When I make burgers I like going beyond the traditional and trying different variations. Oftentimes this means stuffing them. Stuffing them with blue cheese and goat cheese have worked, but my latest attempt at stuffing them with mozzarella cheese and green garlic was less successful. I based my recipe on an epicurious recipe for Veal burgers stuffed with mozzarella cheese. Alas, I used ground beef instead of veal, green garlic instead of green onions and thyme instead of sage. The result were burgers that were good, but not special. The devil may indeed be in the details, but somehow I don’t think so – so I don’t think I’ll try them again. Plus Safeway’s sale on 7% ground beef is over so I won’t be buying ground beef for a while.
Author: marga (Page 85 of 112)
This is an incredibly easy recipe for ribs with BBQ sauce, it makes delicious, succulent ribs with little work. I got it from All Recipes.com. I’ve used both country style ribs and spare ribs for it, and I’m sure it’d work just as well with every kind of ribs. I’ve always made it with two bottles of BBQ sauce (my favorite is Jack Daniels) though I think next time I’ll try using just 1, adding more water and boiling it down afterwards. As it is, there is too much BBQ sauce left over which seems like a waste. The original recipe is for 2 1/2 lbs of ribs, but I use it for whichever size package of ribs I buy.
- a slab of ribs
- 1 tsp. salt
- black pepper to taste.
- 1 onion, qurtered
- 2 bottles BBQ sauce
- water
Salt & pepper the ribs. Place them in a large pot along with the onion. Cover them with the BBQ sauce and enough water so that they are submerged. Bring to a boil, turn down the heat and simmer uncovered for 40 minutes. Remove the ribs and boil off excess water from the sauce.
Oil the grill and preheat it for high heat. Grill the ribs, basting and turning frequently, for about 20 minutes.
It’s summer so it’s grilling time, and that means burgers. Or at least it does when ground beef is on sale at the local supermarket. Yesterday I made burgers staffed with goat cheese – they were delicious. All you have to do is season the ground beef with salt and pepper, make a thin patty (about 1/8 lb), put a slice of goat cheese in the middle and cover it with another thin patty. You then bring the edges together and flattent he whole thing as much a you can. Remember, burgers shrink when you cook them.
I used ground beef with 7% fat (the goat cheese will add moisture, so you don’t need a higher fat meat) and herbed goat cheese. I served them with the usual accrutements and condiments, I particularly liked ripe avocado on mine, it softened the flavor of the goat cheese.
Give them a try!
Mike has finally returned a whole batch of restaurant reviews (19!) which I’ve written over the last few months. They are:
- Aslam’s Rasoi an Indian restaurant in the Mission focuses on fresh ingredients but needs more confidence with its curries.
- Buon Appetito in Hayward offers pretty good Italian food at reasonable prices (imagine that!). Definitely a “must try” place.
- Chef’s Experience China Bistro in Hayward serves standard Chinese food is served with a flair in stylish surroundings.
- Chez Panisse, the venerated Berkeley institution met our expectations for a good yet uninspired meal with fresh produce bursting with flavor.
- Dick’s Restaurant and Lounge is a classic independent coffeeshop serving coffeeshop fare in San Leandro.
- Dolci Amore delivers mediocre food at sky-high prices in Castro Valley. One wonders how it can stay open.
- The English Rose Tea Room in Pleasanton is feminine and frilly but just can’t brew a good cup of tea.
- Filippos, a mediocre Italian restaurant with a mediocre brunch in Berkeley.
- The Fish Hopper in Monterey offers an incredible view of the sea (otters!) and some damn good fish & chips.
- Manresa. According to Restaurant magazine it was one of the 50 best restaurants in the world in 2004 (but not 2005). We were disappointed by less than imaginative food and terrible service.
- New Hong Kong Restaurant An updated review of our choice for Chinese delivery
- Priya Indian Cuisine on University in Berkeley has beautiful menus, but not much more to distinguish it.
- Red Kwali a Malay restaurant in Newark, tries hard but fails both in food and ambiance.
- Super Burgers is a burger & sandwich joint in Washington Manor serving truly yucky burgers. Best to avoid.
- Sushi Musashi in San Leandro offers mediocre Japanese food in less than stellar surroundings.
- Taste of India is the one Indian – or for that matter, ethnic – restaurant on I-5 between the Bay Area and LA. It’s OK but expensive.
- Thai Satay is the only Thai restaurant in San Leandro and, unfortunately, pretty inconsistent.
- An update to my review of Vo’s Restaurant, a wonderful Vietnamese Bistro in San Leandro
- Zocalo – I’ve written a review of my favorite coffeehouse.
We spent a couple of days driving down Highway 1 last week. I’d meant to try a couple of nice restaurants along the way, but it didn’t turn out like that. We left late, and had some leftover stew before we left so we weren’t really hungry for lunch until mid-afternoon. By then we didn’t want to ruin our appetites for dinner, so we stopped at Nepenthe, a restaurant complex in Big Sur.
Nepenthe had been recommended as a place to go for a great view. And indeed, the view from the restaurant – in particular the dehind the restaurant – was wonderful. Of course, you have to pay for that view and Nepenthe’s Californian menu is quite expensive. Sandwiches are in the low teens, entrees in the twenties and even a basket of fries is $7. We got a goat cheese & toast appetizer ($12, I think) which was just that, thin slices of toast served with a roasted garlic and a little bowl of warm goat cheese. It was surprisingly good. I had a coke (flat!) and Mike had a regular margarita, which was “nice and strong.” In all, we spent a wonderful hour or so hanging out there.
Nepenthe also has an open-air cafe and a gift shop, both pretty expensive. Hot chocolate was about $4 while pastries $3.50, if I well remember. Alas, it’s a level lower than the restaurant and the view is not nearly as impressive.
Nepenthe
Highway One
Big Sur, CA
(831) 667-2345
http://www.nepenthebigsur.com/
Later we stopped at a convenience store for some snacks – prices were about twice as much as in regular convenient stores so if driving through this area you may want to bring snacks with you.
We were staying in Cambria for the night, and I had gotten a couple of recommendations of places to eat – but decided to take on the evening tour of the Hearst Castle instead. That gave us only time to grab some fast food and the first place we found serving some was Medusas Taqueria on Main street in Cambria. Both Mike and I got super burritos, his with chicken and mine with carne asada. They were just OK. Mike complained that the chicken was shredded (but that was probably his fault for not ordering pollo asado), and also that the meat and beans were too hot while the other ingredients too cold. My complaint was that the meat wasn’t particularly tasty.
Medusas Taqueria
1053 Main St.
Cambia, CA
927-0135
Mon.-Sat. 11-8
The next morning we had a breakfast of surprisingly good English muffins with butter and jam at the hostel where we stayed, followed by an OK ham and cheese croissant at the French Corner Bakery. Then we were off to explore the southern part of Highway 1.
For lunch we stopped at the Rock n Roll diner in Oceano, a restaurant situated in two railroad cars. The cars are surprisingly roomy, one has double and single booths while the other one includes a larger family table and has a TV on. The cars are decorated in a 50’s motif with framed vintage ads and pictures. The menu features standard diner items plus Greek specialties (don’t ask me why) and prices are on the high side. The food, unfortunately, was also diner quality. They won’t cook burgers below medium-well-done, which is a sin in my book. Mike, who is no fan of rare meat anyway, had the BBQ burger and he thought it was fine. The accompanying onion rings were also average. I had a gyro and wasn’t as pleased. The three meat slices had the consistency of reconstituted meat and no lamb flavor whatsoever. The gyro had an overwhelming amount of lettuce, a couple of pieces of chopped tomato and a not very tasty tzatziki sauce. The accompanying fries were fine, though.
Rock ‘n Roll Diner
1300 Railroad St.
Oceano, CA
(805) 473-2040
We made it to my parents in time for dinner, so that was the end of our eating adventures on Highway 1.
Cafe Sorriso opened about a month ago in the old Lateda location, in front of the downtown Safeway in San Leandro. Lateda was much loved in this community, but it had to close after the owners increased the rent to impossible levels. I’m not sure how the economics will work for Cafe Sorriso – the sad fact is that cafes in San Leandro (save, I imagine, for Starbucks) are not big money makers.
The new Cafe Sorriso looks wonderful. On the outside, it’s benefited from a coat of orange paint that makes it look sunny and friendly. I’m partial to that particular yellow-orange color, so I may be biased here. Inside it looks brand new. The “kitchen”/food preparation area has shrank a bit in size and is now composed of brand new impecable stainless steel surfaces – while a new counter has appeared making an L-shape with the old one, where they feature the day’s pastries and take your order. Back there there is a wall with miniature tea pots and small mugs – I thought they were just for decoration, but apparently that’s what you get if you order tea. I didn’t pay attention to their tea offerings this time, but I certainly will in the future (which reminds me – I have to make reservations for our April and May monthly teas!).
The rest of the restaurant features new paint, a lot of dark wood lintels, a new fake-fireplace (but still nice) and new, stylish furniture. There are a couple of fake-leather (or cheap leather, didn’t look closely) couches with a fake-marble coffee table, and otherwise crowded tables and chairs. But everything looks very nice and comfy. Cafe Sorriso’s space is quite small, so there isn’t an area for children – but they do have a couple of toys and story books in a shelf, as well as a lot of newspapers. The sofa area is large enough that a couple of patient kids can hang out for a little while – but still close enough to the rest of the scene that it took my 4 yo no time at all to make friends with another little girl sitting nearby. Still, I’m not sure of how child friendly this space will be if we have to sit at one of the tables. I’ll report on that later.
The menu features teas and coffees – but alas, I didn’t take the time to look at those. Instead I concentrated in the half-dozen or so ‘smoothie’ offerings (including a mango lassi) and the 3 or 4 shakes (all $3.50, I think). I’m convinced that if independent coffee-makers want to stand up to Starbucks they really need to spruce up their cold drink offerings (does anyone really go to Starbucks for coffee? It’s the frapuccinos that keep them coming!). I didn’t see any Frapuccino-style drinks here (though truth be told, I was feeling hurried by the server) but the smoothies sounded yummy. I settled in a “strawberry vanilla surprise” while Kathy went for a vanilla shake. I don’t know what the “surprise” on my smoothie was, perhaps that it wasn’t really a smoothie – more like a shake with a heavy ice cream base. I saw frozen strawberries and strawberry torrani added, but I don’t know what else. The result was quite good, it reminded me of the shakes at Vo’s, though it wasn’t quite as yummy. Still, some kids at a nearby table who were also savoring it seemed to like it very much and I certainly would order it again. The vanilla shake started good, but it didn’t hold up. It probably had too much ice, for at the end it was thin and tasteless. If you order it you may want to ask for “easy on the ice”.
We were hungry but none of the limited soup or sandwich options sounded appealing (of the latter they have a turkey, a veggie and a ham and cheese, I think, for about $5) so we instead went with a couple of pastries ($2 each). These were dry and not very tasty – unexcusable given that the cafe is just a few feet away from Safeway where they could easily get better quality baked goods.
In all, I’m quite pleased with Cafe Sorriso and I will go again. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to offer WI-FI.
Cafe Sorriso
1501 Washington Ave
San Leandro CA
(510)351-3605
M-Sa 6 am – 7 pm
Su 6 am – 5 pm
I was alerted by one of my readers (ok, ok, most likely someone just doing an internet search who chanced upon my site) that Phuping Thai, in Richmond, has closed. To be honest I hadn’t been to Phuping Thai in six years, since we moved to San Leandro. We had reallyliked it when we lived nearby however.
Alas, the restaurant is closed. But it does have a sister restaurant in San Francisco, Thep Phanom, that you can check out (and feel free to comment here if you like it/dislike it). We rarely go to SF anymore so it’s unlikely I’ll give it a try.
I’ve written here before about how much I like Joaquin Deli before. It serves the best sandwiches in San Leandro and offers a quirky assortment of Eastern European products. Its roasted pork shoulder is also to die for.
But Joaquin Deli is closing. The building is up for sale – and there is no guarantee the new owners will want to keep the deli. Indeed, the current owners seem to think not as their flyer says that the downstairs could be used as as “medical/dental office”.
Apparently the business is not doing badly, but the owners are just tired of running it. Still, it can’t be doing that well if they’re not trying to sell the business itself. So I’m not optimistic. I’ll just have to say goodbye to those delicious sandwiches 🙁
I like celebrating holidays. All sorts of holidays, whatever their cultural or religious significance. I’m all for partying, whatever the cause. So when St. Patrick’s day snack on me, I wanted to do something to mark it. Corned beef and cabbage is just not my style, but I had a great Irish stew at the Wilkenny Irish pub & restaurant in my home city of La Plata and I figured it’d be enjoyable to make it myself. And, as we were going to spend St. Patrick’s evening with a bunch of friends at a cabin in Truckee, I’d get to share it as well.
I found this highly rated
IRISH BEEF STEW Recipe at Epicurious.com and made some of the recommended modifications, such as using more beef, reducing the amount of beef broth, adding salt and a guiness. The stew was certainly better the next day, but I was all in all disappointed with it. It’s not that different from the stew I usually make (except that rather than broth and beer I use tomato sauce and wine, and add a bunch of different herbs and spices) but more work (in that you have to cook the veggies separately) and the results are definitely less tasty.
Oh well, at least we had a little of the Irish on St. Patrick’s day.
For months we’ve seen the “Kolbeh Restaurant” sign at the old Casa Mar
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