Weekend Getaway & Bagels

I'm watching FOOD TV Network at 1:23 am....Giada's Weekend Getaway has taken her to New York City. She's finding the best food at the best places. She just went to a REAL bagel bakery in Brooklyn and bought one along with some salmon spread. Now I'm wishing for a real bakery bagel.






The bagels we now are able to buy are NOT real. They are fluff compared to the real thing. Like Giada said, the crunch outside and the soft inside...oh yes!!! Not the soft stupid bagel in a bag or even the ones in local bagel shops compare to a REAL bagel. Ok Noah's isn't so bad! ;)



This brings me back to a good memory with my former neighbor, Stephanie. She had lived in Berkeley prior to the suburbs where I met her. She lived across the street. She knew where a REAL bagel shop was..down on Gilman Street in Berkeley. I forget the name now. It's probably still there across the street from the Community Co-op Grocery Store.

Most often on Fridays you could count on the fact that the two of us were zooming through the Caldecott Tunnel heading to get our dozen bagels for the week for our families. It was always crowded inside the small shop of course...we didn't mind the wait!

The Salt bagel was my favorite! Big sea salt on the top...perfect on the inside. We would buy a little pot of cream cheese and break into our bags of bagels to eat one on the way home. We usually drove around the neighborhoods so Stephanie could show me the houses she loved best. Mostly she loved the ones with doors that were arched and unusual. There were so many, it was kind of a fun trippy thing to do. Berkeley is a fun place to find such architecture.

There's an area up by University of California that has some very fabulous old homes. The Craftman style are not unusual in this neighborhood. On one street there is one grand home that is known because of the fact that a spy lived and operated out of it during WWII.



I worked in Berkeley for a dermatologist for a couple of years so I knew some of the roads quite well. I also dated someone from Berkeley who lived near the spy house (which is how I know the history).




When we would get back to Lafayette, we'd stop in town and buy fresh Dungeness Crabs at the local fish place. They had them cooking out front..ready to crack and clean for us . Also lines there every Friday when Dungeness were in season!
Lines didn't seem to bother me when I was in my 30s!!!

I might have to head to Berkeley tomorrow to find that bagel bakery and call it a weekend getaway. Thanks Giada!!!

OH NO! Now on FOOD NETWORK TV it's Rachel Ray and her husband on their getaway weekend in the San Juan Islands in Washington State which I also love. Riding the ferries up there is so fun and the scenery outrageous!! I actually have been on 90% of the ferries on different vacations up in WA. Maybe I'll head to Orcas Island and eat whatever Rachel is having!!! (I WISH)!!!!

Berkeley will have to do!