Rourke McNamara

Jen and I were poking around looking at maps of the Desolation Wilderness in the REI in Berkeley on Sunday and identified this as a potential two day shuttle backpack. While procrastinating, I used Topo! to plot the route and see how long it would be and just how bad the elevation profile looked.

The route looks really nice. Not only does it pass lake after lake on the way south, but it also climbs almost to the top of Phipps Peak and then desceds through Philips Pass. This definately looks to be worth doing.

Sunday morning I made waffles for breakfast. Not that exciting, I know, but I made them from scratch, and I made piles of them.

The Good Eats! episode on waffles pointed out that if you have extra waffles you can freeze them and then just pop them in the toaster some other day and you have a nice, quick breakfast. I tried this not long ago and found that frozen homemade waffles are way better than the frozen Eggos you pick up at the grocery store. Since we’re normally in a rush to get out of the apartment in the morning, I decided to make a whole pile of waffles and freeze them.

2004 VINCENT GIRARDIN TASTING - Vino Vino Wine in Palo Alto (4/21/2006)

This was a really challenging tasting for me. I’ve gotten comfortable with Napa Cabs, CA Zins, German Riesling, and Red Bordeaux, and even CA Pinot. This was really new, and I even had trouble deciding which wines I liked most, and whether or not I *liked* a given wine. That should be easy, shouldn’t it?

APRIL 2006 BORDEAUX TASTING AT K&L - K&L Wines in Redwood City (4/22/2006)

It was really hard to evaluate these wines — most of them aren’t too appealing to me now, so I’m trying to guess what’ll happen to them in the future. My limited experience with older Bordeaux (and wine in general) hardly seems up to the task. The best I think I can do is see which styles appeal to me most and then rely on the experts to determine which are the best made / balanced wines.

Jen and I stopped at the “The Cheese Steak Shop” in San Francisco:

Cheese Steak Shop Inc

MAP HERE

The neighborhood where this place is located isn’t the best, but going there was well worth it. As soon as you step inside it’s clear that these guys are trying to create a small shrine to Philly in San Francisco. All the pictures are of Philadelphia, one wall is covered with PA license plates, and everything on the menu is classic Philly.

I purchased a frozen pack of four fairly thin buffalo patties from Whole Foods and tried making buffalo burgers.

The first thing I did was fry some onions in olive oil. Near the end I added salt and pepper and transferred the onions to the oven, setting it to warm.

Next I added minced garlic to the pan, fried that for a while, and then threw in two buffalo patties. To properly cook the meat it took four minutes on each side. At three minutes for the second side I put a slice of cheddar and a slice of provolone on each of the patties and put a top on the pan.