Road trip - Day 6 Vancouver

It's day 6 of our road trip, can't believe we're half way there! Today's schedule includes dim sum for lunch, walk in Stanley Park, HH at the Boat House with Settlers of Catan, and dinner at Hapa!!

We got to the dim sum place (Kirin) 15 minutes before it opens, so we walked to the liquor store next store and boy alcohol in BC is really expensive. Kirin has good decor, descent food, but crappy service. The dead fish floating in the fish tank didn't really help with our appetite either, sometimes I wonder why can't Chinese restaurant provide better service, but I guess that's a whole other subject...:)

After lunch, we started our "big walk" around Stanley park. When we took the walk this past April, I had a pair of leather boots on and the walk in the park wasn't really "a walk in the park" for me. So this time I'm very well-prepared, I had a pair of sneakers on, sweat shirt, and comfortable pants. 1/3 through our walk, my fiancee threw his hip bone, he tried to be a good sport but it was too painful for him to finish the walk. So we walked up to the main road and took a trail hoping that we can find a short cut to catch the trolley or the cab to the Boat House.

At the end of the trail, we found a cafe! So we stopped by and grab a drink, played 2 games of Settlers and the caught the trolley on our way out. The trolley is pretty expensive, 20 Canadian dollars for the 2 of us, but it did help a lot since my fiancee is "injured". It took us probably around 15-20 minutes to walk from the Second Beach to the Boat House. We had couple of HH food items and couple glasses of wine. For some reason I felt like the experience at the Boat House last time was better, it's funny that I felt the same way about Lupo as well. Guess 2 trips in Vancouver within a year is enough for me!

After Boat House, we were debating whether we should still hit Hapa. We walked down Deman street and saw this restaurant called Cosca with a chalk board on the street with it's special for the day: Duck Risotto. We both love duck and risotto, so we stopped and was going to check out the menu when the owner of the restaurant walked out and introduced himself to us, told us a bit more about what's on the menu, I think we were both on an Italian food streak so decided to give it a try.

The pasta platter was pretty good, but the duck risotto was DELICIOUS and it cost only 18 Canadian dollars. The duck was cooked perfect and the risotto was al dente and fluid, with a creamy and slightly soupy consistency. We were both very impressed by the food. The restaurant was pretty small with probably around 8 tables that can sit 2 people plus the bar, we're hoping this restaurant will be able to stay in business until our next visit!

After dinner at Cosca, we went back to the hotel and watched a Van Diesel movie that we checked out from the front desk, I wasn't expecting much but it was actually pretty entertaining. Hope my fiancee's hip feels better tomorrow :(

Road trip - Day 5 Vancouver

Day 5 of our road trip was pretty chilled. We were driving from Portland to Vancouver. I'm not too sad about leaving Portland, didn't think downtown Portland has too much to offer, we did hear that the East part of Portland is nicer, but we didn't get a chance to drive across the river, guess it will be on our "visit list" for next trip.

On our way to Vancouver, we stopped by Seattle for a quick lunch at House of Hung, the food was ok, don't think I'll ever go back there again. We did stopped by Woodinville (north of Seattle, 10-15 miles away) for some wine tasting (yes, you can probably guess by now, we LOVE wine). Woodinville was really cool, there are more than 80 tastings room there now and they are all very close to each other. So if you didn't feel like driving all the way to Yakima Valley or Walla Walla Valley, Woodinville is a really nice option and has a lot to offer. We visited Lachinni, which is actually the only Oregon winery that has a tasting room up in Washington, we liked couple of their Pinots. William Church is another tasting room we visited, the wine was ok, we weren't blown away by it.

Our drive to Vancouver went pretty well, traffic was ok and it only took us about 10 minutes at the border. It was the traffic into downtown Vancouver that made us nearly missed our dinner reservation. I can't believe for a major city like Vancouver, there was no freeway that goes into the downtown area. My fiancee has this short cut he took to get to downtown but it really did kinda suck that at one point close to the airport area there was only 1 lane during rush hour...oh well...enough with my complaints.

We stayed at Aviawest when we were in Vancouver. It wasn't really a hotel but more like a time share and they rent the room out when there's no one staying there. The room was nice, it has 2 bedrooms and a living room, the office where you check-in has DVDs and some board games that you can check out.

Dinner reservation was at Lupo, one of the best restaurant I have ever been. We had been really excited about our reservation here and we had really high expectation. After dinner, overall, I'd say the food was good but the service was a bit disappointing. First of all, they told us we can't bring our own wine to the restaurant because of this BC code, I was kinda surprised coz we brought our wine to the restaurant when we visted back in April. Good that we found this Peppoli on their menu that we liked. Appetizers were great though. We ordered the Barrata to start with, the tomatos that were paired with the cheese were so fresh and refreshing that I can just keep on eating that for the whole night.

For our primi, we ordered 2 pasta dishes. I have been in the mood for pasta for a long time and was waiting for this dinner to quench my cravings. We ordered 2 pasta dishes, the pappardelle with slow cooked rabbit and ricotti gnocchi with veal cheeks. They were both fantastic but I had proven to myself that gnocchi is just not my thing even when it's really really good. For some reason, I don't find it very satisfying compared with the real pasta. For our secondi, we had the stuffed quail and special for the day: veal porterhouse steak. They were both good but I wouldn't say it's the best thing i have ever had. The veal porterhouse steak was overcooked (despite the fact that I told them I want it rare) so I sent it back, when the steak came out again, it was still cooked a bit too much to my liking, I guess it's probably just because it's a real delicate piece of meat so really easy to overcook, don't think I'll order that again when I see it on the menu.

Overall, the experience was still good. Lupo is still going to be on our list of restaurant to visit if we come to Vancouver again!

Road trip - Day 4 Portland

Weather on Monday morning in down town Portland was a bit chilly and overcast. We had breakfast at our hotel (Hilton executive tower, comes with free
breakfast, smart reservation from the fiancee), and decided to visit Voo Doo donuts since apparently it's a "must visit" tourist spot.

It was around 10-12 blocks from our hotel, we got there around 11am and man the line was LONG. Who eats donuts in the morning anyways, I thought it's more like a snack/dessert thing but apparently people have donuts for breakfast nowadays!

I went inside the store and took a peek at the donuts in the display window, they certainly look good. There are a lot of interesting flavors that I have never seen before, but we don't really feel like waiting so I guess we'll try VooDoo donuts when we're in town next time!

On our way back to the hotel, we walked past a French bistro called "Little Bird". The restaurant hasn't opened yet, we peeked through the window, nice cozy place with whimsical decor, we decided to give it a try.

The wine selection was ok, a bit limited for us but the bartender definitely tried his best to help us pick out the wine we might enjoyed. We ended up ordering a glass of burgundy and a glass of bordeaux. I wouldn't say I was blown away by the wine but they paired nicely with the food. We ordered the bone marrow and steak tartare, we were definitely blown away by the food! The way they cut the bone marrow allowed the extra fat to be dripped on the plate. The olive and citrus tapenade balanced out the greasiness of the bone marrow. It was sooo good that I forgot to take a picture until we're half way done with the food. It's definitely something we'd order again! The steak tartare was also very good. It came with a fresh farm egg on top, again, I was so eager to taste it and started mixing it before I took a picture. It was another huge hit! The richness from the egg yolk glued all the different flavors together, mustard, caper, the green onion, combined with the beef, super tasty and lush flavor!

Dessert was just like a taste in heaven! We ordered "Wildflower Honey Pot de Creme" with blue berries, graham crackers that shaped like little birds, and "Hazelnut White Chocolate Financier" with raspberries, marscarpone, and a glass of dessert wine to go with it. What can I say? You should always save room for dessert, especially when you're at a French restaurant. We left "Little Bird" well fed and happy as a bird!

In the afternoon, we decided to visit Owen Roe for some wine tasting. My fiancee has been a wine club member from Owen Roe for many many years. The have a wine portfolio of wine and we have been fans for pretty much all their wines. The winery recently opened up a tasting room at St. Paul in Oregon (even though it's a Washington winery, their grapes are mostly from the Yakima valley in Washington), my fiancee and I are both excited about finally being able to visit the tasting room!

When we got there, it was not really what we have expected. First of all, we were lost driving back and forth on Champoeg road trying to find the tasting room. When we eventually found it, it looks more like a warehouse than a tasting room. To be real honest, we were both a bit disappointed with what we saw, it was just too different from what we have pictured in our heads.

The tasting experience turned out to be THE BEST we had ever have. Patty sat with us for almost 1.5 hours, opened total 11 bottles of wine, and was telling us stories about the wine maker, the winery, and the stories behind every bottle of wine we tasted. We bought almost 2 cases of wine (tax free!!) and left very happy.

Last thing about day 4 was the hotel we stayed at - Avalon hotel and spa. The staff at the hotel are so friendly and the spa was great! The restaurant right next to the hotel has awesome HH menu. :)

Road trip - Day 3 Portland

We woke up in our motel around 7:30 in the morning, I looked outside the windows, the weather is a bit overcast, tide is coming in and out, I’m feeling a bit sad leaving Bandon and the Cioppino.

I popped my work out DVD on my laptop, good that I brought it with me on this trip, can’t imagine 11 days heavy eating and drinking without a little bit of exercise…:). My fiancée was playing this game with very annoying music on his iPad. We’re getting ready to leave Bandon.

10:30am, we finally had everything packed up and ready to go. We decided to drop by some wineries in Dayton and the Dundee hills before getting into Portland. The 1st winery on the list is Stoller Vineyards, 240 miles to go.

The drive again was very pleasant. The trees alongside the road changed from redwood to evergreen. When we were on 38 heading east, the woods, trees, lush greens, meadows, and lakes keep us in awe of the stunning scenery of the Northwest. Hopefully it will stay that way for many years to come before humans figure out how to destroy it.

After around 4 hours of driving, we arrived at our 1^st winery for tasting – Stoller. The wine they were pouring was just ok. They were pouring 2 Chardonnays, 1 Rose, and 1 Pinot Noir. We weren't convinced by the wine, paid our tasting fee, and we head out to Domaine Serene.

We had high hopes for Domaine Serene. Couple of our friends whom are wine connoisseurs had highly recommended Domain Serene, so even they only has 3 stars on Yelp when I did my research, we still decided to give it a try. :)

They were pouring 4 wines, 3 Pinot and 1 Syrah. The wine was soooo delicious, the staff very knowledgeable, and was overall a great experience. We bought a bottle of 2007 "Evanstad Reserve" for dinner. One thing about the winery though, they charged $15 for tasting and it's not refundable unless you buy more than 6 bottles of wine. My fiancee felt the wine is good enough for us to pay $15 for the tasting, but it was a bit pricey for me!

The last winery we visited is White Rose. The winery turned the attic into the tasting room, the rest of the house is underground and used to store the wine. Don't let the attic scare you away, it's actually pretty nice and has this rustic vibe. The wine was pretty good, I'd recommend to visit the winery if you're in the area.

After 3 wineries and all the yummy vino, we were satisfied and ready to head to Portland. While we were on 99 west, there was some pretty heavy traffic, that's how we saw "The Dapper Frog" when we drove past and fiancee was curious about what the store carries so we made a U-turn and paid the store a quick visit. The store is actually very interesting, it specialized in unique, high-quality, artistic home decor. It carries products from $15 all the way up to $8,000. The sales person offered us wine and snacks when we walked into the store, that probably contributed to all the $$ we spent in the store. In the end, we bought some pretty unique home accessories, we're excited about our purchase!!

Dinner was at El Gaucho tonight. We had been to the El Gaucho in Seattle but not the one in Portland. We ordered seafood tower for our entree (I know, it's strange that we didn't order steak at a steak house), the oysters were fresh (a bit too big to my likings but taste good regardless), huge succulent prawns, the King crab leg was sooo sweet, I feel like I can just have the King crab for the whole night, wishful thinking I guess....haha!!

Day 3 of our road trip was another huge success. Except for the annoying game my fiancee was playing, everything else was awesome!! Can't wait for day 4 to begin!!

Road Trip - Day 2 Bandon

We're driving from Mendocino to Bandon today. The map told us it's 330 miles so we figured if we leave Mendocino around 9ish, we should be able to get there by 2ish.

Overall I was pretty happy with our stay at MacCallum house. It cost us total $580 which includes one night of hotel, 2 chef tasting menus (4 courses dinner including wine pairing), and breakfast the next day. Breakfast was yummy, you ordered off from their menu. I got breakfast burrito and fiancee got the pancake. Just the right balance of savory and sweet.

We walked around town after breakfast. It was pretty chilly and foggy in the morning, most of the stores weren't opened yet but there are couple of interesting local stores we walked pass. We checked out and left the hotel around 9:30 in the morning on our way to Bandon. I have done research for Bandon and there's this place called "Port O'Call" on the boardwalk that you can rent gears to go catch crabs and clams by the ocean. So I was very very excited!!

The drive to Bandon took a lot longer than we had originally expected. The 1st 40 miles of highway 1 is mostly windy mountain roads. The drive sure was pretty, we passed by probably 3-4 bigger towns, but most of the drive was woods, trees, and ocean. The view was just breathtaking!

We got to Bandon around 4pm, checked in to the hotel. We're staying at Windermere by the Ocean, it was a great motel if you have kids. There's a small kitchen in the room, ocean's just 1-2 minutes walk away. We dropped of our luggage, and head out to the boardwalk, I'm sooooo ready to catch some clams.

After we got there, the store told us they sell gears for all type of fishing activities, but you can only catch crab right now at Bandon. I was a bit disappointed, but we walked around and had some snacks at Tony's crab shack. We ordered oysters, fish tacos, and a glass of wine. The food is good, very fresh, but the wine came in a plastic cup.

After we got back from the boardwalk, we took a walk by the beach, sat on the sand dunes, it was so relaxing and calm. All we heard was the ocean (ok, I have to admit we can hear kids screaming as well...:), then we got ready for dinner.

My fiancee went to Bandon Bill's 6 years ago and he said he doesn't remember what he had but he thinks the food was food. I was a bit skeptical but since the restaurant is right across the street from our motel so we decided to give it a try.

We ordered steamed clams, clam chowder, and cioppino. They are all so delicious! The clam chowder was so flavorful, there's creme in there but it's not the typically clam chowder you get with heavy roux and not a lot of real clam flavor.

The cioppino, oh the cioppino!! I wasn't sure we should order cioppino since we're from California and supposedly have the best cioppino in the world. But we ended up getting a second order. It was out of this world! The broth is so tasty with just the right amount of spice to kick it up a notch. The fish (I think it's rock fish and salmon) was so tender, steam was cooked perfectly, not rubbery at all, and the shrimp is also perfectly cook, there's also shredded crab meat in there. Wed dip the bread (there's roasted garlic cloves in the bread, yummy) in the cioppino and it was heaven!

Steamed clams were also very good, with tons of garlic, and the right amount of richness from the butter but not overly heavy.

Service was great and we were lucky there's free live music playing that night!

The second day of our roadtrip was a lot of driving, but also great ocean view and very satisfying food!! Bandon is a great town, if we take another roadtrip in the future, we'll definitely stop by and revisit Bandon Bill's! :)

Road trip - Day 1

Today's the 1st day of our 11 day road trip! We're both really excited for 2 reasons. One is we really need a vacation, Aaron has been working long hours and stressed at work, hopefully this trip will really help us get more relaxed (need to make sure I don't throw shoes at him during the trip...ha!). Second, this will be the ultimate test of our relationship...;) 2 people get stuck in the car for 11 days, total 2,200 miles, sounds scary in a good way!

It's a cool morning in Boulder Creek. Making breakfast and try to finish all the food we have in the fridge. Our final destination will be Mendocino today, staying at the MacCallum Inn. Aaron got a food and wine package from the hotel so we'll see how that goes. Hopefully we leave the house in time to stop by Sonoma for some wine tasting...it's a tough life...;)

Easy Paella

Yield around 6-8 servings

3 cups chicken stock
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium yellow onion
4 garlic cloves, chopped
1 red or green pepper, seeded, ribbed and cubed
2 pinches of Spanish saffron
1 1/2 cups short grain white rice
1 can diced tomatoes
1 pound raw, peeled large shrimp (around 25 counts)
1 pound chicken thigh meat (bone removed)
1 pound of little neck clam
Salt and pepper
1/3 cup chopped Italian parsley leaves
Lemon wedges, for decoration

In a medium saucepan, heat the chicken stock until boiling and add the saffron in the chicken stock.

In a separate large saucepan or paella pan over medium-high heat, heat the oil and add the chicken thigh, onion, the garlic, and the peppers. Cook for 6 minutes or until vegetables are soft and chicken is browned.

Stir in the rice and tomatoe until well mixed and cook for 5 minutes. Add the boiling chicken stock. Cover the pan and cook for 25 minutes over low heat, until rice is tender. Add the shrimp and the clams and let cook covered for 5 to 7 minutes more. Decorate with the chopped parsley and lemon wedges.