Safari West in Santa Rosa

May 20, 2014 0 Comments

A few years ago I decided to stop giving my best friend actual, physical gifts and started giving her gifts that we could share together.  I felt that we didn't necessarily have enough girl time outside the home doing fun things other than dining out.  Plus, I wanted to share new experiences with her.  My first gift in this vein was when we went indoor surfing at SurfXtreme in Elk Grove. 

Dari liked the idea of event gifting and so this year her Christmas present to me was to go to Safari West in Santa Rosa. Turns out our friend Val had also bought a package for her mom and daughters and so all six of us went out this last weekend. 

Safari West is located on 400 acres in the hills northeast of Santa Rosa. We were told by our guide, Stephanie, that the ranch owners, Peter and Nancy Lang, had cattle, but had started adding African wildlife to their property for fun. In 1993 they decided to open offer a safari style experience to the public. Safari West gained full accreditation in the American Zoo and Aquarium Association shortly after.

Safari West is now home to about 90 different species of wildlife, mostly antelopes and birds.  There are some cheetahs, monkeys, and other large animals as well.


You can also stay overnight. There are about two dozen tent cabins that range in price from $200 to $315 depending on season and location. These are like hotel rooms with full bathrooms and luxury features, just not solid walls. I guess they could be a bit chilly at night then.

Tour packages range in price from $35 for children to $95 for adults during peak season. The tours last about three hours - one for the walking portion and two for the jeep ride.  Some parties start walking first, some start the ride first.

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Need New Dining Companions? Apps and Services to Make New Foodie Friends

Need New Dining Companions? Apps and Services to Make New Foodie Friends

May 06, 2014 0 Comments
I have no problem dining in restaurants alone, with a few exceptions.  Brunch, to me, is a social affair and requires a partner or a group.  The other exception is elevated fine dining. What I mean by that is someplace where it's an experience and that you are probably investing a serious wad of cash.  An example is The French Laundry.  I wouldn't want to go alone!  You want to share that experience with another foodie friend that can really appreciate it.

 So, yes, you can sometimes find me eating solo at Ella, Mother, Broderick, or elsewhere. I'll be reading between courses or playing with social media. It may be that I'm using a half-off coupon.  I'm the type the restaurants hate. I'll use a coupon just for myself. I want bang for my buck. In that regard I can be a bit selfish.

 But then again, eating alone is, well, lonely. I suffer from a lack of foodie friends that are single who I can count upon to join me. Some of my foodie friends have families, or are partnered, or live too far away. I guess I need (more) new friends. 

 There are several new ways to accomplish this. And so I thought I would share them with you.

 MEETUP.COM

 Meetup has been around for over a decade now and it is a great site, especially if you are new to an area.  There are groups for every diverse interest you can think of. There's everything from Chihuahua Lovers to Knitting groups. There are definitely dining groups as well.  In fact, for a few years I was an Organizer for the Dining Galore group. Then life changed and I stopped. But I'm actually occasionally putting an event on there again.  I also belong to Forkscrew, which is a group that does theme potlucks about once a month. What's nice about this group is that everyone is on their A-game for bringing homemade dishes versus grabbing a veggie platter from Raley's.  

 I do have a great appreciation for Meetup.  Some of my current friends or acquaintances are from those groups, and, in fact, my new job at Dinnerwire.com even came indirectly through Meetup. Thank you!


EATWITHUS.COM 
VOULEZVOUSDINER.COM
EATFEASTLY.COM
COZYMEAL.COM

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LOVING Superbutter - my new energy secret

April 29, 2014 NASFT , superbutter 0 Comments
I got hooked on SuperButter.  If you are looking for a peanut butter equivalent that doesn't have any nuts, then look no further.

This year I got some really great new items at the Fancy Food Show.  Sometimes a new item will interest me, but not actually hook me.  SuperButter has hooked me.

 Here is their own description:

 Roasted sunflower, flax and sesame seeds comprise the flavorful base, with a little cane sugar, palm oil and sea salt added for maximum deliciousness!  SuperButter premium seed butters are high in protein, fiber and antioxidants (Omega 3's and Vitamin E), are gluten, trans fat and cholesterol free, and contain less fat than regular peanut or nut butters. 

Yes, this is an all natural, super healthy, non-nut butter that can be substituted into your recipes like peanut butter!  And it comes in original, crunchy, vanilla bean, and chocolate flavors!

 I should tell you that I've never been a big peanut butter fan. I don't hate it, but it's not high up on my food list.  I'm not interested in peanut butter cookies, Reese's or other peanut butter flavored candies, cookies, or desserts.  I will eat a PBJ on occasion and I do like it as an ingredient for satay and curries. Not that interested in putting it on my burger either. And in the argument on creamy versus crunchy, I'm a crunchy gal.

 I have to say, though, that this SuperButter....I like it a lot!

I had to try SuperButter out to see if it really could be exchanged for peanut butter in a recipe and so I chose my favorite chocolate chip cookie - the Monster Cookie.  Monster cookies are actually gluten-free because they don't use any flour, but instead use oatmeal. I like them because they remain chewy for days. The recipe uses 12 ounces of peanut butter.


The SuperButter version came out beautiful and delicious, except for one weird thing. A few hours after I got home I looked at the mixing bowl and then at the cookies and found a strange, bright dark green color.  If the product is all natural, what in the world is this green chemical reaction?

 I emailed the company and received this answer:

All plants contain chlorogenic acid mostly in the stems and leaves, but sunflowers also have it in the seeds. SuperButter will turn cookies and other baked products green as they cool if you are using standard recipes; the solution is to reduce the amount of baking soda or baking powder in your recipe by almost half. This balances the acidity of the ingredients and keeps them from changing color. Adding a bit of lemon juice to your dough or batter can also help maintain expected color.


Even though these are cookies, they are or can be pretty healthy too if you use a different sweetener.  But where I'm going with this is that due to the SuperButter and the oatmeal, I was eating a cookie before going to spin class for some extra energy.  Did I notice a difference in my workout!  I plowed through spin class every time I had a cookie before hand!

I decided then that my next experiment would have to go to power bites without the sugar.  So I made the power bites you see in the top picture with the recipe below.  These are also gluten-free and are not cooked. Now I eat one of these pre-spin class.  And I do notice the difference.  I had meant to grab one before Friday's class, forgot, and sure enough I noticed a lag in energy.

SuperButter has definitely hooked me and so now it is a matter of spreading the word to get it in nearby stores.  I already mentioned it to Sprouts.  It is available online at Amazon and SuperButter.com.
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SuperButter Power Bites

Note:  I like to use Go Raw brand granola because it is super crunchy and has no added sweeteners that ruin granola's health benefits.
1 cup quick-cook oats, uncooked
1/4 cup dried Go Raw granola
1/2 cup SuperButter
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp vanilla

Mix everything together thoroughly in a bowl.  Use a small scoop to shape bite sized balls of dough. Place on a cookie sheet or plate, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate.  Once hardened, store in a sealed container in the refrigerator.

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Throwback Thursday: Tuna Cutlets aka Tuna Cakes

April 24, 2014 0 Comments

I'm an oil brat. Or, more specifically, I'm an ARAMCO brat. I grew up in Saudi Arabia where my dad worked for the Arabian American Oil Company, or ARAMCO.  We lived in Arabia from 1971 to 1987, so basically all my school-college years. 

 We lived in an American compound that was as close to being an American small town as you can get in a foreign country. Dhahran, the main ARAMCO town, occupies so many square miles that you never even really felt enclosed in a compound.  I would say that the size of Dhahran would probably be equal to the size of the City of Rocklin. 

 We had American schools, a theater, bowling alley, public library, pools, baseball fields, and more. What we didn't have was shopping. We had to go into Al-Khobar, the nearby Saudi city, to go shopping for everything except for food. Groceries were bought from our camp commissary, similar to a military commissary. 


as I remember it, circa 1980
Recently our ARAMCO Brat organization came upon some historical commissary newsletters. A throwback look at life in the past. They asked if anyone would be willing to blog some of the recipes and I volunteered. First up, a recipe for Tuna Cutlets from the March 20, 1978 commissary newsletter.  Actually, I have no idea why they were called cutlets as these are pretty much the equivalent of crab cakes, just made with canned tuna. 
pre-breaded 
These were pretty good.  I like them. And it's funny that I've never had these before, and yet they transported me back in time to 1978 and living overseas. 

 How?  Because it brought back a time when we had very limited food items. Think about today and how many thousands of products line our grocery shelves. How much processed and packaged food there is now. Back in 1978 food was simpler.  And by being overseas, we were even more limited to what we had available.  Here was taking simple canned tuna and creating a meal from it with a few, whole ingredients.

I used a fresh jalapeno (the green you see) and I also whipped up a simple Sriracha aioli by mixing together some mayo, Sriracha sauce  and lime juice.  A tasty treat with a bit of kick.

 Oh, and since I'm single, I froze the pre-cooked patties so I could have them for later dinners. That makes this recipe an even bigger winner for me! 




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The Firehouse Courtyard Welcomes Spring

April 21, 2014 0 Comments


Last Friday was a beautiful spring day and perfect for this year's grand opening of The Firehouse's courtyard patio. I must disclose that I was invited to sample the new spring menu. Therefore, this is not a review piece, as my meal was comped.



from Firehouse

The Firehouse has been a Sacramento fixture since 1960. Over the years it has always been one of the best fine dining experiences in town. It has kept that classy, elegant touch of fine linens, top notch service, and beautiful decor within a piece of architectural history. Many an engagement, anniversary, business or political deal has been celebrated here. Yet with the ups and downs of the economy and its own fluctuations in quality over the years, it has survived and remained a local favorite. 


Speaking of its own quality fluctuations, my Firehouse review on this site is from 2008 and it was not a good review.  That was obviously a low point. But as I said, every restaurant has cycles, especially over decades and with ever changing chefs and menus.  

from Firehouse
I've eaten at The Firehouse several times over the decades, but as much as I can recall, it's always been at the upstairs dining room. During this visit I entered upstairs and took the stairs down to the patio and downstairs dining room. I realized there's so much more to The Firehouse just by being in a different part of it. Every section is lovely, yet different.



I was greeted by Maro Ortiz, the General Manager and & Sommelier. I had met him a few months ago at Ella during happy hour.  I also had a chance to talk to the Executive Chef, Deneb Williams. Williams describes his menu as eclectic, with many "global flavors" paired with French techniques. 

 I was seated at a table in the center of a full courtyard. Apparently many had gotten the word that the courtyard was now open for lunch and to celebrate this first day, the restaurant had gotten some musicians to play. Mario says that the musicians are an occasional treat, such as for brunches or holidays. 


For my lunch I chose the Chevre & Asparagus Soup, Chimichurri Sea Scallops, and then asked for an assortment of desserts for my sweet tooth. 


Atique Ramen, an Assistant Manager with a mixology background, presented me with a lovely citrus based mocktail since I don't drink. 


Here is the salmon special with an olive tapenade and roasted Brussels sprouts. 


My Chimichurri Sea Scallops were served with a smoked paprika fondue, red pepper chutney, and a quinoa-lentil-spring veggie ragout.



Tropical Paradise Gâteau -kiwi, prickly pear, guava sorbet, coconut cake, rum sabayon, tropical coulis


 Strawberry Cheesecake -fromage blanc, anise graham, poppy seed cake, 
strawberry-tarragon compote


PB&C - peanut butter and dark chocolate marjolaine, malted milk froth, blackberry pâte fruit.

Now I have to say, by the way, that I'm not a peanut butter fan, but this last dessert was definitely great and a must-get for any PB fan. They definitely have a talented pastry chef.


 I look forward to going back soon because I just have to have the Grand Marnier souffle for dessert!




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Dinnerwire is keeping me busy.

April 07, 2014 0 Comments
Sadly, my blog has been on low priority of late. I've been a little busy finishing up the Sacramento Food Film Festival (which raised about $10k for CA Food Literacy, thank you) and with my new job.

 Perhaps you read yesterday's (4/6/14) Bee article "Rezku has no reservation on challenging OpenTable".  Well as I mentioned a few weeks ago, this is my new employer.  I'll be retiring from my State job to work at this new start-up company. Leaving a very secure State job is a bit of a gamble, but at least I'll be happy doing a job that I have a passion for.

 My new company is Dinnerwire/Rezku.  Dinnerwire is the end user app/webpage where you can look up restaurants and make reservations.  Rezku is the restaurant reservation system used by the restaurants to not only schedule bookings, but alter floorplans, assign servers, move tables, keep analytics on service, etc.

 Taking on OpenTable is going to be like an ant going up against a foot. We are starting with less than a dozen employees and they have thousands worldwide. They made $56 million the last quarter of 2013 and have used that wealth to buy up other companies such as Foodspotting.

 What we do have is a significantly lower price plan that can save the restaurants hundreds or even thousands of dollars each month. We also have a state-of-the-art system. I'm sorry, but the other guy's looks like it hasn't been touched since it was created in 1998. 

 When I leave my State job in July I will start selling the system as well as my current duties. Right now I work for them part time and love my new job. Who wouldn't love filming restaurants?  I'm doing "Ms. Munchie on the street" style videos that we post to the Dinnerwire page. The idea is that other sites have photographs, but we are showing you videos that give you a feel of the place and the food and sometimes include an interview with the owner, manager, or chef.

 So with that, let me show you a sampling of what I've been up to.  I'm not able to embed them here, so you will have to follow the links.

Mama Kim Eats

Crawdads River Cantina

Lucca

 Even though we are based here, we are signing restaurants up for Rezku nationwide. So if you have any contacts in the restaurant biz who might be interested, let me know.  

We are also hiring sales people for the rest of the country. 

Restaurant owners/managers should go and "claim" their restaurants on Dinnerwire.  If you have your own video, you can post it there and edit your restaurants information.

Lastly, if you are in the Northern California area and would like me to come and film your restaurant, I would be happy to do that - it's my job!
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Why I want to go on an eight-day Emerald Waterways river cruise through Europe

March 26, 2014 0 Comments

I like cruising. I like that you only have to unpack once and yet travel to several destinations. I like that your food is included and it's pretty damn good food at that. I like that you can magically wake up in a different city or country every day.

 I also like to think of it as travel window shopping.  If you have never been to a selection of countries, you get a small taste of them for a day and then can decide if you want to return to visit them more in-depth in the future. This what we did on our honeymoon cruise, returning to Cozumel for a week several years later.

 What I do not like about cruising is getting motion sick, which I have done via all methods of transportation my entire life.

 In Europe, though, you can go luxury river cruising! Rivers, the cruising versus the white water type, don't make you motion sick! And because the ships are long and narrow, every room has a view. No inner cabins for the claustrophobic here!

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Koreana Plaza and International Food Court

March 17, 2014 0 Comments


One of my favorite memories of going to the Philippines was going to the food courts they have in shopping centers.  These aren't like American food courts with McDonald's and Sbarro.  These are similar to ones you find throughout Asia where individual vendors have small stands selling their specialty.  There's a grandma over here making rice cakes and over there is an auntie who has special skewers. The next stall over is a girl making halo halo or selling pastries.  Each one is independent and as close to homemade as you can get in a shopping center.

When I read last week in the Bee that Allen Pierleoni had gone to Koreana Plaza for the International food court, I had to check it out too.  I really hoped it might be similar to the kind I remembered. It wasn't, but it was still pretty good.


To find Koreana Plaza you need to get off at Zinfandel and onto Olson Drive. If you are familiar with the Target at Zinfandel, then KP is behind the Target. The next thing to note is the size of the place.  This picture above, it's only a third of it.  Basically it takes up the space that three supermarkets or large stores would occupy!

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My Water Conservation

March 14, 2014 0 Comments
I can remember the drought of 1976-77, even though I was living overseas at the time. That's because the summer of 1977 my family was touring the Southwest National Parks - Zion, Grand Canyon, etc. I even remember we were somewhere in Arizona when we went to see Star Wars.
During our travel through California I can remember the signs at a few motels that told us to reuse our towels and not flush unless we did number 2.  I guess the saying is, "If it's yellow, let it mellow. If it's brown, flush it down." 

 I've carried that with me my entire life. I appreciate the need to conserve water. Maybe it's because I lived in the desert or maybe because I've traveled the world and seen where clean water is not readily accessible.

 So I might be extreme in my water conservation during this drought. But since I live alone, I can be without annoying anyone in my household. Please know that most of this is done when I am alone and that when I have guests, I curtail these practices, for the most part.

 1)  I've practiced the "If it's mellow" thing my whole adult life.  I do not flush every time I pee. Rest assured, this will not be the case if you are visiting.

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The Death Knell of Retail Stores

March 06, 2014 0 Comments


Hallmark leaves Country Club Plaza and the question is raised - Is Country Club dead? Radio Shack is closing 1100 stores. Staples is closing 225 stores. Shopping malls have huge vacancies. What is happening?

 It was made clear to me in an interview I saw on a news show with a retail expert. He explained that no new shopping mall had been built since 2006. Malls across the country are struggling to keep or attract tenants. We see it all the time as we drive down the road - large numbers of vacant storefronts and dying shopping strips and malls. 

 The reason for the closing of brick n mortar stores is the ever increasing reliance on internet shopping.

 This worries me because the fact is, retail provides a huge number of jobs, especially at the lower end of the pay spectrum. Retail provides great opportunities for part-time work or secondary incomes. Like fast food, they are great first jobs for young people. Retail jobs are immensely important to the local economy. 

 In fact, local retail jobs also are important for the taxes of the City or County they are in. The sales taxes of retail purchases fund our social services such as police, fire, schools, and more.

 It's a troubling trend. Understandable, yet troubling. After all, I love using Amazon myself. And if you have Prime, the shipping is not an issue anymore. It's now all a matter of convenience.

 The brick n mortars can't compete with the low prices that are possible by online comparison shopping. And if you can't find something locally, of course you rely on the internet. 

Is it any wonder the economy is slow to recover?

I have no solutions or suggestions myself. But I thought it was important for people to begin thinking about. What are your thoughts and what can we do with all those empty storefronts?

Update: Discovery of website Deadmalls.com.

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