The Local Report – Sweets for the Soul

0.8 miles, about 3 minutes, from my home in Atwater Village.

I have been wanting to give a shout out to Sweets for the Soul for sometime now. Primarily because it’s one of those small, local businesses that you want to see succeed. And also because they sell brownies! Yummy, rich, gooey, chocolate brownies. By using Valrhona chocolate exclusively they up the delicious factor by 10.

The small company with an even smaller storefront on Glendale Blvd. in Los Angeles’ Atwater Village was started by Lilly LaBonge who gave up a demanding career in TV commercials and music videos to make brownies full-time. On offer are such items as Brownie Points, unctuous bite-sized rounds made with Valrhona cocoa and chocolate chips, Brownie Bliss, squares of chewy chocolate brownies made with unsweetened Valrhona chocolate and toasted pecans, Cocoa Bliss, heart-shaped brownies made with Valrhona cocoa and Valrhona chocolate, and last but not least, the Obama Brownie, made with Valrhona dark and white chocolate.

I have tried them all and they are all delicious. I like an intense chocolate flavor so my favorite is the Cocoa Bliss – double chocolate. For those readers who don’t live locally, Sweets for the Soul will send orders via Federal Express.

Purposely keeping the selection small while they start out, they will be adding new products over time. One of the upcoming items is Brownie Shards, the bits leftover in the pan after baking Brownie Points, to sprinkle on ice cream, freeze, or eat as sweet snack.

www.sweetsforthesoul.com

• Sweets for the Soul
• 3169 Glendale Blvd.
• Los Angeles, CA 90039
• 323-668-9338

A Recipe for Quiche Lorraine

When I first returned from France in 1978 I was 18 years old and cooking up a storm for friends and family. Intricate five and six course French meals. Amuse-bouches, appetizers, main course, salad course, cheese course, and dessert course. One of my favorite things to make was a dish I discovered while living in Alsace – la tarte a l’oignon, or onion tart. It was simple, delicious and very satisfying.

The recipe in French that I used to make the dish listed pâte brisée for the crust. A pâte brisée is translated as ‘short paste,’ ‘pastry dough, or ‘pie crust’ in ‘Mastering The Art of French Cooking.’ All good except for some unknown reason I found a whole wheat pie crust in the vegetarian cookbook ‘Laurel’s Kitchen’ that I started using. It’s not because I am vegetarian. My reasons for this decision are now lost to time. It is simply an amazing piecrust. One I have made often.

When Robert and I decided to stay in this past New Year’s Eve and make a quiche I knew I’d be making that whole wheat piecrust. It had been a long time since I’d made a quiche, or even an onion tart, and I was excited to do so. We had even purchased a beautiful ceramic quiche pan from Sur La Table just for the occasion. I hauled ‘Mastering The Art’ out so Julia could give me guidance, and in reading the recipe I was reminded of what a quiche really is.

Her translation of quiche is ‘open-faced tart.’ Her translation of quiche Lorraine is ‘Cream and Bacon Quiche’. Heavy cream, eggs and bacon. That simple. A lot of French cooking is fairly uncomplicated with a minimum of ingredients and for good reason. By keeping the ingredient list to the few the flavors of those included stand out. I think we tend to want to add a lot of ingredients to a dish like quiche and that often takes away from the simplicity of flavors that could be there. Julia does go on to allow for other types of quiches in the book; cheese, Roquefort, tomato, and so on. The only alteration to her recipe we made was to add a little gruyere cheese.

Final note (before recipes): a friend recently pointed out that The B-52’s recorded a song called ‘Quiche Lorraine.’ If you are so inclined to play it while cooking, please feel free. Forthwith my version of Quiche Lorraine. Add a green salad and you have a meal.

Quiche Lorraine

Adapted from ‘Mastering The Art of French Cooking’ by Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle, Simone Beck

Serves 4 to 6

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

3-4 ounces lean bacon (6-8 slices, medium thickness)

1 quart water

An 8-inch partially cooked pastry shell placed on a baking sheet; see below for a whole wheat piecrust recipe

3 eggs

1 ½ - 2 cups whipping cream, or half and half

½ cup grated gruyere cheese

½ tsp salt

Pinch of pepper

Pinch of nutmeg

1-2 Tb butter cut into pea-sized dots

Cut bacon into pieces about an inch long and ¼ inch wide. Simmer for 5 minutes in the water. Rinse in cold water. Dry on paper towels. Brown lightly in a skillet. Press bacon pieces into bottom of unbaked pastry shell.

Beat the eggs, cream or half and half, and seasonings in a mixing bowl until blended. Stir in cheese. Pour into pastry shell and distribute the butter pieces on top.

Set in upper third of preheated oven and bake for 25-30 minutes or until quiche has puffed and browned. Slide quiche onto a hot platter and serve.

Piecrust

Adapted from ‘Laurel’s Kitchen’ by Laurel Robertson, Carol Flinders, and Bronwen Godfrey

My one change to this recipe is to replace margarine with butter. And I always opt for the combination of whole wheat flour and whole wheat pastry flour. I have included the recipe pretty much as the book lays it out so it can be used for other purposes. For the above quiche recipe do not make a lattice.

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour, or combination of whole wheat and whole wheat pastry flour

1/2 cup wheat germ

10 tablespoons of butter

1 tsp salt

4-6 tablespoons cold water

Stir together the flour, wheat germ, and salt. Cut the butter into the dry ingredients with two knives or a pastry cutter. When dough is the consistency of rolled oats, sprinkle with the water, using just enough to hold the dough together. Using cupped fingers, work the dough together quickly and gently. As soon as it will hold together, form into a ball. For best results, refrigerate for at least a half-hour, or even overnight, but be sure to remove from the refrigerator and hour before rolling it out.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Press the dough out into a thick disc. Roll to size on a lightly floured surface, or between sheets of waxed paper, or on a pastry cloth. Gently roll the dough over the rolling pin and onto a pie plate, easing it loosely into the plate. If it should stick to the table, slide a long sharp knife underneath, and if it should tear, patch with extra dough once it is in place. Gently press the dough into the plate so there are no air pockets. Cut off the excess with a sharp knife, but be sure to make the rim extra thick so it won’t burn. If you are going to fill the pie before baking, you may use the extra dough for lattice.

Form a rim, and prick pie shell all over with a fork.

Bake for 10-12 minutes, cool, and fill. Bake for just 7 minutes if your recipe calls for a partially baked crust.

Makes one 10-inch crust, or crust and lattice for one 8-inch pie.

Cookbooks: Guides To Good Cooking

Friends occasionally ask me if I have any cooking tips. I always say ‘use salt.’ And then I tell them if they don’t have two cookbooks, Julia Child’s ‘Mastering The Art of French Cooking’ and the ‘Joy of Cooking,’ to buy both.

‘Mastering The Art’ because it’s truly that. The methods used in French cooking are the basis for all good cooking. Anyone who has a desire to cook well should become familiar with French cooking. Julia and her two French girlfriends will walk you through it. ‘Joy’ because it has everything in it. If there’s something you want to make and you need to know how, look in ‘Joy of Cooking.’ You might not necessarily use the recipe but it will tell you how the dish is made. You can go from there. Or you can use the recipe.

Since my last post was about the closing of The Cook’s Library, a bookstore specializing in cookbooks, I thought it would be a good idea to write about them. I have added a list to the blog of my cookbook collection. Not that I am a collector by any means. The books I own I have picked up along the way for various reasons; I knew the author personally, the book intrigued me for some reason, or the author was a person of some stature in the food world.

People have mistakenly referred to me as a ‘chef’. A title I have never used nor would. Calling myself a chef would denigrate those chefs I have known. I am a home cook now, and I once was a ‘professional cook’. I cooked on restaurant kitchen lines as: head line cook at my first restaurant job in Santa Rosa, California, breakfast cook in a San Francisco cafe, and for a short-lived time on the line of Jeremiah Tower’s Santa Fe Bar & Grill in Berkeley, California. But none of those experiences ever came close to those of the men and women I have known who really were chefs, who toiled away from early morning to late night six sometimes seven days a week.

The reason I mention this is that I still use cookbooks. Even though I’ve had training, and have worked in restaurant kitchens. Not every time I cook but often. Sometimes just for inspiration, other times I follow the recipe to a ‘T’. ‘Mastering The Art’ is now well-worn, stained. My favorite pastry crust is out of the vegetarian cookbook ‘Laurel’s Kitchen.’ Whole wheat and amazing. I use Judy Rodger’s, and Jeremiah Tower’s books often. I make a tarte a l’oignon recipe out of a French cookbook I brought back from France: ‘Gastronmie Alsacienne.’

And yet there are holes in my collection. I still don’t have any books by Marcella Hazan. I have long wanted ‘The Classic Italian Cookbook’ and I fear it may be out print. I also don’t have any Richard Olney. Every cook’s library should have ‘Simple French Food’ at the very least. I’d like more Elizabeth David; need at least one James Beard. I have Diana Kennedy’s ‘The Art of Mexican Cooking’ but still need a few Paula Wolferts – the doyenne of Mediterranean cooking. Every cook should also have ‘The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook’ for both the historical aspect, and for the sheer folly of the writing and recipes; as well as for an infamous recipe on page 259 for ‘Haschich Fudge’ more commonly known as marijuana brownies.

Finally, my very first exposure to food writing was that of M.F.K. Fisher. Titles like “The Art of Eating,’ ‘How To Cook A Wolf,’ ‘Serve It Forth,’ and “The Gastronomical Me’ opened my eyes to the art of living as well as inspired a passion in me for the way that food is gathered, prepared and eaten; the dining experience as social effect. She captures the essence of what it means to be human in her writing.

In looking back over this entry I realize that my cookbooks and influences are probably a bit passé now. The people I write about here are from the early part of the food revolution in this country. But they are important forebears. Maybe I’m just a bit old-fashioned. There are now hundreds of new, young, brilliant chefs, amazing new restaurants, cookbooks and Food Network TV shows. The food revolution has grown up. Guess I need to play catch up. I will endeavor to try.

Watch for my next blog: a recipe for Quiche Lorraine adapted from ‘Mastering The Art of French Cooking,’ and ‘Laurel’s Kitchen.’

Bon appétit.

The Cook’s Library

An appreciation.

Sadly, The Cook’s Library is closing. After twenty years in business owner Ellen Rose has decided to close. Citing the poor economy, the abundance of chain bookstores, as well as readers ongoing defection to the Internet, as reasons for her decision.

I wish I could say I was a regular visitor. I’ve been to the small shop on Los Angeles’s Third Street a handful of times during the various periods I’ve lived in Los Angeles -- and each time was a treat. A whole store devoted solely to cookbooks, and books related to food and cooking! For anyone interested in food it was a very special place. And even though I didn’t make it in as often as I’d have liked, just knowing it was there was a comfort. Ellen, and her helpful and knowledgeable staff, only added to the experience. They all have such a passion for cooking and cookbooks, and would help locate the most obscure titles. Or discuss a dish, a chef, a restaurant or anything else food-related. If they didn’t have whatever it was you wanted, they’d order it for you. But more than likely they’d have it in stock.

It was a place in which one could spend hours: browsing, reading, drooling, and I usually left with at least one new cookbook for my collection. Many a well-known chef – and the lesser-known too – have frequented the shop. Author book signings took place at the store often. A number of world renowned chefs and foodies have been by to sign their most recent books and cookbooks. Signings also happened at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market on Sunday mornings. Several years ago I attended one with my friend Jeremiah Tower when his cookbook ‘Jeremiah Tower Cooks’ came out. It was an inspired place to hold a book signing. Right there amongst all the amazing fruit and vegetable stands, and those of us there to shop. This speaks to how the store was run and why it was so popular.

Another memory of an afternoon spent in the store was the day that my friend, Jill Foulston*, a book editor from London, and I hung out there for several hours. Jill is an inveterate foodie, we met at an amazing dinner in an Italian hill town, and we love to talk food. Earlier the same day we had spent a couple of hours lingering in the cookbook stacks of the Central branch of the Los Angeles Public Library in downtown Los Angeles (yes, the library has cookbook stacks!) After lunch at the fun and very hip, ‘The Restaurant’ at the downtown Standard Hotel we headed up to the Cook’s Library. By the time we left the store a few hours later she had a handful of books and I had one of my now favorite books - ‘Dinner at Miss Lady’s – Memories and Recipes from a Southern Childhood’ by Luann Landon. The book is about meals that the author’s grandmother, Miss Lady, prepared. I bought it as research for my own project about my great-grandmother, her home garden, and the meals that came out of it.

The shop is closing April 30 and is currently selling off it’s inventory. Robert and I went in last weekend. He’d never been and I wanted him to see it before it closed. All books were 20 % off. I bought a book that I didn’t have but that holds special memories for me: The Silver Palate Cookbook. When I first lived in New York City in 1982, the Silver Palate, a little food shop on the Upper West Side, was among the more popular gourmet food shops. I’d come from San Francisco’s Oakville Grocery to work in Dino de Laurentiis’ food emporium, DDL FoodShow, as a cheese buyer. The gourmet food industry was still fairly young, the community relatively small, the stand out stores at the time were Balducci’s, Zabar’s and Dean & Deluca but Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins’ tiny shop was different. They had well-prepared food, nicely displayed, in even nicer packaging. Geared towards take-out and catering, it was easy to stop by after work to grab dinner, or on the weekend to pick up food for a picnic. Their book, published in 1982, was full of all of the dishes everyone grew to love. I now have the 25th Anniversary Edition on my shelf thanks to the Cook’s Library.

If you love food, and cookbooks, and have yet to visit the Cook’s Library hurry over to see what they have left before the doors are locked for good on April 30th.

*Jill has edited: ‘The Joy of Eating: The Virago Book of Food,’ and ‘The Virago Book of the Joy of Shopping.’

www.cookslibrary.com

The Cook’s Library
8373 W. Third Street
Los Angeles, CA 90048
323-655-3141

Chef Wally’s Baked Papaya

October 10, 2010 ~ If you are here because of the 'Foodista Best of Food Blogs Cookbook: 100 Great Recipes, Photographs, and Voices' this blog, 100 Miles, has moved to a new URL: http://www.100miles.com. If you would please click the link below it will take you to the blog post 'Chef Wally's Baked Papaya' (where you may also print out the recipe) at its new location:

http://tinyurl.com/248bpj4

Thank you,

Charles G Thompson

100 Miles

One of my earliest memories of a great dish -- when I first understood that food could be amazing -- took place when I was 10 years old. My mother, sister and I lived on the Central Coast of California near Hearst Castle in San Simeon. We lived in a trailer park across Highway 1 from the Pacific Ocean about fifteen minutes south of the castle and about twenty minutes north of Cambria. The entire area is stunningly beautiful. We spent many afternoons walking the rocky usually chilly beach five minutes from home picking up shells and rocks, and collecting driftwood.

As I remember the day, after one of our afternoon walks, we returned home and upon opening the door the most wonderful, amazing smell wafted over us. I was instantly intrigued as it smelled delicious. Like nothing I had smelled before. I went to the kitchen and looked in the oven, and inside were six papaya halves baking away. But there was no one in the trailer. Who had made this amazing dish?

It turns out that, Wally, a family friend had come down from Carmel and while we were out made one of his signature dishes: Baked Papaya. The smells of the cooking process had permeated the small trailer. He had stepped out to get something. For a 10-year old it was all very magical and mysterious and who knows how much the interceding years have affected those memories. It is still one of my earliest and strongest food memories. When Chef Wally returned we all sat down and ate the baked papayas and they were as delicious as they smelled. I asked Wally to send the recipe and he did. I have made it many times over the years.

The funny part to this story is that when I recently asked my mother about it she had to correct a few things. I thought Wally really was a chef at a restaurant in Carmel – all these years I thought that. He had signed the hand written recipe ‘Chef Wally'. Well, as my mother patiently explained, Wally was not a chef but a traveling auto parts salesman -- albeit one who liked to cook and was quite good in the kitchen. So my memory of this great chef giving me one of his coveted recipes was dashed. No matter it’s still a recipe that I cherish, and make, to this day.

This dish can be eaten alone, or can be served with pork or fish dishes -- like pork chops, roast pork, or a sturdy fish like Mahi Mahi, or red snapper, etc. A full-bodied white wine like a Chardonnay is a good wine to accompany it.

CHEF WALLY’S BAKED PAPAYA

Ingredients

2 papayas; if green when purchased allow to ripen 1-2 days to a green-yellow color. Soft to the touch.

1/4 cup fine bread stuffing

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese – I used Parmigiano Reggiano

1 cup onion, finely diced

1 tomato, skinned & chopped

2 tbsps. butter

Salt & pepper

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Mix the stuffing and parmesan cheese together in a bowl and set aside. Cut papayas in half length-wise, remove and throw away black seeds. Dig the meat out of each half with a spoon leaving the remaining shell intact for refilling later, chop the meat coarsely then set aside. Skin and chop the tomato and set aside. Finely dice the onion.

Heat the butter in a skillet until it bubbles then add the onions and cook until clear not brown. Add the papaya meat. Add the tomato. Stir the whole mixture together. Season with salt and pepper. Cook over medium heat, stirring gently from time to time. When mixture is thick, after several minutes, turn off the fire.

Place the papaya shells in a casserole dish in a half-inch of water so they won’t burn. Spoon the cooked mixture into the shells evenly. Top each off with the bread crumb-parmesan mixture. Dot each with butter.

Bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until the tops are brown.

Bon appétit.

A Garden at the White House

The first day of Spring was last Friday, March 20th. It was also the day that First Lady Michelle Obama and a group of D.C. schoolchildren broke ground on the new (yet returning) White House vegetable garden or, as some have been calling it, 'America's Garden'.

I first heard mention of a garden at the White House in the Alice Waters biography 'Alice Waters And Chez Panisse' by Thomas McNamee. Apparently she and the Clintons were quite chummy -- Bill had eaten at Chez Panisse, Alice's Berkeley restaurant, a few times and was quite impressed. Based on their connection, she began a letter writing campaign trying to get the President to plant a vegetable and fruit garden on the White House lawn. Her efforts came to naught, the Bush administration came to power, and the idea sat fallow until the Obamas arrived.

My first reaction to the idea was that it was elitist and beneath the dignity of the White House, and the President, to have carrots and spinach poking out of the South Lawn. After all, less than 1oo miles away, there is surely local, organic produce that can be delivered to the White House within a few hours. But as I came to understand, the garden is not just food for the First Family; it’s a symbolic gesture, to show the rest of us that we too can be self-sustaining. And this is always a good thing, no matter what the current economic vicissitudes. Alice should be proud, her patience and doggedness finally paid off.

Gardens have a long history at the White House especially in the early days when they were planted to feed its occupants. The last vegetable garden planted at the White House was a Victory Garden that Eleanor Roosevelt planted in 1943 as part of the war effort. She planted it as an example to encourage the nation to plant their own Victory Gardens. The result worked prodigiously: In 1943 there were 20 million Victory Gardens in the country, and the produce they generated accounted for 1/3 of all vegetables eaten that year.

In my travels around the blogosphere I have read about a chef in Washington state who is turning her front yard into a garden in hopes that the neighbors will contribute to and take from it; and a man in Boulder, Colorado who convinced several neighbors that they should all plant gardens in their front yards and share the bounty. Those are two of many stories out there. There seems to be a ‘get-back-to-the-garden’ movement afoot with our new President leading the way.

Final comment: Alice wasn’t alone in persuading the Obamas to plant America’s Garden. Roger Doiron started his own campaign called Eat The View on February 6, 2008. He and his supporters had a big hand in making the First Garden happen. Michael Pollan writer of ‘In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto’ and ‘The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals’ put a call out for a White House Farmer in November 2008 by writing to President-elect Obama in a New York Times article. These are only a few. There are other heroes of the movement out there as well.

Happy Gardening!

The Local Report - Locali

3.7 miles, about 8 minutes, from my home in Atwater Village.

Another ‘local’ find is Locali Conscious Convenience – a sort of ‘green,’ organic convenience store, or, as they call themselves on their website, ‘your sustainable neighborhood market’. Several blog postings and articles already written have called it ‘a 7-11 for hippies’ and ‘a small-format, hybrid grocery and convenience store’. The reference to 7-11 was something that came to mind as Robert and I visited the store this past weekend. It felt like a ‘green’ 7-11. An idea that appeals. I immediately had visions of more of these stores on neighborhood corners around the country. I believe that is the intention of husband and wife owners, Greg Horos and Melissa Rosen.

Here is a description from Locali’s Facebook page: ‘Locali was constructed in an environmentally sound manner and serves local, organic, natural and most importantly, delicious food and beverages. The market seeks to make healthy eating and eco-friendly necessities easily accessible to those on the go. Roughly translated from Italian, locali means "community".

It’s a bold idea that I hope succeeds. The shop on Hollywood’s' Franklin Avenue is in a small strip mall, a block away from a Gelson’s grocery store. The tiny space is chock full of green, organic, sustainable items. Once inside the store the feeling I had was much like entering a 7-11 – that of sensory overload. But not in the way I experience a 7-11 which is a desire to get in and out as fast as possible. After we ordered sandwiches I perused the shelves. In the back a freezer contained pre-packaged, frozen, organic chicken and beef selections amongst other frozen grocery and food items – easy to grab on the drive home from work. Prepackaged sandwiches, salads, bottled drinks and other grab-and-go items sat in a refrigerated case along one wall. Other shelves held other convenience store standbys: energy efficient light bulbs, alternative shampoos and toothpastes, as well as energy-saver kits. Near the front window was a small collection of organic wine, beer and sake.

At the main counter you can order off a menu of breakfast, lunch and dinner items including seasonal, organic tamales from La Guera Tamalera, and Haute Dogs on Multigrain Buns – grass-fed beef hotdogs from Let’s Be Frank. Other convenience store-style items include low glycemic sno-cones; slushies made from agave sweetened, ginger infused, fruit juice; fair trade, organic coffee from The Coffee Cellar; as well as natural and locally made bakery items. They will also make menu items vegan and gluten-free. The sandwich menu states that their deli meats come from Applegate Farms and are antibiotic, hormone, gluten and casein free.

When our sandwiches were done – a Franklin Phenomenon (turkey, Monterey jack, spinach, tomato, red onion, and chipotle sauce served hot on pretzel bread) for me ($8.95) and a Peaceful Warrior (turkey, red onion, arugula, red pepper, mango chutney, curry spread on pretzel bread) for Robert ($8.95) – I grabbed a bag of Boulder Canyon Kettle Cooked Potato Chips ($1.29) and went to the grab-and-go case for a bottle of water. I have to admit that I was flummoxed by the offerings. I didn’t see any plastic in the case. I had to ask the person at the counter where the water was and he pointed to a row of glass bottles. I sheepishly grabbed a bottle of Mountain Valley Spring Water – a lovely green, glass bottle ($1.59). I quickly realized that I needed to break my plastic habit while fully appreciating that there were no plastic bottles for sale. Green and sustainable just like they claim.

As I absorbed all of this I found myself wishing there was a Locali on a corner near my Atwater Village condo – if there was I’d be in it all the time. And just think how much thinner and healthier the citizens of our country might be if there was one Locali for every 7-11 type convenience store already in existence across the country. One can dream.

www.localiyours.com

Follow on Twitter: locali

Locali
5825 Franklin Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90028
323-466-1360

The Local Report - Delilah Bakery

5.1 miles, about 10 minutes, from my home in Atwater Village.

A few weeks back Robert, in his travels on the Internet, saw a write up about cupcakes in the Los Angeles Times. In the piece it mentioned Delilah Bakery located in Echo Park – very near to us. So Robert and I along with our friend Vladimir ventured over to check it out – cupcakes being the draw. Delilah Bakery is located on Echo Park Ave. where it becomes a canyon, before leading up and over a hill towards the 2 and 5 freeways. It’s a charming if slightly Bohemian neighborhood full of creative types; artists, writers, actors. Several years back a friend and I went to a gallery crawl on the block down from Delilah. The few art galleries along the block stayed open one night, offering wine, cheese and art for sale. We roamed between the galleries, drinking wine and admiring (or not) the art. A fun evening in a funky neighborhood.

Delilah offers all manner of baked goods including cupcakes, cakes, pies, cookies, bars, muffins and bread. The storefront is small and feels like a bakery more than a café although they do offer a selection of lunch items – fresh-made sandwiches, salads, quiches, homemade potato chips. There are tables outside on the sidewalk and adjacent small brick patio where you can sit and enjoy the offerings. Standing at the counter you readily see the commercial ovens, mixers and other paraphernalia of a professional bakery.

We ordered sandwiches, coffees and two cupcakes and sat outside in the sun to eat them. I was impressed with the way they made a regular coffee. It wasn't already brewed sitting in one of those large holding tanks that most coffee places use. The young woman behind the counter made each cup fresh by putting a coffee filter into a basket, adding fresh grounds and running boiling water through them. It made for a very different tasting coffee. The way coffee should taste. The way it tastes at home when properly made. Not too hot nor bitter the way Starbuck's coffee always tastes. The sandwiches, made on Delilah bread, were simple but tasty. The cupcakes – one German chocolate and one red velvet were the perfect ending to our meal.

As the Los Angeles Times piece mentions, the bakery sells to other establishments such as Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea in Silver Lake. They also offer catering. The shop’s website implies that the owner, Genevieve Ostrander, is from the South. That might explain Bundt cakes with names like Coca Cola Cake and 7-Up Cake; as well as cupcakes like Chocolate with Jack Daniel’s Frosting, and the Pecan Bourbon, and Pumpkin Bourbon pies.

Whatever the influence may be, she has a good thing going. Next time I plan to try the Chocolate with Smore Frosting cupcakes and maybe a piece of the Tollhouse Cookie pie.

Delilah Bakery
1665 Echo Park Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90026
213-975-9400

www.delilahbakery.com

Photo Credit: Vladimir Ballesteros-Moreno

The Local Report - Local

5.3 Miles, 8 minutes, from my home in Atwater Village.

After reading about it in the Los Angeles Times, and because its concept is all about staying local, Robert and I decided to check out a new restaurant this weekend. In fact it’s even called ‘Local’ and as stated on the menu it is ‘committed to using locally sourced, organic ingredients whenever possible’. In the Los Angeles Times story, chef and owner Jason Michaud said that he’s made sure the ingredients he uses are from within a 300-mile radius. Not exactly 100 miles but a good start. Michaud only uses organic meat, cage-free eggs and free-range chicken. The goal is sustainable, locally produced food and there seems to be a national movement slowly evolving with restaurants like Local leading the way.

The menu is straightforward, no high cuisine here but that’s as it should be. Our meals were uncomplicated yet flavorful. We both opted for the Mixed Greens Salad with Avocado – the treats in this dish were the roasted tomatoes and the golden beets – the beets cooked perfectly and tasting slightly of the earth the way they should. Robert ordered the Slow Roasted Heritage Pork Sloppy Joe which came with what looked like homemade pickles piled on a homemade bun. The pork was delicious and reminded me of cochinita pibil, the slow roasted Mexican pork dish that we ate on our visit to the Yucatan Peninsula. I ordered the Niman Ranch Pork Chop with Mashed Potatoes and Currants. The chop was cooked to perfection. Full of flavor, juicy, and just amazing. I was reminded why Niman meats are considered top flight. It was one of the best pork chops I’d eaten in years. The cooked currants on the side, sweetened but still nicely acidic, were the perfect complement to the pork.

The rest of the menu includes a mixture of vegetarian dishes along with pork, lamb and fish. A few I'd like to try on a next visit are the Albondigas Burger, the Braised Lamb and Greens with French Fries, the Osso Bucco Style Braised Pork Shank on Brioche. If in a vegetarian mood the Tofu Chili with Cheddar Cheese and Onions, the Vegan Tempeh Sloppy Joe with Soy Mozzarella or the Quinoa Burger might do the trick. The breakfast and lunch menus are similar and have some of the same dishes on them as the dinner menu -- one stand out on the lunch menu: Spicy Fries with Ranch – a shout out to junk food? Why not.

I’ll be going back to eat at Local again in support of what they are trying to do and because I liked the meal I had.

Bon appétit.

http://www.silverlakelocal.com/

Local
2943 W. Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90026
323-662-4740

Photo Credit: Robert Guerrero

Surfas - Restaurant Supply

15.2 miles, about 22 minutes, from my home in Atwater Village.

I guess I must be a pseudo-foodie, or, at the very least a lapsed foodie because somehow the amazing restaurant supply store, Surfas, in Culver City, California completely passed me by before two weeks ago. Steven and Dana, two friends of ours, had mentioned in passing how wonderful it was and I realized I didn’t know what it was nor had I ever been. Some local foodie I am! The place has been in the same location since 1937 and I used to work in Los Angeles restaurants.

So a couple of Saturdays ago Robert and I made the trek (pilgrimage) across town to Culver City, the 5 south, to the 110 south, to the 10 west, off at the West Washington Blvd. exit, to see for ourselves what the fuss was all about it. And I fell in love with the place. A true restaurant supply store full of the industrial-sized equipment, mixers, ovens, ranges, dishwashers, cutlery, china and other supplies I was used to seeing in restaurant supply stores. But then there was the addition of the food items – this I hadn’t seen in most other shops. A counter for bread, cheese, charcuterie; shelves of olive oils and vinegars, all manner of spices, ingredients for world cuisines, pastas, varieties of rice, huge slabs of Callebaut baking chocolate, and other baking ingredients for the professional or serious home baker. All very high quality, amazing stuff. All open to the public, and the public was there in force. Usually a restaurant supply store is for wholesale trade; for those opening, or already owning a restaurant. Surfas is different. It also invites and sells retail to the public. Additionally, it has a café, Café Surfas, where it sells coffees, baked goods, sandwiches and salads.

We were there on one of those recent cool, rainy weekends. A perfect day for this outing. We grabbed sandwiches and coffee in the café then set off to explore the store. It was such fun poking through all of the rows and rows of supplies and gourmet food items, and it took me back to my days of cooking and working in restaurants and fancy food stores. It also made me want to add to my meager kitchen but I held back. Before we left we grabbed a hunk of Spanish sheep’s milk cheese, a fresh baguette and a jar of delicious Cajun Power Jalapeño Pepper Jelly, as well as a stove-top ring to rest my wok in. I now know where to go when I do need something for the kitchen or simply when I want a coffee, a sandwich and a gander at all the wonderful gadgets this great shop has on offer.

http://www.surfasonline.com/

Surfas
8777 Washington Blvd.
Culver City, CA 90232
310-287-2375

Photo Credit: Robert Guerrero