tastebuds & earbuds

A few tasty items from last weekend.

1. Cupcake top sandwiches from Frosted. DELISH. Especially the salted caramel ones.

2. Charcuterie at Mediterraneo…7 assorted meats and 7 assorted cheeses. Was quite a nice selection.

3. A proper Moscow Mule in a lovely copper mug…with candied ginger. Well done Med.

Recent snapshots from my life…whisky on the rock…two new Maggie awards…a couple of really cute puppies…pork rillettes at Minh’s…the White Buffalo at Saint Rocke. 

A few pictures from Fishbar a few weeks ago…I’m such a lame blogger…but better late than never. It was my first time to visit the former Sharkeez MB location that everyone has been raving about. Nice to have a fun, casual seafood place in town with good decor and atmosphere. Of course I ordered oysters and mussels and was not disappointed. But the highlight: the bloody mary with bacon and a shrimp. Delicious.

Sometimes the best Saturday nights are spent at home reading, eating something tasty, playing iPhone games with friends and drinking wine…

I love the umami flavor of maitake (hen of the woods) mushrooms and I was so excited to get this awesome bunch in my farm box this week. I saw a YouTube video of this woman who just pan fried the mushrooms and then scrambled eggs into them…add a little salt…so earthy and good. I also made some asparagus with garlic, lemon and olive oil. Paired it all with an awesome 2007 Estate wine from Star Lane, a fast-moving memoir about British chef Marco Pierre White…and then some strawberries marinated in balsamic, sugar and pepper. Delicious. And easy. And relaxing.

RECIPE: Quick and Easy Roasted Root Veggies

I totally forgot to post this easy recipe from about a month ago. You can use any root veggies you love or happen to have on hand. I had butternut squash and beets from my Farm Fresh to You box. There were also leeks in the box, so I used them as well.

• Chop root veggies into cubes of a uniform size.
• Slice white and light green part of leeks into rounds (rinse well because they tend to trap sand).
• Put all three ingredients together in a large mixing bowl and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper. I also use these super awesome “cheats” from Gourmet Garden to add a little more flavor. I happened to have Lemon Grass and Garlic pastes on hand. Mix well.
• Spread out in a casserole dish (or baking sheet) and cook for about 45 minutes at 400-degrees. I stirred/flipped them twice during that time.

Easy…and delicious. And you can really make this with whatever you have on hand…potatoes and sweet potatoes with garlic…parsnips and carrots with ginger and nutmeg. Enjoy!

Here’s a video of our dessert being painted on the table at Alinea. You can see the captain scramble to get the missing spoons on the table once the chef gave him a cold stare.

Alinea: Part 2 (the Savories)

On with more food:

9. Maitake (pumpernickel, black garlic, blis elixer)…this was hands down my favorite thing all night. No joke, the umami goodness of this mushroom dish was unbelievable and I wanted to lick my plate. (I didn’t…but I saw an older gentleman do just that when he was served this same dish later in the evening.) First they brought out the bowl of hot lava rocks and a tea kettle with liquid and a bouquet of caramelized root veggies and herbs. Next they asked us if we wanted it classic or gangster style…come on, of course gangster…and they lit it with a lighter shaped like a mini machine gun. (Nobody in the room asked for classic…so I can’t tell you what they would have used to light it the other way.) After the tea kettle came to a boil, they brought out the plate with maitake mushrooms, puffed rice, black garlic and other goodness and poured the broth over it, instructing us to mix it around before we ate it. The portion size was a nice. I love mushrooms. I love that umami flavor profile. This was simply heaven. I wish there was a way for me to recreate this dish for every single person I know.

The mushroom dish was served with what would turn out to be both my and Michelle’s favorite wine pairing…Rioja Alta “Vina Ardanza - Reserva Especial” 2004. Must find in store. And we proceeded to ask for not one, but two more pours of this one later in the evening. Of course we did.

Simply put, the ninth tasting with its wine pairing killed it. Awesome, in the literal sense of the word.

10. Hot Potato (cold potato, black truffle, butter)…this item basically stays on the menu at all times. My picture doesn’t do it justice, but our server told us it was time sensitive and I wanted to taste it in all its glory. This is one of those unique serving vessels that was made specifically for this dish. The pin is holding a hot round potato with a generous slice of truffle over top. Then there are cubes of butter. You slide the pin out and they mix with the cold potato soup in the dish and you shoot it back in one swallow. It was amazing….more umami flavor with the truffle and butter. I could have used a second shot of this.

11. Duck (……..?????…….!!!!!!!!!!!!)….seriously. This is how it was listed on the menu. Kind of like Duck WTF this is so crazy. Ha. It was duck five ways…fois gras, mousse, duck breast, duck neck rillettes, and duck leg with crispy skin. This was all paired with the remarkable tray with 60 different condiments to pair with your duck. The key part…they don’t tell you what anything is…so it’s all blind tasting and super fun! Some things were obvious from sight…a candied walnut, an egg yolk, a fried onion, blueberries, pink salt, apricot, etc. Some were recognizable once you tasted them…apples, hearts of palm, caviar, tequila gelee, whiskey gelee, garlic. Others were just interesting and I had no idea what I was eating. They say to try about 3 condiments with each serving of duck…and after the duck was gone, I kept tasting the condiments. It really was like Willy Wonka for adult foodies. My favorite? Who knows…they were all interesting. Now here’s the thing…as my brother will happily tell you, I do not eat duck. But I told myself I was eating everything that was put in front of me and I can now happily say that I like duck. (At least as imagined by Chef Achatz and his kitchen.) Second favorite course of the night. And let me tell you, we were beginning to get stuffed at this point. The duck was paired with Chateau Msar, Bekaa Valley 2004.

12. Black Truffle (explosion, romaine, parmesan)…a single raviolo arrived on a spoon with a small piece of romaine lettuce and a sliver of parmesan cheese. The instructions for this one were very particular. Put the entire raviolo into your mouth, close your lips (and make sure they are tightly sealed) before you bite down. Michelle was nervous on this one because she had no idea what to expect. The word explosion had her thinking it was going to be a pop rocks type of sensation. Instead it was a mouthful of warm, liquid umami flavor of truffles. Wow. This was spectacular. And I think it might have been Michelle’s favorite.

13. Pork (pain d’epices, turnip, orange)…this suckling pig with turnip puree and crispy fried kale tasted like every Thanksgiving/Christmas flavor wrapped into one. It was homey and comforting. The cloves and other spices with the orange reminded me of our cranberry sauce. This was our final savory dish and it didn’t disappoint. It was paired with a Tommaso Bussola “TB” Valpolicella Classico Superiore 2007.

A quick note about the service. Even though I felt our team was a little on the less experienced side, they were super. Every glass was taken away on a silver platter, they set Michelle’s utensils on her left once they realized she was left-handed. They were spot-on with their descriptions and we had a great time joking around with them and the table next to us. (A couple there celebrating the wife’s birthday who had dined there several times before and they said this was their favorite service experience because it was so fun.) When you got up to go to the bathroom, they escorted you there and had a fresh napkin for you upon your return. Every person we came in contact with was super professional and really made the dinner better.

Next up: Alinea: Part 3 (the Desserts)

You can read Alinea: Part 1 (the starters) here.

Alinea: Part One (the starters)

Expect several posts about dinner at Alinea last weekend. I need to get all the pictures up and I’ve got to figure out how exactly to describe such a unique dining experience. (Due to limitations on Tumblr, I can only post 10 pics at a time…so we’ll start here.)

The word alinea refers to the copy editor’s symbol for a new paragraph or new train of thought.

Our reservations were for 6 pm on Friday evening. I came prepared with both my iPhone (with Hipstamatic Foodie pak) and my work DSLR (with low light settings). Dork much? Yes, but I don’t care. I knew I’d want to share photos of the food with everyone, but mostly I knew I’d want to be able to look back and remember the evening. The pictures turned out OK, not great. I was trying to snap a quick pic and then enjoy each moment. (I also brought Chef Grant Achatz’s book “Life on the Line” in the hopes that he’d sign it for me. Sadly…and this is the only disappointment of the evening…he wasn’t in the kitchen that night. I guess that means I’ll have to go back.)

A little history first…I read Chef Achatz’s memoir a few years back and was fascinated with his story of becoming a chef and battling mouth cancer at the pinnacle of his career. His love of food and invention was apparent from reading his book. Three Michelin stars, multiple James Beard awards, and seven years running on the S. Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurants (currently at number 7). He’s interested in creating and invoking memories with food. And many of the serving vessels were created to his specifications to elevate the diner’s experience.

Back to the evening. Michelle and I arrived at a nondescript building in Lincoln Park and upon entering walked down a narrow, blue-lit hallway. About halfway down a sliding door opened and we were greeted my multiple servers. They took our coats, led us to a glass wall where we could watch the kitchen staff at work, and handed us an interesting hot chocolate with marshmallows that had a smokey spruce/pine flavor. A great start to a cold Chicago evening.

The kitchen was spotless and practically silent. It was like watching a well-rehearsed ballet. Every member of the kitchen staff had his or her own job, knew his place and performed wordlessly — except when they chanted out numbers in unison in response to the expeditor.

We were seated in the downstairs dining room that has five tables. There are several more dining rooms upstairs and we never went to peek up there to see what they looked like. All very similar I assume. Each dining room has a team: a captain, a head waiter, a sommelier, and numerous other wait staff. Our team were all adorable, if not a little nervous (we later found out our captain had only be in that role for a short time).

We prepaid for our “tickets” when we made the reservations. But upon arrival the captain went over our wine options. Michelle and I both opted for the standard pairing of 9 pours (they told us it would equal a little over 3 1/2 glasses of wine) to accompany the 17-course tasting menu. The sommelier (cute, young, mumbly, but really knew his wines) would bring our tasting out and explain the wine, where it was from, how it was made, and what the significance was. It was interesting, but I have to admit, I paid less attention to the hows and whys and more attention to the taste.

The head waiter (darling, very shaky hands, but very friendly and fun), the captain, or one of the other servers were always on hand to bring out our food with great explanations on how to eat it to best enjoy it. Our glasses were cleared on silver platters. We were never waiting long for anything. It was all timed down to the littlest detail.

OK…so let’s get down to the food:

1. Hot chocoate (abinao, smoke, spruce)…warm and delicious and tasted like pine trees. (Sorry no picture. I was too excited to pull my camera out in the hallway.)

2. Butternut (muscovado, finger lime, West Indies)…these two ice sculptures were set on our table when we arrived and we were told more would come later…then they brought out two glass straws filled with the butternut puree and the other ingredients (can’t remember what they all were) and we were told to set it inside the liquid in the ice sculpture and suck it all down in one sip. It was slightly sweet and a very cool presentation. The wine pairing with this was a cocktail of L. Aubry Brut with dry vermouth, vin santo, and amaro.

The next five courses were all brought out together and paired with a cold sake called Ginga Shizuku “Divine Droplets” Junmai Daiginjo-shu, Hokkaido-ken. Yeah, I don’t know, but it tasted great and went well with the seafood.

3. Scallop (mirin, bonito)…raw sliced scallops were brought out marinating and we were instructed to cook them for 10 seconds on one side on the hot lava rock (there were lots of rocks used for heating/cooking throughout the course of the evening). So good! Although I kind of dropped one of my slices in the sand under the hot rock so I had a little sand in my mouth. Ha.) This was my favorite of the seafood courses.

4. Shrimp Head (togarashi, pincage)…basically a deep fried shrimp head served with a sauce made out of the innards of the shrimp head and tomato. Michelle was skeptical on this one….but it was great. Crispy, not overly fishy, and just plain cool.

5. Ehu (white soy, ginger)…basically a Hawaiian short-tailed red snapper tartare. The small round vessel was placed in our icy orchid centerpiece to chill while we were enjoying the other parts of this course. It tasted good. But wasn’t the star of this round.

6. Onaga (lemongrass, star anise)…another Hawaiian red snapper, this time long-tailed…it was brought to the table raw on a lemongrass skewer and we were instructed to drop it into a broth of lemongrass and herbs and let it poach in there while we ate the other courses. It was light and delicate in flavor. I love lemongrass, so this was very tasty.

7. Pineapple (slush, shot)…this was basically a palette cleanser and I didn’t really understand it. I think maybe it sat on the table too long. It had some sort of frozen powdered component with pineapple chunks that melted together. (No picture.)

8. Halibut (mole, avocado, escabeche)…beautiful and DELICIOUS. It tasted like Mexico…like a really, really, really amazing fish taco. And it was a nice three-bite size (the portions were great). The fish was perfectly cooked, the micro cilantro and radishes on top with so cute, and I especially appreciated the cubes of mezcal gelee on the side. Yum.

The halibut was served with FX Pichler “Urgestein Terrassen” Gruner Veltliner Smaragd, Wachau 2011. Basically, it was a white. Haaaa.

Next up: Alinea: Part 2 (the savories) and Alinea: Part 3 (the desserts)

Went up to Hollywood on Friday night to see The White Buffalo at the Troubadour and we decided to try out Jon Shook and Vinny Dotolo’s Son of a Gun. Their other restaurant, Animal, is all about meat. But Son of a Gun has a seafood flair, harkening back to their Florida roots.

The decor was a crazy eclectic mix of maritime and other salvaged goods. Pictures in the bathrooms are actually of their ancestors out fishing. It’s small (I think it seats 55 people) and we didn’t get reservations, but we got there early enough that we didn’t have to wait for a seat at the communal table. (It was very close quarters with our neighbors.)

The food was delicious. And as far as small plates go, it was actually decent sized portions. We ended up giving our table-mates some of the food that we couldn’t finish. Ha. (Hush puppies anyone…I mean come on…who needs 8 hush puppies?)

The lobster roll on a buttery croissant-like roll was AMAZING. So good. The peel and eat shrimp were HUGE and delicious. The beet and baby lettuce salad was fresh and TASTY. The only thing that was a miss was the country ham and hush puppies. The honey butter on the hush puppies was great. But it wasn’t country ham, it was prosciutto, and I really only needed one or two of those fried balls. We also ordered fries…forgot to snap a pic. They were fine, nothing amazing, and we were really too full to even eat that many.

They also had a great bar menu. We started off with a delicious mezcal cocktail, followed up by our recent favorite Moscow Mule.

Awesome dinner. Awesome place. Cool little touches. I will go back. And I’ll definitely be trying Animal too. 

I discovered a few new wineries in Santa Ynez last month. In addition to our usual favorites like Dierberg/Star Lane, Daniel Gehrs, and Blair Fox (I can’t believe I didn’t make it there even though I’m a club member), we had tastings at Sunstone, Saarloos and Sons, and Carhartt. Loved all three. Came home with some great new wines, and even joined Carhartt as a club member. Any and all of these are worth checking out. 

Dierberg has an awesome private tasting area in the barn and a great old pickup truck that is perfect for team photos. And both Dierberg and Star Lane wines are delicious.

Sunstone was lovely and had some great organic wines.

Daniel Gehrs is quaint and has a great back patio…love their smoky reds (and their kitty cats).

Blair Fox is cute and tiny with amazing Syrah’s and it’s a small family-run operation. 

Carhartt reminded me a lot of Blair Fox…small, family-run, good wine. I decided to try out the membership because I loved the red blends and the logo/labels (I care about those things). 

Saarloos and Sons was my favorite. It’s in a little house, it’s family-run and it has some edge. Great wines, super small runs, only available there. It’s worth the visit…and they have an awesome photo booth in the front and really cool retail items as well. 

I heart wine.

I realize I didn’t blog about my 40th birthday weekend in Santa Ynez…but I posted so many photos on Facebook that I kind of felt like it was redundant.

Anyway…a word about turning 40. It wasn’t so bad. I think maybe 38 and 39 were harder to swallow. But 40 feels like a new decade, a fresh beginning. And let’s be real…I don’t FEEL 40. 

And I’ve decided that I’m celebrating turning 40 all year. Starting it off back in January with a weekend of wine tasting with a great group of friends, now I’ve got some pretty awesome plans for the remainder of the year (and apparently I’m just going to keep adding to this list because I’m a little impulsive. So here’s how I’m celebrating:

1. Trip to Kiawah this week to see my aunt and cousins…it’s been a year and half since I’ve seen them and it’s a much-needed family visit, especially this time of year with how much I’m missing my mom.

2. Headed to Chicago for work in March and Michelle and I bought tickets for dinner at Alinea. It’s James Beard award-winner Grant Achatz’s place that is a once-in-a-lifetime culinary experience. I’m so excited about this, I can hardly stand it. Read Achatz’s memoir “Life on the Line”…it’s really great.

3. The Lehigh girls and I all just turned 40 right around the same time and we’re getting together in May in Sea Island, Ga., to celebrate and spend a fun weekend catching up. It took us forever to figure out where and when, but we finally pinned it down and it’s going to be so good to see everyone. 

4. On my way to another work event in Florida, I’m stopping off in Austin to see Zeke and go see the Avett Brothers. They haven’t announced if they’re playing in LA yet, so I didn’t want to chance it. Besides, it gives me a few nights to hang with the brother.

5. The big trip…Nicole and I are headed to Tulum for 5 weeks this summer. We booked our tickets, put a deposit down on an awesome condo and we’re making plans now. I’ll be working part-time, but it’s the perfect situation because I get up so early…I’ll be able to get a lot done in the mornings. 

As you can see from the last post, I’ve been kind of gluttonous lately. And not just recently…but for about the last two months…Thanksgiving vacation in Tulum rolled into the holidays with the wine and cheese and plenty more parties and celebrations. Christmas in Austin was one of the biggest fattening food fests I’ve enjoyed in a long time…chicken fried steak ON A DOUGHNUT, the world-famous Franklin BBQ, and of course, my self-famous thanksgiving-supper for Christmas eve. Then it was my birthday…so why start being healthy before that? It was all so good…but whoa.

Yesterday my NutriBullet arrived in the mail…and I am stoked to get on a healthy/juice plan. This morning I made my first concoction. It was awesome. Really tasty. And this NutriBullet works like a charm (and it’s so easy to clean up!). The claim is that it’s better than a blender because it pulverizes everything (even flax seeds and nuts) and it’s better than a juicer because it keeps all the nutrients since you aren’t discarding the pulp. It really worked well to break everything down into a juice.

Here’s what went into mine:

• Two handfuls of spinach
• One handful of pineapple, blueberries, raspberries
• 12 raw almonds
• 1 tsp of flax seeds
• 1 tsp of fresh ginger
• spring water to the fill line

Then all you do is screw on the blade/lid and blend it together. Easy and great-tasting. I think I’ll try to do at least one in the morning…maybe I’ll take one for lunch too. I can’t wait to try more varieties of drinks. 

The last two Sundays, I went to MB Post for brunch. On Jan. 6 (my birthday), Zeke, Alison and I got there about 5 minutes too late for brunch, so we ordered from their Afternooner Delight menu. It was tasty and at least we still got the bacon cheddar biscuits. Zeke wasn’t too happy with his bloody mary…too much horseradish. But if you like horseradish, it’s a damn good sunday morning drink.

This past Sunday, Rowe, Mel and I went early and got to order breakfast. I had the corned beef cheeks hash with a fried egg and gremolata. It was delicious. Rowe’s poached egg with creamy polenta and asparagus was also quite tasty.

The cocktails are always amazing there. This one is basically a salty dog with raspberry and pink peppercorn jam on top. Yum. 

In any case…it’s been lovely (but COLD…in the 40s…brrr) here in California. And at least I got a few fresh air walks in to battle all that bacon at MB Post.