Archive
LA: Mélisse (Dec. 2012)
Author: Victor
Restaurant: Mélisse
Exec Chef: Josiah Citrin
Date: December 22, 2012
1st Dinner
Notes:
-My friend Simon was in town for a day before going to San Diego for a short vacation, so we decided to make some plans to eat! We made reservations for a first dinner at Mélisse and then a second dinner at The Bazaar. (We figured that we might as well eat as much as we could while he was here!)
-Overall, it was an enjoyable meal with solid service and very well-cooked food. Thankfully, we weren’t too full after. We finished at about 9:30 p.m., 30 minutes before our Bazaar reservation, giving us time to prepare our stomachs for more eating!
LA: OOtoro Sushi (in Walnut, CA) (Dec. 2012)
Author: Victor
Restaurant: OOtoro Sushi (in Walnut, CA)
Chef: Kai Wei “Kurt” Chen
Date: December 19, 2012
Notes:
It was my first meal in SoCal since August, and I wanted to go with some friends to try this sushi place I’ve heard about. I don’t know why they have wagyu from Kobe, Japan (what people know as kobe beef), or kama toro (the collar bone of the bluefin tuna). It’s basically in the middle of nowhere—I’m not sure how they’ll be able to sustain business at this place haha.
After finding out that this place had kobe beef and kama toro, though, I knew I had to try this place! Finals just ended, so it was a nice excuse to go eat delicious food and drink a bunch of sake haha.
The menu has four omakase options, and the names are basically different grades (C, B, A, and A+), with each option rising in price and quality. The menu lists the food in the C, B, and A options. There’s a fourth option, A+, that’s just described as “best in season” haha. Anyway, we went with the “Omakase A+” option. (On another note, I wonder if the omakase options are named like that to target Asians…)
The fish was really good (especially the kama toro—but, then again, you can’t really go wrong with any kind of toro haha). The rice really wasn’t too great, however. At times, it was warm but a little too hard; at other times, it was cold and very hard. Overall, I think it qualifies as a pretty solid/good sushi restaurant with really high-quality fish/meat. Unfortunately, the rice could definitely improve a bit. For now, it might not be worth the price.
LA Kaiseki/Sushi: Urasawa (July 2012)
Author: Victor
Restaurant: Urasawa
Chef: Hiroyuki Urasawa
Date: July 5, 2012
Notes:
I decided to stop by Urasawa once again while I was in town, and I went with two old friends. Here’s an excerpt from my friend’s site about this meal—it was basically his first really good sushi meal!
“This all changed this summer. My friend invited me to join him for a meal at Urasawa when I visited Los Angeles in July. I was able to see the craftsmanship and attention to detail that contributes to each course in person and experience the end result. The sushi really stood out to me. The balance of flavor and the just-right density of the sushi rice just worked so well for each of the sushi courses. Yes, the items placed on top of the sushi rice were exquisite, but Hiro and Ken could have put almost anything on top of that rice and the end result would still be amazing.
The seed was planted in my head. Amazing food isn’t just about the individual ingredients on the plate, but how they are put together. And I wanted to see what else is out there. I started reading more about food online and talking with my friend about other restaurants to try in the future. I then remembered that I have a copy of The French Laundry Cookbook, and dug it out. Suddenly the recipes made a lot more sense. The goal is to make every component that goes into a dish as perfect as possible. I then searched online for “french laundry at home” to find other people’s experiences with the recipes, and stumbled upon Carol Blymire’s blog “French Laundry At Home”. The post that Carol wrote after cooking every dish in The French Laundry Cookbook was extremely inspiring and has a list of great first recipes to try. I decided that this is where I’m going to start my gastronomic adventure.”
—
Monte
Victor
tadv3
Happy Noms 