Monterey Aquarium

Friday morning we packed up the car and headed to the Monterey Aquarium. It was an exciting day for everyone where we got to see the Penguins being fed in real life vs. watching it on their webcam. The coolest exhibit was the cuttlefish tank which i don’t think i’ve ever seen in real life. They’re super cute for being such funny looking creatures. He had lunch next door at Johnny Rockets for some burgers and fries. It was a good afternoon looking at all the fish but everyone was wiped out by midafternoon. We all took naps, and just spent time hanging out with each other while Jesse cooked up some tasty steaks.

Just a month later i finally carved out a few minutes to finish recapping our trip out to the Monterey Bay.

Central California

Thursday morning we woke up early and continued our drive up to Monterey, making a quick pitstop at Hearst Castle Visitor Center, Elephant Seal Vista Point, and Paso Robles for snack break.

Monterey Bay

We finally arrived in Monterey around 2pm meeting up with Nina who drove down from SF at our Airbnb house rental. I really wanted a place big enough beds for six adults and two kids. It was so good to finally get in, move all the luggage inside and just be able to sit down, and stretch out. Alice was super excited to see Kaylee, and was constantly chasing her around and trying to see what she brought. For dinner we went to Monterey’s Fish House for dinner for some bbq oysters and cioppino. After dinner we went to the Del Monte Beach to get some sand time in for Kaylee, but too bad the waves were a bit too loud for her to enjoy.

Time just flies when you’re dealing with the little one. I can’t even pull out my laptop to write anymore when she’s around because she instantly wants to crawl over and bang on the keys. So i’m just going to sum up my weekend trip up to Monterey. We’ve been to San Francisco a few times now with Alice and thought we should try something else, and figured Monterey would be a good location to meet up with Nina and Kaylee. I got a pretty good house rental on airbnb.com for two nights that basically fit us, my parents, and nina’s family and granted us access to a full kitchen and bbq.

I am not a fan of the Fair.

I am still not a fan of the Fair, but since Joy said she’s never been to one, i figured we could go if we can get in for cheap, which we did since admission is only $3 before 11am on Saturday and Sunday.

If Las Vegas ever wanted to puke out a food court this is what i imagined it to look like. Lots of obnoxious signage with everything deep fried and wrapped with bacon.

We started off with some deep fried oreos which were already prepared which made them not as fresh as i would’ve liked them.

We opted for a healthier option for lunch with some shimp with rice and pineapple which was ok, but the rice was soggy, or coated with coconut milk? I couldn’t really tell.

The only thing that i actually went searching for was a Texas Donut (big donut) coated with frosting and Cherry Poprocks. It was surprisingly good with the added crunchy texture.

The real treat was after the fair we went to Ritter’s Steam Kettle Cooking for some Pan Roast Seafood, oysters, and cajun fries. Now thats something worth spending money on. I think the flavors are on par with the Oyster Bar in Las Vegas, but lacks that je ne sais quoi of eating in the middle of a casino half drunk.

We were a bit in the mood for Dim Sum the other day, and i wanted to try somewhere new and tried out one from a new list of Dim Sum joints in the SVG. We normally go to Elite, but this time we tried out King Hua which was another high end joint that serves by ordering vs. carts. We went a little overboard when ordering because we were 1. Hungry, and 2. I wanted to try multiple things that were mentioned on top of our normal order of food. These were some of the more different dishes that we ordered. Dumpling Soup Egg Tarts Coconut Rolls Milk Buns

I’m still getting some residuals off of my www.istockphoto.com account which still nets me a few hundred dollars a year. I normally just throw that back into my normal banking account, but for some reason i got the itch to do a little shopping with it. So i hopped onto ebay and just started searching for random things of interests.

Thats when i started searching for old toys that i once owned, or wish i owned, that would be less than $10 including shipping, and thats where i fell upon some Generation 1 Transformers Mini Cars. These were the small transformers that came with no accessories and really barely transformed, but it was a good starting point. I started off with a Cosmos, then Seaspray, and Warpath relatively within the same day.

The piece de resistance i’ve been looking since is a Transformers Generation 1 Snarl Dinobot. I had one as a kid since the stegosaurus was my favorite dinosaur, but of course i have no idea what happened to it. From watching current and past auctions depending on condition and accessories will run between $50-100.

Leading up to the 4th of July i really didn’t have any plans since i’ve just been busy with work. With my parents heading out of town, and no friends really doing anything i checked into our SPG account to see if we could go anywhere and was able to get a free room using our points at the US Grant in San Diego. They place is a fancier hotel than the Westin, and the best thing about it was all the water they gave us. The hotel, room, and staff were of course excellent, but the free water in the room and every time we got our car from the valet they gave us cold bottles of water for us.

We drove down Saturday morning and met up with Dr. Nomo for lunch in Little Italy and Pappalecco gelato for dessert.

For dinner we opted for some seafood at Spike Africe’s which was just across the street from our hotel. Decided that i wanted some seafood for dinner tonight so Spike seemed like a decent place to bring a baby to. Pretty casual, loud place, with plenty of space.

We stuck with the appetizer menu and some fresh oysters instead of getting any main courses.

Oysters were good.
Mussels were good.
Clam chowder was good and buttery
Poke was good.
Butterscotch dessert was great.

Sunday morning after breakfast at Influx we headed to the San Diego Zoo. The weather was really nice, and most of the important animals were still awake (i’m looking at you pandas!) which Alice loved.

To end the day we took the Skyfari back and forth to get a bird’s eye view of the entire zoo. Our little dare devil seemed to enjoy it too.

With the 4th coming around i volunteered myself to make some faux kalua pork for a get together with Joy’s friends. Since i don’t have an imu i had to go with the crockpot method. The recipe from Pinapple & Coconut seemed pretty simple with just a couple ingredients (none that i had) and thankfully my dad has a banana tree in the backyard. I cooked the sucker over night and it turned out pretty good.

I went with tacos since it needs less utensils, and of course needed some roasted salsa and mango pico de gallo.

Put all together it was delicious.

The past week i’ve been making batches of salsa because we had some tomatoes that were getting soft and wanted to give it a shot.

Roasted Salsa

• 5 tomatoes
• 1 onion
• 1 garlic head
• 1 handful of cilantro
• 1/2 jalapeño diced
• salt
• pepper
• olive oil

Preheat oven to 400°

Cut tomatoes in half, and drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle salt. Cut top off head of garlic and drizzle with olive oil. Slice onions into chunks. Place all on a baking sheet and cook for 20 minutes.

Place all ingredients into a blender and pulse until well blended, and season to taste.

During Joy’s maternity leave we discussed her changing jobs. Her current job has worked out so well for us with Alice’s drop off schedule and relative ease of her current position it was more of just a thought than reality. That was until about two weeks ago when a directors position at another hospital opened up where someone else she knew worked at. She got recommend, went for an interview and a week later was offered a position there. So now she’ll be heading up the social services department of a hospital in Culver City.

We’re both pretty excited and nervous about the change since now we’ll have to do a bit of maneuvering of our routine to hand Alice off to my parents which will include a mix of them coming to pick her up, and me dropping her off in the morning and taking the train back to work. On a side note i’ve also been accepted become an adjunct professor at Santa Monica College so that Jonathan and I can teach a web design class in the fall, more on that later.

To celebrate with took my parents to get some Prime Rib at Lawry’s. Its been almost a year since the last time we were here so it was like seeing an old friend after time apart. Everything was still just as tasty, although a bit more difficult now with Alice in tow.

It was still bright out after dinner we so drove down the street to the Grove to take a walk around, get some ice cream, and do a little shopping. Alice liked the water show, and all the people to stare at.

Saturday marked the first day of summer, and it just so happened to be Joy and my first real date night since Alice came into our lives. My mother was kind enough to spend the night at our house to watch over little Alice while we got to head out sans diaper bag.

A month ago Jonathan Gold released his 101 Best Restaurants of LA and had Providence as its #1 restaurant. A few weeks later Providence announced the reopening  and a special nine year anniversary four course dinner special for the month of June so i jumped online and made RSVP for the 21st.

We got up to LA with a little time to kill so we started off by getting a drink at Mozza Pizzeria, but unbeknownst to me, they serve wine in little carafes at a glass and a half, which we had to finish in a half hour. We were pretty toasty to say the least.

Having a 5:30 RSVP made us have restaurant almost to ourselves, but filled up once we finished. We looked over the menu and besides the 4 course menu, we could’ve gone with the other menus that ranged from 8-12 dishes with the longest being around 3 hour ordeal. We decided to keep to the 4 course, and add in an Uni Egg, and i ordered the supplemental a5 Wagyu Beef. It was my delayed father’s day dinner so why not splurge a little.

Along with the four courses it started off with a bunch of amuse bouches from a Dark and Stormy jello shot, to a really good smoked halibut soup. The Uni Egg was delicious and this coming from two people that don’t typically eat it.  The wagyu beef was super buttery and i’m glad i tried it, but it really made me miss having some actual beef beef. The dinner took about 2 hours to finish, and was a great experience.

After dinner we took a walk around Hollywood and Highland

My father’s day started off early when my mom accidentally informed me in a group text that my gift had arrived on Friday, which made my day for the rest of the day. That evening i got to open my present to find my very own GoPro Camera. Of course i spent the next few hours on amazon looking at all the different things i could buy for it.

Sunday morning we went to go see the fish at the California Science Center since its cheaper than the Aquarium of the Pacific. The difference between paying $20-30 per adult vs. any donation amount is a no brainer.

Now that she can lean onto things it makes these trips funner to go. We can let her out of her seat and let her kind of explore on her own accord. She was more interested in the host on the mic and the kids around her than the big fish in the tank.

The rest of day was business as usual with my Huntington Beach Basketball League, and KFC for dinner with my dad.

I still try to get my hands dirty when ever i have a little extra time on my hands and wanted to share some of the recipes that i’ve tried and have been happy with. Most of these recipe i halved because i’m not looking to feed an entire family.

Braised Short Ribs and Mashed Potatoes

Short ribs are a pretty easy dish to do as long as you have a dutch oven and time. This short rib recipe works pretty well even if you don’t use pancetta, or thyme.

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2009/11/braised-short-ribs-heaven-on-a-plate/

Canned Apricots

I’m always bugging friends with backyard gardens for any excess fruits or vegetables. This year Robin’s apricot tree was popping off dozen upon dozens of apricot so i rolled over there to pick up a grocery bag full of them. I kept the skin on and they do break down enough where you don’t realize they’re there when spreading it on toast.

http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2009/08/apricot-jam/

Carne Asada

Some carne asada recipes require 20 ingredients but i think this recipe does it well enough with more of the basic spices and herbs that should be in your cupboard already.

http://www.closetcooking.com/2013/05/carne-asada-grilled-marinated-steak.html

Branzino

I picked up some branzino at the farmers market one weekend and tried out a recipe out of the Frenchie Cook book i had recently bought. It was the first time it basted a fish, and boy that butter oil can really splash on your hand a lot if you’re not careful about it. Too bad my vin jaune sauce didn’t come together and was just a oniony chunky relish instead of an actual sauce.

http://www.amazon.com/Frenchie-Bistro-Cooking-Greg-Marchand/dp/1579655343