Xian Wei Dinner Series Elevates Regional Chinese Flavors

Chinese food has long been cornered into the "cheap food" category, but 19 year old Luther Chen tries to fuse his fine dining culinary training with the regional Chinese cuisines that he tasted when he was traveling through China. The Xian Wei (which is the equivalent of "umami" in Chinese) is a dinner series taking place at Luther and partner Kenny's home in San Pedro (they will also soon launch a Chinese food truck called Shaokao). Curated by blogger Clarissa Wei, the underground dinner promises a journey through "5 courses, 5 regions". The next dinner is taking place on Saturday, February 8. The suggested donation is $75 and you can reserve a spot here. 

Luther Chen

I tasted the menu during a Saturday afternoon. My lunch started strong with an amuse bouche of 30 second microwave sesame cake, one served with sesame salt, the other served with fermented bean curd

The sesame cake is light, sweet and fluffy. Surprisingly the savoriness of the fermented bean curd complemented it quite well. This was inspired by an El Bulli dish which was a black sesame cake with miso.

There is a wine pairing for $35 but we're hoping that Xian Wei will start opening it up to a BYOB or partnering with a local wine store, in the spirit of supper clubs!

The first course is Sichuan pickles (daikon, cucumber, wood ear mushroom, sichuan peppercorn vinaigrette, sesame sand)

This was a great starter, as well, with the pickled daikon and the spicy vinaigrette getting your palate going.

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Lobster Binge!

It's lobster fest! I had to take just a couple hours away from work just to splurge on fresh boiled Maine lobsters!

There are lobster festivals in long beach and redondo beach also on other weekends, but last year I've found that the San Pedro one gives the best deal lobsterwise.
$6 admission (using the $2 coupon from their website), $17 for a 1.25 lobster meal or $31 for 2 lobsters on a plate! It isn't that cheap but is still cheaper than going to a restaurant!

I got ... a 2-fer of course. I was late and got there around 2 pm, but the line was not too bad. There was about a 5 minute ticket line and a 5 minute lobster line. We also managed to find seats in the back tent, and then got to chowing down our lobsters.
The lobsters were nice, big, and fresh! I thought it was well worth $31.

We were in lobster heaven :) It comes with lemon, butter, dinner roll (don't bother eating it), and cole slaw.

Since we were starting to get thirsty, I got a strawberry lemonade from a lemonade booth.
Yummy. A little on the sweet side for me, but still so delicious and refreshing. They had a few already made beforehand waiting for you - but then the girl taking the orders was so slow they might as well making everything fresh each time.

Then I had to get my favorite festival food: roasted corn on the cob.
It was pretty good here, although I have had better, sweeter corn on the cob.

I also then decided to get a Smoothie by the Yard - since refills are $5 regardless of the size, I went for the big yard cup!

We were stuffed at this point, so we just walked around. I considered playing one of the carnival games so I can get a large lobster stuffed animal, but then I decided against it...

Besides the food and some knick knack/jewelry booths, there wasn't much else so we started heading to our car.

We parked on the event parking lot on 1st street, which was about 3-4 blocks away. We decided to walk it and that way get a feel of the shops/restaurants around there. Walking along the pier was pretty nice (although the water there is pretty stinky). They had cute shops and tons of seafood restaurants.


They also had little carts along the walk, so the fruitaholic among us got distracted and got a box of pre-cut mangos.
They weren't quite ripe yet, but at least not too sour.


He also got further distracted by a fried plaintain+churro cart, and got a small thing of fried plaintains.
Pretty yummy. Sweet and nicely caramelized.

As you can imagine, we all had food coma on the drive back home ...
I really enjoy going to lobster fest ... will be back next year!

Mark The Dates! Lobster Fest

Be sure to mark your calendars! September 19-21 is the Port of Los Angeles lobster festival (in San Pedro) !!!

$17 gets you a 1.25 lb meal, and $31 gets you the "2-on-a-plate special"! That's 2.5 lbs of lobster!
Here's my picture of the glorious meal from last year:I think you still have to pay for admission on top of the meal, though ($8 or $6 with the coupon on the website ) so might as well take that to its full advantage and get the 2.5 pounder ;)

The Lobster Hall of Fame!

1. The blue Lobster at L'atelier de Joel Robuchon
5-7, rue de Montalembert, Hôtel Pont-Royal
Paris, France 75007 · 01 42 22 56 56
2. The lobster curry at Chinois on Main
2709 Main St
Santa Monica, CA 90405
(310) 392-3037
3. The "2 on a Plate Special" at the Port of Los Angeles Lobster Festival
www.lobsterfest.com