Moh-Ro-Co Lamb Dinah

It's winter. At least it is everywhere else, except for LA. This is the time of year conjures cravings for stews, curries, soups and hearty one dish meals. When I lived in London, I made Moroccan Tagines (a sweeter, lighter version of curry) with lamb, dried apricots and shaved almonds.  


They are called Tagine because of the funnel pot it is cooked in. Moroccan cuisine isn't very popular in LA and is best eaten in cold weather. I've missed it terribly...


So, I made a quickly thrown-together, Moroccan inspired dinner, with a spice mix recipe I found on CookingLight.com, called Ras el Hanout. 


I bought New Zealand lamb leg steak from Trader Joe's and marinated it with the rich and sensual Ras el Hanout, olive oil and fresh mint. Then I grilled it in a pan. On the side, I made a lentil salad with garbanzo beans, onion, garlic, tomato and the special spice mix. It was fantastic! Lastly, I threw together some whole wheat cous cous with cranberries, fresh mint and shaved almonds on top. Very tasty and easy meal!

Juicy Lamb, Cous Cous, Lentil Salad and Fresh Mint

Recipe for Ras el Hanout:

Yield: 1/4 cup (serving size: 1/4 teaspoon)

Ingredients

• 2 1/2  teaspoons  kosher salt
• 2  teaspoons  ground cumin
• 2  teaspoons  ground ginger
• 2  teaspoons  freshly ground black pepper
• 1 1/2  teaspoons  ground cinnamon
• 1  teaspoon  ground coriander
• 1  teaspoon  ground red pepper
• 1  teaspoon  ground allspice
• 1  teaspoon  saffron threads, crushed
• 1/2  teaspoon  ground cloves
• 1/4  teaspoon  freshly ground nutmeg

Preparation

1. Combine all ingredients in a small bowl. Store in an airtight container for up to 1 month.

My Favorite Sushi Inspired Salad

SASHIMI Salad is what I call it. Nothing funny or exciting, just straightforward. It's like a mezze platter with Japanese or Asian food.

My Brother slicing tuna sashimi

I start with mixed greens because I like the way the taste the best and they are higher in vitamins. Then, I added soy beans, cucumbers, seaweed salad, daikon (pickled or raw), green onions, avocado, ginger, roe, and shiso leaves, sashimi (tuna, salmon, yellowtail or albacore). What's great about this salad is that you can play around and add what you like depending on your preferences and what's available. Try brown/white rice, noodles, kimchee, octopus salad tofu, sesame seeds, tomatoes, etc.

Be adventurous and explore a Japanese market.
They have great ingredients and usually run on the cheap side.

I like to make my own dressing with low sodium soy sauce, teriyaki sauce, touch of chili or sesame oil, sesame seeds, fresh ginger and lemon/lime.

This salad is super healthy and fresh. It's a twist to your favorite sushi rolls.

Huckleberry Finn -- Without the Finn

Highest-quality, fresh, artisan, special, Italian flare: Huckleberry Cafe in Santa Monica is a dream come true. They use the best meat from Niman Ranch, farmer's market produce, organic flour, etc. The design of the restaurant is modern, clean and elegantly casual. Chalkboards on the tops of the walls hold the menu and specials. Immediately, you are transported to to an upscale farmhouse, somewhere near woods or a lake. Everything from the freshly baked bread and pastries, to the deli-case filled with rainbow prepared salads, to the gorgeous/funky business cards; is perfect.

You move in line from the back of the restaurant to the front and pass by the various sections of foods and sweets 

Giving you time to let your mouth salivate before you order and pay

Although everything looks amazing, the taste is even better. I got a trio of  fresh and vibrant vegetable salads with a hefty slice of whole grain bread. It was truly Fabulicious (fabulous + delicious). Mmmm.....

The quinoa eggs was also a fantastic dish. It was a combination of the sweet flavor and softness of the eggs, with a crunchy texture of curried carrots, roasted butternut squash and grainy quinoa below. The mix of textures was complex and the flavors complemented each other. I'm a texture in food person, and this screamed to my liking. I had never experienced a sweet sunny-side egg with a somewhat bland flavor in the grain before. The egg stepped in in flavor where the quinoa couldn't. And, the quinoa brought the texture that the egg didn't have. Total bliss on a plate.

    

One of the Best Sushi Places in LA- BOSS Sushi

Who's the boss? Tom is. He is the oldest, bleached-blonde, Japanese man behind the sushi bar. He cracks jokes, makes amazing rolls and slices the sashimi beautifully. I get a kick out of him. Beware, it looks sketchy on the outside, with funky black windows, and the decor inside isn't anything exciting, but I promise you will love it. You can't judge this book by its cover. Trust me...

Top: Albacore Sashimi
Bottom: Spicy Scallop hand roll

Top reasons I love BOSS and could never get sick of it:
1. Always have fresh fish, not fishy-fish
2. Huge rolls that taste delicious
3. Prices are reasonable and you get a lot for it

If you go, I recommend getting: 'I love Tracey roll,' 'Super Bruce roll,' albacore sashimi, and a lobster hand roll. The lobster is always excellent there. The 'Dragon' series rolls are also great. I always have a great meal at BOSS and next time, I'm going to try Omakase (chef's choice)!

Look how big these are!
Top: Citrus & Spice
Below: I Love Tracey 

Back to LA

Mammoth week is finally over. I hope you enjoyed my food account of the trip. Now I'm back in LA and will hit the trails here.

I Remembered it Being so Good...

Front Sign

My family and I used to ski Mammoth or Utah every year. Even as a child, I had a sophisticated palate and loved good food. We have been to Nevados Restaurant many times and it's always been delicious. It's fancy and pricey for Mammoth, which is not judged at the same standards as LA. It's bustling, so be prepared for a noisy room.

Even a physical therapist in my dad's office building recommended it to us. Sometimes restaurants don't stay GREAT forever.

I ordered the Duck Confit Salad with fried leeks, blood oranges, pumpkin seed oil (very hip and trendy right now) and pumpkin seed brittle. It sounded amazing. When I started eating the rich duck meat, my knife brushed up against a duck leg bone. No one wants to pick off the meat from the bone in a salad!

The other tragedy of the salad was that blood oranges was listed under the ingredients, and they tried to pawn off canned tangerine instead of the gorgeous blood oranges. Honestly, I hate the taste of those canned oranges and think they degrade the sophistication of the salad. I was disappointed to say the least.

Then I opted for the Maryland Crab cakes, which were fine and nothing special. The basil aioli drizzled around the cakes was an unexpected touch that worked. The biggest problem with them was that outer layer was burned during frying and it took away the sweet flavor from the crab. Also, it lacked seasoning.

My dad ordered the Special - Swordfish wrapped in crab with a teriyaki glaze. I will not eat Swordfish because they are bottom-feeders and have a higher tendency to accumulate worms, but I took a bite and it was very good. He loved it and that is all that matters. The yellow squash and green beans were very tasty as well.

Finally, we ordered dessert, the highlight of my evening. We had a caramelized banana sundae. It came out on a plate, not in a bowl; first mistake. It's not classy to serve an ice cream sundae on a plate. The bananas were caramelized only on side, an then cold and hard on the bottom side. I would expect an $8 dessert to at least have intricate plating, sadly that wasn't the case.

My biggest problem with Nevados is that their plating lacks finesse. We also ordered Cioppino, fish and shellfish in a tomato broth, and it came out a big mess with linguini on a plate. I thought it was more like a Bouillabaisse, a french fish stew.

My Dad took me there because he wanted me to have a really nice meal on our trip, and I was so disappointed and guilt-ridden that he took me to special and expensive restaurant I didn't like, that I ended up critiquing every part of the meal. I didn't even realize I came off like a brat, I was just critiquing like my favorite host's from Top Chef. Needless to say, I ruined the evening with my complaining and felt horrible...

However, that doesn't get the restaurant off the hook. I do believe that half the dining experience is the visual component. That is my one piece of advice for the chefs at Nedavos: take an art class and plate with a delicate hand!

Best Pizza in Mammoth- Giovanni's

It's strange they don't have Margarita pizza on the menu... We had to customize it. They had BBQ Chicken, various forms of vegetarian, a 'Meatlovers' style, and Spicy Thai, but no classic, traditional, every Italian restaurant has one- Margarita pizza.

Menu

So we ordered a mozzarella, basil, garlic and tomato pizza on a regular crust, instead of thin. It was delicious! They really should it put it on the menu.

We also had a half/half pizza: 'Masterpiece' on a thin crust with pepperoni, sausage, bell pepper and mushroom. I'm not a fan of pepperoni, but this was tasty. Great for carnivores. The other half was the 'Eggcentric' with basil, red onion, eggplant, feta and tomato. It was an interesting mix of a greek and italian vegetarian that was excellent.

The restaurant itself is nothing special, but the smell of the food envelopes you and tantalizes your taste buds into extreme salivation. You're mouth waters and stomach growls in the few minutes it takes to wait for a table. I loved Giovanni's.

Side note: I am very sorry I was unable to take pictures due to extreme hunger. Please google them for images.

Gorgeous Red Rubies

Pomegranates are still in season...

Look how gorgeous they are when they're ripe!

I never fully appreciated these blood red seeds before this year. They always tasted bitter to me. Now, I love them. I put them with greek yogurt for breakfast; the acidity helps break the salty flavor and the crunchy texture counter-acts the creaminess. The seeds are also great thrown in an Asian style salad. You can even reduce the juice down into a syrup to pour over vanilla ice cream or french toast. Try it out...

Post your favorite pomegranate recipe below!

Shit's Not Schat's

Here's the real deal about Schat's Bakery: Cookies were pretty shit....

VERY DISAPPOINTING
Almond Lacey, Oatmeal Raisin & M&M Peanut Cookie

The 'Elephant Head' was delicious though! I don't want to write off Shat's Bakery yet, because I've been there years (alot of years) ago and it was great. It's just some of the cookies too crunchy and stale. I'm going to give it another try so more to come...

DELICIOUS Mexican Wedding Cookie

Shat's or Shot's- It Doesn't Matter

Schat's Bakery is pretty famous in Mammoth. It's a quaint dutch bakery with two locations, about 45 minutes from each other. My family and I always try to stop there while we are skiing there. We pulled up, and my Dad yelled out, "Look it's Shot's." Dad, "it's SCHAAT's," I corrected him.

It was about 5 o'clock when we got there. They were cleaned out. There wasn't much left to choose from, but we refused to leave empty-handed. It's a cute shop to with a stained glass window entry way that was beautifully decorated for Christmas. There was a sign with a cartoon of an old European man baking; their signature image.

Brittle and Chocolate Gelt

We turned down the brittles and toffee's and went straight for the unusual selection of cookies. We left with Chunky Oatmeal & Raisin, a bit peculiar looking, Mexican Wedding cookies (powder sugar balls) that tasted of rich maple syrup and spices, M&M's and gigantic Chocolate covered Almond Lacey.

Toffee and Caramel Chocolates

Before we made our final decisions, we decided to try a a cinnamon sugar massive spiral cookie that was bigger than my dad's head! It was a pounded thin pastry with crunchy sugar covering every inch. It was fantastic! I think they called it an 'Elephant's Head,' which would be fitting since it was huge.

Since I was unable to see or taste any of the pastries because they were all sold out, this will be a two-part post and I will report back to you.

Food Scene in Mammoth

This week, I will be blogging about the food/restaurants in Mammoth Mountain. Please add comments to my posts if you have been to any of these places! It's a small town, and not too much changed in the past 10 years.

FAIL- Seasonal Pumpkin Ravioli with a Brown Butter Sage Sauce

I wish I could say I made the ravioli by hand, but I didn't. They're from Whole Foods, but they were made from a small Italian artisan, much better than Whole Foods own brand- 360. 

I used Martha Stewart's recipe as a guideline, looking at ingredients and then building off it with what was available and sounded good. I used sweet onion instead of shallots and sauteed them in olive oil first to give the sauce another dimension of flavor. The recipe also called for fresh sage and balsamic vinegar, which I added to taste rather than following the recipe exactly. I also changed around the order I added my ingredients, and I'm not sure that was an advantage in this instance.

I didn't taste the ravioli until after I sauced it, and it
was surprisingly too sweet. With the rich, butter sauce, it turned into a very heavy dish. To counteract the sweetness, I added red chili pepper flakes, Meyer lemon juice (a sweeter variety) and a touch of ground ginger. This helped immensely.

I wasn't as great as I had imagined it to be. Not every dish is a success and you learn from experience and mistakes. Next time, I would find a more savory ravioli, used shallots, and maybe added a little heavy cream, or white wine instead of balsamic vinegar.

To be honest, I had a stomach ache after eating and popped two extra-strength Tums. This meal, which was meant to be a 'light snack' before dinner,  just didn't quite come together. It wasn't bad, it was merely an intense mix of rich and sweet that was overpowering.

Gingerbread MaN EgG

I love a good man-egg, also called an egg-in-a-hole. This one is made with a gingerbread cookie cutter in the spirit of the holidays, using a wheat sourdough bread from the farmers market. It's simple, you just crack an egg into the space, while its cooking in the pan. To have the egg cook more evenly, you can cover it with the pan lid.

 

Spice it up with Cholula Sauce