“The poor man is not he who is without a cent, but he who is without a dream.”
I love anyone who opens a German or Austrian restaurant in LA. It’s such great comfort food!
Austrian Cuisine hits Beverly Hills
BierBeisl isn’t a locally minded restaurant.
Whenever possible, chef Bernhard Mairinger turns to the country of his birth, Austria, to stock the kitchen of his new Beverly Hills spot.
Stiegl, the Salzburg brewery that’s gloriously inescapable in Austria, dominates the beer list. And there’s plenty of Grüner Veltliner, Zweigelt and Blaufränkisch, too.
The sausages at BierBeisl aren’t imported, but the smooth texture of the bratwurst ($9), made by Continental Gourmet Sausage, might convince you otherwise. Mairinger brings a delicate touch to the links here, belying his training at L.A.’s finishing school for chefs, Patina. His sausages aren’t strictly about snap and char; some, like weisswurst ($9), are simmered in milk.
That deftness carries over to more definitively Austrian dishes such as schnitzel ($19 to $25). Feel free to choose whichever fried cutlet–turkey, pork or veal–you’d like to eat with lingonberries. But we implore you to pick the potato salad for your side dish.
Despite all the true imports Mairinger brings to BierBeisl, this vinegary salad (click here for the recipe) is the Austrian dish we’re most glad to now have available; this is the potato salad we fell for when visiting Vienna–the one we’ve been chasing ever since.
BierBeisl, 9669 Santa Monica Blvd., Beverly Hills; 310-271-7274 or bierbeisl-la.com
Who is going in with me on an island?!?!?!?
Three Rules for Running Your Own Island
Contrary to popular belief, renting out an entire island in the Bahamas isn’t all fun and games. Okay, it’s mostly fun and games, but there’s a modicum of work involved, too. Namely, laws. You’re going to need them. Your monkey butler is going to need them.
So allow us to introduce Royal Island, a newly rentable, 430-acre, palm-tree-shrouded paradise… along with some basic guidelines for a blissful stay/successful reign.
Cool it with the pirate act…
One of the perks of temporary private island stewardship: your own catamaran and personal fleet of jet skis. Yes, the sea vessels come complimentary with your stay, but you’re still bound by local maritime laws. So swashbuckling is a no, but jet-ski jousting is a definite maybe.
Remember, sharing is caring…
You’re going to want to bring along some company. For one, there’s no way to use five beachfront villas, a full-service spa and a team of on-call chefs all at the same time. For another, suntan-lotion application.
Treat it like a party…
Or whatever kind of fete you’d throw together when you have a fire pit, steel-drum band and outdoor movie theater at your disposal (clearly, a calypso pig roast independent film festival).
Changing Education Paradigms by Sir Ken Robinson
This animate was adapted from a talk given at the RSA by Sir Ken Robinson, world-renowned education and creativity expert and recipient of the RSA’s Benjamin Franklin award.
For more information on Sir Ken’s work visit: http://www.sirkenrobinson.com
“Worry is interest on money never borrowed.”
Looks like YUM!
Miyata Menji
“Inauthentic” is a dirty word in many food circles.
So it’s no wonder that the opening of Miyata Menji made the food blogosphere balk. This, after all, is a new noodle spot on Sawtelle that serves ramen with teriyaki beef, and tsukemen topped with grated cheese.
But we’ll make a case for the “inauthentic.” Because you know what else is “inauthentic”? Korean tacos, for one. See also: most high-end burgers.
Miyata Menji is part of an Osaka-based chain, which even further problematizes screams of inauthenticity. Stop in for noodles at lunch and you’ll hear plenty of Japanese spoken. And while the tsukemen noodles (pictured; $9)–tossed with anchovies, cabbage and grated cheese–resemble our go-to lunch of pasta with chicories, fish sauce and pecorino, a brief dip in the heady pork broth takes the flavor straight to Japan.
Just inside the door there are two empty bags of flour pinned to the wall: One is an all-purpose generic brand, and the other a kanji-branded bag of Kyoriki Ko hard wheat flour. We’re guessing this is an Us vs. Them comparison, in which Miyata Menji uses the better, more-Japanese flour–which happens to be grown (inauthentically) in Canada.
Miyata Menji, 2050 Sawtelle Blvd., West L.A.; 310-312-3929 ormiyatamenji.com
“Is the glass half full or half empty? It depends on whether you are pouring or drinking.”
Wow…this is pretty amazing….like having a computer in your head!
Google’s Project Glass
We believe technology should work for you — to be there when you need it and get out of your way when you don’t.
A team within our Google[x] group started Project Glass to build this kind of technology, one that helps you explore and share your world, putting you back in the moment.
Follow along with us at http://g.co/projectglass as we share some of our ideas and stories. We’d love to hear yours, too. What would you like to see from Project Glass?
“If you advance confidently in the direction of your own dreams and endeavor to live the life that you have imagined, you will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.”
I love any new sushi spot, especially on the west side of Los Angeles!
Shunji
We’ve become unabashed fans of a welding-shop parking lot in West L.A.
There we parked our car en route to a smashing meal at Shunji, a new restaurant housed in a space that was previously a barbecue joint.
It’s an unlikely place to find high-end Japanese food. But once you’re settled at the bar and are watching the handsomely gray-haired chef, Shunji Nakao, blowtorching the skin of a pampano fillet, or tossing raw squid and uni with truffle and squid ink, you’ll forget the peculiar space and steel yourself for greatness.
There’s a menu, but don’t pore over it; order the omakase. Dinner runs about $90 a person, which is by no means cheap. But the full experience (click here to see a slide show) is one of the most exciting meals we’ve had recently.
Both French and Californian cuisines inflect Nakao’s contemporary Japanese cooking: An orb of purple yam, topped with dried persimmon, is stuffed with pungent blue cheese, and seared kanpachi is garnished with a sweet sprig ofarugula flowers.
Of course, your omakase might be different–but that’s part of the thrill.
Shunji, 12244 Pico Blvd., West L.A.; 310-826-4737 or shunji-ns.com
I’m not 100% sure about this one but it was so wild, I had to post it. Lola’s was the spot back in the day (I sound ancient) so whatever they do is A-OK in my book. It’s also across the street from my favorite Chinese restaurant - Genghis Cohen - the best Chinese in LA and up the street from our newly famous whole animal butcher - Lindy & Grundy. Thoughts?
Cereal Martinis at Lola’s on Fairfax
Typical Friday night: a formidable sprawl of oysters and steak.
Typical Saturday morning: you kind of just want some Lucky Charms.*
(*In a martini glass.)
Introducing Cereal Martinis—finally, a respectable way to get your cereal splashed with vodka instead of milk—launching this weekend for brunch at Lola’s.
If you’ve been looking for a way to combine a hazy breakfast on your couch with a big morning-after brunch on Fairfax… Lola’s has finally stepped up as the place to make this happen. Come Saturday morning, grab a table on the patio and order your Lucky Charms—it will actually be a martini, with some cereal floating in marshmallow vodka. All that’s missing is the Cartoon Network.
And if you’ve always assumed vodka might go better over some Froot Loops—or Cinnamon Toast Crunch, or Reese’s Puffs, swirled together with chocolate vodka and a homemade peanut butter blend—they’ve got you covered.
So yeah, these cocktails may be a bit sweeter than what you usually drink…
But you didn’t come here for Müeslix martinis.
Total Recall – Official Trailer
There’s no crazy, roided out Arnold, but the official trailer for the new Total Recall showcases plenty of impressive visuals and a healthy helping of Kate Beckinsale for your enjoyment. You’ll have to wait until August to find out if this version can hold a candle to the 90′s sci-fi classic, but for now you can watch Doug Quaid beat the shit out of some scout trooper look-alikes. And no, the chick with three cans isn’t in the trailer, sorry.
Oh I love it when Rapha puts up a new cycling video!!!
Den.m Bar in Downtown Los Angeles
Bespoke EVERYTHING is all the rage these days and I LOVE IT! Can’t get enough of it. I signed up for Bespoke Post and got my first product email today - it’s SALT - brilliant, awesome salt that Tere and her chef girlfriends are going to oooh and aaah over. It’s going to be awesome.
I find that although I’m not a GIANT or have three arms or anything, my body type is slightly more unusual than the usual fare at the mall. I love to be comfortable and don’t think I should suffer for beauty. To that end, I’m always looking for someone who is making clothes for ME and not for every woman on the planet.
This is where the den.m bar comes in. I’ve posted about them already from some swanky site but now you get my bird’s eye view of it as I walk through their process. First off, I emailed them about 10 days ago and Derek emailed me back fairly quickly to let me know that because of recent demand, he couldn’t set an appointment for a couple weeks. We emailed into the evening as he burned the midnight oil on his new business. Sure to his word, he emailed me about a week later to let me know we could set a time this past Saturday.
I arrived on time to Steve who quickly helped me walk through all the options that lay before me. I was measured, leg widths and lengths were discussed and soon Steve was swiping my credit card on the store’s iPad.
And now we wait for them to be made! I will be back soon to tell you how they turned out - with PICS!!
This looks amazing!!!
Delfini Citta PIZZA
The days of Los Angeles being a wasteland of bad pizza are long behind us.
With Neapolitan-style wood-burning ovens dotting the restaurant landscape, you can now find imitators of Naples’ platonic pie throughout the city.
Hunting for a good New York-style slice, however, is still largely futile.
Delfini Città, the newly opened Beverly Hills restaurant run by the owners of Caffé Delfini in the Pacific Palisades, splits the difference between the two styles. The crust has that soft, airy texture favored by the likes of 800 Degrees, but the bottom has a good crunch to it, the texture reminiscent of the slice you’d order in Brooklyn that’s served after a quick turn in the oven.
The Margherita ($13), topped with grated cheese rather than the globs of fresh mozzarella you may have become accustomed to, looks far more New York than Naples, too. But because buffalo-milk-cheese-topped and raw-greens-scattered pizzas are the new normal in our Naples-fetishizing times, Delfini Città delivers on that front as well.
Augmented with a squeeze of lemon courtesy of the wedge affixed to our water glass, the rucola-and-mozzarella pie (pictured; $13) balanced America’s crust and Italy’s toppings wonderfully.
Delfini Citta, 8635 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills; 310-659-9555 ordelfinicitta.com
More t-shirts!!!
Saturdays Surf NYC
Saturdays. Surf. NYC. All three of these things, when mentioned separately, bring good thoughts into our heads. Put them all together and what do you get? A great line of off-duty tees. The brand makes it its mission to outfit a lifestyle occupied with surfing, living and working in the Big Apple. Even if all that doesn’t appeal to you, the simplicity of their laid back designs surely will. $40
“Learning is discovering that something is possible.”
“You make a living by what you get. You make a life by what you give.”
“If you lose your money, you’ve lost nothing. If you lose your friends, you’ve lost something. If you lose your word, you’ve lost everything.”
LOVE this idea…a MUST DO!
Tugg: Watch Anything on the Big Screen
You know a little something about cinema.
Sure, The Hunger Games packed some houses last weekend. But you’ve got the inside line on a scrappy little underdog called The Godfather…
Take a first look at Tugg, a new crowdsourcing website that works with theaters to show whatever movies you feel like watching on the big screen, in private beta mode now.
Think of this like Kickstarter for the movies—head to the website, propose a movie you want to see, a date and a participating theater, and then tell all your friends. If enough people band together to buy tickets, then the movie shall be screened.
So yeah, if you want to test out a rough cut of your indie before Sundance, you can use Tugg to do that. But it’ll probably be more fun to just invite a bunch of people to see Wet Hot American Summer on the big screen, as it was meant to be seen. (The small screen just doesn’t do jean shorts justice.)
They’re still testing out the site, but you can sign up now to get notified when it’s fully active here in LA. The advisers include Terrence Malick and Ben Affleck.
But there’s no obligation to book Reindeer Games.