kalat-o-scope

stay tuned...

2009-04-27T15:27:00.001-04:00

i'm trying to gather my thoughts on a eating and drinking blog. i'm still trying to come up with the proper name for the new blog. in the meantime, i'll try to post all of my food adventures to kalat-o-scope in the very near future...

thanks for sticking around!

cractus

2008-12-05T08:35:00.007-05:00

so i didn't post anything about the making of the rillettes, nor the beef jerky. but here's a quick sum up:

rilletes: i cut the pork into too small chunks so that by the time it was cooked and i put it in the kitchen-aid stand mixer, the finished texture was kind of dry, overcooked and mushy. the thing is, though, is that it wasn't overcooked but it's texture was really not that great. so i'd have to say the potted meat project was a failure. *sigh*

beef jerky: this was cavin's project, so i can only comment on what i know. because our oven's temperature only goes as low as 150 or 165, and the beef needed to dry out at 90F, he propped the door open. in the beginning, this turned out pretty good; cavin had the thermometer inside the open oven and the temp was steady at around 90-100. but, i was told after an hour or so of cooking, the oven door somehow shut close, without him knowing it, and so the oven temp went back up to 160. i don't know how long the jerky stayed in the 160 oven, but cavin decided to take it out a lot sooner than the 10+ hours it says in ruhlman's charcuterie book. either way, it actually turned out pretty good, though, probably more dried than supposed to be, and a little more saltier than it should have been. i think it was saltier because he left the beef to sit in the marinade (of onion powder, garlic powder, adobo chipotle chili, and salt) longer than called for. but we've been snacking on it and he's ready to try another batch in the near future!

but the real reason i wanted to post was because the other night we finally went back to cractus, uh, i mean cactus (cantina). it's yet another restaurant/bar trying to cater to the mediocre college graduates looking to take it one step higher than say, the newish manayunk tavern.

the first time we went was opening day. sure, i expected it to be chaotic that first day. but i didn't expect to not even get greeted by the host, waitress, or the several bartenders helping the other boozers trying to get their drink on. i mean hell! i understand all about getting their drink on - that's why cavin and i went. but i at least wanted someone to say to me, "hi, i'll be right with you," even if they were lying.

but we got nothing. so after standing behind all the bar patrons for a good 10-15 minutes with no acknowledgment that we existed, we decided to walk out. and of course, as soon as we started leaving, someone at the door who worked there was alarmed and asked us, "leaving so soon?" to which i responded "yeah, it's too crowded". (i think that's what i said. i could have been more pissed, but it's been months since and i've cooled down.)

so this week was our actual first trip back to the cractus, and i wasn't too impressed. there wasn't really anyone there because it was kind of early, though, there was a surprise party for some beotch that came in blindfolded, led by her idiot friends that didn't close the door behind them so there was crazy cold wind blowing into the bar until cavin went over and closed the door.

we sat at the bar, but honestly? if i ever happen to go again, i won't sit AT the bar. i might sit at the tables against the wall in the bar area, but definitely not at the bar, especially if i'm trying to get something to eat. the bar counter doesn't hang too much over the actual bar. it's hard for me to explain, but basically we couldn't sit facing the bar - we had to have our bodies turned sideways because there wasn't enough knee-leg room. i really feel like owners and designers need to actually sit in the chairs and at the bars of the places they are working on. this was really annoying to me as i had to basically sit slanted for me to have enough leg room.

the food was ok, but nothing special. of course they give you the complementary basket of tortilla chips and their chipotle-spiked salsa (i should mention that it specifically states that only ONE basket of chips and salsa is free). the salsa wasn't terrible, but it was kind of sweet, and i felt like it was a costco tub of salsa that was mixed with some chipotle chiles to make it smokey. i bet i'm not too far off on that.

we ordered a salad with steak, and three pork tacos. you can't really go wrong with a salad, and the pork tacos were decent in flavor, but the texture of the pork reminded me of the pork rilletes i made a few weeks ago: over-cooked, over-shredded, and over-processed.

that leaves me to the drinks. we both stuck with margaritas, and while i didn't taste cavin's 'aztec gold' (cuervo 1800, gran marnier, fresh squeezed lime juice on the rocks), my 'pasion de fresca' (sauza gold tequila, fresh squeezed lime juice, triple sec, shaken over ice with fresh strawberries) was pretty decent. though, i happened to noticed that the bartender (probably the manager) was taking a really long time to mix up the drinks because he was measuring EVERYTHING. now i understand why that first day it was so busy - if you can't get decent bartenders, everything backs up!

they do have some specials, and the ones that looks the most promising is their sunday $10 pitchers of margaritas or their tuesday $2 tacos or their thursday (?) half-price pitchers of sangria.

i was pretty sure that this place wasn't going to be on our go-to list, but think i'd go back for drinks. oh, and did i mention that they have a huge tequila list (something that i'm sure cavin and i would like to go back to sample when we had the time) though i'm betting that the majority of jerks that go there go don't even notice all the tequilcs and care more about getting margaritas, or even coronas.

cactus restaurant and bar
4243 main street
manayunk 19127
(267) 385-6249

rillettes + jerky = back to blogging.

2008-11-14T13:14:00.005-05:00

i've been absent.

two people have asked me why i haven't updated. i'm not sure why. partly because i didn't have time for a while with buying a house. partly because i'm lazy. and partly because i didn't feel motivated to write about anything.

i've been in a funk and because two people actually cared to ask me why i haven't updated, a spark has been lit and i will get motivated.

i'm making pork rillettes now, recipe courtesy of m.ruhlman and b.polcyn. i haven't made anything from their charcuterie book yet, so i'll try to document as i go.

cavin is also making beef jerky so i'll keep everyone posted.

thanks for sticking it out...

homeowning thoughts

2008-06-04T14:14:00.007-04:00

i'm sitting here waiting. we're getting a new couch and it's getting delivered in 15 minutes.

we've gone a long way from settlement five days ago. here are some thoughts on my new title, "sucka homeowner" (sike!):

we've uncovered the truth: it's the seller's wife and his pig-face* agent who put the B in the word Bitches
some of our neighbors have been living here since the 1950's
i didn't know we were supposed to have our friends and family over for a (cleaning) party
pre-planning (packing lists, u-haul truck rental / van use for the move, paint colors, etc) was a waste of time
i have the most generous family (in the world)
i'm 100% thrilled that poyu was our agent and our friend
we spent a lot of money buying the house, but now we're spending more $$$ on all the things that go into the house

i've been taking pictures, but unfortunately (for you) i used an old school polaroid camera. so until i get a scanner or start using my digital camera (where is that thing anyways?), my home posts will be sans pictures.

* yes, i know that pig-face holds no ground in the joseph chaves theory, but maybe it's time that theory has been revisited...

"did iiiii do thaaat?" --steve urkel, family matters

2008-05-29T13:17:00.010-04:00

i can't even believe that tomorrow cavin and i are going to be homeowners. i know tomorrow after closing and we're back in OUR house, i'm going to turn to cavin and say, "um, did we just buy...a HOUSE?"

i thought i was nervous last week! today, after going to the bank and getting a cashier's check for a large, insane amount of money, i can't sit still. my hands are shaking, and i'm constantly freaking, making sure i didn't misplace the check, or it didn't get stolen from my bag. and to top it off, my stomach hurts!

30 days ago, when we started counting down the days, cavin told me that the days were going to fly by - and they have. two weeks ago, i was telling myself that we were going to start packing up all of the kalat we've been accumulating while living at my parents' house, and start cleaning up. but did we do any of that? uh, no. but in our defense, we DID decide on a couch, which took a lot of discussion of the pros and cons, and we started going to stores that sold things we might need, to find out prices, and hey! we made a list! but in the famous words of doug martsch, "but the plan won't accomplish anything, if it's not implemented." *sigh*

besides this minimal preparation, i guess we've been trying to deal with this soon-to-be major change in our lives. let's see if i can recap the ways we (well, at least me) have been "coping": dinner at cochon; drinks at james; buying new cell phones; duran duran at the mann (thanks bob&ga!); 3 pairs new shoes (for me); new clothes/coat (for me); taking crosby to the vet (is there such a thing as cat insurance??). so yeah, basically spending TONS of money before dropping major bones this friday. great way of "coping", right?

hopefully tomorrow everything will go smoothly: the seller will be moved out before walk-in and we're not waiting around, and that signing the paperwork won't result in me losing my patience (and getting carpal tunnel). if everything DOES go smoothly, i know the first thing i'll be doing: spending more money on built to spill tickets for both shows at the troc in september (perfect from now on, here i come!). i mean, i should get some sort of reward for successfully walking away from the house buying process only semi-scathed, right? hehe

one week jitters

2008-05-23T10:31:00.006-04:00

this time next week, we will hopefully be new homeowners. i say "hopefully" because there have been a whole slew of things that has happened that has made me lose faith in human beings, in general.

the whole process has been a real struggle, and the most recent thing that has happened (which is stressing me out) is that the sellers' agent asked us if we could push our final walk through AFTER settlement. i've never bought a house before, but i'm fairly certain that it doesn't happen that way. i think the buyers need to walk through the house beforehand so that the house is in the condition they expect it to be in, with all of the seller's crap removed from the house for the walk through.

of course, poyu responded to the seller's agent, "uh, i'll talk to my clients, but i'm fairly certain they are going to say NO." (duh).

being the nice people we are, we are allowing them to finish moving the morning of settlement, and push back the walk through and settlement. so they are supposedly going to have movers come at 6am and hopefully be out of the house by 10am, so that we could have walk through at 10:15am, and then settlement at 11am. i'm very dubious about the entire moving process, because i've moved many times in my life (and been part of other's moving process) and i feel like i have a good grasp of how long it takes to move.

i'm not doubting the fact that it can get done in 4 hours, but honestly, when moving, you usually end up taking longer than you anticipated, no matter how much extra cushion time you add. and the fact that we KNOW that the seller's lady person is going to be out of town the night before, doesn't give me much confidence that things will be packed and ready to be moved out by the time the movers come (if they even come on time).

i'm concerned they are going to leave all their crap behind for us to get rid of because they didn't do it ahead of time. i'm worried because i'm going to feel rushed during the walk through, because we have to make the settlement at 11am (downtown). i'm stressed because if their move doesn't go as they planned, then we might be sitting around waiting for the sellers to finish moving, and then everything would get pushed back several hours. i'm annoyed at the seller for not having thought this plan all the way through ahead of time, thus affecting everyone's time (buyers, agents, titling company, etc). i'm nervous because a large chunk of the money we saved up will very soon be gone, and because for the past 6 months, we (me, cavin AND crosby) have grown comfortable living under my parents' roof and we're going to have to acclimate again (hopefully this will be the last time we move for a while).

i'm trying to think of everything we need to do to make settlement go as smoothly as possible. but not having bought a house before, i really have no idea what to expect. i really hope that things go as planned, because if they don't, knowing my temper, there might just be words exchanged between myself and the seller. watch out!

strip mall sushi

2008-05-07T12:49:00.011-04:00

i don't think i've written about sushi since we've moved back in the area. while my allegiance is always to kotobuki, there are some worthy contenders for getting our sushi on.

we haven't been actively exploring sushi restaurants, but we have gone to a few places (some since we've moved back, others while we were living in dc or nj). each has its pros and cons.

i would say that sagami has very fresh sushi, killer agadashi tofu as well as other japanese cuisine (other than sushi), is a byo, and has cozy feel to the place, but it's all the way in nj, so it's more of a i'm-bored-wanna-drive-to-nj? kind of place.

osaka is in chestnut hill, which is very close to where we live now, but it's expensive, and it's not a byo, so getting sake, wine, or liquor adds to the already high prices. [though, i just read this so maybe kirin ichiban is the (cheaper) way to go.]

speaking of high prices. while we haven't visited in a while, morimoto is spectacular, if by spectacular you mean having the freshest seafood (they have seafood tanks in the restaurant where they fish out your entree's main ingredient for you - at least they did the last time i was there). on the menu is my favorite dish of all time, rock shrimp tempura with spicy 'kochujan' aioli: light and crunchy batter on the outside, perfectly cooked sweet rock shrimp on the inside, coated with a sweet/sour fruit-based sauce (morimoto's take on the korean kochujan, a sweet and spicy bean paste) and masago (i seriously LOVE this dish!). this is definitely the kind of place you go to if you have a surplus of money lying around (hello economic stimulus!), or for a very special occasion.

our most recent find is bluefin. it's in a most unsuspecting strip mall in plymouth meeting, which happens to be a mere mile from my office. cavin and i have been a few times, and actually, we ordered a ~$100 tray of sushi for christmas 2007 for my family gathering. while it's not as cheap as kotobuki, their fish is quite fresh, and going for lunch isn't terribly expensive (today i had their 'sake lunch special': soup or salad, 1 spicy tuna roll and 4 salmon nigiri for $14). one of the other best things is that the sushi chef trained/worked with morimoto, and has added a 'spicy rock sundae' which pays tribute to morimoto's rock shrimp tempura dish. while it's not exactly the same as morimoto's version, it's a close match and definitely worth the price ($~9 vs morimoto's $18).

i suspect we'll be going to bluefin more often whenever a sushi craving strikes. the only downside is that it gets super crazy for dinner and if you forget to make a reservation, you are looking at a long wait, or dinner at bluefin another night.

bluefin sushi
1017 germantown pike
plymouth meeting, pa 19462
610.277.3917

adobe cafe

2008-05-02T08:34:00.005-04:00

if you're just finding out about dining out for life, then you're too late. it was yesterday. heh.

restaurants donated a percentage (most i've seen are 33%) of their profits yesterday to aids organizations. it was a great cause, and an excellent excuse to go out to dinner.

we were tempted to go to one of our favs, beau monde, but we decided to pass and try out adobe cafe, a southwestern restaurant in the roxborough/manayunk neighborhoods. [it's actually in roxborough, though, but a lot of people are like, 'roxborough? where's that?', to which i respond, 'have you heard of manayunk - it's right next to it.' and then most people have a general idea of where i'm talking about.]

i think this place has been here forever, though, i haven't gone to many restaurants in roxborough for the 15+ years i've lived in the area. so, hoping for the best, we gave it a try last night since we wanted to support dining out for life.

when you are driving/walking around the neighborhood, the building is hard to miss: it's a converted stucco home, painted an aztec-y, adobe orange, in a sea of white/tan row houses. there is an outside patio that has the potential for lazy, summer evening hangouts, but we didn't eat out there, as it was a little dreary out.

the hostess sat us towards the back section of the restaurant, and from our seats, we could see there was a bar area, and it was also good to see that the place was at the start of a busy evening - a good sign, maybe? or maybe not - could dining out for life possibly be one of those amateur "holidays" for going out - like valentine's day, or new years eve?

we started with a half pitcher of the red sangria, which wasn't bad, but it wasn't anything special. we also shared the french fried yams, which were lightly covered with melted cheese. again, nothing special, just sweet potato fries with shredded cheese melted on top.

my pork burrito was dubbed the title, "new mexican" because it had white beans (canned, i might add) instead of red or pinto beans. how fancy (not). the portion was large and someone in the kitchen had a heavy hand with the cheese in the filling (seriously - way too much). it was covered with some sort of canned imitation sour cream, which the chef squirted on with a bottle, no doubt. why he/she didn't just give a small side of fresh sour cream, one will always wonder. once i pulled the pork out of the flour tortilla and separated it from the cheese, it was, uh, edible? there was a side of grilled squash and mushrooms, which was bland, but at least didn't come from a can.

cavin ordered the combo: a tamale (not wrapped in a corn husk though), taquito (flauta), soft flour taco, and enchilada. i only took a small bite of his food, and while it was better than what i ordered, that's not really saying much. though it was only yesterday, i honestly don't remember what type of fillings were in his food, except for the chicken (in the soft flour taco), ONLY because we both were like, "oh look, there's cilantro in there".

both of our dishes were served with a yellow rice (boxed) mixed with lima beans (frozen) and corn (also frozen). and, of course, it was bland.

i know the economy is in a slump. and maybe adobe cafe's managers expected a busy night (for amateur restaurant goers). but why were the dishes totally lacking (lacking in what? EVERYTHING)???

so, i beg you adobe cafe: if you are going to serve mostly canned and prepared foods, at least try to sandra lee it up! come on! splurge and buy fresh herbs and add them to the canned sauces! buy fresh sour cream instead of the fake crap that you squeeze on the dishes - i'd much rather have been served one of those little plastic containers of the real stuff, than artfully squeezed faux sour cream any day. oh, and please season your food! there was seriously no salt added to any of the side dishes and my side of veggies could have used a quick marinade in olive oil and salt and pepper.

we spent a total of $45 and left totally unsatisfied. well, at least ~$15 went to a good cause. *sigh*

it was quite disappointing that adobe cafe could have been so great, but just fell so, so flat. i KNOW i can make dishes 10 times tastier than what i had last night (i should just open up a restaurant!). if i ever go back, maybe i'll have better luck drinking a michelada (which they actually have on their drink menu) and sitting outside on the patio.

adobe cafe
4550 mitchell street
philadelphia, pa 19128
215.483.3947

eating on the train in chinatown

2008-04-30T14:07:00.004-04:00

it's always good going out to new restaurants with a bunch of people, especially when the menu is rather large and it would take you many return visits to try a good selection of the food. this is definitely the case when eating ethnic food (like in chinatown).

last week my college friends decided to meet for dinner at the choo choo restaurant. i've always walked by this place, but have only ever gone in once, a long, long time ago. so to me, this was a new restaurant.

the name of the restaurant is not choo choo restaurant, as you might expect. there is a neon choo choo train in the front window, which is why we (my friends) call it that. the real name of the place is pho xe lua (a viet-thai restaurant).

with nine of us there, we were ready to try everything, and we did.

the salt baked squid was better than the last time i had them at neighboring sang kee, but not as good as the when the dish is spot on there.

the papaya salad with shrimp and pork could, and should have been pre-dressed with the vinegary/not-so-spicy chile garlic sauce, which would have allowed for the green papaya to soak up the vinegar and take on some sort of flavor (raw, as is, this particular papaya was tasteless). [just to mention, i've had the best version of this dish at thai square, in arlington, va: very spicy and highly flavored with shrimp!]

the snails in lemongrass and hot peppers was ok - i'm not a connoisseur of snails, but they taste very similar to mussels, but a bit more firm. i'm guessing they had been cooked a tad bit longer than they should have been, leading to a tougher texture [or maybe i'm wrong, because again, i'm not a snail snob]. we were served a big bowl of them, with a little dish of toothpicks. you are supposed to remove the "foot" part of the snail, which is hard and similar to the shell itself, and then you use the toothpick to pry the snail out of its shell. they were tasty, and i would try the snails with coconut and basil if i were there again with a group willing to give it a try.

we also ordered frog legs in garlic butter, but i just wasn't feeling it. i passed on it, but cavin took a liking to them. i've only every had frog legs once before, many, many years ago, and i remembered them tasting like chicken.

while cavin ordered pho, i just couldn't do it because it was already so hot in the restaurant. so i opted for #305: minced shrimp on sugar cane, grilled pork balls, and bbq pork on vermicelli noodles. it was quite delicious. it was served with a side of the vinegary chile sauce, similar, if not the same, as the sauce used for the papaya salad, and the raw flank steak we ordered. one complaint was that the entire dish was served in one bowl (with lettuce at the bottom of the bowl), so it was difficult to get at the noodles. but that is a tiny negative and i would re-order this dish again any day. (and for $5.50, it's a complete steal!)

i tasted cavin's pho (#114: beef balls rice noodle soup - beef in the shape of balls, not "beef balls"!) and while it was good, i thought the broth was heavy on the star anise and i think i prefer pho 75. but that's just one opinion.

after dinner, we walked a few blocks to zen teahouse to end our meal (not our night, though) with bubble tea. my cold taro bubble tea was pretty good, and since they have hot bubble tea, i might opt for the hot taro the next time i stop by.

when we go to chinatown this friday, we'll probably try another restaurant, but maybe we'll give zen teahouse another whirl!

pho xe lua
907 race St (btwn n 9th st & n 10th st)
philadelphia, pa 19107
(215) 627-8883

zen teahouse
225 n. 11th street
philadelphia, pa 19107
(215) 629-4848

duck prosciutto

2008-04-28T18:57:00.007-04:00

holy crap. tonight cavin and i discovered the joys of our first homemade charcuterie! but before i get into it, let me first tell you how we started down this road.

about a year and a half ago, while we were living in dc, we decided to press our luck by ordering a half hog from a butcher leigh knew. since the first year turned out quite well, we decided to go for it again in 2007. needless to say, we haven't used up all the pork yet, and it was taking up a lot of room in my parents' new freezer. after reading through jacques' complete techniques, we thought, 'what the hell?' and decided to dry cure a ham.

i'm a little pissed at myself for not documenting the process more, but basically we took a ~5 lb. ham (organic), salted it for about 2 weeks, draining the liquid every so often, removed all the salt, rubbed it with garlic and cracked peppercorns, wrapped it with cheesecloth, and hung it the garage. we're supposed to let it sit for 6 months or longer. we did this march 13, so if we waited the obligatory amount of time, it would be ready for my birthday.

fast forward one month later. i was reading ruhlman's blog on curing and i had this hankering to buy his (and brian polcyn's) charcuterie book. as we were driving home from work, we took a mini detour and stopped by the bookstore to pick up a copy.

ruhlman says, 'Duck breast is one of the easiest dry-cured items to prepare at home. Duck breasts are widely available, and their size is perfectly manageable. Even a frozen store-bought breast of duck will provide results that will surprise you, especially if you've never cured your own meats, yielding a rich prosciutto-like flavor.' [p.54, charcuterie]

as soon as we read this, cavin and i immediately got to steppin'!

we couldn't find duck breast, but we did find a whole duck, which i ended up butchering myself, in the hopes to maybe confit the legs (but we didn't have enough rendered duck fat so we'll try again once we've save up enough fat).

anyway, we basically did the same thing we did for the ham: we salted the duck breasts for 2 days in the fridge, removed the salt, dusted with white pepper, wrapped each breast in cheesecloth, and hung it next to our friend (the ham) in the garage for 1 week. so guess what today was?!?

here's a picture of the two duck breasts after drying for one week. i have to admit that the breasts were thin to begin with, but since this was our first attempt, we continued on, wanting to see how it would turn out. the breast at the top of the picture is skin side down; the white stuff is the white pepper that we sprinkled on it. the bottom breast is skin side up.

this is a picture of one of the breasts after i thinly shaved pieces off. you can see that the breast is a deep red color (which is how it's supposed to look), and you can see that there is a lot of fat on the breast (cavin and i haven't been eating the fat, though, it's perfectly acceptable, as you would if you were eating a traditional piece of thinly sliced prosciutto.

it tastes a bit salty - we could have probably adjusted the salting period, based on the thickness of the breasts. ah, maybe next time. but anyway, prosciutto is supposed to be salty!

but the fact that we ate a piece of duck that we never really cooked, and am still alive to write about it makes this, in my book, a successful attempt. we're taking this as a sign of good things to come in the fall/winter when we uncover our dry-cure ham project. i can't freaking wait!

debunking the yunk

2008-04-22T11:07:00.003-04:00

so ever since cavin and i decided to take the plunge and become homeowners in manayunk, we've been trying to embrace our inner meathead by hanging out on main street. [there is future in a spin-off blog on manayunk, but for now i'll keep everything in kalat-o-scope. though, i have now added a manayunk tag.]

whenever i have been back visiting philly in the past 10 or so years i've been living elsewhere, i've only hung out in manayunk a handful of times. it always felt so cheesy and the people that hang out are so young, and so naive (and so god damn annoying), that i've avoided it at all costs. in fact, the only times i've hung out in the 'yunk since i turned 21 were times when other people dragged me there.

but now that this is our soon-to-be neighborhood, i'd better start owning it. and so it begins.

i'll hopefully be dedicating a separate blog entry to a different establishment in manayunk (or even roxborough, maybe east falls and mount airy, too).

stay tuned to see if kalat-o-scope can get motivated and find a decent place to hang out! hehe

korea, an neong ha seh yo!

2008-04-18T09:44:00.006-04:00

when i think of my blossoming love affair with korean food, i think of that fateful day at hill center registering for my first classes in grad school, where it all began.

three asians (one of them me) sat on the bench in the hallway outside of room 501, waiting in line to see the secretary. when one of them left to register for her classes, i was left with who i now know as sung hee, and that was the beginning of our friendship. but had i gotten there a bit earlier or a bit later, i could have befriended the chinese girl and would have been gushing about my love for chinese food. or the chinese girl could have befriended sung hee, and you would be reading a chinese girl's blog professing her love for korean cuisine. but alas, it was i who became entangled in the bibimbap mix (and brought cavin with me).

after leaving new brunswick and all the korean joints in nj, cavin and i explored the korean restaurant scene in dc and outlying areas. so when we moved back to philly, we had to start from scratch and see if we could unearth the holy korean bbq.

some research later, we discovered that philly does indeed "do" korean in the form of our own little koreatown. armed with this knowledge, and the fact that we basically drive near this part of town to get to hong kong supermarket, we ventured out to olney to reconnect with our inner mandu.

what did we find? one place was a small korean noodle house on cheltenham ave that hand draws their own noodles. nothing was written in english, but as we looked around, everyone seemed to be eating either a big bowl of the seafood noodle soup, or the black bean noodles - so of course, we got both. while it was tasty (and rather cheap, if i can recall correctly), we left still in search of good ol' fashioned korean bbq.

Cheltenham Seafood Noodle Shop
401 W. Cheltenham Ave.
215-635-3959

the next place we found was actually not in koreatown, but in north wales, of all places. koko restaurant is next to the assi plaza, an asian grocery store, reminicent of h-mart. koko restaurant opened up fairly recently and we decided to take our chances - plus, we knew where they were getting all of their ingredients...

they had electric grills at only some of the tables, and i recall the prices being fair. i remember that the panchan was a little lacking (maybe only 3-4 varieties), and the portion of kalbi was a little smaller than i expected. that said, it's still a good fix if you are out in the suburbs, jonesing for korean bbq.

korean bbq koko
1222 welsh road
north wales, pa 19454
(215) 412-4300

around the same time cavin and i started to really search for korean restaurants, the philly inquirer came out with a timely piece on koreatown. the day before the article came out though, we already had plans to try korean fried chicken we had heard so much about down in dc.

apparently there is a lounge on cheltenham ave, soho cafe, that serves only one food item on their menu: bon chon chicken. we went and picked up 2 boxes of mixed spicy/mild chicken wings and were completely blown away. one box had 20 pieces of large chicken wings, a container of cubed daikon radish, a can of soda, and a cute magnet for the fridge with their info on it. the coating is so amazing - it's light and airy and the technique used to fry the chicken allows the skin of the chicken to be super crispy. i remembered reading a nytimes article about the korean fried chicken, but i wasn't expecting it to actually be this addicting! [and now i understand sung hee's unwaivering devotion for fried chicken, like popeyes - if only we had found a bon chon in the area!]

be aware though, the frying technique takes time, so i'd advise you to call 30 minutes ahead of time to place an order, or be prepared to hang out in the soho cafe lounge and wait. oh, and while an order of 20 wings (with daikon radish and soda) is $20, it's totally worth it. trust me.

Cafe Soho
468 W. Cheltenham Ave.
215-224-6800

finally, i treated the fam out to our most recent korean outing at everyday good house. the service was great and they serve alcohol. there were 7-8 varieties of panchan, our kalbi and bulgogi were intensely flavored, and they were more than willing to keep refilling our requests for more of the japchae panchan (which my mom loved).

each diner received a small dish of seasoned sesame oil and fermented soybean paste for our bbq. this is something that i hadn't seen before in all of my korean restaurant experiences to date (except i think they did that at koko), but it was a welcomed custom, especially when eating the grilled, unmarinated pork belly.

another korean custom that i KNOW sung hee has recounted tales of is getting a room at a karaoke bar, drinking with friends and getting sloshed while singing neil diamond tunes. apparently the building that houses everyday good house also has these karaoke rooms of which i speak. cavin and i have yet to go, but maybe in the future we'll build up enough courage and take the plunge. i mean, it IS a private room, so why not?

Everyday Good House
5501 N. Front St.
Philadelphia, PA 19120
215-276-7942; New World Karaoke 215-549-7942

amada, or should i say, a-MEH-da

2008-04-18T08:34:00.006-04:00

i'm behind on my blogging about restaurants so hopefully today i'll get to post a whole slew of mini reviews of the places that we've been in the past 3 weeks or so.

cavin's birthday was in the beginning of april, and since we've been living with the 'rents, i thought it would be nice to get out and do something, so i not-so-secretly made a reservation to amada, with high expectations. before his birthday date night, i kept dreaming of a philly version of jose andres, since amada was created by another jose, jose garces, and because, quite frankly, i was missing the dc dining scene.

i already posted a reply to don rock's post on the alleged fantastic restaurant on donrockwell, but it bears repeating below:

QUOTE(DonRocks @ Jan 24 2008, 11:15 AM)
I went into Amada with high expectations, given that its chef, Jose Garces, was a 2007 finalist for the Best Chef, Mid-Atlantic James Beard Award.

Eleven dishes later, and $240 poorer, I can say with confidence that Amada - at least on this night - wasn't even as good as the downtown Jaleo, and considering that it's a much smaller operation, that's saying something.

The highlights of the evening were the Sangria, a glass of Godello, the dip brought before the meal, and the dessert. In between came an armada of courses, ranging from decent (Albóndigas ($11), Amada's Empanada ($12) Chipirónes A La Plancha ($5)), to mediocre (Pulpo A La Gallega ($11), Boquerones ($12), Piquillos Rellenos ($12), to poor (Gambas al Ajillo ($9), Entrecote A La Plancha ($15)), to inedibly salty (Patatas Bravas ($4), Caldo Gallego ($7)).
. . .
Cheers,
Rocks.

QUOTE(purplesachi @Apr 9 2008, 12:22 PM)
i wholeheartedly agree about amada. politburo and i went this past saturday and the best thing i had that night might have been the dessert (banana torrijas). nothing was memorable, except the extremely saltiness of every dish we tried (boquerones, pulpo, patatas bravas, etc). the pato con datiles (duck confit flatbread) could have been any meat other than duck and it was extremely greasy. the hamachi special was seared too much, creating a rubbery, tough texture to the fish. and the dip brought before the meal was reminiscent of canned tuna and capers swimming in an excess of mayo and olive oil.

on top of the mediocre food, there was a very loud table at the front (next to the window) that almost started a fight with the table nearest to them (because they were asked to keep it down a bit). the waitress knew they were loud yet didn't do anything about it.

i'll give tinto a try, but i don't think i'll be heading back to amada any time soon. *sigh*

yeah, so basically that's it. oh, i did neglect to mention my thoughts on the seating. while the space inside is quite cozy and warm, there are many tables that are up against the wall, so that there are chairs on one side, and bench seating on the other. while i don't mind the padded benches, i DO mind the fact that when you sit on them, they sink down so that you are basically a whole foot lower than your dining companions at the other end of the table. it really makes for awkward conversation (cavin sitting up high staring down at me) and i felt like i was a little kid again, barely being able to see above table height.

amada
217 Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19106
Phone: 215-625-2450

missing jackie

2008-04-04T10:56:00.005-04:00

at the end of february, during a break in a training class i was attending, i stumbled into a conversation about hair salons.

girl 1: ... yes, i got my hair cut, but this was a few weeks ago. i got it all chopped off! An did such a good job! i love him! did you know i work there as a massage therapist?
girl 2: oooh! i didn't know! i LOVE An also! he's the only person i ever let cut my hair!
me: are you talking about hair salons? i've been looking for a good place to get my hair cut, because i'm really nervous about paying a lot of money for a haircut that sucks.
girl 2: oh! then you should DEFINITELY go to heaven and earth - it's in lafayette hill. you should have An cut your hair. see this? see my hair? this is An's work. i don't even have to blow dry my hair! it just dries naturally like this! TOTALLY go to heaven and earth and get your hair cut by An!
girl 1: yeah, you should go there - the only thing is that An doesn't do "updo's". but other than that, he's REALLY good. here's the phone number. definitely make an appointment.
me: sure, why not? i'll give it a try. thanks!

so, i made an appointment to get my haircut by the alleged amazing An. i'm picturing this total diva, perhaps with stylistics similar to Christian, from project runway. i mean, what kind of person (guy) has the name "An", except an over-the-top, self-righteous prima donna?

but before i go into the details of heaven and earth and this "An" character, let's review the conversation i had weeks before my fate, which might have hinted at what was to come...

clue #1: i was in a training class AT WORK. no shortage of khaki pants and tacky color coordinated sweaters and cardigans here! i should have guessed that the people dressing like color coordinated robots get their hair cut at robot salons.

clue #2: the salon is in lafayette hill. while i don't doubt that there are some trendsters in the area, i would bet my mittens that the majority of people going to this salon are suburbanites and that more style-conscious peeps are not traveling to the suburbs to get their hair styled.

clue #3: girl #2's uninspired hair cut. she basically had long (down to the middle of her back), straight, hair. no layering. no angles. just cut straight across. !?!? like that is supposed to show off "the amazing An" and his prowess with scissors? pul-leeze. i just cut jano's hair a few weeks ago and i think i did a better job than what An did with girl #2's hair...and i don't even get PAID to cut hair!

but, my hair was just getting too long since my last haircut several months ago. i didn't have any other leads, so i thought, well, maybe it won't be that bad...

i was really nervous all day before my haircut, and with good reason. when i parked the car, i was thinking, 'well, this can't be that bad." heaven and earth is in a house that was converted to a salon. when i was walking up to the door, i noticed a woman walking out - a middle aged lady whose hair didn't look terrible, but looked very unremarkable.

once inside, the lady at the front desk was an older woman (no hair style whatsoever). she was nice enough, but as i started to look around, everything there seemed to scream, "WE ARE MEDIOCRE IF YOU PLEASE!" (teen magazine in the waiting area; Q102 music blasting from the speakers; no younger people). yet, i went against my better judgement and still hoped for the best. plus, i didn't yet meet the amazing and mysterious An!

to say that i was disappointed when I met An is an understatement. he wasn't a diva in any way, shape, or form. most importantly, his hair wasn't styled (or even cut) remarkably, plus he was going gray. and, the mysteriousness of his name was debunked: he was vietnamese. (i was secretly hoping that it was short for something fantastic, like Anwanatobioshizimbabwe - and maybe it is, but after one look at him, i didn't really care anymore.) but still, i was hoping for the best...

i showed him a picture of what my hair used to look like after jackie cut it and i asked, "do you think you can cut my hair like this?" and unequivocally, he stated, "of course!" and started hacking away. and it seemed like everything was on course until he started blow drying my hair.

i took my glasses off during most of my haircut, but something didn't feel right. i felt bristles scraping my scalp, very similar to bristles that would be on a ROUNDED brush. i quickly asked, "maybe you want to blow dry my hair straight? isn't that a ROUND brush you are using?" the response i got was, "oh, i'm just giving your hair some body, that's all. it's so fine that it needs body." to which i responded, "are you sure? i think you should blow it straight" but he reassured me that it would be fine.

then i said, "please don't cut my bangs so short because i don't want them getting into my eyes" and he reassured me that they would be fine. then later he used the small rounded bristle brush to curl my bangs. (yes, i just said that he CURLED my bangs!)

finally i put my glasses on. he handed me a mirror and spun me around and said, "i didn't stack it as much as you wanted in the back," (i.e. he didn't cut it that short in the back AT ALL, which basically meant he didn't cut my hair like in the picture i showed him at the start). when i saw what he did, my first reaction was shock. he totally had styled my hair as if i was some senior citizen working the streets in north philly. all i needed was uber red lipstick and blue eyeshadow to make the look complete. "oh, uh, thanks. it looks...pretty ok."

then he handed me his business card and told me to call in the future for my next appointment. as i walked to the front desk, i felt embarrased that i let him style my hair the way that he did. did he see me as a complete idiot? (apparently so, since he cut my hair to look one.) i tried to get out of there as quickly as possible.

driving away in my car, there were moist cheeks and screams coming from the mess that i was. by the time i made it home, i was livid that i had spent all that money for an awful haircut. i made a scene when i walked in the door and my parents thought something terrible had happened to me. "LOOK AT THIS! LOOK AT THIS!!!" my dad was nice, "it looks good." meanwhile, my mom could see that it wasn't good. but she was on the phone and couldn't console me.

i immediately ran upstairs and washed my hair, muttering swear words at An and at myself for not knowing better. after it dried, it wasn't necessarily as bad as it could have been: he left it longer than i wanted, though the bangs were shorter than what i asked for.

my saving grace was telling myself that because he left it long, when i get it cut in the near future (NOT by An, or anyone else in that old folks home they are calling heaven and earth), i would still have enough hair to get it styled properly.

so... to sum it all up:

1. don't go to heaven and earth
2. don't get your hair cut by any vietnamese person named An
3. don't listen to co-workers in corporate america about where to get your hair cut
4. do trust your instincts
5. don't betray the all-knowing and most awesome stylest, jackie.

maybe temple mba candidates do have a brain?

2008-03-26T14:49:00.005-04:00

boy. the stuff that can happen in just one week!

after we decided we weren't backing down, i started to have doubts about whether we had made the right decision. i'm sure part of it had something to do with the fact that i wanted the house even more, now that i couldn't have it. but after we started hunting for houses again, it became clear that this house had all the things we needed in a house, and was cheaper than other houses that were on the market with the same specs.

over the weekend, i called poyu and told her that cavin and i were going to send her a list of new prospective houses we wanted to see. i also expressed my doubts about the house we just backed out of. because i brought it up, she then proceeded to tell me that the other agent called her a few days before, saying that maybe we could still work through this, because she thought ours was a good offer.

this brought light to the situation: was it possible that the seller realized his mistakes only one week later? both cavin and my mom knew that the seller was going to come back to us, but thought that it wouldn't happen so quickly.

the skinny: the seller got the integral plumbing work done. monday we made a new offer, and the seller chose our offer over the other three that were on the table. we are getting the warranty for the plumbing work transferred over to us. settlement date is still july 31, unless the seller and us agree on a date sooner (this will be highly dependent on whether the seller buys a new house sooner than later).

we will probably have a detox party before year's end so get your drinking / dancing shoes on!

temple mba candidates = assholes.

2008-03-18T08:29:00.007-04:00

the ordeal is over. one week later, and we have decided not to go through with the agreement of sale.

our reasons for backing out:
1. we did not get the $ credit (for the inspection) that we wanted. the seller decided that he would only offer us 3/4 of the cost to get integral plumbing done. it's not like we were trying to rip him off. we just didn't want to have to pay for something that he should be vested to fix himself, since it's still his house and he would be living there until the end of july.

2. we felt that we were making all the compromises (late settlement date; 10-day inspection period; no credit for the AC unit as was listed on the agents' listing sheet; having to get all of the plumbing work done on our own time after settlement, etc), and he wasn't giving us anything in return.

3. we did not appreciate the seller making comments, through his agent to poyu to us, that there were a lot of buyers out there that he could sell his house to. basically, threatening us that if we didn't accept his "firm" inspection contingency counter-offer, that it would be fairly easy to get the price he wanted (or more) for his house from other prospective buyers. i think there was a moment where we almost took his counter-offer credit, but when poyu informed us that the seller/seller's agent consistently bragged about how there were other buyers in the market that would pay more than what we were offering for the house, we were immediately turned off. it didn't feel professional because at that point, the seller was still committed to us and if our offer was not "acceptable" to him, then why did he accept it in the first place?

it's sad. i purposely distanced myself emotionally from the house itself, so i'm basically over not getting this particular house. though, i am sad that we spent much time and effort to buy our first home and we got stuck with an asshole seller that seemed concerned only about getting his wants, was not willing to compromise, and tried to take advantage of us as first time home buyers.

but even after yesterday's disappointment, i'm realizing it was the right decision, and we are just going to take it as a learning experience (though, i already knew that there are lots of assholes in the world). so i guess we're still waiting for our house to find us...

nickels and dimes

2008-03-10T15:42:00.005-04:00

ever since my emotions jumped off my sleeve and i went bezerk when my mom was pestering me (see?) about my stomach issues, cavin and i have started the house hunt.

all i ever hear is, "it's a buyer's market! it's a buyer's market!" which i guess is fine and dandy in candyland, but it seems that everyone else has been hearing it's a buyer's market too. in my mind this translates into a lot of other people looking to buy themselves a purty home to live in, which basically equals: me getting my panties in a bunch. it's been pretty competitive out there - houses on the market for less than 2 weeks getting snatched up before i've even gotten my foot in the door to see it...but then again, what do i know?

for the past month or two, our awesome agent, poyu, has been showing us houses we've been interested in in mt airy and chestnut hill. after deciding that all of the houses had the same crappy layout, or had a concrete box for a backyard, and also after our almost near purchase of the wrong house for us, we took a two week break. (plus, pv and cb became canadians so we were busy with seeing them off.)

after two weeks, we extended our search to the 'yunk. this past thursday we saw a house we liked and decided (for real) to make an offer. being the nosy selves we are, we noticed in the seller's kitchen, written on a calendar that he (and the gfriend) were going on vacation, and that they had some appointments lined up as well as an open house when they got back from vacay in a week. knowing that the odds would be against us if we waited to make an offer when they came back from their trip, we made an offer. it was a very stressful time trying to decide what to offer, because we found out that the seller didn't want to entertain / negotiate an offer since they were leaving on vacation in just two days, and also because he knew that the house was going tbe shown 12 times in the next few days and that would give him a better chance to get his asking price. our only hint was that he said that he would consider an offer before his trip, if it was a "good offer". (close to his asking price and with a later settlement date.)

what constitues "good"? who the hell knows. cavin and i put down on the table a "good offer" (in fact, the figure we came up with was a number that we thought he would like, and wouldn't have to negotiate - because remember, he said he didn't want to negotiate because he was going on vacation!) with a july 2 settlement date. we compromised because ideally we would have liked to be out of rudy and vicky's by spring, and july - well, that's summer, man!

well, being a jerk, of course the seller counter-offered, increasing the price, asking for only a 10 day inspection period (as opposed to a 15 day one) and a july 31 settlement date. woah. after discussion with cavin, we caved in to the inspection time and settlement date, but did not budge on the price. and he accepted. woo-hoo!

we're in the process of getting the house inspected and some things are coming up (it's an 88 yr old house - it's to be expected), and i'm not so sure the seller is going to like what our inspector is finding (btw. if anyone reading this needs a PA inspector, i can give you his name - he is very thorough and is very good at explaining things that a person like myself doesn't quite understand). but screw the seller! there's other things that have been going on that lead us to believe that he's a complete asshole after we've been very accommodating to his requests.

stayed tuned for more drama. i'll update more as i get deeper and deeper in the seedy business of buying a first home!

oh, and he doesn't want us to nickel and dime him on the inspection? yeah, we'll see about that, buddy...

winter updates

2008-02-28T20:22:00.004-05:00

work is busy. i'm busy. this past month it's been crazy busy.

my company is laying off 10% of it's entire global workforce (over the entire year) and it's quite frightening. i have been told that, while nothing is guaranteed, i shouldn't have to worry. i'm doing a lot of production work, so if i was let go, who would do it? (i guess whomever was doing it before, hunh.)

but it's scary because cavin and i are in the process of looking for a house and i don't know what we would do if i lost my job. we did find a house that we liked, very much, but after a second viewing and my dad pointing out that there might be structural damage to the house (floors were sagging and were being held up by 2x4s in the basement), and the fact that the price wasn't right, we lost our nerve and renegged on making an offer. so, we're still searching around for our new home (oh, excuse me. i meant to say, "our new home is still waiting for us to find it")

my family life has been, for lack of a better word: dramatic. some members are boycotting events, others are acting like greedy bitches, another is being brainwashed by his parents, cousins are moving across the country, and two of my immediate family members have been in the hospital over the past 2 weeks. it's been a bumpy road, seriously.

so between my family, the house hunt, and my really busy work schedule, i haven't had time for anything else (fun).

oh, i guess, except for rock band!

...i can feel it!

2008-01-15T15:55:00.000-05:00

trying to save money is leaving me in a trifecta of funk: work, eat, sleep. repeat.

but recently the fog of funk has been lifting:

we saw juno. i don't want to give anything away or give any hints, but you should watch it for yourself and then we can discuss in the comments.

last thursday we went to matyson, a downtown byob, for their (weekly changing) tasting menu. pv alerted us to one of her "favorite meals in the past year" so since we didn't have anything else to do, we took the train and made it in time to grab a drink at elephant and castle (a big MEH), and to our 6:30pm reservation.

last week the tasting menu focused on duck:
1.rilletes with a trio of garnishes [apricot marmalade, crumbled blue cheese, & cornichons]
2.foie gras ravioli & truffles [black trumpet mushrooms, parmesan foam]
3.cassoulet [crispy duck confit, andouille sausage]
4.duck l'orange [potato puree, haricot vert, almonds]
5.chocolate toffee cake [vanilla ice cream]

while it wasn't the best meal of my life, it was very affordable ($45 for the 5 course tasting menu) and delicious. probably my favorite course was the foie gras ravioli & truffles second course: a very savory pasta and mushroom dish, one that i could have eaten 10 more of (seriously). the cassoulet was not as heavy as the dish could have been, which is a good thing, but the spice of the andouille sausage was too strong and overshadowed the duck confit (which was delightfully crispy). everything else was good and indicative of the quality of food they prepare. we'll definitely be going back in the future.

matyson
37 S. 19th street (between market and chestnut)
philadelphia, pa 19103
215.564.2925

i'm also super excited because i've started listening to yrock at work, and i was just talking to cavin about maybe going to the electric factory to see this "freezetival" show (three bands: editors, hot hot heat, louis xiv). i was listening today and they were giving away free tickets to the show, and guess freaking what? i won! yea! i never win anything! so now we have a date to go out again and be social (or something).

things are definitely picking up, i can feel it!

car accident

2008-01-11T08:43:00.000-05:00

so nothing serious, but cavin and i got into a car accident this morning on the way to work.

we were on germantown pike going west, past st. philip neri, when the truck/van in front of us just stopped. because it was a little bit rainy and wet out, and when cavin hit the breaks, we skid and hit the truck/van in front of us.

we got out of the car, and the guy in front of us got out also and was saying that a car pulled out of a driveway and he had to stop suddenly. there seemed to be no apparent damage to his car, but the front bumper of our car hit the trailer hitch of his car, thus pushing up the bumper and preventing us from opening the hood of our car to make sure there was no internal damage.

no information was exchanged, basically because nothing happened to his car and because we hit him. i guess it's better so that our insurance rates don't go up, but looking at the damage of the car, it's something that we are definitely going to have to get fixed, especially since we can't open the hood of our car unless we use a screwdriver, which we'll probably have to do once we get home today.

cavin dropped me off at work but now i feel a little depressed. i'm not sure why. maybe i'm also just tired from our trip to matyson last night (i'll write about it in a bit).

i feel like going home. blah.

living with your parents: could YOU do it?

2008-01-10T08:47:00.000-05:00

so i've been living at home for the past couple months - something i never would have guessed i'd be doing. but here i am, 30 yr old sachi, once again living in my pink bedroom (but without the hot air balloon wallpaper!!), the only difference is that this time around i've got crosby and cavin (plus all my kalat).

it's really nice that my parents are so giving and letting us stay here for a year or so while we save up money to buy a house, and especially magnanimous of them to allow us to live rent-free. and while this is really great, i've come to realize that there is an underlying reason why i never moved back home since college.

whenever i have a conversation with my parents, i can't seem to communicate as clearly, or i can't really understand what they are saying. it's really frustrating to me and i think it's one reason why living at a distance is preferable. i already have a hard time getting my point across, so add trying to talk to my parents, and i'm completely stressed out.

case in point. we got my dad a computer for christmas. he's super excited, and i'm glad to be able to afford this present for him, especially since he's totally into "new gadgets". but i honestly don't have the patience to try to teach him how to use it, especially when we can't communicate what problems arise.

at work yesterday, i missed his phone call. when i called him back, he told me that the computer wasn't working but now everything is fine. but when i asked him what exactly happened, all he kept saying was, "well, when i clicked, nothing happened." and while i'm not a whiz with computers, i do know that i would need a better, more explicit description of what the problem was in order to fix it. when i got off the phone with him, i realized that i was talking much louder than i had started and that people around me probably picked up on my rising stress level.

so when i got home, i see my dad and he's telling me that the calendar and other stuff that used to be on his desktop is now missing. ok. easy enough. i can help fix that. and i did. and everything was fine.

but as cavin and i were leaving to go to the movies (to see juno), my dad is telling us that the dvd burner isn't working and that he can't burn stuff anymore. i left it up to cavin while i went upstairs to get ready. when we got back 2 hours later, he's still on the computer, and next to him is a new stack of coasters, the result of those that didn't burn correctly. i'm trying to ask him what exactly what happened, except he's backtracking with his words and just when i think i pin down what is going on, he's telling me that's not what's going on and something else happened. cavin is trying to calm me down because at this point i'm just yelling, but it's no good. so i just retire upstairs, hoping that cavin can fix whatever the problem is.

and it's not just with my dad i'm having communication problems. early on when we first moved back, we went to dinner with my immediate family. we drove an hour + away to go to this smorgasbord that my parents had gone to several times in the past. i seemed to have remembered going there also when i was younger, and when i brought this up to my mom, she's telling me that it can't be. but i'm pretty sure that i remember being there and definitely remember that on the way back home, i was driving with art and pv in the car and a bee flew in while art was driving. he started flipping out and we almost crashed. so anyway, my mom is insisting that i've never been there before. i'm telling her that i DO remember being there and that i'm not making it up. well, it won't drop because she can't be wrong, and i can't be wrong, and then it turns into this chaotic conversation ending with me talking very loudly in a room filled with people, asking my mom how she knows my memories and how can she know what i remember?

i don't know how my brother does it - he's never moved out except for college. i'm glad to be around my family, in fact, i like it very much and it's a welcome change from my jersey and dc days when i would only be able to visit for a weekend. i guess i just need to figure out how to deal with them without freaking out and getting an ulcer from stress.

i'm such a hater.

2008-01-04T20:00:00.000-05:00

um...so yeah. when i first started this blog, i was living in dc and i had more downtime at work and could blog while getting paid. but now i'm living in philly and have a new job where i'm constantly busy. in fact, just today i was telling cavin on the way to work that i was "not going to do anything today because i didn't feel like it."

of course, when i got to work, i had at least a dozen emails with details of all the things i had to do. blah. i guess it makes the day go by faster. something.

so i've been working for about 2 months now and it's actually not as bad as i thought it would be. the people i work with, for the most part, are pretty friendly. but i've come to realize that i don't want to mix work with my outside life anymore, and honestly, i don't need any new friends. i have enough right now - some i haven't even seen since i've moved back (i'm the worst!).

now that this is my third "real" job, i've been thinking that there are certain types of people that you inevitably end up working with. there's one particular character that i've come across that i can't quite figure out.

so there's always this one person that seems to be someone that i would get along with. but when i try to actually talk with them or be friendly towards them, i don't know...something just isn't right with this person, or rather our relationship. here are some examples:

let's call the first person, felly. felly started work after i did, and since there weren't that many young people where we were working, especially girls, i thought i would be extra friendly and try to engage her in conversation. but whenever i did, our conversations would go like this:

sachi: hi felly!
felly: hi.
sachi: so, did you do anything exciting this past weekend?
felly: no.
sachi: oh, so you just stayed in town then?
felly: no.
sachi: so you went out of town?
felly: yes.
sachi: oh, i went out of town also. i went to philly this weekend to visit some friends.
felly: oh. me too.
sachi: oh, you went to philly? that's cool! did you go anywhere exciting?
felly: no.
. . .

as you can see, having a conversation with felly was very painful, as she basically only gave one word answers. i probably would have had a better time talking to myself (which i probably did later at my desk because i was so bored). but i just couldn't understand why she didn't want to be friends with me. am i that unappealing? at the time too, i could have really used a friend, but alas, a friendship was not formed with felly. a year later or so, new people started coming into the area and she somehow became good friends with these other people, and then, of course, i became bitter about it and now i hate her. ok. let's move on to the next example.

let's call this second person, fee. i was working in an office that was hiring new people every other week, or at least it seemed. in a matter of months there were 4 new people, and when each one started, i talked to them and they seemed pretty nice, though they weren't necessarily people i would hang out with outside of work. but no worries - i wasn't looking for that kind of relationship. i just thought it would be nice to be friends with someone that i could have lunch with every now and then. then fee started working, about a few weeks before i moved to another office at the same company. i found out from a third party that fee and i had lots in common. but for some reason, every time i would see her, we would have the most awkward conversations. sometimes i'd get to work and happen to be walking in with her at the same time, forced to ride the elevator with her. but every conversation we had would go like this:

(walking into the building, waiting for the elevator, riding the elevator with her, and then walking past her office to my office)
fee: oh. hi.
sachi: hi.
(silence)
sachi: uh, so. how's work going?
fee: it's ok.
(more awkward silence)
sachi: oh, did stephanie have her baby yet?
fee: yup.
(more silence)
sachi: oh, that's nice. i was thinking i should stop in and say hi because i haven't seen everyone in a while since i changed offices. it's so different in my new office.
fee: hmm.
(we FINALLY get to her office door)
sachi: well, have a...
fee: (at the same time) uh, yeah, have a good day
sachi: yeah, you too.

i just could never get into a jived conversation with her. but when i would have lunch with my old officemates, she would be jibberjabbing away, laughing at inside jokes, and basically ignoring me. so i said, 'fuck her then!' and i ignored her whenever i'd run into her on the train or see her in the hallway. so yeah, i hate her too.

finally, at my new job, i've come across another one of these people. let's call this one, feather. at the holiday luncheon, she sat diagonally across from me, and basically with all the younger people in the office. because we sat pretty close to each other, i could hear what she was saying. it sounded like she had some interesting things to say and we had some things in common, like traveling. and i was going to talk to her, but during the lunch, out of the corner of my eye, i could see her kind of looking / staring at me, and i was kind of uncomfortable, so i didn't approach her. and at work, she is good friends with the girl who sits across the aisle from me, so every now and then she goes to her desk and chit chats. but i feel like she says things really loud so that everyone (especially me) can hear. in fact, just yesterday she trampled over to the friend's desk and was basically having a one-way conversation:

feather: oh! good! you're here.
friend: yeah, i just got off the phone with this company who screwed up my online order...
feather: oh yeah. my vacation was really great. you know, cause i like to travel, and my new year's resolution is to ski every black diamond out there
friend: mmhmm.
feather: and so i did that, but you know, the black diamonds out on the east coast are way different than the black diamonds on the west coast. but next time we're going to this other place so that we can try all the other mountains
friend: mmhmm
feather: and then after that, i'm going to try to...

it was pretty obvious that the friend was trying to tell her the story about how she ordered this coat online and when it got delivered it was the wrong color and she had been on the phone for a while trying to get it straightened out (i know because i sit across from her and i heard the entire thing!), but feather just wanted to talk about herself. and while it is cool that she likes to travel and have fun (she was bragging at the holiday luncheon about a xmas costume party she and her husband had and how they made a 12-month calendar of him w/o his shirt on at all the different places they traveled to as the take-home presents), she just comes across, kind of fake.

she's actually a manager and i'm glad that when i interviewed with her, i didn't take the job working for her. i think my opinion of my job would be a lot worse.

but yeah, i basically stay away from her and, you guessed it. i hate her.

i don't know what it is. maybe as i get older, i'm more bitter about people not wanting to be my friend, or at least willingly want to talk to me. and i know i said i didn't want to really make any friends. but it's always nice to have a family-like relationship with the people you work with (like my very first job, which i will forever be thankful that was my first real job experience) and it makes it more enjoyable to be at work and go to work functions or even just to have options for lunch.

i guess we'll see how it goes in my first few months. but as of right now, i'll just stick to hating the fellys, fees, and feathers out there and flying solo for lunch.

i'm back.

2007-11-06T14:53:00.000-05:00

well, by now i've alienated anyone who might have read my blog in the past. oh well.

if you didn't know, cavin and i are back in philly. the month of october was dedicated to packing and moving. i have to say that although moving is my least favorite thing to do, this time around it wasn't that bad. it rained the day we moved, and there was major traffic which led to a 12 hour total move, but we had lots of help from john&cheri, pv&chief bro, and jano and rudy.

but yes, we are finally here and we are trying to figure out how to live comfortably and without chaos with vicky and rudy (my parents). [i should also mention that crosby and jano are also living under the same roof also.]

with that in mind, i've decided that i need to find a place where cavin and i can go to escape. right now since i am jobless (i start in a week - yikes!), being at home all the time coupled with being around my parents in the evenings has already started to prove disastrous. i exaggerate, but i can imagine it only getting worse. and of course, once i start my job, i won't be around them so much, but i still need an escape to go to when i need to get out of the house. kind of like a second home to hang out in (beck's anyone?).

so for the past week or so that we've been living in roxborough, we've been trying to find a decent place (or bar) to go to that is relatively close. it's actually harder than it might seem.

we've gone to a few places so far: manayunk diner (meh), manayunk brew pub (totally not worth going to), mcnallys in chestnut hill (the lights at the bar are piercing - how can anyone stand it?). last night we went to the general lafayette inn. i used to frequent this place when i would visit town and stay with my parents. it's close and i would run into people i knew (which may or may not be a good thing). the only bad thing about it is the smoke. i guess the no smoking ban is only in philadelphia, and since this is in lafayette hill, patrons can smoke to their hearts content. when i woke up this morning and put on my sweatshirt, it reeked of smoke and then i started to miss dc dearly. :(

my next place to try is this coffee house less than a mile from my parents house: spoons. i'll have to check it out - once i get un-lazy and walk my ass over there.

hugging banned?!?

2007-09-30T19:36:00.000-04:00

cavin alerted me to this article, "school bans hugging". the last line of the article is best, but i won't ruin it for you. but seriously. this is outageous!

vodka martini - the focal point of mediocrity?

2007-09-18T11:23:00.000-04:00

this past weekend i was at (another) wedding. i always have the same problem whenever i go to an event like this: what will i drink?

sometimes i will have a craving for something, like a white russian, which most bars will have (unless for some strange reason they don't have milk). more usually, though, i will order something based on what liquor is smiling back at me from behind the bartender.

on saturday when cocktail hour rolled around, and after having drank my fair share of homemade white russians in the motel room, i decided that it was time to move on to another drink. i felt like a dirty martini, and when i looked to see what they had on the shelf, the pickins' were mighty slim.

a couple of years ago, i have to admit, i was an ignorant bastardess when it came to martinis. i didn't really know what was in them, but i knew i liked the extra dirty briney-ness to them. for all i would have cared, a bartender could have poured rubbing alcohol in the martini glass, with a large helping of the olives and their au jus and i would have been set. so of course back then, i ordered the sacriligious vodka "martini", because, gin was for old fogeys and losers, right?

but as i've been more inclined to make my own drinks at home, i've read more about this martini character. hmmm...gin? vermouth? in the past two years, i've been schooling myself in the art of tending bar and learning about the martini (shaken vs. stirred, how much vermouth, etc) and i'm a convert. gin does have more flavor than vodka, which translates into a more flavorful martini (a "martini" doesn't need the gin qualifier - that's exactly what a martini is). just this week i've discovered more people on my (the correct) side of the fence who think "vodka martinis are for twats and wankers" and that they are the "focal point of american mediocrity."

since i've finally come around, the more important question is what type of gin is best?

cavin and i have been experimenting with different types of gins. he is of the "gin&tonic" camp, meanwhile i of the "dirty martini" camp. while cavin has been purchasing many gins and assessing their quality and their success mixed with tonic and lime, i haven't been quite as enthusiatic with making the home martini as of late. as we get ready to move though, this bad habit of not drinking the liquor in the house (and drinking belgian beers at beck's) will probably shift to all out benders because 1) the less stuff we have, the less stuff we have to move, and 2) moving is very stressful and what better way to relieve stress than by drinking (and yelling)?

last weekend at the wedding, i wanted a dirty martini, but all they had was tanqueray. "do you have any other gin back there?" i was asking while trying to peek over the bartender's shoulders and waist, fantasizing there would be some cabinet of bombay sapphire, hendricks, beefeater, junipero, etc. the bartender looked at me like i was crazy, as probably no one had ever asked him that type of question before. "nope." argh.

why is it that tanqueray is the one gin that most places invest stock in? after having many tanqueray&tonics, i can see how the typical novice non-gin drinker can stand the extra sweetness of this liquor, especially when mixed with lime and soda. but for the purist i'm becoming, tanqueray is probably the worst gin to have in a martini, especially a dirty one. who wants a sweet martini with olives in it? of course, if you're one-of-those that wants an appletini then perhaps tanqueray is perfect for this, though, i just read that an appletini is made with vodka, not gin. hmph. go figure.

we've had several gins in the house in the past months, and while i cannot assess their quality in the G&T (earth to cavin?), for dirty martinis, i prefer hendricks, beefeater, and boodles. i've been to some nicer bars that have hendricks and beefeater, but i have yet to see boodles in public bar, unless you count gin under the counter in one of these. (haha - i would never do that...!)

don't get me wrong. vodka has its place (rusky standard!), but in a martini, it does not.

trash at mcdonald's

2007-09-13T11:10:00.000-04:00

ok. so here. i'm admitting it. i eat at mcdonalds. i've mentioned this before in a previous post. earlier this week we got one of those mcdonald's coupon books which lures me into their death trap fast food box with the $3.49 (hunh! it went up 10 cents since the last coupon book back in march!) mcnuggeRs deal.

but seriously, i don't go there that often. on occasion, while cavin and i are doing one of our regular trips up to philly and we're pressed for time and food, we'll stop at mcDs and grab a quick bite. in fact, the two weeks ago we were driving up to PA was one of those rare times. we went to mcDs to get a big mac (which actually wasn't that great - i kept thinking about how "light" the burger felt in my hands, as if i was eating air). part of it was because we had recently been to in-and-out out on the west coast and i wanted to compare their double double animal style to the classic big mac. (i also recently had a five guys burger and i think i favor the five guys over in-and-out, which obviously wins hands down over mcdonalds - duh.)

but today, since having the coupon book, cavin decided to meet me at the recently refurbished mcDs at union station, where we could take advantage of the 99 cent mcmuffin (any kind) sandwich coupon. here's where it turned downhill.

cavin, being the smart man that he is, suggested that we only get one sandwich and split it (of course getting hashbrowns also) - i'm fine with that. except, when i go up to the non-english speaking cashier, he doesn't want me to tell him my order (aka speak english), he wants me to tell him a numero. well, i don't want a meal, i just want the sandwich, and finally his supervisor comes over and punches it in for him, utilizing the $.99 coupon i've handed her. though, her mentee is not the only one lacking english skills, so when she says, "$4.38", i'm left wondering how a $.99 sandwich and two hashbrowns adds up to over $4, and i'm doubting my price-is-right skillz on pricing hashbrowns.

i finally see the receipt, and i see that we some how ended up ordering two mcmuffins, one being at $2.19. this is bullshit, but cavin convinces me that the $2 isn't worth it. ok. i'm fine with that.

now we're looking for a place to sit. i have one requirement - i don't want to sit next to the bathrooms. fine. we walk over to the other side, and there is a free 4-seater against the wall, with benched seating on one side, and two seats bolted in on the other side. next to the table we picked is another 4 seater, and a probably late 30s black woman, zoned in on txt messaging...who the hell cares. she's got this huge backpack in the space where someone (cavin) would need to squeeze into the benched seating. he literally has to climb over her bag, all the while, she's not looking up, but is most probably aware of what is going on, yet has no reaction.

our table has been littered with crumbs from some slob before us, so i take my napkin, and not purposely doing anything to distract this lady from her most important text messaging, and brush off the crumbs onto the floor, which have inadvertantly hit her foot or some part of her body. but why do i care? if she had shown the least bit of courtesy and moved her bag and her body over a few spare inches, this could have been avoided.

well, of course, she didn't "notice" when cavin was climbing over her bag to get into the benched seat, but she does "notice" when the crumbs accidentally hit her leg (or whatever), to which she then, looks at me and says in a disgusted tone, "please DON'T brush your crumbs on ME!" her response has illicited my don't-fucking-mess-with-me tone as i bite back, "well, if you had moved your fucking bag and moved over so that he could have gotten in the seat then we wouldn't have this problem!"

of course, now, at this point, she's not having any of my attitude, as i'm not having any of hers. she's calling me an asshole and a bitch and i'm saying the same things right back. cavin sticks up for me and tells the lady not to tell me to shut the hell up and now she's yelling at him. i'm finally like, "whatever. it's not worth it" while she's still muttering "asshole" under her breath. she finally shuts the hell up and we're eating (both a sandwich and hashbrown each!) as pleasantly as possible while she's still totally immersed in her oh-so-important txt messaging.

after we were done eating and chatting (~15 minutes), right before we get up to leave some other flake sits down next to her, he obviously knowing her. i get up to leave, look at her, roll my eyes, while kevin re-climbs over her bag to get out of the benched seat. as we walk away, i know that she's telling her flake friend about how i'm the asshole. whatever. she's lucky that i was on my way back to work.

of course, cavin was right. we should have only gotten one sandwich to split and i should have just given the other away or something. so when i got back to work, i started having chest pains and i was still a little livid from the encounter of the rude kind at mcd.

mcdonald's is so not worth it, but i just can't get over the stinkin' chicken nuggets and french fries. maybe i'll learn my lesson soon.

happy freaking birthday, eh?

san francisco in 4 days

2007-09-03T15:57:00.000-04:00

day one

day one on the west coast consisted of many "hi! i haven't seen you in so long!" comments, "auntie, uncle, this is cavin" introductions, and "are you going to be next?" questions (directed towards me about getting married, because the main reason we were out in california was for my cousin's wedding). the rehearsal dinner was thursday night also, and while i don't have any pictures posted here, let me just tell you the priest and church coordinator were completely anal, the music (two guys singing bee gees type karaoke) was deafeningly loud, the food was mediocre (filipino cooked without much care), and we were dead tired because we had traveled all day and opted not to go out with my cousins and her million bridesmaids and groomsmen. (seriously, there were 8 bridesmaids and 8 groomsmen!)

day two

my morning started pretty early, with me having to travel to my uncle's house to pick up the minivan we were borrowing all weekend (which was very gracious of them). before we even flew out to the west coast, we decide that we might as well do the whole touristy thing because cavin had never been, and i hadn't been in a long, long time. we got our asses out of union city and drove downtown and parked. here are the noisy, and sometimes mean to each other, sea lions that reside in fisherman's wharf.

while we were waiting to meet gaberage, we walked to ghirardelli square to sample some chocolate and get iced coffee. we then rode a street car (for free, because the driver was all kinds of late) to the rincon center, and when we got off at our stop, there was all kinds of hoo-ha going on.

apparently, we were just in time to hear the end of a speech about the value of having goals when you are a child, blah blah blah, from the one and only, barry bonds. who knew that august 24 was barry bonds day? i guess all the people on their lunch break walking past that exact moment, figured it out, as we did.

after we met up with gaberage, we put our names in to eat deem sum (dim sum) at yank sing, a place i had researched before we left dc. it was very tasty, and between the three of us, we were able to sample lots of fresh food, including mushroom dumplings, sesame balls, turnip cakes, and fried taro (my favorite). while it was quite good, it was a little on the pricey side. (we did have a lot to eat, i'll admit, but still!) though, i'd say the food was a lot more fresh than what i've seen on the east cost, and there was much more selection at yank sing than i've seen in PA, NJ, MD or DC.

after lunch we drove on lombard street, the crookedest street. since i was driving my uncle's white 1989 minivan, i was a little scared driving up and down the steep streets, especially when tourists were standing in the middle of the road, not caring that these were actual streets where cars were whizzing by. i almost ran over people, not by accident, but because they were being stupid and standing in the middle of the road taking pictures. i'm all for taking pictures, but come on! stupid asshole tourists! :)

after stuffing our faces, we walked off all the calories consumed by heading towards the golden gate bridge. we drove across the bridge, parked on the sausalito side, and walked south across it, towards san francisco. well, we actually only walked half-way, and then walked back. (it was windy!) it was a little bit scary walking across, after all press lately with the bridge in minnesota collapsing, but i'm still alive and here to tell the tale. plus, i started freaking out thinking, 'what if there were drunk drivers driving and weren't paying attention and drove their car into me!'...i know i know. i can't help it. i worry too much. but still!

barry bonds day was a pretty good day. after i argued with my dad about when we would be home and dropped off gaberage, we made it back to one of my uncle's houses where my (huge) family was all there enjoying oysters on the grill, lots of filipino food, and ended the night with our friends, don julio and johnnie walker (black label, of course).

day three

our third day in california was all about the wedding. it was a very "west coast" style wedding, with the majority of the 300+ attendees being filipino, and most of them being the bridal party (hehe). since the ceremony was at 10am (early!), the five east coasters (pv, reg, gavitron, cavin, and i) couldn't wait until cocktail hour for food. we satisfied our craving by hitting up the infamous (and non-existant on the east coast) in-and-out burger joint. apparently the way to go is "double double animal style" (which is essentially a glorified big mac). it was very tasty (and i'm sure a zillion calories). i'm glad we didn't go animal style on the fries, though, it probably would have helped their naturally dry taste and texture.

there was lots of dancing at the 7.5 hour reception. the only problem was that cocktail hour started at 2pm, and by 4:30-5pm, the "open bar" ran out and it turned to cash bar. hunh? i guess that's what happens when you have 300+ people at your wedding and all of them are boozers. the parents (especially east coast) were a little ho hum because only krunk music was being played. they complained that the music was too loud, but seriously. if they had been playing swing music, and the todo todo todo, would they have been complaining about how loud the music was? probably not. the night ended with another (regretful) trip to in-and-out burger for more eating and drawing on a narcoleptic's face - gavitron. (don't get me wrong - in-and-out was good the second time around, but i don't think it was really that necessary to get more burgers to eat before retiring to bed).

day four

in the morning before going to luzelle's mansion for the next-day brunch, the east coasters and the san diego first cousins decided to hit napa valley. we were tired of eating filipino food all weekend, and welcomed the french food at bistro jeanty, which is actually in yountville, ca. [bouchon, which was a few doors down was all booked for lunch! :( ]

we ordered:
duck and goat cheese pate
home cured pork belly with lentil and foie gras ragout
fried smelts
beet and mache salad with goat cheese
onion tart
cassoulet
pork chops
coq au vin
sole meuniere
pomme frites
white wine / rose

the food was decent, but nothing outstanding. i thought the onion tart and duck rilletes and faux gras terrine we had at central last month was much better. we didn't get a chance to do the whole "wine tasting" tour of napa valley, but that's ok. now that we know it's only 45 minutes from relatives house in the bay area, i'm sure cavin and i will make a special trip in the near future to do the whole sideways bit.

we left the next morning with a broken thumb (i'm exaggerating, though, cavin did lose a battle with one of the oysters), a 40 pound box of longaniza (which i'll probably need to wait on eating because i'm sick of filipino food), down on our sleep (which resulted in me getting sick!), and 5 pounds heavier. i guess that's what the west coast style is all about?

i'm an asshole.

2007-08-30T09:48:00.000-04:00

i'm an asshole because i haven't written in over month. i also have not finished writing about the rest of my baltic adventure - i didn't even make it to the good parts when we were in st. petersburg.

i think part of it had something to do with being busy. another part of it was also just being lazy. so here's my asshole catch up post to get me up to speed, though, i'm sure that any readers i might have had no longer even check to see if i post anything on here. ah, those are the breaks.

1. uh, we went on a cruise to the baltic sea area. (duh). more importantly, we came back alive, after our dealings with the russian mafia. oh, and in case you were curious, here's where we went: kiel canal; warnemunde, germany; tallinn, estonia; st. petersburg, russia; helsinki, finland; stockholm, sweden; copenhagen, denmark.

2. since our trip to the baltic, my favorite vodka is rusky standard. apparently the american name for rusky standard is imperia, which is now being imported in the states. in russia, you drink shots of it in little shot glasses, and when you order it, you order it by the milliliter.

3. friends and family have actually come down to visit us in dc. we even went to the air and space museum and played with that heat sensitive thingy in the picture. (don't know what it's called. sorry)

4. apparently i'm now a ninang to this little boy passed out in the picture, zachary, aka "wild man".

5. went to san francisco for 5 days, which i WILL post about in the near future.

june 12: rostock (warnemunde)

2007-07-15T09:44:00.001-04:00

today we arrive at our first port, warnemunde, germany. it's a cute little touristy town, selling the obligatory keychains and postcards and what not. well, at least it looked like it was. we never made it past the atm machine and the train station to buy tickets to get out of town.

this picture of gavitron and pv reminds me of the time we were in spain buying bus tickets and the ticket agent pulled the shade down (cerrado!) right as we got to the ticket window to comprar our billetes. rejected!

while the rest of the fam (including jano) took the 3 hour train ride to berlin, we waited for the train for the 15 minute train ride to rostock. it was probably one of the hottest days for us on vacation, and there was no air conditioning on the train for us, nor the other part of the fam that went to berlin. perhaps this contributed to the "let me give you some advice" (finger pointing) shellacking that took place on the train-ride back from berlin. i won't go into the details now, but if you really want to know, i'll tell you about it. let me just say that now i know where my anatomy of a breakdown madness comes from.

we took the train and then a bus/tram to neuer markt in rostock. you can't really see the bottom of this sign, but it says, "nazis? no danke."

rostock was a medieval town, and parts of the city wall are still standing. it's quite cool to see things in the city that have been here for hundreds of years.

we were trying to find our way to an old monastery that was converted into a brewery. while wandering through town unsuccessful (we found a brewery, but tours were not available that day), we came across this ad, literally just on the sidewalk. looks refreshing, no?

rostocker bier is the brewery we tried to get a tour of, though, it didn't look like a monastery (at least from the outside). it tastes like other german beers i've had (warsteiner immediately comes to mind).

we walked down Kröpeliner Straße, and ducked into a little courtyard (the name escapes me) for some rostocker.

everytime i've been in germany, the easiest thing to get to eat is the döner kebab. after drinking our share of bier, we headed back out on the main street for some street food. we settled on the doner kebab and some körri braat-wurscht. yum.

chief bro found a wine shop with $5 (USD) bottles of wine. what a deal! we decided to buy the cheap wine and bring it on the dream so that we could drink it in the room and not have to rack up our credit card bill. not until we got back on the boat did we realize our mistake with purchasing wine: when you buy wine outside of the boat, you MUST check it in, and are charged a mandatory $15 (USD) corkage fee for each bottle you bring onboard. so we essentially paid $20 for each of the three bottles we brought back onboard. we were totally hosed and so we came up with an alternate solution on how to drink on board without having to pay the dream's exorbitant prices...stay tuned for more on this.

after many hours of gallavanting around rostock and berlin, we all met up at 9pm to celebrate tony's bday at le bistro, the reservations-only, french restaurant, that costs $15 per head (the only pay restaurant onboard). it was one of the better nights of food for us on the dream. the staff were really great, and when it was time to bring the cake out for tony, the waiter pretended he was going to shove the cake into tony's face. here's a picture of just that, while tony is covering up with the napkin.

june 11: kiel canal

2007-07-02T17:08:00.001-04:00

today is a day at sea - basically relaxing on the boat. but it also happens to be the day we go through the kiel canal, which links the north sea to the baltic sea. the dream is especially suited to travel through the canal, because the stacks on the boat flip over so that we can travel under some of the lower bridges in the canal. here is a picture of the smoke stacks normally.

you can see here the stacks have fully "lowered". the captain of the dream talked about it like it was some life-changing event, which, in my opinion, was a little anti-climactic. the total time it took for them to flip the stacks took about 5-7 minutes, and afterwards, most of us were like, 'oh. is that it?!?' though, the dream is one of a few ships that is able to go through the kiel canal, and after september, the dream will be retired from the north baltic. i guess that's something, right?

here's a picture of the backs of people's heads. sike. it's a picture of the locks we had to go through from the elbe river to the kiel canal. oh, and apparently the canal is the world's busiest artificial waterway. woah.

while we were waiting for the locks to open, looking out the side of the boat, there was a band playing music, and lots of people with flags waiving: the dream's fan club. on the bridges we passed under, people were up above anticipating our arrival. i also remember seeing this guy driving up and down the road in this red car following us while we were in the canal. europeans are wacky.

after we finally got the lowering of the stacks and the opening of the locks out of our system, we realized it was a really nice day. so we headed for the back "plunge" pool. the other two pools on the boat were heated, but not this back one. it's filled with whatever water the boat is cruising in (in this case, the north sea), at whatever temperature it was (cold). here's cavin, me, chief bro, gavitron and jano doing "the jano" thumbs-up pose.

here's a view of the kiel canal from the aft (from the plunge pool area). nice, eh?

before dinner, there was a "weakest link" game for the guests. jano, cavin, and chief bro's name were in the pot. jano and chief bro's names were randomly picked. here they are competing for luxurious dream prizes!

"what fairytale includes a character named tinkerbell?" it's pretty obvious that the answer to this is peter pan, but it wasn't that obvious to jano. not only does he get it wrong, but then he continues to get berated by the host. now everyone on the boat knows who jano is (partly because it's replayed on the tv for the next several days, consecutively, 24-7).

fortunately for chief bro, he makes it to the final round with another contestant, jeff. unfortunately, jeff answers more questions correctly and is deemed the winner of the weakest link. here is chief bro and jano doing their consolation tequila shot (and enjoying quite thoroughly, i might add, hehe).

when we finally retire to bed, cavin and i get our first towel animal, which are very popular with the guests on cruises. (i think it's a bunny rabbit.) in fact, later on in the cruise cavin and i attend the "how to make towel animals" hosted by the housekeeping crew. monkeys, snakes, lobsters, oh my!

june 10: we've christened our 1st night on dream

2007-07-01T07:54:00.001-04:00

after the 3-hour bus ride from lhr to dover, we finally made it to our first port. the white cliffs of dover are really white. who would have thunk?

here's a view of the norwegian dream (deck 10, star deck) while we are still waiting for all passengers to embark.

it's hard to tell, but it's extremely windy today. in fact, we were sitting towards the front of the boat (forward), but it was just too much for us to handle. so we moved towards the aft. the ice cream bar is that structure in the back with the glass windows.

we started off with a bang. the "special" on the cruise was to buy this bucket of 5 beers, and then get one beer free. but in fact, it wasn't a bucket, it was a helmet. here is jano on deck 13 (sky deck) where the basketball court is. like i said earlier, it was really windy and the helmet was blowing off jano's head before we could get a decent shot of his football stance.

along with basketball, and ice cream, and helmets of beer, they had a wii on board the boat for bowling tournaments and what not. i had hyped up the wii to my mom in the past few weeks, and since they were doing a demo, my mom jumped at the chance to try it out. here is tita vicky bowling for a spare.

we had been traveling for quite a while. in fact, we left phl on saturday, and arrived in the uk around noon or so. we pushed on and stayed awake until the wee hours, when we discovered the stylistics of jose and patty in the observatory lounge on deck 12. while tita vicky is used to little sleep, pv looks like she might kill someone. but you know what all woke us back up? blue kamikazees, the blueish drink on the table! (vodka + blue curacao)

here is our first foray into the seedy world of the blue kamikazee, which would eventually be our shot of choice on the dream for the entire vacation.

even tito tony enjoys the blue kamikazee.

after some blue kamikazees and other booze, the nebulus nine decide to try the "jelly bean" shot instead of our tried and true blue kamikazee. here we are doing our blue steel poses, before figuring out the jelly bean shots were nasty!

in fact, there was an extra jelly bean shot that no one claimed (not surprisingly). the 6 youngins rolled the dice and the lowest dice roller was to do the shot. chief bro and jano tied as the lowest, and their roll-off resulted in a loss for chief bro.

here you can see the lone pip on the die that ruined him. also, take notice of his cougar bait shirt.

the booze is flowing now, as well as the dancing tunes from jose and patty. rudy and vicky show us how it's done.

apparently pv and chief bro have been taking dancing classes. they are hamming it up for the camera (or ARE they?).

here's cavin and i dancing the old-school 5th grade slow dance.

note: what i don't have pictures of, is us hitting the sports bar after midnight for bbq chicken wings and fries. even pv was wasted, as we all heard her originally say she didn't really want to eat, but then after finishing a bunch of wings, saying, "so who's turn is it to get the next plate of food?" hahah

june 9: phl to lhr

2007-06-30T18:00:00.000-04:00

yes, i'm back. i've been back for about a week but i've been uber lazy to do anything regarding our baltic vacation. but, i'll push forward and see if i can recreate the trip right here on kalat-o-scope right before your very eyes. i won't inundate you with silly details, unless i have pictures of them (which i probably might, hehe).

so let's begin. oh, and here are the players: me, cavin, gavitron, pv, chief bro, jano, tito rudel, tita vicky, and dj tone deaf (tito tony).

june 9, 2007 (saturday)

(cavin) we're finally packed and dropped off at the airport, where we're supposed to meet chief bro and pv. we were able to check-in online the night before so all we really needed to do at the airport was to check our luggage. oh, what's this - a fast bag drop? how convenient, if you define convenient as waiting 15 minutes for some brits to check their luggage (and their life stories) to the clerk. meanwhile, rudy and vicky (who wasn't able to check-in online) wait in the longer line to check-in, and beat us to the front. suprisingly, cavin is not a happy camper.

(rudel, sachi, vicky) tita vicky drives us to our gate.

(jano, chief bro, cavin) yahtzee fun can be had at any place, at any time.

(chief bro, jano, pv, rudy, tito tony) ah, the luxuries of british airways!

baltic or bust

2007-06-07T10:38:00.001-04:00

i've been stressed the past week or so. why? i'm leaving for vacation on saturday, and i had a bunch of things i needed to do: finish up a bunch of stuff for work, figure out who's going to watch pippi and crosby while cavin and i are away for two weeks, clean the apartment (cleaning always stresses me out - maybe that's why i don't do it so often. hehe), buy last minute items, etc.

but this morning, i'm actually starting to realize that i am going on vacation! it's so bizarre, because the family had first talked about going on a cruise about one year ago or more, and now it's only a few days away.

i'm getting really excited - i haven't gone on vacation with my extended family since we were younger, when we used to drive to all sorts of places to visit my parents friends, and family (michigan, california, virginia, canada, etc).

this time nine of us are going on a cruise to the baltic: me, cavin, pv, chief bro, gavitron, jano, tito rudel, tita vicky, and tito tony. we'll be going to tallin, st. petersburg, stockholm, helsinki, and copenhagen. there is talk of keeping a blog while we are there, so if there is one, i'll make sure to link to it from kalat-o-scope, under the links section.

otherwise, when i get back from my 2-week hiatus i'll make sure to post the highlights of the trip. i'm sure there will be many.

До свидания!
(Do svidaniya! see you next time!)

the heely epidemic

2007-06-04T12:24:00.000-04:00

a few years ago i started noticing strange things about kids in public. i would see their torso staying still, yet they somehow magically "rolled" along. then one day i actually saw their feet - they had on what appeared to be sneakers, but they were fitted with wheels to allow for them to roll down the street - basically rolling sneakers.

"what a great idea!" i once mused. my friend nancy and i even talked about how great they would be in the office; how we would be able to glide by a person's cubicle to say hi without stopping.

since the first time i saw this strange phenomenon, i've seen more and more kids rolling around stores and restaurants. "look cavin! another one!" i even saw adult sizes when cavin and i went to a street festival in vancouver, bc, last summer.

but about a week or two ago, i started noticing something else. i started seeing signs at stores: "no rolling sneakers allowed". why would stores want to ban kids from wearing the sneakers? while i might not know the answer to this question, i do know that parents are denying their kids of the beloved sneakers, or 'heelys', which is the popular brand that kids go for these days.

cavin sent me an article about heelys on msn. apparently kids are fracturing wrists, arms and ankles, and even crackin' skulls! the article says that one kid required "surgery and pins, and he was size weeks without using his hand right at the beginning of school."

cavin informed me that heely's run up to size 10, so i could get a pair. but knowing my bad luck, my clumsiness, and my lack of balance, i'd better just stick with plain ol' regular sneakers. and since the injuries of the rolling sneakers are on the rise, instead of watching out for "those cool kids with the rolly sneakers", i'm now gonna look for "those idiot kids falling while wearing the rolling sneaker death traps." it's kind of like cheering when the contestants land on bankrupt on wheel (yes, i'm a wheel watcher).

ah, fun times.

making sushi at home

2007-05-31T07:42:00.000-04:00

about two weeks ago, cavin and i metro'd our way to pentagon city and headed towards sur la table. we weren't shopping for kitchen gadgets (though, we would do that later in the evening), but instead we were there to take one of the culinary classes they offer throughout the year: beginning sushi.

i've made sushi before on my own, and it's really not that hard. but we thought some instruction might be a fun way to spend the evening. that night we ended up making california rolls, spicy tuna rolls, vegetarian rolls, shrimp tempura rolls, tuna nigiri, and bagel maki. we even got a %15 discount at sur la table (which we used to buy a muddler for mojitos, as well as cordial glasses).

since taking the class, though, cavin and i finally mustered up the courage to make it at home. stopping by super h-mart over memorial day weekend (and hong kong supermarket in philly), we picked up sushi-grade salmon, oshinko (japanes pickled radish), sushi rice, nori (seaweed paper), cucumber, carrots, avocado, fish sticks, surimi (crab stick), and unagi (eel, which was pre-cooked and frozen).

like i said earlier, it's really easy to make. all you do is make the rice (which is slightly different than making other white rice because you add vinegar and sugar), spread it out on the rough side of the seaweed wrapper, add your ingredients, and roll it up using a bamboo mat covered in plastic.

sushi rice
(yields 5 cups cooked rice)
2 cups sushi rice
2 cups water
3.5 tbsp vinegar (we used rice wine vinegar)
1 tbsp sugar
1.5 tsp salt

-rinse the rice well, at least three times. since we have a rice cooker, cavin just added the rinsed rice, and water. while the rice is cooking, add the remaining ingredients to a small sauce pan, and heat up the mixture making sure the sugar and salt are fully dissolved into the vinegar. when the rice is done, spread it out in a large dish (we used a pyrex casserole dish). add the vinegar/sugar/salt mixture a third at a time, mixing into the rice. let cool to room temperature.

the seaweed wrappers come in a large square, so cavin and i cut them in half so we wouldn't have excess seaweed in our rolls.

once you do that, to make a california roll, take the cut piece of seaweed, and place it shiny side down on your mat, the long side of the seaweed towards the bottom. add a thin layer of sushi rice on the entire piece of seaweed, leaving a gap of no rice at the end furthest away from you. (you may find it much easier to dampen your hands with water during the process of adding the rice to the wrapper.) add the crabmeat, julienned cucumber, slices of avocado, then roll the mat away from you, making it tight as you roll. (if you've ever been in college, you will notice that this is similar to rolling other things and you might have an easier time doing it than someone who has no idea what i'm talking about, hehe).

once you have your roll, get a sharp non-serrated knife, dip in water to wet the blade, and cut your sushi into pieces.

we had dried wasabi powder, which we added to a small bowl, and added drips of water at a time, mixing thoroughly, until the wasabi is at the correct consistency. (the wasabi adds a horseradish bite to your soy sauce. i like a lot of it, but it gives me this bizarre, but addicting head rush. i'm wacky).

so once you get the hang of it, you'll be making sushi in no time, which is what cavin and i did, alternating making rolls and cutting them. we also made spicy salmon rolls, which turned out delicious and very easy to make. here's a rough "recipe":

spicy salmon (or tuna, etc.)
chop up the sushi-grade salmon (or any other sushi-grade fish) into pieces. add a bit of garlic chili paste (i didn't have any, but i used sambal and it worked out ok) and a tiny bit of mayo. mix and add more of the ingredients to your liking. done!

once you get the rolling part down, you can pretty much make whatever type of sushi you want. we had leftover adobo so i even made chicken adobo sushi. woah!

brasserie beck

2007-05-18T08:40:00.000-04:00

ah, it's been a long, long time, my friend. "busy with work" is my excuse for neglecting my kalat-o-scope duties, but in actuality, i've been "busy with life" (read busy drinking and eating at beck's).

beck's, or more formally known as brasserie beck, is the new sister restaurant from chef robert wiedmaier, chef at the fancy french-belgian restaurant in dc, marcel's, which we have not (yet) had the priviledge to dine at. it's a more casual (though business casual) belgian restaurant on 11th & K streets NW.

i won't go into great detail about decor (though you can read a quick bite about it here and here), but i will mention there are clocks everywhere. clocks that are all different, yet none of them seem to have the correct time. perhaps this is supposed to emphasize that you are there enjoy yourself, and not think about the pressing and maybe stressful things going on in your life. (let's just say this clock ploy has roped cavin and i to beck's about 5-6 times in their first 12 days of being open, completely losing track of time.)

when one thinks of belgian cuisine, moules and frites immediately come to mind, and of course, beck's has them ($17) in three flavors: white wine & garlic & parsley, curry apple, and fennel & sausage. while we haven't yet tried the fennel & sausage (though that will be on our soon-to-eat list, as we are trying to eat the entire menu before we leave for vacation, though, i don't know if it will happen), the traditional mussels (white wine) were very plump, and served in a large, shallow le creuset dish, with the lid removed as it was placed in front of us, allowing us to revel in the aromatic essence of the mussels (fumè), wine and garlic. the frites were served with three flavored mayos for dipping: regular, tomato, and curry (by far the best of the three). the curry apple moules were presented similarly (as are all the moules), but they were lacking in any curry/apple flavor, unless you dip your bread into the juices that accumulate at the bottom of the le creuset (which i highly recommend, regardless of which flavor you order).

i've been thinking about the frites for the past two weeks, especially since i've started making my own french fries, and while the frites at beck's are good, i still think i enjoy the truffled frites at poste better. (maybe there's something about the truffle oil on the frites that does it for me, though, reading an article in the nytimes about truffles and truffle oil makes me wonder if the truffle oil is really worth seeking out).

there are other stand-outs on the menu, like the braised pork and rice beans, the tomato shrimp avocado salad, the gratin of brussel sprouts, and crispy fried skate served with spinach and dill, and the choucroute en croute (weidmaier's twist: choucroute wrapped in puff pastry).

but to be quite honest, we aren't always there for the food; it's the beer we're after. bill, the beer specialist, is a belgian beer fanatic and is very committed to have a rotating cache of beers available. we've tasted all the beers on tap (even the new ones that keep rotating) as well as the bottled beers. i should mention that every beer has its own glass to be served in, which is fantastic, because it showcases the beer in all its glory. some of the beer they have: saison dupont, delirium apple, kasteel blonde, bacchus, scaldis, de konick, houblon chouffe, wittekerke, and all kinds of gueuze, probably my new favorite type of beer, which tends to be on the sour side.

and every time bill sees us, he knows we are always up for trying something new, so he pours us glasses of things we might like, or extra bottles of an easter (or noel) beer he has around, or a taste of the new beer that he's just changed the tap to. it's great to know that the people working there are really into what they are doing, and since we go there regularly now, it's also great to be greeted by familiar faces.

so if you ever go, you'll probably find us sitting at the bar in one of the stools in the above picture, as we never sit in the dining room and always patronize fitz and todd, two of the bartenders at beck's.

brasserie beck
1101 k street nw
washington, dc 20005
202.408.1717

i heart frites.

2007-05-05T17:40:00.000-04:00

if you read regularly, you might already know that cavin and i like to snack on truffled frites at poste, where they are a mere $4 during happy hour (4-7pm weekdays).

recently though, we have found another place to fill our frites obsession: brasserie beck (or, just beck's, as the dr community is calling it these days). we've already gone twice and it's superb, but i'll save my post about beck's for another day. this post is strictly about french fries.

after eating french fries my entire life, the pommes frites variety rules over curly, waffle, fat steak fries, etc. you probably know them as the skinny ones that you might get if you ordered steak and frites, or if you order moules and frites at a belgian restaurant, which are sometimes served with mayonnaise.

shamefully, i have never made fries. but this weekend, i finally decided to take on this endeavor, since we had some days-old potatoes sitting around begging to be used. i wanted to also make homemade curry-flavored mayo as a condiment, but i flaked out and just mixed jarred mayo with curry powder (making fries at 9:30 in the morning, i felt, was enough badness for the day).

the key is to fry them twice, at different oil temperatures, but to also cut the potatoes at the proper thickness - too thin and you end up with potato chip sticks, too thick and you end up with those thick-cut ones you might get at ponderosa. it's really not that hard and they are far superior than most of the french fries i've had in my lifetime (which are quite a bit).

pommes frites
peel 2 large baking potatoes. cut potatoes into 1/4" to 3/8" thickness. rinse in several changes of cold water. thoroughly dry potatoes.

add vegetable oil to a large pot so it is about 3" deep. heat oil on medium-high to 325F (use a thermometer to check!). when the oil is up to temperature, add a handful of potatoes, turn heat to high, and add the rest of the potatoes, then turn heat to medium once all the potatoes are in the oil. cook, stirring sporadically, until the majority of the potatoes start to brown (10 minutes or so).

when the potatoes start to brown, turn heat to low and remove them from oil onto a paper bag or paper towels. at this point, they should be limpy and pale. once all the fries are out of the oil, turn heat to high until the oil is at 375F. (edit: only heat oil to 350F)

return fries to the oil, and fry for only a few minutes until they are browned to your liking. remove them from oil onto papertowels, and add salt (or any other flavoring like chili powder) and toss immediately.

sweet-pea canapes & homemade crackers

2007-04-30T20:35:00.000-04:00

two weekends ago i finally got around to trying out the sweet-pea canapes recipe from gourmet magazine. the recipe seems a bit involved, but is actually quite easy. and, instead of using toasted slices of baguette, i enlisted cavin's help: he made crackers from scratch that i served the pea mousse on. the only thing i would change is maybe to not use as much ham on top of the canapes; it was a little overpowering for the pea mousse. overall, it was a mighty fine recipe that i would definitely make again if i needed to make an appetizer for a small gathering.

this makes about 48 hors d'oeuvres, but i bet you could cut the recipe in half if you didn't need that many canapes.

sweet-pea canapes
2 1/4 cups frozen baby (petite) peas
1/4 cup water
1/2 cup chilled heavy cream
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp black pepper
1 tbsp finely grated parmigiano-reggiano
homemade crackers
1/4 lb very thinly sliced baked ham

simmer peas with water in a saucepan, covered, until tender (~5 minutes). puree peas with water in a food processor (gourmet says not to use a blender!) until very smooth. force puree through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl and discard solids. chill until cold.

beat cream with salt and pepper in another bowl until it holds stiff peaks, 3-5 minutes. (cavin says beating the cream in a chilled bowl makes the entire process go a little faster.) fold in pea puree and cheese until just combined. chill pea mousse, covered. (you can probably make the crackers while the pea mousse is chilling.)

spoon a dollop of mousse onto each cracker, then top with a small piece of ham (torn from a slice). serve immediately. [note: pea mousse can be chilled up to 8 hours.]

homemade crackers
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tsp olive oil
1 tbsp water (plus more as necessary)
pinch salt
~1/2 to 1 tbsp flavorings, if desired (i.e. sesame seeds, curry powder, black pepper, etc.)

preheat oven to 350F. mix together flour, salt, and flavorings (if using) - in the picture we made sesame crackers. add olive oil and mix. add water and mix until a dough forms, adding more water (in 1/4 tsp increments) if necessary. roll out dough mixture, adding flour to rolling pin and working surface so dough doesn't stick. roll out the dough to the desired thinness (1/16" works ok). prick the dough with a fork all over, and cut into the desired shapes. (if you want salted crackers, sprinkle a bit on each cracker before you bake.) bake on a lightly greased cookie sheet for 20-25 minutes, until crackers are golden brown, or to your likeness. this should make about a dozen crackers, depending on thickness and size of each cracker.

[note: you can also use butter instead of olive oil, just cut small pieces butter into the flour (1/2 to 1 tsp butter should suffice). using the olive oil is easier to mix in with the dry ingredients, but the crackers don't come out as flaky. my only advice is to not use vegetable oil. the crackers had an awful after taste and we had to throw the vegetable oil batch out.]

domingo cinco. domingo cinco.

2007-04-29T19:58:00.000-04:00

it's been a busy past two weeks - that's why i've been neglecting the blog. but, i've accumulated maraming kalat during this time, so i'll mention a few of these things now. so i guess what i'm saying is that my domingo cinco spans the past 14 days. aie.

1. wine wednesdays at dino. fellow rockwellian dean gold has started up a 6-week wine wednesday special at his restaurant, dino. a week and a half ago cavin and i checked out the first wine wednesday and it was pretty decent. you get three flights of italian wine which are paired with 3 appetizers for $25 per person. cavin and i split the appetizer, which was on the small side but we also ended up ordering a bunch of stuff off the regular menu to supplement. we missed the second week because of our hectic schedule, but hopefully we'll make it back this week for the rosso di montalcino, and toscana wines.

2. we actually had two different visitors come to dc at the same time. woah! triumph (cavin's younger bro) detoured to dc on his way to the annual croquet match between the u.s. naval academy and his alma mater, st john's (annapolis, md). apparently the schools play croquet on the front lawn of st. john's, which has been called by gentleman's quarterly (GQ) "the purest intercollegiate athletic event in America." in actuality, it's an excuse to be outside and drink all day, no matter who wins (for the record, i believe st john's won). the b.o.b. and ga also were in town for a wedding and made it out to a sports bar by court house metro to watch the devils/lightning game. [note: don't EVER go to ireland's four courts. complete cheeze hell.]

3. who knew the extent of the florida market? we sure as hell didn't. luckily for us, cultural tourism dc had free walking tours last weekend which gave cavin and i an excuse to go out there and see what there is to offer. it's more of a warehouse-type district, which is understandable; the florida market mostly deals wholesale, but we were given a "tour" of which places sell to smaller scale purchasers. we finally went to litteri's, a small, but packed-with-great-italian-products store that i've been hearing great things about. we picked up a made-to-order italian sub (capicola, ham, fresh mozzarella on a hard roll) that was outstanding. i can't wait to go back and sample the crazy amounts of balsamic vinegars, olive oils, and italian wines.

4. i'm glad cavin also has a close-knit family. cavin's grandpop passed away on monday so we took some time off of work for the viewing and funeral and to spend time with his family in pa. it was a very sad time but it was comforting to all be together. i didn't know that his grandpop was a p.o.w. in poland (for over a year) during wwii, nor that he was a pilot, and that he also was a train conductor for septa. from what i've heard everyone say, he was really a great man. i wish i could have known him more when he was still around. there is a nice write up about him in the philadelphia inquirer.

5. i like games. this weekend i was determined to go to this store i keep seeing, five below. the store's sign is a bit misleading. the "o" in below is written like it's a degree (say fahrenheit or kelvin), creating the illusion that the store actually has something to do with cold weather sports, like snowboarding or skiing. not that cavin and i go skiing or anything, but we (or rather, i) was very curious about the store that i've been seeing all around. so since we had some free time this weekend, we decided to go in and check it out. not only does it have nothing to do with snow sports, it doesn't have anything to do with cold weather! it's basically a glorified dollar store - everything in the store is five dollars and below (thus "five below"). i just went to the website and the tag line is, "the cool store for teens and beyond" - woah, we were way off.

i just realized that the three things we bought were all games: purple dice (we'll bring these on vacation), umjammer lammy for ps1, and an official wiffle ball and bat. later that day jano and gavitron beat cavin and me in a friendly game of wiffle ball 9-7. (i scored a hr, as well as a sore pitching arm.)

also, sunday morning we all went to facenda whitaker lanes, where the four of us bowled unlimited games from 9am-12noon for $38, including shoe rental. my high was 87. man, i suck.

domingo cinco

2007-04-15T19:11:00.000-04:00

1. wendy wasserstein's fantastic the heidi chronicles is still playing at the arena stage. "In this insightful comedy, Heidi Holland, feminist art historian, recounts significant milestones in her life – meeting lifelong friends at ‘60s political events, her own uncertain activism in the ‘70s, and finally confronting her inner turmoil over her role as a woman of the ‘80s and ‘90s. The Heidi Chronicles brings Wasserstein’s grace, humor and smart sensibility to the dilemmas of modern womanhood, indelibly leaving her one-of-a-kind mark on American theater."

i don't want to ruin anything, but i was pleasantly surprised (and a little moved) by ms. wasserstein's work. the play is 18 years old, yet the topics and difficult life decisions can still be appreciated today.

2. japanese culture is very cool. we went to one of the last events of the national cherry blossom festival: sakura matsuri, or the japanese street festival. devoured unagi donburi, watched taiko drumming (i wanna take lessons!), listened to outrageous karaoke, met up with friends. the kid on the left was totally schooling the guy on the right in go.

3. i am the master of my brew (or at least i will be now). redhead picked up on my gravity towards quality beer, and since she prefers her bourbon, she passed this nugget of technology my way. we just got the AAA batteries (are AAA batteries going extinct?) and i can't wait to turn it on. apparently there are jokes!

4. for dim sum go to mark's duck house. every dim sum place we tried so far in the area has just been general, that is, until now. we met up with my long time college friends for dim sum in falls church and were not disappointed. apparently they go here all the time - and i can see why. the fried taro balls were light and fluffy. the turnip cake was studded with pieces of pork (or was it ham?) - yum. the selection was pretty wide and nothing was overly greasy, as is normally the case in most dim sum joints i've gone to. i'm glad there were eight of us at brunch - good conversation, but also a great chance to try more things than we normally would. we'll be going back for sure - with reservation in hand.

5. i live with a baker. cavin made croissants de boulanger this weekend and they were completely fantastic. the dough he made is "the version of puff pastry found in france at the boulangerie, as opposed to the classic puff pastry made at the patisserie". flaky and light yet with more body than classic puff pastry you might buy in the store, we filled some with chocolate and some with cheese & cherry jam. thank you, king arthur flour baker's companion!

arena stage
1101 sixth street sw
washington, dc 20024
202.488.3300

mark's duck house
6148A arlington blvd
willston center I
falls church, va 22044
703.532.2125

marigold kitchen byob

2007-04-11T07:58:00.000-04:00

wanting to celebrate cavin's bday in style (culinary style, that is), i made a reservation for us at marigold kitchen in west philadelphia / university city.

why did i choose marigold kitchen? quite honestly, the last time we saw pv she said something to the effect, "that is the only restaurant i would pay to eat in currently." while quite extreme and somehow a little unbelievable, i took her advice regardless and went through the appropriate channels and snagged a 7:30pm res.

marigold kitchen is literally 'housed' on the corner of 45th and larchwood streets, amidst the surrounding victorian styled houses. after the $10 cab ride from pv & chief bro's, we walked up the steps into the house. once inside, what would be the porch was turned into an anteroom, where the host was patiently waiting for us to arrive (which we did 10 minutes late. whoops.)

we were seated in the first room we entered (i suppose the parlor, back in the day), thus leaving it up to our imaginations on what the rest of the house/restaurant may look like. in the parlor there were 20 or so other seats, mostly filled with what looked like study abroad euro upenn students as well as their professors all dressed darkly with their reading glasses and an air of snobby sophistication. we didn't care who was around us: we were there to have a great dining experience.

we had our red wine in tow (marigold is a byob), and when our waitress came by, she uncorked it and poured it in our glasses, as if she were the sommelier (though, i would think that she does this many times a night, as i noticed the wine was flowing at every table in the parlor).

we settled on the $60 5-course tasting menu, selected by the chef, michael solomonov. in actuality, there were 6 courses, and with the exception of the dessert, everything was wonderful.

an amuse bouche of scallop ceviche on a hand made cracker came out first. it was light and airy and made me anxious for what was to come next.

in the past when i've done tasting menus, all members in my dining party receive the same dishes. at marigold on saturday, the first two courses and dessert that i received were different than what cavin got. this was kind of neat because we were afforded the chance to sample more of the menu. here's a list of the courses we received:

1. butterfish crudo w kumquats & mint / roasted beet salad w pecorino & argan oil
2. yellow fava soup w fava caponata / spelt gnocchi with english peas
3. seared scallops w egyptian rice and saffron
4. seared duck breast w parsnips & swiss chard crepinette
5. selection of 3 artesinal cheeses (pecorino romano, and two cheeses from israel)
6. lemon tart w lemon curd & lemon merenge sorbet / halvah semifreddo w chocolate-sesame crisp & cranberry

i really enjoyed the butterfish crudo. the macerated kumquats provided a nice tart counterpoint to the supple, mild fish. cavin was really into the fava soup: it was seasoned with something that we couldn't quite put our finger on (i suggested that it might just have been the flavor of the favas, but still, there might have been something else to it).

the scallops must have been dusted with a tad bit of sugar when they were seared. there was a salty-sweet flavor to them that went well with the saffron sauce that was served with it. either way, they were fantastic and i probably could have eaten another plate of them.

i rather enjoyed the duck. while cavin thought the parsnips were a little much on the sweet side, i thought it went well with the savory flavor of the duck.

cavin and i agreed that the desserts fell short of the rest of the meal. my lemon curd was way too heavy for a dessert (especially after eating 5 courses), and the cracker sandwich w sorbet filling inside, was very difficult to break apart and eat. it was as if it was sitting in the freezer 3 seconds before our waitress brought it out to us. i also couldn't help but compare it to my lemon dessert at dino a few months ago, which was really light and fruity, and dare i say it, perfect.

cavin's dessert, i don't even have words for it. it was really not that pleasant, and left this weird taste in my mouth. at the beginning of our meal, our waitress did tell us that we could request certain things, and as i was eating dessert, i was wishing i had asked if we could try the warm chocolate cake, and the pineapple semolina cake with pineapple sorbet. later i was reading on dr that someone else went there this past weekend and had the two desserts i just mentioned, and how they were fantastic. :(

all in all, it was great meal, and for the price, i think it was worth it, especially since we didn't have to pay for wine and was able to bring our own. and if you don't finish the bottle, you are able to bring it home with you as well, just don't forget to bring the wine in a bag so in case you do bring it home, you do it the proper way, and not ghetto-style, like cavin and i did. hehe.

marigold kitchen
501 s. 45th street
philadelphia, pa 19104
215.222.3699

cochinita pibil

2007-04-09T07:22:00.000-04:00

molly steven's has done it again: she's come up with a fantastic home-cook's version of the traditional yucatan slow-roasted pork dish, cochinita pibil.

after we raved about it to the fam back in february, pv & chief bro requested we make it for easter, along with the million other things that were served (spinach lasagna, shanghai lummpia, waldorf salad, leek and goat cheese crostini, braised lamb in hoisin, filipino laing, couscous paella, lamb stuffed with mushrooms and pork, coconut pound cake, key lime pie...the list goes on).

so cavin and i picked up a 9.5 lb bone-in pork shoulder, marinated it for 18 hours in the banana leaves, and got up at the ass-crack of dawn to throw it in the oven for 5.5 hours. it was so worth it.

on easter it got its own serving tray, along with the fresh salsa i made, and the corn tortillas i heated in the oven. it's a superb dish to serve at a party or gathering, especially when you cook the shoulder whole, as we did. as we were still heating up the rest of the food, i saw that my mom had christened it by making her own little taco. she was excited and already trying to figure out how she could make it in the slow cooker (this is an interesting theory).

it's really easy to make. the hardest thing to do is to wrap the darned thing in the banana leaves. but once you get that accomplished, it's smooth sailing from there.

i don't have the recipe handy, but here are the approximate measurements of the ingredients i used. (oh, and the pictures posted here are from our first experience making the pibil, which we used a smaller pork shoulder since there was just the two of us eating it.)

cochinita pibil
5 to 9 lbs of bone-in pork shoulder (skin removed)
banana leaves (can be found in the freezer section of some asian stores)
2-3 tbsp achuete powder (this gives a red color to the pork)
3 tbsp cumin
3-4 cloves
2 tbsp oregano
1 head garlic (or more), peeled and crushed
1-4 habaneros (depending on how hot they are, and how hot you like things)
coarse salt
3 tbsp orange juice
1-2 tbsp lime juice (or grapefruit juice)
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 large le creuset pot (or any heavy lidded pot)

make a paste (i used my handy mortar & pestle) with the garlic, habaneros, and salt. once it is pasty, add the cumin, cloves, oregano, achuete powder, and more salt. keep grinding and mixing into a paste, adding the vinegar and juices.

if there is a layer of fat on the pork, score the fat until you get to the meat (don't remove the fat). rub the garlic paste all over the pork. wrap the entire thing in the banana leaves and secure it with kitchen string. (seriously, this part is annoying). put in the fridge for 12-24 hours (probably in a plastic bag).

heat oven to 300F. cross hatch chopsticks in the bottom of the heavy pot (this will elevate the pork from the bottom of the pot so it won't be sitting in liquid). put the pork in the pot, add 1-1.5 cups water to the bottom (there should be 1/2" liquid at the bottom), put on the lid, and throw it in the oven.

after 3 hours, turn the pork package over inside the pot. be careful because it will be really hot. put back in the oven for another 2.5-3.5 hours.

(warning: after the first 3 hour mark, you house will start smelling like wholesome pork goodness and you will want to start chanting pee-BIL! every few seconds.)

after about 5-6 hours, take the pot out of the oven (hot hot hot!). you won't really be able to assess how tender the pork is if you wrapped it pretty well in the banana leaves. but trust me. you've let the pork sit in the oven, undisturbed for many hours. it will be tender!

the easiest (and prettiest) way to serve it is to carefully lift the pork out of the pot, and put in on your serving platter. cut the strings off and unwrap the banana leaves. you can use the banana leaves as a liner on the platter for the pork.

once you have the entire thing unwrapped, you can use some of the liquid (mostly fat and spices that have leaked out of the package during cooking) in the bottom of the pot to drizzle over the pork.

you really only need a fork (maybe two) to remove chunks of the tender pork to make your own taco with the salsa and corn tortillas. (probably the pork has fallen off the bone).

like i said earlier, it's really a great party dish. you can throw this thing in the oven unattended (except for flipping it half way through), and then serve it on table where everyone can pick at the pork and make their own tacos.

despite the enormous selection of foods during easter, there was only a small fraction of the cochinita pibil for leftovers. that's ok. i'm just glad that everyone enjoyed it. i can always make it again. hmmmm...when is the next party???

domingo cinco

2007-04-08T20:19:00.000-04:00

1. i have a new place to go to lunch. jj introduced dpl, cavin & i to bistro italiano, a cutesy cap hill neighborhood restaurant very close to my work. it's on an unassuming residential street, and only seats about 30 people. while the service was terribly slow (i think there is only one waiter), the pizza was pretty decent, all things considered. i'd probably go again if i had time to take a lazy long lunch.

2. 2006 was a better year for the peak of the cherry blossoms. cavin and i were all set to take a half day off in the middle of the week to hopefully see the blossoms in full swing. only we were foiled by the outrageous thunderstorms that moved through the area in the wee hours of the morning. we took off anyway, but many of the blossoms had fallen to the ground, and the sky stayed dreary...that is, until we were finally done paddle boating and on our way to matchbox (fraking sun!).

3. marigold kitchen's 5 course tasting menu for $60 is a good deal. i took cavin out to west philly (well, the cabbie took us) for his annual special day. we went to marigold kitchen based on a positive personal review from pv. i won't go into the details here (but i will in a dedicated post in the near future), but it was definitely worth the trip. it's also a byob, which was an added bonus.

4. i have the best hipster hair stylest. this past week i finally broke my procrastinator streak and got my hair cut at my normal place, after having to wear my hair in a mini-ponytail daily for almost 2 weeks. when i walked in, jackie immediately wanted to change it up and she did - the back is much shorter than it had been. yay!

5. easter 2007 was a good time. spending time with my family is always a comfortable time for me. easter was no different. pv & chief bro made lamb two ways, tita vicky made couscous paella, gavitron brought spinach lasagna, and dj tone deaf made laing. i brought the cochinita pibil (pee-BIL!!!) which turned out really well, maybe even better than the first time we made it. (post to follow...)

flay as un perdidor

2007-04-02T20:58:00.000-04:00

the first of april's tomfoolery played me like a 1930s frenchman played his accordion.

hunh?

sunday night was the airing of food network's iron chef (american flavor) battle pitting america's grillboy bobby flay against the emeril of spain and avant-garde mega-chef in dc, jose andres.

thanks to dpl, we were able to snag reservations to crystal city's jaleo to attend the iron chef viewing party hosted by senor andres and co. when we got there for our 8:15 seating, there was a live band playing upbeat spanish hits, large screens were set up all over the restaurant (showing emeril, which must have been the program before the 9pm battle), free paella at the bar, and j.andres supporters (and flay haters) vying for a sweet spot to witness a possible beatdown.

the secret ingredient? goat!

speakers blasted the audio, and to be honest, it was hard to hear alton brown's commentary. but from what we could hear, and definitely see, cooking progressed and ended how i thought it would: j.andres, katsuya, and ruben put together an innovative 5-course menu, while flay does what he always does, sloppily stringing along 5 courses incorporating his "southwestern flavors" (blue-corn crusted, chipotle flavored, tamale wrapped, etc.).

so why was i played? during the commercial breaks, j.andres would get up on the mic and make comments like, "when we were shown the secret ingredient and rushed up to the table to grab pieces of the goat, i was all the way on the one side, and ended up with all goat's head, meanwhile, bobby flay was on the other side and ended up grabbing all of the loin!" while my heart was truly on j.andres' side, my brain was picking up mixed signals and was starting to believe the impossible. how could that cocky and repulsive flay beat out my beloved j.andres?!?!

when judging time came, the obnoxious (yet somehow lovable) jeffrey steingarten was sitting in the first spot of the judging table. after watching several hilarious videos of j.steingarten and reading the man who ate everything, i knew fair refereeing would occur (read j.steingarten sees through flay's demoded and obvious "tricks"), and that it would be smooth sailing for j.andres & company. senor andres could fool me no longer!

i vaguely remember the final score (maybe j.andres 55 to flay's 48?) due to the copious amounts of sangria imbibed, but when the chairman handed down the verdict, unanimous cheers sounded from the restaurant. i think i threw my hands up in the air and was hootin' and hollerin'! que fantastico!

as soon as flay got served, the band started up again, people were very lively and still indulging in j.andres' triumph and even started dancing at the bar.

it was getting late for cavin and i, so we decided to head out. on our way out though, we spotted j.andres welcoming the accolades from everyone present. redhead and i snagged a picture with j.andres. we're such groupies!

(first two pictures from food network online.)

domingo cinco

2007-04-01T10:49:00.000-04:00

1. kotobuki is, hands down, the best sushi deal i've ever come across. as if you don't know already, kotobuki is our go-to sushi joint in the palisades part of the district. we got all this fresh sushi for under $50. it's really an unbelievable deal. (nigiri sushi: toro (fatty tuna), salmon, yellowtail, flounder, fried bean curd, uni (sea urchin), unagi (eel). rolls: salmon skin, shiitake mushroom, spicy scallop, spicy tuna & avocado)

2. i have a new appreciation for tequila. brent blessed the sweatpants party with a bottle of corazon. yes, it's already april, but cavin and i have been aging the liquor (hehe) and are just breaking into the stash now. did you know that corazon is made by the traditional method, using 100% blue agave, distilled twice in pot stills and aged in oak barrels? well, you do now.

3. baby lumpia are just as tasty as shanghai lumpia. friday cavin's ma duke inquired about making shanghai lumpia. this reminded me that we had all the necessary ingredients (besides ground pork) to make it also. so sunday morning while doing laundry, we ran over to safeway to pick up some ground pork, and after i made the filling and wrapped the shanghai lumpia, we had strips of the wrapper and the pork mixture leftover. not wanting to waste anything, i rolled these baby lumpias. so cute!

4. a soccer ball this big is terribly hard to get off the ground. at the kite festival this weekend, right behind where cavin and i set up camp for a few hours and secretly boozed (see #5 below), a middle aged couple had this huge soccer ball kite lying on the ground, while he was flying his other kites. every once in a while, he would pull on the strings attached to the gihugic ball and kids (wearing sunglasses) from all over would come running towards the futbol to try to get underneath it, kick it, have it land on their heads, and pretty much just play around. it never really got off the ground, but it was thoroughly entertaining watching the munchkins messing around, especially when the middle-aged man tired from pulling the strings and tried to get the kids to stop playing.

5. $100 for a case of avondale cabernet sauvignon rose is a steal. ace beverages in nw dc is a really neat liquor store. the manager advertised a case of the 2006 rose from south africa as $100, tax included (a mere $8.33/bottle) on DR. he says, "It's still super-juicy and lovely. Bottled under Stel-Vin closures, it has infinitesimal oxidation, if any. Remember, nothing's going in that wine, and nothing's coming out until it's opened. It is "maturing" as though it were in magnum format, i.e. at a GLACIAL pace." we jumped on the deal and picked up our case on friday. it's great for the warm temperatures coming our way, and it looks like grape juice in my blue-tinted nalgene. hehe.

cherry blossom festival etiquette

2007-03-30T09:15:00.000-04:00

the other day i mentioned that it must be the start of spring - with the invigorating morning weather and the agreeable temperatures we've been experiencing lately.

another sure sign that winter is out and spring is in, is the blossoming of the sakura. hunh? oh, cherry blossoms.

this year, the last day of march inaugurates the 2006 national cherry blossom festival.

cavin and i are fortunate to live so close to the tidal basin, which homes a large portion of the 3,750 cherry blossom trees in the district. last year cavin's ma & pa came to visit during the festival. it was a fantastic time that included fireworks and homemade crabcakes, despite the gray skies and ultra-breezy weather (though, we did see just a couple of paddle boaters braving the turbulent waters of the tidal basin).

besides the cherry blossom trees, something else i did see last year was the large amounts of (idiotic) people holding branches of the cherry blossoms they picked, and kids swinging on the delicate branches of the trees. seeing things like this really irks me, and if cavin's parents weren't with us last year, i would have given these kids (and adults) a piece of my mind (which if you know me, could definitely have gotten ugly).

in today's washington post's express, there is a timely article entitled, "cherry tree etiquette emphasized". one of the questions posed: ...how do you sustain the trees so we can continue to sustain the festival?

it's a great question, with very common-sense answers:
-don't snap branches off the trees to give to your SO
-don't let your kids climb the limbs because you are too lazy to keep them in check
-don't place your kids in the limbs of trees for photo ops to send to all your relatives
-don't trample the roots of the cherry trees

april 3-5 is the expected peak bloom of the cherry blossoms this year. this is good news for cavin and i because this falls in the middle of a work week. we'll probably take a stroll down there during the peak to soak up the picturesque views. but because the peak will fall between tuesday and thursday, i'm hoping minimal crowds (yeah right) will result in less exhibits of selfishness and cruelty to one of our nations most beloved trees.

ode on a greasy truck

2007-03-28T09:33:00.000-04:00

this morning as i was crossing the street to start my day with a metro ride, i came across a familiar aroma. while the beautiful weather has proven that indeed, spring has finally arrived, it wasn't the crisp, fresh air that was grabbing my attention.

in the safeway parking lot, wafts of just-brewed coffee and fried eggs & sausages (or something like it) made their way to my olfactory organs, and then up to my cerebrum. as i looked around to find the source, there in the parking lot, was a pick-up truck with a large metal cover on the cab, and a man prepping to sell morning goodies to passersby. it was then that i experienced a sort of deja vu and was immediately transported back to my grad student days at rutgers.

rutgers may not be well known for its awesome athletics or its famous alumni. but what it IS known for are the infamous grease trucks.

the grease trucks are on the corner of college ave & hamilton st (behind the bus stop) and consist of about 4 or 5 stationary trucks that cater to students, faculty, new brunswickers & highland parkers on a strict schedule (and tight budget), as well as the heavyweight drinkers (and eaters) leaving the bar on any given night. the grease trucks sell the famous "fat" sandwiches, which essentially are big sandwichs stuffed with as many heart-unhappy things as you can imagine.

apparently the fat darrell is the most famous sandwich (deemed by maxim), consisting of chicken fingers, french fries, mozzarella sticks, and marinara sauce. it was name by darrell butler (pictured on the left with his famous sandwich, though, i'm not sure what that long, lightly colored hot dog looking thing is). if you're thinking, 'hey, that's a lot of stuff to have on one sandwich!' you would be absolutely right.

during my two year (and too short) stint in new brunswick, i can proudly say that i have eaten two fat sandwiches. i believe both times were on occasions where alcohol had been involved, which, in my opinion, is really the best time to eat them. i think my state of mind prevented me from physically feeling the ill-effects of finishing an entire fat cat, but i'm still alive today, so how bad could it really have been?

so this morning, as i walked by the not-even-close "grease pick-up", i remembered the grease trucks, and felt a little choked up. although the sandwiches are more novelty than culinary discovery, to me the fat cats represent more than just a food item. it is a window to my former life. whether it be waiting for the H or the A buses, walking to work at the phoenix foundation, dealing with pepe's bullshit at some trashed undergrad house on hamilton, late night study sessions with sung hee at sojin's, watching sopranos at the wich, running into ashwin all over town, or taking random walks with cavin, it only takes a quick whiff of a fat darrell in the morning to bring me back...

domingo cinco

2007-03-25T21:59:00.000-04:00

1. beer sampler cases are for suckers. we got a case of yards this weekend while in the hood. we picked up the sampler thinking that it would give people options while drinking. well, we were wrong. only two of the beers were consumable (the saison tasted like soap and just plain skunked beer, though i bet it wasn't); and the IPA wasn't terribly bad, but jano didn't particularly care for it. so to avoid getting beer that breweries might possibly try to get rid of by putting it into a "sampler" pack, we picked up troegs dreamweaver. tastes like a more concentrated wittekerke. i'm down with that.

2. michelle's wedding shower was a really nice time. even after the bit of stress in the planning stages !P, everything turned out really nice, and i have to thank jay's sisters, kristen and amy, for putting this together for michelle. (and damn! i would bet she got most of her stuff from her registry!)

3. apparently, i now make an award-winning chili. after going out for dumpings at china bistro, i dragged my tired ass into the kitchen and made a white chicken chili (chicken thighs, red & yellow bell peppers, onion, white northern beans, cannelloni beans, anise seeds, cumin, oregano, chipotle peppers, and amaretto) for my office's chili cookoff. later that night i couldn't fall asleep and was obsessing over the chili. well, i can now justify my obsessing - my chili earned enough votes to place first in the poultry category! here is my trophy, which is currently residing on my bookshelf in my office. hahahah.

4. it's a done deal. this week i completely committed to our cruise vacation. i just have to pay the credit card when it comes...yikes.

5. i heart cavin.

dumplings, dumplings, & more dumplings.

2007-03-22T13:53:00.000-04:00

last night cavin and i braved the supposed bad dc metro area traffic and drove ourselves to another $20 tuesdays (which was held on a wednesday this time around). the destination? china bistro in rockville, maryland. in a 4 or 5-store strip plaza that also houses a liquor store, dry cleaners, and unrented commercial space, you would practically miss it if you weren't paying attention.

the menu? all dumplings. it is always nice to dine with other people, especially if your goal is to try as many things on the menu as possible. although cavin and i have big stomachs (though, our eyes are much bigger), if we had gone there by ourselves, we wouldn't have been able to taste the flavor profiles as we had last night.

the others that were there ahead of us (and that put the event together) chose some appetizers that were already on the table by the time we arrived. mama's mixed vegetables consisted of woodear mushrooms, dried bean curd, and some sort of gluten product. this was my favorite, as i love that thin cartiledge-like texture of the black mushroom. pickled radish and spicy cucumber were reminicent of panchan we would get in any korean restaurant. we also got baby fish and peanuts (more of a finger food than an appetizer), and five flavors of beef (the beef was bland and looked like head cheese).

we sampled almost all of the dumpling flavors china bistro offers (they were out of the fish meat dumpling). i shouldn't even use the word sampled. it was more like stuffed our faces. here's a list of the dumplings we tasted:

vegetable
vegetable triple (chive, shrimp skin, egg, bean curd)
pork w/green squash (zucchini)
chive shrimp
beef w/ celery (fried)
ji cai pork (fried)
mama's special (pork, shrimp, chives, nappa cabbage, fried)

my favorites were the veggie triple, the beef w/ celery, and the fried ji cai pork. (the chive shrimp gets an honorable mention.) i think the veggie triple was rather interesting with the scrambly egg inside, though i tasted no shrimp flavor. the beef dumpling was quite different than any beef dumpling i've had before: with each bite, i was pleasantly treated to crunchy bits of celery.

were these the best dumplings i've ever eaten in my life? probably not. but i'd safely bet that these have been the best i've eaten in the metro area. if we venture out to the md burbs again, maybe we'll stop by and pick up some dumplings for a quick and cheap meal, though, i'd probably pass on the ordinary americanized chinese food (so i hear) and just stick with the dumplings.

(did i mention that we each paid $13 total for the appetizers and about 16 dumplings per person?)

china bistro
755 hungerford drive
rockville, md 20850
301.294.0808

domingo cinco

2007-03-18T10:12:00.000-04:00

since being in my new office for the past two weeks, i've noticed that i barely have enough time to browse the interwebs at work, let alone blog about what's going on in my life.

so i'm starting my "domingo cinco" posts: five things i've been learning/figuring out that i haven't had time to write about in the past week. happy reading!

1. 2.5 beers + mediocre thai food + 29 year old sachi = old geeza. since the weather was so nice out for a total of two days this past week, cavin and i decided to hit rfd for some happy hour drinking. after only having a couple of beers and chowing on take-away thai at kanlaya, the following day i ended up having to nurse my delicate condition at work. work was flowing, so i wasn't able to take sick leave, but i was pretty much headache city / achey body all day. man, i'm getting old.

2. walking to chinatown from work isn't really that far. i've been doing a little exercising during the lunch hour and recently discovered that chinatown is the land of $4.95 lunch deals, including house-made noodles and dumplings at chinatown express. once the weather gets nicer, i think cavin and i will have our lunch time rendezvous here and the like for some cheap eats.

3. using a crock pot to cook corned beef is really the best way to go. in honor of the great saint patrick we made corned beef and christened our $7 crock pot (clearance bought by my mom). using a 16oz. can of guinness, half an onion, 1 head garlic, cloves, bay leaves, and the package of spices that came in the point cut corned beef, ~5 hours later the beef came out most tender and very flavorful. cavin also made irish soda bread. i feel like i'm an honorary irishwoman.

4. even though i saw super size me, i still have a soft spot for mcdonald's chicken mcnuggets and french fries. while i don't doubt that there are healthier alternatives to mcdonald's, there's just something about the fries. oh, and using the $3.39 coupon for 20 nuggets (which we got in the mail), how could you go wrong? (remember, everything in moderation...)

5. i prefer saan soju to kombawoo. apparently, kombawoo is "korea's original soju". saan soju (mountain flavor) is distilled from sweet potato with green tea extract, and kombawoo is distilled with barley, rice, and tapioca. well, whatever it's made of, i still think kombawoo tastes like burning (go to 3:25), and by burning i mean drinking popov straight up. blech.

regional food and drink (rfd)
810 7th street, nw, dc
202.289.2030

chinatown express
746 sixth street, nw, dc
202.638.0424

kanlaya thai cuisine
740 sixth street, nw, dc
202.393.0070

to write or not to write

2007-03-13T08:28:00.000-04:00

i'm sure most of you are painfully aware that i don't have any writing skills. while i do believe i have technical writing skills, as evidenced by the A i received in english 202C (uh, summer session :) ) as well as the published paper i wrote last year, when it comes to creative writing i'm as out of luck as a, er, hmmm...let's see, um...well, you get my point.

part of the reason i started this blog was to advance my writing skills. or what i really should say is to start writing. i did write in a journal once upon a time. it was a great thing, but when i'm the only one reading it, i'm not as aware of sentence structure, my choice of words, active/passive voice, etc. basically i just didn't care about those things, as i was writing for self-therapy.

writing is just so hard for me to do (well, creative writing, that is). even just saying (or typing) "i am going to start writing" makes me cringe. when i read margaret atwood, i long to have her talent. some of the things she writes are so perfect - she gets the point across in a way that i wish i could do sometimes, even when talking. (i wish i had an example here with me now, but i am currently reading tolstoy's anna karenina - no m.atwood until i 1) finish tolstoy and 2) pick up another m.atwood book.)

i think part of my problem is that i don't have a good enough handle of the english language. i don't really "get" those sayings - you know the ones: "the pot calling the kettle black," or "counting your chickens before they hatch" (or whatever). that's not to say that if someone understands them they are a good writer. (and probably, i would bet that using those sayings leads to using cliches, which i know are the bane of great writing.) and having a limited vocabulary doesn't help either.

i remember being in seventh grade. our assignment was to write a story. afterwards, we were supposed to get up in front of the room and read our story to the rest of the class. i remember being completely stressed about the entire ordeal, meanwhile all the other students were sharing their ideas and stories with each other. i, of course, sat at my desk by myself thinking of something creative to write about. in the end, i got through it, though i was very aware that my story made the least sense, and had no YO factor. i'm sure my classmates were wondering what the hell i was talking about and i could feel their stares as i read aloud my (dull) story. i was quite embarrassed about the whole thing.

i still harbor these same insecurities to this day.

when i write, i am reluctant for people to read it, because i am so aware of my inability to be creative with words (i'm more of a "numbers" person, i suppose). blogging (though, i do not know how many people read this) hopefully, will help me overcome my shyness. in the near future i want to take a creative writing class. if i don't push my boundaries, i'll never know how good i could really be or become. i'm hoping that if i practice enough, i will be comfortable enough to show my writing to others, and eventually lead to a gig in food writing.

we'll see.

the dismemberment plan - sold out!

2007-03-08T08:23:00.000-05:00

today is the beginning of day 4 in my new office (i'm in the same bldg, just down the hall working for a different supervisor on different data).

it's been pretty chaotic so far. i told cavin yesterday at happy hour that i think i've done more work in my first 3 days than i had in the past 3 months i was in my old office. woah.

well, as a result of being uber busy, i have not been keeping myself abreast of the latest developments in the dc area. and this morning as i'm perusing dcist, i'm kicking myself in the nuts for being totally out of the loop.

why do you ask? well, i'll tell you freaking why! apparently the dismemberment plan - only one of the best bands to come out of the dc area, but broke up several years ago - is reuniting for 2 shows in dc at the end of april to raise money for callum robbins who has spinal muscular atrophy.

apparently once the tickets went on sale for the first show, they were sold out in 3 or 4 minutes (damn you, ticketmaster!). a second show was added, and again, it was sold out in mere minutes. (apparently i'm not the only fan...)

tonight at 8pm the black cat will be selling a limited number of tickets at their box office (2 ticket limit per person). if i could, i would go there right now and wait all day in line, but alas, i cannot. like i said above, i'm super busy getting a project off the ground, and cavin and i are already committed to going to a wine 101 class tonight at 7:30pm.

i doubt anyone in the dc area reads this, but in the off chance that someone does, i'd get my ass to the black cat pronto and try to snag two tickets for the event. i mean, the tickets are only $15, and 100% of the proceeds will go towards treatment for callum robbins. plus, seeing dplan one last time is a treat in itself.

oh, and have i mentioned that i seriously have a crush on travis morrison, ever since i saw him at macrock back in 2000? what a smokin' hot performer.

pork riblets braised in caramel sauce

2007-03-06T07:16:00.000-05:00

on my quest to cook as many recipes as possible from molly steven's art of braising, a few weekends ago cavin and i decided to make this dish after i spotted pork riblets at h-mart.

what are pork riblets? essentially they are pork ribs, but sawed across the bone to make half ribs or "riblets". and because we have an abundance of patis and all other ingredients handy, it seemed like an appropriate sunday afternoon cooking adventure.

while i've never really used that much patis (fish sauce) in a recipe before, i wondered if the riblets would come out salty. but because a caramel is made as the base of the sauce, the patis melded together quite well to create an extremely savory, though thin, sauce. (if i was served this dish, i don't even think i would have been able to pick out fish sauce as an ingredient.)

molly stevens suggests serving these as an appetizer before the main course, but cavin and i thought highly enough of the riblets to eat them as our main, served over rice, of course. we'll definitely be making this again the next time we see the riblets at h-mart.

pork riblets braised in vietnamese caramel sauce
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1 tbsp lime juice
1/3 cup asian fish sauce
1/3 cup sliced shallots
1 tsp pepper
~2 lbs (we used 2.66 lbs) slab baby back ribs sawed lengthwise in half (2.99 lb h-mart)

spread sugar in the bottom of a wide heavy-based skillet (12-13"). pour over 1/4 cup water and lime juice and let sit for a minute to soak in. heat over med heat until sugar begins to liquefy. you can shake or swirl the pan or stir with a wooden spoon once or twice so the sugar melts evenly, but don't stir constantly, and stop shaking or stirring once the contents of the saucepan have liquefied entirely. (if you stir too frequently you risk crystallizing the sugar.) reduce heat to med-low and let caramel boil until it turns a deep reddish-brown, but not black, ~10 min.

remove caramel from heat and standing back, add the fish sauce slowly and the remaining 1/4 cup water. (don't worry if caramel hardens.) return caramel to heat, stir and boil until you have a smooth, thick sauce, ~4 min. add shallots and black pepper and simmer for 2 min. remove from heat and set aside to cool to warm. (the caramel sauce may be made ahead up to this point and kept refrigerated for a week.)

separate the pork ribs into individual ribs by cutting down between the bones. add to caramel sauce, stir to coat, bring to simmer over low heat. cover and braise, stirring and turning every 10-15 minutes so that ribs remain evenly coated in sauce for about 1.5 to 2 hours. ribs are done when they become tender enough to pull easily away from the bone and are a deep mahogany color.

remove as much fat as possible from caramel sauce (which will be rather thin). pour some sauce over riblets to moisten. serve over white rice.

craft beer festival

2007-03-05T19:37:00.000-05:00

this past saturday was the craft beer festival in philly. after we learned that poot & co. were going to be there, we decided to pony up the $40 (per person) and tag along.

after waiting in a long line that moved rapidly towards the entrance, we were carded and each given a plastic beer glass. [i forgot my camera (darnit!) so i took these pictures at home and didn't have great lighting or space so they didn't turn out as i had wanted.]

in the large warehouse-type room, there were about 50 breweries around the perimeter of the room where the 1000+ drinkers were able to roam about trying different beers. somehow in the packed room, we managed to run into trish, jason, meg, and peter, and 2 of their other friends. it was fantastic. i hadn't seen them in such a long time so it was great to run into them where we'd get to hang out during our 12-4pm beer session.

i wish that a map and a list of breweries was handed out when we got there. that way i could have kept track of what i tasted. i drank quite a bit, and can only remember a fraction of what breweries i visited: triumph, yards, magic hat, iron hill, ithaca, rogue, brooklyn, dock street, independence, nodding head...i have an even harder time trying to recall the types of beers each of these places had, though i do remember a few.

magic hat had a vanilla porter that sounded like it could have had potential, but it fell a little flat and tasted flat as well. monk's was there serving a sour ale which reminded me of the sourness buttermilk has. it wasn't something that i could chug or even drink more than one beer of, but it had an interesting taste. i heard people not liking it too much. i guess it's an acquired taste. ithaca served an apricot ale which was very popular with the crowd. as i stood there getting my sample, i overheard this lady saying that the apricot ale was the only beer she was drinking the entire time (she must not have been drinking that much!).

i was most pleased with the smoked weissbock and local 1 that brooklyn brewery was serving. cavin and i tasted this at the brooklyn brewery dinner last month and while i thought it tasted different from when we first tried it, i think it was partly due to the fact that the first time around the beer was paired with food. plus, we hadn't been drinking all sorts of beer for hours beforehand.

next time i do a beer festival, i think i might try to keep track of all the beers i tried, and maybe even try to go in order from light to dark (though, that may be hard). oh, and i definitely would bring my camera. one last note: the shuttle ride back (aka big yellow school bus) to broad & patterson was hi-larious. just imagine how entertaining a bus full of drunk 21-35 year olds could be: "NICE SHOES, TWO SHOES! WHAT IS THIS, A GAP COMMERCIAL?!?!"

i guess you had to be there.

i am certified to save your life.

2007-03-01T13:57:00.000-05:00

i've been patiently waiting out my final days (1 day left!) in my current work rotation. during this time i've been a hard-core slacker, reading anthony bourdain's rants about the food network, debunking food and kitchen myths, taking walks to chinatown and back, finishing alias grace by margaret atwood and worrying about the 3/4" bug i saw crawling on my desk late last week (ugh - don't even get me started - i do NOT leave any food out whatsoever by my desk so it must be the other slobs in the office attracting the creatures).

when i saw a cpr (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) & aed (automated external defibrillator) class being offered for free here at work during my last week in my current office, i jumped on the chance to take it. besides giving me a reason to leave cubby hole land it more importantly gave me the opportunity to pick up important skills that i could use for the rest of my life and maybe even help to save a life.

it's probably ignorant of me to not even know the basics of cpr, considering my mom is a nurse. in the past we've talked about it and she's told me how it's done, but this was very long ago and the only thing i could remember was having to push on the person's chest (compressions).

fortunately i've never been in or near a situation where someone was having cardiac arrest or been in an accident that would require cpr, but i'm really glad that i took this class. after this morning, i think it's important for people to know what to do in a crisis and i'd like to share what i learned this morning in my class.

click on the picture for more information.

wittekerke birthday

2007-02-27T20:55:00.000-05:00

a belated toast to the b.o.b.

last snowfall

2007-02-26T20:28:00.000-05:00

this quite possibly, is the last snowfall i'll get to see in dc.
february 25, 2007

stomach woes

2007-02-23T16:23:00.000-05:00

if you've been paying any attention, you would already know that i've been having stomach problems.

after i went to my gastroenterologist on wednesday, he suggested that i get an endoscopy (which is what ma dukes suggest i ask him about). and what luck - there was a 7:45am appointment slot available on friday.

it's a non-invasive procedure. the doctor puts a long tube down my throat and looks around with a camera that is at the end of the tube, as well as takes a biopsy so the lab can run some tests. this all happens while i'm consciously sedated.

the night before i wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything after midnight (but i stopped way before that). the following day, cavin drove me to the clinic where i signed in and waited only 10 minutes or so before the nurse called me back and informed me of exactly what was going to happen, and to have me sign some waivers and what not.

i changed into my hospital robe and i was escorted to the room where the procedure was to be performed. i was quite nervous - the idea of having a long tube stuck down my throat into my stomach is not very appealing to me.

there was a european lady nurse in the room verifying all my personal information verbally, and putting the oxygen tube into my nose. she sounded like she could have been german or austrian based on her accent, and she had a very soft-spoken voice. i'm sure she was trying to present a soothing voice to put me at ease before my procedure, but it was a little too soothing for me. there was also another nurse setting up the iv in my arm for the demerol while the euro lady was talking to me. the doctor was in the room, but he was on the phone dealing with work related stuff and was rather busy.

after the iv was set up but not yet administering the demerol, the euro lady told me to open my mouth, stick my tongue out and say 'ahhh' while she sprayed a cherry-flavored numbing agent towards the back of my throat. she said, 'what lovely teeth you have!' and i felt like i was a character in the little red riding hood.

then the doctor said they were going to administer the sedation in the iv, and then the last thing i said was, 'i'm getting sleepy', and i think i saw a grey tube sitting next to me.

i don't know how much time passed (i was told that the procedure only takes 30 minutes tops), but when i awoke i was lying on my left side (which is the last position i remember being in) but in the recovery room with the curtains drawn all around me. i felt out of place and really strange, like my body had been invaded: my neck was sore, and i was really dizzy and just plain out of it. it reminded me of the seinfeld episode where jerry goes to see tim whatley (the dentist) and when he wakes up after being anesthesized, he sees tim whatley zipping up his pants and the hygenist buttoning up her shirt.

now, i am not saying that i was violated in anyway - in fact, i have received the most professional service at all times, but i guess i just don't like the feeling of being konked out and not knowing exactly what happened. afterwards when i asked the gastroenterologist how it went, grinning, he said, "you were quite comfortable," which didn't help alleviate the weird feelings i had.

cavin came into the room when the doctor was giving his preliminary results of the pictures, and he said all he could see was mild inflammation. i guess that's good, right? there's nothing wrong with me, that the doctor could tell. i'll have to call back in a week to get the results of the biopsy, though.

i'm glad there's nothing wrong with me, but it's discerning to know that everything seemed ok from the endoscopy, yet i'm still experiencing stomach pains.

i got a copy of the report which has pictures of my stomach and what not (which is where these pictures came from). it's kind of gross, yes, but it's also kind of fascinating. i mean, how many times do you get a chance to see the inside of your stomach?

mandu: korean dumplings

2007-02-23T16:05:00.000-05:00

cavin and i attended our second don rockwell event: $20 tuesdays. this time it was at mandu, the newest korean restaurant to hit the district proper.

when we arrived around 6:30pm, not too many people were there, but when we were actually eating, i noticed that most of tables filled up. so it seems like the word got out since they first opened about a month or two ago.

when we walked in, some of our dining companions were already there enjoying cocktails, and since cavin and i didn't want to feel left out (hihi) we split a bottle of mountain soju (the one with the mountains on the bottle in the picture on the left, duh). the soju we had was made from sweet potato and uses fresh mountain spring water and green tea for other flavorings. we thought it was quite delicious and encouraged others to try it. someone said it tasted like gin, but without the juniper berries. hmmm...not a bad description, i guess. [picture taken from here.]

two members of the dr board (one being korean) talked to yesoon & danny and had our menu already set up for all 14 of us, so we didn't have to worry about deciding on what to order. we got a lot of food for the amount we paid ($26/person includes tax&tip) and everyone had ample leftovers for future meals. but...

the panchan consisted of kimchi, green beens with tofu, black beans with potatoes, fish cakes, or eggplant, and spicy cucumber slices. while the panchan wasn't bad, i am used to seeing more variety, though, whenever we finished, the staff was very generous in bringing out more to us.

next came the mandu. mandu means dumplings in korean. in my opinion, if you are going to basically call your restaurant "korean dumpling" you had better have some kick-ass dumplings. i was able to taste all three flavors of their mandu (which were offered steamed as well as fried). the only one i really cared for was the veggie dumpling. the shrimp mandu was really dry and was almost inedible for me (woah!). and the only flavor the shrimp and the beef&pork dumplings had was the soy sauce/rice wine vinegar/chopped scallions condiment i doused quite liberally on them.

we then received pa jun, a korean seafood pancake. i normally see the pa jun as one big pancake, which is then cut into pieces for everyone to share. yesook serves hers as individual pancakes, a shade smaller than a cd. one critique that i heard the most around the table was that we couldn't tell if there was any seafood in it. usually larger pieces of seafood are left in the batter so when it fries up, you are like, 'look! a shrimp! oh! a piece of squid!' we heard later from the waiter that yesook grinds all the seafood before adding it to the batter.

eh. i think it's a mistake to grind it up, but perhaps i'm biased because pa jun oddly reminds me of filipino ukoy. i'm not sure why i think this. the pa jun is pan fried and ukoy is deep fried. and pa jun has more batter in it as well. not to mention that pa jun is a pancake, where as ukoy is a fritter. i guess the fact that the pa jun was formed into individual pancakes similar in size to ukoy might have something to do with it. oh, and btw? i love ukoy!

we also got jap chae which was not bad. it was served only mildly warm, which some of the non-experienced korean eaters at our table questioned: 'is it normally served just warm like this? or is it supposed to be hot?' (when i've ordered it in the past or had it at my korean friend, sojin's house, it's been served hot).

our mains consisted of bulgogi (marinated and grilled strip loin) and dak-geem (chicken simmered in spicy flavored sauce), of course served with white rice. while the bulgogi was ok, it wasn't nearly as good as i've had it at other korean restaurants. i missed the charred and carmelized flavor that comes from leaving the meat on the grill for a tad bit longer. the dak-geem had a nice heat to it (i believe the spice used is the same as the red spice that is used to make kimchi - red chili peppers), but there wasn't anything spectacular about it.

along with the mains came yache gui, which essentially is grilled veggies (eggplant, peppers, zucchini) that were marinated in some sort of soy/vinegar mixture, and topped with sesame seeds. while it was very tasty, it didn't strike me as being "authentic korean."

we finished the meal with fresh fruit (cantaloupe, blueberries, grapes, strawberries) which was actually very refreshing.

would we go back to mandu? eh. first, there is no table top korean bbq grilling. more importantly, everything there is pretty general. don't get me wrong. it wasn't bad, but there really wasn't anything outstanding about the place. yesook came up to our group during the meal and asked how everything was going. she seems like a very nice lady and i hope she does well - and she just might because there is a lack of korean restaurants in the district. but it's just not worth it for us to metro (& change lines) and then walk half a mile out to mandu. i think cavin and i will just stick to koreatown in annandale.

mandu
1805 18th st. nw
washington, dc
202.588.1540

guinness + baileys != car bomb

2007-02-18T20:05:00.000-05:00

apparently friday was the great guinness toast where people all over try to break the record of the number of people simultaneously drinking and toasting guinness drafts.

back in college i remember aimee & ang going to zeno's for the toast and coming back wasted. i, on the other hand, was a dedicated student who didn't have time to go gallavanting around town haphazardly spending my hard earned cash (donating plasma). plus, i was the last to turn 21 amongst the three of us. :)

i was jealous that they came back with a bunch of free stuff (who doesn't love free stuff?) like stickers and what not. so i was determined to get in on this guinness toast the next year. but i had soon forgot about it all these years until friday night.

so this past friday, when we got to irish times and saw a counter underneath the tv, we knew something was up.

about an hour until 11pm (when the toast is supposed to occur, apparently), a man in a cape started walking around the bar, drumming up business, making people chug pitchers of guinness and giving out those monstrous hats that resemble guinness pints. (incidentally, the man in the cape closely resembled mc king kong mushi from parappa.)

somehow jj was able to wrangle mc king kong mushi into giving us a t-shirt if we each did an irish car bomb. but after we finished, mushi only had ONE t-shirt to give. so while jj and leticia each scored one of the guinness hats, and cavin scored a wicked all-day hangover on saturday, i got the "i was counted in the great guinness toast" t-shirt, a white smithwick's t-shirt, and a bunch of dc 101 shit like beer cozies & lighters.

i think the best thing i got, though, was two free dvd's: national lampoon's tv the movie (which is advertised as 'a very special kind of stupid') and man about town starring ben affleck.

thank god i have monday off for prez day so i can put these oscar-contender films on repeat all day. (not.)

oh, and by the way. guinness + bailey's + irish whiskey (like jameson) = irish car bomb.

i just ate grasshoppers.

2007-02-15T21:20:00.000-05:00

no, seriously. i did.

i was on opentable looking for lunch possibilities for friday, and i happened to see that oyamel (a mexican restaurant serving fancified antojitos and authentic tacos) had open reservations for later in the evening. oh really?

cavin and i have a intimate relationship with oyamel's menu. well, at least we did, before they closed back in september. we were confused when at minibar when chef andres mentioned something about how "the crystal city location wasn't working out." we didn't quite understand what he was talking about (it might have had something to do with the amount of wine we were drinking), but a week or so later, i had heard the news that oyamel did indeed close. and, unfortunately, cavin and i did not have the chance to go there one last time before they did.

the good news, though, was that they were to re-open downtown, and even better news was that on thursday we found out about the soft opening (that night) in time to attend.

the space is much smaller than the cc location, but it still had the charming hanging butterflies from the ceiling. it was early, maybe 6pm, and no one was really there yet, though, there were many oyamel employees standing around waiting for a big surge later in the evening. so we opted to sit at the 8-10 seater bar. there is also a 4 seat ceviche bar in the opposite corner of the normal bar, and from the outside (7th & D Streets NW) you can see little plates of ceviche being made.

they are still working out the kinks. an individual order of margarita puts you back $9, yet if you order the pitcher, it's only $30. so if you at least have a partner to drink with and you plan to drink at least 3 drinks between the two of you, you're already getting a steal: the pitcher served around 5-7 drinks for us. and, since cavin and i are both boozers, you can probably guess what we ordered.

we ate things that were on the previous menu like the tuna ceviche, papas al mole (potatoes in mole with creme and sesame seeds), and the carnitas tacos (baby pork tacos topped with crushed chicharron).

they also had things that weren't on the previous menu (well, at least the not the last time we were there): chapulines tacos. oh, and chapulines=grasshoppers.

i was really curious about it, so we decided to order one and split it. i've heard that chapulines are a normal part of the oaxacan cuisine, eating them like pulutan with beer and drinks. i was completely anxious about the entire thing. while the idea of eating it sounded exotic and fun, realistically i knew frightening and strange would be a better way to describe it.

when i was first living on my own after college, crickets (which are in the same major insect group as grasshoppers) invaded the bedroom walls of my apartment. they somehow got into the walls (especially the wall behind my bed) and chirped all night. some of them eventually made their way into the apartment where young pippi and crosby would pounce on them but then easily grew tired of their playmates.

ever since then, i've grown to really dislike them, and most times am frightened by them (all insects in the grasshoppers & relatives group).

in grad school to use up some credits, i took an entomology class to try to get over my fear and learn a little bit more about insects. i even had to keep a cricket for a week at home and write up a small report about my experience (that's where the pictures in this post come from). while i got an A, it really didn't change my feelings for the cricket.

which brings me to thursday night, and the chapulines taco. the bartender told us that we might not be able to recognize that we were eating grasshoppers, because they were sauteed in shallots and garlic. uh, wrong! when the taco was set down before us, i looked and a grasshopper happened to fall out onto the bar, and i could tell exactly what it was.

so i took my first bite, feeling a little bit like being on fear factor. it was crunchy, but not like a potato chip. i could taste that the particular grasshopper i was eating had some 'meat' in it. the flavor was described to us as 'earthy', which i suppose is true, but honestly i think it had more texture to it than flavor.

i was doing fine until i realized that most of the food i was chewing was in the right side of my mouth, yet somehow a sole leg had made its way to the other side of my mouth. once i realized what was going on, i had to quick get a grip and push the leg back over to the chewed up mass on the other side of my mouth. that was the most unnerving part about the experience.

i had two bites (though, i have to admit my second bite was a bit smaller than my first bite) and cavin finished the rest. it's exciting to say that i ate grasshoppers, though i wouldn't call the experience quite that. i probably won't order it again, but hey. at least i tried it and can say that i don't really care for it.

oyamel
401 7th street nw
washington, dc 20004
202.628.1005

2 hour delay? wha?

2007-02-14T09:39:00.000-05:00

yesterday as i sat at home reflecting on one of my previous lives, chaos around me ensued. apparently opm (office of personnel management) decided to close the federal government at 2pm in order to get people off the roads by the evening so that dot or whomever could properly prepare for the supposed inclement weather.

cavin came home before lunch, so luckily he was not stuck in any jammed up metro situation. and from the time opm announced the early closure to about 6pm, from our balcony we watched all the feds (and others, i'm sure) leaving early, populating the streets with car after car, making the commute home hellish.

when i woke up this morning, i wondered if we really did get the predicted weather. it seems that the roads were icy (from news reports) and opm granted feds a 2 hour delay. what is a 2 hour delay? good question. i'm still trying to figure it out.

from opm's status website:

federal agencies in the washington, dc, area are open under a delayed arrival/unscheduled leave policy. employees should plan to arrive for work no more than 2 hours later than they would normally arrive, and employees who cannot report for work may take unscheduled leave.

this means...
employees should plan their commutes so that they arrive for work no more than 2 hours later than they would normally arrive. employees who arrive for work more than 2 hours later than their normal arrival time will be charged annual leave or leave without pay for the additional period of absence from work.

employees who cannot report for work may take unscheduled leave for their entire scheduled workday.

emergency employees are expected to report for work on time.

hunh? i actually came in on time today, so does that mean i don't get the 2 hour credit and still need to work a full 8 hour day, while those that took 2 hours to get here (i.e. took the 2 hour delay) only have to work 6 hours?

if that is the case, it seems totally unfair. it's as if they are penalizing me for living close to work and getting here on time.

think about it this way. take two people, ann and bill. ann lives 10 minutes walking from work. bill lives an hour away and has to drive to work. say ann and bill both leave at the same time to get to work today. because of the weather, it takes ann 20 minutes to get to work while it takes bill 2 hours to get to work. following the rules, bill gets credit for the 2 hours of traveling, while ann more only gets 20 min of credit of traveling.

so at the end of the day, essentially ann has worked more hours (clocked more hours in the office) than bill, yet they are still each getting paid for the full day. does that seem fair to you?

what opm should do is give the 2 hour credit to everyone, regardless of how they use it. jj puts it nicely:

"I shouldn't have to work more hours today than someone else because I choose to live in the District and have Metro access. I think giving everyone two credit hours usable only today is a great idea. It rewards everyone who comes into work in crap weather, not just those who have a longer commute."

opm should also make it a bit clearer on the website about how the policy works. either way, i'm making it work to my advantage and shooting for a departure time of 3pm today (if i have the 2 hour credit or not): i planned on getting to work at 6:30am, but i took the 2 hour delay, thus causing me to get to work at 8:30am, thus, making my 8-hour day from 6:30am-3pm.

gotta love the government.

stuck

2007-02-13T12:43:00.000-05:00

i'm at home nursing my poor stomach. i haven't been treating it well and it's mad at me.

from my bed, i can see the snow and it reminds me of a particular time in grad school.

it was snowing pretty steadily (with inches of snow accumulated on the ground already). my roommate maria and i were both at home and had been doing some serious work, when lunchtime rolled around.

aie samanta! i'm so hungry. we don't have that much to eat in the house.

i've got an idea! pepe just took me to the popeyes and i think i remember how to get there! it's only like 10-15 minutes away!

aie, popeyes? i've always wanted to go there! but samanta! it's SNOWING out!

come on, maria, let's go! get your coat and i'll drive us there!

so we bundled up, we drove around trying to navigate through nj, and eventually we ended up at popeyes, where maria was deflowered by the 2 piece spicy dark meat combo, mashed potatoes & gravy, and of course, the buttery biscuit.

it was a fun and whimsy time and i suspected maria was having a good time as well.

this was back when i mostly depended on driving to get places. when i was fearless. when i could (and did) drive many hours alone trying to seek out new and unknown places.

things are different now. these days, i depend on the metro to get places. and when we have to go out of town, cavin almost always drives. rarely do i get into the car on the driver's side.

and because i rarely drive, i don't know how to get anywhere. i mean, i have an idea based on the times we've gone out and cavin has driven. but if i ever got lost and was driving by myself, it would not be a pretty picture (me freaking out, trying to figure out what to do, completely stressing...). and you can forget about asking me for directions - i'm completely useless.

but here is where it gets silly: all this non-driving has caused fear to supplant my once fierce driving skills. it's completely stupid, i know. i should just get in the car and drive somewhere and get over it. and maybe i will...soon. but that day isn't here yet.

so gone are the carefree days when i am able to go out on a whim to popeyes on a snowy day like today. well, at least until i grow a set.

my morning routine

2007-02-12T13:50:00.000-05:00

i have a routine during the weekdays (more or less): i get up, make the bed, feed the cats, take a shower, check the weather, get dressed, ride the metro, get to work, sign in, turn on my computer, fill my nalgene (or mug) with water, sit down and read the news, donrockwell, dcist, etc. only after i complete this routine, am i able to settle down into my work.

i would suspect that people who work in my building also have a routine, perhaps as similar (and dull) as the one i have described above.

in the morning, as soon as i step onto metro ground, i'll admit, i'm cranky. it's like 7am (more or less), i'm trying to get to work with thousands of other people and i just want to get there. a successful morning is judged by being able to get to the metro, not wait long for a train that isn't jammed up, read my book (currently alias grace by m.atwood), switch trains without having to wait long, and not having the metal detector go off when i walk through it once i get to work. and, i should add, it's most successful when i don't have to talk to anyone during the course of the morning, at least not until i've had my green tea.

i'd say that my success rate for the past month has been at a low - possibly 30%.

so what's been gooing up my morning routine? here's a few things that really irk me in the morning:

waiting for a train, only to discover it's already completely packed like sardines and one more body just won't fit, and then having to wait for the next one (or the one after that, or the one after that)

people on the train who lean on the vertical pole that i'd like to use to hold onto (i can't reach the top bar that runs along the length of the train), and then they look at me like i'm a jerk when i try to hold onto the bar anyway and my fist is essentially punching them in the back.

when i run into someone i know on the train. not to be rude but seriously. i just woke up less than an hour ago, and i don't want to talk to you about work or anything else, plus i'm trying to read my book.

when i'm switching trains and i see that the red line train is already on the platform and i'm sprinting as if i was in the olympics reaching for the gold, yet when i get to the door of the train (which is usually the first door in the first car, right next to the train operator) and the train conductor closes the door in my face (IN MY FACE!), before i can make it onto the train, and then gives me a dirty look, and pulls away.

getting stuck on the right side of the escalator (which is normally reserved for those standing, with large suitcases, or physical disabilities which prevents them from walking on the left side)

when my smartrip card doesn't want to function properly through the faregates and then i have to back up and budge in front of a million other people trying to get through at an adjacent gate

when people directly in front of me aren't courteous enough to hold the door open for me and let the door slam in my face (i've written about this before and this really, really bothers me)

when employees entering my building cannot work the id scanner correctly. UGH! we have to hold our ids up to this scanner thing, and when it recognizes it's legit, the light turns green and you can walk through. sometimes it doesn't turn green, but you HAVE to move forward as if it already turned green. this prompts the scanner that someone is standing there and it WILL turn green, giving you the thumbs up to walk through. i don't know how many times i've seen people standing there, waiving their id badges across this scanner thing, holding up the line to get in for several minutes. how long have you been working here for?

there is one last thing that disrupts my morning routine that i just can't seem to understand. and it happened to me this morning which really just irritated me. and the thing about it that i cannot understand, is that people who work in my building do this EVERY SINGLE DAY, so there is no excuse (unless you are a new employee or just visiting, but then you wouldn't be walking in through the same doors as i would be): passing their belongings through an xray machine and walking through a metal detector (just like in the airport).

yet, as i got to work this morning, i came across a gentleman who did not appear to be a newbie (i saw his badge when he scanned it in and it was old and faded) yet did not have this routine down.

as soon as i approach my building's doors, i already have my id badge in hand, my book in the other, and as i waive my badge over the scanner and walk through, i routinely put my badge, book, and bag on the xray conveyor belt, walk through the metal detector with my arms across my chest (so my watch doesn't set the metal detectors off) pick up my stuff off the belt, and i'm off to my office.

the man this morning must have been hit over the head repeatedly, resulting in brain damage which prevented him from remembering that this is routine, that this is something we do every day when coming into work. (you are a robot.)

seriously. he had all sorts of things in his pockets. he had his cell phone, his wallet, his keys, some paper clips, chewing gum with the metal foil wrapper, other junk, and like wads of change. dude! it's like 7:30am! what are you doing with all that crap in your pocket??? and, to make it worse, it was as if he didn't realize he had so much stuff in his pocket. he was acting like, 'oh my! what's this? ah, gum? i'll have to save this nugget for later in the day when my breath reeks of the garlic my wife packed in my lunch today! oh, change? how fantastic! now i can visit the 3rd floor pantry and purchase some peanut butter cheese crackers and party mix for my afternoon snack!'

his whole discovery.com demeanor really irritated me (it's obvious, no?), yet i had to grin and bear it because he beat me to the door by a few seconds.

maybe i'm being harsh, maybe i'm being a bit mean. but i don't have the luxury of having my dream job, and i put up with what i do so i can live the life i want to. the earlier i get to work and sign in, the earlier i can leave. and when i have all these general jerks around dilly dallying, disrupting my morning routine, well, in all truthfulness, i'm going to be passive-aggressive about it and blog about it here.

:)

general tso's chicken

2007-02-12T07:03:00.000-05:00

i don't know how i came across it, but i found a new york times article about general tso's (zuo's) chicken, "the most famous hunanese dish in the world." only, this sweet&sour (and spiked with chilis) chicken dish was actually fabricated in the states and ceases to exist in china.

i'm pretty sure the article was from early february so i think the times has archived the article already. while you may not be able to read the history (or lack thereof) of general tso's chicken, you can at least make the dish at home yourself, as cavin and i have printed out the recipe and made this last night (for the second time with the leftover chicken thighs we had).

the second time we made it was better than the previous attempt, i think partly due to frying the chicken a bit longer. it's a bit of prep work, but once you start it'll be done in no time. i should add that making it with a partner really helps get the dish on the table in no time.

also, this recipe results in a hot and sour chicken dish, not like the americanized version which is rather sweet.

nyt's general tso's chicken
chicken:
4-5 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
1-2 tbsp oil
2 tbsp cornstarch
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp dark soy sauce
2 tsp light soy sauce

sauce:
1 tbsp tomato paste
1/2 tsp dark soy sauce
1 1/2 tsp light soy sauce
1/2 tsp cornstarch
3 tbsp chicken stock
1 tbsp rice vinegar

2 tbsp minced garlic
2 tbsp minced ginger
sliced chilis (add as much as you feel necessary)
chopped scallions
2 tsp sesame oil
oil for deep frying

mix together the sauce ingredients (tomato paste through rice vinegar). set aside.

mise en place the garlic, ginger, scallions, and chilis.

cut chicken thighs into 1/4" slices. mix the chicken with the rest of the chicken ingredients and set aside.

deep frying: add about 1 1/2" - 2" oil to a pot, heat until 350F. add chicken to oil, deep frying until dark brown (3-5 minutes). do this in batches until all the chicken is cooked. set aside.

heat wok (or pan) on medium. add 1 tbsp oil. add chilis and cook for 30 seconds. add ginger and garlic. cook for another minute. add tomato paste sauce you made earlier and cook until the sauce starts getting thick (this should happen within 30 seconds). add the cooked chicken, and turn the heat to low and cook for a minute or so. add scallions and turn off heat. add sesame oil right before serving. serve over rice. (serves 2-3 people).

the real restaurant week: restaurant kolumbia (with surprises)

2007-02-11T08:44:00.000-05:00

to round out our "restaurant week" cavin and i decided to have an extravagant lunch (and by extravagant i mean spend close to $100 and take a 2 hour lunch on a weekday) at restaurant kolumbia. about a month ago we walked by the place on the way to my doctor's appointment, and i was like, 'oh, so this is where restaurant kolumbia is!' so armed with that knowledge, and the fact that it is brought up quite frequently on dr with positive reviews, we decided to give it a try.

when we walked in, i was surprised by the layout. from the outside i didn't believe that the building went that far back, but it did. we were greeted by the sole hostess who had to go back and forth from the front of the house to the dining area, seating people while other patrons waited by the hostess stand.

the view from the hostess stand is a long hallway, which emptied into what seemed like a well lit main dining room. along the sides of the long hallway were wine caves, as well as a 10-14 seat bar, with 2-top boothes opposite the bar. looked very cozy. on the walk to the restaurant, we decided though, that our first outing would be to sit in the dining room, and save the bar lunch for another time. (i should mention that restaurant kolumbia has $9 lunches at the bar, which from what i've heard, is a steal.)

upon entering the dining room, the first thing i noticed was the openness of the entire room. the ceiling opened up to some sort of dome, with artwork lit up and lights hanging from above. (for me, it was reminiscent of caesar's in atlantic city, with the domed sky above you, making you feel like you were actually outside.) the fact that the tables were very spaced apart also contributed to the sense of openness.

we were seated in a booth and each started with a glass of chardonnay. warm bread was presented to us, along with some sort of eggplant puree which was a pleasant addition to the butter. i was hungry (what's new) so we started off with appetizers. i ordered the daily soup, which was a duo of mushroom and potato, with a spinach (?) flan on top. i wasn't the biggest fan of the flan, but the soup was great. the mushroom provided an earthy flavor to the salty, creamy potato. cavin got the samboussek, spiced chicken in a crispy rolled pastry (think long pencil) and shallot remoulade. the filling was quite spiced, and while it was tasty, it was a little bit dry.

it took me a while to decide what to order, but once my food came out, i knew i had hit a winner. the truffled parsnip pierogi with parmesan mousse, brown butter and raisins was probably one of the better pasta dishes i've had in a while. the filling was light and airy, and the scent of the truffle oil mixed in with the browned butter sauce kept bringing my nose to the plate to smell (and then taste, of course) over and over again. the raisins were quite interesting, and were a nice complement to the sweetness of the truffle oil.

cavin's grilled squid over polenta was served with rapini (broccoli raab) and black olives. the piece i tasted was delicious, if not a little on the salty side (perhaps due to the olives). i don't really order polenta, but my standard now is the 3 cheese polenta at dino i had last week. kolumbia's polenta was just general. i've seen polenta cooked before, and i think sometimes it gets harder the longer it sits out (i could be wrong). so i think the polenta was indeed sitting out and/or it was cooked a bit of time ago, because cavin's polenta had a stiff crust on top, indicative of what i just mentioned.

i should also mention that we also ordered a side of 'best on k french fries' to see how good they were (well, i just really like french fries) and they were fantastic. they were in the belgium frites style, and were crispy on the outside, yet delicately potato-y on the inside (if that even makes any sense). had they been doused with a little bit of truffle oil, i would have been in heaven. while i cannot vouch for the fries being the best on k street, you can be definitely assured that cavin and i will be making a trip back for these bad boys.

as we were enjoying our meal, something unexpected happened which caused me to lose my appetite a little. because we were sitting in a booth, our table was up against a wall. as i was looking around, i spotted a BUG, about 1" long (similar to a roach, but not exactly - it did have a hard shell and antennae) crawling on the wall, walking down towards the table. i informed cavin and he used his napkin to try to steer it clear from the table, so he could eventually push it to the floor.

maybe you don't know this, but i don't like bugs. this is serious. i really don't like them AT ALL. i'm not a big proponent of killing them (though, flies and mosquitos i don't care - they are nasty), but i still just don't like them.

so i was fine with cavin's idea to push it to the floor. but the darned thing wouldn't make up it's mind. it kept walking back up to the picture that was hanging from the wall, then it would walk back down towards the table, then it started crawling towards cavin's coat. the whole thing was upsetting to me, as i couldn't eat my food without having to check the wall every few seconds to make sure we hadn't lost track of our friend.

this must have went on for at least 5 minutes, because who i can only suspect was the manager, walked over to our table and said, 'i'm so sorry! do you want to move to another table?' at the same exact time she walked up, i noticed cavin was fooling around underneath the table with his napkin. i told the gm it's fine, we don't need another table (at this point, we had like 1/4 of our meal left and i didn't want to have to relocate). cavin agrees, and at this point, i'm still wondering where the bug is - i can only assume that cavin has brushed our friend onto the floor because it was no longer on the wall.

the gm is still standing there, and is finally like, 'well, let me at least give you a clean one.' hunh? a clean what? apparently cavin has squashed our poor friend at the same exact moment the gm walked over to our table. they traded napkins and then we finished our meal.

we did not get dessert because we were really full, plus we had already been there for like 1.5 hours. i do have to admit that even though we ordered a lot of food and we are slow eaters, there were long delays in getting our food. had it not taken so long to get our appetizers, and then our mains, we would have been out of there in an hour or so. plus, the whole bug debacle didn't help matters either.

all in all, i thought it was a fantastic meal. the restaurant wasn't crowded at all so we'll have to add it to our 'places to go for lunch'. (i don't know if it was too cold for people to go out or what. but even when we walked out, there were only 2 patrons at the bar.)

hopefully next time, their fumigating (which the waiter explained happened the day before) will have worked and all the bugs will be long gone.

restaurant kolumbia
1801 k street nw
washington, dc 20006
202.331.5551

new blogger look

2007-02-10T11:18:00.000-05:00

i don't know if anyone reads this, but i am working on creating this new template for my blog. i was tired of using that black one and i wanted to try my hand at making a new one myself (well, sort of).

so, if you are reading, don't be surprised if things change dramatically (which i think they already have), or if things don't work like they used to. i'm still trying to figure it out.

leave me a comment if there is something you can't find or if you have any other comments.

here are some comments i already have:

1. if you click on the "home" tab, it opens up a new tab (if you are using firefox). i'm trying to figure out how NOT to do this
--fixed! (thanks cavin!)

2. you can't click on the title of the blog to take you to my most current post
--fixed! you can now click on the big kalat-o-scope header and it will take you to the home page (i.e. most current post).

3. i want to be able to see the titles of my archived posts. (currently, when you click on, say, december 2006, you get all my posts in a row on one page.)
--i have a feeling i won't be able to have my archives the way they used to be (if you even remember). for now, try searching on a particular topic at the top left and then click 'search blog'.

4. i want to add a list of my labels in the left column so it's easier to search
--fixed! i've been able to figure out how to add my labels. i.e. if you are interested in reading posts about french fries, you can click on it in the labels box.

5. i want it so when you put the cursor over a link, the link turns to a different color, even though you haven't clicked on the link yet.
--done! at first i couldn't get it to work, but later discovered it was because i was using a . instead of a :

6. i originally had this rss feed thing on my blog, but i didn't know much about it so i removed it. but apparently someone other than myself reads my blog and has requested it. so now i'm going to figure out how to do it and add this feature to my blog.
--i dunno. i added something though i don't know much about the rss feed. if jeff is using it and it works, then i'll just keep it the way it is now. if it doesn't work for you, just leave me a comment and let me know. thanks.

7. i'm starting a new feature (well, the only feature, i suppose): domingo cinco. it is sort of like a weekly round-up that i will hopefully be able to post every sunday. prolly just random things that i notice or am figuring out. we'll see how it goes.

the real restaurant week: kotobuki

2007-02-09T10:44:00.000-05:00

cavin and i went to kotobuki on wednesday night for a grand ol' time of sushi and the beatles. this was no ordinary kotobuki visit, though. where normally we would leave as early as possible to beat the rush, eat, and be sitting back at home in a little bit over an hour, we went a bit later to meet two of our friends. some would call it a "double-date". whatever.

although kotobuki is off the beaten DC path (it's in the palisades section of DC), it has acquired a cult following (cavin and i included). i basically describe it as a no frills japanese sushi dive restaurant. don't expect fancy named rolls, or even fried rolls (like spider or shrimp tempura rolls). but what they do have is extremely fresh fish and seafood, the most friendly staff, and a sushi chef who adores the beatles.

we planned to meet our friends at 7:30-7:45pm, and i had my doubts. what would it be like at the 25-seat restaurant? well, i'll tell you. the place was full. there were only 2 seats open (at the 4-seat sushi bar), and there were 4 (obnoxiously loud) hoochies (early to mid-20s) already waiting for a 4-top to open up.

d&l were not there yet, so cavin and i waited. several people arrived before then, and grabbed the 2 free seats, and picked up to-go orders, but no one seemed to be leaving.

when d&l arrived (only 10 min later), still, no one had left. so we waited. and waited. finally we saw checks being handed out by the waitresses. but upon further inspection, the two tables were not next to each other. while we were standing at the top of the steps crammed in, we debated whether we should just bag the entire "breaking bread together" concept and each go for a 2-top. but we decided to keep in the spirit of the "double date", in the hopes that another table would open up, preferably one that was next to a table that was already free.

after about 45 min of waiting, the slow pokes finally paid their bill and we were escorted to our seats. (thanks a lot, jerks)

as usual, cavin and i ordered a variety of things: toro (fatty tuna), hamachi (yellowtail), lobster, uni (sea urchin), oshinko, unagi (eel), salmon skin roll, sea scallop, salmon, and white tuna. this time around, the toro wasn't as stellar as it always is, but everything else was fantastic.

along with our meal we also ordered the cold sake, which they serve in a box cup, and provide you with salt, so you can add it to the rim of your box cup. i guess you could say it is somewhat similar to adding salt to the rim of a margarita glass. cavin and i don't normally order the sake - usually we dine and dash (but not literally) - but since we were with friends, why not get into the spirit (hehe)? plus, i was fuming because i was in a bad mood all day, so it was good that i got a drink to wind me down.

kotobuki is one of those places that i wish was in my neighborhood (god, i wish something was in my neighborhood!), but kind of glad it isn't. the sushi is ridiculously cheap (on normal outings to kotobuki, cavin and i stuff our faces for $40 total) for how fresh it is and i would be there everyday (or every other day) if this place was within walking distance from our living quarters.

kotobuki japanese restaurant
4822 macarthur blvd
washington, dc 20007
202.625.9080

the real restaurant week: brooklyn brewery dinner at eatbar

2007-02-07T00:06:00.001-05:00

a few weeks ago on dr, someone mentioned a glass giveaway at rustico. curious about this, i visited rustico's website and struck gold:

Garrett Oliver subtitled his novel, "Discovering the Pleasures of Real Beer with Real Food." Tonight we do just that! Brooklyn Brewery's Brewmaster will be onhand to discuss the art of pairing great beer with great food as we explore a vibrant selection of his beers paired with dishes created by EatBar's Chef Nathan Anda. Cost is $90 (including tax & gratuity); $120 for dinner and a signed copy of Garrett's beer bible, The Brewmaster's Table. This evening's blow-out beer dinner is not to be missed!

i don't claim to be the next michael jackson of beer, but i know what i like, and i like brooklyn brewery beers. so it was obvious that we were going to reserve tuesday, feb 6 for the brooklyn brewery dinner.

eatbar is in virginia, a half mile or so from the clarendon metro stop on the orange line. it actually opened recently (2006) as a gastropub, attached to another neighborhood restaurant, tallula.

after braving the cold walk to the restaurant, i was pleasantly surprised by the atmosphere of the place. we walked in the eatbar doors (and not tallula), and it was a very relaxed. the lighting was warm and inviting, and it seemed the patrons were neighborhood folk trying to warm themselves up from all the cold with good beer and good food.

when we finally figured out the dinner was being held in the private back room, and made our way back. we found a lowly lit room (candles) with a 6-seater rounded bar, and 5 or 6 tables with name cards (well, a folded piece of paper, actually). we were the first ones there, and found our names at a cozy 2-seater booth against the wall next to the bar. great! i was glad that we didn't have to sit with people we didn't know and make small conversation. people started to trickle in, and at 7:30, the dinner began.

garrett oliver started the night off contrasting homemade bread/wonder bread and artisan cheese/kraft "slices". this naturally led him to talk about the differences between large scale beer makers and smaller craftier breweries (like brooklyn brewery). he was a great speaker and captivated the audience every time he spoke, which he did before each of the 6 courses, to talk about the beer and why it was paired with a particular dish.

i won't go into full details about the food and the beer pairings, which you can see in the linked picture in this blog entry. but i will mention a few things.

i think my favorite dish was the braised pork belly with house baked beans, paired with the brooklyn smoked weissbock. if i remember correctly, i believe mr. oliver mentioned that the malt was lightly smoked for brewing, which led to the nice smokiness of the weissbock. i think it was perfectly paired with the pork belly, which was also smoked, as well as the beans. i seriously could have eaten 5 of those dishes and still had room for the rest of the meal. it really was outstanding. i might have to try to recreate the dish at home.

we also were privy to a new beer they were making at the brewery that hadn't yet been released to the public: brooklyn local 1. it had notes of bananas, cloves and bubblegum (that's what mr. oliver said, and when i tasted it, he was spot on). it reminded me of victory's golden monkey, but not as strong, with a smoother finish. (i think i prefer brooklyn's local 1.)

the 5th course was a cheese course. i was curious to see what cavin was going to do, because not only was it a cheese course, but it was a stilton cheese course. it was paired with a black chocolate stout. eh. mr. oliver actually told us a quick anecdote of how this pairing came about. he was at another pairing: stilton cheese with the barleywine (which actually ended up being paired with the 6th course), except when he arrived, someone messed up and they only had the black chocolate stout. so he had to "bluff" his way thru the talk, as if he had done the stiltons and the stout on purpose. for him, this ended up being a blessing in disguise, because he actually thought the pairing worked, and decided to include it in our dinner.

there were two "stiltons" served, one an old-world style from england, which actually was a stilton, and another new-world style from wisconsin, which was in the style of a stilton, but technically wasn't. i thought the cheese from wi was fantastic. i even ate some of cavin's because i knew that he wasn't going to really touch it (to give him credit, he did taste it). but the pairing was a little off to me, and i could barely drink the stout, even though i love them so much. (i would have prefered the barleywine with the stiltons, truth be told.) ah, tant pis!

to end the night, the last "course" was the barleywine served with a cigar. cavin and i don't smoke, but i thought it would be kind of cool to smoke the cigar (not the best cigar i've ever had, but it was decent with the barleywine) so we split one. it was a pretty great ending to the whole night.

at the end of the dinner, it was announced that there would be another beer dinner in the next month or so at eatbar: victory. i am also a fan of victory, and have actually gone to the brewery in pa, so we'll definitely be going again.

and eatbar/tallula seemed like a great restaurant to go to relax and hang out, so we'll probably be there in the future as well.

tallula/eatbar
2761 washington blvd
arlington, va 22201
703.778.5051

candy line up

2007-02-06T23:58:00.000-05:00

just yesterday i was asking cavin, "where the hell is our new games magazine?!?!" and, just like an actress taking her cue, our march 2007 issue arrived.

the cover reminded me of the candy line up seinfeld episode so i thought i'd share it with you.

can you name the candy bar based on the cross-sectional pictures on the cover of games magazine?

the real restaurant week: dino

2007-02-06T08:37:00.000-05:00

this past weekend cavin's bro, brent, came to the dc area. it was the first stop on his month long driving adventure across the country (more or less).

so saturday during the day, we decided to do some touristy things and then go out to dinner. it was fun because we ended up going to places that cavin and i hadn't gone before, even though we've lived here for a year and a half.

the first place we ended up was the national archives. i was always curious about this archives place. i'm like the opposite of a history buff, so i really never had a strong desire to go there. but saturday was a good excuse to finally get my butt over there.

so what is there to see at the archives? well, first, i should say that when you get inside, there is minimal light, and no flash photography is allowed (i guess so that the documents could be preserved as long as possible).

like i said, i'm not into the whole history thing, but it was kinda cool to see the magna carta (in latin), the constitution, the bill of rights, and of course, the declaration of independence. i saw the large john hancock signature, and i also overheard some foreign tourists comment on the louisiana purchase:

ew. they didn't even FIGHT for most of their land. they just BOUGHT it.

after leaving archives we headed over to the national portrait gallery, which just opened less than one year ago. it was actually really cool to go there. the place is really huge, which we realized when we walked up a set up stairs and it was like teeny hallway after teeny hallway of art, similar to being in the stacks at the pattee library. i think cavin and i will have to go back in the near future, because we didn't even get a chance to see half of the art in there. and the fact that it's open until 7pm (11:30am-7pm) is pretty awesome.

we left the portrait gallery a little early, but decided we would press to dino an hour early, and sit at the bar. i was completely excited to be going - we've heard so much about dino on dr. but when we got there, many others also had the idea of sitting at the bar as well. and we didn't realize that it's a small 6-seater bar. but dean, the owner, was very gracious and said he could seat us right away if we wanted, which turned out to be a blessing because all three of us were already hungry.

one of the other reasons i was excited to eat at dino was because i knew brent didn't necessarily have any money restrictions either, so we would be able to order lots of stuff (and wine!) and not have to worry about money.

we ended up asking the waiter for advice on wine, and we ended up ordering a bottle of collemattoni (sangiovese) rosso di montalcino 2004. it was a full-bodied red wine from italy (dino's speciality). we tried to pick our dishes to go along with the wine we chose, so we first ordered a cheese plate (which we selected the cheeses): caseficio dell’alta langhe "la tur" {sheep, goat, cow} cuneo, piemonte, pecorino foja di noce {sheep} toscana, and guffanti provolone 28 mesi {raw – cow} valpadana, lombardia.

along with the cheese plate came out the salumi artigianali (cured meats: bresaola, speck, petit jesu, spanish choriso), as well as the burrata (bufala cheese air freighted from campania every sunday and thursday; essentially it's really fresh mozzarella wrapped around fresh ricotta). everything was completely fantastic, and the burrata was one of my favorite things that i ate that evening.

our second course (yes, we ate a TON of food! it was awesome!) consisted of calamari fritti (fried calamari) and the fritti di mare (fried sardine and baby anchovies). the calamari came out perfectly fried and tender. the fritti di mare was excellent. the sardine was fried enough so that you didn't have to worry about the tinik getting stuck in your throat. the anchovies were fried to a crisp and really went well with the rustic tomato sauce that accompanied it.

at this point in the meal, we ordered another bottle of red, alma rosa (pinot noir) santa rita hills 2004. i have to say that i don't know if this was on purpose, but our 3rd course (entrees) came out after some time. i actually thought of this during the evening, but was glad that our entrees had not come out immediately. we had eaten the hell out of the bread, the cheeses, the cured meats, and the fried fish that i was getting a little bit full, and i needed the welcomed break before getting our main. later, talking to cavin, he mentioned to me how he liked that there was a gap between when we finished the fried calamari and sardine and when we got our entrees. it really was great timing.

when our entrees arrived, they looked fantastic. to compliment the wine, brent ended up getting the pappardelle ai cinghiale (wild boar pasta), cavin the cervo (venison with roasted mushrooms & madeira sauce), and i the pepposa (braised beef short ribs served on 3 cheese polenta).

i tasted cavin's venison and it was quite delicious - i had never had venison before. but to be honest, i thought my dish was the best of the two (i did not taste the pasta). the beef was cooked to the point of falling off the bone tender, though no bone was presented on the plate. but i didn't need a knife because it literally just came apart with your fork if you even tried to move it around. it was so delicate! oh, and the 3 cheese polenta? omg. i had never tasted anything like it in my life, it was outstanding: very creamy, with a slight cornmeal texture. i'm going to have to replicate it at home, i think.

finally, while brent ordered cognac, cavin and i opted to stuff ourselves even more and order dessert. cavin got the macedoine di fruitta (winter fruits marinated in prosecco with sorbetto) and i got some sort of lemon tart with a sorbet on top. we both also ordered the moscato, a sweet grape wine that complimented our desserts. my lemon tart was not too lemony and not too sweet, so it really did end my night perfectly (since i'm not into sweets and chocolate too much).

because we got there early, we ended up being seated around 6pm, and when we were finished and leaving, it was about 9pm! woah! we stayed for 3 hours ordering and drinking whatever our hearts desired (~$270 pre-tip). it was fantastic. we didn't feel rushed, and cavin noticed as we were leaving that we weren't holding up a party waiting for a table, though, the restaurant was definitely full of other patrons having a great time.

we'll definitely be going back to dino (i'm going to push for once or twice every two weeks!) again. on sundays and mondays they have a great wine special: 1/3 off all wines above $50. i have to admit that i'm very ignorant in the wine department, but after a quick search online, the wines that we ordered at dino were not at the wine store we frequent. so we'll have to just go back and order them there (and eat the fantastic italian food)!

dino
3435 connecticut avenue nw
cleveland park, washington dc, 20008
202.686.2966

bistro bis

2007-02-05T08:58:00.000-05:00

the end of january has come abruptly. what happened? it's been a month since new years? hunh?

there is a restaurant in the hotel george, which is about 2 blocks from where i work. cavin and i went to bistro bis during the first (and only, thus far) restaurant week we've gone to. i remember it being really cramped, and the food was good, but nothing super-spectacular. i guess decent french bistro cooking.

since that first time we went, i've gone to bistro bis for breakfast a couple of times. they have excellent coffee that doesn't give me stomach aches, flaky croissants you would find in any parisian bakery, and, despite its capitol hill location, an upscale, yet non-demeaning atmosphere.

cavin and i have been talking about going back for a while, and it wasn't until this past wednesday that we made good on our whim.

at the last minute, i made a reservation for lunch about 30 minutes before our time, and we headed over there. the place was full. it was actually full of suits and army people, having a midweek lunch out of the office.

while cavin and i discussed our living plans for 2007-2008, we dined on some yummy things. i ordered the frisee salad (frisee lettuce with bacon lardons, croutons and sherry vinaigrette) and the steak frites bernaise. cavin ordered the jambon terrine persille (ham terrine) and the saint pierre et palovrdes (john dory fish).

i can't speak for cavin's dishes, but my frisee salad was dressed with the proper amount of vinaigrette, and the bacon lardons provided an extra saltiness to an otherwise plain salad with croutons. my steak (sirloin) was perfectly cooked (medium rare) and the bernaise added a nice acidic touch to the steak. the frites were pretty tasty as well.

i'm not sure if cavin had too high expectations for lunch, because he thought it was good, but short of outstanding. while i have to agree that lunch wasn't spectacular, i still thought it was decent french bistro fare. we spent about $75 (before tip) which was kind of pricey for lunch, but i wasn't really that surprised when the bill came out.

i wish that other decent restaurants would open up in my work neighborhood. sometimes it's nice to have options for lunch outings (besides all the crappy restaurants in union station). i guess for now i'll keep bistro bis on the list, and if i want other options, i'll just have to travel to cavin's work neighborhood and try out the places near there.

bistro bis
15 e street, nw (hotel george)
washington, dc 20001
202.661.2700

the real restaurant week: zaytinya

2007-02-05T08:41:00.000-05:00

this week, starting saturday the 3rd, was supposed to be a big restaurant week for cavin and i. on deck was dinner at dino with cavin's brother, the brooklyn brewery dinner at eatbar, kotobuki with dpl, and finally culminating with the gerard pangaud dinner at l'academie de cuisine on the 10th.

but for reasons beyond our control, the second night of the gerard dinner was cancelled. and since we were unable to switch to the first night, we had to unfortunately decline (very sad day in our lives).

so friday being all depressed about not being able to go to the gerard dinner, cavin and i decided to eat out. we actually didn't decide we were going out until we met up at gallery place metro stop friday after a long day at work.

where do you wanna go? how about matchbox? ok. sure.

wow. what are all these old people doing at matchbox? and it's super jammed! aie. i don't see any bar seats, and i don't feel like dealing with it. ok. so what do you wanna do now? i dunno, but i like truffled frites.

but as we're walking in the cold weather to poste: well what are we going to do about dinner? are we eating at poste? oh. i dunno. would you rather go to cafe atlantico? well, it would be cheaper than poste. it would? wait. where are we? 9th street? let's go to zaytinya. it's right over there. ok.

so after going through all of our possible choices, we ended up at another of jose andres' empire of restaurants (including cafe atlantico, minibar, jaleo, oyamel).

when we arrived, we tried to jockey for seats at the bar. unfortunately, everyone and their mother was there early saving seats for their so's. ugh. so we ended up getting a table, which actually was better in the long run.

zaytinya is an upscale eastern mediterranean (greek, turkish, lebanese) restaurant that has mezzes, or small plates. it's of the tapas fashion, so you order a bunch of mezzes and share with the table. normally for cavin and i, we tend to order 4-6 mezzes (though, we ordered 6 this time around and we were stuffed).

we started with cocktails: i ordered the apricot sour and cavin the retsina cocktail. my drink tasted like apricot juice with sour mix (and vodka, though, i could barely taste the alcohol). apparently, retsina is some sort of wine. to be quite honest, cavin's drink would have tasted ok had it not been so watered down. i'm not even sure if it had any vodka in it, as the menu says it does. well, you win some, you lose some, eh?

we decided on 6 mezzes, because i had only eaten 1/2 peanut butter sandwich all day and i was hungry. we ended up with two veggie mezzes, two meat, and two seafood:

-cabbage dolmades (stuffed with rice & mushrooms, served with avgolemono sauce)
-kolokithakia (baby squash served with ladolemono and micro greens)
-mavrofassoula me loucaniko (grilled pork and orange rind sausage with bean stew)
-kafta harra (ground lamb and beef served in a stewed tomato sauce with pine nuts)
-fried squid (served with fresh dill & garlic-yogurt sauce)
-seared salmon (marinated in herbs & served with roasted garlic yogurt)

the cabbage dolmades was tasty - the inside tasted like it might have had some sort of cheese in it, and it was topped with the avgolemono sauce, that was very reminiscent of hollandaise sauce.

i think the best dish was the kafta harra (one of the specials). the meat was cooked perfectly and was not dried out, and the tomato sauce that was served on top was not too acidic for the rest of the dish.

the one dish that didn't wow us was the mavrofassoula. i didn't taste any orange rind in the sausage, and the bean stew consisted of the beans and the bean liquid one would find in a can of beans.

this was our third trip to zaytinya, and i think our bill each time was about what it was friday night: $60 (before tip). not too bad, for being able to taste 6 different dishes. i think next time though, 4 or 5 mezzes would be enough, and i might stick to drinking wine or maybe even try ouzo.

oh, and i just found this out on the zaytinya website: zaytinya is olive oil in turkish.

zaytinya
701 9th street nw
washington, dc 20004
202.638.0800
202.638.6969

lemony chicken with prunes and green olives

2007-01-29T21:17:00.000-05:00

ugh. it's been a long week of trying to get stuff done at work and at home. it's prevented me from blogging.

last weekend cavin and i made it out to the grocery store and i happened to see organic prunes. ah! there was a recipe in molly steven's all about braising: lemony chicken with prunes and green olives. i've been wanting to make this for a while, but i would always forget to pick up prunes.

so we picked up the prunes, now all i needed were the olives. hmmm. the recipe calls for lucques, and i thought about ordering them from igourmet, but as usual, i never got around to doing it.

oh! what's this? an olive bar? lemme see what they have here...cerignola? i guess this will have to do!

with the chicken legs, prunes, and green olives in hand, i was ready to make the dish. except...oh. what's this here? the recipe says i have to plump the prunes. for 8-12 hours! aie. i guess we're having this for dinner another night.

so sunday afternoon i researched about plumping prunes (dried plums). apparently you can plump them by pouring boiling water over them, and letting them absorb the liquid for about 2 hours, and then you can use them. molly stevens mentions that this deteriorates the quality of the prunes so she prefers to soak them for a longer period of time in non-boiling liquid. and since i had the time, why not soak them longer?

you can also plump the prunes in liquids other than water, and the prunes will absorb the flavor of that liquid. (don't use chicken stock though, because the prunes will be sitting out on the counter and you don't want the stock to go bad.) since i knew the recipe called for white wine or vermouth, i decided to go that route. i plumped the prunes in vermouth (to cover) for about 20 hours. monday afternoon the prunes were a little bit puffed up, and when i tasted it, it had a mellow vermouthy flavor to them. great!

the recipe is pretty simple.

braised lemony chicken with prunes and green olives
3.5-4 lbs chicken leg quarters (with skins and bones)
1/4 cup prunes, plumped up
1/3 cup green olives, pitted (lucques, picholine, or cerignola, which is what i used)
2-4 whole cloves
4-5 strips of lemon peel (removed with a veggie peeler)
4 cloves garlic, smashed
1 cup dry white wine or dry vermouth (if you plumped the prunes in wine, use this wine as well)
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
flour
olive oil
salt & pepper

cut the chicken leg quarters into two pieces: separating the thigh from the leg. s&p the chicken pieces, then light coat with the flour.

heat oil in a large, shallow skillet on med-high. brown chicken pieces in batches, starting with the skin side down, until golden brown. remove and place on a plate. continue until all chicken is nicely browned.

pour off oil in skillet, but keep the browned bits. add garlic, lemon peel, cloves, saute for 30 seconds, then add the vinegar and wine to deglaze. cook for 1-2 minutes, then add the chicken pieces back in a single layer (it will be a snug fit), as well as any chicken juice that accumulated on the plate. add the prunes and olives on top, then cover with a heavy lid. cook for 35-45 minutes, basting the chicken with the liquid occasionally, as well as turning the chicken pieces once half way through. (if using a thermometer, cook until the chicken hits 180F.) salt & pepper afterwards to taste.

i'm a big fan of this recipe. the chicken was moist and flavored with lemon and a hint of cloves. the sauce ends up being thickened from the flour used to coat the chicken in the beginning. molly stevens says the consistency should be like "a thin vinagrette." the prunes tasted amazing to me (and i didn't even use the best prunes out there!), partly i think, because i plumped them in vermouth, and not water. and they complimented the sauce and the olives quite well.

earlier in the day i made potato muffins so we served the chicken with the muffins. i won't go into the details of the muffins because they didn't turn out exactly how i wanted (i think i added too much potato, but how am i supposed to measure 10.5 oz potatoes without a scale?) but well enough to eat. once i figure out the proportions properly and test out the recipe again, i'll post it on here.

beef stew with red wine and hoisin sauce

2007-01-28T09:23:00.000-05:00

despite the fact that it was almost 60F degrees on saturday, the rest of the week was pretty freezing. i think when i woke up on thursday it was like 17F degrees, with a wind chill of 3F. woah.

the cold weather prompted me to want to cook soup or a stew. the stew won out. here's my go-to recipe for beef stew that i snagged from epicurious a few years back. i altered it a little by substituting beef broth for 1/2 of the amount of wine. so you may notice that my recipe differs a little bit from the original.

beef stew with red wine and hoisin
4 tbsp olive oil
4 lbs boneless beef chuck roast, trimmed and cut into 1.5-2" pieces
3.5 cups chopped onions (i normally use like 3-4 small to med yellow onions)
1 cup cabernet sauvignon (or whatever red wine you happen to have in the house i guess)
1 cup beef broth (i've also tried it with chicken broth and it turns out fine)
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes, undrained
1/2 cup hoisin sauce
2-3 bay leaves
flour
s&p

1 lb slender carrots, peeled, cut diagonally into 1" lengths (or just use those baby carrots)
1 tbsp cornstarch mixed with 1 tbsp cold water (optional)
2 tbsp chopped fresh parsley

s&p the beef. lightly flour. heat 2 tbsp oil in heavy large pot over high heat. brown beef on all sides, doing in batches if necessary. remove from pot.

reduce heat to medium, add 2 tbsp oil. add onions and bay leaves and saute, adding a little bit of the wine to deglaze the pot. add meat (and meat juices) back into pot. add the wine, tomatoes with juices, hoisin sauce. bring to boil.

reduce heat to low, cover pot and simmer for about 1 hour, stirring occasionally. add carrots and stock. cover, simmer 45 min, stirring occasionally. check to see if meat is done; if not, simmer a bit longer. when meat is cooked and tender, uncover, increase heat to high, and boil until the sauce is slightly thickened, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes longer. if you want the sauce thicker, turn heat to medium, add cornstarch mixture and simmer until sauce thickens - about 10 minutes. season with s&p. sprinkle with parsley and serve.

(Can be made 1 day ahead. cool slightly. chill uncovered until cold, then cover and keep refrigerated. bring to simmer before serving, stirring occasionally.)

here are some pictures of the process:

browning the meat.

browned meat resting in another vessel.

one last piece of meat to brown.

onions and bay leaves added to pot before deglazing with red wine.

browned meat added to onions and bay leaves.

i've just added hoisin, tomatoes, rest of wine.

finished product, after thickening with cornstarch.

honey-miso baked chicken thighs

2007-01-24T07:34:00.000-05:00

i've been a little down on myself because the past few weekends i've been eating out of control. when i'm not held down by my work schedule, i tend to lose focus and want to eat everything i see in sight.

yesterday at work i was depressed about the whole thing, but towards the end of a long day, i thought about it more and decided to try to have a healthy meal for dinner. (and to think i almost roped cavin into getting 10 cent wings at capitol lounge!!!)

i think we did pretty well. i removed the skin and all visible fat from the chicken thighs, while cavin made up the marinade (more like glaze, because we didn't have enough time to marinate), which consisted of honey, miso, lemon juice, smoked paprika, and cayenne. then we threw the chicken thighs in a 400F oven for about 45-50 minutes (~180 degrees if you use a thermometer). oh and we added in some baby carrots i had leftover from lunch for good measure. we covered it for the first half to 3/4 time it was in the oven and removed the foil towards the end.

while i was on the phone negotiating, cavin made our old stand by, quinoa, and also prepped the baby bok choy so that when i got off the phone i could saute it in oil with sesame seeds and garlic.

i think it turned out great, and i also couldn't finish my plate! woah!

take-away points: have miso around in the house (store in the fridge). it's a great salty flavor that you can use on fish or chicken mixed with honey (which you should also have around in the house). even if you don't have the lemon, the miso-honey combo is a winner. try it.

pan fried noodles

2007-01-23T12:12:00.000-05:00

i've been lazy. i haven't been taking as many pictures as i should be taking, especially when we're making stuff we haven't made before. ah, get over it.

after eating like a little piggy this weekend and not having a care in the world, i am back on track with the sensible meals. after getting home last night around 5:30, i was trying to find a chicken thigh recipe that didn't require too much prep work. i couldn't find anything to my liking (at least that's how i felt last night - maybe subconsciously i didn't want chicken for dinner), so i decided to regroup and discuss with cavin the foods we had in the house: baby bok choy, snow peas, carrots, eggplant, green peppers, onions, garlic.

i thought about stir fry, but lately i've been eating too much rice. oh! what's this? i forgot that we have fresh noodles in the fridge! let's try to recreate the chinese dish pan fried noodles!

essentially i was thinking about the pan fried noodles we had at sang kee a few weekends ago: crispy noodles that get softer as they sit in a brown sauce poured over it, with a mix of veggies and meat on top. how hard could it be to make? not that hard, apparently. all you really need to do is cook the veggies/meat before hand (i cooked it with the sauce), and then pan fry the noodles (duh) and then top the veggies/meat on top and serve. simple!

because we didn't have any meat in the dish, we cooked these really cute mini-pork dumplings we had in the freezer, which i first boiled for about 5 minutes, and then pan fried to make crispy.

i think it turned out pretty well, despite having to change pans halfway through. (originally i didn't use a nonstick pan for the noodles. even though i added oil and water, the noodles were sticking to the pan and i had to quick bail on the faux wok and grab the nonstick pan.) you can use whatever veggies you have in the house, no need to get the bok choy or snow peas if you don't have them. even just onions and peppers (and chicken, beef, pork, or shrimp) would be fine.

i think you might need to use the oyster sauce to get the proper flavoring, though, if you use only soy sauce, it might still be ok if you thicken the sauce.

our version had many veggies on top of the noodles, more so that at sang kee, but i think i would rather have more veggies than noodles. you can also use less amounts or omit some of the veggies, though i would definitely try to use onion and garlic.

here's our version of pan fried noodles:

vegetable pan friend noodles
1 asian eggplant
handful of snowpeas, ends trimmed
2 carrots
1/4 head green cabbage
half of a large green pepper
3 or 4 baby bok choy, rinsed well
1 small onion
garlic
8 oz. fresh noodles (thin kind)
1-2 tbsp oyster sauce
1-2 tbsp soy sauce
water
oil
cornstarch (optional)

chop the onion, eggplant, carrots, cabbage, and green pepper into uniform size - 1" or so. chop garlic.

heat oil on medium high. add garlic, cook for 1 minute. add the following veggies in 2 minute intervals, constantly stirring: 1)eggplant 2)onion, carrots, peppers, cabbage 3)baby bok choy, snow peas. add soy sauce and oyster sauce and mix together. if you want the sauce to be thicker, mix equal parts cornstarch with cold water (use about 1 tbsp or so) and add to pan and bring to boil. otherwise, just add a little bit of water. cover to help steam the veggies. season with pepper (and salt, but i didn't use any because of the soy). once the veggies are cooked thru, remove from pan.

heat a nonstick skillet on medium, and add 2-3 tbsp oil. add fresh noodles to skillet, trying to separate the strands if possible (you can put the noodles in boiling water for 1-2 minutes to get all the flour off the noodles and separate them, if you wish). cook until the bottom gets crispy and then flip the entire thing over.

when the noodles are cooked to your desired crispiness, remove them from pan and put on a serving dish. pour the veggies and sauce on top of the noodles and serve.

eggplant adobo

2007-01-21T17:46:00.000-05:00

while we were in new brunswick, we ended up going to asian food mart on rt 27, home of the seaweed crackers pv loves so much that we cannot find anywhere else. asian eggplants were on sale and i couldn't resist. they also have a filipino food aisle, so along with picking up mama sita packets for the shanghai lumpia (for my mom), i got me some coconut vinegar.

we got home and i assessed what we had in the pantry: mushroom dark soy sauce, garlic, onions. hmmm...ADOBO! except instead of making the normal meat adobo (pork or chicken), i made the vegetarian eggplant adobo.

i normally don't make eggplant, or really, any vegetarian adobo. i think the last time may have been 4 years ago, when i eyeballed the measurements yet it turned out really good. this time around, i made up the measurements, considering the 2:1 vinegar to soy ratio. i think it turned out pretty darn good. the soy sauce was definitely mushroomy, which resulted in a deep flavored adobo. i have yet to determine if the coconut vinegar provided a significant difference to the regular dark soy sauce i normally use. i'll have to keep experimenting.

eggplant adobo
5 medium sized eggplants, chopped into 1-1.5" pieces
1 head garlic, minced
1 small onion, finely diced
1/2 cup coconut vinegar
1/4 cup dark soy sauce (i used the mushroom flavored kind)
ground black pepper
bay leaves
1/2 cup water (or more)

bring garlic, onion, vinegar, soy sauce, pepper, and bay leaves to a boil. let simmer for about 5-10 minutes. add eggplant and water, mix, cover and lower heat to low. after 10-15 minutes, mix the eggplant, making sure that all eggplant gets exposure to soy/garlic/vinegar liquid. if it starts to burn or get dried out, add more water. cover and cook on low for another 15 min or so, or until eggplant is cooked through and tender.

serve over white rice.

how do you eat it - with your hands???

2007-01-21T07:50:00.000-05:00

i know i know. i haven't written in almost one week. things have been hectic with being at work only 2 full days, and then driving to nyc to see the drowsy chaperone (which was very entertaining and comical) with cavin's family.

after the show, we took the f speeding rocket elevator up to the top floor of the marriot marquis hotel to the view restaurant, which is touted as "nyc's only revolving rooftop restaurant featuring ny state cuisine and wines." it moves very slowly - so slowly that we thought that it wasn't moving at all, but as we sat there, we finally noticed that our nyc skyline scenery was ever-changing. i'm not sure we made it all the way around back to where we started, but it was neat to be so high up and moving around and not get sick. haha.

while cavin went to work on friday, i took the train down to new brunswick. i haven't been there in a while, so since we didn't really have any plans, other than trying to meet up with my friend, sojin, we decided we would stay at the new brunswick hyatt, have an ethopian dinner at makeda, and then make our way down to the wich.

i had gone to makeda several times while in grad school. i always enjoyed the dark atmosphere, as well as eating with my hands, so i was excited to make it back there. the menu changed a bit since the last time we were there, but not terribly. we ended up ordering the "best of the best" sampler platter which allows the diners to taste almost everything on the menu. ($51, meant to be shared between 2 people. not bad!)

we started the night with an appetizer: zaalouk (diced eggplant pan fried in virgin olive oil with a blend of garlic, ginger, chopped parsley and cumin with a hint of lemon). the eggplant was served warm, on top of chopped romaine lettuce, which was, in essence a salad we had before our main course. (for the appetizer, the waitress brought out forks for us to use.)

as i mentioned before, ethiopian food is meant to be eaten with your hands. a spongy, tangy bread (similar to a crepe, but more spongy and soft), called injera is served with the meal and is used to scoop up the food. our meal came out on a large oval platter, with many dishes scattered on it, with the injera folded up on the sides.

there are two best of the best samplers: meat and seafood. cavin and i decided on the meat, though we did end up with some shrimp as well. here's what we got on our serving dish:

1. tibs wat (sauteed prime beef simmered in kaywat, and seasoned with specials ethiopian spices and as touch of salt and fine white pepper)

2. doro alecha (chicken legs and thighs seasoned with ginger, rosemary and jalapeno peppers and simmered in a hearty ethiopian herb reduction sauce)

3. doro wat (chicken legs and thighs marinated in lemon juice, then sauteed in butter and seasoned with garlic, fresh ginger and fenugreek, then coated with berbere sauce and cooked gently until tender)

4. beg alecha (tender pieces of lamb braised slowly in green pepper, flavored with an Ethiopian herb, reduction sauce, ginger, rosemary and a touch of jalapeno pepper)

5. shrimp tibs (shrimp marinated in honey wine, rosemary and awaze sauce, then pan fried with hot peppers, onions and greens)

6. kitfo (finely chopped tenderloin of beef seasoned with an Ethiopian herb reduction sauce and "mitmita", a fine powder of chili pepper and red pepper)

7. atakilt wat (fresh green beans, carrots potatoes, green peppers, cabbage and onions, sauteed with garlic, ginger and tomatoes)

8. kik alicha (yellow split peas cooked and flavored with green pepper, onion and ethiopian herbs)

9. gomen wat (fresh collard greens sauteed with fine onion, garlic, ginger, tomatoes and ethiopian spices)

10. mesir wat (lentils cooked with chopped onions, garlic, ginger, olive oil and mild berbere sauce)

afterwards, at the wich, cavin and i were discussing makeda. i think that makeda has slipped since the last time we were there. we distinctly remembered makeda being so much better a few years ago. this time around, the ends of the injera were too thin, so they hardened to a crust on the edges, while it was too thick in the middle. i really didn't care for the lamb, and i was expecting some of the dishes to have a little bit more heat. we had to order our wine three times until the we finally picked something that they actually had (we ended up with a new zealand shiraz the waitress pointed us towards, which she knew they had at the bar).

that being said, we still had a good time at makeda. the food was still pretty good, just not as great as in the past. our waitress was very gracious enough to only charge us for one drink, and she comped our appetizer. (i'm not sure if she comped us, or if she just totally forgot.) our total bill came to a measly $62 (expensive for ethopian food, but not expensive for makeda). when she delivered the bill to us, out of nowhere she said, "so! when will i see you again?" i don't know if she had some sixth sense which told her that we were decent tippers and had loot to spend, but it was wacky!

we told her that we wouldn't be back soon and that we now lived in dc. as soon as we said that though, she immediately told us the best ethopian restaurant in dc was dukem in the u street area. it's in our fortune to try a new restaurant this week, so maybe we'll have to get on the green line going the other direction and make sure to stop by.

makeda ethopian restaurant
338 george street
new brunswick, nj
732.545.5115

you can't be a hero sitting down.

2007-01-15T08:18:00.000-05:00

this weekend was spent back in the city of bro love (where else would i be?). it was a full weekend, starting off by going to johnny brenda's. it's a really neat space on girard in fishtown. there's three floors - well, technically 2 floors with a 3rd floor balcony that overlooks the stage.

since jb is blocks away from b-o-b and ga, we all decided to go. the sound was pretty good on the 3rd floor balcony and i think they enjoyed the georgie james show so it worked out well for everyone involved. (and, there was minimal, if you want to call it that, absinthe in the picture, so that was good as well. hihi)

the next day we went to lunch with the fam (jano's bday) to our go-to chinese restaurant in chinatown, sang kee. there were 10 of us crammed around one circular table, but it was fine.

ever since i first took cavin to sang kee, we always ordered the half peking duck, which comes out in 2 courses (make your own pancakes; leftover chopped duck with scallions and whatever veggies they decide to mix with). when we ordered the whole peking duck this time around, i don't think my family had ever had it! (wha?!?) so when the plate of cut up boneless duck, the plate of scallions & bowl of hoisin sauce, and the bamboo steamer of folded pancakes came out, everyone waited for cavin and i to show them what to do. i think everyone really liked the duck (i know pv&chief bro were asking us about it during the meal, so they must have taken a liking to it!). i recall jano also asking for the 2nd course of duck to be passed over to him because he couldn't get enough!

so while the italian tales were shared, we chowed down on all of the following dishes (~$160):

whole peking duck
crispy softshell crab in 5 spice dressing
pork fried dumplings
shrimp dumpling soup
baby bok choy in garlic sauce
roasted pork, roasted duck & soy sauce chicken on rice with veggies
beef & broccoli
house special pan fried noodles
beef & eggplant
salt baked squid
house special fried rice
bubble tea (for dessert)

later as we were getting ready for the eagles vs. saints game, we got a little GH in. what is GH you ask? well, we know for sure that you cannot be a GH sitting down! here are some action shots from my new favorite game:

when i woke up saturday morning jano was like, 'sachi, did you see what i got downstairs?' when i walked down there, i was super excited - GUITAR HERO!!! i had never played the game, even after all the hype that i heard during the holidays. so i immediately woke cavin to tell him the good fortune and after he got up, we tested out our rockin' skills.

i'm completely hooked! as we were driving in the car, all i could think about was how the song on the radio could be used in GH and i caught myself trying to play it on the air guitar as we were listening. i'm a dork!

but seriously. the game is really fun, and my family got into it. before the eagles game we played GH. during half-time we played GH. after the eagles lost (why, oh why, andy reid, did you decide to punt on 4th and 15 with < 2 min. left???) we salvaged the day by playing GH. i played so much that my left arm hurt. it was out of control. my brother is also hooked. he originally bought GH2, but saturday we went out and i bought jano GH1 for his bday. woah!

if you get a chance, please try to play the game. it's freaking hilarious, and it's hard as well. as someone who plays guitar, it's really not the same, and it's actually harder than playing the real instrument.

oh, and i think the funniest part about guitar hero is that when you watch people playing, they really feel like they are a guitar hero, and they make all the same body movements as if they were really heavy shreddin'. it's frakin' great!

pho shizzle

2007-01-12T08:07:00.000-05:00

ugh. because last weekend i made the kare-kare, cavin and i had been eating leftovers for several days afterwards. and, i have to admit, i'm having problems with wanting to cook traditional filipino foods and eating healthy. i mean, i did skim the fat from the broth before i added the veggies, but it does have about 1 cup of peanut butter and the meat isn't the leanest. plus, when i eat it, i want to ladle cups and cups of it over my rice, which i am also eating too much of.

so, part of me doesn't feel like cooking, so yesterday at work cavin and i were toying with the idea of going to cafe atlantico and eating at the bar like we did a few weeks back.

i was totally down for it, but then i knew i would probably get out of control with eating, so after talking it over with cavin, we decided to get pho (pronounced "fuh") instead. (and i'm pretty sure pho would have less calories and fat than the food and alcohol i would have gotten at cafe atlantico.)

i think the last time cavin and i got pho was when we first moved down here. we were pointed to the eden center, a vietnamese shopping center in va, when asked about asian shopping and stores. the place we went to wasn't bad (i can't remember which restaurant we went to), but based on all the reports i hear around, we also didn't hit THE place to go (four sisters) for authentic vietnamese food.

there have been constant reminders about pho: on dr, people have been posting quite regularly comparing all the pho places in the area; the amateur gourmet's piece on serious eats about take out vietnamese food is hilarious; and, of course, i just happened to notice last week when we were at ray's the steaks, that there was a pho 75 in the same little strip mall. woah!

it's been a long time since i've been to pho 75. when i was still living with my parents, i used to go to pho 75 in the northeast. i don't remember with who, when, or why i went, but i distinctly remember filling up on the deeply flavored broth, mixing in the mint leaves, bean sprouts, jalepenos, and lime that are included on the side. and, it was cheap, to boot! (did i use 'to boot' correctly? i see people use it all the time, and i'm trying to add it to my colloquialisms)

oh, so what was i saying? right. so it was cold out yesterday, and i had this hankering for soup, and since we haven't gone and gotten pho in over a year (shame on us!), i suggested going to pho 75. and not surprisingly, last night's visit garnered pho 75 a spot on our top 5 "go-to" places (including poste for truffled frites, kotobuki for sushi (especially toro), irish times for happy hour, and matchbox for pizza and mini-burgers).

cavin and i each got a regular bowl of pho. he got #1 (tai, nam, gau, gan, sach: slices of eye-of-round steak, well-done flank, fat brisket, soft tendon, and bible tripe) while i got the similar #4 (tai, chin, nam, gan, sach: slices of eye-of-round steak, well-done brisket, well-done flank, soft tendon, and bible tripe). and if you are iffy on the tripe and tendon and stuff, you can get pho with meatballs, or just beef as well.

it was delicious, and i'm kicking myself for having forgotten about pho all the times cavin and i were indecisive about what to eat. and our total bill was under 12 bucks! un-freaking-believable!

so if you are reading this, and you haven't gotten pho in a long time, or you have never tried it, i suggest finding a decent vietnamese restaurant and getting some RIGHT NOW. seriously. it's cheap eats, and it's so delicious you'll wish there was a pho shop next to your office.

note: pho 75 is a chain and there are some in philly, see the picture above for info

kare kare

2007-01-07T18:13:00.000-05:00

last week on dr someone asked if there was good filipino food in the area. manila cafe came up so i decided to take one for the team and go for lunch buffet this weekend with cavin and see what the deal was. it's a small place in a strip mall in springfield, va. there are 12-15 tables and while we were there, all the clientele was filipino (save for cavin and this other white boy with a filipina).

lunch buffet is $12.50 and isn't too bad. there are three buffet stations, with 6 dishes or so in each - lots of variety. i tried to taste everything, but there was too much. i tried the kare-kare (nice consistency, but bland in flavor, and i didn't like the bagoong they offered on the side - too raw), pancit bihon (good flavor, but a bit greasy), beef caldereta (great!), pinakbet (some of the veggies were a little to raw for me), laing (too salty), lechon (most of the skin was picked off already, but the meat was tender), chicken adobo (tasty with the correct vinegar:soy sauce ratio), pork bbq (kind of sweet, but tasty), fried tilapia (probably fried earlier in the day so by the time i ate it, it was dried out), and ginataan (great way to end the meal; wasn't overly sweet, with tapioca pearls). we'd probably go again if we were going out to the fairfax area. plus, i'd like to see if they change up the buffet menu, based on what they feel like cooking.

manila cafe
7020 commerce street
springfield, va 22150
703.644.5825

so, speaking of kare-kare. last time i was at the 'rents before holiday, we went to hong kong supermarket - a mega-asian chain with stores across the country. while we were there searching for the mama sita's lumpia shanghai mix packets, i found some mama sita's achuete powder packets, and i remembered that kare-kare uses the annatto seeds. so making kare-kare (from scratch, not using the prepared mama sita mix) has been brewing in my head for a few weeks now.

i made cavin try the kare-kare at manila cafe this weekend so that we could compare. since the one we had on saturday was bland, i was pretty sure that i could make a better one.

so after we gourged on filipino foods, we stopped by h-mart to pick up the necessary ingredients for my first-ever attempt at kare-kare. for those of you that don't know, kare-kare is a filipino stew made with oxtail and veggies, flavored with peanuts/peanut butter. some refer to it as "peanut butter soup". so i picked up oxtail, beef shank (for extra meat), sitaw (long beans), cabbage, bok choy, and asian eggplant.

we were planning to have kare-kare for sunday dinner (during the eagles/giants showdown) so i started cooking the meat saturday afternoon. basically, i washed the oxtail and beef shank, and put it in a pot and covered with water (about 9-10 cups). i brought to a boil, and then simmered with the lid on for 5 hours. (if only i had a pressure cooker! and actually? i think i cooked the meat too long, but i'll comment on that later.) i let the whole thing cool overnight in the fridge (thanks, cavin) and skimmed the fat off the top in the morning. the beef stock was most gelatinous (more than the short ribs) and later when i heated it up, the flavor was undeniably beefy - awesome! i used three different recipes, one of them being the kare-kare recipe from pinoycook.

here is a list of the ingredients:

-2 onions, chopped
-1 head of garlic, minced
-achuete powder
-1/4 cup rice flour, toasted in pan until light golden brown (about 8 minutes)
-1 bunch sitaw (long beans), cut into 2" pieces
-half head of cabbage (cut again in half, with core removed)
-2 asian eggplants, sliced
-baby bok choy
-1 cup peanut butter (chunky is better)
-salt
-patis
-bagoong alamang (for serving)

reheat the stock and take out the pieces of meat and set them aside. add 2 tbsp oil (or some of the beef fat if you saved it) in a pot on medium high, and add onions and garlic, cook for a few minutes.

add 2 tbsp achuete powder (i used the mama sita powder, no seeds) and cook for 1 minute, then add meat and mix until meat picks up the color of the achuete. add the stock and bring to a boil.

lower the heat and add the veggies in the following order in a 3-5 minute interval (pinoycook says 2 minutes, but i found that some of the veggies weren't cooked through enough, so i'm upping the interval): sitaw, eggplant, cabbage, bok choy. i covered the pot so that some of the veggies would steam if they weren't submerged in the liquid. also, if you don't think there is enough liquid, then by all means add water.

finally when all the veggies seemed mostly cooked, i mixed 1/2 cup stock (or water if you have none left) with the peanut butter and added it to the pot, and i mixed another 1/2 cup stock with the rice flour and added it as well. the peanut butter made the color of the kare-kare lighter, which i was worried about because when i started adding the veggies, i thought i had added too much achuete powder. so just be forewarned that the broth should be darker red before you add the peanut butter. the rice flour (which i already had pre-packaged, but you could toast and grind up your own rice) thickens the soup, so you should add as much as you need, but i found i added about 1/4 cup and this did the trick. finally add salt (and patis) to adjust the salt level. up to this point, i sparingly salted when i added the veggies, but it still wasn't salty enough, so i added patis and more salt.

serve hot over steamed rice with bagoong alamang.

here is the final result! looks good, no? especially for my virgin attempt! there are a few things that i would do differently than this first time, but now i know...

final notes:

1. use chunky peanut butter. we had two opened containers of creamy peanut butter in the fridge that we needed to use up. (don't ask. i prefer chunky so i don't know why we had TWO jars of creamy. but i guess that explains why they weren't used up.) while eating the kare-kare, i missed having pieces of peanuts to crunch down on, and i just felt like it was missing something.

2. don't overcook the meat. aie. i made the mistake of cooking the oxtail and beef shank for 5.5 hours saturday night. then, on sunday while i was heating up the stock, i didn't take the oxtail out because i thought it wasn't tender enough. but, the time it takes from adding the meat to the achuete oil to the finish, is enough to finish cooking the oxtail. so when it was done, it was tender, but it was too tender. the meat had fallen off the oxtail bone, and all separated in the liquid. it wasn't that pretty, but it was darn tasty! i'd suggest cooking the oxtail and/or beef shank for about 4 hours, knowing that it will be in the pot for another 30 minutes while adding the veggies and peanut butter and what not.

3. add the entire bunch of sitaw. when i bought the bunch of sitaw at h-mart, it seemed like a lot, so i only added half. but then after it was finished, i was like, "where's all the sitaw?"