Ugly Christmas Sweater

It’s amazing the things Dad will do to spend time with his girls.  This year on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, I would have gone shopping at the mall to be with Dana, but she would rather hunt for ugly Christmas sweaters needed for an upcoming ugly-Christmas-sweater party.  So instead of the Mall, we went on the hunt at used clothing stores.  We started at the Goodwill and found nothing.  People must be wearing all of them still.  However, we hit pay dirt at “In Your Wildest Dreams” downtown where there was an entire rack of ugly Christmas sweaters to choose from.  Most time on these shopping trips I can find something for myself, even if it’s a used book.  This time I found the most awesome “like new” silk shirt that would have been perfect for Tony Soprano or Pauley Walnuts.  Check it out in the picture.





Truffle Fries at the Padre



Ugly Christmas Sweater







All this high intensity shopping makes us hungry and thirsty.  So after Dana scored ugly Christmas sweaters for her and Charlie and I walked out wearing a totally cool Tony Soprano shirt, we were ready for some grub and adult beverages.  Say Hello to Padre Hotel just across the street. 

Destination….. Fries

Can French fries be so damn good that they are destination worthy?  I’m not talking about McDonalds or In-n-Out or fast food fries.  I’m sure most people have their favorite.  My favorite fast food French fry is none at all.  As a rule, I don’t eat fries or fast food.  But since rules are meant to be broken, I can say that I like Chick Filet, an occasional John’s Burger and the Mexican food at Rancho Grande Market and Vallarta Markets.  My favorite fast food is still the lengua tacos at Gabby’s taco truck that parks at Contractors Road, Entrance D, off highway 33 in the middle of the Belridge oilfield.  Made with 2 of the full size corn tortillas, heated with a little oil on the grill so they are hot and soft, they are full of meat and taco garnish, I haven’t had tacos this good in Mexico.  And they have the best salsas and pico de gallo to dress them up with.  The pico do gallo is chopped jalapeno and cilantro, heavy on the jalapeno.  There is a green avocado salsa and hot red salsa also.  I have enjoyed many impromptu tailgate and open-trunk lunches.  For variety, and since they don’t always have lengua, I often order the cabeza or tripas tacos.  The carne asada can be a bit gristly and the chicken is common and bland. 

The appetizer menu at the Padre Hotel has Truffle Fries for $8.  They are the best fries I can remember having anywhere.  They are made to order, so they are hot, crispy and tossed in truffle oil, garlic and fresh grated parmesan cheese.  They are served in a cone-shaped basket or can you can upgrade a burger to include the truffle fries.   After our shopping success, we ordered the Truffle Fries and Mimosa’s. 

Rodriguez

At the Flicks at the Fox, our favorite movie entertainment where we see international films during the fall, winter and spring, we got a great tip that the Maya Theater downtown is showing international films on Wednesday nights at 7:00 PM.  We recently saw the movie “Searching For Sugarman”. 

http://www.sugarman.org/

1970 was my era in pop music.  And I had never heard of Rodriguez.  He never made it in the US, but was a superstar in South Africa.  The movie is a great documentary of his story and music.  I highly recommend seeing the music for the story and to sample the music from 1969 and 1970.  It’s like a blend of Jose Feliciano and Bob Dylan.  The lyrics are haunting:  

“Cause they told me everybody’s got to pay their dues and I explained that I had overpaid them”

And the digital quality of the instrumental’s are great. 

If 1969-1971 music meant anything to you, you owe it to yourself to check out with you missed. 

Wine Review… Varozza Vineyards

32 years ago as a mud engineer, when I was working on gas wells in Rio Vista, I had colleagues working on the geothermal wells in just north of Napa.  I heard that the wells and power plants are scattered all over the mountains and for 32 years I have wanted to visit The Geysers.  I have friends that have worked on the sulfur filter presses at the Geysers that they make for removing sulfur from the H2S process.  Now with Fiberspar I thought that The Geysers could use our corrosion resistant line pipe.  I got contacts from my friends and located the facilities engineering manager.  I got a good response from my phone calls and e-mails and made an appointment to do a lunch and learn presentation on Fiberspar.  They have a tremendous display in the lobby of the main engineering building that explains the history and technology in making power at the largest geothermal production facility in the world.  And there are wells and power plants scattered over the mountains and valleys.  It was a great day in learning about geothermal power and I got a personal tour of the field from the manager of engineering.  We concluded with lunch and my presentation on opportunities for Fiberspar composite line pipe.  They do have some applications where the run 1-2 miles of 3 inch pipe for draining brine condensate from the steam that is produced from the wells.  It’s a 2 day trip to make this call.  And there are 2 ways to get to the remote town of Middletown, CA, the nearest town to The Geysers main offices.  One way is from I-5 north of Sacramento and one way is from Napa Valley. 

http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Calpine+Geysers&qpvt=Calpine+Geysers&FORM=IGRE

By chance, a few weeks earlier, I got a pop -up ad on Facebook from Varozza Vineyards.    Their website said they are a small family producer in Napa Valley and barrel age their wine for 3 years and bottle age for 2 more years.  I contacted the winery and asked for an appointment for the afternoon after my presentation at The Geysers.  The Varozza winery, just north of St. Helena, is a historic stone and wood winery built in 1885 and has been owned and operated by the Varozza family since 1913.  I got a great education from the owner, Dianna and tasted their 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon and Petite Sirah.  The wines were both bold and big on concentrated fruit flavor with a rich nose.  The 2008 Pitite Sirah, only 150 cases produced, was my favorite and priced reasonably at $40.  You can read with I think of a lot of Napa wines in my previous blog on Napa.  Varozza is a great find for the discriminating wine lover. 

However, with our Christmas rib roast, I am having the black label Pentimento by Le Cuvier.  But I look forward to having the Varozza Petit Sirah with a juicy steak and tomato pie this summer.

http://varozzavineyards.com/

Tulare

 

Today I met an engineer for lunch at Champs BBQ in Bakersfield.  He was on a project at the Shell Pipeline Station across from the airport.  I enjoy remembering and sharing good times and experiences with people.  You never know how we are all connected in this business, even across generations.  I mentioned how I worked with so-and-so in 1995 at that pipeline station.  I was providing Plasite and Briner coating to coat the big storage tanks and high- temp silicone to paint the large crude oil heaters.  The heavy crude needs to be warm enough for flow through the lines to L.A. and S.F.  There are multiple stations with tanks and heaters on the long routes.   My client was in Bakersfield to inspect my Fiberspar pipe and connectors that was purchased for some new pipelines in the Carson/Long Beach area he has been working on. 

My companion’s Champs burger looked really good as always, but I don’t eat burgers much any longer.  It looks like a great bun and the large Angus patty is hand shaped.  I ordered my usual meat salad.  The Champs salad includes choice of meat on romaine lettuce, blue cheese and a great chipotle, lime vinaigrette and a small corn muffin.  I like to add the sweet and spicy BBQ sauce to the salad for additional flavor.   It’s a great salad, but the tri-tip, although cooked to my preferable medium/medium rare, had a few pieces with grizzle hidden in it.  And as I was busy trying to eat while relaying stories of places and people he knew, from a time when my guest was a toddler, I had to nonchalantly spit hunks of chewed grizzle into a napkin.  He seemed interested in that I used to work on projects with the Shell engineer that he only knows of as a sort of legend and is too busy to ever meet.  I’ll scan and send a technical bulletin that I found about this same plant and corrosion engineer that I wrote in 1995 when he used my products.

In asking my client about his business trip and telling my old-school stories that these young people probably hate, I learned of his staying over last night in Tulare.  I commented, “That’s a weird town isn’t it?  I remember making sales calls in Tulare 25 years ago.  I sold water filter skids and instrument air dryers to the Haagen Dazs ice cream plant in Tulare.  And in downtown, there is a huge Dairyman’s Co-op.  I would sell filters for the milk bottling plant.  That plant bottles milk, cheese and yogurt for the entire West Coast.  The stainless steel milk trucks are lined up to get in and unload all day and night.”

One day selling filters for the sterile water and air that is used in the milk bottling operation, I got a chance to see the process and consult on using the filters.  In putting on the white lab coat, hard hat and hair net, I was having a hard time getting the hair net over my head.  The guys started laughing at me and I asked what was so funny.  They said, “That’s the beard net.  You need to put that over your mustache.”  I can’t think of any food or beverage processing plant that ever smells good.  Even wine and beer plants can smell bad from the fermentation.  But a milk plant is the worst.  And to get to the bottling room we walked through the yogurt room where they made yogurt in 5’ by 20’ open tanks.   Remember how your baby’s spit-up smells?

My favorite story from Tulare is from when I was selling ultra-high purity filters to a small business that made a very high value serum for use as a growth medium in bio-tech labs.  I got a lead from Pall Corp. that this company in Tulare is making fetal bovine serum.  The most high purity and valuable serum made.  Bovine serum is valuable and fetal bovine serum is a higher level of purity coming from the fetus.  It needs to be filtered with 3 stages of 0.1 micron filters.  And the most high tech process filtration company I was selling for is all excited about this great high tech company in my territory.  I was mostly an oilfield process guy and spent 90% of my time with oil, gas & produced water processes.  So I did not know what to expect and I took our technical specialist familiar with bio-tech applications with me.

On my first appointment, the serum guy tells me, “The building is just off the 99 Fwy behind the glass and mirror store on the right.  You’ll see the dry ice sign.  That is us”.   The only building was a concrete block bunker with no windows and no address.  There’s the dry ice sign. That must be it.  I open the door and this waft of smoke and tiny white flies pours out of the door at us like it’s been bottled with positive pressure.  Greeting me was a messy desk with fast food remnants on it and old stale coffee cups.  The owners, Ross and Randy stood there looking at us as I am waving my hand across my face to clear away what I realized are not tiny white flies, but cigarette ashes and smoke filling the room.  Ross was a great tall slim man that reminded me of the Rifle Man, (Chuck Connors) after 40 years of smoking.  And Randy was a short sloppy man with a beer belly and shabby cloths.  I recall to myself, Tulare is a fucking weird place. 

In the room to my right, the size of a living room, there were centrifuges the size of washing machines lining all the walls and a row down the middle?  And next to the door was a large freezer filled with blocks of dry ice. I know because a customer came in to by some dry ice while we were there.  My colleague and I are looking at each other like, “What the hell kind of place is this?”  It’s supposed to be an ultra-high purity fetal bovine serum plant. And we’re trying to sell them the most premium filters that cost $400-$500 each?   We got to see the filtration process and the production operation.  It was a little room in the back with a little filter stand and stacks of 1 liter glass bottles full of serum in a refrigerator.  The fetal bovine serum was probably worth thousands of dollars per liter.  These old coots are rich.  I think they were rich because they were using cheap-ass filters instead of the high dollar ones were have to sell.  This is going to be a tough sell, but they could buy $5K per month in filters in this dump.  And I have a sales goal to sell this high purity line.  So I persisted.

We gave our song and dance and I remember eventually selling, or giving, them some filters to try.  I remember after getting to know Ross and Randy, I asked Randy one day, “How did you ever get into the fetal bovine serum business?” 

He said his PhD brother at USC mentioned that he needed fetal bovine serum for the lab.  There is a short supply and it’s really expensive.  And Randy had a friend that worked in a slaughter house in Paso Robles.  So he contacted his friend to ask if he could help.  Randy explained that cow fetuses are really hard to come by.  At the slaughter house, they do not want to slaughter a pregnant cow.  It’s a real mess to deal with.  But if you are in need of fetal blood, that is the place to look.  Sometime a pregnant cow is unknowingly slaughtered.  Randy’s friend would call him and he would head to Paso Robles and bleed the fetus of its blood and take it back to Tulare.  The blood from the fetus is more pure because it’s naturally filtered and protected from antibodies and all the biology stuff that I forgot from high school. 

“What’s with all the centrifuges and dry ice?”  I ask.  The blood is centrifuged to separate the serum from the red blood.  He explained, “We didn’t have much money back then and we could not afford new centrifuges.  We searched all over for used centrifuges.  (How did one find a centrifuge without the internet 25 years ago?)  We would buy whatever we could and fix them up.  Pretty soon we had lots of them and we would sell the one’s we didn’t use.  So we got into the refurbished centrifuge business.  And when we got orders for serum, we had to ship it with dry ice.  We were buying so much dry ice we eventually started selling it and got into the dry ice business.  It’s great for Halloween parties”.

On a following visit to Tulare, I stopped by this thriving empire to see my buddies.  Ross was there alone with an office clerk.  I asked about Randy and learned he had recently passed away.  I was sad but not surprised.  And I was not surprised that Ross was still chain smoking like a chimney.

Great steak topping:  crumble some blue cheese with chopped garlic, butter and olive oil.  And the money part, add some chopped roasted pecans.  It is great on top of your favorite steak.

Great new wine discovery:  I got a hit on facebook (someone is monitoring us).  It was an ad for Varozza Vineyards in Napa.  I checked out the web site and saw that they are an ultra small winery and that they barrel age for 36 months and bottle age for 18-24 months.  I was going to the geothermal geysers for a sales call and made an appointment on the way back.  They sell most of the grapes they grow in the heart of Napa but make 125 cases of cabernet sauvignon and petite sirah.  Both were great but the petite sirah had the edge.  It’s massively full bodied and wonderfully balanced after all the aging and dark like octopus ink.  I can recommend it at $40/bottle.

http://varozzavineyards.com/

Bill Lee vs. Great Castle

After 3 months in Drilling Fluid School in Houston, I came to Bakersfield as a Mud Engineer in 1981. It was the first Monday in January, cold and foggy.  I was assigned to a deep well being drilled just north of Taft Highway in the North Coles Levee field for ARCO.  I remember trying to find the rig in the dark fog, not being able to see the lights of the rig and I had to stop my car, rool down the windows and listen for the diesel engines roaring, the draw works whining and the pipe and tongs clanging, so I could figure out which dirt road to turn on.  Bakersfield was a lonely town to a single young man of 25 in a strange town back then.  Since my life is about finding comfort in food, I found a few restaurants where I felt comfortable, friendly people and good food.  La Cabana had a restaurant on Oak Street and Truxton.  They had great menudo on weekends and chorizo con juevos like at home.  And Mossmans had a comfortable restaurant on Brundage that was kind of homey.  I also found Bill Lee’s for a hot Chinese meal.   I recall the waitress, Helen.  She was middle-age in 1981 and I used to ask for her table.  Maybe she reminded me of my Mom.  Bakersfield was not so lonely after Betty joined me in Bakersfield in April. 

My favorite meal at Bill Lee’s was the Wo Won Ton Soup.  A beautiful clear broth loaded with shrimp, chicken, pork, vegetables and won tons; it is great on a cold winter night in Bakersfield.  Eventually, I discovered the Hong Shew oysters and it became my new destination dish.  I ordered it every time we visited on New Year’s Eve when we took the girls out on our anniversary.  The dish is an exotic mix of fried oysters, mushrooms, bamboo shoots, green onions and ginger root in tasty oyster sauce.  The dining room has been remodeled over the years and they have kept the hand carved wood panels.  The carpeting in the dining room makes for a nice quiet dining room and the staff is always friendly and inviting.

 

Overall Bill Lee’s is a Bakersfield classic and a nice dining experience.  Most of the dishes I have tried are like old school Americian/Chinese food made for a mid-west palette that is kind of plain and bland with lots of noodles and rice.   For more authentic Chinese food in Bakersfield, if there is such a thing, I now prefer the Great Castle on Union Avenue.  The dishes are more robust in flavor with some really spicy dishes that I love, like the crispy garlic beef and hot and spicy eggplant.  And the walnut shrimp is as good as advertized.  Everyone should have a favorite Chinese Restaurant.  And in Bakersfield, the options are limited, especially now that Grand China on Ming and Real has been closed for a few years.  The family reopened in Hong Kong in Chester Ave, but it’s not quit the same since the owner/chef that passed away is not there.

Try the Hong Shew oysters at Bill Lee’s and try the walnut shrimp at Great Castle and find your favorite.

The Ultimate $7.00 steak dinner – a good summer for tomatoes.

To my blog fans, I apologize for not providing my usual standard of entertainment recently.  However, I have not been inspired enough to share any dining experiences until tonight. 

I have obtained the status of “Maintenance” at weight Watchers.  And I have to maintain my “goal weight” for 4 more weeks so I can become a life time member.  To me this means that I will not have to continue paying $42 per month to weigh in.  This losing weight is a piece of cake.  I’m down 30+ Lbs and continue to reduce.  I am thinking that I will try to hit 199 Lbs.  I obtained a note from my Dr. that says 210 Lbs. is a healthy weight for my frame.  From 240 Lbs, it’s been a great journey.  I have lots of tips and recipes that have helped me to get to this point.  Maybe I’ll share my experience and recipes in a separate edition.  Basically, it’s classic, eat less and exercise more. 

BJ’s Brew House revisited:  I was inspired by a horrible luncheon experience at BJ’s Brew house on Stockdale Highway to start my Food and Wine Blog over a year ago.  (See my first blog post in the archives)   I tried BJ’s again for lunch and had a very pleasant experience and I got my salad and it was good and everything was fine.  I have to comment that BJ’s is a bit more pricy than my favorite luncheon spots.  My favorite lunch spots are the Salads at Tahoe Joe’s, Steak and Grape, Champs Bar-b-que and the Elephant bar.  I was at the Elephant Bar with customers recently and I wanted a salad with salmon.  I was treated to a side salad with an entree size portion of glazed salmon.  It cost $15.00.  It was a great low cal. meal that the waitress was gracious enough to put together for me.  The luncheon salads at Tahoe Joe’s are fantastic for $9.95.  And the seared salmon salad at Steak and Grape is a great meal for $13.95.  The salads at Champs are beautiful with your choice of bar-b-q meat on top.  Champ’s has a light and flavorful vinaigrette dressing.  I like to squirt their bar-b-q sauce over the top also.

The picture below is my Ultimate $7 steak dinner.  On my way from dropping Betty off at the airport this morning, I stopped at Albertsons to load up on fruits and vegetables.  I picked up a Manager’s Special rib-eye for about $6 (this means it’s old and ready for quick sale.  To me, it’s been aging in the meat case).  The portabella mushroom was $1. The tomato and basil are out of my garden.  The wine is out of my wine cellar.

I trimmed the steak of excess fat.  And I stuffed some small garlic cloves into the fat that is found in the middle of all rib-eyes.  I make my own seasoning blend and applied it generously to provide sweet, salty and spicy flavor to both sides of the steak. 

On the side I sautéed the portabella in garlic-olive oil, soy sauce, wine and spices.  This cooked down and the liquid reduced to offer amazing flavor to the steak.  I have started keeping garlic-olive oil available for everyday dishes.  I dice 4-5 cloves of garlic and add a cup of olive oil to marinate with the garlic.  The oil has great flavor that is awesome on meats, popcorn and salad dressings. 

Pop-Corn?  For a great after dinner treat, I make pop corn in the microwave.  Add ½ cup of popping corn in a plain brown paper bag.  Pop it in the microwave.  Dump it into a bowl and add a tablespoon of garlic oil and sprinkle parmesan cheese over it.  Garlic-Parmesan-Popcorn, it’s great with a movie on TV with a small side of chocolate.

Tonight I mixed this same garlic oil with some blue cheese and topped my rib-eye steak after turning it on the grill.  Be careful that the steak doesn’t burn with the oil melting on the grill. 

The tomatoes and basil are from my garden and vine ripened.  I sliced parmesan cheese and layered it with tomatoes, garlic oil and fresh basil from the garden and balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper.  It makes a great low-cal side dish to the ultimate $7 steak. 

Now for the wine.  My favorite winery is Le Cuvier.  Last night we opened a bottle of 2002 Le Cuvier Zinfandel.  It was barrel aged for 3 years and cellar aged in my cellar for 7 years.  It is 16.82% alcohol and very fruity and velvety.  But it has a kick, so be careful.  I had a little left from last night.  My favorite new wine club is Paoletti Winery.  Paoletti is in Calistoga at the north end of Napa Valley.  They grow and produce Estate Cabernet Sauvignon.  They just started a wine club and I joined without reservation.  You can get more information on Paoletti and other Napa wines in my blog on Napa from last summer.  The 2007 Paoletti Bella Novello Napa Cab is great.   And with a little Le Cuvier 2002 Zinfandel to finish off, I tried some blending.  A few wineries will blend Cabernet Sauvignon, Sangiovese and zinfandel in various proportions. I added < 10% of Le Cuvier 2002 Zinfandel to the Paoletti Cab.  The small addition of Zinfandel added additional ripe red fruit to the Cab. As well as softening the finish.  It was great with the medium-rare spicy rib-eye with garlic blue cheese on top.  And as the basil and balsamic vinegar from the tomatoes mixed with the steak and sautéed portabella mushrooms, magical.   I ate every bite.  This is a great meal for a deprived body.  I’ll have to go for a brutal bike ride tomorrow night to work it off.

Manny’s Tam O’shanter, Valentien’s and garlic-parmesan  popcorn

“I feel like a gangster that gets the entire restaurant to himself.”  And then I told Betty, “I feel like Alice in Wonderland and we just fell down a rabbit hole into this surreal dining room where we are the only one’s here on a Friday night.  What a trip this place is.”  The last time we were here was about 1988 when we entertained a couple on business.  The dining room is lovely and clean with table cloths and new red booths.  It’s very old school, 70’s vintage with wood paneling and stained glass windows.  Frank Sinatra was crooning at a pleasant level in the back ground.  There were 3 other people at this restaurant: Manny Mendez the owner, the waitress and the chef.  “It’s kind of weird being the only one’s here.”   But look at the good side, there are no obnoxious jerks and no noisy kids.  One guy walked in wearing surfing shorts and flip-flops and he picked up an order to go. 

Manny comes to the table and explains the menu.  I never had bone-in Filet mignon before, so I decided to try it even though it was $60.  Betty ordered the stuffed shrimp, but they were out, so she had the chicken cordon-blue.  We ordered wine by the glass.  The glasses were topped to the brim and only $6.  The red wine was quite good especially after it had a chance to aerate.  I picked up lovely notes of cherries and dark chocolate.  Betty enjoyed her Chardonnay.  The salads were extra but they were fresh and crisp with a wedged tomato and just the smallest slice of red onion.  The fresh rolls were warm and the waitress felt obligated to inform us that the green butter had food coloring in it.  Toward the end of my wine I could smell my 22 oz. Angus filet mignon cooking.  It was served hot with garlic mashed potatoes and sliced veggies, both of which were delicious. The steak was seasoned nicely and it was very tender and the sauce on the side was like browned gravy and added extra flavor.  I ordered it medium rare to medium. It was cooked closer to medium to medium well and a little longer than I would have prefered.  It was a bit rarer along the bone and over-all a very nice steak.  It is not a $60 steak through. 

The chicken cordon-blue was a large portion and served with the same sautéed veggies and rice pilaf.  Betty enjoyed it very much and we both cleaned out plates.  The restaurant.om gift certificate took a bit of the sting out of the high prices.  If you google Manny’s Tam O’shanter, you’ll find most reviews are not as generous as mine.  But it was a quite night out for us.  And it inspired me to cook my own steak and open some of my favorite wine for a great meal at home next time I want a great steak.

We also recently went to Valentien Restaurant and Wine Bar on Truxton Avenue recently. 

http://valentienrestaurant.com/

It is one of Bakersfield’s gourmet restaurants.  We had filet-mignon there also.  The food at Valentein is a step up the gourmet ladder and along with the Brochelle 2010 Zinfandel that we had there, the meal was superb.  The dining room at Valentein’s is kind of bland, however.  Our table was small and the concrete floor makes the atmosphere seem a bit cold and informal.  The service at Valentein’s is great and the food is wonderful.  If you get a chance to go I recommend the Brochelle Zinfandel.  The current 2010 vintage is a Brochelle classic and will make the meal an extra special occasion.  It is such a big wine and goes so well with the steak.  The tannins are almost non-existent, so the wine goes great by itself.  We ordered a side of cheese to pair with the wine also.  It’s $50 for the bottle at Valentein’s.  The basic wine club at Brochelle is a great way to get 6 bottles of the Zinfandel a year.  And wine club members, like me, also get the Ridge Top Reserve Zinfandel that is even more special. 

http://www.brochelle.com/

I have started making garlic olive oil and keeping it available to use in salad dressing, topping a steak and now over pop corn with parmesan cheese.  I dice up about 5 cloves of garlic and add it to a cup of olive oil and let it marinade in the fridge.  It’s great on salads and over meats.  We have been making pop corn in the microwave.  It pops in a brown paper bag beautifully.  Transfer it to a bowl and add a few spoons of the garlic oil and shake generously with grated parmesan cheese.  You gotta try it.  It’s even low cal.

Steak and Grape - Lunch with a Friend

Steak & Grape – Lunch with a friend

I was 26 years old when I went to work for Betz.  I was hired as the sole pioneer to go after the accounts in the Midway Sunset field by Taft, Fellows and McKittrick.  Troy worked with a team of technical sales guys handling the lucrative Kern River account.  They seemed to have a lot of fun together as I heard them talk on the 2 way radios we used back then.  I was struggling in a remote area with customers that didn’t really like our company much, with products that didn’t perform all the time.  Either the cobalt catalyst in the sodium sulfite didn’t react fast enough to reduce the oxygen in the steam generator feed water or the emulsion breakers couldn’t produce dry oil in the heater treaters like my competitors.  One time a Unocal Foreman told me, as I was starting my oil treatment chemicals, “if your chemical makes my treaters reject, you better be able to eat crude oil and shit dollar bills, God damn it”.  Those old foremen were a tough breed.  And it made me rough around the edges at a time when I should have been mellowing as I raised 2 daughters. 

I got one of them back one day when a demonstration backfired.  I tried to get the water treatment business in one particular plant for years.  I felt I was close and wanted to go in for the kill with a demonstration of my desire to do a good job.  I got a jar of oysters at the store, the big Pacific oysters.  I trimmed one up so that it resembled a round fleshy ball.  I put it in a sample jar with alcohol, but the oyster dissolved.  So I got another one, trimmed it up and put it in a jar of tap water.  I sealed it up and took it out on a Friday to one crotchety old foreman that took my cocktails and lunches for years, but never gave me any business.  I put the jar, with the oyster in it, on his desk and said, “I want your business so bad that I’ll give you my left nut”.  And it really looked like a testicle that was just cut out of a scrotum.   He thought that was the funniest this he ever saw.  He put it up on the window sill behind his desk.  But when I saw him in the field on Monday, he was mad as hell and wanted to kill me.

“What the Hell was that fuckin’ thing you put in that jar?” 

“ I told you it was my left nut”.

“You son-of –a –bitch, it exploded over the weekend and my office smells like shit”.

It was a good thing that the housekeeper cleaned up the mess, because we both ended up getting a good laugh out of it.  Funny thing is that he did award me the account after years of trying.  And the day that I went to the office to tell my manager the good news, he gave me my notice and fired me.  It was not related to the stunt I pulled, we all thought that was great.  “The numbers don’t work out”, he said.  8 weeks later, I was back out at Unocal selling Pall filters.

Troy and I talk and laugh about such stories from our young selling days.  We need to do it more often. 

The new Steak and Grape restaurant on Coffee and Hageman in Bakersfield was a very nice surprise when I met my friend Troy there for lunch today.  The last restaurant in that location was the Basque Café, formerly Maitia’s Basque.  The interior has been tastefully redone with nice carpet in the dining room, which makes it quiet for visiting, unlike so many new restaurants with concrete or tile floors that are so noisy that you can’t even enjoy a conversation. 

http://www.steakandgrape.com/

I had a rare occasion to meet “Troyski” because I made a wine delivery to him.  Along with my club shipment of Brochelle 2010 Zinfandel, I brought back some extra.  I first discovered Brochelle Zinfandel in 2006 when I was perusing the wine at my favorite wine cellar at Luigi’s.  I read the back of the label which describes Brochelle as… “ tucked away on a steep hillside on the west side of Paso Robles, CA… warm days and cool nights… head pruned and dry farmed vines, produce low yields and intensely flavored fruit… neither fined nor filtered and opens up beautifully when decanted…”

That sounds like how Le Cuvier is made.  I tried it then and found it to be a rare wine that hit me with a “WOW” When I tasted it.  I recommended it to Troy and I remember him telling me it was the best wine he ever had. 

http://www.brochelle.com/

Café Med used to carry it also when their wine selection was more extensive.  Betty and I had the Brochelle 2010 Zinfandel at Valentien Café and Wine Bar recently.  It was $50 at the restaurant, which is a bargain compared to rest of the wine list.  It was the perfect accompaniment to our filet mignon’s that night.  The Brochelle 2010 Zinfandel was the highlight of the meal.  Brochelle also produces a Ridge Top Reserve Zinfandel which is extremely limited and only available to the wine club members – like me.

With our modest transaction out of the way, we ordered lunch at Steak and Grape.  Troy ordered the steak sandwich ($13.95), which was served with lovely sautéed vegetables and a small bunch of grapes.  The steak looked delicious cooked medium rare.  I had the salmon salad ($12.95).  I ordered it with spinach instead of greens.  The salmon was a generous 6 oz portion, pan seared perfectly, almost crispy on the outside and just done in the middle which left it moist and tender.  The spinach was tossed in Champaign vinaigrette and the vegetables were sautéed.  The salad was also topped with artichoke hearts and sliced avocado.   Both the steak sandwich and the salmon salad were large meals that neither of us could finish.  I highly recommend Steak and Grape for lunch and I look forward to a dinner experience.

The Biggest Loser

It’s official.  I broke the 30 Lb. barrier, my total weight loss since January is 31.8 Lbs.  To coin a phrase from a friend of mine, I made Weight Watchers my Bitch.  It is simply a mental commitment to eat less and exercise more.  And tracking points works for me. 

During the winter I had cabbage & vegetable stew either for lunch or dinner almost every day.  And when I went out for lunch, I usually had a salad and most times only eat half of it.  And I switched from blue cheese dressing to vinaigrette and cut out the bread and butter.  Now that it’s getting into summer, I eat a spinach salad almost every day.  I think Popeye had the right idea.  I’m looking forward to our summer tomato pie, only this summer, I’ll have to make it without the crust.  And the topping, shredded cheddar cheese and mayonnaise will have to be light and sparse.

My favorite summer dinner is a generously seasoned and grilled steak with tomato pie and a bottle of Le Cuvier Cabernet Sauvignon or Zinfandel.  The tomato pie is only worth cooking in the summer when tomatoes are vine ripened.  I have found that the summer fruit stands and farmers markets are the best places to find good tomatoes if you can’t grow your own.  And the vine ripened Roma’s are excellent because there is less juice and more flesh with richer flavor for the tomato pie.  Here is our receipe:

Tomato Pie

Start with a pie crust in a pie dish.  Brush it with egg yolk and bake until the crust is partially cooked, about 15 minutes at 350.  The egg yolk will be fully cooked.  This seals the crust from getting soggy with the tomatoes. 

Meanwhile, par boil the tomatoes (usually 5-6 medium) enough so that the skins can be removed (you’ll know when the skins crack).  When the tomatoes have cooled, remove the skins and squeeze out as much juice as you can.

Take the crust out of the oven and sprinkle with fresh chopped basil and green onion tops.    Slice the tomatoes into the pie shell and fill the pie crust.  Add additional basil, green onion, salt and pepper (a little oregano is good also) on top of the tomatoes.

 In a separate bowl, shred a ½ Lb. of cheddar cheese and mix in a ¾ cup of mayonnaise.  (This mixture also makes a great dip for crackers and makes killer baked cheesy bread on a French roll)  Cover the top of the tomatoes with the cheese mixture.  Press with your fingers to seal the top of the pie to the crust.  Bake for about an hour until the top is browned and bubbly.  It’s best to let it sit for a while to cool as the melted cheese and tomatoes hold the heat and can cause 3^rd degree burns in the mouth.  Blistered skin in the mouth takes away from the enjoyment of the steak and the wine.  The Tomato pie is actually better the next day.  Reheat it in the oven not the microwave.  I like to reheat it on the top level in the barbeque. 

One of my favorite places for lunch is Tahoe Joe’s.  They have killer salads for $10 that includes lean steak or chicken and a nice light vinaigrette dressing.  The last lunch I had at Tahoe Joe’s I tried the seared Ahi tuna appetizer.  It had a generous portion of tuna and a small bit of greens.  It costs $10 and is a delicious plate of protein.  I tried the same thing at The Padre Hotel in the bar at happy hour.  The portion of tuna is half the size, but the salad portion is larger.  The price at the Padre is $13.  And at happy hour we had that, 3 slider burgers 2 glasses of wine and a margarita.  It wasn’t much to eat and cost $46.  However, we made up for it at the Fox Theater for Flicks at the Fox and had a large bag of popcorn.  The bar at the Padre was really noisy that Friday night and was not a great happy hour experience for me.  I much prefer Café Med for happy hour.  The Padre has the 2^nd floor rooftop lounge that is open at 6 PM and during the week has good deals for drinks and food,  And if you can catch a night when they feature Jazz singer Candace Freeman, that is a real treat worth attending. 

http://www.thepadrehotel.com/?gclid=CIH97uz_4a8CFQF7hwodpGIR-Q

The Scorpion at Luigi's

The Scorpion at Luigi’s

Luigi’s is one of the best lunch experiences in Bakersfield. It has been family owned for over 100 years. On Friday, my last day on the job with Cameron, the Pall filter guys took me and my inside salesman to lunch. I know they wanted to pump me for information while they still had a chance. That’s cool, I have a legendary 26 years of information that I will not be using any longer. Friday at Luigi’s can be very busy. It’s not uncommon to have to wait an hour for a table. So we arrived early and got a table on the patio. It was a beautiful spring day with the flowers on the patio in bloom. I ordered the Friday seafood special, sautéed salmon topped with candied walnuts and a small Giovanna salad (instead of pasta). My inside guy ordered the mussels.

We ordered a side of blue cheese and pickled tongue to go with the rolls that are also served with a few slices of Italian cold cuts and cheese. The sugar in the candied walnut topping made a sweet and savory crust on the salmon. The generous portion of salmon was delicately cooked, delicious and moist.

As we all were being seated, I got an e-mail message that a customer needed some filters.  We did not have them in stock, but we had everyone at the table to make things happen.  The distributor sent a text to check on his inventory in Houston.  They had stock and could still make a shipment that afternoon when UPS picked up.  My inside guy gave a verbal PO and I e-mailed the customer that he would have filters on Wednesday.  Even though it’s my last day, I’m still excited to see the transaction happen from the table as the blue cheese and pickled tongue is being served. 

I commented, “I can’t believe that I give a shit about this order, it’s my last day.  That is why Ross and Pat call me the Scorpion.”

“What does that mean?”

I explained that when we were all taking cuts in commission and benefits at my last job, I kept on selling and working hard over every prospect and every sale while some of the other salesmen worked only half-heartedly.  When they asked why I was still working so hard, I would say, “I can’t help it, it’s in my nature.  Like the Frog and the Scorpion.”  And I explained, as the story goes, the frog and the scorpion were on the river bank one day and the scorpion asked the frog to take him across the river on his back.  The frog said NO, you will sting me and I’ll drown.  The scorpion says, I promise I will not sting you.  If I sting you then we will both drown.  So the frog agreed and half way across the river, the scorpion stings him.  And as they are sinking into the river, the frog says, why did you sting me?  Now we will both drown.  The scorpion says, “I can’t help it, it’s my nature.” 

I got the story from the Soprano’s in the episode where Tony takes over the sporting goods store from his friend as payment for money loaned in a poker game.  As Tony and his crew is selling everything in the store and charging the guys credit cards to the limits and the guy loses his family, his livelihood, his inventory and is sleeping in the store in his last sleeping bag, he asks Tony, “Why did you do this to me?”  Tony says, “It’s in my nature” and tells the story of the Frog and the Scorpion.  It’s a lesson that we can all learn from when judging someone’s character. 

Barns and Nobel

For years I would go to Barns and Nobel to search for new music that I could listen to samples of on the head sets they provided.  I could scan the bar code on the CD and tell if I liked the music or not.  I have found a lot of great new music this way.  And as a result Barns and Nobel sold me many new CDs.  Some time ago some “genius” in the Barns and Nobel corporate office decided to remove the listening devices from the stores.   When I complained to the store manager in Bakersfield about this bad decision, she told me to call the corporate office in New York.  And this week in Houston, I found the same thing.  Only this time I got the corporate phone # (800-THE-BOOK).  I’ll call on Monday and suggest that they provide head phones with a credit card or drivers license deposit at the counter.  That will protect the equipment and keep the riffraff out.  Please, join me and call the Idiot at Barns and Noble and ask them to put the listening stations back in their stores.  I wonder how many books they would sell if you couldn’t open them and sample the text.

Nicole Henry - Embraceable

My intuition was working when I bought the CD “Embraceable” by Nicole Henry without the benefit of hearing a sample.  If you like easy listening jazz vocals and love songs, I highly recommend it.  It was a lucky guess on my part.  I recognized some of the song titles, “Just a little lovin’”, “Since I Fell for You” and “Embraceable You”, my favorite song on the CD is “Waiting in Vain”.  It’s a song about a woman waiting for her lover to commit.  It’s a sad song, slow and beautiful.  The whole CD is great music for a Sunday morning or to enjoy while cooking with a glass of wine (preferable, Le Cuvier).  The CD is a bit peppier than Diana Krall which can be a little too slow sometime.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncE35lIFWa4

Pawn Star

Pawn Star

Palm Springs is in the Colorado Desert east of Los Angeles and is HOT most of the year – except in the summer months – when is unbearably HOT.  The hotels and resorts run great specials in June because no one in their right mind would want to go during that time.  Hence, the sales managers of the company I worked for in 1995 decided to have a 3 day sales meeting there in mid June. 

Sometimes, it’s difficult to recall the date an event has taken place 15 years later.  However, I distinctly recall this sales meeting in Palm Springs in 1995 because I rode my new 1995 Harley Davidson Heritage Soft-tail.  Leaving early that Saturday morning in anticipation on beating the heat of the afternoon, the Tehachapi pass on Hwy 58 was still cool, but my leather vest was enough to keep me comfortable.  Through the Mojave Desert in mid morning, over the Cajon Pass on I-15 and through the remote high desert, I took the back roads as much as possible.  By 1:00 PM I was riding down out of the high desert into the Palm Springs basin and the temperature got hotter and hotter as I approached the low desert of I-10.  By the time I got to the destination “resort”, I was parched and exhausted from the 115 F dry desert airs at 75 mph. 

I left my Harley parked out in front of the lobby, checked in and joined the other type-A personalities that composed our sales team who had already started to coalesce at the only reasonable place, at the pool.  The beers tasted good and the pool was instant refreshment.  Something happened to us when we got together.  We were all remote sales people and had been friends for years so getting together was a time to compare stories and share opinions.  Everything was funny and nothing was off limits.  Especially reminiscing how cheap our managers were for having an annual meeting in Palm Springs in June.  Did I say it was 115 degrees?

Tory finally shows up by the pool with a cool little portable bar.  Thank God, because the drinks are expensive and there were no managers out yet with an open tab.  You’ve seen these portable bars, a cheap plastic case holding some glasses, a cocktail spoon, jigger, strainer and shaker.  Tory’s bar also included a bottle of Jack Daniels and a little bottle of maraschino cherries.  I don’t drink the hard stuff anymore (I don’t drink any less either).  He started making Manhattans, a glass of ice filled with Jack Daniels and a spoon of the cherry juice.  The sweetness of the cherry juice took the edge off the whiskey.  At the time I had not remembered tasting a cocktail so good, so refreshing – around fun people, in the pool, telling stories.  Man, the first one was so good.  I’ll have another, and another.  The 115 degree heat that ended up being closer to 120 F in the late afternoon, the fatigue and the cocktails were a deadly combination.  I should have taken my dad’s advice about cocktails: “they are like a woman’s breasts, one is not enough and 3 are too many”.   Especially when they are in a 6 oz glass, in 120 degree heat and the afternoon sun and having too much  fun to keep count. 

I survived with no mishaps and a great memory and recipe for Manhattans.  Sometime later I saw a portable bar in an antique store.  This one was from the 50’s and in perfect shape.  Not cheap plastic, but leather like with brass hardware and locking clasps.  Now I can make the Manhattans at the next party.  I kept the bar in my home office ever since, on guard for the next party.  I never used it once.  Now in 2012, I’m moving back into my home office for my new job.  Betty put my prized portable bar out for the next Goodwill run.  I really could not object.  I hadn’t used it once and I don’t dink the hard stuff anymore (or any less – an old joke).  I loaded everything up and made the drop off at the Goodwill, but I just couldn’t dump off the bar.  I can sell this thing.  It will just get ruined at the Goodwill.  It’s not like I need the money.  It represents a fond memory and if I can sell it, it may give that memory some more value.

I can sell it to an antique store.  That’s where I bought it.  I went to the Curiosity shop on 19^th street.  I like to old guy there in the wheel chair.  He seems like a man who could appreciate it.  I’ve bought a couple flasks from him over the years. 

He looks at it, “what’s missing?” he asks.

“It’s missing one glass” There were only five glasses of the original six, gold rimed I might add.

“No, these empty places?” Looking at the glass shaker with the cocktail recipe’s on it.

“That’s where the booze goes, Jack Daniels, Scotch and gin” I point out.  “It’s a self sustained portable bar.  It carries the booze and everything you need but the ice”.

“It’s nice.  But I have no place to put it and if I leave it open, people will just steal the stuff out of it or break it.  The most I would give would be $25.  But I can’t use it”.

“That’s cool”.  I didn’t want to sell it that bad anyway.

So I tried the Wooden Nickel where the crack heads fence the stuff they steel from breaking and entering.  The guy there says, “That’s cool” and tries to find some kind of value on his computer.

 “What do you want for it?” he asks.

“You have a cheap plastic one with nothing in it for sale on the shelf back there for $29.  You can sell this one for at least $60.  I’d like to get $25”.  I figure like on “Pawn Stars” these guys will really low ball you, so I better ask double what I would be happy with.  If I can get $10, it’s better them schlepping this thing around downtown Bakersfield any longer.

“Sorry, I have to pass” he decides. 

After my Dr’s appointment, I thought I’d give it one more try.  I went to the Pawn shop on 19^th street just east of Chester.  Waiting in line behind the druggies, the guy behind the glass calls me over and asked to take a look at the case I was carrying.

“What do you got”? 

“A portable bar”

I open it up for his perusal, “That’s cool”.  It’s the common assessment from everyone that saw it.  “Where is the rest of it?”

“It’s all there.  The gold rimmed glassed, the shaker, the cork screw, spoon, jigger, keys for the lock.  These places are for the booze, Jack Daniels, Scotch, Gin.  Everyone that comes in here looking for one of your guitars will want this bar to take with him on his gigs.  Every rock star needs a portable bar”.

“What do you want for it”?  I could tell he liked it. 

“$25 dollars”. 

“I’ll give you $10”

“How about $20”?  You know it’s cool.

“I’ll give you $10”

“Can you do $15?”  This guy is not going to budge.   I guess we all watch the same show on TV. 

“I’ll give you $10 dollars.”

 “Come on man, you’ll sell this for $60 dollars here.”

“I doubt that.  I’ll give you $10 dollars”

“OK.  You’ll probably take it home with you, it’s so cool” I said as he took it from me.

I took the $10 dollars.  It’s better than leaving it at the Goodwill.  Maybe someone will make some memories.  I’m such a Pawn Star. 

When I told Betty about it and that it was my next blog, she says, “did you take a picture of it for your blog?”  When your readers see how cool it is, they would give you more that $10 dollars for it” 

“Now you tell me”. 

                

Lamb Fries

Lamb fries

Sunday lunch at Noriega Hotel Basque Restaurant is a really fun time.  The weekday lunches and dinners have a fixed menu.  For example, Friday lunch is always Red Snapper and Tri-Tip.  And dinner on Wednesday is always Lamb Stew and Prime Rib.  Lunch and dinner on weekends always varies.  In reserving Sunday lunch for a birthday celebration Betty asked, “What is on the menu for Sunday lunch?” 

They replied, “Lamb Fries and Spare Ribs”. 

“What are Lamb Fries?” 

“Well, it’s hard to explain”.

“Are they French fries with lamb?  Or, fried bits of lamb?”

“Maybe you should google it”. 

So I googled it…to quote Wikipedia, “Lamb fries are lamb testicles used as food. One popular dish in the United States serves them breaded and fried. Lamb testicles are served in a variety of ...”

What the hell, I feel adventurous.  And Lia doesn’t eat meat anyway.  And they are also having spare ribs, which are really good.

We got to Noriega’s a little early to enjoy the atmosphere at the bar.  Some of us tried the famous Basque drink that is Vodka, a special bottled Ginger Beer and lime wedge, called a Moscow Mule.  It’s served in a hand hammered copper cup reserved especially for this drink.   The Bloody Mary’s looked great and I always love the Gin and Tonics like we just had last Thursday before for dinner.  But as I am still counting points, and I know there is wine on the table, I resisted the extra drinks.

Lunch that Sunday included a soup of broth and thin noodles instead of the cabbage soup.  Beans and salsa is always standard.  The salad was served with blue cheese and the fresh bread is always great.  The red wine on the table that is included with all meals (even breakfast) is fruity and cold and is enjoyable with the food. 

The first entrée that was brought to the table was ox tail stew.  “What about the lamb fries?” I asked.  The ox tail stew is for those that do not want lamb fries.  I love this stew, the ox tails are rich and tender and fall off the star shaped tail bones.  A bowl of lamb fries were passed around and most of us tried them.  They were indeed lamb testicles with no attempt to disguise what we were eating.  They are just sautéed.  I thought they might be breaded and fried, hence, “Lamb Fries”.  This was an Andrew Zimmern moment.  They were oval shaped and in different sizes.  The large ones were the size of the end of my thumb and the  smaller ones were the size of a small pea.  The texture and taste was that of a chicken liver in a hot-dog casing.  I did eat my share as well as my share of the roasted spare ribs that were served next, along with the best French fries.  It was a memorable lunch.  The food was good as always and we met some nice people seated next to us.  If you haven’t been to Noriega’s Basque Restaurant, you should go for the historic experience and the great food and company.