Me vs. The Menu

smorgasbord (most...links...ever)

( image taken from living-language.org )

Webster's defines "smorgasbord" like so...

Main Entry: smor·gas·bord
Pronunciation: \ˈsmor-gəs-ˌbord\
Function: noun
Etymology: Swedish smörgåsbord, from smörgås open sandwich + bord table
Date: 1879
1 : a luncheon or supper buffet offering a variety of foods and dishes (as hors d'oeuvres, hot and cold meats, smoked and pickled fish, cheeses, salads, and relishes)
2 : an often large heterogeneous mixture : mélange

With that in mind, let's catch-up on a few things...

First, I won the yearly Cinco de Mayo guacamole contest at work.  More clear, I tied.  Even more clear, I cheated.  Well, not exactly "cheated" more like "campaigned for votes in a effort to draw attention to my obviously superior recipe in an attempt to garner support."  Is that really cheating?  I thought so too; so I stepped down from the champions' podium and allowed the real winner to bask in office culinary glory.  It was deserved...who would have thought a great guacamole recipe would come out of New Jersey?  Anyhow, here is the guacamole recipe I used.

Second, who doesn't love cast iron cookware?  I know I can't live without mine.  Mostly I use a plain old fashioned 12" skillet by Lodge .  I got mine years ago, but I think it's finally coming into form.  I use it constantly - on the grill (at least when we were in Texas), on the stove top, and in the oven.  The best part - it's super easy to clean.  Just don't use soap.  Warm water, scrub it down, and pop it in a warm oven for fifteen minutes to dry.  Finally, a lite coat of olive oil keeps it ready for the next use.  Now, I know these have become increasingly popular and there are a variety of options out there, but I've got my eye on this one by Fjorn.  By the way, check out Fjorn's philosophy against "throwawayism."

Third, several months ago I came across a recipe for Momofuku Milk Bar's compost cookies.  This unusual recipe features a foundation of crushed potato chips and pretzels. Throw in a good mix of whatever you deemed best in cookies and you have a fantastic treat.  They were devoured at both the wife's office and mine as well in minutes.  About David Chang - he opened his first restaurant, Momofuku Noodle Bar in the East Village in 2003.  According to his website, momofuku means 'lucky peach' in Japanese; it could also be a reference to Momofuku Ando the inventor of instant noodles.  In the years that followed, Chang opened Momofuku Ssäm Bar, Momofuku Ko (a 12 seat restaurant that takes reservations in advance, online only, on a first-come-first-served basis, without regard to social status or income.  I'm still gaming to get into this one), Momofuku Bakery & Milk Bar, and recently the French-Vietnamese inspired Má Pêche inside Midtown’s Chambers Hotel.  As a cookie recipe with chips would seem to suggest, Chang has a penchant for recipes with odd ingredients.  If that sort of thing interests you, there is a cookbook available and this interesting blog which features the recipes geared for two.

Fourth, I've been on a Breaking Bad marathon recently.  If you haven't seen this show and you love really tense, engaging, uncomfortable, character-loving-then-character-hating dramas check it out.  iTunes - get it.

Finally, and so I can give you more links than anytime before, here are a few recipes I have lined up in the queue:

Lemon-Scented Pull-apart Loaf

Brussels Sprout and Pancetta Pizza

Chocolate Bourbon Truffle-Turtle Tart

Baked Falafel

Flaky Cheddar and Ham Biscuits

Raspberry Buckle

Lemony Risotto with Asparagus and Shrimp

Orange Chicken

Sopa de Lima

Friday Night Bites

To kick-off the weekend we finally took the opportunity to make it over to Sweet Afton.  I've been wanting to check out this establishment since it opened in Astoria last August.  Well, we went, we saw, we tasted and we were not blown away.  Don't get me wrong it was good, not great, but good. 

The service was way better than the complaints online; our waitress was attentive and friendly.  The food, however, was just so-so.  We ordered the fried pickles, hand cut french fries, and Irish sausage rolls. What?  It's a bar...we had bar food. Know this - I love pickles and I would fry my cat's tail if I thought it would taste great.  The fried pickles at Sweet Afton are more like Puff Pickles, the batter was doughy and rubbery not crispy and flaky like the word "fried" suggests to me.  The french fries were average and the puff pastry wrapped sausage rolls were great until I dipped them in the HP Sauce that accompanies the dish.  Maybe I've suckled on the A1 sauce infused teet of America too long, but I much prefer that sauce to the British alternative, and I should have known better.

And the drinks (did I mention it was a bar?) were well...interesting.  We both ordered the Spicy Cherry Margarita.  As the menu maintains this drink is a mix of Habanero infused tequila, cherry preserve, simple syrup, and lime.  True to it's name, it's spicy and took me nearly 40 minutes to drink.  For comparison, it usually takes me ten minutes to finish the average margarita; 5 minutes if it's been a long week.  Given the time issues related to the first round, we decided to only stay for one, but there were a couple of other choices I'd come back for next time.  So, I guess what I'm saying is that despite the bar food, the bar drinks mean I'll probably be back.

C.R.E.A.M. - Dolla Dolla Bill Y'all

Living here in the Big Apple affords one the opportunity to experience all manner of great chow.  I say "affords" and make no mistake, I understand the pun involved.  As expensive as most can seem, there are still plenty of great choices in the more "affordable" range.  To me, Watawa is great example.  Their menu is full of reasonable choices, but none better than the Lunch Box or the Sushi Roll specials.  For less than $10 you get a salad, miso soup, and your choice of three rolls or shrimp tempura with pork dumplings and a California roll.  Throw in the free green tea and that's a pretty hefty haul.  Now there's the second pun of this post.  The portions are huge.  In fact, we generally go and can't finish our lunch.  Our most recent visit yesterday, saw us both order the tempura special and take-away the leftovers for dinner last night.  Below are some pictures so you can judge for yourself...

Our Little Neighbor

(I've been taking these panoramics with my iPhone and using an
app called Autostitch to put them together.   I know, I'm a big goof.)

We've been walking by this little place near our little place in Astoria for nearly 18 months.  Every time we would pass by one of us would remark that we needed to stop in next time.  Well, next time came last Wednesday night, and then AGAIN Friday night.  I think we've found our newest favorite little hole in the wall.  It's called Xochi and a little Google work results in a loose translation of "beautiful flower" or something of the sort.  What I can tell you is that it's inexpensive - I don't say cheap because it's not at all cheap.  It's filling, and homemade, and made when you order, and real Mexican goodness, and real freakin good.  It will be more than a couple of days before we go back, but we will be going back.  Check out our dinner (me a combo and C had an enchiladas dinner) last time - $24 including tax and tip.

Fa la la la la, la la la lafel!

One of the best things about moving to New York is the opportunity to try all types of food I've never had before, much less even heard of.  One of the things I had never experienced before moving was falafels.  Well, now I'm head over forks for them - between my many visits to Crisp, and my vegetarian experiment, I can't get enough of them.  I've even got a famous street vendor near my place in Queens ( King of Falafel ) and a co-worker highly recommends ( Mamoun's Falafel Restaurant ).

  

(tonight's dinner - falafels with feta cheese, pita, and store
bought tzatziki.  Don't fear the store bought stuff - saves
time and money.)

Here's an easy recipe:

Prep Time: 10 minutes  Cook Time: 5 minutes

Ingredients:
·  one 15 oz. can chickpeas, drained
·  one medium onion, finely chopped
·  one tablespoon minced garlic
·  two tablespoons fresh parsley, finely chopped
·  one teaspoon coriander
·  three-quarters teaspoon cumin
·  one-half teaspoon salt
·  two tablespoons flour
·  oil for frying (canola or vegetable)

Preparation:  Combine chickpeas, garlic, onion, coriander, cumin, salt and pepper (to taste) in medium bowl.  Add flour and combine well.  Mash chickpeas, ensuring to mix ingredients together.  You can also combine ingredients in a food processor. You want the result to be a thick paste.   Form the mixture into small balls, about the size of a ping pong ball.  Fry in 2 inches of oil at 350 degrees until golden brown (2-5 minutes).

A Great End

Summer Restaurant Week wrapped up last Friday so we had one more chance to visit one more place and are we ever glad we did -

 

My wife found Kittichai on the list when it first came out and as we were sitting up each of our reservations we decided to save this modern Thai restaurant for last.  The ambiance of this Soho establishment in the 60 Thompson Hotel is slick and modern with a darker shade of cool.  Did I just write that?  Yeap, but still.  The food was wonderful and the service exceptional.  We'll defineately be going back, if for no other reason than to expeience Thai brunch...hmmmmmmm.  Here's what we had -

appetizers:
    Salmon tartare with limestone tartlets, peanuts,
            ginger and lime zest
    Bangkok style pork "tonnato" with grapes and
            chili-truffle aioli
main course:
    Pineapple braised short ribs in green curry, thai
            eggplant, and sweet basil
    Lemongrass chicken breast, wild mushrooms,
            chili jam
desert:
    Flourless valrhona chocolate cake with
            fresh cream
    Jasmine flan on a sweet and sour fruit salad
            with jasmine rice ice cream

(pictures of all on Flickr)

Kittichai
60 Thompson St
New York, NY 10012-4308
(212) 219-2000
Mon-Wed 12pm-2:45pm, 5:30pm-11pm;
Thu-Fri 12pm-2:45pm, 5:30pm-12am;
Sat 11am-2:45pm, 5:30pm-12am;
Sun 11am-2:45pm, 5:30pm-11pm

Toronto Tid Bit

We got back from our extended weekend in Toronto last night and I wanted to start posting some of our experiences.  I decided rather than have some build up to the best meal winner or something, I would just simply write about the best experience first.  Hands down, the single best meal we had in Toronto was the vegetarian fare from Fressen.  The recommendation to try this Queen Street West establishment came by way of our Canadian friend Jill who practices the vegetarian lifestyle more strictly than I can imagine (more on this topic in a later post).  One of the things we liked most about Fressen was the portion sizes - just small enough so you could share three or four per couple, but big enough where you felt like you were getting your money's worth.  At $9 a plate, the price was outstanding too.  Here's what we picked for the evening:  sweet potato and ginger soup with a spicy chili sauce accent; seared cornmeal polenta suits on herbed tomato sauce and sautéed lemony garlic spinach; beer battered deep fried tempeh fish and taro chips with a tangy tahini cucumber tartar sauce; and pan seared king, shiitake and honey mushrooms on cold sesame spinach with a lemon garlic sauce.  Since Fressen only serves one dessert, we ordered it asking that the waitress surpise us with what exactly it would be.  In the meantime we wagered what exactly a vegetarian place makes for desert.  The wifey guessed a mix fruit and I suggested a flourless chocolate cake.  Turns out we were both right and the dessert was an excellent end to an excellent meal.  If you are ever in Toronto you should listen to Jill and check out Fressen.

One Trip and I'm Hooked

I recently got the chance to try out a vegetarian place I'd been wanting to check-out for some time.  Crisp recently opened another location near my work in Bryant Park, so I walked in the other day for lunch.  The food lived up to everything I'd read and expected, and at $8, the lunch was very filling.  It looks like my regular circuit of Chipotle and Pret a Manger will now include Crisp.  Here's a picture of the Crisp Africa on whole wheat pita I ordered and ate in the park...

Weekend Wrap Up

Friday lunch was spent with the wife at one of our "Power Lunches."  This phrase comes from an understanding I have with my wife that these events will only be the two of us and I should not casually invite others.  This rule was made after I made the mistake of inviting someone to lunch when we should have been dining for two.  With the code, this should not happen again.  Anyway, we decided to hit Koreatown and go for some Korean BBQ.  The joys of being in the City are being able to try [I would argue] any type of food.  Never having done Korean BBQ proper, we decided to try a place called Shilla NYC.  We found the place through Urbanspoon (I'm told if I link to my own blog enough that Google will eventually start tracking me...) and it was wonderful.  We ordered far to much food, as the pictures seem to indicate, and I couldn't even tell you what we were eating - BUT I'LL BE BACK SOON!

Saturday lunch was a picnic at the New York Botanical Gardens.  Spring is great in New York and it was obvious by the crowds at the garden that New Yorkers are ready for some beautiful weather.  I took a quick snap shot of our spread which included - chicken salad, a walnut / grape / bluecheese salad, goat cheese & fig spread, crackers, 3 kinds of olives from our visit to The Pickle Guys, and chocolates.  We wanted to bring wine, but decided to honor the garden's no alcohol policy.  Saturday night was spent at another favorite, 24 Prince with some friends.  As always the food was good (we love the ginger spare ribs! and tried to copy them at home) and the atmosphere was especially vibrant as the place was packed.

Sunday was a relaxing day spend tending to the window gardens and planting some new items we picked up at the Botanical Gardens.  For brunch my wife made a Southwest style omlette which really hit the spot after planting and tending to the fields.  I will update pictures of the window gardens next weekend at the three week mark; for now you'll have to settle for a snapshot of the omlette.  All in all, a good weekend.  Way to fast, but the good ones always are...

Totally Tapas, then Totally Cool

We went out Saturday night for a friend's birthday party.  We met eight others at Alta for tapas, or "small plates" as our waitress stressed they are now being referred to as.  I love tapas, and I really like Alta.  I would recommend several things from the menu above.  The Spanish cheeses (all of which were great), the sangria (technically on the wine menu not the one above, but STRONG none the less), the brussel sprouts (always a MEvsTHEMENU favorite), and next time we go back we're going to roll the dice on The Whole Shebang (dinner for at least nine for $400 - are you kidding me?).

After dinner we strolled through Washington Square Park and ended up downstairs at The Dove.  The night quickly got out of hand there when I tried the Absinthe...