hi all. i know i haven't posted in a long while. i was finishing up the semester at berkeley, and then immediately off to sydney and new zealand. i've only now got a bit of time to finally post something. so here it is:
daniela, lori and i had a wonderful food overload at tetsuya’s, a french-japanese restaurant in sydney. i have seen tetsuya’s near the top of some “best restaurant in world” lists, and some people had mentioned it to me, so it seemed only natural that if i could get a reservation, i should go. here we are:
tetsuya’s serves an n-course meal (n > 10) that is, quite simply, superb. the signature dish, Confit of Petuna Tasmanian Ocean Trout with Konbu, Daikon & Fennel, is to die for. just the right amount of fishiness, a nice spiciness on top, wow. the other dish I strongly remember is a palate cleanser apple sorbet with apply jelly that lead into dessert. it tasted like granny smith apples, transported me back to apple picking in ontario in the fall, and put a big smile on my face. here are pictures:
of course, there were other good courses, but these two resonate.
in addition to the meal, we matched it with the “you will drink about a bottle of alcohol” wine pairing. of course, that wasn’t the name, but that’s how the server described it. well, pairings are good, and though i can’t remember anything too fantastic about the wine, other than a cab and dessert wine that I thought were excellent, the wine certainly put lori a bit over the top, and we had some interesting arguments/conversations.
here are two discussions that i think you, dear reader, will appreciate.
the first involved a painting in the women’s bathroom. we disagreed on what it depicted, with omar and daniela in one corner, lori in the other. i actually saw this painting by briefly going into the women’s bathroom, because i had to understand the controversy. daniela was kind enough to capture it with the camera, and so you too can join in the discussion. what does this painting depict?
the second controversy erupted over this dish, comte with lentils:
now, in my mind, food can make a statement about food. this dish was perhaps trying to make a statement about what dessert is, and how flavors can be paired (the red beans, traditonally sweet, were not so sweet and the cheese was a different touch). but just like art can make a statement about other art, the form of that statement, and how it appeals to the visual sense is of the utmost importance for the statement to be very successful. so, in my mind, i thought this food statement fell on its face because it just didn’t work at all in my mouth.
this is not to say that i wouldn’t appreciate a food that doesn’t taste good. i would, if it really did something else that was quite profound. same with art.. i’ve seen some pretty “bad” art that i nevertheless liked because of the connection i thought it made. but i guess i have a really high bar when it comes to food that tries to make that movement. i can’t even remember what lori was arguing but notice a picture of her below… clearly she’s having a good time :)
finally here's a fun video of a required dunking we had to do to make the taste just right:
while shopping today i observed the most annoying and interesting thing in the checkout line. the cashier asked the patron "paper or plastic?" she thought for a moment, and then said "both." both! the cashier looked at her funny and then she said "you know, paper inside the plastic." -- ah it's for ease of carrying, very nice.
oy.
waste -- we don't even think about how much we waste. today while shopping i thought "huh, it's sort of dumb to use these new plastic bags for my vegetables when i have the same ones just sitting at home." well, at least i took a canvas bag to the shop -- ease my conscience a tad.
oy.
on my birthday my net stuff accumulation was +12 toy horses - 10 marbles.. give or take. oh, and of course gifts of wine. and a poster.
oy.
looking around my room now, i realize i have so much junk, and i wonder if anyone would find much of it useful. like, what the hell is that easter egg basket with the frizzy pieces of string going to do to improve anyone's life? waste. though, maybe i can get raja to ride in it.
hmm... maybe it is better that it just inhabits a spot in my room -- who knows, it may end up in the landfill otherwise.
bea and franz had the idea that szechwan food was in order for friday night. so most of the staff and me went out to eat. the food was fantastic! but there was one dish that was pure torture, pictured below:
if you're wondering what those red things are, they are red chilis. this was a dish labeled chicken with red chili but more accurately would be chili with chicken. the chili were strong, and you couldn't help but eat at least 5 during the meal. the NZ sauv blanc really helped, but i'm still a bit smoking.
to give you a sense of how serious szechwan food is, consider this fish in broth dish. before delivering this dish to our table, the server scooped out hundreds of red chilis. i guess they add flavor.. the peppercorn-like spices in this dish numbed my face, but the flavors were well worth it.
here's bea and franz, looking happy after a happy meal :)
and here i am, happy and blurry after a tasty meal and drinks out. i wish i could come to london more regularly
i am in london and so happy to be back. it was so vibrant last night that despite my jetlag i felt the energy. as i lie awake in the hotel room, here are some pictures:
being tax season, i was amused by the name of this small cafe. i definitely need coffee, and usually something stronger, when i deal with amt.
but now onto eating. i thought i'd be doing my best eating while in florence, but bea certainly knows how to make someone feel welcome after a long flight. she brought me all this food, and i dipped into all of it. oh, and the food included the famous cupcakes, but i ate that before even thinking about taking a picture :)
here's the spread. quiche, sandwich in plastic wrap, fruit salad, some meaty tasty thing, and a muffin!
i really felt quite upside down when i was eating -- topsy turvy with both joy and jetlag.
more food hiding in the bag. it doesn't want to be eaten but it knows it will be!
seth roberts came to my games class yesterday and spoke about self-experimentation and games. seth is a UC Berkeley psychology professor who experiments on himself to learn more about how the mind works, and has published his results to quite stirring successes (one being the shangri-la diet).
anyway, he spoke to us about omega-3. he found that taking three tablespoons of flaxseed oil (high in omega-3) in the morning had a huge effect on his ability to: balance, perform well at certain memory games, aim at targets, sleep.
anyway, with nothing better to do, and intrigued, i bought flaxseed oil today and took three tablespoons. that's a helluva lot (you could do less fish oil, i'm told, but i am starting from his observations + flaxseed may have other magical benefits). i'm going to see what this does to me. in reality, we are constantly doing crazy things to our body and very often experimenting, but not consciously. so i'm going to try and be conscious about this move. brain tests, here i come :)
oh and games: seth takes a lot of self-measurements. in some cases, he needs to take many measurements a day, and that gets very, very tedious. he came to the class to show us a game he had developed to make it slightly more fun to take measurements. he then asked us if we could help him improve the game.
as a final note, of course i looked up what others were saying about taking flaxseed oil (didn't want to miss any research that says what i'm doing is completely nuts). found this article that talks about potential danger of taking flaxseed oil for men. anyway, author recommends flax seed oil with lignans. that's what i got.
i am so proud to say i'm an investor in my friend bea's new cake shop in london: Bea's of Bloomsbury. doesn't it look tasty?
the shop just recently opened, and i am salivating for a cupcake, and hoping i get there soon! i know some of my readers may be in london soon, and if so, run, don't walk, and sample the wonderful food. bea is a culinary wizard and tireless worker who got the business going almost singlehandedly, entirely from scratch. here's a quote from the londonist review:
What makes Bea’s cupcakes so damn good (as well as the rest of Bea’s menu for that matter)? Well, in addition to applying their Michelin-Star pedigrees, Le Cordon Bleu training and prior experience at yum factories such as Asia de Cuba and Nobu, the folks behind Bea’s intend to use fresh produce and the finest ingredients in an attempt to “redefine the concept of takeout as quality, indulgence and style.” From what Londonist tasted, Bea and crew have more than a fighting chance at achieving such a lofty goal.
while in toronto, i decided that i needed to become a better cook of indian food. so i enlisted my dad and mom to show me the ropes. i prepared three dishes: chick peas, lentils (soft), and mixed rice. it was quite an ordeal! but i learned a lot by trying to keep track of my dad's intuitive movements, and the choice of spices. i'll post recipes one of these days, but i just wanted to post some pictures up here as well.
here are all the spices that we used:
the wine was stricly consumed to keep me sane during the process:
glamor shot with me and the food:
another one
and here are the happy people eating the good food:
