I moved into my new place this past weekend.  Still unpacking and discovering the neighborhood.  Unfortunately, I got sick right after the move, but that hasn’t stopped me from trying out the restaurants and asian supermarkets in Chinatown.

One of my primary motives for moving here was to be closer to good food, so I hit up a chinese friend who used to live in downtown LA.  Here’s his take on eating in Chinatown.

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Here are some good eats around your neighborhood.

I had a foodie coworker who loved this sandwich place (I thought it was just ok):

http://www.yelp.com/biz/mendocino-farms-los-angeles

The grand central market is a good place to pick up cheap food and fresh groceries.  There is this Korean grocer towards the front of the market who has the freshest fruits at low prices:

http://www.yelp.com/biz/grand-central-market-los-angeles

My foodie coworker gave rave reviews for their Pupusas:

http://laist.com/2009/03/19/recession_obsession_the_pupusa.php

There’s a Farmer’s Market at the Bank of America building (one block north of McCormick’s).  It has some good food.  My favorites are the Hawaiian Chicken (sooo salty and spicy) and the bacon-wrapped hot dogs.  The market comes to BOA on Fridays.  The same market also sets up shop in front of the Central Library, but I forget what day it is:

http://www.yelp.com/biz/downtown-la-farmers-market-los-angeles

The best sushi IMHO is R23 (though I’m no expert, YMMV):

http://www.yelp.com/biz/r23-los-angeles

Thousand Cranes has a cool roof garden restaurant.  A nice place to take the parents to for brunch:

http://www.yelp.com/biz/a-thousand-cranes-los-angeles

All the white folks love this Yang Chow place.  It is ok.  It is slightly better than Hop Li.  A good place to take white people who aren’t ready for Sam Woo:

http://www.yelp.com/biz/yang-chow-los-angeles

My favorite thing at Sam Woo is the BBQ crispy fried noodles.  Mmmmm soo good.

People will tell you to try Water Grill or the Patina inside the Disney Concert Hall.  They’re overhyped, don’t waste your money.

After a while, I just ended up driving to Monterey Park for food.  Chinatown chinese food is kind of substandard.

My mom gave me a bottle of this Crispy Prawn Chilli she got from Malaysia.  It is so good.  I can’t say enough to express how good it is, but I’ll try anyway.

Tean's Crispy Prawn Chili (front)

It’s not too hot.  There’s a perfect mix of saltiness, sweetness, and spiciness. It’s so good, and not so spicy, that I’ve been reduced to eating it straight from the bottle as a quick little snack.  So good.

It’s got great texture with these little crispy bits.  I don’t know what the crispy bits are.  They’re the size and shape of deep fried roe (the small kind), but have a crunchiness that reminds me of fried chicken batter.

I haven’t seen it at any local supermarkets, but I’ll keep looking out for it.  I did find this website that sells it for less than $5 a bottle.  Haven’t tried buying from them, but seeing how quickly I’m going through the bottle I have, I’m guessing I’ll be giving this vendor a try in a next couple of weeks.

So good. Go get a bottle today. (More pics after the jump.)

Tean's Crispy Prawn Chili (close up)

Tean's Crispy Prawn Chili (back1)

Tean's Crispy Prawn Chili (back2)

Tean's Crispy Prawn Chilli Barcode

These were the 3rd batch of cookies I made this week. I don’t know how long this will last, but I started baking cookies as a new hobby — even bought gear for it. More on that later.

This recipe is my second variation of a basic chocolate chip cookie recipe from the Field Guide to Cookies: How to Identify and Bake Virtually Every Cookie Imaginable by Anita Chu.  The only thing I would change is to chop up the dried cranberries a bit so you don’t get big pieces of cranberry skin.

I like this balance of ingredients — I reduced the flour and sugar, and increased the amount of add-ins, so now it’s not too sweet and not too bready.  Just the right mix of chunky and softness. I’m going to stick with this cookie base and try out different variations of morsels to mix in. Butterscotch chips, bacon, nuts… lots of variations to try.

Cranberry White Chocolate Chip Cookies

Makes 20 cookies.

Ingredients

• 1 C flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 C unsalted butter (half stick)
• 1/4 C granulated sugar
• 1/2 C light brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 3/4 tsp vanilla extract
• 3/4 C white chocolate chips
• 3/4 C dried cranberries

Directions

1. Mix dry ingredients flour, salt, baking soda together.

2. Beat sugars and butter until light and fluffy.

3. Beat in egg and vanilla extract until they disappear.

4. Mix in dry ingredients. Only mix until flour disappears. Overbeating brings out gluten, which makes cookies chewy.

5. Mix in chocolate chips and cranberries until evenly distributed.

6. Dish onto greased cookie sheet. Even portions make for evenly baked cookies.

7. Bake for 9-12 minutes, or until the edges are brown. Don’t cook until the entire cookie is brown or it will be burnt by the time it cools. Rotate sheets halfway through baking if you have an oven with hotzones.

8. Cool on sheets for a few minutes, then transfer to wire rack to cool completely (at least 15 minutes).

A couple of weeks ago, I was looking for a restaurant that would be a good local place for a longish meet-and-greet meeting*, and I reached out to my social circles on Facebook and Twitter.

* In the end, we ended up at Paul Martin’s American Bistro in El Segundo.  It was a suggestion from my friend Paul.  Great choice!  My pork ribs were very tender and tasty, but the real star of the night was the halibut with creamed corn and bacon that I kept stealing from Lynn’s plate.

My question generated over a dozen comments on Facebook, but got exactly zero responses on Twitter.

That’s interesting.

I don’t think it means Facebook is better than Twitter for getting questions answered, but I did find it interesting that the same question generated such different results.  I have a few thoughts on why the difference.

I don’t have a very large group on either account — 250 or so friends on Facebook, 250 or so followers on Twitter — so this is by no means conclusive.

1) Different types of social graphs

My Facebook social graph reflects my real life graph better.  I only friend people I know in real life (have met face to face) or work with closely (have had extensive contact).

So for my particular question about a good local place, Facebook was more likely to give me a useful answer because a lot of my friends on Facebook are local folks.

2) Facebook is designed to be  more intimate

I find that people use Facebook for more personal sharing — true personal status updates.  That makes updates more mundane, but because only your friends see them, they are also much more compelling.

I use Twitter more like a broadcast medium.  I find that a lot of the people I follow do that too.  It’s hard to have a real conversation on Twitter.  Personally, I get bored of Twitter streams that have too many @replies, and I don’t like doing it myself.  I’ll usually DM or email someone if they ask me a question on Twitter. I don’t think we need to bother everyone else with our little conversation.