Lunch: We heated some HEB brand chicken tamales and beef & potato tamales for lunch.

Dinner: My high school friend Brian who I haven't seen for eight years was in town, so I picked him up and we all headed down to The Salt Lick for dinner. I ordered two combination plates with moist cut brisket, sausage, and ribs with an additional pound of ribs and extra cole slaw.

Lunch: I had a tuna fish sandwich and the left over two slices of pizza from last night.

Dinner: I had a piece of lasagna. We froze the lasagna into serving size pieces, but when reheated, there's a tendency for the frozen lasagna to spread. This results in an unsightly picture, but doesn't really affect the taste of the lasagna.

Lunch: I had a slice of the lasagna which I prepared before my trip that Tina baked a few days ago. A couple interesting notes about the lasagna: I used Belgioioso brand ricotta which is much creamier after cooking than Precious brand. Also, the pasta I used was HEB store brand (precooked) which came out much softer than my regular brand (Ronzoni) which I haven't seen here in Austin yet.

Dinner: We had dinner at Central Market Cafe prior to grocery shopping. Tina ordered a Artichoke Olive Mushroom Pizza (Basil pesto, roasted artichoke hearts, roasted mushrooms and Feta cheese, $8) which was good, but only after we removed about half the olives. The overabundance of olives made the pizza much too salty to eat without scraping some of them off.

Click here to read the rest of
What I Ate: January 10, 2010 (Central Market Cafe)

Breakfast: I ate a McDonald's Sausage McMuffin with Egg and Hash Brown Patty at around 4:30am. I didn't take a picture because both my cameras were packed away for the flight back to Austin.

Dinner: After flying to Houston and then Austin, I made it home. Tina (who has been cooped up inside the house for the last week) suggested we go out for some Mexican or Tex-Mex food, and I agreed. We ate dinner at Serrano's where I decided to try the Pollo Perfecto (three marinated chicken thighs mesquite grilled and topped with chile con queso and fresh avocado). The chicken was tender and rice was good, but I didn't really like how the chili con queso and rice were burning on the hot iron plate while I was eating.

Lunch: I ate lunch with Papa at Kasa Indian Eatery (4001 18th Street, San Francisco, CA‎ - (415) 621-6940‎). Kasa serves kati rolls (flatbread wrapped around fillings like curry, paneer, egg, etc.). I got their lunch special ($7.95) which gives me two rolls and a fountain drink. I chose Chicken Tikka Masala and Gobi Aloo as well as paid an extra $1 each for Unda style (with egg inside).

Dinner: I headed back down to South Bay to try Ramen Santouka (675 Saratoga Avenue, San Jose, CA‎ - (408) 255-6699‎) in the Mitsuwa Japanese Marketplace. The place closes at 7:30 (because Mitsuwa Marketplace closes at 8:00pm) and there's usually a line. They cut off the line around closing time - I got there at around 7:15pm and was the fifth to last person to be served.

Click here to read the rest of
What I Ate: January 8, 2010 (Kasa Indian Eatery, Ramen Santouka)

Lunch: I stopped at the Erik's DeliCafe in Mountain View for a Pilgrim's Progress sandwich. The Pilgrim's Progress may be the best turkey-avocado sandwich ever made. I had a cup of clam chowder with the sandwich.

Dinner: I went to dinner with Harold and Darcy at Chelokababi (1236 South Wolfe Road, Sunnyvale, CA‎ - (408) 737-1222‎). I had the Kabab Bareh (A skewer of tender marinated filet of lamb) and Joojeh Kabab (Our specialty: Tender pieces of chicken filet, marinated, and garnished with saffron.). Both were very tender but the Joojeh Kabab was quite a bit more complex in flavor than the Kabab Bareh.

Click here to read the rest of
What I Ate: January 7, 2010 (Erik's DeliCafe, Chelokababi)

Lunch: Fanpop ate out as a group at One Market (1 Market Street, San Francisco, CA‎ - (415) 777-5577‎) for our 2009 holiday lunch. The food was excellent and the prices great for the quality. The Market Lunch is a special they run that lets you get any starter and any entree for $28. Cliff got a couple of vegetarian entrees while Dave, Papa, and I each got the Market Lunch with a different appetizer which we split.

Grilled Octopus - tender and strongly flavored - worked wonderfully with the grainy edamame puree

Click here to read the rest of
What I Ate: January 6, 2010 (One Market, Plearn Thai Palace)

Day One of a four day trip to the San Francisco Bay Area for work.

Lunch: Dave, Papa, and I ate at Il Cane Rosso (Ferry Building, San Francisco, CA‎ - (415) 391-7599).

Marin Sun Farms Spit-roasted Porchetta with pickled Cabbage, house made dijon mustard & peppercress $9.

Click here to read the rest of
What I Ate: January 5, 2010 (Il Cane Rosso, In-N-Out Burger)

Lunch: I ate the rest of the tuna noodle casserole for lunch (1 and a third pieces).

Dinner: We ate leftover Chinese food from Asia Cafe.

We ate a big early dinner at Asia Cafe (8650 Spicewood Springs Rd, Austin, TX‎ - (512) 331-5788). We had mustard greens with pork noodle soup, won ton soup, yang zhou fried rice, stir-fried rapa (rapeseed plant), and braise pork belly with preserved vegetables.