late July culinary wanderings

After a few days off from work, I've ventured all over the map for some summer bakery hunting. A visit to my hometown brought me to Marukai, our local Japanese market. Though I was there to investigate baked goods, I had to resist the strong temptation to take advantage of Daikokuya's new Orange County location. If you have not yet sampled their food, know that they produce the ramen dreams are made of-- pure ramen magic if I've ever tasted it! For those of you wanderers who food hunt back and forth between San Diego, Orange County, and LA, their location in Little Tokyo is no longer your only option! Tucked into a strip mall off the 405 freeway, Marukai also offers a food court that includes Beard Papa's notoriously indulgent cream puffs. Beard Papa's is also attached to MamMoth bakery, which features a truly cavity-inducing honey bread among other treats. I could write more about their offerings, but blogger ChubbyPanda has already done so for me in his very thorough blog post.

During my visit home, I took advantage by utilizing the ample kitchen space of my parent's house for a baking opportunity! It's much more spacious than my little studio. After thumbing through my mom's arsenal of cookbooks, I went for an obvious, but classic choice-- recipes from New York's Magnolia Bakery.

While whipping up a batch of chocolate chip almond cookies, I listened to my brother talk about the ten year high school reunion he just attended the night before. The night was full of nostalgia coupled with the reality of ten years passing by-- i.e. classmates faced with a plethora of marriages, trouble with the law, good fortune, high paying salaries--the unpredictability and predictability of life all at once, the stuff of Romy and Michelle. As the stories continued, I thought to myself "This calls for another recipe." Ten years of marriages, jailtime, childbirthing, and career opportunities could not be captured with brevity. I eyed a molasses jar and decided to whip up some random molasses cookie recipe from the label on Grandma's molasses. These cookies were simply delicious and unsophisticated in all of the right ways. (Perhaps a nod to the three for $1 cookies my brother and I once enjoyed from our high school cafeteria. Often slightly undercooked, you could taste the sugar granules in those chocolate chip cookies, but there was something so perfect about them. Grabbing a few at the end of the day meant you were on your way to freedom. It was a little bit of decadence in our bland world of rigid dress codes-- a sweet break from the khaki, navy, collared shirt monotony.)

Walks down memory lane aside, I eventually headed back to my apartment. In efforts to check out a new bakery, I traveled towards Brentwood to give the Belwood bakery a try. Sometimes when I stray from Santa Monica towards Brentwood, I'm a little unsure of what I'm getting myself into. Such was the case that day, when I sat down with my pastries and listened to two stockbrokers arguing over their stance on cell phone etiquette, talking business, and complaining about the youth "with their long hair." Pigeons circled around our crumbs, also noticeably irritated by their loud argument. Can't us Santa Monicans enjoy our pastries in peace?

At least I had happy reading--As I was nibbling on some fluffy bread with chives, I caught an article about Paris bakeries in LA Times magazine, a literal ode to bakery hunting across Paris.

Oh, to be a sweetheart of the freelancing world! If only I could jet set to any pastry of my choice. If only!

rare days off in July lead TGABH to new frontiers!

That's right folks, on one recent day off, I made a plan to conquer unseen territories in the Hunt! After carpooling down to Santa Monica, I was left with only my wallet, my folding bike, and the strong desire to go on a quest for my next bakery discovery. With helmet on head and a plan to bungie cord my leftovers on the way home, I rode my Dahon, determined, down San Vicente Blvd. to none other than SusieCakes in Brentwood. This gem of a cupcake shop also sells cake by the slice, a true measure, in my opinion, of its "all American home-style bake shop" claims. Its cupcakes feature an ooey gooey extra shot of frosting in their cores, making for cupcakes as sweet, if not sweeter, than Yummy Cupcakes on Wilshire. The cake's moist factor was also solid. Among their other selections, they offer whoopie pies-- two chocolate cookies with a thick layer of frosting in the middle. Hard for anyone to resist-- and it seems that SusieCakes is being received well among fellow West side food bloggers.

For the sake of more material (and for the good of my readers!) the next day after my SusieCakes adventure I took a morning run along the beach, then cut up to Montana Ave. to reward myself with a pastry find. I found myself at Cafe Luxxe, and although not primarily a bakery discovery, it is a find I have to mention. If Cheers were a coffee shop (with a modern feel and a selection of pastries), Cafe Luxxe would be the place to grab an espresso where everyone knows your name. Perhaps my perception of this place just comes from my natural tendency to make friends randomly as I wander about the city-- but even still, it was such a friendly place to get a caffeine jolt. Very focused on quality, the fine folks at Cafe Luxxe gave me an encouraging nod when I inquired about the chocolate almond croissants (delicious and from LA's Breadbar). And when my excitement over great coffee led me to consider a 2nd drink, they knew just what I needed-- as if I had been a regular for years.

The best part of all was that it was a place I could sip my coffee, read travel journals for hours, and enjoy the decadence of a lazy day off. The funny thing about having weekdays off is that it's easy to feel that you're stealing moments of time from the world around you. It's an evil but satisfying feeling when you see people walking past in business attire, coming up for air during the lunch hour, and you have nothing else to do but to drink cappuccino and thumb through a newspaper. After several hours of a travel memoir, a pastry and two coffees later, I said goodbye to the fine coffee connoisseurs of Cafe Luxxe and took four Peruvian cookies to go (made, mysteriously, by a local Peruvian woman whose name I cannot confidently pronounce/write), and ran home. Some people run with Ipod's, or pets-- I prefer to run with baked goods in hand.

Later on that day, enjoying some Peruvian goodness on the way back to work...

The City Bakery: more than meets the eye!

I recently discovered the City Bakery, a famous New York transplant, just a 10 minute drive from my apartment. Its LA location is nestled within the Brentwood Country Mart, a trendy shopping center around San Vicente and 26th.

Don't let it's upscale appearance fool you: While the City Bakery's cafeteria-style selections offer customers such choices as roasted endives, they also sell freshly made down home dishes like their Mac and Cheese by the pound. Granted, this is a $10 a pound purchase, but this piping hot M & C definitely looks better than your typical boxed macaroni.

There is something so inviting about this bakery-- friendly service compliments an enticing variety of baked goods, including a famous Pretzel Croissant that has a legendary following from its East Coast beginnings that has now reached the diaspora of baked good lovers across the country.

As a California native who only recently made my first trip to New York, I never knew until last year the abundance of bakeries I was missing out on in The Big Apple. It's nice to get a piece of that here on the West Coast.

Thus far, I have made two trips to The City Bakery. I've tried two of their apple creations, the apple sticky bun and the miso apple muffin (made with yogurt instead of butter). I found both to be a fresh and satisfying experience. Yet what I was most pleasantly surprised by was their chocolate chip cookie, a large, soft, and fresh find among the often too-crunchy or over-baked cookie landscape of Southern California.

The benefits of The City Bakery extend beyond the food-- it is also an oasis from the heavily wi-fi'd out coffee houses of Los Angeles. While I applaud free internet access and caffeine in one spot, it's refreshing to discover an opportunity to unplug and read a regular newspaper-- to sip your cappuccino, get newsprint on your hands, and enjoy some quality baked goods.

It's fitting that this bakery experience made me feel as if it was keeping me in touch with the surrounding world. After doing some more research, I discovered that The City Bakery is tied to another baking venture dedicated to environmental awareness. Birdbath, Neighborhood Green Bakery, bakes in their East Village location and transports goods by bicycle-driven cargo rickshaw to their West Village shop. Milk and cream served in the store comes from a family farm north of Manhattan. And, they offer a 25% discount if you arrive on skateboard or bike.

With my love for alternative transportation, baked goods, and dairy products combined this bakery sounds like my cup of tea!

I'm still waiting to try the legendary Pretzel Croissant-- it seems like a croissant of these legendary proportions warrants a special occasion, so stay tuned.