She arrived on Thursday and I took her to downtown Culver City to this yummy grilled cheese place called Meltdown, which is in an area of great restaurants (including Tender Greens, Ford's Filling Station, and a delicious-looking fried chicken place - oh, only if I could eat the stuff). Then the two of us cruised over to Santa Monica to do some necessary shopping before K came home. That night the three of us went to a local sushi joint where we sipped sake and sat for hours chatting and laughing.
On Friday, JD and I got up early and went to the gym before the three of us went to the Farmer's Market and bought...nothing! But it was still a nice little trip.
Afterwards, we went to brunch at Lily's and shopped some more.
That night our friend JH was having an intimate dinner party, and we had to leave time to whip up the peanut butter oatmeal cookies we had decided to bring. They turned out to be absolutely fabulous. Here's the recipe:
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup flour
3/4 cup rolled oats (quaker, etc.)
1. heat oven to 375.
2. mix sugar, brown sugar, butter and beat until light and fluffy
3. add peanut butter, vanilla, egg and blend well
4. add flour, rolled oats, baking soda, salt and mix well
5. put in fridge for 2 hours (we put it in the freezer instead for 15 minutes, made a sheet, then put it back in the freezer between sheets)
6. shape into 1-inch balls on ungreased cookie sheet
7. flatten with fork dipped in sugar in criss-cross pattern
8. bake for 6-10 minutes until golden brown
makes approx. 4 dozen cookies
The dinner was such a pleasure - it centered on us building our own Vietnamese spring rolls which are made from rice flour but not fried like Chinese spring rolls. We stayed there until late, sharing many glasses of wine and an interesting combination of a viscous raspberry wine and champagne. Suffice to say, we didn't wake up early the next morning.
For Saturday, I had made the executive decision that we would go to Grub for brunch so JD could taste Betty's sweet and spicy bacon, which is out of this world. We met her mother-in-law up there and I think JD really loved the bacon and getting to see part of her fam. After we shopped all the way up and down the edgier part of Melrose, though we didn't make it quite all the way to Ed Hardy's store. As it was nearly time for Z's party by the time we were done, we headed back to the west side and K and JD whipped up a tasty feta cheese and walnut salad while I bought chips, guac, and margarita necessities at the store with S. The party was crazy - I'm not going to go into details, but let's just say that there was wrestling in the hot tub and we didn't leave until after 2am.
Sunday was a lazy day as we were all a bit zonked from the Saturday party, though K and JD did put together a really nice breakfast of crepes and salad. And despite a bit of super-crabbiness on my part later that afternoon, I also managed to rally by the evening and put together a homemade drunken noodle dish that I had learned the prior week at the cooking class. I think the most useful thing I learned there was how to use a knife, because the mise en place took me probably half the time now that I have a clue how to cut a tomato and an onion. Despite not having all the right ingredients (I was missing Thai basil, sweet soy sauce, and Thai black soy sauce and had to substitute) I was pleased with the dish, though I want to make it again with everything on hand. Also that night S and company staged a light beer tasting competition where six of us were to determine if there was a difference between the light versions of Coors, Miller, Bud, and Miller High Life and if we could identify which was which. Each beer tasted slightly different, but I didn't know Coors from Bud as I'm not exactly a connoisseur of those types of beers.
I had to work Monday, and JD was set to take the red eye that night, but we made time so she could experience her first In and Out burger and do a long walk through the canals.
On the left we have a hamburger animal style, protein style and on the right, a cheeseburger animal style.
During our walk, JD found a spider.
Some roses
A cool house
The water
And an egret.
And that night, after dinner at La Cabana, we dropped JD at the airport just as the moon was preparing to enter its lunar eclipse.
Oh those peanut butter cookies were fantastic. And I'm glad you took Jess to Grub, because the bacon there is really out of this world. It's a hot topic on the Yelp reviews for the place. As much as I like beer, I couldn't taste the difference. You've got better taste buds than I do! S
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