Perfect Day

Yesterday was a perfect day. While much of the country is under snow and storm, we are basking here in San Diego in 70 to 80 degree weather. Although the Santa Ana winds are playing havoc with allergy sufferers' sinus's, it is nothing short of glorious in these parts. Sunsets have been gorgeous all week. No worries, as they say in the islands.

A bunch of us Fallbrook foodie friends met yesterday morning at Jasmine for Dim Sum, the number diminishing at the last minute because of various member's ailments or family situations. It is hard to beat dim sum for a gluttonous food orgy for the money you spend. We all jumped into our various cars and made our way to San Diego for the mass feeding frenzy.

The cavernous Jasmine was packed as usual and we went right to work, ordering a steamed fish in garlic and ginger and a Peking duck for the table. They brought our prospective entree out in a tub for inspection and it looked like a happy, tasty rocky cod so we said go ahead and cook her up!

Dim Sum is tricky, especially with a big table because the food is coming so fast at you from so many directions, sometimes it is hard to pace yourselves and say no. Too easy to get filled up. We were like voracious termites, gnashing our way through trays and trays of every manner of crustacean, fowl and sea creature, Superb roast pork. Broccoli. Calamari. Turnip cakes. Eggplant. Barbecued duck. (We really like duck!)

We forego the won ton soup and some of the usual delicacies we get at Jasmine (spare ribs, duck rolls, lotus wrapped rice) because we were in such a mass consumption mode right off the bat. Every dim sum meal is going to be different because of the luck of the draw. But we had no complaints. We pillaged and conquered and did Fallbrook proud.

Carmen ate the fish eyeballs, which she said were a bit firm. She was welcome to them. It was her husband Michael's birthday and it was nice that they could join us.

We sat there engorged in a bacchanalian stupor, like some roman liege from Caligula. I wanted to ask for a feather. Everybody was stuffed to the limit when I forced my lunch compatriots to eat one more thing, the sesame balls stuffed with bean paste, in order to have a final sweetness in our collective palette's. They all agreed that it was a good thing, after a bit of muted protest.

The final bill was about $25.00 a head, which is really nothing when you consider the peking duck and the steamed fish, which are twenty bucks a pop. For the money, you just can not beat it. The great french food god Escoffier reportedly got his greatest inspiration from chinese cooking, a cuisine that had over one thousand ways to cook an egg and an appreciation for texture not rivaled in any other school of cooking.

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After brunch we ventured down to the harbor where our companions took us out on their boat for an afternoon of whale watching. The ocean was calm and the sky was clear. The gray whales were traveling south from their northern haunts and were positioned about two miles out.

We saw quite a few of the magnificent leviathans. I lay on the front of the boat and just soaked up the rays and the enormity of our perfect day. Great friends and great food. We spent about three or four hours out, unfortunately with more delicious food and champagne. A major cheese and fruit tray and cheesecake and blackberries for dessert. That after the holidays' diet has obviously yet to occur.

Sailboats darted in and around the giant cetaceans. D, our host and a marine biologist, explained the particular feeding methods of the gray whale, who will clean the plankton off a boat anchor line like dental floss and tilt his or her head to the side to strain a nutritious meal out of the seabroth.

Coming back in, we were treated to an epic sunset and lovely views of the metallic San Diego skyline shimmering in the distance. Thank you all, for making this one happen. (p.s. none of these photos have been photoshopped or supersaturated, this stuff is out of the can...)