What Are You Eating Today?

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by clinthopson

And how do S.F. Chinatown restaurants compare with your Apple faves?

Did you have a chance to say hello to peterdubya?

Didn't see Peter.

S.F. Chinatown is not the neighborhood to go to for good Chinese food. The Richmond is. Ton Kiang, on Geary & 22nd has the best dim sum in the USA, AFAIK.

[clinthopson]

I think we had some dim sum at that place a few years ago. It was incredible. Actually the best dim sum I've had is at the Shanghai [something] in Monterey Park, near L.A., they had more carts rolling around the aisles than the 1-5 at 5 pm. Huge selection and every bite was superb.

[Pete C]

Bay Area meals, 5/26-30

Paul K, a Mediterranean restaurant on Gough & Oak–a convenient place for the concert halls, and quite good, though I’m more impressed with the appetizers than the main courses. I hooked up with Sergio & a high school buddy of mine.

We shared a mezza platter -- lamb riblets and kofte, baba & pomegranate [/walnut] dips, feta, olives, confit artichokes. The lamb riblets, with a bit of a pomegranate glaze, are really great.

Syrian spiced duck breast -- red cabbage, cippolini onions, ragu of duck confit, bulghur-rice cake, pomegranate molasses.

http://www.paulkrestaurant.com/

http://sanfrancisco.about.com/cs/res...lz/a/paulk.htm


Dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, period, Bruno Viscovi’s wonderful Istrian place, Albona, with, among others, David Gitin.

For starters we had the Craffi (pan fried 3-cheese ravioli with pine nuts & raisins in cumin-sirloin tip sauce); chifiletti–pan fried, wonderfully fluffy gnocchi, and a mixed pepper salad. My main course was a heimish lamb dish, in a brown sauce with potatoes and stuffed mushrooms on the side.

We drank an Alsatian Riesling and an Italian Pinot Bianco.

I wasn’t going to order dessert, until Bruno insisted I have a fresh strawberry sorbet on the house.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/listin...nue?vid=181589

Dining solo at Pesce, a wonderful Venetian Ciccheteria (tapas bar) on Polk in Russian hill, where I’d been twice before with friends, I tried 2 new things–Zuppa di pesce (good, but not bowled over), and a very nice octopus salad, with potatoes. It’s a great place to go with a small group and sample a lot of stuff, mostly seafood.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/listings/r...nue?vid=182135

http://sanfrancisco.about.com/od/eth...ts/a/pesce.htm

Dim Sum, as I mentioned, at Ton Kiang. The most amazing thing is the hot mango custard dumplings–the custard comes inside a pan fried, chewy rice flour disc.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/listin...nue?vid=181542

http://www.tonkiang.net/

Lunch at Old Shanghai, on Geary & 16th. I had OK, but nothing special shao lon bao, and a very nice chive turnover that was filled with chives, egg & clear noodle inside what was like a big potsticker wrapping. Everybody else in the place was Chinese, and I think they were all speaking Mandarin, or maybe Shanghaiese, but nobody was speaking Cantonese.


Sunday afternoon-evening, I went to a barbecue at some friends’ house in Berkeley. Robert & Gail are psycho-foodies, and many of their friends are too. There were about 25-30 people there. I’ll try my best to remember what was there, or at least what I tasted: noodle kugel, Basque chicken salad pintxos, eggplant salad, 3 kinds of potato salad, bay shrimp kebabs, grilled prawns, kalbi (Korean marinated beef short ribs), steak, spicy dry rub baby back ribs, sweet & messy ribs, pork belly with star anise & cardamom, boudin blanc, Italian sausage, chocolate cookies with a hint of chili & ginger, grand marnier cookies, blueberry pie. I’m sure I’m forgetting a bunch.

An amazing Memorial Day lunch at Bistro Jeanty, in Yountville, in the Napa Valley. 3 of us made a meal of shared appetizers–Rabbit terrine with celery root/apple salad; Quenelles de brochet (pike dumplings in lobster cream sauce); lamb tongue & potato salad; beet salad with chevre & frisee (my least favorite, since I don’t care for chevre, and I’m not crazy about beets either); perfectly grilled asparagus with cream sauce; pommes frites done just right & a very nice bottle of local Sauvignon Blanc (Mason). For dessert I had Armagnac prunes with vanilla ice cream. The place is a low key gem, and not expensive, especially considering the quality.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/listings/r...nue?vid=181660

http://www.bistrojeanty.com/

[clinthopson]

Pete,

I think I gained three pounds just reading about your amazing meals.

We are Albona fans too. It's a bit of a well kept secret.

[Jimmy Cantiello]

Joanne and I spent the weekend up at our house in Vermont. Friday, after dropping groceries off at the house, we headed to Putney which is just a short drive from Newfane by Vermont standards. We pulled into Curtis' Barbeque on Route 5. We settled on a "slab" of pork ribs with Curtis' sauce (very vinegary). We also had some coleslaw and Joanne insisted on getting some sauteed vegetables. Curtis works out of two blue buses on ten acres of land. He's there six days a week tending to his ribs. He came to Vermont from down south about 25 years ago to pick apples. He stayed and started barbequeing. I've had better ribs but the ambience of sitting at a roadside stand in Vermont eating ribs on a nice spring day cannot be beat.

Saturday evening was Thai in Brattleboro. Vegetable tempura, shrimp tempura, coconut vegetable soup, imperial duck, and seafood stir-fry (shrimp, scallops, squid with vegetables) triple hot, washed down by Singha Thai beer...................

[Brian Olewnick]

We had the guys next door over for dinner last night. Linda made a great salad w/ cherry tomatoes, candied walnuts and goat cheese, simple Italian dressing and a big luscious paella, leaving out the chicken (one of the guys goes meatless), but including big shrimp, mussels and clams w/string beans, peas, red peppers, etc. Finished off both tonight. Also got some great little pastries from Carlos in Hoboken, especially a hazelnut/chocolate creme cup that's incredible.

btw, tentative plans are afoot for another attempt at a birthday do in August. Will keep everyone posted.

[RedJazz]

Low sodium turkey on white bread with low fat mayonaise and tomatoes

[vibes]

For dinner: Pepperjack cheese omelette with Cholula sauce on top (been eating a lot of these lately), bacon on the side.

After taking a few months off and gaining too much weight, I started doing the Atkins diet again, so I've been eating tons of eggs and meat lately. It's a good thing I don't mind all the protein.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by vibes

It's a good thing I don't mind all the protein.

How do you feel about the saturated fat?

[vibes]

Doesn't bother me a bit. I've had incredible success on Atkins, so I'm OK with it. Eventually, once I learn to control my habits and maintain my weight at a certain level, I'll have to watch my fat intake more closely.

[Captain Hate]

With the onset of summer heat yesterday, grilled a pork tenderloin with a cherry, balsamic vinegar & allspice glaze. Also had a chutney made from onions, cherries, cherry preserves, cayenne & the glaze ingrediants. Found the recipe in Bon Appetit; Mrs Hate usually isn't one for pork but this got a thumbs up from her, my toughest critic.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by Captain Hate

Mrs Hate usually isn't one for pork

What's with women & pork anyway?

[Jimmy Cantiello]

Grilled cornish game hen for lunch............

[Jazzzoline]

Question for you guys:
When you brag here about those gargantuesque dinners you cook on the grill, does your wife (g/f, mother, someone else) previously prepared the meal ( marinade, sauce, vegetables ... ) so all you have to do is the easy part : grilling ?

[Sergio Zamora]

Home cooking this weekend!

On saturday for dinner, tortitas de camaron, which are made with eggs and dried shrimp in a spicy sauce with nopales. Also, nopales just with egg and white rice.

On sunday for breakfast, two big-ass bowls of menudo.

On sunday for dinner, campechanas, which are cocktails with shrimp, octopus, (imitation) crab, oysters, and some other stuff.

[clinthopson]

Originally Posted by Jazzzoline

Question for you guys:
When you brag here about those gargantuesque dinners you cook on the grill, does your wife (g/f, mother, someone else) previously prepapred the meal ( marinade, sauce, vegetables ... ) so all you have to do is the easy part : grilling ?

Jazzzo, I'll have you know that I f'r one do ALL the buying, marinating, prepping, sauce making and whatever else there is to get the meal on the table. I even clean up the dishes I dirty during the preliminaries.

Donna, very gladly, does the dishes. If the kids come over, they help her.

I don't do dishes or windows.

I may have mentioned this before, but every so often a friend's 11 year old son, who wants to be a chef, comes over and we cook together. We've made Chinese, French, Itralian and Mexican.

He's coming over this afternoon and I'm going to teach him some basics. We'll partially bone a chicken, leaving only the leg and wing bones intact. I'll show Danny on one side of the bird and then guide him through the other side. I'll then give him a lesson in proper stock making using the bones from the bird plus some left over bones I've had in the freezer.

We'll stuff the chicken with a rice mixture, tie it up, brown it and poach it in the stock.


We'll make a good dijon vinagrette for our salad which will have tomatoes and radishes from our garden.

For dessert, we're making a fig clafouti with raspberry sauce.

The neat thing is that Danny is one very smart kid and he remembers everything, I mean everything, I teach him.

Over dinner, he'll tell his mom and Donna what went into the meal, in great detail.

[Jazzzoline]

Originally Posted by clinthopson

Jazzzo, I'll have you know that I f'r one do ALL the buying, marinating, prepping, sauce making and whatever else there is to get the meal on the table. I even clean up the dishes I dirty during the preliminaries.

Donna, very gladly, does the dishes. If the kids come over, they help her.

I don't do dishes or windows.

I may have mentioned this before, but every so often a friend's 11 year old son, who wants to be a chef, comes over and we cook together. We've made Chinese, French, Itralian and Mexican.

He's coming over this afternoon and I'm going to teach him some basics. We'll partially bone a chicken, leaving only the leg and wing bones intact. I'll show Danny on one side of the bird and then guide him through the other side. I'll then give him a lesson in proper stock making using the bones from the bird plus some left over bones I've had in the freezer.

We'll stuff the chicken with a rice mixture, tie it up, brown it and poach it in the stock.


We'll make a good dijon vinagrette for our salad which will have tomatoes and radishes from our garden.

For dessert, we're making a fig clafouti with raspberry sauce.

The neat thing is that Danny is one very smart kid and he remembers everything, I mean everything, I teach him.

Over dinner, he'll tell his mom and Donna what went into the meal, in great detail.

I'm impressed!
My husband wants me to do the window cleaning too. The outside windows on the second floor are impossible to reach without a ladder. Last year I decided it was too risky of a task so when a telemarketer called at 18h00 and offered his help for my windows, I replied yes. The guy came and estimated the cost for cleaning the windows, outside and second floor only (first floor were already clean): $400.
My husband did the work himself.

[clinthopson]

That's why god made undocumented aliens.

[Leopold]

One day I too will be able to eat my money, but lo I am a student (empty pockets) so here is my diet:




But if I had my choice... (among others)

[Captain Hate]

Originally Posted by Jazzzoline

Question for you guys:
When you brag here about those gargantuesque dinners you cook on the grill, does your wife (g/f, mother, someone else) previously prepared the meal ( marinade, sauce, vegetables ... ) so all you have to do is the easy part : grilling ?

Absolutely not; Mrs Hate will, on request, help me out with the side dishes when I'm trying something new and am jammed up on not knowing how long the prep will take. Not to mention that she likes to eat so effing early that we'd prolly qualify for the AARP discount. But in all cases I do at least 75% of the heavy lifting or I'd hear about it. She washes the dishes and I dry; it's been that way for 30 years. Although on the rare occasion when I wash them I dry also; sometimes Mrs H will do that after a particularly arduous meal by me, but it is the exception. I usually clean the prep dishes up when I put stuff in the oven.

*And* I do windows.

Pete, I have no idea why women cop attitudes on pork; give me a chef that can do innovative stuff with a pork roast any day. Pigs get such a bum rap anyway; easily the most intelligent of the animals we consume. And most maligned.

[clinthopson]

Originally Posted by Captain Hate

Pete, I have no idea why women cop attitudes on pork; give me a chef that can do innovative stuff with a pork roast any day. Pigs get such a bum rap anyway; easily the most intelligent of the animals we consume. And most maligned.

I with you Cap'n. Pig meat is by far the most versatile and succulent of all meats.

Besides the other attributes, pigs are the most economical food animals to raise and produce more consumable product than any other critter.

The number of delicious dishes that can be made with pig meat is astronomical.

My Donna has absolutely no negatives about porcine products.

The Jews, Muslims and 7th Day Adventists have it wrong here.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by clinthopson

The Jews, Muslims and 7th Day Adventists have it wrong here.

That's the least of their problems.

[Sergio Zamora]

Maybe it's a cultural thing. I've never known a Mexican woman of any age who wouldn't dig into a nice plate of carnitas.

[clinthopson]

We're heading down to EL Tapatio for lunch today - the best carnitas in Santa Ana. Almost as good as those in Guadalajara.

[Brian Olewnick]

OZ, I have received a question about the virtues or lack thereof of Baja Fresh. I supplicate to the master...

[Sergio Zamora]

Originally Posted by Brian Olewnick

OZ, I have received a question about the virtues or lack thereof of Baja Fresh. I supplicate to the master...

It's far from authentic, but it's quite delicious within the context of that kind of thing. Certainly much better than the Rio Grande type Tex-Mex food. It's also certainly healthier than most authentic Mexican food. I go there all the time.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by Sergio Zamora

Maybe it's a cultural thing. I've never known a Mexican woman of any age who wouldn't dig into a nice plate of carnitas.

I had a carnitas burrito last night at Chipotle--which I only tried because it had the Zamora seal of approval. It wasn't bad, but the tortilla was sort of gummy.

[Sergio Zamora]

Originally Posted by Pete C

I had a carnitas burrito last night at Chipotle--which I only tried because it had the Zamora seal of approval. It wasn't bad, but the tortilla was sort of gummy.

I actually usually have the 'burrito bol' there, sans tortilla (but with rice). If I was in NY, I probably wouldn't frequent it, but out in the burbs and semi-burbs, where the pickins are slim, it's not bad.

[clinthopson]

Originally Posted by Sergio Zamora

I actually usually have the 'burrito bol' there, sans tortilla (but with rice). If I was in NY, I probably wouldn't frequent it, but out in the burbs and semi-burbs, where the pickins are slim, it's not bad.

My sons claim that there isn't a decent Mexican restaurant on the East Coast. Of course they were spoiled growing up here and making many trips to Arizona, which has spectaular Mexican grub.

We like Baja Fresh - they're never stingy with the avocado. Every Mexican restaurant around here serves some version of the fish taco. My first fish taco was in Zihuatanejo in 1980.

No, I'm lying. Back in the 50's and 60's we used to go down to Puerto Penasco where they would grill fress caught fish on an oil drum and serve it with tortillas , salsa and avocado.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by clinthopson

My sons claim that there isn't a decent Mexican restaurant on the East Coast.

They haven't been to Sunset Park (Brooklyn), the Poblano neighborhood.

[chupa]

sweet potato slices/cinnamon, bream fish wrapped in bacon. spanish pasta. cola+red wine (combined) and fosquitos for afters lol cause i ma pig!! jajajaja!

[Jazzzoline]

Originally Posted by chupa

cola+red wine (combined)

Am I reading this right?
You mixing Pepsi or Coke (go ask Larry) and red wine togheter?

[Sergio Zamora]

Originally Posted by Jazzzoline

Am I reading this right?
You mixing Pepsi or Coke (go ask Larry) and red wine togheter?

When I was a kid, my dad used to love mixing cheap Spanada wine with Squirt or some other grapefruit soda. He even let me drink it. Many years later, when I would come home to visit, I had to convince him not to do with the $30 bottle of merlot we'd buy.

[Jazzzoline]

Originally Posted by Sergio Zamora

When I was a kid, my dad used to love mixing cheap Spanada wine with Squirt or some other grapefruit soda. He even let me drink it. Many years later, when I would come home to visit, I had to convince him not to do with the $30 bottle of merlot we'd buy.

I'm trying to imagine the taste. Not sure I'll try this at home.

[Sergio Zamora]

Originally Posted by Jazzzoline

I'm trying to imagine the taste. Not sure I'll try this at home.

It's like a poor man's version of the wine cooler.

[chupa]

Originally Posted by Jazzzoline

Am I reading this right?
You mixing Pepsi or Coke (go ask Larry) and red wine togheter?

cola and red wine. no pepsi...

yes its superb, mix it to yer taste.. great for evening gymnastics lol...
and is also rather nice.. it works when you want it too lol...!

[chupa]

Originally Posted by chupa

cola and red wine. no pepsi...

yes its superb, mix it to yer taste.. great for evening gymnastics lol...
and is also rather nice.. it works when you want it too lol...!

course it could be my spanish/scottish taste buds lol....!

its very common in spain.

[Pete C]

Originally Posted by chupa

jajajaja!

chupa, I don't know about that drink, but it's always nice to see somebody laughing in Spanish. What are fosquitos?

[chupa]

fosquitos.. junk food!

sponges with cream inside and wrapped in chocolate! quite small, y'know... typical spanish childrens junk food... well... im just back from valencia and i miss it, so we bring back all this stuff...

oh! i wouldnt drink that cola/wine all the time mate! just get some down ya every now and then jajajaja!!!

[Sergio Zamora]

Originally Posted by Pete C

chupa, I don't know about that drink, but it's always nice to see somebody laughing in Spanish.

How do you know he's not saying yes in German? Or praising God in Jamaican English?