More Food Memories

This weekend took us to an old familiar spot! Phoenix Inn Chinese Restaurant. Last nights experience wasn't anything to write home about, but the memories are!
Being from San Francisco I've enjoyed plenty of Chinese food over the years, so I have enjoyed the memories food always brings ... Some of the more eclectic places like Spices Restaurant just off of Clement Street in the Inner Richmond District, and So on Irving Street out in the Sunset District, have the memories of my youth. Sitting at Spices with my Uncle Jose and ordering the Spicy Beef with Flaming Hot Oil an both of us being in tears because of it. That started my love affair with peppers and heat! The times we went to So and enjoyed the So Fish, a lightly breaded white fish with a sweet and just slightly spicy sauce. That opened my eyes to the world of fish that I had closed off as a youth.

Yesterdays journey reminded me of  my wife's Grandfather! About 11 months ago Grandpa died but in the 3 and 1/2 years I knew him I got to build up a reservoir of memories. I guess a lot of them start with Phoenix Inn Restaurant. The first time I met Grandpa was at Phoenix, I was dating my soon to be wife and she wanted me to have dinner with the family. Grandpa was a funny man, it took quite a bit to rock his boat. When I met him he was just over a hundred years old and showed no signs of stopping. He was interesting, when you looked at him he would look you in the eyes for a moment then he seemed to be looking past you but what he was doing was studying you with his peripheral vision.

Over the next few months dinner with Grandpa was a recurring thing. It was a date that I never wanted to miss. How often do you get to sit and have dinner with a centenarian? I mean here was a man that had come to the States before my own grandfather had even been born. After that perilous crossing (for a lone 16 year old) he spent time at Angel Island and started a new life with barely $40 in his pocket. Later in life he owned his own restaurant, brought his wife and son over from Hong Kong all the while supporting them from afar, he worked in the kitchens at CBS studios, he sent his son to college, and then even later in life he was part of the best memories of my wife's life!

You can understand why I wanted to get to really get to know him. The time finally came when I would get the chance. In early 2011 I quit my job and Grandpa needed someone to take him to the doctor and to go shopping. I volunteered. On our first trip Grandpa had the day planned out, we would go to his doctor visit, then to the Asian markets in Alhambra and the he would take to eat some lunch.

His doctor visit went well enough and I knew exactly where the Asian markets in Alhambra were. I took him there with pride. At first on our shopping trips he would be ahead of me the whole time, looking at fish, meat or produce, grabbing what he wanted, sometimes not happy with the quality or selection. Then it was time for lunch. As we sat inside Phoenix Inn it might have looked funny, and older Chinese man with a relatively young Caucasian man. From our monthly trips to the restaurant over the last few years the staff had gotten to know me and even they were surprised.

Grandpa ordered his usual lunch, some House Style Won Ton Soup. For him the soup and the won tons were easier to eat. I ordered the congee, Chinese style porridge, just slightly savory because it was made with chicken broth. And in this case with ground beef, ( that wasn't ground beef, actually steak that the cooks in the back ground to order with two cleavers) green onions, ginger, and just a taste of white pepper. The best part was when they brought out my porridge first, Grandpa just a bit surprised said "I didn't order that!"

Confused the waiter almost took it back. And I stepped in and told Grandpa it was mine. His shocked reaction, "YOU like that?"

To this day it gives me a chuckle, especially when I bring it to work for breakfast, and someone says "YOU like that?"

Food memories

Today while I was drinking my coffee, there was a taste that seemed familiar! It was from the past but not exactly...

Usually when I have my java at work I stick with 2 Coffeemates and 2 sugars, today we were out of Coffeemate. So I used the powdered creamer. Not my usual but in a pinch it works. As I sat at my desk I was reminded of being a kid sitting in my Grandma's kitchen drinking coffee. Grandma and Grandpa always gave us coffee. Some folks might say that coffee stunts your growth and other unfavorable things but we never knew that stuff. Mami as we call Grandma would make us coffee with warm milk. What it really was, was warm milk with just a taste of coffee.

Papi, that was what all of us called Grandpa would get the milk warm on the stove and have hot water at the ready. Mind you this was the early 80's before the days of Starbucks or Peet's rise to fame, my dad would laugh at me for paying 4 bucks for a cup of coffee. Folgers crystals were the specialty of the house.

Speaking of hot water, Papi would have the hot water ready on the stove at all times. He had (probably still has) this old 2 quart percolator coffee pot with no guts ready with hot water on the stove at all times. In the middle of the night you could find your way to the kitchen by the glow of the stove under that kettle. It was always on!

If you wanted a cup of coffee any time of day Papi and Mami's kitchen was the place to go. But you had to follow some rules.

#1 Never use Papi's cup... that was the first cup on the rack. it didn't matter if that was the second cup yesterday.
#2 Always offer to make Papi's cup of coffee first. He would always do the same.
#3 Be sure to put your spoon in the sugar before you put your spoon in the jar of Folger's. That way you never saw the coffee crystals in the sugar!
#4 Add the milk first. It was always easier to top off your cup with hot water than the other way around.
#5 Wash your cup after you were done. Nobody should have to clean up after you!

This was the routine when we had coffee as kids. It did seem simpler now that I look at it! Were we that simple as kids? I think so. I miss it, I mean really who needs coffee that is more complex than DNA?

Mixed Emotions!

My original title was; "Eddie Winslow is Lame" or "I Felt Deceived!"

I am watching the Oklahoma City Thunder play the Memphis Grizzlies in OKC. As I sit here watching I realize that every time I see #50 on the Grizzlies I get some mixed emotions! I look at him and I think "Oh look at Eddie Winslow playing basketball! I like him..." Then after a few seconds I remember that is Zach Randolph! That's when I remember Z-Bo is a lame!

Eddie/Z-Bo seems to have built a career around being a NHL enforcer that moonlights as a middlin NBA power forward. At 31 Eddie I mean Z-Bo doesn't have the legs to keep up with the premier players in the league so he fouls them!

Just so you understand I'm not just being funny here!

See the video below of Zach Randolph suplexing Blake Griffin! 

Eddie/Z-Bo seems to get away with it this time, but the Clippers and Grizzlies will meet again! 

Below is another video with Eddie, I mean Randolph punching Blake Griffin in the face! 

It hasn't been just a grudge match between Blake Griffin and Zach Randolph tonight Z-Bo tangled with Kendrick Perkins!

This has been happening during Eddie/Z-Bo's recent career, I could find a quality video of it but a couple of years ago Eddie, I mean Z-Bo punched Louis Amundsen in the face! While Amundsen wasn't and still isn't a premier player he was giving Z-Bo the business that night. He outplayed and out muscled Randolph at every turn and Z-Bo couldn't handle it. Either the game or the humiliation.

I guess what upsets me is that the NBA doesn't do anything to fix it! If the referee doesn't see it, it doesn't happen I guess. 

Needless to say I'm not a Zach Randolph fan there is nothing he could ever do to make me change my mind!

Duck Prosciutto

 This was an experience!!!

Making duck prosciutto was an exercise in patience! In the end totally worth it. I have to thank my buddy Brennan for being my sounding board about all of my home cooking/curing experiences.

After experimenting with homemade bacon and brining my own Canadian bacon I decided to try my hand at duck prosciutto. After looking online for some Muscovy duck breast I settled on the duck breast from the Bristol Farms. It was kind of thin but the dark rich duck meat looked good. I won't go into details about the process today (but I will in a future blog)

I seasoned the salt with herbs before I buried the duck breast in it. So in the strictest sense what you will see here isn't really prosciutto. I let that stay in the fridge for 2 days waiting for the salt to dry out the outside of the breast.

After that 2 days I wrapped, trussed, and hung the breast in my fridge for about 7 days.

 Around the 5th day I could feel the edges harden just a bit and the squishyness of the center started to 
go away.

I didn't just go off the "feel" of the duck to decide to open up the cheesecloth. I used a scale to weigh the duck each day. When it lost about 30% of it's weight I decided to try some duck prosciutto!

Just like a week ago!

I cut the trussing and unwrapped the cheesecloth. Honestly I wasn't expecting it to look almost exactly the same as when I put it in the wrapping. But it did!

I grabbed my sharpest slicing knife to try and cut the thinnest slices possible. The skin side of the breast sliced very easily and as you sliced into the breast the harder dryer parts of the underside of the breast were a little tough to cut.

All in all I really enjoyed the experience. I definitely am going to do this again! 

Follow Up: Support your local...

I have to post this short and sweet because I'm from the school of thought that you fix what you can.

I had someone post a comment on my last blog entry: http://foodiefromfrisco.blogspot.com/2012/11/support-your-local.html

I then got a reply on my Yelp account that pretty much mirrored the comment on my blog. My only issue was the comment and reply did nothing about my issues, granted the thing on my mind late last night was supporting local... But the coffee wouldn't have stopped my from going back to David Schat's Bakery. http://www.yelp.com/biz/david-schats-bakery-cafe-el-segundo#hrid:nXgeXXfzE-iY-ZMSI3Dxww I just wouldn't buy the coffee.

I want to thank Mr. Schat for replying back to and addressing some of my issues. It seems he really took my comments to heart. 

To me his second reply is rare. He accepted what I had to say and he gave me assurances that he would do his best to fix it. People PLEASE follow his example, don't justify what you have done, take your lumps and see what you could have done to make it better! That is really all I was expecting...

Thank you David!

Support Your Local...

Gunfighter! No that's not it!

Support your local (insert producer here!)

I try, I love farmers markets, mom & pop liquor stores, bakeries, and restaurants. But I have a problem with supporting them at the cost of consuming an inferior product. 

If the local guy makes beer just as good as (insert your favorite brewery here) but it costs a couple bucks more I buy local. I remember hearing Fritz Maytag talk about the sour disappointing beer he produced when he first bought Anchor Brewing. It took him 3 or 4 years to develop his "Steam Beer" and then another 6 years to finally break even but he stuck to making beer that was as good or better than the competition. Now we know him as the "Father of Micro-brewing."

My point is by all means support your local (insert producer here) but hold them to the same standards as you would the big name whatever! 

I went to a bakery in El Segundo this last weekend. They were promoting a local coffee roasting company (I think it was Groundwork) but I'll be honest it didn't even smell good, it smelled burnt! Yes they might have burnt the brew but they acted like that was how it was supposed to taste. As I walked out I could hear someone behind the counter arguing about the choice to switch to the new coffee producer. If he had listened and offered the guy a freshly brewed cup I probably wouldn't have thought twice but he said the that catchphrase that seems to excuse mediocrity, "We wanted to support a local (insert producer here)"

I'll admit I'm a coffee snob, I love Peet's coffee, granted it's not local to you but in my heart Berkeley is still just stones throw away!

I have enjoyed brew from 49th Parallel Coffee Roasters.I'm planning on getting some more of that soon. (Thanks for the heads up on that one B!)

I love local whatever it may be, but I'll admit I'm spoiled it needs to be good! Don't let that wonderful catchphrase be an excuse to produce mediocre or inferior product. That is what make buying local worth it. It might cost a couple bucks more but it's better than what they get in the next town over!

Homegrown Mushrooms Part 1

That kinda sounds like a Pink Floyd song!

I found this at the store!

It doesn't look like much at first.

This is my first post, now that I have stated the obvious, I'm just going to get into why I decided to write a blog. I love to share what I find with the people I know! Especially when it comes to food. 


I was walking through the produce department at the Von's in MDR and I found this display. For $16.99 you can grow up to 1 1/2 pounds of oyster mushrooms. While it doesn't seem to be economical it did look like fun!

As soon as I got it home I opened the box and found the little spray bottle... This is probably for the "kid factor" that was part of the display. What is harder to see is the perforations on the cardboard. The instructions on the side of the box kind of allude to "opening the front panel" I pulled the panels off after finally finding the perforations and followed the directions. So far so good, this looked like an easy project so far. A lot easier than the lime tree that was a gift from one of my best friends (no offense B) . Easier than the pepper sprouts in a can (from my wife) that are finally starting to get bigger, but not yet blooming!

Its made with coffee grounds,
my favorite coffee grounds, Peet's.

Inside the box I found a coupon for Peet's. Cool mushrooms and $1 off my next bag of coffee! I'm really liking this project.

If you have a problem with the written directions on the outside of the box the inside of the perforated panel has pictures. I like pictures too. The pictures made it easier to understand that I was going to cut into the plastic bag that held the used coffee grounds.

After opening the cardboard.

I know this sounds redundant! But I'll say it anyway, find a sharp knife! Dull knives are dangerous, you stand a better chance of cutting yourself with a dull knife you have to fight with than that sharp knife that does it's job the first time.

Once that was done I had to find a container that would hold the entire plastic bag. I tried some of the smaller pots I own but I had to use my enormous stock pot. See the bag needs to soak for 12 hours. The biggest problem was the bag wants to float...

The instructions make it look easy to 
put it under water to soak but it's not!

Ultimately my solution was to weigh down the whole this with a gallon jug of water. Even after an hour the bag o' mulch wanted to float.

Tuesday morning I'll pull the bag out of my stockpot and continue to follow the directions and place the box in out of direct sunlight.

I'll keep you posted!