Our plan was to drive from Durango CO to Tucson AZ to visit my brother and sister-in-law. I had been to Tucson a couple of times (where I highly recommend the Baja Cafe for breakfast) so I wanted to find a town I hadn't visited before which was on the way to Tucson and where we might be able to have a decent breakfast. We stayed the night in Holbrook AZ but nothing looked very interesting there so we traveled 44 miles south into the White Mountains of Arizona and the hyphenated town of Heber-Overgaard.
Three Bear's Cafe
Heber-Overgaard, Arizona
AMBIENCE: I'm no grammarian as you might surmise by this blog, but isn't something amiss if you zoom in on their sign? If there are three of them, then "Bear" should be plural or "Bears". If the cafe belongs to the "Bears" then shouldn't the apostrophe be after the "s"? As an alternative, wouldn't it also be proper to call it "Three Bears Cafe". I planned on bringing this up with the management once we got inside.
AMBIENCE: I'm no grammarian as you might surmise by this blog, but isn't something amiss if you zoom in on their sign? If there are three of them, then "Bear" should be plural or "Bears". If the cafe belongs to the "Bears" then shouldn't the apostrophe be after the "s"? As an alternative, wouldn't it also be proper to call it "Three Bears Cafe". I planned on bringing this up with the management once we got inside.
The Three Bear's Cafe has only been open less than a year. The co-owners are Michelle Reynolds and her daughter Cassie. The Papa Bear is Michelle's husband/Cassie's father. I'm not sure of his role, but if the restaurant sign tells the story, he maybe off fishing most of the time.
The restaurant is in a large modern log structure of which half is used by a real estate company. There are tables outside but the thought of dust rising from the parking lot pushed us indoors.
The dining room is fairly small with lots of varnished wood and an outdoorsy, mountain cabin, hunting decor. The place was super clean. The room only had a few windows and could have used more natural light. Even with their modern track lighting it seemed a little dark but maybe that's what customers want when the sun shines, on average, 278 days per year.
The restaurant is in a large modern log structure of which half is used by a real estate company. There are tables outside but the thought of dust rising from the parking lot pushed us indoors.
The dining room is fairly small with lots of varnished wood and an outdoorsy, mountain cabin, hunting decor. The place was super clean. The room only had a few windows and could have used more natural light. Even with their modern track lighting it seemed a little dark but maybe that's what customers want when the sun shines, on average, 278 days per year.
FOOD: As I examined the menu, one dish seemed to stick out from the rest.
.
.
Avocado toast was unfamiliar to me. I had never heard of it nor had I not seen it on any of the menus of the previous 22 restaurants we had visited on the breakfast tour. Apparently, I have been living in a closet because as I discovered later from articles on the internet, avocado toast has probably been the biggest food fad during the past two or three years. In my defense, avocado toast seems particularly popular with Millennials, a generation far removed from us Baby Boomers. Also, it sounded like it was more available at brunch than at breakfast and I haven't been to brunch in 15 years.
Last year, a real estate mogul interview on Australia's version of 60 Minutes stated that young people should lay off the avocado toast if they wanted to buy a house: "when I was trying to buy my first home, I wasn't buying smashed avocados for $19 and four coffees at $4 each." That created quite the uproar on the internet and Millennials certainly know how to "bring it" on social media and they fired back . This baby boomer real estate mogul was endlessly skewered and toasted for preaching to the digital generation. One person calculated that if he gave up his weekly avocado toast fix and instead saved the money, he could afford to put the 20% down payment on a condo in Brooklyn in March 2410.
I had also not heard of "basted" eggs (which when I first looked at the menu thought it said bastard eggs which could have provided an interesting culinary experience). Our waitress, Cassie, explained that it was sort of a cross between a sunny side up egg and a poached egg and that it was a very healthy way to cook an egg.
And the toast was not just 5 grain, or 6 grain, it was 9 grain! It was a veritable fiber factory.
So I ordered the avocado toast with basted eggs. Avocados are 75% monounsaturated fats - the good kind of fat. They are also packed with too many nutritional vitamins to list. The eggs were cooked a healthy way and the bread had 9 grains. Maybe, for once, I could out-health the Healthy One. But I blew that right away by ordering a side of sausage which probably contained all sorts of stereo-saturated fats.
The avocado toast was delicious. I'm a believer! I got what looked like the insides of an entire avocado on a perfectly toasted piece of freshly baked bread. The eggs were flawlessly cooked and fresh tasting. Believe it or not, the sausage played third fiddle in this meal.
The Healthy One ordered the Veggie Omelet which was made with egg whites, mushrooms, onions, spinach, red peppers, broccoli, and tomatoes. She told the waitress to skip the broccoli because who eats broccoli for breakfast? The omelet came with toast and fruit.
The Healthy One thought that everything tasted wonderful.
5 out of 5 stars
COFFEE: The bold yet smooth taste of the coffee I had in Marcos CO was a hard act to follow. This coffee was timid and bland in comparison.
2 out of 5 stars
SERVICE: Your pretty sure to have a positive experience when the co-owner is your waitress. Cassie was friendly and helpful. We liked her so much I didn't bring up my thinking that the name of her restaurant was grammatically incorrect.
5 out of 5 stars
COST: $26.44 with tip. My avocado toast with eggs only cost $6.99, a real bargain compared to the $10-$15 charged in big city restaurants catering to Millennials and their Instagram accounts. By the way, I find it curious that the Bears engage in psychological pricing, with most everything on their menu ending with 99 cents. I would think that someone who wanted an omelet would not really care if it is $9.00 or $8.99.
A FEW WORDS ABOUT HEBER-OVERGAARD: Heber-Overgaard (population 2,700) are technically two different unincorporated communities but are so close, most consider them one and the same. The town was settled in 1883 by members of the LDS Church. Today, tourism, retirement, and timbering are the foundations of the economy.
The area is a summer getaway destination for the hot desert cities of Phoenix and Scottsdale which are about a 2 1/2 hour drive away. At an elevation of 6,600, the summer temperature rarely exceeds 85 degrees. The area also receives significant amounts of snow in the winter. Wildfires are an ever present danger. A fire in 2002 destroyed 268 structures, mostly in Overgaard.
Heber received a great deal of national attention, when in 1975, Travis Walton while working with a logging crew, was abducted by a UFO. Walton went missing for five days until the aliens released him and he made a call for help from a Heber gas station pay phone. Walton stills lives in the area and is reportedly still traumatized by the incident. We were on highest alert as we drove by the exact spot where the abduction occurred on Black Canyon Road. We did not want any ETs disrupting our tight schedule.
The area is a summer getaway destination for the hot desert cities of Phoenix and Scottsdale which are about a 2 1/2 hour drive away. At an elevation of 6,600, the summer temperature rarely exceeds 85 degrees. The area also receives significant amounts of snow in the winter. Wildfires are an ever present danger. A fire in 2002 destroyed 268 structures, mostly in Overgaard.
Heber received a great deal of national attention, when in 1975, Travis Walton while working with a logging crew, was abducted by a UFO. Walton went missing for five days until the aliens released him and he made a call for help from a Heber gas station pay phone. Walton stills lives in the area and is reportedly still traumatized by the incident. We were on highest alert as we drove by the exact spot where the abduction occurred on Black Canyon Road. We did not want any ETs disrupting our tight schedule.
BURN THOSE BREAKFAST CALORIES OFF:
- - We walked the lovely grounds of Tohono Chul Park - "one of the world's great botanical gardens" according to Travel & Leisure magazine. It was 107 degrees, but it was a dry heat.
- - While in Tucson we walked on a bike/walking path along the Pantano Wash as well as the streets of the downtown area.
- - While in Tucson we walked on a bike/walking path along the Pantano Wash as well as the streets of the downtown area.
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May 5, 2017
NEXT UP: New Mexico
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