Wedding Weekend

This past weekend, my brother, Ben, got married to his blushing bride, Aivan, at the Portofino Hotel & Yacht Club in Redondo Beach. It was a great wedding at a wonderful locale. The only thing about it was the wind coming off of the harbor.

Friday night was the rehearsal. Because it was windy, it was a pretty quick rehearsal. We then had dinner at Sea Empress Chinese Restaurant in nearby Torrance. All the food was pretty good. We all liked it a lot and stuffed ourselves. I don't have any photos of the food because I was too busy eating, but I did manage a photo of the restaurant itself.



The food at the banquet on Saturday was decent. The cake was good though.



However, the really good food came the day after. We had brunch at the hotel's restaurant, Baleen. The decor is a little on the casual side but still had a hint of elegance. Along with the hotel, the restaurant is sandwiched between the docks and the harbor wall.



Ben & Aivan ordered the crab cakes as an appetizer. It was served with guacamole, tomato jam, and chimichurri sauce.



Kris ordered clam chowder as his starter.



I also ordered 2 dishes. The first was steak and eggs, served with home fries



And vanilla bean brioche french toast, served with spiced banana and maple syrup.



Overall a good weekend with good food. You definitely can't beat that.

BOA

For those of you who really know me, you know how much I love meat. You will probably agree with me and safely say that I am one of the biggest carnivores you've ever met. I don't think I could ever go vegan or vegetarian. I jokingly think that vegetarians have something psychiatrically wrong with them. I know they don't though. I commend people who choose not to eat meat for either religious, dietary, or personal reasons; I just don't think I could ever lead that kind of lifestyle. Would I be healthier? Probably. Would I live longer? Most likely.

Anyway, this post isn't to give you a health lesson nor a guilt trip for eating the side of a cow or slab of pig.

As a few of you may know, my brother is getting married soon. As his bachelor party, we (meaning him, I, his best man Kris, and few others) were supposed to go on an overnight fishing trip. Well, that entire weekend, we were getting reports of bad weather and that the trip could possibly be cancelled. Well, mid Friday evening was when we got official word that we wouldn't be going fishing. We were all pretty bummed.

Well, whether or not the fishing trip was to happen, we were planning on taking my brother out for a nice steak and go to the shooting range afterward. After much deliberation on a date, we ended up going for lunch on a Sunday to BOA Steakhouse in West Hollywood. I thought BOA was in Santa Monica, but turns out they have 3 locations, the other 2 being in Santa Monica and Las Vegas. I had heard a couple good things about BOA and when I heard we were going here, I got excited. We actually were supposed to go to Fogo De Chao, which is a high end Brazilian BBQ restaurant. That would've sufficed as well.

When we first got there, it was at the beginning of lunch service so we were the only ones there. Long story short, the service was good as was the food. I got the Kansas City bone-in filet mignon. Of course cooked medium rare. When I was a lot younger, I used to get my steak well done. Looking back, I have no idea what the hell I was thinking. As I got a little older, I moved up to medium. In most cases, medium was still a little overcooked. It wasn't until college did I see the light and start ordering my steaks medium rare, especially if I was at a high end quality restaurant such as BOA.

And now for the visual aid...


Served with a whole head of roasted garlic and a caberet sauvignon reduction sauce.

Been a while

It's been over 9 months since my last post and I'm in dire need of an update. I've got a few things to talk about (such as my trips to Chicago and Dallas), but right now I'm at work, so I currently do not have the freedom nor the photos to post about my culinary adventures.

But do not fear for I shall return....

Davis

UC Davis. What do you think of? I think of spread out, barren fields. A "cow-town". I mean, Davis is pretty rural, or at least I thought so. UC Davis' mascot is the Aggie, and for those of you who don't know, "aggie" is short for agriculture, so every university with Aggies as the mascot means its an agricultural school.

So this past weekend when I went up to Sacramento for Kevin's law school graduation, the plan was that we would go to a restaurant in Davis afterward for dinner, and my initial response was something along the lines of "Davis? What the heck is in Davis?". I spoke too soon... way too soon.

So we get in all the cars and make the 15 minute drive out to Davis. I didn't know Davis was so close to Sacramento. I thought it was farther. Anyway... as we pull into Davis, I get the small town kind of feeling, which well, Davis is a pretty small town. But I actually mean that in a nice way. Almost immediately, my impressions of Davis being nothing but cowfields quickly went away. And let me tell you, when we pulled up to the restaurant, I was almost blown away. It was right on the corner of the street and as I looked down to the far end, I got even more of the cute, small town feeling. The only thing that would have made it perfect was seeing Buick's and Pontiacs from the 1950s.



The restaurant we went to is called Seasons. As you can see from the photo, it is right on the corner of the street. The restaurant itself is moderne with dark wood tables and cream-clothed seats. We had arrived before the dinner crowd, so it was empty upon walking in. We were greeted by a 3 course prix fixe menu. There was a choice of 2 appetizers, 4 entrees, and 1 dessert. The appetizers were either a dungeness crab quesadilla with monterey jack, served with housemade salsa, sour cream, and guacamole. The other choice was fried calamari with an arugala and sweet pepper salad. I selected the calamari.



The calamari was a little overdone, but the arugala was a nice peppery balance to the sweetness of the calamari. I actually did decide that I should have gotten the quesadilla instead. Oh well.

The entrees were a choice between sea scallops, roasted chicken, cioppino, or a grilled ribeye with foie gras butter, potatoes au gratin, and roasted broccoli. I think you can guess what my choice was. And with any tender cut of beef, I always order it at most medium rare. I haven't been brave enough to try rare, but I don't think it's the best idea anyway.

*Sorry folks, I was so entranced by the beauty of my steak that I forgot to take a picture. It was big too, I'd say it was about 16oz. My kind of cut.

So, moving onto dessert, which was entitled "Scharffenberger Brownie" and it came out with a very simple and clean presentation. The brownie sat on the plate, swimming in a small "puddle" of chocolate sauce, and had a large scoop of caramel gelato resting on top. The plate was garnished with cocoa nibs and a light dusting of powdered sugar.



The brownie was not too sweet and a little bit more cakier than your typical fudge brownie. It had a nice texture to it. The caramel gelato was pretty light in flavor. Like, I didn't really have much of a caramel flavor. I liked it. Wasn't the best, just REALLY honest, but I would definitely order it again.

Overall, I really like the restaurant and if I ever go to Sacramento again in the near future, I would definitely want to go back to Davis and to Seasons restaurant. And actually having been to Davis really changed my stereotype of that town.

Holes in the Wall

This type of eatery can be a bit of a mystery and even a scary thought for most people. A restaurant that is considered a "hole in the wall" would actually probably be high on a germaphobe's list of places to never go to. I do agree though, the cleanliness and sanitation of these places is almost always in question. However, that does not stop me and hundreds of thousands of people from frequenting these places. Case in point, Pollo de Oro in Santa Ana. A group of people from my church this past Saturday went up to Santa Ana to tour a Children's Activity Center as well as walk around Downtown Santa Ana, ultimately having lunch there as well. Our group ultimately decided on Pollo de Oro because it seemed to be the only place large enough to seat 15 people. I think it's the fact that these places are a little less than perfectly clean and that they do a not so great job of keeping their kitchen appliances clean either makes the food taste SOOOO good. I ultimately decided on a carne de res torta and a chicken taco.





I know, I realize as a chef, what goes on in these places goes against perhaps about 90% of what I learned and know about sanitation, but ultimately, as long as I don't get sick, which I haven't yet *knock on wood*, then it's all good.