mizducky

Good morning, all! Or wait, I guess I should officially say "good afternoon" at this point. Yep, *so* not a morning person am I ... I suppose it wouldn't be a totally true-to-life blog of my existence without doing some damage to the bod at some point. I woke up and discovered that my left knee was announcing it was officially on strike for the day. Nothing out of the usual, just being all owie, probably from testing IKEA mattresses a little too vigorously yesterday. So I am definitely going to play it real low-key today and try to stay off of my feet as much as I can manage. That still does not rule out either my cooking plans, or even a shopping jaunt. I usually drag a chair into the kitchen so I can sit while doing stuff like my mise en place, stirring long-simmering items, etc. And I have pretty well memorized which grocery stores in the immediate area have electric scooters--I'm already thinking of one or two ingredients I'll need to pick up for the evening's cooking projects. Speaking of said projects: I truly hate to disappoint all of you who have submitted such lovely braised pork belly recipes, but my food-brain is still craving crispiness, so I think I'm going to go with roasting the piece o' piggy. I think I've sussed out a general method from the various recipes I've scanned on the web, and now just need to determine what flavor-direction I want to take the seasoning. (This is often how I cook, by the way--surveying a bunch of recipes and then hybridizing them. I almost never do a recipe "straight" as written, except if it's something like a yeast-raised bread, where the little yeast-beasts will get pissed off and die on ya if you don't treat them exactly right.) But I do think I'll follow helenjp's suggestion to have fun with some kind of dipping sauce: Lessee--I've got some red miso somewhere in the back of the fridge, and a variety of soy sauces. Would need to go pick up a fresh supply of sesame seeds--I'm assuming tahini won't really do here. Don't have sake or mirin on hand; I do have shaoxing wine and some inexpensive amontillado sherry. So I could either substitute like mad; pick up the recommended ingredients at the store; or perhaps keep the general idea of the dipping sauce and go some other direction with the flavoring based on what kind of flavor I rub into the meat itself. I could easily imagine a Cantonese dish that includes both sliced-up cucumbers and pork belly. It wouldn't surprise me if hzrt8w makes or at least knows of such a recipe. Of course, you could instead use those vegetables in a salad... Anyway, sleep well (which I wish I was doing at the moment...) ← Yikes, Pan, that was 4am your time when you posted this! Hope you did finally get to sleep okay. Yeah, what I'm thinking is some kind of chopped salad/pico de gallo kinda thang. Yep, you were on the other side of Kearny Mesa from where I am. There's a whole bunch of corporate campuses and office parks tucked into that area--Lightwave Ave., the street on which Spectrum Center is located, is named after some company that I think does fiber-optic telecom or some such. And the photo of the big cubic Jack in the Box sign I posted earlier was taken in front of JITB's corporate headquarters, also in that area. Totally really--it was even recommended to me with great enthusiasm by the pharmacist at my HMO, and right when I was picking up my first batch of prescribed gout medications too! I'm not sure exactly what property/constituent of cherries does the trick, but I've found that fresh cherries, dried cherries, and pure cherry juice all help stave off an acute gout attack when I start feeling that tell-tale tingle in my toes. For those of us who are dedicated carnivores, especially lovers of offal, gout is truly a royal pain (which is a bad joke at a couple of levels; gout was known in ancient times as a king's disease because in those days only royalty could afford to eat the extensively meat-and-booze-oriented diet that can precipitate gout in those genetically inclined to the disease). Here's a good in-depth overview of the disease, its causes, diagnosis, and typical modern medicine treatments. And this PDF file is one of the better and more detailed anti-gout diet recommendation sheets I've come across. Although when you read that sheet, you'll see why I don't stick very closely to its recommendations at all, unless I am in the midst of an acute episode--it basically puts a huge number of my favorite foods on the "avoid" list, and I'm sorry, that's a quality-of-life issue for me! So I work a series of compromises--I actually have a lot more meatless days in a given week than I'm showing you in my blog; the idea is that if I go meatless on some days, I can indulge with a bit more safety on other days, which seems to be working so far. Y'know, I haven't really tried Propel or any of its kin--I have a distinct preference for carbonated beverages. I do have a deep fondness for flavored seltzer waters; Canada Dry and Schweppes (sp?) make good ones, though I miss the Talking Rain brand I used to get when I lived in Seattle.

Okay, I go fall down go boom now. See you all tomorrow.

I thought it was "Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes you get rained out," but I guess not in southern California. (Except when the monsoon comes and it floods!) But there's always tomorrow! Any plans for tomorrow, or will you surprise us? ← Yeah, well, when you're as tired as I'm feeling right at this point, aphorisms tend to morph a little bit, y'know? And as for tomorrow: I think I need to take it easy a little bit, so rather than another major tour around town, I'll probably keep things pretty low-key. I'll make some final decision as to which recipe I'll be inflicting on the pork belly, possibly do a quick trip out to 99 Ranch or similar nearby shop to get any ingredients I'm currently lacking, and then I'll enact and document the pork belly project in detail for your blog-reading pleasure ... plus a couple of other little cooking projects as the spirit moves me. (Remember, I still have those tomatoes and cucumbers I picked up at the OB Farmer's Market to do something with--not the ingredients one usually thinks of as a side dish for pork belly, but hey, who sez I have to play by the rules? )

Now for some responses to various comments: Welcome to official membership in eGullet, Kouign Aman, glad to have you aboard! My current housemate and I get delivery from Sorrentinos all the time--good solid red-gravy Eye-talian comfort food. We've also gotten takeout from Panda Country a couple of times--standard Americanized Chinese cuisine, but they do it very well. Thanks, Madame Zuke. Yeah, I don't know how I managed to miss out on writing any food-themed performance pieces--definitely gotta fix that. And hey, I could use a good excuse to come back up to Vancouver, and I can think of no better excuse than a chance to be pure ham-in-a-can (so to speak) in front of a live audience. Oooh, another tempting recipe! Yeah, even if this winds up not being my choice for tomorrow, it definitely looks like a keeper for some other occasion. And finally, a general comment to you all: once again, I totally appreciate all the encouragement and positive feedback you all are giving me. Thanks again!

Let's see ... what the hell was I doing all during that time?!? Oh yeah, right--first off, I went to my new abode to take precise measurements of my bedroom, the better to figure out how I was going to fit my stuff in there. And while I was there, I snapped a few shots of my new kitchen--which was considerably more disarrayed than it was when I first came to check it, and my prospective new roommate out: Sigh. Bachelor living at its finest. But hey, all it takes is soap and water to set it aright. The important thing is that, although small, this galley kitchen looks pretty workably laid out. I especially appreciate the wall full of pantry at the far end. Oh yeah, and the dishwasher. This will do okay for me. But one of the best features of this apartment is my new roommate's cat: I am embarrassed to admit that I cannot remember kitty's name for the life of me. That's okay, he was happy to come and play for your entertainment when I presented him with my shoe. That's a Crocs clog, by the way; as I was raving in another topic earlier today, I first got turned on to Crocs from reading the Mario Batali interview here on eGullet. They are fabulously comfortable--and I am so tickled to own purple shoes! After persuading kitty to reluctantly part with my shoe, I departed with my tape measure and sheet of scribbled numbers, and hied me to IKEA, which happens to be just a short ways west on Friar's Road from my new digs: Ah, IKEA: the Disneyland of home furnishings stores. Especially when one borrows one of the little electric carts for the disabled to travel the trail through the store. I was almost expecting little Swedish animatronic elves to pop up out of the sofas and start singing "It's a Small World After All." There ensued much non-food-related inspecting of and deciding about furniture, at the end of which I realized I was hungry enough to eat one of their sofas. But I decided instead to hit Ye Olde IKEA Restaurant ... ...where I indulged in that iconic IKEA meal, the Swedish Meatball Manager's Special: Heh. Methinks the chef needs a little brush-up course on his presentation skills. Hey, it's hardly haute cuisine, but those meatballs are pretty decent, and $5.99 for the entree plus a cup of soup and a beverage is nothing to sneeze at. The soup was chicken gumbo--no doubt from a can, but there were goodly-sized hunks of chicken in it and it was piping hot and wholesome. The lingonberry drink, however, tasted like berry-flavored Koolaid. Oh well ... My cruise through the rest of the store was pretty cursory, but I did poke my head into the kitchenwares department briefly: Behold: the Great Wall of Cheapo Cookware! By now it was closing in on 5pm, and the I-8 was beginning to bog down in serious rush-hour traffic. However, since my food exploits so far this day hadn't been all that impressive, I decided to see if I could sneak through the jams and get a peek at that Vine Ripe Market kalypso recommended. With a bit of creeping and beeping, I succeeded in taking the I-8 the few exits eastward to Fletcher Parkway, made it past all the Babies 'R' Us and other suburban shopping experiences, and arrived at Vine Ripe only a little the worse for wear. I was still majorly full from my IKEA meal, and it appeared that the restaurant part of this operation was closed anyway, but I still had fun making the rounds of this joint. The emphasis here seems to be on ethnic foods from Southeastern Europe (Greece, Bulgaria, Turkey, etc.), and even though I did notice that some of the vegetables were a little dodgy, the collection of grocery and deli items definitely had me excited: Produce, mass quantities of jarred items--pickled things, saucy things, all kinds of yummy things ... The olive bar... A humongous aisleful of imported sweets ... They also had spices, cheeses, yogurts, kefirs, smoked fish, baked goods ... I contented myself with picking up a package of kashkavel sheep's cheese, just under $5 for a pound. The I-8 still looked miserable, and I had to make my way back in-town to North Park for the spoken word event, so I decided to pull out my trusty Thomas Guide and plot my way through surface streets ... heh. After getting turned around a couple times, and taking an unplanned detour through La Mesa's Village Center (incredibly cute old-timey downtown, but not exactly where I wanted to be at that moment), I straightened out and flew right, westward all the way down University Ave. back to North Park. Alas, parking seemed to be much more difficult than usual even for that area--by the time I finally found a spot, it was pretty close to showtime, and the joint where I had wanted to grab a quick bite had a line almost out the door. So I decided to just coast on the remains of my IKEA lunch, and plan to pick up some takeout on my way home after the event (which went quite well, by the way--though inwardly I was seriously beginning to lose steam...) Fast forward to 10pm, and I'm on my way home trying to figure out what's still open at this hour that might be of even slight interest to my fellow eGulleteers. I finally decide on El Cotixan, the 24-hour taqueria nearest my current home--this is the place where I got the fish taco meal that appeared as one of the teaser photos for this blog. Alas, when I arrived the joint was awash in teenagers, apparently hanging out after some high school sporting event or other. I just didn't feel like I had the energy to bluff my way into taking photos with that kind of rambunctious crowd looking over my shoulder, so sorry, no photos of El Cotixan itself tonight. But I can show you a photo of the carnitas plate I brought home from there: Alas, this meal was not quite as good as it looks--recently, El Cotixan seems to be confusing crispy carnitas with dried-out carnitas. So--all in all, a rather less than totally spectacular blogging day this time around. But at least I got some food-joy out of my visit to Vine Ripe Market. Hey, ya win some, you lose some, you call some a draw.

Greetings, all! A very exhausted duckling greets you after a good eight hours worth of wanderings here and there across the San Diego landscape. I'm going to apply myself to getting the day's photos sorted and put together in a post, and then I'll catch up on all your comments while I was out. So hang tight, I'll be back with you shortly ...

Okay, I'm off again, like a herd of turtles--see you all later (possibly way later) today ...

ooh, sounds like fun! We ate at Big Kitchen in North Park - that IS North Park, right? ← Actually, I think that would probably count as more in South Park--also a terrific neighborhood. North Park proper is in and around the intersection of University and 30th, and as the name indicates due north, by about a mile or so.

Amen, preach it sistah! I learned about Crocs from Mario's interview right here on eGullet, and have my own purple ones on my feet right this very instant. Definitely the creaky-jointed person's best friend, are these shoes--like walking around on a pair of springy sponges. And the colors you can get them in are just insane. As to weirdo ICA matchups I'd love to see: how 'bout bringing in the whole Osbournes clan? Or are they too totally last season? Or perhaps that makes them even more appropriate? (Somewhat) more seriously: despite how much I like Alton Brown in his explicator role, I'd like to see him take a turn at being the challenger. Rube Goldberg cardboard and tinfoil gizmos for days! And actually, a high probability of some proverbially good eats. He did an Iron Chef parody episode on his own show once--secret ingredient was pork belly. I thought it was hysterical. But then I'm easily amused.

Okay, here's what I'm contemplating for today's round of blog fodder: --Sometime last evening, I succeeded in hooking up with New Roommate and picking up my set of keys. His prior roommate has succeeded in vacating the premises early, so now I can measure my new room exactly without having to climb over furniture. So--I'll be going by there today, and can show you what my new kitchen looks like. --Next intended stop: IKEA, with measurements in hand, to order a new bed and workstation (my current ones are crap and not worth moving). Not sure if I'll have an IKEA meatball attack or not, but I'll at least poke my head in at the restaurant ... and I can never resist puttering about any kitchenware department, so I'll probably show you that too. --If time permits, I'm going to swing by that Vine Ripe Market kalypso mentioned. The adjoining restaurant looks yummy! If I don't eat at IKEA, I'll probably lunch here. --And this evening: I'm attending one of my favorite monthly spoken word/open mic events. Alas, the event itself isn't really on-topic for the blog, as somehow I've yet to write a food oriented spoken word piece--unlike the fabulous Zucchini Mama (girl, every time I think of that photo of you as the embodiment of Saskatechan in that grain elevator bra, I get this huge happy grin on my face!). But its location right in the heart of San Diego's North Park neighborhood puts it at ground zero for a host of cheep eatz possibilities, so my intention is to share with you where I wind up dining. Busy day! So I'll pause here to get my ducks in a row (har har) and then check in one more time before I head out.

Whoa, I crashed *hard* last night! But here I am, back again, bright-tailed and bushy-eyed ... erm, or something like that. Once again, thanks for all the love--and thanks for all the yummy pork belly suggestions! Catching up on various comments etc.: Yeah, what is up with that intersection? The first several times through, I was totally bewildered by all those silly concrete berms. Does the city really need yet another person taking a lawsuit out on them? Okay, that's as political as I'm gonna get here, respect to the eGullet groundrules and all ... Meanwhile--thanks for this latest crop of fabulous food suggestions, kalypso! That Vine Ripe Market sounds like it has my name written all over it. I'll see if I can take a swing by there sometime today, as you'll see in a post or two that I'll be in that neck of the woods again... Oooh, that looks terrific, Kirk! Would 99 Ranch or Nijiya happen to carry okara, or do I need to hunt down a more specialized store? And I'm curious what function the okara serves in the recipe--is it tenderizing or seasoning the pork? I've seen okara listed in other recipes, and it's been on my list of ingredients to investigate further, so even if I don't wind up doing this recipe for my blog, I'm sure I'll get to it eventually! And that goes for all the rest of everybody's lovely suggestions--I'm definitely storing them all up! Say, isn't Englishtown the home of a humongous flea market? I never got a chance to go, but friends who did have told me it's outrageous. And to haul this back on topic, I was given to understand there are bunches of food vendors at this flea market too. Who knows, maybe someday when I'm back in the New York Metro area visiting family I'll give you a holler. The southern half of Jersey really is a whole other trip than the part up closer to New York, innit? Yeah, the Lake Murray bit was probably what I was thinking of--just checking Google Maps now, I guess I didn't realize it was totally separate from the more mountainous rattle-snakey parts--YIKES! Fearless Housemate's band used to play the 4th of July celebrations at Lake Murray--lovely family-oriented crowd, all picnicking and barbecuing on the grounds, and booths selling burgers and kettle corn (yum!). Saving up your local food suggestions too ...

India Bistro in Ballard ← Seconded on India Bistro. Even after being away from Seattle for 3-1/2 years, I still remember that place with great fondness. The only drawback was the tiny dining room--you had to either get there right when they opened or be prepared to wait for a table. Maybe they've had a chance to expand the place since then ... even if they haven't, though, I think it's well worth the wait to get in.

Alas, I currently do not own a barbeque grill. Shocking, I know--I guess I'm not living up the the SoCal ideal here. But at least the apartment complex I'll be moving to has a community grill right in the courtyard.

Heheheh ... great minds think alike--that's actually the first recipe linked in my audience-participation announcement post, the one I actually cooked the last time and liked so well. About public domain--alas, just because something is on the web does NOT make it public domain. Public domain, regardless of whether an item appears on paper or in electronic format, generally means the author's copyright on the piece in question has officially run out on it. I dunno how long that takes for recipes, and they keep changing up the laws on full-length book works, but I think it used to be something like at least 50 to 70 years? Anyway, it's a danged loooooong time, whatever it is. The bottom line is that copyright laws are in full force for all authored works regardless of format, and unless you see a piece (recipe, text, graphics, photo, whatever) specifically labeled as public domain, the safest thing is to assume that it is not, and is not legal to reproduce unless one has received explicit and documented permission from the author to do so. In this case, since this recipe is on the BBC website and has the chef/creator's name right on it, it's pretty safe to assume that it's completely and totally copyrighted right to its very last period and pixel (and that Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall probably got financially compensated in some way by the BBC for the right to reproduce his recipe on their website). However, it's perfectly legal to link to it to our hearts' content--and that's the beauty of the Web, innit?

Oh yeah--I remember that one! I still think it looks darned delicious, not regrettable at all! Like I said, I think I'm more leaning towards a crispy treatment than a braise this time around, but I sure wouldn't mind having your recipe for future reference ... or in case I decide to change my mind and go for a braise again anyway.

That's a bummer about Englishtown--somehow, I thought it was far enough out of the Metro-New York Suburbia orbit to follow the small-town pattern rather than the suburbia pattern. And you're right--suburbia around East Coast cities can also be parking lot/strip mall purgatory, which is why I ran screaming from my childhood home in suburbia as soon as I was able to engineer my escape. As to my new neighborhood: the main drag, alas, would make a really ugly walking neighborhood. However, once you get away from that into the residential area, it really is quite charming. Plus I'm also within a few miles of another hunk of major terrific urban greenspace, Mission Trails Regional Park, where I think at least a few of the trails are flat enough that I can try working out on them. I'm hoping, as I progress in this new exercise/physical therapy thing I'm starting next week, that I can start taking advantage of that. And if all else fails, I guess I could do the mall-walker thing at the nearby humongous shopping malls (shudder!). Although I can't totally slag off the Mission Valley area shopping malls--after all, the Fashion Valley Mall is where Alton Brown has done his San Diego stops on his last couple of cooking demo/book-signing tours.

Okay--it's audience participation time! So I've got this 2.5-lb hunk of pork belly I picked up at Iowa Meat Farms this afternoon. My intention is to cook it Saturday evening (it's currently defrosting, wrapped, in the fridge, so I figure it will be ready to roll by Saturday afternoon). Now the question becomes: what exactly to make with it? The last time I cooked pork belly, I used this recipe and was well pleased with it. I could do this again--it's been several months since the last go--but why repeat myself when I could do something different? Plus I'd really like to do something that gets the skin all crispy. (Yep, the skin is still intact, I checked.) This recipe purports to produce crispy skin, but it strike me as being a bit on the fussy side, plus I don't think Fearless Housemate would be happy with confronting a nekkid hunk o' pork belly lying around on a plate in the fridge. This one certainly has simplicity to recommend it. And I imagine I could use substitute some other spicing if I so desired--not that I have anything against fennel seed. But somehow I want a happier medium between minimalism and fussing. There's a pork belly recipe halfway down on this page that looks like it's in that groove. And I like soy/five spice powder seasoning. So I might wind up doing that ... ... or I might try something suggested by one of you out there. So--any opinions? Let me know! Oh yeah--the reason why I'm looking on the web rather than in a book for this: believe it or not, I actually don't own all that many cookbooks, and those I have, lack recipes for pork belly. I've been a net-geek for literally a couple of decades, and it's really spoiled me in some ways--for reference work, it often seems so much easier to Google than to buy, shlep, and pore through books, especially since so many book indexers seem to do a slap-dash job (sez the veteran tech writer who has seen slap-dash contract indexers in action for twice the bux per hour she was getting paid ... ).

Heh. The "they paved paradise and put up a parking lot" aspect of West Coast US car culture definitely takes some getting used to--especially since I spent so many years associated with East Coast cities (New York, Boston) where you basically either walked or took mass transit everywhere. One of the biggest things I miss about Boston and Cambridge are what beautiful walking cities they were--there, a sidewalk cafe really *is* a sidewalk cafe, not a parking-lot-side cafe. Seattle at least had a whole bunch of walker-friendly neighborhoods. San Diego just has a relative few--OB is one of them, which is another reason why I like it so. Oh, it's *totally* an issue! Sometimes, especially when I'm slaving at a particularly huge deadline, I can look up and go, "waitaminnit, have I even been out of pajamas and out of the house in the past three days?" And I totally use food errands to make sure I get out of the house and face something besides a computer screen all day. It's one of many reasons why I can easily spend an hour or more dawdling my way through a supermarket--that, and, well, I just like *looking* at all the stuff and thinking of interesting things I can make with it. (I confess I'm that way in hardware stores too--it can take one of Home Depot's crowbars to get me out of the darned store--but that, to paraphrase one of my favorite TV food personalities, is a topic for another board. )

As kalypso has pointed out, the stretch of Mission Gorge Road that runs through my soon-to-be-new neighborhood is home to a bazillion fast-food emporia of various degrees of inspiration or lack thereof. I suppose this is to be expected of a city that is the corporate headquarters for this sterling enterprise: But still, as kalypso also mentioned, there are a number of real gems among the cubic zirconia, and so today's mission was to visit a few of the ones she had cited, some of which I had already researched by way of Google and such. First off: I am always interested in finding a (relatively) cheap but still good sushi joint, so I decided my first stop would be lunch at Jump Tokyo: This place is wedged into a large busy strip mall right at the head of the overly-complicated and heavily-trafficked intersection of Friar's Road and Mission Gorge Road, and it took a little skill to get into the parking lot without having my head handed to me. However, I made it inside with head still safely attached to body, to find a soothing pleasant-looking dining room: Notice all those pieces of paper taped to the walls behind the sushi bar? I don't think I recall seeing that anywhere before. Each hand-written sheet lists a roll named after somebody--like "Bob's Roll" or "Jack's Roll" or etc.--with its price. I'm guessing those are rolls created in honor of various regulars? Next time I'll be sure to actually sit at the bar and see if I can find out. This first visit, I decided to sit at a table rather than right at the sushi bar the better to get away with whipping the camera out. Still, I had a pretty good sightline to the bar to watch the sushi chef in action. He seemed a methodical yet affable sort, at a guess around age 40--that is, not a (possibly untrained) kid. (I'm really getting off on the "Harriet the Spy" aspect of this whole blog food photography thing, by the way. At one point this afternoon the whole thing started striking me as so funny that I started giggling in the car. What can I say? I'm easily amused. ). In an attempt to keep this lunch still vaguely within the realms of cheep eatz, I decide to go with one of the lunch specials--the 2nd sushi lunch plate, consisting of spicy tuna roll, five pieces of nigiri, plus a miso soup starter. The soup: Nice flavor. Only a couple of tiny tofu cubes. Some slices of scallions, and a couple of pieces of seaweed (I was guessing wakame). The lunch platter: In addition to the roll, we've got ebi (cooked shrimp), sake (salmon), ?I'm guessing tai (snapper), maguro (tuna), and unagi (eel). The nigiri was all nicely made and the fish well-flavored--the maguro was perhaps a little more heavily doused in sauce than I usually prefer. The spicy tuna roll was very good, with a light but noticeable taste of sesame oil leading, and the spiciness sneaking up on you afterward. I found myself wanting a little bit more, and decided to order a salmon skin hand roll: This was very pretty, and tasty, but not quite what I was expecting, as I could find no actual salmon *skin* in it, just bits of hot grilled (skinless) smoked salmon. And again the chef put in a little more sauce than I preferred--in fact, it started dripping out the bottom of the cone as I was chowing down on it. Maybe this is what I get for sitting at a table rather than going right up to the bar, making friends with itamae-san, and letting him get to know that this Caucasian girl isn't afraid of the stuff that often makes other Anglos go "euw." With the additional roll and my iced tea, this meal came to $18 and change--definitely higher than what is usually considered cheep eatz range--but then again, sushi is always pricey, so for a sushi meal I consider this pretty reasonable. Like I said, I do want to come back with a bigger budget and do the bar, so that I can really let the itamae do his thing. I get the vibe that it would be worth my while. There are several other food joints in this strip mall that I also need to come back for. I noticed that Troy's, the Greek place next door, had come up with an interesting way to give some personality to an outdoor dining area that sticks into the parking lot: (Monty Python voice: "Bring me a shrubbery!!!" ) Next stop on my list: that vegetable market I'd noticed on my first visit to the neighborhood, Farmer's Outlet--after a few more death-defying traffic maneuvers, I finally found the well-hidden entrance to its parking lot, and made my way to the entrance: Inside, the place was pretty big, and had a nice, though not particularly unusual, stock of produce: But what really turned me on was their non-perishable grocery items, which included a bunch of ethnic ingredients--not only Mexican, but also Middle Eastern, Indian, etc.: (I had more photos of the ethnic bounty, but alas they did not come out at all.) So--that was a nice find! And perhaps the produce will be more prolific come summer. Okay, next stop, the well-ballyhooed Iowa Meat Farms: They had this cute li'l guy welcoming you into the parking lot: And inside, a huge and impressive meat counter--this is a hair less than half of the fresh meat bounty: In addition, there are a couple of freezer chests, plus several shelving units and chill-chests of sauces, condiments, and general grocery items. They didn't have any fresh pork belly, but they did have some in one of the freezer chests, and at $2.49/lb they succeeded in underpricing 99 Ranch. Their other items are not necessarily tight-wad bargains, but to judge from the looks of the stuff, their prices are definitely in line with the quality of what you'd be getting. I think I see a splurge on a beef rib roast somewhere in my future. Okay, at this point my bod was giving out definite distress signals, plus it was past 3:30pm and I did *NOT* want to get caught up in the beginnings of rush hour, so I beat a hasty retreat back up the I-15 towards Clairemont Mesa and home. But I did pull it together to make one final stop--just for you, Ling, a patisserie! This place opened up a little over a year ago in a strip mall about a half-mile from my current abode, and I hadn't had an excuse to drop in until now--so, thanks, Ling! The whole little mall is dominated by Middle-Eastern/Persian-oriented businesses; but while the handsome young proprietor appears to be of that ethnic group, his bakery offerings have a distinctly European look to them: And here is what I got there: The cream horn is dusted with chopped pistachios; the large chocolate cake item has a cappucino flavoring; and the little cake roll, the proprietor threw in as a free sample. Erm, the cream horn and the cake roll are already gone now. Like I said, I usually don't seek pastries out without prompting, but if they're around, I have no problem eating 'em. Okay, time to contemplate a nice soak in a hot bath ... and a nice simple dinner in. This galivanting around doing the foodie-reporter thing is hard work! (But it's so much fun...)

Heh. Y'know, I've run into all kinds of people with connections to Nyack, the town we moved to when I was eight, but I think you may be the first person I've run into with any sort of connection to Blauvelt, the town I lived in before that. I dunno what Blauvelt looks like these days, but when I was a kid I remember it as sort of a "sneeze and you'll miss it" kind of place ... while Nyack seems to have gotten discovered and has taken off. Anyway--I am back from today's round of explorations, a little early because my bod started giving off creaky-joint distress signals. But I got some more fun photos ... back in a bit when I've whipped my report into shape.

Have I said recently how much I love this thread? I'm between PMS blasts at the moment, but it's only a matter of days before the munchie madness descends again...

Good morning, all! I'm up bright and early (for me, at least), and nursing a bit of an achy-breaky bod after hiking around the OB farmer's market yesterday, but still am planning to do some more local food travelogue for y'all today. There is one advantage to SoCal car culture, I will admit--for those of us a bit on the disabled side, we can at least count on being able to drive right up to, and (usually) find a disabled parking spot right next to, almost anywhere we need to go. (And because I work at home and thus don't car-commute as Sandy pointed out, I feel a little less guilty burning a few extra dinosaurs to get around and about.) Once again, many thanks for your positive feedback. As I joked to Fearless Housemate last night, I'm feeling a Sally Fields moment coming on: "You like me! You really like me!" Catching up on a few comments and questions: Will do. As a matter of fact, I've got a couple of markets in mind for today... Y'know, there really isn't a whole lot more to tell. I've just been totally in love with Asian food for as long as I can remember--literally so: one of my very earliest childhood memories, verified as going back to before I was 2 years old, is of my parents taking me to a Chinese restaurant for the very first time (it was called China Pearl, in Pearl River NY, just a handful of miles from my home at the time in Blauvelt--even the lighting in that place is engraved on my memory). And that was the first of innumerable family Chinese restaurant feeds throughout my youth--my family was definitely part of that trend, famed in song and comedy routine, of Jewish-American fondness for Chinese food. (In fact, I think the last time this came up I posted a link to this most excellent article on that trend; while I don't agree with every single point made in that article, I still think it's one of the most thoughtful discussions of the trend I've yet seen.) Anyway, after many restaurant outings, and many explorations of New York City's Chinatown (another fond memory: of my dad and I having lunch in the venerable Wo Hop basement noodle house--say what you will, folks, I still cherish that ol' greasy spoon!), I continued and expanded my explorations into various Asian cuisines when I moved to the Boston area, where my repertoire expanded to include Vietnamese, Indian, Korean, and Japanese (yep, I was eating sushi back in the 1970s before it became "fashionable" ). Another formative experience: living in an international women's grad student dorm, and watching and learning from the Chinese and Korean students as we cooked our meals in the big shared kitchen (and they watched and learned from me, too: I recall having a rapt audience as I demonstrated how to make pan gravy). Then when I moved to Seattle I got exposed to Thai food (favorite Thai restaurant in the Seattle area: Bai Tong, right outside SeaTac Airport), had my first exposure to Filipino food, spent large hunks of time in Seattle's International District--especially the huge Uwajimaya market--and just generally soaked up the growing Pacific Rim food sensibility happening up there. And now I'm just continuing my learnings down here. And those learnings most definitely include eGullet--my knowledge has grown exponentially thanks to the many eGulleteers living in and/or hailing from Asian cultures who have so generously shared their recipes and cultural lore. So--many thanks and deep respect to all who have given of those lessons so freely, it really means a whole lot to me! Anyway, from the very first, even with the heavily Americanized food that was my first experience, there has been something about Asian cuisines that has deeply resonated with me. I do love all kinds of food, but I could happily confine myself to the (admittedly huge!) world of Asian cuisines for the rest of my life and never feel deprived. I dunno, sometimes the peanut butter just winds up in there because it's convenient. Or something. And thanks for the validation of my ethnic funkitude, man ... at this point in my life, I consider it my mission to make every day just a little more funkadelic. No sweat equity at this one--they maintain a paid staff to do the daily work of the store; all the board and committee and event tasks, however, remain volunteer. I pay $15 in dues annually, which entitles me to avoid the non-member 10% mark-up (yes, the co-op is open to the public). This seems to be the pattern with a number of food co-ops that I have known over the years, to have started out as a wild-and-woolly all-volunteer operation back in the late 60s/early 70s, only to move to this more consumerist model partly as a response to member/owners' busier lives, and partly to compete successfully against privately-owned natural foods chains such as Whole Paycheck, erm Foods. You can read more about the OB co-op, and their beautiful environmentally-sensitive building, right here.

Alas, I wish they did--I think they should contract me to do their PR! Many thanks! I'm still getting used to the new camera--I think the reason why a few shots are blurry is that it's a tiny thing, and I'm still trying to figure out how best to hold it so that it stays motionless when I hit the shutter, without getting a finger in front of the lens or some damn thing. As to the Coronado farmer's market, alas no, haven't been to that one yet either. I adore farmer's markets, flea markets, all those sorts of things, but in recent years with the arthritis and all, anything that involves walking more than a block or two has become a bit of a challenge. I've been arguing with myself for some time now about getting one of those little electric scooters--they're a bit pricey and a bit of a bother to shlep, plus I've seen how screwed up from heavy use the ones in stores can get, so I've been loathe to invest in one. Next week, right after this blog ends, I'm supposed to start a brand new exercise/physical therapy program through my HMO, so maybe that'll help with the mobility issues--and then, no farmer's market will be safe from me! BWA-Hahahahah!!!

Oh, by the way: Frank Zappa is actually sorta-kinda-semi-on-topic for this blog, because while he was born in Baltimore, he grew up in, spent the rest of his life (aside from touring) in, and, despite his best efforts, was indelibly shaped by Southern California. He even lived in San Diego for awhile as a kid. I've met people here in San Diego who knew him way back in the day--one who had his dad as a substitute teacher, another who actually had the young Frank himself as a babysitter. (How's that for an interesting thought?) Southern California references as well as food references are rife throughout his music, from celebrating the turkey farmers who used to populate Sun Village (just outside Palmdale) to dissing the speed freaks who hung out at the local Winchell's Donuts at 3am. Anyway, thought I'd throw that in. Carry on, folks!

Giada and Rachel, eh? Somewhere there's an editor at FHM nursing a broken phone-dialing finger, caused by his haste in calling up his best photographer to do a tie-in photo spread.