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http://www.lacocinasf.org/

Sadly, Turmerik in Sunnyvale has been closed for a while now. (they were good, but I don't think they were worth-driving-from-southern-ca good. For that matter, none of the indian places in this area are that good, IMO).Indian: - Dasaprakash in Santa clara, one of the best (but under-appreciated) South Indian restaurants. I believe they used to exist in the LA area, so you may already be familiar with them. - There is also this brand new south indian place in San Francisco -- Dosa -- but I havent been to this one yet. Apparently, they have "non-vegetarian" dosas. - Shalimar in San Francisco. Probably the best Tandoori chicken in the bay area. No ambience whatsoever. They also have a branch in Fremont, but skip that one. - Empress of India in Santa Clara. This is a one-woman tiny shop. Closest, IMO to "home-style" indian cooking. But please call before you go as they are closed a lot. - For chaat, I would skip Chaat Cafe. Either try Viks Chaat in Berkeley or Chaat Paradise in Mountain View (the latter is very close to Santa Clara). Dana Bazar in Fremont is also good. Others: - Rose Market in Mountain View. Iranian Grocery store -- sells kebabs (chicken/lamb/beef/veggie) in the evenings. I like the juicy chicken kebabs. - So many of these great little hole-in-the-wall Vietnamese restaurants, too many to mention. There are these great Banh-Mi places as well. Lees Sandwiches in Sunnyvale used to be good, but they have gone downhill. There branch in San Jose may still be good... - Kabul in Sunnyvale isnt bad. - No good Italian places around Santa Clara that I know of, Sad. - Chez Sovan (Campbell and San Jose) used to have good cheap cambodian food, havent been there recently - DishDash in Sunnyvale is not bad. Middle Eastern I did not mention the expensive places as there seems to be more than enough discussion here about them.

Episode 1, #103 (Old Krakow/Incanto/Hard Knox Cafe): Video , and Photo Gallery

Thanks for the reply. Yes, I have checked out the Alemany Farmers' Market. Its pretty good, one complaint I have is there are very very few organic produce stalls here (yes, I am spoiled). Havent checked out Good Life yet, was planning to. Thanks for the reminder. Thanks also for the info on Drewes, thats new to me. Thanks for all of this info... Do you know of any Butchers on Mission who have good quality goat meat ("chivo")? Thanks

Have recently moved to this area. Looking for advice on good quality asian grocery stores. Along Mission st, from about 30th to about 21st st would be good. I am looking for sources of good quality "ethnic" produce and fresh seafood. There are plenty of small groceries around here (mostly latino), but which are the really good ones?

When Banana Leaf opened (perhaps about 6-7 years ago?), it used to be very good and we used to go there fairly often. Unfortunately, when I visited them about 2 years back, the food had gone significantly downhill. Maybe its time to give them a visit again...

We again went to Manresa a few days back (This is our 3rd visit; prior two visits were an year back). We went on a Wednesday evening, and had the chef's tasting menu. Sadly, this time around, the food was merely good, not great. Many of the courses were overly salty, including the flan dessert!. Which was not even good. There was a dish served with bluefin tuna which I remember being very good, but all the other dishes were not worth remembering. I wonder if the restaurant has already started its downhill slide or if it was simply a bad night.

Hmm.. I am no falooda expert, but I have used rice noodles as a pretty good substitute. ... ← Sorry, I don't know what I was thinking when I wrote that . I have never used rice noodles. I usually always use Corn Starch Noodles (which I boil for 30 minutes and then cool down) that I get from my local vietnamese grocery. These little packages of corn starch noodles work pretty well as a falooda substitute in my opinion. (Isn't real falooda also made from corn starch?). The part about the frozen falooda from Iranian store being expensive still stands though.

Hmm.. I am no falooda expert, but I have used rice noodles as a pretty good substitute. I buy the "thick" noodles (I forget the brand name). I then boil them in water for close to 30 minutes. Once they are soft, they are then dumped in cold water to cool them, and then drained. I have also tried the falooda from my local Iranian grocery store (they come in little cups, frozen along with a syrup) -- they are good, but boy they are expensive. I can't afford to use them on a regular basis.

ravum, for the uninitiated, please explain what is the ratio of dal to water. Even an approximate ratio will do, as right now I dont have any idea. I dont even know what an idli batter should look like. Thanks

it's seasonally available in indian grocery stores:call and ask around. ← Also available in Chinese/"Asian" grocery stores when in season. Green jackfruit is a standard ingredient in many of the vegetarian dishes available at That restaurants around here (northern California)

I reckon they're not as "heavy" tasting since there's a bit of lemon taste to them. I found them again today. They were in with the Indian foods at the supermarket. Does anyone know if they're called something other than "finger bananas"? ← Looks like what we Bengalis call "Singapuri Kola" (literally, "Bananas from Singapore"). Unlike in the USA, you get many different varieties of Bananas in India, and this is one of them,.. The thing you call banana "sticks" is what we call "Thor" in Bengali. Its actually the pith or the stem of the Banana plant.The purple looking things are banana blossoms, called "Mocha" in bengali. If you peel of all the layers of petals , you will eventually get to the edible part. I believe the use of both these things is quite common in South East Asian cuisines. We bengalis have a tradititional preparation with "Thor" and mustard paste, which is an absolute favorite of mine. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to cook it. Here are some threads from the India forum on "Thor" and "Mocha": http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=55084 http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=50510

From http://www.leesandwiches.com/corporateinfo/timeline.cfm : And from http://www.leesandwiches.com/corporateinfo/profile.cfm : So there.

I had somehow missed this topic earlier. We go to the Sunnyvale Farmer's Market regularly, every Saturday. And some of my favorite vendor's are: * ACME Bakery. We also have Le Boulanger, but I like ACME better. Their Batards are my favorite and also there Olive Bread. * Preverdelli Farms. I never used to like eating apples. That was before I tried apples from these guys. Right now, the Fuji and the Gala are in the prime. * The Fish Guy, (sorry, I forgot the name again) . He sells wild king salmon, among other things. Salmon is usually what we buy. Hands down his salmon is the best salmon I have ever tasted. His salmon is supposed to be sushi grade, too. * Hamlow Ranches -- these are the folks selling the best peaches and nectarines here. This last season, the peaches were not that great, but the nectarines made up for it.

I have eaten there a few times, always for lunch and have always found it very good. Our last meal there however was 2 years back, however. But I would definitely like to return.

I am no Shawerma expert, but Mediterranean Wraps in Palo Alto has stuff that tastes good.

There's a newly opened (a few months old I think) one in Sunnyvale. We've tried it a few times, its pretty good. Before this, we had to drive down to San Jose (near Tully Rd) for the nearest Lee's Sandwich. Looks like they are on an expansion spree. I wonder if they will be able to keep their quality good and prices low. EDIT: darned typos.

Three Seasons and Tamarine, both in Palo Alto, come to mind. I have eaten at both the places, a couple of times each. I thought they had above-average food, but nothing really stood out.

Only 3 minutes less? Were the quarry tiles you were using fairly thick? Gas or electric oven? How long of a preheat? ← Yes, I was also surprised about the "only 3 minutes less", I was expecting a bit more. The quarry tiles I was using before are the plain vanilla pretty thin variety.I usually set my electric oven to its highest setting (550 degree fahrenheit) and preheat for at least an hour. The stone/tiles is placed on the lowest rack, which is about 2 inches away from the heating element.

I used to use unglazed quarry tiles (from Home depot -- I bought 4 six-inch tiles, cost around $3-$4 I think) for a long time, they worked great for my thin crust pizzas. I then purchased the Fibrament D-stones that trillium recommends. This one was around $40 I think. With unglazed quarry stones, My (12-inch) thin crust pizzas used to take about 12-14 minutes in my oven. With the Fibrament stones, it shaved off about 3 minutes. These few minutes are important to me, especially if I am making multiple pizzas and I have to do them serially. If you are starting out, I would recommend you purchase the cheap unglazed quarry tiles, they are much cheaper, and really would give you decent results for the price. Once you are ready to step up, you can spend your money on more expensive stones. And, like scott123 sez, nature of pizza stone is more important only if you are making thin crust pizzas.

Antica Trattoria?

Yes, we have been to Maya. But our last visit was over 2 years back... coincidentally, it was during that year's Dine About Town promotion.I don't remember much about the meal, except their mole sauce in one of the dishes was very good. Sorry, couldnt be of more help...

Not sure if the original poster meant cutlery as in things you eat with or cookware as in things you cook/prepare food with. As for the latter, the "bonti", as others have mentioned is quite ubiquituous. In our Bengali household in Kolkata, there was one bonti for cutting vegetables, one bonti (a bigger one) for cutting fish and meat, and there was another one -- this one had the coconut grater attachment -- this one was used to grate coconuts. Then there is a "katari", it is a heavy-duty knife, used for various things, e.g. chopping a green coconut. Here are some other cookware/cutlery I can quickly think of, worth mentioning: Then there is the "Shil nora" -- this is the Bengali equivalent of a mortar & pestle. The "Shil" is a flat, rectangular stone, and the nora is a cylindrical piece of stone. Both have notches made into them. These are used to wet-grind spices. Not sure if this is used in other parts of India. Then there is also a "shanrashi" -- this is like a pair of pliers -- it's used to grab hot utensils. You use a "Kunro" (made of clay) or "kolshi" (made of metal) to store water. The clay one is useful as is made of unglazed clay and hence slowly evaporates water, which in turn helps keep the water cool. As for "eating-ware", there are plates, called "thala" in Bengali, and bowls, called "bati" and tumblers, called "gelash" (from english "glass" I think). We used to have stainless steel "thala"/"bati"/"gelash" for day-to-day use. Utensils made of "kansha" (a type of bronze) are more traditional, and in our household they were reserved for special occasions. We also had these "enamelled" utensils, but we rarely used the.

It might help if you could mention where in India they are going.

Is this the Grasshopper in on Telegraph Ave in Berkeley/Oakland border?They used to serve an awesome calamari dish. Sadly, I havent been to the place in the last 2 years or so, not sure how they are doing these days...