Tried: Cashew Ice Cream

Strawberry ice cream made from cashew milk!

Back in San Francisco, my cousin took us to a food court in Emeryville, and told us about a cashew ice cream place. I was so intrigued I had to try it.

It's called Mr. Dewie's Cashew Creamery that has ice cream that is dairy-free, gluten-free and soy-free. The shop was started by two Berkeley-native brothers, Ari and Andrew Cohen in 2011. They wanted to create an ice cream to meet their dietary requirements of having no dairy, soy or gluten, only use organic ingredients and not have any preservatives either.

The shop is in a converted shipping container

Sounds like a tall order, but they did it. The cashews are ground into a fine powder then mixed with water to create "milk" and then the other ingredients are added to create the flavour, then it is put in the freezer to set.

Mr. Dewie's Cashew Creamery have three locations and the shop we visited in the food court is actually in a repurposed shipping container which is cool. It has a refrigerator, the ice creams on display, and even marble countertops.

On display were many different flavours, like tumeric spice, roasted cashew, coffee, chocolate orange chip. What to try?

In the end I had the strawberry flavour, but the strawberry and cashew taste seemed to fight each other and so I mostly tasted a thick, dense ice cream with a hint of strawberry.

Meanwhile my mom had the tropical trio -- pineapple, mango and coconut -- and it worked very well, tasting very refreshing.

There are several interesting flavours including tumeric spice

Nevertheless it was fun and interesting to try ice cream made from cashews!

We sat at a communal table by the store and for the next few hours watched a steady trickle of customers, and at times a crowd waiting to buy the cashew-based ice cream (after dinner). It shows that this kind of ice cream appeals to men, women and children regardless of it being dairy free.

While we do have a brand of dairy-free ice cream in Hong Kong called Happy Cow, it would be good for pastry chefs and even entrepreneurs to come up with non-dairy ice creams as a healthy alternative.

Mr. Dewie's Cashew Creamery
Emeryville Public Market
5959 Shellmount Street
Emeryville, CA 94608
(510) 350 8171

San Francisco's Chicago-Style Pizza

My very stringy slice of spinach and mushroom pizza at Zachary's

On our last full day in San Francisco, my cousin took us to the botanical garden there, and for lunch we stopped at a nearby pizza place called Zachary's Chicago Pizza.

I was told this is no ordinary pizza joint and it's an institution since 1983 with several locations in San Francisco.

It serves Chicago-style pizza, which is a deep-dish pizza so that there is a very high crust, and this allows for even more toppings to be put on the pizza (more like a pie) and then it is smothered in a chunky tomato sauce.

Check out how thick this pizza is! It's more like a pie!

We didn't really know what we were getting ourselves into until my cousin highly suggested one large pizza would be good for five of us. It took 30 minutes for the pizza to arrive so we had a large plate of Caesar salad to start and my cousin and I sipped on Moroccan mint iced teas.

When the pizza arrived, it was placed on the wooden stool next to our table and the server immediately started serving the slices which were very thick!

We ordered two flavours, spinach and mushroom with three cheeses blended together, and Zachary's Special, featuring Italian sausage, green peppers, onion, mushroom and Mozzarella cheese.

Needless it's really difficult to pick up the pizza slice -- you really have to eat it with a knife and fork! And after one slice, you're practically full!

Zachary's Chicago Pizza
1853 Solano Avenue
Berkeley, CA
(510) 525 5950
zacharys.com

Visiting the Botanical Gardens at Berkeley

The poppy known as the fried egg flower at the botanical garden

Yesterday the temperatures in San Francisco were unusually hot and today was even hotter at 37 degrees Celsius! But we braved the heat and headed to the University of California Botanical Garden at Berkeley.

A poppy whose petals look like they are fiery red flames

Even though we were armed with large brim hats, we still had to try to find as many shady areas as possible to keep cool. As a result, we did a relatively quick tour of the place; if it wasn't so hot we'd probably be there for two hours. We ended up hanging around there for an hour and 40 minutes.

The garden features plants from around the world, and are grouped according to their origin: Asia, Australasia, California, Eastern North America, Mediterranean, Mexico/Central America, Deserts of the Americas, Southern Africa and South America.

We just wandered down the paths to explore the area though admittedly our direction was determined by where we found shady routes. Along the way we saw so many different kinds of flowers, succulents and cacti.

According to TCM, this plant is good for many ailments!

One of the first flowers we saw was a white poppy called fried egg flower because it has five large white petals and a yellow centre. Its actual name is the matilija poppy. Love the name. We also came across an unusual looking red poppy with petals that looked like flames, particularly in the heat!

At one point we came across the Chinese medicinal herb garden, where some plants that are used in traditional Chinese medicine or TCM are grown, or at least attempted to -- some herbs were wilting under the heat.

A plant we saw was called Chinese leek seeds or jiu(3) cai(4) zi(3), or allium tuberosum. It is apparently good for back and knee pain, incontinence and frequent urination... hmmm maybe I picked a bad example. We also observed that many of the herbs were good for treating impotence!

An aloe plant from South Africa that grows in a spiral

This being California, we saw lots of aloe plants, one of which grew in a spiral pattern that I had never seen before, and some cacti that were very tall! The taller the cacti the greater its ability to store water -- it is able to store as much as 90 percent of the plant's weight.

For example, a cactus about 7 metres tall and weighing 6 tons can capture and store as much as a metric ton of rainwater in one day. This can cause the ribbed stems to expand 30cm!

Meanwhile, on a hot day, the same 7-metre tall cactus can lose 0.24 litres or one cup of water. Interesting factoids!

A cactus called African milk barrel from South Africa

Across the street from the botanical garden is the California Mather Redwood Grove and Amphitheater. We got the special door code to go in and actually the area isn't that big but still nice to walk in a mini forest filled with redwood trees, also known as sequoia sempervirens.

These trees are the world's tallest ones, with some reaching 106 metres with a diameter of 7 metres, and can live over 2,000 years.

They grow best in the California and Oregon coasts where winter rains and condensation from summer fog provide the moisture they need.

Another interesting fact is that it takes two weeks for water to travel from the roots of a redwood tree two weeks to the tree top. The needles in the tree can also absorb water, and when there are fires, the redwood tree's bark can be as thick as 30cm to protect itself. Really fascinating!

Looking up at the super tall redwood trees

University of California Botanical Garden at Berkeley
200 Centennial Drive
Berkeley, CA
94720-5045
(510) 643 2755
botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu

Review: California Typewriter

Actor Tom Hanks loves typewriters so much he has 250 of them -- that work

On the flight back to Hong Kong I watched several movies. One was a documentary that was a labour of love called California Typewriter, named after the shop in Berkeley, California that repairs and sells old typewriters.

An African-American called Herb Permillion III, a former IBM employee, started the shop believing that people would go back to this mechanical machine, but his dream doesn't quite work that way -- there are fewer people interested, and more typewriters are dumped at flea markets.

From the store we meet some customers who love typewriters and explain their connection to this machine. Singer-songwriter John Meyer talks about how he used to write songs on his computer and backed up all of them, only to realize he never looks back at these old lyrics; whereas when he types them out, it's easy to refer to and corrections can be made.

Herb Permillion III in his shop, California Typewriter

Meanwhile author and historian David McCullough observes how it is important to see for example presidential speeches and how they were written and corrected, and that can only be done with speeches that were typed out. He says it's important in terms of history to understand what the president was thinking at the time.

Others talk about their relationship with the machine. For example actor Tom Hanks enthusiastically talks about how he has a collection of 250 typewriters, and each of them makes different sounds when you type on them.

One time one of his friends wanted a typewriter and he sent it to them only to find it parked on a shelf instead of being used. He says he prefers receiving notes that were typed on a typewriter than on email. Good to know.

Singer-songwriter John Meyer prefers typing out his songs

Playwright Sam Shepard talks about how he can write plays easily on his typewriter, that he never did get along with the computer screen. He says he feels closer to his words when he hits the keys that print the letters onto the paper that he can immediately touch.

Perhaps in a spooky part of the film, Silvi Alcivar is able to compose poetry on the spot for people -- she never worries the words won't come out. One time she wrote an elegant elegy of a woman who recently died and her husband was overwhelmed by how the poem touched him.

An interesting inclusion in this story is artist Jeremy Mayer, who, inspired by the movie Metropolis, takes apart typewriters and rebuilds them into sculptures. He admits getting a lot of criticism for what he does, but explains he loves typewriters too, just in another format. He is a struggling artist, but putting his work online has helped -- someone who bought his deer sculpture actually works in Silicon Valley.

Artist Jeremy Mayer takes apart typewriters to make sculptures

There are also those who turn to typewriters because they want to unplug themselves from the computer and go analog, much like people preferring vinyl over iTunes, or they definitely feel compelled to get away from computers, feeling they are taking control of their lives.

Each of the perspectives are interesting, but some of the interviews could have been a bit shorter, and more infuriating is the lack of subtitles to identify the interviewees. Nevertheless, California Typewriter is much like a love letter to the machine. Perhaps it will inspire others to rethink their lives and actually invest in a typewriter. Wouldn't that make the shop owner Herb fulfill his dream?

California Typewriter (2016)

Written, shot and directed by Doug Nichol

Starring Tom Hanks, Sam Shepard, David McCullough, Jeremy Mayer, John Mayer