Sunday, April 5, 2015

Boozy Brunch at Harlowe (West Hollywood, CA)

1933 Group brings black Old Hollywood glamour with Harlowe. The gorgeous space incorporates fine touches like antique tiles and a sleek wooden bar that takes center stage.

Harlowe
The decor is best appreciated in daylight, and now you can do just that with their brunch hours. The bar program is the main draw here, so naturally brunch will be a boozy brunch with specialty cocktails ($14 each). They had brought in mixologist Dushan Zaric (from NYC's Employees Only) to design the opening cocktail menu and the GM Chris Amirault and other local bartenders are keeping the game up.

Harlowe
Swap your regular cup of joe with Coffee is for Closers (Teeling's Irish whiskey, Stumptown coffee, Chartreuse whipped cream). This take on Irish Coffee is lovely - not too sweet and enhanced by the chartreuse in the whipped cream. For me it was the perfect drink choice to start my morning.

There's a full food menu at Harlowe. When Harlowe opened, Chef Eric Greenspan consulted on the menu, which has since been refined by chef Sam Hoke.

You'll find the usual brunch suspects like Eggs Benedict (brown butter hollandaise, country ham, homemade biscuit, $13). The brown butter is a nice touch that distinguishes it from the typical eggs benedict.
Harlowe

Friday, April 3, 2015

Good and Cheap Sushi in Boston! Ebi Sushi (Somerville, MA)

Have you heard me complain about the lack of cheap sushi in Boston yet? Sure, you can get good sushi at O Ya, but I don't really feel like dropping $200+ all the time. I tried a couple other highly rated places that were either not good or pretty good but overpriced - but I kept hearing about Ebi Sushi and finally made it out to Somerville, now that the snow is (mostly gone).

I normally don't order "sushi combo" but I made an exception here and it turned out to be a great deal!

Ebi Sushi
The reason I made an exception was because I was talking to the sushi chef (Jose, whom I later found out was actually one of the owners. Yes, he's not Japanese, but he's got quite a few years of experience behind sushi bars). He told me the specials for the day and I started asking him whether or not I could get this fish in the combo or that fish or this cut. And he said yes to all of them.

Thursday, April 2, 2015

Public School 818 (Sherman Oaks, CA)

by guest blogger @iam_robot

Every now and then we get nostalgic about school days – the carefree phase in our life, the days we found best friends for life, the naught and nonsense we committed to gain notoriety, and the many times we got caught staring our secret crushes’ (no matter how swift we were). I was lucky to be in the same school from kindergarten through high school, I always thought school was my second home.
Exterior
And this is what Bob Spivak, President & CEO of Daily Grill, had in mind when he opened the first Public School a few years ago – to relive some of the best days of our life and make Public School your home away from home. 
TheBar1
Whether it’s the menu designed as a composition book, cocktail napkins that look like lined college-rule notebook paper, the desk lamps on dining tables, or the cosine wall mural - Public School definitely elicits that nostalgic memory of a classroom.

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of checking out the latest Public School chain in Sherman Oaks. Taking over the former Sisley Italian Kitchen spot at Sepulveda and Ventura, Public School 818 will be a full service restaurant/ bar that delivers “An Education in the Art of Food and Beer”. 
PS Cocktail Yellow
Smoke
The menu is diversely American with its international influences, seasonal offerings, local flare and current trends. Naturally, drinks selection is pretty eclectic, including 20 – 30 taps of craft beers along with modern cocktails served up with house-made syrups and fresh squeezed juices. For pre-dinner cocktails, I had the Duck Thunder (watermelon, St. Germaine, Aylesbury Duck vodka) and Yellow Smoke (Fresh Pineapple Juice, serrano agave, El Silencio mezcal). Both were refreshing without being overly fruity or sweet.

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