“Listening, as far as I’m concerned is certainly a prerequisite of love. One of the most essential ways of saying “I love you” is being a receptive listener…Listening is where love begins. Listening to ourselves and then to our neighbors.-Fred Rogers
Mr. Rogers birthday was this week. Let’s live out his legacy by remembering to listen. Happy Weekend!
A few weeks ago I called my friend Lisa with some good news. “I got us tickets to go see our boyfriend perform in SF. Be prepared to Big Eat beforehand.” This made Lisa very happy. I submit Photographic Exhibit A.
Obviously our boyfriend is Jordan from NKOTB. I know that many of you do not understand my love for them. Judge me as you will. We’ve been in an imaginary relationship for 20+ years now. It’s safe to say I’ll be loving him forever. Ahem.
“Emily you are so awesomely notorious baby. I’m so glad you are my imaginary girlfriend. You are a rockstar. Now I will sing you a sex-ay song in my falsetto voice.”
I am just sane enough to realize that my “relationship” with Jordan is almost entirely in my head so I have no problem stuffing myself with food before hooking up for our annual visit. This is the best part about imaginary relationships. No worries about garlic breath or distended stomachs.
#38 The Little Star at Little Star Pizza
My friend Jeannie hypothesized that Little Star was the reason she gained 20 lbs when she moved to the city. My formative research shows that this is a strong probability. Quality deep dish pizza is few and far between on the West Coast and Little Star shines in our barren deep dish pizza wasteland.
The pizza itself has all the important components. Pleasingly oozy? Check. Chock-a-block with fresh ingredients and flavor? Check! The crowning glory was the amazing cornmeal crust that tasted light and crunch and airy like it was made out of the freshest croutons in the world. Lisa and I spent 20 minutes discussing its merits and frankly I’m not sure that was enough time.
Verdict: Go eat pizza. Bring your stretchy pants.
#39 Puka Punch at Smuggler’s Cove
Waiting around for concerts to start is a waste of my limited leg power so we decided to have a little Sunday night happy hour at Smugglers Cove. I was disconcerted as I dragged Lisa to a building that had no markings, blacked out windows and a very uh “suggestively” dressed woman entering the building. She was not going to be pleased if I accidentally dragged her into a brothel. She hates it when I do that.
Despite our concerns we entered the creepy building. Our jaws immediately dropped open like cartoon characters. Smugglers Cove is like crossing the threshold from San Francisco to Pirates of the Carribbean. It is three stories of Captain Jack Sparrowness.
The specialty at Smugglers Cove is rum (duh) and the menu is like a textbook on rum with little piratey drawings. We were instructed to try the Puka punch which was both giant and satisfying but what I really wished we could try was a drink that was being set on fire behind us. FIRE! Cinamon scented FIRE!
Verdict: Who cares what you drink there? This place is an ex-per-ience and there is rum! Toss some back until you are just punch drunk enough to walk yourself safely to see your “boyfriend”. Not too much though. The girl next to me at the concert was drunkenly slurring “I just NEED Jordan in my LIFE” to the security guards. My friends, that is amusing but way too drunk. No more rum for her.
I was talking with friends this weekend about the beauty in fighting. Without romanticizng the ugliness of hurt feelings and the words that cut to your heart there is a flip side to the pain. There is the possibility for reconciliation and the safety of knowing someone who continues to love you after you’ve shown your worst side. There is the ability to remember that even when it gets really, really stormy there’s still a good chance that it will all be okay.
There are certain types of days when one craves healthy foods. For me those days usually fall into two categories:
1) The day after a party or a Big Eat or 2) A sunny day when my optomism is overflowing
Last Sunday did not fall into either of those categories. Last Sunday was a mess, It was overcast, I didn’t feel good, the batting average for my toddler’s dry sheets in the morning was alarmingly low, I had terrible nightmares all week and we found out that there was a possibility that a wave of layoffs would hit our family.
It was not a day for virtue or platitudes about not hiding feelings with food. It was a day for stop-gap measures and burying your head in the sand.
It was a day for Dan-Dan Noodles followed by a nap.
I first learned about Dan-Dan Noodles from Fuschia Dunlop’s excellent book on Sichuanese cooking. Ever since then I’ve been thinking about them, longing for them, imagining them etc. etc. The basic ingredients boil down to primal basics: carbs, chile, red meat, salt and fat. They are wonderful and decadent.
They are also tricky little beasts. A steady hand is needed when you are using extrmely volatile chiles, sichuan pepcorns, high heat and ludicrous amounts of soy sauce. I have messed up DanDan Noodles more times then they have come out perfect but if you do it right these noodles are heaven: salty enough to cure a primitive survival need, slick with sesame and bursting with chile to burn away your worries for a little while.
Last Sunday mine weren’t perfect, but they were good enough to get the job done. We slurped them down in a frenzy of self-pity and they induced a carb coma of the most comforting variety. Two hours later I woke up ready to face the world. This weekend we’re feeling like fresh veggies, but I have sichuan peppercorns on reserve, just in case. :)
Get Fuschia’s recipe here.
Countdown to restorative nap in 5,4,3,2zzzzzzz
Last week Arnold and I joined the year 2007 and got our first iPhones. Obviously we only now only communicate via Siri now which means I spend my whole day getting texts that say things like “I’m coming hope to eat some mitzi-trufuletta”.
Excellent. Mitzi-trufuletta sounds great to me.
In addition to exploring the wonder that is texting ( we didn’t have a text plan before!) I also got to join Instagram! Like the rest of the world I am now taking pictures of every mundane part of my day, adding a filter and calling it art. If you don’t mind following somebody who adds and deletes photos at a drunken pace please friend/follow/join me on instagram. My user name is NotoriousMLE!
I’m eating 100 Items off of 7 X 7s SF Big Eat List. You can see the rest of entries to this series here.
Sacramento has a burgeoning food truck scene and every few months a local group has been organizing a mobile food festival called Sactomofo. The third incarnation was located within walking distance of my house. Even better? There was a Big Eat venue on the list of out of town attendees. Thank you so much Sactomofo organizers for bringing Chairman Bao to me!
#37 Pork Belly Bun at Chairman Bao
The upside of this scenario is that I did not have to figure out how to find this truck on a random day in San Francisco, the downside is that Sactomofo is crazy busy with hour-long lines at all the trucks. Not exagerating at all, Sacramentans are food truck crazy.
By the time we got to the front of the line everyone around me was getting grumpy. “This better be worth it” grunted the guy behind me. I couldn’t help thinking the same. I was hungry cold and very concerned that I would be dissapointed.
I needn’t have worried. It was extraordinary. Chairman Bao does a modern take on buns. They have two kinds baked and steamed. The baked are split in half like a sandwhich and the steamed are rolled up like a puffy taco. If I had to choose one to love forever in domestic partnership I would go with the Big Eat list and pick the pork belly. The pork was absolutely luscious and piled with pickled daikon to cut the richness. The bun itself was both toasted and soft. I feel jealous of myself just by looking at the picture. Memories….
This is an example of a steamed bun, I don’t remember exactly what these were. One was tofu and one was, uh, something else delicious? It was all so good that everything dissapeared before I had the chance to store the wonder of each one in my long term memory.
Ugh, more mystery deliciousness. I’m sorry dear readers. I’ve failed you! I have no idea what kind of bun this way, all I can say, is eat it!
Verdict: I waited in line for an hour to eat this and I didn’t get pissed. Instead my friends and I shoved them in our faces with a glee that is almost indecent. If that’s not a glowing review, I don’t know what is.
