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Having tried to brave the Union Square crowds yesterday, Rick and I eventually had to admit defeat and seek shelter from the Thanksgiving sales. First off, we we tried out the new Burger Bar at Macys. This is Hubert Keller’s new casual outpost, where you can build your own burger, based on his famous high-end recipes. It’s a great new addition to downtown shopping eats, and I was thrilled to see Chef Keller very much in evidence throughout our visit. He didn’t just lend his concept to the place, he was practically bussing tables! Very exciting. And the banana milkshake? Fabulous.
Once we were full of great quality junk food, it was time to hit the movies. Rick and I have wanted to go see The Fantastic Mr Fox ever since we heard it was being adapted for the big screen. Growing up in England, and a complete bookworm, I devoured the books of Roald Dahl. Every single one. Hard to even say which is my favorite, but The Witches and The Twits are still up there for me. I loved Road Dahl because he refused to patronize kids. His books usually had a dark center and didn’t always have a traditional happy ending. He understood that kids don’t want always want or need things to be wrapped up prettily in a bow, and that the most interesting stories are those that don’t conform to the norm.
I remember loving The Fantastic Mr Fox, with its graphic descriptions of the evil farmers, Boggis, Bunce and Bean, trying to smoke out the wiley and charming Mr Fox. The movie version is also just wonderful. Filmed in stop motion animation, it feels simultaneously old-world charming and completely contemporary. What I loved the most was the very adult (but never inappropriate for kids) dialogue and interplay between the characters. These are foxes and badgers dealing with some very human emotions, such as sibling rivalry and marriage guidance! Chris Brogan, someone I admire in my working life, described it as “The Royal Tenenbaums in stop motion” and I couldn’t agree more. (They share the same director, Wes Anderson, and most of his favored actors are in both too). But there’s still enough slapstick and laugh out loud moments for children too.
George Clooney was divine as the eponymous Mr Fox, but my favorite character had to be Jason Schwartzman’s angst-ridden young cub, Ash. Very subtle intonation, but his lines were soooo good.
I’ll remain loyal to the original books, and particularly the illustrations of Quentin Blake, but this was a great movie experience, that showed that you don’t have to think at the lowest common denominator to appeal to the mass market.
Rick and I just got back from a ‘mini-moon’ – a long weekend in NYC the week after our wedding. It was great to be on the East Coast in the Fall. I love any chance to wrap up warm in cosy hats and gloves, and go walking, so this was the perfect time of year to do that.
NYC is also one of the rare times i get to bust out an outfit that doesn’t involve flip flops in some way. You know I love the West Coast, and believe me, i’m not complaining about the weather, but San Francisco is just sooooo casual. You can feel over-dressed if you wear proper shoes with no fleece! In NYC, you have to step it up a level, even for casual days. So, i enjoyed the opportunity to play a little ‘dress-up’ and glam it out at a few restaurants and bars we were dying to go to. I also kick started my wardrobe overhaul, finally!
My top NYC spots from this time around?
- CraftBar - yes, i have an obsession with Top Chef, and spent weeks literally drooling in advance after perusing the menus of Tom Colicchio’s various restaurants. CraftBar had this wonderful chicken consomme with home-made tortellini and a fresh farm egg. Delicious! Cool spot too.
- Balthazar - i still love this place! Even though they didn’t have my favorite eggs in red wine and bacon sauce this time around. An NYC classic.
- Spotted Pig – we didn’t get to eat here, but spent a very cozy and late Sunday night propping up the bar. Of course, i felt right at home, as it’s styled like a classic English pub. Albeit a classic English pub full of young New York hipsters, clawing their way to the front of the line.
- Top Shop – you can’t understand the excitement this store causes for an English girl living in the States. When will Top Shop come to San Francisco?? Poor Rick was dragged around 4 floors of fabulous, and fell asleep waiting for me to try things on. Oops! Worth it though.
- City Bakery - I don’t think Rick will ever forget the hot chocolate they serve at this place. Ridiculous. And the candied French toast? Divine. We had to go back twice for the hot chocolate alone.
- Central Park – still wonderful, even when it’s raining!
- Uniqlo – way too busy and overwhelming. But cool, stylish basics. Again, when will SF get a store?
- SoHo – just in general. My favorite part of the city, no doubtt.
Here are a few snaps of the stay – enjoy!
Balthazar
What used to be Buddha Bar
City of contradictions
Again, the contradictions
Coolest revolving door EVER
NYC nights
The elevator at Tiffany. Sigh.
Window dressing
Guess who?
Ugly beautiful
Cental Park
View from our hotel room
Flying the flag in SoHo!
A little macabre in SoHo
Along with the outrageously good SYTYCD and Glee, the other show that makes my Wednesday night TV viewing party complete is Top Chef. I’ve been on the bandwagon since Season One, which aired in the first few months of me moving to San Francisco. The first season was actually set in the city itself, which made it even better, as it helped orient me a little to the foodie culture here.
I never get tired of a good TC episode. Even when they’re bad or boring, they’re never bad or boring! I’m not sure what it is about the show that people love so much (whatever it is, it clearly wasn’t Katie “Fembot” Lee Joel, as she was replaced with Padma Lakshmi after the first run), but for me, it boils down to a couple of choice ingredients. Sorry. Had. To. Pun. Personal drama, great food, and challenging situations. The perfect episode is when the three mix to create something amazing, but I’m not gonna lie – sometimes the personal drama just makes the show!
So then, here is my Top Chef Top 10 . Of course, they’re in no particular order, and I recommend you wasting a rainy day sometime soon watching one of Bravo’s marathon stints. But, the reasons I love it so much:
1) Best cheftestant – No question, has to be Tiffani Faison, the flame haired bad ass of Season One. I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking that Tiff was badly mis-represented in the show. To me, she was just someone who was straight up about wanting to win, put her best into everything she did and demanded that everyone else do the same. In my book, that just makes you a formidable competitor and an effective one, not a b**tch. I loved Tiffani and her food. That pumpkin ravioli in the first ever episode? Oh my gosh. And looks like I’m not alone in my assessment, right Tom Colicchio??
2) Most mouthwatering dish – Hmm, tricky, as there has been so much great food over the last 6 seasons or so, but I think I’m going to have to go with the roasted chicken with tomato and corn salad that got served up at Dan Barber’s Blue Hill at Stone Barns, by Season 5 cheftestants, Jamie, Steffan and Carla. That dish had me craving roast chicken for weeks afterward, and actually motivated me to try a similar dish. Top Chef in inspiring people to cook shocker!
3) Best overall season – Yep, I’m going to have to stick with a classic and say Season One. Start with it being set in San Francisco, throw in an awe-inspiring trip to Napa, the best cast of contestants EVER, and the hilarious bitchiness from Dave and Stephen, and you have me sold. I also love the fact that some of the challenges were just really hard core (remember the original wedding challenge? Rough!), even though they got modified and made a little easier over subsequent seasons. Yes, it was lower budget and less glossy. But i think it was better for it.
4) Most drama-filled episode – Of course, you know which one I’m going to say. Remember in Season 2, when Cliff tried to hold Marcel down to shave his head and got thrown out of the competition? That was actually a little disturbing to watch, and went waaay beyond being a cooking competition. Seeing the judge’s reactions to the row of bald heads they were presented with the morning after was pretty funny though. And come on, didn’t you feel just a little bad for Marcel? Which brings me to…
5) Most mis-represented cheftestant – Even more so than Tiff, I think Marcel got a really bad rap, and I staunchly defended him throughout Season 2! Ok, so he might have been a little annoying at times, but I never saw him do anything that deserved the verbal kicking he repeatedly got on that show from the others. Especially Betty. Really Betty? Your slow-roasted soups were all that? I don’t think so… Unfair, unfair!
6) Guy who shoulda won and didn’t - Ok, I do think Stephanie was very talented, and I don’t begrudge her the win in Season 4. But Richard Blais totally deserved to get there. In addition to being a constantly inventive and technically excellent chef, he also seemed to be just a really nice guy. Professional, generous and sincere. I’d love to try out some of his food!
7) Most disappointing season - Sorry, but it was really hard to see anything that was cooked during the entire Season 5 that really deserved anyone taking home the big prize. I think overall, the quality in Season 5 was lacking actually. Sometimes, you could literally read Tom Colicchio’s mind thinking “The talent level isn’t good enough, the talent level isn’t good enough”. There were so many bad dishes that season! And worse than that, there was just a lot of mediocrity on show, and i think it showed in every episode. (To be honest, did anything in that season really knock the judge’s socks off?) Looks like they’ve rectified it for Season 6, especially with the addition of…
8) Hottest cheftestant – Ok, ok, so maybe I have a thing for soft-spoken boys with manners who also happen to have tattoos, but Michael V from Season 6! Luscious. Even cuter than Jeff (he of the blond hair and startling resemblance to Billy from Neighbours – that one’s for my English readers!) from Season 5. And damn, that boy (and his brother) can cook.
9) Most unfair elimination – Ooh, this is a contentious one, but I’m going to have to go with Dale getting the boot in Season 4. Ok, ok, he was the head chef that night of the restaurant challenge, but Lisa’s Laksa and sticky mango rice mess? Come on! Even the presence of Anthony Bourdain couldn’t stop me from shouting at the television in derision. I think Dale deserved to go further in the competition.
10) And finally, my favorite ever TC moment - So many good ones to choose from! But at the end of the day, it has to be when Fabio calls out Jamie for cooking one too many scallop dishes. “This is Top Chef, not Top Scallops!” Too funny. There are many, many, more. Probably another blog post!
I’m so glad Season 6 looks like a good one, both in terms of quality of food, and potential emotional drama. I’ll have to start following some of these blogs for their take. Yeah, I’ll admit the seasons where the drama was lacking (er, hello, Season 3??) kinda lacked something for me. And the TV producers, clever little things, know that. So expect it to be ratcheted up this season. My guess is it might have something to do with Robin. Anyone???
After a great weekend in Napa, sampling wines at the wonderful Cakebread, and eating waaaay too much at Mustard’s Grill (hands up who is as dorky as me about the fact that the owner, Cindy Pawlcyn, has been on Top Chef), which was, to quote another Bravo fave, Rachel Zoe, “bananas”; it’s time for a little detox.
But, honestly, doesn’t water get a little boring sometimes? Especially after a long, grueling day, and an equally grueling workout. Water might be refreshing, healthy and oooh, pure, but I drink it all day. In the evenings, I want something a little more interesting. A little something that might be considered a treat.
Some days of course, that’s wine. And now I have a couple bottles of delicious Napa specials to crack open for a special occasion. But there are lots of days when wine just isn’t a great idea – smack bang in the middle of a busy working week, and with the first, suspicious murmurings of a sore throat, is one of those days.
So what’s a girl to do? Well, i finally cracked open a mini bottle of Wine Country soda. Check the cute bottle in the pic and tell me it doesn’t look delicious! We were given a couple bottles of this stuff on a recent stay at the Ritz Carlton in Half Moon Bay, and brought them home with us. it’s non-alcoholic, and uses wine grapes. This one is Pinot Noir. Pour it into a beautiful wine glass, add some ice and voila! It has all of the flavor and none of the alcohol (and alcohol calories!) of wine, and you still get the feeling of ‘ritual’ that you get when uncorking a really great bottle of vino.
I think this might become my stand-by treat for evenings at home, when a mere splash of aqua just won’t do.
Vignette Wine Country Soda
Meh. It’s been a tough day. One filled with misunderstandings, mis-communication, frustration and one rather surprising disappointment. In fact, it was an apt day for me to be reading this post from the personal blog of one of my favorite writers in the tech industry (where my day job keeps me busy), Sarah Lacy. She wondered when she became such an angry girl, and if it was somehow linked to her own high expectations for herself, and of herself. I nodded along as I read, even commenting about my ridiculous desire to keep approximately seventeen plates of my life spinning all at once, even the “organic veggie growing when you have neither the time or space to do it and the mere fact of having to water that thing stresses you out every morning as you rush out the door at 7:15am for the bus” plate.
On days like today and in situations that test me, my best intentions sometimes desert me, and I find myself doing or saying things that i know are about as far from graceful as David Beckham is from ever being really welcome in a U.S. soccer stadium. Then of course, i go home and stew about them, and beat myself up about them (not literally of course – don’t get scared people). All filled with the intention to do better the next day. Which I’m hoping will happen tomorrow.
In the meantime, I was stuck feeling blue. My usual, set-in-stone-on-the-calendar-never-miss-it Tuesday gym class failed to lift me, even though it was filled with the types of kicks and punches that for me, release stress in the way that ten hours of yoga never could. In fact, I was so tired and all my limbs ached so much (for me, one of the worst side effects of stress), that it was all I could do to crawl home after bailing on the class half-way through, a cardinal sin in my book.
But whaddya know? As I hauled myself up the stairs to my city cottage, i spied the box of squash plants, sown in wild optimism two months ago. Only one remained after the great snail siege of 2009, and i was privately wondering when to admit defeat. Maybe the squash plant didn’t take too kindly to me belittling it in public, because the very beginnings of a flower were starting to show! Ok, it was only a very slight emergence, but it was enough. Enough to send me barrelling into the house for an impromptu play session with Sophie the dog, pour a medicinal glass of delicious Pinot Noir, and heat up a mound of the carbohydrate described by skinny people as “ugh, a bowl of white bread with sauce all over it” and to the rest of us, pasta. With home-made cherry tomato sauce, natch. Perhaps I can keep those plates spinning after all…
Ok, i admit it, you can often find me emptying the contents of a tin of Nescafe instant coffee into a mug each morning. If you start work at 8:00am, you definitely need some rocket fuel, and you don’t really care what it tastes like.
But come the weekend, you can find queuing with the best of them for a Blue Bottle cappuccino at the San Francisco Ferry Building farmer’s market. Or begging my boyfriend to brew something nice in our little coffee machine.
That’s why i was so delighted to come across The Roasterie, where you can answer a fun quiz to decipher precisely what type of blend suits you. Fruity, spicy, bold, smooth – whatever you like in life, they say, you’ll also like in your coffee! Then, you can customize your coffee packaging, right down to the label, with your own photography and brand name, and have it delivered.
Even better, the Web site and packaging is all very retro, Art Deco cool, which is a particular little design fetish of mine. All in all, a win! And such a small thing that can deliver big amounts of pleasure. And caffeine.
Yesterday I was in Sonoma for the day. Not really for wine tasting, although we did stop by Benziger Family Winery (delicious bio-dynamically farmed grapes) and Ledson (having a strangely off day, and also recently blighted by pestilence – i did cave for a bottle of the Legend though, couldn’t help myself – thanks to Bride In Exile for her recap of this delicious red blend). No, we were there for lunch at The Girl and the Fig, one of my favorite restaurants. We sat in the lovely covered patio, and thank goodness it was covered, due to the blazing 90 degree heat. And yep, I’m a typical Brit in that I crave the sun, and then complain loudly when i get too hot. To be honest, it was too warm to fully enjoy the food, although it was wonderful, a fig and arugula salad being a highlight. No, I was really there, after an hour-long drive, for one cocktail.
The Girl and the Fig serves beautiful and refined cocktails, with the First Street Cosmo being my absolute fave. It’s a cosmo with premium tequila instead of vodka. I know, I know, it doesn’t sound too good, but trust me. Looks like Betsy Husband agrees with me. Very delicately flavored, it’s a blend of Arette Tequila, St Germain elderflower liquer, fresh lime juice and cranberry juice. It’s beautiful too, the palest rose pink in a chic little martini glass. This is my favorite cocktail of all time and i’ve tried many times since (way too many, according to my boyfriend) to replicate it at home. After a few disastrous attempts, I’ve come pretty close (the trick is not adding very much cranberry juice, but stop by the restaurant for the actual measures, after you’ve ordered one of course), but it’s still not close to the one they serve at the Fig. If you’re ever in Sonoma, skip the final few wineries and head for one of these beauties instead.
My version - still not pale enough!!
