All posts filed under: Taste.

brigadeiro.

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Chocolate dessert craft time! I purchased an Easter Egg decorating kit from Tiny B Chocolates in South San Francisco. The kit came with everything I needed to fill an Easter egg chocolate shell with brigadeiros! Popular in Brazil, brigadeiros are like fudge bonbons. They are bite-sized pieces of decadent, rich chocolate covered in various toppings like sprinkles or nuts. The Easter Egg kit came with the brigadeiro filling, three ‘filler’ chocolates already in piping bags, assorted sprinkles and candies, and a handpainted Easter egg chocolate shell, plus instructions. Look at these eggs! First, I filled the shells with chocolate, then used the different pastry bag tips to add texture with the yellow and red chocolates. I rolled the brigadeiros into small balls and covered them with sprinkles. This got a little messy, but it was definitely the most fun step. You can make about a dozen brigadeiros with this kit. I decided to decorate the eggs with just a few brigadeiros, so I had plenty left over for snacking. To finish off I dotted with …

sushi cake.

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Need an alternative idea to cake? Why not a tower of sushi! You could take this a step further and make your own sushi, but if you have a favorite sushi spot, you can whip this ‘cake’ up in five minutes or less! When it comes to celebrating Hubby’s birthday, I get excited when I come up with a new cake alternative. (Remember the sandwich cakes?) For this sushi cake I picked up some of our favorite rolls from Kyoto Sushi in Berkeley. This was the first time I had created such a cake so I had a hard time visualizing how many rolls I’d need. I ended up getting enough sushi to make two cakes (~6″ at the base and 4 tiers tall), but no one is mad about extra sushi. I used about 35 pieces of California with and without roe, smoked salmon, and mackerel rolls stacked on a 6″ cake stand*. For the base I used the bigger rolls and for the top tier the smaller rolls. I topped the whole thing …

i heart food. i heart puns.

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I’m a sucker for heart-shaped anything, and heart-shaped food? I am all over it! Here are a few places you can find heart-shaped snacks to make your Valentine’s Day celebration extra cute. you’re my everything. The special Valentine’s heart bagels at Boichik Bagels in Berkeley are the size of two regular bagels and come in regular and everything. Perfect to share, or not. In previous years you could pre-order and pick up on Valentine’s morning, and they are doing it again this year! you have a pizza my heart. One year for Valentine’s I baked a heart-shaped pizza. It was good but I enjoyed this professionally made one from Mountain Mike’s Pizza much more. They, too, are offering hearts this year. Also, I get a kick out of pizza boxes perfectly fitting between Bebe’s stroller handles. rice rice baby. Year-round the kid’s bibimbop from Bowl’d in Albany comes with a rice heart (and a dino nugget). The first time we ordered this for Bebe I was so delighted! This makes me want to serve rice …

munching thru martinez.

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Someone was chosen for jury duty and the same someone ate her way through downtown Martinez. Here are a few munchies and places to hang while fulfilling your civic duty. States Coffee x Bread I can never get enough States. I previously featured them here and I am still a big fan (PS They’ve got a few more locations throughout the East Bay now, too). Their Martinez space has expanded since my last visit so there is lots of room to spread out. I am currently obsessed with their Earl Grey Lattes, both hot and iced. Their savory toasts are always a yes, too. I definitely came here more than once during my jury duty service. Taco Daddy’s Get on over here for tacos, burritos, bowls, … and get here quick. The lunch crowd keeps this place busy. I later learned you can place your order online, so protip: do that instead! There is indoor and outdoor dining, but I took my lunch to the park a short walk away. Ginger Thai I could have …

tasting, tasting. 1, 2, 3.

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Hello Yelp Elite badge 2021! We’re already more than a third of the way through 2021 so I best recap some tasty Yelp events! So far I’ve been able to participate in a virtual beer and snack pairing, yogurt tasting, coffee run, and sushi take out! All the Yelp Elite events, though still virtual, are still deliciously fun! Here’s what I’ve been snacking on… Anaviv’s Table and East Brother Beer One of the first Yelp Elite events of the year was a virtual beer and food pairing with Anaviv’s Table and East Brother Beer, both located in Richmond, California. Anaviv’s Table, pre-pandemic, was a communal dining experience (they sat 12 max per seating) that focused on featuring local food from nearby farms. Today, they sell goods market style and a select nosh offering. East Brother Beer is a local favorite brewery (I enjoy their house stout!) among many of my friends, and it’s a family friendly spot, too. This was the first event with a delivery option for the tasting menu and if I have …

cookies at the claremont.

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To celebrate being fully vaccinated I met up with my basically-family friends for an outdoor cookie decorating event at the Claremont hosted by East Bay Provisions. The Claremont had converted part of their parking lot into an outdoor restaurant and event space. It was the perfect weekend to be outside! Each ticket came with a dozen sugar cookies (we received kitten, bear, turtle, and butterfly shapes), four icing colors, assorted sprinkles, popsicle sticks, and hand wipes. Our host came around and provided a quick demo. I was hoping for more direction, but it really was meant for open play. Since I do much better looking at samples, I watched my niece decorate her cookies first and was inspired by her creations. My favorite technique was piping out splotches of color and then taking one of the popsicle sticks to drag the color across the cookie. It made it look like watercolor and blended the colors (almost) seamlessly. I really liked how my bears turned out! In the end, they all tasted the same so we …

one of everything.

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The traveling baking company Blooms End popped up at Morningtide. This was my first time trying this local bakery and it did not disappoint. Per usual, all great pop-ups at Morningtide draw a crowd. I made sure I was in line at the start of the pop-up (it’s even better if you come earlier). Also per usual, I shopped Morningtide after I got my pop-up goods. 🙂 Mary Denham, the baker and visionary behind Blooms End, put together the most delicious array of savory and sweet creations for the day’s festivities. The menu was released the day before and I knew when I got to the front of the line I would order one of (almost) everything. I ended up getting one of every croissant (minus one because she sold out of the chocolate croissants by the time I got to the front of the line), plus cookies (chocolate chip and white chocolate-marcona almond). Check out this croissant line up: croissant (plain) chocolate coffee-cardamom monkey meyer lemon-breakfast tea twist blackened date-graham-chocolate quince & manchego roasted …

smorgastarta.

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Throwing back to a savory birthday cake I made for Hubby’s birthday last year because it seems like a great Springtime snack! I’m always looking for savory alternatives for cake. We eat normal cake, but we love savory foods more. Plus, it’s always fun to try something new in the kitchen. One year for Hubby’s birthday I made “ice cream sundaes” but out of mashed potatoes and sausages. This last birthday: smorgastarta, Swedish sandwich cake! Instead of making one normal sized cake I made a few mini ones. I cut out bread circles (and made cinnamon sugar toast with the excess!), then made fillings. Many recipes call for lox which would have been so delicious but I was pregnant at the time, so I found inspo for vegetarian fillings. I created three: Roasted beetroot + dill + honey + salt and pepper + cream cheese Roasted red peppers + Colby Jack cheese + salt and pepper + cream cheese Avocado + lemon + salt and pepper + cream cheese Making mini cakes allowed me to …

holiday macarons.

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Raising Bebe is no walk in the park, but he slept long enough for me to enjoy a little macaron decorating session with my Yelp Elite Squad and Macarons by Natalie. Remember when I decorated boba and dumpling macarons? This time we enjoyed decorating a few holiday designs in Hello Kitty, Baymax, and corgi shapes. Like last time, we picked up our kits from Macarons by Natalie headquarters. Each kit came with macaron shells for a dozen cookies, three types of filling (red velvet, peppermint mocha, and snickerdoodle), assorted icing (red, yellow, green, and white), sprinkles, and a food marker. For the event, we donned our best ugly holiday sweaters and holiday hats, and Natalie demoed a few macaron decor ideas for each character. I tried to create Hello Kitty Santa… Tahdah! All the macarons! Almost too cute to eat! This was such a fun event, and technically my first holiday party of the season! In my world it barely feels like December, so this was a nice reminder that Christmas is coming! 🙂 Are …

macaron night.

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Macarons by Natalie and Yelp East Bay hosted a macaron decorating night. OMG so fun! Natalie created macaron kits for Yelp Elites and we spent the evening together apart decorating our macarons to look like dumplings and boba. Our kits came with everything we needed to fill and decorate a dozen macarons. Plus, a bonus Yelp macaron that you could have eaten right away if you just couldn’t wait! But in true Yelp Elite form, I resisted so it could be part of the photoshoot. 🙂 Before we got started, Natalie shared her dessert biz story and goals for the future. She’s already a published cookbook author, and has dreams to open her own dessert shop! Then, Natalie demoed how to fill macarons and decorate them in the cutest ways. She provided us with buttercream fillings in Cookies n Cream and Fruity Pebbles flavors, a trio of icing colors, and a food coloring pen, and encouraged us to get creative with our designs. My favorite techniques were the kawaii eyes (with the ‘sparkles’) and creating …