Worthwhile

the Romanesque Room at the Castle Green

Maybe you remember our visit with Ron Hobbs of Castle Catering just over a year ago. He's organizing a special event, and he asks so politely for our participation "...if you are so inclined..." 

Here's Ron's email:

Again this year I am organizing a special Valentines Dinner for some very Special People. Forty to forty-five Soldiers and their spouses will enjoy an intimate dinner provided by Castle Catering and it’s Restaurant Partners at The Castle Green and The Romanesque Room.

I want to give you an opportunity to express your gratitude directly to one of our Heroes by delivering “your” message that you are proud of them and thank them in the form of a Valentines Day card.

If you are comfortable doing so, please help us get the word out by forwarding this email to your contact lists. As I ask this, I do not know if this request violates any kind of privacy issues for you….if it does, then don’t worry about forwarding. We are just trying to get as many Valentines Day Cards with a “message of thanks” as possible.

Here is what I am asking you to do if you are so inclined…

1)         Send a Valentines Card with a message of Thanks to:

                         “A Soldier and Spouse”
                          C/O Castle Catering   Suite 102
                          50 E. Green St .
                          Pasadena , CA .  91105
             
2)         Certainly NOT required….but if you would like to enclose a check for $5, $10 or $20….or whatever you would like, made payable to “The Wounded Warriors Project” the soldiers will see them and we will forward them all to the Wounded Warriors Project.

3)         Last, if you are OK to do so…..please forward this message to some of your contacts and give them the opportunity to also send a Valentines Day Card with a “Thank You” message.

That is it…..I hope you will participate.

Thank you so very much.

Ron

Ron Hobbs
Owner, Castle Catering
50 E. Green St. 
Pasadena, CA.  91105
(626) 792-4444
Fax  (626) 793-6769
ron@castlecatering.net
www.castlecatering.net

Castle Catering and HUD

The Green Street wing of Castle Green contains a HUD housing facility on the upper floors, and businesses on the first floor. When you enter off Green and turn left, you see this.

The hallway ends at the corner of Green and Raymond, in a residents-only lobby. I got to see it but didn't take pictures, because it is private and I am nice. It's an updated lounge with comfy seating, a big-screen TV and large windows overlooking the Castle gardens. A covered opening in the south wall reminds you that it once opened to the hallway leading to the dining room of Castle Green. Next to that, a grand staircase leads upstairs. Had we stayed at the Hotel Green a hundred years ago, we might have come down those stairs to go to dinner in the ballroom, now known as the Romanesque Room, which is run by Castle Catering.

Ron Hobbs of Castle Catering gave me a tour of the first floor environs. In the photo below, which I took from the rear of the building (facing northeast toward the intersection of Green and Raymond), you can see the difference between the two wings. (HUD housing on your left, Castle Green condominiums on your right.)

A few more fun facts about Castle Catering:

Castle Catering offers sit-down service, buffets, station service or family style. Event hosts can bring in their own alcohol, while Castle Catering provides complete Bar Service. In favorable weather, lounge furniture is placed on the outside patio north of the building (Dayton Street side). Screens are set up to make the area private.

Despite the lovely old facility, about half of Castle Catering's business is off the premises at private homes, businesses or other event venues. They offer their own complete California Cuisine, plus Ron told me about their new concept in catering, which I think makes a lot of sense. It's called the "Restaurant Partners Program." 25 different restaurant partners provide a wide range of options, right there in the Romanesque Room. For a room so-named, perhaps you'd like Italian. Or maybe you want Dim Sum. Of course you may have it.

They've even had In 'n Out Burgers on their fancy china. I'll have my diet cola in a champagne flute, please.

Castle Catering

Meet Ron Hobbs, founder of Castle Catering at the Castle Green in Pasadena. Ron founded Castle Catering in 1984, after having already catered numerous events at Castle Green. He thought he knew the place pretty well by then.

What he didn't know at the time was that there was a huge kitchen in the Green Street wing that hadn't been used for a very, very long time.

Ron got himself a visit to the Green Street wing, where he found not only the 1200 sq. ft. kitchen you see behind him, but also a ballroom that was once the main dining room for the historic Hotel Green. The kitchen had not been used for decades, and the ballroom hadn't fared much better. A scene from the 1977 Liza Minelli/Robert DeNiro film, New York New York, had been shot there. When Hobbs first saw the room in 1984, the set was still standing.

But Ron believed in the place. He renovated both ballroom and kitchen, and named the ballroom the Romanesque Room. (I like the pictures on his website better than mine). The Romanesque Room seats 250 with the dance floor, even more without it.

the bar at the Romanesque Room

I have another picture or two, and more to tell you tomorrow. For now, something to think about: in 1984, the concept of Old Pasadena as a high-end shopping area was just that--a concept. It was a neighborhood folks didn't walk in at night. Making it better took a lot of people with chutzpah, or nerve, or even a bit of the crazies. 

Whatever it was, it worked.