Sampler Platter: Tiki drinks, coffee roasting and Hawaiian food

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Midweek food bites...

• If you love tiki, be sure to visit the Tonga Room in San Francisco before the Fairmont Hotel is turned into condos. Kevin Kidney
• Why carbs and sugar make you hungrier. Wall Street Journal
• Pleasure Palate digs into a Hawaiian breakfast at Gardena Bowl, a hidden gem of Hawaiian food that South Bay residents have long known about.
• Mattatouille tours the Intelligentsia roasting works in Glassell Park.
• Hollywood hiring freeze spreads to restaurants. Citrus at Social and Eat on Sunset are reducing hours, and Campanile’s business dropped 25% in the final quarter of 2008. Variety via Eater LA
• Germany bans cultivation of GM corn. Der Spiegel
• L.A. and O.C. Foodie checks out opening night at Saam at the Bazaar by Jose Andres: salty air margaritas; caviar steamed bun; bagel and lox crispy cone; ‘canned’ uni conservas; boneless chicken wing; nitro gazpacho; smoked sous-vide salmon; dragon’s breath and more.
• Teenage Glutster gets an 18-course lesson in authentic Mexican food from Ramiro Arvizu and Jaime Martin Del Campo of La Casita Mexicana.

-- Elina Shatkin