Napkin's Beach Shindig

Clarification, our friend's name is Matthew Kim, a scrappy young fellow who likens himself as a Venice beach bum. Called "The Napkin" because of shorter name's (Matt Kim) similarity to the word, we joined him and a few friends at Dockweiler State Beach for a bonfire and food food. The water was prohibitively cold, but the firepits were perfect on a breezy, if not windy Saturday afternoon.



I loaded up about 80 pounds of firewood from Christine's house, just waiting to be burnt to ashes. Napkin and I almost got hernias trying to carry the wood from the car to the firepit. Christine pre-grilled some spicy marinated pork belly since we were planning to eat them in torillas like Kogi. Napkin prepared some kalbi skewers while Sarah brought some delicious macaroni & cheese shells and a broccoli-apple salad in a mustard dressing.

It took about half an hour just to get the fire going because some of the wood had a lot of moisture in it, but Napkin worked hard to keep it going. Since I'm a pyro at heart, I chipped in (ha) with the wood chips and newspapers. Eventually, we set the skewers on a nice piece of wood (sanitary!) and let 'em go. Oh man the char was amazing.



It's not even summer yet. The breeze was freezing. Still it was bearable (Christine was wearing three beach towels as blankets). You gotta love LA.

Times like these aren't expensive. During a recession, you can still enjoy yourself by grilling up a meal at the beach. There's something so beautiful and primal about eating grilled meat at the beach, on the sand. The breeze, the waves, the roaring of airplanes up above (joking), the whole experience is just fun. Can't wait to go back (this time, armed with more meat and better equipment).