Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Giveaway! Tickets to THE TASTE Desserts After Dark

LA Times and Food and Wine's weekend-long extravaganza, The Taste, is happening this weekend!
Spanning 4 days over 3 locations and 9 events, there are plenty to choose from. Now, we know most of you can't afford to go to ALL of them, which why they've offered to give away A PAIR OF TICKETS (up to $300 value) to one of the events!

Now, since I love desserts, I'm going to give away tickets to the Desserts after Dark, taking place on Sunday evening. The event features Food Network star Duff Goldman, desserts from Craft Restaurant, Waylynn Lucas's fōnuts, Compartes chocolates, Sweet Rose Creamery, and much more. Wash them down with some Qream Liqueur, Dow’s Port and a little Villa Massa Limoncello.

You can enter in two ways (or get two entries if you do both):
1. Comment below with your email address and tell us what your favorite dessert is.
2. Comment on my Facebook Page with your favorite dessert.

Easy, right?
They need the name of the winner by the end of the day tomorrow, which means this contest will end at NOON tomorrow! Then if I don't hear back from the winner by 3pm with their full names, I will draw another name - so be checking that mailbox.

PS. If you want to attend the other events, you can get tickets at 40% off from Bloomspot or OpenTable.

Meet the True Ice Cream Sandwich

Sandwich, according to Wikipedia, "is a food item, typically consisting of two or more slices of bread with one or more fillings between them". But then there's the ice cream sandwich, usually consisting of ice cream in between two cookies. Where's the bread, I asked. And Night+Market answered.

The ice cream sandwich ($4.50) at Night+Market actually involves bread, and it is a must try.

Ice Cream Sandwich
The contents are everything you'd think of in a Thai dessert, minus mangoes.
Sweet sticky rice and toasted mung beans are doused with condensed milk, sandwiched by a (toasted) sweet roll, then topped with coconut ice cream.
Sandwich

Now that's what I'd call an ice cream sandwich.

For a review of their dinner menu, go here.

Night+Market
9041 W Sunset Blvd
West Hollywood, CA 90069
(310) 275-9724
thenightmarket.blogspot.com

Monday, August 29, 2011

Margarita Dinner at Border Grill

Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger's Border Grill may very well be the restaurant that popularized Mexican food in LA back in the day. The Santa Monica restaurant is as popular as ever, but they're trying to keep things fresh by holding special events, such as the Margarita Dinner I recently attended.

The margarita dinner is a 5-course dinner prepared by Executive Chef Alex Moreno, each paired with a cocktail (well, the last pairing is nonalcoholic). The cocktails for this dinner were all made with Greenbar Collective spirits, a Los Angeles-based company that makes all organic spirits and bitters.

Hoja Santa ShrimpWe started our meal with a Grilled Oja Santa Shrimp and farmers market tomato mint tea.
We were supposed to alternate between bites of the crispy-fried shrimp and sips. The tomato mint "tea" was a little salty, though.

The dish was served with a Cucumber Mint Gin and Tonic, made with Tru organic gin, cucumber, and mint.
Cucumber Mint Gin Tonic
The herbal notes of the Tru gin was pretty strong.

Second course: Abalone and California Avocado Ceviche, lime cured, heirloom cherry tomatoes, persian cucumbers

Abalone Ceviche
This was an unusual ceviche. Not only do I rarely encounter an abalone ceviche, this was mixed in with an avocado sauce which lends the dish a nice creaminess instead of the strongly acidic lemon juice normally associated with ceviche.

Gourmet Pigs   © 2008. Template Recipes by Emporium Digital

TOP