november already.

september and october have come and gone with nary a post from me. where does the time go? for me, september began with lots of good eating and a quick trip to las vegas with my mother and sister. it continued with more eating, and keeping myself busy with little things, which continued into the month of october, with moments of pure laziness in between. october also found me baking rather frequently, becoming the proud owner of an iphone 4S (siri rocks!), and participating in choc walk on an early sunday morning. i'll touch on some of these in another post.

as of now, the ramen tour with my friend c is pretty much at its end - our pace had dropped off considerably since the summer, but we still made time to go. i hope to get the few remaining bowls posted very soon. we have one more stop to go from our original list, and our goal is to complete it before thanksgiving, which is closing in fast.

this past sunday night, c and i kicked off our "pho"n with phriends pho tour. (thanks c for the clever name!) the topic had come up during our ramen tour, and this pho tour is limited to shops with fun, clever, and unique names. we started it off at 9021pho. guess where that's located? yup! in beverly hills. geographically, this tour covers more ground than our ramen tour. we had originally agreed to complete the ramen tour before beginning the pho tour, but when the voucher is going to expire in a few days...we can't waste it. i had purchased a $15 for $30 voucher for 9021pho via bloomspot a few months back, and all this time i had thought it was going to expire on 11/15/11, but good thing i checked, it was set to expire on 11/09/11.



it's been rather chilly these days, so it was a great night for us to get warmed up with some pho. it's not the usual hole in the wall kind of pho place that we usually go to...it cost a little more than we what we usually see (trendy area!) so we were able to hit the $30 pretty quickly. my sister came with us, and we each ordered a bowl of pho, and started off with an order of crunchy rolls. instead of the egg roll wrapper we had expected, it was covered with noodles. definitely crispy and very tasty.





i opted for the hot and sour pho soup. it was great! it reminded me of the tom yum noodle soup that c gets when we go to three spice thai kitchen. along with some rice noodles that needed to be loosened up at the bottom of the bowl, it was topped off with some sliced carrots, baby bok choy, red onions, straw mushrooms (i wished there was more in it!), fish, shrimp, baby corn, and surprise - some chunks of pineapple. the sweetness of the pineapple was a nice contrast to the spicy heat of the soup. i topped it off with some asian basil and lime juice. very warming on a cold autumn night.

a very easy tomato sauce recipe.

sometime last week i found out about gojee...it's basically a site full of recipes pulled from various blogs. the pictures are awesome, and you can even search by ingredients that you have on hand in your fridge or pantry. one of the first recipes that i came across was for marcella hazan's tomato sauce from steamy kitchen. comprised of 3 ingredients, it is a sauce that takes minimal effort. i tried it last night and was so pleased with the results.

basically, all you need is a 28oz can of whole plum tomatoes (san marzano if you can find it), an onion, and butter. i did my shopping at trader joe's so all i was able to find was the plum tomatoes. i opted for the canned plum tomatoes with basil, no salt added. the original recipe didn't specify if the tomatoes contained salt, and calls for salted butter, but i opted for unsalted so i could control how much salt was used. other than that and the addition of some fresh ground pepper, i followed the recipe.

the result? a very simple, yet flavorful pasta sauce. the taste of the tomatoes was the perfect intensity for me - i love the tang of tomatoes and when i make my own meat sauce for pasta, i tend to add tomato paste to intensify the taste of tomato. the canned tomatoes without any changes are intense and on the tart side as i had opted to use tomatoes with no salt. but the onion and the butter help to round out the full on intensity of the tomatoes. i finished with a bit of salt and fresh ground pepper, and found the sauce to be tasty. this sauce yields about two servings. since there was no meat in this sauce, i cooked up some chicken sausage with sundried tomatoes (also from trader joe's) to go with my pasta. i also grated a little parmesan cheese on to it. dinner is served!

the ramen tour, bonus stop: kitahama shoten.

i tend to read the food blogs on oc weekly and la weekly pretty regularly. so on one particular reading session of oc weekly, i came across a snippet about the "gourmet food festival" at mistuwa marketplace at both the costa mesa and torrance locations. both locations were going to feature kitahama shoten ramen. once i read about it, i told c right away so that we could hopefully add it as a bonus stop on our ramen tour. so on the saturday morning of the festival, we stopped in at mitsuwa in torrance for an early lunch - and got in line for the kitahama shoten ramen. the line wasn't very long when we got there, so we were able to order pretty quickly. c ordered the shio ramen, and i ordered the shiro miso ramen.



it cost about $10 each...but imho it was totally worth it. the soup had umami - and you could taste the delicate shiro miso... i always thought the shiro (white) miso to be so light on flavor - and when i make miso soup at home i usually combine the shiro miso and the aka (red) miso. but the broth of the shiro miso ramen was so tasty... i consumed it all. the toppings included roast pork, marinated poached egg, menma (bamboo shoots), negi (green onions), and a piece of nori (seaweed).



it was so good, i ate it all.



they also had gyoza as part of the gourmet food festival, so we bought the two kinds being offered - veggie and seafood - and for the price, i expected better. they were both a bit of a disappointment even though they were cooked fresh. the skin was a little too thick, the filling a little too mushy. i could totally do better...i think.

get shaved.

lilikoi and melona with condensed milk :)

hash house a go go.

i had a fun meal with some fun people at hash house a go go in las vegas.

the huge caesar salad...

the portions here are incredible! needless to say i didn't finish. :(

meat loaf pasta...

i realize that meat loaf pasta sounds a bit...different. but it tasted really good. it was a little spicy, with a tex mex kind of feel. with the tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms, cheese, pasta, and the meat loaf - it all worked. and the crispy parmesan tuille on top was a fun addition to the dish. the meat loaf is one of the signature dishes at hash house, and even though it was on the pasta, it didn't disappoint. (the crispy parmesan tuille was also on my caesar salad!)



hash house a go go (imperial palace) * 3535 las vegas blvd. s * las vegas, nv 89109

the ramen tour, stop #7: santouka ramen.

santouka ramen is located in the food court of mitsuwa marketplace in torrance. it is part of a chain of ramen shops in japan, serving hokkaido style ramen, and they have several locations in california. lucky for me! as it is by far one of my favorite ramen places in and around the home digs. my friend y and i, neither of us are very big on ramen (she likes it less than i do) and even she likes it, so i think that's saying something. my favorite ramen there currently is the miso chashu ramen, and of course i have to order the seasoned egg on the side.

there are several slices of yummy roasted pork, along with some menma (bamboo shoots), kamaboko (fish cake), kikurage (woodear mushrooms), and of course, negi (green onion). for me, the broth totally has that umami factor.



you can get shio (salt) broth, shoyu (soy sauce) broth , or miso (soybean paste) broth for your ramen. santouka uses a pork broth as a base for all of their ramen. they have two bases as the miso ramen uses a different pork broth base than the others.



of course, given that the miso chashu ramen is my current favorite at santouka, that's what i ordered. c ordered the shio ramen. the shio ramen is topped off with an umeboshi (salted plum). we barely made it there in time to order our ramen - although the marketplace is open until 8pm, most of the stalls in the food court close earlier, and we both learned that day that santouka takes their last order at 7:15pm.

there's no question that i will go back!

santouka ramen @ mitsuwa marketplace * 21515 western ave. * torrance, ca 90501

starry kitchen.

starry kitchen was once an illegal + underground restaurant in north hollywood. i didn't know about it back then, but i initially heard about it sometime last year, probably about a little over a year they started up (which was may of 2009). i'm sure i would have gotten there eventually, but thanks to blackboard eats it sweetened the deal. 30% off! :)



(before we go any further...i apologize for the darkness of the photos...i only had my iphone...)

k, liz, and i headed out to starry kitchen a couple of weeks back. located in the courtyard of california plaza, they must do really well during lunch since they aren't open for dinner every day. there was a bit of a crowd to order when we got there, and nguyen tran (husband of the husband and wife team behind starry kitchen) laid down the rules of how to order. first - pick your protein. they have a rotating menu of proteins, the only mainstay being the lemongrass chicken. then you pick your vessel (wrap, salad, banh mi style sandwich, or rice plate), and then pick any sides. they also have a few other items on the menu that you can order. so i opted for the korean spiced pork belly on a rice plate. i upgraded the rice to basil fried rice, and it was accompanied by japchae (korean noodle salad) as well as goi (a vietnamese salad). also, for an appetizer i ordered the double fried ginger glazed wings. as good as my plate was, those wings were by far and away the best thing i ate that night. (i even got an order of wings to go!)









starry kitchen * 350 s. grand ave. * los angeles, ca 90071