GBU... Good Bad and the Ugly... La Vista and my Stir-fry

No recipes in this blog, just some food experiences.

Angela and I went to La Vista, http://www.fatbutter.com/ on Memorial right by Town and Country Wednesday. Before going, I was expecting a great view, maybe of the nice trees of the memorial area, but it got its name from a joke about the first location, off Fountain View. Located in a strip center with no view of anything, the waiter said it was named the asphalt lounge because of the lack of scenery.

The menu is pretty good, some creative entrees with creative items, pizza, sandwiches and salads. Their pasta dishes seem pretty standard. I had the coffee cinnamon cumin crusted pork tenderloin and Angela had the shrimp and grits. Both were pretty great! The bread with the meal is really good and you can bring your own wine for a $5 bottle corking fee. They do have outside seating which I think would be great once Houston gets into its 2 month pleasant weather period. One thing about this location is the crowd, its definitely more a memorial older crowd. There was one younger couple in there, but when we left just after 8, we were easily 10 years younger than any other customer in there. If that doesn't bother you and you live in the memorial area and want some good food to eat out with your $7 bottle of wine, definitely give this place a try.

Here goes the bad and ugly, I managed to capture both with a stir-fry dish. I bought a couple different veggies from the Asians grocery store and wanted to do a stir-fry for a healthy meal. The week got busy and I threw together dish last night. There was 5 veggies, small bok choy, carrots, yellow pepper, and sugar snap peas. I didn't feel like making a sauce so I tried to use a Paul Newman's Teriaki marinade. I basically cooked the veggies stir-fry style and then added the sauce. At the end, I didn't like the flavor, not sweet enough for a teriaki and I overcooked the veggies.

One thing about stir fry and cooking veggies in general, don't over cook them. They can go from fresh looking and tasting to discolored and mushy really quick.

I also tried to make baked sweet potato fries this week, which have elluded me since first discovering their fatting cousin from the south, the sweet potato fry deep fried. I went more with a steak fry cut this time and the flavor was good, but still not getting the crispness I'm wanting on the outside. My sweet potato fries have only know 2 stages in the past, mushy or burnt.

I told you I'd bring you experiences about food, even if they aren't great so there you go all 6 readers. I took the day off so I'm off to the next item on my agenda...