Mendocino Farms

4724 Admiralty Way
Marina del Rey, CA 90292

*Killing time waiting for our flight at the airport*

Occasion: Right after we got off the plane and got our rental car, we came here to meet my friend David for some lunch! 12.06.11

Pork Belly Banh Mi

Had all the ingredients of a viet sandwich, cucumber, carrots, pickled diakon and big chunks of pork belly that was sweet and tender with some chili aoli on grilled ciabatta bread.  This was Henry's choice and of course he liked his better than mine.

Three little piggies

My choice: with pork belly, carnitas and bacon bits with an avocado spread bits of bacon, pork and carnitas. It's a lot of meat and i'm not usually the one to order such a heavy hearty meaty sandwich, but i must admit it was good. I was really happy that there was avocado spread because it made the sandwich that much better.

Coupa Cafe- Palo Alto

538 Ramona St
Palo Alto, CA 94301

Occasion: Seemed like 3pm was a popular hour for tea, so Tea Time became filled with a lot more people.  We migrated our catch up session over to Coupa Cafe for some desserts.  12.05.11 

Tres Leche

My pledgemom was raving about how great it was.  And it really was amazing.  It was a little bit on the sweet side and a few bites will be good enough, so make sure you share it.  It's some kind of milk based dessert with sponge cake.  It's soaked in  three kinds of milk: evaporated, condensed and heavy cream. (Thanks for the educating me Sandy) It was so creamy, so decadent, but so delicious.  Thanks for introducing it to me.  I'm a big fan!

Tea Time

542 Ramona St
Palo Alto, CA 94301

Occasion: Catch up session with Christine and Sandy with high tea! 12.05.11

Plate of two tea sandwiches and tea

My choice of tea was a pot of the pearl jasmine tea.  I think I'm just really asian and enjoy the more asian flavored tea leaves, less of the fusion types of tea.  As for my two choices of sandwiches I opted for the smoked salmon with cream cheese topped with caviar and the bay shrimp salad topped with avocado.  They were tiny, but delicious.  I liked both sandwiches, but I'd have to say I like the smoked salmon more.  I was actually a bit disappointed with their variety of brunch stuff.  At the tea houses I've been to in the city.  There are choices that include sandwiches, crumpets and scones.  I'm a type of girl who likes trying a variety of things, so knowing that I was limited was disappointing.  At least the food was pretty decent.

Kingdom of Dumpling

1713 Taraval St
San Francisco, CA 94116

Occasion: We stayed in and had an early dinner, but by 8:30pm we were hungry again.  In our sweatfits, we came back here for some northern Chinese food. 12.03.11

 Pork and spinach dumplings

We loved them so much last week, we came back for more.  They come in a plate of 12 and its definitely not enough.  They're juicy, delicious and flavorful made with skin that's not as thin as XLBs but not as thick as potstickers. They're a bite of goodness!

Chow Mein

We were actually trying to order the Chow fun (flat rice noodle), but since they were out of the noodle we decided on the next best thing: chow mein.  This was surprisingly really really good.  Almost reminds me of my favorite chow mein place on stockton and jackson in Chinatown, but better!  The noodles taste a lot more fresh and it's less greasy.  Delicious and satisfied. Yum!

Chives pancake

Last time we had the scallion pancakes, so this time we decided something different.  So glad we did because these little pockets filled with chives, fried egg and clear noodles are freaking delicious.  The dough component of this dish is fried to the perfect crisp, yet still has a chewy consistency.  Next time, I'm definitely getting this again. One of my new favorites.

Xiao Long Baos

Perfect amount for just the two of us.  We liked it so much we ordered it again.

Roam Artisan Burger

1785 Union St
San Francisco, CA 94123

Occasion:  Dinner after grocery shopping at Trader Joe's.  It took us half an hour to find parking, but it was worth it.  Something to compare to Umami Burger about 6 blocks down the street. 12.02.11

Drinks: Cane Sugar Cola and Ginger Lime Soda

Fry Fecta Fries 

Here we have a trifecta of fries:  Russet Fries, Sweet Potato Fries and Zucchini Onion Haystack.

I couldn't decide between the three types, so I decided to try all three.  The russet are just regular fries with what seemed to be parsley sprinkled on top.  I love sweet potato fries, but the highlight in this bowl were the zucchini onion haystack.  Graded zucchini and onion are deep fried and freaking delicious.  It's not starchy like the fries where you get to bite into something mushy.  Since they're grated, it's light and crispy.  We loved the light crisp of it.

The Classic Burger
with Butter Lettuce, Tomato, Onions, House-Made Pickles, House Sauce

The sesame bun was amazing.  Fluffy bun, with a slight crisp from the grill and absolutely flavorful! As it's name specifies, it really is your classic burger with lettuce, tomato, onions and pickles.  We selected their beef patty cooked medium rare and their house sauce reminded me of some recreation of thousand island sauce. Yum!

 French and Fries 

Truffle Parmesan Fries, Gruyere, Avocado, Caramelized Onions, Watercress, Dijon Mustard

Everything in this burger appealed to me.  I was a bit disappointed as my burger only had like 1 or 2 truffle parmesan fry, which didn't have too much of the truffle flavor to it.  Caramelized onions were sweet and soft.  The use of watercress instead of lettuce was different, but it worked as it is thinner and easier to fit into the burger.  I love avocado in anything so that definitely added flavor to it.  I though the flavor of the dijon mustard actually took over flavor wise.  It was hard to taste everything in one bite because the taste of dijon mustard was very overpowering.  Between the classic burger and this burger, I would choose this one eventhough not all the flavors were executed well.