B-Side Blog

THINGS I ATE: Pretty Much Everything at The Corner Door

It’s Autumn in Los Angeles. Well, actually, it’s Autumn everywhere. Except the Southern Hemisphere. It’s Spring down there. I think. The point is that we — as a global community — are in a different season than we were, say, two months ago, and to celebrate the leaves changing color from green to slightly less green, The Corner Door in Culver City, CA has trotted out some autumnal cocktails. What better reason to head all the way down to this nifty gastropub for a media-comped meal, replete with cinnamon smoke and beignets.

Photos after the jump…

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THINGS I ATE: Sausage and Beer at ‘Berlin Currywurst’

It’s October, and among the fall pleasures in Los Angeles is Oktoberfest, that German celebration of the harvest or beer or who knows what. The point is that I have Germany on the mind, which means this is a great opportunity to revisit a restaurant my friends and I dropped by over the summer: Berlin Currywurst.

Ardent readers of this blog may remember that I happily visited the Silver Lake location of “Berlin Currywurst” on its opening day two and a half years ago. Since then, the plucky sausage shop has expanded into fresh new digs in Hollywood, taking over an old BBQ joint on Cahuenga and adding on a biergarten. There really aren’t enough outdoor biergartens in this city, and so it was with high hopes that I assembled a crew of people to head to Berlin Currywurst for an afternoon of beer, sausage, and outdoorsiness.

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THINGS I ATE: Food and Adventure in Kauai

I’ve spent so much time this summer blogging about Big Brother and podcasting about Bravo that I’ve hardly had time to post about food, but I can assure you that I have been eating. I’ve been eating a lot. Perhaps too much. Nevertheless, way back in July, I had a glorious jaunt over to the island of Kauai (that’s in Hawaii, for all of you who are geographically challenged), and in between luxuriating in the sunshine and falling off rocks in the mountains, I managed to enjoy a bite or two at some of the local eateries.

After the jump, check out what I ate and a few vacation pictures to boot. Warning: long post!

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Win A $15 iTunes Gift Credit!

Hey everyone! Lisa Timmons and I are giving away a free $15 iTunes gift credit plus a free Sade song download of your choice! That’s right — we’re giving away iTunes swag! All you have to do is come up with the most amazing .com domain name. For instance, something like sadeandnight.com would play very well with us. I would also welcome something along the lines of four-thor-and-seven-years-ago.com.

Here’s what to do:

1) Go to godaddy.com and sign up if you need to.

2) Create a domain (must end with .com) and use the promo code “banter” on checkout. You will only be charged $1.99, which is about as much as you’d pay for a soda or a taco (or both, depending on the establishment).

3) Once you’ve signed up your domain, post it on our Facebook page, specifically on the comments section of this post.

That’s it! We’ll accept new entries until noon on September 18th.

Good luck!

WATCH WHAT CRAPPENS #92: Jersey Horseplay; Also, Frenchies Fighting and Insufferable LA Foodies

VIdeo.

Audio only.

This week on “Watch What Crappens,” Ben Mandelker (bsideblog.com) and Matt Whitfield (Yahoo!) break down all the drama and horse therapy on Bravo. First, the guys take on the bickering in Miami. Then it’s off to New Jersey for some equine emotions and tribal drumming before we wrap things up with the catty women of “Eat Drink Lie.” Along the way there’s gossip about “Tamra’s OC Wedding” and Lisa VanderPump. Come listen!

A Preview of ‘Los Angeles Times THE TASTE’

For years I’ve been reading the Los Angeles Times food section — sometimes for the restaurant reviews and sometimes for the recipes that the staff churns out on a weekly basis. The dishes are all prepared in the newspaper’s test kitchen, a mythical place that I’ve always imagined was run by elves and little hamsters in wheels. Imagine my delight when I was invited last week to a media-comped meal at this hallowed culinary ground. Yes, I was headed to the LA Times test kitchen, and I was just barely less excited than the time I managed to get myself into the Playboy Mansion ten years ago (but that’s a whole other story — spoiler alert: I was in the same room as Gloria Alred, Jesse Jackson, Anna Nicole Smith, and Tiffany. Need I really say more?).

Anyway, the purpose of these test kitchen shenanigans was to provide a preview of the LA Times’ upcoming food event titled The Taste. It’s a multi-day affair this coming Labor Day weekend at Paramount Studios featuring food, wine, and various noteworthy speakers. To give us a taste of The Taste (see what I did there?), we were treated to various bites from a few of the vendors who’ll be at the festival. After the jump, check out some pics of what’s to come…

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ADVENTURES IN DOMESTICITY: Spiced Chickpeas and Fresh Vegetable Salad Edition

It’s been a hot minute since I’ve served up an Adventure in Domesticity, but fear not: I have been cooking my arse off the past few months. I have a full-on backlog of recipes to share, and I’m getting back into the groove with this healthy ditty from Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi’s amazing cookbook, Jerusalem: The Cookbook. The recipe I speak of is Spiced Chickpeas and Fresh Vegetable Salad, a hearty and healthy vegetarian option that makes great use of summer veggies such as heirloom tomatoes (which conveniently I used).

Check out the results after the jump…

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THINGS I ATE: Croughnuts at Kettle Glazed Doughnuts

Cronuts. Err’body talkin’ ’bout cronuts. And for those of you reciting this blog post out loud, be sure to inform your listeners that I am referring to cronuts, the doughnut/croissant hybrid, not crow nuts, the testicles of ravens. Yes, in case you’ve been living under a rock for the past three months (and/or doing something productive with your time), cronuts are the allegedly divine creation of Dominique Ansel, a New York City baker who allegedly sells out of the things within mere SECONDS of them coming out of the oven. Cronut madness has apparently swept Manhattan and is now taking over Los Angeles as a slew of Cronut imitators have popped up in the past two weeks alone. None of these doughy purveyors can offer Official Cronuts™, and in fact, none of them can even call their creations Cronuts because the damn things are trademarked.

And that’s where the Croughnut comes into play. In a sleepy strip-mall by Argyle and Franklin resides the brand new (and swanky) doughnut shop, Kettle Glazed Doughnuts. I had read in LA Weekly that this upstart business had their own version of the Cronut, and since I found myself driving by earlier today, I figured I’d give it a try. Impressions after the jump…

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THINGS I ATE: Seasonal Ice Cream Flavors at Cafe del Rey

People who know me know that I love ice cream. I mean, there’s nothing groundbreaking about that statement. Who doesn’t love ice cream? Maybe aliens or ornery Disney villains like Jaffar. I don’t know. The point is that I take my ice cream very seriously. Not only do I consume it, but I make it occasionally (with the help of David Lebovitz’s must-buy cookbook, The Perfect Scoop). Naturally, when I was invited for a media-comped ice cream “social” at Cafe del Rey in Marina Del REH, I couldn’t resist. After the jump, check out pics of the various ice creams and toppings I sampled…

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Help My Friend’s Kickstarter

Hey everybody. My friend Sita is trying to fund a short film called Lenny&Dahlia. For those of you who don’t remember Sita, she’s the crazy lady who made frequent appearances on Housewife Hoedown back in the day. I’m sure we’ll have her back on Watch What Crappens (I really don’t know why we haven’t already), but in the meantime, help her out and check out her Kickstarter page.

Here’s the deal. Sita has coordinated an all-female cast and crew: director, producer, actors, writer, editor and production coordinator. They all be women! Reality shows make ladies look terrible on a daily basis. Why not support something empowering?

So, if you feel like helping out, check out the details here.