by Ellen Bannink -

Meet Salted, an online video cooking school

Salted-chef-gallery – Click here for this recipe in Dutch -> Salted, een online video kookschool –

Two weeks ago, the online video cooking school Salted launched and I was invited to attend the pre-launch party! Really nice of course because there was good food,a nice view on Venice beach and four LA based chefs who told why they cooperated with Salted. But what is Salted anyway?

Salted is a website with several cooking videos in which various chefs demonstrate cooking techniques and share their best recipes. How do you make a really good grilled cheese sandwich? How do you roast a steak? And how to use a wok? Sushi rice, how do you prepare that? Salted gives you the answer!

Salted-recipes

Rose sponge cake with meringue, strawberries, raspberries and pistachios for the LA Cake Club | in my Red Kitchen
by Ellen Bannink -

Rose sponge cake with strawberries and pistachios

Rose sponge cake with meringue, strawberries, raspberries and pistachios for the LA Cake Club | in my Red Kitchen

I love social media. Okay I’ll admit it: I’m a social media junkie. The moment I wake up you’ll find me checking Facebook, Instagram and Twitter (in no particular order) with still one eye closed.

I wanna know what happened while I was sleeping and I want to know what’s going on in the world. It’s my coffee – the only way to start the day properly.

And the best part about social media? Meeting new people! And that’s a very welcome thing if you just moved to LA. Well ‘just’…

by Ellen Bannink -

Photoblog: Chinese Food Tour in the San Gabriel Valley

Chengdu Taste
Chengdu Taste

Hey guys, I’m trying something new here, I’m photoblogging today!
Last week I met up with my Meetup friends for a Regional Chinese Food Tour in the San Gabriel Valley, hosted by Clarissa Wei. Clarissa is a LA-based writer specialized in Chinese food and culture and she took us to 5 different restaurants.

Today I’ll be sharing the pictures of all the food we ate at this tour!

We started the tour with Sichuan food at Chengdu Taste, a restaurant that has been open for only 5 months now but is really succesful. There was a long line by the time we left!
Sichuan food means spicy food, so brace yourself!

Chengdu-Taste-2 Mung bean jelly noodle with chili sauce. Whoa! That’s a good way to wake up and open up your taste buds!

by Ellen Bannink -

Weekend finds: Artisanal LA

So my husband bought a black BMW convertible last week… Early mid-life crisis? 😉 No, just a boy’s dream 🙂 Too bad the weather wasn’t that good in LA last week, but luckily the sun came out again last weekend.

Artisanal LA

 

We were thinking of taking the car for a ride and drive up to the Palisades or Malibu to go hiking, but instead I stumbled upon Artinasal LA on Twitter. They were organizing a Fall Show in Downtown LA. We rescheduled our hike to next weekend, when my brother and his girlfriend are here, and we drove east to DTLA with some cash and empty bags.

This was the first time I heard about Artisanal LA but their website explains exactly what it is about: Artisanal LA is a pop-up community event with weekend long seasonal shows and shops celebrating the city’s finest local, sustainable and handmade edibles.

by Ellen Bannink -

review: Palmilla Cocina y Tequila

With just four months of living in LA there is still so much of this city to discover, so many beautiful places and interesting restaurants to check out.

So when Palmilla | Cocina y Tequila in Hermosa Beach invited the LA Foodbloggers for a brunch on a Saturday I knew I couldn’t say no. I’d never been to Hermosa Beach before and you can always wake me up for Mexican food so that made me go jump in the car on an early Saturday morning two weeks ago. OK, 11am doesn’t sound early at all but to me it meant I had to leave around 10.30am and beat traffic… on a Saturday!

If you go there you have (!!) to order the avocado plate with plantain chips, it’s yummy!

Palmilla is located at the Hermosa Beach Pier and that area is really popular with tourists. You’ll find a lot of boutiques and eateries around there and I was surprised that Palmilla is so much different than the other restaurants.

by Ellen Bannink -

review: Mama Lu’s Dumpling House

I’m on a quest. Yes, just like those little hobbits. But I don’t have to endure scary things to throw a golden ring in the fire in order to save our world.
No, my quest is different, my quest contains Chinese food!

In Amsterdam I loved to go out for dim sum, I did that at least once a month. So in the first week after arriving in Los Angeles friends took us to Empress Pavilion in Chinatown, to have some dim sum. I liked the big chaotic dining hall with noisy Chinese people and waitresses with push carts. It reminded me of China, although I didn’t had dim sum during the month I was there three years ago.

I thought I was done, I found my new favorite dim sum place which served delicious food.

But unfortunately Empress Pavilion suddenly closed a month later, at the beginning of June 🙁

So now I’m on a quest to find the best dim sum in the Los Angeles area.

Different lists direct me to the East, so yesterday Christine from Feed My Sole and I went out for dim sum at Mama Lu’s Dumpling House, in Monterey Park.

Mama Lu's

No push carts here, but a menu in Chinese ánd English.

by Ellen Bannink -

review: Hinoki & The Bird

I totally love the idea of Meetup.com! I found this website while I was looking for other foodbloggers in LA. So when Christine from Feed My Sole organized a Four Course Prix-Fixe Dinner at Hinoki & The Bird I immediately rsvp’d YES! Back in Amsterdam -while we already knew we would be moving to LA- I started to follow Hinoki & The Bird on Twitter and I really wanted to go there for dinner. So this was my chance!

And it was also a chance to do something social for myself since we’ve arrived in Los Angeles. It was so exciting, but I also knew I needed some time with like minded foodies 🙂
Hinoki & The Bird is a Silk Road-inspired restaurant which just opened 6 months ago in January. I got attracted by the Asian/Californian menu, like the corn soup with cilantro and hijiki (seaweed). It’s sounds great to me!

I'm a total sucker for delicate cutlery and tiny flowers.
I’m a total sucker for delicate cutlery and tiny flowers.

And wow, the whole experience at Hinoki & The Bird was stunning. The food was great and well balanced and the service was also perfect. Really friendly staff, the way it’s supposed to be!