Fourth of July

Hubby and I waited all year for the Fourth of July. We started off our day by hiking the Stream Trail at the Redwood Regional Park in Oakland. Then we made sure to stop by the ATM to get cash for the yummy BBQed meats on sticks. Last year, my parents came to visit on the Fourth and we spent our time at Jack London Square before dinner at Yoshi's. As we walked around, we all drooled over the BBQ vendors. We were so good. We didn't eat any of it. We waited for our sushi dinner instead. So this year, we were totally looking forward to having the BBQed meats on sticks. But when we got there, there was no BBQed meat booths! We figured that they had the vendors and fireworks there every year, but I guess not! You don't know how grouchy I was. I was extremely disappointed and already had a headache from getting too much fresh air during our hike.

Anyways, we ended up going to Everett and Jones. We were so pleased when the host seated us in front of a window. But a few minutes later, he asks us to move to a smaller table. Normally, it wouldn't have really bothered me, but man, it ticked me off this time, but I politely moved. Anyways when our platter of BBQ came, I felt better. It had beef brisket, beef ribs, chicken, and beef links with the spicy and tangy sauce poured on everything. The best was the brisket. And the sides were so good. We loved the cole slaw and the cornbread muffins. The potato salad was delicious, too.

But man! I still can't believe they didn't have the BBQ! ARG!!

Here are some photos of our hike. Very beautiful!

Burmese Food Baby

I'm pregnant with a food baby!

After we checked out (and ended up spending money at) the new Berkeley Bowl West, we headed over to Alameda to go eat. We ended up at Burma Superstar. There's always a wait, but not today since we got there before the dinner crowd.

Mango Tango and Lychee Julep. Both very good, but we let it rest a bit to allow the ice to melt to cut the sweetness.Platha with Coconut Chicken Curry. Mmm!Garlic Noodles with Duck. Great texture on this thin noodle, and loved the crunch of the fried garlic pieces.Burmese Style Curry with Shrimp. Reminded us of Singapore Chili Crab, but with curry. It was good, but on the too salty side. Hubby wanted Tiger beer as he ate this. Had this dish with jasmine and coconut jasmine rice.Jackfruit and Banana Fried Rolls with Nutella (and coconut ice cream and mango sorbet)

First Days of Summer Break!!

My last day of school was Thursday, June 11th. To celebrate, we went to Katana-ya in SF. We went there for my birthday, too. Ha ha. I ordered the strawberry-milk shaved ice. I always eyed it when others ordered it. It was so yummy. When I went home last summer, my mom and I made shaved ice. I requested that we do that again when I go home this summer.

Katana-ya's shaved ice.Mom's shaved ice.
Ramen, sushi, and shaved ice made a comforting meal after hiking at the Marin Headlands in Sausalito and shopping in the city.
Isn't it beautiful? I just love it there.Neat kelp!This kelp I've seen before. I tried picking it up. It's darn heavy!!This is the beautiful scene we saw when we exited a tunnel to go to SF.

Taste of Singapore

Hi R! So, Hubby and I went to Kopitiam as you requested. Extremely friendly owners. The chef (we think) kept telling us to order the laksa when he noticed me pointing out the sign for it to Hubby. But we had ordered already and didn't want to add another dish. Everything was very good. I especially loved the roti prata. It was so crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. The chicken rice tasted just like it did in Singapore. I was so happy to see that they put the cucumbers underneath the chicken. It put a big smile on my face as I chewed.

We picked up the copy of the menu to plan for another dinner there (soon, I hope). I heard the chef say that he'll be going back to Singapore for three weeks soon so maybe we'll go when he's back.

A coconut flavored sago dessert with caramel and strawberries.Braised Curry Pork. The curry and the cabbage in it was very good, but unfortunately the pork was tough.Chicken Rice. Mmmm....Roti Prata with curry dipping sauce.

Three Meals!

On Friday we went to Bui Contemporary Vietnamese Restaurant in Berkeley. We saw it before and decided to try it. We ordered the fried calamari with alioli sauce for appetizer. It was good. It had a light panko crust and the calamari itself was cooked so perfectly. It was soft; not chewy. So the meal started out alright. Then our entrees came. Hubby ordered a hotpot of Chilean Sea Bass in carmelized sauce. It was so overly sweet. There were no other ingredients in there. No onions or anything. Just a few chunks of fish. And I ordered roasted eggplant with minced chicken sauce. Yup, it sounds like that dish I made, right? Yeah, I decided to order it to compare. It had the basil in it for color and taste. It was pretty tasty. On the salty side. And the eggplant had a nice roasted flavor but there was only one small eggplant in there. The portion was ridiculous. The rice we got was $1.50 a bowl, and the bowl was so tiny. It was a little bigger than a teacup. Maybe I exaggerate, but there was definitely not enough to eat with that flavorful entree I got. The total bill came out close to $60. It was so not worth it there.

So when we decided to eat out on Saturday, we made sure to pick a cheap but yummy place to make up for Friday's dinner. Hubby looked at the 2007 Bargain Bite that the SF Chronicle puts out every year and found a Chinese place in Oakland Chinatown called Shan Dong. It was a grungy place with red Chinese lanterns. What was a little shock for me was that we were greeted by a smile and taken to our table. And what I noticed was that the language I heard spoken there be the guests was mainly English. There a lot of young cool people like us of different backgrounds eating there. So, immediately I felt comfortable there. We ordered the 5 dishes for $31.50. There are about 35 dishes you can choose from. The one thing I was disappointed with that deal was that there were no noodle dishes there. We read that they make the noodles themselves. The photos below are what we ordered. Everything was really good. The deal even came with a bowl of soup. It was hot and sour soup, not just a cabbage soup, but a real soup! We decided that since all the dishes were so yummy, we'll come back to order their noodle dishes next time. This place will definitely be one of regular places to eat. We loved the fact that this meal lasted us for two more meals. We had the leftovers for lunch and dinner. So for $31.50 plus tax and tip, we got three good meals from it. We tipped a little more because they actually poured tea for us when they came to our table. Oh! And this place actually takes cards and delivers for free to our area! This place made up for Bui and then some.

Salt and Pepper Pork Chop
Dry Braised Green Beans
Shan Dong Chicken
Fish Fillet with Cream Corn
Broccoli with Beef

Fog City Diner

During Spring Break, we went to Fog City Diner in SF for my birthday dinner. We've been there once and I just loved their fried calamari. They're light and crispy and mixed in there are fried onions and jalapeno! Yum!! And it comes with a spicy and garlicky lime dipping sauce. Hubby ordered crabcakes for his appetizer. I didn't care for it. For our entrees we got Red Curry Mussel Stew and Chicken Schnitzel with broccolini and lemon caper sauce. The stew got too sweet as it cooled. And my schnitzel was edible but everything on my plate only tasted of butter. It's as if Paula Deen cooked it for me. So I wouldn't recommend it unless you're a butter lover like her. Oh... But that calamari... It makes me want to get a deep fryer. And I want to make that dipping sauce and put it on everything.

At home, Hubby presented me with a chocolate cupcake from Miette that he had secretly bought when we had gone to the Ferry Building earlier in the evening. It was very moist and perfectly sweet. I tasted the freshness of the vanilla frosting, but I didn't care for it and ended up scraping it off. We ate it with a petite bottle of Prosecco. It was our first time, and we enjoyed it very much.

Yummy Saturday

I made Mochiko Chicken Wings yesterday. I got the recipe from a mochi cookbook from Hawaii. The flavor is so similar to the Sesame Chicken my mom makes. Only, sorry to say, this mochi chicken recipe is better. So here's the blurry photo of it.
Then, during the evening, we went to the city to have dinner at Schnitzelhaus for a friend's 30th birthday dinner. It was such a loud fun place. It was decorated with tons of antlers. I never had German food. I really wanted a sausage but ended up getting a schnitzel instead. Never had a schnitzel so I thought I should try it at an authentic place. It was so good. It was breaded so well. And I loved the lemon sauce it came with. Sounds like other guests who had the schnitzel wished they had gotten one with some kind of sauce. So, I'm glad I did. I was so happy that I had leftovers just so that I can have it home again. And I did. Still good!! Hubby had a pork leg. It was big. He said that he wouldn't get it again. Oh, and the restaurant has super large boot glasses for beer. I think a live human can wear it!

Vegas

We went to Vegas this week. We took the Zagat guide for Vegas my hubby got from work. It was so wrong in recommendations. So our first day of eating sucked. We went to Cravings for buffet food. I was so disappointed that almost all the cakes were sugarless. Sugarless cake?! Fortunately, I found a chocolate mousse cake that was so yummy. We went to Isla Mexican Restaurant and Tequila Bar and had a really good meal on the second day. We were served with chips and salsa. Ohhh!!! It came with salsa fresca, chipotle salsa, and tomatillo salsa. Yum!! We ordered Mexican Cucumber cocktails. It was strong but had the sweet, refreshing taste of cucumber. It was garnished with a dried chili pepper. So the last sip of the drink was spicy. We had a steak pyramid and a BBQed shortrib. The steak was good but just needed some salt. The shortrib was a bit too sweet for my taste. We ended the meal with flan. The most perfect flan ever!!

On our last day in Vegas, we went to Carnegie Deli. Hubby had the humongo pastrami and I had the chicken noodle soup and the most delicious grilled cheese sandwich ever. It was crispy on the outside and oozed with gooey, salty American cheese.

Leno and Izakaya

Oooh! I've tried several new places this month. We had Japanese food again with our friends in SF. This time, we had izakaya food. Oh, but on our way to meet up with our friends, we came across a crowd at Union Square. When we looked into the crowd, I saw a large chin and white hair. Yup. Jay Leno. There was a film camera and a mic involved. Maybe Jaywalking?? Anyways... The izakaya is called Sozai and it's run by a husband and wife team. The wife is Japanese and is the chef. The husband is the head waiter who helps pick out the sake to go with the dishes. All the sake are from True Sake in the Hayes Valley neighborhood. So, I guess he's the sake sommelier. The food was really good. They had a maguro tartar for only $3!! And they have edamame hummus that's so yummy. The "Sake Sommelier" said that one of the Whole Foods is carrying it now. At the end, we made sure to get the four desserts sampler. It came with lychee ice cream with matcha sauce, green tea tiramisu, green tea panna cotta, and a ginger chocolate cake. Mari, the chef, wasn't happy with the tiramisu, so she gave us full portions of everything else. I would probably go back there again. It was weird though because no one was there in the restaurant. But once we got seated several more guests trickled in. Must be a late night place.

Another Japanese place we checked out is a sushi place my sister found in Monterey Park on Garvey. It's called Sorafune. Another hubby and wife team. This time the wife is the waitress and the hubby is the chef. The place isn't even an year old but getting business. Very fresh there, and the wife is quite proud that the green tea is from Japan.

Missing Mom's Grilled Fish

To make up for the yucky food we had last weekend, we decided and hoped to have better luck this weekend. I have been craving for grilled salted fish like my mom makes, so last night we went to Norikonoko in Berkeley again. We went there last year but haven't gone since. It's a Japanese place that serves homestyle cooking. So it serves robata style food, oden, and noodle soup dishes. No sushi chef there. It's pricey but really good. When you get there, you have to open a sliding door. Cool, huh? And when you go in, it's a little place and you feel like you walked into a Japanese family's home. It's cluttered with knickknacks all over the place. And the kitchen is not in the back somewhere, it's right there. You can even sit at the bar facing the kitchen. So, it's like a sushi bar, but without the sushi. It's a Japanese husband and wife team that does everything. When we got in, one of first thing I hear in Japanese from the husband chef is, "Have them sit there, that couple is about to leave," to the server. Right away, I remember that the husband is very tough on his servers. He is one of those strict Japanese guys. He's like Gordon Ramsay in Hell's Kitchen. He's always yelling at them. I had forgotten that about him, and the warm cozy feeling of eating food that my mom makes was then met with a feeling of awkwardness. Just hearing him constantly chiding the young servers made me feel bad for them. I felt like being there put them in that bad situation. But I was still excited to eat. My husband ordered the the maguro yamakake for appetizer and miso ramen with char-siu pork. The maguro was so good. The maguro was good - dark red color, firm, and fresh. I got the grilled salted sanma (pike fish) with daikon oroshi. I don't like daikon oroshi, but decided not to say anything about it when I ordered it. I was scared of the chef yelling at me for not eating his daikon or something. So for $15, the fish came with a bowl of rice, pickled veggies, miso soup, salad, orange slice, and two sidedishes. They were boiled spinach with ponzu sauce and nikujaga. I liked everything, but the nikujaga. I never liked nikujaga. Don't like it that it's sweet. The fish was so yummy. It was lightly salted and thankfully, it came with the daikon oroshi on the side. And a wedge of lemon! That's how I grew up eating it - with some lemon juice. It was very yummy until I noticed that they don't clean out the fish. So all fish meat that touched the innard part tasted bitter. I wasn't happy about that. My husband got a mini BBQ to use on our balcony, so I hope I can make this on my own when he has it all set up.Maguro Yamakake
Miso Ramen with Char-siu Pork

Untastiest Weekend

Last weekend, we had very bad food experiences. We went to International Blvd. in East Oakland to try a Vietnamese place my husband found on Yelp.com. It's called Cam Huong Cafe. We wanted the BBQ pork sandwich and it got good reviews there. Well, out of 26 reviewers, it got four out of five stars. When we arrived, we were met with a coughing homeless guy in front of the entrance. When we got inside, it looked hopeful when we saw a line in there. Thought that it was weird that a lot of the prepared food like the spring rolls, bento-like plates, and desserts were on a shelf without any refrigeration though... Well, we got in line and noticed that there were tables that were not cleared off yet. And that really put off my husband. So we decided to take it home. My husband got the grilled pork sandwich, and I got the BBQ pork sandwich. I also ordered the Thai ice tea which tasted standard. But my husband got a sugar cane juice. It was so yummy! It was sweet but it had a citrus taste to it that made it quite refreshing. Our sandwiches were... blech! My pork was the red char-siu pork. I was surprised that it didn't really have the bold flavor. The jalapeno slice gave it the spiciness. The bread was good - it had the crispiness. Oh, and the pickled veggies didn't have its pickle flavor that I love so much! My husband's tasted a lot better, but not good enough. He said that it tastes better than Lee's Sandwiches. I disagreed. I would much rather have Lee's. Ever since I had a fresh one at Pho 89 in Richmond, I compare all banh mi to it. The sandwiches my husband gets from SF are also very good. Anyways, we will not be going back there again even though the sandwiches were super-duper cheap.

We also tried Boran Thai Restaurant in Berkeley. We didn't know what to eat, so we drove around until something caught our eye. I saw a cozy looking place as we drove by this place, so we went. It looked very similar to another Thai place we've tried before, but after looking at the menu, I realized that it was a different place. Anyways, that's not the point. When we sat down, we were given a basket of those fried fat chips thingies (is that what it is?) with a side of sweet dipping sauce. The place is definitely homey. I liked that atmosphere. So, we ordered a calamari appetizer, a BBQ pork dish, and a dish that sounded like the fried tofu and eggplant dish we had at Thai Basil in Fullerton. While we waited, we got a soup of just chicken broth with chopped cabbage in it. It was so simple and very yummy. So I was very excited to get my food. When we did... Oh my... How can anyone mess up on Thai cuisine?! All the flavors of Thai cuisine are yummy and so boldly flavorful. You're using the best flavors!! And all the dishes we got came out super sweet. We didn't finish eating everything. Our server looked was this grandpa looking guy who was so smiley and sweet. This was the only time I was ever glad that when the server came to check on us, that my mouth was full. He asked if everything was okay, and I just gave a polite nod with, "Mm-hmm." Later when he asked if we were done, we asked for boxes. We didn't have the heart to tell him that we didn't want to take the leftover home. We then walked over to Andronico's and got salt and vinegar potato chips to balance the sweet taste in my mouth. We then left the leftovers by a trashcan in front of Walgreens where I know I've seen homeless people hang out before. As soon as we got home, we checked it out on Yelp.com, of course. I don't know why people like it. *sigh*

Pain in My Tummy

That's me in the emergency room.

These little succulent morsels are probably what got me there. But we will never know for sure.

This is what I taught my hubby to make for me today. Okayu (rice porridge usually served when you're sick) with umeboshi (pickled plum).

Let's see... Without going into the embarassing details... On Monday starting after lunch and up through bedtime, my stomach wasn't feeling that great. Earlier that evening, we decided to go to Luka's Taproom and Lounge. We've been there a few times for only cockails. Our friends told us that you can get one dollar oysters every Monday there. So we decided to go and try their entrees as well. The entrees weren't good. But the oysters were so good. We ordered a half dozen more, in fact. Our only complaint was that they were not all consistent sizes. There were puny ones that should have only been charged fifty cents!

Then, the next day on Tuesday, my husband and I headed out to the city to check out the cute stores on Hayes St. in Hayes Valley and then go to the Giant Robot store in Haight-Ashbury. When we were shopping on Hayes St., I spotted Patxi's Chicago Pizza. I was so excited because my friend told me about how it's supposed to be the rival of East Bay's Zachary's Chicago Pizza. So, I wanted to try it. We went there around 3pm and ordered a slice each of the spinach and mushroom deep-dish pizza. It was a lot less gloppier than Zachary's. And I was able to taste the flavor of the spinach. Overall, it was good, but I think I still crave for Zachary's. I don't know what it is. I think I'll have to go to Zachary's and try again. Hee hee!

Oops. Better stop with the food commentary. So anyhow, maybe around 5pm when we were in Haight-Ashbury, I had to go to the bathroom. Didn't feel too urgent, but I had this pain in my stomach like the squeezing pain you get when you have the stomach flu. So, right then, I thought that something's not right with me. As we finally headed home, we made a stop at the San Francisco Shopping Center to use the restroom before hopping onto BART to head back to Oakland. The squeezing pain kept occuring once in awhile, but it was nothing compared to the urgency of needing a restroom once I was waiting for BART. I was so miserable on BART and then the walk back to the apartment was excruciating! Once I got to the apartment, I ran for the bathroom. After that was all over, that squeezing pain just became worse. It was sharp and would stab me several times and then stop for awhile and start again. It was worse than the pain from the flu. It was so bad that I felt the saliva coming to the sides of my mouth so that I felt like vomiting. So then, Hubby took me to the emergency room.

I was tested and asked questions by the nurses and the doctor. Basically he found nothing wrong with me. He said that it's one of those things where we will never know what it is that caused this. He said that it may be food poisoning even though Hubby ate everything I did. He said that it's normal to have a thousand people eating the same contaminated food and half the people would be fine and the other half get sick. So, I got 2 cold bags of fluids put in me since I was so dehydrated. He said that that would relieve the pain in my stomach since it was so empty. I feel a lot better today. I still get the squeezing pain once in awhile, but it's a lot tolerable. The funny thing is, my mother-in-law called yesterday before we headed out to the city to ask if we were feeling fine; she knew we had eaten oysters. She had heard that oysters were recalled in Washington so she was concerned for us. At the time she called, I was fine. Oh! Another funny thing is that while we were at ER, there was a 3.2 earthquake! The epicenter was right there in Oakland.

I emailed the friends who recommended Luka's Monday $1 Oysters and Patxi's pizza the photos of me in ER. Hee hee. Giving them a hard time for their recommendations. *wink wink* So, I think out of all the things we've had, it had to be the oysters. I don't think I'll have $1 oysters anymore. I'll only eat it if maybe I fish it out of clear waters myself during peak safe and yummy season. And no dolphin better have pee-ed on it!

My hubby just told me a funny thing. He said that he was worried for me because if anything were to happen to me last night, I wouldn't have finished "Harry Potter". Hahahahaha! Yes, he is so right!

Ici Ice Cream

I've passed by this ice cream store several times on my way to a pet bird store on the same street. It's very cute and I always check to see what flavors they have. It's by a Chez Panisse protege named Mary Canales. They have sorbets and ice creams with adventurous flavors like habenero or raspberry lemon and verbena. She uses fresh, in season ingredients so it's constantly changing. It's a bit pricey but the sign says that the ice cream is made there on site. There's always a customer in there getting ice cream. This time, my husband and I couldn't ignore it. We saw many people walking around with ice cream in their hands and the line was going out the door. And it was such a beautiful warm day - perfect ice cream weather. So, when we passed by it a second time, we stood in line. Maybe it's because I will finally start working soon that splurging on fancy handmade ice cream didn't seem like a bad idea. I only later remembered to take a photo of the ice cream. That's why the ice cream is half eaten. I got green tea flavor. Not an original flavor but my test was to see if she gets it right. It didn't have the typical matcha color but the flavor and texture was spot on. Yum!! And I got mine on a cone. The cone had a surprise for me. There was chocolate at the end of it. Hubby got candied lime and orange ice cream. I had a taste and it was too tart for me, but he liked it. I'll definitely try other flavors again especially since it didn't give me a stomachache. *Wink* Check out the review and photos of the beautiful ice cream creations on Yelp.com. Just type in "Ici" and it's located in Berkeley.