$60 dinner roll...

Stay tuned for a post at the end of this week where I will attempt to delineate every grocery purchased and how it went into making a variety of marvelous lunches with few ingredients.

Meanwhile, I took a walk over to Chelsea Market during my lunch hour. (http://www.chelseamarket.com/) For those of you not in the know, Chelsea Market is an old warehouse space that spans a whole city block, and has lots of amazing little specialty food shops, bakeries, etc. It's awesome.

Now there's apparently an Anthropologie store attached to it. Let's just say the little dinner roll I bought to go with my chicken salad cost me about $60 in incidental expenses.

Photos on Friday.

Legendary Dining

Yesterday I ate lunch at a legendary restaurant. Chez Panisse, which opened in 1971, is credited as the birthplace of California Cuisine, where importance is placed on fresh, seasonal, local produce. I went with my parents to celebrate my birthday and my mom's birthday. We went all out.

Lunch is served upstairs in what is known as The Cafe. As we were shown to the back of the restaurant we walked past the exposed kitchen with several people busily preparing beautiful food.

I had a glass of Savignon Blanc, as I often do.

The salad had medallions of goat cheese covered in amazingness which was something like bread crumb. The spring greens were tasty, but unremarkable.

For my entrée, I ordered duck. Not a dish I often have, but this duck was amazing. The outside was crispy, and the meat was moist. The flavor was awesome. The greens on the side were also remarkable. I'm also not sure what kind of greens they were, other than the green beans, and the menu online is incorrect. They change the menu daily, so let's not judge harshly.

Dessert we all wanted the coconut ice cream with chocolate sauce. Duh. But rather than have 3 of the same dessert on the table, I ordered Panna Cotta, which was so good I forgot to take a picture until it was gone. The coffee was also fantastic, and I enjoyed drinking coffee after a big meal, as I usually have to abstain in order to sleep at night.

So the verdict: Chez Panisse is awesome for it being the first restaurant of its kind. It is still a high quality eating experience, and I recommend it when traveling to Berkeley. There are other restaurants I have been to that are just as good at local, seasonal food. For example, in Manhattan Hundred Achers is awesome, and in Brooklyn Rose Water. Both change the menu frequently and offer delicious seasonal, local fare.

Thai Tofu in California

The rumors are true.

I've left NYC. Not on tour or temporarily, but for reals. I'm currently vacationing in Sacramento, at my parents house.

But the blogging will continue.

Yesterday I decided to make dinner. I asked Pamela for a vegetarian suggestion (my parents are vegetarians, as you may recall.)

She sent me a recipe for Thai Style Baked Tofu.

The following ingredients were in the house:

marinade

Sesame oil

Soy Sauce

Canola Oil

Garlic

Ginger, Red Pepper

sauce

Peanut Butter

Basil

I had to buy:

Tofu $3

Red Pepper $1

Limes $1

Scallion $1

Mint $.30

The dried mint posed complication in procuring ingredients. There was a bottle for $6 at Raley's, a large grocery chain. $6 on enough dry mint for a lifetime seemed unnecessary. I went to Elliot's, a natural food store, where they sell spices in bulk. I couldn't find the spices right away, so I passed the samples several times to try sesame sticks and chocolate peanuts. They were delish. Eventually the spices were discovered, and I went to work, combing through the alphabetically arranged spices for Mint. I can't find it. I keep looking through the Ls, the Ns if maybe it was misplaced. And I still don't find it. I am about to give up. I even look at tea to see if any of them are pure mint leaves, and then it dawns on me! I go back to the wall of alphabetical spices and I scan the letter P, and I find Peppermint!!!

This recipe was super easy and tasty. There was rice and steamed broccoli to accompany the tofu. There was rice in the house, I think the Broccoli was $2.

Thanks Pamela for a great recipe.

Other Fish in the sea...

Well, hmmm.

This was an honest-to-goodness attempt to incorporate more fish into my diet. I dutifully bought some unassuming-looking tilapia at the fish monger on route to work, thoroughly researched some interesting ways to prepare it, schlepped it back to my apartment to commence cooking, and then promptly decided to meet up with Eva for cocktails and Big Buck Hunter. (You will never beat me, Blank. Never.)

So I ended up throwing it in the oven in the morning with a little salt, pepper, and olive oil, and sticking it on a bed of arugula and barley. The verdict? Meh. Probably didn't help that I didn't feel like heating it up at lunchtime, since it was hot out and I've been spending my Eva-less lunch hours going for a run. But there you go.

Tilapia: $1.85
Barley: like, 6 cents? Seriously.
Arugula: $.75

Would anyone be grossed out if I attempted bringing ceviche for lunch?

Whoever Said Orange was the New Pink Was Seriously Deranged

But carrot soup sure is tasty.

Carrots, leeks, thyme, olive oil, garlic: $3.65ish from Amish Market, 'cause it was Sunday and late, but I would not start Monday off with takeout. Just not gonna do it.

Eva and I ate here last night: http://rosewaterrestaurant.com/. Delightful.

You Give Lunch a Bad Name

Can I get points for commitment?

This morning I was rushed and this assortment of edibles has to qualify as perhaps my least interesting offering thus far. But I humbly present it here as evidence that I am back on/under the lunch-blogging wagon, and committed to sharing my lunch with you. Sort of.

Whatever:
Potatoes: $.30
Arugula: $.50
Chicken: $2 (yeah, I cooked a batch. You'll see it again tomorrow, so get ready.)
Truthfully, it was all kind of tasty.




The title of this post requires a shout-out to my colleague Dave, who presented the idea of replacing the word "love" with the word "lunch" in any song lyrics. We have yet to actually do this karaoke-style, but I have a handful of favorites:

What about lunch? Don't you want someone to care about you?
Lunch stinks, yeah yeah.
i want your s**; I want your lunch.

Holy Spicy Blueberries, Batman!

And Holy Two Days in a Row!

This was from a recipe I pulled from a magazine of my mother's. I have often enjoyed the combo of corn and blueberries together. (Really, it works.) I got a little overzealous with the jalapenos, perhaps, and the sitting overnight caused the whole thing to be a bit spicy.



Ingredients from TJ's:
Corn: $.50
Blueberries: $1.50
Cucumber: $.70
onion, cilantro, lime juice, olive oil, honey, cumin: negligible
Super fancy happy free roaming and seed-eating chicken: $2

Super fancy happy free roaming and chicken-eating Pamela: priceless.