Sanctification and Salvation. And tomatoes.

Monday night, (when even troglodytes get a day off) I looked in the fridge and there were 12 jalapenos, yogurt, and a third of a lemon. I'd earlier cooked up a pot of yellow split peas (about three hours, to get them into a nice mush.) On the counter were a bunch of tomatoes. No problem.

I started by opening this thing, Sanctification Sour Blonde by the Russian River Brewing company in Santa Rosa, CA. What I don't know about beer is a lot, and this is the first sour I've had, so how it compares, rates, in the big scheme of things I can't say. 409 reviews at Beer Advocate give it an A, so I'm thinking that's pretty good.

It's like white grapefruit.

After the jalapenos softened, I threw in the tomatoes and a little bit later added some garlic.






A little later after that went some curry, red basil, and thyme.






Mix in the yellow split peas





Serve with cucumber, yogurt, and lemon. Not a bad pairing, actually. Lots of acidities out on the playground.






For dessert: Russian River's Salvation Dark Ale. 350 reviews on Beer Advocate, A-.

aka, chocolate brownie.










When I was in Whole Foods sort of recently snagging a Guinness, Mike the Beer Guy was there, and I was trying to avoid eye contact with him, buying just a Guinness. But it's a good, basic, standard quaff, and learning where center is for your palate is half the battle.

From there, I'm grateful for new experiences, this particular one granted by Sir Richard the Envious. It remains I have the best job on earth, but also I confess: I don't seem to be much of a grapefruit/chocolate brownie sort of troglodyte, and despite their swell ratings and new palate experiences, I would probably next opt for the Guinness or other good stout or porter.

Beware the seemingly innocent mourning dove.

I walked outside The Cave yesterday, and standing out there, staring at me, was this:











Don't be fooled by these birds and their sad and coy persona, evil lurks in that bird. It stared at me for a few minutes, I stared at it for a few minutes and then I went to the bathroom. When I came back I looked up and...










Are you serious? Either these birds are seriously messing with me or they are the dumber than dirt. Or they're geniuses and me falling for their little game of tag is dumber than dirt. Either way, there's something dumber that dirt going on here, and I'm involved.

Hey, wait a second...

Speaking of Trader Joe's...

Izzy stopped in yesterday and then Izzy left and then I went into my locker to make a deposit and saw sitting there a bottle of Trader Joe's Vintage Ale, 2008, and thought - oh, right, Izzy the Generous gave me this more than a month ago with the direction that I needed to open it within a month because it was on its way out. So, as not to upset the Izzy, it accompanied me upstairs last night.

I think we are all in the know by now that I never eat the right food for the occasion, and of course last night was no exception. However, while I was in Whole Foods getting chicken, I did partake in an impulse buy and bought a Dolphin Chocolate, which, now that I type that out, sound like a bad name for a chocolate, especially a "natural" chocolate, which these are - no sugar or dairy, very kumbaya. Also, to clarify, no dolphins.

Okay, so I have salad and chicken and beer for dinner, not a great combo to be sure, but let us plow through this.

I actually never knew TJ's did this beer each year, and if you click on the picture up there, you can read more about it. The bottle was still well-carbonated. My first, initial taste of it was actually a bit unpleasant, overwhelmingly boozy and acrid, but it calmed down A LOT and was ultimately interesting. It remained a bit boozy, but it came together and had nice chocolate things going on in there.

Chocolate? That's right, I had some of that on hand, so I popped the Dolphin in and then tasted the beer again. Now the fruitier notes were evident, fruity things that hadn't previously registered. How does that do that, I wondered?

Charles Shaw versus Three Wishes: the battle of the $2 wines.

Today was the Rave in the Cave, the cheap wine throw down between Trader Joe's and Whole Foods.

Trader Joe's started selling Charles Shaw in 2002. With grapes grown on the central coast in California, 6 million cases sell per year at a $7.2 million/yr. profit for Bronco Wine Company who bought the label from Charles Shaw after he got a divorce and moved to Chicago to work for a healthcare software company.

Whole Foods, aka Whole Paycheck, has apparently decided they wanted a chunk of that seven million dollars, and has stepped up competition by offering Three Wishes Wine beginning around the holidays last year, though I only noticed it last week. With vines planted in 2000, Three Wishes is in Tasmania and is in its fourth vintage.

Trader Joe's Merlot and Three Wishes Merlot went head-to head today, and the five people who tried them were aligned 100% in their assessment of the two.


Trader Joe's had an easy peel off foil.

Yes, I'm a cork challenged. That aside, Three Wishes went with a non-cork cork, very environmentally PC these days. (You can read more about that here.) Additionally, Three Wishes, on its website, states, "We are in a five year program to grow wine according to Organic principles, with "minimalist" viticultural pesticide and herbicide practices used in past vintages."

Before tasting the wine, I asked the tasters which wine they'd be less embarrassed to bring to a party, and everyone agreed "2-Buck Chuck" has in image problem, a negative connotation, and the stigma of cheapness that hasn't yet caught up with Three Wishes. Izzy offered a re-designed label might help the Charles Shaw.

After tasting the wine...everyone agreed the Charles Shaw tasted better. It had a deeper ruby color and it was more complex. The Three Wishes was fruitier in nose and flavor, but was thin and lacked presence.

But Three Wishes has the organic, corkless thing going for it, and at 71 cents a wish (tax included), Whole Foods customers might forgive the tradeoff.

Glendale

Late breaking news posted on the Glendale News Press website yesterday, that a commercial shoot for Outback Steakhouse would involve the following: "At approximately 10 p.m., three long, brown cylinders running along the front of the billboard – symbolizing a grill - will be ignited. The flames will then consume the billboard and the grill will fall off, landing on a car, which will result in an explosion."

Awesome!

Scott and I were on the phone trying to strategize our positions based on how chaotic and crazy we anticipated this to be: police barricades, closed off streets, crowds of onlookers.

It was me, Scott&Natalie, another family of four, and this guy Eric. And Eric's friend.

Scott&Natalie and I were the last holdouts, around midnight, when they accidentally really did set the sign on fire during a test run. Then everyone headed for the craft service table - except for the techies who started routing around their trucks for Plan B, and we took this as our cue to leave.

I went back this morning and it seems like they finally figured it out. Nothing a little CGI can't fix, anyway. Really, who still blows up actual cars anymore? Silly Aussies.

The Hotel Glendale

We need a new Facebook, but until that happens I was on Facebook yesterday, on The Cave page, catching up on the "likes."

(small aside, New Scandinavian Cooking is on public television and is the most calming, relaxing, interesting cooking show there is. All the hosts have been good, and Andreas Viestad is adorable.)

I went over to the Glendale Public Library sight, and on there was a link for a site called Historypin. A quick search there yielded this photograph, circa 1940-1950, of Broadway looking east. That's the Hotel Glendale on the left/northeast corner (click on image to enlarge). You can see the cables overhead and tracks in the street for cable cars, and on the building the signage and radio towers still existent. On the southeast corner was a bank, now a small parking lot. The other two corners, once storefronts, are now city hall and the courthouse.

The sight also gave the option of seeing the photograph juxtaposed onto the current street view, and it was perfectly aligned, allowing for both an interesting contrast of eras and the only thing of that original photo that remains. Endures.

Cheap Whole Foods wine versus cheap Trader Joe's wine.

Whole Foods has thrown its, er, corkscrew into the cheap wine ring, taking on Trader Joe's legendary Charles Shaw wine, more fondly known as 2-Buck Chuck.

The Whole Foods brand is Three Wishes. My guess is after you place your first wish for a billion dollars, the next two will be for a better glass of wine. (I got a million of 'em!)

Both sell for $1.99 here in California. So far, 2-Buck Chuck is winning just for the (nick)name; there are no hidden agendas or delusions of grandeur in it. Three Wishes, not nearly so catchy or fun or, well, obvious.

Stay tuned for the results of this taste test...

...and then we drank everyone's wine.

The only reason I wanted the history ride to come here was because of how fun it is to come down that hill.









































Scott did all the talking. I just stood next to him and took a picture.

Saturday: The Glendale History Ride

Tomorrow morning, the Glendale Historical Society, Glendale Community Services and Parks Department and the LA County Bicycle Coalition is sponsoring the Glendale Historical Bike Tour.

Meet time is 8:30 am, at the (historic) Glendale train station, and ride is at 9.

I of course will be sleeping, but I will be up in time to have The Cave open; it's a stop on the tour. The Hotel Glendale opened 1925 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

Last night Scott , who instigates these things, and I did a test ride. Lots of actual riding , which is nice, and a good mix of places of interest. Of course we know the most interesting, but I'm not biased.

ah...Sunday - aka - ah...Friday.

cartoonists.cartoonbank.ru
Gervasio Troche

Only $7,000,00 and it can be yours!

I learned on European Journal, this morning, that if you live in France and want to make wine, it only costs $7,000,000 to buy a vineyard.



What I learned today: One euro = 1.42 dollars, and one hectare = about two and a half acres. This will help when perusing Business Insiders A Complete Guide To The World's 15 Best Wine-Producing Regions. The link gives you the run down on the average price/hectare/wine region. No surprise that Bordeaux is the most expensive at $642,000/hectare. Napa is second at half that price. On the other end of the arc, though, you can do well in a number of places, like Argentina at only $27,000-per-hectare. Which is maybe why its wine is also more accessible, economically speaking.

Design

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/

Art in the Streets closes Monday.

This is what happens when you wait until the last minute to go to the Art in the Streets show at the Geffen. The show closes Monday, so you still have the weekend.











The show is uneven, but you get to see a lot of Jamie Reid's original art work for various Sex Pistols album covers. (click on images to enlarge)











You get to see the history of spray paint.







Shepard Fairey's section is cool.








I like the refrigerator.

Craig Ferguson @ La Tour D'Argent

The Cave adores Craig Ferguson, and if you're not fortunate enough to be a troglodyte who prefers a less crowded time of the arc of day, chances are you haven't been watching The Late Late Show in Paris all week.

Last night Craig visited La Tour d'Argent, a 400 year-old restaurant with a 400,000 bottle wine cellar. As this website puts it, "... the restaurant prides itself on its traditional French cuisine but also having probably one of the most technically perfect wine cellars in Paris that provides a perfect setting for its glorious, renowned and prestigious bottles that they contain."

This place is awesome! A lot like The Cave, but even cave-ier. And more French. Not as dark as here, though.