Tag Archives: Fish and Chips

Sushi Glutton – Takao Three

Restaurant: Takao [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Location: 11656 San Vicente Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90049. (310) 207-8636

Date: May 15, 2011

Cuisine: Japanese / Sushi

Rating: 9/10 creative “new style” sushi

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I’ve already covered Takao in some detail HERE and then separately here, but we went back (we go often) and I built another “custom omakase” trying some different things. The full menu and some information on the history of the place can be found through the first link.


House cold sake. Masumi “Okuden-Kanzukuri” Nagano prefecture.


Heirloom totmato salad with sesame dressing.


Tai (red snapper), with garlic, salt, red peppercorn, onions, olive oil. A very bright flavor, and the peppercorns, not spicy at all, add a nice textural component.


Seared bonito sashimi with scallions and ginger in ponzu.


Miso soup. I think if you ask they have a couple different types. This is the basic scallion and tofu.


Uni (sea urchin) tempura with shiso leaf and seaweed. Sea salt.


There is also the classic tempura dipping sauce.


Here is a closeup of one of the Uni fries. This stuff is yummy! With the crunch of the fry, the minty flavor of the shiso and the briney soft taste/texture of the sea urchin pairing wonderfully.


“Scottish Salmon ‘to-ban’ Taki.” Salmon and vegetables cooked on Japanese earthenware ‘to-ban’ with special Miso sauce.


Rock Shrimp Tempura Dynamite. The underlying component is in itself tasty. Sweet rock shrimp perfectly fried. Then you ad some dynamite with it’s zesty zing and it gets even better. For those not in the know Dynamite is a warm sauce consisting of mayo, sriarcha hot sauce, and masago semlt roe.


The big sushi plate. This was all mine! And so were most of the preceding dishes.


Kani (Alaskan king crab) sushi.


Japanese scallop sushi (raw).


On the bottom, Ika (squid), perfect chewy pasty texture. Underneath was shiso leaf.


Scottish Salmon.


Kanpachi (young yellowtail).


Uni (sea urchin — from Santa Barbara).


kura (salmon eggs).


O-toro (ultra fatty tuna belly). Like butter!


Unagi (fresh water eel) BBQ, with sweet BBQ sauce.


Tamago (sweet egg omelet) sushi.

And this wraps up the custom omakase.

ANY CHARACTER HERE

Below is the Salmon Terriyaki “set dinner,” it comes with everything shown.


Salad.


Mixed tempura.


Miso soup.


Salmon Terriyaki.


Rice.


Choice of dessert, in this case vanilla mochi balls (ice cream coated in sweetened pounded rice).


The chefs at work, Takao himself on the right.

For more LA area sushi, see here.

January in Paradise Cove

Restaurant: Paradise Cove

Location: 28128 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, California 90265. 310-457-2503

Date: Jan 16, 2011

Cuisine: American

Summary: Great place to spend the day. Food is fine but hardly inspired.

 

Sunday morning rolled around, January 16, and the temperature was in the 80s. The hardships of Southern California — so what to do?  Go to the beach!

We headed up the Malibu coast to Paradise Cove. This joint isn’t my usual fare food wise, but they are superbly located in a quant beachy cove in Malibu, and they have tables on the beach and public chaises on the sand. A word of warning: if you go on a nice day, be prepared to wait. Sometimes as much as two hours for an outside table!

“Pineapple, Tequila, Mojito.” Gimmicky, yes. Tasty yes. I did wish the “glass” was bigger, really not that much volume had been hollowed out.

“New England Clam Chowder.” I was a sucker for Clam Chowder long before I went to Boston for grad school, and I still am. This was a respectable contender in the arena. Not amazing, but lots of cream and butter.

“Fish and Chips,” for the boy (2 years old). He was highly preferential to the chips.

“Veggie Burger and fries.”

“Iced Seafood Sampler.” This was me. The concept is good, the execution wasn’t perfect. Certainly edible, and the fish was fresh. It was soaked fairly liberally in what seemed to be Italian dressing — not sure what I thought of that — and it isn’t the most exciting specimens. Small scallops, frozen king crab, octopus. Still, I enjoyed it.

Cocktail sauce and louis dressing.

“Strawberry ice-cream,” came with the kid’s fish and chips. My son was much appreciative.

This is what you really come for. Umbrellaed and available chaise chairs.

On a gorgeous beach!

Quick Eats: Brentwood

Restaurant: Brentwood

Location: 148 S Barrington Ave Los Angeles CA 90049. 310-476-3511

Date: Jan 9, 2011

Cuisine: American

 

Brentwood is a local bar/restaurant perfect for the Sunday night with-the-kid dinner. It’s pretty straight up American, very tasty, but a bit overpriced. The menu can be found here.

Their bread is good. I (and my two year-old) particularly liked the flat cracker-like bread.

“Tomato & Farmer’s Market Vegetable Salad.”

“Swan Depot Seafood Salad, jumbo shrimp, baby Maine shrimp, Dungeness crab,iceberg lettuce, 1000 island dressing, fresh dill.” This is essentially a crab and shrimp Louis salad. The seafood is very fresh, the dressing good, so if you are partial to Louis (and I am), then that’s all a good thing.

“Fish & Chips, beer battered Alaskan halibut, fries, tartar sauce.” While overpriced, this is a very good fish and chips. The fish is very most and well cooked, the batter perfect, the fries crisp, and the tartar sauce very tangy.

“Short Rib Tacos, vegetable rice, black beans.” Interesting hybrid dish. Fresh corn tortillas, and soft rich short rib.

Paired with beans, creme fraiche, and pico de gallo. I had them cook the pico down because of my raw tomato hate. It tasted like oniony tomato soup.

Combined in the taco it was pretty delectable, mostly because of the rich tasty short rib. Perhaps a little avocado or cilantro might have made this perfect.

The small little bar. Not pictured here is that I had a nice “2006 Sancerre, Rolland Tissier et Fils.” A very crisp white, perfect with the salad. Not absolutely ideal for the short ribs, but it worked well enough.

This is a good little place, and the service is very accommodating. Despite the high price tag the kitchen has a “knack,” so I approve.

Brunch at Tavern – again

Restaurant: Tavern [1, 2, 3, 4]

Location: 11648 San Vicente Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90049. (310) 806-6464

Date: Dec 19, 2010

Cuisine: Market driven Californian

Rating: Not just your typical short order brunch — but better.

 

The weather is terrible (for LA), 58 and rainy, so brunch. Tavern has a nice glassed in patio.

And cappuccino.

The menu.

My son liked the fish and chips.

Pumpkin waffles.

The Tavern take on the east coast fish breakfast, like we had at the ThanksGavin. They substituted a chevre (fresh goat cheese) for the cream cheese. This worked extremely well, I think I’m going to try it at home.

Turkey burger.

The Tavern eggs benedict: prosciutto, frisse, brioche, Meyer lemon Hollandaise. A very good variant on the classic, only subtlety tweaked.

Carmel salt macaroon.

Check out some other Tavern meals of mine HERE, HERE, or HERE.