Crab Season in Chesapeake

18 Jul 2018 2 Comments

by scolgin in On the Road, Recipes, World's Best Sandwiches Tags: , , , , , , ,

We were recently on the East Coast, an adventure whose photos some of you may have seen on my Instagram @skinnygirlsandmayo.

The journey commenced in Washington D.C., although we flew into Baltimore.

“Maybe we should spend a day in Baltimore,” said pal Jon, who was born in Baltimore and happened to be traveling with us. I was reminded of a scene from the movie, “Shape of Water”:

Elaine Strickland: “I’m really beginning to like the house. And it’s only 30 minutes from D.C.!”

Richard Strickland: “It’s still Baltimore, Elaine. No one likes Baltimore.”

The first crab of the trip

We opted to skip Baltimore, heading instead directly for the Amtrak to D.C., which took about 30 minutes.

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A Roundabout Route to Baccalà Mantecato

23 Mar 2018 2 Comments

by scolgin in Markets & Stores, Recipes Tags: , , , , , , , ,

My local Vallarta Mexican grocery store never ceases to surprise and amaze me.

First of all, it’s just darned cool to have a market that actually feels — smells, sounds, visuals — like you are in Mexico. And in that regard, I have yet to need a Mexican cooking ingredient that I can’t find there.

Secondly, I find countless ingredients I need for other cuisines — the fine tripe they have, for example, that I need (yes, need) for trippa alla Romana, and a dazzling variety of fresh herbs.

Newfoundland salt cod illustration from the 1700s

A recent happy discovery was baccalà, also known as bacalao, also known as salt cod — not something I ever associated with Mexican cooking. In the past, I’ve had to travel to a Spanish purveyor in Harbor City (a heck of a drive to non-Angelenos) or wait until I’m in San Francisco to visit North Beach’s famous deli, Molinari, to get some. Not only does Vallarta have beautiful European baccala, but it’s considerably less expensive than at either of those other places. More

The Sean Dog

05 Jan 2018 6 Comments

by scolgin in Markets & Stores, Recipes, World's Best Sandwiches Tags: , , , , , , ,

Necessity, as the saying goes, is the mother of invention. But could that really be true of a hot dog? Is there such a thing as necessity when it comes to a hot dog.

Sit back, friends, and let me tell my tale.

The Sean Dog

It all begins at our local Ralph’s supermarket (Krogers to you folks on the East Coast). I’ve become obsessed with the hunt for their “Woohoo” deals — items throughout the store which, due mostly to rapidly approaching “sell by” dates, have had their prices precipitously cut and have been flagged with a little yellow-and-red “Woohoo!” sticker. It has the same appeal as mushroom hunting or garage sale-ing: sometimes you find something, sometimes you don’t. More often than not, I make staggering discoveries — $14 Italian La Tur cheeses for $4; $20 dry-aged ribeyes for $6. More

The Japan Series — Totoro, We’re Not In Hokkaido Anymore

16 Oct 2017 3 Comments

by scolgin in On the Road, Recipes Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Actually, we knew we would be going to Russia as part of the voyage we were on. But we weren’t totally prepared for the experience.

One day we are wandering around a small northern Japanese city — tidy, orderly, polite, clean. The next, after crossing a narrow channel of water, we have exchanged slender, scampering salarymen for buff, blonde, steely blue-eyed guys in tight t-shirts, standing around smoking cigarettes, eyeing you suspiciously. We are now in Russia.

You see, just above the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido is another island, part of the same chain, but this one belongs to Russia. It used to belong to Japan, so you’ll still spot the odd Japanese-style building sticking out like a sore thumb here or there. But Russia — claiming it was their’s originally — took it back after World War II (Crimea, anyone?). More

The Japan Series — Salvation at the 7-11, Big Pig and More!

08 Sep 2017 6 Comments

by scolgin in Humor, On the Road, Recipes Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Our flight arrived in Japan around 3:30 p.m., which for us was 9:30 p.m. the previous evening. We left Los Angeles at 11 a.m., and flew 10 hours in daylight, although when we arrived in Japan it was the next day. On the flight, they served breakfast, lunch, and then breakfast again.

It was around 6:30 by the time we figured out how to take the trains into Tokyo and locate — on streets that do not have names — our Airbnb. We were hungry, although we weren’t sure if we were hungry for dinner or breakfast. I offered to go out and find some take-out while the family got settled, which suited everyone just fine.

Flynn and Willa at the Airbnb in Kanda

Tokyo, from a non-Japanese-speaking westerner’s perspective, is a bit confusing at first when it comes to food. There are many, many restaurants — our little pedestrian walking area of Kanda was chock full of them — but it is challenging to figure what many of them serve. You look into the dark restaurant, there are six seats, and bodies are hunched over plates of something. Many restaurants serve only one thing — eel, for example, which would not have gone over well with 3/5 of my family. The point being, that a jet-lagged gaijin fresh off the plane trying to find some quick, not-to-exotic takeout in a non-tourist neighborhood of Tokyo was not going to have an easy time of it. More

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