Cook's Tortas, yum!

We sold what we could at Saturday's yard sale and are madly packing up what is left. After spending the morning stuffing boxes we thought we'd knock one item off our list of places in Los Angeles that we have never managed to visit. So, for lunch we took time off to try out Cook's Tortas in Montery Park.

I am so glad we did. Cook's Tortas is a delight. I had the #61, or Zacatecas, and it is the first torta that has measured up to my very first torta years ago at a long gone stand, Tortas Pancho. My first torta there was just about the bestest, juciest, roasted green pepper zingiest, fresh avocado and tomato chompiest, toasted on the greasy grill crunchiest sandwich ever. My memory of that torta is probably blown out by it being the first revelation of what chorizo could do but I have to say that the torta I sampled at Cook's today gave that tasty memory a run for the money. At Cook's the bread was tasty-chewy with a nice toasted crunch, the chorizo seco was tangy and sloppy with red juice, and the avocado and pico de gallo added up to a big messy delight that had to be scooped with a fork from the wrapper. What tortas are on offer each day changes so if you go you may not see the Zacatecas on the board, but there were many other combinations (including a few vegetarian options) that gave me a Pavlovian rush just reading the menu. mrs' a-go-go had the Mohito. We sampled each other's and her's was good but it didn't have the out-of-control charm of the Zacatecas. The tortas come with a small side and we chose the caprese and the potato salad, both were nice counters to the tortas. To wash it down we had two flavors of aguas frescas, delightful lightly sugared fruity drinks mixed up daily.

I can't recommend Cook's Tortas enough and it is now high on our list of things we'll miss in LA. We'll have to go for another taste on our first return visit after the Big Trip. Until then, if you're in LA, I hope you'll go try out these super-bomb sandwiches. [Ced if you're reading this, get crackin'. You have alot of good food to get out and try.]

trying to cram it all in

it was my birthday yesterday and when asked what i wanted to do, i simply couldn't decide. we're leaving in two months. two months! and we're not just leaving on our trip, we're leaving los angeles. like mr. a-go-go said, l.a. has got some good eats and fun places to visit.

is it sad to admit that celebrations are all about food? and when you have such great choices around you, how do you choose? i feel like i need to cram them all in before we leave. you know, not just go once but go two or three times. so when i was asked i had to think. and think. and think.

would we hit the valley and get french fries at Dagla's?

or should we roam around India Sweets & Spices and get cheap veggie curries?

and i know we just had banh mi but stacey had never had banh mi and i really do love that chocolate dipped strawberry at Fosselman's.

oh wait, what about Blue Hen? they have such delicious food. organic, locally grown and all that jazz plus their turmeric fries are pretty tasty.

which made me think of pho but mr. a-go-go wouldn't be accompanying me and i feel bad getting pho without him.

switching back to sandwiches i thought maybe we should go to Porto's for cheese rolls and cubanos. Porto's also makes excellent coffee but it is so close i think i'll pick something up there next week. potato balls anyone?

i just couldn't decide so i opted to play outside of the city. sort of. instead of Dagla's or Blue hen or Ba Le, i decided we should go thrift shopping in Covina. at the magic thrift. where i scored a technicolor afghan, a handful of doilies and a bag of porcelain bunny heads (thank you stacey!).

and for lunch, since we were driving through Pasadena and i had a craving for pie, we parked ourselves at Pie 'N Burger and enjoyed a classic that rivals In N' Out any day. oh soooo good.

for dinner it was thai food ordered from a local place not a favorite but worked out fine (note to local place, you need to update your prices on your website). when you're happy with thai iced tea, sate and kang ka ree it's pretty easy to find adequate thai.

seriously l.a., i am going to miss your culinary options. big time. oh and i just remembered, why didn't i think of macarons? i've always wanted to try Paulette. phew! it's a good thing they do mail order.

ba le banh mi

Yesterday we made a food trip that we have made many times in the last year, and after we do the Big Trip we will likely make this food trip again any time we get the chance. After running some errands we stopped at Ba Le, a Vietnamese sandwich shop in Alhambra. Our order: two of our favorite mouth watering barbecue pork bahn mi sandwiches on slightly-crunchy-outside soft-and-chewy inside french rolls. Yes, it's another Vietnamese delight that we will miss in LA. There are quite a few places around LA selling their version of these tasty sandwiches born of French colonialism in Vietnam. The sandwich isn't a brand new thing but it was just this year that we first tried out our favorite place. Since then we've stopped in when ever the craving strikes, and sometimes that's nearly every weekend. Ba Le's bread rolls are a delight and we like their barbecue and sweet pickled vegetable filling. We always order them with the hot peppers but pick most of them out before the first bite. I'm too much of a softy for all that heat, it just kills the other flavors, but I like to rub the bread with one of the peppers to give it all a zing.

After the yum sandwiches we had to visit Fosselman's Ice Cream, also in Alhambra. If you live in Los Angeles or are just visiting and you're an ice cream nut, Fosselman's has got to be on your list. We will dearly miss their toasted almond, blueberry, chocolate dipped strawberry, lychee, green tea, horchata, flavors and so many others. They make all their ice cream on the premises, in fact if you stop by in the morning to pick up an ice cream pie for a party they will have the back of the shop open and you can see into where the big freezer/mixers are working. Fosselman's goes way back and started as a delivery dairy in the Pasadena area in 1924. On yesterday's visit while we sat and dug into the three scoops that mrs. a-go-go and I were sharing, I took note of what a true Los Angeles kind of place Fosselman's is. Ice cream has near absolute universal appeal and Los Angeles surrounds Alhambra with a polyglot population like few others. It was a busy day and in the thirty minutes we spent soaking up our ice cream, the shop was visited by two generations of a family from the Indian sub-continent, three generations of a family from Vietnam, Philipinos, Latinos, African-Americans, not to mention us northern Europeans. They had pistachio on a cone, coffee-and-chocolate-cookies in a sundae, strawberry piled in a waffle cone, a four-year-old worked at catching the drips of mint-chip on his sugar cone, dulce-de-leche in a cup, and every other facet of delicious you can come up with.

Oh man... I think we're going to have to go for another visit today too. Fosselman's... I'm gonna miss you.

one pho the money...

When we head off on the Big Trip we are figuring that we won't be returning to Los Angeles. We need to find a new place to plant our feet, and Los Angles is just too dern expensive. There are things I'll miss here, and near the top of the list is the variety of food. Furthermore, near the top of the list of food is pho. I have been a fan of this Vietnamese soup since my first sip. It is an unparalleled cold day meal, but I like it any time. I'll risk being corrected here and say that it's pronounced fuh. I'm sure there is a subtle sound in there that I can't hear or pronounce, but that is the best transliteration that I can make based on hearing it uttered by a Vietnamese friend.

Our favorite place, Pho Huynh, (so far, we're always sampling new ones) is in El Monte, and requires a half hour drive from us. It's worth it. The majority of patrons at the place are Vietnamese, and I figure that's a good sign. It's family style seating at long tables, cash only, and when it's busy you may feel like they are itching for you to finish up and make room for the next hungry group. None the less we come back for more.

A good bowl of pho is a delight. The hot broth could stand on its own. Add lime juice, tear up some leafy Vietnamese basil like herb, stir up your choice of meat (or no meat), and dig in. When my bowl comes I don't even take a breath until I am at least half way through the noodles and have slurped up a belly full of broth.

Los Angeles isn't the only place to find pho, and we are researching places to find it on our trip. It will be hard to replace the pho I know.

not goin' far

Los Angeles is a big place and we haven't even scratched the surface after years for exploring close to home. Both mrs. a-go-go and I have a couple of generations of family roots right here in this Mediterranean climate. In fact we attended the same elementary school only two years apart. How did this town bring us back together through Bust magazine and an Internet date? Between the two of us we have more than seven decades of poking our way through Los Angeles, and we are still novices. It's love-hate like most people's feelings toward their local megalopolis. The variety of foods here is staggering, but so is the overwhelming number of people. From the mountains to the beach, the peculiar sights never stop, but so does the ever spreading ugly sprawl. With all this so close some of our best trips require the least packing.

Mass transit in Los Angeles has improved dramatically and it facilitates our day trips through the boiling mess of city. A favorite destination as part of any excursion downtown is the Bradbury Building at 3rd and Broadway. The restored central atrium with it's golden brown brick and tile, wild wrought iron, and glass ceiling steals some of the awe normally reserved for Gothic cathedral stained glass. Often our subway trips are driven by a food destination and the Grand Central Market next door to the Bradbury drags us back regularly for pupusas and tortas. The sawdust covered floor, the lunch time crush at the food counters, and the variety of produce and meats on display make it all feel like Los Angeles has outgrown a reputation for fluff.

Sometimes we stumble on bitchen stuff on our way somewhere mundane. With a keen eye mrs. a-go-go picks out the startling thing even at a dumpy Fosters Freeze. Her photo will stick in my head and I'll find it tacked to the icy slick taste of every vanilla malt to come.

Even trucking down Ripple St. next to the LA river to load up on stinky free mulch from the city green waste program can bring opportunity for surprise. The free mulch area is constantly stocked with new offerings; chairs, televisions, and cryptic messages on the wall.

Los Angeles, this big awful place and all the bits we've seen will take many more posts to cover. Stay tuned.