Seafood at Redondo Beach Pier

I absolutely love shellfish! Crab, lobster, shrimp, etc etc. Kirk suggested we go to Redondo Pier now only minutes away from my place, to enjoy some hot seafood. Our friend Shin came along as he was the one who originally told us about this place. It is Korean run seafood house. You must eat the salad which consisted of raw tuna, smelt eggs, salad, rice, cabbage, and some tasty spicy dressing. Mmm...it was so good. We also had baby octopus and some raw oysters which didn't quite agree with my taste buds, but Kirk and Shin chowed down on them. The main part of our meal were two huge steamed crabs. They gave us some mallets and bibs and we hammered and pulled out juicy fresh crab meat. I always enjoy that kind of seafood because it is so much fun to eat with other people. There is something about hammering crab legs that I love.

Dine LA at Akasha

I was planning on skipping out on Dine LA this time since I just bought the house and was trying to save some dough. But wonderful, generous Kirk was so nice to surprise me with reservations at Akasha. We had actually gone to dine la here last year and loved it. The restaurant is a very farmers market fresh type of place with lots of organic and free trade this and that. For appetizers we had the pork sliders and grilled shrimp with ciabatta. The sliders were super moist but a little on the salty and very spicy side. The grilled shrimp was served on grilled ciabatta that was slightly burnt. For our main course I had the braised short ribs and Kirk had the albacore and quinoa. You can't go wrong with braised anything is my saying! It was super delicious and moist. The albacore was just alright...I really wasn't digging the quinoa (pronounced Kin-wa). For dessert, we had the banana split cake and smores pudding. They were just alright. For some reason, I was not quite as impressed as I had been in the past with Akasha. I don't think it was quite a representation of what they are capable of.

Year 3 of Angie's Beauty Strategy Meeting

This is now the third year in the row that I've helped Angie arrange some flowers for her annual strategy meeting. I thought we were totally out of ideas but somehow we put our thinking caps together and managed to come up with a great design to go with the theme of hollywood glamour. Angie found these great silver bowls and crystal pins which we placed in the rose centers. We created a large display for the front that included quince branches with hanging crystals, and wired roses. It looked quite sparkly with all the crystals and crystal pins. It was a lot of work, but in the end everything looked great.

Old Skool Dining at Dal Rae

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Kirk and his family often go to Dal Rae for special occasions. This year for Mrs. Shintani's birthday, the whole family and significant others went to dine at Dal Rae. It was a very old school vibe with great service and soft leather booths. Our waitress Kitty, was a elderly yet super spry lady who kept the jokes going throughout the meal. Complimentary radish tray came filled with radishes (my favorite), pickles, carrots, pepperocine, and other yummy goodies to crunch on. I had the chilean sea bass ala Ben. Man o man...it was so tasty. I got this huge piece of fish served with parmesan and carmelized onions. The fish was super flaky and it went well with the cheese and lemon butter sauce. A large baked potato was served on the side. This restaurant has a nice menu of american style fish and meat dishes. It reminded me of Lawry's but without the prime rib. Probably one of the nicest restaurants outside the LA restaurant area that I normally dine at.

Japanese Eats and Drinks: Yuzu

My weak sauce Shochu and Calpico mix

Shrimp salad with sesame dressing

Grilled Yamaimo with nori

Grilled beef with mushroom and bean sprouts

Karaage Chicken

Grilled beef tongue

Grilled kurobuta pork

Lately, Kirk and I have been exploring the Japanese eats and drinks in the Torrance area. Luckily, Kirk's friend and now our new drinking buddy, Shin, is not only knowledgeable of Japanese cuisine, he is an expert Japanese alcohol drinker! He's great to eat with because he knows his Japanese alcohol, food, and speaks in Japanese! On our second drinking evening (first was at Torihei, but forgot to blog), we went to Yuzu in Old Town Torrance. It has a very modern feel inside, but the food is pretty traditional. I think a great date night place.
We started off with some Shochu which kind of reminds me of Vodka without the heavy alcohol taste and less of a hangover effect. I like the lighter tasting ones and I love adding Calpico drink to kill the alcohol taste. I got my own bottle because Shin and Kirk wanted to more manly, stronger tasting one. We ended up ordering a bunch of food. We started off with some grilled shrimp salad with mixed greens and vegetables. They serve some really large pieces of shrimp with some tasty sesame dressing. Next, we had grilled yamaimo....yum. It was lightly dipped in shoyu or teriyaki sauce and grilled, then sliced. For those of you who don't know, yamaimo is a root vegetable that has a sort of crunchy, slithery texture. I also love it grated and eaten with soba. We also had some other typical grilled items like beef, beef tongue, kurobuta pork, which was grilled just right and so easy to bit into. We finished the meal off with some cold soba, hot udon, and grilled rice balls. Of course, I was pretty toasted at this point, so there are no pictures of the food towards the end of the night :)
Japanese eating and drinking is such an art of pacing. You eat a little, drink a little (or in Shin and Kirk's case, drink a lot). We were there for over 2 hours enjoying the food, Shochu, and conversation...albeit the conversation was pretty geared towards the video game Call of Duty. I'm quite excited to keep exploring the restaurants out here in the South Bay. If anyone wants to join us for some good eats and drinks, let me know!

Gyushintei: All You Can Eat Shabu Shabu

I myself have always been a big fan of Shabu Shabu ever since I was a kid. Although I must admit, I liked Sukiyaki better because it was more flavorful. I also must admit, that I really haven't been to too many Shabu places because my mom would always make it for us. The first time I went, Kirk took me to this in West LA and after dinner, and a big check, I was starving. I felt jipped. More recently, Kirk and I went out on a date night with our friends Joni and Dean, sans Evan :( They took us to their favorite place in Torrance called Gyushintei. After my second time eating there, I am a fan. You get your own cooking pot, which I think is great since I don't like sharing my food while I'm cooking :) We went with the all you can eat, which was also great because there was no chance of me leaving there starving. It comes with all these choices of meat, vegetables, and noodles. It's definitely fun eating there with other people. We can't wait till our next date night with the Kishiyamas...hopefully Evan can join :)

PS. This is my first post as a Torrance resident!