Happy Lunar New Year!
January 26, 2009 § Leave a comment
I’m so homesick right now as I look through my photos of real roast duck, slow-cooked pork belly with mushrooms, and other delicious Chinese dishes from when I was off for winter break. Jia and I went to a Chinese restaurant called Harmony Cafe this past weekend but in my opinion, it really didn’t measure up to authentic Chinese cuisine. I wanted hot pot with spicy peanut sauce or pork or red bean buns and instead I ended up getting a flavorless ma po tofu and beef chow fun. DAMN YOU DC WHY DON’T YOU HAVE A HALF-DECENT CHINATOWN!? One can only have so many cupcakes in a given time before she starts to go insane.
Nevertheless, the room is now as clean as it will ever be in that rush to get rid of any lingering bad spirits, but I haven’t found anything red to hang up for good luck. I’m still contemplating what I’m going to have for dinner tonight, seeing how any Chinese food that I order will be sub-par, but maybe we’ll manage to find something edible?
When I was home our entire family chipped in to make these simple scallion and peanut butter pancakes. Since finding the recipe via userealbutter, I don’t think my parents have ever really felt the need to buy them at our local Asian supermarket. This was also the first time we tried using peanut butter with a light sprinkling of sugar, and OH EM GEE it was delicious. Next time I’m voting to try using red bean paste. I think red bean + anything pan fried = heaven. AAAAAAAAAAAAAh.
Just a note for this recipe: The measurements given are just a guesstimate. I found that there was not enough water, so I had to add a little extra to get the right consistency. Just trust your instinct until you can feel with your fingers the texture that you’re looking for and then you’ll be fine. You’re going to dust your board with a lot of flour as well so even if it is a bit sticky at first, it won’t be for long.
salt
In a large bowl, mix the flour gradually with the 1/4 cup of water until the water is completely absorbed. Continue adding water in small increments and mix thoroughly until the dough begins to pull away from the side of the bowl. Let it rest for about 20 minutes and cover with a damp towel.
Cut the dough into about 6 pieces of equal size and roll them into balls. Place dough onto a well-floured work surface and roll out into a thin circle about 1/16 inch thick. Spread teaspoon of oil evenly over the pancake. [I find that it’s easiest to just use your hands to do the spreading, even if it is a bit messy. The oil is more uniform that way and it’s much quicker.] Sprinkle salt evenly and then curl the roll into a spiral from top to flatten it. Roll the pancake out to 1/8th inch thickness.
Dimsum at A-K (formerly known as 1-9) Seafood
January 8, 2009 § Leave a comment
I’m back on the Hilltop and already missing home. In my first class on Keats and Shelley, our professor (who by the way had a posh British accent) handed out Keats’ “On first reading Chapman’s Homer” and asked us to write about one rhetorical device that “contributed to the poem’s overall meaning.” EH? I’m definitely not in study mode yet, so that was quite the rude awakening.
They offer your typical dimsum dishes, and that’s what makes it so great, in my opinion. Hardly ever does my family order something new. We go to A-K because we have certain expectations and we know they’re going to deliver. For example, their honeycomb tripe with radishes is spicy and tender and every fried dish they serve is surprisingly light and wonderfully seasoned. I also suggest any of their delicate shrimp dumplings as well as the egg tarts. YUM.
Christmas dinner
December 30, 2008 § Leave a comment
Last year, winter break was fairly mellow and unchaotic. It mainly consisted of hanging out with high school friends and then spending time with family at home, but all of a sudden this year, I feel like we’ve been going to family friend gathering after family friend gathering. I’m never really too enthusiastic about these huge reunions where the parents spend hours reminiscing and chatting while the offspring has to watch movies, but the food is always pretty good. And if there’s good food, I’m content.
I don’t really know the measurements I used but it was incredibly easy. I diced one onion, quartered a couple giant handfuls of pepperoni and then quartered one of those tubs of brussel sprouts from the grocery store. Dunk the sprouts in boiling water until they become bright green and take them out immediately and put them in an ice bath. I think boiled brussel sprouts taste absolutely awful.
Birthday at Bangkok Joe’s
December 10, 2008 § Leave a comment
This year, I celebrated my birthday with dinner at Bangkok Joe’s. Even though it was down on K Street and snowing by the time we left campus [we opted for a cab], once we got to the waterfront it was extremely easy to find.
Bangkok Joe’s is nowhere near your casual Thai restaurant – the decor inside was extremely classy and dimly lit – but the food comes out amazingly quickly. Erin and Lee had to leave at around 8:00 and ordered their food while we waited for friends from University of Maryland to arrive, and they got their food in about 15 minutes. They definitely could have ordered with the rest of us and still made their party afterwards.
The food was delicious. Joe’s is more of a dumpling bar than entree-oriented, so we orderd appetizers for the table as a sampling. Pork and crab shumai, fried calamari [because I can never resist anything dipped in batter and submerged in boiling oil], giant chicken dumplings, and others. I really liked the calamari here but the shumai wasn’t that amazing. I think I still prefer the dimsum ones at China Garden.
The entrees were served in these beautiful white noodle bowls that were rather deceiving when it came to serving size. I was full before I even finished half of my drunken noodles but ate them anyway. I don’t know why I love them so much, but the balance between spicy and sweet is always an excellent combination. And for some reason, the chicken tasted really good too. The only gripe we had [mostly Ameya] was that due to the asymmetricity [?] of the bowls, we couldn’t reach over and steal some noodles from the person sitting across the table as stealthily.
The highlight of the dinner was definitely dessert. My favorite was the fried roti dough with taro paste inside and ice cream on top. It was so simple yet everything came together so well and I loved the subtle sweetness of the dough itself. The other desserts were a flourless chocolate cake with berries and rum chocolate sauce and mango sticky rice, a classic.
We will definitely be returning to Bangkok Joe’s in the future but with a focus on the dumplings. I saw peking duck dumplings, a variety of different rolls, and other items that sounded delicious but I couldn’t fit everything in my stomach at the time.
1/2 Off Sushi
August 21, 2008 § 1 Comment
Where I live is just your average suburb. Average + countless places for ethnic cuisine. There was even an article about Edison’s ethnic restaurants in the New York Times a while back. Iselin, also known as Little India by many (even people from out of state know this town) has a slew of different eateries particularly along Oak Tree Road. And there’s also a bunch of Korean and Chinese restaurants scattered all over Westfield, North and South Edison that keep the strong Asian population here very very VERY happy.
But, by the far the best perk of living in this area is the 1/2 off sushi. No, that was not a typo. I guess it’s because there’s so many established sushi places in Woodbridge, Westfield, and Edison, that to stay competitive, many had to adopt this plan to keep the customers coming in the door. Example: At Westfield’s Fujiyama Mama, my favorite 1/2 off sushi place, lunch is 1/2 off on certain rolls Monday through Saturday and dinner is 1/2 off on Mondays and Tuesdays. So…where three rolls would normally cost you about 20 dollars, you’re only spending 10 on those specific days. It’s a wonderful thing.
So as a going-back-to-school get-together, a bunch of close friends trekked to Westfield for lunch and ordered a bunch of rolls including: funky monkey (eel and banana), volcano (fried calamari with spicy mayo sauce and cucumber), dragon, crunchy spicy salmon (spicy salmon with tempura flakes), and others.
Maybe it was because I’d had a craving for Fujiyama all summer yet never got around to it or maybe it was the company, but that was damn good sushi, better even than the stuff I had in New York while working. I guess whatever’s most familiar sometimes tastes the best to us.
The fish is fresh and the presentation is much better than a Benihana or competitor U-Yee’s in Woodbridge plus the service is usually pretty efficient and patient. And…the thing I just found out today, you can draw on the tables using soy sauce! If you dip your chopstick in soy sauce and then write your name or initials on the table and leave it there, after a couple minutes, when you dab it off, your name is left in a bright pink! I probably shouldn’t be telling you all this, but if you get the corner table in the first room on your left, you’ll see my name! I always like to leave a mark. =)
Fujiyama Mama
341 South Avenue East
Westfield, NJ 07090
908.232.6598
U-Yee Sushi
675 US Highway 1 South near Gill Road
Woodbridge, NJ 08830
(732) 283-7888
Warning! Long post: Dylan’s, Papillon, La Maison du Chocolat, and Bo Ky
July 15, 2008 § 20 Comments
Saturday, July 12th, was my second youngest sister’s birthday. Laura turned 15, and two days before, my youngest sister, Jackie, turned 10. What way to celebrate other than a whole day out in New York City? And I mean a whole day.
We first visited the Brooklyn Museum to see the Murakami exhibit for ourselves – Murakami is probably best known for his
art on Kanye West‘s last album and the cherry-covered Louis Vuitton bags. The exhibition as a whole was pretty eye-popping and funky and a bit freaky, something I’m glad we’d seen before it’s closing the next day.
Here’s an example of Murakami’s SUPERFLAT art. See the flowers below the actual canvas? Well, entire walls were covered in those psychedelic happy flowers. Let’s just say I was a bit dizzy by the end.
SUPERFLAT
From Brooklyn, we took the 4 all the way up to 59 and Lex where Laura and Jackie went gaga over the treats at Dylan’s Candy Bar. They’ve just finished renovations, and now the lower level is exclusively for candy while the upper level is a full-out ice cream, frothy drink cafe.
Afterwards, we walked down to 5th where Laura wanted to see the cubed Apple store (there were droves of people waiting in line for the new iphone so we didn’t actually go inside) and amused ourselves in the Ugly Doll section of FAO Schwarz. Other stops included the Disney store (Jackie went beserk when she saw the Jonas Brothers window display), Henri Bendel, and Takashimaya, until we finally decided at 2:00 PM that it was time to eat and randomly chose Papillon.
Papillon was a mediocre “bistro” with the usual French dishes such as French Onion Soup, foie gras pate with greens, etc. Since it was brunch time, we also got brioche French toast (my favorite of the dishes), and a disappointing burger that lacked tenderness, salinityand flavor. I could’ve been eating a chew toy. Well, I guess you win some, you lose some.
Dishes at Papillon
Walked around a bit more until we got to Rockefeller Plaza, where I dragged the two kiddies to La Maison du Chocolat to FINALLY try one (well, three) of their famous macarons.
Is there anything more delicious? These really are the best macarons I’ve had in NYC – the almond meringues on each had the desired crispiness at the initial bite, yet the insides were soft and slightly chewy and went well with the healthy dose of the filling (Financier macarons don’t have enough and that bothers me a bit). My personal favorite was the chocolate and tea. There was a hint of raspberry that lightened the richness of the chocolate, perfect complements to one another. The coffee was delicious, and the caramel a bit too rich and sweet for me, but it was just plain wonderful to finally eat even a single one.
Macarons!
We ended our day out by shopping in Soho. I stopped at Vosges Haut Chocolat to pick up a couple chocolate bars and we looked around the MoMA store to see if there were any interesting gadgets on sale (usually it’s way too pricey for us). But most importantly, we had to eat noodles for dinner. It’s a Chinese tradition to eat noodles on your birthday because the food symbolizes long life, and we went to our family favorite – Bo Ky.
Just simple, duck and mushroom noodle soup at an unbelievably low price. Flavorful broth with condiments on the side that you can add to your heart’s delight, tender duck, and a helping of Chinese broccoli and mushrooms. Comfort food at its finest and a wonderful meal at the end of a very long and jam-packed day. We went home quite happy.
Soy sauce chicken noodle soup
So there you have it, another long day in the best city in the world. I’m biased it’s true, but after this post, how can you not think it so?
People’s Republic
June 27, 2008 § 4 Comments
Ameya (high school friend who is also interning in the city) and I went to grab some lunch at Republic near Union Square on Monday. The area is a favorite of ours since it’s the second stop on the uptown 4 express from Fulton Street where we work plus there’s a whole slew of decent restaurants right in that circle. I’ll be going to Danny Meyer’s Union Square Cafe for Restaurant Week on July 25. *
Republic is a Thai restaurant and it’s HUGE. It’s a bit deceiving from the outside, but once you walk in and up the steps, there’s a large and spacious area with communal tables and benches and the noise is so loud. However, it’s cheap, there’s variety in the menu, and it’s quick so it fits within our one hour lunch break.
For drinks, we ordered the Thai Iced Tea (Ameya’s) and a Honey Kalamansi (me). What I really appreciated about both was that neither was sickeningly sweet and you could tell there was no artificial flavoring included in the making of the drinks. The Thai Iced tea was smooth and delicious and I only wish I could recall exactly what was in the kalamansi – honey, meyer lemon, thai basil? There was a lovely tartness from the lemon that lingered on the tongue a few seconds after drinking it. If anyone knows the recipe, please tell me!!! I’d like to try making some myself.
Thai iced tea and Kalamansi limeade
Ameya ordered the Grilled Beef with rice angel noodles, mint, lettuce, jicama, and carrots and I got three small dishes –fried calamari with sweet chili sauce, grilled eggplant with lime juice, sesame seeds, and miso, and beef satay with a spicy peanut sauce. Service was quick and my goodness, these portions were HUGE! Ameya, a devoted meat lover, had trouble finishing the somewhat too-salty grilled beef skewers and I think that’s the first time I’ve ever seen him struggle eating beef. In the middle, he started taking it off the skewers and just wrapping it in the lettuce Korean bbq style before dipping it in the provided peanut sauce, which couldn’t compare to the one I had for my beef satay.
Ameya's beef dish
My fried calamari was unfortunately, inconsistent. Some rings were rubbery and hard to chew while others were perfectly tender, but there was a sizable amount of crunch on the outside (well-seasoned too) and the chili sauce had just the right amount of sweetness to counteract the saltiness of the crusts.
Assorted appetizers
The eggplant, on the other hand, was just what I was craving at the time. Light, smoky, and a bit acidic from the lime juice. It wasn’t overcooked and mushy, but it did not have that raw taste either. The only way to improve this appetizer would be to create some spicy condiment to accompany it. As for the beef satay, the result was similar to Ameya’s dish. Heavily seasoned, yet for the most part, rather tender, and paired well with a spicy peanut sauce that was both sweet and salty. I liked. But those three dishes were pretty substantial, and I walked out of the restaurant feeling very full and very sleepy. So it shouldn’t be any surprise I didn’t get much work done after lunch.
Next time: trying their noodle dishes, which is what they’re more famous for, especially their broth noodles. Eeeeeee!
Republic
37 Union Square West
212.627.7172
Manhattan delivery
* Restaurant Week NYC is from July 21-25 and July 28-August 1 this year. Book your tables at opentable.com now! I know of some places I have in mind already.
Father’s Day & Mom’s Birthday brunch at 1-9.
June 15, 2008 § 1 Comment
In Edison, there’s only one dimsum place that my family goes to – 1-9 Seafood. Their food is consistently good, service is decent, and if you get there early enough, the wait isn’t too long.
Today though, since it was Father’s Day, every seemed to have the same idea about brunch and when we got to the restaurant it was a 45 minute wait, longer than we’ve ever had before. My sisters and I amused ourselves by watching the Japanese-style reality show on the large-screen tvs, where poor contestants had to climb rolling piles of logs and vault their way over giant ponds. As each one of them smashed their faces into the ground or fell into the water, the entire restaurant would break out into fits of laughter and forgot about their food. I guess that’s why management changed the channel to CNN shortly afterwards.
Food-wise, there were new items that I’d never seen before at 1 and 9 – most of them lightly fried like soft shell crabs and baby squid. They tasted almost exactly the same as the fried frog legs they serve during dinner but were still quite delicious. It’s pretty hard to make anything deep-fried in flour, salt, and pepper taste bad.
Fried soft-shell crab
Fried calamari
Old favorites like shrimp in rice rolls, shrimp-stuffed eggplant (or is it the other way around? I’m too full to really care), and tripe with radishes were also present and met expectations but disappointments, however were the spring rolls, which had barely any filling at all and just oozed grease the minute I bit into one of them and the not-so-fresh-or-hot shumai dumplings that I ate anyway.
Stewed honeycomb tripe with radishes
This isn’t a dimsum item but I highly recommend it anyway: lobster pan-fried noodles. Yes, it’s hard to eat but that wonderful sound when you crack into the crispy noodles and smother them in the lobster sauce is simply music to a food-lover’s ears. A lot of restaurants have something similar, more likely with all different kinds of seafood like scallops, squid, octopus, etc. Try it next time if you see it on the menu!
Lobster pan-fried noodles
Dim sum spread
Dim Sum Go Go!
June 5, 2008 § Leave a comment
“Lunch. Dim sum. Find a place. 11:45.”
Basically the message I got from my friend Ameya as I was rounding up a project at work. Dim sum!? To my knowledge, all the good dimsum places were in Chinatown, and I didn’t feel like trekking that uptown since lunch is only an hour. My search on NYMag for decent dimsum places in the Lower East Side gave only a couple names, but Dim Sum Go Go was a critic’s pick and only one stop away on the 4.
We were joined by fellow JP student Andrew Hsu who was in town for an interview and luckily managed to snag the last table in a tiny, barely decorated establishment on the outskirts of Chinatown. Go Go has regular sized entrees as well, but it’s rare to find dim sum on a weekday and they have a surprisingly extensive menu, so we helped ourselves to 9 small dishes, all in the $3 range.
Sesame balls are hard to mess up, and Go Go did a well enough job. These were petite but the outer crust of glutinous rice was thick (I like) and contrasted nicely with the crunch of the sesame-covered outside, and the filling was plentiful and perfectly sweet without being cloying.
Sesame balls
Out of the dumplings, the shrimp and chive steamed ones were my favorite since neither ingredient overpowered the other (a mistake of most dim sum places) and they were encased so perfectly in the rice wrappers. Yet the bites were so small that we barely got to enjoy the dumplings when they already disappeared in our mouths. The snow pea leaf dumplings (the longer ones with green filling) were mediocre to me, but that might also be because they reminded me of jiu tsai (Chinese leeks), which I don’t really like in the first place. Go Go’s pork dumplings were the familiar fried potstickers that everyone loves, and I loved that the juices from the pork spilled out once I bit the crispy exterior.
Other dim sum staples like the shrimp rice rolls, the spare pork ribs, and the shumai dumplings, were satisfactory. Comforting and most times piping hot, they all lived up to the expectations of decent dimsum with the added plus of better presentation than usual. One gripe though: the shrimp rice rolls had too much rice roll, not enough shrimp (which weren’t dry and shrunken, another mistake of dim sum eateries). I like a lot of filling! The spare pork ribs, which are usually drenched in the black bean sauce and then cooked until dry, were tender and wonderfully light and vibrant due to a modest sprinkling of chives and a stayed hand with the salt.
Line of condiments
Dumplings!
Shu-mai dumplings
Black bean spare ribs
Overall, the food was well executed and well made, but service was horribly slow since Go Go, being such a small restaurant, can’t abide by the usual dim sum set up of circulating steam carts. They brought out items one by one, teasing us, and the sesame balls came first. And they’re supposed to be for dessert! However, if you have a decent stretch of time and wish for well-priced anddeliciously light Cantonese food, this is the place to go.
Dim Sum Go Go
5 E. Broadway,
New York, NY 10038
at Chatham Sq.
212-732-0797
Trix, Lucky Peach, and The Financier
June 3, 2008 § 5 Comments
Finally, FINALLY, I got to try the food at Momofuku Ssam Bar today. Ever since it opened, I’ve wanted to sink my teeth into all the pork and offal goodies, but with school, work, etc, there just wasn’t enough time for me to trek to the East Village. But the past is behind me now, and the future ahead looks very bright and Momofuku-filled.
Outside Momofuku
I brought along a friend; for anonymity’s sake and because he absolutely insisted on the nickname, let’s call him Trix. Trix isn’t a schemer or skateboarding champ but rather, the guy who always falls for the ill-conceived prank or reveals confuzzlement when plums are marinated in interesting herbs (ginger?! what!?) He is, however, a good eating companion, and being of Korean descent, I thought he’d appreciate the special twist on Asian food that David Chang’s restaurant applies.
When we got to 2nd Ave and 13th, we didn’t see the restaurant at first. It just had a simple black awning with the tell-tale peach on the door. Momofuku means “lucky peach.” After a quick review over the menu and recommendations, Trix and I ordered the pork buns, the asparagus, banh mi, and pig’s head torchon.
Let me just say straight out that though everything was superb, my favorite by far were the buns. Fatty pork, full of flavor, with refreshing cucumber, hoisin sauce, and a bit of extra kick. Homey, but also, incredibly indulgent, especially when the grease started running down my hands. My only regret was that we didn’t order more.
The asparagus encircled a poached egg, wonderfully runny, and perched on top of a smooth and sweet miso butter which I absolutely LOVED. We could’ve just spread it on fresh, toasty bread and I would’ve been happy since I didn’t care much for the asparagus. It really wasn’t anything special and not as crispy as I usually like mine served.
Roasted asparagus with poached egg on miso butter
The banh mi was excellent simply because it was my first time trying anything like it. I believe the waiter said there was a top shelf ham with chicken liver pate and veal head terrine along with familiar pickled Asian vegetables. And the crackle of the ciabatta that enveloped all this goodness was a wonder in itself. Ah…if you can’t already tell, I love this restaurant.
Banh mi sandwich
Our last dish was the Pig’s head torchon which the waiter insisted we try. My god, has there ever been that much fat in so little a space? And FRIED for crying out loud! I especially liked how the horseradish-y dressing cut the richness of the torchon, and the way the gingered plums balanced with the saltiness. Needless to say, we left Momofuku feeling very satisfied. Thanks to the waiter who gave us such good recommendations!
Pig's head torchon
Since we still had some time afterwards, we headed back downtown where I took Trix to Financier. Well, I wasn’t just going to forget the macaron immediately after I fell in love with it right? And this time, there were BIG ONES! I’m a sucker for pistachio (my sister, Laura, isn’t though. When I brought the 8 pack home, I accidentally stuffed it in her mouth in my eagerness to share the love when I suddenly remembered afterwards that she’s allergic to nuts. She didn’t talk to me for the rest of the day. Most likely because she was lying in bed having difficulty breathing. LOVE YOU LAURA!). Trix helped himself to a pear tartelette which earned his approval. All in all, though, after a hectic day at work, it was a wonderful ending to the day.
Pear tartelette
Momofuku Ssam Bar
207 2nd Avenue
New York, NY 10003
http://www.momofuku.com/
Notes on Food 