Chen-Wu Family Visit

LA County Safer At Home: Days 44-45

Sweet Rice's boat noodle soup.

Sad just how excited you can get about eating fresh boat noodles in the parking lot.

Long line at 99 Ranch in Gardena.

And even longer at Sam's Club.

Even Daiso has a line.

M4 Sherman at the corner gas station.

M2 light tank. There was a third WW2 vehicle, too, I think it was another M2 light tank.

Someone's ham'ing it up for the camera.

Father and son. n/naka.

n/naka.

Unassuming yet distinctive.

As befits a Michelin 2*.

The bag of tasty noms.

Three n/naka Kaiseki Jūbako. Subtle.

Subtle.

Abalone and duck, waygu beef, sashimi, and sushi.

Braised Monterey Bay abalone next to smoked duck.

Red snapper, botan ebi, and tuna sashimi.

Seared waygu salad.

Grilled seasonal fish (kinki? cod?) next to ikura, daikon, and sansho to mix.

Strawberry daifuku, matcha white chocolate cake, passionfruit chocolate truffle.

The Chen-Wu's go crazy.

Full meal shot.

Miso soup. So perfectly balanced between rich and flavorful.

Crispy lobster kara age, Takiawase braised vegetables, seasonal fish, rice.

Lobster kara age. NOM.

The menu.

Strawberry daifuku was amazingly fresh and sweet.

Lan Lan's imported toilet paper.

Napkin as a hat?? Crazy kids!

Lucas nom's away on his grilled cheese. In constrast, Milo looks like he hates eating.

In constrast, Milo looks like he hates eating.

He'd rather play with his mom.

Zeus, the 1% dog.

Why did you stop petting me??

Tried to go grocery shopping... forgot the day before was pay day for a lot of people. Gardena stores were mobbed. o_0 Grabbed some surprisingly good boat noodles from Sweet Rice at least. Sad that I used to fly to Thailand for boat noodles, and now instead I'm excited about slurping them out of a take-out box in the parking lot.

Managed to get reservations for n/naka's Kaiseki Jubako box last weekend for the Chen-Wu family, so they made a (rare for COVID-19 era) trip up for it. It was friggin' delicious. Superb even. The quality is as expected for a Michelin 2*, and at this price it's a simply ridiculous value-- perhaps even incredible. The tiny bit of botan ebi is delectable, the lobster oddly works better than it should, and even the waygu salad is pure NOM in every bite.

And the strawberry daifuku is such a ripe, sweet strawberry inside. Holy cow.

Meanwhile Lucas is now clearly ham'ing it up for the camera, and he too enjoys food. Breakfast the next day from John O'Groats wasn't special by any means, but it hit the spot, down to the fat strips of bacon.

The Chen-Roethle family made it over for a few hours before the Chen-Wu family left; their son Milo clearly has much less interest in food than Lucas. It was good to see the kids play together tho-- something they don't get to do very often at all during safer-at-home. (and holy cow, the kids ran crazy all over the house once they got comfortable with each other!)