Taste of Soul LA

October 17, 2011 | Posted By: Nahchusdivad @ 4:33 am

Over the past weekend, I heard about Taste of Soul LA and thought it’d be cool to check out. A food festival for soul food! Sounds good to me. It’s supposed to be one of the largest food festivals in Los Angeles and I have to say, it was quite packed.

The food was a mix of soul food, Caribbean food, classic American, and some others. It was hard to get through all of the crowd to check out everything. But it’s a Taste of Soul so we had to find some good soul food. We finally settled on a place called Dulan’s. They had a $12 special with chicken, collard greens, mac and cheese, corn bread, candied yams, and fried fish. My friends got the Soul Food special and I grabbed the Chicken and Fish with a side of mac and cheese.

The food was pretty classic soul food. Delicious. The chicken that my friend’s got had a gravy and was served with some stuffing with collard greens, cornbread, mac and cheese, and candied yams.

The chicken and fish combo I got came was done well and came with some fries. The mac and cheese was awesome! And the candied yams was like crack it was so good. All in all it was some good eating.

 

Yum Cha Cafe

July 7, 2011 | Posted By: Nahchusdivad @ 6:07 am

A little while back, while in the San Gabriel Vallery hunting for dim sum, I found a place called Yum Cha Cafe. It’s about $1.50 ~ $2 range with all the things you can want. It’s a different set up there. The food is laid out in front of you and you just point and choose and pay and eat. Good stuff.

They have 8 different locations all over the place. Check em out here on their site. www.yumchacafe.com

Silverlake Jubilee

June 10, 2011 | Posted By: Nahchusdivad @ 6:42 pm

Went to check out the Silverlake Jubilee a little while back. The Silver Lake Jubilee is a two-day music and art celebration located within the eclectic and bohemian Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles.

Food trucks, artwork, trinkets and jewelry, booze, doggies, and bands. Pretty much sums it up. Oh and hipsters. Lots of hipters :)

Here’s photos from that day.

Koreatown Plaza Cafeteria

May 21, 2011 | Posted By: Nahchusdivad @ 2:27 am

I’ve been to this KTown mall a couple times before and wanted to share the awesome deals in their food court. An entire food court of just Korean food! Ranging from Kbbq to soups to noodles and all sorts of various popular Korean foods.

I took a friend here last time and he ordered a Tonkatsu dish. Best way I like to describe it is that its like an Asian country fried steak except usually made with pork. I think it’s also available in beef. When he ordered it, we were both surprised at the size of the cutlet! It was huge! Anyways, on my last visit a little while ago, as usual I was stumped with what to order. I decided to go ahead and try the Tonkatsu for myself. It’s definitely a cheap eat at around $7 and it comes with some side dishes. The pickled radishes were delicious. The mound of cabbage wasn’t very interesting. The macaroni salad was good, but nothing special. Also a little pile of peas, corn, and carrots. And it comes with a little side of soup which I thought was gravy. Regardless of what it was, it was pretty tasty as well. And they also give you an empty dish to go ahead and grab some kim chi or other side dish at one of the other spots in the food court. For FREE! For FREE! For Freeeeeeeee. I didn’t get any though.

My friend ordered herself an omelette rice. It’s kind of like fried rice, typically with ketchup mixed in and covered with a blanket of thin egg. I don’t think this version had ketchup but  she seemed it to like it just fine and ate most of it =) Here’s are the beauties. Big Portions!

Tonkatsu (Pork Cutlet)

Omelette Rice

The Tonkatsu pork cutlet is bigger than your face! It’s a huge slice of meat. Although it’s thin, it still was a lot to eat and I ended up packing up half of it to go. Here’s my food pictured next to my 7 up can.

So check out Koreatown Plaza. Most of the dishes are under $10 bucks and you get a lot! Corner of Western Ave. and 9th in Ktown Los Angeles. Enjoy.

Mama Lu’s Dumpling House

May 15, 2011 | Posted By: Nahchusdivad @ 8:44 am

A little while back, I was in the San Gabriel Valley area hanging out with a couple of friends. We were on a mission that day to find some good cheap food. We had heard about “dumpling houses” in the area and were on our iphones yelping every one we could find. We finally settled on a restaurant called Mama’s Lu in Monterey Park.

We had read on yelp that the xiao long baos (juicy pork dumplings) were awesome there so we ordered that, green scallion pancakes, fish dumplings, napa and pork dumplings, and beef chow fun noodles. Sounds like a lot, but the price was pretty cheap. It’s a bit more than dim sum prices but the portions are larger. While we were waiting, we noticed people were making a sauce with soy and vinegar, so we copied them.

Xiao Long Bao ( Juicy Pork Dumplings)

These pork dumplings were awesome! They are so juicy inside and flavorful. Bursting with juiciness.

Napa and Pork Dumplings

These were good, but not as good as the xiao long bao. Tasty.

Fish Dumplings

These were kind of bland to me. Not very exciting.

Beef Chow Fun Noodles

These noodles are one of my all time favorites to order at a Chinese restaurant and I have to say that Mama’s made them perfectly! Very tasty.

Green Scallion Pancakes

Just awesome. I could eat these everyday.

Mission to find great cheap food for under $10 a person: Great Success. Ended the day off with a full body massage for $15 an hour. And it came with a cup of tea at the end. Not a bad day.

Anyways go and support your Chinese people today! Or at least go check out Mama Lu’s….or actually Mama’s Lu Dumpling House. Hen Hao!

First Fridays at Venice 05/06

May 8, 2011 | Posted By: Nahchusdivad @ 8:59 pm

This past weekend was my first time checking out First Fridays at Venice off of Abbot Kinney Boulevard. My friend was telling me about how on the first Fridays of every month, there would be food trucks lining the streets, people selling various trinkets, music, and beer. I was pretty much sold at food trucks. Along with food, there are various stores, art galleries, bars, and restaurants that are all open late.

Some of the food trucks I saw were the classic Calbi BBQ, which sold Korean style BBQ in tacos and burritos, the Dim Sum Truck, the Grilled Cheese Truck, the Flying Pig Truck, and a many more. It was a tough decision picking out what to food truck to order from. Food prices kind of range from $5 ~ $8 and up with sodas around a buck or two. Eventually I had decided to start with a traditional Mexican food truck (it was called Danny’s Tacos I believe) and ordered a Sope which is kind of like an open faced taco with a thicker tortilla, topped with meat of your choice (I ordered pastor), lettuce, tomatoes, cotija cheese, and hot chili sauce. It was pretty deliciously awesome. It’s messy to eat and actually I’m not sure if there’s another way to eat it other than just folding it carefully and stuffing your face.

At this point it was around 11:30pm. I have to admit my first choice was kind of boring since there’s a taco truck right outside of my apartment. But you know the taco truck will be delicious most of the time. After devouring this little dish, I decided to stop being indecisive and just get whatever the hell  I want. I headed to a Cogi Truck and was craving a Bibim Bap Burrito with Bulgogi. I went to order and discovered that they were sold out! Thats when I started to notice that a lot of the trucks were starting to sell out of stuff by 11:30 to midnight.

The Grilled Cheese truck had some tasty sounding items on the menu but the line was never ending. Dim sum was nearby and I saw they had Pork Belly Buns, Peking Duck Tacoes, and Cheeseburger Dumplings. Gross? Or does it sound interesting? I was going to order all three, but again I was disappointed to learn that they were sold out of all three of those. So I ordered a Kung Pao Chicken Taco. It was so so. Ma ma hu hu. Will not get this ever again.

After that I kept staring at the Grilled Cheese Truck so my friend told me to just stand in line. I had my eye on the Cheesy Mac and Rib Sandwich. Its a grilled cheese sandwich with mac and cheese, sharp cheddar, pulled bbq pork, and carmelized onions. Drooool! Hen Hao as my chinese people would say! Not too long after getting in line ready to order my cheese bbq pork sandwich, we noticed a girl ahead of us holding some mysterious sign. When we saw the sign, it basically said she was going to be the last person to order! So upset I was.

So I learned my lesson. Get here sooner and get ordering sooner! I will be back maybe next month and hopefully I’ll get my hands on some Grilled Cheese!