Koki's Japanese Teppan House - Tustin, CA : Vegetable Delight

Koki's is a fun place to eat if you have children and haven't seen the tricks before. The food here USED to be pretty good. Apparently it was sold, and the only location now is in Tustin. The Irvine location closed. I'm sorry to say that I did not enjoy my food, and neither did The Meat-eater.

Salad

My only option is the Vegetable Delight set (besides tempura), and it comes with salad, rice, and the vegetable yakisoba plate. The salad is just an iceberg lettuce...and pretty much nothing else. A few straws of carrots here and there. The salad dressing is still the same and good though, but the substance of the salad is very cheap. Iceberg lettuce in a $16.50 combo meal. Hmm....quality down.

Fried Rice

Instead of plain rice, I opted for fried rice. However, my fried rice was just mainly white rice cooked in loads of butter, garlic butter, and some seasoning. Do you see anything else besides rice? There was a small bowl of veggies dumped in...but it's 98% white rice. That is part of my combo meal. I've definitely had better fried rice under previous ownership...which is why I usually choose the fried rice. Boy, was I wrong in this decision. Again...quality down.

Vegetable Delight

My main meal were the yakisoba, vegetables, and tofu. This is pretty much the same except...it has loads of salt. Blegh! The quality has really gone down since the ownership change. The Meat-eater's steak was also not as good as it used to be. The chef gave him a big chunk of grisly fat. I would say, it's totally NOT worth the price anymore. They did have decent customer service...but they were trying really hard and you could tell. There were also 2 kids birthdays going on at the same time, so it seems to be more of a family place now. The quality of food going down doesn't seem to matter as much, as long as the family/kids are having a good time. That must be their new motto. So sad since this used to be such a good place. Maybe I just got a bad chef, who knows. All I know is, I'm not going back and we're going to have to find a new teppan place.

Koki's Japanese Teppan House

http://kokisteppan.com/

1061 E. Main St.

Tustin, CA 92780

(714)505-6738

SOL Mexican Cocina - Newport Beach, CA : Veggie Grilled Burrito

Flipping through the AAA magazine that we receive, we came across an article that suggested SOL Mexican Cocina as a good eats. They usually have suggestions every month, but this one was close to us...yay! So of course when we were in the area, we had to stop by.

Freebie Appetizers

Your meal starts with some fried tortillas and dip. Nope, we did not order these, they just give them to you. BTW, I enjoyed both dips mixed together. Yum.

Grilled Burrito

A vegetarian dish to be had is their grilled burrito vegetarian style. As you can see by the burn marks, the burrito was literally grilled. I actually liked this, it gave it a nice "grilled" flavor. Added a slightly different taste to your typical burrito. Me likes!

Vegetarian Style

Besides the typical beans, corn, and guacamole, there were also mushrooms in the burrito. The mushrooms were pretty darn tasty. But from the size of that thing...yeah...I could not finish it in one sitting. So full! But good!

View of the Bay

Also, there was a lovely view of the water from where we were sitting. Apparently, you can actually boat over to this place and eat. They have three docks...but it helps to call ahead and make sure they're empty to dock...or else no parking space means you do circles or go back. Either way, this place was indeed a good eats. (Apparently they just opened a place in Scottsdale, AZ. Not sure if it's the same quality though.)

SOL Mexican Cocina

http://www.solcocina.com/

251 E. Pacific Coast Highway

Newport Beach, CA 92660

Phone: (949) 675-9800

Homemade Whole Wheat Banana Pecan Bread

What to do with those ripe bananas...make banana bread! Been looking for a good banana bread recipe and somewhere someone suggested this one. The recipe is from Saveur.com but I've rewritten it here as well with my substitutes.

Whole Wheat Banana Pecan Bread

Mom's Banana  Bread Recipe:
Butter, for greasing pan
1 cup flour, plus more for dusting pan  (or whole wheat pastry flour)
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. kosher salt  (or sea salt)
1 cup sugar  (or brown sugar use 3/4cup if you don't like things too sweet)
1/2 cup canola oil
1/3 cup buttermilk (or soy milk)
1 tsp. vanilla
1 egg plus 1 egg yolk
2/3 cup chopped pecans
3 very ripe  bananas, mashed

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9"x5"x2 3/4" loaf pan with butter and dust with flour; set pan aside.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt; set aside.
3. Whisk together sugar, oil, buttermilk, vanilla, egg, and egg yolk in a medium bowl until smooth. Pour wet ingredients over dry ingredients and whisk until just combined. Add pecans and mashed bananas and whisk gently to combine. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle of the loaf comes out clean, 60–65 minutes. Let cool for 30 minutes before slicing and serving.

The substitutions made are written in green. I like to use whole wheat pasty flour for cakes because it's softer than regular whole wheat flour. I also don't have buttermilk handy, but I do have soy milk at home. So I would say to just use whatever kind of milk you have handy. I also used less than a cup of sugar because I don't like things that are too sweet. All in all, I think it came out pretty good! It may not be as rich and creamy without the buttermilk, but I still think it's pretty darn good! It's kind of like cake because it's not doughy at all. So next time you have extra ripe bananas at home, make some banana bread. (You don't have to use my version of course.)