Pat’s Topanga Grill from “Medium”

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (13 of 16)

Way back in December, after stalking the Topanga Canyon house where Paula (Sissy Spacek) lived in the 2008 Yuletide comedy Four Christmases (which I blogged about here), the Grim Cheaper and I passed by Pat’s Topanga Grill and decided to pop in for some breakfast. Because the GC always likes to joke that businesses in Topanga, an area known for its bohemian lifestyle, only accept beads or wares in trade for goods rather than cash, I was a little reticent about dining at the eatery, but as it turned out, we both absolutely LOVED the place! Come to find out, Pat’s is also a big time celebrity hot spot AND a filming location. Talk about a fortuitous stop!

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Pat’s Topanga Grill, which has long been a Topanga Canyon staple (although I am unsure of the exact year in which it opened), was founded by Pat and Kathi Burke. Amazingly enough, despite being an area landmark, I could find virtually no information about the place’s history online or in my extensive collection of Los Angeles-themed books, which seems to be a pattern lately. I had the same problem with the Sierra Pelona Motel from Crossroads (which I blogged about here) and the Malibu Hindu Temple from Beverly Hills Ninja (which I blogged about here). Boo!

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (15 of 16)

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (12 of 16)

Thankfully though, we did get to meet Kathi while we were dining at the Grill and she could NOT have been nicer. When I asked about filming on the premises (as I invariably do whenever visiting a new place), she informed me that a Season 1 episode of Medium had been shot there. She also chatted with us about some of the celebrities who have dined at the restaurant over the years, which as you can see below, is quite an extensive list. Just a few of the stars who have been spotted at Pat’s Topanga Grill include Kate Hudson, Wendie Malick, My So-Called Life’s A.J. Langer (whom I was most excited about), Vinessa Shaw, Rosanna Arquette, Kyle Chandler, Anthony Crivello, Gene Simmons, and Dave Grohl.

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (3 of 16)

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (4 of 16)

While I was fairly certain that Pat’s breakfast menu would be comprised of mostly tofu items, I was floored to discover that was not the case. The restaurant does serve some vegan options, but most of the cuisine is made up of down-home cooking, and, thankfully, sausage (both links and patties – my fave) and eggs are also offered. And I am very happy to report that the food was FABULOUS!

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (7 of 16)

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (8 of 16)

As was the vintage, haphazard décor, which makes one feel as if they have stepped into an eatery miles away from city life. I absolutely fell in love with the antique Topanga freeway sign pictured below. How cool would it be to have that hanging in your home?

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (1 of 16)

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (2 of 16)

Unfortunately, Kathi could not remember which episode of Medium had been filmed at the Grill, only that the restaurant had been turned into a gas station for the shoot. So I did quite a bit of scanning yesterday to figure it out. Thank God for Netflix! As it turns out Pat’s popped up in the Season 1 episode titled “Coded” as the supposed Springville, Arizona stop-and-go gas station and minimart where Henry Yellen (Joe Chrest) received weekly phone calls from his imprisoned brother, Darrell Yellen (Don Harvey).

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As Kathi had mentioned, the interior was dressed heavily for the filming to make the restaurant look like a minimart and is not very recognizable in person.

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Although the counter, where the GC and I ate, is visible in the episode, which I was floored to see.

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You can find me on Facebook here and on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And be sure to check out my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic.

Pat's Topanga Grill Medium (16 of 16)

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Pat’s Topanga Grill, from the “Coded” episode of Medium, is located at 1861 North Topanga Canyon Boulevard in Topanga Canyon. You can visit the restaurant’s official website here.

Johnson Lake in Pasadena from “Celebrity Rehab”

Lake Johnson Pasadena-1000279

A couple of weeks ago, while trying to track down the lake house belonging to Donna Meagle (Retta) in the Season 4 episode of Parks and Recreation titled “Sweet Sixteen”, I discovered that there was a lake in Pasadena and just about fell right off my chair! Having lived in the area – as a stalker, mind you! – for well over a decade now, I consider myself a virtual expert on Pasadena and its environs, so how in the world had I not previously known that there was a lake – like an actual lake! – within the city limits? Well, believe you me, I immediately added the place to my To-Stalk list and dragged the Grim Cheaper right on out there.

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There seems to be quite a bit of discrepancy online about the origins of Johnson Lake, which was formerly known as Mirror Lake and is also sometimes referred to as Johnson’s Lake, Johnston Lake and Beaudry Lake. According to the book Images of America: Garvanza by Charles J. Fisher, the lake is a natural one that was originally located on land belonging to Prudent Beaudry, the thirteenth Mayor of Los Angeles. At the time, the property was part of an area called Garvanza, but it was later integrated into Pasadena. Some other online reports stipulate that the lake was initially part of a natural spring that was dammed to provide irrigation to the 2,200-acre San Rafael Ranch, which was then owned by the Campbell-Johnsons, the very same family who built the oft-filmed-at Church of the Angels. And then there are further reports still which state that the site was first developed by the Annandale Golf Club and/or the San Rafael Winery in the late 1890s. (You can see a picture of the lake taken during that time period on the Pasadena Adjacent website here.) Whatever the case may be, at some point the lake became part of Brookmere, a private gated community comprised of about twenty homes. The Brookmere gates are pictured below.

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Lake Johnson Pasadena-1000282

Because Johnson Lake is located inside of a gated community, I scoped the place out online before heading over there to make sure that it was viewable from the road. And, as you can see below, it is clearly visible via Google Street View. So I was absolutely shocked when we arrived and the lake was nowhere to be found! As the GC later explained, the Google Street View camera is elevated and therefore had a view above the large hedges which surrounded the Brookmere community. Man, I have got to get me one of those! Winking smile

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Have no fear, though – the GC was able to snap some pics of it by holding the camera up over his head. So while we never actually got to lay eyes on the lake ourselves, our camera got a nice view of it and, as you can see below, it is pretty darn amazing.

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Lake Johnson Pasadena-1000291

You can also catch a very small glimpse of the lake through Brookmere’s front gates.

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Lake Johnson Pasadena-1000284

Oddly enough, the house that seems to have the most lakefront land is not located inside of Brookmere at all, but is on La Loma Road, a public street, just a few blocks west of the Beaches mansion (which I blogged about here). The 5,100-square-foot Craftsman-style home, which was designed by area architect Doug Ewing in 2006, boasts four bedrooms, five baths, a .59-acre plot of land, a whopping seven patios, and a 20-foot boat dock! You can see some interior photographs of the place here and here. Have a bib handy to catch the drool, though, because the place is nothing short of breathtaking! I realize that I stated in Monday’s post (which you can read here) that Chris Traeger’s apartment from Parks and Recreation was my dream home, but I think I’d be OK with this place, too. Winking smile

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Lake Johnson Pasadena-1000293

Because the residence is so incredibly unique, not to mention picturesque, it is, of course, no stranger to filming. In the Season 3 episode of Celebrity Rehab titled “Family Weekend”, Dr. Drew takes his patients, including Heidi Fleiss, Dennis Rodman, and Mackenzie Phillips, to the house for a reunion with their family members. In the episode, the home was referred to as the fictional “Johnston Lake Retreat Center”, but in reality the place is just a private home where actual (and extremely lucky) people live.

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Thanks to my buddy E.J. over at The Movieland Directory website, I learned that the home also appeared as the residence belonging to Gabrielle Cafferty (Marisa Coughlan) and Joel Tiernan (Max Casella) in the Season 5 episode of Medium titled “Soul Survivor”. In the episode, quite a bit of the property was used, including the front exterior;

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the interior . . .

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. . . and the backyard and lake.

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Be sure to “Like” IAMNOTASTALKER on Facebook here and “Friend” me on my personal page here. You can also check out the IAMNOTASTALKER About Me page here and you can follow me on Twitter at @IAMNOTASTALKER. And don’t forget to take a look at my other blog, The Well-Heeled Diabetic, here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! Smile

Stalk It: Johnson Lake can (sort of) be viewed from the 800 block of Burleigh Drive, just south of where it meets Laguna Road, in Pasadena. The Johnson Lake Retreat Center from Celebrity Rehab is actually a private residence located at 1260 La Loma Road in Pasadena.