Live Blog: Happy B-Day To Me!

When you go to Luce for no reason other than it's THU and Michael Mina so often the Maitre'd recognizes you, WHAT do you do for a special occasion meal? That's what I have to ask myself every B-Day. I can't really complain about last year, I went to Aqua for their Lunch Tasting Menu (back when they had and still served lunch) and a local place, Pappo, for dinner. You've never heard of Pappo, but it merits a ZAGAT 26 and is arguably the best food here on Silicon Island, but I digress...

This year the plan is to hit two of my perennial favorites. With The Grumpy Parental Unit involved I don't want to visit places TOO far out there (both in terms of cuisine and location) and my A to Z has ALREADY sent me to plenty of new places this year. So Bouchon for lunch and dinner at One Market for their tasting menu it is. It's a FRI, so The Hottie took the day off and I made the One Market reservations well in advance. Nomnomnom...

9:43 A.M. – Now normally, my B-Day B-Fast begins with something(s) The Hottie bought the day before in The City and then heats up along with some tea or hot cocoa. If it hadn't been firmly established before, The Hottie does NOT and canNOT cook. Period. Canned soup and microwave meals are pretty much her limit, but she can heat up chocolate croissants and bacon cheddar scones with the best of them!

This year, however, I knew what I was having in advance: Ham Biscuits. I've never had this staple of The South, but The Meat Guy (who's also never had them) sent me two dozen of them as my B-Day gift, so having them as B-Fast on my birthday was a no-brainer. They're from Callies of Charleston and, supposedly, are some of the best Ham Biscuits known to man. They're a bit smaller than I had imagined, really, REALLY savory and, surprisingly, not particularly hammy. The Hottie's addition to my breakfast is a Japanese “Pound Cake” in one of the kewlest boxes I've ever seen. Seriously, this box is a keeper. It was purchased from a Japanese candy shop in The City where EVERYTHING on the packaging is in Japanese. So, yeah, it's an authentic bean paste cake. Yum? Anyways, it's about what would expect from a Japanese “cake”: small, pretty, dry, crumbly and only the teeniest, tiniest bit of sweetness. My favorite? No, but some Pumpkin Spice tea pairs rather nicely with it and, honestly, the subtle flavors are a pretty solid yin to the incredibly flavorful yang of the ham biscuits.

10:04 A.M. - Not food related BUT we watched Modern Family on DVR while chowing down B-Fast. If you aren't watching this show already, you should. I LOL IRL and snort more during that half-hour than the rest of the week combined. Modern Family. ABC. WED. 9:00. Have I ever let you down before?

11:34 A.M. - Starting out a little later than I had planned, but the GPS (The best invention EVER) says we'll arrive @ Bouchon @ 12:32, so we're GTG. Itinerary includes Bouchon (and, of course, the Bakery), a couple of Gourmet-type stores (Napastyle, Sign of the Bear and the Sonoma Cheese Factory) and prolly a couple of wineries (Cline and Gloria Ferrer).

11:42 A.M. - The GPS lies. Traffic has ground to a halt for no apparent reason. Seriously, there shouldn't be any traffic on the road this time of day >_< In just eight minutes we've tacked five more minutes on the arrival time...

11:48 A.M. - Well there's the culprit - a carbeque. Looks like they're cleaning up after the burning car that was on the morning news. Lanes closed and people in orange vests spreading tons of that powder that sucks up liquids. The Hottie claims that the carbeque was on the Bay Bridge, not the approach to the Bay Bridge, so this is something else. I ignore her, because a carbeque makes a better story.

12:46 P.M. - We make it to an extremely packed Bouchon a good fifteen minutes after our reservations but since Bouchon is Bouchon our table is still waiting for us. I've gone through at least two-thirds of the Bouchon menu but my B-Day brings me two good specials on the old-school chalkboard: Salmon Tartare and Boudin Noir (a.k.a. Blood Sausage) - I'm a Happy Panda. The Hottie predictably goes for her go-to dish, the Croque Madame, but also gets a chalkboard special, Escagot.

12:50 P.M. - The Hottie informs me that Ashley is at one of the tables behind me. Since I don't KNOW any Ashleys, I'm a bit confused. Ashley Who? Ashley from Top Chef. I turn around and, sure enough, it IS the Top Chef contestant. Upon further review, she's dining with two other contestants Preeti and (just eliminated last night) Laurine. The "celeb" sighting isn't nearly as interesting to me as the fact that they are HERE and this season takes place in Las Vegas which tells me that the Finale -which is always in a different city- might well be in Yountville!!! Yes, they're eliminated, BUT Top Chef has a history of bringing back the eliminated contestants to help as Sous Chefs for the finale, so it makes sense. Granted, both Preeti and Laurine are "local", so they might be friends with Ashley who just came to visit, but I doubt it. Hopefully, I'll bump into Padma at Bouchon Bakery and then I'll KNOW I'm right :D

12:58 P.M. - The Hottie is SURE that Ashley keeps looking at her. Seemingly every time she looks at the Top Chef crew, Ashley is looking at her. Granted, their seats ARE facing each other but I remind The Hottie of two things: 1)She's a smoking-hot redhead and 2)Ashley likes girls. She's prolly just checking her out the same way guys tend to do. "Oh yeah. I forgot". So, if for some reason Ashley stumbles upon this blog, the Hot Redhead @ Bouchon in the orange Tory Burch-ian dress says "Hi!"

1:10 P.M. - Bouchon recently started using local wineries as "House Wines" that they serve by the glass, carafe or half carafe. Today's is a Yountville Semillion that The Lush -err- The Hottie got a half carafe of. Math not being her strong suit, she didn't realize a half carafe = 500 ml (i.e. 2/3 of a full bottle of wine). Somebody's going to fall asleep in the car...



2:05 P.M. - ZOMG!!! Birthday wishes DO come true (no, not Padma). I was hoping against hope that Bouchon Bakery might have some Halloween type creations and they do! Selections include a pumpkin "cupcake", that looks nothing like a conventional cupcake, pumpkinseed brittle, giant shortbread cookies decorated with a candy web and spider, bat shaped TKOs (Thomas Kellers interpretation of an Oreo) and, The Hotties fave, a giant candy apple. It should surprise nobody reading this blog that I get one of each.

2:22 P.M. Having visited Michael Chiarello's Napastyle recently, there isn't a whole lot on my shopping list. Regardless, I do overfill a 1l bottle of Unfiltered Sicilain EVOO. Yeah...that's messy. Still, picking your own apothecary-type bottle and filling it with one of six different olive oils from a giant metal dispenser is pretty damn kewl. Messy...but kewl.

3:28 P.M. If your local, old school hardware store and Sur La Table had a love child, it would be Sign of the Bear in Downtown Sonoma. Thousands upon thousands of kitchen gadgets you never knew existed or needed (until now) randomly crammed into narrow aisles. I get a cutting board that folds into a scoop, a reversible, silicone jigger, a double sided rubber spatula/scraper thingy and a turkey baster with a giant silicone turkey as the bulb. Oh, did I mention they're ALL bright orange (the predominant color of my kitchen)?

3:50 P.M. I can't go to Sonoma without visiting the Sonoma Jack Cheese Factory. I've been coming here since I was a wee lad and they actually made the cheese on the premises. They've since moved the cheese making operations and replaced it with froo-froo wine/cheese boutiquey retail space but the sandwiches (featuring their cheese, of course) are still a picnic must and they have over twenty cheeses to try. There's fudge to sample too but cheese>fudge and we need to get home. The Hottie forgot how hot the Habenaro Jack cheese was. Heh. Silly girl.

6:19 P.M. My birthday loot is, predictably, foodcentric as has been the case since...high school...maybe even earlier? The new Ad Hoc cookbook, the reprinted (and no longer $200) Fat Duck cookbook, a pair of Himalayan Salt Plates and a set of Staub Mini-Cocoettes are among the haul. Non food items include stuffed murlocs, a WoW Loot Card (the Ogre Pinata) and a Cal Polo Shirt!

7:12 P.M. Chef Mark Dommen vexes me!!! You see, I've NEVER had his tasting menu because, frankly, there's ALWAYS some special going on that looks even BETTER. Dine About Town, a knock-off of Dine About Town or, the most frequent offender, The Daily Roast >_< Could I interest you in a tasty Pork Saddle today? Or perhaps a 10 oz. Filet of Beef slow-roasted in our fire pit! He always makes me change my mind. Well today I went to get his tasting menu, dammit! So I refuse to be tempted by...oooooooo...what's this? The Weekly Beast? A new FRI and SAT only special during OCT where he picks a different animal and makes a 5-course Head to Hoof tasting menu. And tonight is...Lamb!!! DAMN YOU MARK DOMMEN!!! DAMN YOU!!!!!!

So, yeah, I'm having lamb tonight. Did I mention the wine pairing is only $20? So, yeah, The Hottie is having more wine. Whee!

9:55 P.M. Even though I'm stuffed and, yes, there was a lamb dessert (Sheep's Milk Ricotta Fritters) we still have to have B-Day Cake. It's a tradition, after all. Now, I'm still fuzzy on the details but, apparently, there was some sort of mishap on my birthday cake and the box was too short and/or it got slammed around in the back seat and the frosting got smudged on the lid or some junk. So The Grumpy Parental Unit decided in his infinite wisdom to just smear the entire top rather than leave it be with a couple dents. I can still make out some balloons, but whatever writing was once there looks like hyperactive finger painting hit with an Adobe blur filter. I have no clue. I gave up trying to figure out his "logic" many moons ago. Bottom Line: It's a tasty three-layer chocolate cake from the same old-school bakery my B-Day Cake comes from EVERY year. And The Puppy likes the finger painting frosting once we scrape it off, so it's all good.

Happy Birthday To Me.