California Eating Part IV

This morning, *Ginger and I met up with Carlo, Yuichi, and Brain, for some drinks at Barefoot Coffee Roasters whom really pride themselves in being real baristas and anti-Starbucks.

Ginger


They do serve excellent coffee. They also take there time with it and make cute designs in the foam.



Something I noticed were the pastries. They had things labeled like "French financiers" and "French pastries" which clearly were nothing close to what they were labeled. Am I weird for being annoyed with that? I mean the financier was a hard, square, brick. And I even told the barista ringing up my hot chocolate what a real financier is. Am I a food snob now? Really, they are desecrating what a financier really is ! Or maybe because I am just so in love with real, French financiers. Sigh. Oh and I have to disagree with Wikipedia on financiers being light. I make them with a lot of butter. And Eric Kayser probably puts 1.5x more butter than I do. I don't think I have had a light financier in Paris... yet... ummm... ok... Anyway, skip the pastries there. The blueberry muffin sucks. Sorry Barefoot - you got the coffee down but you ain't got nothing on Starbucks blueberry coffeecakes and muffins ! And French pastries ! Whatever that is supposed to mean.

Barefoot Coffee Roasters
5237 Stevens Creek Blvd
Santa Clara, CA 95051
Phone: 408-248-4500

And after, met up for lunchee with the fam.

Hi, I'm Zacky. Aren't I the cutest baby in the world ?


Terrible pic of me, but Zacky is so cute !


Can you say SZECHUAN SPICE ? Lots of lamb and beef.






Fish and tofu soup


Every time I would eat, lil Zacky would stop whatever he was doing and give me a serious look. It was SOOOOO cute ! Aw, he takes food seriously; he must take after auntie !


Excellent restaurant. Sorry, can't help you with the names of the dishes because my mom ordered everything.

Szechuan Era Restaurant
10971 N. Wolfe Road
Cupertino, CA 95014
(408) 873-8628

My fam. Love you all ! Bro - Huang, Mom, Pops, Sister - Sue, Zacky, me, and Raffy (Bro-in-law Rick is taking the pic)


And of course, afterwards we had to get tea at Fantasia. A couple of my favorites.

Zhenzhu Cafe


Zhenzhu chamai nyunai


Zee family again


Fantasia Coffee & Tea
10933 N Wolfe Rd # 120
Cupertino, CA 95014
(408) 865-1689
(I used to work here, btw... oh like 10+ years ago? OMG I am getting old. JK JK !)

For dinner, I ended up cooking a simple and traditional 3-course meal for a couple friends who have immensely helped me out by taking care of Ginger, as well as a couple other friends.

First course was a Velouté Dubarry (cauliflower puree soup) with lots of cayenne - yes, very untraditional. ;) Second course was Striped sea-bass with a beurre blanc, potato purée (cannelled of course), asparagus and cherry tomatoes. Third course, I made my brownie recipe that I had been working on for quite awhile, and crème anglaise. Ah the butter and chocolate are 100000x better in France. I didn't like my brownies here, but the others enjoyed them. =) It was nice to be able to see my family and close friends in such a short period of time.

Until August, j'espere !