Whiling Away The Weekend

Over the last few months, I have come to cherish my weekly 48 hour cube farm furloughs. This is due, in part, to the fact that I recently discontinued my weekend knit/crochet teaching duties (nine hours of yarn store play every Saturday just became too much atop my weekly full-time cube farm commitment). It is also due, in part, to the fact that I now have my own space, chock full of my own things, a new locale filled with the delightful hustle and bustle of a mother/daughter duo going about their respective lives. Combine those ingredients with a heap-load of good friends, a busy urban setting providing lots of events to partake in at week's end, the new found psychic space in which to spread my wings and I've got a recipe for weekend scenarios that have become nothing short of a delightful respite from my work week stress-test-like schedule.

As such, last weekend's menu o' fun stuffs began with a lovely Friday eve dinner amongst friends at Hae Jang Chon in K-Town. (Got to love a restaurant that sports a grinning pig on the sign!) Our little foursome partook in the all you can eat meatfest where we sampled HJC's Bulgogi (BBQ beef), Black Angus beef brisket, marinated beef short ribs, thick slices of Canadian pork belly (mmm...bacon...), and BBQ pork.

Does anyone see a knit Canadian pork belly kilt on my design agenda? Methinks that might be a must...

*Ahem*

Anyway, all of the usual yummy Korean BBQ sides were also present: Kimchi; cone tortillas; rice cake; bean paste soup; and lettuce with sesame paste for constructing your own, uh, Korean tacos. The quality of the meat was stellar, sides were delish, price per person super reasonable in addition to something you don't see much of in my hometown...FREE PARKING. Oh, and my new buddy, Heather, and I drank many a bottle of pomegranate wine too.

Bellies full, our little party headed over to the Wiltern for a screening of one of my all time fave films, The Big Lebowski, for none other than Lewbowskifest. White Russians, I mean, uh, Caucasians all around! By the way, many a said beverage could be obtained throughout the screening from the bar...Nice!

Saturday, I had the opportunity to join a group of friends for an evening cooking class at Simple Gourmet in Redondo Beach. We spent the evening drinking wine and playing with knives. It was great! At the end of the evening our little group of novice chefs enjoyed the fruits of our labors...a three course French-inspired vegetarian meal. I would go into more detail and oh, show a few pictures, but I seem to have lost the camera I was using that evening. You see, my brain seems to be a bit muddled these days. Oh well, at least I still have my little point and shoot.

Easter Sunday involved, yes, you guessed it, more food. Brunch with family and friends at Luminarias followed by a lovely motorcycle ride traversing a handful of SoCal canyon roads. Nice way to spend the day to be sure...

Beauteous Bagels

How did you spend your Thanksgiving weekend LadyLinoleum?

Well, I sported a few pies atop my head while darting to and fro about the western reaches of the Los Angeles city limits AND when not driving around while donning pie, I attempted a bit of baking! Oh yes, bagel baking...

Are they not beauteous???

Okay, I admit it. My rings o' dough are probably not the most handsome examples of bagel-dom. However, they're not a bad first attempt and, more importantly, they taste like heaven. Seriously good. Really, my lips shall never touch another store bought bagel again. Okay, not really, but you get my drift.

Inspired? Come on, you know you wanna boil and bake some chewy bagel-y goodness! I know that homemade onion bagels are definitely on my upcoming weekend's slate of baking activities...Yum!!

Recipe source for bagel-y goodness: Fannie Farmer Baking Book

Market Sunday

The hubs and I spent Sunday morning perusing an LA landmark, the Grand Central Market, located in Downtown Los Angeles.



Earlier that morning we searched in vain for a restaurant we intended to try in an adjacent neighborhood to Downtown. We drove around for a good 45 minutes before giving up and heading straight for our ultimate destination. There we were met with plenty of eateries to partake in. We chose to give Tacos Tumbras a Tomas a try because they had the longest line. Rule of thumb...When you're looking for something good to eat in territories less than familiar, always follow the crowd!



Both the hubs and I settled into a couple of tortas. For him, birria. For me, carnitas...my fave. Yes, we all know I have a fondness for pork. Although, I try not to eat it often because I have to watch my girlish figure...It's okay to indulge every now and again though. Hence my lovely and delicious Mexican pork sandwich...



The tortas were typically huge and truly I could only eat half. Warm roll piled high with fresh ingredients and a mountain of pork, this sandwich hit the spot following our little driving expedition earlier that morning.

Tummies topped off, it was all about the shopping. Produce shopping that is...



We came away with bananas, beets, garlic, broccoli, carrots, yams, cilantro, lettuce, blueberries and even a cherimoya! In addition, we also acquired a generous amount of dried ancho chiles, roasted and seasoned pumpkin seeds, Mexican hot chocolate and handfuls of dried fruits. All of this cost about $20!



Definitely worth the trek from Westside to Eastside. My other half confirms this notion with a smile for the camera!



What a great was to spend a Sunday morning!

Grand Central Market
317 South Broadway
Los Angeles, CA 90013
213.624.2378

Tacos Tumbras a Tomas
Grand Central Market, Space A-5
213.620.1071

Experimentation

Things are back to normal (well, relatively normal anyway) at ChezLinoleum. So normal in fact that the hubs and I found the wherewithal to take on the roles of culinary mad scientists. Yes, lots of experimentation happening in our kitchen...

First, there is fermentation happening here.

No, we have not built our own still!

Although that's actually not a bad idea...I digress. We are making a crazy sort of moonshine though. Ours, however, is a health-nut approved elixir - Kombucha. Yep, after spending 30 bucks a gallon on a weekly basis for this stuff at our local natural foods emporium over the past several months, we've decided to brew our own shroom. And let me tell you, this process is not for the faint of heart. Very involved it 'tis, that's for sure. However, the hubs was determined and his patience paid off for we now have a gallon of the stuff brewing.

Lookie how purty our fungal tea is...



The hubs has definitely got foodie mad scientist tendencies in his blood. Anyway, this reddish, amberish, brownish liquid has been sitting on it's heating pad for close to a week now. Hubs checked the pH yesterday and we're almost at the drinkable level. Definitely a little scary, but awesome nonetheless.

While the hubby has been playing around in the fermentable zone I've been concentrating my efforts in the realm of dehydration. That's right, for me it's been all about the jerky. Uh-huh, I made my own by following the recipe and oh so sage advice regarding the dehydration of foodstuffs from one of my favorite Food Network personalities, Alton Brown. Love him.

What's cool about his jerky recipe is way the meat is dried out by using a box fan, paper air conditioning filters and bungee cords. Dude, who knew that one could literally suck the moisture out of food by using items from your local hardware store? Needless to say, AB's method worked and I now have a container full of dried out meaty goodness...



Fruits and veggies beware. I will suck the moisture out of you sooner than you think!

We've definitely entered a whole new level of craftiness over here and I love it!