rainier. You could put it down as it's a nice place to visit, but nothing to fall in love with...like New York or Chicago.
Soon to be posted are pictures of the trip.
[Update] Sleepless in Seattle pics
The view from the top was awesome! Congrats Dan, Rich, K-dogg, mongolian deathworm, Ron, thecrystalball, Juliet and David. I even saw Clee up there and my cube-mate from work. Small world!
It was a great experience. I'm not saying it was easy...to hike 8.2 miles up 4800 ft. of elev. gain...with absolutely no water coming back down...but it was worth it.
Turn off your computer. Get away from your office. Go climb a mountain!
My humble flickr set of Operation: Mount Half Dome.
[Update] David Ko's photos of Half Dome. Dan's set.
And since the mountain will not come to me, well, then I will just have to go outside and find the darn thing myself.
Seriously I won't be turning on any computer this weekend. Time for me to get my refreshment somewhere else...some open air pleasures, of the planned and serendipitous type. The best part...I'll be waking up bright and early tomorrow morning to climb Half Dome.
I'll try to bring back snapshots.
