eastern standard

i adore eastern standard inside the commonwealth hotel. the food's not revelatory by any means, but it's comforting and always reliably good. the atmosphere is vaguely french and elegant, but still relaxed and cozy -- i don't really feel like i'm at a restaurant; instead, i'm just sitting down in a well-appointed room, and there just happens to be people serving me food (how nice!). there's also a cool photo gallery on the second floor. and last but not least, the drinks here are definitely some of the best in boston.

all in all, it's just a wonderful place to come to eat and talk and drink and repeat ... on and on for three hours, and never feel rushed. :)

"corio coupe"--reyka vodka, apricot puree and orange oil

offal du jour: crispy chicken liver!

camembert & tomato flatbread

egg cream; drowning my reading period woes

christmas decorations in the commonwealth hotel!

truffle risotto @ la petit maison, nice

this feels like it was a world ago, but i thought i'd share anyway because it makes me happy!

mistral

school night dinner at mistral in the back bay. i'm just going to let these pictures speak for themselves...

By the way, what is a "mistral," you ask? (Or at least I did.) I looked it up on Wikipedia, and found this explanation which made me smile:

The mistral is a strong, cold and usually dry regional wind in France. The mistral is usually accompanied by clear and fresh weather, and it plays an important role in creating the climate of Provence. 

The mistral helps explain the unusually sunny climate (2700 to 2900 hours of sunshine a year) and clarity of the air of Provence. When other parts of France have clouds and storms, Provence is rarely affected for long, since the mistral quickly clears the sky. In less than two hours, the sky can change from completely covered to completely clear. The mistral also blows away the dust, and makes the air particularly clear, so that during the mistral it is possible to see mountains 150 kilometers and farther away. 

This clarity of the air and light is one of the features that attracted many French impressionist and post-impressionist artists to the South of France.

a thankful thanksgiving dinner

this thanksgiving, i am thankful for....

friends who take me in and feed me well when i am far from home

boston lettuce, pear, walnuts, red peppers, kumquat

penguin-shaped bottle stoppers

apple, for creating such lovely shiny toys

tory burch, for creating heartbreakingly cute accoutrements for said toys

the chance to have so many delicious meals and share them with the world

no thanks to the meanie who insisted on putting an onion in the middle of my plate. :P

PIE!

especially those made with puff pastry

and for countless other things, people, and places.

happy thanksgiving!

love,
li

prana!

recently i got an email from a concerned reader asking me why i haven't posted lately. firstly, bless you for caring! secondly, i'm so sorry! i know i've sort of just fallen off the blogging wagon, but i think my excuses are pretty valid:

1. there's not much to blog around boston...
2. i've been traveling a lot. at times i even thought about changing the blog to "the room service diaries," but then the #occupyharvards would likely come after me.
3. my dslr is heavy, and combined with the weight of my books and whatnot, my shoulder would likely snap off if i tried to carry it around with me.
4. i've been going through a sort of existential quarter life crisis and i vowed to myself that i wouldn't blog again til after i had it all figured out. well, after much reading of kant, kierkegaarde, voltaire, the bible, etc., long walks through mt. auburn cemetery (then subsequently getting locked in, but that's a story for another day), clarity still hasn't happened... wtf. so to hell with it. here's some food!

photo from the boston herald

i went to prana in newton the other night for dinner, and i think even my staunchly anti-vegetarian friend (who constantly reminds me of richard wrangham's research and how anthony bourdain [loveee him] disdains vegetarians) was impressed!

the decor was super zen — blue and green, lovely, clean, and modern, and the food was so fresh and light, with lots of raw dishes on the menu.

lots of paintings of faces everywhere... watching judgmentally as you make your choices.

"room temperature water, please." it was still on the chilly side :(

lots of neat foods for sale — raw chocolate, brownies, kale chips, nuts, nut butters, coconut meat, powders... to be ransacked post-meal :)

this was the "immune booster" smoothie, made with hibiscus water, apple juice, shilajit (just googled it... i'm still confused), strawberries, and ginger. it tasted very healthy and immunity-enhancing hehe.

we started with a pear and pecan salad, which also had dried cherries and some sort of "cheese" made with cashews, with the consistency of brie. i LOVE pear salads. this was among the best i've had.

then their raw pizza du jour, topped with sprouts, some sort of nut cheese, pesto, mushrooms, and red peppers. quite good! in the middle of eating this i realized that raw food is very filling and leafy. so much chewing... omg. tiring. exercise and dining in one! 

my friend asked, "why do they even bother calling this a pizza? why not just a flatbread?"interesting thought. perhaps to raw foodists this actually begins to taste like their memories of pizza? (in which case, that's kind of sad.)

fact: raw food is prettier than cooked food.

the dessert stomach appeared just in time for this coconut cream pie. (raw, of course.)

did you know that in france they write "miam miam"? why must they be so darn adorable??!

white peony tea.

this fermented saffron soda tasted like a mix between kombucha, apple juice, and beer. it claimed to be probiotic too.

and then i had a lot of fun poking around their grocery selection and spent a small fortune on kale chips, raw chocolate, and raw truffles.

before we left i told the waitress that they should open a location in harvard square. i'm sure the busloads of asian tourists would be all over it!!

i'll leave you with some random pictures of my favourite city:

i had a gossip girl moment walking outside and seeing this at night :)

i might not update again for a while... but i have epic (seriously epic) plans for dec-jan so stay tuned :)