A Little Taste of San Diego

I recently spent a few short days in San Diego--or, to put it more accurately, I recently spent a few days inside a hotel conference room that happened to be located in San Diego.  That said, I still managed to avoid hotel catering on a few occasions.  Unforch most of the suggestions I got and read were in La Jolla, and I didn't have a car!  Alas, next time--I'll even bring The Man with me.  Here are the highlights from this past trip, including this awesome tree:

Cafe 222: I gather this place is never really empty--it's only open for half of the day (serving breakfast and lunch from 7-1:45pm), and everybody got the memo that it's delicious.  Cafe 222 happens to be the site of Bobby Flay's favorite French toast, stuffed with peanut butter and banana.  I'd LOVE to share that with someone, but you all know I love eggs waaaay too much to trade them 100% for a sweet like that.  At this point you should be able to look at the menu and know what I got, so quiz yourself.

...
 Is it the Green Eggs and Spam?   Nah, I only eat green eggs at Belga.

...

 Pumpkin waffle?   No ya'll, that's out of season.

... 

Answer?  Eggs Italia.  Eggs scrambled with pesto, diced tomatoes, and goat cheese.  The creamiest, herbiest, zangiest eggs I've ever had.  The pesto wasn't a sauce on top of the eggs, it was IN the eggs.  Sorry for the iPhone pictures, I was on my way back from a run along the lovely bay.  I got take out, and I was able to refill my iced coffee a few times from a little help-yourself station near the patio seating while I waited.  It wasn't shady, I promise--the host told me I should!  Their coffee was really really good.  There wasn't any milk out, and I could have asked, but instead I took a taste and decided it worked for me.  If coffee is really good, I like it on ice without the milk.


Shout House:  Going to Shout House is like watching TRL if you really love music videos.  A song you might like begins, but the AM rush hour-like banter and drunk girls ruin that moment for you.  And you're left with snippets of almost-happiness.  GRANTED, it was St. Patrick's Day--no fault of LC, who sent us there. Still, it was a good time to hear talented people play and sing.  I even ruined it a little by singing along myself.

Sidenote, I went up to LA for a day and hit up Gardens of Taxco again with the fam (chicken mole, SO GOOD--like it was born in the sauce, SPICY, not hot, etc), and also had a delicious oatmeal cookie and iced coffee at Urth Cafe.

But my first night we stopped in super cute and built up Culver City (sort of Clarendon-y).  Our destination was Ford's Filling Station, the joint by Harrison Ford's chef son Benjamin.  We ordered the fish & chips, which was pretty good.  My favorite part was the fish, and I was slightly disappointed to find all these other fried things in there--veggies, shrimp (granted, the description mentions the shrimp, I just didn't read carefully.  Bad me.).  MORE FISH, less other stuff!  But this isn't Eamonn's.   The curried lentil salad was really good--I didn't get so much curry, but definitely got lots of lentil.  Halibut with mashed potatoes was okay, but didn't blow me away. Our server was super sweet, and told us we HAD to have the mashed potatoes because they were AMAZING.  I'm not the hugest potato fan (I like them, but I'm not about to do a 5K on their behalf or anything), so maybe I just didn't get it.  The mushroom flatbread that came out first was actually my favorite.  I'll take two, please!!!!  Ford's calls itself an American gastropub (how very now), so if I lived nearby I'd bet the beer list and happy hours would do a body good. 

All in all, the most favoritest deliciousest thing I ate on this trip was my Eggs Italia.  I can't help it; I'm addicted to breakfast.  Thanks to my Seester for giving me the 411 on 222.

Coming soon: Birch & Barley, PS7's (again), Rosemary's Thyme, Seder 2010, and more.

I hope you are all having a lovely week!  Apparently the weather is going to get better any second.  ::listening for when the wind stops making the windows make scary noises::