December « 2009 « Two Fat Bellies

Archive for December, 2009

4 West Diner

Friday, December 18th, 2009 by virginia

DSCN4538

The first time we tried to go to the 4 West Diner turned out to be a bust, as it wasn’t opening until the following week. Several months passed before we tried again, and I must say that I was pleasantly surprised by both the food and the décor of the diner.

It’s located in a space that use to house a Bennigans but they’ve totally re-done both the outside and inside. The outside is a gleaming silver highlighted with neon lights, which evokes memories of old time diners and has the benefits of attracting cars passing by on a busy section of Route 4 in Englewood. The inside, however, is nothing like what I expected. Instead of metallic tables and booths covered in brightly colored vinyl, the décor is understated with neutral brown/beige tones, and is actually quite pleasant. The space is deceptively large on the inside, and we were seated along the back wall so we had a nice view of the entire diner.

It was a chilly and rainy night when we went so both Josh and I decided to start with some bowls of soup. I opted for French onion, which is usually a hit or miss at diners. Some seem to dump soup straight from a can and top it with barely melted generic white cheese. Fortunately 4 West Diner took better care than that. The soup was served piping hot, had a nice rich onion-y flavor, and wasn’t too salty. I don’t think the cheese on top was quality gruyere but it was a generous sprinkling and pretty evenly melted.

Pretty good french onion soup

Josh’s matzo ball soup, however, was pretty dismal. The chicken broth was greasy and lacked seasoning while the matzo ball had a really weird rubbery texture to it. Proper matzo balls should be light and fluffy so that they almost dissolve in your mouth, not dense lead-like balls of dough.

Bad matzo ball soup

For my entrée, I chose the chicken bello sandwich, which was served open faced on a square ciabatta roll. Each side of the roll had an enormous slab of chicken breast topped with a portobello mushroom and melted fresh mozzarella. Both sides were huge, and there was no way I could slap them together to make a normal sandwich. Instead, I could only finish one side, eating it with a knife and fork, and saved the other half for later. The chicken on the sandwich was cooked so that it was still nice and tender, and it worked well with the slightly chewy portobello and stringy mozzarella cheese. I just wished there was more balsamic dressing on the whole thing, or more seasoning, as it ended up being a bit bland. The huge sandwich came with a side of fries, which were standard but decent.

Chicken bello sandwich

Josh had the french dip sandwich, which was also served on ciabatta bread and had tender, thin slices of beef. It was real slices of steak, not like deli roast beef, which Josh liked, but he wished that they put some swiss cheese on the sandwich for extra flavor. The dipping sauce was pretty good, not too greasy or salty. The french dip sandwich came with french fries as well.

French dip sandwich

Overall we both thought the food at 4 West Diner was pretty decent and slightly more creative than standard diner food. Prices aren’t dirt cheap but they’re reasonable, and service was fast and efficient. I did like the more upscale atmosphere, though you lose some of the nostalgia factor of eating in a diner. The menu is very extensive so it’s a good place to go if you have a large group or picky eaters, as everyone will find something they like. It’s by no means a destination restaurant but if you’re hungry and happen to be passing by or in the neighborhood, it’s not a bad place to stop.

4 West Diner
412 South Van Brunt St.
Englewood, NJ

Tags: Diner, Englewood, Fries, NJ, Sandwiches
Posted in Restaurants | Comments Off on 4 West Diner

Disappointing Dessert at Cones

Thursday, December 17th, 2009 by virginia

DSCN5057

After our lovely dinner at Po Restaurant, we decided to skip dessert there in favor of some gelato down the street at Cones. There were plenty of flavors to choose from and even though I was considering being adventurous (corn gelato anyone?), we all stuck with our standard favorites.

Just a small sample of the large selection of sorbets and gelatos available

I went with the pistachio gelato, which is my must-have whenever we’re traveling in Europe. I ate tons of pistachio gelato when we were in Italy with Josh’s family a few years ago and it’s my favorite ice cream flavor. Unfortunately the one at Cones was kind of gritty, not smooth like you would expect gelato to be. Flavor-wise it was fine, but they blended the pistachio in miniscule pieces, which was the culprit for the grittiness. It’s nice that they use real nuts but the texture was off putting. I also found several icy bits that detracted from the gelato as well.

Pistachio gelato in a cup with a cone on top

Josh had the coffee mocha chocolate chip gelato, which also had tiny pieces of chocolate chip running throughout but they were less offensive because you were expecting them, and they melted on your tongue right away. The coffee mocha was mild in flavor, and while the gelato tasted ok in general, it definitely wasn’t the best.

Coffee mocha chocolate chip in the front, lemon sorbet in the back

Josh parents opted for the lemon sorbet, hoping that it would be like the sweet creamy sorbet we had in Italy. Unfortunately the sorbet they received was icy and not creamy at all. It was also extremely tart, much tarter than you would expect from a sorbet. There was hardly any sweetness to it at all and made my mouth pucker a bit. It definitely wasn’t what we were expecting and pretty disappointing.

Overall I wasn’t too impressed by the gelato and sorbet we got from Cones. To me, they failed on both flavor and texture, the two most important things for good gelato/sorbet. However, I’m not all that familiar with the NYC gelato scene so I have no basis of comparison. All I can say is that I definitely won’t be coming back here the next time a gelato craving hits.

Cones
272 Bleecker St. between Morton and Jones St.
New York, NY

Tags: Gelato, Sorbet, West Village
Posted in Ice Cream | Comments Off on Disappointing Dessert at Cones

Po Restaurant

Wednesday, December 16th, 2009 by virginia

DSCN5048

I’ve read a lot of good things about Po Restaurant in the West Village and have been eager to try it for some time now. Mario Batali used to be the chef/owner there, before he opened up Babbo. Although he is no longer affiliated with Po, the restaurant is still turning out fabulous Italian food with interesting flavor combinations and beautiful presentations.

It was just four of us for this particular Sunday night dinner – me, Josh, and his parents – so we were able to snag a last minute 6:30 reservation at Po. The restaurant really is tiny; it’s basically just a narrow room with limited seating. Tables are small and space is a bit cramped, but the room has a quaint townhouse feel to it. The restaurant did get a little bit too hot though, even though it was cold outside.

We started off with a bottle of bubbly prosecco and munched on the amuse bouche while we looked over the menu. The amuse was a garlicky white bean bruschetta doused in olive oil on top of toasted slices of Italian bread. And boy, was it garlicky! There were whole cloves mixed in with the white beans, camouflaged by their similar appearance, so each mouthful was a bit of a surprise. Fortunately the garlic was cooked through (poached maybe?) so that it was soft, sweet, and creamy, without any harshness. This was a great starter for any garlic lover.

Garlicky white bean bruschetta

They also brought us a loaf of rustic Italian bread with olive oil for dipping. The bread had a hard crust that crackled when we tore into it, which I liked. It had a bit of a sourdough flavor to it that complemented the sweet and fruity olive oil well.

Good bread and olive oil

For my appetizer, I had the roasted beet salad with endive, sliced baby artichokes, watercress, and a taleggio crostino. The beets were sweet and tender and were a nice contrast to the bitter endive and watercress. The sliced baby artichokes kind of got lost in the mix but the taleggio crostino added a nice richness and butteriness. The taleggio was almost like a brie, and I broke up the cheese and crostino and mixed it in with the rest of the salad to give it some crunch.

Beet salad with endive, sliced baby artichokes, watercress, and a taleggio crostino

My beet salad paired perfectly with Alice’s goat cheese and black olive tartufo with pickled vegetable slaw. I love the combination of beets and goat cheese, and I wish the restaurant had done the pairing itself. But her tartufo had a nice tanginess to it from the olives and pickled vegetable slaw, which worked nicely with the creamy and savory goat cheese.

Goat cheese and black olive tartufo with pickled vegetables

Josh’s dad had the polpette di carne, which is meatballs with tomato sauce and cheese. The meatballs were soft and nicely seasoned, though not as good as the ones he makes himself. Lloyd’s meatballs are legendary in the family, and our golden standard that we measure all other meatballs against. That said, Po’s meatballs were actually pretty good, one of the best that we’ve had at any restaurant.

Polpette di carne - meatballs in tomato sauce

Josh had the winning appetizer of the night though, in my opinion (and his). He ordered the cured tuna with white beans, artichokes, and chili mint vinaigrette. He first made sure that the cured tuna was made from fresh tuna that was still rare, not canned or cooked tuna. It was, fortunately, and it was spectacular. The tuna was very lightly cooked on the outside and still bright red in the middle. The curing gave it a nice saltiness and tanginess, and the meat was so tender it almost melted in my mouth. The beans, artichokes, and vinaigrette gave the dish a nice texture and a freshness, so that all the flavors just popped. I couldn’t stop stealing bites from his plate and secretly wished that I had ordered this dish for myself.

Fabulous cured tuna with white beans, artichokes, and chili mint vinaigrette

We decided to share a pasta for a mid course, as well as a cucumber salad. We selected the spaghetti carbonara, which was the lightest version of carbonara that I have ever tasted. Although I kind of missed the silkiness of the egg finish that you get in other versions, the pasta packed in a lot of flavor from the crunchy salted and smoked pork bits (I think maybe it was guanciale, as it didn’t taste like regular bacon). The portion was surprisingly huge and fed all four of us easily.

Spaghetti carbonara

The cucumber salad was thin shreds of cucumber mixed with capers, red onion, and a chili and mint vinaigrette, topped with thin slices of salty ricotta salata cheese. It was a nice mix of salty and tangy flavors. We all thought that it was very refreshing and a great palate cleanser.

Refreshing cucumber salad topped with ricotta salata

For my entrée, I had a really hard time deciding what I wanted to eat, as all of the menu offerings sounded really delicious. After hawing and hemming for a bit, waiting for everyone else to order, and asking the waitress for her opinion, I finally settled on the grilled guinea hen with roasted pumpkin and scallion fregula. I typically don’t order poultry in restaurants, except for the occasional duck, but I was glad that I went with the guinea hen. The hen was deboned and cooked under a brick so that the meat was flat but still juicy and tender. Though the skin wasn’t crispy, it was covered in a delicious balsamic glaze. The fregula is a tiny ball-shaped pasta, similar to Israeli couscous. It had a nice chew to it and worked well with the roasted pumpkin and scallions.

Grilled guinea hen with roasted pumpkin and scallion fregula

Josh had the porcini crusted cod with borlotti beans, sautéed kale, and sweet red pepper vinaigrette. He liked that the earthiness of the mushrooms translated to the fish, making it seem a lot meatier in flavor. I only took one bite but I thought it tasted a bit weird. Josh enjoyed it though and liked the unusual combination.

Porcini crusted cod

Alice had the grilled pork chop with mashed pumpkin and apple mostarda. When I took a bite of her dish, the first thing I said was, “this tastes like fall!” The ingredients were obviously very seasonal, and the pumpkin and apples were spiced in just the right way to make you think of pumpkin pie and hot apple cider, but in a good savory way. The pork chop itself was huge, and cooked perfectly so that it was tender and juicy. It was one of my favorite dishes of the night.

Grilled pork chop with mashed pumpkin and apple mostarda

Lloyd had the linguine vongole with clams, pancetta, chilies, and white wine. Again, the pasta portion was pretty huge and there were plenty of clams mixed throughout. The sauce was a tad heavy on the white wine flavor but the pasta was cooked perfect and it was a pretty good dish.

Linguini with clam sauce

Overall I would have to say that Po Restaurant is one of my new favorites for upscale Italian food. This isn’t a red sauce, chicken parmesan kind of joint. Although some of the pasta dishes are familiar, the food is definitely more upscale and creative. Each course we had was well thought out with interesting flavor combinations, and beautifully plated. While the restaurant isn’t cheap, I wouldn’t consider it expensive either. Prices are pretty reasonable for the quality of food that you receive. Service was attentive and helpful. It was really a lovely meal and I can’t wait to come back again.

Po Restaurant
31 Cornelia St. between Bleecker and West 4th St.
New York, NY

Tags: Italian, West Village
Posted in Restaurants | Comments Off on Po Restaurant

Jacques Brasserie

Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 by virginia

DSCN4434

Josh has been traveling a lot for work recently so my meals lately have consisted mainly of leftovers from our weekends of gorging, easily prepared foods such as sandwiches and salads, or pre-made soups and frozen pizzas. Sad, yes, but a lot of my joy from cooking and eating comes from sharing the experience with someone. If I made what I thought was the most fantastic meal ever and no one else was there to taste it, would it still be the most fantastic meal ever? It’s kind of like hitting a hole in one with no witnesses. It’s still a great feat but no one can fully share in your excitement.

Ok maybe I’m just making excuses for being lazy. Regardless, one mid-week night while Josh was away, I was thrilled for the opportunity to have a girls’ night dinner with Josh’s mom and his cousin. We met up on the Upper East Side at Jess’ apartment and went off in search for food. None of us are all that familiar with restaurants in the area still so we basically chose a place based on where we could find street parking. We ended up at Jacques Brasserie, a lovely restaurant with a menu that offers all of the standard French bistro classics.

We started off with some delicious slices of baguettes with salty butter. The bread had a decent crust, nice chew, and good flavor. My only complaint was that they had a bread man doling out one slice at a time, and he couldn’t come around fast enough. We were starving and couldn’t get enough of the bread!

Yummy baguette

For our appetizers, both Josh’s mom Alice and I opted for the soupe a l’oignon, classic French onion soup. The broth was deep and rich and full of onion flavor, and there was plenty of cheese melted on top. However, the soup wasn’t quite as hot as it needed to be, and all that cheese quickly congealed into one big lump. I ended up trying to break pieces off with the spoon and using my fingers, so it got to be quite messy, but it was a delicious soup nonetheless.

French onion soup covered in a thick layer of gruyere

French onion soup covered in a thick gooey layer of gruyere

Jess ordered the salade de bettrave, which was beet salad with chopped endives and manchego. She asked the waiter if they would substitute goat cheese for the manchego, and he easily acquiesced. The resulting salad was a mix of complementary flavors, textures and colors, with the sweetness of the soft red roasted beets, the tanginess and creaminess of the white goat cheese, and the bitter crunchiness of the yellow endive leaves. We all ended up stealing bites from Jess’ plate and loved every bit of it.

For my main course, I chose the steak frites, which came with a choice of béarnaise sauce or au poivre sauce. I selected au poivre and was disappointed with the watery and greasy sauce that I received in a ramekin with my steak and fries. The sauce had no discernable peppercorn flavor to it. Fortunately the steak was fabulous, a thick and meaty piece that was cooked rare per my request. It was actually almost black and blue, with a dark, flavorful crust on the outside and still pink and bleeding in the middle. Just how I like it! The steak had a good amount of flavor and just needed an additional sprinkling of salt to boost it up.

Perfectly cooked steak with a nicely formed outer crust, but disappointing au poivre sauce on the side

The fries were freshly cut and nicely fried so that they were hot and crispy on the outside and soft and potato-y on the inside. It came in a separate cone that I didn’t mind sharing with everyone else.

Freshly cut and fried french fries

Jess had the coquilles St. Jacques, which were seared sea scallops on top of wild mushroom risotto with manchego and cranberry reduction. Neither she nor I have ever tried coquilles St. Jacques before, but Alice said they were not what she knows of as coquilles St. Jacques. The scallops were cooked well but the risotto was slightly gummy, and the manchego appeared to have been melted on top of the risotto, which was kind of weird. Jess ended up scraping that off to the side and focused mainly on eating the scallops.

For her entrée, Alice had the poulet roti, which was roasted chicken with garlic mashed potatoes and sautéed spinach. The chicken was cooked perfectly and had surprisingly crispy skin. The mashed potatoes were nicely garlicky and the spinach wasn’t bitter. It was a simple dish but very well prepared.

Of course with this being a girls’ night, we couldn’t pass up on dessert. First up was an apple tart that had a nice thin layer of apple filling and creamy vanilla ice cream, but the crust was an absolute disaster. It appeared to be made of a piece of flattened puff pastry, so that the layers of the pastry dough were stuck together in a tough and unwieldy way. We couldn’t cut through the crust with the side of our forks, and even when we busted out a knife it was still extremely hard to get through. After a few attempts that ended up rattling the plate and the table, we sadly had to give up on most of the tart.

Beautiful apple tart but with a terrible, hard-to-eat crust

Our second dessert, the crème brulee, had an evenly browned crackly sugar crust on top but the custard itself wasn’t properly cooled before it was served and as a result it was too warm and liquid-y. Even though it had a nice vanilla flavor, the dessert lost all the silkiness and lusciousness of a properly prepared crème brulee.

Creme brulee with an evenly browned sugary crust but a too warm and liquidy interior

For the most part, we enjoyed our girls’ night meal at Jacques Brasserie. The meal got off to a good start with delicious French baguettes and continued from there. Although desserts weren’t quite up to par, pretty much everything else we had was tasty and well prepared. Service was fine, and the restaurant has a laid back atmosphere that allowed us to have nice conversation. It is a bit on the pricey side though, so it’s not somewhere we would go very often. It looks like the brunch menu is pretty reasonable though, which I might have to check out next time. But overall it was good company and good food – what more can you ask for?

Jacques Brasserie
204 East 85th St. between 2nd and 3rd Ave.
New York, NY

Tags: Bistro, French, Fries, Steak
Posted in Restaurants | Comments Off on Jacques Brasserie

Flashy Restaurants

Monday, December 14th, 2009 by josh

If you watch food shows on TV you’ll observe a common characteristic of the better chefs. They abide by the KISS philosophy (keep it simple, stupid). On competitive shows (Top Chef, Iron Chef etc.) the judges typically prefer the dish with fewer ingredients that’s masterfully prepared to the one that tries to develop complex flavors and suffers from under or over cooking. When you eat at the restaurant of one of these chefs you can tell, simplicity rules. The décor may be elegant or modern, but its never cluttered. Whatever is on the table (glasses, sliverware, dishes, candle etc.) typically has clean lines. Even the garnishes on the plate serve a purpose, lend a flavor, are meant to be eaten and are considered part of the experience. A big faux pas are garnishes that do nothing, but take up space, like the top of a pineapple. When the rules of simplicity are violated its noticed by the partrons, even if we cant always define it. Virginia wrote about The Studio in Hilton Head, SC and mentioned the space as being like someone’s funky living room. It was awkward. Too complex. And it distracts from the food.

So, given that the world’s best chefs seem to agree that simplicity is best when it comes to the food they serve and the restaurants they build, why, for the love of god, do they not abide by this when designing their web sites? Why do I have to wait 30 seconds for a flash web page to pan from a school of fish to an island sunset to the skyline of NYC (Le Bernardin) or for the left to right visual progression of Thomas Keller’s vision of bringing French Laundry to NY? Seriously, I lived through the dial-up era and am glad to have fast internet access now. One of the things I’ve become accustomed to is pages loading quickly. And don’t tell me there’s a “skip intro” link.

Its usually small and hidden and I have to search for it which makes me angrier.

The whole point of going to a three-star restaurant is to surrender yourself to the chef. The waiter at Alinea told us how certain dishes were intended to be eaten, he didn’t say “first smell the smoke and then eat the steak OR just skip the intro and dig in”. If the site has a lengthy intro, I assume its there for a reason and I’m intended to watch it.

Doesn’t the presence of a “skip intro” link kind of prove my point? Its like the site is saying to you “Even we know its obnoxious we’re making you watch this ridiculous display so go ahead and skip it”

Besides the waiting, the sites are then hard to use. Go check today’s dinner menu at the Jean-Georges website. Find it? Were you able to navigate to it without the page constantly flashing at you as you highlight the names of the 29 restaurants you didn’t go to check up on? Oh, I should have mentioned, don’t try to check these sites on your mobile phone, like when you’re at happy hour with coworkers and are trying to convince one of them to take his girlfriend to Masa: your phone doesn’t support flash. Pretty inconvenient, huh? And non-functional. A big no-no in the cooking world, is somehow okay with how they present their restaurants in a medium that nowadays, lets face it, is going to be the customer’s first impression.

I’m not saying Flash serves no purpose online. There are plenty of sites that should be using flash, for instance a the homepage of a web-design firm that tries to convince restaurants to hire them. Or a site hosting flash-games (my favorite time-waster is free-kick fusion). But restaurants, not necessary. When I show up for my reservation do you make me watch a laser-light show before you’ll seat me? Does the coat check girl come out to dance and sing the overture to Oklahoma? No. Then why are you forcing me to watch these things when I visit your website?

I visited the website for all six three-star Michelin restaurants in the US (PerSe, Le Bernardin, Masa, Jean-Georges, French Laundry, and Joel Robuchon in Las Vegas), every single one requires flash, has a longer-than-necessary intro and is hard to use. To verify the phenomenon is not uniquely American, I also went to the websites for each of the world’s ten best restaurants. Nine of them are flash-based. Funny enough, the one that isn’t, El Cellar De Can Roca is cleverly designed to look like a flash site.

Although I believe function trumps beauty, I also recognize that the true masters are those who can achieve both. It baffles me that these chefs, known for their detailed-oriented personalities would allow their restaurants to be represented this way. Its not as if technology were released that could make tiny fairies fly around plates as they were placed on the table that these chef’s would jump at the opportunity.

It also escapes me why this isn’t part of a restaurant’s review. If a reviewer from the times called to make a reservation and was treated rudely on the phone, we’d surely read about it in the review. How is this different? Isn’t it like being on hold for too long? Or asking a question about the menu but being forced to listen to the chef’s biography before getting the answer to you wanted. Having a horrible website has got to be as bad as a bad odor when entering a restuarant.

Restaurant websites should be simple. Their purpose is to provide information. They should load fast and be accessible from my mobile device. This means no flash. They can still be sexy and satisfy this criteria, open-source web designs has plenty of good-looking free site templates (the bitter_sweet one is proof-positive that simplicity can be attractive). Also, the websites should be up-to-date, the “Fall” menu shouldn’t be there in May. It should be easy to get the phone number, make a reservation and see the menu (with prices). Let me know if I’m being unreasonable. My view is that I should be able to obtain information online faster than I can over the phone. That’s why there’s a website (and to take workload off those who answer the phone). You’d think the most successful chef/owners in the business would adhere to this philosophy the same way they do with their dishes. I wonder why they don’t. Am I crazy? I can’t be the only one bothered by this.

Tags: Rant
Posted in Opinion | 2 Comments »

Banh Mi Saigon Bakery and Di Palo’s Fine Foods

Monday, December 14th, 2009 by virginia

Since we were finally back in Chinatown there was no way we were going to leave without picking up some banh mi sandwiches from Banh Mi Saigon Bakery and some fresh mozzarella from Di Palo’s.

Banh Mi Saigon Bakery

DSCN4998

Out of all the banh mi sandwiches that we’ve tried so far, Banh Mi Saigon Bakery is by far my favorite. It’s located in the back of a jewelry shop so it’s basically just a counter and there isn’t much room inside the shop. The last time we were in Chinatown we had to go to Paris Sandwich for banh mis instead of Banh Mi Saigon Bakery due to the extremely long line and no real sitting area to eat. This time we were there at an off peak hour so there was no line whatsoever. Phew! I was worried that due to all the positive press the place has received in the last few months, we wouldn’t be able to get in. Too stuffed from our dumpling and noodle feast, we picked up some sandwiches to go.

I ended up reheating the sandwiches a few days later briefly in the oven to crisp up the bread. I preheated the oven to 400 degrees then stuck the sandwiches in for about 5 minutes so that the bread was warm through but the fillings remained relatively cool.

Pork banh mi with pate, pickled vegetables, and cilantro

Even left in the fridge for a few days and then reheated, the sandwiches were spectacular. The toasted bread shattered delightfully when I bit into it, and although the pork filling is a bit tough, it’s cut into tiny pieces, which makes it easier to eat. The pate adds a bit of moisture, and the pickled carrots and daikon are sweet and tangy. We requested the sandwiches to be hot so they put on both a squirt of hot sauce and some jalapeno slices. If it gets to be too spicy, I just pick out the jalapenos, plus the cucumber spears in the sandwich are a cool refreshing comfort for my mouth.

Banh mi innards - look at all the great layers of flavors!

Though the debate about the best banh mi sandwich in the city rages on, much like the debates about the best pizza or burger in the city, Banh Mi Saigon Bakery has my vote. True, I haven’t tried a lot of places, like Nicky’s on the Lower East Side, the famed joints in Brooklyn, or the new Ma Peche version in midtown, but of the ones that I have tried (Paris Sandwich, Vietnam Banh Mi So. 1), this one takes the cake. I’ll make my rounds through the other places sometime soon though, I hope.

Di Palo’s Fine Foods

We stopped into Di Palo’s to pick up a ball of fresh mozzarella and some proscuitto for our lunch the next day. The last time I was there, six months ago, the store had moved its wares into the space next door while they were making renovations. Now I see that it has expanded to both spaces, making it huge and spacious. The meat and cheese counters are more spread out, and the imported Italian goods are also spaced out so that you no longer have to be backed up against the shelves while you wait for your number to be called.

Spacious new interior

We got a pound of mozzarella and half a pound of San Daniele prosciutto, which was about $22/lb. It sounds expensive but it’s actually cheaper than the ones you can get at the supermarket, and a million times better. The prosciutto was soft and delicate in texture, not tough or stringy. It had a deep, almost gamey flavor to it, and wasn’t too salty. We put together our favorite spread and noshed to our hearts’ content while watching football the next day.

San Daniele prosciutto, fresh mozzarella, basil, tomatoes, and a baguette

Josh was traveling yet again for work so one night I made a quick and tasty caprese salad with the leftover mozzarella and prosciutto. I simply cut up a tomato and salted the slices, layered on slices of the mozzarella, sprinkled on freshly cracked pepper and thin ribbons of fresh basil, piled on the prosciutto, and drizzled olive oil over the top of everything. Fast, easy, and delicious!

Fresh caprese salad topped with prosciutto

Banh Mi Saigon Bakery
138 Mott St. between Grand and Hester St.
New York, NY

Di Palo’s Fine Foods
200 Grand St. between Mulberry and Mott St.
New York, NY

Tags: Banh Mi, Chinatown, Italian, Sandwiches
Posted in Bakeries, Specialty Stores | Comments Off on Banh Mi Saigon Bakery and Di Palo’s Fine Foods

A Tale of Two Wondees

Sunday, December 13th, 2009 by virginia

As I mentioned in my post about Wondee Siam II, there are several Wondee Siams in the neighborhood but only one is BYO. We were planning on meeting up with some friends from high school (coincidentally on the night of our 10 year high school reunion, which none of us had an interest in attending) for a late dinner. Some of them had requested an economical option so Josh called the branch of Wondee Siam that offers BYO to make a reservation for 8 people. He was informed by whoever answered the phone that we all needed to be there on time before they would seat us. That was fine by us, as it’s not an unusual restaurant policy.

Josh and I arrived at the tiny restaurant first and looked inside the window, a bit shocked to see just how tiny the restaurant is, and that it was completely full. There wasn’t even a free two-top in sight, let alone a table for 8. Four of our friends arrived a minute later so Josh went inside to check in with the host while the rest of us stood outside in the freezing cold, as there is no room to wait inside the restaurant. We watched through the window as the guy who seemed to be in charge looked startled that we had the nerve to show up on time for our reservation and that we expected to be seated.

To be fair, the last two in our party were about 5 minutes late, but it didn’t really matter. Clearly the restaurant was full, and they had not set aside a table for us. The guy told Josh that a few tables were ready for their checks and it should only be a short wait. So we stood outside, shivering, clutching our bottles of beer and wine. Another fairly large group showed up after us without a reservation (not that it made a difference) and we told them we were waiting for a table. Since they didn’t know about the BYO policy anyway, we sent them across the street to Wondee Siam II where the space is larger and there would probably be more tables available.

And then we waited. And waited some more. All the while trying to peek through the window to get the host’s attention so that he would know we were still waiting. He saw us standing outside and didn’t say or do anything. We did see that checks were handed out to a few tables, but they didn’t seem to be in any sort of rush. So we kept waiting, hoping that someone might notice us still standing outside and take pity. After 45 minutes, we were cold, hungry, and furious.

Debating what to do next, we looked around at the other offerings on 9th Ave. but had our hearts set on Thai food. So we called Wondee Siam II across the street to make sure they had a table available for 8 people, which they did. They don’t have a BYO policy though, and the corking fee is $15. At this point, we didn’t care about BYO anymore. Sure, it’s a money saver and gives us the opportunity to drink whatever we want, but it wasn’t worth the aggravation we were dealing with. We just wanted to sit down and eat, so we headed across the street.

Right before we walked away from the original Wondee Siam, Josh opened the door and gave the host a sarcastic wave and indicated that we were leaving. The guy then had the nerve to run out after us and ask us how many people were in our party. Was he serious??? WE HAD A FREAKIN’ RESERVATION!! It was just so ridiculous, and all the more infuriating that we waited so long for basically nothing. They never intended to honor that reservation and only showed interest in us when we were about to leave. We could have ended up standing out there for hours.

After we arrived at Wondee Siam II, we were a bit hesitant because we didn’t want to give a restaurant that had just treated us so poorly business, but we figured that based on all indications, the two restaurants might share the same name and some sort of association but the actual owners were different. Had the two been more closely related, the guy from the first restaurant would have told us that there was the same restaurant across the street, and might have possibly tried to waive the corking fee for us. That would have been the right thing to do. But him running after us while we were leaving indicated that he wanted to keep our business for himself. And when we got to the second restaurant, we told them that we had a reservation at the branch across the street and they didn’t honor it so we had been waiting forever, and all we got from the hostess was an “Oh really?” but nothing more.

A bit perplexed and still a bit annoyed by the whole situation, we settled down and tried to salvage the rest of our evening. Everyone wanted to order their own entrees but we decided to share a few appetizers. First up were the Thai spring rolls, which are deep fried and filled with shredded vegetables. These are simple and standard but always tasty. Everyone was so hungry that they grabbed at the rolls before I could take a picture.

Thai spring rolls

Next we had basil rolls, which are like summer rolls (unfried spring rolls). They were thin noodles, basil leaves, and shrimp wrapped up in soft rice paper. These were refreshing and light, a nice contrast to our other fried appetizers.

Basil rolls

Someone requested the kanom jeeb, which were ground pork and shrimp dumplings, similar to shu mai at Chinese dim sum. They were pretty tasty but the filling was a bit dense and the dumpling was a little soggy.

Steamed pork and shrimp dumplings

Last was the fried tofu, an ample portion that I couldn’t stop eating. The tofu was perfect – light and crispy on the outside and soft and tender in the middle. It was almost like the fried tofu I had in Taiwan that my mom and I still obsess over. Even the people in our group who don’t normally like tofu loved this dish.

Awesome fried tofu

Josh and I decided to share our entrees though we debated for a long time about what to order. As I’ve said before, I’m not a fan of Thai curries, so our options were a bit limited. We finally settled on tofu with eggplant in basil sauce and the pad thai with beef. The tofu was similar to the fried tofu appetizer we had, except that was soaking in the sauce so it didn’t retain any crispiness. They ended up being a bit too chewy and tough though, so I actually preferred the pieces of eggplant instead. The basil sauce was a teensy bit spicy but not terribly so. I’m sure they could adjust the heat accordingly if you request it to be spicier or milder.

Tofu and eggplant in basil sauce

I really liked the pad thai the last time we were at this restaurant, which is why I pushed for it even though Josh wanted to order something else. I was really disappointed though, as it seemed like a totally different dish. This time the noodles were mushy and greasy, and the sauce binding the dish tasted like it might have had ketchup in it. It was just way too sweet, and none of the tanginess or seasonings that I praised the last time we were here.

Beef pad thai

Overall I had mixed feelings about this meal. The appetizers were pretty good, especially the fried tofu, but the entrees were kind of lackluster. Service was excellent, despite the initial indifference to our experience at the first Wondee Siam. Our water glasses were constantly filled, and when the waitress saw what a hard time I was having taking pictures with everyone attacking the food, she made sure to place each new appetizer directly in front of me first. So while they did their best to try to salvage our evening, it was still kind of hard to recover from the level of aggravation we had after our experience with the first restaurant. I think for now we’re going to explore the dozens of other Thai restaurants in our neighborhood, but I would still recommend Wondee Siam II to anyone looking for good, cheap Thai food.

However, avoid Wondee Siam at 792 9th Ave. at all costs!!!

Wondee Siam II (multiple locations)
813 9^th Ave. between 53^rd and 54^th St.
New York, NY

Tags: BYO, Midtown West, Noodles, Thai
Posted in Restaurants | 1 Comment »

Tapas de España

Saturday, December 12th, 2009 by virginia

After we ate the pimientos de padron, we had tapas on our mind so we headed out to dinner at Tapas de España in Englewood, NJ with Josh’s parents. We used to go there a lot when the restaurant first opened but it’s been a few years I think since our last visit. It’s always crowded on weekends so we could never get in, but this time it was pretty late in the evening and there were only four of us. We called ahead for a table and luckily we didn’t have to wait too long before we were seated.

They brought us a basket of nicely warmed up baguettes while we went through the menu. The bread was basic but had a nice crispy crust and fluffy innards.

Yummy carbs

Although the restaurant does offer many full size dishes, we were here for the tapas, and the list is pretty long and extensive (no pimientos de padron though!). In addition to the regular tapas menu, they had another sheet that listed the specials of the day. So many things looked appealing to us that we ended up over ordering but at least we got to try a wide variety of the tapas offered.

Of course we couldn’t eat tapas without ordering a pitcher of sangria. The sangria is not to sweet and has lots of big chunks of fruit in it, which I like.

Red sangria with lots of fruit

To start off the meal, they served us some soup made with collard greens, potatoes, and sausage. The broth was light but flavorful, with a hint of smokiness from the sausage. They give the soup to everyone, kind of like an extremely large amuse bouche, and it’s pretty tasty.

Collard green, potato, and sausage soup

The first dish that we ordered was jamon serrano with manchego cheese. Serrano ham is kind of like prosciutto, and we ate a lot of it while we were in Spain (Museo de Jamon anyone?). Unfortunately, the slices we received here were awful. They were stale, lacking in flavor, and totally dried out, making them hard and tough to chew. The slices of manchego were decent at least, but even they couldn’t salvage the terrible jamon.

Decent manchego and spanish olives with awful serrano ham

Fortunately the next dish was much better. It was from the specials menu and was baby squid served in its own ink. The squid bodies were tender, not chewy, and covered in the rich, delicious black ink. I think some people might get a little squeamish from squid ink, but please don’t knock it until you’ve tried it! I can’t really explain it, but the flavor is just so deep and tastes like the sea. I really loved this dish and it was one of my favorites of the evening.

Baby squid in its own ink

They brought out the rest of our tapas on two tall towers so there was a lot of food all at once. I still made sure to take pictures of each dish though before everyone dug in. The beef empanadas were pretty solid. They were freshly fried with a nice flaky crust and the filling was well seasoned.

Beef empanadas

The lightly fried bacalao fritters were recommended by our waiter. The chunks of salted cod were lightly battered and deep fried. They were served with a tasty tartar sauce.

Bacalao fritters

Less successful were the chicharones de pollo, chunks of fried bone-in chicken. The chicken was also lightly battered but they didn’t have enough meat so what was there was really dried out and tough.

Chicharones de pollo

The empanadillas de atun were miniature empanadas filled with kind of a tuna puree. Sounds kind of gross but it didn’t taste fishy at all, and the crusts were light and crispy.

Empanadillas de atun

The patatas bravas, deep fried potatoes covered in a spicy sauce, were very poorly made. The potatoes were soggy and mushy, and the sauce didn’t have a good kick to it. It’s such a simple dish to make that it’s kind of disappointing that they screwed it up so badly.

Poorly prepared patatas bravas

The shrimp in garlic sauce were served with a lot of deliciously garlicky oil/broth, which we sopped up with pieces of baguette. It’s a standard tapas dish that we always order whenever we’re in a Spanish restaurant.

Shrimp in garlic sauce

We also got side dishes of tostones and maduros. The tostones were sliced thinner than at most other places, so they were light and crispy, not too heavy or starchy. And they came with a delicious garlic dipping sauce.

Tostones with garlic sauce

The maduros were soft and sweet and not too oily. We loved plantains in all forms so we polished off these plates pretty easily.

Sweet maduros

We were stuffed after all the food but we still had some room for dessert. We shared a flan, which was a bit tougher than I normally prefer and not quite silky enough. The caramel sauce was good though, and not too sweet.

There's always room for flan

In general, I thought the food at Tapas de España was pretty decent. There were some misses though that highlighted the inconsistency from the kitchen. I don’t think anything was ill-conceived, as what we ordered were all pretty standard tapas dishes. The patatas bravas, for example, were just poorly prepared. Service was ok. They delivered our food kind of all in one shot, and then everyone disappeared for a while. But we were still able to flag someone down when we needed more water or another pitcher of sangria. As I said earlier, the restaurant does get pretty crowded on weekends, and there seemed to be a lot of big parties the night we were there, so reservations are recommended. The tapas might not be the most authentic but the atmosphere of the restaurant is fun and festive, and we had a good evening overall.

Tapas de España (multiple locations)
47 North Dean St.
Englewood, NJ

Tags: Englewood, NJ, Spanish, Tapas
Posted in Restaurants | Comments Off on Tapas de España

Pimientos de Padron

Friday, December 11th, 2009 by virginia

When Josh and I were in Spain in 2006 with my mom, I jokingly stated before we went that I wanted to eat tapas every single day we were there. And surprisingly enough, we did. Whether it was a full meal or just for an afternoon bar snack, we actually did have at least a couple of tapas each day. The dishes we chose varied, ranging from patatas bravas to spanish tortillas to assorted seafood, but there was one tapa that we ordered every time we saw it on the menu – pimientos de padron.

Snacking on pimientos de padron with cava sangria at a bar in Barcelona. Funny story about the cava sangria, but that's best saved for another time...

Pimientos de padron are small green peppers about the same size as a jalapeno, but they are softer and more wrinkly in texture. Padron peppers are really hard to find around here so many times people substitute shishito peppers instead. The cool thing about eating pimientos de padron, however, is that it’s like playing Russian roulette with your mouth. As the saying goes, some are hot and some are not. Although different sources vary on the percentage of spicy peppers, we heard that one out of every 10 are hot.

So we were in Spain for about 8 days, and day after day we ate pimientos de padron, hoping for a spicy one. My mom, who loves spicy foods, was especially eager to taste just how spicy these peppers could be. Day after day, none of us struck gold with a spicy pepper. Then on our last day in Spain, Josh and I had gone off on our own to watch a Barcelona soccer game at Camp Nou. Before the game, we stopped in a crowded restaurant to grab a quick bite to eat. And of course we ordered pimientos de padron.

At this point I had stopped believing that padron peppers could be spicy. All of a sudden, on my very last pepper, my mouth exploded in fiery pain. The spiciness actually wasn’t terrible, it was just the surprise of it that startled me. Josh had a little nibble and confirmed that this was indeed a spicy one. So out of the almost 100 padron peppers we ate collectively, only one was spicy. And sadly, my mom wasn’t there to experience it.

Josh and I have often lamented our lack of access to padron peppers here in NYC so when our friends Felipe and Silva went to Spain to visit Felipe’s family, they brought us back a packet of padron pepper seeds. Not being the best gardener, I gave the seeds to my mom, who has the greenest thumb. From one little packet of seeds, she managed to sprout several pepper plants, and she called us home to NJ when the first crop of peppers was ready to harvest.

Picking out a few padron peppers to cook up

Although there were several peppers sprouting, only five were ripe for plucking. We cut those off and prepared them how they’re done in Spain, fried in oil and sprinkled with coarse salt.

Frying up the peppers in some oil

The three of us each took a pepper, clinked them together in a toast, and all took a bite at the same time.

Fried pimientos de padron sprinkled with coarse salt

Both my mom and I yelped in shock, our mouths on fire, while Josh just calmly chewed on his. The ones we had were SPICY, much spicier than the spicy one I had in Spain. My mouth was numb and tingling afterward. But the flavor of the pepper was exactly as I remembered, a little sweet, a little bitter, and a bit smoky. I nibbled on Josh’s and confirmed that his was most definitely not spicy.

We saved the last two peppers for Josh’s parents, but I don’t know if they ended up eating them and whether or not they were spicy. Even if they weren’t, 2 out of 5 spicy peppers was a huge difference from the 1 out of 100 we had in Spain. It was just such a fun time for us to be able to play the pepper roulette game again, and brought back great memories of our trip. So thanks very much to Felipe and Silva for bringing home a little bit of Spain for us, and we can’t wait until the next batch is ready to harvest!

Tags: Spanish, Tapas
Posted in Recipes | 1 Comment »

Bad Food at Madison Square Garden

Thursday, December 10th, 2009 by virginia

DSCN4444

Since I posted about the food at Yankee Stadium and Citi Field, it’s only fair for me to talk about the food at Madison Square Garden (MSG) as well. Sadly, there’s not much to talk about. Basically, your only options are cafeteria food. Expensive, terrible cafeteria food.

We were invited to attend the Knicks/Nets preseason match-up at MSG and our seats were located in the Club section, meaning that we could get food and drinks delivered directly to our seats. Perusing the menu, there wasn’t much that interested us. Sure you could get hot dogs, sandwiches, nachos, and other standard sports arena food, but it was shockingly pricey.

Josh and I weren’t starving at that point so we ended up splitting an order of chicken fingers, which came with waffles fries. The cost? About $12, not including tip. Not being club seat regulars, I gotta ask – who do you tip? The person that takes your order? Or the person that brings you your food? Being newbies, we tipped the person taking the order 20%, thinking that they would be getting our food for us. But it turned out to be someone else, so we ended up tipping that person as well. It ended up being a very expensive order of chicken fingers and waffle fries.

So was the food at least good? Nope. The fingers and fries are obviously the frozen variety, and there were four tenders to the order. Even though they were delivered within 10 minutes, they were lukewarm and soggy and had clearly been steaming inside a plastic container for some time. Ugh. It’s hard to mess up fried food, and they managed to do so. You all know how much I love fake seasoned waffle fries, but these were just sad.

Soggy, ordinary chicken tenders and waffle fries

It’s really too bad because you would think that they’d want to give Club seat ticket holders decent food, since the tickets are so pricey to begin with. But what did I really expect? I personally think you’re better off walking out and getting your own food, but then I feel bad about taking business away from the order-takers and delivery people. But then you pay a lot extra for a service that doesn’t even really do a good job. It’s quite a dilemma. At least we can get away with not ordering drinks from them, as they only have Bud, Bud Light, and Bass, while the beer garden stand just outside has far more and better beer choices.

I don’t know if the concession stands are cheaper than if you order from the Club menu, but I can’t imagine that it would a big difference in price. I’ll have to look the next time we’re at MSG. I really hope that MSG will step up soon and provide better food choices, a la Yankee Stadium and Citi Field. Both of those stadiums have vastly improved on the typically mediocre sports arena food. But until then, the food at MSG is pretty pathetic, and expect to pay through the nose for it.

Meanwhile, the Knicks beat the Nets handily, which was apparently a preview of things to come for the Nets. Not that the Knicks are doing so much better these days either. It’s hard to be a basketball fan in this area!

Good seats, fun game, bad food

Tags: Fries, MSG
Posted in Sports Arena | Comments Off on Bad Food at Madison Square Garden