Showing posts with label torrance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label torrance. Show all posts

Saturday, December 3, 2016

21 Square Bar + Kitchen (Torrance, CA)

by @bstunoda

21 Square, named because the city is approximately 21 square miles, is the latest addition to the Torrance food and beverage landscape. It is located inside the Torrance Marriott Redondo Beach. A lot of attention was placed on creating a cool coastal vibe. I liked the uniqueness of the interior decor - the walls featured the city of Torrance in a creative way. The venue extended outdoors with a beautiful fire pit and adjacent seating.

The “21st Mule” is their version of the ever popular cocktail with Tito’s® vodka, ginger beer and fresh squeezed lime. I enjoyed both the presentation and the taste of “El Dude”. This is their house-made creation of Fugu Horchata vodka and Kahlua.
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In addition to the their cocktails, they feature wine and ten beers on tap. They’ve partnered with Absolution Brewing to create their own exclusive brew and that’s only available at 21 Square. It is a smooth ale and probably a great beginner’s entry into craft beer. In fact they make their delicious fish & chips using this very brew!
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The LYB (Loosen Your Belt) is a shareable dish consisting of tater tots, capicola, mortadella, salami, sausage, cheddar, mozzarella, chopped scallions and topped with a poached egg. It’s is the perfect item to share with a draft beer.

Friday, May 8, 2015

The Jolly Oyster Market, Bringing Fresh Shellfish to Torrance

The Jolly Oyster is a beloved oyster shack in Ventura, where many Angelenos have taken a day trip to get fresh oysters and have a picnic in the park where the shack is located. They have all natural oyster farms based in Baja in Mexico. If Ventura seems too far for you, though, don't worry, since The Jolly Oyster just opened a market in Torrance! As with everything in Torrance, it's in a strip mall. Hanging on the walls are photos of their oyster farms in Baja. I really enjoyed listening to the story of how they got started and what they do. If you're interested, you should check out the documentary video.

Jolly Oyster
Now, since the space is small they can't have seating for you to eat oysters there, but they will shuck them and sell them to you to take home (or to a park nearby or whatever). It does cost more to buy shucked oysters than unshucked ones, obviously, but it's still cheaper than getting them at a restaurant. A half-dozen shucked oysters go for $10, while unshucked oysters are $1.25 each (or $1 if you buy more than $40).

Jolly Oyster has three different sauces you can put on your shellfish, but there's no cocktail sauce because that overpowers the oysters! There's a vinaigrette made with beets, a spicy one with garlic and thai chili, and a brown rice vinegar with cucumber.
Jolly Oyster

Sunday, December 14, 2014

Hey 19: Fun Food and Cheap Drinks in Torrance

There are tons of great Japanese restaurants in Torrance, from oden and yakitori to soba to wonderful pastries, but I wouldn't know where to drink in Torrance. Until now, when Demi Stevens of Ortega 120 opened up Hey 19, a pub with affordable drinks and comfort food - serving until late at night.

Hey 19
The drinks range from $7-8.25. You can hardly get those prices even at happy hour in LA! Yay for low rent in Torrance. I tried the South Bay Storm (Cruzan rum, Campari, lemon, pineapple, Roy Rogers - that's coke and grenadine, $7) and the Classic Cup (housemade Pimm's #1, lemonade, ginger ale, cucumber, mint, orange - also $7).
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Just like the popular margaritas at Ortega 120, the drinks tends to be strong and sweet, easy to drink. It turns out Demi prefers her own drinks less sweet so she made me another one that's coming on the menu soon. She said people tend to Uber down from LA in groups to drink because of her much cheaper prices!
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Tuesday, August 5, 2014

Awesome Affordable Sushi at Sushi Nozomi (Torrance, CA)

It's easy to spend over $100 on a sushi omakase, and while some of them are certainly worth the money, you can't do that too often. Instead, most of us frequent the mid-tier, affordable sushi joints - some of which provide really good value for the money. The best value for sushi omakase may well be Sushi Nozomi down in Torrance. The "chef's choice" or omakase is only $38 for 10 pieces of sushi plus a negi-toro roll and we're talking fresh fish, some of which are pretty hard to find in town!

Each omakase starts with a bowl of miso soup.

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When I visited, the omakase included a piece of Halibut fin, topped with yuzu
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Blue nose. This fish looks similar to a bass or grouper, leaner than the former but fattier than the latter.
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Thursday, July 18, 2013

Saturday July 20: Support Torrance Memorial, Attend Evening Under the Stars

Los Angeles is not the only one with food festivals, South Bay has their own, too. Hosted by American Honda at its Torrance campus, Evening Under the Stars gathers some of the best in South Bay restaurants while raising funds for Torrance Memorial Medical Center. Disneyland Resort Sommeliers will be serving 80 different wines while educating the guests and saxophonist Kenny G will be the entertainment of the night.

Some of the restaurants and bars that will be there include Alpine Village, Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar, Gonpachi at Miyako Hybrid Hotel, Jackson’s Food & Drink, Nothing Bundt Cakes,  Ortega 120, Riboli Family Wine Estates, and The Strand House.

The festival will take place from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. Tickets are $150 per person, $250 per pair or $4,000 for table sponsors (10 guests per table) and can be purchased by calling the Chamber at 310-540-5858, the Torrance Memorial Health Care Foundation at 310-517-4703, or by visiting www.TorranceMemorial.org.
Tickets can only be purchased online until noon, Friday July 19.

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Kyushu & Okinawa Fair at Mitsuwa, Back on July 18-21

I love going to Mitsuwa during their various regional fairs and the Kyushu and Okinawa Fair is returning on July 18-21, featuring some very fun food items. They sell most of the stuff at all the Mitsuwa Marketplace locations including Costa Mesa and San Diego, but the most complete one is Torrance (check out this page to see which store is selling what)

My favorite from last time was the caramel pudding with cream in a choux pastry! They're not doing the caramel one this year but they'll have a strawberry pudding in a choux pastry :D I'll definitely be trying that.
Last year they had tonkotsu ramen from Ramen Tatsuno-ya but unfortunately they'll only be in San Jose this time around. Instead, we'll have Hakata Nagahama Ramen from Tanaka Shoten.

Monday, October 15, 2012

A Tour and Many Tastes of King's Hawaiian Bakery

King's Hawaiian Bakery was started by Robert Taira, the father of the current president, Mark, first as a stand alone bakery in Hawaii in Hilo in 1956. The family then moved to Honolulu and opened up the bakery on King Street. All the family worked at the bakery and tourists were buying them as souvenirs. The round bread was the number 1 fundraising item on the island. Mark's grandma then had the great idea of starting a mail order service and demand for King's Hawaiian bread kept growing into what it is now - a big factory in Torrance, California where they still produce bread with Robert's original recipe.


I was invited to tour the factory recently, and of course I'm not going to say no to such an opportunity!
Part of this tour involved some confidential information like the machines they use etc so not many pictures, sorry! But I was surprised at what a big operation this really was, from machines that cut and knead the dough to packaging it. The end of the line was a favorite, of course, with the smell of butter and fresh baked bread wafting in the air.



Of course, the best part was probably trying the rolls fresh off the line (we got the wheat rolls), just with butter! Can't beat this.
After the tour, we went out to their back lot for lunch! They've called in some of LA's best food trucks that serves or uses King's Hawaiian products, along with a whole spread of their own desserts. Mark's daughter Courtney experiments with different recipe using the bread in the factory kitchen including things like white chocolate chip bread pudding and garlic cheese bread. Some of the desserts we had are served at their restaurant, and also their newer fast casual restaurant, The Local Place. The Tres Leches cake and the bread pudding was my favorite.

I immediately went for Lobsta Truck's lobster roll, which is served on toasted King's Hawaiian sweet hot dog bun! I've always loved their lobster roll!
The Kogi Truck does their sliders using King's Hawaiian sweet dinner rolls. Both their short rib and tofu sliders were crowd favorites.
Buttermilk Truck's French Toast sticks also uses King's Hawaiian bread.
Ludo Truck serves their fried chicken with the dinner roll.
When we left, they told us they had a parting gift for us. I was expecting a bag, maybe one or two packages of their bread. But noooo. This is the Aloha spirit after all! Our parting gift was a huge box of goodies, so big that I needed help carrying it to the car! Enough bread to last me months, coffee, cookies, apron, gift card, etc ... Jealous? I bet. Want one? They're actually giving away a box to one of my readers too! The contents won't be exactly the same but you can be sure they will be as generous. Check back tomorrow for a new post for the giveaway! :)

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Brunch at Lazy Dog Cafe (Torrance)

Usually my trips down to Torrance only involves Japanese restaurants and bakeries, but I broke the pattern on my latest trip with brunch at the Lazy Dog Cafe.

Here is what you need to get at brunch:
Sunny Side Up Pizza: white pizza with Spinach, Sundried Tomatoes, Bacon, topped with three fresh Eggs, baked until golden brown ($9.25)

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Fellow blogger LA OC Foodie ordered this, but luckily he was generous enough to share. It was my favorite thing I had at Lazy Dog, especially the slices with the egg yolk on them. It's breakfast on a pie! Hmm, maybe they should put six eggs instead?

IMG_8435For sweet potato lovers, get the sweet potato tater tots with roasted jalapeno-lime aioli ($4.75)

The bacon lovers should try the Bacon Bloody Mary (Vodka, housemade crispy bacon infused bloody mary mix, pepperoncini, pickled cherry pepper,olive, bacon-corn nut salt, $7.50). I'm not a huge fan of savory cocktails and bloody marys so I didn't order one. I tried a sip of someone else's and it's got quite a kick to it! Bloody Mary lovers should enjoy this one.
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Lazy Dog Cafe has their own house brews, made by the brewery Firestone Walker and you can get a taster of six for $6.95. The taster includes the Lazy Dog Honey Blonde, Lazy Dog American Hefe, Lazy Dog Bavarian Hefe, Lazy Dog Pale Ale, Lazy Dog Red and a seasonal beer (which happened to be the Firestone Velvet Merlin the day we went).
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Out of the Lazy Dog beers, we liked the red ale the best, and I also liked the Bavarian Hefeweizen.

You can also get a sampler of their three house-made Sangrias: White Peach, Black-Currant Rose, and Pomegranate Red ($8.25)
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The three have pretty distinct flavors. I liked the white peach and black-currant rose, but if you've never had them, the sampler trio is definitely the way to go.

It's rare to see fried rice on a brunch menu, especially at a western restaurant, so I was intrigued enough to order the Hawaiian Fried Rice: Stir-fried steamed rice with hickory-smoked bacon, pork sausage, cabbage, veggies and eggs ($7.95)
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I wished they had put a sunny side up egg with runny yolk with this instead of the frittata-like egg. It's an enormous amount of food for the price-I could barely eat a third of it - but I much preferred the breakfast pizza.

We had to try the pancakes for dessert, especially one with a bacon butter, no?
Wild blueberry pancakes and maple bacon butter: Three large buttermilk blueberry pancakes, topped with blueberry compote, housemade maple bacon butter and syrup on the side ($7.75)
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The maple bacon butter actually had chunks of bacon in them! This made me be picky when I spread the butter, as I had to look for the parts with the chunks. The small, wild blueberries are sweeter than the big supermarket kind and thus worked better as a pancake topping.

When you live far from Torrance, it's hard to go there without stopping at at least one Japanese restaurant or bakery, but Lazy Dog Cafe should certainly be a spot for the locals. The menu is a good value, they have their own brews plus a few more local craft beers on tap, and that addictive sunny side up pizza!

Lazy Dog Cafe
3525 W Carson St
Torrance, CA 90503
(310) 921-6080
lazydogcafe.com
 The Lazy Dog Cafe on Urbanspoon

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Soba-Ya + Common Grains Soba Pop-up (Torrance, CA)

After having Sonoko Sakai's hand cut soba at her soba making class and the Common Grains pop-up at BreadBar, I just had to have them again. Luckily, Common Grains is doing another pop-up at Soba-Ya in Torrance until February 21!

It seems a bit funny for me - a soba pop-up at a soba restaurant, but Soba-Ya, who also makes their own soba (but doesn't hand cut them, it's not a scalable operation) is newly opened and is eager to work with Common Grains. There are only two of Sonoko's handcut soba on the special menu, so we also ordered some of Soba-Ya's soba.

One of the handcut soba option is the Teuchi Arabiki Soba with soy bonito dipping sauce and pecan dipping sauce ($12) - a cold soba with two dipping sauces. I've had the pecan dipping sauce during my soba making class with Sonoko. It was excellent and I highly recommend trying it, but since I've had it I decided to try the other dish:
Premium Mushroom Seiro Soba, white truffle oil, bonito dipping sauce ($16)

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The truffle oil smell is light. The hand cut soba slippery and chewy. As always, just really, really good.

All tables get a small bowl of fried soba "chips" to snack on.
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I ran into Food GPS and we all sat together and shared some appetizers.
Agedashi Tofu
Agedashi tofu


Thursday, February 9, 2012

MochiCream (Torrance, CA)

As you may know, my mom sells her own handmade mochi in Indonesia, so when I found out that MochiCream, a popular Japanese mochi brand, had opened up shop inside the Mitsuwa Market in Torrance, I thought I should try them. You know, for "research".

Mochi Cream
MochiCream does not sell ice cream mochi like Mikawaya. The mochis here are filled with bean paste and whipped cream, but they are all made in Japan and shipped frozen.
Mochi Cream Torrance

Friday, April 23, 2010

Gonpachi - Torrance and the Miyako Hybrid Hotel

Upon pulling into the Miyako Hybrid Hotel parking lot I already loved the place: they have special parking spaces for Fuel Efficient Vehicles. Go Prius!

We were invited for a tasting of the Gonpachi Restaurant that opened as part of the Miyako Hybrid hotel. I remembered going to the Beverly Hills Gonpachi but that was so long ago before they changed their menu.

Unlike the very traditional decor at the Gonpachi Beverly Hills, the Gonpachi Torrance went for a more modern and "hip" look.

While waiting for the others to finish their hotel tour (coming from Pasadena, we couldn't make it to Torrance on time), I had a shoju-based cocktail at the bar.
We started with some Zensai (appetizers): tofu, shrimp shinjo, kinpira
The shrimp shinjo was paired with a sweet & sour fish sauce. The tofu seemed to be homemade and had a nicely rich texture.

Our meals were paired with the following sakes: Hakkaisan, Aiyama Nanbu-bijin (a floral sake), and Onikoroshi Daiginjo

Kobe Beef Carpaccio with ponzu and spicy miso sauce.
The kobe carpaccio had a seared edge and a smoky smell.

The most impressive item that night was definitely the Sashimi platter.
Abalone, salmon, squid, tuna, orange surf clams and more.

Here they serve Hokkaido "Bafun" uni, not your usual Santa Barbara, and it actually has a stronger, sweeter and more concentrated flavor, although it's actually not as creamy.

The sashimi was followed by Gindara (grilled miso marinated black cod)
Very tender, flaky and sweet. It pairs well with the onikoroshi. It's served atop rice with edamame and seaweed.

Sushi plate
I found that the fish, and especially the toro, to be of very good quality, but the rice was too dense.

Just like their Beverly Hills counterpart did, Gonpachi handmakes their soba in-house.
They do this in a small room with glass windows so patrons can actually watch it being made as you walk into the entrance.
We had the Zaru soba to semi-end the meal before the dessert.
The soba here is certainly better than store-bought dried soba (although it's no Ichimiann). Soba-yu is also served with it.

After cleansing with a cup of hojicha that had a lovely roasted aroma, for dessert we had the Pumpkin Zenzai (sweet red beans, mochi balls, vanilla ice cream in pumpkin soup, topped with almonds).
I've had this dessert before and have always enjoyed it very much. I'm happy to see it is served here also.

Torrance is a mecca of Japanese food in this area, but the "fine dining" and sushi restaurants are still lacking. With its ambiance and setting in this new LEED silver-certified hotel, Gonpachi is poised to fill this gap for the locals. After all, as much as we love Ichimiann and Otafuku, we can't very well hold a business meeting there.

Gonpachi - Torrance
21381 South Western Avenue
Torrance, CA 90501
(310) 320-6700
Gonpachi - Torrance on Urbanspoon
Gonpachi - Torrance in Los Angeles on Fooddigger

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Hot and Soupy #1: Handmade Soba and Udon at Ichimiann (You Never Knew It Could Taste This Good)

I've eaten at Ichimiann so much it's a wonder that I hadn't written about it sooner, but this cold winter weather is the perfect time to start it off as the inaugural post of my "Hot and Soupy" series of posts!

Ichimiann is a place I found through Exile Kiss' blogpost, lauding it as the one amazing teuchi(handmade) soba place in town. I was on a crazy soba kick and wanted to venture further than Yabu.

Ichimiann, aka Bamboo Garden, is a tiny shop on a dilapidated side street right next to Foster's Freeze and looks just like a typical noodle shop.
Cash only, you can place your order and then take a seat at the bar by the wall.

The rite of passage for all soba noobs is the Zaru Soba, so even though it doesn't meet the hot and soupy winter theme, it simply cannot be left unmentioned. Zaru soba gets its name from the bamboo sieve that it is served on and is typically served with tsuyu (a mixture of dashi, sweetened soy sauce, and mirin), scallions, and wasabi.
Mix the scallions and wasabi in the tsuyu, then pick up the buckwheat noodles and dip it in the tsuyu.
This is the dish that best highlights Ichimiann's excellent handmade soba, the wonderful texture and the flavor of the buckwheat noodle itself. The soba here is devoid of that doughy and powdery taste and texture that I always hated in mass produced noodles.

If you want hot soba, however, Ichimiann has plenty of options for you, from a simple bowl with poached egg to many more. The flavors of the broth are subtler here, unlike many places which tend to be salty, but it is ultimately more satisfying and worth savoring.

When you want your protein you could opt for the unagi soba topped with grated yam.
Even though this dish made me realize I'm not big on japanese yam, the rest of the dish was excellent. The unagi is nicely grilled and lends a nice flavor although I did miss the crisp texture of the unagi before it's soaked in broth and yam.

When Exile Kiss did a second post, this time on the udon noodles at Ichimiann, I had to go back and try that too (even if I'm still a soba girl).

A bowl of beef sukiyaki udon seems like the perfect meal for a chilly Saturday morning (ok, afternoon).

Ichimiann's udon is thin, unlike the type you normally see in stores and restaurants.
The sukiyaki udon bowl is bolder in flavor than the other soba dishes that I've had and it really hits the spot. The udon, while thinner than usual, is wonderfully chewy without that doughy consistency.
Ichimiann's subtle but deeply satisfying flavor doesn't leave you overwhelmed and dehydrated like some salty dishes might, but instead it just keeps you satiated all day long.


Ichimian Bamboo Garden
1618 Cravens Ave
Torrance, CA 90501
(310) 328-1323
Ichimian Bamboo Garden on Urbanspoon
Ichimian Bamboo Garden in Los Angeles

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