After lunch at SALT, we walked around the Pearl Street Mall, an outdoor walking mall closed to traffic similar to 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica. We made a few observations about the stores we saw. For one thing, there were a lot of shops for outdoor activities. That's totally understandable as Boulder is right next to the Rocky Mountains. There were several exotic stores with world/ethnic clothing, accessories, knick knacks, etc. We also passed by multiple "apothecaries" that sold herbs, spices, oils, etc. It felt like a concentrated Berkeley-esque hippie land tucked away in the mountains.
So, after the late lunch (we didn't eat until close to 3pm), we drove back to Denver and walked around the Cherry Creek mall until it was dinner time. Lawrence wasn't particularly hungry so we eventually decided on sushi for dinner.
We went to Sushi Den, one of the top sushi bars in Denver. They fly their fish in from the Nagahama fish market in Japan. Their selection is uniquely exotic for prices that are extremely reasonable. We wanted to take advantage of that and so ordered several fish that we don't normally get the chance to try, including Tilefish, Needlefish, wild Yellowtail, Golden Eye Snapper, Spanish Mackerel, Japanese Shad, Albacore sashimi, and Royal Miyagi Oysters sushi-style. They mixed up an order and we actually got an extra order of salmon for free.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Denver trip, part 1
Lawrence and i were in Denver last week. We flew in Friday night and after checkinng into our room we went out to grab some food. We didn't have a car yet so we walked several blocks through downtown to the Denver Diner. They served fresh cooked diner comfort food and the place was packed. The biscuits and gravy Lawrence ordered were surprisingly light. The fried chicken tenders I ordered were very juicy. It was a good hearty meal for a pair of weary travelers at 1am.
Saturday we rented a car from the closest place we could find that still had a small sedan available. It was still halfway to Boulder, so we drove on up to check out the area. We walked around the Pearl Street Mall and had lunch at a place called SALT. It was a cute space and they gave 2 types of salt to try with the bread. One was a black volcanic Hawaiian salt, and the other was a French fleur de sel salt. They cook seasonally and source locally, organic, and sustainable whenever possible.
Lawrence ordered the Rotisserie Chicken Pot Pie. It was certainly not traditional. The chicken and vegetables came in a wide shallow bowl and looked like a sort of creamy chicken stew. In the middle, a large square of puff pastry sat on top. I ordered the Butternut Squash Cannelloni, which came with "garlic seared chard" and sage brown butter". It was similar in concept to the traditional butternut squash ravioli in sage brown butter, but in the cannelloni pasta it practically oozed butternut squash everywhere. It was very good and in fact, Lawrence liked my dish better than his chicken pot pie.
For dessert we got the Roasted Local Honeycrisp Apple. It came with cinnamon puff pastry, brown butter walnut ice cream, and a caramel sauce. The tanginess of the apple went great with the sweetness of the other components.
Overall, we had a very enjoyable meal. Portion sizes were relatively large (I would have been super full if I had finished my entire entree). I would come back if I were in the area, but at the same time I would not necessarily go here over trying another good local restaurant.
Saturday we rented a car from the closest place we could find that still had a small sedan available. It was still halfway to Boulder, so we drove on up to check out the area. We walked around the Pearl Street Mall and had lunch at a place called SALT. It was a cute space and they gave 2 types of salt to try with the bread. One was a black volcanic Hawaiian salt, and the other was a French fleur de sel salt. They cook seasonally and source locally, organic, and sustainable whenever possible.
Lawrence ordered the Rotisserie Chicken Pot Pie. It was certainly not traditional. The chicken and vegetables came in a wide shallow bowl and looked like a sort of creamy chicken stew. In the middle, a large square of puff pastry sat on top. I ordered the Butternut Squash Cannelloni, which came with "garlic seared chard" and sage brown butter". It was similar in concept to the traditional butternut squash ravioli in sage brown butter, but in the cannelloni pasta it practically oozed butternut squash everywhere. It was very good and in fact, Lawrence liked my dish better than his chicken pot pie.
For dessert we got the Roasted Local Honeycrisp Apple. It came with cinnamon puff pastry, brown butter walnut ice cream, and a caramel sauce. The tanginess of the apple went great with the sweetness of the other components.
Overall, we had a very enjoyable meal. Portion sizes were relatively large (I would have been super full if I had finished my entire entree). I would come back if I were in the area, but at the same time I would not necessarily go here over trying another good local restaurant.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Friday, January 28, 2011
50 SF Treats to eat before you die
http://www.7x7.com/eat-drink/big-sweet-sf-50-treats-eat-you-die
I've already had a few items from this list -
- Egg tarts from Golden Gate Bakery - Sadly, they're not the same as they used to be before their pastry chef died.
- Sam's Sundae from Bi-Rite Creamery - DELISH! Didn't realize that Tartine was right next door too.
While I haven't had the items on the list, I've had other items from these purveyors of desserty goodness:
- Three Twins Ice Cream
- Humphrey Slocombe
- Chow
- Dynamo Donut
I've already had a few items from this list -
- Egg tarts from Golden Gate Bakery - Sadly, they're not the same as they used to be before their pastry chef died.
- Sam's Sundae from Bi-Rite Creamery - DELISH! Didn't realize that Tartine was right next door too.
While I haven't had the items on the list, I've had other items from these purveyors of desserty goodness:
- Three Twins Ice Cream
- Humphrey Slocombe
- Chow
- Dynamo Donut
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
New music
The latest new music I've been listening to is the Tron: Legacy Soundtrack! Daft Punk did a great job. I only wish the tracks were longer and that there were more of them. My favorites so far:
The more clubby tracks are:
Castor
Derezzed
End of Line
The tracks that sound more like soundtrack pieces are:
Flynn Lives
Encom Part II
Fall
I wondered why the older actor guy from the original movie seemed familiar... he's The Dude!!!
The more clubby tracks are:
Castor
Derezzed
End of Line
The tracks that sound more like soundtrack pieces are:
Flynn Lives
Encom Part II
Fall
I wondered why the older actor guy from the original movie seemed familiar... he's The Dude!!!
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
soo behind...
... on everything!
I need to
- clean the apartment
- do laundry & put clothes away
- clear out the fridge
- bake cookies
- come up with (late) Christmas presents
- finish knitting my left mitten
- finish the shawl on the triangle loom
- start a new lace shawl - Jared Flood's Juneberry Shawl
- hem pants
- dry clean pants
- farm mats for tailoring & alchemy transmutes
- organize yarn stash
- start cooking dinners again
- exercise
- get birthday presents
- organize financial stuff
- work on side programming projects
- work on planning for a website for dad
I need to
- clean the apartment
- do laundry & put clothes away
- clear out the fridge
- bake cookies
- come up with (late) Christmas presents
- finish knitting my left mitten
- finish the shawl on the triangle loom
- start a new lace shawl - Jared Flood's Juneberry Shawl
- hem pants
- dry clean pants
- farm mats for tailoring & alchemy transmutes
- organize yarn stash
- start cooking dinners again
- exercise
- get birthday presents
- organize financial stuff
- work on side programming projects
- work on planning for a website for dad
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Cookie Baking
A little while back, I bought the Martha Stewart Cookie book. The lime meltaway cookies that I made from a recipe on a cooking blog I follow was based on the one from Martha Stewart's book. I wanted to make my way through lots of cookies (probably not all as a few of them require specialized molds). I started off with 3 - the Honey Florentines, the Gingersnap Palmiers, and the Cornmeal Thyme Cookies. I made these on Thanksgiving morning with the idea that I'd have some to give out to family later that day.
The honey florentines seemed a little bit off... too sticky and not crunchy enough. I wanted to try adding chocolate to them. It seemed like a good idea at the time... but then I realized that I didn't have enough time to let the chocolate harden enough so it wouldn't get smeared, or even (if I were overly ambitious) to attempt to temper the chocolate so it wouldn't melt at body temperature. So in the end, these were a failure. Lawrence and I ended up eating these.
The Gingersnap Palmiers were interesting. They weren't completely made from scratch as they called for frozen puff pastry dough. The sauce used to glaze the dough had raw grated ginger, molasses, and black pepper in it. After the dough was brushed with glaze and rolled up, it had to be wrapped and frozen for a few hours. Then, it was sliced. My first batch, I let it bake for slightly too long because I was pressed for time and had to shower. I was mad at myself for making such a stupid mistake. These failed too, but I still ended up eating them. I think the molasses glaze made them look darker and they weren't actually as burnt as they looked. I didn't take any pictures of these. I did bake more later, and those turned out beautiful. I brought some to Lawrence's family's Thanksgiving dinner. I also gave a bag to my parents when we went out for my brother's birthday. Sadly, I forgot to take pictures of the good ones!
Third was the cornmeal thyme cookies. I had to run out on Thanksgiving morning to buy the fresh thyme and dried currants used in these cookies. Other than those ingredients, these were a breeze to make. I used a medium grind cornmeal that I had in the fridge for a while. These cookies were surprisingly good, though the cornmeal was a little too coarse. I wrapped these up and gave some to my aunt and uncle as well as my parents. They don't look particularly great, but they were interesting to eat.
Lastly, today I tried making a classic chewy chocolate chip cookie. There are three kinds of chocolate chip cookies in the Martha Stewart book - soft and chewy, thin and crispy, and dense and cakey. I made the first because that's how Lawrence likes his chocolate chip cookies. At first I thought the butter might have melted too much before I started mixing in the sugar but the cookies didn't spread much so I guess not! They looked weird when taking them out of the oven - thick, brown along the bottom and edges, but undercooked-looking on top. What caused the thickness, I think, was the large sized chocolate chips I used. There was also an over-abundance of chips. I halved the recipe as I only had one cup of chocolate chips so I only made 16 cookies. Some of them also may have been a little large as the original recipe says it makes 3 dozen. Sorry the light in this picture is pretty bad. I would make color adjustments, but I don't think it would make these pasty-looking cookies any prettier.
The honey florentines seemed a little bit off... too sticky and not crunchy enough. I wanted to try adding chocolate to them. It seemed like a good idea at the time... but then I realized that I didn't have enough time to let the chocolate harden enough so it wouldn't get smeared, or even (if I were overly ambitious) to attempt to temper the chocolate so it wouldn't melt at body temperature. So in the end, these were a failure. Lawrence and I ended up eating these.
The Gingersnap Palmiers were interesting. They weren't completely made from scratch as they called for frozen puff pastry dough. The sauce used to glaze the dough had raw grated ginger, molasses, and black pepper in it. After the dough was brushed with glaze and rolled up, it had to be wrapped and frozen for a few hours. Then, it was sliced. My first batch, I let it bake for slightly too long because I was pressed for time and had to shower. I was mad at myself for making such a stupid mistake. These failed too, but I still ended up eating them. I think the molasses glaze made them look darker and they weren't actually as burnt as they looked. I didn't take any pictures of these. I did bake more later, and those turned out beautiful. I brought some to Lawrence's family's Thanksgiving dinner. I also gave a bag to my parents when we went out for my brother's birthday. Sadly, I forgot to take pictures of the good ones!
Third was the cornmeal thyme cookies. I had to run out on Thanksgiving morning to buy the fresh thyme and dried currants used in these cookies. Other than those ingredients, these were a breeze to make. I used a medium grind cornmeal that I had in the fridge for a while. These cookies were surprisingly good, though the cornmeal was a little too coarse. I wrapped these up and gave some to my aunt and uncle as well as my parents. They don't look particularly great, but they were interesting to eat.
Lastly, today I tried making a classic chewy chocolate chip cookie. There are three kinds of chocolate chip cookies in the Martha Stewart book - soft and chewy, thin and crispy, and dense and cakey. I made the first because that's how Lawrence likes his chocolate chip cookies. At first I thought the butter might have melted too much before I started mixing in the sugar but the cookies didn't spread much so I guess not! They looked weird when taking them out of the oven - thick, brown along the bottom and edges, but undercooked-looking on top. What caused the thickness, I think, was the large sized chocolate chips I used. There was also an over-abundance of chips. I halved the recipe as I only had one cup of chocolate chips so I only made 16 cookies. Some of them also may have been a little large as the original recipe says it makes 3 dozen. Sorry the light in this picture is pretty bad. I would make color adjustments, but I don't think it would make these pasty-looking cookies any prettier.
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