The Muffaletta Report

[ED. NOTE: Today's post is also featured on San Francisco Treats, which is a much nicer blog than what I have going on here. But they asked me to write something and so I did.]

[ED. NOTE PART TWO: It may not be posted there yet, but I'm sure it will be soon.]

Food trucks!!! They’re the black chunky glasses of mid to late 2011! If you don’t own one, you want to. If you don’t eat at one, you’re hopelessly out of touch. FOOD TRUCKS FOOD TRUCKS FOOD TRUCKS. In 10 years, people are going to be like “What was up with the fascination with eating bacon and waffle things on Acme artisanal bread from an idling vehicle in a parking lot? SO WEIRD. Also, I need the hoverboard tonight. I’m going to a Re-Elect Ashton Kutcher for President rally at the oxygen farm.”

NEVERTHELESS, I am a slave to fashion and thus a dedicated food truck aficiondo, by which I mean there are 4 or 5 that appear within 3 blocks of my office every Friday and now it’s like A Thing with me and my coworkers to go.

Today’s lineup at Off the Grid – Civic Center was the usual lineup:

Ebbett’s Good to Go – Fancy-shmacy sandwiches
Curry Up Now – Indian, duh. BLAZINGLY PAINFULLY HOT Indian, I should say
Liba Falafel – What do you think?
HapaSF – “Modern organic Filipino cuisine,” according to the website. I’ve never gone to this one so I’ll take their word for it
Crème Brulee Cart – Man, you guys are phoning it in with the names. It’s supposed to be a funny name! How about “Crème Bru-WAY Cart!!!” or “Crème OKAY Cart!!” “Crème Lisa Bonet Cart!!!”??? THINK ABOUT IT AND GET BACK TO ME.

But enough about me. Let’s talk about food. I wasn’t sure what I was going to get today. Then I was advised that Ebbett’s had a muffaletta today. MUFFALETTA. In case you don’t know and thus by definition have been living an empty and sad husk of a life, a muffaletta is a New Orleans-birthed sandwich that usually features ham of some kind, mortadella, salami, provolone and maybe mozzarella too. Now, all that sounds good, but then it’s topped with olive tapenade, which is the money shot of a muffaletta. Olive tapenade is the Stunt Casting of sandwiches. It makes the muffaletta.



So I go down there and order the muffaletta. The girl who makes the sandwiches says “I made you an extra big one” because that’s the effect I have on women and also I was wearing my Noted Local Blogger smock. Then I ate it.



It was good. The bread was nice and soft, almost focaccia-like, or maybe it was focaccia, which, strictly speaking, isn’t what a muffaletta is supposed to be on but we’ll let it slide. It had the appropriate meats and cheeses. And the olive tapenade was solid.

So, good sandwich! I think it was 9 bucks. Don’t think that Food Truck food is extra-cheap or anything because it isn’t. It actually tends to be pretty steep. But that’s cool. It’s worth it.

SO, IN SUMMATION:

Ebbett’s Good to Go Muffaletta: It’s Like Rain on Your Wedding Day. No, wait, that’s bad.

Ebbett’s Good to Go Muffaletta: Did You Know That the Girl From the College in Your PJs Ad Was Don Draper’s Whore Mother on Mad Men? No, wait, that’s just too weird. Here we go:

Ebbett’s Good to Go Muffaletta: If Sandwiches Were Wu-Tang, It Would Be GZA. There.

Here's another restaurant review, like you give a shit

No one's reading this. You're all stuck with your parents somewhere trying desperately to get a flight to JFK because you're about to freak out and kill them or you're home waking and baking and watching Maury (SPOILER: In the case of Charmaine, YOU ARE NOT THE FATHER) or you're in Tahoe or God knows what else. You're not at work, which is where you'd be reading this under normal conditions. That's OK. I understand.

Last night was Moms' final night here in SF and she got it in her head that she wanted Burmese food, probably because that sounded like it would make a good story for her friends back in Arizona about Crazy Shit They Eat in SF. So I made a reservation at Mandalay to get our Burmese on.

DIGRESSION #1: Shouldn't it be called "Myanmarese" food now? I guess that's too hard to pronounce and plus we're sticking with "Burma" as a protest against the current junta or something.

DIGRESSION #2: I know you're inwardly screaming "Why didn't you go to Burma Super Star??!?!??," you little food-obsessed foodie snob. I'll tell you why. Last time I went to BSS I waited an hour and a half for what's essentially Thai food with different names. So fuck that. I made reservations at Mandalay that day, no problem. Reservations are an extremely good idea, as we will see.

Mandalay was fine. My impressions are: (1) The food's pretty good. Maybe really good. We had some noodle stuff that was pretty great and also Sizzling Beef which was exactly what it sounds like and also Mango Prawns which I didn't taste. I'm not super-into prawns. (2) Everything took a very long time. (3) It was FUCKING CROWDED, like jam packed.

What is the deal with this town and the fucking Burmese food? There was a crowd standing by the front door looking like they were going to leap on us and rip the fucking Nan Gyi Dok right out of our hands. Clumped together by the door, anxiously staring at the hostess each time she went to the clipboard. Jesus Christ, people, just go to one of the 2,786 Thai restuarants in this town. It's basically the same fucking food. And this is on a Monday night. I mean, really?

So yeah, if you have reservations and happen to be in the area, I guess it's worth going to. But if you're one of those people waiting an hour, took a long hard look at yourself and ask why. "WHYYYYY," ask yourself. "WHYYYY AM I DOING THIS." Then go get some Thai food like a rational human being.

This concerns food trucks, so it might be the most SF thing you read all day

All due respect to Ramona Emerson, there is nothing San Franciscans like more than (1) food trucks, and (2) blogging about food trucks. So if you're a San Franciscan, prepare to have your mind blown.

I've been stalking the Seoul on Wheels Korean BBQ truck for a while now. One time we heard that it was going to be parked down by the Ballyard, so Olu and I trucked down there but it was nowhere to be seen. Now it Twitters its location everyday so there's no tragedy like that.

Lo and behold, come to find out that a bunch of food trucks will be gathering in Civic Center Plaza, very close to my Work Station, every Friday as part of something called Off the Grid. And my long-sought target, S.O.W., would be one of the participants this week.

L-R: Crack Cocaine, Liquid Heroin, Pork Buns

Hied myself down there w/ 2 coworkers and loaded up a combo rice plate (N.B.: This is not on the menu, but I found them very accommodating when I asked for a combo and also for some kimchee on the side). Left them waiting in the pork bun line because it's kind of raining and I didn't want to eat it cold. Voila:



THE VERDICT: Very good! I liked the spicy pork somewhat more than the bulgogi, which means "beef." The kimchee was nice and crunchy and spicy but not incinerate-your-mouth spicy, which I am most definitely not down with.

Fuck you.

Could have done without the broccoli. Broccoli is an instrument of the Devil and is way worse than masturbation or the New York Yankees, no matter what anyone tells you.

Coworker who I had abandoned to drown in the drenching rainfall / slight drizzle was surprisingly forgiving, and in fact gave me a segment of her chicken tikka masala burrito from Curry Up Now, and is there some requirement that food trucks have cutesy pun names? Guess so. Anyway, it's exactly what it sounds like: C.T.M. wrapped up, burrito-style, in thin Naan and is delicious but a little spicier than expected. Good, though.

Going back for pork belly buns in like a half hour.

OK, here are my Proposed New Food Truck Concepts:

Jerk Me Off (Carribean chicken & rice)
Let's Get Bulgur! (Tasteless vegetarian cuisine)
Domo Ari-Scot-o (Japanese/Scottish fusion)
Mesquite on Your Face (BBQ)

Mad Men #5: Riding the Honda

This episode was all about masturbation and Peggy riding a Honda motorcycle in a circle, although not at the same time.

So here’s what I want to know: Which sitcom is missing a sassy, wisecracking old secretary? Because Miss Blankenship seems like she just wandered in from the set of “Rhoda" or something. Sure, she’s a hoot, but it’s weird. Anyway, tonight our main plot is about getting the Honda account. Pete likes it. Roger doesn’t like it because he was in WW II and is still mad. Bert likes it because he’s already a big fan of tentacle porn and sake bombs. Hey, I’ve got an idea about how to make this work for everybody! Get the account and then do an ad with a kamikaze motorcyclist! Win-win!

Don’s got the kids but he’s going out with Bethany so he gets Neighbor Nurse to do some babysitting. She doesn’t do a very good job and Sally gives herself what is actually a pretty fashion-forward, choppy kind of cut with a lot of layers. Sally is now eligible to become the lead singer in a Yeah Yeah Yeahs cover band. Unfortunately the Yeah Yeah Yeahs won’t be invented for another 40 years. Anyway, I guess cutting your own hair is the 1965 version of cutting. Sally’s a hot mess. I can’t wait for her to grow up and start smoking hella weed and banging every longhair with a guitar in sight. Don doesn’t share my artistic vision and is pissed about Sally’s new do. Whatever, Don, chillax. Just because Ted Chaoughaugh shit all over you at Benihana doesn’t mean that Sally’s not cool as shit.

January Jones is back in my life and all is well! Oh, she drunk again. That January Jones. Sally comes home and she slaps the kid! Jesus! If she did that to Don, they’d still be together. You’re slapping the wrong Draper, Betts!

Back at the office, the Japanese arrive and there’s some hijinx with the translations. Man, I love a good translation subtitle joke. That shit never fails. Pete’s handing out cantaloupes and Johnnie Walker when Roger comes in and blows up the whole deal. Wow, what a shitbird Roger is. You gotta let it go, man!

David McCallum from Man from U.N.C.L.E.: Hot or Not? Sally votes “hot.” Eww, gross, there is not going to be any way to get through this without it being super uncomfortable. OK, Sally gets busted…we’re going to need a euphemism here. Riding the Honda? Sally gets busted Riding the Honda. Other Mom rushes Sally home and rats her out to Betts. Time for more beatings! And finger removal surgery! Oh, Cryptkeeper has a little more perspective since he’s seen this kind of thing before over the last 150 years. He is a Calming Voice of Reason and we will send Sally to first of many, many mental health professionals she will be seeing during her life.

Next, we have a mini-Caper Movie within the show. Don has a Plan: they’re going to make Chaoughaugh think they’re working on something when they’re not! That’s what I do every single day at work! I would perfect for this! False leads are planted and there are meetings with directors and blahdeddy blah it all works because Don just Gets Shit Done.

Here comes Faye. She finally fucking says what everyone has been thinking for 3 years: “I don’t know how people drink the way you do around here.” She says this as she’s tossing back a little Lunchtime Sake with Don. Humorously, my Mom said the exact same thing last time she came to visit! Anyway, I have just about had it with Faye and Don not fucking. For Christ’s sakes, people, let’s get our shit together.

We will now wrap this up. Betty tells the therapist that she wishes Cryptkeeper had met her Dad, I guess because they could have traded Revolutionary War stories. Roger’s office looks like Lime, but without the bottomless mimosas and house music. SDCP somehow ends up with the Honda account and I’m not sure how it all went down but I think Don gave them a check for $3000 and that did it. Still no mention of the Rolling Stones.

Product Testing: Hormel Compleats Beef Steak & Peppers

Hormel Compleats are these little microwaveable meals that you don't have to refrigerate and you heat up at work and make you feel like an administrative assistant at an insurance company in Dayton, Ohio and taste like failure and sadness.

Here's what one looks like before you put it in the microwave in the break room and have an awkward conversation with a coworker who's getting her salad out of the fridge about just what the fuck you're about to put into your body:

Here's another picture of my Compleats next to a cool miniature skull I bought at Chichen Itza. You're not doing a very good job of warding off evil, Mr. Skull!!!!

BEEP. It's been 2 minutes. My Compleats is ready! Ouch, it's hot. Here it is!

MMMMM MMMMMM. Doesn't that look good? No, it doesn't. There are a lot of unfortunate things you could say this looks like, but "Beef Steak & Peppers" is not one of them.

It tasted like food of some type. I didn't gag or spit it out. Maybe "Santa Fe Style Chicken with beans and rice" will be better. Hey, it was only 210 calories! That saves me like 300 extra calories for beers tonight. I'd call that a win.

The LHC, the end of the world as we know it, and my brief career in particle physics

Let us all collectively now take a break from Tiger and the 10 11 12 mistresses and the Muni stabber and Copenhagen and South Carolina governors and Top Chef and whatnot and instead talk about something that will TRULY BLOW YOUR FUCKING MIND. I'm not even kidding.

So there's this thing called the Large Hadron Collider on the France-Switzerland border, or I guess, technically under the border, since it's way underground. It's a big ring that's like 17 miles around, and what happens is that science guys go down there and shoot subatomic particles at each other and try and find shit like the Higgs boson and figure out why we have mass and where everything comes from and who sent the UFO that's buried under the ocean floor near New Zealand. I might have made that last part up.

If you're saying "What the fuck is that thing?," you're not alone.

Anyway, it's totally fucking complicated and just click on the Wiki link if you want to read more. Me, I'm personally kind of interested in string theory and particle physics and cosmology but I figured out early on that wouldn't be my life's calling when I found that I couldn't mulitply 5 times 6 without looking it up and all this shit apparently requires a pretty good grasp of math. We're getting way off the point here.

Now here's the thing. Because of the way it works (and that's as specific as I can get), there is a nonzero chance that the LHC may produce miniature black holes. WHAT THE FUCK. No, seriously. As we all know, black holes are bad news because they suck in everything around them and so forth. Now, the LHC people obviously don't want anyone thinking they could destroy the Earth with their accidental mini black holes, so everyone's toeing the company line and telling you what they want you to hear: "Destroy the world? Pshaw. This thing's safer than a riding mower. Your clock radio has a better chance of creating a world-ending event." That's what they want you to think.

As it happens, the LHC has been beset by problems. Like one thing after another. And they're weird problems. Like a bird dropping a baguette into the fucking thing. You could not make this shit up.

Here comes the mindblowing part: I had this theory, which I freely admit was probably caused by watching too much sci-fi as a kid, about why the LHC couldn't get fired up. Here's my theory: All the shit they told us not to worry about is real, and the reason they can't start it is because people from the future are traveling back through time to sabotage it so we won't destroy the Earth.

WHOA DUDE. THAT IS FUCKED UP. Have you ever really looked at your hand before? Let's order pizza.

So I was all, "Man, I'm not just a drunk with a blog and much younger wife. I have come up with some groundbreaking shit here. Who do I call about this?"

But of course, I shoulda known better. After Googling for about 3 seconds, I find out I'm not really the first person to think of this. Much smarter people have already thought this up and probably used math. (Although, to my credit, these guys think the Higgs boson went back in time to kill it. I don't even get that at all. I say it was a couple of guys in jumpsuits. Which one do you prefer?)

Sorry for this brief interlude into the world of subatomic physics. We'll return to booze and Jersey Shore and shit like that next week. Unless they start that LHC up. DUN DUN DUN!!!

Introducing New Bar Night™

Sometimes you get in a rut. Don't beat yourself up; it's natural. You sort of get in the habit of going to the same places over and over. That's life.

So what can you do about it? Well, you could make some changes in your life, stop going to bars so much, clean yourself up, shave, spend some time outside, maybe throw the ball around with your kid.

Nah, fuck that. The answer is force yourself to try some new bars.

I would like to introduce a new feature, New Bar Night. Once per month, I will take one or more intrepid adventurers with me and we will visit at least one new bar where none of us have ever been before. It's going to be a little scary and a little fun.

Tonight is our maiden voyage, so to speak. Results will appear in this space tomorrow.

If we don't make it back, do pour out a PBR and a shot of Jameson's for me, won't you?

Product Testing: McDonald's Third Pound Angus Burger

I don't go much to McDonald's any more because I got sick of getting the McFeeling about a half-hour after I ate there. If you ever eat at McD's, you know the feeling I'm talking about.

But after seeing repeated commercials for the new Angus Third Pounder I finally gave in.

The Pitch: "The More the Meatier"...."So thick and juicy, you're gonna need an extra napkin."

The Product: I went with the Bacon and Cheese Angus Value Meal, which came with a medium french fries and a drink. I got a Diet Coke. $7.11 total. As for the bacon and cheese, hey, in for a penny, in for a pound.

I know what you're thinking: After ordering 1/3 lb. of beef with bacon and cheese slathered on it, who the fuck do you think you're kidding with a Diet Coke? I know, I know. The lady behind the counter looked momentarily perplexed too. I just like the taste of Diet Coke better than regular Coke. Speaking of, someone recently told me you can still get Tab somewhere. If you see Tab in the wild anywhere, let me know. I kind of fondly recall its bizarre petrochemical taste.

The result: Not bad, actually.



The bun was nice and soft and tasted fresh. The meat actually tasted like meat, which is unusual for McDonald's. It's not like Quarter Pounder meat (which must be like 75% fat) or the little pucks that are in the flat regular cheeseburgers (which are also full of a magic potion that cures hangovers, but that's another story.) Big slices of red onion. The cheese tasted like the usual McDonald's cheese.

The only weak point was the bacon. It was those super-thin translucent bacon slices that are basically just grease held together with fat and with some kind of bacon flavor added. What would really makes the TPAB a monster would be thick slices of real bacon, but that's probably beyond what McD's is capable of.

The damage: For the burger alone, 790 calories, 39 grams of fat. With the fries, my totals are 1170 cal. and 58 grams of fat. That sounds like a lot. But hey, I can have about 2600 calories a day, so I can still eat dinner! Yay!

Some things are just as bad as you were told. Like professional wrestling, or the Bubble Lounge

Difficult as this must be to believe, I actually found myself in the famous-for-its-douchebag-quotient Bubble Lounge on Saturday night, for a friend's girlfriend's birthday thing. It's maybe not as bad as I thought it would be, crowdwise, but I wasn't there that long.

2 or 3 significant problems, though:

1. It's fucking expensive. The Sister wanted a glass of champagne and I asked the very affable bartender about it and he made a suggestion and then gave me a sample! Nice, right? So I asked him how much it is per glass and he said "$18" and I said "Show me something more in the $10 range" and he said "We have an entry-level prosecco for $11" and I said The Sister would like entry level just fine.

2. There was nowhere to sit. All the seats at the bar were taken and you can't sit at any of the tables unless you guarantee $30 a head for everyone in your party. Oh, fuck you.

3. I don't know what they have going on downstairs but it looked like a prom. Obvs it wasn't a prom, but it was a bunch of very young-looking overdressed chicks. Wait, that sounds pretty good. I'm not describing it right or something.

So we vacated that place and walked down the street to The Kells, another place I would normally never go (Yelp sample: This is a great place if you want to drink Budlights out of insulated aluminum bottles, meet some 19 year olds from Sacramento and dance to Montell Jordan) but we saw a few open tables in the front and more than anything we just wanted to sit down. Boy oh boy is that place full of assholes (General rule: If you're wearing a visor backwards and upside down, you're probably an asshole. Fuck, if you're wearing a visor, period, you're probably an asshole) but we had a place to sit and it was fine becuse we pretty much stayed out of the fray, as it were.

I don't know what's going on down on the lower end of Columbus these days, but it looked like prom at The Kells too. Where are all these 19-year-old girls coming from? And how did they all get fake ID's?

Now I know why I never went to either of those places even when I lived in North Beach. The End.

Oh, P.S. Signs You're Getting Old: Our plans for this Friday night include renting a Rug Doctor. SLOW YOUR ROLL, COMMANDER PARTY!!!! WHOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Bachelorette party? Heavy metal band in animal costumes? All part of a weekend.

We've got a lot of ground to cover, so let's get right to it.

There used to be a dark, dank, unwelcoming bar on Market Street called the Expansion Bar. The kind of place where you might find a 65-year-old alcoholic with a Miller and a shot of Wild Turkey next to a tweaker who's scanning the room for CIA agents. But it was cheap and unpretentious and so it fit the bill on many an occasion.

Then it closed. And a (mostly) gay bar called Metro opened where it was. Then that closed. Now there's a new place that just opened called Blackbird. The Wife and I checked it out Friday night.
Here's the problem. On their website, they say "The Neighborhood Bar is back," and ask if you are "fed up with fancy-schmancy lounges" and go on to talk about how regular and comfortable and blah blah blah whatever else they are. Well, guess what, Blackbird? You're a fancy-schmancy lounge. Maybe it's the indirect lighting and the modern art on the walls and the low, uncomfortable tables and the bar staff that looks like they should be in Fashionable Hipster Bartender magazine, but I would say that "comfortable neighborhood bar" is the LAST phrase I would use. Maybe if your neighborhood is an episode of "Sex and the City." I'll pass.

Moving on. Saturday early evening at Bloodhound (WARNING - music plays automatically and BTW I fucking hate that) was notable for 2 things: (1) Sitting at the bar, we are approached by an attractive young woman who asks us if we're in the Mile High Club. OH HAI LADEE. As it turns out, none of us were but AYW ("Simone," as it turns out, if that's her real name) is there as part of a bachelorette party and RIGHT I guess that explains the chick in the veil over there doing shots. Anyway, I wish I could say that hijinx ensued but nothing really exciting happened and The Wife reads this blog anyway. (2) Shortly thereafter, a well-dressed preppy-looking guy in a seersucker blazer WITH A POCKET SQUARE weaved his way up to the bar and slurred "What's the capital of Poland?" And I said "Warsaw?" And he smiled and then looked like he was going to fall over or puke. Dude was SHITFACED. He got kicked out a little while after that for getting handsy with an Iranian chick.

And then yesterday. One word. ZEMEZYZ.

What? You've never seen a heavy metal band dressed as mythical animals or maybe Where the Wild Things Are? ZEMEZYZ.

Who will finally look out for me and my fellow white males?

After much consideration and careful deliberation, I must reluctantly announce that I am compelled to join in opposition to the appointment to the Supreme Court of Sonia Sotomayor. As a straight white male, I simply cannot accept yet another Supreme Court justice who is unwilling to look out for my rights.

Like my fellow straight white males, I have felt the sting of discrimination many times. It becomes so routine, we internalize - nay, even accept - it, but that doesn't make it right. I feel it every time I step onto a dance floor or eat spicy food. When I walk into my corner store, the guys suddenly stop talking in Arabic or whatever it is they speak and then just smile at me and I know they were just talking about me. There are whole blogs dedicated to making fun of me.

And now you want to put a justice on the Supreme Court who doesn't have, as her top priority, protecting the rights of me and my fellow white males? I proudly join with my brothers Jeff Sessions and Lindsey Graham and say ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

In other news, convicted Laci-killer Scott Peterson (or, I guess, his family) has set up a website seeking donations to help pay for his appeal. Um, good luck with that.

Product testing: Axe shower gel

Like any right-thinking man, I have been beguiled by the advertisements for the Axe family of grooming products. As you know, the TV ads typically depict a rather humdrum fellow who, upon dousing himself with an Axe product, is set upon by a pack of suddenly sex-crazed young minxes, who have been driven to bacchanalian abandon by the mere whiff of the man's fragrance. Here's a perfect example.

Now, it's possible - possible - that maybe I'm not in the Axe demographic, but in the interest of science, I embarked on a recent experiment to test the accuracy of these advertisements. Since I'm now married, and didn't want to put myself in a situation where I'd be unable to control the gang of women hurling themselves at me, I undertook this test within the confines of my own home.

THE PRODUCT: Axe Phoenix Revitalizing Shower Gel. Not sure what the significance of "Phoenix" is. Perhaps the suggestion that I will rise, phoenix-lile, from the flames of Uncleanliness and Not Getting Laid? Or is the product intended for use specifically in Arizona?



THE TEST: Finished assembling, and then moving around, some furniture yesterday. Became appropriately sweaty. Showered using the Phoenix. Observation: Feels refreshing! Like there's actually some chemical in it that makes your skin feel tingly.


ANTICIPATED RESULT: Wife saying "Oh my God, you sexy piece of meat. Violate me like we're on Spring Break. Let's make Caligula look like Captain Kangaroo. Take me!"


ACTUAL RESULT: "What is that? Are you wearing cologne? Ugh, you smell like you're from Walnut Creek."


There you have it. Axe shower gel. Do not want.