Recent food snaps
November 23, 2014 § 1 Comment
Dinner at Drew Nieporent’s Batard in Tribeca – at 4 courses for $75, one of the best deals in NYC
Tete de cochon
Octopus “pastrami” with pommery mustard and new potatoes
Pork belly with onion and baby vegetables
Caramelized milk bread with blueberries and brown butter ice cream
The fried chicken large format lunch at Momofuku Noodle Bar – 1/2 Southern style, 1/2 Korean style with fixings and baby vegetables
After a long day of work, a dry Riesling and free oysters at Lelabar, which is slowly becoming my second, more booze-filled home
Brunch with old high school friends at home…a rare chance to cook up a storm, including this classic broccoli salad with bacon, slivered almonds, cheddar and grape tomatoes
Brunch at All’Onda near Union Square, with a small-portioned but highly flavorful spaghetti carbonara
Bordeaux Under One Roof event for City Harvest – a before and after (when people starting putting half-finished bottles in their bags)
A 2007 Etna Rosso (from the year I graduated high school) at Lelabar with their triple cheese panini, possibly my favorite grilled cheese in the city.
Kinshop
August 15, 2012 § Leave a comment
Dinner at Kinshop with Cahill girls began with a bottle of crisp white wine, a perfect pairing with the brightly-flavored meal to come…
Starters included a (very) spicy duck laab salad with toasted rice, ground chili and romaine hearts. Acidity from fish sauce, rich meatiness from the duck, and cool freshness from the lettuce – so many different elements playing off each other in a seemingly simple dish.
Our second starter were the grilled prawns with fresh lime and “Phuket-style” black pepper sauce. Loved sucking on those brain-filled shrimp heads a la Anthony Bourdain, and the sauce was so good that we kept it for other dishes.
This fried pork and crispy oyster salad with celery, peanuts, mint and chili-lime vinaigrette was probably the dish I was most excited about (based on reviews) and yet, it thrilled me the least when I finally tried it. Don’t get me wrong, it was still mighty tasty but I think the flavors didn’t meld together as well here as in other dishes.
This was the runaway favorite – fried broccoli and Chinese sausage with young coconut-gooseberry chutney and fermented plum vinegar. Yes, the broccoli is fried so it’s probably lost all its health qualities, but none of us cared. It was surprisingly light and ever-so-crisp and went so well with the tartness of the plum vinegar and sweetness of the chutney. And who’s going to complain about Chinese sausage with their vegetables?
My favorite main plate – Northern Thai style curry noodle with braised brisket, cucumber, peanuts, fresh herbs. So comforting, so complex. This is something I’d want to eat on a rainy day while watching television on the couch. Definitely better than a burger and fries.
Our second main – massaman: braised goat with fried shallots, purple yams, mustard greens, and toasted coconut – a very rich dish with tender goat, lots of greens (there’s our fiber for the day) and an amazing coconut brothy concoction. Roti was the ideal vehicle to mop up any remaining sauce.
Desserts: Thai iced tea ice cream, lychee sorbet, coconut cream cake with kaffir lime syrup and toasted coconut. The coconut cake was somewhat bland, but we all fell hard for the ice cream and sorbet, the lychee sorbet especially. It reminded me of being in China, where we’d eat bowl after bowl of that fleshy, sweet fruit.
Top Chef fame aside (the owner and chef is Harold Dieterle, winner of Season 1), this is a great, casual place for a dinner that features a spin on your classic Thai and Southeast-Asian cuisine.
Kinshop
469 6th Avenue
New York, NY 10011
212.675.4295
Doughnut Plant
June 18, 2011 § 1 Comment
Ugh, I’ve been so bad about posting lately due to work and general craziness. Definitely going to try and be better about that as I slip into a summer routine.
So, in continuation of our most recent NYC trip, after our time at the Met with McQueen, Laura and I went to Chelsea to take a look at some of the art galleries – the beautiful, the ugly, and the wtf? – and also FINALLY stopped at the Doughnut Plant by the Hotel Chelsea since we discovered they had opened a relatively new location in the area. In the past, difficulty in getting to the Lower East Side had always prevented us from visiting.
Options at Doughnut Plant
I loved the look of the place. First, the smell that hits you when you enter the shop is absolutely insane. All that sugar and dough makes for an incredibly heady combination. There were also cute doughnut plushies on the walls and donut patterns on the seats, and everyone appeared to be happily enjoying their orders with some iced coffee.
Wall decor
We chose a yeast based donut, the peanut butter and blackberry jelly, and a cake donut, the rich tres leches. Laura and I were split on favorites; I preferred the cakiness and creaminess of the tres leches whereas Laura went gaga for the PB&J, a terrific balance between crunchy, peanut-y saltiness and tart fruit from the filling, but we both agreed that these were the best ring-shaped desserts we’d ever had.
PB&J
Innards
Tres Leches
Innards
We debated ordering another one, perhaps the blackout donut, but we had lunch plans at Company (post to come later) and decided to wait until another time.
So the next time you find yourself in Chelsea craving something sweet, definitely consider heading to the Hotel Chelsea to indulge in some serious donut fare.
The Doughnut Plant
220 West 23rd Street
New York, NY 10011
212.675.9100
www.doughnutplant.com
Notes on Food 