Now that my Grandma has passed I don’t get Greek food cooked for me nearly as often as I used to.  I still cook something Greek at least 3-4 times a month, but once a year I know there is a place I can go, to get home cooked, quality, Greek food. 

That place is the Valley Greek Festival hosted by St. Nicholas Greek Church in Northridge.

Every major city, it seems, hosts a Greek festival at some point in the summer, but for my money, the Valley version is one of the best.  There is a large Greek community in Northridge and Reseda and the food here is all homemade by loving hands, of members of St. Nich’s Greek Orthodox Church.

If you do go here are my suggestions:

Loucanico:  Greek sausage, grilled and served with a hunk of bread, feta, some lemon and kalamata olives.  This is delicious with a little sip of Ouzo on the side.

Greek Chicken is going all day on large open grills.  It’s served with rice, salad, bread, feta and other fixins.  I like their version, it’s really well made, so if you’ve never had it, give it a try.  For me, I find Greek Chicken is so easy to cook at home, I often go with the dishes, that, due to their complexity, I don’t often cook at home…like…

Pastitsio or Moussaka:  Pastitsio is like a Greek Lasagna made with bechamel sauce.  I’ve made this on numerous occasions, and let  me tell you it’s a bitch to make!  Their version often dries out a little bit, but it’s the nature of the beast.  It’s still worth a try.  The nutmeg flavors in the rich sauce are so damn yummy.   Their Moussaka is delish as well, and usually not as dried out.  I love egg plant, don’t you??

The Gyro (pronounced “Year-oh”  not “Jeye-ro  or Guy-ro”) is also really fab.

For desserts, well, when it comes to Greek desserts they’re all pretty much some version of flour, nuts and honey (my Nouna would kill me for saying so, but people, it’s true!).
The ladies of the church, though, create something crazy, like 48 THOUSAND pieces of pastry.

The most fun dessert, hands down, are the handmade Loucoumathes. 

Little donut holes they cook right in front of  you!  Yum.  I feel so sorry for the poor soul who has to man this station on a hot day.

When you are done eating, you can dance…

watch cooking demonstrations…

play games and shop.  It’s just a nice atmosphere, and for me, I always get a little nostalgic, for my childhood, when big Greek family gatherings where a regular thing in my life.  These days, I still embrace my Greek-ness, and my friends (my extended family) have embraced it with me. 

I plan on spending a good few hours at the festival this weekend, and I’ll let  you know how it went.

Click here to check out The Valley Greek Festival website
 

Photos courtesy of Valley Greek Festival Website

In a rather savvy cross-promotion (actually, a no-brainer, when you think about it…) the delightful ice-cream parlor and café on Beverly, Milk, teamed up with the Got Milk? people (namely, the Cali Milk Processor Board) to host an open house last night.

I spotted a handful of fellow bloggers, including the gorgeous Kristy of Best of LA and met Javier the teenage glutster who is going to have to change his blog name any day now, once he ‘comes of age’ - lol

I met the gal who writes Mikey Hates Everything and she even came with two - uh - robot dudes in biz suits…

I also got to catch up with the dashing and daring Eddie Lin of Deep End Dining fame.

A few people asked after you, Jonah, but the words ‘new baby’ and ‘Westside’ seemed to explain your absence (!)

Over the past year, Bret Thompson (former Corporate Executive Chef of the Patina Restaurant Group, Michelin trained, and now owner and executive chef of Milk,) has been tantalising the palates of Angelinos with his delectable treats at Milk. Through this unique partnership with the Got Milk? campaigners, Thompson has adapted and now shares the secret recipes to some of Milk’s most divine sweet desserts – from the ever-so-popular Milky Way Melt (which I did not sample) to the pan-Latin-inspired Berry Tres Leches, which was out of this world!

Bret’s recipes can now be found on their really cool little site.

Other yummy desserts that were being passed around were:
mini ice-cream cones with a fantastic banana & dulce de leche filling and dipped in crisp caramel;
a petite meringue ice cream sandwich;
malted milk shake with teeny choc-covered malted balls within;
a feather-light cornbread cake with raspberry filling and kernels of corn that was truly sensational
also an elegant plastic goblet of a creamy, dreamy and lightly spiced pumpkin squash soup with smoky toasted pepitas on top;
and of course the Berry Tres Leches, which has to be hands down the best version of this classic Mexican dessert I’ve ever tried.

The cake is infused with berries until it is purple-blue and then layered with white cake. The custard parts are not too sickly sweet at all (as is sometimes the case) - it’s simply perfect. Topped with fresh berries and you have a winner. I got to chat with Bret about his Berry Tres Leches dessert, by the way. He explained that it was tough to perfect the genoise or French-style sponge cake part of this delectable dessert so that it doesn’t collapse under the weight of all the three milky ingredients, namely evaporated, condensed and fresh milk.

I also talked to Steve James, the head honcho of the (actually two-person) Got Milk? team and learned how the Got Milk? campaign was created, about fifteen years ago. Legend has it that apparently some creative minds from the advertising firm Goodby, Silverstein and Partners – who they’ve been with ever since – were waiting outside the conference room door, ready to make their pitch. They’d surreptitiously filmed people in their own office reacting, with varying degrees of frustration and anger, to deliberately minuscule amounts of milk left in almost empty containers. They had the campaign and strategy all worked out but no punchy, hooky catch phrase. The team were brainstorming right outside the door, saying, ‘But we need something really simple, like, I dunno, ‘Got Milk?’

Such goes the legend of one of the most enduring food-related ad campaigns you can name.

It was a really fun event.

TIP:

Feast on superb Italian fare at Angelini Osteria across the road, then walk to Milk for dessert.

Milk
7290 Beverly Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90046
(323) 939-6455

[photo from their website]

I occasionally like to imbibe a cocktail or dine in a hotel. It feels extra glamorous and I can pretend I’m a traveller in a foreign land. So when a visiting friend suggested we meet for lunch at the Hotel Intercontinental, on Avenue of the Stars, I jumped at the chance to put on a pretty frock and heels (despite LA’s pre-emptive June gloom – okay, I added a chic cardie, aka sweater) and tool over there.

The Park Grill dining room at the Hotel Intercontinental is surprisingly unpretentious. Diners can relax in the clubby atmosphere of the dining room, with its gay, striped carpeting and comfy, upholstered armchairs.

Beyond the large, glass french doors lies the garden patio, where I’m sure we would have dined had it been a sunny day. It’s an attractive and intimate little garden and the umbrella’d dining tables skirt an expanse of lawn. Apparently this is a popular venue for weddings.

The menu offers a decent range of two soups, several salads and sandwiches, a few hot meals and desserts. My dining companion went for the great sounding watermelon and spinach salad ($15). This came out as a kind of log cabin of sticks of watermelon with a mass of baby spinach, chunks of chevre and candied walnuts in the middle. On either side of the ‘cabin’, the long, rectangular plate was attractively drizzled with the mango dressing as well as cross-hatched drizzles of vibrantly ‘kermit’ green basil oil. Now, while this looked impressive, in fact it’s a little tough to get the dressing off the plate and onto your food. But the baby spinach was also lightly dressed and sprinkled with black sesame seeds (love them!) so this wasn’t an issue, just a tiny bit irksome.

She also ordered a prosciutto and arugula pizza ($19) that was, shall we say, extremely disappointing. Suffice to say, upon reflection, one probably shouldn’t go to a hotel and expect them to have a roaring pizza furnace…

I opted for the ‘Bento Box’ ($35) as it gave me four small courses with two options per course. It arrived all at once, on a large, white, square ceramic platter with four smaller square dishes within.

The soup was the soup du jour; a chicken broth with a hint of lime, neat cubes of breast meat and finely chopped vegetables. Delicious! Of the two salads, I went with the wild rocket salad. It was studded with candied walnuts (actually, too many…), sweet slivers of dried pear, and a couple of teeny little heirloom tomatoes. The rocket was generously dressed with a rich balsamic vinaigrette that was perfumed with white truffle oil. Rich and satisfying. I couldn’t imagine a whole bowl of it; it worked really well as one small course of four. It also came with two batons of plain but toasted crostini.

The ‘entree’ portion of this bento was one of their cooked entrees, and I would recommend dining at the Park Grill for this dish alone. A small but sufficient hunk of Chilean Sea Bass, beautifully cooked, was resting on a bed of ‘forbidden’ black rice that actually looks dark red. The modest portion of fish was served with two gorgeously braised and grilled wedges of endive and a sprinkling of soft greens. It was superb!

For my fourth course I went with the plate of fruit over the pastries, and I was glad I did. A sprinkling of blueberries, boysenberries and raspberries were complemented by a slice each of honeydew melon, cantaloupe, orange and pineapple. All the fruits were exquisitely ripe. This was a perfectly balanced, filling and delicious meal.

I noticed they are doing a special buffet for Mother’s Day. I definitely think hotels are the ideal place to pamper the grande dame in your life. I’ve already raved about the exquisite afternoon tea at the Peninsular Hotel.

But the Hotel Intercontinental might be just the place for a family gathering. If it’s a nice day, you can dine outside and the kids can run about on the grass. There will be a band performing soul, jazz and Latin music.

The buffet menu is pretty extensive and has something for everyone. Highlights from the menu include:

Kid friendly choices such as wild berry mini pancakes, triple decker peanut butter sandwich, mini BLTs, mini nutella and banana club sandwiches and baby sliders.

Assortment of miniature breakfast pastries and a seasonal sliced fruit display. Egg dishes include omelettes by request and crab eggs benedict with paprika hollandaise.

There are salads such as mushroom and shrimp salad with green papaya, multicolored heirloom tomato salad with bocconcini and aged balsamic reduction, ahi tuna salad ‘a la nicoise’, grilled marinated artichoke salad with Asian beef and so on.

In addition to a sushi and sashimi display, there’ll be shrimp, mussels, oysters, clams and crab claws. Pasta dishes include truffle gnocchi with sage and brown butter or wild mushroom risotto.

Barbecue items include prime rib eye steak, citrus marinated organic white salmon, and baby lamb chops marinated with whole grain mustard and lavender. Loads of grilled and roasted vegetables, such as parmesan grilled corn on the and roasted vegetables with fresh cilantro and lemon oil.

Assorted cakes and desserts, including panacotta, tarts, pies, cookies, brownies and blondies and even a sweet crepes station with fresh fruit sauces.

This gastronomic spread will cost $68 for adults and $34 children 4-12, (with no charge for children 3 and under).

Happy Mother’s Day!

Park Grill, Hotel Intercontinental

2151 Avenue of the Stars,
Los Angeles
Front Desk: (310) 2846500

[FYI – Validated valet parking was $6.00]

Born April 19th, he was a big boy, well fed from our pre-infant dining tour for sure. Just look at all that hair!

One email did catch my eye this week. From a PR company, I got a cleverly titled email, “Recession Concessions at Table 8″. Hm, sounds enticing, Table 8 is certainly one of the more talked about restaurants in Los Angeles. The “Recession Concession” is priced at $38 and looking at the options, it is a reduction of Table 8’s normal prices, but is it prudent financial advice to go drop $100 for two (after tax and tip) if you are facing tough financial times? Isn’t this what got us into financial trouble in the first place? Spending more than we should?

In fairness to Table 8, here is what they are offering (Monday through Friday only)

Appetizers
(choose one)

local baby oak lettuces with feta, roasted beets, sweet onions and black olive oil
pan-roasted baby broccoli with confit potatoes, flaked salt cod and parsley hollandaise
kobe beef carpaccio with celery root salad, treviso and truffle aioli

Entrees
(choose one)

grilled baby chicken on short rib hash and cipollini onion jus
olive oil poached sea trout with shaved artichoke salad and caramelized onion mash
estancia grass fed rib eye with pea tendrils, potato puree, roasted baby carrots and pearl onions

Desserts
(choose one)

vanilla panna cotta with honeyed blueberries
dulce de leche chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream

Note that this doesn’t include wine, cocktails or sparkling water (maybe cut those out in order to pay your mortgage?)

Here is my la.foodblogging Recession Concession advice. Rather than dropping $100 for lettuce and beet salad, grilled baby chicken and vanilla panna cotta, head over to Zankou. Split a half chicken with pickled turnips, hummous and pita for under $10 then go splurge on dessert for another $5 at Scoops. (That’s a dinner for two!)

Money “saved”? $85!

So where would your Recession Concession meal be? How much would you spend? Are you cutting back on eating out?

So what exactly is molecular gastronomy? What it comes down to is examining how food changes and understanding why. Molecular gastronomy seems to get confused for cooking, but This stresses repeatedly that it is a science, not cooking. “Science looks for the mechanisms of phenomena,” and it is “not useful except for producing new knowledge.” Once you apply that knowledge, it is no longer science. Now you might be wondering if molecular gastronomy is a science, why is there a demonstration at a culinary school. Chef Lachlan Sands, one of the CSCA instructors, explains it is important to learn and understand what is happening to the food during the cooking process so that if a mistake happens, it’ll be easier to fix. In addition CSCA does apply scientific knowledge. For instance, Chef Matthew Zboray shares that for a Valentine’s dessert, he used methylcellulose, which acts like a gelatin except it solidifies in heat instead of cold. I think it’s fantastic that CSCA provides not only traditional culinary training but also exposes students to new techniques.

This shares with the class some of his experiments. Now I will be forthcoming and admit that I didn’t really comprehend everything he said. I haven’t thought about chemistry since high school, so please forgive me if there are any atrocious inaccuracies in what I report because quite a lot of what he said went over my head. Things I did understand include how different parts of a carrot stalk hold different sugars. Cooking a carrot for a particular length of time will affect the levels of sucrose, glucose, and fructose. This has these intricate graphs that show exactly how much sugar and which type of these 3 sugars are released based on how long they have been cooking. He also talks about why culinary treatments have an effect on the color of green beans and green vegetables in general. The photo on the right is of This grinding a leafy green to show us how there are pigment molecules in the leaves. For me, the most interesting part is when This talks about whipping versus shaking/swirling to make a wine sauce. He shows us super magnified versions of a wine sauces identical in every way except that one was whipped, the other shaken. The whipped one has very tiny oil bubbles and will give more of a wine taste. The shaken one in contrast has larger oil bubbles and will give more of a buttery taste. (Personally, I will be whipping my wine sauces from now on.)

After the demonstration, I enjoyed a very lovely lunch with This and about a dozen chefs. During this time, I had the opportunity to ask This, who is known for debunking old wives tales in the kitchen, if he wants to do the same for foods of other cultures, as different regions have different old wives tales in regards to cooking. His response was yes, he wants to, but he currently has 25,000 books he’s trying to get through, and it takes him about a month to test a myth and 10 years to complete. It would be “inefficient” for him to decipher a book on Japanese cuisine and then run those experiments when he has so much left undone. Thus it is his hope that molecular gastronomy will take off in other regions so there will be others who will conduct similar experiments. Then in about 10 yrs, they can all convene and share their findings together for the different cultures of foods. I would love to see that happen and attend that conference.

I know that the votes are still be counted, but I am going to project that this event has been a winner. People trying places they haven’t been to, returning to old favorites and generally enjoy some good deals.

A couple posts here at la.foodblogging

• Beef and Butter Dominate at Ruth’s Chris
• Good Grub at Grace

Nannette has a busy week at Say it, don’t spray it

• A for Abode
• Victory at Violet ($25 dinner BTW)
• I Cugini is “pretty good overall”
• Border Grill is disappointing and a trip to Simon

L.A & OC Foodie Makes the Rounds

• Ford’s Filling Station “slightly above OK”
• “Kickin’” dinner at Beacon ($25 dinner)
• Graces falls “considerably short”

A other blogs weigh in

• Food GPS declares Red Seven a “restaurant week success”
• Teenage Glutser goes to Grace, but decides “es pura propaganda” (its all publicity!)
• Potatomato not impressed by NOÉ

Any others I missed? Let me know in the comments. I have one more dinner to try tomorrow night. Who else has plans?

Normally, a place like Grace would be a very special occasion dining choice for me, so restaurant week seemed like the perfect time to try it. I have walked by Grace often enough gazing longingly at the low light and neutral tones of the interior, and the trio of soups and homemade donuts on the menu. Come to think of it … I could afford to go there just for a trio of soups and some homemade donuts. I’ll have to remember that.

The first thing I have to say is to sneakypeteiii who asked me to inquire about the “Close to Home” menu. I asked my server whether they were still doing it, and he said that they were, but it has been suspended temporarily for restaurant week.

The second is that one thing we did not get even a hint of, was any attitude about being there for restaurant week. The service was as friendly and attentive as if we had been any other diner. Also, we were not made to ask for a separate menu, as the DineLA meal was included within the regular menu. I didn’t feel that we were treated differently than any other customer.

It may be because it’s almost impossible to get away with simply sticking to the $34 set menu, because the people at Grace are wicked, naughty seducers that supplement the menu with bonus choices that are enticingly delicious sounding. I think we went at the height of temptation, also, because one of our table members was accidentally given a menu from the night before and there weren’t nearly as many special supplements.

The first thing that you can’t help but add on is drinks. I suppose you could stick with the water, but that’s boring. We all ordered Grace Gimlets rather than choosing the $30 wine pairing option. The Grace Gimlet was $10 and consisted of gin, blood orange juice, and a rosemary simple syrup. The simple syrup really made this drink. The rosemary scent and flavor was strong and it took the drink from a standard cocktail to something really special. A poster on Chowhound described it as just okay and I am wondering if it is better in the form we ordered it. Our server told us they usually serve it on the rocks, but we all ordered ours up, and they were fantastic.

For starters, three of us ordered the vegan coconut scented winter squash Soup, and the other ordered the shrimp cavatelli with Peas and Chanterelle Mushrooms, both of which were part of the DineLA standard menu choices. The soup was really nice. It was thick, but not too hearty and suited the cold weather that night perfectly. I didn’t really get the “coconut scent,” it must have been very subtle, but I ate all of the soup in about two seconds so maybe I just missed it, I was going so fast! The shrimp cavatelli got good marks as well.

For our main courses, only one of our party ordered off of the DineLA menu, getting the king salmon with quinoa, artichokes, and lobster nage, although without the lobster nage (due to shellfish allergy). The kitchen happily left off the lobster nage and even replaced it with a red wine nage. I tried a bit of the salmon and I have to say it’s the best salmon I ever had. Maybe it was because many salmon I have had are heavily sauced, I am not sure, but this fish tasted so clean and fresh, like it just came out of some really nice seawater. I loved it.

I ordered one of the supplemental dishes that came with a supplemental price. I ordered a Morro Bay Petrale Sole in a lemon butter sauce with endive and potatoes. First, I had to support the fishermen of my homeland. Second, petrale sole is something you don’t see everywhere, but is a very good fish. It is actually a flounder, and it is lean with a mild, sweet flavor. Petrale sole is also classified as an environmentally sound choice of fish, if you care about that kind of thing. My sole came in several pieces, and was crispy, brown, and buttery on the outside, and tender, white, and flaky on the inside. I loved the soft potatoes as well, but the endive was difficult texturally for me. I left most of it on the plate, sadly. The sole was $10 extra.

The third entree was a sauteed John Dory with chervil gnocchi, salsify, wild mushrooms and red wine nage. The fish was good, but I think the best part about this was the gnocchi. The por guy who ordered didn’t get to eat to many of them because they kept getting stolen.

The final entree was another supplemental dish - bay scallops. I’m not much of a scallop fan, but I had a bite and they seemed nice, buttery and evenly cooked.

Dessert was the famous homemade donuts. I am a fan of cake-y donuts. I don’t really like Krispy Creme or donuts with lots of air. I like donuts that are all fried and crunchy on the outside and really soft and fluffy and caky on the inside. As such, these donuts weren’t my optimal, because they were too small to be really soft inside, so they were a little crispier than my ideal. I liked the cinnamon glaze on the top, though. That was yummy. The donuts came with a hot chocolate and “toasted orange marshmallow,” which was more like a gooey whipped cream. The chocolate itself was not very sweet, while the marshmallow part was, so I ended up mixing the two together to make sort of a thick warm pudding, but that was way to rich for me. I couldn’t finish.

All in all, our bill came out to much more than the $34 per person that sticking strictly to the restaurant week menu would have netted us, but at the same time, I would say that on a regular night, a dinner for two with all of the trappings might cost almost as much as our dinner for four last week, so I still feel that it was a bargain.

EDIT: People may like to know, for comparison’s sake. I can’t remember the exact total of our bill, but it was around $250 for four people not including tip. That included two cocktails apiece (we walked! don’t lecture me!), so drinks made up about 1/3 of the bill. So even with the supplements, the food bill came out to an average of around $42.50/person. Not a bad deal for a three course meal.

Grace
7360 Beverly Blvd.
323-934-4400

• More controversy at Tiara, where Franklin Avenue tried to have lunch on Sunday. “We specified the Dine L.A. menu when we made reservations and the person on the other end took a note of it and acknowledged our request. The only waiter there took our order off the Dine L.A. menu, only to return twenty minutes later to say that they were not serving the Dine L.A. menu on weekends.” Previous Tiara switchup here.
• Gourmet Pigs is putting in time, with their third review, this time lunch at Asia de Cuba. “All in all the food was good, but service sucked.”
• Shihfan feels that Simon did not showcase their best menu.
• Food GPS may return to Patina for dinner, but points out that they have a regular business lunch for $25 that isn’t too different from the $22 DineLA menu.
• Chowhound schmamo tries Patina, however, and gives it a “Boo, boo, boo, boo, boo” sparking a debate of what DineLA menus should be
• Chowhound vinosnob finds Abode to be very busy, enjoys the food, but finds the portions on the small side.
• Chowhound MeAndroo enjoys some hearty steaks at Nick & Stef’s, with complaints only about the coat check.

Overall, reviews are trending towards disappointment. Is this because of diners’ unreasonable expectations, or restaurants skimping on their offerings?

• Our own Sneakypeteiii finds fabulous food at Ford’s Filling Station for dinner.
• LAist has a happy dinner at Allegria in Malibu and a precious lunch at Patina.
• Chowhound is rather light on reviews, seems that all Chowhounds are heading to Grace, with some debate whether the supplemental dishes for $10-$15 are a nice offering, or a bait and switch (I tend to lean towards the former).
• Sounds like Simon has plenty of space available, however not too much enthusiasm for their dinner.
• Chowhound EliseT ventures to Vermont, “food was killer, and well worth $34″