LA restaurants to try

BRUNCH

Casablance on Lincoln is a semi-quirky hole in the wall in my opinion. I think it's a Mexican restaurant, or at least that's what it looks like to me, and have a Sunday brunch that's pretty cheap in my opinion with fresh homeade tortillas an bottomless sangrias and other drinks. And you get flan at the end

Malibu Seafood, about a mile north of Pepperdine

KTCHN105 This is a pop-up that does only Sat-Sun brunches

HOLE IN THE WALLS

Musha
Sokongdong
Hungry Cat
Langer's

samosa house 11510 W Washington Blvd. Los Angeles, CA, 90066 10700 Washington Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90232-3314
Woodlands Pure Chatsworth
Rahel Veggie Cuisine Little Ethiopia
Leda's Bake Shop
Artisan Cheese Gallery

Guelaguetza, Musha, Orris, La Buca
Won Won Kitchen
Sin Ba La
Dai Ho
Wood Spoon
Scoops
Pann's
Seafood Village
Yuca's (for the burgers)
Golden Deli

* * * Manpuku
* * * Mon Land Hot Pot
* * * Shin-Sen-Gumi Yakitori
* * * Sushi Zo
* * * Tama-en
* * * The Boiling Crab

Krua Thai-North Hollywood

Jitlada Thai
Monte Alban
Rahel
Nata's
Los Balcones de Peru
Sanam Luang
Urasawa (okay it's SOOOO not hole-in-the-wall)
Bay Cities

Phoenix Inn Chinatown for porridge
Texi's (Vermont loc) for pupusas
Matador taco truck at Fountain & Western
Attari for asht & tongue sandwich
Mario's Italian Deli in G-dale (RIP Bebe Jesus Salami)
Elvira's in Eagle Rock
Taylor's Prime Steak (on payday)
El Huarache
Super Tortas (Alvarado location)
Korean Rice cake dessert thingies trailer at California Market on Western(1$! each)
Monte Cristo at The Bounty
TITO'S TACOS!!
Wandering Tamale Guy outside of Shortstop in Echo Park around 1:30 AM
Chung King on San Gabriel
Tarzana Chevron Breakfast Taco Bar on Ventura Blvd.

last but definitely not least, The Talpa on Pico w of Barrington

im KINDLED! finally...

I've been contemplating purchasing the kindle for some time now... (since xmas at least) but finally did it yesterday!  YAY! It took some time to research and debate but thankfully the boy's pretty handy at this sort of stuff too, these were my final thoughts supporting the decision: I did not want to see advertisement at the bottom of the screen so the special pricing was out, I wanted to be able to download books without a computer on the other hand did not feel I needed to spend an extra 50 bucks to get books wherever and whenever, soooOOOOoooo...

I went with the kindle wifi :)

super iDia, kindle

I so esiding(!) to get back into leisure reading, it's definitely an essential that's been looooOOoong ignored in my life. Now comes the difficult part, what to read first? I should tell you too, my other intent in purchasing the kindle is to read to increase my intel. yup, u heard it (here first :)

Here are a couple of books I've logged away to read one day to achieve both entertainment and upping my IQ:

• don quixote
• jane eyre
• les miserables
• women in love
• utopia
• the bible
• a brave new world
• guilliver's travels 

I won't exhaust the list today (yes, this post is getting rather bland) however before I get off I have to say thank you to all the amazing volunteers who've spent the time to convert these and other classic novels over to digital format so all can enjoy. (and best of all, enjoy them for freeeeEEeee)

iDia

eat cleveland!

i'll be Cleveland for my first OIT project (currently slated for 3 months). the foodie i am, searched out Cleveland's most treasured restaurants. my biggest source was CHOWHOUND, and other food blogs. i'll add to it as i go. the only qualifier for this list is, NO CHAINS, maybe limited chains. maybe.

the other thing I'll have to do one of these nights is to organize this list by area, so I can easily pick out a restaurant in the area. 

1. Ha Anh Korean (korean) small, cramped, ghetto, food was aite.

2. superior pho (vietnamese)

3. saigon (vietnamese) - warehouse district

4. sasa (japanese)

5. koko bakery (asian) sweeeeet bakery, sweet buns, cakes, smoothies (not real fruit though), i'll have to come back for a cake.

6. Phnom Penh (cambodian)

7. umami asian grill (asian fusion)

8. seoul hot pot (korean), across the street from koko's in asianville

9. Velvet Tango Room in Ohio City

10. Pacific East on Coventry BOMB sushi!!!! This is one of my fave sushi places ever, it's cheap and great quality. They also serve malaysian food, haven't tried it yet. There's another Pacific East on Eton.

11. Flying Cranes

12. Taqueria La Loma in Akron

13. El Senors at La Mexicana grocery in Painesville

14. i Pueblo on Lorain ave @ 128th

15. crop 

16. pier w

17. Bier Markt (love beer!)

18. Sokolowskis

19. fire, food, drink

20. El Tango in Lakewood

21. El Jalapenos

22. Bar Cento and The Flying Fig

23. chianto (Italian)

24. siam cafe

25. moxie, went here for lunch one day, it's super close to the hilton. had the beef asian salad, it was aite, think: viet bun. nothing special, i've had much better asian salads. good atmosphere though.

26. melt not that great. went with about 7 others, didn't seem like anyone else was that fond of their dishes. the fries were awesome though.

27. Lucky's cafe

28. The Greenhouse Tavern

29. Paladar- close to hotel in the Eton mall

30. Momocho on Fulton- in ohio city

(edit 1-17-11)

On Sunday I visited a friend in Akron and checked out El Rincon a great Mexican restaurant. They had super large servings! Stayed stuffed the whole day from this lunch. They also had awesome magarita's, the 4 of us shared a half pitcher of magartas for 10 bucks!

fairy flower girl outfits

my sisters getting married august 2011! and im in charge of flower girl outfits. this is the easiest place for me to post things publicly for her to see. so my loyal readers will have to excuse the interruption to their regularly scheduled readings. hehe

sheng... here's what i can find. let me know if any of them speak to you. if not, say no, and i'll keep searching.

end of the season buyer

those of you that know me know im an end of the season buyer. almost almost always i'll wait till the end of the season to buy something cause im cheap. luckily i live in the midwest so it really doesnt matter when i buy... they'll be in style for the next 5-ish years. one of the few perks of living in wisconsin, well, indiana now.  i'll be back later to post what ive been wanting for this past winter.

and im back from my years hiatus

my first entry was pretty weak sauce. but here's to a new year and a newer me. i took a long break from the blogging world just cause id rather flip through other's then try to write my own... but i realized in reviewing 2009, or really the past 5 years, that i have a horrible memory.  y e a h  i know blogs get annoying, esp when you read them a couple months/years down the line "do i really sound like that? im annoying." but i need it for some soul (and SOLE) searching.

i dont do the whole new years resolution, come to think of it, i dont set many goals outside of work, but there's something abut 2010 that feels fresh. so here we go:


if i don't do anything this year, at least do these:

1. travel (backpack) somewhere outside of the u.s.
2. travel somewhere inside the u.s., for kicks, let's say, destination determined via dart board
3. do a project with mom, make a hmong skirt or something
4. payoff my car payoff my credit cards. which shouldnt be hard at all
5. be a big sister (you should too- www.bbbs.org)
6. learn 6 zaj tshoobs
7. go golfing at least 10 times (didnt touch my clubs last year)
8. run a half marathon

is eight too many? reading over the list, doesn't seem complicated or unrealistic... we'll see.

plea for guidance

dude im a fail-ure! due to my inept ability to make any progress on my hmoob im turning more and more....hmoob-mekas. i cant let another moment pass, sib hawm tsis tos yus na.

when i graduated from college (then using schoolwork as an excuse for my lack of time) i set out to learn some hmoob. some serious hard hmoob. and i failed.  i haven't any concrete goals. what am i trying to learn? what i need, is a mentor. a study buddy too.  i need to set some S.M.A.R.T goals, specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely goals.

all i know is, i wanna be a niam xaiv/mej koob one day.  that is my goal. for what reasons. i could go on and on about why. but what i need to settle right now is HOW!

if anyone else in the world is trying to learn hmoob, kwv txhiaj, txiv xaiv, zaj tshoob, hmoob txuj ci.... PLEASE. HELP GUIDE ME. or at least lemme know how ur doing and how u went about to do so. i'd much appreciate any inputs.

what u should know. my hmoob is very limited to basic conversation. im not competent, however i can read and write. i guess that's the first step. i know some txheej txheem however that in itself will be an adventure. im hoping learning cov zaj and txheej txheem will come hand in hand =)