downtown adventure day

Last Saturday turned into one of my favorite kinds of days... wandering around downtown exploring! My friend James' sister Karen was in town from Austin to watch her favorite hockey team, the Boston Bruins, lose to my LA Kings. So along with Daryl, we set off downtown with the 7:30pm puck drop as our only scheduled activity.

Stop #1 was at my second favorite place to hang out downtown (after Staples Center, of course), the amazingly delicious foodie paradise on the corner of 7th and Grand, Bottega Louie. It was 1pm and the weekend, so the brunch menu was still in effect, and we took full advantage!

Daryl and Karen had Bloody Mary's, I had a Bellini.
Dessert was the caramel butterscotch parfait on the lower right, with a salted chocolate macaroon.
We also, of course, made Karen try the famous portebello mushroom fries! (Sorry, no photo. They were gone too fast ;)

Our brunch meals were (clockwise from top left): My lemon ricotta pancakes, Karen's smoked salmon benedict, James' salmon millefeuille with soft boiled egg on the side and Daryl's lobster hash.

After brunch, we were walking back to my car to put stuff (ie: my Bottega Louie sugar cookies and raspberry beinget, which I had for breakfast on Sunday) away, when we spotted R2D2 and some storm troopers. Now, I've seen a live cow wandering the streets of downtown, but seeing an actual celebrity like R2D2 had to be investigated! Turns out, they were there to promote the 24th Annual Art of Motion Picture Costume Design at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising (aka FIDM), which is a block from my go-to DTLA parking lot. The exhibit was free, so we wandered in and saw all the costumes nominated for Oscars this year, plus the wanna-be's (Jem and the Holograms anyone?). It was a welcome surprise on our Downtown Adventure Day!

The Force Awakens costumes, official exhibit greeter R2D2 and a combo land cruiser/back to the future prop car (it had a flux capacitor inside, along with a mini-BB8). Check out the cool "Kenobi 2016" bumper sticker and the "Yoda" "fish" :)

My fave movie surprise of the year, Brooklyn, Academy Award Winner Mad Max: Fury Road, and the Cinderella princess dress

After the stop at the car, we wandered to LA Live. Karen wanted to check out the Grammy Museum (which -- tip! -- only costs $10 with your AAA card). They had exhibits on Otis Redding (4th floor), The Supremes (3rd floor) and a Bob Dylan photography exhibit (2nd floor). But my favorite thing on the 2nd floor was found in the hallway on the way to the restroom... framed photos of Adele and the Foo Fighters. Apparently 2011 was an excellent year for the only two music acts I've listened to on the iPod in my car for the last four months (with the exception of an experimental week, which I'll be blogging about here soon ;)

After the Grammy Museum, we hit up Rosa Mexicana for their famous pomegranate margaritas, guac and a mini-dinner.

Then it was time for Karen and I -- well our hockey teams -- to go into battle. Luckily, the good guys prevailed so Karen got a ride home ;)

products i love: bottega louie butter cookies

I feel sorry for people that don't live in Los Angeles because they will never experience the delicious downtown foodie mecca that is Bottega Louie.

I've blogged before about the delicious dinner and brunch menu, but on this lazy Sunday I'm going to simplify things a notch and talk about the yummy deliciousness you can get without waiting 15-45 minutes for a table: the to-go butter cookies from the Market.

Here's what I love about these cookies:

• I love how the 12 of them fit so perfectly together in the tiny little bag
• I love the pink Bottega Louie ribbon they use to tie the tiny little bag
• I love the tiny little bag's fancy label, which almost makes up for these cookies being in a bag instead of the fancy Bottega Louie bakery boxes that are almost as pretty as a box from Tiffany & Co. 
• I love that nowhere on the tiny little bag is any mention of nutritional info, or lack thereof. (If they don't say there are calories or fat in them, then there must not be any right? ;) 
• I love that the cookies are crisp but not dry
• I love that they absorb tea when dunked in hot tea, but don't crumble
• I love that the cookies melt in your mouth
• I love that they cost $4 (that's only $0.33/cookie!)
• I love that Bottega Louie is far enough away that I can't buy these weekly, cuz then I'd be in serious trouble ;)

brunching at bottega louie

I've been to the fabulous Bottega Louie in Downtown LA twice for dinner, drinks and dessert, but have always wanted to try their breakfast menu. So when my friend Diana asked to take me to brunch to kick off my birthday week, and mentioned going somewhere special (aka somewhere other than Hugo's or 4n20), I picked Bottega, and I'm so glad I did (even though I've been in a food coma all day). 

Here's the deliciousness we devoured:

I started with a chai tea latte (shocker!) and fresh squeezed orange juice. The chai was small and just sweet enough. The juice was thick and pulpy and good. Diana had fresh pinapple juice. 

We ordered raspberry beignets as a "starter." These are not like the beignets I've had before from the world-famous Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans (which actually did not live up to their hype). These are covered with normal sugar, not messy powdered sugar, and were lighter..just like a sugared doughnut. The raspberry compote was great!

Diana had the Breakfast Flatbread for her entree, which consisted of Bottega's pizza dough (fresh out of their giant pizza oven) covered in prosciutto, mozzarella, baked egg, arugula and a house arrabiata sauce she said was really good.

I had a really hard time deciding what to order for my entree. I almost got the french toast, but decided that'd be bread overload after the beignets. So I ordered the spinach and goat cheese quiche, served with a side of frisee salad and pear tomatoes. It was pretty great. My one recommendation would be to add another layer of spinach lower in the quiche. It was all up on the top layer, which was crispy. 

After all that (plus the yummy Bottega bread they bring for breakfast too, but with jam!), we were stuffed. However, I'd already decided I was stopping at the patisserie on the way out for Sunday night dessert with the 'rents. Here's what I took to-go:

A giant piece of tiramasu, that made my mom decide she wants to start making tiramasu. This isn't my fave dessert, but the bite I had was pretty good.



Creme brule -- this IS my fave dessert! And Bottega Louie has three flavors. I ate the normal vanilla one, surrounded by raspberries, with some green garnish that I never figured out sprinkled all around, and sitting on a crisp, sweet base.

Dad got the chocolate creme brule. He didn't share so I don't know what it tasted like, but I assume it was good since he devoured it pretty quickly. The third flavor they have is hazelnut, which I'm not a huge fan of, but I'm sure it's good to people who like hazelnut.