For whatever reason, be it novels or movies or those suave car commercials showing SUVs pulling smooth turns over a steep mountainside, cross country road trips still carry cachet in the minds of American people.   The freedom of the open road, idyllic American countryside, a slowed sense of time.

Never mind the jostling with trucks for the fast lane, the constant Charley horses in your legs, the continuous lack of sleep due to sitting in a car all day, and pure delusion by day five.  (“Fuck, we’re in New Jersey?!”)

Whatever illusions of grandeur I had about driving from Los Angeles to New York were quashed quickly. But admittedly it was one of the best travel experiences of my life.  Not once did I need to stop at a hotel — endless thanks to the friends and family who boarded us at each of our stops — and through pure determination that only a food lover can have, I managed to eat great dinners each night.  I present to you the first in a five-part series on my cross-country drive across America, with meat.

Day 1 — Destination: Vegas.  Dinner stop: The Mad Greek in Baker, California.

Robby and I got a late start out of Los Angeles with the intention of making it to Vegas by dinner, but heavy traffic meant that we were starving well before Sin City.  The dusty, familiar I-15 stretched long ahead of us, and we couldn’t help but make fun of all the cities that stood in the way of our final destination.

“Who on earth thought it would be a good idea to live in Riverside?”
“San Bernadino.  Ugh.”
“Barstow is truly the armpit of California.”
“You ever been to Fresno?”
“Touché.”

The sun began to hang low over the highway, and the hunger pangs we were ignoring would no longer stay quiet.  We stopped at the Mad Greek Cafe in Baker, California — population 913 and home to the world’s tallest thermometer.  Wikipedia states the economy here is primarily tourism.  On this particular day, I would be contributing all of $16 to it.

The go-to restaurant in this city is the Mad Greek, a cafe touting the “Best Gyros in America” and a classic, according to Guy Fieri’s “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives.” The blue and white building with its fake Greek statues and Christmas lights is not hard to miss.  Inside, fake Greek columns with gold paint and posters with Greek words liven up the blue booths and fluorescent office lighting.  Kitsch at its most glorious.

We opted for the lamb souvlaki over the “Best Gyro in America,” as well as an order of tiropita and a drink.  I can’t say I was disappointed, in so much that I had very low expectations from the start.  The lamb was kinda tough, the tomatoes were mealy, and the tiropita may actually have been spanakopita — I couldn’t tell because I couldn’t get past the burnt phyllo.  Nevertheless, the flavors were all there, and the homemade tzatziki sauce and soft pita concealed the flaws well.

The high point of the plate was the rice, perfectly buttery and al dente.  Robby, who is a quarter Greek, reminisced.  “Whenever we had a funeral in the family, I liked going to the Greek Orthodox church because they would serve big platters of this rice.” (Hey, we can all admit liking funerals for the food — no shame in that.)

We skipped out on the Mad Greek’s famous strawberry milkshakes — a good thing, considering the disgustingly fatty foods I would eat in the following four days.   But people — aka Yelpers — claim they are good.

We left Baker with all the fanfare with which we arrived.  Dust in the wind, another receipt in the cash register.  Just a few more hours to Vegas.

“What is the benefit of freaking customers out?”

– Alan Pearlstein, as quoted in the NY Times piece “Retargeting Ads Follow Surfers to Other Sites“

When I first arrived here in 2002, a fresh-faced college student full of awe at the vastness of Los Angeles, food was the last thing on my mind.  I was picky, and I accepted it.  I hated sushi and shellfish despite never having tried it, I enjoyed my salads topped with syrupy French dressing, and I only ate tacos in flour tortillas with cheddar cheese and iceberg lettuce.  Up to that point, the fanciest meal that I had ever had was at a local steakhouse in South Bend, Indiana.  It was a great steak in my 18-year-old opinion, cooked to a perfect well done and doused in plenty of A1 sauce.

That L.A. was going to change me into a veritable bon vivant was unthinkable.  The seafood hater has transformed into a seafoodie who has eaten everything from monkfish liver to sea cucumbers to squirming raw octopus tentacles.  My penchant for French dressing has turned into a preference for light homemade vinaigrette.  Mexican with cheddar and iceberg is now a Mexican’t.

As for that well-done steak girl?  Never would she have imagined dining on Wagyu beef cheeks, Kurobuta pork belly or foie gras.  Dishes like “Philly Cheesesteak” with air bread, cheddar and beef carpaccio or “Not Your Everyday Caprese” with liquid mozzarella were inconceivable.

But here they were, presented one-by-one in a 22-course tasting menu at Saam at The Bazaar (part of my 20 Things to Do).  It was a last hurrah for my fine dining experience here in Los Angeles, full of whimsy and flirtation and fun, a fitting celebration of the food eater I once was and the food lover I am today.

I won’t rehash the details of everything I ate — the slideshow will tell you everything you need to know — but here are a few of my favorites.  (Click photos to enlarge.)

Most Surprising Dish of the Night: Bagel and Lox Steamed Bun
I don’t know exactly what I was expecting, but as I bit into the warm bun and creamy cheese oozed out, I let out a surprised giggle.  Those who know me know that I’m not a giggly girl.

Pure Elegance: Jamon Iberico with Caviar
Surf and turf in one luxuriously composed bite.

Best Interpretations of Classics: Crispy Nigiri and “Linguini and Clams”
Believe it or not, the Philly Cheesesteak doesn’t win here.  The puffed rice, which stood in for sushi rice in the Crispy Nigiri, provided great textural contrast to the delicate fish.  A pickled turnip added the necessary acidity.  In the “Linguini and Clams,” dashi broth noodles had a chewy mouthfeel that blended in with the thinly sliced geoduck — the two blended together seamlessly.

Best Produce of the Night: Japanese Baby Peaches
A little burrata was all that was needed for these miniscule fruits, which are green on the outside and a creamy peach on the inside.

Sex on a Spoon: Hot & Cold Foie Soup with Corn
Chilled sweet corn espuma atop hot foie soup.  It would also be my favorite use of espuma that night, of which there were many (something like 4-5 dishes).

Most Visually Arresting: Wagyu Beef Cheeks
The mandarin orange glaze filled with beef jus was too pretty to eat.  But that didn’t stop me.

Best Dessert: Lychee and Coffee
Waylynn Lucas, whose dessert I first tasted at Taste of the Nation when she was still working with Patina, had just returned to The Bazaar before I dined there.  I will eternally thank her for showing me just how harmonious lychee and coffee can be.  This dessert features a molecular-gastronomized (read: I dunno) coffee with lychee sorbet, white chocolate espuma and coffee gelee.

A full slideshow:

If first impressions are everything, then San Pedro Fish Market may not have lasted more than the 50 years it has been in business.  There’s a lot to be turned off by at first glance: the overwhelming crowds, long lines, a pervasive smell of raw fish, high prices, and pigeons and seagulls stalking your every move, waiting to pickpocket your shrimp at an unsuspecting moment.

But, oh the food!

It begins with the long line at the fish market.  Rows and rows of freshly caught fish lay on mounds of ice, gutted and staring blankly into the fluorescent space.  Pick your fish, literally — as in pick it up with your bare hands and unceremoniously dump it on a bright blue cafeteria tray to hand it to the cashier.  Fried?  Grilled?  Filleted?  Sauteed?  You pick and pay, they scale and prep the sucker, then return it to you in a bag.  This particular Sunday, as part of my 20 Things to Do, we selected a medium-sized catfish and wild bass, which decided to grill after a recommendation from the staff.

Meanwhile, you wait in another line for the seafood counter, which houses a selection of raw and cooked shrimp, scallops, oysters, clams, squid and all other sorts of mollusks and cephalopods available for consumption.  Shrimp is by far the best choice here, and a pound of medium unpeeled shrimp runs about $19.  Add to the order vegetables and potatoes (a must) for $7, and perhaps some garlic bread for $3.50 to complete their famous Shrimp Tray (pictured above).  You pay, they give you the shrimp and a receipt.  The whole shebang, fish and shrimp and all, set us back about $70 for four people.

The next line — yes, a third line — is for the kitchen.  Drop your bags of seafood at the counter, pick up a buzzer, and then seek out the beer stand.  Pitchers of Corona or Tecate are a must-have to keep your company while the kitchen frantically prepares all the orders ahead of yours.  On a weekend it can get crazy crowded, so waits of 45 minutes or longer are not uncommon.

If you get tired of waiting, an arcade game in which you can try and pluck a lobster from the tank (as opposed to a fluffy stuffed animals) is mildly entertaining.  Winners get to eat their prize.

Despite all this, the dining area is relaxed and jovial.  Family and friends sit back with beers in hand, stuffed to the brim with piles of shrimp and fish and crustaceans.  Young kids stare out into the harbor, awing at giant cargo ships unloading their wares and waiting for the next foghorn.  Different mariachi bands compete for attention, serenading whomever will throw a twenty their way.

When the food is ready for pickup, it’s immediately clear why the wait and long lines are worth it.  The steaming platter arrives piled high with shrimp sauteed with potatoes, bell peppers, onions plenty of spices.  After a healthy dose of hot sauce, what looks like way too much food is devoured easily by four people.  The grilled fish, which takes a bit longer than the shrimp, comes rubbed with Cajun spices and charred to perfection.  With just a squeeze of lemon, the flaky fish is picked clear to the bone within 10 blissful minutes.  The seagulls didn’t even have a chance.

San Pedro Fish Market (map)
1190 Nagoya Way
San Pedro, CA 90731
310.832.4251

In Los Angeles, the Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers Market is to foodies what The Ivy is to celebrity hounds.  There is no better farmers market in the city, and for Travel + Leisure, perhaps no better market in the country.  Big-name chef spottings are practically guaranteed.  But celebrity chefs aside, what sets the market apart is the sheer variety.  You want rare Persian mulberries?  You got it.  Japanese Gage Plums?  No problem.  Adriatic figs?  For sure.  Heirloom or baby-sized anything?  Of course.

This week, my friend Eddie and I found ourselves surrounded by summer’s best — peaches, plums, melons, squashes, avocados, berries, berries, berries and tomatoes of all shapes and sizes.  The Wednesday market is all about the produce — there are no prepared food stalls like the weekend markets, but you can practically fill up just on fruit samples alone.

Delicate Gaviota strawberries, sweet and sensuous and bursting with flavor, sold me at first bite.  As my friend Pat later said, “Now that’s a legit strawberry.”  We also ate our way through several varieties of stone fruits, berries and citrus, and stopped by the Carlsbad Oyster booth for one — yes, one — delicious snack, despite how tempting it was to devour a whole dozen of those beautifully briny Blondes.

To fully describe the dynamic of this market is far beyond my one experience there.  (Up until this week, I’ve always worked on Wednesday, so I resolved to go as part of my 20 Things to Do.  Other 9-5ers will be happy to know that there is a Saturday and Sunday market as well.)  For weekly updates on what’s in season, I love David Karp’s “Market Watch” report on the LA Times, or listen in to Laura Avery’s “Market Report” each Saturday at 11 a.m. on KCRW’s “Good Food.”

Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers Market (map)
Arizona Ave. and 2nd St.
Santa Monica, CA 90401

My friends took me to this Mexican restaurant in the Lower East Side that they said was so good.  We sat down to the order and the waitress asked me what I wanted.

“Do you have tacos?”
“What kind?”
“Carne asada.”

The waitress gives me this blank stare.

“Err… carnitas?  Pastor?”
“We don’t have that.”
“What do you have?”
“Do you want chicken or beef?”

Sadly, I knew exactly the kind of tacos Robby would be getting: piles of gut-busting shredded beef on either flour or hard-shell tortillas, topped with lettuce, cheddar cheese and a poor excuse for salsa.  It was the same type of Mexican food I ate growing up in Indiana, from chain restaurants that had whitewashed it multiple times over until it was barely recognizable.

I can’t blame New Yorkers for being a big fail on authenticity, but the thought of shredded beef tacos on flour tortillas has only served to increase my appreciation for great Mexican food.  As part of my 20 Things to Do, I resolved to eat the O.G. Mexican before I left, and that meant a trip to La Casita Mexicana, the Mexican media darling of the SoCal food community.  They dominate everything from Univision to La Opinion, and are championed by everyone from Jonathan Gold of LA Weekly to Javiar Cabral of Teenage Glutster.

My one mistake was taking just my boyfriend, already stuffed with a late lunch of pizza and beer.  “I’m not hungry,” he proclaimed. “But I’ll go with you.”  (Frick.)

I looked at the menu.  Indecision, indecision.   Queso Azteca.  Mole Poblano.  “Tres Carnes” with beefsteak, homemade chorizo and beef cecina.  Enchiladas Tres Moles. I settled on Chile en Nogada, one of Mexico’s most famous and most patriotic dishes. (Pictures above.)

The poblano chile arrived stuffed with meats, dried fruits, candied cactus and walnuts, topped with a pecan cream sauce and pomegranate seeds — all the colors of Mexico’s flag in one delicious dish.  Though the dish was a tad too sweet for my tastes, I could see why just about every news clip on the wall featured a picture of La Casita’s version.  It was beautifully cooked and delicious.

Robby settled on Flautas “Tres Moles,” or tortilla “flutes” stuffed with chicken and topped with the three mole sauces that La Casita is famous for.  Their signature 46-ingredient mole is the nectar of gods: rich and savory, chocolaty with notes of sweet, salty, bitter and spicy.  Their red and green sauces, called pepianes for their use of pumpkin seeds, were also beautifully complex.  The French mother sauces don’t hold a candle.

As dinner also included a starter bowl of tortilla chips drenched in tres moles, as well as an accompanying bowl of tortilla soup with each entree, the two of us could barely finish our own entrees.  Shame, because everyone touts their flan and churros.  Guess that’s good enough a reason to go back.  Not that I needed one.

La Casita Mexicana (map)
4030 Gage Ave.
Bell, CA 90201
323.773.1898

Summer in L.A. isn’t complete without a trip to the Hollywood Bowl.  In all my years here in California, I had never been, so this summer I went three times: once to the Playboy Jazz Festival in June, once to see Planet Earth Live, and lastly to see my boyfriend duet with jazz great Dave Douglas and his big band.

The Bowl has been consistently named one of the country’s best outdoor music venues, and a survey of the land will show you why.  The amphitheater is nestled into a natural concave hillside of Bolton Canyon in Hollywood, with the mountains and the Hollywood sign just to the north.  For a modern amphitheater that seats 18,000, the Bowl looks much like it did in the early 1920s when it was first conceived — check out the pictures through the years on their site.  The most recent addition to the theater is the debut of its first-ever HD jumbo-screen, which was used to broadcast clips from the documentary series Planet Earth recently.  (As one who has seen the series and owns it on DVD, Planet Earth on the HD screen was magnificent.)

The grounds include numerous picnic areas that are open as early as four hours before the show.   It’s practically a tradition to pack a picnic or order one from many neighborhood restaurants.  Eating at your seats is encouraged, especially if you score one of the fabulous box seats with the tables.  If you don’t want to pay the Bowl’s inflated drink prices, there is usually a couple with a cooler just down the street on Highland Avenue that sells bottled water and sodas for $1.  You can hear them chanting from a block away: “Dollar over here, three dollars in there…”

This year’s schedule is about halfway done, but there are plenty of spectacular shows still on the calendar.  RENT is this weekend, and if I didn’t have the rest of my 20 Things to Do, I would be there.  Other summer acts include Harry Connick Jr., John Williams and Music of the Movies, Herbie Hancock, The Chemical Brothers, Earth, Wind and Fire(works) and of course, the ever-popular Sing-Along Sound of Music (dressing up encouraged, I hear).

At the risk of sounding melodramatic, the best thing that ever happened to me in moving from Indiana to California eight years ago was avocados.  Oh how I adored those luscious, silky specimens of the Lauraceae family, so readily available all year round.  Outside of salting an avocado and eating it right out of its skin, the best way to devour these fine fruits is through guacamole.

I don’t claim to be a guacamole expert, or to have some secret recipe passed down to me from a long-lost Mexican grandmother, but I have learned a few tricks that ensure that my guacamole gets devoured at every barbecue and party in about 10 minutes. (No exaggeration — just ask Caroline and her birthday party guests.)  Here’s my recipe for Mango Guacamole, which works great as a dip, or on turkey sandwiches, or on hot dogs, or in spoonfuls straight from the bowl to your mouth.

Mango Guacamole
Serves… however many people can get their grubby little hands on it (about 1 medium bowl)

4 ripe Hass avocados
1 mango
2 jalepeno or serrano peppers
1 small to medium red onion
1 lime, squeezed
salt, preferably sea salt or kosher salt

There are two secrets to great guacamole.  First thing to remember is that it’s not really about what ingredients you use.  There are so many variations, and virtually all of them are delicious.  Although I love cilantro, I don’t use it because I have more than one friend who complains about the “soap in your mouth” phenomenon of the herb.

Secret #1 — Sharpen those knife skills.
The line between good and great guacamole lies within how well you dice the ingredients.  The finer your dice, the better the texture of your guacamole.  Big, unwieldy chunks of onion or pepper or whole leafs of cilantro are the signs of lazy guacamole making.  Get as close to a brunoise as you can: 1/8″ x 1/8″ x 1/8″ cubes.  Brunoise the onion, peppers and mango.  Set aside.

Next, peel, pit and mash the avocados.  You can do this any way you want, but I like to chop up the avocados into medium-sized cubes so that they are easier to mash.  The best way to mash them is in a molcajete (mortar and pestle), but I don’t own one of those, so I make do with a large bowl and potato masher (works much faster than a fork).  Add about half the lime juice as you mash.

Add the rest of the ingredients, using a fork to incorporate them into the avocado mixture.  Incorporate the rest of the lime juice — a key ingredient, as the ascorbic acid helps prevent the guacamole from turning brown.

Secret #2 — Salt is your best friend.
I don’t know why so many people either forget or are afraid of salt.  Salt brings out the flavors of foods and harmonizes them in a way that physically mixing them cannot.  But don’t just throw in the salt all at once.  I salt my guacamole a pinch at a time, mixing and tasting until it’s perfect.  It usually takes me about three generous pinches (about a teaspoon or so) before I get my “aha!” moment. And trust me, there will be an “aha!” moment.

Side Note: There’s an old cook’s tip that claims that leaving your pit in the guacamole keeps it from turning brown.  As I recently discovered, this is not entirely true.  The pit only prevents the surrounding guacamole from turning brown (by cutting off oxygen, the main culprit).  Best trick is to layer plastic wrap directly on top of guacamole until it’s ready for serving.

So when this email from a supposed marketing company made its way into my inbox, I was all sorts of appalled, bewildered and bemused.  I’ve left off any identifying information, but will say that this company works in the music industry.  The emphasis in the email is from the company, not me.  (*facepalm*)

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Check in with God?

Of all the ways you can train for a 14-mile urban hike down the streets of Glendale, Eagle Rock, Pasadena and Arcadia, I can tell you from experience the one thing you should not do.  Don’t go to the Hollywood Bowl the night before, park a mile away, hike up to the Bowl, forget your phone and wallet, then have to run all the way back down Highland Ave. and back to the Bowl again — in flip flops.

I hobbled out of bed this morning, my left foot and right knee sore from the night before.  But goddammit, I was going to find a way to walk 14 miles today.  It was on my list of 20 Things to Do.

Luckily, I had a good hike leader in H.C., the LA/OC Foodie extraordinaire who does regular urban food hikes throughout the city.  (Check out his posts on past urban hikes he’s done on Sunset, Robertson, Beach and La Brea.)  I met him at his 8 a.m. call time (oy) at the edge of Colorado Blvd. in Glendale.  Having researched the route ahead of time, he highlighted some possible foodie stops along the route, the first one being the famous Porto’s Bakery for a little breakfast — potato balls and blueberry muffin for me, guac and cheese omelet for him.

Our little detour down Brand Blvd. took us just past the Americana, a ghost Disneyland of sorts at that early morning hour, where the two of us marveled at the fabrication of it all — the train tracks, the fountains and the music pumping in through hidden streetlamp speakers.

Between Brand Blvd. and our next major stop in Eagle Rock was a serious dearth of excitement.  Car wash, liquor store, office building, more liquor store… and this amusing church sign.  I did convince H.C. to stop for a savory cheese boerek at Sasoun Bakery — this is Glendale, after all — because he hadn’t yet tried the Armenian treat.  It’s no Taron Bakery, but pricing is comparable.  We also wandered into a Russian market nearby offering a variety of “fishy” goods.

Our next stop was the Eagle Rock Plaza’s weekly farmers market, where we met up with Fiona of Gourmet Pigs.  We were greeted by the sultry tones of Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” blaring from the DJ booth.  Er, did someone not go home from da club last night?  I grabbed a watermelon agua fresca and snapped a few shots, all the while trying not to get Ke$ha and Black Eyed Peas stuck in my head.  “Imma be, imma be, imma be, imma be…”

I then introduced H.C. and Fiona to one of my favorite unheard of markets: Seafood City.  Sandwiched in between Target and Macy’s in the Plaza, Seafood City services much of the strong Filipino population in Eagle Rock.  Here is where you come for your pancit and ube-flavored anything fix, and perhaps grab some sugary spaghetti from Jollibee across the way.

Further down Colorado Blvd., we passed a lot of my old favorites — Spitz, Yogurt Haven, Swork and Dave’s Chillin’ and Grillin’ (closed on Sundays, boo).  Our next stop was Colorado Wine Company, where the clerk apologized for being low on stock after the weekend rush.  No need to apologize for success, dude!  The plan was to grab a bottle for lunch a few doors down at the newly opened Four Cafe, where Caroline on Crack and Robby joined us for lunch.  The Jamaican mahi salad we shared was satisfying, but the real winner was the cookies: lavender brown butter and Mexican chocolate.

By the time we left, my hobbling turned into an old man’s limp.  The tendon behind my right knee was not having any of this 14-mile walking business.  I cried uncle and decided to catch a ride home with my knight in shining armor.

It’s a shame, because all the fun, unexplored parts of the hike were just coming up.  (I already know Eagle Rock all too well.)  Caro and H.C. made it to the Little Flower Candy Company, then down to Old Town Pasadena’s La Grande Orange for some sangria.  Arcadia’s Santa Anita Racetrack would have been the final stop, but they detoured and took the Gold Line to cut the hike short so they could make it back to Eagle Rock Brewery in time for closing.  On the way back, they surprised me with a milk custard from Phoenix Food Boutique in Arcadia — H.C. remembered my post on Yee Shun!  Aw shucks, guys.  It didn’t fix the legs any, but that creamy custard pretty much made my day.

Urban hike, check.

More photos: