Travelog: Thebaghag hits Berkeley’s quaint shops

We went over to Berkeley’s 4th street, where all these nice and quaint shops are located. We always make it a point to come over here. Don’t expect to see the big department stores, coz there are none (we’ve had Bloomingdales overload haha). Instead, this area houses quaint knick knack shops, and contemporary design shops– so if you want to remodel your home, you would want to come see this place. Lots of furnitures made by local artists and things for your home– for your kitchen, etc.

There’s Sur La Table where they stock the most complete copperwares. DM and I bought all my copper cookware here before I got married. DM paid a pretty penny for all those, and I never wanted to use them because they’re too pretty and I’d much rather hang them from the ceiling as decor 😀 hehe..

And there’s a nice strip of shops like Papyrus, Jest Jewels, Barely Escentuals, and also a Crate and Barrel outlet.
We went into Thousand Cranes, a Japanese shop that sells Japanese silk and kimonos. I walked out with a vintage Japanese kimono 🙂 Woohoo what a good find!

In the Air sells a lot of knick knacks from different kinds of handmade wrapping paper, to all the kinds of pens imaginable. They also have a little art workshop on the 2nd floor.

Molly B has really nice clothes, but they’re all geared for the fall/winter season, so lots of thick coats and cashmere. There was this really nice flannel skirt made by a local designer which would have been quite a hit in Manila, if only it were not made from flannel 🙁

There was BeneFit cosmetics (a San Francisco original), as well as Mac, Kiehls, and Aveda, all in the same block.

Then there’s Anthropologie. I love their stuff, but again, I walked out with nothing (and congratulations are in order!)

A visit to Berkeley would be incomplete without going into Rabat. DM and I have always loved the shoes that this shop stocks. I bought my black Un Apres Midi de Chien bag here back when I was still in college and I still use it to this day 🙂 They also have Francesco Biasia bags available.

We settled on having afternoon snacks at Cafe Rouge.
I love this shot. I just had to put it in. Look at all those colors 🙂

Ordered shoe string fries (the cafe’s specialty)
And DB ordered a gourmet chicken sandwich.
When I was asked what I wanted to drink, I asked for water (which means tap), but they brought out bottled flat water 😀 *darnit now we have to pay for that! haha cheapskates!*

Cafe Rouge is situated right beside this market that I always go to. So after I finished eating the fries, I hopped over next door to see what goodies there were.
Look at that dog 🙂 There was actually another dog that was waiting patiently for his/her owner before I took this shot 🙂 It was just too cute! I don’t think my dog can do that *haha.. DH can you make our dog “wait patiently” for us? hehehe*

I love this market. I am a hopeless cheese lover (but I really hold out often because cheese can be realllly fattening… ALL the time!), and look at their selection of cheeses. By the way there’s more but I couldn’t take them all in one shot 😀

Then there’s the sinful chocolate counter FULL of chocolates too. Again, apologies that I only took one part of the counter!

The freshest veggies perfect for grilling are all here!

Pasta from Italy anyone?
And here’s my loot for the day. I ended up buying 3 kinds of chocolates from the same brand (cocoa from Venezuela, Madagascar, and Colombia), and a gourmet chocolate bar with raspberry filling, and of course, a small teeny block of cheese– Pecorino with black truffles. OH YUM!! I love truffles and this market also carries truffles at certain times of the year– according to them, white truffles hit a high of US$3,000/ pound last year (no supply) and black truffles went for US$1,000/ pound *HOLY cow!! For a pound of those you can get a nice bag!!*. Thank goodness I don’t have a wanting for truffles haha. I am ok with tidbits, but I am not crazy enough to buy poundfuls of them!

I did a chocolate tasting back at the restaurant and I liked the Colombian brand the best. It was very good and not overpowering. The Madagascar cocoa tasted like ordinary bittersweet chocolate so there was not much to rave about.

Ok it’s time to get offline now. I have to run some errands for DM today. Sigh, I’ve been waking up at noon and even after noon lately! This is the ultimate pseudo-vacation for me haha. I miss my DH and my kids a lot though 🙁 *sniff*

xo