I dont have to tell you how much I love boccolone.

Also Yes, only idiots will frown their face at Lard. The same people who don't frown their faces at butter, which has higher saturated fat and cholesterol. Lard rules. Get over it. You're just scared of the word you butter-asses.

Also taking suggestions on places to eat in Rome. I will be chilling there for a few days and would like some foodies suggestions.

lard=mexican butter.
remember back when i was kid always seeing big packages at our grocery store of fresh lard.

Mexican style cooking is what turned me on to lard. Frijoles negros just aren't the same without it. Why do Americans love bacon but fear lard?

Mama Roma! If you like chocolate ice cream, try Tre Scalini at Piazza Navona.

You've gotta have the Carciofi alla giudìa (fried artichoke) at Ristorante da Giggetto in the Jewish Quarter. That was a real revelation for me. Serious oldskool goodness.

There are lots of great little family-run restaurants in nooks and crannies around the Pantheon. I'll dig around and see if I can find the name of the one that totally blew me away.

It would be hard to go wrong in Rome. Just about any trattoria or pizzaria that looks good will be great. If you like wine, don't bother spending a fortune on it there unless you really want to ... the young table wines are very good (and inexpensive.)

lol... Joe, Alex and I on "View from the Bay" today..

Nice!
what were you doing on that show?

ever watch "california gold"? Love that show

Yeah Alex showed me his signed Bourdain book ... most cool. You guys should blog about it ... people would enjoy reading that.

Really? Clip I can view online?

You guys have all the fun!

LASK'ers are obsessed with Astro Burger.

Ok before we get to any of that.
Let me give a review of an LA spot I really enjoyed.
Hopefully Henry can chime in.

Comme ca on melrose


menu here http://www.commecarestaurant.com/files/ ... _26_09.pdf

It's a casual french brasserie I'd compare to Absinthe. I had the Duck confit with pomme frites and braised red cabbage. The duck was cooked perfectly. (You know what and I hate it when people say that but it's true.)

My friends had the a 3 cheese angolotti, the scottish salmon with oyster mushrooms & polenta and escargots. My friend Meryl had a creamless creamed spinach. WHAT? yeah it was great too. In fact it was all were great. I was kind of shocked.

For dessert I had a brioche bread pudding with ice cream(flavor I forgot because it barely held a candle to the bread pudding). I honestly will probably go back as many times as I can to try everything on the menu including the frisee salad aux lardons and the roasted marrow with oxtail jam.

Truly awesome event yesterday.
Thanks to Alex for the heads up.



It started w/ a book signing by Anthony Bourdain.
That was cool meeting him.

I forgot what I was pointing to.



Lunch wasn't bad.
It was four course meal w/ endless wine from Trione Vineyards & Winery.

Started w/ a plate of cold cuts.



Insalata - Tamatta Cu Casu Sardegna
(Heriloom tomatoes with spring onions, basil leaves, red wine vinaigrette and pecorino grand gu)



Secondi - Branzino Vermentino
(Bluenose seabass seared with roasted fennel, alta cucina tomatoes, green colossal olives and gregola; vermentino sauce and fennel greens)



Dolce - Panna Cotta Al Mirto
(Chilled cream desserts flavored with Sardinian blueberry liquor and garnished with blueberries, lime and sugar)



Look at all these girls!



And in between courses, Anthony went around taking questions.
Look at Alex in awe.



Kirkland had a little too much to drink. Again.



More pics here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fiendsaint ... 179763343/

Recommended place to try:
Rosamunde Sausage Grill
http://www.rosamundesausagegrill.com/
http://www.yelp.com/biz/rosamunde-sausa ... -francisco

There's two locations, Mission & Haight.
I stopped by the Haight St one.
It's cool how you can order and then take it next door to eat at the bar, Toronado.
http://www.yelp.com/biz/toronado-san-francisco

what can I say? He is as close to a culinary/writing hero I'll ever have.

Rosamunde is delicious

Cmon joe, talking about rosamunde's is like talking about house of prime rib. Even Flynn has been there and he hates eating.

For the record the one of the mission is ten times better than the old one. More selection, more room and, according to friends, better beer. They also have blue bottle coffee and brunch there. You deal with a different type of douchebag than the ones at toronado. Key word there is different, because I can deal with mission douchebags more than the haight ones. Don't worry because the mission hipsters skip rosamundes completely.

Josh and I both had our birthday partys there(mission). Recommended as well for Vegans since they have vegan beans, dogs and soups.

Recommended:
$5 Lunch Buffet @ Gold Club
http://www.goldclubsf.com/
http://www.yelp.com/biz/gold-club-san-francisco

Pork chop, fried rice, fried chicken, various desserts & strippers!



More pics here (Somewhat NSFW):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fiendsaint ... 180051573/

haha oh man. I have no words for that. except maybe amazing and gross.

Alex.....if I had a pic like that with Bourdain it would be hanging on wall already. Lucky!

Alex...next time you're in town let's do lunch.

I haven't been to Comme ça in a couple of years. I've only been once and it was early when they first opened. I honestly can't remember what I ate and it was pretty average overall. I should probably give it another chance one of these days.

Reminds me of the time I went to Govind Armstrong's restaurant Table 8 the first month it opened. We ordered our food and were just talking when about 15 minutes later the chef walks out and apologizes for taking so long. I said I really didn't notice it but he insisted that the whole dinner would be on him. I was pretty blown away and vowed to go back again to repay his kindness. Never did go back and now he changed the restaurant.

So the moral of the story is restaurants disappear into the night, every night, so don't take them from granted.

Ok one more from LA:
Border Grill food truck.
This is Susan Feniger's truck. I think a lot of you remember her from Top Chef masters. She was eliminated for basically serving a sandwich. Which is total bullshit if you ask me, but hey we can't all be models turned food critics like Kelly Choi.

Anyways onto the food:
The truck was parking in the middle of a neighborhood in Los Feliz. I love it when food trucks are in actual random locations and not in front of a school or someplace easy. Just saying..

The Menu

Honestly it was hard to make a decision.

I decided on:

Yucatan Pork Taco -braised achiote pork, black beans, pickled onion, orange jicama slaw (2 on the right)
Carne Asada Taco - caramelized onion, salsa fresca, guacamole (1 on the left)
Crispy Baja Fish Taco -chipotle honey, creamy salsa fresca (not pictured)
Potato Rajas Taco -roasted potatoes, chiles, mexican cheeses, pickled onion

The Pork taco was way too sweet for my taste. It was the Jicama that pushed it over the edge honestly. The fish taco was not bad. I'm not much of a fish person but I thought I'd push myself.
The Carne Asada taco belonged to a friend. I also had the potato one because a friend was full. I ate half, it was kind of forgettable but I don't remember disliking it. I think its just the vegetarian staple for them.

Now for the fantastic:

Green Corn Tamal -sweet corn, crema, salsa fresca
Call me bias but this 100% comfort food for me. I could have eaten 100 of these if I was pressed to. The taste of the tamale was so spot on, I thought my mom was in the back making them. She wasn't though(I checked). The consistency of the Crema was amazing and against the warm sweet corn, it had me saying "oh shit you should all buy one of these" to the people still in line.

I would have gotten the Churro bites but they were sold out. Hopefully I will get a chance to inhale them.
http://twitter.com/bordergrill


Also on a side note. I got to dine at the (in)famous Harris Ranch on the way back. Honestly, I didn't order a steak but had a tri-tip sandwich. It was eh(peppercorn ranch? Come on that's just lazy, motherfuckers). I also had their "rocky mountain oysters". All novelty and no taste. They came with cocktail sauce for christ's sake. Borring!

The decor was obnoxious. It was a combination of what what a redneck thinks is fancy meets Italy meets race track chic meets sports bar. Does that paint a pretty enough picture for you?

I would go back but only to see how the actual steak was because the tri-tip wasn't bad but was marred by the "lets make the white trash happy by making this taste like every other sandwich they get at TGIFridays" treatment.

Not to sound to geeky but how was Bourdain in person?
I wasn't a big fan of his fiction stuff but I really like he's nonfiction writing style.

Hey Joe....did you get weird looks for taking a camera into a strip club? Who the hell does that?!

During the beginning of the event when Bourdain was signing, he was whatevers.
But maybe after a few beers he was pretty rad.
He was quite funny in answering everyone's questions.


Spy camera!

Hey Alex - next time you are at Comme Ca try the Tarte Flambe, with fromage blanc, caramelized onions, and lardon. Although I've never had it, people say the burger is one of the best in LA. Those tables in the front room by the window are sweet. Speaking of burgers, Annie Miller at Clementine is serving a burger as part of her summertime menu, and it's worthy entree into the burger wars. Get it while it's still on the menu.

It's amusing seeing Susan Finegar's green corn tamale served in a cup. It was one of the original dishes served at her first old Border Grill restaurant when it was on melrose, almost inevitably as an accompaniment to the peppered vinegar turkey.
II was sad to see her eliminated from Top Chef because of her Kaya Toast, but if you haven't already been to STREET, you should check it out next time you are in town. Go before sunset, and ask for a table on the patio.

the Bordain lunch and book signing looks super fun, and lunch looks great there. Where was it held?

Went to get Little Star Pizza last night.
http://www.littlestarpizza.com/
http://www.yelp.com/biz/little-star-pizza-san-francisco

It's often recommended from people I talk to.
They've got two spots in the city, I went to the one on Divisadero.
Even at 9ish, the wait for a pizza was half an hour.

We got a Pesto Chicken thin crust (pesto base, roasted chicken, mushrooms, onions).
Wasn't bad, pretty tasty, but a bit dry.
I prefer the thin crust pizzas at Delfina's.



Known for their deep dishes, we tried the house name Little Star (spinach blended with ricotta and feta, mushrooms, onions, garlic).
Maybe I'm just not a big fan of deep dish pizzas, so to me this was whatevers.
It just tasted like mushed tomatoes w/ some veges.
Wasn't a fan of the crust either, it had a deep sesame seed taste to it.



The Mixed Salad (mixed greens, cherry tomatoes, red bells, red onions, gorgonzola cheese and chopped walnuts, tossed with a housemade vinaigrette dressing) wasn't bad but nothing special.
Wouldn't bother getting it next time.



What I'd definitely get next time is the Housemade Cheesecake.
Nice and fluffy w/ a crumbly crust.



In conclusion, not a big fan of Little Star Pizza.
It's probably because I'm not a big deep dish pizza eater.
I'm more of a thin crust aficionado.