Laura 'jinx.tv' K.'s Profile

Since we became vegan over a year and a half ago, Tamarine has become the favorite eating/wine drinking place of my bf and I.  The location is a great, and the parking is even good compared to other restaurants on Univ. Ave. in Palo Alto, since it's on the outskirts of the main shopping/dining area.

No, the restaurant isn't vegan, but the menu has several vegan menu items and others that can be made vegan on request. Earlier this year, they put a yuba (tofu skin) entree on the menu that we loved so much we had to try making something similar at home (from Bryanna Clark Grogan's blog: http://veganfeastkitch...) which my bf's whole family loved, and they are NOT vegan, so don't not try the dish just because you're an omnivore. Now they've added a vegan fish-type dish that my bf loves...the only problem with this is that it's not my favorite, it's okay but I like the yuba much better, so now instead of sharing an entree they've tricked us into each ordering our own.

There are usually about four starter plates on the menu that are vegan or can be made so. The bahn mi roti is delicious but probably not the healthiest choice, if we're feeling virtuous we skip it and have the spring rolls instead - the vegan version is minty fabulousness.

The side dishes are mostly vegan - the basil tofu is really tasty but with two entrees we don't really order it any more. There are many choices of rice you can order - brown, jasmine, coconut, garlic. The only thing that could make the rice better is if you could get say, brown jasmine coconut or brown jasmine garlic - it's the same problem I usually have at Whole Foods: how come you can get whole grain, OR a delicious flavor, but not whole grain WITH a delicious flavor added? Hmph!

The wine menu is pretty decent. We are very picky but we usually find something we like. Actually, we insist on drinking red wine but the food would probably be better served with white, or with the really super fantastically yummy peach sangria they seem to always have lately.

Finally dessert: Well, peach sangria makes a wonderful dessert. Otherwise since you're vegan they probably have some SORBET you can have (is it not one of the worst things about being vegan and going out to eat...having sorbet as your only dessert option?) Actually, Tamarine softens the blow by serving their sorbet in delicious tropical flavors with tapioca and some other...stuff...with it until it's practically like having Halo Halo.

They do make an even better dessert by special request. Just ask them for the "Rick and Laura". If they have no idea what you're talking about, gently remind them it's an order of coconut sorbet with Godiva chocolate liquor poured over the top. Yum!

The reason I am giving this place four stars not five even though I love it and it's our favorite place to eat right now is because I feel the place only rates five stars if you're sitting at the bar, which you can't make reservations for but you MAY be able to get them to hold some space for you at if you call before you arrive and request it. The bar is crowded and for good reason...the bartenders are awesome, the service is great, the other people at the bar are interesting and friendly, and it's the best place to sit in the restaurant. By contrast, especially if there are just two of you, the rest of the restaurant just isn't the same fabulous experience. Most of the seating for two is banquette  style with small tables for two placed in a long row so close together you may have to drag your buttocks along the top of the table next to yours to get to the far side, which may be somewhat disconcerting for the people sitting at that table (but just wait until the people on the other side of you sit down and someone drags the family jewels along the top of YOUR table. Suddenly buttocks don't seem so bad.) The person on the aisle side of the table won't really be able to connect with the server or anyone else that comes to the table and it just become a crowded, rushed and impersonal experience.

My advice would be: if you aren't going to sit at the bar, come with at least four people so you don't get stuck in banquette purgatory. Oh also, reservations are highly recommended as that place is almost always crazy busy.

Do you ever order flowers for someone and wonder if what you ordered and what showed up are the same? I do, so the second time I ordered from this florist I had my mom send me a pic of what she received. Boy was it different from what I ordered!

After spending a while going over all the choices on their website, I ordered an arrangement called "Rustic Canyons". Here is the description:

"Fresh flowers in all the colors of Red Rock Country, gathered together in a rustic wooden vase, create a tall, naturalistic display. With exotic elements including fragrant orangeflowers, Mokara orchids and Asiatic lilies, it's a unique floral arrangement with a touch of Western style.
Orange Mokara orchids and Asiatic lilies, plus red hypericum - accented with seeded eucalyptus and variegated pittosporum - are delivered in a Roma wood vase lined with a cylindrical glass bud vase."

(I've included a picture of this arrangement in pics for this business.)

What my mom got was a totally different vase, ceramic instead of wood and quite ugly, a few pink roses, some hot pink carnations and some very cheap filler flowers.

(I've also included this pic above.)

Every. Single. Thing. About. This. Arrangement. Was. Different!

When I checked out on their website, I very carefully unchecked the box that says "Yes, my florist may substitute an arrangement and container of similar value in the unlikely event that my selection is unavailable." I figured if they didn't have what they needed in stock, they had my phone number and could call me to find out what I'd like instead. But...they didn't.

Even if I HAD left that box checked, I really don't think that what my mom received was "of similar value".  The closest things I could find on the website were about $30 cheaper than what I paid.

Soooo...I called up the florist and I told them I was unhappy. The guy on the phone tells me "well, we're too small of a shop to follow teleflora's rules". Um what? I have no idea what Teleflora's rules are...I just know I went to http://twincityflowers... to order some flowers (an original design by Twin City Flowers, not a teleflora arrangement) and they delivered something totally different. So the guy tells me "we didn't have everything in stock so we had to use a few substitutions." Um, what? Not ONE of the flowers that was supposed to be in the bouquet was in the bouquet, and the vase wasn't even the same!

The bouquet is listed, among other places on their site, under "for Him", so is supposedly not too feminine. He tells me "we didn't have enough orange flowers so we had to use a few lavender." Ummm...well I'm glad they didn't use orange and lavender together because that sounds hideous but um, they didn't use ANY orange...it was pink and hot pink!

Finally the guy dismissively tells me that if my mom isn't happy, she can bring in the arrangement and they will try and do something for her.

Um what? I'm sure my mom has better things to do with her time than take the bouquet she got for her birthday to a flower shop to complain about it, plus it's a rather disingenuous thing to say. Who doesn't like it when someone sends them flowers? My mom liked her flowers, because someone sent her flowers, she likes flowers and they were a gift. I am the customer, it should matter whether 1.) I like the flowers and 2.) whether I actually got what I paid for.

Needless to say, next time I order flowers I will be looking for a different Twin City florist. I'll call them directly, too, after checking out their website. Then I will have my mom send a pic again, and when I find a florist that treats me right they will have a loyal customer for years to come.

Live and learn, I guess.

Atherton: our shit don't stink

You didn't know Atherton had a town motto, didja?

Well, I didn't know Atherton had any businesses.

It's just that place you drive (or ride your bike through...nice bike paths!) on the way to somewhere else, unless of course your 2nd or 3rd 100 million dollar home is located here behind one of those big gates at the end of a mile long driveway.

It's the place where you're driving down Alameda De Las Pulgas and suddenly for a mile or two the name of the street changes to just "Alameda" because you know, Athertonians would never be associated with fleas.

It's also the place where I THOUGHT there weren't any businesses, but today I learned from the Poo~Pourri website (http://www.poopourri.n...) That there IS a business in Atherton and it sells Poo~Pourri! (Yes, I was trying to find a local distributor of Poo~Pourri because that's what you're getting from me for xmas. Yes YOU, I'm talking to you. Do you see anyone else reading this Yelp review? You do? Well, they're getting Poo~pourri, too.)

Anyway...it's not too surprising that if you live in Atherton (or have to stay in your fourth house there while youre doing a little VC bidness in Palo Alto) your shit is absofreakingLUTEly not allowed to stink.

Poo~pourri: we help keep Atherton stink free!

Am I the last person in the country to know about comedy traffic school? We passed one of these places the other day and I was like "whoah, comedy? I love comedy, sign me up!" Of course, I don't actually have a car, so since running a red light, running over a pedestrian or reckless endangerment in a moving vehicle weren't really options for me, I felt really sorry for myself not being able to get into this exclusive, themed comedy club.

Two things happened to snap me out of my no-comedy-traffic-school-for-you funk. One was doing a search on google videos and realizing they aren't really that funny, and the other was attending one of Colleen Patrick-Goudreau's cooking classes the next day.

Coleen is F-U-N-N-Y. Much funnier than comedy traffic school. Take one of her classes and she will entertain and educate you for three hours while she also prepares really tasty food that you get to eat. You can listen to her podcasts, which are great, and get a sense of what she's like, but she's very good at interacting with her audience, and that's something that just doesn't come through in a one-way audio recording.

When I was vegetarian, it was a little challenging finding cooking classes to attend, but when my bf and I became vegan, well, if it wasn't for Coleen we wouldn't have anywhere to take classes any more.

Even if you aren't vegan or considering becoming vegan or trying to eat healthier but you just love food and want to learn about it, I highly recommend this class as a way to spend three hours of a Saturday.

Oh yeah, and the lemon bundt cake? To. Die. For.

Crapplebees!

Man, this place cracks me up. Somebody must be smoking some crack because every time they have anything good on the menu, they go and change the menu and remove it. My grandmother, who pretty much eats in a different stratosphere of food than I do, agrees.

The service here is somewhat spotty but usually friendly. Very family atmosphere which may be good for some but not what I look for in a restaurant. You know, noisy kids and stuff.

I would probably never have been here in the entire time I've lived in RWC (3+ years) if not for the fact that they had deep fried pickles. Ummmm...I am pretty sure they removed them from the menu though. Because you know, they were good and stuff. I told ya'...crack smoking...NOT A GOOD IDEA KIDDOS!!! Leads to impaired judgment.

Fret not, though, because I'm going to tell you how to make 'em...

Deep Fried Pickles (and they're vegan, too!)

         o 8 dill pickles
         o 1/2 cup flour or 1/4c corn flour and 1/4c all purpose flour
         o 1/4 cup beer
         o 1 1/4 T paprika
         o 1 1/4 T cayenne pepper
         o 1 1/4 T black pepper
         o 1/2 t salt
         o 2 t garlic salt
         o few dashes tabasco sauce
         o Oil for deep frying

Cut the dill pickles into slices or wedges. Mix together the remaining ingredients to form the batter. Dip the pickles in the batter and quickly fry in the hot oil (375F/190C) until pickles float to the top, about 4 minutes. Serve with a creamy vegan dressing (ranch style or whatever.)

Walking into the Red Lantern, I was desperately looking for someplace to throw out my gum. Lucky for me there was a wastebasket right in front of the host stand!

Just as gravity was pulling the wad of gum into the cylindrical hole, I realized it was actually an umbrella stand. D'oh! Looking around, I didn't think anyone saw what I did, but it made me feel vaguely uncomfortable imagining that someone is going to open an umbrella as they extend it up and over someone's head and...out pops my gum and nestles in that person's hair.

Vaguely uncomfortable is basically the way I feel about Red Lantern overall.

First, I don't understand why it is so popular. We came here on a week night...in Redwood City...and couldn't get a table because we didn't have a reservation. I was going to take a friend here for dinner and did try to make a reservation and I couldn't get one! (Did I mention it's in Redwood City?) When we couldn't get a table, we thought we might sit at the communal table in the bar area, but the two open seats were right across from two people sitting side by side and there is just something very wrong about the communal table. It's too narrow. If we'd chosen to sit across from these people, we'd have been giving them eskimo kisses all night. My bf prefers to give super besitos, so this wouldn't have worked out for us at all.

We chose to sit right at the bar itself. The chairs at the bar are cool looking but really uncomfortable to sit on. They don't have a back, the seat is just a narrow strip of curved wood. I dunno...maybe my ass is just huge or something but I wouldn't wish those stools on anyone.

The red wine list leaves a lot to be desired. Someone pointed out to me that most of the food served here would best go with white wine, and this very-knowledgeable-about-wine person said the white wine selection was very good, so perhaps they just don't see the point in putting any effort into their reds list.

I guess the food here is okay. The good news for a vegan is that you won't find much dairy on the menu, except in the dessert section, the bad news (besides the dairy in the desserts) is you will only find a few items that qualify as vegan. Heck, that's a few more than many/most restaurants have, though. BTW, while I thought the food was okay, my bf really did not like it at all and we actually ended up ordering food somewhere else after we left.

The thing that we REALLY did not like about this place was that all the staff seemed to hover over to the right of the bar, and they were all talking in spanish about the restaurant patrons, you know, saying "did you get a look at that person at table ___?" and then going to casually walk by and look at that person and then huddling around sharing images of I have no idea what on their cellphones. Besides that, they just in general really seemed to be completely not into their jobs.

A few days after eating here we were at Whole Foods and they had this cylindrical trash can looking thing there by the door and it had a big sign on it..."umbrella stand, do not put trash here". Hmmmm...I wonder if Red Lantern might consider doing the same after a certain gum-in-the-customers-hair incident...

My mom read an article in the New York Times about this restaurant and wondered, since my bf and I like to visit wine country, we like to go out to eat, and I'm a vegetarian, if we'd been here or not. We hadn't but almost immediately made a reservation once we'd read the article, which names Ubuntu as the #2 current up and coming restaurant in the country.

Reservations for the number two up and coming restaurant in the country weren't that hard to get, but there wasn't anything available before 7:30. This is a minor hassle in Napa because most wine tasting rooms close by 5pm and even the few exceptions are closed by 6, so since we had a little time to kill between tasting dozens of wines and eating dinner, we ended up a few blocks down from Ubuntu at Tuscany, a very inviting and comfortable restaurant where we quaffed a superb half bottle of wine and had possibly the best scallop dish ever. I rarely eat seafood but am occassionally tempted by scallops, and the bartender's description of the scallops in a chunky mushroom broth won me over. He was very knowledgeable about their wines and everything on their menu, rattling off everything they had that was vegetarian and everything that wasn't that could be made vegetarian as well as giving us tips about when we can walk in without a reservation and how we can get a fabulous seat overlooking the kitchen on a busy Saturday night. We are definitely going back to Tuscany, but the warm atmosphere, delicious food and wine and outstanding bartender weren't enough to tempt us away from our rendevouz with Ubuntu.

Just as we arrived at Ubuntu and were seated, our eyes caught sight of the communal table in the middle of the room. We immediately felt a strong desire to sit there, but we were told that they were expecting a party of three that was going to be seated there so it was best if we stayed where we were. I had a perfect view of this table our entire time there, and not only did this phantom party of three never show up, there were actually FIVE spots open at the table. I have photographic proof (check for my photo of this restaurant if you don't believe me) and last time I checked, three plus two equaled um...wait, let me get out my fingers and add this up...one...two...three...four...um....five! See? The party of three plus the two of us equalled there is room for us at the communal table.

Since we were forbidden a seat at the communal table, we compensated by treating the people at the next table over as if we WERE at a communal table, sharing with them our opinions about how the drinking age should be 18 or maybe even 16, at least for having a glass of wine at your meal. How wrong it is for famous kitchens and big name chefs to have people working for them for months at a time FOR FREE, how unfair it was that we couldn't sit at the communal table as well as a sprinking of commentary on their choices of food and wine. I hope they weren't trying to have a romantic evening.

Normally when we eat at a restaurant featuring meat, I'm scanning the menu to find the few meatless dishes and possibly making do with the wood fired pizza. For once it was my bf scanning over the menu for something he might like and ordering the pizza. His pizza was actually really good but he ordered it with a duck egg on top. I think he just did it because he could. Put it on the menu as an option, and somebody is sure to order it. That duck egg REALLY did not add anything to the pizza. Myself I ordered some cauliflower dish. I'm not a big fan of cauliflower but I had this fantasy going on in my head that the dish would be so good I'd suddenly be a total "cauliflower is great" convert. That didn't happen, but the dish was okay.

After we were finished with our salad and our entrees, the server came by to say "you never got your soup. Do you still want it?" No apology or anything, she acted like while soup was supposed to be coming out, she was in some parallel universe, actually delivering a bowl of soup to the table, it's not her fault that we got our alternate realities mixed up so that in OUR timeline the soup never appeared. That was her basic attitude throughout the meal, and I'd say that Ubuntu suffers what a lot of restaurants around Napa and Sonoma suffer:
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Ummm...Yelp says my review is too long so if you really want to read the whole thing, I guess you'll have to check my blog: http://jinxlicious.blo...

You know, I received a few emails from Yelp near the end of 2007 reminding me to nominate myself or anyone else that was maybe worthy of Elite status for 2008 by thus and such a date and I just thought, "meh, can't be bothered." I thought, "who cares about being Elite?" It's not like I've ever used my "status" to go to an Elite event or anything, so what diff does it make?

Well, it turns out it DOES make a difference...when I got an email saying congrats I was now Elite '08 I kind of surprised myself by being like, really, really happy and excited and honored.

The only reason I didn't give it five stars is there are some cool people like KayJay and Cooter who don't seem to have it any more. Of course, they are so 1337 they transcend Elite status.

I've been wanting to make seitan stroganoff lately, something I haven't made for about five years, and also to try and recreate a dish I used to have at a small vietnamese restaurant in Cambridge, MA. You can get seitan or wheat gluten products at Whole Foods, but they just aren't the best and can be somewhat expensive. So, I asked my bf to take me to an asian grocery. Usually I would try and look one up on Yelp, but I think sometimes it works out better to simply ask someone who knows the area fairly well to just take you somewhere.

We ended up at a large, easy to see from the freeway but hard to actually get to, strip mall in Milpitas, where 99 Ranch Market, the largest asian grocery I've ever seen, sat there surrounded by bakeries, noodle shops and other various businesses like it was the star of the show. Which, in fact, it was.

This place is AWESOME! Never have I seen so many types of wheat gluten product, refrigerated, frozen, jarred and canned, in one place! I was like a kid in a candy store. Well, if by kid you mean practically cougar age and if by candy store you mean place full of rice cookers, a giant aisle devoted to packaged noodles, 100 kinds of soy sauce and a huge fish section. My bf was looking at me like "who are you?" He loves California Cuisine, Italian food, French...sometimes sushi but when he says "are you hungry?" he never means "let's have some Chinese, Vietnamese or Thai food." And so, since there is a whole world of food out there, and generally speaking I love it all, my fondness for eggrolls, stir frys, curries and exotic tropical fruits has gone largely unnoticed and neglected.

This place is cheap! I got eight types of wheat gluten products (that's a lot of mock duck!) some packages of my favorite noodle soup with tofu, and a big package of dried sliced mushrooms and it came to less than $25. That is such a small portion of what they have here, I am already making a BIIIIIIG list of all the things I want to get next time, so I can make my favorite spring roll recipe with rice paper wrappers, halo-halo, which I have never known where to get the ingredients for before but as a vegetarian in the Philippines I practically lived on the stuff 15 years ago, and some stuff that looks really tempting in a vegetarian Chinese cookbook I got recently.

Fortunately this place is a chain, so while I went to this Milpitas branch this time, next time we're going to Foster City. Their website has a store locater that will find your closest branch by zip code. Woohoo, rice noodles and weird exotic fruits, here I come! Again.

A few days ago, my bf and I skipped out on our responsibilities and went to taste chocolate at both Charles Chocolates and Scharffen Berger. While Charles Chocolates takes couverture chocolate and turns it into fancy little one-bite chocolates, Scharffen Berger takes cacao pods from various cacao farms around the world and turns them into fine couverture chocolate.

I found the tour here, given by a very sweet woman wearing a polka dotted dress that gave her a Willy Wonka type vibe, to be just awesome. We learned how the cacao pod goes from growing on the trunk of a cacao tree to slabs of tasty, tasty chocolate, the learning of which included a number of tasting samples from cacao nibs to Scharffen Berger's special really delicious take on milk chocolate. We also learned how the founders got started, the history of the building the factory is located in, and even what will happen to Scharffen Berger now that they've been bought by Hershey.

We also learned that the parts of the cacao pod that are not used to make chocolate are instead sent to a farm in Petaluma to feed chickens. Chickens fed on cacao pods...maybe I should rethink this whole vegetarian thing! We didn't get the exact name of that chicken farm out of the tour guide, so if you know please send me a message.

Dammit, forget grass fed chicken, I need chocolate fed chicken!!!

The most useful thing I learned here was that the smaller Scharffen Berger chocolate bars are made elsewhere. They make them into big chunks and they are sent out to be re-tempered and made into smaller bars. The larger baking bars are packaged right there, though, meaning they are tempered one less time. SO, I'm thinking if you are going to be tempering (or melting) the chocolate yourself, you might have extra incentive to use larger baking bars, since chocolate can only be tempered a limited number of times before becoming nasty.

I highly recommend this tour, just don't come wearing open-toed shoes like I did, they'll make you wear a pair of really ugly white clogs. Well, at least they match the hair net.

Oh and also...they sometimes make limited edition chocolate that is only available in the gift shop right there at the factory. Really only for the snobbiest of chocolate snobs, they are usually something like plain bars made from only the cacao pods from one particular area which have a distinctive taste...like fruitier than usual or something. The last one they had sounded a little more interesting...Scharffen Berger's own milk chocolate (which is really fantastic) with cacao nibs mixed in. It's already sold out, though. It's a sad, cruel world sometimes, isn't it?