Simple Sugar Cookies

Finally, I found a really easy cookie recipe that I can follow. The cookies turned out really taste but not very cute. I'll have to get some cookie cutters for my Christmas batch.

Ubuntu Restaurant in Napa

On a recent Napa trip  I discovered Ubuntu Restaurant  in downtown Napa. We went to dinner at Ubuntu without knowing that they had received a 2011 Michelin Star. When I called for a reservation early in the morning, I was surprised to hear that they were already booked and that we could try our luck at the bar.  During the course of the meal I was surprised that I hadn't heard more about the restaurant because the food and service was so good. Every dish was made with extra care and consideration and it was delivered to us in the same manner. Since this is a vegetarian restaurant, they are very creative with their dishes so that they can provide a variety of filling flavors. Every time we asked the waiter about an ingredient on the dish, like a piece of dried fennel, he was able to go into details of how it was made. Even the smallest garnish had been chosen with care. When I learned that the  name Ubuntu  originates from a South African humanist philosophy of focusing on people's allegiances and relations with each other, I couldn't think of any other way to express the experience of eating at Ubuntu. 

Local Wine & Merchant

Local Wine and Merchant is a genuine neighborhood restaurant. Since it opened up in SOMA a couple years ago, I have ate here a handful times. I have never been disappointed by the food nor the experience. The only thing I don't like about this place, is the formal name. I feel like the restaurant's tag line, "Eat Local, Drink Global," is more reflective of the experience. I am surprised that the executive chef-partner Ola Fendert, would give it such a blah name after giving my other favorite SOMA restaurant OOLA such oh la la name. It goes to show that you really can't judge a restaurant by it's name. 

Twenty Five Lusk

Twenty Five Lusk is a new restaurant in SOMA that according to the Chef Dolan, in an Grub Street article interview, has been three years in the making to become "an approachable fine dining experience." I really enjoyed the dining experience. I have to say that the thing that I enjoyed more than the Scandinavian fire places, semi-private dining areas, the service that never allowed an empty glass of water on our table, was the Cauliflower Creme Brulee! Where had it been all my life? It was really delicious. You have to try it if you ever go there and you have to share it. I ordered one for myself and almost ate all of it. Leaving very little room for the rest of my meal. I will definitely go back to Twenty Five Lusk. If you want to learn more about others food experience, here some more Yelp reviews.  

A Simple Sunday Dinner

The last two weeks have been filled with many nights of eating out. Trying new restaurants and going back to some old favorites is always a fun food experience but sometimes you really want a home cooked meal. Tonight I was craving a healthy home cooked meal so I turned to my all time favorite easy meal - baked salmon. I can never ruin a salmon meal. It's just so tasty that you would really have to try hard to make it awful. I found a salmon with caramelized leeks recipe on All.Recipes.com that I have never tried before. To add some additional greens, I made this simple roasted Brussels sprouts. I cooked the salmon with the brussels sprouts at the same time in the oven at a lower temperature of 400 degrees. It took a bit longer than the recipe said it would but it tasted great. 

French Apple Tart

Every Thanksgiving we all gather at my aunt's place and she does pretty much all the cooking. I love to cook, so every year I eagerly volunteer to make something and my offer is usually kindly dismissed.  Last year, I was finally extended an invitation to make a side dish. This year my contribution was upgraded to making a dessert. I wanted to make a traditional Thanksgiving dessert but I've never made pies before and was worried about the outcome. A floppy dessert could have resulted in being demoted to making a salad next year. I found this French Apple Tart recipe on the Food Network and it was really easy to make. The taste results will be finalized next year when or if I get my invitation to cook a Thanksgiving dish.

Best Ribs in San Francisco @ Oola

Oola is one of my favorite SOMA restaurants and their baby back ribs dish is my all time, everywhere favorite ribs. I don't know what they put in that sauce, but it somehow tranquilizes me. It's the best prescription for a bad day. One bite into the tender ribs and all that has bothered me is forgotten and forgiven. If you are having an extra bad day order the Parmesan truffle fries as well. This combination will put a smile on any rib lover's face.

Flour + Water = Amazing Rich Chocolate Dessert

Last Tuesday I went to Flour + Water. 1 hour wait for a table + 4 lovely ladies + 2 bottles of wine + 2 slices of  calabrese pizza + a few bites of strozzapreti pasta + many bites of the amazing pumpkin tortellini + profusely licking the spoon that fed me the chocolate budino with expresso-caramel cream & sea salt = the evening left me with a big smile and a new dessert obsession with the chocolate budino with expresso-caremel cream & sea salt.

Greens Restaurant

Last Sunday night I tried Greens Restaurant for the first time. As the name suggests, everything is vegetarian. Even though most of my lunches are vegetarian and filling, I still have this misconception of vegetarian food as not being filling. Because of this, I checked the menu before I went to dinner and picked the most filling dish I could spot. I chose the the stuff squash -the Ronde Nice Squash Provencal.  Thinking if it is stuffed, it must be filling too..Right? It was definitely stuffed but not as full of flavor as I expected. However, I loved the polenta. I recently tried to cook polenta and learned that it is not as simple to make as it appears. This experience left me with an appreciation for good made polenta. The salad and entree were both very fresh and simple. The dessert was the best. We ordered an upside down cake and these amazing profiteroles. One of them was stuffed with Carmel ice cream and tasted just like the amazing Salted Carmel ice cream at Bi-Rite Creamery.  It was a really nice, healthy dinner and thanks to Black Board Eats 30% discount  the meal came to a good price as well. 

San Francisco Radius Restaurant

"Locally sourced French California Cuisine"

At first glance at Radius motto, "Locally sourced French California Cuisine", I thought that this would be a food match made in heaven. First of all they are in SOMA. Anywhere I can walk to to get good food, I get excited about. I love staying in my SOMA  zipcode. On top of that they support local growers. All the ingredients are from 100 mile radius, hence the name Radius (ah huh!). So many reasons to love it... but I recently went for dinner and I didn't love it. The food was very fresh, and the combinations of ingredients were good. The rockfish I had was served with fennel and potatoes. So, why wasn't this a food match? Something was missing from the dishes I spotted and it was the spices. The dishes were bland. Maybe they had an off night because the Yelp reviews are mostly 4 stars. I noticed the good reviews are for lunch so I will give Radius another try because it is local.

Te Gusto Tacolicious

I am probably late to the fiesta but I am happy that I finally arrived because I love Tacolicious. I didn't expect delicious tacos and for a "reasonable price," outside of the Mission. $12 for 4 tacos is reasonable to me. I especially loved every bite of the carnitas taco except when I accidentally added a big helping of the yellow salsa on it. For some reason, I thought yellow is suppose to be mild. WOW! was I wrong.

Sugar & All The Fixins: Chocolate Dipped Pumpkin Biscotti

These biscottis by Shirin are on the top of my dessert list. Check out her blog for more sweets recipes.

Sugar & All The Fixins: Chocolate Dipped Pumpkin Biscotti: "The nice thing about making cookies is that you can make one batch that feeds many. So I brought some to my parents and grandparents, sent s..."

The Brass Monkey at Little Star

I went back to Little Star Pizza tonight for off course some pizza and was introduced to a hidden gem- the Brass Monkey pizza. This is one of SF secret menu items because it's not on the menu! The Brass Monkey is basically the Little Star pizza, which is spinach blended with ricotta, feta, mushrooms, onions and garlic, with something special - sausage. I am actually not a big fan of sausage on my pizza but time it made a lot of sense. This pizza is delicious. After just one bite, I realized why they call it the Brass Monkey. One taste and you'll become a junkie. I had 3 slices tonight and would have had more if I hadn't O.D on the stuff. 

Bushi-tei Lunch

My friend had mentioned a few times how she loves Bushi-tei restaurant. Finally after a few mouth watering descriptions of the place, we made it to Japantown, where the restaurant is hidden, for a Saturday lunch. 

Bushi-tei describes its food as French California fusion and I would add some Japanese seasoning to the description. For lunch, I had an open faced croque wagyu sandwich and a complimentary carrot soup. Both were good. The ambiance was really nice too. I actually really enjoyed the simple decor. 


Although the food was good, and the ambiance nice, I don't think I will be going back there soon. There just wasn't a wow factor that made me think I will crave it to go back anytime soon. With so many places to eat in the city, its hard to go back somewhere for seconds if there isn't a wow ingredient in the dinning experience. 

Bongo Burger

Berkeley is one of my favorite food cities because there is so many good ethnic restaurants. My favorite Mexican, Korean BBQ, and Persian restaurants are in this little city. I actually get a little nervous before a trip there because I have to choose one place to eat at. Tonight the choice was easy. I picked Persian food. I went to visit my little cousin who just started at Cal. Since she is away from home, I thought she would love to visit Bongo Burgers for some Persian Burgers and Doogh. Turns out she really wanted an American burger, which they also make well. I enjoyed my Persian Burger, Doogh and our stroll through the moon lit campus.

Nihon Whiskey Lounge

Thanks to a recent Groupon deal, I had a nice dinner at Nihon Whiskey Lounge in the Mission for a better deal than usual. With drinks, a dinner at Nihon can get pricey, especially since Whiskey is their specialty. This time it was not too pricey even with the green tea whiskey drink I ordered.  Thanks Groupon. We also ordered the Thunderbird and Samurai roll. The Samurai comes with jalapenos on top. I've found jalapenos are always a tasty addition. This time I also tried the Mackerel Robata, which was delicious. For appetizer, we got this avocado salad with fried chips. I can't remember the name and they don't publish their menu for me to double check. But, if you see an appetizer that comes with fried chips and avocado get it no matter what the name is.

Zero Zero Pizzeria

Zero Zero is located in SOMA.. So great to get a new restaurant in sleepy SOMA. Follow my blog with bloglovin

Bodega Bistro

I recently discovered Bodega Bistro through a friend's suggestion. It's a casual Vietnamese restaurant located on Larken near Eddy. To most San Franciscans this location may not come as a surprise but I actually just learned that we have a "little Vietnam" area there filled with Vietnamese restaurants. The dishes I shared below were really delicious. I especially loved the Nom dish. I loved it because of the fantastic name for a dish - "NOM!" Also, the fact that it had these little spicy beef jerky meat dispersed in shredded papaya and herbs made it irresistible to me. 

           

          

Viva Las Vegas Local Restaurant FireFly

 I recently had dinner at Firefly Restaurant in Vegas and the experience reminded me once again to never judge how good a restaurant's food is by the decor. Firefly Restaurant is located in front of an abandoned hotel tower and from the outside this place does not look appetizing. But after trying the tapas, I found a whole new reason to all the other reasons why I love Vegas. The tapas are unique,and  delicious. Here are a couple of my favorite things to try:

#1 Filet Mignon Sliders

#2 Stuffed dates. These are some rich dates.. They are stuffed with bacon, almonds, and blue cheese. 

The tapas are so tasty and reasonably priced that like all things in Vegas it's hard to remember your limit. 

Salad-e olivieh

I woke up this morning craving salad-e olivieh. Waking up thinking about food is not that unusual but craving salad-olivieh so early is a first even for a shekamoo. Salad-e olivieh is the Persian version of potato salad. It’s my brother-n-laws best dish and a family celebration would not be complete without it. I think this craving must have been triggered by the fact that I am leaving for a family Tahoe trip today. I am hoping that I will be eating a lot of this dish this weekend (hint, hint). 

Welcome to A Shekamoo's Food Blog

You may be wondering.. what is a Shekamoo? In Persian it means a person who loves food. At least that is the polite interpretation.  Some, like the Urban Dictionary, say a shekamoo (spelled shikamoo)  is a fatty.. I don't agree.. Anyone regardless of how fat or skinny they are can be a Shekamoo if you love food.. So if you love food, eating it, cooking it or you may just love to stare at food, follow my blog and we can explore it together!

Happy Eating!

Shekamoo