Day 4: Rockies, Train to Denver, Dim Sum & Ping Pong

After saying our goodbyes, we left Glenwood Springs with amazing memories. We were on the road for only a couple of days, but it already felt like we were on a vacation going around for weeks. During the 6 hour train ride from Glenwood Springs to Denver, we were lucky to enjoy the magnificent views of the Rocky Mountains ands run into John and LJ who have been living in the Denver area for a long time. John recommended the Colorado History Museum and the Modern Art Museum in Denver. He also really recommended that we take the B bus that goes to Boulder, Colorado. At this point of the conversation, LJ joined in. She suggested several amazing places to eat and even was kind enough to say that should would drive and take  us around if she wasn't working :) She just loved Bolder. The more recommendations John gave about places to eat, the more obvious it became that he was a huge foodie. It turned out that he was actually a pastry chef himself! 

He suggested a restaurant called ACE, which was close to the place that we booked over Airbnb.  Apparently the place serves Asian comfort food such as Dim Sum and had a great ping pong area. What a marvelous combination! So this place stood out from their several suggestions, and we decided to go there tonight. We also couldn't turn down John and LJ's offer to drop us off to ACE from the train station. Such an awesome couple! 

Either way, after having some amazing pork belly bun, crispy shishito peppers & Brussels sprouts with lime mayo and pork & ginger shumai as small plates, we moved on to the Kung Pao pork loin. Everything was very original and tasty. We were really looking forward to the ping pong portion of the dinner, but were not able to play due to a private ping pong party going on this Tuesday night. 

Also following John's recommendation as a pastry chef, we walked for 10 minutes down 17th street with all our stuff to The D Bar. It was very cold outside and we were already full, but I insisted to give this desert place a shot. After seeing the menu, I lost control and ordered both "Nola" - a brioche bread pudding with brandy butter sauce, cinnamon ice cream and port soaked raisins, and the legendary "cake & shake", which was a huge piece of rich awesomeness as a 3 layer chocolate cake and a fresh and tasty vanilla milk shake on the side to accompany and ease the richness of the desert. Wow! You can imagine how well we slept that night :)

Day 1: Tahoe, Truckee & Reno

Spent the first day in the warm California Zephyr heading to Chicago, while the weather was getting worse and worse outside... Passed through Sacramento and got to Tahoe when it really started snowing and stirring up the weather.

Climbing our way to Truckee and the to Reno, it was getting late and the temperature was dropping below 0 F.

Then came the time when the lights were turned off to shift to the sleeping mode in the train.

Apart from waking up every half an hour or so to change into another weird body position, I woke up when the train slowed down in the middle of a huge flatland in Nevada, where all you can see is snow and the half moon. No hills, no plants, no roads, just flat land with a white frosting...

However the speed was unexpectedly slow.  Soon enough, the conductor of the train announced that due to the extreme weather conditions they lost connection with the main station, and therefore reduced their speed to 10 mph... At this speed, it would take us 3 days just to get to our first stop -Glenwood Springs, Colorado!

Within an hour, the connection was re-established: we were back to normal speed and I was back to sleep. 

Leaving SF

So the journey begins... After cleaning up the house and packing until 5:30am, "sleeping" for and hour, then getting up at 6:30 to catch the Amtrak bus from the Ferry Building, our long journey east begins with a beautiful sunrise :)

Quail egg ravioli

here is a simple delicacy.... caramelize the onions, on a fresh sheet of pasta, put some chèvre cheese, some caramelized onions, and the quail egg yolk. Top with a touch of fresh ground black pepper and seal it with another sheet of pasta. Cut into the shape you desire and boil for <2 mins... Top with some parmesan and good to go.

 The runny yolk when you cut through the ravioli with your fork really adds a lovely texture to the dish :)

Feta & dill börek

Here is an unorthodox way of making a typical Turkish pasty. It is normally baked, however cooking it over cast iron pan gave it a very nice crispness and smokiness...

feta, dill, milk + filo dough

Salmon (鮭 Sake) Sashimi

Especially when I was working in Livermore, CA, I used to stop by the Asian market after work before taking BART back to San Francisco and would grab some salmon, seaweed salad and noodles to overdose on raw salmon... what more can you ask from a regular week night :) 

sashimi grade salmon, soy sauce, wasabi + ginger

hello world :)

here is the first little blog post with a photo from one of my favorite places in the world! the afternoon fog was definitely a nice touch... 

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