Ixtapa, Molinillos and Tequila Tunnels

This past week, Anson and I were invited to a fun little gathering of food bloggers and journalists at Red O Restaurant in Los Angeles to promote the upcoming Food & Wine Festival in Ixtapa Zihuatanejo. The event was hosted by celebrity chef Rick Bayless (who will also host the Food & Wine event) and the Mexico Board of Tourism. If you would like to get a feel for Ixtapa's beauty, check out my blogs from Food Blog Camp at Club Med last January. Ixtapa really is that tropical paradise you've been dreaming of on these dreary winter days.

Chef Rick Bayless from Red O, and Chef Victor Torres from Hotel Las Brisas in Ixtapa spoke about the cuisine of Mexico, which is as varied as regional cuisine is across America. It's not just rice and beans, despite what Taco Bell would lead you to believe! We snacked on some fresh mahi ceviché, corn and goat cheese tamales, and really good margaritas. We sat down later and shared duck taquitos, which were my favorite bite of the night.

Red O is a really stunning restaurant, I had a great time getting some details.  How about that tequila tunnel? I could barely drag Anson out of there.

We got a very sweet gift bag which contained these two items. Do you know what they are? It took me a second, but then my brain started spinning like a rolodex and I remembered a show where the host made hot chocolate in the authentic Mexican style using a molinillo, a whisk-like device that froths the hot chocolate. Simply heat some milk in a pan, add Abuelita  hot chocolate mix and spin the molinillo between your hands in the pan to create a froth. Authentic Mexican hot chocolate and you don't even have to grind your own cacao beans!

2010 In Review: Shooting From the Hip

When I got my Droid phone at the beginning of 2010 I found myself taking a lot more photos. Not the hurry-up-and-shoot-before-the-soufflé-falls kind of photos, but the pull-over-the-car-and-shoot-out-the-window kind of photos. Okay, I admit, there were a lot of "cute cat" photos mixed in there too. But I would often pull out my phone to just snap a photo of a moment, a place, a feeling, something to remember it later.

I discovered how much fun it is to take those quick impressions without putting too much thought into it. Don't worry about the soufflé falling, the ice melting or the light changing, just shoot. Capture the moment and move on. I practice this philosophy particularly on vacation when I don't want to get myself and everyone around me wrapped up in a photo shoot. Still, there was a lot of great stuff on my phone and I thought you'd like to see a little year-in-review from the perspective of my phone.  Enjoy, and don't worry, I left out the "cute cat" photos.

 (Clockwise from top left) Fourth of July hordes in Huntington Beach represented in bicycle; a rare sight--empty PCH; Palm Street, fittingly named; a salty dog at The Salty Dog; spring in Corona.

The Public House in Temecula; Colorado porch; Colorado front range; river in Golden, Co.; first rain of the season. 

San Francisco's China Town; Thanksgiving sunset at the beach; gondolier aglow in Sunset Beach; champagne in Paris (Las Vegas); Alex from Holland.

Sailing in San Diego with John.

Palm Springs for New Year's.