Tag Archives: confessions of a pioneer woman

LATimes Food Festival

1 Nov

I happened to be traveling to LA on a weekend that happened to contain BOTH the Beverly Hills Food Festival and the LA Times Food Festival.  Unfortunately, I had to choose, so I went with the LA Times Food and Wine Festival that happened an inexplicably long time ago (September 5th, to be exact).

Perhaps it’s just because I’m not from LA, or perhaps our tickets purchased online were lacking in information, but we seriously had no idea where to park, and there were no signs.  A bit of digging and we figured it out.  The festival was actually right on the Paramount Pictures Studio Lot… which was pretty damn cool.

It was an insanely hot day, yet we sat in the blaring 90+ degree sun for an hour to hear the first talk: Food Blogging & Beyond featuring Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman); Aarti Sequeira (Aarti Paarti/Winner, The Next Food Network Star” Season 6); & TBD, moderated by Rene Lynch (Assistant Food Editor, Los Angeles Times).  This is where I got to know about The Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond for the first time.

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The panel was really interesting and completely inspired me.  Aarti convinced me to try to  do a video blog (coming soon) and Ree really showed me how artful recipe photography could be.  They were very down to earth.  I don’t know if I really learned much, but it was great to see them and I really enjoyed it.

We were so warm by the time this was done, that we needed a drink.  The lines were quite long at each booth, so I high-tailed it to the very back of the lot and found The Sweets Truck there selling homemade lemonade and limeade.

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I’m not sure if it was just because of how parched we were, but I would say this was the best of both I’ve ever had.  I was looking forward to coming back to try their baked goods at the end of the day, however, they were sold out by then!  Glad we snagged the drinks when we did.

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While I was on a quest for liquid, Mike stood on the long line for the Nom Nom Truck (as featured on The Great Food Truck Race on Food Network).

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When I heard they were going to be at this festival, it really sealed the deal for me.  Not only do I love Bahn Mi, but COME ON, they are called the NOM NOM truck. It is meant to be.  Even when the line was soooooo long.

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So long, in fact, that I accidentally took a picture of the ground while waiting.  I liked the shadows, however, so I will share it.

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Finally we drew close.

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And we ordered the lemongrass chicken tacos.

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And of course the banh mi.

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Which was filled with deliciousness.  I actually liked the tacos even more than the bahn mi.  But it was all delicious and all worth the wait.

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As we walked back into the main grounds, I noticed Alex and CJ from Top Chef talking about “Life After Top Chef” as  moderated by  Krista Simmons. I only stuck around long enough to shoot this quick pic.

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I was fortunate enough to meet up with my very cool Aunt Farrell at the festival and she ordered a custom made ice cream sandwich.  I think it was potato bread cookie with bacon ice cream.  Unfortunately, the picture is blurry… but it was DELICIOUS.  I really wanted one of my own, but by the time we got there the line was prohibitively long and we were excessively tired and on our way to catch the plane.

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Our next stop was at a cooking demonstration by Noelle Carter.

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She made shrimp skewers.

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However, they had spices… so I missed out and gave my bite to Mike.

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Our next stop was for dessert at Nana Queen’s Puddin’ and Wings (also featured on The Great Food Truck Race).

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While I’m sure the wings are good, we were in it for the puddin’.

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It was good, but nothing special.  I’m pretty sure it was advertised as coffee/toffee and neither of those flavors were really present.  But the texture was perfect.

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We didn’t stop at many of the tables selling food due to the lines, however, we heard good things about the Mark Peel station so we decided to try it.  He had a beautiful cookbook displayed.

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They were out of most things, however, the duck confit sliders were left, which was fortunate since that’s what we came for.

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I knew the chef’s name sounded familiar and he looked like someone I knew, however, I didn’t put it together until later that he was on Top Chef Masters.  Luckily, he made an appearance while we were there.

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I somehow missed taking a picture of the duck sliders, but they were REALLY good and I will definitely be trying Campanile next time I’m in LA.

Our final stop of the day was supposed to be dessert, but this was when we couldn’t get online at the ice cream sandwiches and found out that The Sweets Truck was out of stock.  So we went with Korean food! I got a bulgogi taco (which was basically the meat and rice in a taco shell) and it was goooood.

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I think the best talk we did all day was actually the one that didn’t lend itself well to being photographed.  We went to a wine chat with the head wine guy at The Palm, Jonathan Mitchell.  I learned so much about wine in that half hour and he was an excellent speaker.

This was a lot of fun, however, we paid $55 to get in and there was basically nothing to eat without paying more.  You got drink tickets, but we weren’t gung ho about getting wasted before driving to the airport for a 6 hour flight.  I guess that it makes some sense since most food festivals with free food cost closer to $100, however, it made the lines move very slow and I wish they would have told us more details about there being no free food with the entry price.

I’m glad we went and had a chance to try so many places that we definitely wouldn’t be able to try in NYC.  It was a fun and a great way to end our LA trip.

Proud to “Blog with Substance”

28 Oct

I was honored when Amy (from Amy Shops the Web) gave me “A Blog With Substance” award.  I think it’s a fantastic way to honor the incredible blogging that goes on around the web.  I’m sure there are a lot of bloggers just like me who do this entirely for fun, but secretly wish for a bit of notoriety for all the hard work.  Then there are those very popular and “famous” bloggers that we love and inspire us to keep on blogging. And who better to judge bloggers than fellow bloggers?

As for Amy, she started a blog to get her thoughts out there and found herself blogging about a few passions.  As time went on, she realized that the passion she could really sink her teeth into best was fashion.  And I am sure glad she did! I also had the opportunity to guest blog for Amy while she was finding her direction.  

As a relative newbie to online shopping, Amy has given me advice and suggested sales to check out that have been invaluable.  I always know when ideeli or gilt has Badgley Mischka on sale and Amy is the entire reason that I love the site modcloth.com.  Her intro to other shopping sites has also given me the opportunity to find a 2 hour special for pampering at a spa for $99 and some awesome wine glasses that are a hit at every dinner party.  Not only is she savvy about the space, she has great taste.  It’s an honor to be nominated by Amy.  

This award has 3 great rules:

1) Thank the person who gave me the award:
It appears that everyone who writes this award doesn’t want to be thanked in return, including Amy.  I think thanking people for the things they do, big or small, is incredibly important.  So Miss Amy… I will not ignore this rule.  THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!  

2) Sum up my blogging philosophy, motivation, and experience using five words:
Fun. Honest. Informational. Me. Nommy! 🙂 

 
3) Pass it on to 5 other blogs that I feel have real substance:

Stuff I Ate: Lori is the best foodie friend one could ask for.  Not only is she a great cook with fantastic recipes that make me want to run out to try them RIGHT NOW, but she is a fantastic Nomming partner who fully embraces the concept of sharing to enhance enjoyment! We have fully enjoyed our journey through food together and I always look forward to reading her latest posts (and to our next meal together!)  She inspires me every day.

Feisty Foodie:  Even though I do not know Yvo personally, I would be completely remiss to not nominate her for this award.  She has inspired me as a successful food blogger and I am so impressed (ok… and maybe a little jealous) by the fact that she quit her 9-5 to go back to school to do this food thing full time.  I first found her through Lori, and then I was hooked when I realized she was a fellow Mets fan.  One of my all-time favorite posting events she did was her exploration of Banh Mi around the city that she titled “On a Banh Mi Bender.”  

WinedAndDined:  Continuing on the awesome food bloggers that I don’t know personally, I have to give it up to Wined and Dined.  They curate some of the best food deals and events around the city and I have explored quite a few fun opportunities because of their advice.  It is so hard to find this information scattered across the web, so I never miss a posting where they put it all in one place and make some recommendations.  They also have aggregated their posts into great topics including NYC Happy Hour Deals, Free Food, and a place to get your own personal recommendation.  They get it.

Confessions of a Pioneer Woman: Ree is a new find of mine who I only started reading after I saw her speak about food blogging at the LA Times Food Festival.  Her personality was both charismatic and humble and I just found myself immediately drawn in by her blog.   Her lifestyle could not be more different than my city living.  She lives on a ranch with her husband (who she calls Marlboro Man) and children.  She writes about food, but also about home schooling her kids, vocabulary lessons, photography, and her life on the ranch.  I love her photos and she really does a beautiful job of photographing every step of her recipes.  She inspires me to take better, more intimate photos of my cooking.  She wrote about what she has learned from blogging and seriously has more followers than most national website.  She’s kind of my blog hero.

Single Infertile Female: My final nomination goes to someone who has absolutely nothing to do with food (shocking I know!)  To go even farther removed from my life, SIF moved to Alaska to settle down after partying it up in San Diego for a number of years.  Her life plan flew off course when she found out she had an insanely aggressive form of endometriosis and set upon a quest to become a mom, even if a man was not even on the horizon.  I am inspired by her bravery.  Not only for posting to the entire (judgmental) world about becoming a single mom through IVF (it still upsets me that these are both such controversial topics), but also for going through one round of IVF that didn’t work and picking herself up by her bootstraps to try again.  She is painfully and hysterically honest.  I enjoy reading her entries and I can’t help but root for her.  I hope this next round works, but even if it doesn’t, I can tell just by reading SIF that she will be okay… and be an inspiration moving forward.  

Thanks again to Amy.  This was fun!

And, as always, Happy Nomming!