Tacos Sinaloa!

Earlier this week while I was taking a walk around the college town of Berkeley is where I found a recently opened place that makes excellent Mexican food in large portions. Located on Telegraph avenue Tacos Sinaloa has $2 tacos, freshly made juice refreshers such as cucumber and lemon, melon, strawberry, and pineapple in addition to their horchata and hibicus drinks. When I went I ordered their super burrito with shrimp and fish (a little over $17) and was amazed at the portion of it. The burrito itself measures around 13 to 14 inches and was a bit heavy to carry. 

The burrito

Only two thirds of the burrito could fit on the plate!

Credits go to Yelp users for the next pictures

Super burrito is a bit longer than a ruler

six tacos on one place for $2 each

When I got back home I divided the burrito into three pieces and shared some with my roommate. Somehow my roommate's share had most of the fish and the portion I devoured had more pieces of shrimp. It was very tasty though and I could only finish less than half of it. Browsing through their Yelp photos really makes me want to try their tacos next time or their quesadilla. They also have a vegetarian menu where I noticed their veggie burrito that has squash, tomato, onion, corn and beans. It's something I would not mind trying next time too and the service was pretty friendly. Overall, Tacos Sinaloa is now one of my new favorite places to venture to and will most likely frequent whenever I am in the downtown Berkeley area. On most nights they are open late until 11 or midnight. 

Pa’ina Lounge in San Francisco's Japantown

Pa’ina Lounge- SF Japantown area

A friend of mine let me know about Pa’ina Lounge and how it is a must try. Located in the Japantown area of San Francisco Pa’ina is an upscale, non-typical Hawaiian themed bar and restaurant that has a spacious low key lit chill setting with comfortable leather seats. When we went there at midafternoon on a weekday the place was slowly starting to get more customers, but we were seated at a table right away. The friendly server introduced herself and we started off with ordering some drinks. I was very interested in trying their lychee martini and my friend had a strawberry mojito. The lychee martini had a good balance of flavors was not bitter at all. It also had the right amount of stiffness to it which was what I needed at the time. I really missed the lychee mojito at the now closed Olive bar, but Pa’ina’s version of a lychee martini was still pretty satisfying.

My friend and I shared their seaweed ahi tuna poke ($13) which was seasoned with sesame oil, shoyu, Hawaiian sea salt, scallions, and maui onions. It was one of the things that makes me want revisit Pa’ina. That and I read lots of good things about the kalua pig poutine from yelp reviews and my friend. The flavors of the gravy, shredded kalua pork and jalapenos meshed well together. The portion was pretty huge me and my friend couldn’t finish it. I took the rest of it home in a to-go box.

The next time I go back there I would love to try their wingsdays (25 cents per wing has five different flavors to choose from). 

Thanks to my friend I often reminisce about the fun time we had catching up at Pa’ina Lounge enjoying their great food and well-made stiff drinks.

Craving for rice noodle rolls and recipe

I woke up with a craving for the rice noodle rolls stuffed with shrimp or pork and mushroom such as the one served at dim sum teahouses. Since I do not live near any dim sum places I decided to try making my own for breakfast (minus the shrimp and other meat). It actually turned out pretty good so I wanted to share the recipe!

Easy homemade rice noodle rolls

3/4 cup regular rice flour

2 Tablespoons tapioca starch

1 1/2 to 2 cups of water

Makes about 7 to 8 rolls

Mix all ingredients well and pour 1/2 cup of batter in greased microwave pan.

Microwave for 1 minute and 30 seconds, with a spatula roll sheet over continuously. Transfer out of pan to plate.

Serve with soy sauce, sliced green onion, and sesame oil

Just made rice noodle rolls!

Golden Kim Tar Restaurant in San Francisco

Recently I joined my roommate for a huge dinner at Golden Kim Tar, located on Larkin Street around Downtown San Francisco.  For appetizers/drinks I had a Thai iced tea, my roommate had a freshly made orange juice, and we shared a huge platter of fried meat wonton with free extra sweet and sour dipping sauce. We were pretty hungry not having eaten anything the whole day so we filled up on delicious salmon and chicken fried rice ($7.75), roast duck over wonton noodle soup ($7.50), fried prawns ($6.25), salt and pepper rock cod ($9.75), and bought their lamb stew clay pot to go ($11.95). Everything we ordered was delicious, and I liked how friendly and attentive the service was. I really wish I knew this restaurant existed while I lived in SF. I have not had much great Chinese food where I am currently located outside of the city, but I can say that trying Golden Kim Tar was an overall great experience with reasonable prices and huge portions. I would like to try their lunch specials the next time I visit there. Their menu is very extensive also. We had a bit of a hard time at first figuring out what to order because there were so many dishes to choose from in each category.  

Fried meat wonton!

Thai Iced Tea, tasted pretty good

Fresh orange juice

Salt and Pepper Fried Rock Cod

Fried Prawns

Roast Duck wonton noodle soup- so good!

Lamb Stew Clay Pot- their specialty

Recipes for mini poppy seed and carrot mini muffins!

Here are recipes for the mini poppy seed muffins and mini carrot muffins. These muffins were very liked among the guests at my niece's party. Credits to my mom for sending me the recipes!

Poppy Seed Muffins  

makes 24, 350 degrees @ 20mins

3 c flour

2 1/2 c sugar

2 T poppy seeds

1 1/2 t baking powder

1 t salt

3 eggs

1/2 c milk      

1 c oil

1 1/2 t vanilla

1 1/2 t almond extract

Mix flour, sugar, and other dry ingredients together.  Add beaten eggs, milk, oil, vanilla, almond extract.  

Mix well and pour into muffin cup pan and bake at 350 degrees for 20 mins.

Carrot Muffins

Makes 8 to 10 muffins

1 1/2 c shredded carrot  

3/4 c sugar

1 1/2 c flour

1/2 t  salt 

2t  baking powder

3/4 t cinnamon

1 egg

mix dry ingredients with beaten egg and oil mix well 

Pour into muffin pan and bake at 350 degrees for 20 mins.

Mini muffins, sushi, and more for my niece's party!

Late last month, I joined my dear relatives at my niece's 4th birthday party celebration in the seaside town of Half Moon Bay. My older sister asked me and my mother to make tuna with egg and vegetable sushi, vegetarian soy bean curd sushi, pigs in a blanket, miniature green onion mixed with ham rolls, and two varieties of mini muffins. One of them was carrot and the other poppy seed. We prepared most of the food a week in advance except for the sushi, which I helped make the night before. My sister and her husband made really yummy spaghetti with meat sauce, and fried chicken katsu cutlets (from Costco) as seen in the first pic below.

Sister's homemade Spaghetti with meat sauce

Chicken Katsu, ham and green onion rolls, mini bite size pigs in a blanket

When it was time to sing "Happy Birthday" to my niece I made sure to take a picture of my niece's cake before it was cut into. My sister bought my niece's Italian buttercream chocolate Disney Tangled themed celebration cake from a bakery in North Beach.
 

On the left: Sweet coconut sticky rice wrapped in foil and the mini poppy seed/carrot muffins of the left. I will post muffin recipes soon.

I had a blast at my niece's birthday catching up with relatives such as my aunts and cousins. After the party my sister, husband, and their friends took us to grab some Peet's coffee, then around Half Moon Bay for bargain shopping. Later on they also treated us for dinner in the same area at a Greek restaurant, Rainbow Pizza!  There was a bit of a wait, but the owner warmly greeted us saying he would get us a big table for all of us and the wait turned out to be well worth it. I had the lamb gyro sampler which was beyond huge in portion. The tzatziki sauce mixed in with the thickly cut fries, red onions, tomatoes, and lamb was very tasty and filling. I couldn't finish it there so I took the rest of my gyro sampler for to go. If I lived in Half Moon Bay I would frequent Rainbow Pizza all the time. They are very family friendly, and portions are huge like Cheesecake Factory in comparison.

Rainbow Pizza's delicious gyro sampler ($11.99, thick cut fries with long slices of lamb, onions, tomatoes and tzatziki sauce) On the right is their garlic three cheese bread.

My first post

Hello everyone! This is my first blog post and I'm excited to share my food travels/recipes/experiences from around San Francisco and the bay area.

Earlier today I visited Japantown in San Francisco to buy some snacks, but more importantly have dinner with a close friend. My first stop was at Nijiya Market, a compact grocery store that sells freshly made Japanese foods such as sushi in boxes, assorted snacks and sweets, and many other things that are imported like their macadamia Oreo sticks. There was so much I wanted to buy from there though I could not with my current budget. I thought of my mom who is from Hawaii and bought her some tropical flavored mochi for $1.69 each.

The next place in Japantown I visited was its mall to browse around the many boutique stores and food stands. Again, thinking about how my mom asked me to pick her up some sweet red bean taiyaki my friend brought me to a food stand that sold taiyaki freshly made for $2. I bought two in total one for myself and the other in a to-go bag for my mom. I also tried some Thai iced tea ($2.75) from the same food stand but it tasted a bit watered down.

Around 4pm we walked across the street from the mall to YakiniQ, an all you can eat diy Korean BBQ restaurant. The pricing is good for $19.99 a person we chose from a variety of meats such as pork belly, marinated boneless short ribs, beef brisket, garlic butter chicken, and much more. It included compliementary side dishes like potato salad, marinated bean sprouts, kim chi, picked vegetables, and a big bowl of shredded cabbage with dressing. It was all so good, and even though we over ordered a bit we were still only charged the $19 a person.

I do not get to visit the city very often, and overall it was nice finally getting to see my close friend who I hadn't seen in quite some time.