One of the things that I enjoy most when I’m in New York is the way they do brunch. It’s not to say that I don’t love the breakfast spots here in LA. I can always get a great scramble and fruit salad here and it’s especially easy to get healthy breakfast options like egg whites and turkey or veggie sausage.

That being said, I can never find in LA what I can always enjoy in New York–a little something I like to refer to as skilletty eggs. Why is it so goddamn hard to bake eggs in a skillet and serve them up in a restaurant on the West Coast.

Alas, my lamenting can stop. Once again, Cafe Stella has saved the day. They do brunch now. This is the best news of 2009, if you count Obama’s presidency as 2008 news.

I met my good friend Denise there at 11 on Saturday. Every time I introduce her, I reveal her origins as well. She must think it’s really weird. “This is Denise. She’s South African!” I can’t help it.

It was close to 90 degrees and not even noon yet. Flowers were feeling it.

Brunch was everything I’ve ever wanted but could only get in New York. Hallelujah, I am so happy about this.

One gripe, though. They get their coffee from Intelligentsia, next door. For those of you that don’t know, Intelligentsia is outrageously expensive maneur-flavored coffee, in a nutshell. So, while some might think it’s exciting that they have this little exchange worked out, I frown upon it.

Also, I asked for iced coffee given the temperature and the server said they don’t do that because they don’t have cups for iced coffee. Who is “they”? You’re a restaurant, and they’re a coffee shop. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and if you actually wanted to figure it out, I bet you could.

You also don’t get refills because they have to go all the way next door to bring you a fresh cup. I vote they ditch the zero (Intelligentsia) and get with a hero (install their own coffeemaker).

Now that my rant is out of the way, onward skillety eggs!

Denise had baked eggs with spinach and goat cheese:

I had a lardon and escarole fritatta:

It was perfect. Except that LARDon is a gross word if you think about it.

We shared a side of avocado, which had sea salt and lemon on it, I think?

It was about as lovely an accompaniment as it was a ripoff. 4 bucks for that thing. 4 bucks in TJ’ll get you 20 avocados. and a stripper.

M Cafe has brought back some seasonal favorites that were missed, as well as some new salads I was anxious to try.

I got the trio of salads and selected curried cauliflower (welcome back), the greek salad (where’ve you been all my life), and the heirloom tomato and white bean salad (go back to where you came from):

Even when I ate dairy, I hated feta, and I especially hated the way it infiltrated perfectly delicious Greek salads. Here they replaced feta with tofu. Muuuuccchhh betttter:

Curried cauliflower salad with cashews and dried apricots?? Gimme a break. So good!

But the white bean heirloom tomato salad?

Slimier than both Coreys put together.

Last Friday some long lost buddies of mine took me out to Terroni to celebrate graduation. I have the nicest friends. Thanks dudes.

I ate there once shortly after they first opened and thought it was decent. I liked the wine and the atmosphere but since the menu is heavy on the pizza, I didn’t fall in love. Not because I don’t adore pizza but because my allergy to dairy makes it a forbidden love.

Well this time I was able to maneuver around the menu enough that I could order dairy free food and still leave satisfied. This is one of those Italian joints that yells at you on the menu before you even try asking to modify a dish. I quote, “While modifications may seem easily accomodated, such requests compromise the unique characteristics of our food, and the efficiency of our service. Please respect our menu.”

Here’s Joy trying anyway. An attempt to weasel her way out of pork coming with her favorite truffle pasta dish:

She got the whole, “it compromises the integrity of our flavors” speech.

We ordered a light, crisp, appley white for the table:

And bresaola to start:

Good Lord was this some flavorful, lemony, olive oily, delicious bresaola. Meridith was telling me the sweetest story of her engagement and out of the corner of my eye I kept staking out my bresaola territory.

I of course had mine without the cheese, sacrificing, I’m sure, the integrity of the flavor combination. So sue me.

Then Meridith ordered what is basically the embodiment of my remorse over not eating dairy, burrata ravioli. I die inside:

Sophie had a special pasta that I tasted but I forget what it involved besides mushrooms. Not sure why I was so distracted??

Joy’s attempts at negotiating with various Terroni representatives for something that involved Truffles sans pork were unsuccessful. She got the same pasta as Sophie and I’m pretty sure is still lamenting her loss.

I got the Farinata di Ceci–a warm chickpea farinata (like a tart) served with fresh Italian tuna, black olives, arugola, red onion, and cherry tomatoes. Perfection.

Like a famous twin once said, I’ll be back.

my fruit guy and your fruit guy! standing by the fire!
huh?

the good thing about fruit vendors randomly disappearing and being replaced by distant cousins and sisters-in-law and friends of the family is that if the quality isn’t great, then maybe the next guy gets better mango. also, in the event your regular fruit guy saw you eat shit while you were going for a run on your lunch break, you no longer have to be ashamed to pay him a visit.

Welcome new fruit guy! And welcome better quality fruit!

mango, melon and coconut. chile and lime, no salt.

I bet if I told you one of my favorite places to get fresh seafood was basically in Skid Row I would lose all credibility.

Then again I wrote about a sausage fight at Vons yesterday and you’re still here.

For amazingly fresh and simple fish, either raw or cooked to order, Fisherman’s Outlet is the spot.

There are usually two lines and often some strapping young Nuyorican will come take not only your order, but that of all 30 people in line behind you. And he’ll get it right without writing it down, too. Plus it will kind of feel like he’s yelling at you and ignoring you all at once, which hurts inside but it’s also exhilarating.

The menu is simple, all seafood, some fried, some grilled. Your food comes on rice or fries. Only recently have they added the salad option.

Keep in mind you don’t come here for the atmosphere unless your idea of a good time involves any of these guys:

I promise the food is worth the trouble, though. Mayra and Tony always order oxymorons:

Jumbo shrimp, served with rice, lemon and a cajun sauce:

I always get the jumbo scallops, as they are called on the menu, over a bed of lettuce. Let it be known you can order a jumbo shrimp/jumbo scallop combo.

Bobby Flay would be jealous of those grill marks! Or maybe he’d just be appreciative. Who knows. He seems like a good guy.

so saturday night I had dinner with my parents at our favorite Arabic restaurant in town. Oh…I mean, um, Wednesday night I did that and Saturday…Saturday was wild. I had a crazy time and I was doing all this really fun shit and stuff and…no? k.

Saturday night, dinner with mom and dad at Marouch. It’s fun to sing, “Marouch! Marouch! Marouch is on Fire!!!” instead of “The roof! The roof!” Oh you got that without me explaining it? sorry.

It’s impossible to leave here without wanting to die of fullness. There is no such thing as a light meal at this place but it is the best you will find in LA. This is the closest you will get to being invited into an Arab’s home for homecooking…The owner’s wife chops parsley for tabbouleh in the back and he puts all the meat on the grill himself. Everything is perfectly fresh, perfectly seasoned, and perfectly representative of Arabic cooking at it’s best.

We attempted to eat on the lighter side (which you will see means something different in Arabic than it does in English).

Started with the requisite Meza dishes, including hummos, tabbouleh, and baba ganouj (aka mtabal). Meza basically means “appetizers” in Arabic and includes many dishes for communal sharing, from salads, to meats, to dips.

This is the hummos:

The baba ganouj:

The two are similar but as you may know, hummos is made with garbanzo beans and baba ganouj with eggplant, giving it a more bitter flavor.

Tabbouleh is my salad soul mate, and if I were parsley, this is what I would want to grow up to be. Note how authentic tabbouleh is not lazily packed with cracked wheat filler like it is when you get it store bought:

Then my parents love to order kebbeh nayeh, raw meat meant to be eaten with raw white onion in arabic bread. I tried a bite to appease them since they always give me the “it’s good!” speech. Plus I was hoping to gain maturity points, but frankly, either I wasn’t emotionally ready or my palate isn’t as grown up as I am.

IT should be noted that wherever my parents eat, there is a man in the kitchen that sees them walk in and knows to prepare a spicy salsa for them. They have established a spicy-BFF-salsa relationship with waiters and owners across the city. It’s sort of remarkable. In this case, Bob was our man. The guy goes by Bob, but is clearly NOT a Bob, since he is Lebanese and speaks broken English. I’m guessing that’s not what’s on his birth certificate. Anyway, good man. He immediately hit the kitchen, chopped up some habanero peppers with other fresh ingredients, and returned with this:

My parents added this to the kebbeh and I ate it with the chicken we ordered after the Meza.

We had Shish Tawouk (chicken kabob) that comes with rice and flavorful garlic paste that I skipped since I wasn’t prepared to live with it coming out of my pores for a fortnight, as it sometimes does.

It’s sort of insane how flavorful and moist this chicken is. Amazing.

We decided collectively we were too full for dessert and we asked for the check. Then I saw Bob bring another table some mahalabieh and I instantly made a pouty face. My dad can’t handle the pouty face and he caved.

Mahalabieh is a rice pudding that comes topped with pistachios and swimming in a sort of honey, rose water mixture. The flavors seem so old timey Egyptian and sensual to me. I imagine Cleopatra eating this while she bathed in milk and rose petals.

Long live Marouch!