If It's Hip, It's Here (Archives)

When An Ordinary Churro Just Doesn't Cut It: Xooro; Gourmet Spanish Fritters

I wish I'd never discovered these, for reasons only my hips understand. Xooro (pronounced 'sure-oh' ) is the premium spanish dessert that has been voted Best In LA and garnered other epicurean awards.

They are fancy gourmet versions of the traditional Spanish fritter (or doughnut), the Churro:

Of course they carry the Original (vanilla creme filled, coated with sugar and cinnamon), A Chocolate original, a Gluten-free original, and custom-filled originals.

In addition to those, they have the following various (and some super unique) flavors such as:

• Triple chocolate (dark chocolate filled, dark chocolate coating and stripes)
• Peanut Butter Lover (peanut butter filled, chocolate peanut butter coating, dark chocolate stripes)
• Rasberry (rasberry filling with white chocolate coating)
• Turkish hazelnut (hazelnut creme with milk chocolate coating and white chocolate stripes)
• Maple Bacon (that's right, maple-creme filled coated with bacon bits)
• Black and White (white chocolate filling, dark chocolate coating, white chocolate stripes)
• Pistacchio (pistachio filing with carmelized pistachio and dark chocolate)
• White Chocolate Coconut (white chocolate filled, white chocolate coated and shredded coconut)
• Dulce de Leche (dulche de leche filling with white chocolate coating)
• Mississipi (peanut butter filled with dark chocolate coating and chopped peanuts)
• Tiramisu (tiramisu cofee creme filling, milk choclate coated and dark chocolate stripes)
• Turron (Toasted almond Spanish candy filling, dark chocolate coating)
• Tortoise (dulce de leche filled, mil choclate coated and chopped pecans)
• Jordan's (Nutella filled with white chocolate coating and dark chocolate stripes)
• Mango (mango creme filled with white chocolate coating)

Unfortunately, at this time, they are only available in the Los Angeles area, with their flagship store in Santa Monica and a delivery service available to the surrounding communities. That's right, they deliver these delicious puppies with a minimum order of 12 and at least 24 hours advanced notice and with some other limitations- for more info on that please write to orders@xooro.com or fax them at 310- 260-2919.

But they are set to be open several new locations soon; in Orlando, San Antonio, Los Angeles and San Diego.

Located at 125 Broadway in Santa Monica (one block east of Ocean Blvd), California, 90401

Ototo's Balloon Doggy Bank Exclusive Sale- SOLD OUT

I will be selling some limited edition design items in very limited quantities that are very hard to find in the US.

I'm starting with this fabulous Doggy Bank by Ototo Design Studio of Israel.

This ceramic doggy bank is glazed in high polish gold and has a slot for coins with a removable plug on the bottom. It's a nice large size, 12.5" from the tip of the nose to the tip of the tail and stands 8" tall, and looks wonderful on a mantel or shelf. Sculpted to resemble a Balloon dog, it makes a great gift for children or adults. It even has felt pads for the feet to protect any surface. Comes in the manufacturer's box, safely packaged.

Suggested retail is $74.00 and the least expensive I could find it was for $57.00 +$25.00 shipping here, so this is an excellent deal. The bank will ship priority mail (so no PO boxes) beginning Friday, December 5th and arrive in 2-3 days.

sorry, but these have sold out.

It's A Lamp. It's A Speaker. It's The Amplamp By Futuros

Is it a table lamp? Is it an audio speaker? The truth is that the amplamp is a unique combination of both. The amplamp is hand-crafted by Dominic Bromley, one of the UK's most successful lighting and ceramics designers - and the guy behind Scabetti.

what does it look like?
Available in black or white and with your choice of shade.

How does it work?

Amplamp delivers a unique sonic experience that easily compares to the most advanced consumer audio products. The sound combines tightly controlled deep bass with crystal clear presence, accuracy and precision.

By using a unique configuration of Airsound drivers and a transparent NXT panel speaker, the Amplamp is able to create a 360 degree spatial sound with realistic staging. The listener is enveloped in exquisite stereo sound, regardless of wherever they are in the room.

With the shade in place, the unit delivers above 20kHz, which is higher than you can hear - the domain of cats and bats. And at the same time it reaches down to less than 40Hz - lower than the lowest note on a bass guitar. So you really will not miss a thing.

Features include:

• On-board amplifier - 80 watts including sub woofer
• Spatial stereo from one amplamp
• NXT and Airsound technologies
• Optional docking station controls and charges your iPod

An exceptional speaker- The amplamp takes the speaker out of the conventional black box. An active speaker for an iPod, MP3 player or any other sound source, the amplamp uses cutting edge technology to produce a precision, room-filling stereo sound from a single unit.

The listener is enveloped in exquisite stereo sound, regardless of where they are in the room. A powerful, vertical-firing, bass sub woofer adds a depth and richness only found in larger, higher specification, hi-fi systems.

About NXT technology:

NXT's technologies are unique and based on harnessing the natural modes of vibration in a panel to reproduce sound. These technologies are derived from a profound understanding of bending wave physics and its applications to sound generation.

Traditional speakers act like a piston, pumping air with a rigid cone. NXT speakers are different. A transducer is used to excite a carefully designed panel, which vibrates, & converts the mechanical energy into sound pressure waves over the entire surface area. It is the same principle that makes an acoustic guitar or violin make its sound.

An additional characteristic is that the sound volume does not decay over distance like a standard speaker. This allows users to set a volume that is comfortable whilst they are sitting close to the unit while also being sufficient to fill the whole room with sound.

A powerful, vertical-firing, bass sub woofer adds a depth and richness only found in larger, high-specification, hi-fi systems.

About airsound technology:
It works by using small side firing speakers to reproduce spatial information contained within a stereo input signal. The resulting sound is used to interact with & modify the mono sound field generated by a forward facing NXT panel speaker.

Pre-order yours now here. Or call: +44 (0)1249 700 643
Read about Dominic and Frances Bromley of Scabetti here.

Other wild audio speakers worth checking out:

Ross Lovegrove's KEF Muon Speakers

Tons of unusual and amazing audio speakers

The G1 Giya speakers

the wireless Ferrari speakers

Symbio Design's Loud speakers

Artcoustic wall speakers

Mini-Gods speakers from Marka27

It's About Time Someone Created Hip Watch Winders: SwissKubiK.

Up until now, most of the automatic watch winders I've ever seen were very conservative and traditional in their styling. But now I've found SwissKubiK of Geneva, Switzerland who makes a much more youthful and hip, but equally functional, watch winder for those of you with automatic watches.

In addition to a large selection of colored anodized aluminum ones, wood ones and leather ones, they have a limited edition (200 of each) 'pop art' collection by artist Andrew McCarthy which features legendary actors and actresses like Audrey Hepburn, Sophia Loren, Marilyn Monroe and Steve McQueen printed upon leather:

Above: the "pop art" collection; legends on leather

The SwissKubiK watch winder has been entirely conceived and produced in Geneva, fully respecting Swiss quality tradition, in order to satisfy the most exacting requirements imposed by the highest-quality Swiss Watch Manufacturers.

The SwissKubiK watch winder distinguishes itself by its modern design, housed within the minimal space of a compact square cube 3.937 inches (10 cm), exclusively dedicated to the continuous rewinding of automatic mechanical timepieces.

The SwissKubiK watch winder is available in numerous colors and materials: - anodized aluminum, leather saddle style stitching, precious wood or stingray skinodized.

Versions of the watch winder are available for 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 12 or 15 watches. You may add acrylic glass hinged 'window' to each watchwinder for dust protection if so desired.

The custom 'Python', created to hold 24 watches and clad in genuine python leather:

A very special limited edition, the Joker, contains over 3, 500 full cut diamonds and is housed in 18k white gold:

• Personalized special orders can also be accommodated with specific colors or materials or for a larger collection of watches.

• For antique watches, collection timepieces or watches with specific requirements recommended by the watch manufacturers, the SwissKubiK watch winder can be programmed using the optional USB computer interface cable.

• The SwissKubiK watch winder is guaranteed 3 years from the date of purchase.