The other day I was going through the photos on my iPhone to show someone a picture of how big the kids have gotten. Scrolling through the stream of images I noticed that I had a bunch of blurry, out-of-focus shots of the kids, but nestled in between these soon-to-be-deleted memory wasters were tons of pictures of, well... food.
Food from various restaurants. Delicious food. Beautiful food. Food I tweeted about. Food I posted pictures of on FB. Interesting, lovely dishes and pieces of items I've consumed. I think I may have a problem. Or, at the very least, a new blog feature.
Join me - as I give you a tour of my iPhood.
YU ME YA Sake House
The first stop on HipMamaB's iPhood Fest (HMBiPF) is Yu Me Ya Sake House. A local Leucadia GEM of a restaurant, this is a tiny little place right on HWY 101 which boasts one of the LARGEST Sake collections I've ever seen.
Did you know in Japan, sake is served cold? And did you know that much like wine variations, all sakes have a distinct taste to them based on region and water? All things you will learn at this amazing little place.
And little it is. Unless you make a reservation (which they only take Tues-Thursday) or get there as they open at 5:30, there is a good chance you wont get in. I think they can seat about 40 people at a time, and with the tapas style menu, people tend to hang out, savor the food and sip sake and take their sweet time. No matter how hard you glare at them from the waiting bench.
If you are one of the lucky ones to get in - you MUST MUST MUST order the spicy tuna tartare (pictured to the left), the BBQ Beef salad and fried yams. And just a warning, while the serving of the Spicy Tuna tartare includes 2 wantons filled with YUM, order one serving per person...or you will just get mad and want to throw your chopstick at your partner.
Ono Sushi at Eat.Drink.Read
A few months ago Jason was tapped to help out the San Diego Council on Literacy for its annual fund raiser, this year called Eat.Drink.Read. This culinary event for literacy was a perfect fit for us as it involved 3 of our favorite things - good food, good wine/beer, and raising money for Literacy (if you've ever seen our bookshelves, you are nodding your head in agreement).
Many of San Diego's top restaurants were in attendance, offering up some mouth watering bites. One that particularly impressed me were these yellowtail sushi rolls on a stick from Ono Sushi.
Honestly, I have no idea what it was. But it was crunchy in the middle and had a hint of truffle/truffle oil and I ate about 10 of them.
Another winner from the night was Urban Solace's watermelon mint salad and duck on a cracker amuse bouche (yes, I learned that from Top Chef).
The event was a great success and lots of money, and awareness of what the council does for San Diego, was raised.
Counter Burger, Carlsbad
A few weeks ago Jason and I managed to escape for lunch on a day when Zoe is at her sitter and Lucas is at school. Wanting a GOOD BURGER, we headed up to Counter Burger.. or "The Counter. Custom Built Burgers" our new fave burger joint. I pull out my iPhone and "checked-in" on Foursquare and up pops a message:
"CONGRATS! You are the new mayor of Counter Burger, Carlsbad!"
I duck under the table horrified while cursing the stupid app that really has no good reason to exist. Other than, of course, the competition between a few of us trying to oust Rock on Mommy as mayor of Target Encinitas. Alas, my reign was short lived (THANK THE GOD OF Embarrassment and me having to admit that I eat wayyy too many hamburgers) and now I solely rule over Paper-Source.
Since we know the menu at Counter Burger like the back of our hands, we kinda just order the same thing each time - and on the side the 50/50 fries and sweet potato fries. We really don't deviate much. Then something caught our eye: "Parmesan French Fries".. do we break tradition? We went for it and OHMALORD were they divine.
Needless to say, I really need to stay away from that place.
Flippin' Pizza
When Jason and I went to NYC a few months ago, we were prepared to be blown away by the pizza. I mean really, IT'S NEW YORK CITY! Unfortunately for the Big Apple, but lucky for us, we did not think anything we had there was as good as our local NYC-style pizza place up the street - Flippin' Pizza.
Our friends from NYC turned us onto this place when the La Costa branch opened last year. It's a small place, but super kid-friendly, serves beer and wine and you can order pizza by the slice. This means we no longer have to fight with Lucas over his wanting "cheese, no sauce". Also, for the past 6 or so months they have $1 slices on Tuesday nights. Since it's across the street from where Lucas and Jason do karate on Tuesday nights - it's become a no-brainer dinner option. Until word got out. See, while I love to see my local faves be successful, the line OUT THE DOOR the other night forced us to have to chose another option. And now things are really going to get bad...
Last week Jason and I went to an event where they officially introduced their new item - the Pinwheel - to the public. With a choice of a meat pinwheel or a veggie one packed with spinach, these are pretty much rolled-up pizzas minus the sauce. Wanna know how good they were? Lucas, age 6, ate FOUR of them. He wanted a 5th, but the rest of us had finished eating 30 minutes prior so we put the kabosh on that request. These Pinwheels are ridiculously delish. And that's a good thing because they are going to be replacing the $1 slice night with $1 pinwheel nights...but it may also be a bad thing since now we may NEVER get in again.
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And yes, there are more to come...This weekend I took part in Chevy's Best of Tours where we roamed the streets of San Diego looking for the BEST fish taco (and driving snazzy cars!). And since proclaiming myself a "wanna-be foodie" I think I'm going to have to make this a regular blog feature.
Although, maybe I should really start thinking about reviewing various work-outs around town to counteract all this yumminess.