George hosted a great brunch of congee / porridge. Yutong made two of the three types and they were all delicious. I tried them all, and all the varied toppings. I especially liked the ma po tofu, but that was no surprise. We grabbed some of the voluminous leftovers and had tasty congee for several days afterwards.
We then headed to Rong’s and met her and Riley for tea and scones. The conversation was great and we had a nice walk by the bay. Steph made some delicious tea sandwiches as well.
George was kind enough to host a large cooking experiment, of many different types of hand pies. We had two types of dough and about 15 types of filling. The savory fillings were mushroom, curry chicken, veggie sausage, berbere beef, cheddar jalapeno beef, bacon cheddar potato, rosemary chicken, pear, blackberry, blueberry, strawberry, and ham and cheese. We also tried a dough with sourcream instead of water, but I couldn’t tell the difference. The pies mostly came out really well, and the orange sauce picked up the slack for any pies that were either too dry or too bland. The mushroom and curry chicken were the favorites. Steph had gotten back early that morning, so she wasn’t able to join for much of the cooking, but she showed up as the last pies were coming out of the oven.
Yutong and Paul helped out a lot and brought some really tasty food. Adisa showed up and helped out as well. Steph, Tina, George, and I played a round of Terraforming Mars with the game going much more slowly than it usually does. Both Tina and Steph were not thinking quickly as their jet lags from being in the south west Pacific was still pretty strong. George ended up winning by a lot, hitting a solid score of 100.
Andrew hosted a Hawaiian BBQ at Lost Colony that Steph and I attended. We first did a round of Gloomhaven with George and Tina, then all of us headed over to meet the people playing poker at Lost Colony. Andrew was cooking some kalua pork, and it turned out really well. I helped make the spam musubi, which was a lot of fun. Debby also got a shaved ice machine that she broke in for the get together. She also had made some really tasty syrups to pour over the ice. I had a really good time.
Paul invited us to a dinner at Zanottos where Ridge Winery was doing a tasting of their wines. The wines were very good. We also got a six course dinner prepared by Zanottos, and that was tasty as well. I had a good time and the discussions were pretty interesting.
Steph took the day off on Thursday and we hung around the house as well as getting a few new plants for the garden. That evening we joined the others (Lindsay, Debby, Andrew, Kevin) for our flight to LA for the weekend.
We got in a little later than scheduled and checked into a pretty nice Airbnb while Andrew and Debby went to Jen’s place.
The next morning we all met up at Grand Central Market. Steph and I got some delicious avocado toast, that also had a nice cheese and some cherry tomatoes. Steph got a grilled cheese sandwich that was pretty tasty as well. We grabbed our coffees and headed over to The Broad museum. We were pretty far back in line, but among the first to get callback times for the special exhibit, an infinity room with lights. It was pretty spectacular.
After The Broad we went to Pizzeria Mozza. This was a place we had seen on Youtube and Netflix shows and really wanted to try. It was pretty good, and I think Debby’s breakfast pizza was the best. After a short rest at the Airbnb we went to Korea Town. On the way everyone else got mani pedis, while I talked to my parents. We also stopped by a mall and did a little karaoke while we waited. We had reservations at a Korean BBQ place, and all ate way too much. Our clothes also smelled strongly of the meat smoke and had to be quarantined.
The next day we had breakfast again at Grand Central Market, then headed to the next Airbnb in Santa Monica. We got in a little early so we got some Impossible Burgers at Umami burger. We ate them in the Airbnb while Debby and Andrew came over. The burgers weren’t bad, but also not good. I was pretty tired so I took a one hour nap while the others headed to the beach.
They didn’t spend long there, and we met up on 3rd to do some light shopping before heading to dinner. We went to an okonomiyaki place and it was delicious.
After dinner we wandered around and got some tasty bread pudding.
Sunday we split up after brunch, some going to the beach again, some going to a VR Star Wars experience.
Steph had to head to the airport for her flight to china, so she didn’t get to participate. Also we met up with Grant there. Grant got recognized by one of the people who worked there, and was thanked for his work on Star Wars.
Jen showed me her bunnies, as we stopped by her place to grab Debby and Andrew’s things.
Tina, Amit, Adam, and I played a round of Feast for Odin at Adam’s place. It was fun, and I took a different strategy than I normally do. It didn’t pay off in the end. Tina did emigration and pillaging and ran away with the game. Amit did well on pillaging and got a solid second. Adam and I were pretty far behind with third and fourth.
Afterwards we went to Tap’t, so Tina could get some princess cake. I got a fantastic ginger mead.
Stephanie, Adam, Tina, and I did part of the Skyline to the Sea trail. We didn’t do the part we meant to but we did about the same length we had planned. When we reached the trail from Big Basin, and then made a mistake. We saw a sign that said ‘Skyline to the Sea’ and just went off in that direction. We didn’t notice the sign went both ways along the trail. This meant instead of heading to the ocean, we were heading up the mountain. We made it up to the intersection of 9 and 236, but were unable to get an Uber or Lyft to come get us. We managed to get a ride into Saratoga, and hung out for a bit at Cinnabar, a wine bar.
Later that day we got dinner with George and Adam. The place was Adega and the food was pretty good. My favorite dish was the duck fried rice, and I think the sangria sampler was even better than that. It was a good day.
Stephanie, Adam, and I went on the Napa wine train that goes from Napa City to St. Helena. We got there a little early and decided to walk around the city for a bit after checking in for the train. We found a coffee shop and a charcuterie, that we stopped by again later.
We then went to the train and got on. The train was only half full at 15 of 30 spots taken. We got a nice breakfast on the way to the first winery, Domaine Chandon. They were a typical winery, and we got a nice tasting of some sparkling wine. It was a place we could go hang out during a work remote day, as they had a massive patio. On the way to the second winery we got a soup and salad. The second winery, Hall, was our favorite of the three. They were clearly about creating a good place to be, and it is a place we might go to hang out. The only issue being that it requires a membership to be in their hanging out area. They had art all around, with the most icon piece being a giant silver bunny in the front called ‘Bunny Fufu.’ Hall also had the best wine of the trip, by general unanimous agreement, 2015 hall terra secca cabernet sauvignon. We had a nice dinner on the way to the third and final winery, Inglenook. They had a lot of interesting old things: books, clothes, mechanical objects. They had also built a cave into to house their wines as they aged. We took the train back to Napa and had a nice desert. The wine and food was generally great. A few of the dishes and a few of the wines were fantastic.
We then went back to the charcuterie, and Adam got some food for Saturday. We went to Grace’s Table for dinner as it was recommended by Michelin. Adam drove us back and we went right to bed.
Adam put on a latke party at his place, and it was quite nice. The only not so great part was getting in, as his phone didn’t really work with the intercom call system. We managed to get everyone into the place and I had a few really good conversations. We got in the hot tub for part of it and Yutong brought a cute Polaroid imitation camera. There was plenty of good food and drink, not to mention tons of tasty latkes.
It's an Exciting World 