“So, you ready to run away and join the circus?” David Yoshimura asked me as we stood side-by-side in chef’s whites in the kitchen of his Michelin-starred restaurant, Nisei, watching our hard work that day come to fruition as the first plates went out to dinner guests. I just chuckled because the answer to thatContinue reading “Alternative Careers and A Day in the Life of Chef David Yoshimura at Nisei”
Category Archives: Uncategorized
The Horses in the Lord of the Rings Series
youtube.com/watch A wonderful featurette on Peter Jackson’s commitment to using real horses and real riders when filming the epic Lord of the Rings trilogy in New Zealand.
Boloquoy Farmhouse & Mill
A unique and sweet project in Orkney to restore an 18th-century farmstead as a way of preserving culture and memory on the island: youtube.com/watch
Building the Dohyō for the Grand Sumo Basho
youtube.com/watch Continuing on our Grand Sumo theme, here’s a great video about how the dohyō or competition ring is made. It’s a sloped platform made of clay and straw, and it’s constructed by hand by the yobidashi, the announcers! Amazing.
Origami Pegasus
youtube.com/watch Just incredible.
The Piñata (and other cocktails) from Padrecito
I really can’t exaggerate how good the cocktail menu was at Padrecito, the upscale Cole Valley tacquería that tragically didn’t survive the pandemic. (Happily the bar director, David Ruiz, did and he’s currently running Stillwater with his wife in Fairfax—so check it out if you’re in the neighborhood). But nearly as awesome as the drinksContinue reading “The Piñata (and other cocktails) from Padrecito”
Billy & Molly
You absolutely must watch this: youtube.com/watch
ESC #37 and #38 ft. Exploding Xurros!
I mean, it was high time for Experimental Supper Club to have a spectacular failure, amiright? The good news is no one got hurt. The bad news is it took me the better part of a day to wash my kitchen down from ceiling to floor (including the dogs). We had a vaguely Spanish/Portuguese themeContinue reading “ESC #37 and #38 ft. Exploding Xurros!”
In which Gosha takes a bath, helps Aziza with the fire, and steals some strawberries….
youtube.com/watch
Narrowboat Life
There is this amazing network of canals left over from England’s industrial era, and some folks putter around them on super-skinny houseboats called “narrowboats”: I don’t know the exact width, but I’d guess something like 8 feet? Skinny enough to fit through all of the canals at any rate. This charming couple, Kris and Andrew,Continue reading “Narrowboat Life”
The Rookery 