The 2009 Grub List [SF Eats]
If you don't know me already, you should know that I like to eat. Having recently moved from Chicago to the bay area, it's hard to figure out what to check out and where to eat. Currently, I've been following my gut instinct (no pun intended).
I've been seeking comfort food, or food I grew up with. That translates to Japanese food (predominately ramen), Chinese food (Taiwanese and Schezuan), and fried chicken. Having satiated that innate desire, I've recently venture out of my warm, comfortable center. Earlier this week, I went to check out Hog Island Oyster Company. I went for the $1 oyster happy hour. Turns out, it's Monday/Thursday, not Monday-Thursday. Dash, slash... eh... what's the difference? Well, about $1.25.
I've decided to follow the recommendations of the 400+ judges who make up the James Beard Foundation. There are a couple restaurants that have made the semi-final round. Here is a list of a couple categories, with local restaurants highlighted. I've already made reservations for next week at A16. If you're interested for a 6pm seating on Wednesday, let me know!
Outstanding Chef
José Andrés, Minibar, Washington, D.C.
Dan Barber, Blue Hill, NYC
Tom Colicchio, Craft, NYC
Suzanne Goin, Lucques, Los Angeles
Vincent Guerithault, Vincent on Camelback, Phoenix
Sam Hayward, Fore Street, Portland, ME
Jean Joho, Everest, Chicago
Paul Kahan, Blackbird, Chicago
Barbara Lynch, No. 9 Park, Boston
Michael Mina, Michael Mina, San Francisco
Tamara Murphy, Brasa, Seattle
Scott Peacock, Watershed, Decatur, GA
Charles Phan, The Slanted Door, San Francisco
Stephan Pyles, Stephan Pyles, Dallas
Anne Quatrano, Bacchanalia, Atlanta
Ana Sortun, Oleana, Cambridge, MA
Frank Stitt, Highlands Bar & Grill, Birmingham, AL
Marc Vetri, Vetri, Philadelphia
Janos Wilder, Janos, Tucson, AZ
Michael Smith, Restaurant Michael Smith, Kansas City, MO
OUTSTANDING RESTAURANT
Alan Wong’s Restaurant, Honolulu
Babbo, NYC
Bacchanalia, Atlanta
Bern’s Steak House, Tampa, FL
Blackbird, Chicago
Boulevard, San Francisco
Brigtsen’s, New Orleans
Delfina, San Francisco
Everest, Chicago
Fore Street, Portland, ME
Greens, San Francisco
Hamersley's Bistro, Boston
Higgins Restaurant and Bar, Portland, OR
Highlands Bar & Grill, Birmingham, AL
Jean Georges, NYC
Kinkead’s, Washington, D.C.
Lucia’s Restaurant, Minneapolis
Magnolia Grill, Durham, NC
Sanford, Milwaukee
Vidalia, Washington, D.C.
Outstanding Restaurant
Animal, Los Angeles
The Bazaar by José Andrés at SLS Hotel at Beverly Hills, Los Angeles
Bottega, Yountville, CA
Camino, Oakland, CA
Cork, Washington, D.C.
Corton, NYC
Distrito, Philadelphia
Django, Des Moines, IA
Emilitsa, Portland, ME
Feast, Houston
Holeman and Finch Public House, Atlanta
Hungry Mother, Cambridge, MA
Izakaya at Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, Atlantic City, NJ
L2O, Chicago
Merriman’s Kapalua, Maui, Lahaina, HI
Momofuku Ko, NYC
Noca, Phoenix
Palate Food & Wine, Glendale, CA
Poppy, Seattle
Raku, Las Vegas
Richard Chen Pittsburgh
Scarpetta, NYC
Spinasse, Seattle
Sra. Martinez, Miami
Tei An, Dallas
Trattoria Lucca, Charleston, SC
Volt, Frederick, MD
Zahav, Philadelphia
RISING STAR CHEF OF THE YEAR
Nate Appleman, A16, San Francisco
Sean Brock, McCrady's, Charleston, SC
Aaron Deal, Tristan, Charleston, SC
Sonja Finn, Dinette, Pittsburgh
Evan Funke, Rustic Canyon Wine Bar and Seasonal Kitchen, Santa Monica, CA
Vannessa Garcia, Restaurant Charlie at the Palazzo, Las Vegas
Kevin Gillespie, Woodfire Grill, Atlanta
Will Gilson, Garden at the Cellar, Cambridge, MA
Sarah Kosikowski, Michael Mina at Bellagio, Las Vegas
Jackson Kramer, Interim Restaurant & Bar, Memphis
Travis Lett, Gjelina, Venice, CA
Jonathan McDonald, Pub & Kitchen, Philadelphia
Johnny Monis, Komi, Washington, D.C.
Dave Racicot, Lautrec at Nemacolin Woodlands Resort, Farmington, PA
Charles “Chip” Roman, Blackfish, Conshohocken, PA
Gabriel Rucker, Le Pigeon, Portland, OR
Justin Schoville, Söntés, Rochester, MN
Ryan Skeen, Irving Mill, NYC
Michael Solomonov, Zahav, Philadelphia
Sameh Wadi, Saffron Restaurant & Lounge, Minneapolis
Rachel Yang, Joule, Seattle
Sue Zemanick, Gautreau's, New Orleans
BEST CHEF: PACIFIC
Gino Angelini, Angelini Osteria, Los Angeles
James Boyce, Studio at Montage Laguna Beach, Laguna Beach, CA
Michael Cimarusti, Providence, Los Angeles
Josiah Citrin, Mélisse, Santa Monica, CA
Chris Cosentino, Incanto, San Francisco
Jeremy Fox, Ubuntu, Napa, CA
Hiroshi Fukui, Hiroshi Eurasion Tapas, Honolulu
Bev Gannon, Joe’s, Wailea, HI
Quinn Hatfield, Hatfield’s, Los Angeles
Douglas Keane, Cyrus, Healdsburg, CA
Loretta Keller, Coco500, San Francisco
David Kinch, Manresa, Los Gatos, CA
Chris Kobayashi, Artisan, Paso Robles, CA
Christopher Kostow, The Restaurant at Meadowood, St. Helena, CA
Peter Merriman, Merriman’s, Waimea, HI
David Myers, Sona, Los Angeles
Daniel Patterson, Coi, San Francisco
Gayle Pirie and John Clark, Foreign Cinema, San Francisco
Craig Strong, The Dining Room at the Langham, Pasadena, CA
Jason Travi, Fraîche, Culver City, CA
Read the entire list of nominees here.
Econoland [Economist Theme Park]
In tough economic times, it's always refreshing to hear of companies who are able to capitalize on the environment. According to their website, "The Economist Group is delighted to announce the development of a public-entertainment facility that combines the magic of a theme park with the excitement of macroeconomics."
Among the different attractions, rides include:
- The currency high-roller: Float like a butterfly with the euro and drop like a stone with the pound!
- Chamber of horrors:Fiscal fantasyland: Watch the economy shrivel before your very eyes as you struggle to stop growth falling!
- The Severe Contest: Try your strength against a bear market!
Let's just hope its an April fools joke.
How to be smarter [Exercise Your Brain]
Given that I've left the corporate world to join the startup world, I've been reading up on how to be more creative, more active, and more curious. In short, how to sharpen the mind and be smarter.
I came across this 2007 Wired article by Joshua Green. In short, here are a couple items that Josh tried to sharpen his noodle:
- Eat well, especially during breakfast
- Get a full nights rest
- Shower blind
- Brush your teeth with the opposite hand
- Blast Mozart
- Drink Coffee
- Engage in "Neurobics"
Source: Wired
First Time Angler [Fishing in Austin]
I'm living through my second Chicago winter and I think two is more than enough. By next week, I'll be out in California.
In the process of moving out, I've started to clean out my e-files. So because of that, I'm going to telling you about a fishing guide by the name of Allen Christensen. Back in March of 2008, I visited my friend Bryant out in Texas. With original plans to check out SXSW, we ended up camping, hiking, and fishing in the area.
On one of the days, we decided to go fishing along lake Travis. Bryant had heard that Allen was pretty familiar with the lake. It was a day of firsts. First time fishing, first time with kettle chips. With a six-pack of beer, thai-flavored kettle chips, and a light tackle rod, I felt instantly like an old chinese man. Loved it.
With my beginners luck, I started to catch fish left and right which left Bryant a bit miffed. But suddenly I realized that my line had snagged on something big. My line was meant to catch 3-5 pound bass. This was a lot bigger. 5 minutes pass by, I'm trying to reel in the fish but at times my line looks like its going to snap. 11 minutes pass by, like spotting the loch ness, we shout as we see a flicker of the fish. It's huge.
My arms are screaming as after 15 minutes the fish gets close enough to the boat for Allen to shovel the fish on board. Turns out it was a 36 pound buffalo.
The stretched line fell back into the water, whereby we felt another tug. By hand, we reeled it in to discover that I caught a bass in the process.
Let me tell you, when we got back to the campsite, we had too much fish with us. Good thing we found people to share in on the food.
Don’t Count Your Seats Until You’ve Sat Down [United Suites]
On my return trip from visiting Egypt and Jordan, I spent many miles to upgrade myself to business class.
United Airlines has been slowly rolling out "the next generation" of business class seats. Shown below, they're like miniaturized first-class cockpits.
These seats have all sorts of bells and whistles:
- Ability to lie flat. True 180-degree seats
- On-Demand TV
- Menu designed by Charlie Trotter
- Output for your laptop
- Ipod Dock (you need to buy the converter)
After visiting UA's promotional website and reading blog posts about the new business class chairs, imagine my surprise when I stepped into the plane to find... just seats, no cockpits. I quickly realized that I had been bamboozled. Luckily, I was one of the first to board the plane and got to see everybody's reaction as they piled onto the plane. It was fun.
It was a look of utter surprise and disappointment. Some people looked side to side and probably wondered, is this the right plane? Am I flying back to Chicago? In our section of the cabin, the one and only thing people talked about was on the (lack of) the inquiring how they were expecting something different.
These new cockpit suites are only available on a couple routes (LHR to ORD, for example) and on select planes (21 of 91 planes have been converted).
Business class on a 7 hour flight is a lot better than economy class. But we all felt that we got the short end of the stick. My "single serving friend" had read UA's press release, visited the website, changed his route to fly through Heathrow instead of Frankfurtused a TON of miles to upgrade himself, and double checked that the plane had the new suites, just to try it out. It's an adult version of taking candy from a baby.
Too bad, so sad. I guess I'm telling you this story because I find it fascinating how important it is to manage expectations. We would've been fine with our tattered beige business class seats that couldn't even go "angled flat."
Who knows when I'll be able to fly on an international flight again, but I'll be going in with managed expectations.
This post is a bit of promotion [Gallery 400 Exhibit]
This Shadow is a Bit of Ideology, gathers a group of artists working against the darkness cast by a long, drawn-out war, a rancorous spirit in politics, a social landscape obscured by rampant information retrieval, and a crumbling economy. The artists in the exhibition do not turn their backs on current socio-political issues, but neither do they embrace propaganda. Rather, they harness anxieties—political, economic, personal—as productive generators for form. Introspection, reflective criticism, oblique commentary and cohabitation of past with present are just a few of the tactics by which these artists navigate progressively through the twilight.
Let’s get Photo Synth-ical, Synth-ical
Since Blaise Aguera y Arcas first presented a demo of Photosynth at a TED conference back in 2007, I've been salivating at the opportunity to play with the technology.
A couple weeks ago, when Tommy and Ashley came out from NY, I took the opportunity to grab my camera and get a couple shots in.
Bonus: Try to find the first image in this blog post in the photosynth walkthrough.
Starting to collecting jargons for a jar
Many of all work in the professional field. We often create an ecosystem of jargons terms. I don't know why I leverage these terms, but one day I'll figure it out and draw a strawman for you all.
According to Lucy Kellaway, business jargon cloaks the brutal modern workplace in such brainlessly upbeat language.
Read more about it here.
The Anatomy of a Nap
Everybody has a routine that they follow when they get home. Mr. Rogers would change his shoes and put on a nice sweater and then proceed to talk to a trolley. More often than not, I'll get a glass of water and head to the couch, flip on MSNBC and fall into a quick 20 minute nap. Every once in a while, I wake up two- to three- hours later. I kinda look like this:
In "How to Nap," the Boston Globe tells us everything we've always wanted to know about napping. It notes that midday napping can boost alertness, creativity, and mood. In fact, a British study found that knowing a nap is coming was enough to lower blood pressure.
The graphic helps us define the optimal time to have a siesta (around 3 for me), how long your siesta should be, and what you need to do to prepare.
The only fact I don't completely buy is the ability for a nap to improve my mood. I am the grumpiest person alive when someone wakes me up mid-nap.
Commencement speeches are blossoming again…
When I graduated, Pierre Omidyar, gave my commencement speech. Nowadays, you can get read his stream of conscious through his blog (which mostly contains tweets).
With a little bit a humility, dash of wit, and highlights of humor, commencement speeches, at its best, are inspirational and empowering.
Here are some of my favorite ones from this year:
- JK Rowling at Harvard
- Barbara Kingsolver at Duke
- PJ O'Rouke via LA Times
- Samantha Power at Pitzer-Claremont College
And of course, who can ever forget Conan O'Brien's speech from back in 2000. You can find ten of gawker's favorite commencement speeches here.