Just in time for the 15 year Anniversary the Throdle Youtube channel released these videos about my Elise ownership experience. The videos were recorded in 2019 which is why it seems wierd to have people standing together without masks.
Talking a bit about the Hethel tour and driving Spa
Driving a Seven vs an Elise
We also recorded some videos about the Viper which will be coming out soon.… Read the rest
Today was the 15 year anniversary of my picking up the Elise. I did post some pictures after years one and two but I figure a milestone event like this is worth a few more. Click through on the pictures to see them in more detail on Flickr.
Picked up from Los Gatos Luxury cars on 6-Dec-2005 some 5 months after I placed the build order. I was told that this was the first 2006 Elise delivered in California.
Did the 1500 mile break-in down Highway 1. I was at the dealer 6 days after pickup with the odometer at 1490 miles.… Read the rest
I am happy to announce that I am the new caretaker of this wonderful V8 Stalker and am back in the Seven life. When I sold my Ultralite a few years ago, I didn’t really miss it too much since I had my Elise as a track car. But then I went to Spa with some Sevens and remembered just how much fun they are on track. I decided that I would have buy another one at some point and ideally do either a bike engined Caterham or V8 Stalker to try out a different style of Seven. I wasnt actively looking but when the builder of this car poseted that he was thinking of selling it I was intrigued.… Read the rest
A couple of slow laps (3:17s) from Spa – unfortunately I did not get good video on day 1 when the weather was much better. My theoretical best was 3:11 which I am pretty happy with for a FWD GTI hatchback rented from RSR Spa.
Eau Rouge really is as difficult as they say and the track has a bunch of corners that require way more trust in the car and your abilities than I had for my first time there. This was my first international track day and Book-A-Track did a great job. It was a bit weird to only pass on the left but they ran a great event and I liked the open track (non-session) aspect of it.… Read the rest
One of the most interesting things I ate last year was the Esquites at Californios. It consists of some butter poached lobster and corn kernels sprinkled with mexican spices and then covered with a warm corn mousse on top. I loved the flavour profile of the dish with the contrasts between the sweet mousse and the spiced corn/lobster at the bottom. Nithya and I liked it so much that we decided to make our own version below.
Ingredients (serves 6-8)
Required Equipment
Steps
Recently I’ve been getting a large number of Facebook Ads for a new restaurant in SF called 3rd Cousin and in an example of well targeted advertising I ended up checking their menu when I was looking for a new dinner place. The dishes looked very interesting and they had an available spot so we signed up for their grand tasting which is 10 courses of the greatest hits from the menu.
We get started with the Hamachi Crudo which was my favourite dish of the night. A clean simple preparation with the acid from the yuzu making a nice contrast with the fish.… Read the rest
After a year long hiatus from doing my home tasting menus, I got the urge to a do a new one around the humble potato which led to last weekend Potato dinner. We have a total of 7 diners which did slow down the plating, but having done this several times I have gotten much better at managing my time and we were done with the 7 savory courses in just under 3.5 hours despite this meal including some fairly complex dishes as well as one multi-item course.
Hot Potato Cold Potato is a classic Alinea appetizer that has a hot ball of butter poached potato that is dropped into a cold potato soup made with truffle juice.… Read the rest
Update: Car is sold
After 3 fun years of Evora ownership I am looking for a new owner to care for my 2013 Evora S IPS. I originally purchased the car in 2015 and it served as my daily driver for 2 years and ~15k miles. The car has always been serviced by either DietschWerks or TrackSpec who are the premier independent Lotus mechanics in the Bay Area.
I have written about the car before and can confirm my original assessment that it is a fantastic street car and serviceable on track. Luckily I have enough cars to choose from so this Evora has seen only 2 track days and has spent the rest of its life as a street car.… Read the rest
For foodies in the Bay Area, there is one fine dining place that we all have on our bucket list – The French Laundry. Nithya and I have had the pleasure of dining at Per Se and doing the French Laundry retrospective at Next, but we never managed to get reservations to the big daddy. However TFL moved to a ticket based reservation system last year and that allowed us to finally scored a dinner reservation for he birthday a few weeks ago.
The first course was this cornet of tuna tartare. They usually serve this dish with Salmon tartare but this night it was tuna instead and just as delicious as before.… Read the rest
Last weekend I was lucky enough to see an Atlas V rocket launch from Vandenburg AFB. We are all jaded from seeing things on video every day but I highly recommend watching a launch if you ever get a chance – it is a spectacular event and being a night launch we got a much better perspective on just how bright the exhaust gets.
More info and a much better video is available at SpaceFlightNow.… Read the rest