Spring Weekend in San Diego, Continued

After lunch, we wander through the Gaslamp Quarter and into Little Italy, on our way back to our car parked by the airport.  San Diego's downtown area is tucked between the San Diego Bay on the west/southwest and the hills and Balboa Park on the north and east.  Downtown is composed of nine districts and we have already walked through the Marina and Seaport Village, a tourist district in the Marina, on our way to the Gaslamp Quarter.  On our way back, we'll wander through the Horton district with the Horton Plaza massive outdoor mall and Little Italy.

 Downtown San Diego

In a square outside Horton Plaza, we encounter a statue of Alonzo Horton, founder of the current downtown San Diego.  In 1876, Horton purchased 800 acres of downtown property from the city for $265 and developed the property to become the new city center, replacing the Old Town to the north, where the first Europeans in California originally settled and, in 1769, Father Junipero Serra established the very first mission in a chain of 21 missions that were to be the cornerstone of California’s colonization.

Alonzo Horton

After leaving the square with Alonzo Horton's statue, we come across a grand old hotel, the US Grant, opened in 1910 and built by Ulysses S. Grant, Jr., son of president Ulysses S. Grant.

 US Grant Hotel

Next, Little Italy, originally an Italian fishing neighborhood, but now restaurants, shops, stores, galleries, and apartments.  We see a lot of good-looking Italian dining opportunities (too bad we just ate), but the most popular one is a surprise, a Mexican restaurant with a kitchen and a window through which they sell food to walk-up business.  People are lined up and standing around eating the great food.

 Attractive dining opportunities in Little Italy

Most popular place

 Past Little Italy, we turn left, back to the Bay, and come across City Hall, a historic Spanish-style building completed in 1938.  Two years ago, the parking lots next to the City Hall were converted to a Waterfront park with open grassy areas, a playground, fountain and sculpture.

San Diego City Hall (San Diego Bay on the other side)

 Sculpture "Arbre de Serpents (Serpent Tree)"

in Waterfront Park next to City Hall

We stroll back up the Bay to the airport, passing the sailboats, Coast Guard helicopter base, and then the airport itself.

  Helicopter coming in over the sailboats and after landing

Just outside the entrance to the airport, we find a San Diego DecoBike station.  DecoBike is a bike sharing system rolled out in 2011, now with 180 stations and over 1,800 bikes located throughout the city.  What a great idea - walk off your flight and hop on a bike to go where you want.

But, it is time for us to get in our car and head up the coast about 30 miles to Carlsbad, with one last look back along the Bay at the city from where we walked.

View of the city from our parking spot

Spring Weekend in San Diego

We head down to San Diego for a long weekend, a combination of business and pleasure.  But first, a stroll around San Diego.  We park over by the airport and walk into the city along the San Diego Bay, over to the convention center, about 4 miles.  The view of the pleasure boards, cruise boats and aircraft carriers are somehow all complementary.

Downtown San Diego from the Airport (we are walking there)
 

Aircraft carriers across the Bay

Bougainvillea in full bloom at the airport

 Sailboats anchored along the way, cruise boat in the background

San Diego's climate is quite temperate, with a average high of 69.8°F (21°C), an average low of 57.5°F (14°C) and only 43 rainy days each year.  San Diego was the first part of California that Europeans settled in and is still an incredibly attractive and popular place to live and visit.

Along the walk way are signs about the creatures with whom we share the bay.

Our neighbors in and above the water

The San Diego Embarcadero stretches all along the San Diego Harbor, from the cruise boat terminal past the USS Midway to the convention center, with museums, hotels, restaurants and shops.  It's a little crowded around the cruise boat terminal as people get on and off the ship, but fine for walking, biking, jogging, and just enjoying the day.  The USS Midway, about halfway down the Embarcadero, is the longest-serving aircraft carrier in the Navy and is now a museum with over 1 million visitors each year

USS Midway

 As we continue on past the USS Midway, we come to the commercial fishing fleet.

Fishing boats at rest

Fish for sale, fresh off the boat

We continue on to the San Diego Convention center, about 4 miles from where we parked and started walking, and turn away from the water to enter the Gaslamp Quarter, 16.5 blocks of entertainment, dining, shopping and hotels located in historic buildings dating from the Victorian Era.  The term "Gaslamp" refers to the gas lamps that were common in San Diego in the 19th and 20th centuries.

View of downtown from the Convention Center

 Entering the Gaslamp Quarter across from the Convention Center

As we wander through the Gaslamp Quarter, we start to think about lunch and spot the Gaslamp Union Kitchen & Tap with an open table outside.  Although the craft beer list is appealing, we settle for Diet Cokes and some great food. We share fish tacos (beer battered cod with cabbage, jalapeno cream and pico de gallo on corn tortillas) and a blackened chicken wrap (with corn and red pepper salsa, avocado, cotija cheese and roasted red pepper aoli). Both are excellent.

Sitting outside at the Gaslamp Union Kitchen & Tap

We relax and prepare to wander back to our car and head up the coast to Carlsbad.

Roasted Dungeness Crab!

It's finally Dungeness crab season in California.  The season was originally supposed to start last November, but a toxic algae bloom along the West Coast raised fears of customers being killed or injured by domoic acid, preventing the season from opening.  Well, the commercial crab season finally opened on March 26 for the area south of the Mendocino-Sonoma County line (and remains closed above that line) and crabs are showing up in the markets.

State health officials still strongly recommend that consumers avoid eating the crab’s internal organs because they may contain much higher levels of domoic acid than the crab’s body.  Also, consumers should discard water or broth used to cook the whole crab and avoid using it to make sauces, broths, soups or stews.

But, the crab is good to go!

We go to JP Seafood to pick up crabs steamed, cracked, and cleaned, ready for the table.  But, we have some work to do ourselves to make our favorite Roasted Dungeness Crab.

The steamed crab is lined up in the display case and we ask for three to be cleaned and cracked.

Raw materials at the shop, steamed,

ready for cracking and cleaning

While the crab is prepared, we shop for the rest of our ingredients, fresh parsley and thyme, garlic, lemon, and a French baguette for dipping and savoring the sauce.

When we get home with our bag of cracked crab parts, we toast and crush fennel seeds (remembering why we're go glad for our mortar and pestle) and combine the crushed seeds in a food processor with parsley, thyme, garlic cloves, crushed red pepper flakes, a pinch of  salt and 1/3 cup of olive oil.  We purée it all, divide the crab parts between two Pyrex baking dishes and pour the mixture from the food processor over the crabs, mix well with our hands to make sure all the crabs parts are coated with the marinade, cover and store in the refrigerator for several hours.

When we're ready to eat, we warm the oven to 400 degrees, uncover the crab, scatter dots of butter over the crab and roast until warm and golden, generally 20 to 30 minutes.

Finished goods, ready for serving

While roasting, we slice the baguette - there will be lots of good sauce under the crab to soak up - and find our crab crackers (and a nutcracker or two) to crack the shells.

We put the baking dishes on the table and start grabbing the crab, cracking the shells and eating.  I eat as I go, while Laura and Jennifer build a pile of crab meat as they work through their plate, saving the eating for last.  As the crab disappears, the sauce at the bottom becomes accessible and we dunk our baguette slices in the fennel/parsley/thyme/garlic/red pepper mixture.  Wonderful!

And, at the end, nothing but shells (and great tastes) remain.

 What's left

Squid Ink Pasta

Laura's sister, Jennifer, came back from Fashion Week in New York with a real treat.  Before leaving the city, she stopped at Eataly, an incredible gourmet Italian market, food court, restaurant, and grocery store on 5th Avenue, across from Madison Square Park.  They were making squid ink pasta and it was tempting enough that she brought it back, in addition to fresh focaccia and prosciutto.

The challenge is what to make!

Fresh squid ink pasta

I do some research on the web and find a recipe from Mario Batalli's flagship restaurant, Babbo, "Babbo's Black Spaghetti with Rock Shrimp and Spicy Soppressata."  Although we've dined at many other of his restaurants in New York, we've never made it to Babbo, but it is on our to do list.

The recipe is intriguing, a grand mixture of tastes with the squid ink pasta, a Jalapeño pesto, rock shrimp and soppressata.  The butcher shop at Encinal Market has soppressata, which is an Italian cured dry sausage that comes from locally-raised hogs in Calabri.  Soppressata has natural flavors such as cumin, black pepper, red pepper and chilli peppers added to the meat, which is then cured for 3 to 12 weeks, giving it a hot, peppery taste and an uneven, rustic appearance.  It is really good stuff.

However, we are unable to find rock shrimp, which have a hard, spiny shell, more like lobster than shrimp.  But we don't search very hard (rock shrimp are no doubt available somewhere in San Francisco) and substitute the fresh shrimp that JP Seafood has on hand.

The first step is to make the Jalapeño pesto, tossing 3 cups of Jalapeño peppers, 1/2 cup each of unsalted almonds, and chopped red onion into a food processor with 1/2 cup of olive oil.  Puree and, voila, pesto.

Then set out the ingredients, diced soppressata, shrimp, thin-sliced garlic, sliced scallions, pasta, and Jalapeño pesto.

Ingredients, assembly required

While the pasta cooks, we sauté the garlic, shrimp, and soppressata in olive oil.  When the garlic is toasted and the shrimp are cooked through, we finish with four tablespoons of the Jalapeño pesto, the pasta and a gentle toss.

Sauté the garlic, shrimp, and soppressata

We serve in warmed pasta plates and garnish with the sliced scallions.

 Plated!

What a great dish! And, while the pasta plates are warming in the oven, we pop in the focaccia which has prosciutto and creamy cheese (I bet you forgot about the focaccia) and feast on the warmed treats while we wait (they disappear to rapidly, we're lucky to get an in-process picture).

 Focaccia disappearing fast

This is a great combination and a real treat.  We'll have to do it again!  It is so great when someone brings you a gift that is an intellectual and culinary challenge.  Boun Appetito!

65th Birthday Party

We interrupt our blog series to post pictures from my 65th Birthday Party last Saturday.  We held the party at Pappo in Alameda and they did a fabulous job, including serving octopus family style.  Laura and I met with Chef John Thiel of Pappo last month and he sat down with a blank sheet of paper, asked us what our favorite foods were and explained that he likes to use local, seasonal, sustainable ingredients.  This was not at all like being given a banquet menu to check off the options we wanted -- we designed the menu with him to offer passed appetizers at the initial cocktail party, then the octopus and three 1st course options and 2nd course choices.

First Course
Cream of Asparagus Soup | Extra Virgin Olive Oil
or
Caesar Salad:  Little Gem Lettuces | Creamy Caesar Dressing | Garlic Croutons | Parmesan
or
Organic Garden Lettuces | Cara Cara Oranges | Toasted Almonds | Manchego Cheese

Second Course
Slow Braised Leg of Duck | Garlicky Chinese Broccoli | Soft Polenta | Tangerine-Duck Jus  
or
Steak Frites:  Filet Mignon of Beef | Herb Fries | Sauteed Red Russian Kale | Truffle Butter
or
Local Seasonal Cod | Spring Onion-English Pea-Potato Hash | Lemon Beurre Blanc  
or 
Roasted Mushroom Risotto |Grilled Asparagus | Leeks | Pecorino Cheese

And, for desert, Profiteroles for all, accompanied by Vin Santo!


What a great meal, and a great experience meeting with Chef Thiel and creating it!

And, yes, after a grand introduction by Laura, I gave a speech:

Thank you all for coming to share this celebration with me.  I hope it’s not contagious, as John Glenn noted, "There is still no cure for the common birthday."

But, birthdays are good for us. Statistics show that the people who have the most birthdays live the longest. 

Dave Barry brings us another insight into birthdays (and he requests that we follow this logic carefully), "Unless you die, you will continue to get older."  He notes that such insights that are one of the key things that separate a professional writer from a person with a real job.

With typical British confidence, and the ability to use 20 words when 5 will do, the author G.K. Chesterton declared that, "The first fact about the celebration of birthdays is that it is a good way of affirming defiantly, and even flamboyantly, that it is good to be alive."

Luckily for me, I’ve made it 65, married Laura, met you all, received my Medicare card, and have everyone here to help with the affirmation.

George Carlin on his 65^th noted that, “Today I’m 65 years of age, that’s 18 Celsius”.

In a similar vein, James Thurber, on his 65^th birthday, said, “I'm 65 and I guess that puts me in with the geriatrics. But if there were fifteen months in every year, I'd only be 48.”

And what’s the best thing about turning 65?  No more calls from life insurance salesmen.  But, inside every 65-year-old is a young person, peering our and wondering what happened.

So, I’m not 65, I’m 35 with 30 years experience

Thank you for coming and sharing this event with me.  I truly look forward to many more good times and great adventures with you all.

And, everyone had a great time!

Morning Walk in Shenzhen

Arriving in Shenzhen at the new terminal, which was opened in 2013, is stimulating experience.  There are great displays on the walkway from the gates to baggage claim and remnants of the Chinese New Year decorations scattered around.

 Art display on the way to baggage claim

 Chinese New Year decorations in the airport

Although it's February in Shenzhen, the weather is warm and sunny, quite a contrast from Shanghai.  People are out in the morning, exercising in the parks, just as they were in the Shanghai colder weather.  Shenzhen has a subtropical climate and winter is very short and mild.  However, on the other side, Shenzhen's location at the estuary of the Pearl River makes is susceptible to typhoons, generally between July and September.

 Morning exercise groups in the park

 Morning badminton in the park

There are still holiday and New Year decorations scattered around town.

 New Year and holiday decorations

But, the plantings are definitely tropical and the tropical plants are alive and thriving down here (not like in Shanghai, where they were dying). 

 February flowers everywhere

 Tropical plants are thriving

It's early, and the shops are setting up for the lunch crowd that will come soon.

Rows of restaurants getting ready for the lunch crowd

 I head back to the hotel and over the the Free Trade Area in Shekou (just up Nanhai Avenue from the Shekou Port and Ferry Terminal) where the medical and telecommunications companies with which I work are located.  It's sometimes odd going there as there are very few foreigners in most of the areas where I wander, but the Shekou district has a large population of foreigners working there and out and about in the streets, shops, and restaurants.  I take the Metro over to the Sea World Metro Station (45 minute ride, changing lines at the Window of the World Station, 4RMB or 61 cents).

 Free Trade Zone

Lunch for three in Shekou

We meet, head out for a good lunch and that winds up today.  I'll wander more tomorrow.