Izzy's Deli, Pinkberry, Funnel Mill, Mama's Lu, Beard Papa's Cream Puffs, Fruitti Yogo

Now that we've been in Santa Monica about 3/4 of a year, we have some favorites.

Izzy's Deli again. Big sandwiches. The Matzo ball soup was great. Potato pancakes were overdone. Reuben was excellent. Stay away from the Cobb salad. Oh, and the coleslaw was perfect. So good, and apparently open 24/7. Though the cheesecake is a bit artificial-tasting.

Pinkberry again. Excellent as always...still my favorite place for frozen yogurt because I like their toppings best (except for frutti yogo's lychee).

Funnel Mill again. Everything was amazing. The iced espresso was so exactly perfectly what I wanted. Their two hot chocolates were both great (maybe not quite as good as Burdick's in Harvard Square, Cambridge), but I preferred the "European" version which wasn't sweet.

Mama's Lu: Mother's Day we got out to a restaurant early (10:30am) so as not to face big crowds. This place gets good ratings on Yelp and it's pretty good. I guess it's dim sum, but without the carts and in a small place and no crowds, and without some of the crazier foods. Dumplings were excellent, particularly the veggie. The green onion pancakes were also excellent. I would be fine going back...this is the best place I've gotten dumplings in LA.

Beard Papa's Cream Puffs: I was itching for dessert, so we stopped nearby (it seems like Monterey Park has a high density of good restaurants) at a store that sells little more than cream puffs. Pretty good, but not perfect because they're light on flavor.

Frutti Yogo again. Love that lychee but the other toppings seem lackluster compared with Pinkberry.

Ricky's Fish Tacos, Cheesestore of Silverlake, Pazzo Gelato, Forage, Yamazaki Bakery

Ricky's Fish Tacos: After a terrible experience at a Rubio's, I've been craving good fish tacos for months. A trip to London showed me how good fried fish can be (so amazing), and a free afternoon saw me hunting down not only a fish taco place, but a food stand. Food stands are another goal of mine, and this one was quite good. The fish was nowhere near as good as in London, but still better than most fried fish I've had in the US. Yummy, if a bit difficult to track down. I would eat again. Even better, it introduced me to the Silverlake area with lots of great stores.

Cheesestore of Silverlake: Our second stop was a cheesestore. I love cheese and especially love cheese shops with other import-y type goods. We bought their wonderful house olive oil (tasty but not overwhelming) and a baguette to eat it. Places that let you try olive oil are excellent and they get my money. A half pound of cheese...soft like brie but I forget the name...pretty good but a bit stinky. Also some salty caramels (so good). This was an awesome store. It looked like right outside the door they had a restaurant that was very busy, but we were full from fish tacos. Also right next door was Intelligentsia, which was incredibly busy so we didn't stop.

Pazzo Gelato: Across the street was a gelato place that was pretty good. They had several excellent flavor combinations. I had their balsamic vinegar and fig. I also tried the raspberry/mint/chocolate. While the flavor combos are great, they didn't quite pull off good gelato. Looking at the yelp reviews, I'm guessing they change flavors often. I would go again, but not go out of my way.

Forage: Earlier in the day we heard a radio story about this store (for buying ingredients from locals), and a random passerby told us they had tasty baked goods, so we stopped in. Very busy. The food looked great, and their oat bar with fruit/nut toppings was heavenly. The chocolate cupcake was also great...so moist and with cacao nibs. I loved it.

Yamazaki Bakery: On another day we checked out Little Tokyo. Bleh, I got five "pan" (breads/rolls/cakes) from here, and they were all tasteless, textureless, insipid. I would not let myself be dragged back.

We walked around the area and checked out the stores...bought a little teaset for $20...got some ok tacos at a foodtruck whose name I forget.

Yogurtland: Nearby however, was a Yogurtland. We tried four flavors (strawberry, chocolate, taro, and plain). Definitely just go with the plain yogurt. It was indistinguishable from pinkberry's and the other flavors were not as good. The toppings were fun, but we had higher quality strawberries at pinkberry and better lychee at frutti yogo. The brownie bites were nice, but a bit heavy. And the condensed milk squeeze bottle was a neat touch, but really not what I'm looking for on frozen yogurt. So good, but I'd rather go to pinkberry.

Shaherzad, Paris Pastry, Saffron and Rose Ice Cream

Shaherzad: Last time we were in the area, Shaherzad was packed, and it had been recommended to us and it's highly ranked on Zagat. So we headed there for a Saturday lunch. The waiter was a bit standoffish, but not to the point of rudeness and the food was rather good. We got the hot combo appetizer with excellent dolmes, some wonderful eggplant dip, a good cutlet, and some ok/forgettable chicken salad. For the main course we got the chicken koobideh (very good) with some of their special cherry rice on the side (very good), and the whitefish (fine) with a special herbed rice (tasty. The meal came with extremely good flatbread and a raw onion. I also got a very good Persian tea.

Paris Pastry: Just down the street is a patisserie. The raisin roll was not so good, tasteless and without the structure I've come to expect thanks to Le Pain du Jour. The meringue is amazing, and the cookies range from ok to wow.

Another stop at the Saffron and Rose Ice Cream. This time I got their poppy seed slush. Highly recommended, especially with lemon juice to cut the sweetness.

Miyako, Frutti Yogo

Miyako: I've walked past this restaurant many times, and have even been to the adjacent frozen yogurt place next door, but I never wanted to go in because it didn't look busy enough. After we got rudely treated at nearby The Counter, we hopped out looked toward 31st street but didn't see anything interesting (though apparently Mrs Winston's Green Grocery is over there), and stopped in here to be quite pleasantly surprised. For a very reasonable price we got a huge amount of eel on a bed of onions sizzling on a hotplate, plus a nicely cooked salmon teriyaki bento, and a shrimp tempura appetizer (half off during certain hours). The bento came with quite a bit of tasty veggie tempura (or I could've chosen shrimp), some edamame, very tasty sprouts (pickled?), rice (can get brown rice), a passable salad with a peanut flavored dressing, and an orange slice. The eel special also came with rice/salad/edamame/sprouts. Some of the eel was excellent, most weren't bad. So not the highest quality food, but pretty good nonetheless. Worth going back for.

Frutti Yogo: The second time we've gone. Again, great tasting frozen yogurt. This time we got the lychee and they were awesome. Kiwi, not so good. Strawberries ok.

Jordan's Market, Saffron and Rose Ice Cream

Jordan's Market: I was told at my cooking class to go here to get tenderloin for a party. I expected it to be a butcher shop, and they do have a butcher counter, but it's more of a small convienience/ethnic store. The tenderloin was only $8 / pound, compared with over $25 / pound at Whole Foods, so I was happy to pick some up. Also got some ground beef that looked beautiful for about $3 or $4 / pound, but there wasn't as much variety/selection as I would prefer. I also bought some delicious Turkish Delight and pretty good yogurt soda (carbonated yogurt milk...how interesting).

Saffron and Rose: Just down the street from the market was an ice cream place. I tried the saffron and pistachio, the walnut and raisin, and the strawberry. The ice cream base is rich and smooth and all three flavors were good. It's rare that ice cream has a good raisin flavor, so kudos for that, but I liked the saffron/pistachio flavor best. We also tried numerous other flavors (we weren't asking for them, they just kept handing them over) and they were all good, though the rose ice cream was too delicate for me.

This block or two had several interesting Persian restaurants, of which Shaherzad seemed to be doing the best (only?) business at 3pm on a Sunday. There was also a greek restaurant that was practically empty, and a french bistro that was packed. Unfortunately the patisserie/boulangerie was closed, but the cakes inside looked very pretty.

Novel Cafe, Damon & Pythias, Diddy Reise, K-Zo, N'Ice Cream

Novel Cafe: We've been to the Novel Cafe two or three times. The burgers have been excellent. The club sandwich was ok, but not special. The coffee has similarly been ok.

Damon & Pythias: We were in the area because of the mystery bookstore across the street, and stopped in here because it had pretty good ratings. Turned out to be a typical college town eatery. Nothing fancy, pretty good food, not too pricey. I had a cheesesteak. Pretty good, but I wouldn't drive over to UCLA just to go here.

Diddy Reise: The line was out the door, but the ice cream was pretty good. Their ice cream sandwiches are cheap. I don't think I need to go again, but it wasn't bad.

K-Zo: This is the second time we've been here. It's not the highest rated sushi restaurant in LA by a long shot, but the food is wonderful, fresh, tasty, and the staff are very nice/polite/efficient. This time the blue crab sushi stole the day, last time the fried calamari wowed us...and the raw scallops were quite nice. Oh, and I like their loose leaf teas (buckwheat today).

N'Ice Cream: On the lookout for ice cream and hunted down this gelato joint. The salted caramel was quite tasty, though chocolate orange was declared the winner. Vanilla was quite poor. Cherry mint didn't taste like cherry. Next time I think I'll just go next door to the Pinkberry.

Mitsuwa, Mariscos Chente, Angel Maid, Tudor House

Mitsuwa Marketplace: A Japanese market plus foodcourt. We ate a bento box at Misasa. It was chicken teriyaki and tempura with miso soup, rice, potato salad, cold tea, and a couple of pickled veggies. Pretty good food, though the chicken wasn't the highest quality. Oh, and the tea was bad. (How does that happen? Or is it my fault somehow?)

Mariscos Chente: Great fish and shrimp. Very flavorful. Get the whole fish. Served with cucumber, and green (lime) salsa. The peppered shrimp sauce wasn't as good as the wine-based "barrascus" (?) sauce...but it let the flavor of the shrimp come through much better.

Angel Maid Bakery: Bead pudding, chocolate mousse (wonderful), puff pastry with custard & strawberries & kiwi. Highly recommended. We got ours just before closing, and then ate dinner next door at Mariscos Chente.

Tudor House: Cream of carrot soup (hint of ginger) with carrot chunks (good texture). Cornish pastie tasted like Christmas. Welsh Rarebit as good as homemade. The sausage roll was surprising because the sausage was smooth, almost like a cream, so it went well with the crispy pastry dough. The house tea, Red Rose, was a pleasant discovery and I took home a box of loose leaf from the attached shop. The entrees came with simple salads that were excellent. We also got scones with rasberry jam and clotted cream. Mmmm, clotted cream. One scone was light and fluffy and the other was denser with raisins. Both were tasty. For today they had a special of free Mimosas with the entrees, and the Mimosas were quite welcome. For dessert we had an almost perfect strawberries & whipped cream, and a rather lackluster sticky toffee pudding (not quite as bad as "storebought", but dry, flavorless, and a poor mix of textures...couldn't it at least by sticky or have toffee?). All together a wonderful experience that I hope to repeat again in the future. Perhaps next time as an afternoon tea (we so wanted tea sandwiches).

Angelato Cafe: Bleh bleh. Tastes artificial. Walk the extra block to Pinkberry at the East end of the promenade.

Cafe Laurent, The Corner, Pinkberry

Started the day with a run by Cafe Laurent in Culver City. Yesterday I stopped by late afternoon and they were closed, which was sorely disappointing because it had been two days since any (worthwhile) pastry. The cafe mocha was tasty, similar to a hot chocolate. It may have had real whip cream on top, but the coffee was too hot to verify before it melted away (not a downside, coffee is best hot of course...if I hadn't been driving the whip cream wouldn't have dispersed). For pastry satisfaction I picked up an almond croissant and a raisin pastry. After having a plain/butter croissant from their stall at the Santa Monica farmer's market (great flavor, but texture was a bit stale), unfortunately the almond croissant was a dissapointment; not as flavorful (butter-wise), even more stale, and instead of crafting an almond croissant from the start they had taken a plain croissant and dressed it up. Somehow they taste better if they start out trying to be a filled croissant instead of being sliced in two and filled at a later time. Anyway, enough of the downside...the raisin pastry was excellent and is now on my list of top pastries. The raisin pastry had raisins in each bite, but the pastry dough had excellent flavor for a wonderful balance between the two. Slightly sweet, with a great texture though just the tiniest bit too chewy for my preferences.

Top pastries (so far) around Santa Monica:
1. plain croissant from Le Pain Quotidien
2. raisin pastry from Cafe Laurent (the cafe itself)
3. plain croissant from Cafe Larent (Santa Monica's farmer's market)
4. apple tart from Amandine

Unfortunately, the server/barrista (perhaps owner?) let me know that the pastries are made in a bakery that is not accessible to the public, ruining dreams of fresh croissants. So sad, but will soldier on.

For dinner we had our first experience at The Corner in Marina del Ray, but probably not our last. Burgers made to order. The meat itself was fine-to-good, properly cooked Medium. Bread looked whole-wheat, though it wasn't the reason to go back. Sweet potato fries were tasty but not super crispy; fried pickle slices were fine (with a great apricot dipping sauce that overwhelmed the pickle flavor); and the two shakes were pretty tasty (strawberry) and ok (chocolate). But none of that is the reason I will probably be returning: the burger toppings. I went with red onions, lettuce, pickles, excellent bacon, hard boiled eggs, and sharp provolone with a soy glaze on the side. Wonderful flavor. Onions and pickles were mild...egg went even better on a burger than I had expected. Very tasty blend of flavors, and with so many toppings, cheeses, and sauces I won't be running out of flavors to try anytime soon. Perhaps carrots and guacamole next time...with grilled onions. Only low note was that so much salt made me very thirsty later in the night.

Finished off the night with a parfait from Pinkberry. My second experience and I continue to love the tart (original) flavor of the frozen yogurt and the super-bright flavor of all the fruit toppings. The parfait is recommended if you don't mind granola in your frozen yogurt and you want to try most (all?) of their fruits/berries. Pinkberry will probably be my go-to dessert choice unless I find a good gelato place like the one in Mountain View, CA.