brick + mortar

santa monica, ca

website

a cool restaurant on main street in santa monica - more successful as a bar/nightclub in the late evenings than as a restaurant. although the chicken and waffles were pretty to look at, the chicken was overcooked and the waffles were bland and tasteless. derek, however, likes the atmosphere at brunch - loud music, fun & boisterous crowd. but the food is definitely lacking. for fried chicken and waffles in santa monica, go to bru's wiffle. for a pint on a saturday night? brick + mortar is a great option.

ludobird @ staples center

los angeles, ca

website

sports arenas have gotten fancy with their concessions. i was just excited to see jeremy lin play for the lakers at the staples center. (i was possibly the only person in the stands hoping that kobe would get out of the way so i could snap a photo of jeremy). i wasn't expecting to also be wowed by the food. wandering around the various concession stands, i noticed ludobird. could it possibly be related to celebrity chef ludo? i had no idea if his food was any good - i only knew him from anthony bourdain's show. turns out his fried chicken is damn good. seriously. crispy, herbal, juicy fried chicken will help you ignore how poorly the lakers are playing.

lawry's

beverly hills, ca

website

girl's night out with cindy c, g, and L. L has a special "in" at lawry's because she got married there! brilliant. we had a great wisecracking waitress who had a lot of fun with us girls. smart wine recommendation, reasonably priced. dinner started with lawry's famous original spinning bowl salad. is it really necessary to start with salad? does the bowl really need to spin? who knows, but it's amazing. gives you a nice base in your stomach for the roasted prime rib. the meat is served off of a push cart - like meaty dim sum. for me, the redder the slice, the better. side of creamed corn. mashed potatoes. and yorkshire pudding which is like a deflated creamy popover. eat until it starts to hurt a little. waddle home. success!

r+d kitchen

santa monica, ca

website

hillstone restaurants are generally reliable for good american food and excellent wine lists. r+d kitchen is no exception. on a lazy afternoon strolling along montana avenue, i sat by myself at the counter of r+d kitchen. lovely glass of crisp chardonnay. nice fresh chicken salad. solid.

cat cora's kitchen @ IAH

houston, tx

link to yelp

at the airport yet again. this time at IAH, houston international airport, waiting for our flight to münchen. i'm a big fan of cat cora from watching iron chef america, so i figured this was a pretty safe bet. the menu and our waiter both talked up the spicy tomato soup. so i went with that plus a little burger. for airport food, not bad. the burger was a little overcooked and bland, but i just dunked it in the spicy tomato soup and it worked out quite well. good soup.

bubby's

new york, ny

website

solid spot for brunch in tribeca. biscuits are good when fresh out of the oven. cheesy grits are nice and cheesy. there's a tantalizing menu of pies that i have not tried yet. jenny and i came here the morning after we arrived back from paris. bubby's is always packed, but what was interesting about this visit is that i was so happy to be at an american brunch. lots of food, cheerful friendly waitstaff, no cigarette smoke, and a boisterous crowd talking and laughing. paris was wonderful, of course, but it was nice to be home.

scratch bar

beverly hills, ca

website

sorry for the terrible picture. the restaurant is dimly lit. a suprisingly hipster-ish spot on restaurant row (which otherwise has chains like lawry's and fogo de chao). there are large rustic looking tables. a bunch of us sat around one to celebrate the lovely cindy c's birthday. most of the plates we ordered were for the table to share, but they have little "bites" that you can order individually. they had a "chicken and waffle bite" so of course i had to order it. it was good, nothing spectacular. but the showstopper here is the 30-40 oz dry-aged ribeye that you order for the table. the steak is cooked perfectly - all crispy and fatty in all the right places. it takes forever to prepare, so order it as soon as you sit down. i asked the table whether they thought derek and i could eat one on our own. maybe, was the answer. well, leftover ribeye is never a bad idea.

tavern

los angeles, ca

website

"karendipity, is that a pool of butter in your picture?" why yes, yes it is. vanita and the family graciously invited me to brunch at the super classy tavern restaurant in brentwood. everyone else at the table ordered something healthy. i ordered the blueberry ricotta pancakes doused in butter. so good. almost as good as clinton st baking co, which is really saying something. while the food is great, the best part about tavern is the ambiance in the back room. beautiful luxurious furniture, bright sunlit room, and random trees bringing in just a hint of nature. this is what i imagine it would be like if you're the earl of grantham, you've just finished shooting pheasants, and the downton abbey staff has set up a dining tent for you and your hunting party in a clearing nearby.

top dog

berkeley, ca

website

i love hot dogs. it's one of my favorite foods. people have told me about how hot dogs are made and even shown me pictures of the manufacturing process in an attempt to convince me how bad hot dogs are for me. it doesn't work. anyway - every berkeley grad that i've met has raved about top dog. i had to go to berkeley for a work event and i convinced michelle to stop by top dog with me to find out what the fuss is all about. the verdict? i'm not sure. the hot dog itself was fine. there was way too much bread. eh. the verdict is eh.

millbrae pancake house

millbrae, ca

website

stacey finally came to the bay area for a visit! we picked her and her friend up at the airport and headed directly to millbrae pancake house. okay, maybe not directly - our GPS decided to take us through san bruno first. anyway, we eventually arrived around 11 am and there was already a crowd lined up outside. we grabbed a number and waited about a half hour before our table was ready.

the restaurant is basically a huge diner with a giant menu of breakfast options. the chatty waitstaff refers to everyone as "dear" or "darling." it was very difficult to decide, so i just ordered everything - chili cheese omelette, side of hash browns, side of swedish pancakes, and biscuits and gravy for the table. the omelette was massive and delicious - chili had great spicy flavor. everyone at the table agreed that the swedish pancakes - crepes served with strawberry butter - were amazing. great food, great atmosphere, close to SFO - we'll definitely be back.

hobee's

palo alto, ca

website

hobee's is a chain of restaurants in the bay area. looks like a shari's-type family restaurant and we thought it would be a good place for brunch. clearly they are famous for their blueberry coffee cake - we saw everyone order the blueberry coffee cake and they even sell it at the front desk. breaking one of our cardinal rules (order what everyone else is ordering), we got the peach walnut coffee cake (pictured). it was okay - a little dry, very light, but could have used more peaches.

for our entrees, we each ordered the hash browns with various toppings. mine was topped with cheese, mushrooms, and onions. derek's was topped with chicken apple sausage, green peppers, tomato-basil sauce, and cheese. we were really hoping for the shredded-style hash browns like the ones they serve at joanie's. no such luck, they ended up being small wedges of potatoes. not a fan. it seemed like a popular spot, but derek and i really should know better than to stray from our favorite brunch spot, joanie's.

elite cafe

san francisco, ca

website

to continue the theme of comfort food, derek and i had brunch at one of tina's favorite places, the elite cafe. there's a little bit of a wait on sunday afternoons, but service is speedy once you get a seat. atmosphere is cozy, very appropriate for brunch. tina recommended the beef hash, which derek ordered and enjoyed.

but i had to go with the alabama scramble - scrambled eggs and minced bacon with baked mashed potatoes, biscuits, and gravy. definitely delicious and comforting, but could have used more gravy on the biscuits. we ordered the cinnamon sugar doughnut holes (i have a hard time passing up doughnuts on a menu), but they were unremarkable. next time, we'll just get more biscuits - they're amazing - buttery and flaky.

wayfare tavern

san francisco, ca

website

one of my new favorite restaurants! derek discovered this place while working in his firm's san francisco office. it's actually tyler florence's restaurant - the menu is very similar to the dishes he cooks on his show (which always look delicious). the atmosphere is upscale gastropub - the prices are a little high, but the ingredients and preparation are worth it. we walked in on a saturday afternoon and the place was packed - but thankfully we were able to get a seat at the bar, where we could watch chefs put the final touches on each plate.

wayfare tavern is known for their fried chicken, which derek thinks is amazing. if you're not in the mood for fried chicken, the dish to get is the tomales bay mussels - perfectly plump little mussels served with herbsaint cream, crispy chunks of pork belly, sweet potato, celery salt, and grilled toast. it's a little on the rich side, but trust me, you won't have any problem finishing it.

the publican

chicago, il

website

chicago has amazing food, but it's not easy to figure out which places are going to be good. thankfully i have christine and val to show me around whenever i'm in town. we headed to chicago's version of the meatpacking district for a meat-centric meal at the publican. the restaurant is clearly one of the farm-to-table types and it appears to have brought the tables and pigpens from the farm as well. christine, val, and i were seated at a booth located in one of these pigpens, which was fun.

there's vegetables and starches available on the menu, but we focused on the good stuff - a full order of the mussels served with crusty french bread to dip in the broth (i'm glad we ignored the waiter who suggested that a half order would be sufficient), a plate of pork belly served over lentils (if i remember correctly), and my favorite - the blood sausage served with kimchee and apples. this was my first time trying blood sausage (but i've seen anthony bourdain rave about it on tv). it was fantastic - the richness of the sausage was perfectly balanced by the spicy acidic kimchee.

gilbert's firefish grill

santa cruz, ca

website

after costco, we continued our tour of the south bay by driving down to santa cruz, which was highly recommended by derek's cousins. traveling to santa cruz from palo alto requires taking a windy highway through the mountains and derek was thrilled to test out the car's maneuverability. i was less than thrilled, but was convinced that it was the only way to get to the beach. santa cruz's boardwalk was pretty fun - my favorite "ride" was the skyglider, which is basically a skilift that takes you from one end of the boardwalk to the other. while on the skyglider, we saw a bunch of neon signs in the distance and decided to head out there for dinner.

turns out, we were looking at the santa cruz municipal wharf, which is a long pier lined with restaurants and shops. all of the restaurants served the standard seafood options that you would expect on a wharf. we chose gilbert's because it looked a little bit more modern than the others. something about being near the ocean just calls out for fried seafood - derek ordered a platter with fried calamari and grilled fish, i ordered the fish and chips. everything was very good, but it's hard to go wrong when everything is deep fried.

ben's chili bowl

washington, dc

website

i first heard about ben's chili bowl from stacey, who went when she was in DC for president obama's inauguration. i was in DC for a much less glamorous reason - a three-week trip for work. work was very busy and we rarely made it outside of our offices to see sunlight, much less eat a meal ... but a group of us managed to escape long enough to make a pilgrimage to the famed ben's chili bowl. if you have a certain number of people in your party, you can go straight to the back and grab a table. someone will come by to take your order. we didn't realize that, so instead we ordered amidst the chaos of the front of the restaurant.

ryan recommended the "half smoke," which is a quarter-pound half-beef half-pork sausage, doused in chili. yes, it tasted as good as it sounds. i've never had chili like this before - it's spicy, meaty, and thick - more sauce than soup. however, when ordering, i made a tactical error by assuming that the massive amount of chili that they poured on the sausage would be sufficient and i ordered my fries plain. big mistake. next time, i gotta go with the chili cheese fries just to get more of that amazing chili sauce.

crepevine

palo alto, ca

website

the crepevine is popular with stanford kids, or who i assume are stanford kids. they look young and unemployed. my guess is its because the prices are reasonable, the portions are large, there are plenty of seats, and they let you sit wherever you want for however long you want. derek and i have been here a few times. i don't like sitting inside because during the summer, there's usually flies. outside, for some reason, the flies don't bother me that much. however, i much prefer ordering takeout and eating my food in the comfort of my own insectless living room.

crepevine generally serves diner food - for brunch that means pancakes, waffles, eggs, etc. obviously, they also have crepes which are premade, then heated and filled when you order. on our first visit, i ordered blueberry pancakes, which were good, but nothing compared to the magical blueberry pancakes at clinton st. baking co. in manhattan. derek's corned beef hash, however, was excellent - cheesy and meaty with crunchy bits of fried potatoes. solid brunch fare.

village bistro

san jose, ca

website

santana row is a massive outdoor shopping complex located in san jose, california. in addition to the shopping (standard mall fare), there are hotels, spas, restaurants, and even apartment complexes. although derek remarked that living above a shopping mall would be like living in disneyland, removed from reality. palo alto gets pretty sleepy at night, but santana row is always buzzing. village bistro, which refers to itself as a "california bistro" did not look inviting. it looked fancy and stuffy. but once inside, the atmosphere was fun, light, and vibrant.

too bad the picture is terrible, because the food was amazing, some of the best that we've had since we moved to california. fantastic cocktails. in typical california style, all of the ingredients are local and sustainable. i had wild salmon - perfectly cooked, buttery and delicious. the sauce was spectacular. derek ordered the burger (of course) - he loved it. we went back again and ate outside on a sunny day and had fantastic make-it-yourself bruschetta. they serve crunchy grilled crostini with a selection of housemade ricotta, roasted garlic, tomato marmalade, and candied olives. mmmm.

max's

palo alto, ca

website

by now, derek and i have been to the stanford shopping center many times. when we try to find a spot to eat, we usually end up at the palo alto creamery (which i have apparently forgotten to blog - it is probably one of those photos in my collection that i didn't recognize). the restaurant next to bloomingdale's always looks too dark and imposing. but one day, we didn't feel like the creamery and decided to venture into the dark and imposing restaurant.

inside it's completely different. bright lights, fun music, tons of families. huge menu full of awesome choices. i love the slogans on the menu "this is a bad place for a diet" and "everything you've always wanted to eat." we've been here a few times now and i always get the caesar salad with grilled salmon. each time, the salmon is perfectly cooked - just the right amount of char on the outside and melt in your mouth tender on the inside. derek has gotten a few things off the menu and he always enjoys his choice.

bonfire @ jfk

queens, ny

link to yelp

i had to make a few work calls while at the airport, so i decided to settle into a quiet corner of todd english's bonfire restaurant at the united terminal at JFK. waitstaff was very polite and left me alone while i finished up my calls, except to refill my soda.

i was craving a hot dog ever since i made the tactical error back at la silhouette, so i ordered the hot dog and fries with coleslaw. expensive. greasy. heavy. the bread was too thick and dry. but the fries were good. typical airport food, but i was hoping for something better from a restaurant with a famous chef's name attached to it.