so they’re probably more known for their milkshakes (the two straws are a good call) and ice cream, but man, i have not had cornbread with my breakfast ever.
and it’s pretty good cornbread. the chef’s mess was literally a mess of deliciousness, too.
how i love the mission.
if i hold off on
…then i can afford half of a small wheel of nicasio valley formagella.
because i fail to see any better way of starting the day like this:
i have a lifelong procrastination issue that i have not successfully addressed. but i’m pretty certain that procrastination didn’t look like this when i was in university:
furthermore, i’m proud to share this recipe because of several firsts that came out of the whole expedition:
for budgetary reasons, i only used flax seeds, sunflower seeds, pepitas, and some roasted hazelnuts leftover from previous culinary projects. but even with 3 seeds + 1 nut, it was a chockablock of flavours and textures (and not to mention super good for you).
golf claps all around.
add a drizzle of honey for breakfast (or supper) deliciousness — or lightly buttered with your winter san francisco summer soups.
there’s a scene from the motorcycle diaries where ernesto and alberto are in a restaurant with two chilean sisters. having offered wine but declined since the boys adhered to the argentinian “custom” of never drinking on an empty stomach, the sisters offer them empanadas.
which, like inception, planted the idea of chilean empanadas in my head.
the following morning on 16th, i did a double take (walked by, looked up, walked past, stopped, looked back, walked back) in front of chile lindo. i stumbled inside, fumbled and forked out $5.48, and end up with a beef empanada firmly planted in my hand.
and within that empanada, a wedge of hard boiled egg AND a black olive nestled amongst the pino. my goodness, breakfast hasn’t been so good to me in so long.
mi corazon es para ti, gael.
of all the things i’ve learned out of necessity here in san francisco, improvising with whatever’s left from last week’s CSA is one of the biggest ones. we never seem to finish anything before the next batch rolls around.
but there’s only so much fried rice you can make. i do like fried rice, though. and dude, i’m chinese. of course i like rice.
there is also so much yakisoba you can make, too. again, noodles, chinese, etc.
but what do you do with goat cheese? no, don’t even try to cheese my rice. that’s wrong.
so made this instead.
penne with whatever the hell is left in your fridge
serves a dinner and two take-to-school lunches. really, i take my lunch to school. it fills the whole room with deliciousness, to the point where people will go “hoi, can you commute to oakland and cook for me and my girlfriend?”
(okay, that’s only ever happened once.)
(i’m also pretty sure it was because justin was HANGRY.)
preheat oven to 425ºF / 220ºC.
place the chopped onion and tomatoes in a single layer in a baking pan, drizzle with olive oil and coarse salt. shake the pan to distribute your delicious oils and salts. roast in the oven for 40 minutes, or until the onions are slightly golden and tomatoes are wilting in their skins.
(i threw in the cold roast potatoes with the onions and tomatoes.)
in a large bowl, crumble the goat cheese and set aside.
meanwhile, boil the pasta until al dente. drain, reserving about a cup of the pasta water. while the penne is still hot, add the pasta and pasta water into the goat cheese, and mix until the cheese forms a creamy sauce.
stir through your roasted vegetables and basil. season with coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper.
fortunately, oakland is relatively easy to navigate. otherwise there was no way we would’ve ended up at the fox theatre later that evening.
(gob is an australian / british term for “mouth”.)
in amidst the trucks and tents was this unassuming guy at off the grid with a tray of neatly packaged gobs, with giant “gobba gobba hey” stickers on them.
by the time i saw him he only had 2 left, so i didn’t bother asking what the hell they actually were.
turns out they’re NOT squishy macaroons. nor are they dorayaki, but they’re pretty close. they’re gobs. and they’re delicious. i don’t know how this guy knows matcha the way he does, but he does it so well by pairing it with a bean paste that i almost wept.
admittedly, i was a little drunk and VERY tired, but it essentially tasted like my childhood* and made me feel a little homesick. so i promptly went to bed and dreamed that my bike fell apart and they couldn’t put it back together again. not exactly the best dream ever. but at least the gob was delicious.
* i’m not japanese, but i remember this one trip that my parents made to japan without me when i was about 6 years old. of course, i cried every night like the wimpy spineless runt that i was. but when they got back my mother brought back all sorts of delicious japanese deliciousness for me, which more than made up for it and amongst them was dorayaki, which just blew my mind.
there’s nothing quite like shoving california rolls into your mouth while watching some upskirt action.
i smelled some form of british when i had their strawberry shortcake. and i was right: nestled under the strawberries and cream was a scone straight out of british colonia that is australia.
and in oakland, of all places. too awesome.
there is a small guatemalan food truck on the 16th street BART that fascinates me every time i walk by it. mainly because i look at the food photos and have no idea what any of it is. formless brown blobs with blobs of mexican cream.
some of the other blobs have red and green. but mostly blobs. my spanish is ah, not so good, but they could use a better photographer.
so i grabbed a rellenito de platano on a recommendation. apart from the plantain part i was basically expecting some brown fecal-looking thing. but oh my goodness. you can NOT put plantains and black beans together. that is just too delicious.
the week i spent in LA basically consisted of two things:
here’s something i learned while i wasn’t partaking in the latter category. it’s also a great opportunity for people to say that they love your delicious nuts, regardless of whether you’re biologically male or not.
or, at least, everyone who’s tried them has commented on how amazing my nuts are. hm.
