Taiko - now with more cowbell!
Jul. 18th, 2009 10:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gurdymonkeyDinner at El Huarache Azteca in Oakland was at layla_lilah 's request based on something she'd seen on "Check Please, Bay Area!" It's a couple blocks from the Fruitvale BART in a Latino neighborhood (where I felt very tall and very gringa), it was well worth the visit. I'm a wimp when it comes to hot food. The salsa verde was zingy without being painful. When I picked the Huarache Mole, our waitress mentioned in heavily accented English that I could have a huarache made from nopales (prickly pear cactus) instead of corn meal, so I went for it. It arrived a brilliant green peeping from beneath the chicken swathed in dark mole and lumps of cheese, and was a nice change from the usual maza. layla_lilah 's huarache with carne asada looked great too. She opted to have it with some huitlacoche (a corn fungus) on top. I tasted it, the flavor was very earthy and much better than I would've expected. Inexpensive, easy to get to and they serve Mexican Coca Cola if one wants the Real Thing with sugar.
From there, we made time for a stop at Nieves Cinco De Mayo, right across from the BART Station in the Fruitvale Public Market on 12th street. Featuring hand cranked ice cream in a dizzying assortment of exotic flavors (corn! garlic! pine nut and cheese!), the proprietor was very friendly and quite willing to offer us taste after taste while we dithered over final choices. I had a scoop of cinnamon (for $1.25!!!!), Ellen got a scoop each of coffee and cinnamon and mixed them together. The good news is it's close to home. The better news is it's just out of the way enough I have to make a slight detour to get there, so I maybe won't make a detrimental-to-diet habit of it. SO much nicer than that chi chi place up on College Avenue with the expensive ice creams.
Then it was back over to Alameda to check out Maze (as in MAH-zeh) Taiko at the Rhythmix Cultural Works. Six ladies rocked the refurbished warehouse with high energy and distinctly non-traditional mixes of rhythms and instruments from all over the world. I'm not kidding about the cowbell. Or djembe, marimba, hammered dulcimer, electronic keyboard or squeaky toys.
Several pieces in the second set were inspired by a collection of poems and paintings written by internees at Heart Mountain that had been found in leader Janet Koike's grahdfather's garage. They're well worth catching.
layla_lilah 's request based on something she'd seen on "Check Please, Bay Area!" It's a couple blocks from the Fruitvale BART in a Latino neighborhood (where I felt very tall and very gringa), it was well worth the visit. I'm a wimp when it comes to hot food. The salsa verde was zingy without being painful. When I picked the Huarache Mole, our waitress mentioned in heavily accented English that I could have a huarache made from nopales (prickly pear cactus) instead of corn meal, so I went for it. It arrived a brilliant green peeping from beneath the chicken swathed in dark mole and lumps of cheese, and was a nice change from the usual maza. layla_lilah 's huarache with carne asada looked great too. She opted to have it with some huitlacoche (a corn fungus) on top. I tasted it, the flavor was very earthy and much better than I would've expected. Inexpensive, easy to get to and they serve Mexican Coca Cola if one wants the Real Thing with sugar. From there, we made time for a stop at Nieves Cinco De Mayo, right across from the BART Station in the Fruitvale Public Market on 12th street. Featuring hand cranked ice cream in a dizzying assortment of exotic flavors (corn! garlic! pine nut and cheese!), the proprietor was very friendly and quite willing to offer us taste after taste while we dithered over final choices. I had a scoop of cinnamon (for $1.25!!!!), Ellen got a scoop each of coffee and cinnamon and mixed them together. The good news is it's close to home. The better news is it's just out of the way enough I have to make a slight detour to get there, so I maybe won't make a detrimental-to-diet habit of it. SO much nicer than that chi chi place up on College Avenue with the expensive ice creams.
Then it was back over to Alameda to check out Maze (as in MAH-zeh) Taiko at the Rhythmix Cultural Works. Six ladies rocked the refurbished warehouse with high energy and distinctly non-traditional mixes of rhythms and instruments from all over the world. I'm not kidding about the cowbell. Or djembe, marimba, hammered dulcimer, electronic keyboard or squeaky toys.
Several pieces in the second set were inspired by a collection of poems and paintings written by internees at Heart Mountain that had been found in leader Janet Koike's grahdfather's garage. They're well worth catching.
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Date: 2009-07-19 03:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-19 03:57 pm (UTC)Maze Daiko is just WOW! Do they have any CDs out? I checked the website, but couldn't tell.
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Date: 2009-07-19 04:10 pm (UTC)Try info@rhythmix.org
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Date: 2009-07-19 11:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-20 07:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-21 03:27 am (UTC)