Day 4
My plans for Wednesday in San Diego consisted of cooking dinner and watching the U.S. vs Spain Confederations Cup match.
I woke up pretty early, had some breakfast and got to work on dinner while Wimbledon was on the television. In the hour or so that I worked in the morning, I ensured that our afternoon was essentially free to do whatever we wanted to do.
Once Steve arrived back from a morning of work, we caught the first half of the match before heading over to Ocean Beach during half time, where swung by his office before getting lunch and catching the second half.
We had lunch at South Beach Bar and Grille, a restaurant that claims to be the “home of the world’s best fish taco”. We both had the shark taco and the wahoo taco and split an order of mozzarella sticks (for some reason I saw these on the menu and became pretty excited). The fish tacos were excellent and yes, quite possibly the best in the world, though I have to confess that my knowledge and consumption of fish tacos is pretty limited.
Josmer Altidore and Clint Dempsey - the two goalscorers against Spain
While we were there we caught most of the second half of the match, and I was as stunned as anyone when the final whistle blew and the U.S. had beat Spain (the number one ranked team in the world) by a score of 2-0. Go figure. Just a week ago I was so dismayed and embarrassed that I didn’t even pack a U.S. jersey with me. Now the U.S. had kept a clean sheet to beat Spain to get to the final versus Brazil (though we wouldn’t know the opponent until the next day).
After the tasty tacos and a couple of pints of beer we took a stroll on the beach, up to the dog beach and back, before heading back to the car. We spent the rest of the afternoon driving around Point Loma, checking out Sunset Cliffs and some really expensive houses.
Steve at Sunset Cliffs on Point Loma
Once we were done sightseeing, we headed back to Hillcrest to the Whole Foods to get some arrowroot – exciting I know, but the stock that I’d doctored up didn’t extract enough collagen from the veal bones and when reduced with the sherry didn’t thicken enough, so I needed something to thicken it. Given that I’d already reduced the sauce way down in the hopes that it would thicken, making a roux wasn’t an option and I really don’t care mcuh for cornstarch, so I was left with arrowroot, which worked out just fine.
After procuring arrowroot we checked out a record store just around the corner and then headed over to Wit’s End, a pub that Steve had yet to go to despite its proximity to his house. We entered into what was like an episode of The Office, with maybe 10 or 15 sales people having a meeting. We enjoyed two pints of some tasty draft beer before going back home and cooking.
For dinner that night I made the following:
- Heirloom tomato salad with a sherry gastrique, goat cheese, toasted pine nuts and microgreens
- Sea scallops with warm crab, cherry tomato and basil salad with romesco sauce
- Sweetbreads with sherry/veal jus, pearl onions, asparagus and sugar snap peas
- Foie gras with cherry/shallot compote, braised frisee and polenta croutons
I’ve made the salad before and it dates back to my time working in Chicago, when my dinner one night became the special the next day:
Heirloom tomato salad with sherry gastrique, toasted pine nuts, goat cheese and microgreens
The tomatoes are the ones we got at Chino Farms and were really, really good, quite possibly the best tomatoes I’ve ever had.
The scallop dish per se I’ve never made, but it’s origins date back to the same restaurant I was working at in Chicago: we stuffed whole trout with a crab stuffing and served it with a romesco sauce, so I knew the flavors would work. The romesco sauce went even better than I thought, with a mild tanginess from the sherry vinegar and just a little hint of spiciness to it that played off the sweetness of the scallops and the saltiness of the crab. I used this recipe from Jose Andres as a guide, though I didn’t read the recipe before making it and thus had to take a few shortcuts. (I didn’t take a picture of the dish because the scallops didn’t sear as well as I’d have liked).
The sweetbread dish I know well, which is pretty similar to what we used to have on the menu where I now work, and have made at home before. Everyone seemed to enjoy this, though by now I was getting pretty damn full.
The foie gras course was also relatively new to me. I could have made the polenta croutons a little crispier on the outside, but overall I liked it and think everyone else did as well. Not to mention that Eric cut foie gras “steaks”, so everyone had an ample portion of what we started referring to as “meat butter”:
Seared foie gras (aka meat butter) with cherry/shallot compote, braised frisee and polenta croutons
For dessert we had ice cream and “killer” cookies from Uncle Biffs. The cookies are really good though it seems as if Uncle Biffs isn’t doing too well, which is a bit of a shame. Hopefully things turn around soon for them.
After dinner we were stuffed and I quickly fell asleep on the couch while attempting to watch Top Chef Masters. I still don’t know who won, but I remember being really put off that Cindy Pawlcyn kept pronouncing offal “awful”. It still really bothers me, now that I think about it.
Day 5
I awoke on my final morning craving true breakfast food, but didn’t know where to go, so I ended up at the Whole Foods at the end of the block buying eggs and breakfast sausage. I think the guy at the checkout was envious, because it was painfully obvious that this was going to be my breakfast in just a few moments as my hair was still wet from showering.
After a last go at Wii – I got up to professional level in tennis in less than an hour – we headed over to Coronado island once again, where we enjoyed overpriced food and salads (yes, a salad because dinner from the previous night was still sitting pretty heavey) at the Hotel del Coronado. Afterwards we took another stroll on the beach and up to the dog beach before heading back to the car.
Our next stop turned out to be fairly memorable. Steve wanted to show me downtown a little bit before I left that night, so we headed to Basic, a bar he apparently used to frequent quite often. A few things made this place pretty memorable, but the first was probably the most unlikely scenario of Steve getting the bartender’s phone number, though I can’t recall if that was before or after she bought us both a round.
The next memorable thing that happened here was discovering that Michael Jackson had died – and here it is a week and a half later as I type this and he’s still not buried. The manager walked over to the DJ booth and put on Billy Jean and the fifteen or so of us had a laugh at that one. My initial comment was something like “the world is now a safer place for Cheeto”. If you can’t tell I’m not and never was was a fan of the self-proclaimed “king of pop”, whatever the fuck that means.
And the final most interesting thing about this place (aside from the possibility that you could get a pizza topped with mashed potato and meatballs and the fact that Steve knew that it was delicious) is the ceiling fan, which could seriously fuck you up if it were to drop from the ceiling:
The guillotinelike ceiling fan at Basic
After packing my shit up we headed to Point Loma once more to meet up with some folks at the Wine Steals there, which happens to be in old military buildings that have been converted to public use:
View from the Wine Steals in Point Loma
There I met two of Steve’s colleagues (or employees as the case may be) and we had some wine with the two half platters with everything (which included various cheeses, sausages and fruits). Even though I knew we were going to dinner afterwards I was so hungry I couldn’t resist eating too much and ruining my appetite.
And sure enough, when we got to Roseville’s for dinner, three of us were stuffed. I’m sure Eric, who didn’t join us at Wine Steals, was thinking to himself “What the fuck?”, but then again maybe he knew.
I would have really wanted to try an appetizer such as the foie gras torchon or the ricotta gnudi , but was all too aware that an appetizer would take me over the top. So instead we all ordered our mains and I went with the braised pork cheeks with carrot-cardamom tian, crispy parsnip, candied kumquat & citrus vincotto. What I was able to eat – about half of the dish – was delicious, and I really wanted to try some more stuff but that wasn’t in the cards. And none of us had dessert, which all looked pretty good as well.
And from Roseville’s I went to the airport and flew home, to where it’s taken me a week and a half and some issues with WordPress to get this all posted.
I’m not sure I could ever live in a place like San Diego, because I’d probably just hang out and enjoy the weather and never get anything done, but it’s a nice place to visit. And it turns out there are more food options there, despite what various message boards would have you believe. Maybe the fine dining scene is lacking some, but you can get that in so many places, and I’ve really become disenchanted with it anyway. I just want some good food on a plate with good company and a glass of beer, and I was able to find that in San Diego.
Red Devil in the Kitchen 