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On my last night in San Francisco, we ventured back into the city to check out this restaurant in Chinatown. The group had been advised to put down the menu and to just ask the waiter to bring an assortment of their best dishes. I'd never ordered this way before, but it was fantastic. (Not the way to go, of course, if you're allergic to anything...) We got all types of delicious soups, wraps, and mouth-watering main dishes. A great farewell, until next time.
An arty dish I sampled near San Francisco at a place called Mistral. It was one of their specials for the night - a buttery Halibut covered in garlic mashed potatoes and a horseradish cream sauce, nested in an artichoke shell. Presentation was certainly half the battle in this course, although it was as delicious as it looked!
So my friend Jocelyn took me on a wild ride around L.A. last weekend, and one of the many highlights was a great bar called "Edison" in the downtown area. Their website is actually pretty cool and shows off more than I was able to photograph inconspicuously in the low light. I'm totally the girl who slogs the heavy SLR around everywhere when she travels. And my friends are a collection of REALLY cool people who tolerate me. Anyway, this bar is an homage to Thomas Edison, with really old-fashioned cloudy lightbulbs dangling from custom chandeliers at every turn and massive old machinery everywhere. The whole place is a collection of little leather living rooms with a few well placed bars and an enormous winding staircase that pulls you down into a swirl of flapper-clad waitresses and smokey jazz musicians. I love these bars that make a novel concept out of old stuff. Note to self: keep all that crap I was going to sell on eBay and open a bar instead.
When I was in college, I thought that when I finally owned my own house I would dedicate an entire room to cactus plants. Crazy, I know, but I am still totally obsessed with these things. Perhaps because they're the only plants I could ever successfully grow. And also probably because I had no concept of owning a house... Because when you have a house, believe me, you have nothing but space to store sharp, asymmetrical plants. Anyway, when we came upon a whole patch of these at the UCLA Botanical Gardens last week, I couldn't believe my luck - cactus of every shape and color! Maybe one day, I'll turn to indoor horticulture. But for now, I will just have to enjoy them in their natural habitat.
As many of you experienced first-hand, we just came out of a fleeting week of summer, which suddenly spiraled back to the chilly and damp, making us regret putting away our sweaters for the season, even though it felt so good to let them go! Here's a shot of one night at an outdoor bar in Boston with friends Kelly and Liz, fully enjoying the heat with a tall pint. I, for one, am fully ready for its return! Maybe this is why Boston has so few outdoor bars...