Hey, does anyone blog here anymore???? Come on, I know you guys have been going to restaurants!!
Ahem, okay, so I found myself in the unfortunate predicament of being 2 hours early to meet someone in the Valley today. It was not a super hot day, but it felt super hot in Northridge. I tried to contain myself in a mall, but that drove me crazy, so I had to drive around with the AC on - this was not enough to cool the car down. Finally, I saw a Pinkberry and decided that this would be the solution: I would try Pinkberry for the first time and finally know what it was like so I could form my own opinion. And it would hopefully cool me down.
I made the right choice. The place and the frozen yogurt I got cooled me down and hit the spot. I got a medium original with one topping: strawberry. In retrospect, I should have chosen a more exotic fruit such as lychee or mango. But the frozen yogurt was good, it wasn't fatty, it wasn't artificial, and it wasn't sweet. It was tangy but not too much so. It tasted fresh. The strawberries were equally tangy and zingy and not sweetened. The whole place was cool with air conditioning down to 76 degrees and the cold dessert helped remove the Valley heat from my body.
I liked the experience. I didn't want to like it because it was such a fad, but I guess there is a place for fads like this one.
Oh, and the experience costed just under $5.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Empress Pavilion Chinatown, Father's Office Culver City, and Musha Torrance - all in one day
It's rare that I get a day off to spend with Johan these days, so when the opportunity came up this past Sunday, we decided to head up to Los Angeles downtown, to look at lofts and other opportunities to buy into a housing market that's going through the floor.
To feed our foodie appetites, we aimed to go for dim sum in Chinatown's Empress Pavilion. This is a classic Chinatown dim sum destination, a place that both Johan and I have enjoyed on several occasions. I even recall taking my dad there when we were in town. Well, we weren't the only ones with this bright idea - a huge crowd was waiting for tables like we were. After a half-hour wait milling around the many shops, our table was called. We ordered a variety of steamed dishes, since we tend to like these versus the fried ones. We enjoyed some sui mai dumplings, some squid, tripe, chicken's feet, rice noodles wrapped around minced beef while we sipped our hot tea. We finished with some egg tarts. The experience was good, though not excellent. I was surprised that there was not as much variety as I had expected from a place that was getting such high turnover. But overall the food was good. But maybe not better than a dim sum place closer to us in Cerritos, the name of which escapes me right now.
After this, we headed to the west side, toward Culver City. Actually, we first went to look at some condos on La Tierra Blvd near the airport. That made us thirst, so we headed back north to Culver City, to the new Father's Office. We have been longtime fans of the original Father's Office on Montana. Well, the original location, anyway, since we didn't really know the Original Father's Office, befor the current owner modernized it. Anyway, this second location has been a hit since it opened, catering to a new clientele. We had visited this location once before. We decided to sit inside at the bar and each ordered a Trappist Belgian beer out of the bottle called Westmalle Triple. This is one of our favorite beers, priced at $10 a bottle. What we got was something that started out somewhat refreshing, but later turned not so great, kind of out of balance and acidic. We surmised that this beer was not so fresh, maybe something that many folks did not order. I started drinking water after this; Johan ordered a Maredsous on tap. We ended up having a decent time there, but I would have preferred something else, like a Chimay on tap...
Usually at Father's Office we enjoy some of their tasty snacks, like their Frites (fries) or Sweet Potato Fries, but this time we tried not to ruin our dinner. I still like the place, and think that this visit might have been better if we had actually ordered some fried goodies!
In the evening, we made our way down to Torrance, to Musha. We have been to Musha a few times before, the first time with Paul and Hitomi - and that was the best experience to date! This time, we ordered the chicken leg, the cheese risotto, the torch-seared makerel, and an egg and noodle dish which I don't remember the name of, but it seems really popular since several tables ordered it. We drank some Asahi beer which hit the spot. The food was all lovely. All the other diners seemed to be Japanese Americans. It was fun. We left feeling pretty satisfied, but I think we still had more fun that time with Paul and Hitomi when we order like 10 dishes or something!
So that was our big day of eating out. The rest of the time, we have been eating in mostly, so not much to write about. So I'm happy to have had something to contribute this week!
To feed our foodie appetites, we aimed to go for dim sum in Chinatown's Empress Pavilion. This is a classic Chinatown dim sum destination, a place that both Johan and I have enjoyed on several occasions. I even recall taking my dad there when we were in town. Well, we weren't the only ones with this bright idea - a huge crowd was waiting for tables like we were. After a half-hour wait milling around the many shops, our table was called. We ordered a variety of steamed dishes, since we tend to like these versus the fried ones. We enjoyed some sui mai dumplings, some squid, tripe, chicken's feet, rice noodles wrapped around minced beef while we sipped our hot tea. We finished with some egg tarts. The experience was good, though not excellent. I was surprised that there was not as much variety as I had expected from a place that was getting such high turnover. But overall the food was good. But maybe not better than a dim sum place closer to us in Cerritos, the name of which escapes me right now.
After this, we headed to the west side, toward Culver City. Actually, we first went to look at some condos on La Tierra Blvd near the airport. That made us thirst, so we headed back north to Culver City, to the new Father's Office. We have been longtime fans of the original Father's Office on Montana. Well, the original location, anyway, since we didn't really know the Original Father's Office, befor the current owner modernized it. Anyway, this second location has been a hit since it opened, catering to a new clientele. We had visited this location once before. We decided to sit inside at the bar and each ordered a Trappist Belgian beer out of the bottle called Westmalle Triple. This is one of our favorite beers, priced at $10 a bottle. What we got was something that started out somewhat refreshing, but later turned not so great, kind of out of balance and acidic. We surmised that this beer was not so fresh, maybe something that many folks did not order. I started drinking water after this; Johan ordered a Maredsous on tap. We ended up having a decent time there, but I would have preferred something else, like a Chimay on tap...
Usually at Father's Office we enjoy some of their tasty snacks, like their Frites (fries) or Sweet Potato Fries, but this time we tried not to ruin our dinner. I still like the place, and think that this visit might have been better if we had actually ordered some fried goodies!
In the evening, we made our way down to Torrance, to Musha. We have been to Musha a few times before, the first time with Paul and Hitomi - and that was the best experience to date! This time, we ordered the chicken leg, the cheese risotto, the torch-seared makerel, and an egg and noodle dish which I don't remember the name of, but it seems really popular since several tables ordered it. We drank some Asahi beer which hit the spot. The food was all lovely. All the other diners seemed to be Japanese Americans. It was fun. We left feeling pretty satisfied, but I think we still had more fun that time with Paul and Hitomi when we order like 10 dishes or something!
So that was our big day of eating out. The rest of the time, we have been eating in mostly, so not much to write about. So I'm happy to have had something to contribute this week!
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Avocado Grill - Larchmont
217 N Larchmont Blvd, Los Angeles 90004 between 1st St & Beverly Blvd 323-962-3880Just reading the word "avocado" makes me want to vomit. The combination of slimey, squishiness coupled with snotty shades of extraterrestrial intestines... uugh. In fact even typing it is less than fun, therefore throughout the remainder of this blog, I shall henceforth refer to the dreaded "A" word as "Kryptonite" and I urge all future contributors to follow suit, otherwise I may have to invent a puke-proof keyboard. So why am I even entering this establishment without an air-sickness bag? Because Lorenzo and I really wanted to try Larchmont Deli, but it was closed on Sunday. Being the hungry people that we were (and usually always are), I employed my beyond-superhero-strength to overcome the evil forces of Kryptonite. Actually, Lorenzo loves Kryptonite so I went in partly to make him happy too. The place was pretty quiet, as most probably are at 3:30pm on Sunday - no wonder we actually found a parking spot. He ordered the roasted vegetable burrito - $7.95 (caramelized onions, fire roasted corn, choice of cilantro or white rice, black or pinto beans, guacamole, pico de gallo and sour cream) PLUS chicken (add $2.00). For a minute there you actually thought he would eat a meatless item? Ha! I had a bowl of tortilla soup $5.95 and a bottle (yes, an actual glass bottle) of Lime Soda. The evil forces were surely conspiring against me as my soup arrived with - yep, you guessed it - a slice of Kryptonite right smack in the center. I quickly removed it and gave it to Lorenzo before it had a chance to contaminate the rest of my meal. The soup itself was really more of a spicy tomato sauce with a few strands of crisp tortilla strips that didn't stay crisp for long. Lorenzo's burrito had some noticeably sweet roasted corn, and ironically no Kryptonite. Long story short - dunking his burrito into my soup - or, if you prefer, pouring my soup over his burrito - was a very tastey combination of two otherwise mediocre entrees.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Anisette Brasserie in Santa Monica
Just returned from lunch at Anisette Brasserie in Santa Monica and I have to say I enjoyed the experience and would go again.
The place has a very nice feel and that started right when we walked in. Beautifully tiled floors, long zinc bar, red lobsters chilling on ice next to oysters, and servers dressed like waiters in France with their long aprons. The front desk folks were friendly, and tons of diners were already there enjoying their lunch hour. It was as though the restaurant was recession-proof.
When we got to our food, we found it all to be very good, and creative as well. We had a couple of appetizers to share - pate maison and a smoked salmon terrine. Both were beautifully presented, with the terrine in a fashion that I have never seen before. But even tastier than the smoked salmon was the pate, which was very light and almost like a mousse.
We each ordered a soup for the main course - my companions had onion soup, which was served in a cute tall red crock, and mine was the Provencal fish soup, which was served in bowl, but they poured it tableside from a teapot. My soup was flavorful and everything I wanted from a fish soup - tasted very homemade.
We shared a dessert of lavendar ice cream which definitely tasted of lavendar and vanilla bean.
To conclude, Anisette is a cute and relatively casual but still upscale place that I enjoyed and made me want to live in L.A. again. It's definitely a great addition to the 3rd Street Promenade area that really doesn't have enough good places. I say Yay!!
Anisette Brasserie is located on Santa Monica Blvd between 2nd and 3rd Street, right off the 3rd Street Promenade.
The place has a very nice feel and that started right when we walked in. Beautifully tiled floors, long zinc bar, red lobsters chilling on ice next to oysters, and servers dressed like waiters in France with their long aprons. The front desk folks were friendly, and tons of diners were already there enjoying their lunch hour. It was as though the restaurant was recession-proof.
When we got to our food, we found it all to be very good, and creative as well. We had a couple of appetizers to share - pate maison and a smoked salmon terrine. Both were beautifully presented, with the terrine in a fashion that I have never seen before. But even tastier than the smoked salmon was the pate, which was very light and almost like a mousse.
We each ordered a soup for the main course - my companions had onion soup, which was served in a cute tall red crock, and mine was the Provencal fish soup, which was served in bowl, but they poured it tableside from a teapot. My soup was flavorful and everything I wanted from a fish soup - tasted very homemade.
We shared a dessert of lavendar ice cream which definitely tasted of lavendar and vanilla bean.
To conclude, Anisette is a cute and relatively casual but still upscale place that I enjoyed and made me want to live in L.A. again. It's definitely a great addition to the 3rd Street Promenade area that really doesn't have enough good places. I say Yay!!
Anisette Brasserie is located on Santa Monica Blvd between 2nd and 3rd Street, right off the 3rd Street Promenade.
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