Alan Irwin’s Blog

Ben & Jerry’s is recalling 250,000 pints of their Country Peach Cobbler Ice Cream. It’s a voluntary recall due to their discovery that wheat wasn’t listed in the ingredient label but is in the product. This is only a risk to those with severe sensitivity to wheat, but the company decided to recall the product.
The [...]

I’m just now getting around to posting images from our Thanksgiving dinner. Every year Harriet and I host a dinner for those “who are without a family, who can’t be with their family, or who would rather not be with their family” on Thanksgiving. It’s been called the Orphan Thanksgiving, the Dysfunctional Family Thanksgiving and [...]

Nine different kinds of salami. Now that’s a tasting.
My most favorite food place in all the world, C’est Cheese, had another tasting tonight. But rather than cheese, the tasting was salami. Cured, smoked, dried, salted, and seasoned; thin, thick, narrow, or long; Itallian, Spanish, French; shoulder, belly, ham, or back; but all pork. And [...]

Last night we had our neighbors over for dinner. Harriet was highly motivated since we had two live crabs from the Santa Barbara Harbor and Seafood Festival, and she’d sat in on a cooking demonstration at the Santa Barbara Art Festival (both discussed in my last post). So, she made crab cakes.
I’m not a food [...]

Friday night, Harriet and I ate at the Itsuki Restaurant on Calle Real, between Highways 101 and 154.

Itsuki Restaurant
4020 Calle Real # 3
Santa Barbara, CA 93110
(805) 687-3838
It’s a really good Japanese restaurant that’s pretty small and informal. They have a wide variety of sushi and combo plates, but my preference there is the Oyaku [...]