LA 27

On Sunday Ariel and I met up with my friend Dan who writes about food. His blog, DanEats, is an entertaining look at all the restaurants and dining experiences he gets himself into. Now that he is slowly moving from New York to Los Angeles we have been getting lunch and dinner together about once a week. Since he is writing about food I figured we should try to go to different places. So far we have gone to Baby Blues BBQ, Mario's Peruvian, and a few other spots spread around town.
Having an amateur food critic in my life has compelled me to try new things. For Valentine's day Ariel got me Counter Intelligence by Jonathan Gold, the Pulitzer Prize winning food critic. For the last few years I have searched out Gold's recommendations. For the most part his tastes are a little too spicy for me but sometimes we find ourselves in complete agreement. The Donut Man is the best example of this. Gold and I have come to the mutual conclusion that the strawberry donut from here is the best in LA (my coworkers now agree as well). But lunch on Sunday wasn't going to be donuts so I had to find somewhere new between Santa Monica and Los Feliz.
After 20 minutes of research I settled on El Izalqueno and its El Salvadorian Food. It was suitably exciting and foreign and was located just north of downtown. Ariel and I arrived at the listed address first and were disappointed to find that the restaurant was either never there or had been replaced. In its place was LA27, a Nicaraugan restaurant with a live band and tables filled with families. Had it been Ariel and I the loud music probably would have turned us away; but when Dan sauntered up we determined it was worth a shot. We were quickly sat at a 4 top by the only waiter who spoke english. We asked about specialties and all of the drinks which had names we did not recognize. The waiter helped us out bigtime by bringing us samples (in little salsa cups) of ten different drinks. These ranged from rice based drinks (some with pineapple, chocoloate, and other spices) to fruit drinks (lemonade with sesame seeds, coconut). All of them were different from anything we had ever drank.
Following the drink sampling we ordered a starter of Baho, a meat stew served with perfectly sticky white rice. The stew had some potatoes, plantains, some very fatty meat, carrots and tomatoes. There was very little meat but what was there was delicious. The plantains were too hearty for me and lacked the sweetness of their fried bretheren. The potatoes were very good. Dan and I both ordered the fritanga a la 27 which had chorizo (delicious, but we hardly had any on our plates), carne asada (excellent, thick cut seasoned perfectly) and pork (great marinade but a little dry). The sides were rice mixed with pinto beans, lettuce and tomato, fried plantains, fried cheese, and tons of a vinegar based salsa consisting of baby corn, onions and carrots. The salso went with/on everything and we went through about half a container. Ariel got the shredded beef plate which was like Ropa Vieja from Cha Cha Chicken but not quite as good.
This is probably the most authentic foreign food experience I have had; meaning that I basically felt like I was in Nicaruaga while eating there. No one spoke english, the food was delicious, and the music was inappropriately loud and invasive. Flower vendors and pirated DVD sellers walked the floor looking for buyers. This was an amazing experience, not to be missed.

Tuesday Morning Quarterback

With the Super Bowl upon us I figured now would be a good time to recommend my favorite football column: Tuesday Morning Quarterback. What sets this column apart from all the others is writer Gregg Easterbrook's insights, analysis, and willingness to depart from football and discuss other aspects of American culture and politics. Every column (published on Tuesday mornings following the last game of the week on Monday night) discusses the best/worst plays of the weekend, astronomy, the economy, Congressional pandering, and many other odd things you don't expect to find on espn.com. Easterbrook surprises me every week with the amount of news and preparation that goes into each column. If you have even a passing interest in football you should read TMQ every week.

What I am reading...

I love to read. Everyday when I get home from my workout routine I have to make a decision: Read, play video games, or watch TV. Depending on my mood and my conscience I always try to bury myself in a book. I am about three-quarters through the Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons. I have been reading BS since the early aughts when I was still in college and he wasn't prominently featured on the front page of ESPN. His writing is witty, sometimes intelligent and insightful, and always riddled with pop references. We agree on two things (which is why I still read his articles and bought this book):
1. The NBA is awesome and a collection of the most amazing athletes on the planet and
2. Shows like the Jersey Shore and Road Rules vs. Real World are incredibly and unendingly entertaining. Every year I think it will be my last season watching these shows and every year they pull me back in with their mix of ridiculous binge drinking and physical challenges. Anyways, the BOB has proven to be very interesting even if there is a limited amount of new information in it. Simmons discusses many players I have heard of but know little about (Gervin, Frazier, Cousy, pretty much anyone pre 1989) and never misses an opportunity to plug his Celtics. The writing is not at a very high level and there are more typos than a book of this magnitude should have (on the NY Times bestseller list for months) but it is still a compelling read.
I think the thing that I most enjoy is getting into the history of a sport that is not as well known as the other major American sports. Due to a number of issues (many detailed in David Halberstam's excellent The Breaks of the Game, which happens to be the basis for everything Simmons believes regarding the NBA) the NBA was not a popular league until the early 80s. This means there are few tapes of classic players (there is no video of Wilt's 100 point game and very little tape of a young Russell) and old school games are never televised; not to mention that the tapes that do exist are never on ESPN classic. Compare this to baseball and football's well publicized and recorded histories as America's pastimes and you can understand why a basketball fan would enjoy Simmon's tome.
If you enjoy the history of basketball, reading about its players, and you do not feel the need to be challenged by a book, The Book of Basketball is right for you.