Rainy Sunday in LA

Since both our parents don't live in LA... Arthur & I want to try to spend as much time with our brothers as possible.. More reason why I love our new place .. it's gigantic and lets us host get together with our brothers..

The menu this weekend is BBQ! Only problem is that we picked a day where it rains (like probably 0.1% chance ever in LA).. in any case we started bbq ing at 11.30 (ok really Arthur started bbq ing) and we have the bbq in our balcony with some slight rain coming into our bbq.. a little extra seasoning never hurts..

We are also lucky that on Saturday, we went out with Nicola + Bo, Giuseppe + Federica and Nicole gave us his family made, home made salami (!!) His family actually rears the pig, butcher it, prepares the pork meat and dry cure it for 1 year... it is amazing!! we finished it in two days.. yum.. sad that this is not something we can just pick up in the store.. maybe we should ask Nicola to smuggle in more salami from Italy the next time he returns home..

 Arthur has prepared two special types of burgers for us.. The first is a more fancy burger with garlic butter + baby spinach, the last is a traditional bacon burger with cheddar.. I only managed to eat the traditional burger since I stuffed myself with salami and baked brie, cheddar, pepper jack.. (Ohh boy there goes the diet)...

I had also gone to the Brentwood Farmers market earlier, it's in the corner of Gretna Green Way (1 block west of Bundy ) and Montana Ave. Despite the rain, I had an inkling to buy some flowers and manage to find some good priced and great flowers!! about 2dozen ranunculus for $6!! it's probably about the same price as when I went to LA Flower market.. I also noticed many vegetables are sold really at an affordable price at the farmers market.. not sure if its because of the rain, but i plan to return to the brentwood farmers market every Sunday morning now :)

you see those gorgeous OPEN ranunculus.. it was not open when i bought it.. i put the ranunculus on my dining table, next to some fruits (banana) and they open up really fast.. usually it takes much longer for the flowers to open up..

Tips : when you buy flowers, you want them to be slightly close so they last longer.. the vendor told me the close ranunculus last 10 days while the opened buds last 5 days..

Lo and behold.. i had though the sugar i put into the water cause the flowers to open up..... turns out it's the BANANA!! banana emits a certain type of gas that speed up the opening up of the flower buds.. so if you want your flower to last long don't put it next to fruits/banana... boooo it definitely helps to open up the very closed buds but now my red ranunculus probably will only last me 5 days.. will report back..

Another tips : put a 1/2 teaspoon of bleach into your water in the vase to kill bacteria and make the flowers last longer, change the water every day and obviously cut the stem (under running water they say but i have not been doing so) to make the flowers last...

And lastly this amazing flowers come from the last flower vendor (right by san vincente on gretna green way)...