Still Alive!

I'm still alive!  Nothing particularly blog-worthy has happened.

We did go out to the Kennedy School for a friends birthday last week. For a chain, it is one of my favorite places. Every McMenamins location is a little different and while the food is certainly not over the top, it is consistent and good. And they brew their own beers. And distill their own spirits. Some of which are quite good.

The Kennedy School has a few different bars in the building, one of which (Detention) offers a nice selection of cigars and a cozy fire and a well stocked bar to accompany your cigar. We popped in and shared a cigar after the birthday dinner and though I am not a huge cigar smoker (less than one a year, realistically) it was a lovely and relaxing way to end the day. Chatting and enjoying friends is never a bad idea.

I joined a new gym, which I suppose is noteworthy. Doing such a large amount of walking has kicked me back into a weight loss cycle and I figure there is no time like the present to take advantage and keep it going. I have actually really enjoyed being back in the gym, I had forgotten how much I like that feeling after a really good work out. And there is no equal to sweating out a bad day (or a hangover....not that that has happened to me lately....).

I did go back to Kennedy School and catch up with Spacey (center) last night, which was lovely. We drank more beers than we needed to and chatted and bullshitted and it was just lovely.  I even remembered to take a grainy cell phone selfie...now with bonus Tegan N. Scare-Ya.

Sarah will be here in a few days, expect lots of beer tasting notes and pictures next week!

Ta!

-S

New city, new blog post, new focus.

Well, this experiment at blogging failed spectacularly. Let's try this again.

So much has happened since the last post (damn those ensuing YEARS of time.)

I (Shell) lost my job, couldn't find a new one in the SF area, and ended up looking (and finding) in Portland, OR. That means that right now we are split between two states and dealing with the repercussions of being apart. It's tough. It sucks. But it's OK. Well, it's going to be OK. And we're both staying focused on it being so much better in the long run. The cost of living here is so much less that things like paying off old debt and saving up for new debt (i.e. buying a house) actually seem like possibilities here, rather than just pipe dreams. (Plus, snow!)

The Willamette Valley (about 150 mile long stretch of land that covers from Portland all the way down to Eugene) also happens to be chock full of wineries, breweries, cider houses, cheese caves, small farms, large farms, and other foodie haven locations.

So far our favorite winery find (not that we have done a lot of exploring yet, but spring is coming!) has been Amity Vineyards. The wine maker was there when we went and he and I had a great chat about vines and varietals and wine making in general. Turns out they are also bay area transplants.

The tasting room is up on a hill in the valley and the view is gorgeous, a lovely little spot to sit and sip.

They also have a fabulous winery dog, which, if you know me at all, tells you that this winery got double bonus points from me. This is Mosely, he is gigantic and friendly and oh so fluffy.

They had a Pinot Noir when we were there that I absolutely loved, and all of their whites (the bread and butter of the WV) were lovely. We bought a few bottles to take home and were quite pleased with them. Plus, they give you a little plate of charcuterie to snack on while you taste. Heavenly.

At the end of last year I also took a short trip to Boise and my friend Sarah and I did a little local beer exploring. Of note, Payette Brewing. Their tasting room was small and funky and they had a good number of beers. Unfortunately I failed to note what we got in our flights, but I remember that I really liked the amber and Sarah really enjoyed the ale, which was noteworthy as it's not generally her style.

We also stopped at Haff Brewing, where they had a watermelon wheat beer on tap that was to die for. Light and fruity and one of those beers with which you could get into a lot of trouble on a warm summer day. Perfect for floating the river! Plus, they have the best logo...I bought C a pint glass and Sarah got a growler just because we were so in love with their logo.

Chris found a book about making cheese at home when she was here over Thanksgiving and has been reading up in preparation to start making our own cheese, which I am pretty excited to experiment with and document.  I got her a second book about cheese making for Christmas, and she also got a pressure cooker, so we are getting well set for making all of the things. She's been using her time home alone (she ended up having surgery at the end of the year, so she has had lots of time home by herself) to learn to make delicious things like cheesecake and experimenting with shepherds pie and creme brûlée. I think I gained 5 pounds in the week I was back with her for Christmas, but it was delicious and worth it!

Okay, I think this'll do for today. I would say I'll be back in a week, but I seem to have a poor track record for keeping that promise! Sarah will be here to visit in less than three weeks, so there will definitely be food and beer exploring happening for me to write about then, if not before!

-Shell

A blog a month?

Ummm yeah, blog a week FAIL.  Epic Fail.  Oh well...moving on.

I have all kinds of random photos that I have taken over the last few weeks on my phone and as I was looking over them it really made me realize that I need a new camera.  Like, a CAMERA.  Although apparently the new phones have lenses and resolution just as good as a digital camera, and I am due for upgrade on my phone in June.

It's been a very busy few weeks.  We haven't done very much interesting eating or cooking, although we did squeeze in a few fun things.  There is a decent sushi place close by called Kansai that does a sushi happy hour after 11PM.

I totally forgot to take a picture of the huge platter of sushi before we started eating.

I made a batch of cookies and cream fudge two weeks ago.  It's one of my favorite candies, although we eat so little sweets now that I find it very rich.  As a matter of fact almost the entire batch of it is still in the container on the counter (Chris doesn't eat it).  

Everything in the pan after cooking the sugar, butter and milk together.  This part always messes with my head a little.  Just when you have been stirring and stirring and you start to think that you have absolutely done something wrong and are going to toss the whole thing and go wallow in your failure it starts to smooth out and comes together perfectly.

All mixed together and in the pan, the recipe calls for crumbled up cookies on the top but I like the big pieces, sometimes I even take whole cookies and stick them in upright so that they are standing up on the top.

We pulled out our tabletop rotisserie and cooked a chicken last week.  Chris made an awesome spice mix with a little bit of almost everything on the rack (I don't know exactly, I know there was garlic powder, onion powder, cayenne, paprika, black pepper, salt and probably a handful of other things discovered in the spice rack), we make a very similar rub with brown sugar in it that we use on pork a lot.

Once again I forgot to take a pic before we got it in the oven AND forgot to take one when we took it out (it was a gorgeous, photo spread worthy golden brown lovely looking bird, I promise).  Here it is all trussed and on the skewers right after we put it in.

Chris helped Michael Sebastiani at her store right around the beginning of the year (my Napa wine-head friends will know exactly who he is.)  She happened to mention that we are fans of his wine (we are members of the wine club at his winery Highway 12, it's the only membership we have kept).  He got her info from her and last week we got this box in the mail.  

That bottle on the right, the Highwayman, it's their signature red and not cheap, we were SUPER excited to get it.  We have received two bottles of it in club shipments and the oldest one is FINALLY ready to drink after five years of cellaring...I am so excited!  

I also have to give Mr. Sebastiani some serious kudos for being a damn good business man.  He very well could have driven away from Chris's store and totally forgotten that she was a fan of his wines and never given it another thought.  Taking the time to follow up with a customer and create that lasting good impression is something that tends to be sorely lacking these days.  If you are at all into wine I highly suggest checking Highway 12 out, I have not yet tasted one of their wines I did not care for.  Their Sauvignon Blanc is Chris's favorite wine, bar none and their table wine (Mission Hardware red) makes the best pot roast (I pour about half the bottle in with the roast and we drink the rest with dinner!)

The company I work for moved to a new office last Friday night, myself and 7 other folks stayed late to help supervise the movers, which also meant we got to play in the new space before there was anything in it!  The new office is about twice the footage we moved out of, it's so nice!  

Here it is before the movers arrived with all our desks and whatnot (that's Jeremie on his phone), my new home is in the back corner by that whiteboard on the left.

 Our new building is the light colored one in the middle there.

We can see the pyramid now! I shot this out a window in one of the conference rooms.

I didn't leave the new office until almost 11:30 last Friday, so Chris took me to Kansai for dinner again. =)

Beer was DEFINITELY needed, and they always bring edamame, and we got soup because we ordered tempura.

This time I remembered to take a pic before we started in on the food!  Tempura and three sushi rolls, plus the beer and the free edamame and soup and the total was less than $30.00 with tip!  Can't beat sushi happy hour!  (side note, this was the pic that made me decide I need a camera so I don't have to take all my pics on my phone!)

Last Sunday we decided to take a trip to the Jack London Square Farmers Market, which is one of the best markets in the area during the spring and summer.  It is a bit smaller this time of year but still fun, and we got some great stuff!

There is an awesome vendor who is there every week called Farmhouse Culture, they make great sauerkraut.  We bought a ceramic crock from them several months ago and last week we brought it and had them fill it with our favorite flavor of theirs, dill pickle sauerkraut, it's got sliced pickles in it, it is SO good.

We decided to have brunch at the market.  We got a yummy pizza from these guys for $10, it had prosciutto and mixed olives on it.  Awesome wood fired pizza, and the mobile pizza oven is pretty darn cool.

We also got fish tacos from Cholita Linda, which we had been wanting to try for several months.  I have to say I think it was possibly the best fish taco I have ever had.  Fried fish but not at all greasy or heavy, not too much cabbage on it, house made hot sauce which was the perfect little hit of heat to bring up the fish, and slices of radish!  My only regret is that we waited so long to try their food!

Our fish tacos and pizza brunch, my kinda meal.  And the pizza was so big I took two of the slices home and ate them for dinner a couple nights ago. =)

The cool and slightly gloomy weather kept the crowds down a lot, we got in, grabbed some groceries, had a meal and got back out in about an hour (this pic is standing right behind the market stands looking out at the bay).

So...it's been a little cold at night lately, we have actually had freezes several nights over the last week.  Went out to the car one morning around four a.m. and the whole car was covered in a pretty good layer of ice.  It was pretty, but a nuisance, people who live in our area are not prepared for this stuff!

The barista made a pretty heart/leaf on my mocha the other morning. =)

Being that I work within a block of the headquarters of three major banks we see a lot of the Occupy SF activity.  There was a big protest yesterday.

The protesters blocking traffic at the intersection of California Street and Montgomery Street.

Protesters chained to the doors of the Wells Fargo building across the street from my office.

I guess after a while Wells Fargo got tired of the people chained to the doors, the next time I went outside they had done this.

The dogs and I walked around a block we had never explored before today and we found this really cool plant.  Anyone know what it is?  It looked like black leather from a few feet away, really shiny and a gorgeous purple/black color standing up on a stem that looked like a tree branch.

Hopefully this next couple weeks we will get back on track with cooking more often and there will be more fun things to share.  I did make a loaf of Italian bread last week that I over proofed which baked up about an inch thick and six inches wide, which was pretty funny, but not edible (really, really hard).  No pics though, I was so annoyed with it I forgot...lol.

There are a couple really fun things coming up in the bay area:
February 16 is the East Bay Brew Fest which sounds like it's going to be a good time for all, and benefits a great organization.
February 25 is the first Bay Area Derby Girls bout, I will probably be pouring beer, come see me!
March 3 is the Bay Area Brew Festival, it's a Saturday, so we probably wont go, but you should.

Ciao!
-S

A blog a week, that's all we ask.

Hola!
Sooooo...I don't really "do" resolutions, generally.  This year, however, I am feeling some of the "new year, new outlook" vibe so I have made some internal commitments to do things.  One of those things is to post here at least once a week (in the light of full disclosure, I made this commitment about ten minutes ago.) 

My thought is to try to "save up" up to a weeks worth of cooking/brewing/crafting/adventuring photos and stories and then post them all, instead of trying to commit to posting every day, becuase that CLEARLY wasn't working!

Anywho. 

There hasn't been much going on lately, the holidays kind of got away from us and we sort of, skipped them.  We cooked at home for Thanksgiving (just the two of us, we made paella, which was...a learning experience) and we went out for Chinese (we went to Little Shin Shin in Oakland, btw, which is by far one of the best Chinese places I have ever found) for Christmas dinner.  We stayed home and ate cheese and crackers and drank beer for New Years.  We are recovering from all the busy/overspending/over-extending "ness" of the holidays now and I am really looking forward to getting back into our groove and doing some new exploring in the coming months.

So...off we go!  Hello 2012!

-S

One of my coworkers went home to Morocco over the holidays and brought us goodies from Casablanca, they are all so pretty I just had to take a picture!

Trip to the Central Coast and Los Angeles

Chris and I just got back from a four day trip to the Central CA Coast and Los Angeles.  It was nice, we went to some of the places we loved to eat when we lived in L.A.  We drank a LOT of beer.

We got kind of a later start than intended on Thursday, didn't leave Oakland until about 11AM.  We decided instead of trying to get to Solvang before the tasting rooms closed we would stop in San Luis Obispo and visit Central Coast Brewing instead.  They have a really cool truck parked outside the brewhouse right now!  It says "Tactical Thirst Response Unit" and it has four taps in the side...I wonder if I could rent this for my birthday?

I got a pint of their Doppelbock and sat on the patio enjoying the beautiful Central Coast weather.

From San Luis Obispo we went to Pismo Beach. The idea was to go to Hot Lix, Chris wanted a caramel apple rolled in meal worms, but they didn't have them.  We did get some chocolate covered crickets, and Chris got a scorpion. Those pics are on her phone, I will add them later.

We also stopped at the Splash Cafe to eat.  The clam chowder was AMAZING, I cannot imagine what the ratio of cream was in that soup, and I did not have one sandy clam, which always makes me happy.  I am iffy at best on clams most of the time, sandy clams just slay me.  And all the veggies in the soup were perfectly cooked, impressive considering that with the volume this place sells they must have huge bain marie's of soup in the kitchen.  I got scallops and chips, Chris got a mixed platter, it had fish, calamari and maybe shrimp?  

From Pismo we went on to Buellton, where we were staying the night.  After we got checked in to our hotel we drove over to the Firestone Walker taproom, because we clearly needed more beer.  I was delighted to find they had their seasonal "Solace" on tap, so I got that.  Chris got a taster because you get a pint glass to take home if you buy a taster and I broke one of ours the other day. 

Friday morning we took advantage of our hotels free breakfast (no pics, it wasn't very exciting) and then hit the road to Los Angeles.  Long Beach, to be exact.  We bounced around Los Angeles on Friday...Chris got a haircut, we grabbed some shawerma (we were so hungry we forgot to take pics!), then drove to Long Beach and checked in to our hotel.  Friday night we had tickets to see a concert at The Hollywood Bowl and we stopped at Philippe's for my FAVORITE french dip sandwiches.  If you have never been to Philippe's you MUST go next time you are in Los Angeles. The experience alone is worth it.  

You stand in line (sometimes a LONG line, I have waited an hour for a sandwich here) to place your order with one of "The Ladies" who stand behind a huge counter full of amazing looking goodies.  Potato salad, macaroni salad, pickled eggs, scratch made pies, pickles...it's a little overwhelming if you aren't used to it.  They get you your food and you pay, then you take your tray to one of the long family style tables in the big dining area, sawdust on the floor...and you dig in.  Don't forget to add a little of the house made spicy mustard to your sandwich, but JUST A LITTLE, it's REALLY hot.

This is my double dipped beef sandwich, Chris got one with bleu cheese and we shared halves.

Saturday morning we slept pretty late (for us) so we skipped breakfast and headed to Huntington Beach.  I had picked up a Groupon for a place called Rockin' Crepes.  It had good reviews and the concept seemed fun.  It was...OK.  I love the concept, but I think they have some severe issues with execution.  

The restaurant itself is funky and fun.  Skulls and flames painted on the walls, guitars and album artwork, a good rock selection in the juke box, music loud enough to be rockin' but not loud enough to be obnoxious, our table was painted to look like a Ouija board.   However, the waitresses shoes were obviously sticking to the floor right inside the kitchen, which annoys me right off, mop your damn floor.  Our Ouija board table wasn't designed to be used in a restaurant and the constant wet wiping had made the finish start to weep a little, so it was clean, but slightly tacky to the touch.  They don't appear to have an actual chef/cook, rather the waitstaff does some of the prep and someone who I would guess to be one of the owners wives does the rest, all the while speaking to the staff very poorly.

We got a crepe with chicken, brie, mushrooms and green onions.  The flavors were great together but overall it left a lot to be desired.  The crepe was really thick and I think overcooked.  It had a ton of plain, boiled, shredded, unseasoned chicken in it and a good hanful of green onions, but very little brie or mushrooms.  They could have gotten away with the chicken had it contained more of the other more flavorful items, but, it didn't.

We also ordered a fondue of cheddar cheese with red wine.  Great flavors, but, again, horrible execution.  I am pretty sure our waitress took a pre-portioned pack of fondue ingredients, heated it up in the microwave, stirred it and tossed it into an electric fondue pot.  It was grainy and thanks to the huge fondue pot it was served in, it just kept evaporating and getting grainier and grainier.  They did serve it with some fun dippers...it came with apples, bread, pretzels, sliced pepperoni and cheese puffs.

All in all, it was fun to do once, but I won't go back, which is going to be what causes them to go under, eventually, I think.  The wait staff was decent...a young girl and a younger guy who were the only personable people there.  The woman working the cooking area spoke to the staff terribly and didn't seem to have a very good handle on her organization.  There were also two or three middle aged dudes who I assume are some manner of owner/manager types and wandered around the restaurant not helping with anything and not speaking to any of their customers, not a very good impression.

From there we went to Seal Beach and walked along the main street and the pier...no good food or drink photos since we didn't eat anything there and we only stopped briefly for an overprice beer in a touristy pub, lovely way to spend the afternoon though.

Saturday night we went to see a movie at the Hollywood Forever cemetery.  A pretty cool experience, everyone sits on blankets on the lawn and they encourage you to bring a picnic, which we did. =)  Beer, cheese, crackers, sliced meat, olives, salads.  We didn't come close to finishing it all, but it was good!

Sunday morning we got up and met Chris's dad for a dim sum brunch, which I totally spaced out on taking pics of.  We went to Empress Pavilion, which is (in my book) the best dim sum place in L.A.  Very much the quintessential dim sum experience, the women with carts laden with little trays and steam pots of food, the vested waiters running around bringing pots of tea, the cards on the corner of the tables which the serving ladies stamp with everything your table has consumed.  If you have never been out for dim sum, I highly recommend it.

I did find something fun in a shop window walking back to the car that, so here is a pic of that in place of dim sum.

Everyone needs Hello Kitty pots!

I also took some pics that weren't food...here is the Pismo Beach pier and a crazy heron we found perched at the end watching all the people.

 This is how a heron scratches the top of it's head....who knew??

And these are the pics I took in Seal Beach....

The Hollywood Bowl....

I know, you can't tell, but this is The B-52's and their psychedelic stage lighting.

And this is Teri Nunn and Berlin...

This is looking down from our seats before the show started....

This is the cemetery before the sun set and the movie started...that big white wall is where they project the film.

-S

We made trail mix!

So...our Whole Foods has this great "Mix Your Own Trail Mix" bar.  For $5.99/lb you can make you own blend of a couple dozen or so options that they have...dried fruit, nuts, candies etc.  We LOVE it.  Then we were at the Berkeley Bowl one day and noticed that they have pretty much everything that we usually put into our trail mix at Whole Foods...in their bulk bins...for WAY less than $5.99/lb.

So, we made our own.  And everything is organic, except the pre-packaged candy.  Ours has...

- Miniature Reeses cups

- Dried banana chips

- Dried cranberries

- Dried pineapple chunks

- Honey nut granola

- Butter toffee peanuts

- Roasted, salted almonds

- Roasted, salted sunflower seeds

- Roasted, salted soy buts

- Coconut flake

Here is all the stuff in the bags we brought it home from the store in...it cost us less than $35.00 and we got about 9# of stuff here (about $3.80/lb, rather than $5.99).

We took all the stuff and dumped it into a big bin (we started out in our biggest bowl, everything JUST fit in it but we couldn't mix it up, so we dumped it into the bin).

It made a LOT.  The trail mix in the bowls we had to pull aside because we accidentally filled two of the little containers without making sure they were dry first.  If we had dumped that trail mix back into the big container I think it would have been pretty much full.  The little containers are perfect for grabbing in the morning and taking to work to snack on throughout the day.  We actually made this a full week ago and the big container is still more than half full.