Envelope System: Halfway through December 2008

I decided to make December my "test" month for trying out the envelope system. I put $150 in my Groceries envelope and $200 in my Eating Out envelope. We're now a little more than halfway through the month and here's how it's looking so far...

Groceries
I've spent $104.62 on groceries so far, of which $14 was for vanilla extract that will probably last me for the next two years and $7 was for pure entertainment of friends (some chips and dip). It's gonna be tough to stick to this and I may have just allocated too little to this envelope. Especially with cooking Christmas Eve dinner and co-hosting a New Year's Eve party. I only have $45.38 left and the standing rib roast I want to make will likely take up $25 of that even with the meat on sale this week. Hmmm... Maybe if I can spend less in the eating out department... How's that looking?

Eating Out
Tonight was my major outing for the month, an annual Christmastime tradition of eating $18 AMAZING grilled cheese sandwiches at Campanile. Add wine, cheese as dessert and a mandatory gratuity for a large party (not that they don't deserve it because the service at Campanile is excellent!) and you've got yourself a $50 dinner. I am proud of myself for not falling into the valet trap. I found street parking for free, a block away, while everyone else paid $6.50 plus tip for valet parking. I will gladly walk two blocks to save $8 dollars for nothing. I had planned on spending up to $60, so I am happy that it was only $50.

Back to the progress report... I've spent $104.86, so I'm on track to be OK for the month if I don't go crazy. I've been invited out for drinks tomorrow night with one group of friends and dinner with another... I might have to skip one or both if I want to have leftover money to put towards extra groceries and party supplies.

Overall
I'm happy with the budgeting. I've been taking some ribbing from friends, but I can take it. It's my money and sure, I might look cheap sometimes, but at least I am in control of what I'm spending and more importantly, I'm consciously spending my money. The envelopes definitely help with this because seeing the money in the envelope and writing down on the outside of the envelope exactly how much I spent helps me keep an eye on it. I've also been enjoying cooking more at home. It makes me feel more productive. It's a nice feeling.

Date #42.2 has been set

I've been talking to 42 quite a bit the past few days since our first big date. The second big date has been set for next weekend. I am really looking forward to it! I've been thinking about the first date a lot and realized that one thing I love about him is that he's perfectly willing to dissect a situation with me and talk about it a lot. Most guys probably wouldn't be so gung-ho about that.

It's a really cool quality. It makes me feel more inclined to talk to him about everything. Literally, it seems like we just talk endlessly about anything under the sun. Partly because we're still gathering data about each other and partly because neither one of us wants to hang up! I am not joking when I tell you he had a list of chain restaurants for me to rate so we could compare our "chain" tastes! It was so cute! During our first date, I asked him what he thought about Applebee's (ick!). Turns out, he doesn't like them either! I was so happy to hear that that I kissed him (a lot!)! It may seem like a stupid thing to agree on, but what if he loooooved Applebee's and wanted me to eat there all the time? Gross! I mean, seriously... is true love worth that much bad food? I think not! (On the other hand, there's always the salad bar and cocktails, which are the only things I would ever order there again.)

This is totally light stuff, but we also talk about the "deeper" stuff. We've already discussed all the stuff that I imagine most "normal" people probably wouldn't touch for at least a month or two. It's been great! Before our first big date, I think we had been talking more seriously (than just IMing) for about 10 days. I joked with him that we had crammed three months of casual, pointless dating into a week! Which I think mainly works because we both are totally down with talking about just about anything.

Now, I have to wait a whole week to see him. Man, that totally sucks! But at least he's just a phone call away!

Festive Weekend

This weekend has been quite festive so far. On Friday, after working 12 long hours, I went to Erin & Liz's holiday party and had a good time. I had another party to go to, but after stopping by there, I was too tired to think about driving over the hill and finding parking to boot. Erin made queso - YUM and Liz made some gingerbread cookies that were delicious!! I usually don't like gingerbread cookies, but these were so yummy that I happily took a few home with me when she offered them!

On Saturday, eight of us celebrated Shannon's birthday by piling into a rental mini-van and stopping at seven different restaurants for various courses throughout the day! I overslept and didn't make it to the "bacon of the month" tasting & champagne cocktails at the house before hitting the first restaurant. Boo to me! I don't have the mental energy right now to make the list of all the places we went, but all of them were highly recommended by Jonathan Gold, Pulitzer prize winning food critic of the LA Weekly. It was a stomach crawl through the best of LA!

Today, I slept in (finally!!), went to church, and then came home and watched some football and finally finished decorating my Christmas tree. I've also been slowly working on straightening up the apartment because I'm having people over for a bit on Christmas Eve and for gaming later in the week. Also, I'm hosting a New Year's Eve party, but decided to take a trip next weekend since I'm not working, so I need to make sure my apartment is cleaned and ready for the party before I leave on Friday. Especially since I have to work on New Year's Eve during the day, specifically at 7 AM! In Orange County. Fun! Not.

I'm supposed to go out dancing tonight, but at the moment, I'm really not feeling like going. Hopefully, in the next few hours, I get a bit more peppy! The Spazmatics go on at 10 PM! This is the super-cool 80s cover band we saw at the Mandalay Bay House of Blues last January in Vegas and then at Universal City Walk one time over the summer.

I'm looking forward to going to Providence for their special dinner for Christmas Eve tomorrow night. Providence, a fabulous fancy French restaurant, hosts a very Italian "Feast of the Seven Fishes" on Christmas Eve each year. I was talking to an Italian guy I know and he said that his family does that every year. It should be tasty and fun! I need to decide what to wear too.

Couch Surfer #2 Update

Sebastian, my couch surfer #2, arrived last Friday night, just after midnight. I was out dancing at Clockwork Orange and he called and then texted me to let me know that he would meet me at my apartment. So, I left the club, drove home to meet him and then we chatted for quite a while. Shane & Ron showed up around 2 AM and Ron got a chance to practice some of that German he's been studying on a live person!! Those podcasts have really paid off because Sebastian said that he could understand everything Ron was saying and apparently Ron was understanding what Sebastian was saying too! So, it looks like we'll be set in both France and Germany as far as languages go!

On Saturday, I cooked a HUGE breakfast for me, Shane and Sebastian - bacon, eggs, potatoes with onions cooked in bacon grease, YUM! And then Sebastian headed out to Hollywood & Highland to do some shopping. Apparently, the jeans in Germany are very expensive, so he wanted to buy some while he was here. He also went to Venice and Santa Monica. Meanwhile, Shane & I listened to the rain and watched the last five episodes of Heroes Season 1 so she'd be all caught up for the premiere on Monday. Sebastian met up with us over at L&N's for their movie party later that evening. We ended up watching "Support Your Local Sheriff" and "The Sting." Both were really good! He showed up in time to play Loopin' Louie and sleep through "The Sting." Poor thing, he was still trying to adjust to US time.


On Sunday, he was already gone by the time I woke up which was nice because it gave me a chance to clean up the kitchen and watch some football. He went again to Hollywood & Highland and then 3rd Street Promenade and then drove up PCH to Malibu. It was gorgeous weather on Sunday, so it was perfect for that!! He met me back at my place to go out to dinner with me and Travis. We ended up going to Colombo's, a place that I'd been wanting to try FOREVER! It was OK. Has that really old school feel to it and they have a piano guy singing the standards with a crazy lookin' chick playing a bass. Then we headed over to Barnes & Noble in Old Town Pasadena because Sebastian wanted to get a book about California to figure out where to stop as he drove up to San Jose on Monday. After that, we picked up a piece of Godiva chocolate cheesecake and walked to Lucky Baldwin's for a couple beers.

It was really cool hanging out with him and comparing notes about the differences between Germany and the US. Things he mentioned were: he likes that retailers are nice to you even if you don't buy anything! Also, people in Germany don't call dates "dates." It's just going to dinner with someone. They don't have a different way to indicate that it's a romantic relationship like we do. And people in Germany don't own guns, I guess they're not allowed to.

Kansas City Restaurant Reviews

Jack Stack BBQ
I realized that I never posted a recap of the restaurants I visited while in Kansas City earlier this month! Let's see... on Friday night, we went to Jack Stack BBQ and I ordered the burnt ends & baby back ribs. The first thing I was surprised about was that the place was so nice! When we walked in, I thought, "Wow, this place looks like a nice steakhouse!" and I was worried it would be priced accordingly. Even with the extra charge for the baby back ribs, I think my dinner was about $16.50, which is pretty reasonable. Barbecue in Los Angeles is expensive, so it was nice to pay less than $20 for two different kinds of meat.

Before dinner, I had a dinner salad that had fresh bacon bits on it. Before I go on... the salad was the best tasting part of my meal. Yep you heard me right. The salad was the best part. The BBQ was OK, but not really spectacular. And maybe KC BBQ isn't for me. I can accept that. It certainly won't stop me from trying a different restaurant the next time I go. Most likely Arthur Bryant's or Gates since those seem to be the "big two" around there.

However, if I'm just going for salad and munchies, I would, without hestitation, go to Jack Stack again. We were still talking about our salad when we ate dinner the next night at Stroud's. It was that good. I don't know if it was the blue cheese dressing or the bacon bits? I suspect a bit of both. It did make us joke that next time, we'd go to Jack Stack for a salad, then head over to Stroud's for some fried chicken!

The second best part were the sides. The cheesy corn bake was pretty yummy, but rich. The french fries, even though they look quite institutional, were cooked well and were yummy.

After a comment on this entry, I'm modifying it to include something I neglected to mention... One thing I really did enjoy about Jack Stack was the experience itself. Our wait time was less than expected, our food came quickly, the atmosphere is comfortable and decor were very nice. Our server was great! I used to wait tables for years and I can attest to the fact that it's hard to find good service (at least in California!). She was attentive and very helpful without being annoying.

Here's a picture of my dinner:

Jack Stack Dinner

And here's a close-up of the burnt ends:

Burnt Ends

Stroud's
Then on Saturday night, I went to Stroud's which is famous for its fried chicken. After waiting an hour for a table and then another thirty minutes for my food, I can say that it was worth the wait. The fried chicken was delicious. I still don't think it tops Mrs. White's Golden Rule Cafe in my book, but Stroud's will be a must-eat anytime I'm in KC.

The disappointing thing about both restaurants was that neither one had sweet tea. How far south of the Mason-Dixon line does a woman need to go to get some sweet tea?!

It looks like Stroud's was an old house on a pond that was converted to a restaurant. There are rooms that look like additions and they have a big screened in porch down by the pond where you can listen to the fans, get an awesome freshly made strawberry margarita and munch on some popcorn while you're waiting for your table. This is a picture of the yard between the house and the screened in porch. I think the building on the right is a little chapel.

Side yard

And then our dinner! The green beans were yummily peppery as was the gravy for the mashed potatos. (Not pictured, but for bread, you get these cinnamin buns that are delicious if you like that sort of thing...)

Dinner

Close-up of our star - the Fried Chicken

Overall? I would recommend going to Stroud's, but I'd skip Jack Stack next time.

Bacon Caramel Ice Cream

Where might one find bacon caramel ice cream? At Scoops!! If you're a LA foodie or Yelper, you've no doubt heard of Scoops! Erin & I *finally* went last Saturday because we had heard that one of the flavors that day would be bacon caramel! Who can pass that up?! I didn't take a picture, plus I didn't feel particularly overly descriptive, but here is her account of our visit (with a picture!). Other flavors I tried were brown bread and Guinness-tiramisu.

Overall, the Scoops experience is pretty cool. If you buy an ice cream cake (24 hour notice required), Mr. Kim will make you whatever flavor you request for the cake! How cool is that?!

Pros: Awesome, original ice cream flavors that change every day; VEGAN ice cream for you non-animal product eating people out there
Cons: Not a lot of parking, just go up a block and park there. You might need quarters if you park at a meter.

Scoops
712 N. Heliotrope Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90029
(323) 906-2649

Open Mon - Sat 12 noon - 10 PM
Closed on Sundays!

My birthday plans are shaping up!

My birthday is rapidly approaching and plans have been made! I'm going to Vegas with a few friends and we're going to see O at the Bellagio. Tickets were expensive, but I'm so tired of doing the whole "the tickets are too expensive, maybe next time we'll see a show..." thing. That can just go on and on. You know what? The next time has come and we're seeing a show!

I'm really looking forward to it! It's been ages since I've seen a Cirque show. Also, I picked out a restaurant for dinner too. We're going to Rosemary's Restaurant which has a top rating by Zagat, so hopefully it's good!

Korean Fried Chicken

No wonder fried chicken is one of my favorite foods! Not only did I grow up in the South on delicious fried chicken, it's genetic! Apparently, Korean fried chicken has been under the radar for 20+ years and is on its way to becoming more and more popular with the white people!

Check out this article in the NY Times about it! I wonder if there are any places like this in Los Angeles?

EDIT: Just spotted this thread on Chowhound about places in LA to get chicken like this!

On the fried chicken note, I'm in Arizona this weekend and plan on hitting up Lolo's in Phoenix. He's the grandson of Mrs. White (who makes the BEST fried chicken on this planet!) and has her recipe and has opened up a Roscoe-esque chicken and waffle place in Phoenix. We'll see if it's any good! Full report next week.

Working on the resolutions

I've already been working on my resolutions. I didn't have anyone over tonight and therefore got some stuff done around the house and did a couple errands I put off last week because I was so busy! I returned some ornaments I bought but didn't use and I went to exchange one of the two copies of the new Barefoot Contessa cookbook I received for Christmas. I picked out a Korean cookbook that looks good and a copy of the 2007 Zagat Survey for Los Angeles. If I'm going to be eating out at least one new restaurant a month, I'm going to make sure it's a damn good one.

Speaking of... On New Year's Eve morning, we went to Din Tai Fung for breakfast. They serve soup dumplings. In short, it was amazing. Everything we had was wonderful!! I can't wait to take my sister there the next time she visits because she loves dumplings.

I'd highly recommend the following dishes:

• Juicy pork dumplings
• Soup dumplings - only served on weekends
• Appetizer - That's what it's called, it's shredded tofu and bean sprouts. Very tasty!
• Pork fried pan noodles - similar to chow mein
• Sesame buns - if you like sweet, warm sesame buns
• Vegetable dishes - We didn't order one, but someone else at our table did and it looked so good. I think they have only a few veggies each day. I'd recommend trying those. I am going to next time.
  

If you're planning on going (and trust me when I say it's worth the drive and getting up early on a weekend morning) and you don't want to wait for 45 minutes - 1 hour, I'd recommend getting there by 10:15 AM on weekends. They open at 10:30 AM and we got there around 10:20 AM and we were the last people seated inside. Unlike dim sum restaurants, their dining room is very limited.

After you sit down, you write down your order on the sheet (kind of like a sushi restaurant) and they start bringing it out ASAP. The waitresses spoke English, so they were able to make recommendations and answer all of our questions. Once you're done eating and paying, if you don't vacate your seat relatively quickly, they will *subtly* nudge you out. After all, they have a line of people clamoring to get in and eat some dumplings! Don't take it personally, it's just the way the restaurant works.

You can expect to spend between $15-20 depending on how much you order. Afterwards, we hit up a boba shop in the next shopping center that had a smiley face on the yellow glass for its logo. I'd highly recommend that place too. It took about 5 minutes for them to make our boba though, which to me, seemed like a long time.

Din Tai Fung
1108 S. Baldwin Ave.
Arcadia, CA 91007
(626) 574-7068

Hours:
M-F Lunch 11:00 AM - 2:30 PM Dinner 5:00 PM - 9:30 PM
Sat Lunch 10:30 AM - 2:30 PM Dinner 5:00 PM - 9:30 PM
Sun Lunch 10:30 AM - 2:30 PM Dinner 5:00 PM - 9:00 PM

New Restaurants for 2007

One of my New Year's Resolutions was to eat at one new restaurant a month. I might've set my goals a bit too low! Acquiring the Zagat guide has really upped the awareness of new restaurants all over the city. Plus, I have lots of friends that like to eat! Some of these restaurants may warrant a full review and if so, I'll link to my review for ease of reference. If not, I'll try to refer to a website or review elsewhere online.

1. John O'Groats - 1/6/07. A breakfast/lunch diner with good food and quick service. Their bacon is yummy and they have all kinds of different waffles/pancakes. The French fries were delicious!
   
2. Kansas City BBQ Company - 1/7/07. A hole-in-the-wall BBQ joint new to NoHo. Be warned: the ribs are OK, but sauce is spicy! I love spicy, so it's OK for me, but not for people with delicate palates. Their sweet potato fries are delicious! Cole slaw a bit too creamy for me and the potato salad was a bit sweet. I think it has relish in it.
3. Gorikee - 1/10/07. Full review with photos to come! Really good food, reasonable prices. They have a happy hour dinner special. If you're seated between 5-6 PM (weekdays only?), you get the entree as well as soup, salad and dessert! Service was a bit laid back, decor is nice, but minimal.
   
4. Blue Hen Restaurant - 1/18/07. They serve Vietnamese food made with all organic chicken. The consensus was the tumeric fries and jasmine green tea are phenomenal. The food is pretty good, but not excellent. The service was pretty attentive and good. They tacked on an automatic 20% tip for having 6 people. I ordered the BH sandwich and it was pretty tasty. Bottom line: It's good and it's cute. I'd totally go back.
5. Caioti Pizza - 1/20/07. Dawn, Evan & I went to check out this California-style pizza in this cute little (about 10 tables) pizza shop. They serve thin crust pizzas. The dough was pretty good and I'm not usually a crust eater. We also ordered the "The Salad" and it was good, but the Italian vinaigrette was a bit sweet. Service was good.
   
6. Pink's Hot Dogs - 1/23/07. Stopped by after watching a revival of Gone with the Wind at the New Beverly Cinema. We ordered a couple chili cheese dogs, a "Lord of the Rings" dog and a Polish sausage dog with fries. Good! Normally, there's at least an hour wait, but at 12:30 AM on a Tuesday morning, the wait was less than 10 minutes. It was good, but I could never imagine myself waiting an hour to order a hot dog.
7. Baker's Burgers in Victorville - 1/25/07. Fast food joint with good food.
8. Bellagio Buffet - 1/26/07. Breakfast is $14.99
9. Burger Bar in Mandalay Bay - 1/26/07. Owned by Hubert Keller - the burgers are out of this world!!!
   
10. Blueberry Hill - 1/27/07. A really good 24 hour diner in Las Vegas. They make their desserts fresh everyday. The chocolate cake was out of this world.
    
11. Viva Mercado - 1/27/07. Good Mexican food (and salsa) in Las Vegas. Be warned, portions are huge, split a meal with a friend!
    
12. Sushizo - 2/2/07. New sushi place in L.A. and the food is divine and prices are reasonable. Best pieces of the omakase were: toro, yellowtail and butterfish. The shot of yuzu at the end was a rare treat too!
    
13. Chinese Deli - 2/7/07. The Chinese food place around the corner from my apt. and the food is delicious!!
14. Eegee's - 2/9/07. Fast food favorite of Tucson. They have those slushy/icee type drinks there.
    
15. Las Margaritas - 2/9/07. Mexican restaurant in Tucson. I had the "Tacos de la Casa" which are yummy tacos with beef and potato. Plus, they have choco-tacos!
    
16. Lo Lo's Chicken and Waffles - 2/10/07. Grandson of Mrs. White, he's taken her recipe for chicken and combined it with waffles a la Roscoe's.
17. Carnival - 3/9/07. Seth took me to this Lebanese restaurant and it was pretty good. You definitely want to go as early as possible though to avoid the wait!
    
18. Trattoria Farfalla - 3/21/07. Excellent food. I had the spinace, olivo, penne pasta and it was delicious. The sauce on the gnocchi was outstanding. Service was good. My only complaint about it is that it's a bit noisy inside and crowded. Also, unless the parking gods are smiling on you, you'll probably have to valet.
19. Asia de Cuba - 4/23/07. A deliciously modern restaurant located in the Mondrian on Sunset. I would highly recommend the lobster mash, plantain fried rice with avocado salad, calamari salad, char sui short ribs and the butterfish. It's pricy though. For seven people, we ordered four appetizers, five entrees and one dessert. Plus alcohol, tax and tip, it was about $85 pp. The unexpected part? $15 for the valet (and that's with validation!).
    
20. Jack Stack BBQ - 5/4/07. For a full review, see here.
    
21. Stroud's Restaurant - 5/5/07. For a full review, see here.
    
22. Scoops - 5/12/07. Check this post out for a description of my first visit to have bacon caramel ice cream!
    
23. Mozza - 5/28/07. This is Mario Batali's new restaurant. I took some pictures of the pizzas, but don't have them posted just yet. I had the oregano salame, mozzarella, tomato & fresno chiles pizza and it was a favorite of everyone at the table. I also really liked the gorgonzola dulce & fingerling potato pizza. All of the pizzas we ordered were good, the crust was super-thin, and the service was good too. I'd highly recommend reservations, probably at least a couple weeks in advance. We made our reservation about a month in advance.
24. Frida Mexican Restaurant - 6/7/07. Went here with eHarmony date #7. Located in Beverly Hills, it's set on this street full of eateries. Great for people watching! If you want to make sure you get a table without a wait, make a reservation. The lobster tacos were delicious and the other food was good too. I don't think it's necessarily worth the price though. There are just too many good Mexican places for way less money to justify spending close to $120 on 4 margaritas, an appetizer and two entrees.
    
25. Mother's Tavern - 6/8/07, San Luis Obispo, CA. We jump started Shane's birthday weekend here. The Caesar salad was nice and tangy. I had the ribeye sandwich and Shane had the red-headed step-child pasta, which I enjoyed more than she did. The vibe of this bar is pretty good and the bartenders were cute!
    
26. F. McLintock's - 6/9/07, Paso Robles, CA. Originally, we had reservations for Artisan, but after waiting 45 minutes past our reservation time, we walked down the street and had a blast at this more casual establishment. Food was good! I realized that I think I may enjoy the NY strip steak better than ribeyes!
    
27. Zia Cafe - 6/10/07, Santa Barbara, CA. We stopped here on the way back to L.A. and it was so-so at best. My carne asada tacos were edible, but not great. The meat was cut up into too big of pieces for me. They were like chunks of meat. The corn tamales were actually pretty good. I don't need to go there again.
    
28. Las Fuentes - 6/13/07. The molcajete salsa was delicious at just the right heat level and the carnitas taco was SOOOO good. There's enough meat for two tacos, so I split my taco into two of them (they give you two tortillas). The carne asada was OK, but again, the meat was cut into pieces that were too big. The guacamole was surprisingly good too. The color is a little pale, but the flavor isn't too bad. I would recommend this place!
29. 94th Aero Squadron - 7/6/07. Went there for date #5.4. The great thing is that you're right by the Van Nuys airport airstrip so you get to watch planes taking off and landing all dinner. The bad? The food was just so-so. However, the service was pretty good. Maybe just my particular dish wasn't that great. It was overly salty! And I love salt!
30. Providence - 7/29/07. It lived up to my expectations. After reading on their website that Gourmet magazine has them listed as one of America's top 50 restaurants... this dinner was amazing! I ordered the sea bass, but in reality, the other dishes I had were more amazing. Some of the highlights were salt and pepper ice cream, the king crab appetizer, a shot of chilled melon soup topped with a lemon emulsification and a teeny bit of olive oil... actually, all of it was great. I could basically list everything I had. Let's see if this link to the photostream will work.
31. Johnnie's Pastrami Restaurant - 7/30/07. This place has pretty yummy pastrami. And a price tag to go with it. But I do have to say that I think this tastes better to me than the Hat. I still hold that one of the best pastrami sandwiches (not a dip though) is at Dino's in Burbank.
    
32. Mama D's Italian - 8/6/07. The calamari was delicious and the fra diavolo was spicy, garlicky goodness. I would highly recommend this place, but be forewarned, it gets crowded!!!
33. Bossa Nova - 8/26/07. Brazilian food that was fairly good & reasonably priced. Went there at the suggestion of my French teacher!
34. Rock'n Fish - 8/30/07. Yummy food, steps from the Manhattan Beach pier. You can't get a better location. Food was pretty good too.
    
35. Valentino - 8/30/07. Excellent food, excellent wine list, excellent service. I'm not sure you can get better than this in Los Angeles for Italian...
36. C & O Cucina - 9/3/07. Delicious garlic knots and huge portions of pretty good pasta! I'd highly recommend this place.
37. The Crepevine - 9/5/07. I'd been wanting to try this place since it opened a few years ago. I'm not a huge crepe fan, but I liked the other stuff on the menu. The mac & cheese was pretty good, the apple walnut salad with blue cheese was awesome. I'd go back just for that. I was surprised by my French dip sandwich, which looked more like a panini than a sandwich made for dipping. They only serve wine and beer though, no hard alcohol. They had a guitarist playing music and it was great! He played regular mellow mood music, but then started in with mellow Metallica and Britney! It was awesome!
    
38. El Patron - 10/23/07. I went here on a date. The service was SUPER fast, beans and rice were actually decent, but I really liked the chips and salsa! The salsa was spicy and really good.
39. 
    

Amazing Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

I went out to dinner tonight with a group of friends to Campanile in Los Angeles. It was my first time there. Their food is delicious! On Thursday nights, they do grilled cheese sandwiches in all varieties. I had the Reuben on country white bread ('cause I don't do rye bread). They use La Brea Bakery bread and mmmmm... it was heavenly!! The service was adequate, nothing really to write home about. I had a good glass of champagne and a pretty decent Long Island ice tea. It's been a while since I've gone out for a dinner like this and it ended up costing $67 including alcohol, food, tip and valet.

Here are pictures of all our sandwiches...


My Reuben on Country White (not rye)



Hanger Steak with Wild Mushrooms



Grilled Turkey, Cranberry, Cheese sandwich



Gorgonzola Dulce with honey and walnuts



Grilled Cheese with Cured Meats and a Fried Egg on top


Cheese platter for "Dessert"


Then, we went out to Simon LA for dessert. It's located on the bottom floor of the Sofitel Hotel on Bevery Blvd. To start, we ordered a couple side dishes: macaroni and cheese gratin and truffle mashed potatos. Both were just so-so to me. A couple other people in the group kind of liked the mac & cheese, but I wasn't super crazy about it.

For dessert, we ordered the junk food platter which included: vanilla bean milkshake, Rice Krispie treats (regular and cocoa flavored), fresh pink cotton candy, a peppermint sundae, melon sorbet, bag of cookies (chocolate chunk, oatmeal cranberry and peanut butter), caramel popcorn with peanuts, homemade Hostess cupcakes, and homemade Snowballs. My favorite item on the dessert platter was the vanilla bean milkshake. The second best was the cotton candy and I'm not a huge cotton candy fan!



As if that wasn't enough, we also ordered grilled donuts served with a cup of melted chocolate for dipping.



The one thing that was pretty good was our server. He was pretty attentive, but the best part is when I inquired about our leftover desserts to be sure none of them had nuts, he got us all new desserts that had definitely NOT been in contact with nuts to take home. His girlfriend has a peanut allergy, so he is very aware and sensitive to the seriousness of that allergy. He was very gracious and gave us extra cotton candy for somebody's breakfast tomorrow!

Bottom Line: I would gladly go back to Campanile for the food. However, I wasn't overly impressed with anything at Simon LA, so I doubt I'll make the trek back there. I'm glad I went once to at least try the desserts and a couple side dishes, but I don't know if I'd want to go back and spend $50 on an entree.