I completely adore Littorai pinot noir.

Taj Campton Place on Stockton Street in San Francisco, home of the Campton Place Restaurant

I wrote that first sentence and somehow feel that the point of my story today is more than half accomplished. I adore Littorai pinot noir. J’adore! It even looks good in French.

So I was thrilled when I learned that Hegui and I had the chance to attend another San Francisco dinner with the winemaker, Ted Lemon. We didn’t know Campton Place Restaurant but that didn’t seem as important as the wine somehow—that is until we dined at this divine establishment.

Littorai Assistant Winemaker John Wilson

About a block from Union Square, in the heart of the San Francisco shopping district, the restaurant is gorgeous. Sadly my only camera was an eye-phone so most of the pictures leave much to be desired. Take our word for it; the dining room at Campton Place is elegant. And the staff is impeccable. I understand they’re known for their wine collection and often host winemaker’s dinners. Click here for the schedule.

Since it’s fairly small, the entire space was taken up by the Littorai event. That seemed especially grand. We stood around for a bit sipping (or perhaps trying to sip—it was just too darn tasty. I was probably gulping) the 2009 Mays Canyon chardonnay. It was the only wine not on the preprinted menu so I’m not positive here. That’s when we met our really cool tablemates, Pam and Bill. Like us, they’re fairly new to Littorai but Bill particularly is a dyed-in-the-wool pinotfile.

lobster veloute with red pepper and summer squash

Turns out that fifth at table was Littorai Assistant Winemaker John Wilson. Unfortunately, Ted Lemon couldn’t attend at the last minute due to the death of his father. So sorry! We’re thinking of you and your family, Ted.

That was heavy news, but it didn’t dampen our spirits for too long. John turned out to be like a younger version of Ted—intense, charming and charmingly nerdy, extremely informative and always very polite. We really liked him and what great luck it was to sit by him as we tasted away.

green apple arugula and avocado amuse bouche

the 2009 Littorai Cerise and Savoy pinot noir did not stay in my glass too long

Alaskan cod with roasted nori crumbs, squid ink linguini and bonito broth

Since we drank mostly 2009s all night, which I’ve written about in a couple of other places on the blog already, I’ve decided to focus on the meal and just give our most general impressions on the wine. You can read the other stories if you’re curious or better yet try the wine yourselves.

The first course was lobster velouté with red pepper and summer squash. It was paired with the 2010 Theiriot Vineyard, Sonoma Coast Chardonnay. This is the wine that I liked a lot when we went on the Littorai biodynamic tour. It was a perfect match and a great start to what turned out to be a fine meal.

Then Chef Srijith Gopinathan surprised us all with a green apple, arugula, avocado amuse bouche. Light and really refreshing, it created a mini-sensation at our table.

Next came the Alaskan cod with roasted nori crumbs, squid ink linguini and bonito broth (my favorite dish of the evening) with two pinots: 2009 Savoy Vineyard, Anderson Valley and 2009 Cerise Vineyard, Anderson Valley. Both wines were great though I sort of preferred the more funky nose and fuller bodied Cerise.

instead of lamb, the chef prepared this lovely string halibut with veggies in a spicy cashew sauce

Instead of lamb loin, we were offered an exciting pescatarian option: string halibut with mixed veggies in a spiced cashew sauce. “It’s like Indian taken to the next level. It has all the ingredients that we are using, but different,” Hegui exclaimed. The wine pairing: 2009 The Pivot Vineyard, Estate Bottled Sonoma Coast and the 2009 Hirsch Vineyard, Sonoma Coast pinots perhaps didn’t quite work with the spicy cashew sauce, but I didn’t mind. Both wines were amazing anyway.

A cheese plate was offered all diners rather than sweets. These were Abbaye de Belloc and San Andreas Bellwether Farms , though it beats me which is which. Sadly, and if there is a criticism to make about the entire event, this is it: the wine had run out by the time we arrived at the cheese course. Bill wasn’t deterred one bit by that tiny bump in the road. He ordered a bottle of 2006 Littorai Sonoma Coast pinot noir—I think that’s the one—and shared with the whole table. Thanks again, Bill!!

Campton Place cheese course

At the end, the staff gave everyone shiny little boxes with some tiny sweets, ostensibly to take home, though I ate ours there 😉 Fin.

my only pic of Executive Chef Srijith Gopinathan with Littorai Assistant Winemaker John Wilson is not the best but I had to include it here

So it was a perfect evening all around: good food, great wine, meeting new friends and wine lovers, and even stimulating our intellects. Try Campton Place Restaurant when you’re next in town. And definitely look for Littorai.

spicy pressed tofu salad

I’m so excited about this new-to-me book, Andrea Nguyen’s Asian Tofu. I saw it by chance at the local Whole Foods and was cautiously interested. I ordered a copy from the library and couldn’t put it down once I started reading. I shall have to splurge and actually buy a copy soon.

Nguyen writes in a lucid style with a modern sensibility. Despite the extremely broad sounding title, the focus here is on traditional uses of the various kinds of tofu. She’s lots of helpful illustrations and really breaks down the subject matter into digestible portions—pun intended. I made this dish last week just before we left for a trip to LA to hear fun. at the Wiltern. Mmmmm!

spicy pressed tofu salad

1 package pressed tofu cut into bite-sided cubes
2/3 cup unsalted roasted peanuts
4 spring onions, cut into rounds
3 tbsp canola oil
1 tsp toasted sesame oil
1 tbsp fermented black beans, mashed
2½ tbsp chili bean sauce
2 tsp soy sauce
½ tsp sugar
1 to 2 tbsp spicy chili oil to garnish

Andrea recommends “refreshing” the peanuts by lightly roasting them in a dry pan. Let cool. Add to tofu with spring onion.

In a small pan, add canola oil, sesame oil, fermented black beans and chili bean sauce. Heat about two minutes on medium. Remove from heat and add sugar and soy sauce.

Toss sauce with tofu. Sprinkle with some chili oil. Serve.

I have fond memories of a cooking class we took in Chiang Mai, Thailand several years ago. The chef picked us up early in the morning from the hotel then off we went to a thrilling local market to buy the ingredients for the cooking class feast. I think there were about 16 of us divided into pairs. Each group, after a brief classroom training session, was directed to an open restaurant kitchen area to cook different Thai recipes with the produce we bought earlier. We all shared the prepared dishes at the end.

vegetarian Vietnamese Pho

Steven and I made Tom Yum with coconut milk. Since then I learned to make the one with clear broth which is my favorite. I have been making my Thai inspired soups at home for while now. They’re very versatile: here’s one with fresh salmon, another more traditional style and a third with Dungeness crab. Mmmm!

me at a buzzing Chiang Mai market

our Thai chef instructor

ready to cook amazing Thai food

slurping up my first ever homemade Thai Tom Yum soup

I have not yet had the honor and pleasure of travelling to Vietnam, but I can’t wait! I love Vietnamese Pho, that brothy spicy clear soup that’s usually served with paper thin slices of steak and other cuts of meat. Since becoming pescatarian, I haven’t really had it in a while. It’s hard to find a good pesce-veggie pho alternative. Though we’re blessed in San Francisco with two places, The Loving Hut and The Golden Era, both of which make good vegan versions. However I wanted to make my own soup at home.

I read an inspiring article in the New York Times on vegetarian pho broth and a related post on the subject at Ellie May’s blog.

Like that Thai cooking class for Tom Yum, these stories demystified pho for me. It is completely easy to make provided that you have the correct ingredients. One funny thing about this is that I have never been a huge fun of cinnamon or star anise and these spices shine in the soup… go figure. I’ve already made it twice and will be returning to this recipe often I’ve a feeling. Pho broth has a tart, salty, smoky, slightly sweet, and earthy flavor that matches perfectly well with the fresh herbs added at the end. Love it!

vegetarian Vietnamese Pho

for the broth:

3 quarts water
1 small daikon radish, cut into chunks
3 carrots, cut into chunks
2 tbsp soy sauce
Kosher salt to taste
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp black peppercorns
1 large onion, quartered
1 shallot, halved
1 2-inch piece of fresh ginger
4 shiitake mushrooms
5 large cloves garlic, skin on, crushed
2 star anise pods
4 whole cloves
1 piece of good cinnamon (~3 inches)

for the solids:

Rice Noodles (~1 lb) – (pad Thai noodles)
Small pack of seitan strips soaked in 1 tsp soy sauce and 1 crushed fresh garlic clove
Field Roast cold cut sliced thinly
2 oz of Yuba cut into strips
1 tbsp olive oil
2 cups fresh mung bean sprouts
Chives
Thai basil leaves
Mint leaves
Cilantro leaves
Lime cut into wedges
1 serrano chili pepper cut in rounds

condiments:

Hoisin sauce
Chili garlic sauce

preparing the broth

Put first seven ingredients in a large pot and bring to a boil.

Meanwhile place onion, shallot, garlic, ginger, mushroom, star anise, cloves and cinnamon in a skillet and toast until veggies begin to caramelize and everything becomes aromatic. Add toasted ingredients to the boiling broth, turn temperature down and simmer for 25 minutes. Discard solids.

roasting the onion, garlic, ginger and various spices

While broth is cooking boil another pot of water, drop rice noodles in, remove from heat and let soak for about 15 minutes. Check every now and then for doneness. Noodles should not cook too long. Look for an al dente texture. Drain

Using the same skillet add olive oil followed by marinated seitan and cook for about 4 minutes then set aside.

To assemble the soup, place some noodles in the bottom of a bowl, add some mung bean sprouts, then ladle some piping hot broth over them. Top with a wedge of lime, some seitan, yuba, Field Roast cold cut slices, a few leaves of basil, mint and serve with more herbs and mung bean sprouts on the side.

Broth should be adjusted at the table with a dash of hoisin and chili garlic sauce.

These Yukon gold potatoes came from our community garden plot! I am so excited about that fact. Have you ever grown potatoes? Well, I haven’t before. And we never planted them to begin with—they just “came with” the new plot. These are super yellow and lovely. I wonder if they were planted intentionally? The person who used to have our plot composted, so she could have dumped them in as table scraps or something. Well, whatever the reason, we were able to harvest about 5 lbs of gorgeous potatoes in less than four months. One day we started digging and the spuds kept on surfacing. Wow!

clams with Yukon gold potatoes

Yukon gold potatoes harvested from our community garden plot

I’m continually enchanted with growing some of the produce we eat. It is magical and right now (mid-summer) every other day when I come to the garden I am surprised at how fast things develop. We’ve been getting lots of sun and that is making our plants happy.

This recipe is sort of a cross between a clam chowder and Vichyssoise soup. The clam sauce is inspired by this recipe, an excellently traditional way to enjoy fresh clams.

clams with Yukon gold potatoes

3 lbs medium to small sized clams, rinsed and clean
2 lb Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and cubed
1½ cups dry white wine
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 shallot, chopped fine
6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Freshly ground black pepper
Kosher salt
small bunch chopped chives

Bring a pot of water to a boil; add a little salt and the cubed potatoes. Cook for about 5 minutes or until tender, transfer to a colander to drain. Set aside.

Heat up 3 tbsp olive oil in a skillet, add shallot first then garlic and cook until aromatic. Toss in clams and let them sizzle for a couple of minutes without burning the garlic/shallot mix. Add wine and shake the pan to coat everything with juices. Cover and let cook on high until clams start to open. Transfer clams to a bowl as they begin to open and keep warm. Discard the ones that don’t open, if any. Pour juices over boiled potatoes and blend until smooth using a stick blender. If too thick add a bit of hot water. Adjust taste with salt. Return potato to the skillet and warm through. Toss in chives, the clams and drizzle with the remainder of the olive oil. Serve at once.

Sometimes the most memorable dining experiences are when you cook with friends. Dinner yesterday was a treat: our friend, John, and I made it together. This delicious shiitake mushroom on toast was his contribution. I was mentally taking notes while watching him preparing it. The dish came together in almost no time and it tasted so good that we ate it all just as fast, obviously with sips of red wine and lots of laughs. Most of the ingredients were grown or made locally, so it was all super fresh.

Shiitake mushrooms & fromage blanc on toast

Shiitake mushrooms & fromage blanc on toast

6 slices of rustic country loaf
1 lb shiitake mushrooms, chopped fine
1 clove garlic, mashed
1 shallot, minced
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 to 2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp Marsala wine
Freshly ground black pepper
Kosher salt
½ cup container fromage blanc (ours from Cowgirl Creamery)
1 tbsp Italian parsley, chopped fine

Turn broiler on and position rack close to coils.

Place a non stick skillet on stove top, bring temperature to medium high, and add olive oil, shallot, garlic and cook until translucent. Toss in chopped shiitake and continue cooking for another minute or so. Add Marsala wine and stir until all absorbed, sprinkle with salt and pepper, add butter and set aside.

Place bread slices on a baking tray and lightly toast them in the oven, about 2 minutes. Remove spread cheese evenly on each slice. Return to the oven and toast until edges of bread have become brown and cheese starts to bubble. Remove from oven, top with sautéed mushrooms and sprinkle with parsley.

Sweet or savory, most countries have their own style of making pancakes. I really like the Vietnamese version, bánh xèo. This recipe is especially interesting because it utilizes two ingredients very common on our table in a totally different way: rice and beans, a favorite combination on this blog. See what I mean here.

Bánh Xèo AKA Vietnamese mung bean pancakes with leafy lettuces, mint etc. in the afternoon sunlight

I’ve often seen this with shrimp or pork. (I used fish sauce in the spicy dipping sauce, otherwise this would be vegan.) Omitting these two still delivers a pancake packed with delicious flavor. I’ve adapted this bánh xèo from two sources: flavor explosions and Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty cookbook. It didn’t come out as crisply as I expected, probably due to me limited experience in this art. Nevertheless these were divine.

Bánh Xèo AKA Vietnamese mung bean pancakes

For the batter:

½ cup hulled mung beans, soaked for 2h, drained and then steamed till soft and cooled down
1 cup coconut milk
2 cups rice flour
½ cup corn starch
2 cups water
1 tsp kosher salt
¾ tsp turmeric powder
4 whole scallions, chopped

For the stuffing:

I lb mung bean sprouts
1 shallot, chopped
Canola oil
1 pack enoki mushrooms, stems discarded

For the salad condiments:

Any sweet lettuce, mint leaves, cilantro, chives, mung bean sprouts all undressed

For the spicy dipping sauce:

1 serrano pepper, seeds and ribs partially removed, chopped and slightly crushed
1 tsp chili garlic sauce (Túong Ót Tói Viet-Nam)
2 tbsp fish sauce
6 tbsp water
5 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 limes
1 large fresh clove garlic peeled and smashed

Place sugar, water, vinegar, fish sauce, Serrano pepper, chili sauce and juice of one lime in a small pot. Warm on stovetop until sugar just melts. Remove from heat and let cool completely. Add juice of second lime, and garlic.

Next prepare the filling. Sauté shallot in one table spoon of canola oil until translucent, add mung bean sprout and cook briefly just to wilt them a bit. Sprinkle with salt. Set aside.

To make the batter, place cooked and cooled mung beans, salt, turmeric powder, and coconut milk in food processor and whiz until smooth. Transfer to a large bowl. Add water, rice flour, corn starch and whisk to combine. Mix in scallions. Adjust consistency if too thick with a bit more water.

Add one tablespoon canola oil to a non-stick skillet on high heat. Let it warm up. Depending on the diameter of the pan, ladle in one or two scoops of batter. Spread batter evenly on surface of pan, add some mushrooms so tips are showing on the edge of one side of the pancake. Cook for a couple of minutes, until border is crispy. Flip with a spatula and cook for another minute, flip back again, add a bit of sautéed mung bean sprouts and fold it to shape into half moon. Repeat process with rest of the batter.

Serve the pancakes and salad with spicy dipping sauce.

Point Bonita Lighthouse

My niece Juliana who lives in Virginia came over to spend a few days with us recently. She’s been here few times before so she’d done all the touristy stuff in San Francisco. I like that because it forces us to push ourselves and expand our horizons in terms of visiting different places in the Bay Area. Last year when she came we took a day trip to the Marshall Store, a hole in the wall place in Tomales Bay where they sell delicious fresh oysters served in many different ways. That trip was a complete success, and not something that we’d likely have done without our adventurous visitor.

This time around I chose a visit to Point Bonita and Lighthouse of the same name. They’re just across the Golden Gate Bridge on the Marin Headlands. It’s part of the Golden Gate National Parks.

Oddly for us, this was a food-free afternoon: just sightseeing. I had wanted to see the lighthouse for a while. Right after we relocated to San Francisco, we tried a visit but it was closed for renovation. That left us with “only” the gorgeous surroundings to admire: the GG Bridge, the inlet to the Bay, the Pacific, stunning mountains, exotic wildflowers, and so on; but no lighthouse. What a disappointment 😉

Juliana and I enjoying the wind and fog

gorgeous rugged coastline in the Marin Headlands

Steven and Ju admiring the hazy Bay entrance

hardy purple thistles

The day we went was very foggy. It would restlessly whip along the mountains and occasionally just disappear, leaving a beautiful bright blue sky in a non-stop, off-and-on fashion; hiding the surroundings, then revealing them magically. San Francisco and the Bridge kept appearing and disappearing in this chilly haze.

This time of year it gets very dry so all the flowers and grasses from early spring were shrunken husks with the exception of a few thistle plants, various herbs, hardy trees and some imported coast-hugging succulents. The air was infused with aromas of the sea and plants such as the Monterrey cypress, wild sage and eucalyptus.

can you make out the sea lions half-heartedly sunning themselves on the rocks

this is lovely

silver ocean filled with cormorants

amazing plants hugging the sheer rock

I've read somewhere that these colorful succulents are in fact imported weeds killing off native plants

We spotted the ubiquitous seagulls, but also frolicking sea lions, a hawk, tons of cormorants and several beautiful pelicans nesting on the scarps of the cliffs. One of the rocks just off the coast, housing for hundreds of cormorants, had accumulated so much guano that it was totally white at its peak. Nice contrast with the black stone and the grayness of the ocean.

cormorant haven

readying ourselves for the descent to the lighthouse

the three of us all thought this rock was totally cool--sort of like dinosaur skin or something

that suspension bridge is totally awesome

the Golden Gate from Point Bonita

The coastal drive from the park entrance near the Marin side of the Golden Gate Bridge takes you past remains of a ruined fort and a military base. We stopped a few times to check the area out. Pretty cool!

Finally we reached the lighthouse. Point Bonita Lighthouse was built on the top of a lone rock at the entrance of San Francisco Bay, partially connected to the continent. To get there you must walk down a steep hill, over a bridge, through a narrow, low-ceilinged hand-carved tunnel and then over another, suspension bridge. Here’s more info on the lighthouse.

I love it here

Where do you like to take out-of-town visitors to show them the local sights?