Wagyu beef

While watching an episode of Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations on the Travel Channel, I learned something new about Kobe beef.  I always thought that Kobe beef was a breed of cattle named after the region in Japan where they're raised and get their muscles massaged and sake added to their diet to improve the taste.  Turns out that information is only partly correct - Kobe beef actually comes from several breeds of wagyu cattle who are raised not only in Kobe but also in various parts of Australia and New Zealand (and in a hybrid form, the US).  For more information than you probably care to know, here's the wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wagyu_beef.

I must admit that I've never had the pleasure of eating kobe beef in it's steak format (as it was probably intended to be eaten), instead I had it once in a trendy restaurant in the form of sliders (tiny hamburgers that seem to be all the rage now).  Needless to say, the amount of Kobe/wagyu beef I got was minimal and so I don't feel like I really got to experience the full benefit of it.  It is on my list of things to try eventually only now I know that I can also look for wagyu on the menu.

Mijita Cocina Mexicana

This past weekend I went into San Francisco to see a friend from Chicago who was in town visiting.  We wanted to meet up for lunch and I wanted to take him somewhere that was unique to San Francisco, which ended up being the Ferry Building (aptly named since people commute to/from San Francisco by ferry and this is the terminal where the ferry's come/go).  One of my favorite restaurants in San Francisco is at the Ferry Building and is called The Slanted Door, which serves amazingly fresh, clean Vietnamese food.  When I'm at the Ferry Building I usually opt for Slanted Door takeout but thought that since I had a guest, we'd try something new. After walking around the amazing outdoor farmer's market for awhile, we'd worked up an appetite and were ready to eat.  We landed at Mijita which has a small menu with tacos, enchiladas and various side dishes.  I ordered a carnitas (pork) taco with a side of guacamole and chips.

The carnitas taco came topped with a spicy, tangy salsa verde and the pork was fall-off-the-bone tender.  It was a little tough to eat but tasty.  The guacamole was fresh and the chips were homemade, fried-to-order.  All in all, I would say that it was a good meal but a tad overpriced for the portion size.  Guess I'm just not used to city prices.

Chocolate Raspberry Bars with White Chocolate and Almonds

People who know me well know that I'm a terrible baker.  Even though I'm a fairly logical person and you'd think that the exactness of baking would be a perfect fit for me, I continue to struggle with anything that requires turning on an oven and mixing wet and dry ingredients.  Needless to say, when I do find a baking recipe that I can actually manage, I embrace it and hold on for life.  This past weekend I was invited to a friend's house for lunch after church so I volunteered to bring dessert.  I knew that I had to make something good since she's also a foodie and likes to cook and so I decided on Giada De Laurentiis' Chocolate Raspberry Bars with White Chocolate and Almonds (a recipe that involves baking but one that I can actually make).  The name sounds fancier than it really is because it's basically just brownie mix with some sort of fruit jam layered into the brownie batter that's then cooked and drizzled with white chocolate and almond slivers on the top.  Still, I've made the recipe a couple of times before and it never fails to impress so I knew it was the perfect thing to bring.

Here's a picture of the brownie batter with the layered fruit jam (in this case, grape jam):

 

I basically just mixed the brownie batter according to the recipe and then poured the jam in lines after it had cooled.  I then ran a knife through the lines from left to right to create the pattern.

Here's what the brownies look like after they're baked:

 

It's kind of cool how the jam leaves deep pockets in the brownie mix as it cooks but doesn't sink to the bottom.

Here's the homemade double broiler I made to melt the white chocolate for the top:

 

I learned the hard way when I first attempted this recipe that white chocolate chips have a lot more milk solids in them than regular milk chocolate chips so you really have to use low heat and stir it a lot to get it to melt properly.  The first time I tried melting white chocolate the heat was too high and I didn't stir often enough and it turned into a hard mess of unmeltable goo.  Needless to say, I got it right this time because here's a picture of the final product:

I took the brownies to lunch and people enjoyed them.  Now that I've mastered that recipe, I've decided to try something a little harder - Giada's Peanut Butter Cookies with Blackberry Jam recipe.  Stay tuned for an update on how it goes, maybe I'll become a baker after all...