April Happenings

1) GEEK FEST: Video Games Live Concert at the Strathmore in Betheseda, MD

George coerced me into going to a video game concert awhile back...sigh.  While it's sorta cool to listen to a full live symphony orchestra and choir play popular video game music for 3 HOURS, I felt uber geeked out and oddly out of place--mainly because I didn't show up dressed in costume and know all the songs.  But we even saw a wedding proposal--the guy proposed to her in game lingo!

  

The princesses duking it out with dance moves on the Kinect

  

We were amongst the serious gamers up in third row

Gorgeous venue!

 George seated and ready!

Costume contest final contestants!

Tommy Tallarico: creator, video game composer playing his bad ass guitar

 the dude from Halo

 This was the most worth it moment of the night --late night happy hour at Hank's!! $1 oysters, Shrimp cocktail, shrimp boil, and ceviche! wooohoo!

2) DRAGON BOAT PRACTICE

We're on the APABA-DC (asian lawyers club) team for the Dragon Boat Festival this year!  Our team name is Bakuwanas.  APABA-DC enters in 2 teams each year, Water and Fire.  We decided to be "hard core" and be on the FIREEE team!  We've been training for several Sundays now and practice has been rough since I lack stamina, ab and back muscles and pretty much have no strength and power.  But I love paddling and being out on the water and learning something new!

The festival's on May 19th weekend.  Hopefully I can get some good shots of us being out on the water.  It's gonna be cray!

http://www.dragonboatdc.com/

First Sunday practice down by the pier - next to the seafood market and the crab boil--so cruel.

3) WEDDING!

Albert and Christine gets married in S.F

 

 For more photos:

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10101230564820043.3015080.1207448&type=1&l=673d4c82cf

It's always fun to come home, eat, and catch up with every one!  But as usual, too short of a trip =(

Vietnamese lunch with family and some old college friends in San Jose, CA

 

My littler sister aka "The Booger"

 The nephew aka Lemon Head (b/c he has giant ears)

  

Delicious grilled beef wrapped with onions!

 BOBA time!!! Real mature boogs, real mature

My cousin Evelyn, aka "young goat"

 Skipping back to the van!

 GO BEARS =D  I'm a menace!

At Jacky's house for some Kinect fun

And because we're ghetto, we also jacked some lemons from Jacky's lemon tree! 

Another awesome trip back home!  And to top it off, we flew back on the BEARD!!! on Virgin America!   

GO GIANTS

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/29/fly-bye-baby-san-francisco-giants-plane_n_1389893.html

4) PRESIDENT OBAMA!

I also met the President this month!  Nearly lost my mind and could not contain my excitement..hence the crazy looking photos with my giant mouth wide open and crossed eyes..Definitely one of the best moments of my life! 

He's amazing...I'm gonna cry

 omg omg omg I look crazy!

I'm surprised that asian secret service didn't tranquilize me

For more photos:

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10101242204523983.3016542.1207448&type=1&l=17199ba80f

5) FOOD!

Tried out a new Peruvian place!

http://www.yelp.com/biz/el-chalan-restaurant-washington

 My pisco sour cocktail: grape distilled brandy, key lime juice, beaten egg whites for the frothy foam, topped with cinnamon

Knocked me out!

One of my favorite Peruvian dishes

lomo saltado - stripped beef sauteed w/ fried potato, onion, and tomato, served w/ rice  

Camarones a la Limena: shrimp sauteed in butter..

you can't go wrong!

Spicy peanut sauce!

 Parihuela - seafood soup 

Seafood tasted ok--probably a frozen mix.  But the giant clam was delicious!

Not the best flan I've ever had but I can't resist flan!!!

6) MEET JOE BLACK

Joey--the new addition to our family!!!

Chasin' Tails

The opening of a new crawfish joint in the neighborhood deserves a "HELL YES!" "THANK GOD" "WOOHOO" post. 

This reminds me of when I first moved to Orange County and had crawfish boil for the first time.  I came home sniffing my fingers, re-salivated, and demanded we go back the next day.  Weekly crawfish $80 meals became a must!!  Our wallets got skinnier, we developed back fat and major heart burn but it was alllll soooo worth it.

O.C (randomly) had so many options.  When my first choice Boiling Crab wasn't available, I ran to my next favorite--Claws or Rockin' Crawfish.  When that wasn't available there was The Kickin' Crab near our house.  As long as it's spicy and I got limes--it'll be a finger lickin' good ol' time.

Then I moved to D.C.  I am all for new adventures in a new city because I had no doubt that I would eat my way around town to find delicious food.  But crawfish boil in a bag is a rarity and it was the one thing D.C couldn't satisfy me with--with the exception of Hot n' Juicy which was great in times of emergencies when my crawfish cravings possessed me--but their sauce was too unpredictable and inconsistent--and the other cajun places around town didn't do boils.

But just last weekend, a new crawfish place opened in the neighborhood (drum roll)  .........  

CHASIN' TAILS!

http://www.yelp.com/biz/chasin-tails-crawfish-arlington

Whoever opened this place did their research and down right stole some ideas and learned the mistakes of Boiling Crab (i.e naming their combo sauce "whole shebang", having a "watering hole" instead of closed bathrooms doors, not watering down the sauce and sheisting us on corn, sausages and potatoes!!) and they did a few things that we found to be excellent in their own right.

We came at linner time--around 4 p.m.  I saw lots of Vietnamese faces as well--ofcourse, wherever the seafood is, there we are!

Random: One of my favorite shirts the servers had on: "That fish CRAY!"

Lets get down to business:

*1 coke to share, 2 waters

*2 lbs of fresh crawfish (which came with corn, sausage, and potatoes) Whole Shebang, N'awlins spicy

*1 fried oyster basket, please substitue regular fries for sweet potato fries (yum!) for $1 more (our server ended up giving us regular fries for free! yay!)

*1 basket of 6 chicken wings

*and for later, your beignets (fried to order) and strawberry jam (freshly made every morning)

Crap..i'm salivating again

sweating and hot from the spicy n'awlings heat already

fried oysters..so fresh, so clean, so juicy tasting--and lightly battered in cornmeal 

The wings!!!  Fried and then tossed in a wet garlic rub!  Juicy on the inside as well but George said they could use a bit more salt.

His excited face!

I love sweet potato fries =)

And lastly, the beignets..small dainty fried things sitting on a mountain of powdered sugar next to fresh strawberry jam

I devoured these

That damn jam is so good, my eyes are crossed!

 Not bad for us!

Let the hearburn and stomach pains ensue!

Next food goal trip: taste the real crawfish boil and beignets in N'awlins Louisiana!

My food motto:  You gotta eat good!

In the words of my wise cousin Evelyn, YOLO!!