50th birthday is a big one, no? Peter threw a big dinner party at Raku to celebrate. We took over the entire restaurant for the evening. By the way, I mentioned Raku on my blog before. A Japanese/Korean style restaurant. Their block pork, black cod, lotus roots, grilled liver are very very good. Oh, and the Korean style pancake, YUM. But for Peter’s dinner the owner/chef made new dishes not on the usual menu. Delicious. Everyone was very happy.

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Our Jill P. sure lives an exciting life! She is now part of a music group, Krandon. Check out their sound:

They will be playing at Molly Malone’s every Wednesday in February, 8:00 pm sharp. Will you be in the area? Join the fun!

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I got a rushed project on Sunday, so I stayed in most of the day while CB and Sven went out to lunch and to see the Hollywood sign. No pictures to show for that. But I did join them for dinner at La Serenata. I am throwing in some funny pics of Sven to make up for lack of photos for this post. hehehe

La Serenata

http://www.laserenataonline.com/

We usually go to the West L.A. location. I actually liked the one in Downtown L.A. better. The building was gorgeous. A completely different atmosphere. I think the food was better, too!

10:09 am, CB just took Sven to the airport. It will be CB’s turn to travel and see Sven in Frankfurt next month.

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We started Saturday with a visit to our friends, Mike and Gaby. Sven was still feeling sick, so we hurried to Triumphal Palace in Alhambra for some dim sum. The food is still great. But the service has gotten lousy. Under the previous ownership the service was top-notch. The waiters stopped by constantly to replace dishes and refill water and tea. But this time they didn’t even take our order until we stopped one of them to do so. This is not unusual in a Chinese restaurant. It is just unfortunate that they couldn’t make the experience better than the others. Food is still fantastic, dim sum or dinner. Definitely give it a try if you are in the area. Just be aggressive in ordering and asking for stuff. Well, not aggressive to the point of being mean, of course.

The Huntington Gardens

http://www.huntington.org/

It is absolutely beautiful in the gardens. We’ve only visited the Desert Garden, the Japanese Garden and the not yet finished Chinese Garden. I especially loved the Japanese Garden. Do take a look at the photo album to see more pictures. Especially the bonsai collection.

Yamato Westwood

http://www.yamatorestaurants.com/

Sven’s second visit to this Japanese Restaurant in Westood. Great food. Desert was nicely done, too.

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Eames House

www.eamesfoundation.org

Sven is feeling sick this evening, so everyone is staying in. Hopefully he will feel better tomorrow for Chinatown.

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Wednesday

comme Ça

LACMA & La Brea Tar Pits
LACMA was closed. But we looked around the property. Look at the paw prints on the path.

Thursday

Tender Greens & Ugo

Sanamluang Cafe
The best Thai restaurant in So. Cal. I had friends from New York, Hawaii requesting to eat at this place. They open until 4 a.m. But you risk running into a drunken crowd going there that late.

Rudy de La Mor’s monthly appearance at The Other Side. We really didn’t know what we would see at this piano bar. It just happened to be Rudy’s night. Warning, if you go see Rudy, sit in the back if you don’t want to participate in his show.

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It starts tomorrow!

Sven will arrive tomorrow evening and spend another week with us. This must means that we were good hosts last December.

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