• 5
• Not Your Ordinary Eatery

I love this place! Aunt Mary (yes, there really is an Aunt Mary) is youthful, gregarious, and honest-to-goodness genuine. She cooks amazingly good food on a pink range behind the bar. I'm a gluten- and lactose-intolerant vegetarian. Usually when I go to restaurants I have to ask question after question about their ingredients. More often than not I have to ask for substitute after substitute as well. I'm not trying to make life harder for the server or cooking staff. It's just what I have to do. Yet, inevitably, I feel bad about it, guilty almost. What a wonderful surprise it was when I started my apologetic inquiries and Mary got enthusiastic! about the creative challenge my limitations presented her. She brainstormed aloud and came up with a bunch of choices for me. This is the first time I've ever felt great about ordering dinner. I felt part of a creative process rather part of a big burden. My friend and I chose the taco dinner. Oh my but it was good. As were the real-greens salad with a Mary-made beet vinegar dressing and the tofu pate with rice crackers--all part of the dinner, of course. We didn't go at a time when there was live music, but among other regulars who play there is Lloyd Jones---darn good blues. We didn't know that the restaurant is part of another shop--sort of similar to a coffee shop in a bookstore. But when we walked in and saw The Central Coast Vibrator Museum to our right and noted the "toys" that held the tablecloths in place, we figured that this was not your run-of-the-mill eatery. As I said it's part of another business and that "other" business is a sex shop. This may be disturbing/off-putting/offensive (whatever) to some folks. And I would have been among them. I'd never been in a sex shop before and, truth to tell, I never thought I ever would. Way out of my realm of interest or sense of morality. But, you know what, the whole place cracked me up. Aunt Mary's is a playful and whimsical place, endearingly so. I never in the world thought I'd say such a thing about a sex shop--endearing?! But, let's face it (well, at least I faced it) our seriousness about sex has a whole load of silliness about it. If you can laugh at human foibles and want some really good food, Aunt Mary's is a one-of-a-kind experience.