Korean Dinner and Rock Band 2

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Our friend Susan invited us over for a homemade Korean dinner. She’s been so busy with work and school that we hardly see her so she wanted to have dinner and hang out. She picked up all the ingredients from a Korean supermarket in Daly City, I’m assuming it’s Kukje Super Market on Junipero Serra Blvd. She made us duk bok ki (the Korean rice cake stir fried with kimchi, pork, fish cake, and spicy sauce.) For appetizers we had edamame and kim bap (Korean sushi, sesame oil instead of rice wine in the rice). Both were pretty good.

We also had kalbi and bulgolgi, both premarinated from the supermarket. The kalbi (ribs) were really good but the bulgolgi (marinated thinly sliced beef) ended up being too tough, all the meat juices oozed off the broiling pan and pooled at the bottom so the meat got really dry.

Susan’s fiance Ken brought over his Playstation and a game called Rock Band 2. They were already playing before dinner and couldn’t want to play some more after dinner.

At first, I was a little bit afraid to play it but after a while it got quite fun. The game has four instruments, the drums, guitar, bass guitar, and a vocalist. I tried the drums which were really hard considering there are four drums plus a foot petal and the guitar was even harder with many buttons and sticks to press… I’m not very coordinated! So I stuck with singing and if you know me, this is a big feat for me. The game only listens to pitch so you could be saying as much nonsense as you want or just keep on saying “la la la laaa” depending on the length of each tone. Sometimes the words would be going by so fast that I couldn’t catch up so just said “blahblah blaaah blah” etc. Quite hilarious I must say. Ron had a good time with the drums, it makes you feel like you’re a real drummer although you’re probably really hitting a lot of nonsense.

Susan’s sister Sally’s stage name was “Salicious”.

My stage name was “Juicy”.

It was a good way to burn some calories as the drums and guitar require a lot of movement and you’re also very tense when playing because you want to hit each note just right. With the singing, I just had a really dry throat and exercising my diaphragm with the long notes.

I think Ron is considering getting the game for our Wii… except then we’d need to buy all the accessories… yikes!

Halloween Treats and San Wang Restaurant

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I haven’t baked in a while so I wanted to make some Halloween treats for my co-workers. A few weeks ago, I bought the Halloween edition of Martha Stewart Living magazine and there were these really cool chocolate madeleines with skull marshmallows. I got a madeleine pan from V last year so thought this it’d be a good time to break it out… I think this may only be the 2nd time I used it.

While I was at it, I made peanut butter rice crispy treats made in a shape of a pumpkin, using Twix for stems and chocolate Skittles for eyes.

Turned out pretty cute, don’t you think? I think everyone at worked enjoyed them, they went pretty fast 🙂

We didn’t know anyone having a party tonight so we just went out to dinner with a few friends. My co-worker recommended this restaurant in Japantown called San Wang for good jia jiang noodles. I had mentioned to her that I really liked ZaZang Noodles on Geary and she said this one was good too.

I looked on Yelp for other recommendations for dishes. From Yelp, the restaurant had mixed reviews but I thought it’d be worth a try anyways.

We ordered the spicy noodle soup which wasn’t very spicy but the hand pulled noodles were good.

The jia jiang noodles were only okay. I was a bit disappointed so probably won’t go back. The onions and pork were in big chunks instead of small pieces like I think they should be. The noodles were good though.

To round out our meal, we also had the pea sprouts. It has garlic and mushrooms, this I actually really liked.

Lastly, their dried fried chicken. I think people would like it if they like it salt and with garlic and onions. I think our palates prefer the sweet and spicy of San Tung Restaurant on Irving.

So a quiet Halloween evening. Just as well since I’ll be working tomorrow in Oakland Chinatown.

Made With Molecules

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http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5165490

I came across this great website where you can buy or sell homemade things, it’s called Etsy. They have jewelry, clothing, paper crafts, and whatever creative thing you can think of.

My particular favorite right now is a seller called molecularmuse which brings out the nerd in me, remembering molecular shapes. The designer makes molecule necklaces and earrings of caffeine, estrogen, dopamine, and more. Pretty cool… I’m gonna think about getting something for myself… if only there were rings!

I’m looking forward to exploring the site for more cool stuff.

Maxwell

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So I’m very happy that Maxwell is really starting to adjust back to being with us and sort of getting used to Mochi and Misu. I feel like I’m writing about this a lot but it really is amazing if you know Maxwell. He’s like a cranky old man (he is 9 1/2 already) who doesn’t like his space disturbed and likes to do his own thing…

But he’s gotten back into the habit of sitting on our laps to take his evening nap. After eating a bit and drinking some water, he’ll wander around our couch looking for a lap to hop on and if there’s a blanket on your lap, even better! He reminds me of when he was a kitten and used to do this almost everyday and he’d also sit comfortably in my lap while Ron was driving us somewhere.

Sometimes I have to get up to get a drink of water or something so I lift him up in the blanket and set him back down… do you think I spoil him? He curls up in a little ball sometimes because the light is too bright in his eyes. When he’s sleeping soundly like this, it’s hard to wake him up, you really have to give him a good push or loud call.

I think he feels safer sleeping near us so the other two cats don’t bug him. I’ve seen Misu snooping around looking for Maxwell underneath the couch then suddenly dart underneath and chase Maxwell out. Misu is a secretively mean cat… but he’s also very lovable to us.

Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, Golden Era Vegetarian, and The Hidden Vine

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So we had a busy day today although still had time to nap in between 😛

We went to the SF Ferry Plaza Farmers Market for the first time.

There are beautiful fruits and vegetables and lots of sampling!

We bought some yummy cheese.

And got some delicious fruits: pears, pluots, and lemon cucumber.

We met up with Virginia and Dan at the Blue Bottle Coffee Company kiosk for a cup of coffee.

A delicious latte.

There was a free apple cider demonstration. It was very yummy.

It was a beautiful day.

At dinner time, we met up with some friend we made in Singapore. They live in Southern California and were visiting SF for the weekend. They arranged to have a group dinner at Golden Era Vegetarian Restaurant. The food is Asian, mostly Vietnamese and Thai flavors.

This was the crepe.

Steamed fish that you wrap in rice paper. The texture was kind of chewy, not much like a fish. It was wrapped in seaweed to stimulate skin.

We had a variety of other dishes, the best was the Gourmet Chicken (lemongrass) which had a nice texture and well seasoned. Surprisingly the meal was very filling even though the portions weren’t that large, I guess soy is dense.

After dinner we walked over to The Hidden Vine. It’s a small wine bar which was very cozy. I had the dessert wine flight, 3 1 oz portions of your choice for $14.

Look at all our wine glasses!

It was a good day, I hope to visit the Farmers Market again soon!

Golden Era Vegetarian Restaurant
572 O’Farrell Street

The Hidden Vine
1/2 Cosmo Place at Taylor Street
620 Post Street