Things that you may or may not know about me.

I got tagged by Kelly from Per Se and what I'm supposed to do for this meme is to list seven random things about myself and pass it on to seven other bloggers. I'll do the listing part, but I think I'm going to pass it on later.

1. I am an atheist, but if I had to choose a religion to relate to, it'll be Buddhism and Taoism. Who doesn't like having a bunny on the moon making yummy mochi?

2. My brother called me crazy when I was going around and petting bees in the garden when I was a kid; and if you never petted a bee before.... they have one of the softest fur I have ever touched! As long as you don't try to harm the bee, they don't seem to mind when you gently pet them.

3. I'm somewhat ambidextrous. I write and eat with my left hand (except calligraphy), I play sports, use the mouse with my right, and can use both hands for other various activities.

4. I don't get brain freeze, but I do have nose freeze and sometimes chest freeze when I have a slurpee.

5. I am still driving my first car which I bought during my first year in college. It's pushing 20 years old and I kept saying that I'm going to keep driving it till it dies, but since it's a Toyota that might take another 20 years or more.

6. I like doing dishes so I can hear the clean ones squeak.

7. I am allergic to peeling or removing the shells on shellfishes. I am not allergic to the meat, I love eating shellfish, just the shell. My hand would sometimes start itching when I peel shrimp or crack the crab, that's why my whole family are experts in how to eat crab, and what I mean is they really know how to remove the shells, and I'm the only one that doesn't know how to cause my mom always just feed me the meat. I guess it's not a real medical condition... but it's nice to have mommy do it for you. :P

It's an end of an era!

It has been four hours since I have came back from dinner at the original Vivoli Cafe on Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles; I have already experienced 2 of the 5 stages of grief, skipped the third stage and went right to stage number four: depression. As you can tell, the experience was less than satisfactory, in fact, it was extremely disappointing.

The meal started pretty well, our server seem to have recognized us from all the previous visits that we made, which was pretty impressive cause we live 400 miles away, but it also shows how often we come to this restaurant. However, everything seems to have gone downhill when the food hit the table. The bread was warm, but tasted different. The calamari was good, but the portion was cut in half. The gnocchi tasted exactly like the ones in the Thousand Oaks, CA branch, which is not good and you can read about it on my previous post. The lobster ravioli resembles 90% of the one that I had in the past, but the sauce tasted less refine than before.

So here were my thoughts during each of the stages:

Stage 1: Denial
OMG! I can't believe this is happening! Maybe it's just this one time, maybe if I come tomorrow at lunch everything will be fine again. Or better yet, maybe this is just a dream. Yeah, that's it, hey you! Wake up! If I just wake up, everything will be back to normal....

Stage 2: Anger
What is going on? I demand some answers!!! Did you guys change management? Change owner? What is the deal here!!!! The food is clearly not the same as before, do you think people won't notice?!?! Give me my GNOCCHI!!!!

Stage 3: Bargaining
(skipped)

Stage 4: Depression
Dinner sucks, this night sucks, it's an end of an era!!!! (sigh) I just want to climb into bed and do nothing.

After watching half an hour of The Office, I seem to feel a little better but I still can't seem to move onto the acceptance stage.

I really don't know what happened to my beloved restaurant. My best guess is change of owner/management or chef. I don't even recognize most of the servers there and the service has gone down. It almost feel like one of those cases when a new management team took over a successful restaurant and decided that they can cut cost by using inferior ingredients and give out smaller portion while charging the same price. What they don't realize is that although they might be able to save some money in the short run, they will start to lose their customer base, and world of mouth will eventually kill their business.

I don't know if I will return after tonight, maybe I'll give them another chance, but based on tonight's dining experience, I can no longer say that I will recommend anyone to Vivoli Cafe until I know for sure that tonight is just a fluke. I'm crossing my fingers that tonight was just a bad night for them, and unfortunately for me as well, and hoping that the next time I come back, I will be welcomed by the same fluffy gnocchi that I so fondly remembered.

Thousand Oaks, CA - Vivoli Cafe

Today I had a chance to visit one of the franchise branch of my beloved Vivoli Cafe that is located in Thousand Oaks, CA. We head to the restaurant early so we'll be able to return in time to catch the VP debate and Must Watch TV Thursday; since we got there before dinner time, the restaurant was pretty empty and we got seated right away.

(I did take pictures of the food that we ordered, but I did not realize that the SD card was not in the camera and I left the camera cable at home, so I won't be able to post those pictures till I get home next week, but they are coming.)

There are major differences between the original store on Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles and this franchise store in Thousand Oaks, CA; and although this restaurant is not bad, I was extremely disappointed in how different the food is from the original Vivoli Cafe. Since this is the first time we're dining here, we decided to order a few of our favorites: the calamari fritti and the gnocchi. We also ordered the Pizza margherita with mushroom and MilleFoglie di Maiale, which is pork tenderloin sliced and pounded with mozzarella, leaks, tomato in a black olive sauce.

The menu and the recipe is the same as the Sunset store, however, it is obvious that the chef makes all the difference. First of all, the free focaccia bread was cold, and that pretty much set the tone for the whole meal. I made the comment to my boyfriend saying that I have a feeling that we still need to make a trip to the Sunset restaurant, and I think at the end of the meal, my boyfriend was in agreement with me.

The calamari that I rave about did not make an appearance here tonight. The portion was smaller and the calamari was overcooked and a bit rubbery. The calamari itself was not seasoned and pretty much relied on the sauce to deliver the flavor. The pork tenderloin was cooked well, however, there were no seasoning and the entire dish was bland and boring.

My biggest disappointment was the gnocchi. If you have read my July post about Vivoli Cafe on Sunset Blvd, the gnocchi at Vivoli Cafe is my all time favorite dish; it is THE dish that I would drive 400 miles for, they are "little pillows of heaven" that melts in your mouth, or at least that was what they were suppose to be. The gnocchi at Vivoli Cafe in Thousand Oaks, CA bear no resemblance to the original dish, and I didn't have to taste it to tell that it was not the same gnocchi dish that I love. Just from looking at it, the gnocchi looked dense. I then proceeded to stick my fork into it, and it did not feel light and fluffy. I put one into my mouth and it tasted just like all the average gnocchi out there, it was the same gnocchi that my boyfriend had avoided for many many years; it was dense, chewy, and uninspiring.

The only dish that was good was the pizza. The crust was thin and crispy. The topping and sauce were flavorful and complimentary. I would prefer to have more basil on the pizza, but overall, the pizza was a delight to eat.

The upside of this place was the size of this restaurant was significantly bigger than the Sunset store, and parking was free. The service is about the same compared to an average restaurant, but it did not meet the high standard of the Sunset branch. And it definitely did not have the warm, fuzzy, friendly family restaurant feel to it.

After the meal, I have this urge to just drive down to the Vivoli Cafe on Sunset Blvd to get the bad taste out of my mouth. However, I am glad to have this experience, because now I can really appreciate how wonderful the original restaurant on Sunset is, and I can truly tell you that if you want to try Vivoli Cafe, do yourself a favor and visit the one on Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles. Sure, the restaurant is small and you have to pay for valet parking, but the food is fabulous there and the service is superb. I would not recommend anyone to the one in Thousand Oaks, but if you would like to try it out for yourself, be my guest, but don't say that I didn't warn ya! :P