New Year, New Reviews, and a New Blog

It's been a while faithful readers, but I have returned and I have a lot to catch you up on. First of all, I need to tell you I'm bored. I'm friggin' bored, people. I can't just review food, I have too many ridiculous opinions about other things. So I'm reviewing everything now; not just things that are typical targets for critics, I really mean everything. Food, movies, and books are all still applicable, but so are airports, foreign currencies, and parking lots. Anything that I feel the need to tell you is awesome or terrible. And if you have any suggestions, I'd be glad to hear them. So read to your little heart is content at http://charliereviews.blogspot.com/

Food reviews will still be posted here as well, but you should probably just get used to going to the new blog. Sorry everyone who doesn't know how to change their internet bookmarks.

Yours,

Charlie

Holy Crepe!

I had the distinct pleasure of stopping by Margarita Mix in Santa Monica the other day, and I just wanted to make sure everyone knows that I had an awesome time. The work was top notch, of course, and I can't say enough about the whole ambiance. The facility itself appears to be more of a spa than anything else, and the people are all friendly and courteous. Now, of course you would expect people to be friendly and courteous when they work in client services, but that's because you assume they are being paid to be friendly and courteous. What if I were to tell you that the folks at Margarita Mix are actually professional crepe makers who only masquerade as client services people, and they can make you any crepe you have ever dreamed of in a matter of minutes -- is that something you would be interested in?

Well stop dreaming friend, it's true. I had two of the most delicious things I've had in a long while: an eggs benedict crepe and a strawberry banana chocolatey crepe. It's crazy. They make the crepe and then kind wrap it up like a burrito around whatever goodness you want. It's pretty much all the best parts of a nice brunch without some snooty lady in a hat sitting next to you. Although now that I think of it, they're so friggin' helpful, I'm sure if you wanted to sit next to a lady in a hat they could make that happen. To be honest, I'm grasping at straws with how to say this any other way: the whole experience was just absolutely amazing. But, in the hopes of impressing a pretty lady somewhere or perhaps taking over as king of restaurant reviewers from that asshole Zagat, I'm going to put on my food critic hat and see what happens. Here goes nothing:

As the crepe approached my table, I felt an odd anticipation. The smell was breathtaking, and the plating was gorgeous. Upon the first bite it was easy to tell that the crepe was cooked to perfection; this was an experienced crepist indeed. The flavors of your standard benedict style eggs -- the hollandaise, the egg -- mixed beautifully with the crepe. The ratio of filler to crepe to sauce was marvelous, as if the chef himself was the crepe and therefore knew exactly when he was perfectly bathed in deliciousness. As for the next dish, all the precision that accompanied the first plate was outdone only by the sheer joy you could see in the construction of this one. The crepe was filled with fruit and warm chocolate oozed out in between. This could only be prepared by a man who loves creping things, and the joy is visible in the dish. Five stars, to be sure.

Given the name of the establishment, you can also get some delicious mexican cuisine and a nice little tequila beverage, but honestly nothing compares to the crepes. Much love to everyone at Margarita Mix, you have earned the right to call yourselves crepists.

Snakes! Snakes Everywhere!

I've heard about Cobras & Matadors for a while, but until recently I had never made the trek. As you've probably figured out by now I really like to eat, and therefore the general theme of a tapas bar appeals to me greatly. Lots of different foods on little plates, spread out across the table with great goblets of wine everywhere is my dream come true. It makes me feel like King of the Little People, like I've stumbled upon the Keebler Elves' thanksgiving dinner table and I'm the guest of honor. There's something about the sheer number of plates that really makes it look impressive.

Anyway, in the past month I've had the distinct pleasure of dining at both locations (Los Feliz and right next to The Grove). We're going to take one second to discuss the ambiance and then get straight to the food. I think the menus are the same, but I don't specify where I ate what because I can't remember.

Okay, here's your quick ambiance thoughts because there is a ton of food to get to. It's great. Nice place to go with friends or a date. You feel hip, mysterious, and cultured all at once. You can BYOB to both locations, which is extra convenient given that the proprietor also owns a wine shop next door to each restaurant. When going to buy wine that you know nothing about, say something like "I'm really in the mood for a spanish red" but be prepared: knowing stuff about wine is one of those things that everyone fakes, so make sure you're the first one to make a generic fake comment or else you're going to look like a toolbag. Honestly, I would say the location on Beverly, next to the Grove, is a bit more intimate and better for a date, but what do I know I was probably drooling as the dishes were passing my table so I might not have been thinking clearly.

Now, In order to make this easier on everyone involved, I'm doing the food I sampled as bullet points. These are in no particular order, just what I remember eating, and everything will be given an appropriately cobra related score at the end of the entry (I do not promise that this scoring system will make sense, in fact I doubt it will).

The Cheese Plate: As has been covered in this space before, cheese plates and I have a long history. We've been friends, we've been more than friends, we've fallen out of favor and I feel like we're just getting back to that stage where we can grab a cup of coffee together and talk about the good old days. The cheese plate at Cobras may have pushed our relationship to the next level. It was mostly milder cheeses, which I prefer, although there was a bleu variety as well. Grapes and apples join the cheeses for a sweet touch, as well as an absolutely delicious olive aioli. This cheese plate made me want to get back together with cheese plates. Suffice it to say, even Indiana Jones would like this Cobra. It gets 7 out of 10 Indys.


Mushroom Paella: The texture and mouthfeel were splendid, but I feel like this was lacking in flavor a bit. I guess that's what you get when you order a dish that is primarily rice and mushrooms though, those two are just a tad more tasteful than Skinemax. Decent, but with all the flavorful dishes available here, why bother? I like this about as much as Mr. Miyagi likes the Cobra Kai. I give it 5 Danielsans out of 10.

Patatas fritas with aioli & mojo pican: Pretty standard roasted potatoes with some pretty stellar sauces. Makes a really good snack in between other dishes or a nice addition to some of the meats, but not a superstar. You can easily overlook these, but I don't think you want to. They're a nice addition to the meal. I'd say these are the one last snake that Sam Jackson doesn't notice and almost kills the witness in "Snakes on a Plane." I give them 6 crazy Sam Jackson faces out of 10.

Bacon Wrapped Prawns: Someone please try and find me something that wouldn't benefit from a little bacon wrapping. A twinkie? I always thought it could be a bit heartier. A woman? You would be paraded around the city like Clopatra if you strolled up and down LA in a bacon sarong. Christmas presents? You wouldn't have any waste from the paper scraps. The prawn is still a mystery to me. Is it a huge shrimp? Why isn't it just called a jumbo shrimp then? I doubt it's a whole new species, I just don't buy that. I do buy wrapping prawns in bacon however, and anything else for that matter. Even Rikki-Tikki-Tavi would have to agree with the Cobra on this one: 7 mongooses out of 10.
Fire Roasted Sobrasada: Allright, these are like little bites of chorizo on top of olive oil foccacia. Just a bite of deliciousness, there's no way to argue this. The concept of bread and meat together has been around for decades, and I'm not going to mess with it by making a crazy analogy here. I just can't disrespect the sandwich like that, even if it's open faced with crazy spanish sausage. I can, however, make you wonder where the hell I found a picture of a Snake Sandwich. These get 7 Snake Sandwiches out of 10.

Spanish Style Skirt Steak: Don't get me wrong, this was really really good. However, with all the delicious and dare I say more flavorful options available, why are you going for a skirt steak? If you're reaching into the more expensive options, go for the seafood paella, give that naughty girl a whirl. (Two notes: the most pricey dishes are in the 20s, whereas most things hover around 10-15 bucks. Also, I haven't tried the seafood paella, but given that the seafood was good and all the mushroom paella lacked was a little flavor, I'm guessing it's a knockout.) Anyway, yes the steak is good, but stop being boring. You're at a place called Cobras & Matadors, live a little. This dish gets the boring snake award. Only 5 of those idiot snakes from the jungle book out of 10.

Duck Confit Salad and Grilled Asparagus: I lumped these two together because I'm starting to run out of cobra themed ranking systems. Both meals are very good, but again they don't have the vibrant flavors you should seek out if you're only making one trip here. I'm going to say they're the enemy, because they stand between you and your true intentions: delicious little plates of spanish specialties. On your second trip, by all means sample these delights, but not before. As GI Joe says, now you know, and knowing is half the battle. These get 4 Evil Cobra Commanders out of 10.
Warmed Drunken Goat Cheese: Marvelous. Absolutely fantastic. This dish is served with bread, sherry poached cherries, and almond pesto. Share the love people, share it. Don't go ahead and jack all the pesto with the first bite and leave everyone without the full experience, because this is something to enjoy. Pile your little piece of bread high with cheese, cherry and pesto and indulge. This is one bite that is near perfect, much like the original American Gladiators, which featured the ever so oddly named Cobra: 8 Cobras out of 10.
Artichoke and Goat Cheese Croquettes: These things look like little mountains of goodness and do not disappoint. I don't know what goes into this process, but you end up with a bit of artichoke topped with warm gooey cheese all surrounded by some sort of gentle crispiness that holds it all together. If this croquette was a lady, she would have a firm moral base (the artichoke), a warm heart (the goat cheese), and a beautiful exterior with a bit of mystery (the crispiness). Morals, a heart of gold, and super hot with maybe some mystery? Where could we find such a woman, and is there anyway we could find a picture of her with a snake? I don't want to get greedy here, but could she be overexposed and kinda creepy as well? Awesome! The croquettes get 9 Angelina's out of 10.
Jamon Wrapped Dates: Hands down the best thing I ate in my two visits. Lets cover this process one step at a time. Dates start out okay. I got nothing for them nothing against them. I generally don't eat them because I avoid things with pits. If I get distracted by a firetruck or a pretty bird all the sudden I have a pit lodged in my throat. Not good. They've taken out the pit, replaced it with an almond. Great idea, I'm starting to like this date a little bit. Next, they surround that almond with bleu cheese and heat everything up so it's gooey and melty. Now we're talking folks. They've made this date a vessel for cheese and nut, something I always try and do with my dates. Click here, really fast, right now. Click here and push the red button. Don't read on until you've done this. I made a joke about dates and nuts, you need to click here. Finally, they wrapped this cheesy, nutty, datey goodness in some sort of chewy spanish bacon. The whole thing winds up being one bite of pure, unadulterated deliciousness. This is honestly the best Cobras has to offer in my humble opinion, and therefore it gets the best snake reference I can imagine. In the movie Escape from New York, Kurt Russell was a badass with a heart of gold, and his name was Snake. Jamon Wrapped Dates, you are badasses with a heart of nutty cheese, you get 10 Snakes out of a possible 10 Snakes.

Back to Work

Allright everyone, I know you missed me terribly and couldn't fathom going on without my wonderful insights into the culinary world, so here I am, back in action. Truth be told I had to do a little bit of my actual job for a while, which got in the way of all the eating and what not, but now I'm back with a fresh opinion on an old Santa Monica favorite: Father's Office.

I had the pleasure of visiting the original Father's Office on Montana a week ago for the first time. The first thing you run into, literally, is the bouncer who IDs you if you look young and asks you "Have you been here before?" no matter what your age is. My standard response to that question is "Yes" because I always hate the speech they give you about the history of wherever the hell you are and about how unique and special it is, but I guess I should have listend this time. Why? Well, I sat at a table for a solid 20 minutes before realizing you order everything at the bar. I would never expect the whole "order at the bar" thing, because everyone always raves about the food here, and usually fancy service accompanies fancy food. However, I suppose it is part of the charm of Father's Office that it doesn't take itself too seriously, and the service is faster this way, so I didn't mind it one bit.

Another big allure of the restaurant was the beer, as evidenced by their ever so subtle sign. The options on tap were extensive and exotic. Beers I had never seen in LA were suddenly at my fingertips; my options were limitless. I hadn't felt this free in a long while (not since I got out of prison, anyway). Beer also helps you get used to the atmosphere. Take the time to enjoy a couple before the meal starts (and keep your eyes open) and a table will surely open up. At times I'm told the jockeying for table space can get to be a little much, but as far as I was concerned there was ample space for everyone and tables were turning over in a timely manner. It's kinda like that Missy Elliot video where her and that dude are drinking Belvedere and all the sudden she looks like Halle Berry through the glass: everything looks better when you're viewing it through the haze of a little booze, so if at first it seems crowded and noisy, after a couple brews it'll seem lively and energetic. Don't run for the door quite yet, grab your beer, wait for a table, and prepare yourself for pure deliciousness.

Before we go too much further, there's a few things I should mention. I don't generally like onions. I think they taste odd and make your breath smell funny and as far as I can tell they don't cure cancer. I tend to avoid them. I imagine if I ever met an onion on the street it might step on the back of my sandal and pretend like it was an accident but everyone knows it wasn't an accident because there is no way to accidentally step on the back of someone's foot. Close talkers exist (and creep me out), close walkers do not. That is not an accident. Anyways, if you hate onions too, I understand, but you need to set aside your fear for a night. Trust me, we're going to get through this.

Back to the topic at hand. The staple of Father's Office is their burger, touted by many as the best burger in LA. I have not tried every burger in LA, but I will tell you this is one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. It comes topped with carmelized onions (it's okay, they're nice), some cheeses, and bacon, and in order to distance themselves from Burger King as much as possible, the folks at Father's Office have decided you cannot have it any other way. The names of everything were of course much fancier (bacon compote, gruyere etc.) but that isn't the point. As parts, there were some items involved that I didn't quite like, but as a whole it was marvelous. Remember onion haters (you too, bleu cheese detractors) You have to take everything in context: for daily use, a condom isn't really the best idea, but when you combine it with a willing partner and a bed and a desire to not get a disease or have a baby all the sudden it's the smartest thing you can do.

Anyways, back to the food. We sampled the beet salad and the fries, but all the other foods are the backup singers to the burger. That isn't to say they weren't good; the fries had a perfect consistency, exactly what you would want out of both crisp normal fries and barely chewy sweet potato fries. The beet salad was good I guess (I mean, come on, it was a fucking beat salad from a pub, since I didn't verbally abuse whoever ordered it I guess it must have been really delicious). Those guys are all the rest of the Jacksons though, and you came to seem Michael. A quick note though: there's no Ketchup. None. No where to be found. Everything is served with various sauces that go very well with the food, but if you're committed to ketchup, bring your own. I'm not saying it needs it, but if you ask Anne, my easily excited coworker, she will get excited and tell you all about how it's unacceptable for a burger place to be ketchupless. As she would say, "that's like The Hills without drama" or something like that. I would probably say "that's like The Hills without boobs" but either way we mean the same thing: it's like taking the best part out of The Hills.

So there you have it, my esteemed opinion of the Santa Monica legend Father's Office. Go grab a beer you've never heard of and eat a burger you won't forget, but do it quickly, before all the burgers turn white and their noses start falling off.

Straight thuggin' even after a half dozen Dodger Dogs...

As I teased last week, I had the pleasure of enjoying the Cubs - Dodgers playoff battle from the All You Can Eat section of Dodger Stadium. Now, as a Cubs fan, I was none too pleased with the results of the game. However, I'll do my best to set aside my feelings about the results of the game and instead focus on the cuisine I managed to eat in between fits of body shaking sobs.


First of all, I have never ever been more excited to see a sporting event ever. Thanks to the brilliant, attractive, and incredibly well dressed folks at Shortlist Reps for making it possible for me to see my beloved Cubs in the playoffs. What with Manny fever going around, it was a bit harder to track down tickets than I had supposed, and they really came through with the best tickets I could imagine. I had the same view as Carlos Zambrano. That's him right there, shaking his leg in disgust at the Cubs' play in the center of that photo, while to his right Kerry Wood watches the last few outs go by as he debates whether to bury his sorrows in Everclear vodka or Natty Light. This picture was taken sitting down in my seat. 10 feet from big Z, and all the hotdogs I could eat: it was heaven.


Getting back to the point at hand, I started the day with 2 Dodger Dogs, 2 popcorns, and a tall cool cup of diet pepsi. Now, loyal readers, I hear you all questioning the choice of beverage in your heads, but let's be honest: the food and soft drinks were limitless, the beer was incredibly limited and expensive. Any smart cubs fan, knowing that the night was most likely going to end with a depressing, sad loss, knows that beer just wasn't going to suffice. Naturally, I hollowed out my peg leg and filled it with a handle of Jack Daniels.


One inning, 2 Dodgers' runs, and half a peg leg later I was headed back to the concessions stand for a couple more hotdogs, some nachos, and the most peanuts you've ever seen. It's honestly the craziest experience ever. The vendors don't take any money and don't have anyone watching them, so you ask for a bag of peanuts and they hand you 17. I was eating peanuts like they were happy pills, like Jesus told me if I could eat more than an average circus elephant would in the same time that the Cubs would come back and win. Honestly, I was one more peanut away from being the first person sent to The Betty Ford clinic for addiction to a legume.


The final tally for the whole evening came to this: 7 Dodger Dogs, 3 orders of Nachos, one handle of Jack Daniels, seventeen thousand peanuts, and year 101 of misery for Cubs fans. The funniest part about the whole experience is that I didn't get drunk until 2 days later. I think the Dodger Dogs and Peanuts stopped my metabolism for a while, preventing the booze from having it's intended effect (convincing me that we'll win it next year).


Honestly, can you imagine what was going on in my stomach? I started hallucinating a bit after trying a few different combinations of the items (at one point I was eating a dodger dog dipped in nacho cheese and rolled in popcorn -- don't doubt me when I say I would try anything to get a Cubs victory). Anyways, in the midst of my hallucinations I saw my stomach, it was a beautiful bucolic plain, and then out of nowhere little weiner dogs wearing dodger shirts started running around everywhere. And it was surprising, but manageable, until this crazy old dude with a mustache showed up and started chasing the dogs. Out of nowhere giant peanuts were raining from the sky and waves of nacho cheese were washing everything away. Apparently my buddy Jack doesn't play well with others, and it didn't help that he was trying to herd Dodger Dogs while the apocalypse played out with Peanuts and Nachos in the stead of Fire and Brimstone.


The most amazing part of the night, however, was that I didn't get shot. Not only was I a Cubs fan in Chavez Ravine, but I had to make sure everyone knew it too. No, I wasn't loud and annoying, after all we were losing. I did however find an authentic, LA way to display that I was rooting for the Blue and Red team, not the Blue and White one. Tupacwouldda been proud of me. Too bad the Cubs and I are both starin' at the playoffs through our rearview...

I got some changes to make...

All right people, this day has been a long time in the making (about 1 month and 12 blog posts, to be exact). I have to change the general format of the blog. Don't worry, this isn't going to be a huge, I'm Britney Spears and I'm shaving my head overhaul, it's more like a modest, I'm Britney Spears and I'm going to start wearing panties when I get out of car overhaul. Small, unnoticeable difference really that makes all of our lives a lot better. So here's the deal...

Naturally, I'm going to continue to write about free food, because that's the whole point of this farce, to get more and better free food. But because we're not in post anymore and I'm not getting free food for every meal, I think I need to expand to all food. So here goes nothing. I'm thinking that I'll just review the previous day's highlights each morning.

Anyway, I have some catching up to do first. Last Friday I was at a lovely little audio house called Ravenswork, which has been mentioned here before. Lovely people, cool facility, professionals. The food is always good -- go for breakfast, they have these little quiches sometimes or bagel sandwiches, delicious. There was a new perk this time, and I loved it almost as much as I love a good peanut butter filled pretzel: car washers.

Now don't get me wrong, I realize there's a car wash on every block and they're none too expensive. This was no ordinary car wash. They washed my gear shifter. They vacuumed my trunk. They cleaned the inside of my windows. This was the most comprehensive car washing imaginable. Think about the dirtiest thing you could ever think of -- for me, that would be the toilet seat of an all you can eat Mexican restaurant after that fat dude from Lost was there. Now imagine that that was a car. These car washer people would have made it shine like Mr. Clean's Head. No joke.

Anyway, that's about all I got for now. Get ready to be amazed on Monday though: I'm sitting in the all you can eat section of Dodger Stadium tomorrow night, and I'm going to document it all for you. Jesus told me if I could eat more than 2 dozen hot dogs that the Cubs would come back and win the World Series, and when the J man challenges you to an eating contest, you don't say no.

Meat for Everyone!

I figured it out. I solved the global food crisis, and it's a lot better tasting idea than my Wendy's double the meat scheme. For those of you who didn't get the pleasure of hearing that ridiculous idea, it went something like this:

Wendy's used to let you double the amount of meat on your hamburger for a dollar. If you bought a classic triple and doubled it you would have 6 patties. But they didn't specify how many times you were allowed to double it. So another dollar, 12 patties. Another buck, 24. Thirty five dollars later, you were buying everyone in the world a beef patty. Granted, distributing them would be a bit of a challenge, but I just bought you a hamburger, you can come to me.

The problem with that idea, of course, is that not everyone likes Wendy's. I hear most Bolivians favor McDonald's and a majority of Tanzanians are Carl's Junior people. Are you serious Tanzania? Carl's Junior?!?

I then focused on buffets... There must be a way for me to sneak the world through an all you can eat buffet. A funny fake nose and glasses is good enough to get past the door lady, so we could rotate through like that, but I'm pretty sure when the same exact guy asks for his 47 thousandth slice of honey baked ham that the ham guy is going to realize something is up. You don't want to mess with a ham guy, trust me...

So then I stumbled upon a new phenomenon in eating: the Brazilian steakhouse. The one I visited was Brazzaz in Chicago, but I guess they're popping up all over the place. The set up goes something like this: you pay a ton of money to sit at a table and have different varieties of meat brought to you for your sampling delight. Filet, chicken wings, sausages, parmesan pork, spare ribs... Any meat your little heart desires, brought to you hot on a huge skewer and served by a man wearing funny pants.

The beauty of this is that there are literally dozens of these funny pantsed men running around with their big meat sticks, so a funny nose and glasses would have to work! And as long as we can keep someone overbearing and annoying at the table who also wants to help poor people -- I'm looking at you, Bono -- we can have someone yell and make a scene if they ever question the disguise, which is the perfect way to get a snooty restaurant to leave you alone. It worked for Ferris Bueller, it will work for us.

There's even a salad bar for those of you who don't like to eat meat. And if you don't like to eat the healthy vegetables or fruits, they have grilled pineapple, mashed potatoes, and fried bananas as well. Did you hear me, fat people? They have fried fruit! Have you ever, in your wildest food dreams, imagined a better way to tell Jenny Craig to fuck off?!?

In conclusion, the food is absolutely delicious, we have funny noses and Bono to get everyone in, and it's all you can eat. This plan is fool proof, so much better than the Wendy's plan. Now, the only problem we have is convincing those feisty Tanzanians that this option will be better than a Carl's Junior's Double Western Cheeseburger...