These items didn't fit anywhere else. First up, the giant donut:Chocolates in the shape of the Buddha in Berkeley: Excellent selections from Thai Boom in Culver City, this is tiny chunk of bacon-like pork chunks deep fried and served with Chinese broccoli: Green curry at Thai Boom: This was weird, I went to this fabulous restaurant supply store in CC called Surfas. They had all these whimsical but slightly scary retro foodstuff, apparently all essential for the making of carnival snacks: Dipsy Dog--don't try to make corn dogs without it! Flavocal: A raspberry in sis's backyard in LA: Beautiful potatoes at the lavish Santa Monica farmer's market: Cupcakes!!! Fish tacos in LA: An all-omlette restaurant. Why not?
In a freak coincidence, the past week has seen me floating on my back, toes pointed toward the sky, in *two* count 'em two oceans.
First: the Atlantic. Covering approximately 22% of Earth's surface, the Atlantic Ocean is second only to the Pacific Ocean in size.
Cultural significance: Moby Dick, The Great Gatsby, Hart Crane, The Pearl, The Old Man and the Sea, Jaws
Pro: always freezing cold, which is nice on the hottest, muggiest days of August.
Cons: Scary. When we went swimming on Fire Island, the swells were four feet and breaking close to the short. Strong cross-current = large chance of panic and drowning.
Second: the Pacific. Above, me at Santa Monica beach.
Cultural significance: Baywatch, Hawaii 5-O, Gauguin, Life of Pi.
Pros: bathwater warm, easy, rolling waves, lack of sharks (at least in L.A.)
Cons: too many people, slimy seaweed.
An East Coast sunset
The winner was easy--I had so much fun in the Pacific. Realizing you're not to old to body surf? Priceless.
After I satisfied my long-standing double-double fixation, I went to the Culver City Farmer's market, where there are flan stands and cops on Segeways: The catch of the Pacific: The largest peaches I've seen in a while:
Move over Treats Truck, L.A. has a cheese truck! Strawberries on steroids, the kind that comes from the California sun: Boozing it up at the Trader Joe's:
You know how everywhere frozen yogurt is the new obsession in NYC? Well, the Angelenos started it, and here's the offerings from some new Pinkberry knockoff chain. It's pink grapefruit. I like. All that foodie adventuring made me hungry. So I went home with my bag of goodies and considered the potato. Look at me! I'm a vegan now! Well, at least until tomorrow...
On the eve of a transcontinental jaunt, these notes to self: The streets are empty and filled with whimsy. Paul Thomas Anderson made me think this, Punch Drunk Love. I remember thinking, this is the way Southern California feels: flimsy, spacious, bruisey pastels. A little like a forgotten backlot. They have a vastly superior food scene. Many things have cause me to think this. Going for Okonomiyaki (savory Japanese pancakes) with a friend and her father when I was a child. My sister's hole in the wall vegetarian Indian place in a strip mall near her house. Reading Chowhound posts about Taco Trucks. Jonathan Gold's expeditions. Diddy Reese.
If accepting J.C. as my personal savior would bring an In 'n' Out to NYC, sign me up. People, come on. If you'd tried it, you'd know. Despite NY's superior literary heritage, Angelenos have Miranda July. How does she do what she does without being totally annoying? I don't know. Why can't I be more like her? The jury's still out. The music scene rules. Again, this started in childhood, Sean and I driving to the Roxy in his Ford Escort, going to see Lush or the Pixies at the Hollywood Palladium. Now I listen to Morning Becomes Eclectic every chance I get. In New York, seeing a show invariably a hassle; in L.A., enchanting singer-songwriters grow on palm trees. They work at Book Soup.
These ideas I have are crazy. I am a native Southern Californian, and I should know better.
In Chicago last weekend to see my friend Carrie graduate from law school, which ended up being the perfect opportunity to sample Chi-town's range of special regional eats from hot dogs to organic scones. This city seriously doesn't mess around with the food.
Our first stop was the Flying Saucer, which keeps it real by serving breakfast only seven days a week. It's the kind of funky, expansive, laid-back type of place that you just don't see in New York, where everything is small, and creative brunch means a quail egg sitting atop three matchsticks of taro root. This is the Midwest, people, and portions are huge: For breakfast I had a sort of hearty, everything-but-the-kitchen sink bowl of eggs, rice and tortillas. Really good!
Cupcake heaven at the Bleeding Heart Organic Bakery
But our real undoing was when we stumbled upon the Bleeding Heart Organic Bakery. Over the weekend, Josh and I must have spent forty dollars sampling the colorful cornocopia of baked goods. It was like some of New York's best bakery ideas--the cunchiness of Birdbath, the goey comfort food staples of Magnolia, the special diets focus of Babycakes and the culinary insouciance of Baked rolled into one amazing, Willy Wonka-like shop. I mean, where else can you find vegan cupcakes and an Elvis brownie made with chocolate, bananas and bacon? We tried the fruit soup, smores brownies, vegan raspberry bar, and shortbread made with artisinal salts. All amazing--the only miss here were the handmade chocolates. With a price point similar to Kee's fantastic chocolate, these came up short in the flavor department.
We had plenty of opportunity to sample Chicago's famous hot dogs--at Scooter's, with a side of the shop's famous frozen custard in a root beer float. We also hit Hot Dougs, which features a range of weird gourmet offerings named after members of the Buzzcocks and containing bacon infused duck sausage or wild boar sausage with fennel. Our favorite was blue cheese pork sausage with toasted walnuts and fiery apple salsa. We got cheese fries so as not fully embrace snobby foodiness. Chicago makes it easy to bridge high and low.
Our last meal was room service at the Chicago Marriot. Four dollars for two strips of bacon! It was worth it to not have to venture out until afternoon.
My only regret is not getting to my favorite carne asada burrito place, La Pasadita. But Chicago, trust me, I will be back!
More pictures from the foodie tour are on this flickr map.
You're either the type of person who comes alive in the presence of others, or else you need to get away from people in order really feel yourself. I mention this because I think your identification with one role or the other will probably determine much of they way you feel about Into the Wild, either the Jon Krakauer book or the Sean Penn film.
Watching the DVD the other day reminded me how engrossing I found this story when I first read the book. The hero of the nonfiction story, Christopher McCandless, aka Alexander Supertramp, really calls into question the prevailing attitude that solitude inevitably means loneliness. Conjuring an archetype honed by everyone from Henry David Thoreau to cranky naturalist and Desert Solitaire author Edward Abbey, the Krakauer book grapples deeply with a forbidding yet fascinating topic: being alone.
What would it feel like to just check out of society? Burn all your money? Spend day upon day by yourself, out in the wild? I don’t know many people who could embrace such deep solitude, so, by virtue of that accomplishment alone, I’m fascinated by McCandless.
At the same time, I know that the book and movie are both guilty of romanticizing this character. They want him to be one-of-a-kind, when certainly there are things about McCandless that are of a kind: there’s something about the guy that suggests the sort of self-righteous, fanatical hippie that probably everyone knew in college (exhibit A: when he gives himself the dopey moniker Alexander Supertramp). The hubris of a young twentysomething man--also, of a kind. The Penn film, particularly, lets McCandless of the hook for not having developed the skills to survive in the Alaskan wilderness.
Still, I was surprised how much the film was able to evoke fundamentally internal states. In both the book and the film, there is something really haunting about McCandless’s demise, when it’s certain that McCandless wasn’t feeling the life-affirming joy of self-reliance, but instead desolation…and loneliness.
How easy it is to slip between solitude and loneliness is certainly a worthy subject, and one that the book is able to cover much better than the film. But both portray a fascinating story that I think is worthy of consideration.
"And you pointed your headlamp towards the horizon We were the one thing in the galaxy God didn't have his eye on 900 cc's of raw whining power No outstanding warrants for my arrest Hi-diddle-dee-dee The pirate's life for me..."
A love for small-scale character-drive auterist masterpieces was not born in me at NYU film school. That happened much earlier, thanks to my late father, who introduced me to Raging Bull at age ten (whoa) and later, Clint Eastwood's directorial debut, Play Misty For Me.
Amazingly enough, American independent film wasn't born in a convenience store in New Jersey, or even in Austin, TX. No, way back in 1971, Clint and co. scrapped together the financing for this 16mm production which made incredible use of location photography in Carmel-by-the-Sea, including passages of the famous Highway 1. Still worth a spot on your Netflix queue, Play Misty for Me is a suspenseful precursor to Fatal Attraction with Clint as a late-night DJ stalked by an obsessed fan.
My English coworker Tom asked me the other day what's so great about Philadelphia. Well, the sixth borough of New York has got a lot going for it. Throw down twenty bucks in Chinatown, and within a couple of hours, here are all the wonderful things you can experience:
1. The Philadelphia Art Museum. Yes, it's something of a rite of passage to bound up those steps, Rocky-like, and triumphantly gaze over the whole of the city of brotherly love.
2. The Mutter Museum. A total heebie-jeebie fest, this Victorian medical museum houses body parts in formaldehyde, skeletons, and other disturbing remnants of medicine before doctors, like, knew anything about disease.
3. Hoagies. Back when I was a student at Simon's Rock, there was a weekly institution at the dining hall called "Hoagie Day." The blend of cold-cuts, shredded iceberg lettuce, oil and vinegar, and fluffy bread ensured that this was my favorite day of the week. Well, every day is hoagie day in Philly. All the focus on cheesesteaks may unfairly overshadow this deserving Philly invention. The go-to spot is Sarcone's.
4. Cheesesteaks. You go to the corner where Geno's and Pat's duke it out to see the rivalry for yourself. But don't try to start an argument about which cheesesteak is best in Philly. That's like trying to prove the existence of God.
5. Reading Terminal Market. Have you noticed how many of these reasons are about food? That's because Philly has insanely concentrated areas of foodie delights, including Reading Terminal Market and the Italian Market, so if you are still hungry after all those cheesesteaks and hoagies, you can hook up with some gourmet provisions.
6. The BYOB restaurant phenomenon. I don't really understand this, but I guess Philly has worse blue laws than NYC. So you can tote your own bottle to a schmancy restaurant like Matyson. The boon of broke gourmands everywhere.
7. Cheap real estate and cheap beer. Need I say more?
I was so enchanted by Philly on my last visit that I was inspired to begin a novel about a 30ish ne'er-do-well chef named Charlie Pepper, who takes his English girlfriend to Philly over Christmas to break up with her. You can see more about my irrational love for Philadelphia by checking out that first chapter here.
For the time being, though, Philadelphians, I salute you.
Chocolates in the shape of the Buddha in Berkeley:
Excellent selections from Thai Boom in Culver City, this is tiny chunk of bacon-like pork chunks deep fried and served with Chinese broccoli:
Green curry at Thai Boom:
This was weird, I went to this fabulous restaurant supply store in CC called Surfas. They had all these whimsical but slightly scary retro foodstuff, apparently all essential for the making of carnival snacks:
Dipsy Dog--don't try to make corn dogs without it!
Flavocal:
A raspberry in sis's backyard in LA:
Beautiful potatoes at the lavish Santa Monica farmer's market:
Cupcakes!!!
Fish tacos in LA:
An all-omlette restaurant. Why not?
