Andy Gavin's Blog, page 32
July 20, 2023
Big Citrin Birthday!
Restaurant: Citrin [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14]
Location: 1104 Wilshire Blvd.Santa Monica, CA 90401. (310) 395-0881
Date: January 29, 2020
Cuisine: California French
Rating: Rebooted
_Iconic Santa Monica Melisse has rebooted as 2 restaurants in the same space. In the front, Citrin, in a (slightly) more casual (slightly) more shared format, and a small room in the back with Melisse 2.0 — as a $300+ a head tasting menu only spot.
For Jeffrey’s bday we covered on Citrin for an ...
July 18, 2023
Arcadian Pastures
Restaurant: Meizhou Dongpo
Location: 400 S Baldwin Ave #2045, Arcadia, CA 91007. (626) 538-4136
Date: December 4, 2022
Cuisine: Beijing/Szechuan Chinese
Rating: A bit better than its Century City brother
_I’ve been to the Century City Meizhou many times, and I’ve even been to this Arcadia branch (which oddly opened LATER) for lunch, but I was always skeptical of going out here for dinner as there are so many other places in the SGV (and after all, we have one close by).
But off I went anyway.
...
July 16, 2023
Back to Babita
Restaurant: Babita Mexicuisine [1, 2]
Location: 1823 S San Gabriel Blvd, San Gabriel, CA 91776. (626) 288-7265
Date: December 3, 2022
Cuisine: Modern Mexican
Rating: A rare find
_Chef Roberto and his wife Elba run this unique gem in the San Gabriel Valley. It’s family owned, upscale, tiny, chef driven and elaborate. And it’s Mexican food! Los Angeles has no shortage of Mexican restaurants, both of the classic and modernized formats, but we don’t have a lot (if any others?) that strive for an up...
July 14, 2023
Totally Takeda
Restaurant: Takeda Sushi
Location: 123 Astronaut Ellison S Onizuka St #307, Los Angeles, CA 90012. (213) 613-0083
Date: December 2, 2022
Cuisine: Japanese Sushi
Rating: Could be the best sushi I’ve had in LA
_For penultimate sushi blowout of the year we decided to head downtown and tryout the relatively new Sushi Takeda, which are the new digs for our old friend Chef Hide Takeda who sliced up some awesome fish at Tsujita Sushi for years. He’s recently earned a Michelin star here at Takeda too.
...
July 11, 2023
Haunting Hansei
Restaurant: Hansei
Location: 244 San Pedro St, Los Angeles, CA 90012
Date: December 1, 2022
Cuisine: Japanese
Rating: Serene
_Hansei is Chris Ono’s debut concept presented by the historic Japanese American Cultural & Community Center (JACCC). Hansei, meaning self-reflection, Ono explores his roots as a fourth generation Japanese American to champion the cuisine and culture of Los Angeles’ Nikkei community. At Hansei, Ono brings years of kitchen experience from Michelin starred restaurants acros...
July 9, 2023
Salty Saturday 2022
Salty Saturday is the traditional family bagel and lox brunch we do on the Saturday after ThanksGavin.
For the last couple of years it’s been hosted at my cousin Matt’s house. This year (2022), it’s a touch more subdued than usual due to cooking fatigue, the pandemic, etc.
In his sunny dining room.
Across the way is the kids table.
The deli spread.
Bagels of course. Although I didn’t eat any this year (avoiding the carbs).
Classic Cream Cheese.
Whipped Cream Cheese.
Chive Cream Cheese.
L...
July 7, 2023
Fatty Friday 2022
It’s tradition at ThanksGavin (the 4 day feasting our family engages in each November) for one of my cousins to host the Friday Night dinner, which is like thanksgiving night all over again (but with different food). This year, Matt and his wife Andrea handled BOTH nights!
Shrimp Cocktail with home-made Cocktail Sauce.
Home-made Trout Dip. Very lovely smoked trout flavor and great creamy texture.
Toasts for the trout dip.
A pile of Snake River Farms beef.
Tomohawk steaks.
New York St...
July 5, 2023
ThanksGavin 2022 – The Feast Itself
And so we come to the traditional ThanksGavin Feast in its 2022 incarnation.
The main and kid’s tables.
Cute decorations this year.
And cute name tags.
The turkey straight out of the Green Egg.
Two turkey’s actually.
Mozzerella and Pepperdew appetizer.
The main spread of vegetables.
Salad dressing.
Kale Salad with a nutty dressing. With a meal like this a little fiber is always welcome!
Home-made cranberry jelly.
My mom’s home-made Cranberry Chutney.
Braised Leeks with Cheese. ...
July 2, 2023
China Gourmet – Wednesday 2022
Restaurant: China Gourmet [1, 2]
Location: 2842 St Vincent St, Philadelphia, PA 19149. (215) 941-1898
Date: November 23, 2022
Cuisine: Cantonese Chinese
Rating: Pretty decent Cantonese
_As part of the traditional ThanksGavin progression of meals we go out on Wednesday before Thanksgiving and this year we returned to China Gourmet, which we’d visited on Friday night the year before.
Cantonese banquet hall — Philly style.
Fairly typical interior that is pretty much straight out of the SGV. It s...
July 1, 2023
Vietnamese Maximus
Another holiday return to this awesome SGV Vietnamese for a serious feast (again)!
Check out all the details here.
Crispy Quail. Fried battered quails and dressed with aromatic garlic butter oil. These were even better than the squabs as they had more meat and the crispy garlic stuff (same as on the prawns) was again amazing. There is an ordering repetetion here which is a Yarom hallmark as we had the two birds in a row and the prep on the prawns was the same as the quail.
