Dim Sum for Dim Dummies

I was most hesitant about the trip to Chinatown in the semester leading up to it in my Eating San Francisco class. Whereas all the other neighborhoods we visited were home to cuisines familiar to me, such as Mexican or Italian, the plan for Chinatown was to eat a brunch of Dim Sum, which I had never done before.

I'd been to Chinatown in the past, but mainly to the main tourist drag: through the Dragon Gate leading from Union Square area to Grant Avenue, which is lined with an endless array of souvenir shops. But I knew there was much more to this historic neighborhood than just cheap Buddha statues and paper fans and dragon-motived knick knacks.

A bit of online reading gave me a good sense of the history of this neighborhood. Chinatown actually started out as a ghetto for Chinese immigrants in San Francisco, when they began arriving in the 1850s in waves to work as cheap labor on the railroads or Gold Rush miners.

Americans soon began feeling hostile toward their new neighbors because they worked so hard for so little money and were coming in such an influx that jobs were at a shortage. Government began to enforce this discrimination with legislation such as the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.

Despite these restrictions, Chinatown continued to flourish as a hub for Chinese immigrants, with schools, churches and shops owned by Chinese people.


Nowadays Chinatown is somewhat touristy and Disneyland-ified (given an exaggerated theme to draw more visitors), but it is not all a facade. Between the crowded sidewalks full of Chinese shoppers stocking up on fresh groceries and store owners tending to their small shops and markets, peppered with lively conversations in Cantonese, I actually feel like I've stepped into another country when I walk around there.

When I went with my ESF class, we stopped at the Tin How Temple, a dim sum restaurant called New Asia Chinese Restaurant, and finally to the Golden Gate Fortune Cookies factory.


The Tin How Temple is the first Chinese Temple in the United States. Walking inside, up about four flights of narrow stairs and finally into a tiny room, it was a wonder that anyone could ever find this place. The room inside was filled with the fragrant smoke of incense and stung my eyes. A group of elderly Chinese women seemed to be running everything here. One very kind woman showed our class many aspects of the temple unfamiliar to us and taught us how to ask for a fortune. Turns out you don't just crack open a cookie. I enjoyed learning about the rituals observed in the temple, which were new to me.

Next was brunch. I was starving by this point! We crawled out from the dreamlike haze of the temple into the bright daylight, ready for dim sum. We were walking through streets I had never been on before and I began to understand that Chinatown is for more than the tourist trap I previously thought it was. Many Chinese-Americans perused the streets, doing their everyday grocery shopping or meeting for a meal. Most of them seemed to be meeting at New Asia like we were -- it was absolutely packed inside. It's always a good sign to see locals dining at the establishment you choose, which seemed to be the case.


The restaurant was a huge open room full of many round tables, each surrounded by many chairs, all of which were filled with hungry patrons. Weaving between the tables were waiters wheeling carts of small dishes meant to be shared by the groups.

Finally seated, food was instantly presented to us by some rather pushy servers. They would usually hold a dish out to us, expecting an instant reply of "yes" or "no." They had little patience for questions or hesitation. We seemed to be choosing randomly. I had no knowledge of popular dim sum dishes prior to this, but it seems we tried most of the ones other tables had, and a few others.

Over all I felt pretty overwhelmed by the dim sum experience. It was a bit stressful trying to be mindful of servers shoving food at you constantly and trying to decide if you wanted it or not. Being a somewhat picky eater, a lot of the dishes looked off-putting to me. I tried most and was often pleasantly surprised that I liked them. However, others I would rather not have tried. What I did enjoy most about the dim sum meal is that it was very interactive and made us focus on our food, discussing what we liked and what we should order next as a group.


We walked off our meal as we strolled over to the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie factory. Like the temple, it was tiny, located in an alleyway with a barely noticeable storefront. Inside we got to see fortune cookies being made, from flat discs made by a small machine and then folded in half with a fortune inside by hand. This process was mesmerizing to watch.

I was happy to have spent this day with ESF in Chinatown. It gave me a fresh perspective on the neighborhood that I thought was a mere tourist trap. It also gave me my first taste of dim sum, which I think, with more knowledge and experience under my belt, I will someday enjoy very much.

By the way, in my reading I found this fascinating account from a former chief of police Jesse B. Cook (1860-1938) where he describes Chinatown's sordid beginnings, which included gambling, prostitution, opium dens and gang wars. A fun and interesting read from a white man trying to keep the "Chinamen" under control, with some great old photos.

Cooking for my family

I've never been the cook in my family. Growing up, I was lucky enough to have a mother who cooked family dinners pretty regularly. I often sat on the opposite side of the kitchen counter watching her, but my older sister Lindsay was always the one to jump in and help. Lindsay developed all the essential cooking skills early on: how to best chop various vegetables, how long to cook different dishes, and what spices accompany different ingredients.

The more her skills grew, and mine remained amateurish at best, our roles became clearly defined. Lindsay and my mom would handle dinner, and I would be in charge of setting the table. Sometimes I would be trusted to prepare a salad, heat up rolls, or even make dessert, but preparing main dishes was pretty much off limits to me. *cue tear jerking music*

I've always envied Lindsay's ability to not only cook but enjoy doing so and experimenting with her dishes. She has made homemade Italian pasta, French crepes and various Thai and Indian cuisines. There is no dish that she is too intimidated to attempt. Also, she has been documenting her dishes for years, and there are probably enough photos of Lindsay's masterpieces to fill an entire album.

Last weekend I decided to follow suit and prepare dinner for my whole family: my mom, stepdad, sister, brother-in-law, and boyfriend. I chose to make enchiladas because they are tasty, and I could make them with meat or without for my vegetarian brother-in-law Phil. I documented the process to show how easy it was -- even a novice like me could whip them up easily. I didn't use a recipe, instead going by intuition. I documented the whole process.

With some pretty tasty ingredients before me, I felt excited but nervous to embark on this adventure: cooking a whole meal from scratch for my family.

I started by chopping and sauteing some fresh garlic. If there's one thing I know about cooking it's that fresh sauteed garlic can enhance almost any dish.

Next I browned the ground beef, tossing in some garlic for flavor. I also sprinkled on some cumin.

Now, time to prepare the cheesy spinachy filling. I microwaved two boxes of frozen spinach and drained the water very well.

I incorporated the spinach into a mixture of sour cream and cream cheese, sprinkling in some grated cheddar and jack cheese as well.

Now the fun begins! Assembling the enchiladas:

Step 1: Coat the baking pan with some canned enchilada sauce.

Step 2: Top a medium corn tortilla with desired fillings. In this case, spinach/cheese blend, enchilada sauce, and ground beef.

Step 3: Fold both ends of tortilla over and place in saucey baking dish.

Step 4: When dish is full'o'enchiladas, top with more sauce and sprinkle on some cheese.

Ta da! I baked for about 25 minutes in a 350 degree oven. Taking them out of the oven, they looked saucy, cheesy and gooey.

I heated up some black beans with more garlic and cumin and threw together a salad with tomato and avocado to accompany the enchiladas.

Alas! the final product:

I'm so glad to have made this delicious dish. I finally gained some confidence in my cooking skills. Sharing the meal that I prepared with my family made me feel like I was able to give back to the people I love. Also, my ability to cook a meal (main course, side dish and salad!) from start to finish was finally recognized... Victory!

What I ate today

Food is such an intrinsic part of life that virtually everyone has their own set of values and factors that influence what they will eat. Some people are vegetarians or vegans and avoid any animal products in their meals. Some people worry about what impact their diet is having on the environment. Some people eat a diet based primarily on what is healthiest, focusing on eating low fat or high in fiber or vitamins and minerals. Some people simply go by what tastes best and indulge their taste buds as desired.

My personal eating philosophy is kind of non-existent, other than trying to eat moderately healthily with very little time and money to spare. Being a college student, I think I do better than some (I don't eat Top Ramen EVERY day, though I do have it on hand), but I could certainly improve the sophistication of my diet.

Here is a typical day in the life of me. I find it impossible to separate what I ate from what I did in that day. What we consume has so much to do with our circumstances -- if we're out or at home, if we're busy or if we have the day off. Just a thought.

I rolled out of bed at 11 am yesterday. I had worked from 2 to 6 am the night before and could have slept til 1 or 2 in the afternoon if my alarm hadn't interfered. I had to get up to clean my room and then go down to the DMV to register my car. I didn't think to eat breakfast in my quasi-comatose state, but did have the strength to down a quick Five Hour Energy. I love these things.

Completely shameful. I don't know what's in these things. Supposedly it's like a shot of straight vitamins and a little bit of caffeine, but somehow I don't think I'd consider it a health food.

On my walk to the DMV I had to stop at the bank and while doing so, got a drink at the grocery store next door. It was a warm day out, I was parched, and my sleep-deprived one-track mind couldn't resist another drink that promised me increased energy.

Second drink of the day and still nothing to eat.

While I continued my walk to the DMV, I enjoyed the sunny day and sipped my Vitamin Water. I arrived at the DMV and finally registered my car. It expired in November of 2008 and it only took til March 2009 to register it! Success!

No, I didn't eat the registration tag. I was just really proud of myself for finally registering my car. Though I was getting pretty hungry by that point...

Like I said, I was getting pretty hungry by that point. My boyfriend and I felt like taking advantage of the lovely weather and decided to eat lunch outside at an adorable little place on Geary called Tony's Cable Car Restaurant (click to read my Yelp review). It's simple American comfort food, close to school and home, and has a fun outdoor seating area.

Don't know who Tony is but I love his little cable car shaped restaurant just a hop skip and jump away from USF.

At Tony's I ordered the classic hamburger and french fries. It was darn good. What I couldn't finish of my fries I fed to the lingering pigeons who were salivating over my lunch.

Time to go home. I went to put my registration tag on my car and very ironically found that I had gotten a parking ticket for expired tags! Really what are the odds.. really.

Ah cruel irony of the San Francisco Deptartment of Parking and Traffic: the day I register my car is the day you choose to spite me so?

Recovering from this tragic blow, I went up to my apartment and tried to maintain a positive attitude. I had to work on a big paper due on Thursday, so that kept me occupied for a while. I think I took a nap somewhere in there. I have no classes on Tuesday so it was a low-key afternoon.

At 8:00 I had a meeting for the Residence Hall Association, for which I am in charge of producing their newsletter called The Final Flush. Our president, Hoa, made delicious chocolate covered almonds that she chose to share with us, and which I neglected to photograph. Oops! Thanks Hoa!

9:15 and time for dinner. I trekked home and pulled out of the pantry a can of tomato soup, some bread and cheese. Voila! Grilled cheese and tomato soup.

No I'm not five years old. If you haven't eaten this since you were a kid, you should revisit it. It's quite the culinary combo I must say.

While my dinner may have lacked sophistication, it was tasty and easy. I devoured my meal happily, continued to work on my midterm paper, and fell into bed around 2 am.

And there you have it: A day in the life -- of me and my stomach.

For kicks I decided to evaluate my daily diet on a few of the different scales that the world wide web has to offer.

First I calculated the carbon impact of my diet using a calculator at EatLowCarbon.org

It's hard to read in this screen shot, but the site said I'd used 2,756 CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent) points in my day of eating. These came almost all from the hamburger I'd had at lunch, as the production of beef is incredibly taxing to the environment. My entire day of eating contributed about 4.4 pounds of carbon into the atmosphere. Eek!

Next I decided to track the healthfulness of my diet using MyPyramid.gov. I had to sign up for an account, enter my height/weight and what I ate for a day, and then it told me how I did nutritionally.
I don't think this was entirely accurate. I'm pretty sure I consumed more than 1119 calories and from the looks of this chart I'm practically malnourished, which is hardly a reality. Still if I took the time to do this more accurately an regularly, I would probably get a good sense of my overall health.

And that's the flipside to eating... There are always repercussions to the choices we choose. Who knew that even something as simple as deciding what to have for lunch has repercussions on our body and our earth's environment?

The woes of being an extremely amateur blogger

I don't know how many of you bloggers out there use StatCounter.com or a similar site, but it's really cool to check out. It's a service that shows you on a given day how many people have been on your blog, where in the world they're reading it, what page they entered on, how they found it (be it a link or google search, etc.) and even how long they stayed and what they looked at. All you have to do is sign up for a free account, embed an html code into your blog, and wait for the stats to pour in.

The stats depicted in this chart in no way reflect my own. This chart is taken from Google images from a blog or web site with over 30,000 visitors a month. I probably have around 150 visitors a month. If I'm lucky.

I have made a few interesting observations from this site, some good and some bad.
One surprising observation I made is that even when I am not blogging regularly (i.e. 99% of the time) I still get a fair amount of page views. This is pretty surprising because I really don't know who would be looking on my blog. Fortunately with StatCounter, I am able to see how and why they are finding it.

For example, one entry I wrote for my Digital Journalism class last spring is often searched on Google. It is about Makoto Hagiwara, the original landscape designer and maintainer of the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park. Through StatCounter I learned that many people were searching Google for information about him, and found my blog entry as a result. Very cool!
Sadly, I have also learned a harsh reality that many people who find my blog soon choose to turn around and leave before they even make themselves comfortable. A whopping 61% of visitors stay on my blog for less than five seconds. LESS THAN FIVE SECONDS!?!? Is it really that bad?

Ok, ok, so I won't take it personally.

I've chosen to use the information from StatCounter as inspiration to blog more often and about a wider variety of topics. Seeing that a random topic such as the Japanese Tea Garden could generate so many page views is inspiring to write and write and write some more! Write about odd and interesting things that no one else is writing about. Then more people will randomly stumble upon my blog, and who knows... maybe if it's interesting enough, they'll want to stay for more than five seconds.

The San Francisco Burrito

In food movies such as Big Night and Like Water for Chocolate, the preparation and consumption of food can symbolize everything from personal emotions to societal concerns such as class, ethnicity and gender issues. In real life, the foods consumed by a certain demographic or region can be meaningful as well. In the Mission District of San Francisco, the burrito is symbolic of the struggle of Latin American immigrants to maintain their traditional culture while fitting in to a new society and the sacrifice it takes to immigrate to a new country and work hard for a better life. Huh? Maybe a little background will help.

The San Francisco burrito is not traditional Mexican fare contrary to popular belief. Though small tortillas wrapped around meat and beans were served in Mexico as the first burrito, only in San Francisco did the burrito evolve into what most Americans recognize today. The defining features of a San Francisco burrito are an over-sized flour tortilla, stuffed with rice, beans, cheese, meat, salsa, and sometimes avocado, salsa, sour cream, onions, tomato, cilantro, etc. This basic concept has taken off in popularity and it is now standard to find a similar entree everywhere from Chipotle to Chevys.

The San Francisco burrito got its start when farmers in the Central Valley of California needed a cheap filling meal to give their immigrant workers on their lunch break. Most of these workers came from Mexico and Central America. The giant tortillas stuffed with hot, filling ingredients was just the right fuel to keep the workers going all day.

The rice and beans, are at the foundation of this. Rice and beans have long served as sustenance in the Latin American and Carribean cultures. The combination of the two are not only tasty but more importantly are incredibly dense in nutrtitional value, with fiber, vitamins, minerals, and when combined, form a perfect protein. This makes it the perfect basis for a filling and nutritious meal. When combined with meat, cheese and flavorful salsa, it is the perfect meal to fill you up and provide a tremendous amount of energy.

The burrito came to San Francisco as waves of Latin American immigrants came into the Mission District, replacing the Polish and Irish cultures that were dominant at the time with their own. The Latin American culture is still dominant today. With their taquerias and bakeries and churches and colorful murals splashed throughout the neighborhood, the Mission now has a strong Latin American influence. But stepping into the neighborhood isn't exactly like stepping off an airplane onto Mexican soil. It represents a fusion of the different cultures of Latin America all coming together in a diverse urban city. Likewise, the burrito is not a traditional dish from any one Latin American country, but it uses popular staple ingredients from the Americas, wraps them up in an all-encompassing tortilla, and serves them up to anyone and everyone.

To experience this cultural fusion, my Eating San Francisco class met in the Mission District last Wednesday at Balmy Alley, one of the premiere mural spots in the neighborhood. Murals and street art have been used in the Mission for decades to express political and social concerns of the Latin@ culture.

From there we headed to a taqueria just around the corner. I've probably been to at least 10 taquerias in the Mission, and I swear I've barely scratched the surface. This one, called Taqueria Vallarta, was new to me and I was excited!

The inside was kind of funky. There were murals all over the wall, and although done in the realistic style of Diego Rivera and other Latin American muralists, they incorporated modern imagery of local landmarks and athletes. Not exactly the kind of political message murals usually incorporate, but fun and colorful nonetheless.


The food was delicious, and they were extremely accommodating of our large group! Most of the group went with some form of burrito or chimichanga, but many also enjoyed the taco bar. I got my usual vegetarian burrito. I get this at almost every taqueria I step foot in, which may seem boring, but also gives me a standard unit of measurement for how much I enjoy each place. This one was excellent, with perfect ratios of beans, cheese and rice, all well seasoned.

After a wonderfully filling meal, the 18 of us migrated from 24th & Balmy to Mission Pie at 25th & Mission. Mission Pie is a place I had heard a lot about but never gotten around to visiting. It is a fabulous concept incorporating locally grown produce at Pie Ranch with students at Mission High who all work together to grow the food and cook the pies at Mission Pie.

Mission Pie is a cozy spot that I look forward to coming back to. Though I don't reccomend going with a group of 18 people, they managed to accomodate us and one of the Mission High students even came and told us about the ranch and the shop. Then we enjoyed our delicious pie... and mmm it was good.


All in all another successful ESF outing, full of good people, good food, and good learning.

Check out my Yelp reviews for more specific descriptions of the food and overall experience at Taqueria Vallarta and Mission Pie.

ESF does North Beach

This semester I'm in an exciting special topics class in the media studies department called Eating San Francisco. ESF is a class about food, cinema and the city of San Francisco taught at the University of San Francisco by Professor David Silver. Did I mention how much I love my major?

Our first unit was on all things Italian. We watched the film Big Night, about a pair of Italian brothers who own an Italian restaurant in the United States, and learned about the history of North Beach, the Italian neighborhood in San Francisco. To encapsulate all of our new learning, we took a field trip to North Beach... check out this video of all the sights we saw and the foods we ate!



Makes you hungry, doesn't it? Check back at my blog soon for posts about Mexican food in the Mission, LGBTQ culture and dinner in the Castro, Dim Sum in Chinatown, and more!!!

new gig

You're looking at the newest intern for High Speed Productions, Inc.

HSP produces three magazines: Thrasher, Juxtapoz, and Slap. Today was my first day, and I spent the entire time transcribing an artist interview that will appear in Slap. I may be developing carpal tunnel syndrom. But I couldn't be happier.

:)