Monthly Archives: November 2009

Tartine Chocolate Oatmeal Walnut Cookies

I felt like making a really good cookie and we had a 400gm Toblerone bar that Ron’s parents brought us back from their recent trip Australia. Actually we have two of them which would take a long time for us to eat so I thought it best to bake with it.

I chose a recipe from my Tartine cookbook for Chocolate Oatmeal Walnut Cookies so replaced the bittersweet chocolate with the Toblerone bar.

I made them a few different sizes, from 2 to 3 inches in diameter. Apparently Tartine makes them in a 5 inch size! I ended up with more than 30 cookies of various sizes. They were thin, crispy on the edges, but also chewy. Very delicious if I say so myself. So delicious that Ron ate four in one sitting. I’ll definitely make these again.

Cats taking over the bed

So the cats sleep on my side of the bed, especially when I’m not sleeping and when they think we’re not paying attention. With the baby coming, we’re trying to break them of the habit but it’s tough, especially when I’m tired and too lazy to shoo them away.

Misu giving me a weird look:

Mochi curled up:

Yes, it looks like she needs a good brushing…

California Academy of Sciences

I went for my second visit to the California Academy of Sciences today. My first visit was in July, you can read about it here. This time I took Vicki as my guest as she had not visited before.

We went to the rainforest exhibit first, I missed it on my first visit. Be prepared for warm temperatures and humidity. Kind of reminded me of Singapore. There were a lot of birds darting around and butterflies all over. I saw this bird’s nest on a tree with the bird hiding inside.

I was surprised at how the butterflies really didn’t care that we were walking around their home. I even saw a few land on people.

I guess it must be common they land on people as there is this sign as your wait for the elevator.

I didn’t take that many pictures this time around. We also went to see the new planetarium show about stars, narrated by Whoopi Goldberg, and some of the other exhibits before it started getting busy and we started getting hungry.

There are still a few exhibits that I haven’t checked out, like the Bugs, so I’ll be sure to go back.

Alive!

Our friends Shizuka & Hiro and their son Sean were visiting SF so we went to have dinner with them. Shizuka suggested this restaurant called Alive! located in the Marina, described as raw vegan cuisine.

It’s a small restaurant with seating for about 20 people total.

Considering this may be the only opportunity that we’d eat here, we decided to try multiple things on the menu.

This it the potato leek soup with black miso which is served cooked and warm. It’s a comforting vegetable soup.

They also have quite a collection of teas, served in these cute cups with lids. I tried the lemon ginger herbal tea. It had a nice tartness and spiciness.

The flaxseed flatbread with cashew cream, tomatoes, and avocado. Loved the cashew cream and avocadoes.

Spicy red curry avocado wrap. A bit difficult to eat but kind of like sushi. If you like things on the spicier side then this is for you.

These were their raviolis made with turnips. It was like a very filling salad.

I had the sunflower seed burger with avocadoes. The sunflower seed burger and toppings were really good but the bread-like item on the bottom was really hard to cut and eat.

We ordered four desserts and they were kind enough to cut some of them in half so we could share between couples. This is the apple pie which is uncooked so a bit crunchy and tasted similar to a crumble.

Asian pear torte.

Candy Cap Mushroom Cheesecake with berry sauce. The mushroom gives it a different flavor (described as kind of maple-like) and the berry sauce was quite tart.

We also tried the chocolate banana torte which I didn’t get to photograph.

Overall, it was an interesting experience but I’m not sure if we’d go back again unless we were specifically looking for a vegetarian restaurant. It was good to catch up with our friends as they were visiting from Japan and it was the first time we got to meet their son. I hope we can visit Japan again soon and our kids can meet 😀

Alive!
1972 Lombard Street

Little Skillet

I finally had the chance to try Little Skillet‘s fried chicken and waffles. It was a beautiful day in San Francisco so we stayed to eat our lunch in the alley where Little Skillet is located. There’s sort of a makeshift seating area across from the pick up window.

This is the 3 pc chicken with 1 waffle for $9.50:

I could just eat the batter, a bit sweet and freshly fried and crunchy. The chicken was really hot too and moist. The waffle was not that special but still a good compliment to the chicken.

Next time we’ll try a po’ boy sandwich or their special waffle of the day.


Little Skillet

360 Ritch Street