MY FIRST DAY AT WORK

So I had my first day at work yesterday. It's been almost 3 years since I was last employed by someone other than myself and I gotta say, I like it! I really like my new job at Charles Chocolates. It's a small but growing company. A lot of young people work there and half the staff is Asian- I kid you not. And I'm not saying that just the packaging people are Asian- a lot of the upper management and pastry staff are, too. And actually, it's just a diverse workplace, period. My boss is awesome, and I respect him a lot. He's kinda scatter brained, but he knows a ton about chocolates. Oh, and today, we're having a potluck. It's just my second day and I haven't even cooked at my new place, so I'm just gonna pick up some fruit at the farmer's market, but my co-worker has told me that people make awesome stuff. I guess that's what you can expect when you have like 15 chocolatiers on staff in a food centric city.

I also like my job cause I know I'm good at it, but this time around, I'm getting paid to do it and I have two days off a week. So it's a lot like what I used to do, except with fewer hours and I don't have to deal with suppliers, accounting, or all that not so fun stuff that comes with owning a business. And have I mentioned the rejects? I'm taking a candied apple home with me today.

MY FIRST POST FROM CA

Ok ok, I've been a bad blogger. Yes, I've been here for over a week. Yes, I've eaten out at a few places and visited the farmer's market three times now. But no, I haven't taken pictures of anything and so, can't report on the new places I've eaten. But you try moving 3,000 miles and finding a new apartment and job in 8 days and see how much time you have to blog. Oh, and throw in my two year old cousin who needs constant attention and would find it truly strange that his aunt keeps taking pictures of food when we eat and that'll pretty much stop you from taking your camera anywhere.

Other than that, things out here are going great. I love my new place. At first I was shocked out how suburban it is and now that my car's here, I truly fit in like a real suburban soccer mom, but it's super convenient to everything and just a 10 minutes drive to Berkeley. It's amazing how easily I've slipped right back into my California lifestyle. And one single word makes me happy to be a Californian- PARKING. Yes, parking is plentiful and free.

Fine, parking's not the only thing. Lots of sunshine helps. Good food helps. And I love the diversity of this state. So, as I start to get settled in, I'll be sure to start taking pictures and putting up some real posts. Promise.

MY LAST POST AS A RESIDENT OF BOSTON

My last post from Boston is dedicated to my favorite eating buddy, Leah. (Sorry Tom, Leah’s favorite food of the year so far was not Brooklyn pizza.) I’m actually typing this from the airport while waiting for my plane to depart. FYI- Logan does have wifi, but you gotta pay $7.95 for a day pass, which is why I’m typing this on Word.

Leah and I have had some great meals together over the past few years, whether it’s been an ice cream cake for four (which was consumed by the two of us- hey it was hot out!) or French fries and mac and cheese at ES. And though we’ll be having many meals again in the future, it’ll be a lot harder now that there’s a continent between us.

So before I left Boston, Leah insisted that I try Picco, the pizza place in the South End.

She loves the pizza there, and though I’d wanted to go for some time, somehow, I never made my way over there. (I’m much more likely to have brunch than dinner in the South End.) Finally, early on a summer evening, we headed over there. When we arrived, they had the outdoor seating set up, and since it was pretty early, we had our pick of seats. We peeked inside, and I was immediately captivated by a large black chalk board listing all the homemade ice creams that were available. We chose to sit outside, and looked over the menu, but as the sun started to set, it really started cooling down, and we retreated inside. (The waitress didn’t seem too thrilled, since she’d already taken our orders, but whatever).

And on the subject of service, when we arrived, it seemed rather confusing and lacksadiscal. The restaurant wasn’t busy, but it was hard to be sure who was going to seat us, who was going to take our order, etc., and not one of the staff members really stepped up- Leah had to ask someone if we could sit outside. Leah said this was basically normal for Picco, so don’t be too surprised if the staff members are inattentive.

Ok, but onto the fun stuff- the pizza. Leah always orders the veggie pizza here. She also got a Caesar salad because she loves that the lay white anchovies on top of the salad. The Caesar actually did look pretty good, but I wanted to save room for the ice cream, so I ordered a pizza margherita and I also ordered Tom a steak and cheese pizza to go. (He was working at home and couldn’t join us.)

We’d moved inside, and the restaurant was empty, but slowly starting to fill up (it’d be mostly full by the time we left). Here’s a shot of the interior- lots of red and polished wood.

It’s actually smaller than you’d expect, but that’s another reason why it gets so crowded later on. Another waiter had taken over indoors and we were served our pizzas. Here’s mine:

And here’s Leah’s:

And the verdict: It was actually quite excellent pizza. The crust was well charred and the interesting thing was that it was almost like eating bread. The crust was similar to a bread from Clear Flour- with its texture, crackle and the large bubbles inside. I really enjoyed my pizza, and I think it’s far better than anything else we’ve got in Boston.

I also tried a slice of Leah’s pizza and I was surprised by the fact that I really enjoyed that, also. I didn’t think I would since among other things, the veggie toppings included eggplant and fennel, neither or which I like, but it worked and I would actually order this pizza in the future. As we ate, the restaurant started to fill up, and the staff seemed to snap to attention and started being much more speedy than before.

After pizza, it was time for some ice cream. I had been staring at the big black board for quite some time, so I’d decided I’d be getting 3 scoops. I got chocolate, caramel and espresso. Meanwhile, Leah also got three scoops, but they were the polar opposites. She got peach, peanut butter fudge and I currently forget the other flavor. Oh, and the came with free sprinkles. I got chocolate, and Leah got rainbow.

The ice cream is all excellent, but it’s grown up ice cream. The flavors are so deep and intense that it’s hard to eat a lot of it. It’s like really good dark chocolate, you can eat a square and be happy, rather than eating the whole thing. The espresso was my favorite, and the chocolate had the lovely nuances of whatever chocolate they had used (as in, it didn’t just taste like chocolate, you could get other flavors from it). I managed to finish a few spoonfuls of each, but was done for the night.

Meanwhile, maybe because of the table switch, they had forgotten my pizza to go. The waiter rushed over and offered a discount, but we didn’t feel like waiting for it- I just gave Tom the slices I had left (which he quickly polished off when I got home). I was really glad I tried Picco, but I was even happier with the company. It’ll be hard to find another eating buddy like Leah, who will agree to eat McDonald’s chicken nuggets because there’s a buy one get one free deal or someone just as enthusiastic about fried chicken. I guess I’ll just have to scope out some places to take her out West- like Betsy’s Bakehouse, with its fried chicken sandwich and spicy coleslaw.

As for the rest of you, I’ll soon be adding posts about my dining adventures from the East Bay. I hope you’ll all come out and visit us, so we can have some more great meals in CA.

AND NOW A BREAK....

As you all know, I'm moving to the Bay Area in less than a week. So I've been trying to use up everything in my pantry that's worth using up. Mainly, I've been making baked goods (and many of you have been recipients of a batch of cookies), but last week, I was reading Amanda Hesser's "Cooking For Mr. Latte" and she had the recipe for Hi Rise Bakery's Vanilla Pound loaf. Now, for those who aren't familiar with it, the Hi Rise Vanilla Pound Loaf is a local favorite, filled to the brim with vanilla. I had all the ingredients (minus some eggs and sugar), but I had the important stuff, a ton of vanilla beans, flour, and pounds of butter.

I wouldn't suggest that you make this recipe at home. It requires far too many vanilla beans and that's just way too expensive. But my mom, in a moment of genius, bought me about 3 dozen vanilla beans on her last trip to Bali. I haven't used any of them, just kept them stocked away in my fridge, so this was the perfect opportunity to use them.

So after tripling the recipe and a night spent baking, I came out with 15 mini loaves of bread. For those of you in Boston who haven't received one, don't worry, I've got one waiting for you. And the rest of you can comment on how they turned out.

LONDON: DAY 5, OUR LAST DAY

Actually, our last full day in London had been the previous day. We spent the morning of day 5 packing and getting to the airport (despite the tube strike, the train to Heathrow was still running). We hadn't had much time to grab breakfast, but luckily, Heathrow has an enormous food court/ shopping area with lots of local chains. Oh, FYI, if you're ever taking a flight from Heathrow, spend as much time as you can in this area. Once you go to your gate, there's NOTHING. Not even bathrooms. And they do another security check just to get into the gate waiting area, so leaving is a pain.

I picked up some last minute snacks at E.A.T. Here's my crawfish sandwich with argula and lime

And here's a very yummy edamamae salad with green peas.

Both items were quite fresh and delicious. And that's the thing with London, they have a total culture of take out food, and there are a ton of places that provide really delicious entrees, snacks, whatever, all to be eaten on the go or at home (and it's much better than anything we have in the states). Places like Marks and Spencer, E.A.T. and Sainsbury are all great places to get less expensive foods on the go. I know that historically food in England has been terrible, but on this trip, we ate better than we did in Paris (ok, speaking the language helps), so now you know, if you're planning a trip to London, you'll be able to find great food, though not always at the lowest prices (stupid exchange rate). We had a great time in London, but were happy to come home and just relax.

LONDON: DAY 4

On our fourth day in London, we didn't have any really big plans. The main one was lunch at Maze, a Gordon Ramsey restaurant that I'd made reservations for months before we arrived. So we spent the morning checking out chocolate shops and buying tickets to see Wicked that evening. We also went to Fortnum and Mason- yet another super fancy department store.

I know that some people compare it to Harrod's, but Fortnum and Mason is much smaller and lesser known. It also means it's quieter and makes for a more enjoyable shopping experience. It kinda reminded me of Takashimaya in NY.

Just like Harrod's, the also have a large food section in the basement. Here's a pick of some dried beef and another of the veggies:

After our little shopping excursion, we went back to the hotel to change into some nicer clothes. Then we headed off to Maze at Grovsenor Square (near the American Embassy). I'd chosen Maze because I knew I wanted to have one nice meal in London, and Maze has a 28 pound 4 course prix fixe for lunch. (yes, that's still quite expensive, but it's cheaper than anything else you're gonna find). Also, the current chef (not Gordon Ramsey) at Maze has become quite well known for his talent- he used to work at El Bulli in Spain.

The dining room is very modern and well lit by large windows overlooking the square. I like it's muted colors of brown and beige. When we arrived, the dining room was already half full, and it'd fill up more as we ate. And for the first time, we seemed to be the only Americans in the room. Everyone else was English. There were lots of business lunches going on around us, but there were also a few group of friends having lunch and a few couples like us. First, we were served bread with butter and salt. The butter is also a deeper yellow and more yummy in Europe. (higher butterfat content).

We were then given menus. Not surprisingly(for having a Spanish chef), it was organized in a tapas style, where you're recommended to get 4-5 courses( generally around 10-15 pounds per course). I already knew I was going to be ordering the prix fixe (you get two choices for each entree, and you can also order a 6 course prix fixe if you really want), but Tom decided that he was more interested in ordering from the menu, and so went for that.

My first course was this lovely pumpkin soup:It had little bits of caramelized chestnuts and onions at the bottom, and then the soup was poured over it. I loved the savoriness of the caramelized parts, and the sweetness of the soup- I just wish I could've had a bigger bowl of it. It was supposed to be served with this little brioche that looks like a mushroom (below) but the waiter gave it to Tom! (I let him have it, I don't like egg breads and he loves brioche)Meanwhile, Tom had his first course- some form of avocado mousse with creme fraiche, topped with crab and oddly enough, a quenelle of sweet corn sorbet and caviar. All these flavors my sound kinda crazy, but the sweet corn sorbet was surprisingly good, and this ended up being Tom's favorite course.

My next course was a seared scallop served with squid ink risotto and "micro squid" (really tiny pieces of squid which I gave to Tom). This was also a very good dish, I loved the risotto because it was packed full with butter. Oh, also, Maze is really into tableside presentation, so when I got my plate, the waiter actually came with a tiny copper pot and spooned the risotto onto my plate (I wish I could've asked her to just leave the pot- I know there was more in there). For Tom's second course, I had encouraged him to order a version of the croque monsieur, with Jamon Iberico and what really interested me- a 2 hour egg yolk. (which means the egg yolk was cooked for 2 hours via sous vide). Tom thought this course was ok. I would've liked it more had the presentation been different, but he found it hard to eat the sandwich with his hands while trying to spread the egg on top.

Next up, Tom got a chicken poached in butter. It was served with this little potato guy on the side. Personally, I didn't find it that amazing, but the sauce was packed with butter and the chicken was moist. I guess I just don't particularly like poached chicken, even if it is poached in butter.
As we ate, I did notice that table next to us- a business meeting of 4. They'd ordered wine and were having the same prix fixe meal as me, but I felt I was getting shafted. They got two scallops, rather than my one, and seemed to be getting more generous portions of everything! Tom thought I was being paranoid, but I think it'd because they were more likely to come back, and we were just tourists. Oh, but I will mention that service here is impeccable, as you would expect from a restaurant of this caliber. There's a ton of waitstaff on the floor and they are quick to refill your water (and at 4 pounds for a bottle of Evian, why not?) and meet your needs.

Ok, for my main course I had the "fish and chips". This wasn't my favorite course. The fish was just slightly over cooked, and not hugely flavorful. And the "chips" weren't potatoes! They were fried turnips. Lastly, the homemade tomato sauce that they'd served it with wasn't really tasty at all.

For Tom's final course, he ordered the beef tongue and cheek (aww, isn't that such a cute name?)I think he also found this course to be pretty good. It was well cooked and the meats were tender.

And now for my favorite course of this meal- dessert. Normally, I find desserts to be a major let down. I rarely say that I like them (even the desserts at Jean Georges were disappointing). I asked Tom when the last time is that I said I even liked a dessert. It took a while to decide, but I did love the caramel tart served at Enoteca. (oh, and the gelatos at Mozza). I'd eaten at both places in March.

I wasn't expecting much from this dessert- a mainly chose it because it came with a doughnut. (mmmmmmmmmm, doughnut). You'll noticed it as that little fried ball- and it was filled with a very nice apple filling. But the best thing was the apple caramel trifle. It's got a layer of apple gelee, a layer of caramel pudding, a layer of vanilla cream, and apple granita spooned on top by the server. It was DELICIOUS. I'm not even a fan of cream, puddings and gelees, but the combination of it all was great.
And of course, we ended our meal with a few petit fours: chocolates and rose gelees. By the end of the meal, Tom was stuffed and I was pretty full. I know that people on Chowhound had complained that the portions on the prix fixe were too small for the price, but I think Americans are always complaining too much about how small portions are. I found this lunch to be just right, and I didn't walk away painfully full (definitely a good thing). I really did enjoy our meal, but we certainly won't be doing anything like it again anytime soon. With everything included, I think it came out to around 90 pounds- you can do your own calculations into dollars.

After our large meal, we went back to the hotel to rest. But we were up soon enough. A tube strike had started that afternoon, and we needed to take the bus to get to theatre where we'd be seeing Wicked that night. We arrived a little early, so I consulted my Cheap Eats guide and decided to take us to a fish and chips place a few blocks down from the theatre. I don't remember the name right now, something involving Super Fresh and fish. At any rate, they have a sit down restaurant, but next door, they also have a take out part. We decided a cod fish and chips combo. We took it to go, found a seat on the sidewalk and began to eat (yes, we're super fancy like that). Here's the cod. It actually wasn't too bad. It was really really hot, but it was moist inside and pretty yummy. The customers in front of us had gotten a large amount of take out, so this had just been fried. (I could see how it'd tasty pretty crappy if it'd been sitting under a heat lamp for a while).

The chips were not as great. They were all different sizes, so they didn't fry evenly. And they were clearly frozen and not too delicious. Overall, it was a great little snack to have before we headed into the theatre- and an appropriate meal for our last night in London.

LONDON: DAY 3

For our third day in London, we had planned to wake up early, visit some museums and have lunch. But when we got up, we decided to scrap the museum plans and have a leisurely Sunday morning instead. For breakfast, we got pastries at one of the local chain coffee houses, Coffee Republic. Now, when places in London say they serve coffee, what they really mean is that they serve espresso and espresso drinks. Tom likes to drink drip coffee and when I asked the employee if they had any, she said, "what's that?". So he got an Americano instead.

I ordered a hot chocolate, which tasted like Swissmiss. And Tom ordered two pastries, which are below:
Overall, it was a lot like Starbucks (except I had refused to go to the Starbucks a few doors down). Afterwards, we started on a little walk to head up to Harrod's. A few friends had suggested that we buy a picnic lunch at Harrod's, and then eat in the nearby Hyde Park. However, when we arrived at Harrod's, it hadn't opened yet, so we headed to Hyde Park first and spent an hour sitting, reading and people watching.

When Harrod's opened at noon, we headed off to check out their famous food halls. The food halls at Harrod's are quite expansive and are organized into lots of different room- like seafood, charcuterie, fromagerie, etc and what's interesting is that almost each room also has a little food stall so that you can dine indoors if you want (there was an oyster bar, a wine bar, a rotisserie, etc.)

Here are some of the pics I took:

PastriesMarzipan Fruit (do people ever eat these?)Sushi (ok, honestly that didn't look all that tasty)And some prepared seafood items:It wasn't exactly cheap, so I picked up a few pastries and went for our backup plan. Near Harrod's is a restaurant called Leon- a local chain that specializes in Eastern Mediterranean take out food (but you can also eat in). So we headed over there to pick up our main meal before going back to Hyde Park. It had a hippie-like decor, lots of casual and comfortable chairs, low tables and strings of little lights. We headed to the back and placed our order, and it was up in a few minutes (it was really like healthy fast food). We also picked up a baguette for Tom, so he could munch on the cheese he had bought the previous day at Borough Market, and took everything back to the park where we found a bench.

From Leon's I had ordered a sweet potato falafel sandwich. I'd never had sweet potato falafel before- it was much softer and squishier than normal falafel, and it was also sweeter, but I enjoyed the flavors and found this to be quite good.
Meanwhile, Tom wanted to try a couple of things, so he got appetizer portions. This was their baked "chicken nuggets" in a yogurt sauce.And this is an order of lamb meatballs. Tom enjoyed both dishes, but he like the lamb meatballs more.To finish off lunch, I had bought two tarts at Harrod's- one is a pear and almond tart and the other is a strawberry tart. Both were well made and delicious, and not too expensive (in pounds that is- they were 2.5 pounds each), but of course, that means I paid $10 for two tarts.

After lunch, we headed up to Islington, in the northern part of the city, to visit Jayna. I had also wanted to visit a chocolate shop up there called Paul A. Young. They actually had a pretty interesting array of chocolate flavors, and is one of the few chocolate stores I'd recommend in London. But what they also had was ice cream with chocolate sauce. It came it lots of different flavors- I got a walnut brownie ice cream with chocolate sauce. The coolness of the ice cream forced the chocolate sauce to harden the minute it hit, so it formed this hard shell. The best part were the toasted almonds and hint of cardamom.Jayna ordered a rose infused ice cream and Tom got a chocolate ice cream with chocolate "pearls". I think we all enjoyed our snack. Then we spent the afternoon walking around Jayna's neighborhood. We stumbled upon a small local street fair, where we got to hold owls! while Tom took pictures of us.

After all the walking, we headed back to Jayna's to rest a little and have tea. But before you knew it, it was time to head back to our hotel and get ready for dinner. My cousin, Cynthia, lives in London, and she wanted to take us out to dinner to a Spanish restaurant in her neighborhood called Cambio de Tercio. It is a tapas restaurant, and much fancier than any of the other places we'd been to on this trip. When Cynthia arrive, the waiters were all familiar with her, and she started ordering right away- a platter of ham, sangria, and we also pitched in and ordered a few things. Here's an order of gambas al ajillo on the left, and my favorite pimientos del padron on the right. The shrimps were delicious, but the pimientos weren't the best I'd had (I like the ones at Toro more). Here's my order of a portabello mushroom carpaccio- very thinly slice mushroom with olive oil and salt. It's a simple dish, though not my favorite. I think I prefer my mushrooms cooked. Meanwhile, everyone else at dinner was enjoying their various dishes of pork. Tom was able to order Jamon Iberico- that special Spanish ham made from black footed pigs raised only on a diet of nuts. I think he enjoyed that.

And I finished dinner with this pretty platter of ice creamsI don't think they were homemade, but the strawberry was my favorite. And I liked the plate that they served it in. Overall, dinner was really good, and we had concluded yet another busy day of walking and eating.

LONDON: DAY 2
Our second day in London was a Saturday. We had grand plans to get up early and meet up with Jayna at Borough Market. But at 10am, when she called and we were already supposed to meet her, we still hadn't gotten out of bed. You might think that a 5 hour time difference isn't much, but it really is. So we got ready in 15 minutes and headed to the other side of London, arriving at the market at 11am.

So Borough Market is just like a really great farmer's market- except that some parts of it are indoors and some are permanent stores. It reminds me a lot of Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia. The first shop we went to was Jayna's favorite cheese store in London. I don't recall the name right now, but it was stocked to the ceiling with cheese, with lots of cheese on aging racks inside, and even more cheese to sample.

Here's the main area where you can order your cheese and have them cut off slices for you. Tom got an unpasteurized brie cheese that he saved for later.

Then it was off to do some browsing and shopping. We had lunch plans with a cousin at noon, but it was a pricey place, so we decided to have some food before hand. We bought tarts from this vendor. They were ok, though cold and kinda soggy.

There were all types of vendors, and lots of local ones, so we sampled and walked along checking them out. Here's someone selling olives:Fresh berries:Sandwiches and breads:Potted plants:And fresh seafood:There were also vendors where you could get food made. Tom and Jayna wanted to get chorizo sandwiches, so as they waited in line (Londoners are incredibly good at queueing), I went off to get myself some scallops.
These scallops had been freshly caught, so they were sweet, briny, smokey and delicious. The only problem was the bacon that they decided to put under it. Ah well, I let Tom eat it. Meanwhile, here are the chorizo sandwiches:Tom and Jayna thought these were delicious. Unfortunately, I had to make Tom scarf his down because we were having lunch with my cousin in 5 minutes.

So my cousin chose a restaurant called Roast. It actually sits above Borough market, in a beautiful second floor space that overlooks the entire market floor. It's almost worth it just for the view. Plus it's got huge glass windows, so there's a ton of light pouring in. However, I had looked up the menu while still in the U.S. and knew that this place would be pricey. So after filling up downstairs at the market, both Tom and I ordered light appetizers. I didn't take any pics, but I had a warm chicken liver salad, which was very good. The chicken livers were overcooked by like 30 seconds, but were still tender. Tom ordered a beet soup with goat cheese, which would've been better served cold. He ended up eating only half of it.

After lunch, we took a quick walk over to the Tate Modern where we spent the afternoon. During this trip, we had grand plans to go to lots of museums, but the Tate ended up being the only one we visited. Afterwards, we met up with Jayna again for an early dinner. Ever since we'd decided to go to London, Tom kept saying that he wanted to have fish and chips. But I'd had heard from people that it's not the easiest thing to find. So I did some research and found a highly recommeded place called Master's Super Fish. If you happen to be seeing a show at the Old Vic, this place is right around the corner. The restaurant opens at 4:30, and we weren't the first ones there (we were the second ones). We were seated quickly. The surroundings aren't luxurious. Actually, they're pretty plain and kinda grubby, but sometimes those type of restaurants have the best food. You could order different types of fried fish. Tom got the cod and Jayna and I both ordered the plaice (a type of flatfish). After we ordered, we were given little amuse bouche- 3 little shrimp on a plate. Ok, this was actually one of my favorite parts of the meal, because the shrimp actually tasted like shrimp. I think we've gotten accustomed to eating farmed shrimp that really have no flavor, but these were sweet and very shrimpy. Then we got our enormous orders of fish and chips. I gotta say, the fish was really good. It was well fried, moist and was a huge portion. I ate it with lots and lots of tartar sauce. Luckily, they give you your own bowl of it. Strangely enough, they also offer you gherkins and pickled onions with your fish. (I passed on those). Overall, our meal was really great. Everyone enjoyed it. At around 15 pounds each, it definitely wasn't the cheapest meal we'd have, but it was very good. Also, it seemed to be a place with lots of regulars and local- not many tourists in site. After dinner, we walked around Westminster and Buckingham Palace, finishing with an ice cream from Mark's and Spencer. Overall, a great day, though tiring and long.