At a loss as to what to do this weekend? Well, everyone’s gotta eat. And if you have to eat, why not do it in the sun, accompanied by all of your friends and family? This weekend, Santa Monica will be hosting two separate food events the LA BBQ Festival and Taste of Santa Monica.

Start at the BBQ Festival, which runs both Saturday and Sunday from noon to 6pm on the Santa Monica beach. Grillers, smokers and hard-core que-ers will be showcasing their wares on the beach to live country tunes, and only you can decide which is better: Kansas City, Texas or Mississippi. General admission is $10, and 1/3-1/2 lb portions of meat can be purchased from each pitmaster for $10.   Santa Monica Beach at Ocean & Colorado

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The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf is turning 45 this September and is kicking off a month-long promotion to celebrate the occasion with local community members. They will be doing weekly specials ranging from
discounts on beverages and packaged coffee to free espresso shots to help celebrate!

Here are the dates of all of there specials:

• Tuesday, Sept.16th: 63 cent hot tea
• Tuesday, Sept. 23rd: 20 percent off one pound of house blend coffee
• Tuesday, Sept. 30th: 20 percent off any 20-count tea bag tin
• Tuesday, Oct. 7th: Add a FREE espresso shot to any drink

Enjoy!

Photo by Refracted Moments™

Everyone always says it’s cheaper to cook than it is to eat out, but is it really? If you’re not eating mac and cheese, and trying to make something with fresh. tasty ingredients it’s not going to be cheap. From buying the seasoning, to the meat, to the sauce ingredients, to the vegetables, it adds up a lot quicker than one could imagine, and it’s not necessarily faster or easier.

I am by NO means encouraging people to eat fast food, but when you have the time it is important to know that sitting down and enjoying a good meal made for you can not only be enjoyable and tasty, but it also can be inexpensive.

If you want to know how to do this the answer is you need to know where to go and what to order. Luckily the LATimes just put together a great list of different types of restaurants in LA where you can get GREAT deals. Here are some of my fav’s…

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Montana Avenue has a couple of staples, Father’s Office probably being the most popular amongst them. Beyond the beer and burger, Montana Cafe and 17th Street Cafe have been there forever, and Babalu even survived a fire. Fireside Cellars has an impressive selection of high-end wines, but the Duck Blind is the only liquor store around that sells high-end nudie magazines. With a constantly revolving selection of specialty stores pitching blink and you’ll miss them trends, it’s easy to ignore a new store opening.

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Reserve your tickets now for biggest debate in LA. No it’s not Obama and McCain, it’s LA Cuisine vs. the world! On September 10th, Zócalo and the Hammer Museum present “Is There Such a Thing as L.A. Cuisine?” moderated by LA Weekly and Gourmet Magazine’s food critic, Jonathan Gold.

NY is known for their pizza. Japan is known for their sushi. Italy is known for their pasta. But was is LA known for? Is there such a thing as LA cuisine?

Zócalo brings together a panel of prominent local chefs that will include, among others, Michael Cimarusti, co-owner and executive chef, Providence Restaurant, Octavio Becerra, chef and owner, Palate Food & Wine, Evan Kleinman, executive chef, Angeli Caffe and host of the Good Food show on KCRW to ask what exactly Los Angeles cuisine might be. Does it owe more to the confluence of global cultures or the extraordinary local produce, to car culture or to pure imagination? And where is it going?

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Have you noticed all the small, juicy, ripe little plums in the market these days?  Everytime I go to Whole Food’s I buy at least 2 or 3 just-about-ready-to-eat deep dark black plums.  In the morning I slice them lovingly in a little dreamy mist of dripping plum juice and scatter them across my yogurt.  In the afternoon I might get enraged with lust and rip one open with my mouth in the most un-delicate of ways, my passion calmed by the very hue that ignited it.  Ahh, sweet, fresh plums and subtly stained summer lips.

So in the spirit of a waning summer love along with a food-ready holiday coming up on Monday, I thought I’d share with you one of the hot-damn-near lustiest plum recipes I know.  “Baking With Julia” is a gigantic, glossy cook book for baking and it was the best thing I got when I signed up for a 10-week “baking 101′ course at The New School of Cooking.  Not only that, it holds one of the tastiest cobbler recipes I’ve ever had: Johnnycake Cobbler.  PLUM cobbler.  Now you gettin’ it?  I was also lucky enough to find a fantastic version of this sinfully comforting cobbler on the Café johnsonia blog,equipped with mouth watering photos that break down the steps oh-so-simply, and, even more importantly, really get you in the mood to make some of your own magic.  (Nudge nudge).

I think they’ll convince you to do just a wee bit of laboring in the kitchen this Monday.

Photo by multi_everything

I’m a frequent visitor to Main Street: Clever is an adorable store full of fun toys I never knew I needed, Varga is my go-to shop for inexpensive sunglasses and Monday trivia nights at Finn McCool’s are always good for a laugh. While walking along Main the other night doing a little shopping (mostly of the window variety) I found a new shop in the base of the relatively-new Archstone apartments just south of Pico.

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In sad news for cookie-lovers everywhere, Mrs. Fields Famous Brands, known as a little-old lady started cookie company, is filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The cookie chain has been ailing since at least early 2007, when it started selling off assets and going through several rounds of layoffs.

According to the NY Times, the company licenses and franchises about 1,200 Mrs. Fields cookies and TCBY locations worldwide. Also, they apparently have $196 million in publicly-traded debt. Apparently cookies and frozen yogurt are really, really, really, really expensive to make.

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No matter who becomes the 44th president of this country, I really hope they’re a fan of gardening, especially edible gardening. Eat the View, a campaign to plant healthy, edible landscapes in high-impact and visible places hopes this also.

Eat the View is urging the next president of the United States to plant an organic food garden on the White House lawn. Sure, you say, this is a fun idea at best, but how can the food be used? Eat the View recommends part of the produce go to the White House kitchen and the rest to local food pantries. There’s even a petition you can sign on their website that urges the White House to set a positive example for the country and the world.

You might think this idea is far fetched, however, no traditions are being broken here. The White House has had fruit and vegetable gardens before. In fact, you’ll be surprised to find out that upon occupying the White House, one of John Adams first additions was a vegetable garden. Andrew Jackson was into gardening as well. He created the White house orangery, a greenhouse where tropical fruit tress and flowers grew. Eleanor Roosevelt even planted a victory garden on the White House lawn in 1943, an event that lead to millions of Americans to do the same in their own white houses.

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In an interesting twists of sorts, we’ve got quite a few bits and pieces of news concerning food in Los Angeles.

• It seems L.A. is getting health conscious and environmentally friendly by the day. The Los Angeles City Council approved a pilot program on Tuesday that will provide 5,000 households with a 2-gallon bin that will be used for food waste, reports the Los Angeles Times. Residents are asked to start tossing their scraps, leftovers and food-soiled packages in the bins beginning next month. What will the city do with all this food, you ask? The scraps (which will be combined with lawn clippings) will be delivered to a composting center near Bakersfield. The bins will be delivered to residents in Harbor Gateway, Lincoln Heights and South Los Angeles.

• While we haven’t solved L.A.’s drug problem, crime problem, traffic problem , you can go to sleep tonight knowing we’ve solved something: the Mediterranean fruit fly infestation has been officially declared over. The California Department of Food and Agriculture announced Thursday that the infestation has been cleared in Los Angeles, Santa Clara and Solan counties. The Mediterranean fruit fly is a common insect that threatens agriculture in California. State officials say the Mediterranean fruit fly can infest more than 260 types of fruits and vegetables by laying eggs in the produce.

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I think the LA Times is trying to woo me.

After all, how else could you explain today’s big headline food article on Rillettes.

Those of you who’ve been following our food serion for a while now are probably already aware that yours truly is French (well, half but I’ve got a passport to back up my claim). And anyone who’s spent any significant amount of time in France is no doubt familiar with God’s gift to stomachs. But there may be a small and sad portion of you who are unfamiliar with this.

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As a Frenchman, there’s one thing I simply can’t live without, and that’s butter. It really, truly does make everything better: bread, meats, veggies, desserts… There’s nothing that can’t benefit from a little butter.

Well with the heat keeping most of us indoors, here’s a great little project that can keep you busy and wow your palate: make your own butter!

Believe it or not, it’s actually extremely simple, and can be quite gratifying. All you need is some heavy whipping cream and a food processor.

So head on over to bay area bites for this fun and easy-to-follow little guide that will have you salivating in no time!

Photo by taiyofj, story via Serious Eats