Mom's Polo Shevid Baghali in Lucky Peach

Those hands belong to my mom, Violet.  She is halving baghali, fava beans, for one of my favorite dishes of hers, polo shevid baghali.  I am beyond thrilled to report that I got to cook this dish with her, and interview her about her own food memories, for the Lucky Peach website's "We Love Mom" column.  I've loved Lucky Peach magazine since its inception, but always had a problem with the boy's club vibe that came off its mostly male, mostly restaurant chef writing.  This column is the opposite, as it celebrates traditional home cooking (though many of the moms, and other parents, profiled are far from traditional), and paints a broad ethnic picture of American kitchens today -- all with adorable old-school pictures of the writers and their moms.  Suits me just fine; happy to be a part of it.  Check out my story here!

Real Talk 3: Accountability

Part 3 in a series.  I've employed some practices, and have had some things on my mind, that I'm really excited about, and I'd like to share them here.  Not all directly food- nor LA-related, though food certainly weaves through these stories.  I'm calling it Real Talk, though in a less lofty moment, I could just as well have called it Better Living Through Google Docs.

Real Talk 1: Gratitude
Real Talk 2: Mindfulness

Guys, it's mid-January.  That greyish time when already, we start feeling the wearing of the newness. We use all the tools we have: denial, active resistance, sheer force of will, to try to get it back. Now, I come into 2015 with optimism. I have some lofty goals for the year (more on that later.  maybe.), and one actually reasonable one, involving friluftsliv (who's in?), but as much as I love that fresh, invincible resolve of the first days of January, resolutions themselves have always felt a little flimsy to me.

Fortunately, I have a secret weapon.  At the start of 2012, feeling a little boxed in by the strict declarativeness of resolutions, I figured out an alternative that works for me.  I'd like to talk to you today about a little something I call the Hour of Power.

My issues with the old way of dealing with resolutions stem not just from their lack of fluidity, but from the lack of accountability.  I am notorious for not finishing what I start, and it frustrates me endlessly.  I'm more interested in a way to keep tabs on things I want to achieve as they arise throughout the year, rather than coming up with a few simple resolutions in one day.

So, I've come up with a system with two simple components.  First, I decided to schedule a weekly meeting with myself.  I schedule in an distraction-free hour, every Wednesday from 8:30-9:30, which is devoted completely to the second item, The List.

The List. Ah, the list. The list is everything. The list, as they say, is life.*  The core of this practice is a list, contained in the cloud, accessible at all times, with everything in it. This includes grand plans and visions, as well as mundane to-dos. The key to the List is to update it the moment you remember something.  No need, at that time, to go into detail, but jot down the item.  I started my list in Google Docs, but last year moved it to a site called Workflowy,  which I love.  It's just a few seemingly simple tweaks away from a text file, but perfect ones.  I recommend it.

The Hour of Power. My meeting with myself.  These are the grounds. Each is crucial:

 - Use a different chair.  I do most of my computering on the couch.  A messy morass of Facebook, Sporcle, IM, all the distractions, every night.  The Hour is special, and requires a shift in environment. I spend it on an armchair that's slightly less comfortable.  Play music if you want; pour yourself a cup of hot tea.  Remove yourself from children and other distracting people, and shut the door**.
 - Open a new browser window.  It's impossible to plan life, for me anyway, without the internet.  But for the Hour, I minimize all the nagging tabs, log out of IM, and start clean.  This window will have just a few tabs: The List, my calendar, email, and maybe a couple others as necessary.  I'm mindful to not get sucked into a wormhole though.  Discipline.
 - Go through the list.  Address each item.  If something needs fleshing out, add subtasks.  Go into as crazily minute detail as you need.  If you're not sure where to start, come up with a baby step.  Consider talking to someone.  (And then of course, add talking to that someone to the list, and schedule it in.)
 - Get shit done.  If a task is to send an email, look up the hours for a business, find someone's mailing address, this is your time to do it.  Sometimes, in the time it would take to add an item to the list, you can just knock it out.
 - Schedule in first steps.  If a task can't be done immediately, schedule it. Need to make a phone call during business hours?  Put it in your calendar for 10am the next day.  Set an alarm.
 - Reward small victories.  Strike through things as you complete them. Bask for a moment.  Doesn't that feel great?
 - Reward large victories.  Maintain the list of complete tasks. With Workflowy, you can toggle hiding completed tasks.  With a regular doc, shift them to the bottom. But don't delete them. Look at them every once in a while.  You've accomplished so much.
 - Keep at it.  Keep. At. It.  And don't get discouraged.  Even the Great Wall of China is nothing but bricks.

I don't consider myself an organized person -- I was tagged a slacker early in life -- and it takes major effort for me to keep things from falling through the cracks on a regular basis.  But my little Hour of Power has been such an effective thing for me.  I can't say that I accomplished every single thing I set out to do when I started this practice, because honestly that'd be impossible.  But I have accomplished a lot (so many strikethroughs!), I'm pinned to a path, and with every hour, every item, I'm making progress.

* I recognize the white-girl-problems nature of using a line from a Holocaust movie to describe my self-organization method.  But after years of saying it to, and hearing it from, a friend for whom The List is the closest thing to religion, the phrase has had its original meaning hollowed out, and it's an important piece of our shorthand.
** Yeah, right, parents of small children are gonna be able to get an hour of uninterrupted time to themselves.  I know, super challenging. But I feel like parents are superheroes of efficiency and could actually knock this out in 30 minutes.

Iranstagram: 3 to Follow

instagram/everydayiran

When Thrillist published my post on LA's best Persian food, something interesting happened.  People started talking about it on Twitter, and a new world opened up to me.  I had no idea there were so many Iranian food people (bloggers, MasterChef contestants, restaurateurs, cookbook writers) all over the world, and my Twitter-illiteracy once again bit me.  I've since remedied this, jumping into the conversation to reminisce about Persian foods, share LA restaurant recommendations, and coo over all manner of photos.  And it's the photos that are the most evocative.

Iran's definitely one of those countries that, when experienced at street-level, is so much different than what you hear on the news.  So, I wanted to share a few Instagram accounts that I've recently discovered, reporting from within the country and offering a human view of the menacing Islamic Republic.

everydayiran:  This account features a rotating collection of Iranian photographers, and gives a bright, dynamic image of life on the streets, out in nature, and all over Iran.  My favorites tend to include hip Tehrani women who constantly put together incredibly chic outfits -- veil, manteau, and all.

f64s125: Photographer Ako Salemi's black and whites capture solitary moments in corners shrouded in shadow within a bustling city, and feature the clean lines of Iran's architecture.

solmazdaryani:  Solmaz's photos offer intimate peeks into the home life of non-city Iranians, sometimes very old, sometimes sharing a meal on the floor of a modest home.  I don't know much about the photographer here, but a quick google search leads me to understand she's an amateur photographer in Tabriz.  She only has a few photos up, but I hope she posts more and more.

Some other web-related notes:
 - Brandon Stanton of Humans Of New York (in my opinion, the best thing on the internet) spent some time in Iran a few years back.  His photos from that trip, with his signature human treatment, are terrific.

 - As I've been consuming more Iranian media, I've been wanting to create my own little collection of the things I like: less frippery and ornateness, more modern imagery, contemporary arts, cleaner food styling.  I've created a Pinterest page that does all that.  Follow it for your daily dose.

- And as always, I'm on twitter, instagram, and facebook myself.  The All Kinds of Yum Facebook page will keep you up to date on the very best that LA has to offer in food, fun, and general civic awesomeness, with some relevant side trips along the way.  And here's Twitter, and here's Instagram.  Go crazy.

Three Items

I have some items.

The Red Car River Park, on the LA River, steps from Trystero HQ

After I posted about Trystero, Greg Thomas's Atwater Village home coffee-roasting operation, good buddy Jeff Miller, senior editor of Thrillist Los Angeles, caught wind of the story, and ask me to write up Trystero for Thrillist (!!).  I did; here's the post.  I'm happy to report that since the AKOY and Thrillist posts, Greg has gone on to quit his day job (!!!), and once he's back from a well-needed vacation, he's making Trystero his full-time gig.  Wishing him the best of luck!

rooftop view of Williamsburg

Speaking of vacation, forgive me for not posting for a bit.  I'm just back from an amazing trip to New York and Montreal (aka dreamland city of charming cafes).  I walked a lot.  I miss that.  Photos coming soon.

This.   This is an excerpt from an interview with Anthony Bourdain, in AAA's Westways magazine of all places.  We've seen Bourdain go full dick mode on Sandra Lee or Rachel Ray, but my favorite Bourdain moments are when someone's grandma makes him a meal at home, and you see this tall American television star's eyes soften as he's humbled by her warm, modest hospitality.  The sentiment expressed in this one paragraph is so important to me:  be interested, get past formalities, connect on a human level.  Just show up and be grateful.

Real Talk 2: Mindfulness

Part 2 in a series.  I've employed some practices, and have had some things on my mind, that I'm really excited about, and I'd like to share them here.  Not all directly food- nor LA-related, though food certainly weaves through these stories.  I'm calling it Real Talk, though in a less lofty moment, I could just as well have called it Better Living Through Google Docs.

Real Talk 1: Gratitude

I have a system.  Some might think of it as a burden, others as having 'an unhealthy relationship with food', others as a compromise to spontaneity.  It may seem insane to you, but I'm sticking to it.



I'm talking about meal tracking.  I've done it on and off over the last couple years, and I finally decided earlier this year that I'm going to do it forever.  Every Sunday night, I create a list for the week -- every breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snack is planned out in a Google doc.  Every Friday night, I do the same for the weekend.  Then after every meal, I stop back in to the doc, check off each thing I ate and add any items I hadn't planned.

I know it sounds like such a mundane and unsexy thing, but the effect of this practice on my life has been so profound that I don't ever want to stop.  Now, this isn't about weight management, but something more.  For one thing, what you eat is what makes you:  it's absolutely true that we are what we eat.  And there's nothing unsexy about taking great care of your body.  But beyond that, it's about keeping my wits about me.  There are so many messages surrounding us to eat all the time.  Every billboard, every coworker's birthday cake, every networking date, and dating date, every note of that movie theater popcorn jingle.  At five feet tall, I happen to be especially little, so the portions being pushed on me just do not fit my life at all.  There's pressure to feed -- a lot, but rarely to nourish.

When I track, I cook.  And when I have a moment to plan ahead this way, I end up cooking healthy, balanced meals.  This adds value (and order) to my time at home, makes it a moment to recharge, and provides that elusive nourishment, in more ways than one.

Here's the thing: as much as I love food (and we all know, I lerrve food), I've realized that I can't really enjoy it without occasionally being hungry.  And yet, I go through stages where I just eat whatever's in front of me, non-stop, without too much regard for nutrition, balance, or even taste.  Lunchtime comes around, and I don't even have appetite, but I shovel it in anyway.  I hate those times.

And I mean, do I still eat crap?  Sometimes.  And then I end up feeling gross for having done it.  This is why I do the slow stuff.  This is why I meal track.   I love food -- and eating mindlessly makes me love it less.  So, if I can prevent that, in about 3 minutes a day, why not?

Now, you don't have to be a meticulous crazypants about it like I am.  But if you do want to be a meticulous crazypants, which in this case I encourage, I've laid out the details of my system below.  It looks complicated, but I use 2 templates -- one for the week, and one for weekends -- in Google Docs, and employ the 'Make a Copy' function, so much of it's already filled in.  The planning may take about ten minutes, because I have to figure out what I'm eating for the whole week, but then for the rest of the week, tracking (with my own little language of markings) literally does takes less than 3 minutes a day.

Tracking what I eat prevents that hungerless zombie state, and gives me a fighting chance against the constant eat-eat-eat pressure.  All these things vying for our attention (and our appetite) rob us of the opportunity to do what we really want to do.  And so, these little practices that shake us out of the drone state may slow us down a bit, but they help us fight those forces.  These habits and wake-up calls add up to mindfulness, and they help us win.

Real Talk 1: Gratitude

This post is the first in a small series.  I've employed some practices, and have had some things on my mind, that I'm really excited about, and I'd like to share them here.  Not all directly food- nor LA-related, though food certainly weaves through these stories.  I'm calling it Real Talk, though in a less lofty moment, I could just as well have called it Better Living Through Google Docs.   Here we go.

I've been hearing people talk about gratitude a lot lately.  I think this bodes well for society (or whatever overeducated, overprivileged, over-yoga'ed, over-TED-talked corner of society I happen to run in).  We're rising above the mundane.  We're working on big ideas.

Gratitude has been a theme on this blog since the early days.  Some moments I had it, and with good reason.  Some days I struggled to get it back, remembering how overflowingly amazing those moments felt.

As we moved into 2014, I kept catching wind of people intentionally taking time to write down things they were grateful for.  Diana talked often about how jotting down a few things she was grateful at the end of each day helped her keep perspective in the rocky year that followed a pretty brutal breakup.  Chris shared lists on Facebook throughout Thanksgiving day -- of writers, food people, community leaders -- closing each with the simple hashtag "thankful".  His lists resonated and made me thankful, too.  Gabe felt the power of practicing gratitude as he navigated the shaky waters of moving across the country, quitting his job, and finding his own way.

And then there was Danielle, a person whose wise words have seen me through some rocky days of my own.  At the start of 2014, she looked back on a year that included a new husband, a new career, and baby Oliver, born on Thanksgiving day, and she tied these riches to her own gratitude practice, which she started two years back: "I don't mean to suggest that I believe being grateful can get me what I want, but rather that I can see that being grateful deepened my capacity for joy, helping me to allow in people and events that I would have felt undeserving of before."

Compelling.  So I tried it.  Google Doc.  A few items a night.  It's awesome.  And takes like 30 seconds.   I started off 2014 in amazing spirits, mostly because I was so incredibly happy that no-good, very bad, awful 2013 was over (though I could easily talk about the many profound ways in which that terrible year was in fact, great).  My year has been rich so far:  so many wonderful moments.  I do believe that taking a second to remember this every day has kept me on a path of happiness.  I'm excited to see where it leads.

I'm going to leave you with some highlights from the last couple months of gratitude.  After all this lofty talk, you should probably know how inane this list can be.  Don't judge.

1. naps.  naps.  naps.
2. there is a werewolf howling outside right now. i am inside.
3. dates, even bad dates, are funny.
4. health!  yaaaaayyyy!
5. the good feeling of actually being in my city. i love walking.
6. so so so so thankful that mom and dad have each other.  my god.
7. i took a dive, and it totally paid off.
8. the fb page and how wonderful it keeps getting.
9. beyonce.
10. in a minute i’m going to the trails cafe, where there is free wifi.  in the woods.
11. my friends are amazing.  they are all so smart, and introspective, and involved, and supportive, and understanding, and interested.  amazing amazing.
12. avocado on wheat toast with a farmer’s market fried egg, flaky salt, and tapatio.
13. cousins.
14. the deliciousness of kogi everything, and the fact that we can have kogi and chego anytime we want.  it’s better than having like, the mona lisa, or the sagrada familia.
15. my poor sister, who listens to me whine all the time.
16. the awesome current hair sitch.
17. time bank.  serendipity.  the glory of LA.  echo park lake.
18. that carolyn is ok, and that takashi is so cute and squishy.
19. going out, but then coming home.

Do you have any gratitude practices?  I'd love to hear about them.

Announcements, Announcements, Announcements!

(You're totally singing the song now, aren't you?)

Hi friends!  Let's discuss some exciting bloggy bookkeeping things, shall we?  Boring, yes, but if you get to the end, you get a prize.

1. I'm very excited to tell you that All Kinds of Yum is now part of the Daily Meal Culinary Content Network.  A couple weeks ago, I got a nice email with the subject "We Love Your Content", because clearly someone intuited how easily I am swayed by flattery.  From there, I was easily sold:  it's a group of great blogs around the country, all tied together by thedailymeal.com.  I'm thrilled by the chance to gain feedback through the group, and hope to bring some new eyes to this space and more voices to the conversation we have here.  And as you're seeing already, it's motivating me to spend more time here.  Good thing.  Here's hoping it lasts.  You'll see the Daily Meal's footer at the bottom of the page.  If you ever get bored with my blahblahblah, just click through for tons of delicious reading and viewing material.  
2. Lots of link cleanup.  Now the links to the right point to pages I actually read.  Today, in 2014.  Cleaning house, see. Click around -- lots of good stuff from people I've grown to love.
3. All Kinds of Yum has a Facebook page!  Horray!  Huzzah!  I'm super excited about it.  Throughout the week, I see so many things I want to share with you -- restaurant news, awesome LA stuff, sweet food art -- so many things.  Things that inspire me, and that hopefully inspire you, too.  Just as I believe that the real power of food is the way it connects people, I kind of dream that the page can be a place where food connects people, too -- through the conversation of the future, Facebook comments.  I encourage you to join in.  Like the page right over here.

And on a serious note, I love this time of year -- everyone is filled with so much hope and potential, so much motivation and positive energy.  2013 has been so crazy for so many people that it almost makes me believe in unlucky numbers (Almost, but not.)  I was pretty absent here in last year.  I tried to write once this summer, but the end result was so depressing that I couldn't bear to post it.  I mean, I was writing through tears.  I've had my share of ups and downs this year, but the end result has been deep awe and serious gratitude.  There were a few weeks in September when I couldn't stop saying to myself, over and over, "Everything is amazing."  It is.  

I'm super excited to be back writing here, and I'm deeply grateful (like, kind of to a psychopathic degree) for every single click, every comment, every share.  It means a great deal to me.  I wish each and every one of you a very happy new year.  Here's to a 2014 filled with slow peaceful time with nature; moments of buzzing ecstasy; unexpected surprises; challenges to keep us aware, alive, and grateful; sparkly connections with old friends and new; soul-satisfying food and drink throughout it all; and most of all, love.  Everything is amazing.

Oh! The prize:

it's a cat.  dressed as a shark.  chasing a duck. on a roomba.

Truly, everything is amazing.

links links links!

Sometimes (and by 'sometimes', I mean every single day), there is so much amazingness on the internet that I'm overwhelmed with the task of keeping up.  Here are some awesome things I've found recently.


A Cross-stitched Skillet:  Would you like some embroidered toast with that?  (Note:  Colossal is one of the best blogs ever.  Art and design, excellently curated, always awesome.)

Anissa in Iran: We talked a bit about Anissa Helou's videos of breadbakers in Iran.  She's posted quite a few more gems from her time there.  So much good stuff.  (Also, her Saveur spread is incredible:  beautiful photos, lots of stories, and a book's worth of recipes.)

this LA Times article: I suppose an article about the trials and tribulations of being Bill Chait, a top LA restaurant entrepreneur, is interesting to some folks, but the real nugget in this article (to me) is hidden in the middle of page 2: There are plans to replace the Louise's on Hillhurst with something called Mess Hall: "higher energy, simpler food, with a modern twist."  2 blocks from my apartment in Los Feliz!  Woop woop!

Bon Iver's 'Towers' video: The music of Bon Iver has had my heart for a couple years now.  I couldn't tell you what his lyrics are about, but the perfectly blended harmonies and twangy acoustic guitar make for a sound evocative of cold places, quiet rivers, sturdy old cabins, grizzled faces, wary smiles.  The video for 'Towers', from his newest, eponymous album captures all of that.  (PS: Think of this video when Pixar's Brave comes out and you see the gorgeous short, La Luna, that opens for it: to me, anyway, there are strange little parallels.)

Vermont introduces monumental GMO labeling legislation:  Hell yeah, Vermont!  Rest of US, please take note.  This is huge. 

Banksy on advertising:  What he says is absolutely right, and really important to remember. 

The LowLine: Were it to exist, the Lowline would sort of be the upside down cousin to Chelsea, New York's awesome High Line park.  An indoor, underground park, built in an old trolley terminal on the Lower East Side, using solar technology to to generate enough light to grow trees.  This makes me love the world.  (Watch the video!) 

Little red cake:  Apollinas makes cakes that are inspired by dresses (and sometimes shoes!), and they are amazing.  Here is a Valentino little red dress in cake form.

Baking Bread In Iran

UPDATE: In the last 8 hours (1-9am Los Angeles time), this tiny blog has gotten over 800 hits.  Unheard of for the blog, thrilling for the blogger.  Save a few exceptions, they are all coming from Facebook, and from all over the world.  I'm unable to see who it was that posted the link on Facebook (clearly someone with a lot of friends!), and am dying to know!  Can someone post a comment or email me and let me know?!  So, so curious!!!

UPDATE 2: A kind anonymous commenter clued me in.  David Lebovitz, who writes beautifully and hilariously about his delicious life as an ex-pat in Paris, linked to this post on his Facebook page.  Clearly Mr. Lebovitz is an influental man around these circles.  I am incredibly stoked.  Thanks for the post, and best of luck on the kitchen remodel!

And to those of you who are stopping by for the first time, welcome!  Wish I could pour each of you a cup of tea!
---

When I talk to adults who grew up in Iran, the memory of warm bread, fresh from the noonva, or baker, always comes up.  It's one of those little luxuries that supermarket culture has thrown to the wayside here in the states, but in Iran, bread is still taken quite seriously.  There are just certain ways with Persian bread -- tearing off pieces of the thin lavash that's laid underneath skewers of kabob right off the grill, yellow with saffron and saturated with the rich, seasoned juices from the meat; or splitting open a piece of warm, sesame-specked barbari, spreading it with sarshir, Persian clotted cream, and a spoonful of homemade strawberry preserves -- that you simply aren't going to achieve with your old Wonder bread.  There's also rich and slightly sweet shirmal, taftoon, lightly spiced with saffron, and sangak, with its yummy bits of  char and sprinkling of nigella seeds.
Anissa Helou, a food writer I was first introduced to via her beautiful Mediterranean Street Food cookbook years ago, has a great blog that exposes little bits of the world of Middle Eastern food that we'd probably never be privy to without her.  (She also features a Belly Dancer of the Month, so obviously, she has my heart.)  Today's post tells us about a story she's written for the March issue of Saveur on Iranian food (you can bet I'll be picking this up), and she included a couple videos of Iranian bakers in action.  It's worth checking out: I love how fluidly and rhythmically the three men in the top clip move through each other's space, just like interconnected cogs in a machine.

--
Thanks to mohammadali and kamshots for the photos.

A New Look!

I'm really excited about the little housecleaning tear that went on here.  I loved the look that lovely Heather at CheekyDesign had done a few years back, but minimalist urges came creeping in, and I wanted a clean, white space where I could post larger photos.  The header image is of my own kitchen.  I have a lot of love for that particular spot as it's where, over the past couple years, I've come to discover that I can pretty much create anything I want.  Grab a jar from the shelf up top, pull a bowl from the hook, and turn a bunch of ingredients into something that brings smiles and nourishment, and keeps my apartment feeling like a home (Beloved tea and coffee also start here).  On the best days, it feels like my studio, and I try to share that here.  So, please, make yourself at home!

I trust Thom Yorke when it comes to matters of the heart.  He tells us that true love waits, and if you're reading this after my 3-month disappearance from this place, I appreciate that you're still here!  On this Valentine's Day, thanks for waiting; thanks for true loving me.  I totally true love you back.

what can i say?

totally planning to write last night. scheduled it in for days, had even made tea.  there would be fascinating stories about our istanbul food tour, and how i've brought turkish eating home.  but then comes a "wanna meet for a glass of wine?" IM.  so i went to covell, and had some rare fancy rosé: 10 cases in the whole US, and 2 of them are at covell. the unicorn of rosés.

i mean...it's summer!  can you blame me?

back with real stuff soon, i promise!

--

thanks to Robert S. Donovan for the photo

On getting your gratitude back

I was having a conversation in my head last night, that I planned to have with my traveling companion -- an old good friend -- when I saw her: "what do you hope to get out of this trip?"  As soon as the thought came, I turned it around on myself.

This post is more for me than you.  These thoughts were so good, I didn't want them to just fly away.  I'm putting it in writing to hold myself accountable.  I want this trip to be about getting my gratitude back.  

In 2003, I traveled to Greece, and to this day I still think it's my favorite place I've ever been to.  Our days were simple and amazing.  After breakfast in our modest hotel room of market-bought bread, jam, and the most amazing apple juice I've ever had, we'd spend most mornings on a bus to a beach -- one day a red-sand one we'd have to hike down to, the next day a quiet white-sand shore with warm water and perfect waves.  We'd spend the day at the beach, then bus it back to Mykonos town in the afternoon.  I remember on one bus ride back through empty, rural parts of the island, I found myself ignoring the conversations going on around me, and staring out the window.  As I quietly looked out at the small, sleepy towns, the simple but beautiful white and blue buildings, I realized how lucky I was.  As I wrote in my travel journal on that day, "I am so grateful for my amazing life."

These days, I've been spinning.  Between the ups and downs of work and the ups and downs of life, not to mention an ever-present internet that manages to fill every spare moment with the addictive anticipation that comes with refresh-refresh-refresh, sometimes those thoughts of gratitude -- even though I know deep down they are true -- don't quite stick.  I love being the grateful, amazed version of me, though. 

I'm excited to be going to a place where I really don't know what to expect.  I'm excited to be pulled out of a world whose daily details I have totally mastered, and be thrown into the polar opposite of that stagnancy:  new streets, new language, new everything.  I do think that our accommodations and plans will lead to encounters with a broad set of people, and this I have the highest hopes for:  nothing really gets me buzzing like that first conversational connection with someone interesting.

So, that's my hope, the raw ingredients are there, but I don't think I can force it.  My plan is to be as open as I can be -- eyes, heart, and mind -- take everything in, and make sure I have some quiet time to let it all sink in and do its magic.  When I come back, who knows, maybe I'll be a changed person.  More likely though, I'll be the 'me' I've been all along, grateful for my amazing life.

Our Bake Sale Family

The fifth annual No Cookie Left Behind bake sale came and went, and I'm still trying to make sense of it.  Five years in, we thought we could make this happen with our eyes closed, but actually we learned a few things this time around.  It was awesome, and a little humbling.

A personal lesson was that as much as I try every year to get an earlier start, it just doesn't work that way.  We kicked things off with an amazing brunch chez Heather Taylor, but we let it go slack from there.  Three months out, bake sale work is a slow slog, executed in a vacuum:  you get little feedback, and so there's not much to push you forward.  We're busy people.  Momentum is impossible.  But in those last couple weeks, the frenetic push to get everything done starts getting results, and that feels electric.

This year's bake sale was a little mellow.  It fell on Father's Day, so a lot of people were previously engaged.  And though we tweeted, blogged, and promoted like crazy, we didn't get the 'big press' that we usually rely on:  for various reasons outside our control, we weren't featured on Daily Candy or Good Food this year.  So, we learned.  Those things do make a difference.  Now we know.  (But don't worry: our network never lets us down and as of yesterday, we already have a connection to Evan Kleiman for next year!)

Despite the quiet though, it was a really nice bake sale.  We are so proud to have made over $3100 for Share Our Strength, and any baked goods left over from the day went straight to Hollywood's own Covenant House (note:  there is no better sight than a thuggish-looking teen walking down the street licking the frosting off a pink cupcake).

Year five brought us back a little.  Though we didn't get quite as many of those little thrills from strangers who'd heard about us from sources we didn't even know about (or New York Times photographers covering our bake sale for a story), we had a solid showing of "our people."  Friends stopped by to drop off homemade jams, or some very special popcorn, and stayed the whole afternoon, cafe-sitting and peoplewatching.  Others ate the day away, then left with a shopping bag full of even more desserts.  Our crew's enormous network of friends and family made up the bulk of the crowd, and it was really fun to see a slew of familiar faces, smiling as they enjoyed sweets, sunshine, and each other's company, all thanks to something we created.

But you know, one reason there were so few strangers is the bake sale itself.  Just as we set out, we've built a community.  In our first year, back when I was living in Miracle Mile, a new storefront was going up a block or two from me:  Kiss My Bundt Bakery.  With no knowledge of the business, I blindly sent a message to the email address on their site.  The response I got, from Chrysta Wilson, the proprietor of the shop, crystallized the vision for No Cookie Left Behind:  she came to baking from being a community organizer, and was grateful to find a way to give back.  It was that word: community. 

Chrysta donated that first year, and has every year since.  She hung out for a while this year, selling incredibly moist red velvet bundts in a jar.  So did Meg Taylor of Large Marge Sustainables.  Though her delicious catering company has blown up and is now craft services to the stars (including feeding the crew of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution -- a compliment if I've ever heard of one), she brought her amazing citrus herb shortbread as she has since year one, and stayed to chat.  Two days before the bake sale, I emailed Elizabeth Belkind of the wildly successful CakeMonkey Bakery.  Back in 2006, there was no CakeMonkey: only the dozens of dulce de leche cupcakes that Elizabeth made for No Cookie Left Behind.  This year, her business partner Lisa heeded the call, and I started the morning with a pick-up at their Burbank kitchen, wowed by the incredible smells and the trays and trays of cubed butter in their fridge! I like to think we've had CakeMonkey sweets at the bake sale since before CakeMonkey existed.  And of course there's Tai Kim.  Tai!  What can we say about this man who allows us to wreack havoc on his ice cream shop's tranquil patio year after year, then contributes generously to our cause to boot.  We love him.

And our community grows!  Between the raffle and the spread, we've brought in so many new friend-contributors over the years:  I was thrilled to meet Lauren Soloff of The Granola Project after crushing hard on her amazing kitchen when Heather did a visit for her blog (though I was more thrilled when I dumped the sesame-date-cocoa-nib granola I got at the bake sale in with some greek yogurt, cottage cheese, blood orange marmalade (another bake sale find), fresh apricot, and flax meal for breakfast yesterday.  Goodness).  Heather also introduced us to Full Moon Pickles, and I can't wait to try their Lady Marmalade, a concoction of meyer lemons and fresh ginger.  She also connected us to Holly Flora, who has been helping to make our tables beautiful with their so-special flower arrangements.  Our own Peggy contacted her friend Danielle, and a sweet hook-up occurred:  pastry chef Danielle Keene of Bittersweet Treats happens to be a Top Chef Just Desserts finalist, and kindly donated free seats in her dessert classes held on a family farm in Malibu to our raffle.  This year also brought in Cafecito Orgánico:  they've taken over the cafe next to Scoops, and were happy to caffeinate our sweets-loving crowd.  (It's all connected, by the way: the founder of Cafecito is a college friend of my friend Juan, they used to provide the beans for that old Kiss My Bundt storefront on West Third, Large Marge used to make food for this shop, and they provide my own morning coffee every Saturday at the Silver Lake Farmer's Market.  LA is not so large when there are bake sales.)  Our beloved friends at Golden State Cafe donated to the raffle for the second year running, and co-owner Jason Bernstein sent his girlfriend and his mother to buy up sweets while he worked.  See?  Family.

my personal take of jams and granola

This year, the sisters of SporkFoods were busy getting Jenny married off (the same Jenny who coined the name No Cookie Left Behind in my living room five years ago), so our vegan representation weighed a little heavy on my mind.  Then I met a smiley vegan named Amy at a party, asked if she had any leads, and an email later, Jesse and Mallori of JAM Vegan Bakery were standing outside Scoops with some of the most beautiful cupcakes we've ever seen.

That's pretty much how our bake sale goes:  if we know you, we will put you to use.  And trust us, you will like it.   Because once you're in, you're part of our No Cookie Left Behind family.  We may be a little dysfunctional, but let me tell you, our family reunions are something else.

--

First two photos by Alex De Cordoba via LA In Bloom, next two by Amelia Morris.

Photography Therapy: A Cry For Help

They say that obscenity is the crutch of the inarticulate motherfucker.  As for me, I can put words together fine, but I can't take a picture worth a damn.  My crutch?  Hipstamatic.

Seriously though, can we talk this through?  I'm having an issue.  See, I am MTV generation through and through.  I have the shortest attention span of them all.  So I totally get that, for a food blog to actually be read, you could write like David Foster Wallace himself (still makes me sad), but you better have awesome pictures.  Hello, it's called food porn.  And, the fact is, people are actually doing professional-quality photography out there.  I look at blogs like Gastronomy or Sinosoul, and they go to restaurants, with their unpredictable and often low light, with the stigma of being that guy taking pictures of his food, with the fact that you are actually there to enjoy your food by ingesting it, before it gets cold (and clearly they do), and yet their photos are mouthwatering -- delicious things bouncing off the screen in vibrant technicolor, fancy depth of field focusing your eye on just the right bit, blurring out all the rest.

I have a little Canon point-and-shoot.  (Before that, I had a little Sony point-and-shoot, which I think I may have liked better, but then I got mugged.)  And my photo processing consists of little more than hitting the 'Enhance' button in iPhoto.  Sad, but it's all I know.  My only saving grace is that my kitchen at home gets quite bright.  Now you know why there are never dinner posts around here.

I am very interested in improving this situation.  I would love nothing more than a dslr camera, the know-how to wield it honorably, and the photoshop (or whatever) skills to take its photos to the next level.  But I don't even know where to begin.  Furthermore, there is the catch-22 of the inability to learn how to use  a dslr without having one, but the hesitation to commit to a very expensive piece of machinery without the foggiest notion of what to do with it.  On top of this, I guess there's this whole lens thing?  Evidently, you shell out for a fancy camera, but you can't actually use it without a lens as well?  This is a strange and confusing world.

So, you can see that I need some help here.  I'm standing at the bottom of the hill, looking way up.  I need a mentor, I need handholding, I need advice.  I need a photography sensei.  Tell me people, what's a photographically-remedial food blogger to do?

In the meantime, I have discovered Hipstamatic.  It's a cop-out, and it's amazing.  A 2-buck iphone app that takes my crappy photography skills, and seals them over with its own flavor of untouchable I-meant-to-do-that coolness.  It eschews the invasive world of gigapixels and high-def and gives us the beautiful retro-sexy blur that we crave.  I know it's splashed all over facebook so much it's a cliche, but the fact is, it's pretty awesome.

So for now, you're gonna see some Hipsta-shots in these parts.  Because it makes my blog pretty.  But, really, I want to learn the ways of the true masters.  Someone, please, show me the way.

--
Incidentally, if we're going to talk LA food blogs with amazing photography, we really need to mention eat drink & be merry -- he really elevates it.  For one, I can attest that his Sunset Junction photos are a lot more beautiful than the real thing.  And he does all these actual professional photo shoots at local restaurants, butcher shops, bars.  Lovely stuff.

in 2011, watch this space

 a lot happens in a year (i mean, also nothing happens, but i guess you just need to zoom in more closely).

one thing that happens: over time, you selectively forget how much of a tedious pain it is to write, re-write, revise, check links, research, spell-check, take photos, process, crop, edit, upload, format, then do it again, multiple times a week. and then there's all the dishes to be washed.

but the fact is, there's a reason i forget. because so many little, sweet things happened in this year that i wished i could share here, if only i still blogged.

guess what, tannaz? you still blog.

i still blog!

i say this with trepidation. we'll see how it goes. i cleaned up a little around here, and like i said, there are so many little things that went undocumented:

- Discovering the Silver Lake Farmer's Market, and with it, my kitchen.  Finally fell into a groove of buying produce, enjoying having things set up just so in my kitchen, cooking and experimenting, and (in the rare days when I have time to slow down), doing it right.  You should have some yu choi.

- Impromptu tangerine mulled wine for two on a wintry night in a couchless apartment.  It was a triumph.  Not elaborating here.

- Buttered kimchi chow at Chego.  Street-bro hospitality, LA-ethnic fusion, and explosive flavors.  Dave made me a mixtape (J Live!) expressly for the trip.  Fitting.  Roy Choi is a genius, and we are lucky to have his contribution to our city's culture. (A-Frame similarly cozydelicious.  This food is love.)

- I re-christened myself: Brown Sugar Shorty. If I were ever to enter some sort of blogging secret society (as if one would ever let me in), this would be my codename.

- I started a little edible garden on my balcony!  It's tiny, but having basil, marjoram, parsley, and mint on hand at all times, not to mention the occasional strawberry or tomato, is major.  A lot of plants gave their life for me to get to this point.  But the major thanks go to Marta Teegen and her fantastic container gardening class.  Take her classes.  Buy her book.  Go to her market in Echo Park.  (Get the fancy French blue cheese.)

- Two amazing bake sales came and went.  In addition to our regular annual No Cookie Left Behind bake sale in June, we also held Cookies Without Borders, a wildly successful emergency sale to benefit the earthquake relief effort in Haiti.  We brought together droves of bakers, bloggers, and with the addition of a raffle, tons of local business too, and all in all, we raised over $9700.  Tremendous.

- Bar Covell!  I welcomed my new favorite bar to the neighborhood.  Over and over and over again.  Wanna go?

- The endless search for the new hood's perfect cappuccino (it's important) only led me to the bar at Vinoteca Farfalla, at 6 o'clock in the morning, while watching Lando Calrissian's -- er, Landon Donovan's heroics on the USA World Cup team.  Still searching for my regular spot.  Damn good cappuccino, though.

- I walked over to Little Dom's as many times as I possibly could justify (including today!).

- I, along with other members of the UAFTP (United Angelenos for Transcontinental Playgoing, obvs) discovered the best bar in NYC, Orient Express.  We also 'discovered' Balthazar, and Shake Shack, and the amazing High Line, and even more amazing, Prune.

- The search for matzoh cake meal on the day before Passover started nearly led to tears.  Toto, we ain't in Fairfax anymore.

- 11 in 11!  The dream of the Metro edition of 11 in 11 finally came true.  Over 11 spots in 11 hours, all on the Red and Gold lines: amazing goat stew, breakfast burritos the size of a baby (but tastier), slaw dogs, deep fried everything, unmentionable parts of cows, beer and wurst and mochi, oh my, all ending with margaritas downtown.

- A meal at Test Kitchen -- the wonky experimental vibe, running into friends, exquisite flavors, friendly/yummy bar situation, and an insane strawberry creme brulee parfait -- reminded me of the importance of getting out of the office, and affirmed everything I believe about food (sometimes I forget). (Walter Manzke was behind the burners that night, for those keeping track of such things.)

So that's what happened in 2010.  Camera battery is charging as we speak.  2011 starts tomorrow, and guys, I still blog.

Reminder: Eat My Blog Bake Sale Tomorrow!

Friends, you may have noticed that we love bake sales here just a little bit. An awesome one, called Eat My Blog, is happening tomorrow, at Zeke's Smokehouse in West Hollywood, organized and stocked by LA food bloggers! I am a lagger and thus am not contributing baked goods, but you can bet I'll be there buying, eating, and supporting the LA Food Bank. These deliciously organized blogger-bakers have posted a menu! So I can sit at my desk and drool longingly over rum cakes, butterscotch budino (oh, baby), lemon curd thumbprint cookies, orange and saffron caramels... There appear to be many vegan and gluten-free offerings, and to balance it out the virtue, an inordinate number of bacon-related sweets. Nice. See you there!

Gwyneth Hearts Treat Street, and other Bake Sale Bites

Dude, bake sales are blowing up.

First, Gwyneth Paltrow, in her weekly how-to-have-a-beautiful-life newsletter Goop (I know. It's like Gwyneth meets Martha. Sometimes silly and over-the-top and way too un-self-aware, and sometimes totally in line with the things I love and feel strongly about. Like Gjelina.), features Treat Street, an awesome neighborhood bake sale that crops up in various corners of Silver Lake to stuff our faces with delicious sweets and good vibes. One of the girls behind Treat Street is Crystal Meers, the editor of DailyCandy LA. Crystal has supported our own No Cookie Left Behind bake sale as long as we've had it -- featuring it in DailyCandy and baking giant piles of cookies for us. Miss Gwyneth is smitten with Crystal and her TNT cookies, and frankly, I can't blame her.

No Cookie Left Behind was nominated for an award! Well, technically, I was nominated for one of Share Our Strength's community leader awards -- but seriously it's about the bake sale. This was so completely unexpected and wonderful, but I'm thrilled that people are recognizing what an amazing thing we created with our bake sale. Guys, did you know that of over 7600 Great American Bake Sales that were held this year, No Cookie Left Behind was number nine in funds raised?! So proud. I'm off to Washington DC tonight for Share Our Strength's Conference of Leaders. I can't imagine the bake sale inspiration that awaits me!


And finally, EAT MY BLOG. A handful of LA bloggers are hosting yet another bake sale, this time to benefit our own Los Angeles Regional Food Bank. This one will take place on Saturday, December 5, 10am - 4pm, at Zeke's Smokehouse in West Hollywood. It's "an opportunity for the blogging community to give back to those in need,” and you know I like that. Get all the deets at gastronomyblog!

okay.

so i went away there for a bit, eh? once the guilt of not writing wore off, i thought it was the end of this little blog. now that i sit down though, i really enjoy the feeling of writing here again. but, we should talk about some things. when i first started this blog, i was pretty clueless. i had no concept of the community of bloggers that already existed here in los angeles, i didn't really have a direction, i couldn't really take a decent photograph. i just knew i had some things on my brain that i needed to unload on, well, whoever might listen. things like the glory of maple syrup and chinese tea mug technology, the etymology of various sausage words, or the cozy wine bar down the street. and oddly enough, people started to listen.

but then a few things happened. first, facebook happened. anything i've ever wanted to express could now be broadcast to 500 people at the click of a button. additionally, i discovered eater. their thorough, informed reporting of the minutiae of the los angeles restaurant scene made my sporadic musings about random local haunts seem irrelevant and well, kind of pointless. (of course, this is before they let go of lesley. these days, eater's just another tinny voice, but now we have grub street and squid ink to fill the gap.)

at the same time, my own perspective changed. sharing the fun events that i am lucky enough to be a part of was initially really exciting, but now, spouting details of my humble weeknight meals seems a little too my-what-a-good-boy-am-i (thought i gotta say -- the gruyere biscuits with mushroom gravy that i made for dinner the other night were pretty damn blog-worthy).

and then at some point, people started looking to me as an authority on restaurants. i enjoy dining out now and then, but i really try to eat at home as much as possible (i'm really into eating at home -- mine or yours -- right now). and i'd like fancy restaurants to stay a special thing. and the prospect of saying something bad about a restaurant in a public forum seems like too much for me -- in most cases, i don't think i'm qualified to potentially help make or break a local business. also, i hate taking pictures in restaurants! it's weird, and ruins the moment, and they usually end up coming out bad anyway.

so, where does this leave me? well, i don't think all kinds of yum is over. i still find inspiration all the time -- though lately it's been found poring through websites like apartmenttherapy and designsponge (and particularly, style-files. all those raw woods and white walls and stark spaces! too good.) more than any food blog! and amazing things -- foodish and otherwise -- continue to abound. i've yet to post about an awesome vacuum coffee maker demo with a soon-to-be household name in my now-former kitchen, nor the modern desert dreamland that is the ace hotel in palm springs, nor a recent tamalepalooza with a real mexican abuelita (and her mother!) and our own adorable little baby girl mascot -- amalita the tamalita, or the award i was nominated for (what?!) in honor of my bake sale prowess (i'm not kidding about the last one, and yes, this is amazing).

right now, though, these are lofty ambitions. i just moved, and mostly i'm spending my time doing things like letting bon iver waft through my airy living room while i just stand in the middle of the as-yet-furnitureless space, breathing slow and taking it all in. so, i have to just go with the flow on this one. i'll see you around here soon enough, and in the meantime, let's have dinner. your place or mine?

Food Blog Mashup: The All Kinds of Yum Food Marathon

A food blog mashup: two food bloggers come together to eat, meet, and take awkward photos in restaurants. One provides the premise -- that's Food Marathon, with his flights through several eateries in rapidfire succession; the other provides the location -- Fairfax Avenue, where I could offer Food Marathon a taste of my neighborhood, all within a block's walk.

Food Marathon likes to keep some anonymity on the web, so we'll refer to him as FM from here on in. Since FM already had covered West Third Street with another favorite local blogger of mine, I suggested Fairfax. And since the offerings on Fairfax lend themselves to late night noshing, we decided to make it a night owl's food marathon. In a gametime decision, we nixed Chameau, since, despite its delicious Moroccan fare, there actually is a limit to how much I can eat in one night. This left us with three stops: Canter's, Animal, and Golden State.

We met at Canter's Delicatessen, immediately got past the potential weirdness of a blind meeting over nothing but food (guess it's not that weird to us anyway), and got down to business. We ordered four items, all noteworthy for the restaurant: corned beef on rye, known as some of the best in town, the humble waffle, which LA Magazine named the best in the city in 2005, the meticulously composed fruit cup, and an egg cream -- a throwback to FM's childhood Canter's visits.

As we ate, we talked -- not just about food, though it was a popular topic. FM's made it a point to get to know as many local food bloggers as he can, and it was eye opening to me to learn what a network our city has developed over the many years. He also told me about his idea for a different kind of food mashup -- taking items from different restaurants, and combining them to make new dishes -- all while sandwiching some corned beef between a couple waffle wedges, as if to demonstrate his point.

All well and good, but it was time for the next stop. FM handed off our leftovers to a homeless guy outside Canter's, and we stepped over to the bar at Animal. It was here that our mashup would soon take on new meaning, but we didn't know that yet. What we did know was twofold: Joe's doughnuts and the bacon chocolate bar. The latter has been the talk of Animal since its opening -- the old schtick of the two dudes that are such meatheads they even put pork in their dessert. And it was all you'd expect: rich and chocolatey, with that winning salty-sweet-smokey combo. But the other dessert, Joe's doughnuts, completely stole the show. I'd had them once before, and was excited to share them with FM. And to eat them again myself -- these doughnuts are incredibly delicious. They come freshly made and warm, three fluffy orbs, in a pool of dark caramel sauce.

It was as we were leaving the restaurant that one table caught our eye for two reasons: I saw a guy I met at 11 in 11 (talk about food marathon), FM saw an old high school friend. Both were the same guy. This one table brought the mashup full circle, as social circles merged unexpectedly. FM caught up with a couple more schoolmates as I chatted with another 11 in 11 compatriot; they all mentioned their plan to go to Golden State after their dinner, and then Jon Shook, whom I'd first met through Golden State's Jason Bernstein at Animal's soft opening, came out and told us how well the restaurant was doing in the late night hours. Exactly why we were there!

We let our friends carry on with their dinner though, as we still had to get to Golden State ourselves. I walked in immediately elated: Golden State is home turf for me, and in addition to owners Jim and Jason, two of my best friends, Rachel and Nick -- Jim's brother, in town from New York to check out the new place -- were also hanging out. Though I was hoping that FM might see the place for more than his first impression of "Scoops comes west", we really couldn't eat anything substantial at this point. So, he got Scoops. And I got wine. And we chatted with my friends. Jason and FM talked shop, Jim told us the history of the Canter's fruit cup (apparently an old schoolmate of his has made a documentary on the topic), ice cream flowed, and -- I hope -- good times were had.

But eventually, every great mashup must end. FM said his goodbyes, and I hung back at Golden State a little longer. At some point the rowdy crew from Animal made their way in and a dance party ensued, with my friends and FM's friends rocking out together in the middle of the now-closed restaurant. Welcome to my neighborhood, Food Marathon. This is how we do things here.

--
Here's Food Marathon's take on the night.

Canter's Delicatessen is at 419 N. Fairfax.
Animal is at 435 N. Fairfax.
Golden State is at 426 N. Fairfax.
All of these spots are between Beverly and Melrose.

Norouz: Sabzi polo all over the world

herbs for sabzi polo: dill, parsley, chives, fenugreek

Apparently the world is hungry for sabzi polo. I'm amazed to say that in the past few days, googlers searching for "sabzi polo recipe" have landed on this blog from countries as far and wide as (ready?) Canada, UK, Finland, Norway, Netherlands, Switzerland, Australia, UAE, France, Sweden, Germany, Ireland, Romania, Denmark, Spain, Saudi Arabia, Dutch Antilles, and Turkey (phew!). Served with fish alongside, sabzi polo, basmati rice with fresh herbs, is the traditional meal for Norouz, the Persian New Year,which happens to be today. It's a green, fresh dish that is the perfect way to ring in spring.

Let me make it easy for you, googlers:

Here is my sabzi polo recipe.
And here are a couple sabzi polo photos.

my haftsinn

To those of you celebrating Norouz today, I wish you a joyous one. And to everybody, it's the first day of spring! Here's to beautiful new beginnings!