In Praise of Eggs

A healthy, efficient source of protein, eggs are delicious.

Growing up, my mother used to take my sister and myself to the beach for picnics. We would spend the day at Will Rodgers State Beach in Santa Monica. My mother would sit on one blanket talking with a friend. My sister, Barbara, and I would dig holes in the sand and build our version of "castles" by filling plastic buckets with wet sand and turning them over quickly.

For lunch my mother always made our favorites. Fried chicken, hard boiled eggs and egg salad sandwiches. I guess it must be a truth of the human experience that what we eat as children is burned deeply into our psyches. Sometimes negatively (I won't go near calf's liver, which my mom used to serve on a regular basis) but mostly positively.

More often than not, comfort food means food we ate as a child that made us feel all taken care of. I enjoy eggs so many ways. Hardboiled, sliced and topped with anchovies or 1000 island dressing.

Deviled with a filling of anchovies, parsley and capers.

Egg salad flavored with bacon, charred corn kernels and parsley. Coddled in Caesar salad dressing richly flavored with anchovies and Tabasco sauce. One egg omelets. Egg white cookies with hazelnuts and orange glaze.

This weekend a friend shared one of her favorite eggs. She gave me a half dozen Apricot Lane Farms eggs she picked up at Farm Shop in Brentwood. Wildly popular, the eggs sell out quickly.

What makes farm fresh eggs so special is the bright yellow yolk. Visually impressive, the yolk is sweet, thick and custardy. Lily Farms eggs, sold at the Santa Monica Farmers Market (Wednesday and Saturday) and at the Palisades Sunday market, have a similar quality.

This morning I had one of the Apricot Lane eggs for breakfast.

I think one of the best ways to enjoy quality eggs is to make a fried egg. Personally I like over-easy eggs, but sunny side up would be good too. I fried the egg in a pat of sweet butter in a non-stick pan and served it on a slice of toasted Orowheat Oatnut Bread with Bonne Maman Strawberry Preserves and Pulgra unsalted butter.

Simple. Easy. Delicious. The pictures tell the story.

Summer Travel - Time to Plan a Picnic at 30,000 Feet

When you board an airplane and walk past the first-class passengers settling into their double-wide seats, it’s difficult to avoid feeling like a second-class citizen. The issue isn’t only personal space. As the curtain closes behind the lucky few, you know the crew is preparing a nonstop feast for those with plenty of disposable income.

You can almost see the French cheeses and crackers on a tray with glasses of bubbly Champagne, an opulent first course meant to stimulate the appetite before a gourmet entree — chateaubriand, perhaps, or line-caught salmon with roasted asparagus. If you listen closely, you can hear the flight attendant whispering to leave room for the hot fudge sundae with fresh whipped cream and toasted almonds.

In coach, nothing is free. Sure, for now the sodas, water, and coffee are still complimentary, but if you’re hungry, have your credit card ready. Alaska Airline’s cheeseburger with chips or the Chicken Bánh Mi Sandwich is a relative bargain at $7, but Delta charges $9.99 for a grilled chicken wrap, and a vending-machine-type pastrami and cheese (cheese on pastrami?) sandwich is $9.99 on American Airlines. Delta’s “Eats Treats” is a choice of three snack boxes with packets of easy to eat chips, cookies,  cheese spread, nuts and dried fruit for $5.99-$8.99.

You’ll do a lot better if you brown bag it and pretend you’re on a picnic.

Choose food with staying power

Pack food that travels well: trail mix, your own tea bags and sunflower seeds. Fresh fruit is good, but avoid berries that bruise easily. Carrot and celery sticks are great, as are sandwiches. One caveat: Remember that you can only take 3 ounces of any liquid through airport security, so go easy on the salad dressing or condiments you bring.

Assemble sandwiches carefully

Sandwiches are an easy-to-eat option for in-flight meals because everyone gets to choose what they want. There are an infinite number of combinations from ham and cheese on rye to grilled shiitake mushroom and watercress sandwich for vegetarians. Meat eaters in the family can go crazy and build a feast of turkey breast, salami and provolone on deli rye.

To keep your bread pristine, put the mayo or mustard (as well as tomatoes or lettuce) between the meat slices, not directly on the bread. Or, for really long flights, wrap the bread, meat and cheese in plastic wrap sealed in Ziploc bags and assemble the sandwich with condiment packets while you’re flying.

Avoid fillings that might disturb your fellow passengers. Overly messy food or condiments, like chopped liver and garlic paste are a bit too aromatic for an airplane’s close quarters.

Keep it fun for the kids

If kids like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, stop at a camping supply store and pick up a couple of refillable plastic tubes. The kids can choose their favorite peanut butter and jam and pre-fill the tubes at home. Now they have something to look forward to on the plane.

A salad bar in the air

Make carrot, potato or pasta salad at home and pack it in plastic containers. Keep a green salad fresh by assembling it when you’re ready to eat. (A tip: You can pick up a couple of the empty salad dressing containers at your grocery store’s salad bar.) At home, give everyone the chance to pack their favorite salad fixings. Besides lettuce or arugula, bring chopped tomatoes, scallions, croutons, olives, hardboiled egg slices, crumbled cheese, or carrot rounds — those salad-dressing containers work well for these items, too.

Want to make your salad even more delicious? Try this simple vinaigrette. Just heat ¼ cup of balsamic vinegar over a low flame until it’s reduced to a teaspoon, then mix it together with 2 tablespoons of olive oil. The reduced balsamic adds depth and natural sweetness to the dressing.

Let your deli do the work

To glam up your meal, nothing says classy like a charcuterie plate and nothing is easier to prepare. Pick up a selection of favorite meats, pâtés, cheeses, and a small baguette or a selection of rolls at your favorite deli. Bring along some olives, a few cornichons — those tart French pickles — and a packet of Dijon mustard, and you won’t care what the first-class passengers are eating.

Celebrate your sweet tooth

For dessert, go wild and stop at your favorite bakery. Fresh fruit tarts don’t travel well, but cookies, muffins, scones and even eclairs do quite nicely if packed in plastic containers, like the ones used at the deli or the lidded containers sold by Ziploc and Glad.

Don’t forget the basics

Bring paper plates, napkins and plastic utensils so you can feast in style. A plain kitchen towel makes a perfect airplane tray tablecloth and helps with spills. Pack everything in plastic containers. Be a good neighbor and carry plastic bags for easy clean up so you don’t leave any trash behind. Take along sea salt and freshly ground pepper in empty 35mm film canisters (remember those?) or even the plastic containers used for prescription medication.

Why we love flying

With all the inconveniences, we easily forget that flying is a manmade miracle. Think about it, a hundred-plus people and all their luggage powering through the sky above the highest clouds. Amazing. If only we didn’t feel so claustrophobically uncomfortable, we could return to the wonder we felt as kids when we pressed our noses against the window and looked down at the earth below.

We can’t regain that lost innocence, but enjoying a delicious home-prepared meal, maybe we can reconnect with the fun of flying. A really good sandwich, some olives, and a crisp Fuji apple from the farmers market can do that for you.

Get Ready for Summer with Sangria Fruit Salad

When I was served a glass of sangria in a bar in San Sebastián, a small resort town on the coast of Northern Spain, I loved the way fresh fruit added flavor to the wine. Fortified with brandy and  sugar, sangria goes well with small sandwiches, salads and snacks.

Visit Spain and you'll see sangria pitchers wide at the base and pinched at the spout so when poured, the wine not the fruit fills the glass.

The result is a wine beverage that carries memories of the fruit but not the fruit itself. Sitting in that small bar, enjoying a relaxed afternoon, I wondered at this exclusion. Why keep the fruit out of the glass?

When peaches, apples, limes and oranges go into a sangria, they are sliced but not peeled. The thought that played around in my head was why not peel the fruit and cut everything into spoon sized pieces? Doing that would allow the wine and fruit to be served together. 

Place a dozen on a tray, with an espresso spoon in each glass and your guests will enjoy an appetizer and cocktail in one.

Sangria Fruit Salad

Using a bottle of quality wine to make sangria is a waste. The same goes for the brandy. Because so many of the flavors will come from other sources, select a drinkable, inexpensive red wine and brandy. Supermarkets and Trader Joe's sell good wines and brandies at a low price that work well. For the wine, I like Merlot, but the choice is entirely up to you. If you prefer white wine, fumé blanc and chardonnay are good. 

Use firm and ripe fruit that is in season. Stone fruit like cherries, peaches and nectarines, grapes, oranges, limes, strawberries, Fuji apples and pears work well. 

Cut up and add the fruits just before serving so they don't become soggy by absorbing too much wine.

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

1 750 ml bottle red wine

1/2 cup brandy

1/4 cup white granulated sugar

Juice of one lemon or lime

3 oranges, preferably Valencia

2 Fuji apples, washed, peeled, cut into quarter sized cubes

2 white nectarines, washed, peeled, cut into quarter sized cubes
6 large strawberries, washed, stems removed

Directions

In a large pitcher, mix together the wine, brandy, sugar and lemon juice. Chill in the refrigerator. 

Using a sharp knife, peel the oranges, removing all the peel together with the rind. Hold the peeled oranges over a bowl to catch all the juice. Cut the orange sections free from the membrane. When all the sections have been removed, squeeze the membrane to capture the last bit of delicious juice.

Just before serving, add the orange sections, orange juice and cut up strawberries, apples and nectarines. Stir well.

Use a ladle to fill glasses with a good amount of the fruit. Top off with the sangria. Place an espresso spoon in each glass.

Spring in New York, Time to Explore Lower Manhattan and Eat at the Food Courts in Brookfield Place

Friends in New York talked about the weather all winter. Between ice, snow, rain and cold temperatures, the last winter was memorable for being unpleasant.

Now, temperatures have risen and cold weather is a distant memory. Flowers are blooming. The grass in Central Park is green. God's in Heaven and all's right with the world. This week New York is actually warmer than Los Angeles!

On a recent trip to the city, we enjoyed the good weather. We walked miles around the city each day. Thanks to the health app on the iPhone 6 I can track how many miles I walked. One day that was almost 8 miles. So much fun.

I visited with friends and took foodie-tours in different parts of town. I stopped at the Met (the Metropolitan Museum of Art) to check out the amazing art in the special exhibit of Plains Indians: Artists of Earth and Sky.

I cooked a couple of meals for our friends, shopping at the Fairway Market on the upper west side (Broadway and 74th Street) and had a day revisiting favorite restaurants around the city like the Vietnamese Nha Trang One Restaurant (87 Baxter Street, NYC 10013, 212/233-5948)  in Chinatown to have the salt and pepper shrimp and to eat at a new restaurant, Mission Cantina (172 Orchard St., New York, NY 10002, 212/254-2233) south of Houston on the Lower East Side.

I had walked past the restaurant several times without investigating, assuming it was just another wanna-be New York City Mexican restaurant. A good friend showed me the error of my ways. The wildly colorful, very small Mission Cantina is a very interesting mash up of a restaurant.
Vietnamese dishes are served for breakfast and Mexican-ish dishes during lunch and dinner.  We had Mexican-style dishes for lunch. They were unlike anything I had eaten in LA. The flavors were jazz-riffs rather than representations of traditional Mexican dishes like mole.

In the morning, I loved the Vietnamese duck and scallion congee topped with a fried egg and served with an enormous shrimp baguette with deep fried whole peanuts and mashed garlic. So good. What an amazing way to begin the day.

I spent most of one day with another friend in Lower Manhattan at Ground Zero where most of the public areas are open. One Trade Center dominates lower Manhattan as did the Twin Towers it replaced. At the 9/11 Memorial, cascading water disappears into a dark cavern, the perimeter above is inscribed with the names of those who died.

People take selfies against the memorial and bend backwards to frame a shot of One Trade Center to include the very top.

Construction continues on the east side of the area but the area to the west is now open to the Hudson. On the ground floor of Brookfield Place (before 9/11, the World Financial Center) a broad patio faces the water. Two food courts inside look out into a large atrium.

Le District opened in the spring. Wanting to be a French version of Mario Batali's Eataly, the shops in Le District offer a variety of specialty products that will stimulate a Parisian sense memory.

Affordably priced, inside the market you can buy cookies, crepes, strong freshly brewed coffee, sandwiches on crusty rolls, rotisserie chickens, croissants, cheeses, charcuterie and fresh meat, fish and poultry.

Hudson Eats on the second floor is a large food court. Light pours in through tall windows facing the river and a patio planted with trees. While downstairs focuses on the French experience, upstairs you can range the world in search of culinary treats, including pizza, hamburgers, Thai dishes, sandwiches, baked goods, sushi, barbecue, Mexican food and freshly made salads.

With so many choices, a good friend was my guide. We chose Texas style fatty brisket with cole slaw,  cucumber pickles and baked beans from the Mighty Quinn and an order of pork and chive dumplings from Northern Tiger.

They were as different as dishes could be. They were both delicious. Each in its own way, perfectly prepared. Moist where moist was needed. Crisp where crisp was wanted.

Hudson Eats is definitely worth a stop when you are near the 9/11 Memorial or visiting Wall Street.

Los Angeles Restaurant Recommendations for a Friend who Lives in New York

Sometimes out of town friends ask for restaurant recommendations. The restaurants I love in Los Angeles are spread all over town and they usually aren't ones that are famous. 

I just emailed a short list to a good friend who wants to give a present to an old friend who has just completed a difficult film project.

I thought I'd share the list with you.

Adana Restaurant

6918 San Fernando Road, Glendale 91201 818/843-6237

Delicious food. Written about by me, Mark Bittman and Jonathan Gold. We all love it. The chef, Edward Khechemyan, is a hard working, inventive man. The food is freshly made. Affordable. Delicious.

Here are links to reviews:

Mark Bittman

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/28/magazine/this-armenian-life.html?_r=0

Jonathan Gold

http://www.latimes.com/food/la-fo-0307-gold-adana-restaurant-20150307-story.html

David Latt

http://menwholiketocook.blogspot.com/search/label/Adana%20Restaurant

Yabu 

11820 W. Pico Blvd

LA CA 90064

 (310) 473-9757

The best affordable sushi, tempura, udon and soba in LA. An intimate, cozy, friendly space. (There are two Yabu restaurants. The one in West Hollywood I don’t like. This is the one on the west side.)

Here is my review:

http://menwholiketocook.blogspot.com/2011/08/yabu-in-west-los-angeles-authentic.html

Liquid Kitty

11780 W. Pico Blvd

Los Angeles CA 90064

Half a block east of Yabu, on the same side of the street is Liquid Kitty, possibly one of the coolest bars in LA with very large, well-made drinks, walls painted black and soft-core porn or 70s melodramatic movies showing silently on a screen in the back. Out front there is a neon martini glass that changes into a burning cigarette

My favorite evening is a massively large dirty martini up at Liquid Kitty, then dinner at Yabu (tendon (seasoned rice with tempera shrimp & vegetables), uni sushi with a quail yolk, crab handroll, tamago sushi, yellow tail sashimi, black cod with soy sauce). Yum.

La Fiesta Brava

423 Rose Avenue, Venice, CA 90291

310/399-8005

A hole in the wall restaurant owned by a family. When you walk through the front door, you enter what used to be the living room of a home. This is as close as you’ll get to eating in a Mexican family’s home as you will get without going to a Mexican family’s home. The chicken mole is fantastic. Michelle loves the pepper shrimp in the shell with beans and rice. The fish taco is actually a whole grilled fish filet on a handmade tortilla topped with creamy salsa. The food is really good. Unfortunately Rose Avenue is undergoing a very rapid redevelopment, with upscale restaurants and shops taking over the neighborhood. The days are numbered for La Fiesta Brava. It is really worth experiencing as many times as possible before it is forced to leave.

My review:

http://menwholiketocook.blogspot.com/2014/09/la-fiesta-brava-delights-with-old.html