October 9th, 2009
If you’re a Los Angelesian, you don’t need me to tell you that Korean taco trucks are popular and are growing in numbers. One of the trucks I went to recently was called
Bool and I think they deserve my vote for best Korean burrito I have had so far. Their pork burrito was the heartiest burrito I have had and even though the rice was white (not kim chee fried rice), it was still very flavorful. The sweetness of the meat balanced it well. The pork quesadilla was also quite good with a delicious dipping sauce on the side. Their
official website seems to be down as of this posting.
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Burrito
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Quesadilla
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Quesadilla Insides
Tags: Bool Korean Taco Truck
Posted in Korean food, Los Angeles, Mexican food, food truck | 1 Comment »
September 23rd, 2009
Google released Picasa 3.5 yesterday with two awesome new features: name tagging and geotagging. The biggest of the two is name tagging which allows you to take on the daunting task of tagging all your friends in all of your photo albums. Picasa 3.5 makes it a cakewalk. Picasa begins the task by scanning through all of your photos. It identifies the faces in your photos and presents them to you, asking you to enter a name. If you are logged in to your Gmail account in the upper-right corner, Picasa retrieves your contact list and allows you to select a contact or add a new person.

Unnamed People
Once you have identified a few faces, Picasa starts matching similar faces in the background and compiles a list of potential matches. A question mark next to a name indicates that there are photos that need to be confirmed or denied as the person. Surprisingly, the success rate is pretty high. I’d say over 90% were correct matches. Picasa allows you to confirm and deny each photo or confirm all potential photos. Since the success rate was so high, I found it easier to deny the one or two matches that were incorrect and hit “Confirm All”. The matches become more accurate with each match you confirm. Photos uploaded to Picasa Web Albums retain your name tags.

Photos Attached to a Person
Picasa has also added a new Google Maps panel that allows you to see pins where your geotagged photos were taken. This is also a welcomed addition since the last version required you to open Google Earth to see this information. It appears that you can also assign a location within Picasa to your photos without geotags.

Geotagging
Both features are great, but the name tagging feature is the real game changer. Adding tags to a photo collection is undoubtedly useful but an extremely time-consuming task. With Picasa 3.5 you will at least be able to begin this process with perhaps the most important component of your photos: the people. Picasa 3.5 puts itself one step ahead of the Facebook process of clicking on faces and selecting names. Perhaps this will encourage more people to post photos on Picasa Web albums instead of Facebook. However, I am sure it will not be long before we see a similar feature on Facebook.
Tags: Picasa
Posted in Google, photos, software | No Comments »
September 16th, 2009
With the release of the Zune HD today, I decided I would write a review of the 120 GB Zune I own and have been using since last December. The 120 GB Zunes came out around the same time as the 120 GB iPods (which I also considered getting) and I could not be happier with the capacity. With 6,889 tunes, 3 seasons of How I Met Your Mother, a season of Family Guy, 6,953 photos, and subscriptions to 5 podcasts and the Billboards channel I am not even using half its capacity. Specifically, I am using 53.49 GB and have 66.33 GB free. It will be a while until I run low on space. I have just installed the new Zune 4.0 software and updated my device firmware to 3.2. Both were released today. The following is by no means an in-depth review of the Zune; it is a list of key features about the Zune that I think are fantastic and areas that could use some improvement. I’ll start with the good features.
- The subscription based system. The monthly subscription service is great for people who want to find new music and re-discover oldies. Similar to Rhapsody and the new Napster, a monthly subscription fee ($14.99 for Zune) allows you to stream and download almost any song on their network which can be played on up to 3 computers and up to 3 Zune devices. The songs have DRM and expire after a while so they can be thought of as a music rental. When traveling or going on a road-trip, it is a great way to stock up on a lot of music. It is also great for sampling albums before purchasing them and an easy way to (legally) amass songs for a party. Microsoft also allows you to keep 10 songs (around a $10 value) a month. With the subscription, a feature called “Channels” also becomes available allowing you to subscribe to playlists compiled by Zune DJs. For example, I am subscribed to a Billboard channel that always has the current top 20 Billboard hits. The songs are automatically updated on your PC when the Zune software is running and can be synced to the Zune device if you choose to do so.
- Syncing and Podcasts. I have my Zune set up so that anytime I connect my device to my PC (which also charges the device), it automatically opens the Zune software. When the software opens, it downloads all the latest audio and video podcasts I am subscribed to and syncs them with my device. At this time, it can also be set up to sync new pictures, music, and videos that are in monitored directories. The software provides options on how to manage each podcast. For example, you can have the software always have the 3 newest episodes of a podcast and automatically delete older ones. The software can even save and sync where you left off in your podcast so that whether it is your PC or Zune you resume listening to or watching your podcast, it will take you to where you left off.
- Sorting by album artist. As a music enthusiast, this is a very important feature for me. When I was deciding between the iPod and Zune, I had read that the iPod did not support the album artist mp3 tag even though iTunes did. On the contrary, I had read that the Zune software and device had support for this tag. The significance of the album artist tag is that albums that have tracks by different artists (such as soundtracks and compilations) do not get divided up under each artist and instead can be categorized under one album artist while still retaining the artist data in the artist tag.
- Firmware Updates. Microsoft provides free firmware updates for Zune devices when a new generation of devices are released. Although an older generation Zune may have hardware limitations, the software can be upgraded to be similar to the current generation Zune. I have not noticed much of a change with the new 3.2 firmware that was released today and am hoping another firmware update will be released soon.
And now, the not-so-good features.
- Unicode support. This is one of my biggest annoyances. The Zune software supports unicode characters, so why doesn’t the device? My Japanese text comes up as blocks. A firmware update could easily take care of this.
- Re-downloading purchased tracks. When a track is purchased from the Zune marketplace, the encoding could be in wma or mp3 (I believe they are slowly trying shift all tracks towards DRM-free mp3 files). Files encoded in wma with DRM can be re-downloaded in the case you accidentally delete them. However, DRM-free mp3s cannot be re-downloaded. One of my annoyances is a glitch in the Zune marketplace related to this. A few months ago, I had accidentally deleted a DRM-free mp3 track. After I realized my mistake, I decided to re-purchase the track (since I could not re-download the track for free). The software gave me an error telling me that it was not possible to download the track because I had already done so. However, the software also prevents me from purchasing the track again because I have already purchased it once. I called customer support to see if they could straighten things out and although they acknowledged the glitch, there was nothing they could do to correct it. As of the new Zune 4.0 software, this glitch still exists and gives me the error, “You’ve exhausted the number of times you can restore this item.” The only alternative for me to purchase this track now is to buy it from another retailer such as iTunes or Amazon.
- (Lack of) Autoscroll. When a track is playing, the title does not autoscroll and longer track titles get chopped.
- (Lack of) Dedicated Volume Control. I’m not sure why a lot of music devices nowadays lack volume control, but when a track changes while you are navigating menus or playing a game, it is nice to be able to change the volume without going back to the track view.
- Availability. As of now, the Zune is still unavailable outside of North America.
- Compatibility. As of now, the Zune software only installs on Windows and has no Mac OS X support.
Overall, I think the Zune is a wonderful device despite some its flaws. With the release of the Zune HD, hopefully we will see some great new features, software updates, and firmware upgrades in the coming months.
Tags: Zune
Posted in Zune, gadgets, music | No Comments »
March 25th, 2008
Back in January 2008, I made some Hainanese Chicken from scratch, and it came out delicious. The chicken is uniquely cooked by boiling chicken broth, turning off the heat, and dunking the chicken in the hot broth for 8 minutes, repeat 2 more times.
I wasn’t sure what kind of dark sauce they use, so I used the Indonesian kecap manis, which is a sweet, thick sauce.
The rice was cooked with chicken broth instead of water, and mixed with half a stick of butter. Surprisingly, half a stick was the minimum to get the rice to taste how it should.

Hainan Chicken
Tags: Singaporean food
Posted in Singaporean food, cooking | No Comments »
March 25th, 2008
This is from back in August of 2007, but Tony, Mike, Luis, Mary, and I decided to try a Japanese okonomiyaki (Japanese pancake) restaurant, and the closest one to Los Angeles was in Torrance, called Gaja. After a long drive, we spent about 2 hours eating here. Everyone but me got the okonomiyaki. I got the monjayaki, which is kind of like a watery version of the okonomiyaki. Their menu was enormous. I think there were around 20 pages. The food was was pretty good and it was fun to cook your own okonomiyaki at the table.
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Cooking Meat and Okonomiyaki
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In Front of Gaja
Tags: Japanese food
Posted in Japanese food, Los Angeles, restaurants | No Comments »
July 10th, 2007
Last week my roommate Tony found on someone’s blog a hidden gem of a Japanese restaurant in Los Angeles, so we went to check it out with Richie. The place was called Wakasanchi, or わかさん家, or Waka-san’s House. Their menu consisted of one thing… Chef’s Special or Omakase. Before ordering, our waiter made sure with us that we are okay with this style or ordering. If we were picky eaters, we would be out of luck because there are no substitutions. Luckily, none of us are. The waiter told us that the menu changes every day depending on what the chef, Waka-san, decides to prepare that day. The food every day is supposed to be traditional home-style, Japanese cooking. The 13 course meal we had that night included:
- Boiled Spinach
- A Jellyfish Salad
- Lobster Salad
- Fried Fish (forgot what kind)
- An egg custard with white fish inside
- Sashimi
- Crab Legs
- Soba
- Niku-jaga or 肉じゃが (Meat and Potatoes in soy sauce and sugar)
- Wonton Soup
- Tempura
- Chawamushi
- Green Tea Ice Cream
The best item was the sashimi. The tuna was so soft it melted in my mouth. The fried fish was my second favorite because it was very flavorful and soft. The plates are small, so don’t worry if you think this sounds like too much food.
Word of warning: Several websites incorrectly list the address as 929 Westwood Blvd, Los Angeles CA. The REAL address is 1929 Westwood Blvd, Los Angeles CA between Olympic and Santa Monica. The owner also does not advertise the place.
I give this place a 5/5.
Tags: Japanese food
Posted in Japanese food, Los Angeles, restaurants | 2 Comments »