D's Belated Birthday Crawl: Stops 4, 5 & 6 - Little Italy Farmer's Market, the new Little Italy Food Hall & Blick

It was nice walking around earlier before the crowds...

as we made our way back to the main drag...

Island Brewing Company, Farmer's Market, Robitaille's + Carpinteria Valley Museum of History

Located near the train tracks is a brewery...

which is one of three in Carpinteria...

Dinner from Jamaican Jerk Hut & Russian Food Babushki

I had to do a return at the mall...

and realized that it was a Tuesday...

Silver Lake Farmer's Market, Micheltorena Elementary School mural + the defunct Micheltorena Tunnel

These are some of the pix from our LA road trip from Veterans Day.

This is the view from Lucile St. (a hill) looking down to W. Sunset Blvd...

Lunch and snacks from the Cayucos Farmer's Market plus return to the Cayucos Candy Counter & the Brown Butter Cookie Company

We noticed this on our way in...

and definitely made a stop back before they closed for the day..

The Pasadena Farmer's Market

Under the smoky skies, we headed off to our next stop, the Pasadena Farmer's Market...

passing by the beautiful Pasadena City Hall and Joe's Ice!

Gotta love that "ice font"!

Cathy showed me the parade route and where it ends, which is near Pasadena High on Sierra Madre Blvd...

Farmer's Market + Surf Market, Gualala

I keep switching back and forth from our Summer 2014 trip to our 2015; this one is from 2015. Our next destination north from having breakfast at the Sea Ranch was a small town called Gualala.

If you blink while driving through, you might miss it.

It's a pretty small town, but we made sure to stop by. Lucky for us, it was also the same day as their Farmer's Market...

Pismo Beach Pier & Farmer's Market

Back to Pismo we were...

next to The Scoop where TC enjoyed a cone several years ago...

Imperial Beach Farmer's Market plus Monday Night Traffic

Earlier today...

I jammed the hell out of work (first day back) to make it here...

in laid back IB...

Spring Street Farmer's Market

Driving around the historic core of downtown L.A. before it got crowded was pretty interesting...

We saw lots of beautiful architecture such as this old movie theater that was converted to a church...

Below was another vintage theater...

This particular bookstore was on our list of "must see" things in L.A. and I was determined that we should see it before the end of our trip...

Tom's Farms - The Stores

After waiting nearly an hour for Triple A to come by and open Cathy's locked car door in the Vroman's Bookstore parking lot, we began to head back to good ole San Diego. We had such a fab day so far, going to so many different bakeries culminating in "The Adobo Road" booksigning at Vroman's.

Here is one last look at the lovely San Gabriel mountains as we left Pasadena...

Dessert Part 1 - Little Italy Farmer's Mercato

After our lunch at Isola Pizza Bar, we wanted to take a peek at all the hubbub and hullaballoo

at the Little Italy Mercato, the farmer's market that everyone goes gaga over...

Canada Day 5 - Ottawa, Part 1

We'd arrived in Ottawa in the wee early hours of the morning and were fortunate enough to stay at the lovely home of C's best friend from high school. The next morning we were up and raring to go...

Here we were in Ottawa, the capitol city of Canada, the second largest city in Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the world...

Armed with several tips on where to go, we headed out in search of food and adventure...

Veg-o-rama!

So with all those vegetables we bought at the SD Public Market...

including this tiny and cute Mexican cucumber that somehow got mixed into the pint of okra...it was time to make these bad boys (or girls, let's be equal opportunity here) into dinner sides...

Return to the San Diego Public Market

Still thinking about last week's visit prompted us to go here again...

The day started off sunny and ended up drizzling later that afternoon! But us spoiled San Diegans are finally getting a taste of fall right?

Anyhow, let's go back to the market shall we?

Mr. Potato - Otay Ranch Farmer's Market

I hadn't been to the Otay Ranch Town Center (aka Mall) Farmer's Market in ages....

As I passed by this booth, the word 'Borek' caught my eye.  I had to try at least one...

Lompoc Farmer's Market and the Lacambra Sisters...

Before we headed over to Blue Hairville, we noticed a Farmer's Market a block away (on Ocean and I Streets).

Turns out this was the Lompoc Farmer's Market which gathers every Friday...

More Food at the Ferry Building

I felt so claustrophobic in here...

Ooh, these Michelle Obama totes are so cute! I saw one lady in San Diego with one of these; she told me her daughter bought it in Solana Beach. Guess they're available up here too.

Mmm, Scharffen Berger chocolates! Unfortunately, their factory in Berkeley closed last year. I was so disappointed because I really wanted to visit it based on Darlene's old post from March 2008.

Bert saw that place, the Golden Gate Meat Company had an soup he wanted to try...

He originally wanted a sandwich but his love for chili was far stronger. Plus, it was Wild Boar Chili.

Looks all right...

The verdict? He loved it - the boar meat didn't taste too gamy or anything. The soup was filled with chunky bits of vegetable, which even included baby corn. The chili was smoky and hearty.

And even though I thought Miette's macarons were a bit on the "heavy" side, I still wanted some!

I got 6 different kinds - 2 flavors per pair. I skipped out on the Lavender Vanilla. I really don't like tasting lavender flavored things. Reminds me of TC's old baby lotion, the lavender colored and scented "Calming" lotion. I don't want to be reminded of changing diapers when I'm eating a dessert.

Another vendor...Bert bought some toffee covered pretzel bits here. I think we got that last year as well.

Mmm...froooot!

Despite the gloomy and sprinkly morning, by this time, it was already quite warm by San Francisco standards. The ball game was going on. We had Thane's apartment to ourselves. TC wanted to swim in the complex's lap pool as well. So we headed out, but before we did, we picked up  a little something from this place, Sukhi's (I wonder if they pronounce that as "Suckies"?).

Samosas ($8 for a little more than a dozen). We ate these cold and man, they were delicious. The guy working there wanted to give me sauce too but I thought he meant the tiny little disposable containers of sauce, not the big fkg tubs of sauce that cost $7 or more. No thanks, I'll pass on the tamarind and mint chutney dude.

Too bad San Diego doesn't have a big indoor/outdoor market place like this. It seems most major cities have one, like Seattle's Pike Place, Philadelphia's Readting Terminal Market, Boston's Faneuil Hall and Toronto's St. Lawrence Market (which we visited and I swear I will continue my Canada posts soon!).

I had to look up what "cachaca" was. It's a liquor made from fermented sugar cane and is the most popular distilled beverage in Brazil.

On our way back, we checked out this rocketship along the Embarcadero.

More info here on the Raygun Gothic Rocketship...Very kitschy!



Safe Haven sign at the Embarcadero Police building...

A dive bar long the Embarcadero calle the Hi-Dive. Thane thought this was a cool place...

But he said this place was sucky. It was featured in the San Francisco episode of Bourdain's "No Reservations".

The score on Saturday, October 2.

After the Padres won the game, there was dead silence in the stadium crowd and a few anguished cries among the complex, "Noooooo!!!!" and "Shit!"!!!!

Who else went to the Ferry Building?
San Diego's Captain Jack went to Ferry Plaza Seafood
Menu in Progress went to Boccalone and Acme Bread
The Gastronomer and the Astronomer tried a lot of different samples as well
Clayfu went to the Slanted Door
Alice Q. Foodie went to Il Cane Rossi and Roli Roti
along with Darlene who checked out the Ferry Market and a few other places in SF!

And last but not least, my original post from last year's SF trip:
CC and family try Slanted Door, Miette, and Ciao Bella Gelato and a few days later when we tried the fish tacos at the San Francisco Fish Company and bombolonis from Boriana's Corner.

Portland - Day 2 with Photos part 2

Okay, we're still on day 2. We actually saw A LOT of stuff that day...After getting back from Washington Park and the Japanese Garden, we took off on foot to the Portland Saturday Market, which is actually open on both days of the weekend, not just Saturdays. Since downtown Portland is pretty compact with small blocks and all, we walked all the way over there. It's located under the Burnside Bridge. As we were approaching, I took note of all the cool brick buildings and older businesses downtown. This one's a bookstore - didn't get a chance to go in. We were kind of hungry and were hauling ass to get there. I liked how this one had a cool neon sign - even though it was daytime and not lit up, it looked very old timey.
Another one of Portland's many food carts scattered throughout the city. I believe this one was Mexican food.
Stumptown Coffee Roasters. We walked by it, but planned to go by there later after getting doughnuts. More on Stumptown here. Yelp reviews for this location here.

We also noticed the crown gathered around Voodoo Doughnuts... More on Voodoo here. Here's a few reviews here, and yelp's here.
Yelp reviews here on the Portland Saturday Market. It was pretty crowded since the weather was really nice. It was kind of warm actually and while I was getting my food at the Horn of Africa booth, Bert and TC were lucky enough to score seats at an empty table in a covered seating area! Seats were at a premium - I saw several people eyeing empty chairs and descending upon them like vultures on rotting caracasses as soon as people finished eating.
Tons of people! But not scary Comic-Con crowded though! The food booths were at the farthest edge of the market, closest to the waterfront area. The arts and crafts booths were at the opposite edge of the market.
Bert got something from the booth on the left later - the Beirut Cafe:
This was a side menu board for the "Taste of Himalayas" booth. I remembered seeing this on Kirk's blog during his visit to Portland. Here's his post here. I remembered he wasn't too crazy about the "Tour of Asia" plate so that item wasn't ordered.This was the booth where I got my food. It served Ethiopian food and was family run with a teenager working the booth with her mom as well as two other adults (relatives, perhaps).
Bert's - the Vegetarian Tripti, which is curried vegetables served with yogurt sauce and rolled up in a tortilla. Hmmm, is a tortilla Himalayan? It didn't really satisfy him because he was still hungry after finishing it so he ended up getting something else at another booth.
TC's - Go-Gi (pronounced "Go - jee") Chicken. It was a spiced curried mixture of chicken and potatoes inside a pita served with sliced cucumbers. She seemed to enjoy it - so much that she actually finished it. I had just a tiny bite. It tasted like Indian food to me, but in a pita. I didn't really like the pita - it was too dry. The pita we would have a few days later from Ziba's food cart (Bosnian food) would kick ass on this.
My lunch - The Hoe-Dra - veggie combo over Injera (they described it as African 'flat bread', yeah right). After my yuppified meal at Muzita last month, I still had a hankering for East African food...I liked the vegetables here - carrots, cabbage and potatoes served with a green salad. I didn't care for the salad since it had dressing on it already.
My African appetizer combo - 2 sambussas and 1 bajiya:
This sambusssa had spinach in it; the other had beef (not pictured). The bajiya was described as a 'pastry of herbs and a variety of beans' (seemed like it was mostly lentils). I didn't care too much for the bajiya - it was thin and dry. I could have dipped it in yogurt sauce as well, but I didn't really go for the bajiya. I would rather eat a balut. Just kidding.
Bert was still hungry so he went to the "Beirut Cafe" and got a vegetarian Falafel sandwich.
Bert's self-imposed restriction of no meat, no chocolate and no rice during Lent really restricted his options, but not too much. He ended up getting pretty healthy items. Here's his falafel sandwich. Despite the slathering of yogurt, I wasn't a fan of this but he liked it because it tasted 'fresh' and 'filling'.

After finishing our lunch, Bert wanted to check out the Duck Store, which is the store that sells stuff from the University of Oregon. The store is on the same street as the Portland Market but just a few blocks down...So we went, checked it out, bought a few shirts for TC and Bert got himself a green "O" hat. With our lunches still digesting in our systems, we headed over to Voodoo Doughnuts which most Portland natives say is a "must go to" place for visitors. The reviews I've seen of this place had both "Love it" and "Hate it" type sentiments, but hell, we were here so we were going to check it out and get some fkn doughnuts dammit. This place may also seem familiar to those who've seen it featured on the Food Network and also on the Travel Channel (most recently in Tony Bourdain's Portland episode). This location is right next to a theatre that happened to be showing Japanese anime porn. Look closely as the picture on the far left (in the middle). That was a Japanese girl drawn as a kitty cat (complete with ears and whiskered nose) wearing a short hiked up skirt. It was some sort of 'Hentai' movie.

Here I am in front of Voodoo:
Interior of Voodoo Doughnuts. Heh, I'm sooo imaginative with my titles here. By the way, the line was a lot short by the time we got there which was around 1:30'ish. We waited maybe about 10 minutes or so. Not so bad. We waited 45 minutes for a damn hamburger at the Shake Shack in NYC.
Another crappy interior shot. The walls are pink and there is shit all over the place.
Shit like a giant fake doughnut, plastic skeletons, tiki heads, and a bunch of kitschy framed stuff...
Their menu board...
Their lovely rotating doughnut display:
So, Voodoo Doughnuts is known for their unique flavors of doughnuts with "interesting" names. One of them used to have Nyquil inside. They had to stop making those because it's a medication. There is another doughnut that comes with crushed Pepto-Bismol on top too. I didn't get that okay. One of the doughnuts I was curious about but was too chicken to order was the "Cock 'n Balls". Yes, it is a dick shaped doughnut filled with cream. If my daughter wasn't there, I probably would have ordered it. Another doughnut I actually did order, but they were out of was the "Triple Chocolate Penetration". Bummer! We ordered our half dozen and headed out to Stumptown Coffee Roasters, which was recommended to us by Knitting Diva's brother as well as highly recommended in several food blogs. Well, Bert was the only one who really ordered anything here since I'm not a coffee drinker...
After getting his coffee, we parked ourselves at a booth and opened up our half dozen heart clogging morsels of doughnutty bliss.
We had to get the namesake doughnut, which TC enjoyed eating. The doughnut was a crudely shaped person with a pretzel stick stabbing the heart. The doughnut is filled with raspberry filling. Pulling out the pretzel stake:
Here are the other five doughnuts - from the top left top row: The Maple Bacon bar (recommended by the cashier) and the Dirt Doughnut (topped with crushed Oreos). The middle doughnut was called "Butterfingering" - nice. It had crushed Butterfinger bars on top and a creamy filing. I don't even remember what the filling was, but this was pretty damn good. The doughnut on the lower left was another filled doughnut - the Mango something. The one on the right was a filled powder doughnut which had a fruit filling inside. We didn't eat all of them at once so don't think we are pigs! Ha. I think the bacon doughnut would have been better if the bacon was crushed up on top of the bacon instead of just a strip.

We started off with the Butterfingering...Who could resist a doughnut with that name? Nice! I shared some of that with me along with part of the Maple Bacon bar. Honoring his no meat rule, he took off the bacon and gave it to TC.

TC had fun dismembering her hapless doughnut as well as disemboweling it. No drawing and quartering though.
Goodbye Stumptown...
I meant to put this photo before the exterior shot of Stumptown...Bert got a mocha - doesn't this look pretty? Actually since a mocha is made of chocolate, he shouldn't have ordered this! Too late!

While we were eating our doughnuts, Bert realized that we had a scant few hours left to visit a place I'd read about in several blogs and seen on the Bourdain Portland Show. That place was the Velveteria, which is a Museum of Black Velvet Paintings! They are only open on weekends and close at 5 pm. It was nearly 3! We hauled ass back to our hotel to drop off our junk and doughnuts and headed out to NE Portland! One our way there, we saw the Pacific Northwest version of 7-11, the Plaid Pantry. We arrived a little before 4 pm with about an hour or so to spare. This photo below features Carl Baldwin and Caren Anderson, the owners of the Velveteria. (Yelp reviews here). It was actually taken before we left and also with their permission. You can read more about them on their blog, but hey if you are ever in Portland, you NEED to, No, you MUSt go visit this place!!! Now, dammit!

In retrospect, this was one of my favorite places we'd visited in Portland. Forget the waterfalls and the beautiful scenery. It was the Velveteria for me. It's not in the typical guidebooks, which is what I was going for, and it certainly appealed to my taste in kitsch and pop culture. Walking into the place was like sensory overload. I couldn't concentrate on what to look at first!.

We had such a blast checking out the various walls which were organized by theme...Carl and Caren were also kind enough to chat with us. Carl was interested in Bert's t-shirt which featured the sun and three stars design found on the Philippine flag. That discussion led to another about Philippine velvet painters. I was talking about tacky Philippine souvenirs and mentioned the "barrel man" which Carnen had never heard of. Shewas reminded about these carved wooden nutcrackers shaped like women. You open their legs and put the nut in the crotch region! I'd never seen one before and she had one on display in the back of the museum - it was located on the naked ladies wall. Anyways, I'm so glad we were able to make it to this place. Here are the owners by the celebrity wall which had musicians, artists, and movie stars. Do you see Dolemite? That painting had silver glitter on it!!! It was a total masterpiece. Many people consider velvet paintings to be tacky pieces of crap you buy in TJ, but it really is an art form. You cannot make a mistake when painting on black velvet...When I first saw the sign, I thought to myself, "Okay no photos", which is standard for most art museums. I certainly didn't want to overstep my boundaries. I still remember being admonished by a big burly guy at Dean and Deluca's in New York. WTH! After our visit, I asked permission to take a few shots for this blog and they were kind enough to oblige. I'm not sure what theme this wall was but it had Sgt. Pepper-era Beatles, Dr. Jack Kevorkian (aka Dr. Death), a sad faced clown with a cigar hanging out of his painted mouth, one of the many incaranations of Michael Jackson, bikers, and a well groomed poodle nicknamed "June Cleaver". Among other notable paintings were Tupac Shakur as a Vulcan, Marshall Applewhite (the freaky eyed leader of the Heaven's Gate Cult)), that hot gay silver fox, Anderson Cooper in a Speedo, Jesus raising his arms all Rasputin-like over a semi truck, room entriely devoted to black light paintings, the cartoon version of the Pink Panther perched on a toilet, Jesus and Liberace, and many more! The Black Power Wall - Isn't this awesome? Amidst a sombre portrait of MLK, Ali , and paintings of Malcolm_x and Elijah_Muhammed is a velvet tribute to Beetlejuice) (of "The Howard Stern Show" fame). By the way, that is NOT Gary Coleman at the bottom right. It's a guy who had his portrait done in the Philippines.

Alas, our visit came to an end...I ended up buying their book, "Black Velvet Masterpieces"(which they signed - even cooler!), which was an immediate hit on our coffee table during two parties we recently threw. Here's The Last Supper ( a staple in every Filipino home, except we don't have one):

So we left before they closed and off we went to go to Cosmic Monkey Comicswhich was highly recommended by David Walker, a Portland native, expert on Blaxploitation and creator of the 'zine BadAzz MoFo (one of my favorites). It was in the same neighborhood and wasn't too far away. But before we go, here's one last view of the Velveteria from the car:

Hollywood Theatre in the NE:
Cosmic Monkey Comics:
View from one of the shelves - I was just browsing around here:
Another view from where I was sitting while Bert browsed around. He ended up getting an issue of Infinite Crisis, which is a DC graphic novel. I ended up getting a Trivia book about horror movies. While waiting as Bert was lookikng for titles, I had a little chat with the girl working the counter. I asked her if she was going to the Con this year. Last year, she didn't and wasn't going this year either. It was a bit cost prohibitive I believe. She also highly recommended a visit to Floating World Comics (which we would check out in a few days)...what I really liked about the people here in Portland was that they were so giving of their time and gave tips and advice on places to check out. I really appreciated it - whether it was an email from BAMF, Knitting Diva's brother, Caren from the Velveteria who recommended that we visit the Grotto, or strangers on the stree(ex: the man from Jordan and the Iranian woman), everyone was so kind.
Stickers on the door of Cosmic Monkey:
TC and I in our new Velveteria t-shirts! This one features TC's favorite painting there, the "Unicorn Combover"...I also have another one of a forlorn Chihuahua in a teacup. If you click on the photo to enlarge, you will see that the sides of the "V" in Velveteria are formed by bodacious nekkid lady silhouettes! By the way, I am holding Bobo Bear the 3rd and that's a bag of Dorito's Sweet Chili flavor(which taste really good!!!!)!

Next up - The Columbia River Gorge and Waterfalls galore!