Posted by Anita on 08.12.06 10:24 PM
We’d been doing really well, getting to the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market every Saturday morning, for a while. Then houseguests descended, weekend trips took us away… and we kicked ourselves all week long as we suffered with crappy food from the supermarket at the time of year when no sane food-loving soul should ever tread the fluorescent aisles.
We finally found our way back to where we belong today, and with an added bonus: Our friend Carla was in town, and staying right across The Embarcadero from the market! We kidnapped her from her hotel, dragged her to the market for Blue Bottle coffee and chilaquiles at Primavera, then made our rounds: June Taylor for more preserves, Andante cheeses, Frog Hollow peaches, some amazing Charentais melons and bacon avocados, herbal salts at Eatwell Farms, Toulouse sausage from Fatted Calf, a pork shoulder at Prather, the usual assortment of things at Rancho Gordo… I could barely hold the bags when we were done!
Somehow, even in midsummer, it just didn’t seem that crowded, so we spent more time browsing, finding lots of tasty ideas for things to cook this week. And to get to spend the morning with one of my favorite Seattle people made it all the more fabulous.
breakfast, farmers markets, shopping
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Posted by Anita on 08.09.06 5:02 PM
From our normally sane friends at CUESA, the organization behind the beloved Ferry Plaza Farmers Market:
Special sightings of Gourmet Editor-in-Chief Ruth Reichl lunching at Boulettes Larder and shopping at The Gardener delighted shoppers & store keepers alike. Ms. Reichl intimated to someone at The Gardener that the food at Boulettes Larder was “sooo good”. Martha Stewart visited again – and showed off the Marketplace to friends – making a point to wave at her favorite mushroom man – Ian Garrone of Far West Fungi.
I had no idea Page Six was writing food stuff now…
Update: Mea maxima culpa… the email wasn’t from CUESA but from the Ferry Building Marketplace management. I should have realized this when they were talking about indoor shops, not farm vendors.
farmers markets, levity, shopping
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Posted by Anita on 08.02.06 8:23 AM
In addition to selling her luscious marmalades, conserves and fruit butters at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers Market on Saturday mornings, June Taylor now also opens her warehouse/kitchen for retail sales on Fridays, and on select weekend days for classes.
I took a class back in late winter that featured three-fruit marmalade, which I loved. Last weekend, I followed up with June’s summer preserves class, which focused on peaches and nectarines; we made a preserve with “Summer Sweet” white peaches. Was it good? Let’s just say the jar I brought home is already gone — it was the most gorgeous rose color.
The classes are pricey ($125) but you go home with a good understanding of how to create your own preserves, plus a jar of the goodies that you and your classmates make in class under June’s direction. And you’ll never balk at paying $9 a jar again after you see what goes into it.
June Taylor Company/The Still-Room
2207 4th Street
Berkeley, CA 94710
510.548.2236
Update 08.14.06: June’s classes got an endorsement today from Shuna at eggbeater.
classes, East Bay, farmers markets, preserving & infusing, shopping
2 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 06.30.06 9:03 PM
Greetings from Boston, where it's so freaking hot that we're barely hungry at all… I'm not usually a guided-tour type of girl, but Cameron and I had a great time on Michele Topor's North End Market Tour. The price — $48 for adults — was perhaps a bit high for a 3-hour tour, but our guide took us to a great selection of Italian-american food shops, arranging for tastes of their specialties along the way, and pointing out historic and non-food neighborhood sights in just the right proportion. At the end of the walk, he handed out a list of all the places we'd visited, with addresses and a map, as well as a sheet with North End restaurant recommendations.
North End Market Tours
6 Charter Street
Boston,MA 02113
617.523.6032
Boston, shopping, travel
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Posted by Anita on 02.03.06 5:07 PM
I haven’t had time to download all the photos from our trip, but a couple of people have asked me about our experience with the Tsukiji fish market tour.
Nakamura-san and Yoshino-san speak fluent English, and they’re incredibly well-versed in the ins and outs of the market. They both used to work in Tsukiji for different wholesalers, and Yoshino-san lived in San Francisco years ago. I am sure that we saw things (like the uni showroom) that we would never have found on our own. Their explanations helped us understand the things we saw, rather than just being amused by the visual experience. If our guides didn’t know the answers to a question, they would ask the vendors and show genuine interest in the answers themselves.
The tour costs 7,500 yen (approximately $63/£35) per person. The only tricky part of the operation was the reservation, and even that isn’t hard. They’ve got major spam-blockers running on their email account, so you need to post their message board with your preferred date, and they will email you back.
The first morning, we ate at Sushi-sei, a traditional sushi bar in the outer market. We ordered the middle of the three set menus, and enjoyed everything very much. Nobody spoke any english, but it wasn’t a major problem… it just meant that we couldn’t chat with the sushi chefs! The second morning, Cameron went to Sushi-zanmai, a more-modern, casual sushi-place a couple of streets over. He said both were very good, but Sushi-sei was measurably better. (I, on the other hand, went to Yoshinoya!)
breakfast, restaurants, shopping, travel
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Posted by Anita on 01.25.06 5:15 PM
Cameron was otherwise occupied yesterday, so I decided to head over to the East Bay and check out a couple of Thai stores in Berkeley. I wasn’t shopping for anything in particular yet, but I wanted to get a sense of what each store had, as I ramp back up to cooking Thai more often. Specifically, I wanted to know if I would be able to find Thai produce like young peppercorns, wild pepper leaves (bai chapoo), holy basil, pea eggplants and such.
Totally bypassing the theme of the afternoon, I started off the day with a stop at House of Chicken and Waffles (444 Embarcadero West, Oakland). I’d go into more detail here, but that’s a topic for another post. (Do you see my nefarious plan for blog domination taking shape? I knew you would.) Anyway, it’s probably a good thing that I was stuffed, or else I would have spent half the afternoon stopping at the taco trucks I passed along the way.
I hesitate to admit publically that I had never been to Berkeley Bowl (2020 Oregon Street, Berkeley), but I suppose I am among friends. I feel pretty safe in saying that this would have to be the best outpost that I’ve ever encountered for hard-to-find produce, including a wide variety of asian vegetables and ‘exotic’ citrus. Impressive bulk-foods section and competitive prices on everyday groceries, too. I wish I lived closer so I could bypass Whole Paycheck. Serious points off for the zoolike atmosphere and parking-as-combat — and remember, I was here on a Monday afternoon. God help you if you go on a weekend.
Next stop was Tuk-Tuk Thai and Asian Market (1581 University Avenue, Berkeley). They’ve got a pretty decent selection of thai foodstuffs in a clean, well-lighted store that won’t scare farangs. The size of a small supermarket, this place has nearly all of the ingredients you’ll need for a thai feast, mostly at prices that are competitive with Erawan and other local southeast-asian markets. (I found many things for less in the International Drive stores below, but you would have to make multiple stops in order to get everything you needed.) They have a small assortment of thai housewares, including special pans for kanom krok, and thai woodstoves!
There’s even a small boutique of hilltribe textiles at the front of the store, and a real tuk-tuk in the middle of the place, looking cleaner than you ever saw one in Bangkok. My first impression wasn’t all that good: the hot-food counter looked pretty sad when I was there (lunchtime on a Monday) — it’s pretty nervy calling it a food court! — and the produce section was abysmally empty and overpriced. You’ll need to stop by Berkeley Bowl on your way home: bird chiles and kaffir lime leaves are twice the price at Tuk-Tuk, and other, more exotic items are non-existent. Still, for packaged dry goods like noodles, curry pastes, and coconut milk, they’ve got you covered.
A couple of blocks further down University, I reacquainted myself with Erawan Trading Market (1463 University Ave). Their tiny storefront about the size of a walk-in closet stocking an amazing array of thai groceries, magazines, and videos. My motto here is: “If you don’t see it, ask” — This isn’t the sort of place that carries 25 bottles of each brand, so you might have overlooked it. Their produce selection wasn’t as good as I remembered it being 3 or 4 years ago, but the folks working there were just as friendly and sweet as ever. I think the free parking at the motel next door is a new addition. The only thing I saw here that I didn’t find elsewhere was Thai cardamom.
Deciding I had some more time to kill, I surfed over to Kasma Loha-unchit’s List of East Bay Markets with Thai Ingredients. I’m probably going to come in to work late on Friday and hit the Old Oakland Farmers’ Market, so I deliberately bypassed the Chinatown listings in favor of those under East Oakland.
First stop was Sun Hop Fat Supermarket (501 East 12th Street, Oakland). Recently relocated to the other end of its block, the new store is a warren of formerly-separate stores. One houses a pretty good selection of produce; another is the dry-goods section; the last is the butcher shop and fishmarket. Oddly enough, it was in the latter that I found the day’s best prices on coconut milk, both Mae Ploy and Chaokoh.
Next was Sontepheap Market (1400 International Blvd., Oakland), which Kasma lists as a 2-star market (excellent). I wasn’t all that impressed — their produce looked especially sad — but maybe I didn’t know what I was missing. They did have a fun little housewares section.
Two tiny shops further down International were a little more interesting. Lao Market (1619 International Blvd.) had a nice selection of produce, including wild pepper leaves and pea eggplants (no wing beans, alas). May Kong (1613 International Blvd.) is just 2 doors down, and seemed to have pretty good prices on dry goods, and stocked my favorite kind of Tianjin preserved vegetable, in the ceramic crock.
Closer to home: Today on my lunch hour I went to Battambang Market (339 Eddy Street, San Francisco) in the Tenderloin, where I got to see a shooting down the block. Three ambulances, eight cop cars, and a few dozen homeless/gawkers. Oh, and fresh turmeric, and cilantro with the roots on, too. I used to shop here for the things I couldn’t find at mainstream markets, and it (along with 99 Ranch in Daly City) will probably still be my go-to market for most things. I was sad to see that the formerly-decent market around the corner, variously known as Angkor Premiere Market or Tenderloin New Market (225 Leavenworth Street) has gone way downhill.
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Updated 4/07: A few dozen people a week wind up on this page when searching for Kanom Krok recipes. If that’s ywhat brings you here, my teacher Kasma Loha-unchit features a Kanom Krok recipe on her excellent site, Thai Food and Travel.
East Bay, shopping, Thai
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Posted by Anita on 03.26.05 11:04 PM
Originally posted on Mouthfuls’ Perfect Seattle Food Day thread
My perfect day would have to be a weekday (Tue-Fri) because it would involve lunch at Salumi. But if we’re talking about weekend-days, here are two itineraries we’ve done numerous times:
Down to the market, brunch at Cafe Campagne. Spend the middle of the day shopping for dinner fixings, then return to the car and stash the perishables in the cooler (or the chilly car, in winter). Wander around Belltown and the Market area — sorry, I just can’t type ‘West Edge’ with a straight face — browsing and grazing as we go. Perhaps stop by Beecher’s for some mac-n-cheese for late lunch. Wind up for an aperitif at Zig Zag right when they open, then back to the car and home to cook. If we’re having too much fun, they we end up hanging out for another drink (or two), and thn taking a taxi to Palace or walking to a nearby restaurant, and leaving the foraged items for Sunday dinner.
Another variation on this theme: We go to Essential for a great latte and something from the pastry case for a light breakfast, then back home for menu planning, with the entire dining room table buried by cookbooks and magazines. Then we spend mid-day shopping for dinner stuff, and ingredients for the rest of the week’s meals. In the right season, the first stop would be the U District farmers’ market to get the majority of the produce and anything else we can get find there; this time of year, it’s either Whole Paycheck, Uwajimaya, or Central Market, depending on what else we need to get — WF has good cheese, CM has better deli meats, etc. Lunch is grabbed when we start to feel peckish; a recent favorite has been splitting a cheesesteak and an order of fries at Philadelphia Fevre, or each of us going our own way at the Uwajimaya food court. A new find I’m looking forward to adding to this plan: If we’ve got a Mutual Fish (aka ‘Smoochable Fish’) stop planned, I’ll agitate for lunch at the taco bus, El Asadero on Rainier, before heading home to prep dinner.
There’s usually a cheese plate or some other nibbles on the counter while we’re chopping, dicing, fileting, etc. Lately our weekend meals have been big, multi-hour projects: the latest mexican cooking project from the Mexico forum, Cam’s newfound love of wok-frying whole fish on the turkey-fryer burner outside, etc. It’s comforting to me to have a homey project to fill a winter afternoon. I know when summer comes, the meals will be simpler, less constructed… which I am also looking forward to, in its own way.
There aren’t any particularly surprising finds in these ideas, I’m afraid. Still, reading them over pleases me. We’re actually going to do an abridged version of #1 today, so it was fresh in my mind.
bar culture, drinks, farmers markets, restaurants, Seattle, shopping, travel
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