Avoiding the Accidental "Snout" Taco at Grand Central Market

As you know, I loooooove me some Downtown Los Angeles. Just before Christmas I took some visiting family for a Jewelry District shopping trip and we stopped in at the historic Grand Central Market at Third/Broadway for a quick morning snack. I stopped at a relatively large/prominent counter perched at the entrance to the place, figuring a little $2 soft taco would be perfect for the three of us girls.

Little did I know I'd have to scan the entire menu, limited as it was, to find a meat filling for my taco that did not evoke bad memories of accidental orders in foreign languages! Check the center column on the menu board in the photo. Mercifully it provided English translations, but here were the meat offerings for us:

Ribs

Skin

Tongue

"lomo" (which it turns out is "tenderloin" and not scary)

Ham (but given the other options listed, I don't think this is what I would consider "ham" but some other funky version of it)

Pork (also suspect- never heard of "espaldillo")

Heart

Liver

Kidney

"buche" (which I find online is a mixture of pig and cow "scraps")

Snout

Ears

Feet

Tripe (stomach)

and . . .

Carne Asada

Ding ding ding! That's the ticket. Reading through that list of horrors and I was treated with the best for last- carne asada it was!

Awesome Holiday Cards, Volume I

Our household gets literally hundreds of holiday cards each year, and my favorite tradition is to take a good look at them. They represent such a wide variety of people from my family's long history, it's cool to see them all. I'm trying not to make too much fun of anyone here (and believe me, I could post and comment on some really awful ones and you would die laughing). They do tend to fall into categories, though. Take a gander . . .

North Dakota Folksy

My dad is from West Fargo, North Dakota, so we get a lot of cards from the Mother Land. His friends from back-in-the-day are notable for the things they write in the cards. They are extraordinarily honest: if their crop failed this year, you are going to hear about it. Not like the cards from LA people, with their sun-tanned photos from cruises with beautiful grandkids. Nope, the ND folks are just that . . . folksy. I liked this one, which has hand-written: "We're having our first snowfall of the season. Dick is heading out to get some gas for the snowblower."

This is not some clever statement or inside joke. It's just exactly what it says, honest and straightforward. Well, thanks for letting us know! Maybe he'll pick up some milk, too?

Old People Who Know How to Live
Then there is the segment of my parents' friends who seem to be spending their golden years traveling like crazy. These couples always send a cool photo from a far-off land. This one is amazing, though!

The writing on the back of the card informs us that this is a 1 1/2 year old Cheetah who visited them on a trip to Tanzania. That is an amazing photo! And the man on the left just looks so relaxed about the whole encounter. Wow. I hope I'm that cool when I'm old.

California Awesome

This one is from my friend from growing up, who lives in LA. Can you tell she had twins?? I didn't think so. She's my idol. The card is so exuberant with the crazy feathers. Over-the-top in a really playful way. So cute. I am imagining what the folks at my old law firm in upstate New York would think if they received a card like this. It is sooooo much in keeping with people's stereotypes about Los Angeles. I love it!!

G is for Grapple?

I eat some weird food. Bacon donuts. Shaved beef tendon salad. Andouillette. But none of that is somehow as weird as what John just brought home for me to taste. The Grapple. Pronounced "GRAPE-l" and capitalized because it is a registered brand name for a new grapey-apple product.

Judging from the website's 1950s-looking graphics and the references to combating childhood obesity, it seems that the Grapple is being marketed as a way to get your fat kids to eat more fruit. This is consistent with what I experienced in tasting my first Grapple: looks like an apple, smells like a Jolly Rancher!! The Grapple looks, feels, and tastes like a normal apple. But the aroma coming off it was precisely the same as grape flavored candy. Pretty sneaky trick, but it won't fool your kid more than once because, guess what? The Grapple just tastes like a boring old Fuji apple. In fact, after all that grape-smelling-good-ness, the apple is pretty much of a letdown.

Wikipedia tells me that the Grapple is not the result of some cool hybrid, but instead a patent-pending liquid infusion process in which grape juice concentrate is pushed into the flesh. Well, forcing grape into an apple does not create the "sweet distinctive flavor of Concord grapes combined with the crispness of a fresh, juicy Washington Extra Fancy apple." Ain't no grape anywhere in that apple, except for the Jolly Rancher scent!