QM2 Comes to Town

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The Queen Mary 2 paid a visit to San Francisco on Sunday, passing through the Golden Gate at 3:52pm, that’s right, midway through the first quarter of the Super Bowl. And yet thousands lined the Golden Gate Bridge, Marin Headlands and the edges of San Francisco Bay.

From our Super Bowl Party living room window, we could see her nosing under the bridge, and went up to the roof for a better look. It was a hazy day, but we could see her.

On Monday, I went to Pier 27 for an up-close look, along with several hundred others. Then I got a shot from Telegraph Hill. Continue reading “QM2 Comes to Town” →

Doc B cooks a fish

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Doc B got a fish-poachin’ pan for Xmas, so he went down to his local fishmonger and picked him out a nice, local fish. Here she is, a two-pound Mediterranean sea bass (called loup in French, which also means “wolf”; smaller ones are called bar — sort of like “cod” and ‘scrod,” I guess), posing in the pan next to the fancy Japanese knife that I also got for Xmas, plus a bunch of Italian “palm cabbage” (more about that to come) and a very handy local fish cookin’ book. btw, those are her egg cases at bottom right in the pan. The fish guy asked if I wanted to keep them and I figured they weren’t heavy so I’d at least carry them home and figure out what to do with them later. I ended up just seasoning them and stuffing them back in the fish, natural-like, before cooking. They were extremely fluffy and rich when cooked and Valérie gobbled them up without flinching. I wasn’t as crazy about them but what do I know? I guess I was just expecting something more dense and salty.
Continue reading “Doc B cooks a fish” →

Eric Organic

eric_org.gifFear my righteous wrath.

Marc sent me and Brian an article that was published Sunday, January 28, 2007 in the SF Chronicle) titled: “Will the term organic still mean anything when it’s adopted whole hog by behemoths such as Wal-Mart?” by Jake Whitney. I don’t know who Mr. Whitney is, but I’m sick of being lectured about the sanctity of organic food by people who exhibit little understanding about what organic means, or who don’t care about what organic means because it gets in the way of taking a jab at “The Man.” Writers like Mr. Whitney do more to confuse and upset organic consumers than Wal-Mart, in my humble opinion.

Yes, I’m a big fan of Michael Pollan, and I think that he has done a lot to call attention to how ALL of our food (not just organic) is made and why we should pay attention to this. Unfortunately not everyone is as smart as Mr. Pollan (although I have a few quibbles with his latest book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma), and most writers don’t do the amount of research Pollan does. In an attempt to make similar points that Pollan makes, other writers mostly skip that bothersome research phase and jump right up on the soap box to shout out their points: The Man is BAD! Corporations are EVIL! Save poor little Organic from being kidnapped in the middle of the night and tortured! They are helped up onto that soap box by organizations (who are always ready to supply a supporting quote) who happen to raise money (ahem! solicit donations) from people who are scared by this kind of talk.
Continue reading “Eric Organic” →

Miss Ann’s Rules

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(Miss) Ann’s Snack Bar

Miss Ann has been holding court over her little ramshackle greasy spoon shack on her own for
decades. The area has seen some good times and some bad, but is now going thru a small resurgence, but is still, by all accounts, in the ghetto. Ann’s Snack Bar is south of downtown ATL on Memorial Drive, a little south and east of the MLK memorial. It is an area of detail shops, used car lots, and bargain clothing stores in dirty storefronts, with a few isolated signs of a coming gentrification. No hablo español: “yo hablo hip-hop, playa”. Yeah, it’s like that.

But don”t worry,she runs a tight ship, and everyone is welcome,and safe,at Ann’s. Its not easy to find, but the diligent will be amply rewarded.
Continue reading “Miss Ann’s Rules” →

HiLo Cuisine Continued

lafolie_roland.jpgI serve on the board of an organic farming organization, and there are members of the board who are incredulous that we charge $150 a ticket to our annual five or six course fundraising dinner which is held at one of Maine’s four-star restaurants. I always argue that many people will spend $150 a person on a dinner that is NOT expected to raise money for a non-profit organization. The same board members are also incredulous that anyone would spend more than $50 a person for a dinner…actually, we also hold an informal buffet lunch fundraiser charging $50 a person and some board members complain that THIS is too expensive.

It’s ironic, because many of these board members are also farmers who charge premium prices for their produce and don’t see anything wrong with that because they know that the price reflects the value and the work the goes into the product.

During my recent vacation in SF visiting the folks, I had a 24 hour peak food experience that illustrated how good food can cost $5 per person (Shanghai Dumpling King) and cost $25 per person (Yuet Lee) and cost $110 per person (La Folie), all of which can be justified and equally satisfying.
Continue reading “HiLo Cuisine Continued” →

KFOG RULES!

The doorbell rang about 9:30. It was the UPS guy with three packages; Carol’s mop from QVC, some mail order thing from Carol’s parents, and a box wrapped in brown paper with a KFOG mailing label and a handwritten address to me.

What the hell is that?

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I sliced off the brown paper to find a Bose Sound Dock box with a Bose Sound Dock inside! I already have a SoundDock. Maybe Brian ordered it from somebody and had it sent here for me to mail to him (he does that from time to time). Before emailing Brian, I decided to check the box more carefully.

Taped to the bottom (actually top) of the box I found a KFOG envelope with a letter inside. Here it is.

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In case you can”t read that, it says:

“Dear Foghead,Congratulations! You were a weekly winner of KFOG’s Foghead Football Pool! Many Fogheads vied for the weekly crown, but your exemplary gridiron knowledge prevailed.
http://www.kfog.com/asp/football2006/
As a reward for your football prowess, you”ve won a Bose SoundDock! Your prize is enclosed.

Enjoy the playoffs, and thanks for listening to World Class Rock on 104.5 San Francisco, 97.7 San Jose—the Bay Area’s KFOG!

Cheers,
KFOG Promotions

How great is that?!

Installing Vonage

The Week of the Vonage
On the day of the deadline to get 3,000 miles from United Airlines for ordering a Vonage phone system, I signed up. We had been looking into such a system for a few months. It’s a broadband-based system that’s considerably cheaper than AT&T, even though we stopped the AT&T long distance feature and all other “extra features” years ago. We used the cell phone for long distance and phone cards to call France. With Vonage, we get caller ID and a bunch of other features including free long distance—even to France!

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The orange box arrived on Tuesday. I didn”t open it.

I opened the box on Wednesday and read the instructions, seems simple enough. But I found other stuff to do; I wrote and posted The Best Meatloaf of All Time on eatsforone. Meanwhile, we have no phone. Vonage had notified AT&T that we switched and were keeping our same number, and AT&T turned us off.
Continue reading “Installing Vonage” →

Kelly celebrates half century with ATL bash

kelly-hat.jpgA wise man once said, “You”re never as old as you”re going to get”. And you only hit the big five-oh once. On December 8th it was Kelly’s turn. Thinking of fifty as the “new forty” she told me several months ago that she wanted to celebrate this milestone with a big party, bringing as many of her close friends together as possible, and to “partay” like its,well, you know. A tall order, but one I felt I was equipped to manage. Luckily, 12/8 was on a Friday, so I could plan a party without compromise to available time and ‘school nites”. Her sorority sisters from Philly and Walnut Creek were available, and agreed to fly out for the weekend, joining other close friends and relatives from the general area. The Midtown ATL restaurant South City Kitchen, an über-hip place we had visited before was selected from my ‘short list”, primarily because their semi-private upstairs loft is a MUCH nicer way to get together than being shuttled into a dark, private, closed-off room in the bowels of a restaurant. Sitting above the bar, it looked out over the restaurant so we could be part of the atmosphere, instead of being controlled by it. I quickly booked it and the plans started to take shape. As the date approached, Kelly’s brother Brad called me and suggested that ‘since there are several DUI’s in the family” it might be a good idea to get a van or limo for group transportation, with a reliable DD. MIGHT BE??? Why, it was BRILLIANT! DONE!
Continue reading “Kelly celebrates half century with ATL bash” →