Father’s Day is next Sunday, June 21, which means the window for a reservation at anywhere worth going is closing faster than you think. Pasadena has no shortage of restaurants prepared to take your money in exchange for a steak and a memory. The following eight have reasons beyond the obvious to consider them.
Alexander's Steakhouse
The premise at Alexander’s is essentially philosophical: what if a steakhouse took itself as seriously as a kaiseki restaurant? The answer, worked out over twenty years at locations from Cupertino to Pasadena, involves 28-day dry-aged Certified Angus beef, a Wagyu selection that reads like a geography lesson in Japanese cattle prefectures, and a dining room where the shoji screens open onto what is, improbably, a view of Pasadena City Hall lit up at night. It is a lot.
It is also, for the guy who spent years telling you that a good steak is its own argument, exactly right.
Sunday brings a 16-ounce Prime Rib special at $82. Private rooms are available for families that prefer their celebrations behind closed doors.
Alexander’s Steakhouse
111 N Los Robles Ave, Pasadena
(626) 486-1111
alexanderssteakhouse.com/
Photo: alexanderssteakhouse.com
Fleming's Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar
Fleming’s is what happens when a national chain decides, with some conviction, to do one thing well and not deviate. The one thing is USDA Prime beef, and Fleming’s has been at it on Colorado Boulevard long enough that Pasadena has mostly stopped thinking of it as a chain at all.
For Father’s Day, the kitchen offers a Filet Mignon with Truffle Butter and Pave Potatoes at $82, and a Wagyu Surf and Turf at $138 — numbers that feel reasonable at the table and clarifying in retrospect. The bar opens for Social Hour at 4 PM with $9 cocktails, for the faction of fathers who would genuinely rather start there.
Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar
179 E Colorado Blvd, Pasadena
(626) 639-0490
flemingssteakhouse.com/
Photo: flemingssteakhouse.com
Javier's
Javier’s arrived in Old Town Pasadena recently enough that not everyone has found it yet, which is the best time to go. The Mexican coastal kitchen — part of a small Southern California group with locations in Newport Beach and Century City — is serious about its ingredients and theatrical about its room: real plants, fresh flowers, carefully chosen music, the kind of design that signals someone spent real money and had taste while doing it. The lobster enchilada and the chicken mole have earned early admirers. The patio is the reason people keep coming back. For Father’s Day, it offers something the steakhouse contingent cannot: genuine festivity, without the ceremony.
Javier’s
24 W Union St, Pasadena
(626) 773-3579
javiers.com
Photo: javiers.com
The Raymond 1886
The Raymond has been on Fair Oaks Avenue long enough — in various incarnations since 1886 — that it has outlasted most of its competition simply by continuing to exist and being genuinely pleasant about it. The current restaurant occupies a craftsman cottage surrounded by patios in various states of leafy overgrowth, which sounds like a problem and is actually the point. Father’s Day runs from brunch through dinner, which is useful if your family cannot agree on anything, including what meal to share. The seasonal menu leans California without apology: bright flavors, good sourcing, cocktails that take themselves seriously. Book early. The patio fills up, and the indoors is better than it needs to be.
The Raymond 1886
1250 S Fair Oaks Ave, Pasadena
(626) 441-3136
theraymond.com
Photo: theraymond.com
Bistro 45
Bistro 45 occupies a 1939 Art Deco building on Mentor Avenue and has been doing New American cuisine there, with French tendencies and genuine seriousness, for over thirty years — which in Pasadena restaurant years is roughly geological. The room is warm without being cloying, the wine list rewards attention, and the service has the quality of people who have been there long enough to know what they are doing and care enough not to coast on it. There is a chocolate soup for dessert that regulars mention the way people mention things they do not want to oversell. Dinner only on Sunday, 5 to 8:30. It will not feel like a transaction.
Bistro 45
45 S Mentor Ave, Pasadena
(626) 795-2478
bistro45.com
Photo: bistro45.com
Osawa
Osawa sits on Raymond Avenue and does not particularly advertise itself, which has done nothing to thin the crowd. The menu moves — specials rotate, the kitchen is paying attention to what is fresh — and the range is wider than the word sushi suggests: shabu shabu, bento boxes, sashimi, nigiri, and a black sesame panna cotta for dessert that has developed a following of its own. The fish is fresh in the way that makes other fish retroactively disappointing. For the father who prefers precision over pageantry, and who would rather eat something clean and well-made than something loud, Osawa makes a strong case.
Osawa
77 N Raymond Ave, Pasadena
(626) 683-1150
osawapasadena.com
Photo: osawapasadena.com
The Arbour
The Arbour sits in a shopping complex on Lake Avenue, which the room spends considerable effort helping you forget. It mostly succeeds. The menu is farm-to-table in the genuine sense rather than the decorative one: the sea bass and braised short rib have earned their reputations, the oysters are worth starting with, and the crab toast is the kind of thing that makes other appetizers feel inadequate. It is lively, occasionally loud, and well-suited to fathers who consider a good meal a social event rather than a ceremony. Reservations open at 4 PM.
The Arbour
527 S Lake Ave, Pasadena
(626) 396-4925
thearbourpasadena.com
Photo: thearbourpasadena.com
Nick's Pasadena
Nick’s is the answer to the question nobody quite wants to ask out loud: what if we just wanted a very good dinner without the occasion feeling like a production? The cioppino is loaded and unapologetic about it. The center-cut filet is cooked correctly. The meatloaf, which appears on the menu without irony and is ordered without embarrassment, is better than it has any obligation to be. The staff is attentive in the manner of people who have been trained well and retained the training. Open from 11 AM to 10 PM on Sunday, which gives the family maximum flexibility and Dad no excuse.
Nick’s Pasadena
336 S Lake Ave, Pasadena
(626) 787-1444
nickspasadena.com
Photo: nickspasadena.com
Reservations are recommended at all locations. Hours and specials are subject to change; confirm directly with each restaurant.
