Restaurant WK @ BarBao!...

So...hands down, best Vietnamese food is in Orange County. I've tried really hard to debunk this (including in San Jose/SF, Wash DC, Boston, and NYC--granted I haven't been to TX yet where I guess mah peoplez congregate). We just have more *types* of Vietnamese cuisine across the board--northern, Hue, blah di blah blah and the innumerable seasonal and artisanal (ish) dishes. BUT ANYWAY....

Can we start with dessert? cuz it's pretty? and it's my blog and i'll do as i damn well please!! :)

THE FLAN!! OH! That saved the DAY!!! I love me some flan--some other countries' versions are usually a little more jiggly, or more custardy, ours is a little firmer--but this one is a nice balance. AND it has a little coconut foam on it! ^_^ Sweet little surprise! ALso came with gingko nuts and i think dates but...like our version o fit. IT reminds me of this drink we have with longans, the gingko nuts, some julienne seaweed, sometimes with a little coconut milk, and little cubes of agar/grass jelly. I *never* would've thought those two flavors would go together. YUM!!! Lovin' that foam!

Gary got the Vietnamese bread pudding--whatever the hell that is, haha. But it, was interesting enough. Good texture, nice ice cream on top--and they had the candied fruits that I remember them usualy serving on Lunar New Years. I for the life of me cannot recall what they're called in English with most of what I know the foods to be in Vietnamese--so everytime I eat out at a new "fusion" or haute-cuisine-y place it's like unjumbling a puzzle and saying OH!! so THAT's what that is! :)

I've eaten at Bun and Baoguette (2 Michael "Bao" Huynh enterprises) and u know, it suffices for swanking it up to be upscale with wagyu beef in the Pho, berkeshire pork belly w/ the vermicelli noodles, the frog legs, the blah di blah blah with a lot of "enhancements" while retaining as much of the Vietnamese quintessence. I've eaten some stuff in Chinatown here and it works. We're big on our sauces, our flavors--they're strong, distinctive, crisp, not muddled etc, lots of respect for each individual ingredient and taste. Anyhoodle....we'll get back to how this is relevant.

I had the tiger shrimp carpaccio with shaved fennel and sprouts (a version of this is in the regular menu too, also recommended in the NYtimes review by Bruni). YUM YUM FISH SAAAAAUCE!! WOOHOO!!

Strangely enough--FENNEL...works really well with fish sauce! That light citrusy, licoricey flavor and the diluted "dipping" sauce or "nuoc cham" as it's now been relegated to be (even tho the real name is "nuoc mam pha" which really just translates to diluted fish sauce--but u know, with garlic, lime juice, usually some chili, and a little vinegar). YUP!! FISH SAUCE!! :) not olive oil. TEEHEE!! made me so happy--and the sauce was done right :D However, the tiger shrimp was a little tough--i dunno i thought it would be more crudo than cooked, chewy shrimp. still yum enough with a diff kind of "goi" or salad/shreeded cabbage/frisee/greens kinda thing.

Gary had the Mekong soup...whichebbs--i don't remember the name they assigned it, but for you cognoscenti (mainly just if u're Vietnamese really :P) it's canh chua ca thi la....minus the dill, some other veggies, and tilapia. tolerable form. a little lemongrassy, had some bean sprouts, two puny shrimp, tomatoes. Flavors still on point YAY. quantity of stuff and authenticity not so much. I mean look at it. I didn't even want to try to take any more pictures it just wasn't doing much for me. BUT--the flavors still were strong and all there and admittably tasty. Just disappointing the "girth" of the soup if u will.

ENTREES!! I wanted the Wild Boar Ragout--we like our ragouts to be honest, and with a little french baguette and some braised pork so tender it just falls to pieces at the prodding of a fork. UNFORTUNATELY, they were out :( *tear*. So i went with the frickin ' fish since Gary was already gonna take the Grilled sirloin with carmelized onions etc.

So Gary's grilled sirloin, which is just really "bo luc lac"...which honestly i dont' really know the etymology, but it's sorta close to meaning "beef shaken about"--but it's just cubes of really good beef well sauteed in lotsa butter sometimes a little rare with some vinegar, salt & pepper with some onions. THIS ONE...was DAMN GOOD--like lick each finger eat it wih my hands screw the rice that came with it kinda good. It's been a while since I've had good "bo luc lac" :)

Anyway--honestly, i really like red meat. I was trying to go on a limb with the mackerel @ Convivio, and I really didn't want to eat more fish and honestly i don't even remember what the fish was b/c i didn't really want to, it wasn't memorable and frankly, disappointing even just as a fish dish. Sea bass? Cod? Catfish? i wanna say catfish...but i doubt it since BarBao probably wants to swank it up more. Perfectly cooked technique-wise, really--moist, flakey, but bland underseasonsed and far from stellar.

AND THE PLATING!! WHAT the EFF?!?! brown, brown, grey, dark brown, dark grey, pale pieces of mushroom--from the looks of it when it came out, I thought the skin of the fish--or that side of it rather would've been seared a little more to be a little crispy or almost tender crust-like, followed with heavenly soft and fluffly fish with a little ginger kick maybe with the brown sauce, and i thought the chanterelle (?) mushrooms were the yellowy pickled sliced asparagus that usually comes with it--kinda like in the "ca kho to" or the claypot stuff that they also serve there--at Pho So 1 on Mott St it's pretty damn good. great sauce.

*sigh*. Really anticlimactic and buzzkill of the night--i was really excited after the soup and the tiger shrimp carpaccio (more for the essence of Vietnamese flavors in these very recognizable dishes presented in a new way, more so than total execution).


* * * * * * * * * *
...so that's it really. Seldom do I write this much--but hot damn if i go quiet on Vietnamese food if I can help it :)

BTW--all the Bao endeavors I have to say are a huge upgrade from Viet Cafe in Tribeca--swank with the most muddle and lacking Vietnamese flavors and intensity ever, I don't even know why they call themselves a Vietnamese Restaurant even tho the people who own the Vietnamese gallery next door and their shar-peis are absolutely fantastic :) Honestly tho--I can see how upgrading some of the ingredients really do up our cuisine well while maintaining the integrity of the food but...for what it is--Bar Bao is a little pricey, but I'd def go back for the cuttlefish and other stuff. I'm more pleased with their adventurous side more so than their dressing up old faves. If u're gonna change a good thing, make it notable and new! like that damn flan! even if it's just a reinvention w/ familiar flavors ^_^

That's all. I've eaten enough. Italy pics--those are next I promise....b/c I have to redeem my suffering photography and compensating for lighting skills lately. =/ *sigh*.

brunchy-brunch-brunch @ French Roast...

I have no idea why but I really really like poached eggs. Other than that I love my eggs sunny side up for the most part--and when I was a wee lass in Viet Nam, my mom would soft-boil eggs for us before any big travel dates, sprinkle a little salt in there, stir it up and breakfast a-hoy!

ANYWAY...so I've taken a shining to eggs benedict mostly out of my adoration for poached egginess, and affection for smoked salmon as well.

And a weird curiosity as to what the big deal was with hollandaise sauce based on hearing about it in multiple movies back in the day. Yes--some obscure reference to hollandaise sauce or somebody screwin' up how to make it. Don't even remember which movie it was :)

Anyhoodlekins...I went to French Roast the other weekend w/ Julia for brunchy brunch brunch on the UWS. We initially were going to go to the Polar Rink by the American Museum of Natural History but well--let's just say it was a rough night so I opted for food.

I like French Roast for the most part--but the 'taters were greasy and bland (and...a strange color which I'm assuming is due to whatever...weird..possible chili oil they used but...it wasn't even spicy!). The english muffin the eggs benedict were on were a little on the paltry and far from hearty side--the hollandaise was a bit heavy, but the egg was poached to perfectionnnnn.

Julia got the salmon omelet with sweet potato puree. A little odd w/ sweet & savory--but I'd grub on that orange pile of mash any other day.

Not too sweet. Still a lot of texture as u can see with little yammy-spokes protruding from the pile :) I have to say tho--FR plating aesthetics not so hot. I want my food PRETTY!! Not slopped on and rushed out! "Rustic" plating...is only for the really good sh*t! :D

The other dish I like @ FR? The Salad Lyonaise (which I surmise isn't on the wkd menu--neither is the french onion soup WTF?!). What's in a salad lyonaise? POACHED EGGS. yes. on a bed of frisee, with some bacon bits, and bits of taters and other salady-goodness. including tomatoes. SUPER CLOSE UP TIME!

My fave place for eggs benedict--which you can get WITH spinach AND smoked salmon (woohoo!) is at Cafeteria. Brunch here of course is notoriously...crowded. BUT SO TASTY. esp the mac & cheese with smoked gouda and bacon. Everything just tastes cleaner and healthier and leaner yet heartier there. Not that much more expensive either.

Celeste...

Went to Celeste on 84th and Amsterdam last month w/ Carolyn!! YAAAAAAY to Carolyn moving back from Espagna (I hadn't seen her in like 5-6 yrs!), and yay to Celeste. Jun took me here a while ago and ever since our office relocated uptown I pretty much go here as much as I can.

Italian gets thrown around here a lot so it's great I get to practice (sorta, when I'm not too meek or caught up to start tossing phrases out here and there). The ownder is a lean faced man with bony features, longer hair...an affable man that I guess goes to the fishmarket all the time so much that the Sushi chefs know him (just not by name!).

I only recently got into mussles--this is a basic garlic and white wine sauce but the quality of the mussels are amazing (which makes the owner's little stories believable, and endearing vs. some ridiculous braggadoccio BS!) It has a tinge of sweetness, succulent, well seasoned but lightly seasoned so u really just get...the quintessence of the mussels in what you're slopping around in ur mouth as opposed to stuff that sits in the yummy broth you're sucking down.

I had the Homemade Papardelle Special which is reminiscent of their old Shrimp Papardelle (which now comes with cabbage, goat cheese, and i forget what else). CLOSE UP!!...

But this incarnation has scallops, asparagus, and a light tomato marinara sauce. The pasta really is something to experience (well, the paparedelle anyway) b/c u can more plainly feel the different texture of hand-made/rolled/whatever pasta versus the shit u just pop in and boil at most restaurants.

Carolyn got the Butter-sage cheese ravioli that Julia's gotten too. It was def tasty and the sage was strong but pleasantly so b/c i feel like i don't get to really enjoy sage in a lot of things, and not as a focal point. (pumpkin ravioli @ fig & olive still def rocks my socks!!)

The thing I like about Celeste better than Pisticci's is that Celeste has more distinctive and rustic flavors, a little more pungent in comparison--but I mean the two are so restrained in their seasoning and composition, everything works together well and stand on their own. It's simple, and clean--just Celeste is a little more hearty, but...Pisticci's has so many different and refreshing ideas in their dishes! It's like talking about 2 very diff things joined by an effortless composition of tastes and fantastic ingredients!

...i like to finish my plate :D

I heart Pisticci's (and you!)...

TO mark the end of my grieving period for my failed & irreparable hard drive, here is (what I think) is ze best food pizzorn on zees blog. Pisticci's on 123rd/LaSalle & B'way.

Fig & goat cheese salad w/mangos, heart of palm (yummers!), strawberries, and dijon sauce.

Another looksie at the salad...NOMNOMNOmnomnomonoNOMnoMoNOmNOMMMMM...first time I had heart of palm. I like. Me also likes heart of artichokies...

The garlic bread, avec goat cheese--they don't...usually have this on top, but either way it was damn tasty.

The house tea (black tea with peach...syrup?). As refreshing as it looks...

I always get the homemade fettucine w/ wild mushrooms--this time with the truffle oil added (oooooooooh...not really, there is a diff but i like the diff in some other medium besides this dish). BUT ME LOVESSSIES this dish!! ^_^ Julie-boolie got the same thing sans truffle oil.

Dan (Julia's sis's hubs) had the peppercorn-crusted filet mignon with cognac and something sauce. It was a beautiful peace of meat and I took a picture of it sliced up and splayed but it's a little blurry :( But here it is!!

There were more entrees but they're not as pretty--but seriously, any specials, anything at Pisticci's is phenomenal. Fresh, simple, well seasoned, perfectly balanced, finger lickin' good and despite the Italian starchy fare, very light and not heavy at ALL. I had the seafood special and meat entrees before too and that shiz is the bizzomb in terms of preparation. Pisticci--fave restaurant in Boston, California, or NY (except maybe Kefi :P...and all the cupcake places.

Anyway...onto desserrrrrrt. Always on the menu but best in season (now): fresh berries and hand-whipped cream. Nothing else holding it up!

I disdain desserts topped with whipped cream--anythign w/ whipped cream really. I just think whipped cream is unnecessary and the devil. BUT, with that said, this cream could convert even moi-self :) Also--tiramisu and Frangelico mousse (tasty!but again both not that pretty so whatebbs :P) Here's the coconut-yellow cake w/ some sauce.

You'd think it'd be a little innocuous for such a place I rave about--but the cake is rich but (like my crazy triple chocolate cake) not that sweet, not that heavy or too airy, and the sauce is great with it. A lot of people seem to be averse to coconut but it really shouldn't be the slightest issue here.

another pic of the fig salad just cuz I think it's purty--that and I've only had fig maybe 3x in my entire life (no even a Fig Newton!) The whole fruit is fascimamating and its applications as well. :)

YAAAAAAAAAy. prepare for the last cupcake entry in the cupcake trifecta/showdown, lemon-and-thyme-roasted-chicken flavored chips from England, comped breakfast @ the Hilton in McLean, and purple 'taters coming this wk!

...and one more of the garlic bread :)

Gelati Grom-ness...

I am an italo-phile. no to the francophile. yes to the...anyhoodlekins.
Had some Grom on the UWS (Broadway b/w 76th & 77th st) w/ Jules-ster--she got the pistachio, I got the crema di grom.

I gotta say--it's a little refreshing, but disorienting to see Pistachio gelato/ice cream not in unearthly green form (see spumoni gardens pics). The pistachio also tasted nutty (as it probably should) and u can really taste the "toasted" side to it. Warm, not too sweet, delish.

My crema di grom is egg cream, Battifollo "meliga" biscuits (which evidently just means they made it with corn flour instead of wheat and...Grom's rather prideful about their snootiness in ingredients), and Ecuadorian chocolate. Some other flavors had Venezuelan chocolate--u should read about the crazy chocolate wars b/w Amedei and Valrhona...it's a little inSANE. **

Here's more of my ice cream b/c you love ze peektures. (Btw...a little too pricey for the sizes--what u see there was 5 bucks each.People are getting uber snooty about chocolates particularly the cocoa content, where the beans are from (likened to the origins of ze grapes and regions for ze wine and whatnot) and of course the recent NYtimes article on the emergence of snooty Milk Chocolate. The site 70% (referring to the % of cacao powder blahblahbl) is a good resource to edumacate urself on fancy chocolates (and buy them!).

In Italy, it was 3-4 euros for gelato the size of 2 of your fits clinging fervently to a sugar cone. Packed fo yo FACE!!) This one is a little...diminutive ain't it :P

I tried the Marrons de Glaces (good, i can't pinpoint the flavor but possibly red-bean-y or taro-y). The stracciatella is a good vanilla/cream-ish with chocolate and whatnot. Surprisingly they had Hazelnut AND Gianduja--but I gues that makes sense since gianduja is essentially Nutella (hazelnut chocolate) whereas the other one is just singular. I'm not a fan of sorbet so...I didn't try any. The Zabaione i think has the egg cream base like the Crema di Grom but with Sicilian Marsala wine.

I've had a few gelati downtown but I dunno...this does taste a lot cleaner/crisper and while creamy, just not as heavy as most gelati. My favorite was this place in Rome (I can't remember the cross streets but this was possibly near Piazza Navona on the way back from the Vatican near the bridge where that castle is. VAGUE yes? Whatebbs yo). Florence gelati was good but for some reason...that one in Rome always stuck with me.
There was a great gelato/coffee shop in the Belmont Shore strip in Long Beach. That you can look up yourself but I think it was called Cafe Roma--dun dun dunnn....

--
**(Valrhona refused to let the Tessieri bro/sis work with them, Tessieri goes straight to make a deal with the chocolate plantation folks in South America to work exclusively for Tessieri's AMADEI!!)

Magnolia's Bakery (...the Cupcake Showdown preview...)...

...I don't like Magnolia's Bakery.

YEAH THAT'S RIGHT. I DON'T LIKE MAGNOLiA's BAKERY. me no likey--magnolia not numbah 1, magnolia numbah 10! magnolia not a-okay! (shout out to Operation: Dumbo Drop which when I was younger, was very excited about it being filmed in the motherland--not so sure how I feel about it now. will have to inspect).

Let's go over ze Magnolia cupcake's finer points.

Ze cupcakes are moist, perfectly moist, light, not that sweet (on the fence about the flavor of the cake itself). mmm....nummy nummy nummy nummy. We got some red velvet cake. The frosting was bland and lackluster, but the cake was incredibly moist and light as previously mentioned. Please see exhibit 1.

And...zey are also pretty.
Now, what you can't tell, is the consistency in the frosting which is a HUGE factor for me. Billy's uses buttercream, I assume Magnolia does too but more sugary-ness. Magnolia's frosting is *much*MUCH* sweeter, to the point of overbearing/overwhelming/overpowering, all sorts of "over"-ness as in "over it"--points off. Magnolia's frosting is sloppy, and runny.

Okay, so they pretty much look like Billy's Bakery cupcakes (and u can see below that i smudged a finger on that cupcake there, but BACK TO THE POINT).

Mike & I weighed the fact that we got ours freshly swathed right in our faces, but it DID have time to really settle on the train ride back. (Btw, we went to the new opening of the Magnolia's on the UWS on 69th & Columbus where the Penang used to be--oh Penang how i heart you since beantown w/ ur asparagus chicken and mango shrimp. but tha'ts another story...)
CONCLUSION: I don't *hate* Magnolia's, I just wouldn't go there if I had the chance and I definitely would NOT wait in line OR make it a point to take any friends, who are visiting, to go there. It's really the too sweet frosting that kills it. I don't care about how runny the frosting is, it's just I choke on every bite b/c the sugar just hits the back of ur throat like your tonsils got dropkicked with sunshine and carebears (if u like that sort of thing).

So I've had Crumb's, Buttercup, Billy's (^_^), Magnolia's(with an appalling website)--what's left is Sugar Sweet Sunshine in the LES. Will report back with a cumulative assessment. I had a pistachio cake version of the cupcake from SSS at Karen's bday party--I'm excited to finish out the tasting. Here's a fun little story in NYMAG about the whole cupcake lineage in the city.

Billy's might be a little dry but MY GOD the frosting (even the German Chocolate Cake) is SPOT ON.

(...and thus, u can see the diff b/w setting up the shots w/ no flash vs flash and the world of diff it makes. now that i've got my SB800 w/ diffuser, we'll see how that carries, and how the gold bounce might work out too.)

Kefi on the UWS...

We were going to a Juno screening last wkd, but the line was ginormous and snaked almost completely full circle into Columbus Ave, so no seats =/ Claudz left so Karen & I walked about 12 blocks in the bitter cold to 79th St--I wore ballet flats, my feet froze and my toes tingled...HOWEVER, my god..kefi...mmmmmm. Gladly lose this little piggy for some Kefi meze plates :)

I forgot my camera so I borrowed these pics from a Yelp user and NY mag :) An NY Times article lamented the tapafication of dinners/restaurants, but WHATEVER. We got 3 meze plates and 1 small pasta dish but that were sufficiently full if not more so.

Firstly, we got the Grilled Octopus with chickpea salad. I don't know why, but after eating at Kión for Sam's semi-going away dinner, I just had a newfound appreciation for Octopus and more untraditional meats. Texture was great--you could cut w/ a fork, chickpeas, aka garbanzo beans were lightly seasoned and tossed in olive oil i think? (Btw, in my latest iron deficient anemic episode, I found out that chickpeas are an excellent source of iron, along with prune juice, and spinach :))

We also got some pita with melted feta cheese under a bed of tomatoes, dill, red onions, and ANCHOVIES ^_^ I can't just assume it's so good b/c it was melted--but it seems to really make a big difference in the feta flavor. *shrug*. I love dill. ohhh how I love dill. ANYHOODLE...the next thing...is SWEETBREAD!!

If you don't know, sweetbread is thymus/pancreas--u know, the ish that makes bile? :) WHO KNEW!! I used to do DNA extractions w/ my students w/ sweetbread--who KNEW indeed :) It was heavy on the garlic--as u can see in this pic, with onion rings-ish, and really tasty, but large, caper berries. FREAKISHLY large caper berries. but yummy :)

This next one is a pasta (brai) with pulled rabbit meat with Graviera cheese and other things. I was really excited b/c when I was in Florence, IT we were all at this little trattoria in the Oltrarno neighborhood that had the best olive tepanade & stuffed calamari (it was so soft we thought it was just pasta) and the local tavolo caldo that had coniglio cotto (grilled rabbit) but alas they were out that day =/ If you ever go back, it's across Ponte Santa Trinità and the other one was somewhere else =/ sorry it's been 4 yrs? But here's a picture of us outside of a giant Costco equivalent supermercato north of the Boboli gardens :)

oh yeah and here's a chinese restaurant in Venice//IT by the entrance of the ferrovia ;)

I am now Jewish and/or Tenente Henry...

I always thought eating cheese with some pears/apples and chunks of bread was really Hemingway-esque and really foreign to me, but as of late I really like eating Grana Padano cheese (sort of like Parmiggiano but more flavorful), and by "really like" I mean I'm certifiably obsessed--i CRAVE it...

Seriously isn't that the most beautiful cheese on earth? I love slicing it superthin and eating it with the Fairway 5 mix Olives & rosemary...thing...and mini toast that just rocks my little socks. You can't go wrong with olive tepanade but I'm digging the whole olives at the moment--green, purple, red, french, italian, greek, californian, etc...

Did I mention I bring a little tupperware thing of the Grana Padano sliced up, with some olives, and some Zomick's egg challa bread (comes in an orange/white checkered plastic bag--and sometimes breakaway rolls! :))? That or the All from Fairway? yeaaaaah.....

Btw--kalamata olives are overated, the French's (nicoise) and Italy's (Belle di Cerignola) is the bommmmmmb. :)