Wednesday, June 02, 2010

What to do during long weekend? Eat...eat...and eat...

For Memorial Day weekend, we decided to go to Los Angeles for 3.5 days. We wanted to avoid traffic, so we left on Thursday night after work. We were planning to leave at 7pm, but there were a lot of complication when we tried to pick up the rental car, so we finally left ~9.30pm. We reached the hotel ~2.30pm and off we go to bed....straight until 12pm!

We woke up and got ready for our first eating adventure. The traffic is reeaaallllllyyyyy bad. We only have to travel 17 miles, but it took us almost 2 hours to reach the restaurant. We were there just 30 minutes before it closed. The foods are delicious! Some of it are a bit too sweet, but overall everything is really good. Presenting, brunch foods from The Griddles....

The Griddles


 
We had the alcoholic coffee drink, cream cheese and stuffed nutella french toasts as well as the classic egg benedicts.

After the so-called brunch, we went to Venice Beach for a bit and ended up in Culver City Westfield Mall. We didn't know what else to do as we didn't plan anything else but foods ;) Later that night, we were off to another food adventure. This time, we went to a yakitori place called Shin Sen Gumi. The foods are pretty much the same as Kokko, which is no complain good, but I thought I was going to try something new. Here are some previews. We definitely ordered more than these, but here are the ons that have good pictures.

 
Shin Sen Gumi
 
We went home with full stomach and off to bed not long after that. We actually had some desserts in the hotel, but we'll post those later in the post. 

The next morning, we wake up a bit earlier, sometime around 10am or so. We had a lot of plan for Saturday. We started with Lunch in Little Tokyo @ Daikokuya Ramen where we met Donny. The ramen is not as I expected. The line is really long, but I think Ramen Dojo in San Mateo hands down beat this one. We ordered 2 different kind of ramens as well as the rice bowl and fried rice.
 
 
Daikokuya Ramen

We walked around Little Tokyo for a while and ended up in a dessert place. We ordered some mochi-lato, which just taste okay. We then went to Universal Studio City Walk, but we just can't stand the heat, so off we go to Urth Cafe. The all round favorite is the Organic Green Tea Boba, followed by the popular Spanish Latte. I'll post pic of it later along with the desserts that I promised earlier. After cooling down for a while and the sun is not as bad as it was, we headed to Rodeo Dr. We went to Bottega Veneta to get my friend a bag. By that time, it's already past 6. We were planning to go to Getty Center an d Griffith Observatory after 5pm, because parking would be free by then. Luckily, traffic was not that bad. Getty Center is H.U.G.E.!! We only had ~2 hours to go around and it definitely not enough. We raced against time to go to Griffith Observatory. We stayed until it closed at 10pm and of course we went to get another foodies :D

We stopped by  Crumbs Cupcake to get some cupcakes for to go. And then we went to dinner at Toe Bang where we met with Paulus.  We were sooo hungry by that time. Fortunately, the foods were pretty good. But I didn't like the place that much because it's kinda' outdoor and people are allowed to smoke. Maybe for people who smoke, it would be okay. 
 
Toe Band

We were all exhausted by the end of the day. We went back and slept pretty early that night as we have to wake up earlier on Sunday to head home.

Sunday was the earliest we ever woke up for the entire trip. We woke up ~9am because we need to be ready by 12pm. We packed our bags and left the hotel ~12.30pm. The last meal of the trip was the best of all. We went to Newport Tan Cang Restaurant which is popular for its lobster. Usually the line would be 1-2 hours long, but we got really lucky and we barely waited 10 minutes there. Donny joined us for lunch again. We ordered a lot! They recommended us to order the medium size lobster, but, being greedy, I ordered the large size instead :p 

 
Tan Cang


All of the foods are superb overall. The lobster was delish!! I would definitely go back. This restaurant wrapped up our entire trip. We stopped by Porto's to get some cheese rolls for coworkers and friends. We went to Angel's homestay so she could give back her keys and finally back to SF. 

Here are some dessert pics that I promised. Urth Cafe organic green tea and spanish latte, sweet lady jane chocolate cake and last but not least, different flavors of crumbs cupcakes. Sweet end of a lovely trip!

Desserts

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