Eva Restaurant

We went to Eva for their famous Sunday Dinner. It's a five-course, prix-fixe menu for $35 (including wine!) that changes every week.

Forgettable:

Pretty much everything was blah

Redeeming:

NUTELLA bread pudding!

We ended our lackluster dinner with a short walk down Beverly Blvd. That stretch of Beverly is truly an underappreciated neighborhood. It's charming, clean and bright, has impeccable boutiques and is flanked with really cute houses. Not to mention Milk and Susina just a stone's throw away! (But barely far enough from the worst place ever.)

As we were walking, we came across one of the funnest storefronts we've seen in a while.

Ferrero Gran Soleil

We picked up one of these things while in Sicily (you can see how it got beat up in our luggage).

There are all kinds of flavors, including limoncello, pistachio and hazelnut, but coffee seemed like a foolproof choice.

Without really knowing any Italian, we figured that it was some sort of dessert that you're supposed to freeze (it comes in room-temperature liquid form), invert and enjoy.

It'd been sitting in our freezer since the honeymoon by the time we decided to try it. We ripped open the packaging, inverted it over a dish and gave it a little squeeze.

Out came this shapeless, cold blob (upon Googling, we found out we were supposed to shake it before freezing). But it was smooth, creamy and heavy with espresso - a hybrid between ice cream, affogato and flan.

It was a great dessert, but an even better souvenir and escape back to some great memories. We can't wait to go back, load up our suitcases and try this again the proper way!

Laker Love

No one is a Lakers fan like J is, so it was only natural that he'd attend Monday's parade.

After taking this...

And braving this...

To see this...

It was time for lunch!

Ramen from Daikokuya in Little Tokyo

Now that's the taste of victory!

Happy Father's Day!

If there's anything our Asian families have taught us, it's to celebrate with food!

Saturday night, we cooked for our parents and served up lots of grilled goodies:

The grilled chicken, shrimp, t-bone steak, asparagus and mushrooms were just the beginning...there were like 5 other dishes and a homemade flan for dessert!

Sunday, E's mom laid out a delicious spread -- including amazing homemade pate and pickled veggies -- for DIY banh mi.

The food was awesome, but not as awesome as our dads.

Simple Pleasures

On Friday we visited Restaurant 2117, which touts itself as an Asian/European fusion restaurant that uses all-natural ingredients.

We started with some rolls that were really hard -- almost cold...

Then shared some tapas...

And J had a Kobe-style Japanese meatloaf.

The creamy goat cheese and mushroom small plate was our fave, but nothing really stood out. not that it was bad -- it just wasn't great. Everything looks way better than it tasted.

We left satisfied but slightly disappointed. Our ambivalence quickly turned into excitement, however, when we saw this:

A grand convention of food trucks we hadn't yet tried!

There was the particularly intoxicating scent of greasy saltiness wafting from this one:

So we decided to make up for our blah dinner with an indulgent "dessert:"

These fries were amazing. Crisp but not greasy, and pure in their potatoey flavor -- no fancy batters, seasonings or fussy organic Asian fusion-ness needed!

Wannabe Power Snack

Jamba Juice had this great special, so we got smoothies for ourselves and three of our closest friends.

Who are we kidding? There were no friends. Only us. That's right, we got five smoothies (one per flavor) for two people.

No, we didn't finish them -- we wanted to sample each one and find our fave. Unfortunately, it was hard to figure out which flavor was which, since they all pretty much looked the same and had confusing names. Berry Yumberry, Super Yumberry, Acai Super-Antioxidant, Pomegranate Pick-me-up, Pomegranate Paradise? Nice job, marketing team.

We found that the one in the center was gross, the orangey ones were more tart and the darkest one had an interesting flavor.

Now we totally know what to order next time.

Wannabe Power Lunch

Last Saturday, it was a progressive lunch. Today, it was a power lunch!

Or not. More like a poseur lunch. Very sad.

We aren't good about doing lunch - individually, or together. Even though we work across the street from one another, we spend lunchtime chained to our desks. The closest thing we've had to a lunch date is J dropping off E's half of a $5 footlong from Subway. So romantical.

Today we did a little better, though, picking up some sandwiches from nearby Clementine. Love their seasonal menu and exquisite ingredients!

E's Summer Cucumber sandwich - "with luscious cream cheese spread and radish sprouts on potato dill bread"

This was how they wrote E's sandwich and name...LOL

J's Chicken Chipotle sandwich - "with grilled chicken breast marinated in smoky sauce, with cilantro slaw and creamy avocado dressing on semolina bread"

Unfortunately, we had to wolf down our noms and rush off to an errand. But this won't be our last attempt at a lunch date. Someday we'll get it right -- maybe over the ultimate Century City power lunch at Craft. ;P

A Progressive Lunch

We found ourselves starving in OC on Saturday so we decided to have a few light,  healthy nibbles for lunch.

It started with hot dogs...

,,,And ended with chips and tacos.

Just a little snack!

A Love Fat Danger Dog

In honor of the playoffs, which we've been following religiously (one of us moreso than the other...we'll let you guess who), we made our own version of the infamous Danger Dog -- because it's as LA as our beloved Lakers. 

Here are the components of a typical Danger Dog that you would find being hawked from an illegal street cart a few blocks from any given sporting event, concert or club:

• Really low-quality hot dog wrapped in bacon
• Onions and peppers caramelized in the bacon grease
• Mayo
• Ketchup and mustard
• Hot dog bun

The Love Fat version is VBW-friendly (since it's a weekday and all) and doesn't have a trace of The Enemy (mayo):

• Seafood sausage from TJ's
• Onions and peppers caramelized in olive oil
• Homemade tzatziki
• A piece of naan
• A dash of hot sauce

Our Love Fat Danger Dog was good, but nothing's quite like the taste of victory...something we weren't able to savor this particular night. :(

Pan-fried Trout

J loves trout -- from the perfectly composed trout almondine he splurged on at Bouchon, to the whole trout his mom simply wrapped in foil and steamed over a campfire during childhood trips to Tahoe.

Our version was just a couple of fillets rubbed with a chili and herb pesto (made from the least wilted of last week's herbs), and fried skin-side down in a bit of olive oil.

Not the best we've ever had, but a quick, easy and light dinner...somewhere in between Thomas Keller and a campfire.

Mom Food

Our moms are the best. They are truly loveable, talented and amazing women who also just happen to have mad cooking skillz as well...how lucky are we??

After a recent visit, J's mom sent us home with an awesome party favor:

Boneless, skinless Atlantic cod steamed with mushrooms, aromatics and glass noodles...AHHH OMG

So we did what we do best:

We cuoned it!

YUM. Thanks, Mom!!!

Mud Love

Last weekend it was three kids. This weekend, it was 6.2 muddy miles at the Camp Pendleton Mud Run. With all the craziness going on, we had crammed 10 weeks' worth of conditioning into 10 days, and our training culminated in a pre-race carb fest Friday night.

We had every intention of eating a healthy, low-fat, carb-heavy pasta dinner. But being Love Fat and all, it turned into way more than that:

Bread, burrata with marinated veggies, meatballs and calamari

Oh, and some pasta, too...

Oooops...this is definitely not healthy runner food. 

But when it was time to step up to the plate, we cast aside any doubt and faced the challenge head-on. We mustered up our courage and powered through the whole thing. And loved every minute of it.

Oh, and we finished the Mud Run, too.

*Thanks to our good friend and Mud Run Queen A for the pic!