Sao Paolo summary

Sao Paolo was a great experience. The people are very helpful, but I'm not too sure of the English penetration in the population as I'm traveling with Martin, and he speaks Portuguese.

The food was great...
Santa Grau - lunch(es)
After I got to the hotel, took a shower, and unpacked, Martin and I went to the local spot down the street from the hotel. Pretty cool cafe space, very tropical feel to it with a bunch of foliage around the outdoor patio, and very good vibe with the staff, clientele, and ambiance. After some smoked salmon (which is all over menus in Sao Paolo) and some croquettes with bacalhao that were washed down with caipirinhas and espresso, it was settled that Santra Grau was going to be the go-to spot for food when necessary.

348 Restaurant - Argentinian steak
Martin and I crushed a parillada for two that was a mixture of morcilla, chorizo, beef heart, lomo and bife de chorizo in addition to palmito salad, farofa, and rice. Add some caipirinhas on top and it was a very speedy meal (the Brazilians weren't happy that we showed up 15 minutes before the kitchen closed, but whatever). Note for future - don't show up after 11pm to this place so you don't have to scarf down dinner. It doesn't make you feel any better if you rush.


Cristal Pizza - Italian Pizza 'hot-spot'
This was the recommendation of the boss-man, and we were skeptical. There was not much action at 9pm on Sunday night when we showed up, but the longer we stayed, the more people came. We ended up having a 3h pizza dinner and it was awesome.


Varanda - Brazilian steakhouse
Dinner with clients was great, and very simple Brazilian steakhouse - some small plates to start, one picanha and one ribeye steak later plus espresso. Great picanha too.

Dalva e Dito -  Brazilian "home-cooking"
This was my favorite place that we went to. There is something to be said for the amazing space (glass wall looking into the kitchen, vaulted ceilings and very inviting space even though it was huge) coupled with refined interpretations of "home cooking." I had the best moqueca I've ever had, and overall it was just a great meal.

Jam Warehouse - Sushi
We were recommended to go here for good sushi, and the place delivered. Beyond just the high quality fish and caipirinhas (with maracuia, or passion fruit in English) this place was a total scene. We went late on Wednesday evening, and the place was packed. Towards the end of the night, one couple came, ordered one drink, made out for 10 minutes and then left, without even getting halfway through the drink! I guess there's no reason to delay the inevitable...

Ecco - Local "no frills" spot in a wealthy neighborhood
Apprarently the hotel was around the corner from a really trendy block. Literally though, it was only one block. We decided to walk around and see what the options were before preparing to leave the following morning, and there were amazing options. We settled on a more casual place, but while we were there the club next door started going off. As we were leaving, it was basically a shot out of a movie with people going to a nightclub. Only, they were pulling up in Aston Martin DB9s, Mercedes SLS gull-wings (the new ones) and Porsche GTs... insane. I remember that I had a good fish dish, and that the guy at the table next to us paid for some "companionship" during our dinner, but I won't forget the activity on the street when we left dinner.

Definitely easy to make your way through menus and get phenomenal food and drink. Very contemporary city, and there is still significant upside as the Brazilian economy continues to grow.

Greetings from Sao Paolo

Found my way to Sao Paolo yesterday. Three flights, many Miller Lites and a decent car ride in, I found myself in Faria Lima meeting up with Martin. The rest of the day was pretty low key, mainly comprised of caipirinhas, some walking around, more caipirinhas, a nap, a little work, even more caipirinhas, and a pariillada at the Argentinian steakhouse.

Martin took a few pics and I'll load later, but overall a pretty chill day. Weather is hot (completely different from what's going on back in Chicago), and I'll get more pics of the city and scene during the stay.

More to follow...

Skipping ahead to 2011...

Over the weekend we hosted a NYE party with some of our friends. To kick off the festivities we started out with dinner around the corner at Graham Elliot. Amazing.

7 Courses. With pairings. Phenomenal meal. What a way to close out 2010.

Follow that with the party at our place, and I made three punches. The first was a spin on the Chatham Artillery Punch from David Wondrich. Essentially it is muddled lemon peels in sugar, lemon juice, and a ratio of rye, brandy, rum and sparkling wine along the lines of 1:1:1:3. It turned out very well; definitely better than the original trial.

The second punch was adapted from a bar in New York called Cienfuegos. The recipe for Hotel Nacional Punch involved rum, pineapple juice, apricot brandy, fresh lime juice and simple syrup. Lower potency, but tasted amazing. Topping off with a little champagne really did a lot for this punch.

The final recipe, for the non-alcoholic crowd, resulted in a concentrated syrup of cinnamon, clove, lemon juice, peppermint extract, slivered mint leaves and diced candied ginger. That syrup, poured over some carbonated beverage (either club soda or sparkling wine), was great.

On top of all that, around 20 bottles of wine, full bar, and a serious food spread for everyone. To be honest, I wanted to invite more people than Lauren was interested in hosting, but that's alright. We weren't sure how many people were going to come over, but at one point we had around 30 people in the place. With the weather unseasonably warm we were able to use the deck as well.

Hello 2011. Nice to meet you. Glad to start off on the right foot.

Photos to make up for lost time

This is an attempt to summarize some of our final travels from the summer and fall of 2010.

Staring down a pier towards Oakland in SF

First trip to SF togeter

The 'farm' outside The French Laundry in Yountville

Vineyards in Napa

Pebble Beach

Frog's Leap Winery - Napa Valley

Big Ben - London

Lauren and J at the Tower of London - Tower Bridge in background

Parliament and Big Ben from across the Thames

Make up for lost time

Obviously, the California trip hasn't made it up yet, so it's probably about time for a brief summary of that trip.

We started out for a few days in San Francisco and were able to spend some time with Andrew and Corinna. I was good to see them in their element, and the Cali lifestyle definitely suits them. We also had a chance to meet Tuf, and she seems like a great new addition to the family.

Pictures of our time will be added shortly.

One of the funnier moments of the SF part of the trip actually occurred at dinner on Sunday night. Lauren and I went to dinner at Salt House, which i have been to a few times before on work trips. Our reservation was mildly late for a Sunday evening But not too bad. After we had been sitting for about 15 minutes, in walks Adrian Grenier of Entourage fame. Needless to say, Lauren thought it was pretty cool and instantly had to text Leanne. A great meal made even more memorable.

From SF we drove up to Napa to spend a few days in wine country before driving down the coast to LA. we spend a few days checking out Napa, and picked our way around the larger and smaller wineries in the valley. By no means a comprehensive trip, it was more to get a sense of everything that was offered so we can be a little more guided on future trips. A few of the best places we went were:
- Mumm Napa was a great place to see a large-scale producer of sparkling wine
- Frog's Leap was a real gem located in Rutherford
- Smith-Madrone (Ashwin suggested) was amazing! A few hippies from Berkley started a winery in the 70s and still have it going. We even got to try their next vintage Riesling while it was still in the steel vats. Very cool.

Best dinner while we were out there was at Ad Hoc in Yountville. It wasn't the fried chicken dinner (BBQ instead) but it was awesome.

Next post will cover the remainder of the trip, including driving down PCH, Central Coast wineries, and our time in/around LA.

Catching up to do...

Well,

I suppose I didn't sufficiently chronicle my trip to Argentina. Or any trip since for that matter. So it goes...

Argentina, was a blast. I ate like a champ, drank like a fish, and had to take the first half of March off from alcohol. I was retired for 17 days, right up St. Patrick's Day. It was a rest that was well deserved...

Some trips deserve entries, while others can only live in memories. One of the 'memory' trips is The Battle. As the mystique grows each year, so do the stories, and it's better not to have a written record of anything that goes on during those four magical days. Suffice it to say, The Fuz Invitational is by far the best way to get The Battle going. That is, unless you're sitting in First Class on the ride down and have 8 drinks in you by the time you get to the shuttle bus.

This year the Night Putters, with yours truly, were victorious.

Lauren and I just went to California, and a few phases of the trip deserve their own posts. They'll follow in the next few days.

Upcoming trip to Argentina

I just booked a trip to Argentina to visit Nick. He's been down there since November (almost 4 months) and preparing to get back to the US. I've been itching to go down and visit since he got there, and I finally bit the bullet and bought the ticket. Not the cheapest flight, especially for a 5 day trip, but I'm sure once I get down there it'll all be worth it. Lots of living to do in the few days that I'm there.

As a reference, Nick's blog that he's been keeping for his trip is here.

All that's left now is passport, camera, journal, and a boarding pass.