The-Fuck-it-Market!

Any other night would be a great night to head out to The Grove on Fairfax and have something nice to eat at the Farmers Market… But tonight… not so much!  Little Miss what looking to do some shopping catch some dinner at the farmers market. We arrived and mingled through the different shops, checkin’ out this, and, a, that, and, this, and, ah… You know what I’m saying. Ladies shoppin’.

The vibe at The Grove is very nostalgic, between the music and the people, it's like your in every Christmas movie before the romantic scene.  It gives me the butterflies… especially around Christmas time (Yup! All warm and fuzzy!).

Now I haven’t eaten in a few hours and neither has she, so my ass is hungry. I look at her and I say, “Hey, how about this.. I’m tired and hungry, and my ass wants to sit down and get served… like… by a server. I don’t’ wana have to hunt for my food… Sound good?”.  Wish granted!

As we cross street to The Grove I notice the Marmalade Cafe – Google pin dropped and we are in. The hosts’ are very nice as we enter into their Halloween themed lair. It feels like The Haunted Mansion. It’s pretty cool lookin’. We slip into our high arching booths and are handed menus. The menu looks great… and the service… the service… the…

Yea we fucking left...

It was about 12 to 15 minutes and no server. Screw that, I’m hungry. No one even looked at us as we walked out. Oh well… may be next time. At this point our blood sugar levels were dropping' like it was hot.. We headed over to the farmers market with spears and daggers in hand hunting for a place too eat. Practically clawing at each other, we finally decide on Phil’s Deli. It looked like your classic diner setting with a counter.

We scan the menu. She goes French toast with sausage, and I go the safe, double bacon cheeseburger route. Can’t possibly screw that up… Right! They don’t serve regular sodas… so I settle for the diet Dr. Pepper – Don’t worry – I’ll be ok. It’s a Friday night and the people are a-buzzing. It is not too packed and where we were eating there were only 2 other people (should have been a sign).  The only other 2 popular restaurants there had packed lines of people at them: one Mexican restaurant, and a Brazilian BBQ place that always has a line. At this point there was no way we were going to wait for food. In the words of my girlfriend's father Randy, “If it’s not busy, it’s probably not worth waiting for!”. Right Again!

We get our food; it was so bad I couldn’t even take pictures. I mean, it looked like we expected it to look… like diner food. Staving and tired, she digs in… I dig in… She loves it! I… am confused. It had happened… someone fucked up a double bacon cheeseburger.  Her French toast was perfect. It laid on her plate like 4 pillows on top of a bed. Sprinkled with powdered sugar in a way that makes you want to drizzle syrup over it – In slow motion. Mine: like hand picked frozen Costco hamburger patties – over cooked and as tasteless as a piece of paper. The bacon… couldn’t taste it. The cheese… who knows. The fries… survivable, but I still couldn’t finish any of it. I didn’t even take the rest home for the dog. I love my dog, I wouldn’t do that to him. At this point I am looking around for another place to hopefully salvage the rest of my evening.

There was a place that I remembered that had good New Orleans style food called the Gumbo Pot. They always had the best gumbo and jambalaya. So how could I go wrong? I’ll show you.

I got there and decided to get creative.  The girlfriend was getting tried so the food was ordered to go. I got the hush puppies, the soft shell crab po’boy sandwich and a side of seafood gumbo. That ordered, we got to listen to the lovely (yikes) karaoke they had in the open area. The atmosphere was great; too bad, I had to go. After 10 minutes of watching beautiful desserts going out and singers destroy classic rock tunes, my food was bagged and ready to go.

On the way out we hit Bennett’s ice cream parlor and had a scoop of chocolate junkie ice cream in a waffle cone. This was my only win for the evening and it was delicious! This was just what I needed.

15 minutes later we arrived home and I have-at the rest of my meal. I open it up… and I’m ready for my reward. I dig in to the hush puppies and they are… crunchy as all hell. I am by no means a food expert. I recorded the taste as being something my mouth didn’t want to have in it. So, moving on... Next, the side of gumbo. As always, it was great… not amazing, but just want I wanted. Now, time for the sandwich. It visually looked like something was wrong. I took a bite and it started out great, but then the taste of lemon started to crumple my face like a piece of foil.

Inside were slices of lemon, with the peal, just like a tomato. WHAT? A LEMON!!! It made my whole face cringe the second I tasted it. The first thing that jumped into my head was Gordon Ramsay on Hell’s Kitchen throwing in on the floor and saying, “What the SHIT is that! Are you trying to fucking kill me?!”

“Fuck it! My mouth and I give up!”

I threw in the towel. So I only ate the rest of the gumbo, which I knew was a safe bet. It seems the lovely karaoke from the farmers market got in to my po’boy sandwich, leaving me to deal with the out come.

Every time I‘ve been to The Grove and the Farmers Market I have had a great time. Please don’t let me spoil any future plans. Go, and have fun. I was there and ate at the Mexican restaurant 2 weeks ago. It was great. Thus proving my theory that horrible reviews comes from bad experiences. It is not always about bad food.

Or… Maybe it was my fault for getting creative with the ordering, and not just sticking with the stuff I knew was good. Low blood sugar can make you order horrible things.

If there was anything I could have learned from this experience it was to, trust your instincts.

 And in my case, especially since mine is bigger than my brain, “Go With Your Gut!” 


Remember no guts no glory! MEAT ME!

Follow @meatmeblog



Thank you,
Sean Rice

Baseball Playoffs & the “BIG BLUE" – Baby Blues BBQ

My hands start shaken’ as I handed the menu back to the waitress. I realized how much food I just ordered. The food here is not only good it’s the greatest BBQ on the west coast if not the world. I have poked all around this city for the best BBQ and it was non other than my girl friends father Randy (the greatest cook and BBQ Master I know) who introduced me to Baby Blues BBQ. Its not just where to go for BBQ... It's  the Mecca for BBQ.  Randy's motto was always, "If it isn’t busy, then its probably not worth waiting for."

There is a fine art to BBQ. For those of you who think BBQ is throwing a piece of meat over a fire and serving it… your wrong. Don’t worry! It’s not your fault. For some reason when barbeque migrated from the South to the West it didn’t get translated correctly (Kinda what happen to Pizza from the East). BBQ originated in the south. Back in the day it was so hot during the summers that it made no sense to cook in the house. So they brought cooking outside, and it was then that BBQ was born.

A lot of places claim they have “The Best Bar-B-Que” in Los Angeles. Be careful! 90% of these places are false advertising.  There is a big difference between barbeque and grilling. Grilling is laying meat over an open flame or heated charcoals for a few minutes. Barbeque is a very long slow process; in some cases it can even take days. First you might marinade some meat for several hours. Then you might rub the meat down with special seasonings and slowly smoke the meat at a low temperature for several hours. Then some places might slap some barbeque sauce on it and then flash the grill with it. The result is usually the best tasting meat your mouth has ever tasted. One way to tell if a place is serving true barbeque… Ask them how long they cook their meat? That should answer their question.

Barbeque is a true religion to a lot of people and worth traveling half way around the world for.  Once a man came in and ordered some ribs, had a few bites, and then got on his cell phone. He called his friend from Toronto, told him to get on the next plane to LA (he’d pay for it), cause he need him to try some of the best barbecue he'd ever tasted. The very next day they met up and feasted. Once a woman in labor stopped by to pick up some ribs on her way to the hospital. These stories are just as serious as the barbeque itself. I Shit you not!

In fact, on the wall, they have a framed picture of “The Most Interesting Man in the World!”… Its that fuckin’ serious people!!! If a place puts a picture of that man on the wall… their not fuckin’ around.

There is one item on their menu that will in fact, blow you away. Its "the" BEEF RIB. The marbling of this meat is often compared to that of rare stones you might find in Italy. Weighing in at just over a pound it’s a mouth full to swallow. They rub their ribs with over 20 different spices and smoke them over apple and hickory for several hours. If you have a bucket list, that should definitely be at the top! I don’t’ think I could die knowing I missed out. 

The Big Blue I ordered came with 3 pieces of meat and to fixin’s (sides). I got the beef ribs, the Memphis style spare ribs, and the tiger shrimp. For my sides I went with the “4-cheese” mac and cheese and the seasoned fries. Once this behemoth arrived I was determined to finish it. It immediately put me into a Viking Warrior state of mind, its hard not to resist.

Baby Blues BBQ’s makes all of their own sauces. I don’t even know where to start with these. They have Sweet, BBQ, XXX, Hot, and Sweet Chili Pepper Vinegar. Everyone likes to do his or her own thing. I highly recommend mixing the XXX with the BBQ and you got your self the perfect sauce to smother your meat in!!!

As soon as I finish the beef rib and a few shrimp my eyes watered as I start to question my existence. Now realizing that my stomach has now become the size of my eyes. I can only take a few more bites of the spare ribs as I find myself once again defeated by this ferocious meal! As I look at the bright side I have something to take home and eat later. At this stage, I can no longer see over the hill of paper towels created from rubbing down my battle fingers.  They even have a place to wash your hands at the bar so you never miss out on the action.

I look across the way and see another mans half eaten pie. I now realize that I am delirious and, as good as a desert my sound, it would only put me closer to digesting the rest of this meal horizontally. “In a box to go!” I said. He replied, “Are you sure?” Believe it or not… I paused and actually thought I might eat more… but no… I can’t. I mentally slap myself in the face and ask for the check.

Over time I have had everything on the menu (except for the salads of course), and till this day it still takes me a good 20 minutes to figure out what I would like to order. With my hand over my heart I will continue to bring you play-by-plays of this glorious restaurant. I pledge to cover everything on this action packed menu…  Just to prove to you how “fucking good” this place really is.

May you never go hungry and forever MEAT ME!!!

You can check out Baby Blues at

http://www.babybluesbbq.com/

They have locations in Venice, Hollywood, San Francisco, and Philly.

Long Live the King of Bar-B-Que!!!

If I had a restaurant of the Month this would be it!!! So do your stomach a favor and go down there today. You owe it to yourself to eat food this good!!!

P.S. Readers I challenge you to recommend a better BBQ spot! Mention a place in the comments section and I will check it out. If your spot is better I’ll have you featured in that review. Hell, if you wanna fly me out of Los Angeles. "I'll do it!"

Meat, Love and BBQ,

Sean Rice

aka MEAT ME