brunch specials at square one.

it's been awhile since we've had brunch at square one dining, and i'm not sure why because it's one of my favorite places for brunch. yes, it's a bit expensive, and yes, there's always a wait, and yes, parking is annoying, and yes, the giant blue scientology building looms over it, but one really can't complain about the food.

we usually order off the normal menu, but when we went on sunday, everything we ordered ended up being off the "specials" board. the soup du jour was a gazpacho - super tasty. and still had whole chunks of vegetables in it, and a good amount of jalapeno, to give it quite a kick.

dinner and new beers @ the pub at golden road.

we stopped by the pub at golden road for dinner for the first time the other night. i didn't know what to expect since we'd only been for lunch when it's packed with dreamworks and disney people, but it was still packed! in a good way of course - i absolutely love how laid back and family friendly it is. this was definitely something LA needed. we both tried new beers they had, the west kolsch (above, left) and the surfliner ipa (above, right) which i really liked.

post paddle omusubi.

after our early morning stand up paddle board lesson on saturday, we were very hungry. we stopped into eat at omelette parlour, on main street in santa monica, which is right next to sunny blue, an omusubi place i love. i specifically saved room for one of their miso mushroom musibis - so delicious! perfect savory filling snack.

my first attempt at making galbi tang.

galbi tang is a korean short rib soup that i recently discovered, and love! my parents bought me some really nice galbi, so i did my best to recreate it based on various articles/recipes i found online.

first you soak the ribs in ice water for an hour or two to draw the blood out, changing the water every 15-30 minutes as necessary. then you boil them for a half hour or so to try and get rid of as much fat and gunk as possible. rinse and scrub, and start with a new clean pot.

throw the ribs into a pot and bring to a boil. add some garlic, green onions, ginger and korean radish. i couldn't get a hold of korean radish, so i just used daikon. i left it in big chunks, to be cut up later.

after boiling everything for an hour, remove the daikon and cut into smaller pieces. marinade with sesame oil, gochujang (again, couldn't get a hold of this on short notice, so i just used japanese togarashi), green onions, salt, pepper. after they were well marinaded - half-hour-ish - i put the radishes back into the soup to be cooked for another half hour.

all the while, i had some bean vermicelli soaking, and when the soup was ready, i just threw it in there for about five minutes and i was done! the meat was awesome, the soup was very tasty but still pretty fatty - i probably should have boiled them awhile longer the first time around. my radishes were slightly under cooked - i probably should have diced it up before cooking, rather than after. other than that, i really enjoyed it (heh, that's a lot of caveats i know... lessons learned though)!

the next day, i even took the leftover meat and noodles, diced them up, and stir-fried with some kale for a pretty tasty stir-fry.

stand up paddle boarding!

i've wanted to try stand up paddle boarding for a long time now, and we finally took a class. we met in santa monica at 8am saturday for a class with malibu longboards. they provide wetsuits, but luckily james and i both had our own, a board and a paddle. there was about five minutes of on-land instruction - where to stand on the board, how to hold the paddle, how to stand up, etc. and then we were off! getting past the surf was the hardest part. once past that, we got on the board, and paddled out on our knees for a bit, then we were free to stand up and paddle around as we pleased.

it was really tiring. i've always heard its a core workout, but even more than my core, it exhausted my thighs and butt - the water was a little choppy so for almost two hours you're just constantly rebalancing yourself. i was pretty good on the way out against the wind, but had adjusted to lean forward; on the way back, i didn't "reverse" my balance the way i really should have so felt off balance the whole time and ended up falling off a couple times. luckily, i've always enjoyed swimming in the ocean, so it really didn't bother me. the nice thing also, is that you can always just go down and paddle on your knees, or even sit down completely. a couple other people in the group never even stood up.

we went out toward this green buoy, that had quite a few noisy sea lions on it. we got so close, we could smell them (stinky!). i already thought that was pretty cool, but after we paddled away from the buoy, we were suddenly surrounded by dolphins! a couple jumped out of the water less than five feet from me! what a crazy experience. really wish we'd had a waterproof camera we could have brought out or something, but we had so much fun we'll definitely be doing it again.

sanford's stinking cute face.

petsmart and the angry cat.

this came on the TV the other night as part of a petsmart commercial. it was simply too funny to not share. look at how angry that cat is!

new blog look!

decided to try out one of the "dynamic" templates that blogger has. it makes it nice and clean, but doesn't let me customize as much, so i'm not sure how i feel about it yet. drop by the page if you're an RSS reader!

and yes, my dog is a weirdo.

me and my shadow: first look!

woohoo! the first artwork for the movie i'm currently working on, me and my shadow, was released! comingsoon.net and slashfilm.com both did little write-ups about the hybrid of traditional 2d and cg animation:

Last we heard, Daniel’s human world was to be rendered in CG, while Shadow Dan’s shadow world was to be hand-drawn. It’s impossible to tell just from this poster how the two methods will work together in the film, but it’s a promising combination. Daniel looks like your standard-issue CG-animated human character, but there’s potential for Shadow Dan and his land to look a little more unique.

- angie han, slashfilm

kind of cool, since that hybrid/integration pipeline is exactly what i'm working on, and have been working on since i wrapped on puss in boots. i must say, the animation tests that have gone down the pipe to lighting are looking pretty darn cool.

finally dinnered at red medicine.

finally went to red medicine over in beverly hills the other night. everything was quite good. the amberjack and lamb were especially standouts - the amberjack was surprisingly light and refreshing. the lamb, which was a braised lamb belly, was just so interesting because it had the texture of pork belly, but that amazing lightly game-y lamb flavor.

#70 Johnny Drum Bourbon, Sapling Maple Liqueur, Maraschino Liqueur (shaken with an orange slice and served over crushed ice with seasonal berries and mint

neighborhood eats : mixto.

still love that the awesome people behind tomato pie pizza opened up mixto, and they're both in walking distance from my apartment! their tacos and tamales are delicious!

an afternoon at sunset junction.

we spent a lazy sunday afternoon over at sunset junction, starting with the relatively new sunset junction coffee shop for brunch. it was 3pm when we got there.. so yes, it was a very lazy sunday.

james had their huevos rancheros and a side of tater tots. they were GOOD. i just had a simple scramble  (and stole of few of the tots).

awesome bullie.

saw this awesome english bully just hanging out in the a truck bed (the truck itself was pretty sweet too!) on main street in santa monica.

what a face!

LA's best croissant? maison giraud : part one.

i am a bit of a croissant junkie, and i recently read that maison giraud might have the best croissant in LA. my current favorite is the larder at tavern in brentwood. number two used to be from anisette in santa monica, owned by chef alaine giraud, but that shut down over a year ago, which was devastating. i hadn't realized he opened a new restaurant up in the palisades, so i had to go!

brick+mortar in santa monica.

we were hanging out in santa monica saturday afternoon and stumbled upon brick+mortar during it's happy hour. it was insanely loud inside, but luckily that have some outdoor seating.

sanford vs. the dumpling.

the contestant: sanford the french bulldog

the challenge: eat a dumpling!

random : ice cream, hoarder, plants!

a bit of a random post, but here are some life tidbits: brown butter almond brittle jeni's ice cream is expensive ($12/pint) but really effing good; my dog is a total toy hoarder; and my cucumbers and bok choy i planted last week are growing (marigolds, brussel sprouts and romanesca broccoli aren't doing as well..)!

a seafood craving.

we were both craving seafood saturday night, so we headed over to the hungry cat in hollywood. we started with a raw setting of half a dozen oysters, four clams and a whole sea urchin.

james had the lobster roll, and i had the special of the night which was a tempura battered and fried soft shell crab over black rice, spicy shanghai-style sauce and a sort of asian slaw over the top. delicious and spicy. what a good saturday.

spleen panino and cured mangalitsa.

we went to UMAMIcatessen for dinner on friday night, and i couldn't have been happier with my meal. i ordered the spleen panino off the p!gg menu (of course) and it was even better than the hoof&mouth banh mi-style sandwich i had last time.  spicy and game-y and savory and sweet - SO. GOOD.

dai ho noodles.

after getting our teeth cleaned at my parents' dentistry, we stopped at the nearby and infamous dai ho restaurant for some yummy noodles. not going to go into descriptions here, they were just plain tasty.

hello, dodgerkitty!

so it turns out that the giveaway at sunday's dodgers game (where the dodgers finally snapped a seven game losing streak!) was a hello kitty bobblehead. now, despite being a female asian, i am not a hello kitty fan at all. however, part of me must still like it because when i saw this my brain exploded. it's just so freaking cute. thanks, robyn!

pasadena frenchie meetup = bat ears and snorts galore.

i joined the pasadena french bulldog meetup group awhile back, but have never had the chance to make it out to one of the meetups, until this weekend! first off, i love the park since it's a grass park! silverlake's is dirt, so sanford gets REALLY disgustingly muddy. secondly, holy cow i've never seen so many frenchies in one place. i'd say there were at least twenty! sanford had so much fun, especially since this is his first real outing since six weeks ago when we had to take him to the emergency room for pain. in the photos below, he is the red fawn (dark brown) with black mask and a blue neck collar.

diddy riese and college kids.

james had never been to diddy riese before, so i had to take him. we went on saturday night, after already having a late dinner at ramen yamadaya in culver city. the line was insanely long, and full of loud, obnoxious college kids. it moved relatively quickly though, and in a little over half an hour we had our ice cream sandwiches in hand.