Purple Rice and the Limits of Globalization

Chinese black rice (Photo credit)

Also known as Chinese black rice, or "forbidden rice", this grain is not only very healthy, but has a history of delineating social status.  In ancient China, the grain was only to be eaten by the Emperor.  In today's world, globalization is the norm, and anyone who can afford it can get Chinese black rice on the Internet.  But being available to more of a global audience is not the same as being available to more people.  Purple rice is a prime example of this.

It has been said that with the Internet and social media, we live in a "flattened" world.  This is not true.  Instead, we just built a whole bunch of drawbridges crisscrossing our world, with toll booths.  If you can't afford to pay the "toll", or the cost needed to access social media and to make use of it, then you still are isolated.


1. By Anna Frodesiak (Own work) [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. 

The Origins of Falafel

Falafel is a food eaten in the Middle East (a blanket term that I despise, but in this case appropriate).  It is also eaten in the food stands of cities like New York, Chicago, Portland, and others, probably because it actually is a true "Middle Eastern" food, and most Westerners are used to hearing the term.  Therefore, it is marketable to Westerners, and vendors can be honest about which cuisine it belongs to.



It is often said that falafel originated in Egypt, then spread through the Levant.  To our tastes, this seems accurate.  But there is another form of falafel, one that originated on the Indian subcontinent.  It is known to many as "Indian falafel", but this is a misnomer because falafel is made with chickpeas, and Indian falafel (actually known as "ambode") is made with yellow lentils.  It has different flavors, mostly because they use different spices.

Falafel (Photo credit)

They are made in a similar fashion, though.  They both have similar textures, which lend themselves to be easily mashed.  After the cooks do this, they add certain spices.  They are then breaded and fried into a certain shape.  Falafels are usually made into round balls, whereas ambode is usually slightly flattened.

Ambode (Photo credit)

This may suggest that ambode was invented first.  Falafel in Egypt was probably invented 1,000 years ago.  Ambode was invented in the 6th century AD.  My guess is that falafel was adapted from the preparation of ambode.  It has been established that Arab seafarers regularly traded with the Indian subcontinent, so it could have happened through trade.

Also, lentils thrive in cooler climates.  They have been cultivated in semi-arid areas such as parts of Egypt, but have lower yields.  Lentils grown in Egypt would have been expensive, and more so if imported from India.  Chickpeas would have been a better substitute.  After all, the chickpea was known to Ancient Egypt.  And with that, the falafel was born.


Photo credit:


1. By Elias Bröms, http://www.meatinfo.org (http://www.meatinfo.org/alternativ/) [CC-BY-SA-2.0-de (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/de/deed.en), GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons.

2. By kuttibalu, original at [http://flickr.com/photos/balamurugan/515816151/sizes/l/], photo obtained from [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/c/c3/20080913061542!Masalvadai.jpg], via Wikimedia Commons.

Topic: Culinary Regions of California (Marin)

Sausalito in Marin County (Photo credit)

The Marin culinary region is the same area covered by Marin County.

The area shown in red is the Marin culinary region.

The region is characterized by a more upscale variation of the cuisine of the Hills, Lakes, and Wines region, with less emphasis on wine and a lot more emphasis on fresh seafood.


Photo credits:

1. By en:User:Squirrel 22 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Sausalito.jpg) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

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Food Cart Review: The Egg Carton

Review:  There are two great carts I've been to that serve breakfast food in Southeast Portland.  One is for a quick-yet-delicious meal, and the other is for something to be savored for brunch.  The first is, of course, Fried Egg I'm In Love (second review here).  The other one, the topic of this post, is The Egg Carton.

Eggs Benedict from The Egg Carton.

I've only had the Eggs Benedict here (it is, after all, my favorite breakfast food).  They have three versions, but I always have the traditional English muffin, Canadian bacon, poached egg and Hollandaise sauce.  There is a vegetarian option available.  Expect it to take 8-12 minutes, but also expect it to be good, because it is.


Geography:  The history of Eggs Benedict is complicated.  Each story for the invention of the dish conflicts with another.  I would argue that it was invented, not evolved like most other dishes.  For one thing, every early cookbook that first included the dish had somewhat different variations, but the versions seemed to occur radially from New York outward.  Most evolutions occur across a linear spatial direction.  For example, Hollandaise sauce probably started out as a fish sauce made with butter and vinegar.  As it traveled to France, it added egg yolk.  Then, people used lemon juice instead of vinegar once it got to Paris, and that's what we have today.  It spread in a southwesterly line, changing as it went.  But with Eggs Benedict, versions popped up all over the place.  For the most part, different versions occurred at a further-away place than the last few.  Also, like with most true inventions of food, there are conflicting stories on its origins, all claiming authenticity as its evidence.  But, one has to remember that authenticity is a construct.  What one person may see as "authentic" may not be so to another.  Without bias, the truth would be that both are authentic -- it just depends on the person which version is better.

Topic: Portland's Food Cart Community

So, I lost my wallet in Portland.  I was in Starbucks when I lost it (charging my phone, otherwise I would have just stuck to Ole Latte Coffee... more on that later).  I have had to deal with calling credit card agencies, the bank, and health insurance about the stuff that was in in my wallet, which may account for me being slow to update the blog.

One of the food carts I revisited deserves another review.  I have already reviewed Fried Egg I'm In Love for their delicious food, but I think I should focus on the service on this one.  How do I relate this to culinary geography?  We'll see.

Fried Egg I'm In Love on SE Hawthorne.

Review: It was my third time getting a meal at Fried Egg I'm In Love.  I walked by, and the owner greeted me.  I told him about the missing wallet, and he immediately offered me a free fried egg sandwich.  Having only six dollars with me, I accepted.  I did leave a two-dollar tip (I needed money for the bus to the train station).  This was probably the nicest food cart owner I've ever met, and I've eaten at quite a bit of carts for a non-local.

Geography: Come to think of it, most food cart owners I've met have been welcoming, happy to chat with their customers, and seem to like their job (even with the job being stressful).  Why is this?

I would say that it is because of the often-negative stigma attached to food carts spread by word-of-mouth from people in other cities.  In many other cities, people often look down on food carts due to an idea that they are unsanitary.  This could not be further from the truth, at least in Portland.  But this limits it to more of a local crowd, along with people like me who have already visited Portland a couple of times, and also major foodies who are kept up-to-date on local food trends.  In this way, food cart owners know their customers more, and thus creates a sense of community between food cart owners and customers.  It's always easier to like your job when you have that.

Food Cart Review: Halal Egyptian Food

Ful (Photo credit).

Review: Halal Egyptian Food is a cart serving (you guessed it) delicious Egyptian cuisine.  I ordered the lamb with rice.  It came with hot sauce which was extremely spicy, as it should be for truly Egyptian cuisine.  The lamb itself was also very good.  The rice was a bright yellow, probably due to being cooked with saffron.  It also came with a yogurt-cucumber sauce.

Geography: Egyptian food is often thought of and presented in the United States as a typical Middle Eastern cuisine.  Many people use the over-generalized term "Mediterranean cuisine" to describe all cuisines coming from countries with a Mediterranean coastline.  This leads people to think that all of those cuisines are more or less the same.  However, you'd be hard-pressed to find many similarities between, say, Spanish and Greek food.  Implying that all of these unique cuisines are the same is kind of an insult to those cultures, because they have had at least centuries to form, refine, and perfect their food.

Egyptian food is especially unique because of two reasons.  For one thing, they had thousands of years to form a cuisine.  Also, Egypt is bordering what most people consider to be the Levant region of the Islamic world, but is located in the Maghreb (Northern Africa).  They share quite a bit with both Maghreb cuisine and Levant cuisine.  Then they have their own unique historical cuisine dating from ancient Egypt, which also is a powerful influence.

Then there is Cairo.  It is like Egypt's New York, with a lot of influence from international cuisine.  It may be more of an influence in the future because of a rapidly growing population.

Photo credit:

1. By Abdullah Geelah (English Wiki [1]) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) or CC-BY-SA-2.5-2.0-1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5-2.0-1.0)], via Wikimedia Commons 

Food Cart Review: Thai Mango

Pad Thai, one of the more common Thai dishes (Photo credit)

Review: I've only had one thing here: the sticky rice with mango.  It was delicious, the rice was sweet without being overpowering, and the mango was great with it.  They could have put a bit more coconut sauce over it, but I didn't mind that too much.  The second time I was there, I brought two friends along, who ordered entrees (I ordered my main meal from Maine Street Lobster Company).  They really liked the food as well, and one of them orders Thai food quite a bit.  If she likes a certain Thai place, it's probably good.  I might go back sometime and order an entree myself.

Geography: Thai food is one of the more popular cuisines for food carts in Portland.  Why is that?

First of all, Portland is extremely vegetarian-friendly.  I've been to a lot of eateries in Portland, and only a select few do not accomodate vegetarians.  Even vegetarian nachos are a thing in Portland (Taqueria Lindo Michoacan has one on the menu).  With Thai food being a naturally vegetarian-friendly cuisine, it is not surprising that Portland has many Thai restaurants and food carts.  In fact, a visit to Portland is not complete without eating at one.


Photo credit:

1. By Takeaway (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Food Cart Review: Maine Street Lobster Company

Lobster roll (Photo credit)

Review: If you're in Portland, and you go to Red Lobster, you're wasting your money.  Actually, that's not a good analogy, because it really applies to any Red Lobster.  In Portland, it's especially true because of the amazing cart that is Maine Street Lobster Company.  I got a good-sized lobster slider and a cup of Boston-style (cream-based) clam chowder for ten dollars.  It was delicious.  The lobster here is shipped in from New England regularly so it is fresh.  They cook it well, too, with plenty of butter.  If you're looking for cheap lobster, go no further.


Geography: The story of lobster as food is a somewhat surprising one.  In ancient times and in Great Britain, lobster was as much of a delicacy as it is now.  In the United States, it started out differently.  At first, it was considered nothing more than cheap junk food, or bait.  It was reserved for people in poverty who could only afford lobster, and also for prison inmates.  Today, this sounds ridiculous, but back then, it was the equivalent of a Happy Meal that no one liked.

This changed with two events: the Civil War and the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad.  It became a food for soldiers in the Civil War, and became more widely accepted afterwards.  But what made it into a delicacy was the Transcontinental Railroad.  Many people in the western United States had not heard of lobster.  People going to the West Coast thought that if they served lobster to people on the West Coast, they could act as if it was a delicacy, and drive the prices sky-high.  They were right.  By the 1950s, it was considered a rich person's food instead of bait.


Photo credit:

1.   By Lee Coursey [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Food Cart Review: Fried Egg I'm In Love

Review: When one thinks of an egg breakfast sandwich, the thing that often comes to mind is some half-baked attempt at a meal with a powdered egg patty and some limp bacon and/or a greasy sausage patty, with maybe some Kraft cheese on a day-old ciabatta.  Not here.  What you get here is pure deliciousness.  I had the Huevo Mutilation (a pun based on the song "Wave of Mutilation" by the Pixies).  It is a sandwich made with two fried eggs, ham, caramelized onions, cheddar cheese, and something called "aardvark aioli", all on toasted sliced sourdough.  The owners are very friendly, and seem to really enjoy their work (they were watching a football game while they made the sandwich).


Geography: The name "breakfast sandwich" may have been coined in 1940 in The American Woman's Cookbook by Ruth Berolzheimer.  But Mrs. A. B. Marshall's Larger Cookery Book of Extra Recipes by Agnes B. Marshall, dating from 1902, has a breakfast sandwich called "Sandwiches with Watercress and Eggs".  This seems to be more of a sandwich that Fried Egg I'm In Love would serve.  Perhaps they could serve it as a special sometime.

In 1972, McDonald's bastardized breakfast sandwiches, and made it into the unimaginative sandwich we think of today.  Whether they know it or not, the folks at Fried Egg I'm In Love are doing a huge service to breakfast fans by reviving the golden days of the breakfast sandwich.

It is uncertain how the breakfast sandwich got its ultimate origin, because it comes in so many forms when done right.  I wish I had more on that, because that would contribute to the geography theme of this blog.  It is safe to say it probably originated in Europe at least, because the 1902 cookbook was made in Great Britain.  Other than that, I really can't figure it out.

Food Cart Review: Taqueria Lindo Michoacan

Barbacoa sope

Review: Taqueria Lindo Michoacan has some of the best Mexican food I've had outside of Mexico.  I ordered the super chile relleno burrito.  I could tell it was made from fresh ingredients (I believe they used cotijo cheese, but I could be mistaken).  There was just the right amount of spice, and the tortilla was definitely handmade.  The burrito itself was huge - I ate it for 3 meals.  And it was only $6.00!  I'll definitely visit again.

Geography:  Michoacan is a state in Mexico.  Checking with the owners confirmed that they were from that area, and so they included it in the name of their cart.

Like most "national" cuisines, Mexican cuisine is comprised of many regional cuisines.  The cuisine that is used in Michoacan has been called "Mexican soul food", and is rooted in the native cuisine of the Purépecha civilization.  Fish is abundant in Michoacan, and so fish is featured as one of the meats used in Taqueria Lindo Michoacan.  Many regional specialties are found in the area, but sadly, the cart is lacking in many of these.  Perhaps they believe it would be too unfamiliar with people in America to feature the delicious-sounding pollo placero, a chicken dish with potatoes and carrots, or pozole, a slightly more familiar dish said to have originated in the area.  But this is Portland we're talking about, the food capital of the western U.S.  That is, however, the only area which could be improved.  Everything else about this cart is perfect, and I recommend anyone to go there.

Food Carts of Portland, Oregon

Portland is a very unique and interesting town.  Completely insane, but in a good way.  One of the first things I saw on this trip was a man on a street corner holding a sign saying "Help - Need beer".  I'm willing to bet that you'll only see that in Portland.

One of the many other things that is different about Portland is its attitude towards food carts.  Instead of putting hefty restrictions and obstacles against food carts, the city of Portland encourages it.  As long as you can afford it, and pass frequent health inspections, you can open a food cart.  There are over 600 food carts, and the selection is vast - there are carts serving wood-fired pizza, Tuscan food, Russian food, Cuban food, carts specializing in pie, you name it.  They're also usually very affordable and good.

A photo I took of a group of carts at SW Alder & 10th.

I will be reviewing the food carts I go to while in Portland.  I will also talk about the geography of the food they serve.  Check back next time when I review Taqueria Lindo Michoacan.

Review: Coast Starlight Diner

Review:  Train food on the Amtrak is often bad.  Often, it comes in the form of a revolting-looking squished ham sandwich.  But this is not the case on the Coast Starlight, a train to and from Seattle and Los Angeles.

Okay, so the food downstairs sucks.  But the Coast Starlight Diner serves great food.  Unfortunately, it's pricey, but if you can afford it for one meal while on the train, I recommend it.

Geography:  Describing the geography of a restaurant that constantly moves between many culinary regions, and does not belong solely to any one of them?  Challenge accepted.  But because of this, we must develop a new concept in cuisine; a style of cooking defined by the transportation industry.  Transportation cuisine is a mimic of a fusion cuisine, defined by the stereotypes of the cuisines that the transit line runs through.  But it is only a mimic on a PR level, because it only caters to the stereotype cuisines of the usually-vast regions it runs through.

For example, the Coast Starlight runs through the states of California, Oregon, and Washington.  The Coast Starlight takes the cooking styles that the states are most famous for (their culinary stereotypes), and use them with various ingredients to create variations on widely-familiar dishes (burgers, omelettes, and others) that are not common to most of the areas of those states,but share widely-known cooking styles from those states.  The food is good, and reminds outsiders of those states.  But it is in no way authentic.

Topic: Does Bicycle Commuting Affect Cuisine?

Davis, a university town in the Sacramento Valley Hills culinary region of California, is one of the most bicycle-friendly towns in the state.  This attracts a lot of bicycle commuters.  The question I want to address is: do bicycle commuting trends affect cuisine?

It absolutely does.  For one thing, it helps support the popularity of local foods.  When people are hungry, often what comes to mind is "comfort food".  But what is "comfort food", exactly?  If all of you reading this blog post answered that question with the name of only one food, your answers would be widely varied.  It's usually the type of food a person sees all around them in the region they call home, and it also has to be a food that person likes.

Bicycle commuters usually can't go as far as people who commute to work in a car.  What they see around them is more constrained, localizing what they see.  This includes food.  One effect of this localization of food is that many local foods that an individual likes become comfort foods to them.  The end result is that people crave them, and local foods are more popular in the given region.  This doesn't work as much for areas with less local foods already there.  Davis, with an already-established abundance of local food in the area, is a prime example of when bike commuting does work for an area to accelerate the localization of food.

Bicycles at UC Davis (Photo credit).

Photo credit:
 
1. By Shea (Bike City) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

Topic: Culinary Regions of California (Sacramento Valley Hills)

The town of Winters (Photo credit)

Cache Creek (Photo credit).

The Sacramento Valley Hills (SVH) region is comprised of western Glenn, Colusa, Yolo, and Solano Counties.

The area shown in red is the Sacramento Valley Hills culinary region.

The region is characterized by a local food trend with foods coming from the ranchlands to the northeast and produce from the Sacramento Valley immediately to the east.  Also, the San Francisco Bay culinary region has an influence that gets stronger going south within the SVH region.


Photo credits:

1. By Brian Wickstrom (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
2. By Marcia Wright (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Blog Maintenance

Some of you may notice that most existing posts have been modified.  I'm working on putting correct sourcing and photo attribution on all posts right now.  I'll post when I'm done with that, and then I'll continue the blog as usual.

Topic: Cuisine of Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco

Edited 12/31/2013

Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco.

Fisherman's Wharf is a seafood-lover's heaven.  At the harbor area of San Francisco, it is loved by tourists yet often looked down upon by locals.  But behind what they show for visitors is a deep history of culinary geography, starting with Italian-American fishermen coming to San Francisco to make a living feeding the population of the newly-founded city.  Often, they made much more money than the gold miners, many of whom never found any gold at all.

So where in Italy did these fishermen come from?  Italy has many cuisines depending on the region.  Locating where one of the more influential fishermen immigrated from may give insight as to how the cuisine of Fisherman's Wharf was formed.  Achille Paladini, the "Fish King" of San Francisco, earned his moniker because of his wealth stemming from selling fish to gold miners.  Also known as the man who popularized cioppino (recipe) in the United States, Achille was born in 1843 in Ancona, Italy, a town on the Adriatic coastline in the Marche province.

The Marche province is famous for seafood, especially for a dish known as brodetto (recipe), a fish stew similar to cioppino.  I would guess that the American version of cioppino originally may have partially been inspired by brodetto, because of the introduction of cioppino by Achille Paladini, who came from the same region that features brodetto.  Of course, it was also most likely influenced in equal part by Portuguese-American fishermen, because they had a fish stew even closer to cioppino.  Paladini could have also been inspired by Portuguese-American fishermen in the area as well.  I do, however, believe that the original idea came from brodetto, and modified by Portuguese-American influences.

Brodetto.

Cioppino.

Restaurant Highlight: La Trattoria, The Blackberry Cafe

Edited 12/31/2013

For this Restaurant Highlight, I'm going beyond Redding and covering one restaurant in Arcata, California, and one in Thomastown, Ireland.


La Trattoria (Arcata)

Used with permission from James Becker of La Trattoria.

http://www.latrattoriaarcata.com/

Review: The best Italian food I've had in Humboldt County is here.  When I was attending Humboldt State University, I went here for special occasions: end of a semester, birthdays, and the like.  There is a rotating menu, so the choices are different every time.  I especially like their pasta dishes, but everything's good.  The service is great as well.

Geography: Like many other national cuisines, "Italian cuisine" is a blanket term for many styles of cooking found within the region.  La Trattoria's rotating menu uses many local ingredients, which vary depending on season.  In the winter months, they use dishes from northern Italian cuisines, and from southern Italian cuisines in the warmer months.  Not only does this allow the restaurant to use fresher and more in-season local ingredients, but it also allows it to focus on many climactic areas of Italy, a few at a time.


The Blackberry Cafe (Thomastown)

The staff of the Blackberry Cafe.  (Used with permission from Jackie Hoyne of the Blackberry Cafe.)

http://www.theblackberrycafe.ie/

Review: On my visit to Ireland, I stayed at the Carrickmourne House B&B in Thomastown for a total of two nights.  For those not familiar with Thomastown, it is a small riverside village in the southeast of Ireland.

While in Thomastown, I often ate at the Blackberry Cafe.  It is the quintessential Irish cafe: local ingredients, good food and drink, and friendly people.  The scones and the tea are the best I've had.  If you're in Thomastown, I suggest giving the place a visit.

Geography:  In the Irish countryside, "local" means local.  Even in places such as Arcata in the United States, many foods are branded as local, even if they are sourced up to 250 miles away.  Irish localism is more strict.  In rural Ireland, if you see a dish advertised as locally-sourced, it's probably 15 miles away or less.  This definitely holds true at the Blackberry Cafe, where most items are local.  This could be due to the high density of farms in the Irish countryside -- look from any hill (and there are many hills) and you will see at least two.  The abundance of small farms makes getting truly locally-sourced food much easier.

Belated Restaurant Highlight: New China, Yaadgar

Edited 12/31/2013

Today, I will be reviewing two more restaurants in Redding.

New China

Photo credit: Robin Heater (me)

http://newchinaredding.com/


Review: New China is most likely the best Chinese restaurant in Redding.  Like Gold Street Cafe, it is easy to overlook, but well worth finding it.  If you're going with at least one other person, I recommend the House Dinner.  It's $13.00 per person, and for the amount of food you get, it's a great deal.  The food is wonderful, and the people who work there are some of the nicest people I've ever met.

Geography:  New China represents the Cantonese style of Chinese cooking.  It comes from the Guangdong region of China, and is what most Westerners think of when they hear about Chinese food.  The dishes that New China serves are mostly the ones whose ingredients are widely available here in the United States.  It also leaves out most Cantonese dishes that many Westerners would not be used to, most likely to promote a more welcoming environment to people who are picky in their tastes.

Chinese food is usually broken down into regional cuisines.  I may discuss these in a future series of posts.


Yaadgar Indian and Pakistani Restaurant

Photo credit: Robin Heater (me)

http://yaadgarrestaurant.com/


Review: Yaadgar is most likely the best Indian restaurant in Redding.  It is also the only Pakistani restaurant in Redding that I know of.  They do a great job serving each cuisine; the food is wonderful, and the service is great.  What I appreciate most as a cultural geographer is that they do not deliberately try to mix the two cuisines.

Geography: The reason that I appreciate that they do not deliberately try to mix Indian and Pakistani cuisines is because the two countries have distinct cultures, and the cuisines should reflect this.  There are some naturally-occurring similarities in regions along the India-Pakistan border, and they also have dishes that reflect this.  This is also good, because it serves to more accurately reflect the wide range of regional cuisines within the bounds of the two countries.

If you want to know more about the differences between the two countries, visit:

http://yaadgarrestaurant.com/blog/pakistani-food-in-redding/



Check back next Saturday for more reviews!

Topic: Culinary Regions of California (San Francisco Bay)

Edited 12/31/2013

The Golden Gate Bridge, an icon of San Francisco.

The San Francisco Bay (SFB) region is comprised of San Francisco and San Mateo Counties, and the western portions of Alameda and Contra Costa Counties.

The area shown in red is the San Francisco Bay culinary region.

The region is characterized by innovations inspired by different cuisines, mostly from immigrants who moved to San Francisco from other countries.  It is, in this regard, similar to the cuisine of New York City.  The key difference is that countries with a Pacific coastline, and also Latin American countries, have had more influence on San Francisco because of the shorter distance.  The other parts of the region (besides San Francisco) are included due to culinary sprawl, a topic discussed in the last post.

It is possible that there will be numerous topics on the region, due to the wide culinary diversity even within the region.  In the next post, I will be discussing how the Mission burrito affects cultural geography.