That’s right, Hand To Mouth is back. Despite missing San Francisco like crazy, and Home Sweet Home not really feeling that sweet right now, it is good to be home. Kind of.
We got back to London a week ago, and its been a hectic. Along with flat hunting and catching up with friends & family, I’ve been lining up a bunch of interviews, meetings and trial shifts at bakeries across London. I had my first trial on Monday and have two more lined up this week, along with a couple of meetings. And I’m also meeting up with an old work colleague who wants to get me involved with a food based iPhone / iPad app he’s developing. Exciting times.
I’ve also got a bunch of posts to write when I get the chance, including a round-up of our New York eatathon, a couple of great finds from the city that never sleeps, and a killer rasberry tart recipe, amongst others.
So I promise I’ll pull my finger out and will be back here very soon.
I saw this video about New York based Mast Brothers Chocolate about a year or so ago, and have desperately wanted to visit their shop ever since. As someone who’s interested in starting their own business, I found the approach they discuss really inspirational. I love the romantic idealism of treating their business like a boys own adventure, and striving for something that feels nostalgic and hand made, as opposed to mass produced and uniform.
Anyway, yesterday afternoon I managed to satisfy my desire by paying their Williamsburgh shop a visit. I was hoping to take the factory tour they mention on the site, but alas they aren’t doing them at the moment as they are in the process of expanding their operation. However, when the lovely guy behind the counter saw we were a bit bummed out about not getting to do the tour, he snuck us in to have a look at their new space. It’s a really lovely big, open brick walled warehouse unit, but what hits you first is the smell. It’s like being in a chocolate cloud. I’m pretty sure I started to drool almost instantly. The room is filled will sacks of cocoa beans, a roasting oven, ‘conching’ drums (these heat and grind the beans for 3 days until the chocolate is beautifully smooth), and this awesome mad scientist-esque glass vacuum pump device that separates the cracked beans from the husk. It’s very cool, and feels really nicely old fashioned.
From Nashville we headed for the ‘Low Country’, with a quick overnight pit stop in Atlanta to break up the journey to Savannah. In the short time we were there, we didn’t get much of an impression of Georgia’s capital, but it seems like a modern city that’s expanding pretty fast.
One thing we did get to check out was Varsity, which is (apparently) America’s largest drive in. I was pretty excited about visiting as it’s one of those old school places where they have people bring out your food and do the whole tray on the window thing. Unfortunately we were disappointed. Definitely go and check it out for the spectacle and atmosphere, but don’t go for the food. It was average at best. The burgers were no better than a basic McDonald’s hamburger, the fries were limp, and god alone knows what was on in the chilli on my chilli dog, but I’m not sure it was of this World. Bit of a shame really, because it’s a pretty cool set up.
We’re ‘enjoying’ some the South-East coast’s famous storm season weather, so you’re going to get to read another post.
From LA we flew to New Orleans. After seeing all the news about Katrina and subsequent storms and floods, I really didn’t know what to expect, but I’ve got to say we were really impressed. Aside from Bourbon Street which is a bit of an abomination, it’s really cool and interesting place, that literally sweats music and good times from ever pore. We arrived with a fist full of recommendations of places to go from my mate Graison who I met on the SFBI course and who used to live there, so we set about munching our way through town.
We had three really memorable meals in ‘The Big Easy’. The first was at Dante’s Kitchen. It kicked off in style with some stellar ’spoon’ bread, which is a kind of corn bread, and was absolutely delicious. So much so that I had to know what was in it, and the chefs kindly printed me out a recipe. This was followed by fantastic shrimp and grits and then ox tail. Small dishes, really nicely done. I’d go back in a shot.
So we are exactly a week into our road trip across the ‘States, and so far, so amazing.
From San Fran we drove to Yosemite which is just incredible. I visited the valley before with my folks as a young child, but I didn’t remember much of it. Probably too young to appreciate it, but it’s a jaw dropping place. Everywhere you look, there are unbelievable postcard views. It really is the big country. Food wise we had to pretty much fend for ourselves, firing up the barbie or gas stove at our camp and packing lunches, which was all good ‘back to nature’ stuff.
Next into Death Valley. Everyone had told us stuff like ‘…it’s just a long road…” or “…there’s not much there…”, so we were unprepared for how beautiful it is. That’s beautiful in a kind of brutal way. En route we stopped by Schat’s bakery cafe in Bishop and gorged on his famous sandwiches. The turkey club was the bomb. We stayed in the heart of the valley in a little settlement called Stovepipe Wells, which felt a bit like a theme village you might get at an amusement park. It was as hot as Hades, and the food wasn’t up to much, but the setting was incredible and they had a pool. Nuff said.
I’m writing this post with a very heavy heart as tomorrow we leave San Francisco.
The five or so months that we’ve spent here have been so amazing, and the missus and I have totally fallen in love with the city. The hills, the fog, the history, the food, the people, the atmosphere all combine to make San Francisco a totally unique place. Having visited before for a short time as a tourist, I think I was a bit worried about being bored, but far from it. There may not be a huge quantity of ‘must do’ sights, but it has to be one of the best cities in the world for just hanging out and chilling. No wonder the hippies loved it here!
So yeah, we’re basically totally gutted to be leaving, and if things were different with visas etc, I think we would have stayed for a couple of years. But we can’t. C’est la vie. It’s not all doom and gloom though, as we’re heading on an awesome road trip that will take us across country to New York before we head back to London in late October.
So before we bid San Francisco a very fond farewell, I thought I’d give you my top 10 culinary highlights.
1. Mission Chinese Food – I’m pretty sure you’re all sick of me talking about MCF by now, but humour me. I love everything about this place. The food, the venue, the buzz. It’s been wining every time we’ve been there. Wonder if they’d deliver to London.
Every now and again, you get a really good feeling about a restaurant just by walking past it. In our first week in San Francisco, we walked past The Swan Oyster Depot on our way home after a boozy night out. Even through our alcoholic haze we could tell we were going to like it. It had this really lovely old-school feel to it, so the next day we decided to give it a go. As you can probably conclude from this post, we weren’t disappointed, and we’ve been back a few times since.
But before we get down to the nitty gritty, a short history lesson. The Swan has been around since around 1912, and by the look of the place not much has changed since. The original oyster bar was bought out by a guy called Sal Sancimino and his three cousins (Al, Pat and Frank LaRocca) in 1946, and in turn their kids took it over in the ’70’s, and it not surprisingly has a really friendly, authentic family feel to it.
Gyoza, dumplings, wontons, pot stickers, whatever you call them, I love them. They’ve fast become one of my favourite snacks. One of those things that when you think about them, you’ve got to have them.
I’d never really thought of making my own, but a chance encounter with a dumpling press and a packet of wonton wrappers in San Fran’s China town changed all that, and now I can’t stop cranking them out. Of course if I was a real expert, I’d be wrapping them by hand, but I’m not, and the $6 press does a pretty good job.
This Thai influenced recipe has a pork filling, but you can stuff these little guys with whatever you want really. You could do a variation with salmon or shrimp and chive, or maybe even tofu and shitake mushrooms. The cases we’ve found work best are Singapore style dumpling wrappers as they’re a bit thicker and give the pot stickers more substance.
One more thing, the pot stickers get fried on one side (which is how they get their name) and then steamed, so you’re going to need a wok or frying pan with a lid. Lets begin.
Hand To Mouth is a blog about food. Eating it. Cooking it. Reviewing it. Reading about it. And everything in between.
I’ll be regularly posting recipes, reviews of some of my favourite places and opinion about anything food related that grabs my eye. Hopefully there’ll be a few laughs along the way, and I promise not to cut the cheese.
If you like what you see please let me know, and equally don’t be afraid of throwing a few rotten tomatoes my way if you don’t.
BIG thanks to Tom Hardcore at Nation for the blog design.
