In fact, this was pretty much littlestar's show, as she angled me toward Cascal. She insisted that a promotion calls for celebratory food, and we certainly hadn't been at Cascal in a while.

Apparently it was fate, as Cascal had exactly one table left open -- a table for two.

Cascal is just fun. It's intrinsically our kind of meal. We're going to end up sharing the food anyway, so we might as well have a selection of different tasty dishes instead of just one or two things. This time around littlestar ended up choosing pretty much everything, which set us up with a scallop ceviche, a tasty fried thing whose specific identity I no longer recall, and a moqueca soup featuring crab. Normally, littlestar loves the moqueca, so there was some curiosity on her part about whether the soup version would be as good.

The eventual conclusion -- it was better. So good, in fact, that she asked about getting a second serving of the exact same thing. I agreed with her assessment, and we rounded out our meal at Cascal with bonus moqueca.

We declined our waiter's offer of dessert at Cascal because we did, indeed, have a return visit to Sugar Butter Flour in mind. Conveniently, they're open late on Fridays.

This time around, with a full meal behind us, we decided to cap it at two desserts. I'd been hopeful for a fruit tart this time around, but there wasn't one -- at least, not the kind of mixed fruit tart I'd been looking forward to. Littlestar suggested I give the apple tart a try, and we picked that up along with a mango mousse.

They were both good. The mousse was, well, fruity, and the apple tart was a nice, mild, sweetness that really worked well.

Littlestar, once again, had the tea. She has all the good ideas.

It had been a while, however, since I asked littlestar out specifically for dessert. I wanted to take her some place interesting and new, and after some looking, I found a likely candidate. I poked around a little bit, read as many reviews as I could stand, and decided it would be fun to have our first try at the place be out on a date together.

I made sure to sell its virtues first, of course, so littlestar wouldn't be too dubious about a taste-unseen (so to speak) choice.

On the evening of a typically busy Wednesday we headed out together for Sunnyvale and the charmingly named Sugar Butter Flour. It took a little looking to find the place in one of many Sunnyvale strip malls, and we were both pretty curious about what we were going to find when we went in.

It was, all in all, pretty exciting.

The display case started at cupcakes on the left and then transitioned to tarts, mousses, and all sorts of everything special in between. We took our time trying to decide, and finally settled on a Creme Brulee, a Key Lime Mousse, and a mixed Chocolate Mousse.

Check out the full selection:

I think we enjoyed it all equally, especially with the nice tea that littlestar selected to go with our dessert. We spent our dessert date time enjoying the desserts, naturally, and discussing the specialness of desserts. We also had a little debate about Sugar Butter Flour versus a prior date dessert supplier, Satura. I came out in favor of SBF, but littlestar is a staunch Satura supporter.

I guess we'll have to do both.

We both thought Sugar Butter Flour was great fun, and agreed that it would have to be a date venue again, probably sooner rather than later.

This is perhaps only the second time I've look at frames with a specific person in mind for the frame. Littlestar and I walked through aisles, checking out and discarding frames that didn't seem to suit Pearl very well. We eventually found a design we liked, albeit not in the actual materials they'd used for the frame. With the image of a well-suited frame firmly in mind, we decided we'd be able to find the best possible version of that frame later.

I'm glad we found that right frame style together.

After browsing through Aaron Brothers, we went to fulfill our second goal for the evening and try a new restaurant. This time around our target was En in Sunnyvale, the latest in a list of Bay Area Izakayas that we've tried out.

We ended up with a shellfish-errific order, almost without realizing it, with...

Creamy Scallop Croquet

Bacon Scallops

Uni with Onsen Egg
Uni Gratin

...to which we added Bacon Enoki mushrooms.

Yes, that's double scallops, double uni, and double bacon.

Littlestar is, of course, a huge fan of uni. I'm not usually so much so, but it turned out that the Uni with Onsen Egg was just about my speed. Something about the sauce took enough of an edge off the taste that I really liked it...yet not so much that littlestar didn't. The Uni Gratin probably took too much of the flavor away, and might have been one too many rich foods on the night.

Everything else was lovely as well. It was a good remembrance of Pearl, and then a nice evening together at a new place.

While on the lookout for low-effort date options at the tail end of littlestar's schooling (which is now, blissfully, complete), I noticed that the Cantor Center had a potentially cool-sounding exhibit titled "From Pop to Modern." The content sounded interesting enough, and the promise of commentary not just from a curator but also from the artists and the people donating the work suggested it would be the kind of out-of-the-ordinary museum-going experience littlestar might appreciate. I also had the ulterior motive I hinted at above, as littlestar's background in art makes museums about a thousand times better. It's not just that she knows the artists and the surrounding history, although she does, but she can also comment on which things are easier or harder to do, and let me know just how impressive some of the work really is.

At the same time, she's not taken by everything, and that certainly adds to the overall charm of the experience.

We paused at the entrance to spend some time with the crazy sculpture that looks very much like it's a giant horse made of driftwood, but instead is a giant horse made of metal pieces that were molded off of driftwood and then painted very realistically to look like driftwood. Seriously, we hung out and started at that thing for quite a while. It's good to be able to share your amazement at how much something can look like driftwood with someone.

Once we found our way to the Pop to Modern Exhibit itself, we quickly acquainted ourselves with the color scheme that actually divided the art-associated commentary into four categories - curator, artist, donating individual, and student response. As it happens, you really only need to pay attention to the first and sometimes the second one, but the third and fourth were, well, interesting.

Recalling that littlestar is not necessarily automatically taken by all art, one might not be surprised that we spent a lot of time at this exhibit in a solid state of bemusement, especially when the more underperforming pieces were accompanied by glowing, and slightly overblown, praise by the people who did the donating (or the one student who thought a questionable sculptor was one of the greats of the last century). It's fun to stop in front of a giant, brown canvas and have her share your lack of engagement with it.

Eventually, we settled down in front of the work of the shockingly talented Peter Milton. I think we both could have spent even longer there, being in turns amazed by the images themselves and the process and imagination behind them. For us, this was the major reward of the trip together, and we spent a long time pointing things out, reading the explanations together, and being generally and comprehensively amazed.

Afterward, we escaped from the various silly pieces filled with the happy hum of this good stuff (and a few other things that were also pretty cool) and wandered off to have some dinner.

And no, visits to the gym do not count as dates.

However, at the gym one of the trainers enthusiastically recommended a local restaurant that I'd once lived within two blocks of, but had yet to sample - Bangkok Spoon. An enthusiastic recommendation for a kind of food we like was motivation enough, and our next date was set.

The restaurant is a nice little family place, which makes it homey and cute in an entirely positive way. The menu looked pretty good, and we settled on a green curry fried rice and something else (I admit I forget the specifics of this date's food, as we've since taken people there and gone again ourselves).

The food was really reminiscent of the food we'd shared on our trip to Thailand last year, and that was lovely. It was neither too sweet nor too rich, and as we ate we talked about that shared vacation, and things like riding an elephant (which is both exciting and scary) and eating food at the night market. We also both agreed we need to go back when we can, to visit friends we made there and maybe see the monkey temple this time (last time, it was the fish temple).

Littlestar and I both love good food (honestly, I picked up a lot of my real appreciation for food from her), but this date was more than a nice meal; it was a reminder of a trip we shared that can feel like a long time ago after a very full year.

But it is a good restaurant, too.

As I said above, it was busy, with stops at the Metropolitan Museum of art, a specialty rice pudding place, and everywhere in between (including meeting with a plethora of long-unseen friends).

One evening found us without a scheduled event, in search of dinner and with an eye toward seeing a neighborhood we hadn't yet made it to. We decided to go to SoHo. Following a subway discussion of the pronunciation of "Houston" in New York, we disembarked and found that modern-day SoHo is pretty dead at 9:30 on a Tuesday night. The city as a whole, perhaps, does not sleep, but parts of it certainly do. After bypassing several Italian and French restaurants, we crossed a street and found ourselves in front of Hiroko's Place.

They little sign in front admonished us that there would be no smoking inside, and that Hiroko's Place does not serve sushi. Good to know.

This late (apparently) on a Tuesday, we mostly had the place to ourselves, which was very sweet for a night out together. As we checked out the menus, we also took in the decor, which was a mix of small pieces and large quilts by Kayo Aiba. It was charming and cozy, in the sense of comfortable and welcoming (rather than as a euphemism for small).

We surveyed the menu and eventually settled on mentaiko noodles and a Japanese the omu white (that's a Japanese-style omelette comprising a thin layer of egg wrapped around a rice-mix filling, with bechamel sauce).

The dinner was tasty and a fun experiment in trying yet more food that we hadn't had before. We shared, although littlestar preferred the mentaiko and I probably enjoyed the omu white more. We topped it off with a dessert that was, suiting both our tastes these days, just mildly rather than overbearingly sweet.

We reluctantly made our way back out into what was proving a somewhat blustery and vaguely cold evening; I think if we could have swung it, we might have just stayed in the lands of fine art quilts and tasty foods. Nonetheless, we had a little happy glow as we rode the subway back to our hotel, and a little bit of the evening lingered with us for the remainder of the trip.

As the peripenultimate date of the last semester of littlestar's schooling, we chose to go to Cascal. As I was remiss in not writing about this until now, I can hardly recall much of the details, beyond good food and good company. Those seem sufficient for a good date, though.

We'll call this post elegant, like the meal at Cascal, and move on from there.

Not, you know, that we've ever done that.

This time around, we had a packed day in the city, seeing a movie, the art that led to the movie, and more. Click through to the extended for the full explanation.

Then we found out that Coraline would be showing in 3-D at the Metreon, a scant few blocks from the the museum. Win! Although we aren't generally excited by the prospect of movies randomly being sort of in 3-D, Coraline seemed like it might be a good fit for multidimensionality.

We filled in the rest of our day plan with ideas for places to eat, and a certain shop littlestar wanted to check out.

Our plans almost immediately went awry, as it turned out that the place we were planning on going to for lunch was not open on a Saturday. In fact, a lot of the restaurants right by the museum were closed, catering (in a sense) to the absence of customers who would normally be around on a business day. We ended up at a perfectly cute place called "Tart to Tart", where we shared a sandwich, soup, and a slice of artichoke quiche[.

After that brunch of sorts, we went over to the Cartoon Art Museum to check out the Coraline exhibit. It was fun, being a mix of concept art, concept puppets, and other pieces of art done during the making of the movie. Conveniently, in addition to just being cool, the exhibit also gave littlestar a good idea of how to approach one of her school assignments.

The museum also had a preview Watchmen show, so we took that in, before watching some clips about the making of Coraline and then heading out.

After the museum, we walked over to the Metreon and, wanting to avoid a sell-out later, picked up our tickets. This was a good call - the showing in half an hour had sold out already. The politely bored teen working the counter gave us our tickets and our 3-D glasses; I stowed both in my jacket and we headed back out to go find some chocolate.

littlestar had heard about a place called Christopher Elbow Chocolates. No points for guessing what it's known for. We plunged into the inclement weather (a little rainy, more windy, pretty cold) and made our way down Market. Although the walk turned out to be a touch longer than we'd expected, the chocolates were worth. We lingered around the counter, taking in options like "Banana Curry," "Russian Tea," and "Yuzu." Eventually, littlestar settled on a set of nine of them, which we took home in little box with a lovely, chocolate-colored bow.

Although the rain had let up while we were in the shop, the wind picked up significantly on our return trip. Even so, littlestar said it felt shorter, since we at least knew how far we were going now.

On the way back, we stopped in at Pearl Fine Art Supplies. I was already thinking the place was big when I noticed their sign declaring that they have three floors. After declining to buy a portfolio to carry her smaller work more appropriately, littlestar head upstairs to look at their paper. Eventually, we left with no new art supplies in hand, with littlestar pointing out that even though it might be "correct" for her to have a small portfolio to hold some of her smaller work more safely, if she did everything "correctly" we'd be buying much of the store.

We stopped in at the snazzy "new" (well, new to us folks who haven't been in an SF mall lately) food court at the expanded Westfield mall, where we had decent Japanese food, and a Strawberry-Nutella crepe that inspired the faux-envy of the funny guys at the table next to us.

After that, it was movie time. We ended up waiting in an already-forming line for the movie, bolstering our suspicion that it would sell out.

The movie itself was quite good, and it really did make decent use of the 3-D. It'll still be good without it, but it was at least enough of a payoff for the mild headache we both walked away with.

After the movie, we finished our trip in what is nearly ritual fashion for us these days, stopping in at Bi-Rite Creamery, where we redeemed two purchase cards for stuff on the spot (Blood Orange Sorbet for littlestar, a Chai Chocolate ice cream cone for me) and picked up some more ice cream for later at home.

On the way home, we picked up some sea scallops, which I then seared and served alongside fresh brussels sprouts for Valentine's dinner.

Click through to the extended for more.

Calistoga's main street, by day

Eschewing the opportunity to try something new, littlestar asked if we could just go back to All Seasons again. It was a fun return trip, as the lunchtime feel of the place was different from the evening Bistro mood. It was a fun, pleasant lunch, with the unseasonal blue skies visible from our table by the front window.

A sunny winter's day in Calistoga

After lunch, we headed for our last stop on this weekend off - the Charles Schulz Museum.

When I was scouting out things to do in the general Napa and Marin areas, I was reminded about this museum. littlestar and I are interested enough in this kind of thing to make the museum worth a stop, but when I checked their site and saw that they were running an exhibit about Beethoven in Peanuts, it made its way onto the "almost certainly" list.

The museum is in Santa Rosa, which is just a windy, pretty drive away from where we were in Calistoga. I drove, as littlestar tried once again, with moderate success, to take pictures of the landscape as it swept by.

Landscape, with complimentary cows

The museum itself sits right next to the Ice Arena that Charles Schulz had built to bring hockey to Santa Rosa, so you're already starting to get a feel for how his life impacted the world around him even before you're in the museum. On the way in, we stopped for a portrait:

littlestar and friend

The museum was fantastic, and littlestar stayed until closing. It's too much to detail - better for us to recommend that you go, instead - but it covers everything from the specifics of the temporary exhibits (such as the Beethoven one) and the course of Charles Schulz's life. We loved the annotated strips that are all over the museum, explaining how parts of Schulz's life fit in with and were reflected in his work. We were both surprised to learn that the music that Schulz drew into the strips featuring Schroeder was not random, instead being chosen to fit the emotion or the humor of the moment, based on Schulz's extensive reading about and listening to major composers.

So we liked it a lot, and kept going until they did that light dimming thing to let us know it was time to go. We'll probably want to go back at some point, too.

The mural is made of 3,588 images from Peanuts strips

From the museum, we wandered over to the ice arena, where we rounded out our day with hot chocolate and an ice cream bar at the Warm Puppy Cafe.

A sweet end to the day

It seemed like a good way to spend the evening.

Click through to the extended for more.

One thing we'd noticed ahead of our trip was that literally every single address we'd noted ahead of time for Calistoga, be it a restaurant we might eat at or the place we at which we planned to stay for the night, was that it was on Lincoln Avenue. This suggested that we would be okay, even without a map of the area.

We chose to stay at Dr. Wilkinson's Hot Springs Resort, which is as 50s charming as it sounds like it should be (indeed, it was founded in 1952).

It could be from no other decade

littlestar has a lot of hot springs experience in Southern California, whereas I am a hot springs neophyte, having gone all of twice in my life, and that much of my life ago. She'd been wanting to go for a while, so I thought it would be fun to see what the Napa area could offer. Dr. Wilkinson's looked both charming and good, and seemed like a fine place to start our Calistoga exploration.

On checking in, we decided to go for a post-drive, pre-dinner soak. With the evening cool settling in, we eschewed the outdoor "warm" pool and went for the indoor "hot pool." littlestar tells me it doesn't hold a candle to the scorching heat of a SoCal Korean hot pool, but it was plenty warm for us, and quite relaxing. We just hung out for a while, enjoying warm water, and discussing the cause of skin pruning.

I prune up a lot faster than she does.

After the soak, we both felt pleasantly wobbly, our muscles relaxed by the heat. It's a little bit like exercising without the actual exercise.

But littlestar and I were hungry now, so it was time to dress up and head out on the town. Or on Lincoln Avenue, more or less.

Dressed up for a night on the town

We strolled down Lincoln Avenue, secure in the knowledge that all our restaurant choices were somewhere between our hotel room and the state road we'd come in on. On our way there, we ran into this:

A charmingly static train station

Intrigued by the parked train collective, we wandered in and found a bunch of cute little shops. Especially at night, the faux station was kind of magical, as if we might be able to step onto one of the trains and be whisked away somewhere, perhaps coming back just before dawn.

We looked around the train for a little while and then moved on, with Christine snapping pictures of historical typewriters (in a storefront office) and street lights (for, she tells me, reference).

This time around, our first choice restaurant was open, so we ended up sharing dinner at All Seasons Bistro. As we came in, the place was nearly full -- but just the right amount of nearly, with a table left for us. We settled in, spent some time going over the menu, and then ordered this:

Lobster Bisque with Truffle Oil

Ahi Tuna Tartare with Mango and Avocado

Pan-Seared Salmon, Meyer Lemon Buerre Blanc, Purple Mashed Potatoes, Yellow Wax Beans

Smoked and Grilled New York Striploin Steak, Celery Root and Blue Cheese Potato Gratin, Swiss Chard, Red Wine Sauce

After the perfect amount of food earlier in the day in Napa, this ended up being a little too much, but it was still very, very good. littlestar was so in love with the bisque and tartare that she ended up ordering them again not a day later, as we'll see on the following date.

I really enjoyed the ambiance of All Seasons, with bistro-appropriate (if there is such a thing) music in the background. littlestar noted their stained glass windows with different seasonal (naturally) scenes, and said that they'd look pretty good during the daytime.

That's foreshadowing.

We ended our meal with a sorbet, figuring that was a light, clean finish to the meal. It was a combination triple sorbet, featuring pear riesling, blood orange, and pomegranate.

After that meal, we went back outside and realized it was now actually cold. A hurried walk home followed, where we kicked on the heater and settled in to just relax for the evening, following the mandate of our trip.

Warm, cozy, and well-fed.

Not for the whole semester, you understand, but as a final break ahead of it.

Consequently, the discussion focused on North versus South. A friend had drawn a lovely picture of the unsampled joys of the central coast region, which made it tempting, but at the end of the day Napa won out with the promise of pampering. This just seemed right for littlestar ahead of the final semester's sprint.

So, as early as was reasonable on a Saturday morning, we got in the car and drove north.

Click through to read the rest in the extended entry.

Heading to Napa, we had a few goals. One of them was going to be lunch at Greystone, but that was stymied right out of the gates by dint of Greystone being closed through the bulk of January. Oops. Fortunately, we'd checked on this the evening before leaving, so we weren't stuck out in Saint Helena wondering why no one else was around.

Clearly taken on the way to Napa

Our first goal that was open was Anette's in downtown Napa. Just a week before this trip, we'd had some of Anette's Firey Brittle, which is pretty much what it sounds like and, we agreed, excellent. So we were at least resolved to pick up some more of that.

We parked in downtown Napa and made our way onto conspicuously silent streets -- again, we were there pretty early, apparently, at the cusp of 11am and most of the shops opening. Fortunately, Anette's was open, and the nice ladies inside offered us chocolate as we came in, and then chatted with us about who they wholesale to ("lots of people") while we eventually decided to pick up a bunch of different kinds of brittle.

Then we left the store, walked about a block away, and littlestar decided we should pick some up as gifts, too. So we went right back.

We bought no antiques, but littlestar was fascinated

After our double tap at Anette's, it was looking pretty good for lunchtime, so we headed out west (just a little bit) to hit our Greystone backup plan, Farm, at the Carneros Inn.

I should clarify that Farm was a backup solely in that we'd expected to go to Greystone, and not as an indicator of quality, since we'd never been there before.

After parking and trying to figure out where to walk into the restaurant, we were seated outside near a fountain and two neat little "lawn" bowling areas. The quotes are there because they were more properly "fine gravel" bowling, probably because an actual lawn would be unsound in terms of water use during a Napa summer.

This is a good moment to take a break and point out that we lucked into a completely, utterly, nonseasonally warm off-season weekend. It was sunny and fine the entire weekend -- but there's no reason to expect early January Napa to be like that, so there were no crowds. As evidence of this, consider our rapid seating at this fine restaurant.

littlestar almost giggled with glee (but not really, she doesn't giggle) when she saw the menu. Here's what we ended up ordering:

Sonoma Duck Foie Gras Torchon (Quince compote, pistachios, frisee salad)

littlestar followed the menu's suggestion and ordered the Sauternes Chateau d'Arche Bordeaux France 2003 to go with the foie gras

Wild Mushroom Risotto (White truffle oil, parmesan cheese, mushroom broth)

We ordered this as the full plate

George's Bank Maine Dayboat Scallops (Piquilo peppers, flageolet beans, creamy meyer lemon broth)

Dessert was a peach panna cotta which isn't on their menu at the moment, so I don't know what it was called exactly.

Everything was amazing.

littlestar and I shared the food and chatted, taking our time and enjoying it all. I was impressed with the risotto, and littlestar was in awe of the scallops. We both liked our waiter, who was a nice gentleman whose good mood matched the sunny day.

We both recommend it, perhaps needless to say.

After lunch, we wandered back to the car, ready to head onto the second half of our day (and, as described here, the next date).

Napa is food, and good food at that.

Just so you know.

Knowing that we both wanted to head by the library, I asked her to meet me there, then join me for some hot chocolate afterward. As I said, we aren't really drinking coffee these days. For me, I've decided that as much as coffee may help with the boring parts of work, it also makes me unnaturally awake at odd hours. littlestar, in contrast, turns into a hyperkinetic fast talker when she's under the influence, which is at once entertaining and, after a number of hours, worrying. So we're probably both better of abstaining.

Note that this rule may be broken from time to time.

We tromped around the library for a while, then after that realized that we were both actually hungry, it being evening and all, and decided that rather than just going straight to a dessert of sorts, we'd get real food. littlestar was feeling a need for Indian food, so we strolled down Castro to Godavari (formerly Sue's), where we shared a lovely little dinner.

This is where, of course, the coffee - chocolate - chai transition comes in. Having reasonably eschewed coffee for the idea of chocolate, littlestar decided to change things up during dinner and instead of ordering a sweet lassi as she sometimes does, chose to fight off a cold night with a hot chai. That prompted this exchange:

"I guess you don't mind staying up tonight?"

*shrug*

Just like that.

After a nice little dinner together, we decided we were way too full for hot chocolate or any kind of dessert after all, and wandered off home instead.

More in the extended.

This time around, we started our day with lunch at Mama Lan's. Although she feels a little guilty about not sampling the variety of good things at Mama Lan's, littlestar always goes with coconut milk noodle soup. Naturally, it's totally tasty. I went with an omelet, which is not at all like what you're probably thinking about. It's a shell of crisp egg around a filling of bean sprouts, shrimp, and other good stuff, served with lettuce and a dipping sauce. I ordered this because it's what I picked up on our first visit to Mama Lan's, and at the time I had no idea how to eat it (turns out you want to break it up, pick stuff up in lettuce, and dip it in the sauce).

We followed up a lovely lunch with one of our all-too-infrequent trips to the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, where Ms. littlestar is a member. I somehow forget between trips just how beautiful the Legion's location is, with its view back into the Bay across the Golden Gate. We spent a little time looking, then the cold wind reminded us we were supposed to go inside to see the show.

The special exhibit was "Leonardo da Vinci: Drawings from the Biblioteca Reale in Turin", and it featured a small selection of studies by Leonardo. We did our slow circle around the exhibit together, as littlestar told me just how expensive his materials would have been, and I pointed out that a couple of the drawings were displayed so you could see both sides of the paper -- since, expensive materials and all, he'd drawn on the back, too. I like pacing littlestar around a museum, because she brings the appreciation to it of not just liking and caring about the work, but also knowing what it feels like to do the work.

After the Leonardo exhibit, we checked out one other exhibit, "The State Museums of Berlin and the Legacy of James Simon." This is a crazy exhibit full of all sorts of ancient and at-the-time contemporary work. We thought it was crazy because so much of it was originally in Simon's private collection. We marveled at the pictures of his home, with ancient Egyptian pieces and renaissance paintings just there, in his study. This was a fun one to walk through, and we spent a lot of time staring at things like the Babylonian seals, which are at once tiny and incredibly intricate. littlestar decided that she'd like to have her own seal (mostly because she gets sick of her own signature).

After all that, we called it a day, enjoyed one last look at the Golden Gate, then headed home.

Sounds like a good time for a dinner date, right? More in the extended.

Turned out the timing was good, as I hit Hydration with about seven minutes to spare before closing (yay).

After that, I trucked across campus, littlestar let me into a mostly empty theater, and we sat down for dinner at midnight.

And that's about it. :)