Date night

You go on dates to get to know someone in a personal level. You find our the things you have in common and the things you don't. Best case scenario you make a good friend (actually you find the ONE). Worst case scenario you find a person that you find annoying who you'll try to avoid for the rest of your life. So if you plan the date you choose something you enjoy that you want to share with someone else. This could be a sport, a movie, a game or a place. Most of the time you also share a place you enjoy eating at. Other times you go to a place new to both people. Dates don't always have to involve food, but if it doesn't shame on you.

This is a list of places I enjoy and have had shared to me and I have shared with others.

(in no particular order (maybe the order i remember them))

Shin-Sen-Gimi(SSG) (Ramen House all over L.A.) 

There are several Shin-Sen Gimi in Los Angeles, and they are the same place but do not have the same items. The one I'm talking about is SSG Hakata Ramen. This is my ramen house of choice. Its not your dried noodle like Top Ramen. This is Japanese cuisine all the way. Ramen is big here in L.A.  and you can find a Ramen house pretty much anywhere, but there are lots of poeple that still have yet to try it. Unfortunately the Gardina SSG is temporarily closed but there are SSG in West L.A. and Little Tokyo. Now that I've thought about it a bit I love soups and noddles so yeah I love this place. If its your first time stick with the basics and get a bowl how it is. I get my noodles hard, no sprouts, bamboo shoots and extra pork and extra egg.

 The Kettle (Manhattan Beach)
The Kettle is a dinner two blocks from the ocean. It's open 24 hrs, so a late date or food run are a go. This is where I took my wife on our first date. Before anything if your young and $ is an issue....get a job. This please is a bit pricey. The food is good and you'll find a large selection of platters. Just check out the link. I usually get the same thing every time. Chicken Cobb salad, not tossed, Caesar dressing on the side and an orange muffin. Truest me, the sweet of the muffin works with the bitter of the blue cheese. The tortilla soup and french onion soup are very good. and if you want to keep it simple the chicken tenders are good with there sweet mustard sauce.

Original Tommy's (Los Angeles)
If you want a chili burger, chili cheese fries or a bowl of chili, then Tommy's is it. There are Original Tommy's all over Southern California, but not all of them are 24 hours. The one I'm talking about is the L.A. Tommy's. Just south of the 101 on Beverly Blvd. It's kind of between Hollywood and L.A. but closer to L.A. To say Tommy's is a burger place is just wrong. Tommy's is a chili place. They have burgers, fries, hot dogs, tamales and a chili boat. Of course you need to have chili on all of it. They also have a modest breakfast menu. I remember my first time at Tommy's. I was a kid in the scouting program and we had just gone to the Griffith Observatory. We then went to Tommy's were I had a chili cheese burger. It was so good.  Quick warning, it can get messy.

Buca di Beppo (Redondo Beach, Santa Monica, Los Angeles)
First of all make reservations. Second, Save your pennies. This one will cost you. But the food is good and the atmosphere is great. If you want Italian then this is it. There isn't too much to say here. Its straight forward Italian. You order food to share with the table and the wait staff wear pocket protectors.

El Gallo Giro (Huntington Park, too far then Plaza Mexico)
This is the Mexican Place I take everyone. I mention to locations because the one I go to is twice as far as the one in Plaza Mexico. Yet the Huntington Park location has its own bakery and butcher and is open 24 hours. Though my luck, I have gone two times late night and they were closed for deep cleaning. This is no fancy, get waited on place. El Gallo Giro is a Mexican street food slash Mexican dinner slash bakery. Let me start with what I know/do/love. The Torta is a sandwich. You can get any kind of meat they have in a torta, but want to try their deluxe torta you order a Torta Cubana. This torta has 3 meats, onions, cheese, lettuce, tomato and avocado. Then there are tacos and burritos. There are 7 or 8 meats to choose from from porks, beefs and chicken. I love the chitterlings tacos. Then there are the fried foods. Golden sopes, gorditas, taquitos and tostadas. They have tamales and stews too. If you cant a platter you can order any of the meats with a side of Mexican rice and beans and fresh tortillas, Did I mention they make their own tortillas on side? They do. They also make fresh juices we call Aguas Frescas. Depending on the time you go they may have from 8 to 3 choices.
Finally like I said they have their own bakery and you can finish with a sweet bread, cake flan or what ever they may have that day depending on the holiday too.

I'm partial to El Gallo Giro of course. Go ahead and try them before you take a date. You'll Love them all.

Antipasti at Dough San Antonio

Remember the time in Pulp Fiction when Uma Thurman as Mia went to the restroom in Jack Rabbit Slims and the next scene you see is her lifting her head up from what I'm guessing was a counter after doing cocaine and her reaction? Well, that's what I imagine it was like when I went to Dough in San Antonio. Most notable having the antipasti.

This is how it went down.

My expecting wife, 2 small children and I drove from Los Angeles (LAX area) to San Antonia for Thanksgiving. The drive was about 22 hours and not too bad. We got to Arizona in about 4 hours. From there time is a blur. but driving through Arizona was nice. The scenery was what you imagine, a desert. Yet there were a few large cities along the way so if we broke down I wouldn't have worried. Then we drove through New Mexico. This was also what you expected, and like Arizona, but with less cities. I feel like most of the driving happened in Texas. The only city I remember passing before we got to San Antonia was El Paso, I think it was El Paso. We stopped here and there for restroom breaks and food and gas.

We spent a week in San Antonia, We tourist-ed the Alamo, River Walk, and ate Whataburger and a BBQ place I forget the name, something like Bill Murray. The food highlight was eating at Dough.

Dough is a Pizzeria Napoletana. It looks very nice, they have indoor and outdoor sitting, standered fancy table setup with the white table cloth and  cloth napkins and utensils. There papers towels in the restroom were exquisite, we even framed one. The kids roll the dough for their own cheese pizza, which is complementary. We order the appetizer, the antipasti. We actually order two different antipasti, and two Pizza. I only had pizza that day because we ordered it, but the antipasti was off the chain. I could eat it forever. I don't even know all the stuff that it included. It had cheese, soft creamy cheeses. There were figs, olives and mushrooms, souses and a honey comb. That's the stuff I know, there were other stuff that just made it all a dream. We mixed a
nd matched everything with everything. This place left an impression.

All in all if you happen to be in San Antonia or Dallas TX make your way there. Even if its full and there's a line around the block you stay....STAY!

HotDogs

I remember being in Venezuela and eating a version of their street hot dogs. I was in the city of Cumana. Its a colonial style city on the Caribbean sea. There's lots of plazas in the town, the biggest one being Plaza Bolivar. There are also long stretches of road full of commercial businesses. Here is where you'll find men on the streets selling shaved ice, hamburgers and hot dogs. The hot dogs are pretty much standard, it had the sausage (Frank, weenie) in a hot dog bun, ketchup, mayo, onions, tomato. But what made their dogs different was the potato chips, like Ruffles, crumbled on top of the hot dog. I don't know if it was all the sodium or grease but is was darn good.

I tell you that story to tell you this story. When I was very young my folks would send my brothers and I to spend summers with my grandparents in Mexico. They had a plaza in that little town where people with hot dog carts would sell what is known as Mexican hot dogs. These are the hot dogs  wrapped with bacon in a steamed hot dog bun with pico de gallo (chopped onion, tomato and coriander leaves), ketchup, mayo and jalapeño. As a child I loved this hot dogs, as an adult I don't know if they are made differently but I don't like them any more.

Now I told you that story to tell you this one. When I was in elementary school the area a grew up in had a festival of sorts every 5 de Mayo (May 5th). This consisted of a parade and a fair/carnival in the park. The festival was to celebrate our Mexican heritage. the park was full of carnival rides and different food vendors, and just outside the park where the hot dog carts. maybe about 6 to 8 carts around the park. These hot dogs were also wrapped in bacon, and had pretty much the same things the Mexican hot dogs had. the exception were the grilled onions and the hot dogs were bigger as far as I remember. These dogs are what we know as L.A. Street Dogs (yet still referred to as Mexican hot dogs).

This brings me to my oldest sons hot dog experience. It's pretty simple. we has two, we gave him a hot dog from Disneyland's ToonTown, he only eats hot dogs now. True Story. He's 5 now.

So now down to its origins (not 100% accurate, people didn't keep historic records on hot dogs). Hot dogs originate from Germany. They're a member of the sausages family. In the late 1800's hot dogs got their start in the U.S. Some dude allegedly was selling the franks and handing out gloves because they were too hot to handle bare handed. People started keeping the gloves so said mans wife told him to put them in a roll. allegedly a cartoonist came up with the term "hot dog".  That's pretty much it.

I don't know where you can get a hot dog outside L.A. but there are a few places here you can get good ones (so they say). If you ask the general public they'll send you to Pink's, off La Brea near Melrose. You can also find Pinks around L.A. being sold out of carts. If you're in south of L.A. a Pink's is opening up at the Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance. Then there are Dodger Dogs. These are the ones they sell at Dodger Stadium. You can get them at Arco's ampm. I've had them both, I did not not like them. Pinks has a large menu and different types of franks. Oh, i just remembered. I did visit Berkeley  Ca and had a hot dog from Top Dog. It was a long time ago but I think I liked it. Lastly there is Hot Dog on a Stick, I go for the lemonades but there corn dogs aren't bad.

As I did my research on this subject I sound out that every region of this country has their own style of hot dogs. There are reindeer dogs up north, sonoran hot dogs in Arizona, half-smoke in the capital, Chicago style, the coney dog and so on. New York and L.A. have large variations.

The only advice I can give anyone is...make it how you like it. Chili dogs, plain dogs, just ketchup, cheese dogs, veggie, with bell peppers and so on. Don't get me started on the types and variations of franks.

Fighting the urge for food....Near LAX

DAMN YOU GOOD FOOD!!!!

Why does food have to be so tasty? I know we eat to live, but does it have to be so addicting? I try to have breakfast in the morning. I make some eggs for my sons, maybe waffles. By 11:00 am we want more food, but what? The oldest would eat nothing but hot dogs and chicken nuggets if he could. The little one would be happy eating ketchup with fries (that's right, ketchup with a side of fries). The baby can only have formula. But me? I want everything. Pizza, hamburgers, Chinese, Indian, Thai, Chimichangas, soups, salads, steak, chicken wings, gyros and all the drinks you can think of (non-alcoholic, no coffee or tea).

Why these foods? Because I can find a restaurant with these items close to where I live. If I would move to a place that didn't have so many choices to eat I would cry. Yet I don't eat these foods often. Do I want to? I think the title of this post says it all...uh hell yeah. So I fight the good fight with my urges, but I may not have the means to eat what I want. The dollar doesn't go as far as it use to. My family may not like what I feel like eating. They have different taste in food at times. There are so many reasons why I'm not able or willing to eat what I feel like.

By now you know I'm just venting my food frustration. So that's enough of that. But if you're ever near LAX (Los Angeles International Airport) you may want to visit the restaurants I enjoy in the area. I'll base this off the list of food I want all the time.

Pizza: Valentino's, El Segundo location
I've never had pizza from New York, but this New York style pizza is good. They also have a sausage roll that taste good, it comes with a dipping marinara sauce. They also have other stuff. I recoment getting a slice of pepperoni and sausage and a sausage roll.





: Mel'o Burger, no web site, Lennox off Century Blvd.

(10003 S Inglewood Ave, Inglewood, CA 90304)
This mom and pop joint has a large menu, but stick with the safe stuff. you cant go wrong with a burger. the chili cheese fries are good too. and if you want a shake they have 24 flavors (i think).






Chinese: any "cheap" Chinese joint.
The restaurant I enjoyed the most burnt town some time ago. I haven't found a place like it since. There is one next to Mel'o Burger called China One Dollar Express (4808 w Century Blvd.). It's ok. Or try the Flower Drum (4843 w Century Blvd), they way have changed the name but it's the same dine in style place.

Indian: India's Tandoori Halal Restaurant, Manhattan Beach
(916 N Sepulveda Blvd, Manhattan Beach, CA 90266)
There may be Indian restaurants closer to LAX but this is the one I enjoy the most. The wait staff is cool, the food is delicious and the buffet's good. There is one I do want to try in El Segundo. I'll update this post if I like it more when I go.













Thai: The Thai Plate, Lennox off Hawthorne Blvd.
(10311 S Hawthorne Blvd. Inglewood (Lennox), CA 90304)
The service isn't top notch but the food sure is. My favs are the fried wonton, pad thai, fried rice and wonton soup.






Chimichanga: Chile Verde, Inglewood (but it's a chain so other places too)
(3382 Century Blvd. Inglewood Ca 90303)
Chimichanga= deep fried burrito. THERE!







Soups & Salads: This is a tough one.
I like them from Soup Plantation and Banera Bread, but lots restaurants  have good soups and salads.

Steak:  Outback Steak House, not at all close to LAX.
The closest Outback is in Torrance CA. but if you just want the beef you can go anywhere. I do like outback best in the chain steak house category. and it doesn't hurt they have the Blooming Onion.

Chicken Wings: Wing Stop/Buffalo Wild Wings,
I like both these two wing places. If you want variety go to BWW. The flavors Wing Stop has are good but BWW has a lot more, and more on the menu in general.

I've added the links to the restaurants when I could or the addresses.

Enjoy!

El Ejido Hermosillo, BC MX TripLogs

It's been two weeks since my 3rd son was born into this world. That means I'm taking the two older boys to Mexico for the weekend. There are things we have to do. This includes eating at our regular spots. Some we'll have to drive to the neighboring state for Sonora to eat tortas and have raspados, others we can walk to the town plaza to find tacos and what they (not me) call in L.A. street dogs (Mexican hotdogs).

Day One: Driving to Mexico

We have to drive from L.A. to Mexico via The 10 fwy mosty. We take a couple of pit stops at grandpa's house in Palm Springs and a restroom break at the one truck stop in Cochella off interstate 111. From then on straight to Calexico. It's about 4 hrs into our trip and about 45 more minutes to go from Mexicali to El Ejido Hermosillo.

We get to Grandma's house and just hang for a couple of hours, or at least till the tummy starts rumbling. We head over to the plaza where the hotdog venders and other kiosk are. We order 4 dogs. Two are just wrapped in bacon in a bun. The other two, which I'm going to eat, have diced tomato and onion, mayo, mustard and jalapeño. It wasn't the best, actually it was ok at best. It did come with a side of fries, which I thought were the best part of the experience. My oldest wanted a raspado (shaved ice) from the kiosk next door. We got a small red (strawberry) flavored one. It was pretty good. Cost 10 pesos, that's like $0.75.

Day Two: Hanging

That's all we do. We had breakfast that consists of eggs, potato, chorizo and corn tortillas. We watch tv till about noon and head out to San Luis RC. San Luis is just over the other side of El Rio Colorado. The river is tried out on this side of the border. We pay a toll to cross state lines from Baja to Sonora. It's  an hour ahead in time. We drive around for a bit, stop by a Calimax for some random stuff. We get Nesquik cereal, Apple Jumex, a lime Tang and an orange flavored Peñafiel. I choose the Peñafiel. It's a mineral water in Mexico. Back home it's just a soda pop.  We have lunch at KFC, and before I get any comments that it's the least Mexican thing it better here then in the U.S. They give you jalapeño sauce and strawberry jam for your biscuit.

We drove back to El Ejido and stopped by a juice bar en El Centro. My oldest had the lime ice cream, the next oldest had bubblegum flavor. I had an Agua Fresca, the mixed fruit one. It was creamy with a hint of Apple. For dinner we went to a local "Italian" Restaurant, Its actualy a pizza place. There were a few things that made this experience memorable. First the bad ones. We waited a long time for two pizzas and salad, I mean a long time. I forget exactly how long but it sucked. and to make matters worse.....the little one pooped and peed his diaper and I forgot to  bring the diaper bag. but the Food was good. the salad was fresh and crisp. The pizza was home style. Not New York or Chicago, I dont know if they knew those styles exist, but it was good. As soon as we were done we made a B line to grandmas house to unstink the baby and called it a night.

Day Three: More time with the family

This is when we felt the heat. I'm not sure how hot it actually was but it was hot. We went to my aunts house where my oldest played in the dirt while I hosed him down. the little one didn't want to get wet so he looked at us form the dining room window. He did come out once we took a bin type container and filled it with water so they could play in it. It was reminiscent of the times my grandmother  would fill those old metal containers where people would hand wash clothes in, I forget what they are called, but we would "swim" in it and play. my aunt made us stake and quesadillas for lunch. for some reason I wasn't too hungry, but it was good ether way. by the end of our stay with my aunt's family my youngest was asleep and my aunt took the oldest to my grandmas walking. It's about a mile away, if that. We took it easy the rest of the night. went to the plaza to get raspados and try a different hot dog stand. The hot dogs were a little better then the one we had already tried.

Day Four: Driving to California

We woke up and got ready for our trip back to Los Angeles. We drove to Mexicali, which was about a half hour drive. I'm very familiar with the route so getting lost wasn't on my mind as it had been so many times in the past. We did stop by La Ley, a market a lot like Calimax. We had stop there to use the restroom before getting in line to cross the Mexican American border. We also had to pick up a few liters for Mexican Coca-cola. That was a request from my wife.....(its called an addiction). I didnt have many Pesos left, we only had enough for the Coke. I only exchanged $60 to Pesos when we first got to Mexico. The line to cross was as I expected. It took about an hour and a half in line to cross to Calexico. As we do, we stopped by Walmark to get random stuff like snack drinks and a t-shirt for me since the one I was wearing was a button down and i felt restricted. The rest of the drive was with out incident. about four hours drive.

The drip was a blast. If I could I would make the drip more often. maybe one day if I ever move somewhere closer to Mexico.

Christmas time, time for tamales!

I can't say that every culture that celebrates Christmas has a special dish they eat. But I can say that being an America from a Mexican heritage married to a woman from a Guatemalan heritage my son will have to experience a verity of tamales. Tamales are usually square made from corn and wrapped in corn husk or banana leaf. They are not always made from corn, but all but one kind I have tried.

Christmas time in Venezuela is time for hallacas. These version of tamales are made from cornmeal and wrapped in a banana leaf. The stuffing is a mixutere of beef, chicken and pork. There are olives and raisens too. I'm not quite sure how the cornmeal is made and what is put in the dough when they are mixing it together, but I do know I don't like it much. There isn't much I can say about it, mostly because I don't like it much. Everyone makes them and if you visit with someone who made some then you'll leave with a bag full of them.  I remember I had a freezer full of them which my partner (who was a native) ate throughout the year.

Growing up my folks would take us to Mexico for Christmas. There we would get into trouble, but most important we would have our Christmas tamales. my mom and aunts would sit around the table and start "chismiando" about stuff. but also making hundreds of tamales. This tamales were also made of cornmeal, the exact way I don't know. I do know each person had a job. One aunt would spread the cornmeal on a try corn husk, another would add the pork which was shredded and cooked in its juices and spices, another aunt would add a piece of potato, and olive and a slice of jalapeño. One aunt would hold the tamal and tie the ends with a long piece of husk . they were all put in a boiling pot and set to cook for hours. As a kid iI oved when instead of adding meat and veggies to the tamal, someone would make sweet tamales with the same corn meal but add pineapple juice or coconut.

Getting married introduced me to a new tamal, a Chuchito. This tamal is wrapped in a banana leaf. It has chicken in it and a prune. I don't have much to say about these tamales, just that they are oh so good. I have no idea how they are made, what I do know is that the ""masa" is made from rice, it gives it a soft texture.

Food and I, A love hate relationship

There has always been an obsession with food. But I had also been extremely picky as to what i would eat. That all changed back in 2001-3 when I lived in Venezuela for approximately 2 years. The Thing is, you have to eat what's available, Specially when there is a national strike and food production come to a stand still. My most memorable(in a bad way) meal was that lunch where my plate was full of fish leftovers...yep, fish leftovers. It included fish eyes, lungs, intestines, and lots of it. It could have had some flesh, but who knows. I opened the hatch and down it went... two spoon fools and i was done.

It wasn't all bad. Some of the best meals I have ever eaten were there too. Such was the dish they call Pabellon Criollo, their trademark dish. I could eat that every day.  This plate consist of fried plantains, black beans, rice and shredded beef. Of course the beef is cooked in its own juices and seasoned with spices. The plantains are ripped an at times had cinnamon added to them. the rice is usually white. and the beans, well if you know me you know I'm not a fan of black beans, but these beans are to die for. In the Eastern part of Venezuela it is not uncommon to add sugar to the black beans with country cheese...Wow, it makes my mouth water as I think of it. The combination of the lightly sweet beans with the ages cheese brings back good memories of walking in the rain, about 100 degrees still and walking into a friends house where the smell of this dish over took me and brought a smile to my face.

When i ate any lunch at any house there were either arepas or casabe on the table. Arepas resemble flying saucers, kind of like a pupusa or gordita. It's made from corn flower. not fine flower but a little granulated. They would either be fried, baked or some times but not often boiled. commonly we would use the arepa how rolls are used here in the U.S. but other times we could have them stuffed with something, be it beef, chicken, chorizo (not Mexican) or hotdog. I've been known to fry some up every now and then for the wife and kids. Always with a little guitar to give it a light sweet flavor and a golden color.

Casabe was my enemy, Oh how i hate this food. Its like having a round flat Styrofoam about 12 inches in diameter. It looked and tasted just like it. Casabe is made from yuca. Technically its a yuca flat bread. I was unfortunate to live in a town that had a few factories. The yuca is ground and spread on a large round metal serface which had a burner under it. It was let to cook and flipped over so the other side cooked. and that was that. there isn't much science to it. Casabe is actually a very old food eaten by the natives of that area. come to think about it Christopher Columbus could have eaten some being that he landed in that region before he died...

I hope You enjoyed this posting, See you next time, END TRANSITION!!!!