My New Toaster

Hold on to your hats, kids, it's about to get krazy up in here. After much deliberation and dissappointment, (The toaster oven which I wanted was unavailable) I decided to get the old traditional push down toaster, because, really, if I need an oven, I'll just use the oven, right? I mean, c'mon now.

I don't want to unneccessarily withhold the pay off here simply for dramatic reasons, so I'll go ahead and tell you what you've been dying to know, I got the Black and Decker two slice toaster.


Gave it a test run with nothing in it, just to cook off whatever residual factory junk, lead paint, and Chinese Dry Wall may be hiding in the thing- oh, that's right, good old Black and Decker, now proudly made in the People's Republic of China; and then woo-hoo, threw in a bagel, (Being able to fit a bagel has been an integral part in my decision making process for toasters) and boo, fail, apparently setting 4 ain't enough, even though I pressed the special bagel button, which manages a sort of top brown function, even though the bagels are vertical (Modern science). So, being the patient, intuitive, and capable man I am, I did another round at setting 4, and am proud to share with you the following results. The next step is to find a place in LA with even remotely acceptable bagels. I'm open to suggestions.

Hand roll party with Eric and Kumi.

Hand roll party with Eric and Kumi in Santa Monica, and first stop was Nijiya. I begged to come along so I could pick up the inner secret arts of sourcing good supplies and the best ingredients. Eric, my 6'3" red-headed buddy from San Diego, and his Fiance, Kumi, of Chiba, Japan, led me through the store, explaining the difference in grades of rice and nori, and how to find good fish. And then, I got a special Lychee soda with a little glass ball you push down into the drink which is a special treat for the Japanese kids at carnivals...


Always the most awesome hosts, these guys treated me to their favorite Sake, not even available in the US. I believe the translation was something like, Hatchi Shui San, or 8 Ocean Mountain, or Mr 8 Ocean- as San, or mountain, is also, our equivalent of Mister, you know, like Daniel-San... Hopefully Eric will send me some of the pictures of the meal and of Kumi preparing our magnificent feast, because it was AWESOME!

Rustic Canyon

Anybody who has a problem with this place, clearly didn't have the experience we just did last night. Or maybe they just suck. (That's the reviewer, not Rustic Canyon which kicks some quite serious ass). My friends Eric and Kumi suggested we go there, and I'm glad they did.

First of all, and I say first, because this is my greatest love, they have a SERIOUS wine list, with tons of fairly priced wines, so if you don't get a bottle for the table, you're missing out. We started with an '05 single vineyard Premier Cru Red Burg from Maranges for $55! (Click on the photo above for a closer look at Maranges and the particular vineyard, "La Fussiere", it's up in the dark red part, which are the p-cru vineyards) That's less than $15 a glass! You could easily drop that on any range of so-so Cali crap at ANY place in Santa Monica, so to be able to find what we did, and '05 no less, I consider that a nice score.

We sat at the bar with any extremely attentive, knowledgeable, and friendly guy whose name I've forgotten, but he did a great job. And when I had some overly wine geeky questions for him, rather than bullshit me, he got somebody who could answer my questions. MORE points for the team.
Onto the food: We had :

Crispy Polenta which was really pretty fuckin awesome. I got it because of the other raves here on yelp, and YUP, dopeness. Beautiful mushrooms and a sunny side up egg with some grated parmigiano-reggiano. Order this.

Kumi wanted:

The burger which I was going to pass on because, there are so many good burgers in LA, and I didn't want my new crush to fail to stack up, but no, the burger rocked too. I won't go as far as Eric and Kumi who feel it was the best burger they've had in LA, only because I can't splash all over EVERYTHING this place does, I mean, Damn, I already gave them five stars...

Next, we had:

The Chicken, which was, yeah, I'm going to say it, the best Chicken I've had while here in LA, maybe rivaled only by the prep I had in NYC at Gramercy Tavern. It was juicy and flavorful, really bursting with excellence, and cooked JUST RIGHT. Like secretly cooked just right, with a magic meat thermometer that tells you, pull it out now, cause it's not done yet, but I know you chef, and the extra 45 seconds you'll take to finish chopping will make this just regular done, and I want it awesome, so come over here right now, and get this bird out! It's true, they have magic meat thermometers at this place.

Finally, we had the Lamb Meat Balls, which, were the weakest link, being, MERELY (and notice how I stress MERELY) very good. Not the heights of awesome that the rest of the meal was, but not enough to detract. A little bit of Imperfection that heightened the love of everything else- like the faintest whisper of yellow green in the bruises on a stripper's leg at Jumbo's Clown Room. Somehow, you can infer she slipped while dancing on the roof of some unwilling taxi in last week's Lakers' riot. Those heels are slippery, who could fail to treat that little imperfection with a bit of understanding? Not me, I tell you, not me...

California Bears

Went for a walk around the Hollywood Resevoir and when we got to the dam and walked over it, I noticed from peeking over the side that there were these really great busts of Bears. Sooo, being the kinda guy I am, I hopped the nearest fence and went down to have a closer look..

My Mom is such a rascal

Remember the time she grabbed a can of Ultra Flat Black from Nix, and scrawled this message to us all? So funny.

Where is this?

I know I've seen this sculpture before, and I've always loved it. But I'm drawing a blank... I think I've seen it in Boston, somewhere along the Charles. Anybody know?

Wine and Lamborghinis

Wine tasting at the Lamborghini show room today. First time I had the chance to sit in one. You know, in all honesty, I think I'm just more of an 03 Subaru guy, which just reminds how lucky and grateful I am, since that's what I've got...
Then onto Michael Mina's XIV for a lovely German tasting. All right before heading of to work to run around for five hours...

The New Pad

A near 360 degree view of the great room. Not huge, but the price is right, and I'm home. Feels so good to have my space. I feel like I've been crashing for the last 2 and a half years.