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Some information will be out of date.  Some of this writing goes back to 1995.
See Tiki Road Trip (2007 edition) for the most up-to-date information.

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Tiki Lounge
Modesto, CA

Minnies Restaurant
Modesto, CA

Full review and history of both Minnie's and
the Tiki Lounge is available in Tiki Road Trip

August, 2001 When we heard that there was a Tiki Lounge attached to a motel on McHenry street in Modesto, we weren't actually all that excited.  We wrongly assumed that it was going to be some crappy old bar with a token Tiki or two shoved into the corner, something like Burt's Tiki Bar in Salt Lake City, for example. What we found when we got there, was quite pleasant, and now ranks among our favorite Type-I Tiki bars! The stand-alone building is next door to the Tropics Motel and was opened in 1962.  It consists of a small fenced in patio area, home to some huge plants, and a long, narrow A-frame building. Walking through the front door, there in a large L-shaped booth to the left, surrounding a fireplace.  Beyond that (also on the left) is the bar.  On the right is a row of a half dozen booths, covered by a dried grass awning. To the rear are the 'powder rooms', through a hallway decorated with a big mural. The booths are upholstered in dark leather, and at one time they each contained a phone.  Apparently, the Tiki Lounge was a favorite mobster hangout in decades past, and in order to discourage this behavior, the phones were removed from the 'offices' in which they were once installed. The area behind the bar is chock-full of groovy artifacts, including a collection of Tiki Mugs, many vintage and valuable, and four very nice paintings of exotic wahines frolicking in exotic environments.  Plenty of masks, vintage Hawaiian shirts, and shields round out the classic collection of clutter, while a neon sign featuring a palm tree and the holy word 'Tiki' adds a more modern feel to things.  Our normal anathema to neon in Tiki Bars is temporarily suspended.  A collection of custom stickers made for the bar by Randy, an eight-year veteran bartender, decorates every other possible blank space.  Some of them are really cool, and he gave us a few copies of his latest design.  He also maintains their website, but when I looked at it, most of the images were missing, the javascript was screwed up, and a most of the hypertext links took me to missing pages.  So it's sort of like this one! Stephanie, the woman tending bar when we walked in, is a member of our favorite Tiki Bartenders club, and in addition to a great (but red) Mai Tai, she eased us into her own creation, the Witches Brew (equal parts Vodka, Midori, Malibu (or Parrot Bay), Cranberry and OJ, with a splash of grapefruit.  Serve as a shooter or in a Tiki Mug, to the brave). Meanwhile, Randy was showing us his Hula Girl tattoo, showing off his T-shirt and sticker designs, and trying to be modest while Steph told us about how Randy is largely responsible for keeping the Tiki bar vibe alive and not letting the place degrade into a typical dive bar. Our next round was our favorite post-mai tai one-two punch of a Scorpion and a Zombie.  Both seemed close to the traditional recipe.  The Zombie was red in color, and very strong.  The Scorpion did indeed contain quite a sting, and included a secret ingredient that Stephanie had to retrieve from the back room. Just as we are inclined to forgive the presence of neon, given the subject matter of said neon, we were also inclined to forgive the television in the corner, as the subject matter happened to be Pee-Wee Herman at the time we were there.  I will conjecture that Pee Wee isn't the only thing that this telly shows, but as long as we don't have to watch a Football Game in the Tiki Lounge, we'll let it slide.  Especially given my newly relaxed attitude towards these things (see Jasmine Tree review for details). While we were imbibing our nectar, some local artist came over and presented us with a sketch he had surreptitiously drawn of us. Meanwhile, a middle age fella who was further into his cups that I ever hope to be, went into detail about how installed the floor behind the bar.  An older fella sat silently at the end of the bar, watching everyone like a hawk.  The bartenders changed shifts. We were on our fifth round of rum drinks (we had already been to Minnie's).  Time to go! Minnies Restaurant Modesto CA August, 2001  We made it to Minnie's restaurant in Modesto based on an address on a matchbook cover left in a  sports bar.  It was a long way to go to follow a little lead, but we were pretty glad we did.  Especially since we found out about Minnie's via data gleaned right in the home of the enemy, a  sports bar in wretched Evanston, IL. We made it to Minnie's at 5PM on a Thursday, just as they opened, to find two big Tikis in the front, and the bar already full of happy hour revelers.  As is our custom, we eat dinner before sampling the libations, so we moved into the dining room before exploring the mysteries that would await on the intriguing drink menu nailed to the wall at the left of the bar. The Chinese restaurant with a Tiki Lounge added to the back is a grand tradition in Tiki Bars that also includes Chef Shangri La (Chicago area), Omni Hut (Smyrna, TN), Jasmine Tree (Portland, OR), Mai Tai Lounge (Omaha, NE), and many, many others.  Opened in 1953, Minnie's fits comfortably into this genre, and while it contains no real surprises, there are still plenty of reasons to head over to Modesto for a look. The seating area is decorated in the usual Oceanic Arts style, with the same war clubs, masks, tiki poles, and blowfish that we have seen so many times, but are never bored with.  Minnie's also has a rather large collection of foxy Wahine artwork, both on black velvet (not Leeteg) and painted on framed boards.  Between the restaurant and in the bar, you can find almost a dozen lovely rocka-hula gals enhancing the atmosphere. How's the food? The drinks? The house special? The sizzling cow-shaped iron skillet? Read Tiki Road Trip, young Jedi. A Tiki Bar Review Pages correspondent writes: Minnie's is at the end of McHenry Ave. at an intersection known locally as 5 points. Has the appropriate amount of bamboo, plus a great collection on nude polynesian women paintings on velvet that were the work of a local artist in the late 50's and 60's.  As an added bonus they had a longtime waitress there in the 80's that had been married to Hop Sing of Bonanza fame for quite a while. The signature drink there was invented by the owner Peter Mah in the mid 80's.  Its called the Jerk.  A daiquiri made with strawberry sherbet, and then finished with a straw inserted into the middle of the cocktail and then filled with 151 rum.

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