That's pepper on the matzo ball. My doing.

Sorry I didn’t write yesterday. Actually… I’m not sorry. NOT sorry I didn’t write yesterday. I didn’t eat anything worth writing about, and I was reading the second Hunger Games book (Catching Fire). Among other things.

OH HEY, did you know that today (er, beginning at sundown today) is ROSH HASHANAH? Also known as the Jewish new year? Apparently it’s 5771 now. I have some mental block against knowing what Jewish year it is. Usually I just default to 5756, because it has a nice ring to it. (Apparently 5756 was in 1995. That was probably the one year I had to learn the Jewish year, in Hebrew school or something.)

The traditional Snack of Rosh Hashanah is apples and honey, for a sweet new year. We have both of those things in the office so I just might chow down… later. For now, I happen to have a Jewishy post on deck, so I figured I’d slap it up this morning, so I can go back to Catching Fire… and work. (I DO work, you know.) (GLARE.)

Over the weekend my parents and I took an unexpected jaunt to LA to rescue a beloved family couch from being kicked to the curb. On the way home we stopped in Long Beach and lunched at Katella Deli, one of our family’s chosen Jewish delis. (Get it?)

What I actually ate is pictured above. I think I literally ate that whole basket of bread. But if I’m going to binge on a basket of bread, that is the best basket possible. Pumpernickel, rye, challah, and what I THINK were mini kaiser rolls, with poppy or sesame seeds on top (the first basket had poppy seed).

And matzo ball soup is a Passover food, but whatever.

My favorite part of Katella deli is the order-out counter in the back, where you can admire all sorts of amazing desserts, most of which are somewhat nostalgic for all the Jews out there who grew up eating.

As far as the eye can see...

I have a soft spot for the sprinkle cookies… you know how I love my rainbow sprinkles.

Cookies a la sprinkle.

Whenever I post something colorful, I always have to stop myself from just writing, “The colors! The colors!” I think that was a line in an old Skittles commercial.

Also, can you spot my finger in the shot? I keep doing that, lately. Amateur hour.

Oh, here’s another holiday food that’s not at all associated with Rosh Hashanah. Hamentaschen. For Purim!

I'm skeptical about the prune flavor.

I gotta wonder if prune’s a big seller. I mean, I guess they cater to an older clientele. But my faves are apricot, poppy seed, and chocolate (duh). (Duh to all of those, knowing me.)

The hamentaschen are supposed to look like a three-cornered hat, because the bad guy (Hamen) always wore one. But that’s a story for PURIM, not Rosh Hashanah.

And here are a few desserts that have nothing to do with any personal nostalgia/Jewish holidays, but I just had to document them.

Can you spot everything adorable in this picture?

Those sea creatures slay me! I love starfishes! And those ladybugs are TOO HAPPY. I don’t know if I could eat these. Too cute.

And here’s a dessert where the animal is not a plastic thingy…

Not sure how I feel about this...

Kinda creeps me out, but I bet it’s delicious.

Lest you think that Rosh Hashanah is way healthier than all the other holidays, it also involves round loaves of challah and HONEY CAKE. Oh man, the thing I miss most about college is the amazing honey cake (spice bread?) they had at Hillel this time of year. If I can make it there this year and they still have it, I’m going to steal like 100 pieces. (Or… 4.)

In college I’d always break my Yom Kippur fast with the Hillel honey/spice bread/cake, but my body hates fasting (surprise surprise?), so food/drink would BURN my dehydrated mouth. (I’ve also ended fasts with intense vomiting… I generally don’t fast anymore.)

I wish I had the recipe for that cake, so I wouldn’t have to infiltrate/eat it when my mouth isn’t functioning.

But the potential for pain and torture comes next week. For now… HAPPY NEW YEAR! (Cue mouth-buzzer kazoos and confetti.)

L’shanah tovah!

xoxo…

Dear Peggy, This should be your Facebook pic! Love, the Future

Just finished watching last night’s “Mad Men,” Episode 407: The Suitcase. Written by Matt Weiner and Matt Weiner alone. Did you notice that the episode was about Peggy’s frustration over being the underling idea-submitter, always watching her hard work get rewritten, and not getting credit or awards for her contributions?

And Don’s reaction? Fuck you, Peggy! Your pay is your thanks!

More and more, I see the world of “Mad Men” as a reflection of the world of TV writing. Just sayin’.

So yeah… let’s do a quick rundown of what happened.

-Cassius Clay (aka Muhammad Ali) was in a big boxing match. And it was also Peggy’s 26th birthday.

-Peggy ran into pregnant Trudy Campbell in the Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce bathroom, and Trudy dissed Peggy about being an old maid by saying “you’re still young.”

-Duck wanted to start a new company with Peggy, but luckily Peggy knew he’d gone back to his drinking ways. Duck showed up at Peggy’s office to DO her, but ended up in a wrestling match with Don, which may or may not have lasted longer than the Clay/Liston match.

Float like a butterfly, sting like a Duck.

-Peggy’s boyfriend, Mark, arranged a surprise birthday dinner with her family (I thought he was going to propose, because some people sic families on people for proposals, but I guess I was wrong). But Peggy stayed at work with mean-drunk Don (without telling him that she had plans), and she and Mark broke up over the phone, as Mark sat with her entire family. Awk. Later Peggy tells Don that she expected romance and candlelight, not for Mark to round up the people who annoy her the most. I get that. Bye Mark. I’m over you, too.

-Peggy says, “I’m single!” in a way that is sad, adorable, and exactly what I do every time I’m single again. (Peggy imitating life.)

"I'm Elysse?!"

-Don discovered one of Roger’s dictation tapes for his autobiography, and we found out that Don’s crazy old-lady secretary was a “hellcat” (AKA used to sleep with Roger, kinkily) and that Burt Cooper has no balls (LITERALLY), because they were surgically removed by the mysterious Dr. Lyall Evans to whom Roger alluded in the Honda episode. Why they were removed, I don’t know. But Cooper maybe had the doctor killed?

[-Upon further reflection and prayer, I'm not sure if Cooper ACTUALLY had his balls removed, or whether Dr. Lyall Evans, like, had an affair with his wife. I'm guessing it's the latter. Because Cooper doesn't have a high-pitched voice. I kinda feel like an idiot for not hitting this conclusion earlier. (But at least Peggy was also confused about it, in the episode.) (I'm such a Peggy, you guys-- in case you didn't get that the first thousand times I said it.)]

-The new guy, Danny (the “cure for the common x” guy) is so short! But actually seems like a fun coworker, despite his annoying-ness last week? His line about James Bond meeting a girl underwater is one of my faves. And even though his name is Danny, he’s Jewish? Our first Jew since season 1!

-Don takes Peggy out for dinner at some cheap Greek diner, which is funny because Mark and the fam were waiting for her at a really fancy Greek-themed place.

-Peggy tells Don that her family thinks he’s the father of her given-away baby, and therefore they hate him. Don DOESN’T know that Pete’s the father. Don tells Peggy that she’s super-cute, but he couldn’t sleep with her when she was his secretary. Peggy’s like, yeah right, never stopped you before. But Don’s like, men would line up for you. And she’s like, what? And later he fights Duck for calling her a whore. So… Peggy, you don’t know your own wiles. (And you looked really pretty this episode!)

-Anna Draper is dead, and Don drinks so much that he barfs, and he’s really sad, and he talks to Stephanie on the phone, and Peggy sees him cry? And I think Peggy is going to be his next Anna? And maybe marry him if not-really-married Dr. Faye Miller doesn’t? (And if Peggy doesn’t end up with secretary-Megan or one of the people from the lesbian party– Abe included.)

-Don actually tells Peggy a little bit about his parents and his past– such as, he was in the Korean war. Both of them watched their fathers die.

We're not so different, you and I.

-Peggy has never been on a plane, and I kind of want Don to take her to California with him if he goes there to do Draper-stuff.

-The actual famous Samsonite idea is the elephant one, which Don rejects. Later they see a mouse. That’s kind of funny. Elephant, mouse.

-Um… that’s all I feel like talking about? I can’t think of anything else right now. Oh yeah, Don sees Anna’s ghost, holding a suitcase. Is it Samsonite? I don’t know.

-And I didn’t watch LAST night because this happened (my usual)…

Falling asleep on the couch, that is.

I watched “Mad Men” last night rather than this morning because I was voraciously reading The Hunger Games. People have been urging me to get my butt in gear and read it, and I finally complied. So good! I’d be reading the 2nd one right now if I wasn’t waiting for my sister to mail it from St. Louis. Once again, I wish teleportation existed! (I might just have to Kindle it.)

Not surprising that I would love this book, because it’s all about snacks and TV. (That’s not entirely why, but that’s how I can justifying writing about BOOKS on here. No books allowed!) (Wait– books allowed! I make the rules.) In the future. Really!

The book revolves around this sick televised “Survivor”-type showdown that captivates the nation. First it felt like the Olympics, complete with nationalism (only in this case it’s district-ism) and built-in human interest stories. Then it was like “Survivor,” only you didn’t get voted off the island– you got KILLED off. Then it got all “Bachelorette.”

It’s totally telling us that we are the worst. Sorta.

But I’m not making it sound as awesome as it it. Just read it so we can have a very scholarly discussion about it. (Off the blog. Nothing scholarly happens here.) (I’m about to post a picture of a ladybug cupcake.)

Um, yeah. Sorry I haven’t been recapping “Mad Men” for the past few weeks. Sorry this recap is kinda scattered and lame. It’s Labor Day. I’m not supposed to be working too hard. (I actually did some Labor yesterday. I lifted a couch! And I might do some IKEA-ing today… I’m doing this holiday all wrong.)

xoxo…

Taking pictures of Lauren taking pictures. Not creepy at all.

At last, we’ve reached part 3 of 3! Of course the food of the picnic was excellent, but the setting was a major factor in the wonderfulness of the day. I adore the Getty Villa. It’s built in the style of an ancient Greek villa. Yes, please!

When I was in sixth grade we studied Greek & Roman Mythology for… in my memory, it was months and months of our history curriculum. There were definitely lots of art projects involved. I became a bit obsessed with the gods & goddesses. I read The Odyssey in 9th grade, and again in college. There’s something about the epic-ness of those stories. They’ve just stayed with me.

So it’s really cool to get to hang out in a place that’s all about Greek & Roman mythology, and also makes you feel like you took a time machine back to where it all started.

While we were walking around the Villa in a post-picnic semi-food coma, I noticed that there are a lot of food-elements to the space. Maybe that’s because a real Greek villa would have needed to grow its own food, and it also makes sense to have edible elements on the grounds, for snacking– grapes, pomegranates, etc.

Walking through the herb garden, we noted the gorgeous green basil. Lauren used basil in her bruschetta, and mused that she should grow some of her own. Life imitating lunch. (Our now-dwelling-in-NY friend, Pat– who we’re seeing tomorrow!– used to have basil growing in the window of his LA apartment.)

Yo, basil.

There were grapes growing around the big central pool. They must have been authentic ancient grapes, because I found some that had fallen, and they looked more like blueberries. As a modern person, I demand my Frankengrapes!

Hello, pretty sky.

One thing I love about the Villa is the cutouts in the walls. When I was in Rome, I was kind of obsessed with taking pictures through the cutouts in the ruins. And look what I spied, with my little eye…

When life hands you lemons...

Yep, more food! It’s uncanny, really.

And this ceiling might have been the ancient Greek version of The Daily Binge…

Around here there's a 75% chance of seeing grapes when you look up.

I’m a big fan of cornucopias. They’re basically hilariously shaped picnic baskets, no?

(At this point I went to Souplantation, and it’s PASSPORT TO GREECE month/week/time. Very appropriate!)

I doubt they had glass mason jars at picnics in Greece. They were less about shabby chic, more about GOBLETS.

Prodigious goblet, man.

I adore the colors in that mosaic. It’s part of a fountain that’s located in a little side garden. It seems as if every museum room at the Villa opens out into a beautiful outdoor space. That’s also attributable to the Greek villa design of the place, because back in ye olden days they didn’t have air conditioning. They had to harness the breezes!

The siren song (get it?) of these gardens kept pulling me out of the museum exhibit spaces. This one looked completely magical to me when I first glimpsed it from indoors. The bright light was such a stark difference between the darkened gallery and the sunlit slice of natural beauty. I couldn’t really capture the moment of discovery/revelation in a picture, but… eh, why not try?

The not-so-secret garden.

It’s such a nice palate cleanser to be able to step outside into the sunshine as you pass from one room to the next.

(Am I using food metaphors to describe the museum experience? I would, wouldn’t I?)

And as a former USC student– we love our fountains.

I had a total moment of Malcolm Gladwell fangirl geekout when I realized that this weird AVATAR-looking statue was a probably-forged kouros! (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, drop everything and read “Blink.” And then read “Outliers.” And the other one.)

... OR MODERN FORGERY?!

You don’t need to see a picture of the actual kouros that was standing there. It was not that interesting to me. (It’s in the Flickr album, if you must see it.)

So yeah, such a good day. This may be the most uninteresting post, word-smith wise, because it’s Friday night and I’m wiped. But once again I want to express my gratitude to Lauren and Cole for knowing exactly what would make me super happy, and actually putting it all into action.

And you even gave me a few ideas for my next birthday. On my 25th birthday, I definitely need to rock a castle hat.

The Burger King crown of antiquity.

(They’re actually city walls. Shhh. Nerd-who-reads-the-placards alert!)

Oh, and crazy enough, the Getty blog linked my first post (The Savories). That’s some beautiful cross-promotion. I have no idea how they found me, in this vast blogosphere. But I’m pumped. I highly recommend you visit the Getty Villa. It’s free, other than parking. You just have to make a reservation.

Castle hats for everybody!

xoxo…

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Step on up!

Since I announced the Quest for the Best S’more in LA, I haven’t had any s’mores. That happened with my curly fry quest, too… and my guacamole quest. The moment I announce a quest, it dies out.

Today I finally took a step in the right questing direction by ordering a s’more crepe ($5) from Crepe’n Around. It’s not technically a real s’more, but it’s surprisingly hard to find s’mores in their classical form around here. Oh, LA.

I was totally intending to go whole-hog and order a savory crepe AND a dessert crepe, but luckily fate intervened and the savory crepe I planned on ordering (teriyaki flank steak) wasn’t on today’s menu. (And chicken pesto had mayo. Not in the mood to deal with that.) (And by “that” I mean, the guilt of eating mayo.)

The majority of savory orders were for the maple braised pork crepe, which the Yelpers raved about. But I didn’t feel like violating my lifelong dietary/religious whatevers today. (Yeah, I did it when the Dim Sum Truck was here, but that was just one bite of maybe-pork.)

I had the option of getting whipped cream IN the crepe, or on the side. Luckily I opted for on-the-side and got my whipped cream in a little plastic container, because it ended up being like heavy duty REAL whipped cream, which my fat free Cool Whip self can’t handle. It tasted sour to me. But like I said… I’m a rube.

First look.

You can see that they didn’t use marshmallow fluff… those are real, full-sized marshmallows. They were a little warm, but by no means melted. Interesting choice.

I thought it was funny/cool that the crepe looked like a pizza from the following angle. I also like the way it was wrapped. There was a cool little pocket thing going on. You can’t really see it in the picture, but trust me. (Or not.)

What ARE you? (Famous girlfriend-of-vampire question.)

My mom worked in Burger King when she was in high school. When I was a kid, my sisters and I thought that was the COOLEST JOB EVER, as in, why would you ever quit? If we asked really nicely, Mom would wrap our sandwiches in wax paper with the Burger King technique. I think that wrapper also had some paper-pocket action going on. This reminded me of that.

I tried to make a heart out of my crepe, but seeing as how I had already cut it down the center, it ended up looking creepy. I figured I’d show you, anyway. Cautionary tale.

Broken heart. (...Frankenstein?)

Maybe this goes back to my inappropriate antropomorphization of food, but I feel gross about some of these pictures. Like I literally cut open a naked body and took pictures of it, mad scientist/pornographer style.

I think something might be wrong with me.

But you knew that. Moving on.

Innards!

Although this picture would suggest that I ate my crepe like a savage, I actually cut dainty little forkfuls. I ate 2/3 or 3/4 of the crepe, then forced the rest upon co-worker Bryan. He’s a foodie, so I was glad to get the crepe out of my mouth’s path, and also to get his opinion. (He seemed to like the whipped cream, which is how I know that my problems with it were me-problems.)

We agreed upon the following points: 1) The marshmallows were a bit overwhelming. 2) There was a lack of the crunch factor that we’re used to in a s’more, since the graham cracker was in dust form.

I found the chocolate sauce-to-marshmallow ratio to be a bit off. Like, in each bite I wanted less marshmallow and more chocolate.

BUT overall it was still quite tasty, and the crepe wrapper itself was delightful. If this truck returns, I think I’ll go for a strawberry crepe. That sounded good today, too, but I s’mored it up FOR THE SAKE OF THE BLOG.

Don’t say I never did nothing for the peoples.

Marshmallows and chocolate sauce!

xoxo…

Can you see his big goofy grin?

The bread soup smiled, the cupcake smiled– the food at Tender Greens is alive! Either that, or I’m getting a little anthropomorphism-happy here. (Probably that.)

So what do you do to very friendly food? You hack away at it with a knife! Of course.

Owww. Nice cupcakes finish DEAD.

This reminds me of some Wee Sing style video I used to watch when I was a kid, where they met The Muffin Man and he quartered his muffin (as in the food, not the Lady Gaga whatever-she’s-talking-about muffin) so that everybody could share.

These photos are also making me think, “One potato, two potato, three potato, four.”

Is he making a kinda resigned Charlie Brown face here? (With his one remaining eye squinched tight?)

I feel so incomplete.

But honestly, I didn’t see any of this face stuff until I uploaded the pictures. Let’s talk about what the cupcake tasted like: The frosting was very sweet, but I always go light on the frosting. Just enough to add a little bit of flavor/moisture. The cake was a bit drier than I’m used to, but not necessarily in a bad way. Maybe in a… European way?

As I said, I thought it was buttery, Bea thought it was sugary… it was probably a little bit of both. Now that I think about it, though, maybe it wasn’t that buttery. I was forgetting what buttery tastes like. (It happens.)

Oh, here’s a picture attempting to show you the strange curvy design of the Tender Greens silverware. And I think that piece of cupcake went uneaten. Yay for even the smallest bit of willpower.

Groovy.

Speaking of desserts/willpower/buttery-ness, the Crepe ‘N Around truck is outside. I’m debating whether to get a savory crepe, a sweet crepe, both, or nothing at all. Last time they were here I didn’t try anything. I’m not THAT hungry, but it’s apparently delicious. And they have a s’more crepe.

HMMMM.

xoxo…

Bread soup brings all the Elysse to the yard.

(The reflection on the side of the bowl looks like a big smile. Coincidence? I think NOT.)

Every time I go to Tender Greens, I waffle over whether or not to try the roasted Roma tomato bread soup. I mean, I definitely know I WANT to try it. Tomatoes, soup, bread? Check, check, check– sounds amazing. I’m just like, do I really NEED to add a big soup to my big salad order?

On Wednesday night I finally WENT FOR IT. Man oh man, was that a good call. The soup was a really nice consistency and was super-delicious and tomato-y. And there were plenty of chunks of bread within, perfectly saturated. Not too soggy. Just soggy enough, in a French onion-esque way.

If I ruled the world, every soup would be bread soup. (I generally DO dip bread or crackers into my broths.)

The green stuff on the top is… basil oil? Some sort of oil. At first I wanted to remove the oil, but I didn’t have anywhere to put it. So I became one with the oil. Er, it became one with me, because it went into my stomach.

Wanna see the bread? I don’t care what you want, I’m going to show it to you anyway.

From the depths of my soup...

I tried to get Bea to share the soup, but she pretty much left it to me. (As she did with the sweet tea, later that night.) What an enabler! Haha. But she agreed that it was delicious. (And I was a jerk, because I ate all the bread before I let her have a taste.)

It’s a good thing the soup was awesome, because my Chipotle BBQ Chicken salad was not nearly as good as it was last time.

You've changed. I don't know if I can trust you anymore.

Speaking of salads, another round of Souplantation is scheduled for tonight. They’re following me (the real me) on Twitter, as of this morning. And tweeting at me. That’s when you know… you’re a Souplantation addict.

I’ll tweet the lemon cupcake separately, because this post is focused on BREAD SOUP. (And has enough pictures already.)

Since autumn weather is seemingly upon us, I’m guessing that I’ll be having this delight again soon. With a small salad, because this soup shouldn’t be put in a corner. It’s the STAR.

xoxo…

You go, swirl.

As several bazillion people have pointed out, today’s date is 90210. Kinda clever. My hometown’s zip code date happened in 1961, so I totally missed out on THAT. (I don’t know if I would have noticed, since I didn’t catch this one.)

What’s the big deal? This is a ONCE IN A CENTURY occurrence. You will probably be dead when it happens again. And Beverly Hills might have a different zip code… or be underwater. Or worse… nobody will care about Beverly Hills anymore. (Beverly Hills thrives on attention.)

But who cares about anything anymore? Moving on.

This is one of the Friday-est feeling Thursdays I’ve ever encountered. I cannot convince my brain that it’s only Thursday. (And next week will be equally confusing, with the lack of a work-Monday.)

But that has nothing to do with the Snack of the Afternoon. Lately we’ve been spoiled not only by LUNCH trucks, but by a few DESSERT trucks. Today we were graced by the turquoise presence of the Big Swirl Truck. It’s basically Yogurtland on wheels.

You can buy a $3 or $5 cup and fill it as high as you want. I bought the $5 cup, but I didn’t fill it that high. I probably would have paid less by weight at a Yogurtland. Ah well. My bad. I didn’t take advantage! (And I was still quasi-full from falafel.)

While my brain continues to try to pull a Friday afternoon shutdown on me, here are some pictures…

The dispensary.

I don’t know if you can tell, but there’s a lot of sparkle going on with those spoons.

I took great interest in the toppings dispensers, which had some sort of propeller element to their design.

Not pictured: Ghirardelli chocolate sauce. Yes.

And now, for my own personal creation…

Prettiful.

I like taking pictures in the sun… the colors look so bright and cheerful. (Those sprinkles were really crunchy.) (And that light brown yogurt is dulche de leche.)

Funny that Big Swirl likes to emphasize the BS. Whatever floats their truck.

The flavors were all yum. Maybe a hazard of having a yogurt truck in the sun, but the pistachio was kinda soupy. Still tasty, but I couldn’t take much, lest it soup up the rest of the flavors.

Having a yogurt truck right outside kinda makes me miss the days when the commissary was only a short walk away… frozen yogurt ANY day. (If I could get away from the phones.) Eh… I don’t miss it that much. There’s still plenty of yogurt in my life.

These pesky snacks and sandwiches keep popping up and forcing me to backlog my planned entries. But it’s okay. Something to do on Friday. (I might have to scale back, lest the food-blogging portion of this blog because as overwhelming as the TV-recapping portion once was.)

Cheerfully blah… (Maybe the sweet tea is finally wearing off? Haha.)

xoxo…

Love the design.

My life is filling up with pita! YES. How much do I love it when falafel drives up to my door?

Before I continue with a description of the food, let me show you another angle of the Yalla Truck. Seriously, this truck. It’s a sight to behold.

Seriously!

You probably can’t read that, but it says, “SERVING FALAFEL AND LOVE. But mostly falafel.” I feel the love. I am in an open relationship on Facebook with the Yalla branding. (As in, marketing… I don’t want to be branded with the Yalla bread-brander.)

I’m pretty sure that Yalla (maybe spelled differently… like ya la?) means “hurry up” in Arabic. Just something I picked up in my travels… to my high school bestie Karen’s house (she’s Egyptian). (I also learned that sounds-like “ariyen” means naked, as in, “There’s no way you’re going out in that ariyen blouse.”)

Anyway.

I got the Classic Yalla Falafel, which is vegan– for all you vegans. (I was vegan once, for two months. Kind of a long story.) Here are the ingredients, according to their Facebook page: “Falafel balls, red cabbage salad, tomato/ cucumber salad, onion salad, lettuce, pickled turnips. Sandwich dressed with tahini sauce (sesame sauce with garlic and lemon).” I added hummus, for a dollar. (VERY good call, I think.) Total price: $5. A bargain.

Let’s take a look!

Lookin' good.

I included the business card with the publicity picture. You can see that the difference between the fantasy and the reality is the pita bread, which (sadly) is not branded with the logo. The pita bread on the card looks slightly more delicious, but the pita bread they gave me was probably healthier and tasted fine. So… I didn’t hold it against them.

You may remember that I wished for more veggies in yesterday’s wrap. Today my wishes came true. And they were all so deliciously dressed in whatever pickling, etc, those Yalla geniuses use… even the onion salad was eat-on-its-own delicious.

I thought the pink rectangles were beets, and I was really impressed because I usually don’t like beets. Then I figured out that they’re probably turnips? Either way, they were unique and had a little spicy kick.

Mystery veggies. A delicious mystery.

So yes, the combined veggie salads and hummus were great– but what about those amalgams of ground chickpeas and who-knows-what-else: the falafel balls themselves?

Now, whenever I order falafel, I worry that the balls (haha, get over it) are going to be really crusty and greasy, negating the potential healthfulness of the sandwich. Well, I was delighted to see that the Yalla balls were really fresh and dense/not dry– like, I’m not 100% sure whether they were fried. (If they were, it wasn’t done in the truck. The wrap was cold, in a fresh/crisp way.)

And they were green inside! Not sure how, because chickpeas are tan. But… I liked it! (And this isn’t the first time I’ve seen them like this… but I’m always surprised by it!)

I approve these balls.

I was also able to cut this in half! You know how much I love eat things one half at a time.

So… A+ for the Yalla Truck. Really filling, seemingly healthful… if you hear that they’re in your neighborhood, check ‘em out! Ya la!

And I feel like my mom would like the Yalla Truck. (Which is good, because Yalla Truck and I are in an open relationship on Facebook.) (My mom would probably like the Yalla Truck to make an honest woman of me, but I’m young yet!)

There’s no better endorsement than wishing you could share a snack with your loved ones, right? (Unless you are a character in Hamlet, and you want to poison your loved ones.)

Turnips and beets!

xoxo…

Bad life choices.

The following is a real chat transcript, from 11:39pm last night–

Me: I AM HIGH ON SWEET TEA. THIS IS SO BAD/SO GOOD.

Friend: knowing you, that’s not a metaphor

How did this happen? Let’s back up an hour or two…

Last night Bea (my Tall Texan Twin) and I dined at Tender Greens. We ate all manner of goodness, including a big lemon cupcake, which was apparently very sugary. (I thought it was buttery? Maybe both?) (Of course I have pictures– I’ll post them sooner or later.) So I was already laden with sugar. Keep that in mind.

Somehow our discussion turned to sweet tea, and the fact that I’ve never tried it but have always wanted to try it. There’s a McDonald’s on every corner (and one right across Vine from this Tender Greens) (haha, Vine… Greens), so we sprang into sweet tea-acquiring action.

I don’t know how many ounces that container holds? 32? 64? A hundred million? All for $1.10. Not bad. (VERY BAD.)

When I think of sweet tea, I think of an interview I once read with Reese Witherspoon, about how she’s a Southern gal and loves to make sweet tea in big jars. (Maybe I’m misremembering. Sorry if this is slander, Reese.) But McDonald’s does not want me to picture Southern belles and dainty acts of hospitality (dirty!) when I think of sweet tea…

This ain't yo mama's tea!

“This is no dainty, garden party tea…?” Excuse me? Are they marketing this tea to macho men? (The macho-est thing about this sweet tea is the AMOUNT. That cup is the size of a linebacker.) That little blurb does not compute to me at all, because I want to revel in the Reese Witherspoon-y-ness of sweet tea.

But I love that lemon graphic. Nice work. I’m lovin’ it.

Sweet tea looks like Coke, in pictures.

Too much tea! Shut it down!

I asked Bea what exactly is IN this stuff that makes it so crackishly addictive, and she said that she thinks it’s just iced tea with massive amounts of sugar. (It didn’t taste THAT sweet to me, which makes me question my taste buds.) Reese Witherspoon indicated that there were spices involved! Bea conceded that there might be some cinnamon? Oh man, cinnamon is just busting out all over in my life right now.

Have you noticed that there’s a chaste version of spin the bottle on the table? (I like the happy little cancer heart with the bandaged face.) It’s weird, and also oddly NOT chaste. I’m not sure what the Ronald McDonald House people had in mind, but my version of a “giggle giver” might get me arrested for public indecency.

I didn’t plan on drinking much of this tea, or at least I planned on splitting it evenly with Bea. But I don’t think that happened. I think I consumed the majority of the tea. (I gave in to the power of the tea, a la ZOOLANDER.) (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, drop everything, turn left, and see ZOOLANDER.) I got totally sugar-high on sweet tea. Like, redonk.

The last photo before the sugar really kicked in.

I DID finish it down to the bottom, but that was too shameful to merit a picture.

Fun fact: McDonald’s at 10pm-ish in LA is full of creepy homeless people and farting tourists who speak a language I have NEVER HEARD IN MY LIFE. (And refer to the women of their group as “Lady,” in a sneering, derogatory way.) So… I’m glad we survived. (Hmm, maybe the “this is no dainty garden party” of it all is aimed at THOSE guys…)

Next time we’re going to try Chick Fil A’s sweet tea, which is apparently at least equally delicious– if not more. (Bea’s enthusiasm about the whole thing is infectious… and she’s very excited to introduce me to the special sauce.) (I can’t remember what it’s called. I was distracted by GIANT TEA.)

I woke up sweet tea high and had a sweet tea hangover (and was probably sweating sugar-water at the gym this morning), but I guess that’s par for the course.

Reese Witherspoon knows what I’m talking about!

xoxo…

Some reservations...

If you’re a very astute and loyal reader (hi, Mom), you’ll note that this is the first picture on the Binge to require a dark font. So much white around the edges! Argh.

Anyway.

The No Reservations truck came to our parking lot today. I checked out pictures of the food on their Facebook page and I had Some Reservations about the whole thing, but almost everybody in the office ordered (peer pressure!), and the descriptions sounded really good… in theory.

I don’t even eat lamb, but I was so intrigued by the “Silence of the Lambs” wrap (it had pomegranate red wine sauce!) that I almost ordered it. (Also… I didn’t notice until I read it on another blog that the wraps are all named after movies… in a really awkward way. “The Green Mile”? “Rosemary’s Baby”? Maybe not the best connotations!)

(No, I’m not an idiot– I definitely noticed that they were movie names, but I was thinking more of the punny element than the movie names factor.) (And the salmon wrap is called “Off the Hook.” Is that a movie?) (Why not just “Hook”? Or… “Jaws”?)

Anyway, I ordered the “Rosemary’s Baby,” even though I don’t like freaky-deaky horror movies. (I’m sorry, I know it’s a classic.) Selling points included Israeli couscous and pesto. (I had them hold the gouda.)

Aren’t there any other movies that are chicken-wrap appropriate? “Chicken Run”? (I immediately veto that– too close to “runs,” as in… intestinal ouch.)

Usually I cut my daily sandwiches on a slight diagonal and snap a picture of the lateral view, but when I cut into this wrap it became apparent that it would not cooperate. Hence the creepy coroner-esque picture at the top. Can you see my trepidation as I peel back the skin?

Eventually I found the vein of pesto, and thought it felt photo-worthy. Sorta.

Eureka, I have found it.

There was a sort of overall oiliness to this wrap, and I was not a fan. The Israeli couscous was all right, most of the chicken was not looking so hot (or tasting too hot), and even the tortilla wrap itself was sort of a funny flavor. (I drank some orange juice/ate some strawberries to get the taste out of my mouth.) Maybe this would be up someone else’s ally, but this was kinda too warm/heavy for a lunch wrap. A vegetable/greenery element might have improved this. Or… a total makeover.

BUT whatever, food trucks are a gamble.

And I still ate about half, because… it was my lunch. (And I was giving it a chance.)

In totally unrelated news, today I tried ANOTHER new hair product, and I’m having a GOOD hair day. YES. (Since I’m liking it, I can tell you that it’s classic Frizz-Ease.) (I like products that don’t feel like there’s any product in my hair.)

(I fully acknowledge that my hair might look exactly the same as it did yesterday, but I FEEL good about it today. And it’s not gunky. So… good hair day.)

AND I actually did a full back bend IN yoga class this morning (which made up for having the weirdest night’s sleep/being late to class). Unfortunately when I bend backwards to any degree in yoga at 6am, I feel rather barfulous. But I don’t ACTUALLY barf (yet), so it’s all good.

Much like a horror movie (or a wrap named after one), things have been a bit strange in my brain this week. Last night I had crazy-ass dreams and woke up every fifteen minutes thinking that HOURS had gone by and that I’d overslept, only to find out that… only minutes had gone by. When my alarm finally went off at 5:30am, I was so disoriented that I didn’t notice it… luckily I woke up 20 minutes later and rushed into action.

And then this morning post- definitely WEDNESDAY morning yoga, my brain decided that today was Thursday… and also August 31st. Even though Thursday will be September 2nd. My brain is having issues with TIME (and THINKING).

So it figures that I would order a horror movie wrap against my better judgment, on a day like today. You win some, you lose some. Yin and yang.

BUT on the bright side– my beloved DIM SUM TRUCK is (allegedly) returning next Thursday! THE SAME DAY that THE VAMPIRE DIARIES premieres! (So I’ll be back to my 8pm yoga, 9pm vampires-on-DVR routine.) Does it get much better than that? No. No, it doesn’t.

Back bends for everyone!

xoxo…