Chuck Wagon : San Jose

I grabbed some food while bumming around at the San Jose Flea Market (Official Website). I think I've been a bit spoiled by the Reading Terminal Market in Phili, as it plays its dual role quite very well. Not only is it an interesting tourist attraction, but it also acts as a legitimate place for foodie locals to go grab some damn fine food.

And I assumed that the San Jose Flea Market would be the same for well, sort of semi valid reasons: 1) they sell cheap fresh fruits, produce and spices there and 2) there's a really large Mexican population there. I mean, don't non-American cultures generally care more about simple decent food than us?


Yes, yes, you're looking at the picture and thinking "dude, the hell you talking about? Ribs aren't Mexican."

"Also, did you put your tray on a blue screen, so you can add cheezy background effects to it?"

Crap, you've got sharp eyes.





My thinking was "damn those ribs smoking outside looked fantastic." And well, ribs from Texas could have been co-opted by Mexicans on the border, so it wasn't that far off from Mexican.

Anyhow, the ribs were terribly mediocre. They tasted like they had been painted with some generic barbecue sauce, the beans like some refried beans from a can and the garlic bread like stuff they would serve at Denny's.

Hmm. I guess at least I got some entertainment out of photoshopping the pictures... (Note: this shouldn't take away from the San Jose Flea Market, which is a pretty cool place to visit.)


Chuck Wagon @ San Jose Flea Market
"9th and Main St"
1590 Berryessa Rd., San Jose, Ca 95133
www.sjfm.com
($Burgers / Hot Dogs, $San Jose)

Jack Falstaff : San Fran

(Sorry no pictures for this review; it wasn't really an appropriate event to do so.)

This was really my first time having Californian style food, which is a style that is very focused on using the great fresh, organic produce that is so readily available around this area. I think on paper, this should be right up my alley. I really enjoy cooking that uses fresh ingredients and that it is apparent that the chef understands the essence of that ingredient.

But there's something about California and specifically foodies/restaurants in San Fran that just makes me want to cause a ruckus, blast loud punk rock in public and/or rouse violence. My current theory on this is the following: San Francisco has unbelievably phenomenal local fruit and produce -> which attracts lots of aspiring and established chefs to come here -> which creates a huge higher-end restaurant scene with very refined taste -> but which also creates a suffocatingly narrow band of good food.

And it's hard to argue against local "foodies" about this, because well the food in that band is pretty damn good. Which gets me back to Jack Falstaff.

I went with a couple of the waiter recommendations, the sweet white corn soup, a creamy soup with "pickled mushrooms and bacon", and the pacific halibut, with "Louisiana Prawns, Delta Asparagus, Green Garlic, Serrano Chiles, Lemon-Olive Jus" (descriptions from the menu). Both used sweet white corn, which was locally in season.

The sweet white corn soup was very nice and had a great comforting creamy texture that went well with the mellow corn nibblets and mushrooms. And really you can't go wrong with bits of savory bacon. I was a little disappointed with the Pacific Halibut. The accompanying corn and sauce were pretty good, but the halibut and shrimp weren't quite as tender as they really should have been.

Lastly, I topped things off with donutholes. Yes, that's right. The Housemade Cinnamon-Sugar Donutholes seemed so out of place on the dessert menu, an affront to this pseudo-refined Califonia style, that, well, I had to order them. And it was defintely the right decision. The donutholes were nicely deep-fried, cakey without being overly oily, with a nice but not overly sweet cinnamon-sugar coating. It came with three dipping sauces, Crème Anglaise, Caramel Sauce and a raspberry sauce, all of which were lovely.

I have no problems recommending this place. In addition to the food, we also enjoyed some nice wines, as one of the party was a wine expert.

But I still feel the punk-rock song in me and I'll continue to try to seek more simple, muscular and hole-in-the-wall places to balance out these types of restaurants.

>Note< I'm not sure if it was just the day we went (a Monday night), but it was amazingly easy finding street parking around this place.

Jack Falstaff
598 Second Street
San Francisco, CA 94107
www.jackfalstaff.com
($SF, $New American)

Restaurants on the Cheap in San Fran

Poking around for stuff to do around SF, I stumbled upon SF Gate's list of bargain bites. This is very cool, since most foodies round these parts know mostly of the more upscale places.

Cooking with Masao

Sambuca exotic fruit punch

This had me cracking up at work. I think it's all the more hilarious after having been exposed to so much food porn. I mean, what the f is up with the pile of randomness all over the kitchen (and bathroom)? And is that a Vick's Vapor Rub container on the stove? Seriously, wtf?
What's kind of interesting about this dude is that I kept on waiting for the inevitable outrageous moment, where you know for sure it's a joke, but it never arrives.

Does anyone know more about this masao character? A youtube comment traces him back to a hockey forum website, HFBoards. Commenters on Mefi had the same reaction as me: some laughting because it's funny as all hell, but others somewhat serious/nervous as it's not absolutely clear that it's a joke.

Torta di ceci - I don't think he put enough oil in the pan.

"Grilling sausages" (Be sure to check out 7:40 and god, that's a frickn disgusting toilet)

($Cooking)

Ceramic knives = love?

My mom always mentioned that a cook's most important tool is their knife. I've a Kitchen Aid 7" Santoku at home, which isn't an uber-quality knife, but is well-balanced and has served me very well.

I'm now subletting a place in the Bay area from a lovely couple, one of whom happens to be into cooking and has all sorts of interesting cooking equipment, including this 7" Kyocera ceramic knife:


I totally dig it. It's terrifically sharp, cutting cleanly into tomatoes as well as meat. It's lightweight and easy to clean. The only drawback about the ceramic is that you have to be careful not to flex the blade; it snaps easily with shear forces.

(I guess I shouldn't be too surprised to really dig the knife. It's also recommended by a certain Ming Tsai, of Blue Ginger in Wellesley, MA.)

Anyone else have one of these babies in their homes? I'm thinking of picking up one at the end of the summer.

($Cooking)

Nijiya Market

You know, so far San Francisco has been sort of a big tease. I was expecting to have a number of fanboy blog posts for you being all "ZOMG ZOMG ZOMG, San Francisco iz so kewllzzzz! Check this out!"

Perhaps I just have unrealistic expectations, but some places, which might have had some unique point of interest well just have turned out to be kind of everyday/mundane.

Case in point. I walked across the street from my hotel and was happily surprised to have stumbled upon a Japanese supermarket, called Nijiya. Now I guess I should separate out my thoughts on the place as a grocery store from the ready-to-go food they sell. The grocery market itself was interesting, with a decent selection of product and Japanese ingredients.


It's certainly noticeable that California is closer in physical and cultural proximity to Asia, since you get products that just don't really make it out to the East coast, such as these smiley animal sponges...

...or these fancy see-through bags of rice. (Or perhaps this is a local rice company?)

So far as the to-go food stuff went, Nijiya was also seemingly impressive. Nijiya had a pretty huge (by East coast standards) selection of sushi and Japanese bento box lunches to go. Excitedly, I picked myself up a Hamachi Teryaki Bento box...


...a spam onigiri...


...and a melon sweet roll.


I had never had any before, but each looked interesting in their own way. I mean I understand this is a supermarket and not a restaurant, but I certainly was far from the only one picking ready-to-go stuff up and surely this stuff can't be all that bad, right?

Ick. All of the stuff wasn't so great. The Hamachi was overcooked and covered by a overly-sweet teryaki sauce. A number of the accompanying sides tasted as if they just didn't survive the fridge treatment, having a rubbery texture. The spam onigiri was probably the best thing I did buy, but that was just umm a piece of spam with a ball of rice. And the worst by far was the melon sweet bun, an egregious combination of some fake melon flavor, sugar and a texture that makes me shudder when I think about it now.

I know it seems like I'm being a bit unfair at this point to San Fran, since the two places I've reviewed have been random draws (not even in San Fran proper) and one hasn't even been a restaurant. But I guess my setup for San Fran has been a number of friends who have just fallen head-over-heals in love with the place... and well I'm just not seeing why at this point.


Nijiya Market
143 E. El Camino Real, Mountain View, CA 94040 (Google Map)
(650) 691-1600
www.nijiya.com

There are a number of other locations as well.

Olympic Cyclists' Advice

I've always wondered what kind of stuff professional and Olympic athletes eat. This NYtimes article, An Olympic Cyclist’s Levelheaded Advice, advice from the American Olympic bicyclist, Vande Velde, mentions an example recipe of a full meal he eats *during* his training rides. It's surprisingly fairly simple with very common ingredients.

If you're any sort of recreational athlete, the rest of the article is pretty darn interesting too.

Yes, we will have no bananas

At that price, Americans may stop thinking of bananas as a cheap staple, and then a strategy that has served the big banana companies for more than a century — enabling them to turn an exotic, tropical fruit into an everyday favorite — will begin to unravel.

I never thought an article on bananas could be so dramatic. This is from an interesting NYtimes article on the economics of bananas and why there may be price increases of and decreasing quantities of bananas in the near future.

I wonder. Do these evil big banana companies run Banana.com, a website that gives info on banana farming and hocks the benefits of bananas? (Who else would buy the domain banana.com, besides well Banana Republic)

Alas, if bananas are going to becoming more and more rare, I suppose we can just bask in the glory of this:

Taqueria Los Charros : Mountain View

The East Coast gets dissed for having a lack of good Mexican food, especially by native Californians, many of whom claim Cali as having the best Mexican food in US.

Well, being an East Coaster, this gets my goat a bit. Granted, I found the Mexican food in the Boston area just wasn't so great. But after having some damn solid Salvadoran, Puerto Rican and Peruvian food in Hartford, an area that most would dismiss as a cultural wasteland, and some crack-like addictive Mexican food in Philadelphia, I'm wondering whether these same people are just smug by ignorance or whether there's any truth to their claim.

So with this in mind, during one of my first days in the Bay area, I picked out a random restaurant, Taqueria Los Charros, in downtown Mountain View and ordered myself a carne asada super burrito. As you can see from the photo, the thing is pretty darn large, dwarfing my ball-point pen.


I also ordered a side of rice and beans. Because I was staying in a hotel room by myself and I could damn well stink up the room with sulfuric gases if I damn well pleased.

So how was it?

Well, let's just say that I'm still looking for proof of the argument. The ingredients in the burrito were obviously fresh, which made the burrito slightly better than what's available at the average Mexican joint on the East Coast. But that's kind of to be expected from the plentitude of fresh produce around the area. What was disappointing was that taste-wise, the entire meal was just very meh.

I'll continue hunting around for a place. There is a huge Mexican population in the area and there certainly are a lot of Mexican restaurants anywhere you go. So surely, there must be *some* truth to the argument, right?

Taqueria Los Charros
854 W. Dana St. Mountain View, CA 94041
650-969-1464

On kimchi

I'm not Korean, but do enjoy Korean food, which probably makes thisWalrus Magazine article trying to describe the significance of kimchi to Korea, more interesting and humorous. Here's an excerpt:

There are myriad ways kimchi approaches the sublime. Take its health properties. Kimchi is widely regarded among nutritionists as one of the healthiest foods on the planet, full of helpful vitamins and bacteria that promotes digestion. Among Koreans, it is regarded as a manbyongtongchiyak—a kind of miracle cure—that will help make you strong, prevent cancer and generally give you a garlicky glow, something like a halo, of kimchi-fueled health. My boss, a rail-thin woman who calls herself Beauty and probably eats birdseed nine out of ten meals, told me with a straight face and very serious eyes that Korea was spared the scourge of SARS because of kimchi.

[via mefi]

Frulatti Cafe & Bakery Cookies : Dallas

Marketing and conditioning are strange beasts. Sometimes they provide you with the correct instincts for predicting the quality of restaurants and food.

And then sometimes, they can be completely wrong.

For instance, take a look at Frullati Cafe & Bakery's Website. Look at the picture on the front page:

It looks as unappealing as one of those catered lunches at miserable "Office Space"-esque corporate conferences.

Secondly, I must admit that coming from the Northeast, I come laden with tons o' stereotypes of Texas. Good food, besides ribs and meat and umm meat and umm meat, doesn't really match those stereotype in my head. (Okay, I'd probably give them Mexican as well)

Finally, airport food? That's generally been the bum of the bums: expensive, slow, greasy, crap on your tongue stuff. (Minus my very recent experience with Chicago Midway's Manny's Deli)

Any guess for what I thought about the cookies at Frulatti Cafe & Bakery at the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport (DFW)?

Chocolate Chip Cookie
Surprising, surprising, surprising.

The cookie was a very thin and chewy cookie. What makes it so surprising is that it comes off as cakey, fairly light and airy. Am I really in Texas? This was not a bad cookie.

What's slightly unusual about the cookie is the chocolate. It's a milk chocolate that has a subtle but very unexpected twist at the back-end: a taste that strangely reminded me of fish.

Now, I'm guessing that most would wrinkle their nose at the thought of this taste combination: chocolate chip cookie and fish. But I must say that while it wasn't astounding, I can't say that it was bad. And it certainly made for an thoughtful cookie eating experience.

8.0/10.0


Oatmeal Raisin

The texture of the oatmeal raisin... butter.

Comparing it to the choco chip... butter.

Butter.

BUTTER!

Perhaps the oatmeal raisin cookie didn't have egregious amounts of butter in it, but anytime I came within a 3 foot radius of the thing, I would get tremendous wafts of butter. And everytime, I tried to analyze its taste, the butter smell/taste? was just too much and I got nowhere. All I could think of was butter.

Texture-wise, the cookie was chewy and soft like the choco-chip cookie.

I suppose you could be a lot worse off emphasizing a different ingredient. I mean the cookie wasn't bad per se. But really, do I want to be eating a butter in cookie form with a few raisins thrown in? Not so much.

6.0/10


Dallas/Fort Worth Airport (DFW)
Gate 22
Dallas, TX
($cookies, $Dallas)

Asian Grocery Stores in San Francisco Peninsula / South Bay

PENINSULA (map)
San Mateo Nijiya 1956 S El Camino Real San Mateo, CA 94403 (650) 212-7398 Nijiya - Japanese grocery chain Marina Foods 2992 S Norfolk St San Mateo, CA 94403 (650) 345-6911‎ Foster City 99 Ranch 1070 Foster City Blvd Foster City, CA 94404 (650) 358-9988 99ranch.com - Chinese chain	Belmont Namaste Plaza 890 Ralston Ave Belmont, CA 94002 (650) 610-9600 NamastePlaza.net Redwood City Indian Grocery & Spice 2630 Broadway St Redwood City, CA 94063 (650) 365-1832 Menlo Park Nak's Oriental Market ‎1151 Chestnut St Menlo Park, CA 94025 (650) 325-2046 Pacific Asian Market‎ 850 Willow Rd Menlo Park, CA 94025 (650) 324-4955
SOUTH BAY (map)
Mountain View Nijiya 143 E El Camino Real Mountain View, CA 94040 (650) 691-1600 - Japanese grocery chain San Jose 99 Ranch 1688 Hostetter Rd San Jose, CA 95131 (408) 436-8899 99ranch.com Santo Market 245 E Taylor St San Jose, CA 95112 (408) 295-5406 Mitsuwa 675 Saratoga Ave San Jose, CA 95129 (408) 255-6699 Mitsuwa Nijiya 240 Jackson St San Jose, CA 95112 (408) 275-6916 Nijiya Marino Foods 4148 Monterey Hwy San Jose, CA 95111 (408) 224-8786 Magat Asian Groceries 1176 N Capitol Ave San Jose, CA 95132 (408) 926-4412 Dong Xuan Oriental & American Grocery‎ 1091 Mccreery Ave # B San Jose, CA 95116 (408) 251-5043 Manila Oriental Market‎ 2812 S White Rd San Jose, CA 95148 (408) 414-9000 Dai Thanh Supermarket 420 S 2nd St San Jose, CA 95113 (408) 287-3759 Mc Kee Oriental Market‎ 2331 Mckee Rd San Jose, CA 95116 (408) 251-3039 Lion Supermarket 1710 Tully Rd San Jose, CA 95122 (408) 238-4451 Lion Food Center 471 Saratoga Ave San Jose, CA 95129 (408) 554-9398 Hanil Oriental Market 3851 Seven Trees Blvd San Jose, CA 95111 (408) 578-0334	Cupertino Marino Foods 10122 Bandley Dr Cupertino, CA 95014 (408) 255-2648 99 Ranch 10983 N Wolfe Rd Cupertino, CA 95014 (408) 343-3699 99ranch.com Santa Clara Oriental Grocery‎ 3443 El Camino Real Santa Clara, CA 95051 (408) 984-0448 Mirchi Grocers 4767 Lafayette St. #200 Santa Clara, CA 95054 (408) 988-3374‎ - Indian Sunnyvale Western Pacific Oriental Grocery 905 E Duane Ave Sunnyvale, CA 94085 (408) 720-1006 India Cash & Carry 1032 E El Camino Real Sunnyvale, CA 94087 (408) 735-7383 - Indian New India Bazar 1340 S Mary Ave Sunnyvale, CA 94087 (408) 530-9555 - Indian Coconut Hill Grocery 554 S Murphy Ave Sunnyvale, CA 94086 (408) 738-8837 coconuthill.com - Indian Indian Grocery & Movie Rentals 618 Hollenbeck Ave Sunnyvale, CA 94087 (408) 830-9262‎ Miltpitas 99 Ranch 338 Barber Ln Milpitas, CA 95035 (408) 943-6699 99ranch.com Lion Food Center 1838 N Milpitas Blvd Milpitas, CA 95035 (408) 946-0888 New India Bazar‎ 440 S Main St Milpitas, CA 95035 (408) 262-5300 - Indian Deep Emporium Indian Grocery Store‎ 98 Dempsey Rd Milpitas, CA 95035 (408) 263-8325

($Chinese, $Grocery, $Indian, $Japanese, $Korean, $SF, $San Mateo, $San Jose)

Tastykake : Philadelphia

I was intrigued when I first heard of Tastykake snacks. It's a local Philadelphia company that has been around since 1914 and that makes a range of snacks similar to Hostess Cakes (maker of Twinkies) and Little Debbie. Here's the wikipedia entry on Tastykake and a few interesting tidbits from the entry:

• Rapper Kool Keith proclaimed "I am the fire and brains will burn and bake, like a Tastykake" in the song "Kool Keith Model Android #406."


• On Bastille Day, a woman dressed as Marie Antoinette throws approximately 2,000 Tastykakes from a tower of the Eastern State Penitentiary to the audience below, while shouting, "Let them eat Tastykake!"

Now I should mention that Twinkies and all that other snack-food brings a nauseating feeling to my stomach when I think about it. If you couldn't tell already, I don't tolerate really sweet snacks and particulary detest mass-produced snacks. But I thought I should try it out since it seemed one of the institutions of Philadelphia.


I grabbed a Koffeekake and admit I was a bit surprised. The cake itself was a lot lighter and less greasy than I expected. It also wasn't overwhelmingly sweet. I took issue with the little coffee-flavored nibblets on top, which were kind of nasty in a mysterious what-the-crap-is-this kind of way. Overall, I don't think I'll be buying this stuff as regular snacks, but it didn't come anywhere close to say retch-inducing Ding-dongs or other crap like that.

So Tastykake's most well-known product is their Butterscotch Krimpet, which apparently even presidential candidate, Barack Obama tried out when he visited. Since I have the memory of a goldfish, I had forgotten this while in the store, but perhaps next time, for completeness, I'll try that out.

Oh yeah, and just for balance, there are those who take offense with Tastykake.

Joe's Pizza : Philadelphia

After the recent gems of Hartford restaurants, writing about Joe's Pizza is a bit of a come-down. It's not that Joe's pizza was bad; in fact, it was quite decent and might find its own little place in my restaurant portfolio.

But let's just say you've been digging through a huge flea market and you've just had 3 sexy finds: a brilliant piece of jewelry for your s.o., an elegant watch for yourself and ohh, a classy dining table that matches your refined modern apartment. And then you find a nice, well-crafted pencil-box. You end up buying that because you like it also, but when you think about your day, your mind is drawn to the bigger ticket, more visible items.

Just for reference, here's a picture of a pencil box I found on the web:

That's how I'm seeing Joe's Pizza right now. I ordered a pork sausage pizza and it was a visible step above the average city pizza places. Most noticeable was that the sausage was not some Z-grade ground pork, but rather spiced and flavorful sausage pieces. Secondly, straight out of the oven, the crust had a good crunch to it. And there was not an insignificant amount of tomato sauce which balanced out the crust.



However, this pizza wasn't mind-blowing and I'm pretty sure there are even better pizza places in Philadelphia and surrounding areas. For example, Tocconelli's Pizzeria and pizza at Osteria are both at the top of my to-try list. (Also see the Can Pizza Be Better in Burbs than Center City thread.) So I think this also contributes to my lackadaisical attitude to Joe's.

Anyways, if you live in the area and are looking for to find your go-to pizza shop, I would suggest you trying out this place.

Joe's Pizza
122 S 16th St Philadelphia, PA 19102
(215) 569-0898

Food is Gold...

This Nytimes article, Food Is Gold, and Investors Pour Billions Into Farming describes a trend that makes me a little uncomfortable. As you may know shortages in food are causing food prices to sky-rocket. The article talks about investment companies purchasing farms to take advantage of this financial growth.

Now I have nothing against trading and investment oriented firms. They're the ones who will hopefully let me retire in style.

But there seems to be a big misalignment in incentives. The purpose of these firms are high returns on their investment. With the situation of low supply and high demand of food, wouldn't these firms want to continue to keep the supply relatively low so they can continue to charge high prices?

The article also mentions that these firms have the cash to finance investments in new technology for more efficient food production. But food has an effect on people's health on a long-term scale. What incentive do these firms have in sticking around to see the long-term effect of their changes? As a more concrete example, do you think these firms would care if certain changes they implemented led to an increase in obesity that was observed 10 years later if it was more profitable now?

I, of course, do not have the full details of these deals, so it's possible that some of the players have good intentions. But I still would feel more comfortable if a firm with more riding on the final product of the farms, such as restauranteurs or food companies, invested in farms instead.

India Oven : Hartford

Streaks aren't such a good thing when it comes to windows or underwear, but when it refers to finding good restaurants, es bueno, my amigo.

Ignoring my second Somewhere in Bangkok and the random Lenny & Joe's dining experiences, which weren't really planned restaurant trial affairs, India Oven makes for the third in a row dining outing that was just plain great. In Hartford, this is quite the feat.


I had been wanting to try India Oven for some time now, based on some chowhound recommendations and more recently, the fact that it was voted 2008 Hartford Advocate's Reader Poll's 2nd favorite Indian Restaurant.

So my gf and I meander down to their West Hartford location and order the India Oven Special Dinner (for 2), which was composed of:

Shrimp Tandoori, Chicken Tandoori, Chicken Tikaa and Boti kabab all served on a sizzling platter of saute'ed onions and green peppers. This was lovely. Now, parts of the meat, onions and green peppers were blackened, which have always meant that the food tastes like charcoal and/or is as dry as filling your mouth with cotton balls. But here the meat (chicken in particular) was still quite juicy, tender and flavorful. This was actually the first time that I enjoyed grilled/blackened food.

Lamb Curry was solid as well. The meat was quite tender and the curry, fairly standard but still delicious.

The Naan was humbly great. It was most definitely freshly made, as it was still warm and had a great crunchiness to some of the thinner parts. Secondly, it lacked the greasy butteriness that most Indian places tend towards, which made it less sexy, but we definitely appreciated this drier and less ick-inducing texture.

And lastly and not pictured was the kheer dessert.

I also ordered a salti lassi, which was prickly with spices as it should be.


The most surprising thing about eating here was that neither of us walked out feeling sickenly full as we usually do walking out of Indian restaurants. Now we did have a minimal amount of leftovers, but our general feeling was that the dishes seemed a lot lighter than most other Indian restaurants.

And it's this commitment to cooking tasty food without resorting to grease that I really responded to and which I suspect is a reason why this place is a favorite of others.


280 Park Rd West Hartford, CT 06119 (map)
860-236-5554
http://www.indiaovenct.com/
($Hartford, $Indian, $Recommended)

El Salvador Restaurant : Hartford

This dude, man, JohnnyCT, of Chowhound. If I could give you a prize, I would.

It's obvious he went to some lengths, exploring the thriving Central/South American restaurant scene of Connecticut. One of his first posts is of the Salvadoran restaurant, El Salvador Restaurant, in East Hartford. Yes, its "parking lot" can fit all of 3 cars and yes, it's as small inside as it looks outside.


But man, I totally dug the place. This place had heart with a capital H.

My gf and I go in there, rather clueless. We've never been to El Salvador and never have tried Salvadoran food. We do order a couple of things that JohnnyCT talked about: the Pupusas Revueltas appetizer (pork and cheese inside a cross between a quesadilla and an arepa thick corn tortilla [thanks anon]), which was great.

(The sides were pickled cabbage and a slightly sweet/tangy tomato sauce.)
We also ordered the Jugo de Maranon, Amazon Cashew fruit juice, which ended up tasting like sugar cane juice with a nuttier taste at the back-end.

The jarritos drink is a bit more common. This one kind of tastes like a lighter version of Slice soda (or apparently it's now Sierra Mist)


As for the entree, we ended up asking the friendly mother-like (what we assumed to be) owner of the restaurant what she recommended, to which she replied that there was a nice big steak that she could cook up for us, which wasn't on the menu.

And I immediately said yes.

I'm not quite sure why I did. Well, actually, I think it was the appeal of getting an off-menu entree. But logically speaking, I shouldn't have done so. My gf and I had just had a huge steak the previous night and I was thinking we would order two entrees to try different things.

So while we were waiting, I was kind of kicking myself for springing for the order. But after we got the order, all was good in the world.

We got a large salad with avocados and a simple vinegrette.

And the steak was huge, but thin, juicy, tender and delicious.

It sat atop a pile of rice and beans.

The lady later mentioned this was called churrasco.

Oddly enough, for the large size of the salad and churrasco, it was fairly light and we ended up finishing everything, satiated and satisfied, but not overly full.

Give this place a shot. I gladly add it to the growing portfolio of Central and South American restaurants in Hartford that I would whole-heartedly recommend.

(Oh yeah, the staff speaks both English and Spanish.)

El Salvador Restaurant
514 Burnside Avenue, East Hartford CT (Map)
(860) 528-2442
($Hartford, $Recommended, $South / Latin American)

Somewhere in Bangkok : Hartford

I didn't really expect to be back at Somewhere in Bangkok so soon after our previous visit, but circumstances had it such that we were back a week after we had first gone.

We ordered a few different dishes: Massaman curry tofu, basil eggplant (same), and a chicken dish with a peanut sauce that I can't quite recall the name of.



My opinion still holds of the place. The food wasn't quite there yet. The flavors were not bold enough to really stand out and impress.

Then again, perhaps we're just not ordering the right things. Looking at their website now, perhaps we should have gone for their "Top pick entrees": Bangkok Spicy Snapper, Wild Boar Basil, Phuket Fantasy, Siam Salmon. Maybe we'll give these a shot next time.

Somewhere in Bangkok
1103 Queen St. Southington CT. 06489 (Map)
(860)479-9111
www.somewhereinbkk.com
($Connecticut, $Hartford, $Thai)

Lenny & Joe's : Connecticut

Is it an unspoken rule that after you go to the beach, you have to go eat some deep fried seafood and have soft-serve ice cream afterward?

We had just spent a half-day at the lovely Hammonasset Beach at the southern part of Connecticut. There's something mystical about the beach. Perhaps it's the salty ocean water in the air, the sun beating down on you all day or the fact that you generally exercie a lot at the beach, but I'm always terrifically hungry afterwards. And specifically, I crave deep fried clams.

Anyways, we take leave of the beach and stop at the first seafood place we see, which happens to be the bustling and large Lenny & Joe's. They've picked a phenomenal location near the beach and they understand they're well-positioned to take advantage of that primal post-beach craving. Unfortunately, it comes at a cost to the hungry beach-goer. Lenny & Joe's prices are high and their food is only mediocre.

The lobster in their lobster roll was over-cooked, over-buttered and didn't taste like the just-caught and just-steamed lobster that you should be able to get beach-side. The fried whole-belly oysters were better, but still a bit over-buttery and surprisingly didn't have a strong clam taste.

The only good thing going for the place was that they had plenty of outdoor seating (old school picnic tables) and they did have a pretty decent soft-serve ice-cream booth.

So I guess my recommendation would be if you're coming out of the beach nearby, try as hard as you can to resist the urge to stop here for seafood and hunt for somewhere else where they are more focused on their food. Then when you're done, stop here afterwards for some ice cream.


Lenny & Joe's
1301 Boston Post Rd Madison, CT 06443 (Map)
(203) 245-7289
www.ljfishtale.com
($Burgers / Hot Dogs, $Connecticut, $Seafood)

Mo's Midtown : Hartford

I am 9 restaurants behind on blog posts and I'm temporarily in the Bay area, Cali, for the summer, so I can only assume my parade of restaurant tastings will continue at a torrid pace. Here we go, I'm gonna try to bang these out one after another after another, rambo style.

Mo's Midtown is winner of the Best Breakfast spot of the 2008 Hartford Advocate's Reader's Picks. If you live anywhere nearby, you need to try this place out.


It's setup like an old-school American diner and it's fun to sit at the counter, watching the grill cooks operate at a furious and maddeningly efficient pace. We ended up ordering the blueberry pancakes, Jambalaya omelette and a side of corned beef hash. By far our favorite were the pancakes, which were surprisingly very very airy, yet so very tasty.

The corned beef was also quite good, interestingly with chunks of red pepper in it.

I would probably not order the jambalaya omelette again, not that it wasn't good, but it was more like a chili omelette than a jambalaya one. It was very hearty with chunks of ground meat.

That day we were on our way to the beach and besides the great tasting and decently priced food, it was phenomenal that we were in and out so quickly. From time of arrival in the parking lot to departure of the parking lot, it was less than 45 minutes, great for a speedy brunch before the beach.

One last note, I gotta hand it to the Hartford Advocate Readers Poll. A number of their picks have been pretty darn good.


Mo's Midtown
25 Whitney St. Hartford, CT (Map)
(860) 236-7741
($Brunch, $Hartford, $Recommended)

Bittman weighs in on Meat Production's effect on Environment

The NYTimes Minimalist, Mark Bittman, weighs in on how meat production in such massive scale in the US is playing a significant role in killing the environment.



Here is the accompanying article: Rethinking the Meat Guzzler.

[Via Metafilter]