May 31st. Steak Salad. Egg Salad on Rye.

Another day.  Another steak salad.  I've been eating this steak very slowly.  A great testament to my restraint as it was so small to begin with, I could have easily eaten it in one fine swoop (luckily I have my quarts of ice cream to lure me on to the next course).   I sliced the remaining piece, added it to a mix of lettuce with cherry heirloom tomatoes and the chick peas--was as pleased as could be.  A little excellent meat can surely go a long way.

Bistro filet, blushing for its portrait (it wasn't quite this rare)

After a long walk on the beach with Patty made egg salad with capers, celery and dill for an even simpler dinner.

May 30th. Steak Salad with chickpeas and tomatoes

Sarah sent revised plans, so the morning was filled with New Jersey kitchen thoughts.  Returning from yoga, with steak salad plans, I cooked the mysterious Harris Ranch steak in my cast iron pan. It was incredibly delicious and tender.  And anonymous.  I couldn't remember what it was called--only knowing it was an unfamiliar name.  Surely I could figure this out.  I called Harris Ranch for some steak identification work. At least I had a precise sense of butcher shop geography.  The steak I chose had been resting in the case between the ground sirloin and the rib-eyes. "Did it look like a big piece of sushi?" asked the customer service representative.  I hadn't made that association,  but  agreed that it did.  "That's a bistro filet," she informed me. Yes, that row of bistro filets did resemble massive slabs of  toro longing for giant beds of rice.

But, she explained, they are not tuna at all (I hadn't been fooled for a second).  They are cut from the teres major muscle, and as I learned from my own research  explained that bistro filets come from the teres major muscle, just off the cow's shoulder, and are also called petite teres steaks, described as a cheaper (and perhaps tastier) alternative to filet mignon.  This was all news to me.

In a day of many interruptions, lunch fell by the wayside.  But by dinner time, I made and ate a salad of steak, chickpeas, tomatoes and avocados while listening to Fresh Air Memorial for Doc Watson.

May 29. Latte at La Note, Lunch at In 'n' Out. Chick Pea Salad

Back to Los Angeles.  After a breakfast pancake made by Rinat as part of her pre-work, pre-school, four burner morning spectacular, I was picked up by Gene and Linda for the trip home.  After a quick stop at La Note, for coffees and croissants for the road, we picked up Joanie, who was also heading home and were on our way.

Retracing our steps, our first stop was at The Harris Ranch to continue our meat buying activities.  I bought a pound of hamburger meat, and a small steak whose name I instantly forgot as well as an excellent looking bunch of asparagus tips before we piled back into the car for our return visit to In 'n' Out.  Since our first visit, I'd done a bit of research on the secret menu.  As noted a few days ago, I'd long been familiar with "animal style" cheeseburgers--my regular order--but had not known (oh there was so much I hadn't known about the secret menu) 
that you can order well-done fries.  This time I got my cheeseburger animal style with those well-done fries--and all my previous complaints about the fries melted away.  As good as they were, I kindly shared them with Linda, Joanie, and Gene--they'd  had all ordered the bun-less variation (protein style), but were happy to nibble on a few carbs.

Picking up my car at Gene and Linda's, Joanie and I stopped at Trader Joe's on the way home for a few basics.
Sated from all that weekend eating (and knowing there was more to come), I  reprised a variation of Raphie's salad-romaine with chick peas, tomatoes and  green onions before treating myself to a sunset walk on the beach followed by a (also treated myself to a dish of chocolate and coffee ice cream--in memory of my mother--who I swear ate close to a pint of each (Schrafft's) every night.

May 28th. Oakland Biking. Wedding Brunch. Ikea.

The wedding celebration concluded with a Monday morning brunch for out-of-towners.
Now that I'm re-morphing  into a biker, I borrowed Rinat's bike and helmet and rode the 4.6 miles down Market Street to Scott's Seafood at Jack London Square for a fine spread of bagels, lox, roast vegetables and lots of conversation.
Biked back on Adeline, another broad Sunday-morning quiet street, empty for Memorial Day,  scarcely a car in sight.  Back at the house, in between serious bouts of folding and sorting line-dried laundry,  I managed to do still more  serious and delicious snacking with Raph---left over chicken with snow peas in coconut milk and a chick pea, tomato, feta and green olive salad.
And that wasn't the end of my  biking and eating.
A little ding on my phone alerted me to Sarah's update of New Jersey kitchen plans.  As Ikea was just a 16 minute bike ride away, I decided to continue my bicycle adventures and  check out Akurum cabinets and Nutid Refrigerators  I would not be buying a fridge--just looking--but I did hope to buy napkin rings for the Breines/Fried household.
My biking bravado was challenged by the ride to Ikea which involved  crossing over some intricate Freeway Overpasses--not exactly friendly bike territory.  We were now approaching the end of Memorial Day weekend so the roads were full of returning celebrants.  Needless to say, Ikea, whether in Carson, Oakland or Elizabeth New Jersey manages to be simultaneously familiar and over-whelming--so all was fine once I got there and was guided through the kitchen department (which was in the midst of a renovation, so not quite in its finest mode).

"We are a Swedish company," said Chan, explaining why salaried and hourly workers have the same name tags, no-one denoted as manager, leader, etc.  I nod appreciatively, a little social democracy in action.  They are three happy workers.  They are even happier when I tell them I could easily imagine (though I probably would not go to see) a movie based on their Ikea adventures.  And, once I assured them that I would  never humiliate them on Facebook, they let me document our visit.

Ilan, Raph, Tamar and Rinat all standing very straight

Alas, Ikea no longer carries napkin rings, so I biked back empty-handed.   Raph had just grilled the ribeye steaks I'd brought from Harris Ranch--which were even better than my parking lot sample and there was broccoli and ice cream as well!  No documentation of any of this, so  I'll take this opportunity to include this blurry, sun-splashed image of nieces and nephews, regular and grand taken two months ago.

May 27th. Breakfast Pizza. Wedding Bar-b-que

A day of no cooking but much eating and celebrating.  I did re-heat the two slices of left-over Hudson pizza for a late breakfast with coffee before heading to Maya and Adam's wedding festivities at the Oakland Zoo.
Despite the big sign announcing we were at the Zoo, there were few signs of wild life.  The wedding was on the lawn outside of the Snow Building, which turns out to be a regular venue for such events, with splendid views across the Bay.  After the completely excellent and moving ceremony, there was a grand bar-b-que buffet where I got to feast for the second time in a week (it hadn't been a week since Zeke's Smokehouse) on pulled pork, brisket, collard greens and cole slaw.  And  dancing too!  

May 26. Driving North. In 'n' Out. Harris Ranch. Hudson's in Oakland

After a breakfast of sauteed onions and tomatoes with eggs, I drove to Linda and Gene's to head to Maya's wedding.  For the first time in eons,  I didn't drive north in the Camry, in fact, I didn't drive at all.  I was the passenger in Joseph's Mercedes.  And indeed, the back seat of that car was a good deal smoother than many others.
Our first stop was the  In'n'Out in Kettleman City.  Since it's debut years ago, it's my regular stop on my many trips up and down Route 5.  There used to be incredible lines, but now that others have appeared along the way, it no longer takes forever and begins to approximate its name.  I had a cheeseburger "animal style."  In secret menu land that would be extra dressing and grilled onions.  I learned about the secret menu from Sam at our first In'n'Out on Venice Boulevard (those were Sam's vegetarian years, but he loved to stop there for a grilled cheese, just adequate fries and a chocolate shake).  It wasn't long ago that Linda, had her first In'n'Out moment and was enamored of the protein style burger--that would be burger wrapped in lettuce minus bun, medium rare.  She and Gene were restrained in their ordering--sharing her minimal order (though I did happily share my fries).
Fortified, we drove a bit further to Harris Ranch (I've always driven by, glad to get past all those cow-packed, manure reeking feed lots).  (Had to go to  Wikipedia to get some muddled idea of where it stands on the righteous food continuum--needless to say caught somewhere between Michael Pollan and Temple Grandin).  Gene and Linda wanted to buy steaks as a gift for their hosts in Oakland--and inspired by the samples of well-seasoned rib-eye in the parking lot, I did the same.From there on to Oakland.  At Raph and Rinat's, the keys were waiting, as was a hungry cat.  Hilda had made reservations at Hudson on College Ave.   It's big and sprawling with a lively and noisy bar, but we were seated in a back room which was relatively quiet--and happily shared a pizza (we ordered the sausage with broccoli rabe as they were out of the clam pizza which had caught our eye), a Caesar salad, a fried cauliflower side and pork shoulder.  For dessert, we returned to Raph and Rinat's for the brown sugar cookies I'd brought from home.

Well-traveled cookies

May 25. Chicken, potato and roast vegetable hash. kale with bacon and fried egg.

A little shopping and a mani-pedi after yoga, delayed lunch (can it still be called lunch?). Excelling in left-over removal, I sauteed an onion with  the remaining chicken and roast vegetables for an excellent hash.

Kale with tomato, waiting for its egg

Several hours later, going for the gold medal in left-over work, I sauteed the un-cooked kale from the farmer's market with half a tomato (it didn't make it into the BLT).   After clearing a spot in the middle, I added a pat of butter and fired up an egg.  Another fine late evening meal.