The Patagonian Toothfish

NEW WEBSITE!

2011-03-26T20:20:00.001-07:00

I have a new website! Until I figure out how to redirect people automatically...just click here now!

www.thetoothfish.com

22 Meals Later: Petit-Fours & Future Courses

2011-03-12T11:03:00.001-08:00

I never doubted that good food, real food had always found me as a child. I ate what I wanted and reaped the benefits of having two parents who cared most about food and education, possibly in that order. Through my child and then teenage years, my family nurtured my love for food until I became so self-obsessed with the idea that suddenly I was the crazy food person. This is how I came dressed when I landed at LaGuardia Airport in NYC, and as I shared on this blog, I was searching for an upgrade, a makeover, a new scale of good better and best. Well, I got that new scale.

People told me I wouldn't like it here. The pace was too fast. The energy was too intense. The city was too big. Those people clearly didn't know me as well as they thought. For one, the restaurants are so diverse and the culinary spirit so forward that I could spend 5 years here and still not taste everything this city has to offer. About the pace, intensity and size, I've always worked best as the underdog, when the person next to me is better at whatever we're doing. My fear of failure has always driven my success. When in a large field of contestants I didn't want to be that guy on the bottom. Ok, and then I reached a point where anything less than 1st was the bottom but that's another issue. But the greater that fear, the harder I have ground my teeth and fought against the current. This city, I can feel and see, can easily kick my ass. And I love that.

What NYC has that few other cities do is a rich depth easily accessible by a few stops on the subway. You can eat where Martha Stewart eats or you can walk into a shady noodle shop in Chinatown. Both are good. Hungry during a stroll around broadway? Check out that man over on the corner who could turn heroin addicts into chicken over rice addicts. Every major culinary country has its own territory and a slew of outdoor food markets and parks elimate borders to create the very best kind of cultural anarchy. The only thing this city doesn't have are talking robots and cheap housing.

And that brings me to my next point. Now having tasted what I don't have but have always wanted, for every day I spend away from NYC, I now feel as if I'm wasting my time and missing out on something far better and more exciting. If I want to live in NYC, what am I going to do that will allow me both to live in NYC and then eat, and hopefully, well? While standing in line for the $6 chicken, my friend Henry told me that he was preparing me for the future since there is no money in journalism.

He has a point which had me thinking about what exactly I can do. I have an eye for design, can take good pictures, can write decently most of the time, know my way around a computer, am overly organized, enjoy problem solving and have an insatiable appetite for something tastier and different. What is it that I want to do? At some point I want someone to pay me too much money to eat at restaurants so I can praise the chef who doesn't get the applause he or she deserves and, on the other end, crush that restaurant drunk on its own ego, too out of it to see that its overpriced food and stupid baby carrot garnishes aren't even fit for shantytowns in Hooverville. Somewhere in between the hammer will come down on that restaurant on the corner ruining society with it's soggy mozzarella sticks and offensive waiters. I guess you could say I want what South Park's Eric Cartmen wanted: for someone to "respect my authoritaaay."

This is how I feel about NYC, what I can do, what I want to do and how uncertain I am of how I'm going to do it. But in the same way good food has always come my way, the "how" has always neatly presented itself to me at the right moment. I haven't committed any felonies lately so I can only hope that blessed fortune keeps flowing. In the meantime, I'm just going to continue doing what I love: thinking about food, writing about food, and wanting to know more about it. Now I will do so fully aware that I'm competing with the food capital of America, a course I'm not sure I'm ready to order but one I'll try to eat anyway.

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 7: When the Dress is Prettier than the Person

2011-03-11T19:34:00.000-08:00

By reputation, Daniel is Daniel Boulud's flash-ship restaurant, which holds three Michelin Stars (one of five in NYC) and four NYT stars (one of seven). A French prodigy born near Lyon, Boulud's experience in the kitchen is vast and accomplished to say the least. (picture courtesy of NY Eatery)

One of Martha Stewart's favorite restaurants is Daniel, and that fact alone should unleash a flood of ideas on what kind of place this is. As Martha would have it, Daniel is a place where servers wait to pull out your chair after you've gone to the bathroom, where every woman's purse gets its own stool and where butter dishes are replaced so quickly and quietly you'd think a ninja was responsible for it. For every seat, there's a server, and plates are put down in perfect synchronization. Thus Daniel is a broadway show with the most beautiful of sets and costume design. What, though, of the show's plot and characters?

The lighting in Daniel is dim, and so pictures are on the lame side (picture of the amuse, which was polite and sunchoke-themed, did not turn out).

hot foie gras, apples

I've gladly embraced the lesson — one that NYC has taught me — that I have so much to learn about food. At many of NYC's best, I have had little idea of what ingredients were at play or what techniques were used. I've had to rely on my senses, my palette alone. As with this first appetizer, foie gras and apples were not the only ingredients but it's all I could see. By now you should be aware of my foie gras fetish and so it shouldn't surprise you that this was high-quality foie gras I'd eat any day. That said, the other ingredients on the plate had little relevance in elevating this dish to new heights, like a beautiful girl who doesn't know how to dress.

florida frog legs and Jerusalem artichoke soup

This was my first time with frog legs and to say that it tasted like chicken would be an insult to every toad on the planet. The meat was softer and lighter than chicken and in every way possible so much better. The soup, however, was astoundingly boring. Of course this was a nice soup that tasted fine, but I wasn't paying $105 for a fine soup. I wanted fireworks and tears and bursts of laughter, and this soup put me to sleep. The one redeeming factor this soup had was the silky, creamy aftertaste that stayed until the entree course.

elysian fields lamb loin, confit cipollini onions, sweet garlic coulis, crispy shoulder craqeulins, parmesan-scallion dressing

There's that smile I was looking for. This was lamb at its finest hour, the meat as tender as Wagyu. Somehow the parmesan-scallion dressing did not complement the lamb but became a part of it. The onions and craqeulins, however, were superfluous sides that did little more than look pretty.

grilled yellowfin tuna, red-wine peppered shallots, parsnip, roasted salsify, marchand de vin butter.

The menu describes a multi-faceted dish, but in actuality the tuna was a one-star experience, which was the perfectly grilled tuna. My memory of the dish is vague, but that's because the seasonings were near non-existant. But presentation wise, it was a pretty dish. Martha would be happy.

duo of vermont quail, bacon-wrapped breast, glazed celery leg confit, potato gnocchi, truffle sauce

A baffling presentation that was more complex than the dish itself. Like the soup the quail was a nice dish, but where was the pop? The sparkle? Nowhere to be seen.

roasted black sea bass, syrah sauce, stuffed leeks, potato confit, caramelized cipollini (comment on this post if you know other names for sea bass)

At a restaurant like Daniel, top-of-the-line ingredients are assumed to be the norm and this sea bass was no different. The fish was so fresh I'd believe it if the server had told me the dish was killed-to-order. But also at a restaurant like Daniel, I want more than that and that's where the syrah sauce went that extra step. First there was the strong yet equally subtle butter before ending on a flash of red wine. A perfect sauce for the perfect fish.

warm guanaja chocolate coulant, liquid caramel, fleur de sel, milk sorbet

Like me, it's possible you don't understand half of what this dish is, but the menu writing is a veil for a glorified chocolate souffle. The cake itself was beautiful but there was nothing here I couldn't replicate at home, save the gold leaf on top.

honey crisp apple confit, cinnamon sable, sparkling apple cider sorbet - a dense, apple delight

orange and huckleberry vacherin, naval orange compote, meringue creme chantilly - It's a spaceship! This would be a perfect, summer dish because of the strong tart flavor from the raspberry. After a heavy meal, fruit is often the best way to end.

caramelized hazelnut sable, dulche de leche cream, caraibe chocolate mousse, horchata ice cream - again, I have no idea what this description means but I can tell you this is one, dense dessert that's difficult to finish. It's a lot of thick hazelnut mousse.

coconut sphere with vanilla infused pineapple, basil seeds, cherimoya sorbet - my favorite dessert of the night. Between the texture contrasts to the light coconut meringue to the sweet pineapple, the dessert was multi-dimensional.

petit fours: chocolate truffles (basil, cinnamon, raspberry, lemon)

more gifts from the kitchen

So here's the deal. Daniel was a good time of a restaurant. It was great in fact but mostly because the dining room was gorgeous and the service was sharp, attentive and perfectly-timed. The food, though, was disappointing. With the exception of the desserts which demonstrated vast amounts of effort and creativity, the rest was under-seasoned, over-priced and short on spark.

The food was fussier than it was tasty and begs the question if all ingredients must be molded into obtuse shapes. If Daniel is going to serve food as pretty as an exhibit at the MOMA, there must be substance backing the look, and tonight the stars just didn't match up.

Daniel

(212) 288-0033

Upper East Side

60 E 65th St

New York, NY 10065

www.danielnyc.com/daniel.html

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 6, Del Posto: Where the Godfather Meets Batali

2011-03-10T22:18:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of NY Eatery

Mario Batali is a big, celebrity chef with a restaurant portfolio as lively as his orange-colored hair. His Food Network name is branded across 17 restaurants, not to mention Eately, a giant market on 5th Avenue that would probably overwhelm even the hungriest of Italian grandmothers.

Del Posto is his fancier, more well-known restaurant (second to Babbo) and last year was elevated to four stars in the New York Times thanks to the new critic Sam Sifton. In 2008 Del Posto was downgraded to one Michelin Star from two and this year failed to earn that second star back even in light of the NYT upgrade. But all this back story aside, how does Mario Batali do Italian food?

Del Posto is a formal place, the kind that subconsciously urges you to stand up when a woman approaches the table to sit down. The interior could easily pass for a restaurant in Batman's Gotham City: high-ceilings, steps at every corner, metal railings lining walkways, marble floors, dim yellow lighting to match the scores of candles in the bar area. It's a dark, brown place filled with tall Italian waiters and their slicked-back hair and short, also Italian, busboys wearing the traditional white jacket and white pants, a uniform that reminds me of a small-town doctor.

Amuse Bouche of fried saffron risotto, chicken consomme with egg yolk, and puff pastry with ham pate (I think? Can't remember).

Jean-Georges demonstrated that an amuse bouche should be lively and well-rounded, two qualities this opening act lacked. A greasy risotto ball and a heavy puff pastry did little to wake up the palette. Only the chicken consomme — the clear soup fortified with strong herbs and stock — belonged on the table.

Roasted Winter Vegetables with Robiola Sformato & Truffled Hazelnuts

The first appetizer was one of those delicate moments, a time when flavors and feelings come so seamlessly and quickly that to stop chewing at any moment would ruin the experience. I do not know what was used in this cold appetizer of vegetables except that somewhere in between the squash and a beet, there was smooth, creamy cheese and perhaps genius itself.

Zampone with Lentil Vinaigrette & Salsa Verde

Zampone is spicy sausage wrapped in pig trotters, here paired with a lentils spiked with an acidic salsa verde. The lentils packed more energy than I expected and the spicy sausage less so. Enjoyable and a tad on the heavy side, but not nearly as remarkable as the roasted vegetables.

Yesterday’s 100 Layer Lasagna alla Piastra

Del Posto likes its Italian waiters who take pleasure in spewing a string of Italian words to describe a dish before backtracking with an English translation. Maybe this is why it was at times confusing to know what I was eating. Regardless, this lasagne redefines its sloppy, casserole throw-it-together image with a finely-tuned superior that seems about as labor intensive as a Chinese sweat shop. Fifty (!) paper-thin sheets of lasagna with cheese and sausage hiding in-between — the layers in this dish mean something and with every bite another dimension, another flavor presents itself. In wine terms, this was dish that kept going and going.

Seared Duck Breast, Apician Spices, Savor alla Francescana & Lovage

The seared duck beast is an Italian winter on a plate. Tender duck is oaky and spiced, paired with a pumpkin-apple-pear jelly. The entire plate, though, could have used more of that savory and salty to balance with the sweet.

Sfera di Caprino with Celery & Fig Agrodolce & Celery Sorbetto

Boy does this dish work on the most unexpected of levels. Celery sorbet? Yes. Absolutely yes. It's an icy cleanser that hits right before the sweetness from the figs balances with creaminess from the cheese. A buttery crunch from the crumbs around the cheese. This is dessert with inspiration and precision as its parents.

Spezzata di Castagne Warm Plum Macedonia, Crushed Chestnuts & Yogurt Gelato

I'm a bit hazy on this one, but I do remember loving the wintery plums and the buttery cake.

Del Posto was an interesting experience, one that was intentionally the way it consistently was. The servers, for one, were a serious bunch who never smiled but never frowned. They presented themselves not as a group intent on creating the best experience but one that aspired to be purgatory in nature, facilitators between the customers and the kitchen (we're assuming the kitchen is not hell). As for Del Posto's cuisine, it's creative, fine-dining Italian that brings with it as much tradition and warmth as a plate of spaghetti and meatballs.

Del Posto

(212) 497-8090

Chelsea

85 10th Ave

New York, NY 10011

www.delposto.com

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 5 - Tasty Ramen, Sour Service

2011-03-09T22:50:00.001-08:00

Once again we found ourselves eating more Asian food. Ippudo's interior is cramped, dark, loud and full of servers who shout Japanese at haphazard moments. The place is famous for their pork buns and bowls of ramen, foods which David Chang has laid claim to in NYC. Ippudo though is still extremely popular and very busy. Question of the Night: How do the two compare?

One bite in, I knew Chang's pork buns were far superior to Ippudo's. Chang is king of all things pork and his juicy, fatty pork belly was an experience in itself. Ippudo's pork belly was a tougher, cheaper bite that didn't have nearly enough umami. Where Chang uses a cucumber to undercut the meat, Ippudo uses iceberg lettuce with mayonnaise. Don't get me wrong, Ippudo has some delicious pork buns but between the two Ippudo comes in a very distant fourth.

What of the ramen? Ippudo takes the prize in this category with its miso-inspired broth and slurpy noodles. Chang's broth relied too much on pork for depth (which never came). Ippudo's is just so appropriate for a winter night. The soft-boiled egg might have been my favorite part of the entire bowl. But as far as the best soup broth on this culinaring trip, Lam Zhou's beats everybody.

Now I would to take this moment to wail about Ippudo's inept service. When the first half of our party arrived and gave the hostess our name, she told us the wait would probably be 30 to 45 minutes and to tell her when our entire party is here because she might be able to seat us earlier. When the rest of the party arrived, we told her. Response: The wait is going to be 45 minutes to 1 hour now because your party wasn't inside the room so I just pushed you down on the list. It didn't help that her tone was a condescending and accusing one.

Service Fail #2: I understand that splitting checks can be difficult, but let's not get hostile over the process. When we tried to split the check 5 ways, our server, whose English throughout the entire was sounding like Japanese, explained that she could only (...Japanese... Japanese...) split check (...Japanese...Japanese...) 3 ways (...Japanese... Japanese...) accept 4 credit cards.

Maybe it was the language barrier but between the three economics majors at the table, they couldn't figure out what she meant. 3 ways? 4 cards? She repeated herself several times. Eyes looked to the ceiling. I drank some tea just to calm down. Eventually we figured it — and by figure it out I mean oh-damnit-just-put-everything-on-one-card-I-just-want-to-go-home — but while we were discussing how to balance the check, servers and managers came by our table to see if we were ready to pay. They were pushy and on edge for our payment as if Godzilla were knocking on the door demanding our table and a bowl of ramen too. Please, Ippudo staff, drink some tea.

As we walked out the entire staff, as they had when we first walked in, shouted something in Japanese and threw us a few smiles and bows. The charm this had in the beginning had worn off by the end. Just get me home.

Ippudo

(212) 388-0088

East Village

65 4th Ave

New York, NY 10003

www.ippudo.com/ny/

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 5 - Portion Sizes Everyone Can Agree With

2011-03-09T18:27:00.000-08:00

If only I could consume a Michelin star every day. Well not really, but the break from cafeteria food has been thrilling. Today was lunch at Avoce, a modern Italian restaurant in the Time Warner Center. The three course $29 prix fixe was a big draw.

I usually don't mention the bread at restaurants but Avoce's was something special. The crust had the crunch of a cracker, and the inside had the fluff of a marshmallow. This was one of those breadbaskets where you consider sacrificing dessert for just another piece of bread.

stracciatella: creamy pugliese, mozzarella, roasted artichokes, lemon thyme, arugula - $14

This was an unimpressive cheese appetizer which started off creamy and smooth but quickly took a nosedive to a grittier, rougher finish. The artichokes did little to remedy anything.

beets, pistachio, sweet garlic, thyme, orange

Simple, pure beets. I enjoy beets but only when they don't taste like a pile of dirt. The finish here was clean in part because of the sweet garlic and orange. On any summer day this is an essential dish.

baccala: house made salt cod, curry sauce

Cod can be fishy, but these fritters were buttery and light and looked to the curry sauce to bring that punch every starter should have.

chicken livers, stone ground polenta, spring onions, lemon

If you can't tell from the picture, the kitchen served up a giant portion of chicken livers and polenta. I expected something maybe half this size. Between the creamy polenta, bright, lemon-y onions and solid chicken livers, the plate lacked nothing as far as texture or flavor contrast goes. Now this is modern Italian.

branzino: mediterranean sea bass, blood orange, artichoke - $29

The combination of seabass and blood oranges had excellent potential but was sadly nothing more than what the menu said it was. There was seabass here and then blood orange there. While cooked to the appropriate temperature, the fish was under seasoned, a problem the oranges could have fixed. How about a sauce? A marinade? Something other than just the juice from an orange.

duck legs, cippolini onions

By far the best entree of the meal. Crackling skin and moist duck underneath. Beautifully done and a lot of it to enjoy as well.

handmade whole grain pasta, hen of the wood mushrooms

When I think of whole grain pasta, I imagine pasta from the DUC that reminds me of improperly cooked polenta. Chef Robbins at Avoce has a reputation for pasta and this dish showcases that skill. There's a slight nuttiness from the thick strands of whole grain pasta, a strong, if not overly so, banana flavor from the olive oil, and a heavily salted chicken stock. The mushrooms play more supporting roles here.

apple fritter - a surprisingly light crust with apple right around the corner.

tiramisu - perhaps one of the best I've had. Delicate mascarpone cheese is front and center, and a perfect ratio of ladyfingers to alcohol plays in the background.

chocolate torte, walnut, cinnamon ice cream: pure walnuts undercut the sweetness of this chocolate decadence

I originally had said that lunch at Jean-Georges was the best deal in the city. I still stand by that claim but lunch at Avoce is a reminder that Jean-Georges is not alone in offering wonderful experiences at a reasonable cost. At Avoce the portion sizes are overly generous and the service is gracious and inviting. While some dishes lacked balance or creativity, the experience as a whole was one I hope to repeat again.

A Voce Columbus

(212) 823-2523

Midtown West

10 Columbus Cir

New York, NY 10019

www.avocerestaurant.com

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 4 - A Cart Worthy of a Michelin

2011-03-09T12:17:00.000-08:00

hot chocolate from La Maison de Chocolat - $8

The best way to handle the NYC cold is with a cup of hot chocolate. Rich, deep and warm. La Maison is also a relaxing store to sit in.

After the four-course experience at Jean-Georges, it's funny how a street vendor was the next planned meal of the day. There are several Halal Carts but the one on 53rd and 6th is the most famous and the busiest. We were a block away from the cart when we first saw the line of people waiting for a giant $6 plate of chicken and rice.

it takes three people to man the cart: one cooks, the other two serve and collect money.

It's amazing how people will stand the blistering NYC cold for a plate of chicken (and lamb, if you want) over rice. Are they just crazy? No, they're crazy about the food, and I can see why. Put it this way: if this dish were crack, I'd gladly be a crack addict.

Surrounded by the flashing lights of NYC and quickly losing feeling in my hands because of the hold, I found some absurd pleasure in the tastiest, warmest plate of simplicity ever. The moment felt so New York, so real. Halfway through, what must have been, 5 pounds of chicken + lamb and rice, I knew I had reached my limit. Ok, maybe just one more bite. Maybe just another one. Usually when I push down more food than I care to, it's out of respect for the person who cooked it for me (e.g. my grandmothers). This was different. My body needed one more bite. It craved another one.

A comparison between the $50 lunch at Jean-Georges at the $6 dinner on the street is inevitable and absolutely necessary. Some might take this opportunity to rail on the ridiculousness of fine dining before shoving all of upperclass society into a box labeled pretentious and greedy, but that seems unfair and overreaching. Rather, I think it showcases this city's depth and proves that happiness can be found on all levels, not just on the ones with foie gras.

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 4 - Jean-Georges: A Living Room Worth Eating In (Lunch)

2011-03-08T22:41:00.001-08:00

Sitting on a train whisking its way through Manhattan towards Columbus Circle where three Michelin stars were waiting for me for lunch, I wasn't nervous. My heart rate was controlled. Even now I cannot explain why I felt nothing as I approached a destination I had been salivating over for the past three years. In high school I wasted countless hours combing through the menus at Jean-Georges, Per Se, Daniel — the very best of NYC fine dining. And three Michelin stars? All this should have been enough to send me into some kind of coma (the good kind).

The inside of Jean-Georges is undeniably beautiful, modern and comfortable, maybe even cozy, all at the same time. I've been to far stuffier, starchier restaurants that deserve negative Michelin stars. As light poured into the dining room through the floor to ceiling windows looking out into Central Park, a server wearing a coat and tie handed us a menu. The show had begun.

amuse bouche: sunchoke soup with black truffle dot (left), beet with homemade ricotto (middle) and salmon over potato cake (right).

At last an amuse bouche done right. A creamy, smooth sunchoke soup akin to potato, an earthy beet paired with airy ricotta, and warmed salmon over a crunchy potato cake — together the entire plate evoked a range of flavors appropriate for the dishes that followed. This was an amuse bouche that was more than a free sample from the chef, but one that woke up palettes.

foie gras brulee, meyer-lemon gelee

This was the moment when I forgot where I was, when my heart started fluttering, and when I started grinning madly. As a general disclaimer I have a sadistic fetish for anything foie gras and here was a combination new to me. A wheel of foie gras topped with sugar and then blow-torched for a caramelized crust (like a creme brulee). The crunch was an added layer to play on the gelee which was like a bright, slightly sweet palette cleanser paving the way for the foie gras. Fabulous, I say. Absolutely fabulous.

yellowfin tuna ribbons, avocado, spicy radish, ginger marinade

While enjoyable, this starter didn't come near the foie gras as far as complexity goes. The tuna was fresh, but the ginger marinade was overpowering and common. With a "marinade" so distinct, it's easy to see how the avocado gets buried under the commotion.

coach farms goat cheese gnocchi, caramelized baby artichokes, lemon and olive oil

Gnocchi is a challenging pasta to make. It's often too chewy or too soft or too starchy or too dense. Jean-Georges took the clever approach of serving a gnocchi unconventionally shaped like a tube. Rich, yes, but both the presentation and execution here was precise and without flaw. And instead of using a heavy red sauce or a distinct brown-butter sage sauce, lemon and olive oil acted like simple flip-flops on a dish usually wearing loafers or, in worst case scenarios, giant clown shoes.

wild mushroom risotto, parmesan

Disclaimer #2: I also have a fetish for risotto. How, I wondered, was Jean-Georges going to deliver this classic dish. While slightly over salted, the risotto made use of bitter greens on top to undercut the richness of the cream, butter and starch. A clever idea. As far as technicality goes, the risotto's consistency was exceptional. Creamy, gentle with no sign of anything remotely gelatinous.

butternut squash soup, black trumpet mushrooms

At any other restaurant I would throw a tantrum in the dining room at the sight of butternut squash soup. Let's be real here. Ever since last year, I feel like butternut squash has become the prostitute of winter menus. It's everywhere. But how about from now on only Jean Georges is allowed to serve his light, clean version of a dish usually so thick, heavy and sweet it's a three-course meal in one. This, here, is butternut squash done elegantly.

baked salmon, black truffle crumb crust, crispy parsnip

The salmon was a tender medium-rare, but besides that it was a forgettable dish. This was plain salmon presented and served as plain salmon that could have gone much, much further. A disappointing dip in the meal.

parmesan crusted confit leg of chicken, salsify, basil and lemon butter

I never order chicken at nice restaurants but if lunch at Jean-Georges were a normal thing for me, I'd order this one. A crispy exterior, thinly cut, moist and brooding with basil, chicken parmesan never tasted so fancy.

caramelized strip loin, roasted brussel sprouts, pecans and avocado, maître d'hôtel butter

I didn't try any of the butter, but from what I could tell, this was a thick steak for a man with an appetite, as all steaks usually are. Seasoning and so on aren't really the point, and this was a steak that is on the menu because something has to feed the crazy carnivores, not because it's exceptional or characteristic of a restaurant with three michelin stars.

veal sweetbreads (thymus gland) w. grilled pear, licorice.

Talk about large sweetbreads. The earthy, gaminess of the sweetbreads paired well with the sweet pear and bitter licorice. I can't say I've ever had breads as large and juicy as these either. Presentation, though, was colorless and cramped on the small, square plate it was served on, but still I recommend this to anyone who enjoys sweetbreads.

Sadly I don't have a picture of the one entree that will stay in my mind for some time. The broth for the red snapper crusted with "nuts and seeds" was impossibly light, buttery and direct.

caramel: salted caramel tart, hazelnut streusel, creme fraiche, caramelized expresso ice cream, chewy caramel powder.

I'm almost done. Hang in there. For dessert, the "caramel" was the ugly child in a family of beautiful siblings (e.g the chocolate dessert). The sorbet tasted of grass and the spiral on top the cake was unnecessarily phallic in shape. As for flavor, the cake was airy but that alone isn't enough for a Michelin powerhouse to serve it.

chocolate: chocolate cake, vanilla bean ice cream, caramelized honey ganache, amaranth, seeds, hibiscus streusel

What's admirable about this dessert was how balanced it was. Even the molten chocolate cake didn't end with that sudden sugar spike you always get with cheap chocolate candybars. Because the menu simply called this dish "chocolate," I'll give Jean-Georges leeway to put items on a plate together that don't exactly match. The peanut butter and chocolate (left side) was a dessert of its own.

petit fours: chocolate

petit fours: macaroons

serving handcut marshmallows. lol.

The meal finished with several petit fours. This, of course, two hours later and who knows how many glasses of wine. Service was good, but not three-michelin star quality, which calls for anticipation of needs before needed and, in general, a flawless performance of busboys and servers working in tandem. Twice, plates were given to the wrong people. Jean-Georges does a much better job refilling your wine glass while you're not looking. Too many times did I mistakenly think that I hadn't had any wine yet. Read as much into that as you want.

OK. Was Jean-Georges worth the money spent? Yes. At $29 for two plates ($16 for each additional) and several treats before and after, this is one of NYC's best lunch deals. That being said, lunch was not a three Michelin star experience and probably because it was lunch. Dinner is where the real forks and knives come out (I hope). But certainly this was a wonderful performance featuring carefully constructed dishes executed on levels with the precision that of a surgeon. This all in a dining room so relaxed and chill, it's easy to forget that you're eating in a restaurant, much less one of the top-rated in the New York City.

Jean-Georges

(212) 299-3900

Upper West Side

1 Central Park W

New York, NY 10023

www.jean-georges.com

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 3 - Soup Dumprings (Dinner)

2011-03-08T21:21:00.001-08:00

Even after visiting three pizzerias, a rice pudding shop, and a macaroni and cheese restaurant, we had the stomach and energy for dinner. The 30-minute nap on a Crate & Barrel couch was instrumental in our plan to eat more.

Joe's Shanghai is a popular restaurant in Chinatown known for its soup dumplings. After waiting fifteen minutes, the hostess led us to a round table where 9 other people were already eating. You have to love the Chinese for the effort they put into getting every paying customer through the door.

8 pork soup dumplings for $5

So what exactly is a soup dumpling? It's exactly what it sounds like: soup inside of a dumpling. The proper way to eat these dumplings involves gently grabbing the top of the dumplings with chopsticks and holding a spoon under it to catch any soup which might leak out. The dumplings were hot so I nibbled a hole into the side to let the heat escape. Once it was cool enough, I popped the thing into my mouth. BAM. Warm soup gushed out of the dumpling and filled my mouth. There was probably a less sexually suggestive way to describe this moment, but I'm not about to spend the time figuring that out. Overall I enjoyed the dumplings, but I wasn't a fan of the skin, which I thought was too tough and thick.

Yes, I ordered fried rice and yes, you can call me white-washed for doing so. I don't care at this point because the chicken fried rice was very good. For starters, the rice wasn't the usual greasy, brown catastrophe too heavy on the soy sauce and too wimpy on the frying in the wok. The wok did its job this time and the scallions were a sharp way to lighten up the dish.

It's worth noting that on the night I went, the "white people to Asian people" ratio was probably 1 to 4. Usually this says something about a restaurant's authenticity, and while Joe's Shanghai may be a very popular place among tourists, the food is still enjoyable and worth the the trip if you're in the neighborhood.

Joe's Shanghai

(212) 233-8888

Chinatown

9 Pell St

New York, NY 10013

www.joeshanghairestaurants.com

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 3 - Snacks & God's Grocery Store

2011-03-07T20:23:00.001-08:00

Somewhere in between the second pie and the third one, we decided we wanted something sweet. Enter Rice to Riches.

My mom is going to cry when she hears about this place. Rice to Riches is a store specializing in fancy rice pudding, which, as a sign on the wall says, is "rice pudding that finally doesn't suck." The flavors are many: tiramisu, chocolate, coconut, vanilla, almond, french toast, panna cotta and on and on. I settled on almond and added buttery graham cracker crumbs. Let me just say that this stuff is crack. Unfortunately, rice pudding shops are a long way from becoming a "thing" like fro-yo. It's fattening for one and furthermore requires a lot of skill to make.

brie, roasted figs, roasted shiitake mushrooms & fresh rosemary from S'MAC

Immediately after pizza at Motorino's, we walked next door to S'Mac for some upscale mac and cheese. I mean, we had only been to four restaurants earlier in the day so S'Mac seemed like a reasonable pit stop. The store specializes in a variety of mac and cheeses. We shared the parisienne, which failed to turn me into a S'Mac apostle. It wasn't creamy and the figs were too awkwardly sweet to work with everything else.

I've been talking about revelations today (pizza post) and I had one in the most unexpected of places: a grocery store. Although not just any grocery store. Honestly, if Jesus were here on earth and needed to go shopping, He would totes go to Dean and Deluca. This store has everything: king crab legs, foie gras, terrines, baking dishes, flavored salts, wagyu, all kinds of pastries — if I ever move to NYC, I'm moving right next door because this place is magical.

Look. The seafood was right in the open without any case in sight. And guess what. It didn't smell. At all. You heard me right: a seafood section that didn't smell. Can somebody say fresh? SHEESH. WTF.

Rice To Riches

(212) 274-0008

Nolita

37 Spring St

New York, NY 10012

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 3 - Pizza for a (Entire) Day

2011-03-07T19:36:00.001-08:00

classic pie from Grimaldi's. 6 slices, $14

When I told my friend that I wanted to eat the best pizza in NYC, she told me my question was a hotly debated one and that there were several choices. Thus here is lesson number 1 in becoming a food warrior:

When faced with multiple choices, choose all of them.

Just so we could compare different pies across town, we visited three restaurants — Grimaldi's, Lombardi's, Motorino — in about four hours. Crazy? More like crazy about food.

Contestant #1 - Grimaldi's

Grimaldi's is a classic choice by the Brooklyn Bridge. It's a worn-down, grungy place where the pictures on the wall are crooked, except for the sign which demonstrates the heimlich maneuver. The inside feels time-tested and local.

As for the pie, the crust was light, the tomato sauce was chunky and the mozzarella cheese was homemade. The burnt crust to non-burnt crust ratio was balanced, and after a few bites, I was reminded of Antico in Atlanta. Maybe Antico is better than I get them credit for (even though I love them). More basil, though, was much needed and very much missed. The basil leaves were so small that it seemed unnecessary to even put them on the pie in the first place.

But Grimaldi's serves good pizza. No question about that, but did I have a revelation or gain some insight into what the real stuff is like? No.

Contestant #2, Lombardi's

Supposedly Lombardi's served the first piece of pizza ever in NYC. That very well could be true because Lombardi's doesn't hold back on that pitch. They know they're a destination and they play up to tourists with stylized photographs of pies on the wall, and a menu that required more than Microsoft Word to make.

San Marzano tomatoes gave the sauce on this pie a definite edge to Grimaldi's. San Marzanos are some of the best tomatoes in the world and so it makes sense the flavor is stronger. Grimaldi's crust, though, wasn't nearly so heavy and chewy as this one. Finishing this pie was definitely more difficult because of the crust. As for the mozzarella cheese, I can't remember...

Did I find a pie revelation here? No, but that doesn't mean Lombardi's pizza is an amateur attempt. All of the pies I had today were far better than any other I've had (excluding Antico).

Contestant #3 - Motorino's

Motorino's is the new kid on the block, a restaurant that grew out of the city's fascination with upscale pizza two years ago. NYT food critic Sam Sifton recently declared Motorino as the best pizza place in NYC. Was he right?

Ok, yes, but by a marginal difference that probably few people will care about. While sauce was watery, it was bursting with tomato goodness. We found the whole basil leaves here, but more importantly, we found a crust that was exceptionally fluffy and light complemented by distinct chunks of mozzarella. Everything comes together nicely about this pie.

So while Motorino's may be the best pizza in town, did the best give me a revelation? No, and I think that's because such a revelation isn't possible anymore. I didn't know it at the time but Antico's exposed me to some of the best pizza around. Having eaten around NYC, I know this to be a fact. As for Antico vs Motorino, Motorino wins that one to mostly because the burn crust to non burnt crust ratio is better and because the crust is thinner and fluffier.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to jog 10 miles. Or eat some rice pudding and dumplings in Chinatown for dinner (next post...)

Motorino

(212) 777-2644

East Village

349 E 12th St

New York, NY 10003

www.motorinopizza.com

Grimaldi's Pizzeria

(718) 858-4300

19 Old Fulton St

Brooklyn, NY 11201

www.grimaldis.com

Lombardi's Pizza

(212) 941-7994

Nolita

32 Spring St

New York, NY 10012

www.lombardisoriginalpizza.com

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 2 (Dinner), It's Chang Time

2011-03-07T15:04:00.000-08:00

Without his buns, who knows where David Chang would be. 2 for $10

But first...a snack before dinner

black sesame ice cream (front), lychee (back) from Chinatown Ice Cream Factory

You may experience flavor fatigue after five minutes, but the four minutes before that are wonderful, assuming you like black sesame, which isn't overwhelmingly sweet like every other ice cream in the world, and lychee. The ice cream is unusually icy and not very smooth, texture-wise, but these are minor points.

the bar at Momofuku Noodle Bar

We're entering into the fancier and pricier leg of the trip, of which the first step is with David Chang, a NYC chef whose meteoric rise to the top and (probably) love for pork makes him one of the biggest chefs in the country.

striped black bass at momofuku noodle bar - $15

It's only been one day and I can barely remember anything about this dish, other than that I wasn't impressed when I had it and that I thought $15 was a tad pricey for six small bites. Certainly it's a pretty and uses high quality bass, but the mild flavors seemed uncharacteristic of Chang who is a bold, passionate and certain chef.

duck salad, plum, hazelnut, red endive, raw duck fat - $12

This is a salad that doesn't eat nicely and that tastes better at the end than in the beginning. After popping the plump poached egg and mixing in the yolk, the plate looked messy and perhaps could have passed for a salad after somebody had eaten their filling. A sharp vinegar crashes into you on first bite but overtime the salad mellows out as the duck fat becomes more pronounced and umami-like.

These are David Chang's pork buns. Beautiful, I know. These babies put Mr. Chang on the map as man who could cross borders, dress up the cultures and charge handsomely for the service. Could this be a fluke? A gimmick?

No. These pork buns, which are a throwback to Beijing kaoya, are brilliant. Seductive. Orgasmic. The bun itself was just strong enough to hold everything together, but not a doughy mess. The magic is in the pork belly. Tender and fatty and umami 5 times over, the belly oozed with juices which dripped onto my plate. Now, it's not too hard to see why customers hail Chef Chang.

momofuku ramen - pork belly, pork shoulder, poached egg - $15

But all is not brilliant inside Chef Chang's adobe. The momofuku ramen is one of lesser ramens in the grand scheme of Asian cuisine. The broth relies too much on Chang's favorite food — pork — and translates into something uncomfortably smokey and short-breathed. While some might say this is Chang's way of upping the game of a classic dish, I think he goes too far here and fails to capture the essence of what a bowl of ramen should be: comforting and deep. I'd take the $5 soup in Chinatown at Lam Zhou over this bowl anytime.

smoked chicken wings, ginger, scallions, garlic - $12

These wings are a must not-try. Dry, flavorless and everything else that's wrong in between, these wings were all I needed to know that Chef Chang's $100 Fried Chicken Dinner is ridiculous.

I snagged a picture of some leftover fried chicken. Unless this chicken comes with a side of gold and a small fabergé egg, the cost-benefit ratio seems terribly askew.

So here's the deal. I hesitate to comment to much on Chef Chang and the empire he's built in under three years. I would first need to visit his other restaurant ($500+). But based solely on what I saw this night, I think Chef Chang's popularity might be over-played. There is no denying his pork buns are magical (I will return, but only order them), but if Chang expands his repertoire and menu with other dishes — as he has — they, too, must bring the heat and flaire like that of his signature dish.

Momofuku Noodle Bar

(212) 777-7773

East Village

171 1st Ave

New York, NY 10003

www.momofuku.com/noodle/default.asp

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 2 (Lunch), May be Ghetto, Definitely Great

2011-03-06T22:40:00.000-08:00

oxtail soup

Today was nasty day to walk in NYC. But being the food fiends my friends and I are, we braced the pelting rain to reach a remote noodle shop in Chinatown. At times we had to put our umbrellas in front of us to stay dry, but every minute or so a gust of wind would invert our umbrellas. By the time we reached the restaurant, our jeans were soaked and our shoes were practically two small swimming pools.

Lam Zhou Handmade Noodle & Dumpling is a hole in the wall. Seats and tables (maybe 15 people could fit in here) cling tightly to the sides of the this narrow restaurant. Straight ahead by the kitchen door a man twirls a large log of dough and occasionally slams it into the marble slab on the table in front of him. A booming WACK echoes through the restaurant. Nobody looks up because they're busy eating.

steamed pork dumplings

A plate of 12 (maybe more) dumplings costs $3. It's a wonder how this place makes money. But as for those dumplings, man are they good. The green onions really pull through. There's a tint of ginger coming from either the dumpling or the sauce. In the end it's the texture of the skin that's just soft enough, just sticky enough and just dense enough. Happiness.

A giant bowl of oxtail soup (top of post) is $5 but worth three times that much. While the hand-pulled noodles are fluffy and light, the broth defines depth. This isn't a soup that can be replicated with one hour and a list of ingredients. It's a soup that somehow reaches into the soul and puts it at ease.

Chinatown is lined with cramped restaurants just like Lam Zhou. No way they all operate on the same level, but it's comforting to think that each one has that potential to be unexpectedly memorable and unabashedly cheap.

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 1, This Is How You Do It

2011-03-05T18:09:00.000-08:00

at dinner: cooking the food ourselves over a grill at our table.

Post-Ping's, all of us were feeling the effects of eating 20 courses in a span of two hours. But, ladies and gentlemen, we are warriors trekking our way through the culinary jungle of New York City. There's no time to stop. We've come this far. Onward we go.

while walking around Chinatown, had some passion fruit bubble tea w. green tea.

fruity AND healthy. wonderful.

didn't order any but look — love how the grease from the hanging bird keeps the meat below moist.

cream cheese and seaweed. a simple combination but the cream cheese is unlike that philadelphia junk. this one is smooth, buttery and fluffy.

Dinner was at Gyu-Kaku, an upscale Japanese bbq restaurant in the East Village. A heavy emphasis on spot lighting and wood gives the place flexibility to transform into a dance club at any moment.

ahi tuna poke, wasabi soy marinade, bed of seaweed. I pity the fool who thinks they've had good tuna. firm yet soft, reminiscent of silk, clear and clean like the waters in Maui.

Gyu keeps the punches coming with this fantastic seared salmon in hot oil and a citrus sauce. ginger garnish. Not to be repetitive, but I pity the fool who thinks he's had real salmon. meaty and refreshing. the citrus sauce is alarming and bold.

chuck kalbi

sukiyaki bibimbap - beef, onions, rice and egg. a simple dish that's comforting, warm and very easy to eat.

chicken breast marinated in basil. the char marks from the grill are wonderful.

harami skirt steak

bistro harami hanger steak

duck in miso. while all of the meats above were tender, well-seasoned and overall very tasty, they did not register, taste wise, into some unknown blissful place I had never found myself. Korean bbq comes close enough. But this duck. THIS DUCK. Everything is so right, so umami.

I'm missing a picture of an excellent tuna avocado salad. If you're at Gyu, it's a must order cause that mayo-citrus-ginger dressing be off. da. hook.

Gyu-kaku is everything it claims to be and more. The chic interior matches the precisely-seasoned beef you cook yourself. The fish here is a revelation of what real fish should taste like, but the restaurant doesn't stop there. It goes a step further; it turns up the heat by deftly complementing freshness with simplistic combinations like soy and ginger.

Day 1 Thoughts: If the trip keeps going like this, I'm never leaving this city, for I belong nowhere else. Kthxbai.

Culinaring Through NYC: Day 1, Dim Sum

2011-03-05T17:25:00.000-08:00

the day started with a crusty croissant. buttery and soft.

It's 8:30 at night and at this moment I'm lying in bed exhausted by the mass of food I've consumed today. There's so much going on right now it's hard to write clearly and present a tidy image or taste of what has occurred this day. I'll reflect later, but for now here are the pictures with a few thoughts here and there.

I cannot post all of the things we ordered at Ping's Seafood Restaurant for fear of crashing the server. By my estimation we ordered approximately 20 dishes.

pork shumai. Delicate skin wrapped around moist, soft pork.

beef cheong fun - gentle rice noodles stuffed with beef and a surprising kick of ginger

this is when you know the restaurant is serious:

shrimp wrapped in bacon, fried in tempura batter.

absolutely brilliant. puff pastry with char sui (chinese bbq pork).

buttery, crunchy and salty all at once.

A more doughy take on pastry+char sui. Reminiscent of a boa.

the sign that a master is cooking in the kitchen. the rice noodles are light and delicate and, more importantly, translucent. cheong fun filled with char sui and cilantro. very addicting.

of all the dishes at lunch, the beef chow fun was the worst. noodles were seared well but overall the dish was severely under seasoned.

beef with crunchy noodles. I like my noodles to be crunchy but these were drowning in brown sauce. still good. beef was tender.

I <3> Ping's. The place is clean, classy and calm (relatively), all three qualities most dim sum restaurants lack. In many of the dishes it's clear there's a master in the kitchen. I'm also glad to report that my previous dim sum experiences weren't too far off track compared to NYC dim sum. Nevertheless, this was the best dim sum experience I've had. Ever.

Ping's Seafood

(212) 602-9988

Chinatown

22 Mott St

New York, NY 10013

www.pingsseafood.com

The City of Blinding Lights

2011-03-04T19:59:00.000-08:00

I've been in the city for less than 10 hours and already I think I can feel the energy radiating from the streets. Lights from endless rows of skyscrapers put a white cloud over the city. Do I belong here? Could this be the city of my dreams? Or is it just the place that can easily squash them?

First meal in NYC was pizza from Brick Oven Pizza in Tribeca. It was good. Certainly better than the processed junk Papa John's shovels out its doors and free from an artificial aftertaste, the hallmark of most fast-food chains or just chains in general. But this pizza was not profound or revolutionary. Antico in Atlanta holds on to its #1 spot for another day.

NYC Itinerary

2011-03-01T13:19:00.001-08:00

In anticipation for the week of gorging I've arranged, I've started running on the treadmill. It's probably too late to start, but let me deal with the things I tell myself to feel better. The schedule is so tightly packed I can't imagine not leaving NYC and having some grasp of its culinary culture. Below are the places I will dining at.

Balthazaar

Daniel

Del Posto

DiFara's

Grimaldi's

Gyu-Kaku

Ippudo Ramen

Jean-Georges

Joe's Shanghai

Katz Deli

Lombardi's

Momofuku Noodle Bar

Motorino

Ping's (Dim Sum)

Do you think I'm wasting my time at any of these places? Am I missing something? Comment below.

To the Heart of the Heat

2011-02-25T13:26:00.000-08:00

Spring Break. I'm going to NYC. For someone who obsesses over food, it's surprising I haven't visited the city before. That all changes in two weeks.

Let's talk expectations.

It is impossible to capture the city's culinary scene in seven days, but I will make the most of the time and stomach capacity I've been given. NYC is the heart of America's best, a place where trends start and where the best makes names for themselves. Above all things I expect to be enlightened. It could happen in Daniel — for $230, I honestly should leave the restaurant wailing joyously over the food, but that probably won't happen — or it could happen in a sketchy hole in the wall. Doesn't matter where, but at some point some restaurant has to upend my understanding of food. I want to leave NYC with a new definition of good, better and best.

Here's a list of places I plan on visiting.

Lunch

Del Posto (4 Stars NYT, 1 Michelin)

Joe's Shanghai

Pizza (will visit 4 places in one afternoon)

Balthazaar

Ping's for Dim Sum

Gyu-koku

Jean-Georges (4 Stars NYT, 3 Michelin)

Dinner

Daniel (4 Stars NYT, 3 Michelin)

Maybe those of you reading this can help me out here. Got any ideas/comments? Comment below. Much appreciated!

Review: Polite & Unoffensive

2011-02-25T11:20:00.000-08:00

Rating: 3 out of 5

How do you feed the wealthiest, prettiest and oftentimes most famous faces in America? It's a daunting question but one that the restaurant in the Beverly Hills Four Seasons cannot avoid. Culina bills itself as a "modern take on classic Italian" and the contemporary interior doesn't say otherwise. The food sings a different tune and falls short of embracing the notion of the modern, save for the fancy breadsticks.

Culina is a beautiful restaurant filled with beautiful people. A dark limegreen and oak wood color scheme is current, clean and classy. There is track lighting and crystal everything everywhere. People feel comfortable here and where the lighting is dim, the old elite take pleasure in eating under the shadows. The new elite take the big tables, cover them in half-finished bottles of champagne and white wine and text on their blackberries. What's for dinner? They don't really care.

Piccoli Patti - $12

I do care. Navigating through Culina's menu takes time. There are lots of choices, all sparsely described and all carrying tasty potential. I started with a three plate "piccoli piatti," which is to say three small servings of my choice of cheese, vegetables or meat. I decided on crimini mushrooms with chianti vinaigrette, artichokes with rosemary and lemon and red beets with sicilian pistachio (?!). At this point you expect me to describe the flavors of the three vegetables. Sadly, there is little flavor to tell you about. The beets were beets, the artichokes were bland and the mushrooms were unappealing. There is nothing going on here. Look away.

Crudo Sampler - $23

I continued with a crudo sampler of salmon seasoned with caper salt and a blood orange, ahi tuna with ginger oil, coriander seed and lemon salt and yellowtail with star anise oil and orange sea salt. There is little to say about the ahi tuna but the salmon and yellowtail deserve blog space. The salmon was remarkably tender and fresh and worked well with the blood orange. Both the salmon and the orange came through at the right moments. The yellowtail is special because this was my first time trying orange salt. It is exactly that too, tasting like an orange and then like salt. The rapid switch from sweet to salty with the fish was refreshing.

Bucatini alla Carbonara - $20

Finished with pasta carbonara (pancetta, scallion, black pepper, egg ). The thick noodles, the yokey egg, and the black pepper embodied the spirit of carbonara. Too bad the dish was so heavily salted. Enjoyable but I needed several glasses of water to reach the bottom of the bowl.

So how do you feed pretty people? The answer is with spa food, polite food. Stuff that doesn't get messy or ugly on or off the plate. Flavors are straightforward without being bold. There are no surprises at Culina, and that's not a bad thing for a restaurant in a hotel, emphasis on the hotel.

Culina at Four Seasons Beverly Hills

(310) 273-2222

Beverly Hills

300 S Doheny Dr

Los Angeles, CA 90048

www.culinarestaurant.com

In-N-Out, California Style

2011-02-24T21:46:00.000-08:00

If there's room, then fill it. Post-Bazaar my sister and I balanced out our classy 7-bite dinner with a messy cheeseburger from In-N-Out, California's favorite fast food son. Before walking in I texted my friend Zach about what to order. His response: "Get a double double. I know you'll like it animal style. They'll know what you mean."

"Zach's drunk," I thought to myself. The menuboard at In-N-Out didn't help either since it had little more than "cheeseburger andhamburger."

Well, animal style is real thing. You can find on Wikipedia an entire "secret menu" for In-N-Out. "Protein-Style" is a burger with lettuce for a bun, a "3X3" is a burger with 3 patties and 3 pieces of cheese. Animal style (I ordered this on the fries after I asked the cashier if that was real) is chili and cheese on top of the fries. The place, by the way, was packed. There were tons of people working the kitchen (for a fastfood) and an equal number of hungry teenagers ordering.

What I like best about the burgers are the onions and grilled bun. Usually onions at fast food places bother me and the bread is never grilled, but there's something wonderfully clean about these burgers. There isn't an after-taste of guilty grease. The thousand-island-like sauce is also integral to this burger.

Not a fan of the fries. They reminded my sister and me of cardboard. They weren't greasy or salty, though, which is a huge plus for a fast food chain living in the same state as Alice Waters.

Overall - yes. Cool place, wonderful burgers for a fastfood chain. Let's hope In-N-Out expands out of California (but can still maintain their quality...)

How Bazaar: A Dinner with Houdini

2011-02-12T22:51:00.000-08:00

Cotton Candy Foie Gras

I am unsure how to begin this post. I am equally unsure of what I'm going to say since I have yet to grasp what happened at Jose Andres "The Bazaar," a culinary mecca in LA known for molecular gastronomy.

Molecular gastronomy is what happens when a chef and a chemistry major have a child. The two fields merge to create dishes home cooks have neither the skill nor the equipment to make. Liquid nitrogen, food syringes, grills that freeze foods instead of burning them — what person has time for this after work?

These foods are all edible, many of them wonderfully so, but unless you've been to, I'd say, five or so restaurants serving this stuff, it's near impossible to gauge how good of a job they're doing. Without perspective, anything is skewed. For me, this was an amuse-bouche test run. Since the main restaurant was fully booked, I ate at the bar.

Bagel & Lox

A paper-thin cone (the bagel) filled with herbed cream cheese and salmon in the form of caviar. The saltiness from the salmon — the orbs literally explode in your mouth — combined with the creamy cream cheese was alarming. And then without another word, the flavors disappeared as if a palette cleanser had slipped its way onto my tongue.

Japanese Tacos - BBQ eel, shiso leaf, cucumber, wasabi, chicharro

A bit unimpressed by the flavors in this one, although the contrasting textures were great: crunchy nuts, the soft wrap, the chewy eel. The taco was no bigger than the fist of a 7-year-old. Delicate.

Cotton Candy Foie Gras

This dish is difficult to understand from a structural strandpoint but that doesn't mean it wasn't enjoyable. First question: why the cotton candy? Definitely there's a wow factor to combining carnival food with French high-society. Theatrics aside, the airy cotton candy disappeared from the tongue seconds before biting into the foie gras. The candy served as a rapid palette cleanser

People who have experienced a molecular gastronomy version of a dish often say it is like eating the dish for the first time. I'd have to agree with them. The foie gras was pure foie gras without any distractions.

tuna ceviche avocado roll - Jicama, micro cilantro, coconut dressing

Instead of the traditional seaweed, the tuna was encased in thin slivers of avocado. The coconut dressing worked extremely well with the avocado, a combination that in theory seems awkward. Unfortunately the tuna was not the freshest I've had. But like the previous dishes, flavors were pronounced before disappearing....

Bunuelos - cod fish fritters, honey aoili

I am not cod's biggest fan, but I can appreciate these fritters. The honey aoili was an intense sauce for the fritters which were filled with soft, flaky pieces of cod. The batter wasn't greasy at all. Good but not memorable.

croquetas de pollo - chicken and béchamel fritters

Chef Andres loves to fry things. Thank goodness he's good at it. The croquetas were straightforward chicken and bechamel. Good but also not mind blowing like the foie gras.

Philly Cheesesteak, air bread, cheddar, wagyu beef

Now here's something. So you're asking yourself, "What is air bread?" Honestly I was surprised I was served something that even resembled bread. The inside was a different story. The inside was filled with ... (dramatic pause) ... air. Then out of nowhere there's a flood of cheddar cheese. The beef didn't hold up so well against the cheese in terms of balanced flavors, but it was still very good.

So you could make an argument that gastronomy is nothing more than expensive hot air. I will admit that it is expensive ($100 excluding tip, including $12 valet fee) and that afterwards I had an In-N-Out burger (another post), but there is also something mysterious about this new movement.

No, this isn't a place to take the family or that one relative who just wants a well-done steak with mashed potatoes. All the wealthy LA showoffs aside, The Bazaar is a place for people who want to learn and taste something new. The Bazaar serves "Houdini food" and there are lessons to be learned from all the magic.

The Bazaar By Jose Andres

(310) 246-5555

Mid-City West

465 S La Cienega Blvd

Los Angeles, CA 90048

www.thebazaar.com

I'm in Los Angeles, B****

2011-02-11T13:30:00.001-08:00

The JC Burger - $24

Beverly Hills, specifically. The Four Seasons to be exact.

This place is not a real one, and at any moment I expect to be plucked from this wonderland and thrown back into my dorm room. I had lunch at the hotel's Culina, a pretty place filled with prettier people. Sitting in the patio, I felt surrounded by real housewives and Entourage-esque associates.

On my left: "something something Chris Brown's contract something something Bob Siegal something something pain in the ass/so-and-so threw me under the bus.

The woman proceeded to remove, what looked like, a fistful of crabmeat from her salad. She didn't want it. She wanted shrimp instead, and so shrimp was served. My two waitresses were distinct in that the first one was hiding behind a Great Wall of Makeup and the other resembled Michelle Obama. The bread boy served me a single piece of rosemary focaccia (mediocre) out of a wooden tray before pouring a small puddle of olive oil (forgettable) next to it. The waterboy seemed distraught that I didn't want a new glass when I needed a water refill. Seriously? Another glass?

But how about that $24 burger? Fantastic. A short rib burger with Maytag blue cheese, and onion straws — longing juices were flowing all over the place and that was just the patty. The cheese was sharp and heavy and the meat itself was a manly medium-rare. And the fries. Oh the fries. An insurmountable pile of shoestring fries seasoned with rosemary and salt were addicting. The combination is so simple that I don't why I haven't had such fries anywhere else.

Was this meal worth the $31 spent (+tip). Yes. I'm stuffed to the seams with satisfaction.

DUC of the Day: The Food of Andalusia

2011-02-08T20:04:00.000-08:00

So this lovely sign was perched on the salad bar station, and I must say I am at a loss for words. Andalusian? I really want to know WHO writes these things. What exactly is their inspiration? A quick google search reveals that this is, in fact, a real dish according to "Real Food " magazine. A look through the ingredients shows that there's nothing "Andalusian" (an autonomous community of Spain) about this salad.

On another note, dozens of students are getting food poisoning. If I get food poisoning, I promise that I will post a tirade so vicious that Sodexho will literally have to take me to the Supreme Court before I take the post down.

Long live real food!

Review: Unamused.

2011-02-05T19:35:00.000-08:00

duo of duck

Rating: 2 out of 5

I suppose the exclamation mark in the name should have told me something.

You would think a restaurant that draws heavily from French influences might suffer from using too much butter or too much salt. Midtown's Amuse! breaks the mold and instead suffers from a severe lack of flavor in general.

One of the owners comes from Anis Cafe & Bistro, and so it was reasonable to have, in the least, satisfying exceptions for Amuse! The first few steps into Amuse! are unusual, if not blatantly awkward — to our right, a vast, empty lounge and bar area and to our left a hallway of tables leading into a more suitable dining room. For a Saturday night, the crowd was thin.

While service was appropriate, food was consistently under-seasoned. A watery French Onion Soup that lacked warmth, richness and depth and a fairly average charcuterie plate started the meal.

charcuterie plate. the pate is gritty and dry.

For entrees, a sauteed South Carolina Trout with a lemon butter sauce needed much more lemon and much more butter. And it was not the freshest of trouts I've tasted in recent memory. Liz ordered a duo of duck, which was the best dish of the night (not saying much considering the context). The duck breast was tender, although the sauce could have used more ... salt. The accompanying potatoes were purposely burnt and bland, possibly a good idea had the sauce also not been so reserved. There must be extremes before any balancing can occur.

The Awkward Dish Awards go to the Beef Tenderloin Au Poivre and the Fisherman's Stew. The former, while cooked a wonderful rare medium-rare, was doused in something best described as a glorified A-1 steak sauce. As for the stew, my disappointed friend repeatedly compared it to Listerine.

Amuse! should be much better than it is. When it first opened, the kitchen was perhaps more adventurous than it was skilled. Now, the food is straightforward French and yet every dish we tried was lacking in edge. Maybe if all of our dishes came with giant exclamation marks on the side the food would not have been so boring.

Amuse

(404) 888-1890

Midtown

560 Dutch Valley Rd

Atlanta, GA 30324

www.amuseatlanta.com

DUC of the Day: God is Crying

2011-01-24T21:40:00.000-08:00

Just when I thought the DUC had settled for repetitive, forgettable dishes, they come out swinging with this dish from hell. I would bake 50 cakes and top them all with gummy bears just to see who thought of this apocalyptic creation (and how they thought of it).

What is it? It's pizza. With chicken. With coleslaw. Yes, I said it. Coleslaw. Now I'm all for the avante-garde, but MY GOD. And let's be honest here. They obviously didn't make coleslaw just for this pizza. Most likely a few cups of coleslaw got lonely over at the salad bar and decided to get cozy in the pizza station.

And for the sake of fancy, there's feta cheese creeping under the slaw. In case you were wondering, it tastes as bad as it looks.

Fishing for Pho

2011-01-15T21:25:00.001-08:00

This semester I'm looking to delve into the East. Vietnamese, Malaysian, Indian — basically any cuisine that doesn't involve foie gras, raviolis or hamburgers. Buford is swarming with raunchy hole in the walls, and I want to see what these joints are cooking. I run the risk of trifling stomach aches and awkward mishaps with non-English speakers, but at the end I hope to find diamonds in the rough.

brisket pho (pronounced like the beginning of fu**)

In my quest to discover the secrets of the Orient, I started with pho, Vietnam's national treasure, at Pho Bac next to Penang. Maybe it's because I can't read or speak the language but Vietnamese menus have always challenged me, a roll-a-dex of variations upon variation of dishes which sound the same, have similar ingredients and fall under names which no dignified being would ever try to pronounce.

Searching for the best pho, or the best of any cuisine, calls for an inside man, at the least someone who grew up living and breathing the stuff. For that reason I went with my Vietnamese friend who ordered for the both of us. I asked him what just happened. He said he ordered the special. The special? I didn't see any "special" on the menu or on a board.

But apparently these mysterious specials exist because in minutes our waiter was balancing two watermelon-sized bowls of soup and a plate of fresh basil, sprouts, cilantro and lemon. We added these into the soup, a squirt of hoisin, a squeeze of Sriracha.

My experience with pho is near non-existant. But with this single bowl I felt closer to it than any other creature on the planet. The deep, aromatic broth provoked the fondest of memories. The fresh herbs and slurpy vermicelli noodles washed away my concerns for school. $6.50. That's the cost of warm winter memories by the fireplace. Before bracing the winter storm, a milky taro root bubble tea.

Ladies and gentlemen, I heart pho.

Pho Bac

(770) 986-4273

Chamblee

4897 Buford Hwy

Chamblee, GA 30341

So Good It Hurts

2011-01-14T22:37:00.000-08:00

It was 30 minutes past midnight, and my mother and I were jumping up and down in the kitchen like Teletubbies playing hide and seek on a hillside. Shrills of joy filled the house. Tonight was a special night. We had finally done it, never to be haunted again by that one disastrous mid-summer night in May.

last may...tumors don't even look this bad

What am I talking about? I'm talking about souffles. These are, forgive my language, bastardous (is that a word?) little things, prone to cracking and often suffering from the same problem that afflict men over the age of 50: impotence. Tonight, though, my mom and I did it. We stayed the course and have produced restaurant-quality souffles.

i'm a slaaaaaaave for you... (somebody is going to get this reference)

LOOK. It's so pretty. And puffy. And it didn't sink like the Titanic. Out of principal I ate the entire souffle in under seven minutes. I didn't need to, but I felt that eating the entire dish would be the only way to show respect to this marvelous creature.

Special thanks to my big sister (food related, not blood) for the recipe. Also out of principal I'm keeping this recipe under lock and key. Uh oh, stomach hurts. Gotta run.

Wine Whining: The Poised Diver

2011-01-12T21:47:00.000-08:00

I will never write wine reviews for a living. Kudos to anyone who can taste layers of papaya adorned with crisp cinnamon under an ocean floor as blue as the Great Barrier Reef, but from a purely journalist/writing perspective, the reviews are as inaccesible as OJ's innocence. I've decided that whenever I come across a review that has more...flare... than others, I'd share it. And now, let us begin this series which I will call "Wine Whining."

Here's Wine Spectator's take on a Krug Grand Cuvee Brut Champagne (95). The stuff is good. The writing is..well, what do you think?

A smoky, intense wine, with layer upon layer of coffee, roast nut, golden piecrust, ripe apple, honey and spice flavors. The richness is balanced by a focused freshness, perfectly poised like a high diver about to jump, standing above the crowd and showing the interplay of power and control in an elegant package. Drink now through 2026." (Insider, 11/3/10)

Waving Goodbye to Old Memphis

2011-01-12T18:12:00.001-08:00

popovers with strawberry butter

Today I showed my respects to the well-established Paulette's, a restaurant that represents memories of old Memphis like no other. In the coming months, Paulette's will move to Currents' spot in Harbor Town, where I doubt even the best restaurants can thrive. It's secluded and out of the way, unlike it's current spot in front of Studio on the Square.

I hadn't been to Paulette's since freshman prom. The inside, as it has since I can remember, looked old-school, and all of the clientele certainly had already established their wills. The place smelt rustic and worn-dorn and even the hostess looked tired, her shoulders hunched over as she flopped her feet all the way to our table. Our waiter eventually made an appearance and with the exception of the extra popovers he gave us, was useful only as an excuse vending machine. An awkward one at that. He talked to his shoulders, mentioned he got distracted talking to another waiter, got busy doing something else (there were only four tables in the restaurant).

hungarian gulyas

Paulette's kitchen is recipe-driven, and it shows. From the fluffy popovers with strawberry butter to the homey hungarian gulyas to the buttery chicken sicilian, my memories were refreshed, but not updated with newer flavors or different preparations.

I don't have any memories of Paulette's in the older days so in that way I'm not sad the restaurant is moving. What saddens me is the number of restaurants that have moved or closed in the recent years. I can only hope that newer blood comes to revitalize a city very much in need of culinary exploration and consistency.

Paulette's

(901) 726-5128

Midtown

2110 Madison Ave

Memphis, TN 38104

www.paulettes.net

Review: Larger Than Life

2011-01-12T17:55:00.001-08:00

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Not even the economy can shrink the portions over at Brooklyn Bridge Italian Restaurant. Everything is still very much the way I remember it ten years ago. Pizza slices are still as large as ever. The inside has undergone some updating, no longer a shabby hole in the wall (contrary to internet pictures), but now a cozier, smaller and upper-scale themed Olive Garden.

The food here is good and reasonably priced. Splitting hairs, the caesar salad dressing barely qualifies as caesar and could use more kick, and the raviolis are cut into unusual half-moons, albeit tasty. The Porcino pizza, while monstrous, lacks flavor despite toppings of pesto, sundried-tomatoes, mushrooms and gorgonzola cheese. It's more bread than anything.

But this is all still how I remember Brooklyn Bridge from way back when: not great or subpar, but large and filling. Kudos to them for staying in business this long.

Brooklyn Bridge

(901) 755-7413

Germantown

1779 Kirby Pkwy

Memphis, TN 38138

Review: I No Speak Any Engrish

2011-01-11T23:23:00.000-08:00

Rating: 4 out of 5

some poor chicken is missing his left foot

I stormed into the bathroom, desperate to relieve three glasses of water. Hearing no movement, seeing no people, I went to the closest stall where the door was wide open. BAM. An old Chinese man sitting on the toilet, his long face staring at the wall, trying to relieve more than just water. I was in that stall and then I was out before he could fully turn to face me.

new location, new look, still populated with Asians. All good signs.

The last time I visited Asian Palace, I nearly threw up the rotten food right onto the lazy susan in the middle of the table. Since that fateful encounter, the restaurant closed on Covington and reopened on Summer Avenue, thus signaling a new era in it's long, storied history from the days of great wedding banquets.

Asian Palace's new home is a sharp change from it's previous location. Warehouse concrete stands in place of that nasty old carpet and natural sunlight in place of traditional Chinese lanterns dangling from the ceiling. The food, it seems, also has been recreated and refined back into shape.

fried taro root - delicious

On one Saturday afternoon, I visited Asian Palace with my grandmother for dim sum, fully aware that a key to getting better service is knowing the actual language. The meal started with tough, flavorless meatballs but afterwards quickly picked up pace. Crunchy sesame balls filled with red bean paste, fatty chicken feet with as much flavor as there were bones, savory deep-fried taro root — it was all great and, as my grandmother assured me, all real. No gimmicks. No fried rice floating around. Nobody looking for eggrolls.

By far the best dish was a plate of thin sheets of rice noodles with bits of char siu tucked inside. The noodles — soft, gentle, fresh — were complemented by a lightly flavored (ginger, soy sauce, sesame oil? I dunno) sauce. The dish was so simple yet so addicting. It was heroin on a plate (in drug speak).

egg custard tarts

We ended the meal with these egg custards, a dessert so ridiculously fattening Paula Dean must have been a part of the original recipe. The crust is made from lard so the result is a dense, buttery, rich treat that's so wrong your arteries actually weep tears.

I left Asian Palace on a full and satisfied stomach, not an easy task when it's tapas-style Chinese food. Afterwards I took my grandmother to the Chinese grocery store where she talked with the store owner.

It was a good day to be Chinese.

Asian Palace

5266 Summer Ave.

Memphis, TN 38122

(901) 766-0831

Review: You'll Never Leave Hungry

2011-01-11T01:27:00.000-08:00

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

black eyed pea fritters w. tomato/bacon broth

It is very hard not to like Au Fond Farmtable. Unlike Chef Ben Vaughn's Restaurant Grace, which came and went like last year, it's down-to-earth breakfast neighbor seems to be making a name for itself in Memphis. The morning farmhouse decor is wonderfully complete and fashionable. And the food is good. When it's not, the affordable prices quell any unhappiness.

pimento cheese sandwich

I've been to Au Fond twice, once for lunch and once for dinner. The pimento cheese sandwich, which seems to have captured the hearts of many Memphians, is an excellent rendition of a dish usually too salty and too sharp. The cheese is creamy and warm, and the grilled bread goes along well. The fries, while tasty, could be less greasy.

philly cheese steak

What is this? The philly cheese steak was one that must have come from a different kitchen. Bland, clumsy and looking like a cook decided to reheat yesterday's yesterday leftovers, this poor buggar paled in comparison to the pimento.

The restaurant had been serving dinner for only three nights when I visited. On a brisk Friday, the crowd was sparse and yet service was painfully slow. They're new at it so I guess that's okay.

pork rilletes

As for the food, dishes were tasty and filling, the portions extremely agreeable. Pork rillettes did slain pigs across America justice, a straightforward marriage between fat, pig and more pig. A soup of black eyed pea chili is perhaps better as an idea than a dish. It's temperamental and fiery but flavor lacks, leaving behind a trail of spice and awkwardly tough black eyed peas.

The best appetizer and dish of the night were the black eyed pea fritters. You may not like black eyed peas, but you'll like these. You HAVE to. Chef Vaughn manages to strip the peas — lightly battered and fried — of their gritty, waxy nature, replacing them with a creamier, smoother texture. The tomato and bacon broth lands the final punch for a bite that's classy, upscale, southern and familiar all at once (picture at top).

steak frites

Entrees were unimpressive, but not to say they were bad. The kitchen serves a big and burly farm burger and the steak frites is giant, but both come with issues. The patty is too dense to be cooked and retain any moisture. The steak is served smothered in a sauce of worcestershire and red wine cream, but even that's not enough to hide how poor of a cut of meat this is. It's riddled with gristle and sleeping in puddles of oil. But hey, it's $12 and tasty. The farm omelette is also large enough to satisfy any hunger pains but overpowered by red bell peppers.

blueberry cobbler ($5)

Across the board, Au Fond's desserts are well done. The chocolate cake is a dense, moist chocolate affair, the apple pie simply delicious and the blueberry cobbler a refreshing change from the standard cobbler. Blueberries swim in a watery sauce made of...blueberries.

I give Au Fond 3.5 stars with a strong desire to one day be able to give 4. There is good stuff coming out of this kitchen, but there's also inconsistency lurking behind the salt shakers.

Au Fond Farmtable

(901) 274-8513

Midtown

938 South Cooper Street

Memphis, TN 38104

www.aufondmemphis.com

Vegetarian Delights

2011-01-09T23:32:00.001-08:00

creme fraiche, gouda cheese, pear butter

It's customary to have a general distaste for vegetarians, especially the ones who accuse others of being barbarians ruining the world economy one cow at a time. Religious beliefs and health concerns are more acceptable reasons for shunning a juicy beef tenderloin wrapped in bacon.

Recently, I've had to cook for said vegetarians, and sometime last week I decided it was time to come up with a few dishes that would appease these tofu-loving-but-really-they-hate-tofu denizens.

mexican corn: lime, parmigiano-reggiano, avocado

The inspiration for this corn dish comes from Deli Mexicana. Deli takes corn on the cob and envelops it in some kind of cheese (mayo somewhere in there). One bite catches an explosion of salty cheese and tangy lime. Here is a close rendition of that dish.

asparagus with poached egg, dijon mustard sauce, bacon

The combination is right, but my execution was off. The mustard sauce needed to be stronger and next time I should use pancetta. On an unrelated note, poaching an egg has to be one of the sexiest kitchen moments. Watching the egg wrap around itself...

Recipe for Creme Fraiche w. Gouda & Pear Butter

Assemble crackers, spread fraiche over, top with gouda cheese (cut into square), drop small amount of pear butter (I bought it from a local farmer) on top.

Recipe for Mexican Corn (a la Deli Mexicana)

Frozen Corn

Butter

Lime

Mayonnaise

Avocado

Salt

Melt several tablespoons of butter in pan, pour in frozen corn. Stir until heated through. Toss in lots of salt and juice from half of a lime. Apply small dallop of mayo. Taste and season with lime + salt until satisfied. After plating corn, shred cheese on top and layer avocados (garnish).

Recipe for Asparagus w. Poached Egg, Mustard Sauce)

Asparagus

Eggs (1 for every person)

Pancetta

[Find recipe to make Dijon Mustard Sauce]

Prepare asparagus by bending in half until breaks (where it breaks is where the tender/tough part divides). Saute asparagus in pan with butter. In separate pan, cook bits of pancetta. Finally, poach eggs by heating pot of water and swirling water (almost but not boiling) with slotted spoon. Crack egg into a small cup and slowly pour into swirling water. Pull out when it's cooked to your liking. Plate as you see above.

How High Can a Cupcake Go?

2011-01-07T22:48:00.000-08:00

banana cream pie. yes, it's really that big.

Silly. Silly, silly, silly.

These words rang through my mind as I surveyed the inside of Gigi's Cupcakes. German chocolate brown was the general color scheme, paired with brighter, Nickelodean-esque hues. Everything was so clean and smooth. So bright and cheery. It was Wisteria Lane without the drama. Or the cougars.

Then there were the cupcakes. Resting inside a small, glass showcase were tiers of cupcakes. But not just any cupcakes. Large cupcakes. Cupcakes with so much icing you would have thought the pastry chef was trying to recreate Marge Simpson's hair. The swirls of icing, layered on another level of icing, were endless.

sir, that's quite a large box you have.

I took a moment to gather my bearings before deciding on the Banana Cream Pie, a standard cupcake base filled with vanilla pudding and topped with banana cream cheese icing (I think). The lady behind the counter gently placed the lone cupcake inside a large box — the outside of which could have easily passed for a generous wedding gift — and sealed the top with a sticker.

"That'll be $3.24," the lady announced. I wondered how much cheaper the cupcake would be without the Neiman Marcus packaging.

Once in my car, I opened the box and then just stared. The cupcake was big, so big there was no way to actually grab it without messing up the icing. Note to self: box isn't functional.

All sexual innuendos aside, the behemoth was nearly impossible to handle. How could I get both the cake and the two layers of icing in one bite? Second note to self: this cupcake is unnecessarily large, probably even for the most skilled call girls. As far as flavor goes, the cake itself was dense and flavorless. The filling was better and the icing was, as you might can guess, excessive. Not necessarily too sweet, but so much that half of a cupcake was enough for one person.

I consider myself to be a clean eater. I once wore a white shirt to an Italian restaurant just to see how I'd handle spaghetti. Eating this cupcake, though, was messy. It were as if I had gotten into a fight with a baguette. Crumbs were everywhere.

I've only had one cupcake from Gigi's, but from what I've tasted and paid, this super-sized sweet factory isn't offering anything I find myself salivating over. Yeah the store is pretty, the packing is even prettier and the cupcakes look like sculptures, but for $3.24 a pop I could find better investments.

Gigi's Cupcakes

(901) 888-2253

East Memphis

4709 Poplar Ave.

Memphis, TN 38117

Falafel Cravings

2011-01-06T12:52:00.000-08:00

Rating: 4 out of 5

Aimer Shtaya welcomed us like long lost family members. We had never met him, and he certainly didn't know who we were, but that was clearly lost on him. We had come to his restaurant for dinner and that was enough.

Shtaya's Casablanca, located on Poplar across from Sherwin Williams, is not an oasis away from the Memphis hustle (and flow. Anybody? Anything?), but between the owner's dining room showmanship and a select number of dishes, it's worth the trip.

The chicken shawerma is a large purse of pita bread stuffed primarily with marinated chicken and near-raw onions. It's $8 and worth every penny. The baba ganoush is also good.

But it wasn't the chicken that had me knocking at the door two days later. It was the falafel. A plate of hummus and falafel the size of medallions for $6.50 called out to me one day after I had it for dinner. The falafel is neither too big nor too small, neither greasy nor dry. They're the best I've had so far. Taking the falafel and running it through a knob of hummus, the combination is wonderful.

Perhaps more impressionable than the falafel was Shtaya. He knows his dining room even when he doesn't, and could probably charm the stripes off of a zebra. He exudes a friendly confidence, the kind of man who walks up to a cozy couple and says, "So for every bite, did you make her say 'I love you'?" He had words even for the younger generations.

"I have a thought," I said as he walked up to my table. Before I could go on about dessert, he took my lead.

"I do too. In my country, a man can have four wives, but in this country he can only have one," he pronounced.

He is the kind of man who could sell an arachnophobe a bag of spiders. He explains that his chocolate mousse is to die for (good, but not to die for) and that the baklava is divine.

Regardless of how true these declarations are or how genuine Shtaya actually is, he is king of the dining room, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Casa Blanca

(901) 725-8557

East Memphis

5030 Poplar Avenue Suite 7

Memphis, TN

www.casablancamemphis.com

Who Wants a Cupcake?

2011-01-06T12:26:00.001-08:00

"This is the girliest place I've ever been in," my friend remarked. It really was.

As we walked into Muddy's Bake Shop, it were as if we had been transported to Alice's wonderland. We were small figures in a 5-year-old's dollhouse. Clothes hanging on the wall, tea sets sitting underneath. Lima bean green and sunflower yellow painted the walls and behind a large display case of cakes, pies and cupcakes, a handful of felines with aprons wrapped around their waist. Against the wall on the right, white, square tables.

If the Easter Bunny were an interior decorator, Muddy's Bake Shop was one of his clients.

Cupcakes have been trendy for some time now, and the most common flaw between shops would be the excessive icing that dwarfs the actual cake. A tall, swirly monolith of sugar with little culinary value other than physical appeal.

From the cupcakes I've had at Muddy's, many reach absurdly sweet heights while others skirt on the edge. At the moment, my favorite is the Banana-Peanut Butter Cupcake. While the peanut butter icing is two steps too sweet, the banana cake is right in line with what a banana cake should taste like. The lady behind the counter said she eats one everyday for breakfast.

I could have guessed that much.

Muddy's Bake Shop

(901) 683-8844

East Memphis

5101 Sanderlin Ave Ste 114

Memphis, TN 38117

www.muddysbakeshop.com

Review: A Delicious Delicias

2011-01-03T14:04:00.001-08:00

Rating: 4 out of 5

For now at least, the upper echelons of Memphis cuisine are unappealing as they are unsatisfying. It has been my primary issue with this town for some time, and since returning to Memphis for winter break, I have retreated to the lesser known restaurants in the groggier parts of town. Las Delicias is one of those restaurants, and while the name might lack creativity, the food is in no short supply of flavor.

I admit my first time at Las Delicias was painful. In no way was the experience a reflection on the food. Before walking in, a terrible stomach pain plagued my stomach. Why I thought Mexican food would cure me, I cannot explain. My second trip with four of my friends was what all dinner night-outs should be like. Five high school buddies in college, gobbling down salsa and Delicias' wicked guacamole dip that is so simple yet so tasty. A cold, refreshing Sangria to wash down the chips and then comes two chorizo tacos and a chicken tamale. Both teem with spice and demand attention. For dessert, a moist tres leches cake. At this point I didn't have any room for cake but I made some. No regrets.

In addition to serving non-Tex-mex, straight up Mexican food, service runs at Mach Five. Salsa and chips, drinks and guacamole hit the table before you think about them and refills arrive before they're needed. When it's time to pay the bill, more joy ensues. You've ordered about 6 items and the total is $18.

If only all meals this tasty could be so cheap...

Las Delicias Mexican Bar and Grill

(901) 458-9264

East Memphis

4002 Park Avenue

Memphis, TN 38111

Childhood Indulgences

2010-12-25T23:45:00.000-08:00

grilled cheese of gouda, white cheddar, tomat-basil soup in background

Underneath my budding love for white tablecloth and palette cleansers, I have a peculiar love for cheese puffs, Cheez-its and, of course, grilled cheese. All three are throwbacks to my childhood and no matter how fancy of a place I will eat in, it's always the right time for any of these.

For Christmas day lunch, I kept things simple because I don't operate well in the morning. I reheated a tomato-basil soup I made ahead of time two nights ago and put together a grilled cheese sandwich using gouda and white cheddar.

And now for a brief expose on bread.

A grilled cheese is extremely simple (two ingredients: cheese and bread) and so in order to elevate the sandwich, you must use higher-quality bread and other cheeses besides Kraft singles. For a grilled cheese sandwich, I believe one of the best breads is a rustic italian loaf. Reason being that the bread is not as dense as say, white bread, and so it doesn't soak up the butter like a sponge. Instead, the rustic italian loaf becomes toasty

Today I had to use a dense bread (English loaf?) because Fresh Market didn't have anything else. While the sandwich was good, the bread absorbed too much of the grease and butter.

And when you're cooking the sandwich, I prefer to toast up one side in the pan before throwing it in the oven to let the cheese really get gooey.

Also, the white cheddar / gouda combination didn't turn out like I wanted it to. Gouda is a particularly grounding and solid cheese. You need a sharper, saltier cheese to counter the gouda and white cheddar just didn't do it.

Recipe for Tomat-Basil Soup (from Nordstrom)

http://www.food.com/recipe/nordstrom-tomato-basil-soup-58153

Christmas Eve Dinner

2010-12-24T22:15:00.001-08:00

oven roasted atlantic salmon, bed of caramelized onions

Tomorrow I'll be joining my uncle and other relatives up in Arkansas for Christmas Dinner so I decided to cook the special holiday meal tonight. I will be honest and say that tonight was bit hectic. A buerre rouge sauce (red wine butter) burned into oblivion and somehow time went by faster than it should have.

Typically, Christmas dinner is a 4 hour, 10 course affair, but since my brother wasn't able to make it down to Memphis — my brother being a speedy cook with actual restaurant experience. In this scenario, I usually just walk around with a spoon and taste things — I alone held the kitchen. I kept things simple at 3 courses, and although I was a tad slow, I think the food turned out as good as it should have.

risotto croquettes. Needs a garnish for looks. Other than that, tasty.

Appetizer was the traditional risotto croquettes with goat cheese. I made these last year and decided that these would become a family tradition. Basically it combines everything I love into one bite: goat cheese, risotto, fried breadcrumbs and tomato sauce. They are time consuming to make (stayed up until 3am rolling them), but worth the effort.

At the top of this post is the entree. I intended to cook mahi-mahi but since Fresh Market didn't have any, I ended up buying atlantic salmon, which isn't exactly one of my favorite fishes. It's generally too...fishy...but this fish was very fresh and after a run in the oven and stint under the broiler, turned out very well with the sweet onions.

roasted pears, ice cream w. chocolate bourbon sauce

Dessert was roasted pears with vanilla bean ice cream and chocolate bourbon sauce. I should have left the pears in the oven for another 5-8 minutes because they were still tough when I served them. Flavors though were nice, especially the chocolate sauce which was very easy to make.

Recipe for Risotto Croquettes

*Supplement goat cheese and little bit of cream cheese for the other cheeses. Italian bread crumbs are also acceptable. And for the risotto, you can season with salt, pepper, flat-leaf parsley, and parmesan-reggiano cheese.

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Cheese-Filled-Risotto-Croquettes-with-Tomato-Sauce-243304

Recipe for Oven Roasted Atlantic Salmon w. Caramelized Onions

Salmon Fillets

Salt

Pepper

Lemon Juice (freshly squeezed)

BUTTER

5 Large Onions

Milk

Soak salmon in milk for 5-10 minutes (makes fish less fishy tasting). Mix together melted butter and 2 tablespoons of lemon juice. After removing salmon from bath and soaking up milk with paper towel, baste salmon with the butter/lemon juice. Season with salt and pepper.

Roast in oven at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes (depends on thickness of fillet. Meanwhile, slice onions and caramelize in pan. Remove fish from oven, set oven to broiler (move oven rack to the top) and once when oven is ready, baste fish again in lemon/butter mixture and put into oven for another 3-6 minutes. When the top is nice and crusty (maybe even burnt on some parts), it's done. Serve fish on bed of onions.

Recipe for Roasted Pears w. Chocolate Bourbon Sauce

http://aveceric.com/recipe-Market-Table-Dinner-Social---Maple-Roasted-Pears-with-Bourbon-Chocolate-Sauce-49.html

[Insert Vulgar Word Here]

2010-12-23T22:08:00.000-08:00

The refrigerator is malfunctioning and is freezing everything I put into it. Of course that would happen before the big meal. I am beyond angry. It's more of an inner rage.

Bouncing Off the Walls

2010-12-21T14:10:00.000-08:00

I always order water at restaurants and rarely drink soft drinks. Maybe a coke to take down some greasy Chinese food. But lo' and behold last night I had some caffeine. Correction: A LOT of caffeine. Loco Cocao makes cocoa powder with 175 mg of caffeine per 8 oz. It is, as the package states, a "CRAZY AMOUNT of caffeine." To top it off, threw in a caffeinated marshmallow.

I don't know how much caffeine I consumed in one cup of hot cocoa + marshmallow but it was enough to make me bounce off the walls. Literally. I was physically climbing walls, trying to learn dance moves to Korean music videos and choreographing kung fu fight scenes. I also attempted to do backflips. On the flip side, I didn't fall asleep until 5 am. Try this stuff. It's cRAzY!!!

Links to the powder and marshmallow.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/drinks/e687/?cpg=ogc1&source=google_caffeine&gclid=CPS_-7uv_qUCFS9m7AodszmZpg

http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/candy/e59b/

Recipe: Mac & Cheese 'a la pretentious'

2010-12-21T13:32:00.000-08:00

Served up a nice 5-course meal with two of my friends last night. Most of the dishes made last night have made appearances on this blog before except for this mac and cheese. I'll chow down a gallon of kraft mac and cheese any day, but every once in a while this childhood dish needs, in the words of Beyonce Knowles, "an up-up-upgrade."

I'm naming this dish mac & cheese 'a la pretentious' because the recipe calls for black truffles, black truffle oil, cave aged cheddar cheese and comte cheese. Also, the first time I had this dish, I was sitting at a table on the roof of a high-rise in San Diego overlooking the city (See here).

I didn't use black truffles but, as the chef himself says, the truffles are optional. The flavors of this dish are classier and more refined. Comte plus truffle oil lends the dish to a nuttier edge. I suggest adding more aged cheddar cheese and pepper than the recipe calls for.

Macaroni and Cheese Mr. A’s Style

4 servings

5 ounces thinly sliced pancetta

2 cups heavy cream

2 ounces minced fresh black truffles, optional

4 cups cooked elbow pasta, cooled

1 cup shredded Comté or Gruyère cheese

1⁄2 bunch spoon spinach or baby spinach

2 tablespoons black truffle oil, or to taste

1⁄4 cup shredded cave aged cheddar cheese

2 tablespoons bread crumbs

Sauté the pancetta in a sauté pan until crisp. In a saucepan, heat the cream slowly with the pancetta and truffles, if using. Add the cooled pasta and simmer until hot. Add the Comté cheese and stir until melted. Add the spinach. The heat of the mixture will wilt the spinach very quickly. Drizzle in the truffle oil to taste. Place mixture in an ovenproof dish.

Preheat oven to Broil. Top the macaroni and cheese with the cheddar cheese and bread crumbs. Broil until golden, about 2 minutes.

(From chef Stéphane Voitzwinkler of Bertrand at Mr. A’s)

Recipe: Brussels and Shrooms

2010-12-14T22:43:00.000-08:00

People tend to dislike brussel sprouts and usually for good reason. The very thought might trigger a relapse back in time when a mother demanded the sprouts be eaten or else. These memories seem fairly common with most hated vegetables. I'm going to throw out an idea though. Maybe the problem wasn't the brussel sprout or the stalk of broccoli, but maybe — just maybe — the problem was your mom.

It's very likely her method of preparation was not respectful enough towards the vegetable. If all vegetables are prepared optimally, it seems natural to assume that they would all be good. Optimum preparation, of course, cannot happen every time.

salad of red lettuce & endive w. roasted brussel sprouts, almonds, vinaigrette

Anyway, for those who have already blacklisted a score of vegetables, it's probably too late for them to be converted, but I, for one, love brussel sprouts. I also love mushrooms. And so tonight was a celebration of both.

Salad of red lettuce, endive and roasted brussel sprouts in a vinaigrette was good. The brussel sprouts were just at the point of burning and were very crisp. Crunchy pecans pair well with brussel sprouts and the light vinaigrette was just light enough. My mistake was accidentally putting 1/2 teaspoon too much salt in the dressing (made the dressing too sharp). Otherwise, a pretty and delicious starter.

thin spaghetti w. sweet sausage in mushroom-tarragon cream sauce

Entree of thin spaghetti with sweet sausage and mushroom-tarragon cream sauce was good as well. I prefer sweet sausage to regular because the latter is saltier than it is tasty. The cream sauce was light and savory. My biggest mistake was not cooking the oyster mushrooms long enough (they were chewy in the pasta).

Ok — so dinner was good tonight, but I have a situation. The cream sauce was a good cream sauce. In fact, most of the cream sauces I've made have been good. But I want more than good. Put simply, I want to have a foodgasm over the table. I want the sauce to have depth like the Grand Canyon and longevity like a bonsai tree. Right now, my sauces are substantial but at the same time wispy — there for the moment, gone afterwards.

How do I take these dishes to the next level?

Recipe for Red Lettuce, Endive & Roasted Brussel Sprouts

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Frisee-and-Endive-Salad-with-Warm-Brussels-Sprouts-and-Toasted-Pecans-107362

Recipe for Spaghetti w. Sweet Sausage & Tarragon-Mushroom Cream

1/4 cup olive oil

1/2 cup diced onions

6 large garlic cloves, thinly sliced

1 1/2 pounds crimini mushrooms, sliced

1 cup Chicken Stock

Vermouth (optional)

1 1/4 cups whipping cream

4-5 slithers of tarragon

Butter to add at end

Sweet sausage

Package of thin spaghetti

Add oil to pan, medium-high heat. Throw in two or three pieces of garlic into oil and when they start to fry, add all onions and garlic to pan. After 3-4 minutes & onions are starting to brown slightly, add mushrooms and cook until mushrooms are tender. Pour in a few swishes of vermouth to deglaze pan (optional). Now add chicken stock and let sit for 1-2 minutes. Now add in whipping cream and tarragon. Stir before bringing heat down to low-medium.

Cook sweet sausage as instructed on package (just put it in a frying pan and constantly break the pieces apart). When sausage is done, soak up grease using paper towel. Then pour into cream sauce.

After letting pan simmer for 10 minutes or so, make slurry (water + cornstarch), bring mixture up to a boil and add in slurry while stirring. This will thicken the sauce.

Prepare your pasta (boil, blanch, drain). Take one serving size of pasta and mix it in with sauce. Plate the pasta. Eat.

The Perfect Scrambled Eggs

2010-12-13T13:24:00.000-08:00

sous-vide eggs

Perfect. Scrambled. Eggs. Let me begin by saying that many chefs consider eggs to be the most difficult ingredient to cook. Marco Pierre White, arguably the most talented chef to come out of Great Britain, interviewed chefs by making them cook an egg. Eggs are difficult to cook because they cook so quickly. Five seconds could take a perfect egg to slightly overcooked. Yes, the difference is minor to a household cook but it's still true.

When I cook eggs, I follow Gordon Ramsey's method of breaking the eggs into a cold pan, adding some whipping cream, beating the yolk and turning on the heat to low-medium. Occasionally I will take the pan off the heat. When the eggs are halfway done, I turn off the burner and just keept stirring, letting the heat already stored at the bottom finish the eggs.

everybody in a bag...but there's a problem...

A week ago, RJ informed me of a new way to cook eggs: Ziploc bags. Apparently in a men's health magazine, there was a recipe to cook eggs in a ziploc bag submerged in water. The article touted health benefits and fluffy eggs. I don't really understand why there would be health benefits but the idea was intriguing because it sounded like sous-vide.The recipe for the mixture is at the bottom.

So I put everything into a plastic bag, heated the pan+water to medium-high heat and watched it go. Actually, I didn't watch it. I started eating spinach dip with my back against the stove. Then I smelt something...

a melting bag. note to readers: be careful. do not let bag hang over the side.

Burning aside, after 10 minutes, these things were ready (see picture at top). I had to use a knife to cut open the bag but these still turned out perfect. The more scrambled part of the eggs did not just look fluffy, but they tasted so. The soupier eggs had a soft, gentle nature to them that I haven't tasted before. And because I didn't dirty the pan, cleanup was simple. No need to wash any pans.

Recipe for Perfect Scrambled Eggs

4 eggs

Salt

Cracked black pepper

Whipping Cream

Feta Cheese

Fill pot with water and heat to medium-high.

Crack 4 eggs into a bowl. Sprinkle of salt and crack black pepper. Pour in "some" whipping cream and feta cheese. Beat mixture together.

When water just starts to boil, put bag in the pot. BE CAREFUL. Don't let the bag hang over the pan. It will melt and burn your house down (or just make it smell).

After 8-10 minutes, eggs should be ready. You can tell by shaking the bag and seeing if the eggs on the outside are firm. If so, turn stove off, pour mixture into a bowl and mix to spread the heat (this will cook eggs a little bit more).

Try the recipe out and let me know how it goes.

Gnocchi Wars

2010-12-12T21:06:00.000-08:00

why, gnocchi, do you play me so?

It's good I know what I like, and when served a dish not within that spectrum, I can willingly and accurately complain like Bill O'Reilly. But possibly the hardest dishes to judge are your own. Your subconscious works against you. Today I did something that told me I can finally judge my own food as I would any other dish in a restaurant. But we're getting ahead of ourselves...

Today I started with a recipe that was supposedly a close imitation of Houston's Spinach Artichoke Dip. In general, the recipe is a good starting point, but by no means a near-bulls eye effort. Here's the recipe. Be sure to run the artichoke hearts under water to get rid of the nasty liquid they're floating in. I didn't dry them well enough and so that liquid messed with the dip. Also, 1/2 tsp. of salt is a fat lie. You need to add a lot more. And throw in some red pepper flakes for some spice.

With the dip finished, I moved on to making gnocchi. I try to make things I love to order in restaurants so I can stop being a sucker and ordering them. Case and point: short-ribs, which, while always tasty, are not difficult to make and don't really test a kitchen.

Ok, back to the gnocchi. Here's the plain truth: the experience was a nightmare. First of all, do you know how hard it is to peel a potato that's been boiling in hot water for 45 minutes? It's hot and not in a good way. Also, because I didn't boil them long enough, the potatoes weren't as soft as they should have been, a problem compounding another which was my lacking a potato masher. The result: clumps of potato with gooey flour alloverthekitchencounter!

And what happened when I put them in boiling water and waited for them to rise? Didn't turn out like any gnocchi I've seen. Twas' like mashed potatoes with flour.

**Throws everything into the trashcan**

That's when I knew I had reached "the" point. Last year I would have made some lame excuses and spent 30 minutes trying to turn it into something edible. But this time I knew it couldn't be done.

fancy foods!

But as you can see, this story has a happy ending. After throwing the gnocchi into the trash, I started making profiteroles — yet again another attempt to become a baker. For a first try, they turned out quite well. The profiteroles themselves need some sugar and probably only need 15 minutes in the oven (as opposed to the 20 minutes the recipe calls for).

Recipe for Spinach Dip

http://www.robbiehaf.com/Recipes/H/77.htm

Recipe for Profiteroles

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/03/dining/03minirex.html?ref=dining

Best Milkshake I Eva' Ate

2010-12-09T19:47:00.000-08:00

burnt marshmallow and nutella in the front | pistachio and white truffle in the back

I'm a sucker for milkshakes, and Richard Blais' Flip Burger is the one place that is in no short supply of milkshakes or creativity. Last time at Flip, I had the foie gras and key lime pie milkshakes. For the record, all milkshakes are made with liquid nitrogen. The foie gras was underwhelming, but the key lime pie was memorable enough to call my name tonight as I finished dinner at Hankook.

Well, tonight I had THE BEST milkshake ever. Flip's pistachio and white truffle is absurdly good. There's definitely some seductive almond extract in there that makes me weak at the knees. The pistachios blend well with the extract and aren't ridiculously nutty. Every sip or so you'll snag a salty pistachio that brings out the shake's sweetness. The white truffle (which I'm going to say was probably white truffle oil) was nowhere to be tasted.

The burnt marshmallow with nutella was an unfortunate let down that was more carcinogenic than it was chocolatey sweet. This shake is probably a clever play on the smore, but the drink is too clever for its own good.

Anyway, check out the pistachio and white truffle milkshake ($6). And as pretentious as this sounds, Blais has sold me on liquid nitrogen, as far as milkshakes go. The nitrogen gives the shake a lighter and icy-er texture that milk just can't give.

Review: Korean Tacos on the Cheap

2010-12-09T18:58:00.001-08:00

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Hankook Taqueria is a dive, by my prep-school standards, but a dive customers feel comfortable enough in to bring their own beer, maybe some merlot. Shout out to RJ who gave me the heads up.

Hankook recently made local news when it became the first restaurant to obtain a permit to sell food from trucks. Tacos on wheels, specifically korean tacos, is another trend from the east coast that, although not as quickly as froyo, is making its way into the south.

Hankook is fast and efficient, but most importantly, it's cheap. At $2.25 a taco, there's little room for complaining. That said, Hankook is a tasty street-cart joint paying rent in a neighborhood that's probably not safe to walk around at night.

All of the tacos I tried (beef, pork, chicken, fish) relied heavily on sriracha, a Thai hot sauce that's practically a household condiment. The sweet and spicy kicks from the hot sauce worked well up until the salt from the meat and sauce became too much. At times, the sriracha pulling more punches than the filling, but in general, the flavor was there and by taco #3, my stomach was starting to pump the brakes.

Fish tacos were a bit of a disappointment, and for a few bites I thought Hankook had served me a fish stick (it was a perfect shape for a fish stick). My friend's fish was shaped more like an actual fish which leads me to believe Hankook isn't serving fish sticks.

Anyway, Hankook is a good find. While the tacos aren't out of this world — and I hate to say, not tacos I would chase across town for —, they are nonetheless worth trying at least once.

Fryday Night Fry

2010-12-03T22:48:00.000-08:00

My puns are so sick I should be sued. But seriously, I spent Friday night with MF battering and frying everything from apple pie to avocados. As a general rule, if it can be eaten, it can be fried. Whether or not something fried strikes at the heart has little relevance. Just eat it.

apple pie

crab ragoons

coconut shrimp

pepperjack meatballs

Jimmy Deans Sausage Meets Cream Cheese Meets Tomatoes...Classy

Avocados

Taiwanese Chicken

Thanksgiving Dinner: Not So Traditional

2010-12-01T20:14:00.000-08:00

sun-dried-tomato jam with goat cheese spread

Turkeys are dry. There. I said it. And before you reach for the phone to dial that one relative who can cook a mean turkey, let me explain. I think that if I were to eat 10 turkeys, 8 of them would be dry. What about the gravy, you ask? Sure, the gravy makes it all better. But the turkey is still dry.

my first casserole! an attempt at potato dauphionoise

Most likely because my parents have owned restaurants intent on serving turnip greens, cornbread, mashed potatoes and even turkey, Thanksgiving at my house isn't a day where we celebrate with pounds of yams and rows of neatly-baked casseroles. It's really just a day to get together and cook a nice meal. This year, my siblings couldn't make it back home so this Thanksgiving dinner was more "normal" in a sense that I would have cooked these dishes on any other day.

haricot verts (yes I just went there) with herb butter

But in many ways, this dinner was very much like a traditional Thanksgiving dinner simply because the sides were far better than the entree. Let's not get ahead of ourselves though. The appetizer of sundried-tomato jam with goat cheese was very good. It really hinged on the balance between the goat cheese and jam. Too much of either one was not good.

My attempt to make potato dauphionoise was not a bad first try. I used fontina instead of the traditional gruyere because I had already spent $30 on cheese and didn't want to spend any more money at the store. What I liked most about this casserole was how it was not incredibly rich. You could have firsts but also keep going for seconds and thirds. Overall the potatoes were subtle, and most important, didn't send me running to the bathroom. The haricot verts were surprisingly excellent. They are, after all, just green beans and yet somehow this simple recipe of butter, shallots and a few other ingredients made this dish very tasty.

The entree of red fish with a feta-dill spread was not good. The recipe online looked very appealing but I guess I should pay more attention to recipes that call for lots of mayo...I was just looking at the picture...In retrospect I should have seen how the recipe was essentially a version of ranch dressing. Paired with fish? Eh...it was too dilly on top and not flavorful enough in the middle. But on the upside, that lemon in the picture is looking mighty fancy.

Recipe for Sundried-Tomato Jam

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/crostini-with-sun-dried-tomato-jam-recipe/index.html

Recipe for Haricot Verts & Herb Butter

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Haricots-Verts-with-Herb-Butter-240576

Recipe for Potato Dauphionoise

http://www.marriedtoadesi.com/2010/05/potato-dauphinoise-aka-potatoes-sliced.html

**note, I used fontina instead of gruyere and when I baked it, I just layered the sliced potatoes, put a layer of sauce, cheese and salt and then made another layer. Finished in the oven for an hour or so. I didn't do steps 6 & 7.**

Thanksgiving Lunch: Popovers & Quiche

2010-11-25T12:56:00.001-08:00

my dad wants to call these things "dimples" since they didn't "pop" as most popovers do.

Popovers with pear butter & a mushroom and fontina quiche. Rather easy to make and very fulfilling. Next time I'll be sure to add more mushrooms, onions and cheese to the quiche recipe.

Almost started Thanksgiving with an epic fail. After 20 minutes, I realized that the popovers were baking in the oven under the "pre-heat" setting. I quickly switched it to "bake" and let it go for another 10 minutes. Thankfully, the popovers still turned out great. This is, of course, after I accidentally burnt the butter in the cupcake tray and had to clean it (then add more butter) before filling it with the batter.

Popover Recipe

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/23/dining/231mrex.html?ref=dining

Mushroom, Fontina Quiche Recipe

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Mushroom-and-Fontina-Quiche-355191

Review: Where Everybody Has a Mustache

2010-11-22T23:05:00.000-08:00

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

I imagine mustaches have few social implications to anyone over the age of 25. For us young people, they are signs of puberty, masculinity and le hipster. Select genres of music and Kangol caps are other hallmarks, and if you know anything about le hipsters, you know that the "le" is completely unnecessary and just my attempt to be highfalutin (attempt #2).

So how does this relate to a restaurant? Midtown's Top Flr is a shameless hipster hangout where people wear Kangol hats, muted-colored blazers and, occasionally, sport a stache. Indie music that will never reach the airways fills the dining room, and somewhere between the narrow corridors of this two-story squeeze, good plates of food make their way to the table.

The menu has variety and on this visit I only had the opportunity to try two appetizers, entrees, sides and desserts. In general, these dishes ranged from "okay" to "very good" with an affinity for the former category.

The tuna tartar on paper thin sardinian flat bread was wonderfully spiced with a thai miso pesto. The avocado and lime aioli were refreshing complements. This was better than the fig mille feuille which attempted to combine duck confit and figs, an odd combination better imagined than realized.

I was in a meaty-mood that night and ordered the New Zealand lamb chops with mint syrup. Excellent. Cooked a perfect medium-rare with a nice crust on the edge of the chops, the lamb paired well with the succulently sweet mint syrup. And to all you vegetarians out there, I would veer away from the orange-apple tofu, a boring choreography with an already boring ingredient.

Top Flr's mac and cheese is different from any other I've had in a restaurant. Maybe it's the cheese, maybe it's the use of spinach — either way, between the spiciness there's a ring of cajun inspiration in this cheesy delight. The potato gnocchi was less inspiring as it was overcooked and under-seasoned.

For dessert, a bread toffee pudding that distinguishes itself from others because of its moistness and balanced flavor profile. Then there was this chocolate, peanut butter bar of sorts that was, as a whole, a poor dessert and, by the layers, even more disappointing. Eaten together the three layers were cavity-busters and eaten separately, the individual layers lacked flavor.

As for service, our waiters + busboys were very attentive. As entrees were served, our waiter acknowledged that the mac and cheese had been left in the oven too long, that they were making another one, and that it would be removed from the bill — all in one breath, mind you. I found myself trying to outdrink the waterboys who filled up my glass constantly. I managed to trick them only once and that was because I guzzled down the entire glass 5 seconds after they left my table.

In general, Top Flr is a good restaurant with reasonable prices, a distinct atmosphere and attentive service. The food is not mind-blowing or award-worthy but it's the kind of place you could eat at after a night of work in the office.

DUC of the Day: King of the Cake

2010-11-22T23:01:00.001-08:00

I think at this point, the DUC is just messing with me. There's no other plausible explanation for why gummy bears are sleeping on beds of icing. Maybe there was a nationwide fire-sale. ALL GUMMIES HAD TO GO!

But with the exception of this dessert, the DUC has been on fairly good behavior. It has become increasingly more difficult to spot the blatant mishaps that so often go on inside this cafeteria.

DUC of the Day: Language Fail

2010-11-13T21:01:00.001-08:00

Not sure how many people picked up on this one, but I did. Yesterday was the Unity Month dinner at the cafeteria, and so the DUC trotted across the globe with foods from different countries. For example, for Australia's "chicken on a barbi," they took boneless chicken breasts and speared them with sticks. On the other side of the world, chicken fajitas just scream South America.

But this is what I thought was really funny. Look at the "ASIA" category. It's "hen hao chi banh mi Vietnamese pork loin sandwich." Originally I read this as "Ho Chi Minh's Banh Mi." That honestly would have made more sense because if anyone out there knows Mandarin, "hen hao chi" means delicious in Chinese. So...why the Chinese adjectives with the Vietnamese nouns?

Review: There's Always Five Guys

2010-11-13T15:36:00.000-08:00

Rating: 3 out of 5

tuna crostini with pesto

Not long ago I gobbled down a double cheeseburger with fries from Five Guys at 10 p.m. on a Friday. This would not be news-worthy except that I did so after dinner at Miso Izakaya. No, Izakaya was not a failure, but it was a disappointing experience.

I should first say that I take some responsibility in not ordering enough food from the start. I was with three others, and we certainly should have ordered more than six dishes. However, I think our waiter should have warned us that six dishes wouldn't be enough. Ultimately, the blame falls on the kitchen which took an extraordinarily long time sending out dishes.

pork bun with bbq porkbelly

Tapas are meant to be served fast, like Spanish-salsa-dancer-thrusting-his/her-hips fast. Izakaya's dining room wasn't that busy, and yet food took an extraordinarily long time. One of my friends remarked that she didn't know if the food was that good since whenever a dish did finally mosey its way to our table, we could immediately devour it.

tuna, avocado roll. Good.

Service aside, Miso Izakaya has some good dishes. The pork bun with bbq porkbelly is quite good, but the bread itself comes across as a tad doughy, if not slightly undercooked. The tuna-pesto crostini is also good although the pesto overwhelms the tuna. The salt and pepper quail reminds me of asian-style chicken wings, and the creamed corn served with the scallops is excellent.

filet tips. mmm...

By the time all six dishes had come and gone, it was 10pm (2 hours), and I was still very hungry, feeling like I had only eaten appetizers and that an entree must be on its way. Had the kitchen not been so slow, I would have ordered more, but I feared waiting until midnight for anything else. The only comment our waiter had was, "I don't know why the kitchen is slow tonight" before walking off.

Will I go back? At some point I will. The food at Miso Izakaya is good and hopefully the slow service was just a mishap. There are some interesting dishes on the menu, and considering the place isn't too pricey (avg. $8 per item), it wouldn't break the bank to try them again.

Ok, I have to mention this. As we were paying, the waiter dropped of this vase at our table. An inedible flower with four frozen grapes. This is completely unnecessary and honestly just plain silly. I mean, I can put grapes in the freezer too.

Review: Bone Marrow, Fried Eggs, and Coke Floats — Oh My!

2010-11-13T14:54:00.001-08:00

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

I've now been to Farm Burger several times, and to be honest I'm a bit conflicted. Every time I stepped into the place I wanted to fall in love with its burgers, with its menu.

I don't think my feelings were unwarranted either. The menu is a playground of ingredients. It's a mix-and-match dream come true. House-cured bacon, oxtail marmalade, laura chenel goat cheese — the options are limitless, and we haven't even gotten to the appetizers (fried chicken livers, chicken croquettes) or the fries (sweet potato fries, beer-battered onion rings, fried with smoked paprike etc). So much creativity on one menu that it's hard not to keep coming back to try other items.

Having visited three time, I think that Farm Burger makes good burgers. In the grand scheme of restaurants, this is a sad designation since Farm Burger's menu has remarkable potential and is, in itself, not that ordinary.

No. 4 chicken burger with fried eggplant, arugula, red pepper goat cheese $9

I say "good" because the burgers are tasty and filling, but fail to make any impressions. "The Farm Burger" is a messy, $8 affair of cheese and onions, and while gluttonous, the burger is not beyond the reach of an everyday cook. Homecooks can probably get a better sear on their patty at home. The No.5 (braised pork belly, fried onion ring, pickled jalapenos, bbq sauce) is a disconnected overkill. Farm Burger loves its "grass-fed" beef so the need to blanket it with ingredients, which don't mesh well together, seems counterintuitive.

Moving beyond the beef, the No.4 chicken burger, sweet potato fries, onion rings and ginger-farmade float are delectable. The red pepper goat cheese pairs very well with the arugula and chicken, and the sweet potato fries are addicting. These dishes are good enough to warrant return trips.

Yet at the end of the day, it's all about the beef, the searing in particular, and in this respect, Farm Burger falls short. The menu is diverse enough, though, that you can find happiness somewhere between brisket chili and the wells banana bread beer float.

DUC of the Day: Le Cordon Blue

2010-11-04T09:11:00.000-07:00

Everyone has a right to his own opinion, but not his own set of facts. Fact: this is not what the father (or mother) of cordon blue had in mind. Cordon blue is chicken, wrapped in ham and cheese, breaded and fried. What we have here is a Tyson chicken patty, folded piece of ham, and cheese melted on top.

DUC of the Day: You Say Gyro, I say...

2010-11-02T12:01:00.000-07:00

I haven't had a DUC of the Day in a while. You might say I've been busy. This is true, but it's more than that. I've noticed that the DUC has tamed down on the lyrical menu writing. Also, the dishes haven't been nearly so "interesting." But they could only keep up the record for so long.

What you're looking at is, what the DUC deems, a "gyro." Pita bread that you can't even bend without it breaking in half, a watery tzatziki sauce, lettuce and...wait for it...shredded beef brisket (or something along those lines). Not even gyro meat... Why? Say it ain't so...

Review: Dinner, Zimmern Style

2010-10-28T23:51:00.000-07:00

Rating: 4 out of 5

A few nights ago, I ate a calf's testicle. Correction: I ate the testicles of several calves.

Maybe it was Andrew Zimmern working on my subconscious, but one week ago I had the sudden desire to eat, what American society would deem, the unusual. I was craving parts of all shapes and sizes, and Chef Linton Hopkin's "Holeman & Finch" seemed to be my best bet (the testicles, called 'veal fries', were quite good. Had the consistency of foie gras).

The place is smaller on the inside than it looks from the outside. Walls and tables are cramping even with the high ceilings, leaving the dark space feeling like an industrialized broom closet. While we waited for a table that we couldn't reserve ahead of time (no reservation policy), we peered into the kitchen through a large glass window facing the front door of the restaurant. The kitchen was calm, and I wondered if they were moving too slowly. No, they just had the dining room under control.

By my estimation, the dining room can seat no more than 60 people. The hostess led us to the end of a long, practically communal table. Young professionals on dates buzzed around us.

Regrettably, I forgot to put the battery into my camera so this blog will have no pictures (lighting was terrible anyway). Even without pictures, I can still remember this meal. Bone marrow came first, a long bone topped with breadcrumbs. This was my first time with marrow, and I must admit it's an acquired taste I'm working on i.e. I almost threw up at the table (thank GOD for the Italian flat-leaf parsley which cut the flavor). My reaction was in no way a reflection of the marrow. I was just unprepared for the flavors which I honestly cannot describe for you.

A good but overly mustard-y steak tartar, a wonderfully crisp and bacon-y Niman Ranch pork belly, a particularly distinct pasta carbonara, a croque monsieur and a chicken liver pate followed. All of these dishes were very good. The pork belly in particular paired well with the bed of polenta it sat on. The carbonara deserves attention as well. It was one of the more lively renditions I've seen being both thicker in texture and more robust in flavor.

Yet all of these dishes, especially the carbonara and the monsieur, were within a breath of being too salty. For a majority of the dishes, under-seasoning wasn't the problem; it was the fine line of over-seasoning that the kitchen walked.

Dessert was fried apple pie, and while it sounds like a dish you can envision and taste before it lands on your table, don't write it off so quickly. At its core, it's a great apple pie that's been fried well. The surprise comes with the ice cream. As a way of balancing the pie's sweetness, the vanilla ice cream on top is slightly salty. An unusual idea but a great one to give both the ice cream and pie prominence.

Being the tapas place Holeman & Finch is, small plates came out of the kitchen as they were made. Service in general was appropriately behind the scenes. Would I go back? Certainly, although maybe with a smaller group since sharing small plates between four people can be tricky.

Review: Neiman's Demise

2010-10-26T11:43:00.000-07:00

Rating: 1.5 out of 5

Have you ever touched a jacket made of chinchilla fur? You should try it, if you haven't already done so. But you know what you shouldn't try? Neiman Marcus' restaurant on the bottom floor of Lenox Mall. In fashion speak, it was an experience at which Miranda Priestly would have pursed her lips.

NM Cafe, as it's affectionately called, falls flat for a number of reasons. The interior is a cafeteria meets frozen yogurt shop, and the menu is a celebration of country club cuisine without the tennis courts. Or the spas. The atmosphere is, like the interior, one of a cafeteria: noisy and hollow.

Granted you could argue I should have known better, NM Cafe barely resembles the brand name it operates under, a store known for its exquisite service for the exquisitely inclined with exquisite taste. What unfolded during my Saturday lunch was an hour and a half of nightmare service with average or inedible food at haute prices.

The start of the meal began awkwardly. As the waiter filled our water glasses, he placed two baby teacups in front of us, and without a word whisked away to the kitchen. Tea, now that's a classy way to begin a meal at Neiman. But no, I don't think it was tea. In fact, I'm positive it was chicken broth. Not that the broth tasted bad, but why? Why chicken broth?

Moving on, NM's menu is bland and pricey. Glossing over the $15 turkey sandwiches and $20 salads, I tried the Mandarin Orange Souffle ($15), which, turns out, is just chicken salad with a mandarin orange jelly of sorts. Not quite the souffle I had hoped for, but the plate was good enough for lunch.

Probably the best part of NM Cafe are the popovers with strawberry butter. Flaky and buttery and strawberry-y. Too bad the bread didn't find its way to the table until the entrees were served. All other tables had popovers shortly after they ordered, but I literally had to flag down a waiter.

My friend ordered the "bay of fundy salmon," labeled on the menu as a "heart couture" dish (I'm not making this stuff up). This dish and the events which followed were more bay of pigs than fundy. On the first round, the salmon was completely overcooked and dry. Seeing as our waiter was nowhere to be...seen, we flagged down another waiter who took the dish away only to bring a second salmon that was completely raw.

raaawwwwwww

At this point my friend had spent most of her time watching me eat. When our waiter did return to fill up our glasses (not acknowledging that we had returned a dish), we told him how the salmon was raw. His reply: "Well, how do you want it cooked?"

Au contraire, mister waiter. How about properly? I didn't say that but it crossed my mind. I can bear a waiter who is distant and unsympathetic, but sharp tongues are uncalled for. Long story short, my friend ended up ordering the she-crab lobster bisque, but by then it was too late. The meal had been ruined.

But wait. The story isn't over.

When our waiter did find the time to give us our check, a $2.50 coke was on the tab. Funny thing is, we didn't order a coke, and yet a waiter delivered one to our table somewhere between Salmon 1 and Salmon 2. By now it was nearing 3:30, and I just wanted to leave. We decided to not mention the coke and just take it out of the tip. Upon handing him a Visa card, he replied, "We only accept American Express."

Of course, Neiman. Of course, the only card you accept is American Express. Neither of us had the cash nor an American Express card, but thankfully I remembered there was an ATM machine outside of Neiman on the second floor. The initial shock though was less terrifying and more humorous.

Humorous in a sad, defeated kind of way.

Review: The Sublimity of Sublime Donuts

2010-10-25T22:44:00.001-07:00

Rating: 4 out of 5

On my birthday, I ate three donuts and tried two more. I didn't intend do, but it seemed to be the right move to make. Also, it was my special day so I deserved them. Had these been store-bought donuts, half of one donut would have sufficed. But these were not store-bought. They were sublime, from Sublime Donut near Georgia Tech.

I assumed that because the owners of Sublime were stuffing donuts with strawberries and creme, mocha chocolate and orange filling, these things would be death. Death in a sense that after eating one, a wave of guilt would bombard my soul until I jumped on the treadmill. But the sublime donuts, somehow, someway, were not dense. They were light and fluffy, not the monstrous sugar treats I was expecting.

In all honesty, I don't know how I'll ever eat any other kind of donut.

filled with raspberry, topped with powdered sugar

strawberries & creme, my definite favorite. extremely light & airy yet tasty

beignet filled with chocolate and cranberries, also very tasty (sweeter than the others)

dream star - reminded me of an orange creamsicle

fall donut with cream cheese icing (I think)

If you want to have a wide selection of donuts to choose from, I suggest getting there before 2 pm. They close at 6, but donuts sell out fast. As for prices, one donut was about $1.50.

Review Update: Community BBQ

2010-10-20T08:09:00.000-07:00

I revisited Community BBQ the other day out of a craving for their messy bbq brisket sandwich and their mac & cheese (Mac & cheese is one of those dishes that simultaneously makes me weak at the knees while clogging my arteries).

Unfortunately, the bbq brisket sandwich was extremely dry. Like dehydrates your mouth dry. It's such a pity too because had the meat been tender, it would have been a great sandwich.

Was this a fluke or is Community BBQ losing its touch?

DUC of the Day: Chef Tyson

2010-10-19T15:10:00.000-07:00

"breaded chicken cutlets"

Anyone who had a childhood love for Tyson chicken patties and those crazy fries that looked like they have been cut with crazy scissors knows that "cutlets" is far too pretentious for Chef Tyson and his kitchen. And his chicken.

Also, if these are breaded chicken cutlets, I'd hate to see the veal cutlets...

He had me at "Foie"

2010-10-18T08:26:00.001-07:00

Richard Blais' FLIP on Howell Mill Rd. had me from the beginning. A television celebrity thanks to his stint on Top Chef and a fan of mixing the gourmet with the not-so gourmet with liquid nitrogen, Blais, in every sense of the word, is a fun chef. Naturally his menu reads the same way, but on this trip I only came for the milkshake. The liquid nitrogen foie gras milkshake that is...

I don't know what I was expecting from this milkshake and never took the time to consider how it should taste. I just wanted it. Now having satisfied my crave, I must confess it was disappointing. It reminded me of a very good vanilla milkshake with a wonderfully ice-y/creamy consistency. Not until I finished the milkshake left waiting for the $9 bill did I suddenly taste hints of foie gras. Those hints, unfortunately, were bitter.

A friend ordered the key lime pie milkshake (also made with liquid nitrogen), and it was very good. It wasn't overwhelmingly heavy or sweet, tasting only like a well-made key-lime pie.

From the liquid nitrogen milkshakes to the technofied pop music blaring through the dining room, FLIP is a trendy restaurant in a not so trendy neighborhood. Now, I'm curious to see if the food is as well-executed as the decor.

Anyone been before? Thoughts?

DUC of the Day: Seasons of Fruit

2010-10-14T09:33:00.000-07:00

jello with strawberry quartets (as the DUC might say).

Today the DUC presented 525,600 (read musically) different dishes worth sharing. The real number is four but that is beside the point.

watermelon...in October

Students are beginning to don sweaters and pea coats, and as we all know, as fall ends and winter makes its way through the city, farmers begin churning out the first of many ripe truckloads of strawberries and watermelon. On a serious note, the watermelon was oddly sweet.

"ratatouille"

Now I know what you're thinking: "My, that looks like some yummy ratatouille." But seriously, how did the DUC make ratatouille look more poverty striken than the French peasants it once fed?

And finally, no DUC of the Day is complete without grapes and chocolate cake (although there are some strawberry quartets lying in the back.

Review: The Wonders of Sotto Sotto

2010-10-12T13:55:00.000-07:00

Rating: 5 out of 5

ravioli nudi - spinach, ricotta

Last night I had dinner with Betty White and Jennifer Love Hewitt. Ok, not really, but I sat across from them in the dining room where I watched them talk, laugh and eat like normal people.

It all happened after my group walked into Sotto Sotto and approached the hostess stand. As I told the hostess the name of our party, I turned around, and suddenly my mind went blank. Within arms reach, there she was. "Is...is...is...that Betty White?" I asked my friend. She didn't hear me, too busy looking at the person next to Betty asking herself, "Is...that Jennifer Love Hewitt?"

The hostess led us to our table, and for the next ten minutes the three of us at the table giggled, texted, and stared. We were the only college kids in the restaurants, and compared to the oh-it's-ONLY-Betty-White-and-Jennifer-Love-Hewitt-no-big-deal faces everyone else was fronting, it was apparent we were the wide-eyed Nemo's in a sea of veteren tortoises.

Celebrity sightings aside, dinner at Sotto Sotto was a much-needed reminder that there is more to the world than cafeteria food. In the context of Atlanta's culinary scene, the experience was a reminder that there are indeed a few truly excellent neighborhood restaurants in this sprawling city.

As far as decor goes, little has changed since I dined here with my family, then a boy still in love with Funyuns and Power Rangers. Sotto Sotto is romantically dark with spotlights aimed at the center of tables covered in stark white wax paper. Governing the dining room is an intentionally rustic wall looking unpainted and broken down as if a relic from the previous tenant who occupied the space.

risotto mantecato, carnaroli rice, caramelized onions, 12yr balsamic, Reggiano

At the top of this post you see the ravioli nudi, delicate globes of spinach and ricotto resting in a kiddie pool of butter. It's pure spinach heaven but also light and airy even with the butter and cheese. In the way of Betty White and divine beings, the risotto mantecato presented caramelized onions in a way I didn't think possible. They are, after all, just caramelized onions, but somehow Sotto Sotto has used them to create a dish worth dying for. Seriously. Worth dying for.

tortelli di michelangelo, veal, chicken, pork ravioli in butter-sage sauce.

Although the pasta was slightly tougher than I prefer, the tortelli was, again, a dish brimming with attitude and distinction. The three fillings were in tune with one another while the butter-sage sauce did not hold back. It's not hard to see why Michel Angelo favored these pillows of heaven.

Against the backdrop of the nudi and risotto, the Pappardelle al Sugo d’ Anatra with braised duck ragu was not nearly as impressive but nonetheless very good. Gentle sheets of pasta with tender duck in an understated tomato sauce was an elegant way to go about Italian food without crossing spaghetti and meatballs.

The one dish ordered from the secondi menu was the salmone arrosto, a large pan seared Scottish salmon with a light salad of raisins and roasted potatoes. This was salmon cooked and seasoned at its finest, the outside seared to crispness to contrast with a gentle interior. The raisins added a surprising kick to the fish.

Now breathe. Here come the desserts.

chocolate soup with hazelnuts: decadent and rich and possibly too heavy to finish.

dolce al mascarpone - Sotto Sotto's version of tiramisu. A simple and light union of rum and mascarpone that is the best way to finish a carb-heavy dinner. Almost refreshing, certainly wonderful.

white chocolate bread pudding - light, fluffy and not so sweet you need to see a dentist afterwards. Very well balanced.

And that was it. This review is longer than most because the food being reviewed was better than most. I could have given each dish one sentence each before moving on, but this was a rare case where the food looked as good as it tasted. Dinner was a rare occasion when every course was as good, if not better, than the next, and it's this kind of one-upmanship that makes Sotto Sotto a place worth all the praise this city can give.

FYI, I totally shook hands with Betty White, Jennifer Love Hewitt and her boyfriend, Alex Beh. Betty White is as adorable and pleasant on stage as she is off stage. As for Jennifer Love Hewitt, she is quite the beauty...

DUC of the Day - The Spinach Strikes Back

2010-10-07T15:57:00.000-07:00

Remember the steakhouse-spinach-combined-with-a-parmesan-cream-sauce-and-seasoned-with-cinnamon-and-nutmeg dish? The spinach made a return to the DUC today under the headline "Pot-Licker Collard Greens."

Personally, I think they are the same dish except called two totally different things. What do you think? For a point of reference, here is the picture from two days ago.

Notice the difference in vibrancy...leftovers, perhaps?

DUC of the Day - Who Let the Grapes Out?

2010-10-05T21:20:00.001-07:00

Today at the DUC was especially good. Here are three dishes I couldn't resist sharing.

In the words of Gloria Gaynor, "and now they're back!" Step aside, froyo. grapes with jello is the next big thing.

step aside grapes with jello. grapes with brownies is the next big thing.

Finally, take a look at this. I've been eating at the DUC since last year, and I've never seen such an egregious leap taken by the menu writers at the DUC. This is clearly frozen spinach. Like very clearly frozen spinach which tasted like blah. What was it called?

Steakhouse Spinach combined with a parmesan cream sauce and seasoned with cinnamon and nutmeg....................