Food

This post compiles most of the meals that I’ve prepared in the last week and a half, in chronological order.

Meal 1: Obligatory Pizza Post (OPP)


To celebrate our new pizza peel and Home Depot stone-tile-cum-pizza-stone, I made pizza dough, using an approximation of Alton Brown’s dough recipe, doubled. Because I don’t have a bread machine, I had to mix and knead the dough by hand, which with a large granite surface is surprisingly easy.

A day later, after a trip to the farmer’s market, we had the necessary ingredients: provolone, tomatoes, fresh garlic, crimini mushrooms. I like mozzarella too, but it didn’t look that good, and was expensive.

To make things more interesting, I threw together some meatballs with pepper, salt, bread crumbs, egg, parsley and red pepper. Fresh herbs and onion would have been nice too.



When these were almost done, in went the mushrooms, which look irresistible as they fry in a pool of beef fat.

As you can see, I need to work on my pizza tossing and forming technique. This was, in fact, the first time that I’d used a peel and stone, which despite their many advantages are not as indispensible as some would have you believe. A very hot oven and a pan are more than adequate for small pizzas, when used properly.


The pizzas were composed of sliced tomato, garlic, provolone, meatball, mushroom, basil and olive oil, and topped with red pepper and grana padano.



The asymmetry doesn't bother me in itself, but still, a less-than-ideally formed pie. The second attempt was clearly better.



Although I prefer a thinner, crispier crust, this dough produced a good base for the pizza: substantial without being too chewy. Frankly, I think that fresh tomatoes are a poor substitute for sauce, except when used for specific preparations, like a good margherita-style pie. Not wanting to break open a six-pound can of San Marzano tomatoes, however, my options were limited. I also missed the mozzarella. Overall, a delicious though significantly flawed preliminary effort.

Meal 2: Beef Stir-Fry


As with the pizza, the second meal described here was thrown together in a somewhat haphazard fashion. We had recently been given some Chinese ingredients – soy sauce, black vinegar, fermented soy beans – and had the usual staples – onion, garlic, ginger, chiles, etc – lying around. More than enough for a straightforward stir-fry, which is exactly what this was. Accompanied by steamed basmati rice flavored with a hint of sesame seed oil.

Ingredients:

Corn oil and Sesame seed oil
Garlic, Ginger, Chinese Chiles, Star Anise, Cumin, Onion, Green Pepper
Ground Beef, Crimini Mushrooms and Celery
Sichuan Peppercorn, Five Spice, MSG and Sugar
Fermented Bean Paste, Black Vinegar and Soy Sauce


Meal 3: Beef and Pork Rib Ragu with Sauteed Mushrooms


The ragu was the most premeditated of this week’s meals; in fact, the only one for which the protein – pork rib tips – was deliberately selected. Unfortunately, the fresh herbs available at the Hispanic supermarket nearby were limited to cilantro and a variety of mints. To their credit, a full array of dried herbs, including the bay leaves, oregano and thyme that I wanted were sold in large containers by weight, probably representing a value something like 1000% better than the absurdly packaged and priced offerings from McCormick and its ilk.

Ingredients:

Olive Oil
Onion, Garlic, Thyme, Crushed Red Pepper, Oregano and Parsley
Salt and Pepper
About equal portions of Ground Beef and Pork Rib Tips
Carrot and Celery
Bay Leaves
Red Wine, Chicken Stock and Water
Tomato Paste
Milk
Grana Padano

Process:

Brown pork rib tips in olive oil. Remove. Add more olive oil. Add beef, onions, garlic, herbs and seasoning. Saute. Add carrot and celery. Continue sauté. Add liquids, tomato paste, rib tips and bay leaves. Simmer, then reduce heat to lowest level and cover. Go back to work for approximately 4 hours. More time can only make the flavors better, but make sure you have added enough liquid. Even with a lid, liquids will get incorporated and some will escape as the hours go on. I thought I had added enough water to be present for the final reduction when I got back from work. In fact, the liquid was nearly gone, and the bottom of the pan was beginning to develop a crust, which I reincorporated with some more red wine. Finish with milk, grated nutmeg (optional) and cheese and a touch of olive oil, if the pork and beef fat don’t seem sufficient. Eat with a hearty pasta – we only had penne, although this particular penne worked quite well – as well as more cheese and freshly ground black pepper. I also added crimini mushrooms, simply sauteed in olive oil.

Adding the cheese:

Bringing it together:Mushrooms are delicious.
Mmmmmm

Result:

For me, one of the most satisfying dishes of all: rich, delicious, filling and deep. This particular ragu fed two large men for two dinners and two lunches a piece. It improves substantially in the refrigerator, if you can wait.


Meal 4: Chicken Curry a la Tikka Masala with Indian-style Eggplant and Plantain Stir-fry, Salad

(Forgive the flash)

A hastily thrown together meal, featuring microwave defrosted chicken breast and a farmer’s market eggplant whose time had come. The good thing about Indian curries is that they can be, and usually are, composed almost entirely of dry goods – onions, garlic, ginger, chile, spices – things that you can have on hand at any given time. This dish is meant to be reminiscent of the popular creamy tomato curry known as Tikka Masala, without the tikka, of course. The creaminess comes from a combination of 2% milk, dessicated coconut, almond butter, and macadamia nuts ground to a paste with a pestle.

Ingredients for Chicken Curry:

Oil
Tadka (For this dish: Cumin Seeds, Garlic, Ginger, Mustard Seed/Urad dal mix, Red Chiles)
Turmeric, Green Cardamom, Black Cardamom, Cinnamon stick, Cloves, Coriander and Garam Masala
Onion
Chicken
Tomato Paste
Milk and Water
Dessicated Coconut, Almond Butter and Macadamia Nut Paste

Ingredients for Stir-fry:

Oil
Garlic, Ginger and Fenugreek Seeds
Coriander, Turmeric and Garam Masala
Eggplant
Green Plantain

Process:

For Curry: heat oil and add cumin seeds. Fry briefly, then add rest of tadka. Fry for a minute, then add the rest of the spices and onion. Fry for a couple minutes, then add chunks of chicken. Fry for a couple minutes, then add milk, water, coconut and tomato paste. Simmer, then finish with nut pastes.

It should look like this:


For stir-fry: heat oil in a wok. Fry garlic, ginger and fenugreek seeds. Add other spices, then eggplant and plantain.

Something like this:


Serve curry and stir-fry with steamed basmati rice.


Some beautiful tomato never hurts

Result:

The curry was delicious, even more so the next day. The stir-fry was good, but the plantains were not cooked properly. I imagine they would be better if first boiled, fried for longer, or possibly just cut up much smaller. I like the subtle flavor they bring, and I see potential in their texture. In this attempt, however, they were sort of firm and crumbly. The accompanying salad is composed of beautifully ripe tomatoes, spring greens, pine nuts, grana padano, salt, pepper, olive oil and balsamic. Not a traditional accompaniment to curry, but quite good.


Feel free to try this at home.

King Boletus

Summer Feasta!

That was supposed to be a summer fiesta but with an accented e so a pun on feast and fie- ah, you get the picture.

But here's an even better one.

This cholesterol cornucopia is easily the centerpiece to an all-american feasta. Such a work of art does not magically appear on a menu or out of a genie bottle, but rather through the careful and precious work of MS and MG. I just stood around looking purty.

At the end of a fine afternoon in the nation's capital, we three created a meal so bold it can only be called cliche: bacon cheeseburger, freshly boiled corn, watermelon, and washed down with a glacier-cool Sierra Nevada pale ale.

A quartet of burger balls were lovingly molded from a mixture, nay, formula of ground beef and a bit of meatloaf mix. While lean ground beef was an option, the fat is the flavor. The meatloaf mix had some veal and pork to give the meat some texture and the burst of flavor that it would need to be heard in this Wagnerian symphony of flavor.

Freshly plucked chanterelles BOLETES (KB) found their way into a lovely and lively butter sauce for a delicious sauteed condiment. A purple cherokee tomato was chopchopchopped for another fine condiment. These were complemented by onions and justice.

What is justice, you say? How about a 3 year aged Gruyere with more sustain than Nigel Tufnel's guitar. This cheese was so good it stuck with your palate as though the hook to "Hey Ya" freaked with the overture to "Nozzi di Figaro" in the back of Radio City and then made a baby and then that baby winked at you and was named "finely-aged Gruyere." Or something. If you can gather, it was pretty good.

Too much of a condiment and not enough to be a second course, a side of peppered bacon tenderly fried to a crisped phalanx of phlavor.

MG mixed up a fined cooked summer salad composed of eggplants, leeks, and a bunch of other stuff overshadowed by home-grown chilies added pizzazz and pop to this meal unheard of since Count Basie dropped his latest phonograph.

The burgers on the grill (along with a carrot for caramelization that was too thick to be a success) and the corn in the pot, we could only wait.

Though the watermelon was ripe and juicy, this was one "pudding" we would gladly wait to eat until after our meat.

boom.

Oh, the greasy glory. The bun held up because the meat and toppings were so rich they scoffed at the addition of a flavor blunderbuss like ketchup, although the heat of Sriracha never hurt nobody. Unfortunately, the Gruyere only came through in voluminous bursts as the cooking process favored the fattier Bacon in the battle of the tastes. The burger was fine, but at times lost out to the power of the dueling condiments (and the ubiquitous/alwaysawesome onion). But at times that savour did come through harmoniously, a rising crescendo in each chomp cascading about the caverns of the mouth and contours of the tongue. Hot damn.

This perfect summer's supper was complemented by watermelon, beer, and good company. An American must.

JK

The King of Sandwiches

The BLT is the epitome of a summer sangwich. The fresh tomatos and crisp lettuce can be sourced just about anywhere. Bacon is unreal, as noted in a previous post, and should probably accompany any self respecting sandwich. Combine these articles under the roof of one piece toasted bread, and baby you gotta stew.

My BLT experimentation over the past week resulted in 2 iterations with the first post here and the second having been crowned the undisputed champion. Why undisputed? Well, first off, more bacon went into the second sandwich. The first sandwich had too much tomato, and although the tomato was dank, the bacon was actually lost amidst the excessive juicyness and green crunch provided by the tomato-lettuce one-two punch. I also used too much mayonaisse, a cardinal sin of any competent sandwich maker. You can see the top of the mayonaisse bottle peeking ominously over this outsized sandwich.

Second sandwich had the lions share of the bacon (the dank pepper bacon from Eastern Market) and the addition of avocado, which has been proven to improve anything to which it is added. This sandwich was pretty unbeatable, and perhaps the only thing that could have improved it would have been some tastier bread.

Y'all be warned: step up your sandwich game or prepare to get STOMPED.

Heirloom to the dome

Awash in the fruit of the vine, I opted to turn to my trusty pizza peel. While it may not look it, above is a classic margherita pie: fresh mozzarella (not buffalo, unfortunately), yellow heirloom, olive oil, basil, and a sprinkling of parmagiano reggiano.

The above crust components of this pizza were stellar. The tomato, needing only some sea salt and olive oil, turned into a sweet counter to the rich mozzarella and the piquant parmagiano. Seriously dank.

Once again though, a heavy hand resulted in a slightly soggy center. I also probably pulled this dough a little too thin in my zeal to expand the surface area for the amazing toppings. Restraint, my friend, is a man's arch nemesis and his best friend.

Bounty of da ERF

How dank does that look? A few early season apples on the left, four boxes of incredible raspberries dead center, stone fruit (read: peaches and nectarines) surrounding the berry bounty, all flanked by 5 enourmous heirlooms.

And the cost, for this? $15. Hitting up the farmers market at the end of the day turned out to be the best food related decision of my life. As I'm loitering, trying to stuff my face with as many peach/tomato samples as possible, homeboy at the stall starts exhorting me: everything $1.

My first thoughts were muddled. Was it possible? Usually heirlooms are $3.50 a pound, raspberries the same, and peaches a bit less. This sudden announcement sent me into a buying frenzy and then instant panic as to how I could possibly haul this fragile fruit and vegetable jewels back to my place, a 2 metro ride, 9 stop away affair.

With great care, I managed to destroy only one tomato. And I was rewarded. All last week I feasted on this bounty in a mostly unadulterated form. Raspberries for breakfast, peaches at lunch, tomatoes garnishing every component of dinner. Twas a magical time in a magical place.

Alas, seeking similar produce related bargains, I returned to the same stall this afternoon, hoping against hope that a fruit fire sale was at hand. Alack, the past was not to repeat itself. Normal prices for produce sent my heart sinking and my soul longing for that sublime moment in time when the world stopped and summer produce was $1.

Porchetta: A Love Story

I had to go to Tribeca to get some stuff done for my visa and since its my mom's bday tomorrow she drove me down and we had lunch upon biometrics completion. I picked a spot called Locanda Verde which was real close to the visa office and had also popped up several times on serious eats. Started off with some crispy artichokes with mint and a crostino with chicken liver pate. My mom ordered the scallops which were real solid but those dishes were almost irrelevant to the ensuing pork bliss about to rock my socks.

My most beloved preparation of pig is porchetta. No doubt about it, the sliced porchetta sandwich was my choice. The sandwich, which I think has changed since serious eats reviewed the place, is on a toasted rosemary brioche with all sorts of sauteed goodness (peppers, onions, olives etc). The meat was so tender amidst its corpulent frame it brought a tear to my eye. It was riddled with heavily herbed fat that ultimately negated the addition for cheese. Salty, succulent, perfect. With porchetta, love happens.

- DG

Hot Sauce

Yo, quick shout out to my buddy Gio. After being torn away from Andrea's pizzeria, his Somerville stomping grounds, Gio recently recreated its golden egg. Credit the man with a homemade buffalo chicken calzone. Props.

- DG

MER pancakes

Pancakes are pretty sweet. King Boletus himself is fond of the chocolate chip pancake / grilled cheese 1-2 punch. I was neglected as a child and thus did not experience this sublime combination until senior year in high school, a time in which I routinely goofed off, ate candy, and played super mario 3.

As a yuppie, I am required to enjoy brunch. I am, however, very cheap. Brunch in DC tends to be a $15-for-eggs-bacon-bad-hasbrowns-with-parsley affair. Taqueria DF is dank as hell, but my gut could not sustain anything resembling huevos rancheros or lengua tacos. As such, I made some dank blueberry banana pancakes and bacon. I used Aunt Jemima mix. Being a Bisquick man, I was pretty sceptical. I added some whipped egg whites to ensure volume. To be honest, this were a bit too cakey for my liking. My ideal flapjack is about 1.5 cm thick, crisp outside and gooey-bordering-on-uncooked inside. What do you like? I' m guessing jk the sausage man prefers his thin and crepe-like a la Star diner. I think King Boletus is in my court. dg? Who knows.

Damn, bacon is awesome. I'm almost definitely going to have a BLT later today. But yeah the pancakes were alright. I fried this one in bacon fat. MANCAKE, PUT THAT IN YOUR PIPE AND SMOKE IT.

-mg

It's amore

What an awesomely cliche title for a post on pizza. While I think it will be nearly impossible to top the dough mastery of Larry, I have worked over the past year and a half to develop my pizza making skills. I have only some humble equipment and can only dream of the 800 degree heat of Larry's blistering outdoor pizza oven. In fact, after this year and a half, I am only now beginning to consistently make acceptable pizzas. My craft has been much improved by a pizza paddle, which eases the process of sliding the delicate uncooked pizza onto the baking media. As can be seen in the previous pizza post, amateurs (read: dg) often fail to recognize the restraint needed to amply top a pizza and the steely constitution required to slide the supple dough into its final resting place. All budding pizza makers: MOISTURE IS YOUR ENEMY.

On the topic of dough, I rarely follow a recipe. While much of the blogosphere seems focused on imitating the exactitude of many of New York's finest pizzerias, I find myself haphazardly throwing together flour and water until I sense the dough has reached the appropriate consistency. 5 cups of flour and 2 cups of water usually combine nicely. Coupled with the gas creating power of maybe 2 teaspoons of active dry yeast, I find my recent batches of dough to have been crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside.

I knead by hand. Why? Because I ain't got no damn mixer.

Something that has revolutionized my own pizza making of late has been the discovery of the freezer. Usually making dough requires little active time but a lot of forethought. Now I make a big batch and break it up into 4 or 5 dough balls, 1 to be eaten immediately and the others to be stashed in the freezer. Then alls I need do is pull the dough out two hours before cooking time and the game is one.

My most recent pizza pleased my frugal sensibilities immensely. One of life's sublime pleasures is finishing a lingering food item. In this case, I used a last chunk of mozzarella, the rest of the dank gruyere from last weekends BBQ supreme (jk claims pictures are forthcoming, I doubt his trustworthiness and sense all honor has been drowned in pools of various condiments), the end of a bag of spinach, some leftover bacon, and a fistful of basil from ye olde garden. The end result was symphonic, the mozzarella providing a milky background to the pungent punch of gruyere, the crisped spinach adding a grassy element, and the morsels of fatty bacon reminding me constantly of how awesome smoked pork fat is. This mouth party was a post-work treat.

While toppings are important, it was the dough that really shined. Super thin and crispy and even exhibiting some minor charring.

The exhortations of Comrade Lenin remind me of the importance of revolutionary self-criticism. To constantly fight my bourgeois ways, my inclination towards self-adulation, I note that the dough itself was rather one-dimensional in flavor, lacking the yeasty flavor that might have been gained with another day of slow rising in the ice chest.

-mg

The Earth Doth Giveth

I took a class last year on Russian history. One particularly compelling image, ably recreated by one of the most baller professors at school, was of the vast black earth region--Chernozen--of the Russian hinterland. The image of the yeoman farmer, the noble kulak, has not strayed far from my mind since.

Posessing neither the risk aversion nor the attachment to the land of the Russian peasantry, I have nevertheless endeavored to draw life forth from the marginal soil of my front yard. As previously noted, the land I farm is neither rich in humus nor particulary suitable to the intensive farming of which I dream. Perhaps I should give Larry a call, pack my things into a covered wagon, and make my way, like so many dust bowl Okies, to America's own black earth region.

New found responsibility, primarily of the fiscal variety, has forced me to make due with my few square feet. The cherry tomato plant appears somewhat spindly, which I attribute to my own inexperience. Cutting off the suckers earlier would have done much to concentrate the plants energy into its delicate fruit.

The tomato has now been in the ground for a month and a half. The newer additions to this homestead seem to be doing well. Jalapeños are reaching maturity, herbs are emitting their fragrant essential oils, and cucumbers yearn more and more for the salty sweet brine that will soon be their home.

All told, the bounty has been small. A few cherry tomatoes and some hot peppers. Having recently planted kale, broccoli, and lettuce seedlings, I can hope that more flavorful herbage will flow forth and thus inspire additional verbiage.

-mg

"Hedonism has no rules!"

This is an account of a five day trip in Napa and San Francisco with my parents and our gracious hosts Larry and Susan. The following is not safe for diabetics.

Night 1

Began the eating an hour after landing at a tapas restaurant in Napa. Since the home cooked meals require the most attention, I will try to be brief with meals out. This dinner was insanely good for a brief post-flight and late night meal. Grilled mackerel, sardines, etc.

Day 2

The next day we went to lunch at a well-known Napa restaurant called Mustards (The chef was on Top Chef Masters but I found her irritating and the impressionable clientele rolling up in rented limos supported this sentiment). The meal was actually awesome, but details are not really necessary.

The pièce de résistance of the trip, Larry’s magnum opus, was the dinner for this evening - the hallowed pizza dinner. Larry, as some of you know, has an awesome outdoor pizza oven (he also has an awesome indoor pizza oven too). Larry’s property is flush with the best produce one can imagine (tomatoes, beets, corn, every herb, meyer lemons, leeks, limes, peppers, the list is endless). Larry is also a dynamite chef. While the fire raged in the pizza oven (he got it up to around 850 degrees before spreading out the coals), he prepared his works of art. His dough has the perfect texture, bite, and flavor (he uses a sourdough starter). Five people, six pizzas.

Pizza 1: Classic Margherita – fresh tomato sauce (perhaps the most underrated aspect of his pizza), some buffalo muzz, a lot of fresh basil, an assortment of red and yellow cherry tomatoes from the backyard.

Pizza 2: Corn from the backyard, pancetta, cilantro pesto, and his preferred mixture of cheeses (aged asiago and provelone) This pizza might have been the best. The pancetta, pesto and cheese were the perfect salty foil for the ultra sweet corn.

Pizza 3: The foie gras pizza. No sauce, a mixture of sautéed shallots and leeks, and pear-apple hybrids from one of his trees. This goes into the oven for a bit, he pulls it out, sprinkles liberally with foie gras, back in the oven, onto the plate, rage.

Pizza 4: His tomato sauce, buffalo mozz, asiago/provelone combo, sweet sausage, and peppers from his garden that were blistered in a cast iron pan in the pizza oven earlier in the evening. Bomb.

Pizza 5: No sauce, shallots and leeks mixture, figs, blue cheese. Yes.

Pizza 6: sauce, mozz, asiago/provelone, a different kind of sausage mixed with hot peppers from the garden, mushrooms. However, he bestowed the cooking honors upon my father and myself.

After...

Whatever, it was still tasty.

Our problem was that we missed a crucial step. We did not blow under the dough before sliding into the oven as seen in this picture -

On the table was also an heirloom tomato salad with a mixture of anchovies, olives, olive oil, parsley, basil, and some other ingredients I cannot recall.

Dessert was a rhubarb crisp/crumble with crème fraiche.

Larry contently sips on his wine.

Food coma.

Day 3

With the dreamscape of last night’s pizza parade still fully on my mind (pancetta and corn is an unreal combo), Larry’s compass was fully set on brunch. One of larry’s best qualities is his eternal focus on the next meal. Since our plan was to go to San Francisco to see the King Tut exhibit, Larry’s gaze fixed on a seafood joint in Sausalito called Fish. The picture explains a lot.

A seared salmon banh mi was incredible, summer ceviche, tuna and white bean salad, fish tacos etc. After this feast the people clamored about the amount of food consumed and the early dinner reservation – Larry responded - “I feel very comfortable, I will be ready in 3 hours.” Your move.

Sidenote: King Tut would probably be rolling in his sarcophagus after that exhibit. A Disney-land esque production. I doth protest too much, this was just to pass the time anyway.

Dinner was at a great restaurant in SF called Range. While everything was typically excellent one dish stood out. Marinated leeks with a poached egg shaved parmesan and a breadcrumbs. Put a perfectly poached egg on anything and it will probably be awesome.

Sidenote: Larry frequently eats with a spoon, which I suspect stems from a fear of losing a morsel of his meal through the precipitous gaps of the fork.

Also, cardamom ice cream.

Day 4

Gout would have abruptly set in without our daily exercise routine. Calories and rendered fat were dispatched vis-à-vis competitive tennis matches (morning and afternoon) and walks through town and country.

Larry is a damn nimble tennis player for his age and his “Hedonism has no rules!” t-shirt belies the rules of both biology and physics (copius amounts of food and drink do not restrict his lateral movement, at least on the tennis court).

A relaxing afternoon ultimately gave way to the final dinner at Larry's house.

Sussman once said “I love mixed grills” Not surprisingly, Larry’s first comment before dinner was precisely, “I love mixed grills.”And I, too, love mixed grills.

But first to the appetizers.

Larry’s bocadillos (he kept calling them boquerones but I’ll forgive.) baguette rubbed with garlic and tomato topped with his iberico ham (he has a whole haunch of this spanish beast in his fridge)

Head cheese on toasted bread. Head cheese is perfection. Nuff said

Abalone sashimi (picked off the rocks from his house in northern California, Gualala to be exact)

Gazpacho with roasted beets with olive oil and croutons: tastes more like a borscht, but nonetheless the best gazpacho I have ever had.

Vodka and tonic with calamondin zest (calamondins are these tiny orange fruits that taste like a combination of kumquats and limes, essentially nature’s sour patch kid) He has a calamondin tree. Attention amateurs, Step your game up.

Mixed Grill:

This dish contains the following:
Crepinettes (assorted ground meats and offal wrapped in caul fat)

Merguez sausage

Rabbit marinated in garlic, kaffir lime leaf zest, oil and some other stuff

Duck legs in the same marinade

Grilled Abalone that had been sitting in melted butter

Grilled corn wrapped in fig leaves.

Close-up of a crepinette in all of its fatty glory.

Roasted potato/turnip hybrids with rosemary and butter. Outrageous.

Marinated Lima Beans

Vietnamese watermelon grown in the backyard from smuggled seeds.

My lofty expectations had been met and then thoroughly surpassed.

Larry does not, by definition, possess an insatiable appetite; for you can sate this man with various permutations of the fat, salt, protein/produce trifecta. Amidst this food centered orbit you get accustomed to a cyclical pattern akin to a Bourdain-like gastro-erotic analogy. Foreplay (the musing and preparation) gives way to the climax (eating) which ultimately fades into afterglow (coma).

Day 5

Final Day

To cap off the trip we ate dinner in San Fran at a restaurant Larry has invested in called Water Bar. Two dozen Point Reyes oysters and one filet of sole later it was over. Red eye back to NY.

I am now writing this on a Virgin America flight in their “night club inspired aircraft.”

It was a great trip led by our fearless leader - a man determined not to let the surrounding women slow him down (although it was close). Larry is what I would call a pragmatic hedonist; pleasure comes at a calculated cost which never undermines his responsibility as both friend and host (Although it may undermine his good standing as a taxpayer). Rarely do I admit defeat, but the tennis series ended 4 sets to 2 in his favor. And people think this lifestyle is unsustainable.

Thanks Lar,

DG