Aw, spicy cashews, how I have missed you so

Back in the day (ok, maybe 6 years ago), a group of us went to a South Indian place in the LA area, where Akils ordered us a bunch of different foods. One, in particular, was some kind of rice/bread cup that we were supposed to eat along with a spicy broth-like liquid. When asked how much we should use, he said something along the lines of "it more you use, the tastier it gets". In response to this, and because I do stupid things, I filled it nearly to capacity and then tried to consume it. As a result, some of the spicy broth went down the wrong tube, which ended up with me convulsing it into my nostrils, where it burned a steady fire for the next ten minutes as I tried to clear my air passages in the bathroom.

The good news is, I managed to score some spicy cashews to go from the snack counter, after which we browsed the Indian video rental? store next door. That's all I remember about this place.

Fast-forward to yesterday, when I went to Surati Farsan Mart (on Black Mountain Road), had a delicious and cheap meal, and bought ... more spicy cashews! Remembering that Kirk had mentioned a second location in Artesia, I looked up the address and confirmed, via Google streetview, that yes, it was next door to a video place. In some miracle of coincidence, I had gotten spicy cashews again after six long years.

And yes, they are delicious, with a wonderful spiciness that builds over time, until you realize that you just a whole bag of cashews. Luckily, I am pacing myself so that I have some to bring up with me for the CHMMC on Saturday.

What a week.

Does it make me a bad person that I am more upset that Sammy is leaving than about the $700 billion bailout?

It was not a happy experience to read about that in my RSS feeds this morning... *sigh*

I have some stuff in the works to talk about some other sushi places I went to recently as well as the season openers of both the SD Symphony (Lang Lang played Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto #2) and the SD Chamber Orchestra (mmm, Mozart), but I'm not in the mood anymore.

Jai

So Wolfgang Puck thinks he can just waltz in and plop his fancy restaurant on our campus, competing with such well-established restaurants like Hi Thai Cafe, Panda Express, and Rubios? Hmm, I guess there's not a whole lotta competition. On the other hand, those other places tend to offer decent portions of food (or something that resembles food) at a price that college students can afford. After all, this is NOT an Ivy league school, or even USC...

Ignoring the business strategy of catering (mainly) towards La Jolla Playhouse patron, which I discussed with the cute bartender earlier today, at this blog, we care (mostly) about one thing: food. (service counts, too!)

I started out with a glass of the Riesling, which actually was one of the nicer Rieslings I've had, so props to the sommelier. Then I watched some of the Cubs vs. Mets game. Seriously, walking a guy for the tying run in the top of the 9th? Ugh.

Yes, so anyway, I ordered the Tuna Tartare and Beef Carpaccio, cuz you know, I'm just a raw food type of guy. The tuna came in custom-made sesame and miso cones topped with salmon skin. The fish was very fresh and excellently flavored. The cone also provided a nice crunch with sweet tones. The beef came with a bit of salad garnish, halved grape tomatoes and a ginger vinaigrette. I'm not sure what purpose the radishes serve, the raw beef and tomatoes provided plenty of red color already. The beef was very very good, flavor-wise and texture-wise. The salad dressing was overly salty, so I couldn't even finish the salad, and without a very gingery-flavor. I'm not actually a big fan of ginger, but I don't think a good ginger vinaigrette is that hard to make.

Unfortunately I didn't have my camera, but I will bring it along next time. Still, my feelings about Jai are mixed: some things they appear to accomplish really well (the tuna, for instance), and others, not so much. I don't think it's particularly difficult to create good-tasting dishes with quality ingredients (kobe beef, in this case), but I think the whole fusion aspect adds a bit of a challenge. On the one hand, there are traditional recipes that have been tried and true and present a nice balance of flavors. On the other hand, adding zip to traditional recipes by substituting new ingredients makes the flavors harder to manage. It's not simply a matter of throwing ingredients together and calling it fusion. Just cuz you add truffle oil to your shrimp tacos doesn't make you a fusion chef. (though it is, in fact, delicious)

Sushi Ota

I've heard multiple people tell me that Sushi Ota was a place for good, cheap sushi suitable as an inexpensive alternative to Sammy Sushi. So, M and I, along with M's sister T, and her boyfriend went to check it out earlier tonight.

It was pretty busy, even for a Thursday night, with about a half dozen guys working behind the bar and maybe 10 waitresses. Mmm, gender stereotypes. Somehow, we were able to get a table immediately.

For a first-visit, I opted to get a variety of favorites spanning the culinary range. (nothing from the kitchen, though)

Here's what I ordered:
- ankimo (monk fish liver)
- live amaebi (sweet shrimp, sushi-style)
- toro special (tuna belly tataki style)
- salmon belly
- soft shell crab roll



The ankimo was priced at $7.50, about midway between Sammy Sushi and Izakaya Sakura prices. The texture was a little too smooth, and the subtle exotic flavors I'm used to just weren't here. Sammy's version is pretty top-notch in my book, although expensive, and Sakura's version is a very inexpensive alternative. For the price, I thought it wasn't worth it.



At the same time, I got my toro special. When I ordered it, I thought it would still be sushi-toro, with some special garnish or something. Instead, it was just toro served tataki style. I don't know why they didn't just call it toro tataki. Anyway, it still had that creamy richness of toro, but after searing, it had more of a steak-like quality. I feel that this kinda defeats the purpose of having toro in the first place. Moreover, the slices were all fairly thin, so there was only a bit of uncooked meat on the inside. So, it was actually more like rare or medium-rare toro than tataki-style toro than anything else. Next time, I think I'll just have the plain toro sushi.


Our big platter of sushi came next, including various rolls, sushi, and my amaebi. For the price ($10.50), two amaebi is a pretty solid deal. I'm more used to the $10 or $12 apiece that Sammy and Sakura charge. Then again, those are much larger amaebi, and the heads are deep-fried after being dipped in batter, something that makes the head much more easily eaten. Anyway, a general complaint we had about the sushi was that the rice wasn't soft enough. Actually, it was pretty standard rice, I think we just are used to sushi rice that is a little bit softer and maybe a slightly higher fat content to make it a little creamier, as well. It could be that the rice we got was just dry, but that's a poor excuse, at least at these prices. The amaebi was good, but there is a reason why the larger ones at Sammy and Sakura are more expensive, just having the large cut of meat makes those a much more satisfying order.



And the deep-fried heads were all right, they came with a ponzu-soaked shredded daikon rather than a dipping sauce, which is perfectly acceptable. Actually, the best would probably be a ponzu dipping bowl with shredded daikon and green onions, but no place that I know of does that, though Sammy probably would if I asked...

The rolls as a whole were disappointing. I think the variety of textures just wasn't there, and neither were the flavors. The Diego (spicy tuna, cilantro, sesame oil, with serrano peppers on top) roll we had just wasn't spicy. There was a mild kick at the end, but I was pretty much scooping the minced peppers into my mouth to no real effect. The soft shell crab roll was also a little funky, being wrapped in tofu skin. It was also very different texturally, than soft shell crab ("spider") rolls I've had at other places. I expected it to be crunchy and loaded with flavors, not really needing any dipping, but this one was more on the soggy, falling-apart end of things. Disappointing, given the potential for combining the ingredients successfully.

Finally, the salmon belly, a sushi that I am in love with at Sammy's, was the worst. The cut resulted in more fish than expected, but in the lengthy direction, so you had this long piece of fish trailing behind the rice. The second piece I had was also chewy, which of course is a far cry from the firm, creamy goodness I expect. It's a little cheaper than Sammy's at $4.50, but I'd much rather spend the extra dollar to have a delicious version.

I will probably go back and give some other things a whirl, along with the kitchen, but I'm not terribly impressed so far.

Sushi Ota (reservations recommended, restaurant not so much)
4529 Mission Bay Drive
San Diego CA 92109
(858) 270-5047
(858) 270-5670

and we return to our usual randomness

This is what happens when you let sound engineers do whatever they want:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/29040/psych-daredevils#s-p1-so-i0

Right before the first commercial break, Shawn bites into a churro to a nice satisfying *crunch*. But wait, you say, churros aren't supposed to be crunchy, they're supposed to be soft and chewy, full of delicious sugaryness. Funny how I pick up on these random errors as opposed to the more glaring visual ones that get covered on wikipedia and imdb. Alas, maybe I only have food-sound synaesthesia after all...

Will someone please give the team on Psych some tickets to the fair and a batch of churros?

Junior's NYC

I frequently tell people that it's a good thing I don't have a TV/cable, because if I did, I would watch food network all day long and get even less work done than normal. (sounds impossible, right?)

Anyway, back at home, where we do have cable, I watched a bunch of Throwdown! with Bobby Flay, which is an interesting show with really silly intro bits. One of the places mentioned happened to be Junior's, a NYC-only chain that specializes in cheesecake. Obviously, I had to try it when I was in NYC over winter break.

As a big chocolate fan, I had to get the Devil's Food Cheesecake, of course. You can get these whole or by the slice. It looks like you can even order online from the website and have it shipped (2-day shipping is the default). Anyway, this is what we got:



It was a lot "taller" than I expected. It was a very filling slice, as only a few bites of the chocolate and cheesecake parts were enough to fill me up. The texture seemed overly resistant to me (unlike say, a warm, fresh-out-of-the-oven cheesecake or chocolate cake), possibly due to the cold weather or it being just taken out of the fridge. I suspect the texture would improve if you let it sit for a while. Anyway, I am interested in trying Junior's again the next time I'm in town, as the flavors were excellent. Somehow, the texture just didn't do it for me this time.

BTW, we went to the Times Square restaurant; there's also one in Grand Central Station and one in Brooklyn.

Junior's
(Times Square)
West 45th (between Broadway & 8th Avenue)
212.302.2000

(Brooklyn)
386 Flatbush Avenue Extension at Dekalb Avenue
718.852.5257

(Grand Central Station)
Main Concourse near Track 36
212.692.9800

Lower Level Dining Concourse
212.983.5257

Tajima I

On Tuesday, after promises of Shabu-Shabu and an otherwise good presentation on UCSD's limited program to get more mathematicians and scientists into middle and high schools as teachers, we went to Tajima 1. (the one on Convoy) Also, we had heard good things from Kirk and some other labmates.

Well, I hope that Tajima 2 (the Mercury St. location) is doing much better, because I was severely disappointed with my meal. The Chicken Kara-age was bland and a little soggy, and my Chashu Ramen was frankly not as good as some instant ramen I've had. However, as the ever-skeptical scientist, I have some hypotheses:

1) Tajima 1 is crappy, but Tajima 2 is ok/good.
2) Tajima 1 was having an off-night.
3) I just don't like how they do their broth.
4) $2 more ($8.95 vs $6.95) is worth the cost of three small thin slices of flavorless tough pork.

I'm sorry; the Santouka in SD may not be as great as the ones in LA, but even the chashu in their plain ramen is significantly better than what I had earlier this week.

Regardless, I am willing to give Tajima 2 a shot this weekend. Hopefully I will remember to bring a charged camera. If you're curious about the quality of the food my friends have, their judgments ranged from mediocre to average. Given the price, which is also about average, I can't really recommend this place. What can I say? I'm willing to put up with high prices and slow service if the food is good, but if my primary goal is to socialize with friends and have some food in the process, I could go to any number of good pho places in SD for a fraction of the price.

Tajima Restaurant (1)
4681 Convoy Street
San Diego, CA 92111
858.576.7244

Sushi Siam - not a Sammy Sushi

Continuing the reviews of restaurants I visited 4 months ago, that may not even be around...

My mom and I tried Sushi Siam, a Thai / Sushi place recently opened next to the Target in the new Washingtonian Plaza. Funnily enough, she had described it to me as a sushi place (well, it does have sushi in the title), but never having been there before, wasn't aware that it also served Thai food. (This is what happens when you don't pay attention in geography class, kids. Maybe I should start speaking broken French when we go get pho next time?)

Anyway, we started out with some deep fried tofu, because my mom likes it, but it was bland for my tastes. (agedashi tofu, this was not) I also didn't particularly care for the sauce, which was some sort of spicy nutty sauce (but very different than a chicken satay dipping sauce.

Not being quite in the mood for sushi, but being somewhat in the mood for greasy Thai noodles, I ordered the pad see ew. Overall, I think this is a safer bet than pad thai, since each restaurant does pad thai a little differently with different toppings. Personally, I'm not a fan of uncooked mung beans, but a bit of chopped peanuts and shredded carrots can really bring out the dish. Regardless, I am always pleased when Thai restaurants do NOT use chinese broccoli, but instead use plain old broccoli. This dish turned out pretty well, if a little greasy. I would say the balance of egg to broccoli to meat to noodle came out very well. I like veggies, but it didn't feel like they were skimping out on meat or anything either. The sweetness was also pretty well-balanced with the saltiness. Overall, I would say this was just a really well-balanced pad see ew.


My mom tried the sashimi sampler. Nothing spectacular there. Plating was also mediocre, but then again, it was pretty cheap, so what do you expect. It's a sign when even the sashimi comes with the pinkish ginger instead of the pale yellow ginger. (which is far superior. Much stronger flavor and crunch. I have a story about the ginger at Sammy's, but that should go in a later revisit post to Sammy Sushi.)


Overall, well-balanced Thai place trying to cash in on the sushi fad, but can you really blame them? Still, miles better than Tara Thai. (not the same as Thai by Tara. I still wouldn't go to either one.)

Sushi Siam
31 Grand Corner Ave
Gaithersburg MD 20878
(301) 417-0005

Yum Yum 3 or (Yum Yum Yum Yum Yum Yum)

These restaurant posts are no longer in chronological order, but what do you care? They're 2 months late anyway!

So I was in NYC and called up some friends to have lunch. Due to various miscommunications, sicknesses, etc., it ended up being a cozy lunch with two Techer friends, E and Y. Luckily, Y. knew his way around and took us to Yum Yum 3.

It made us wonder about the status of Yum Yum 1 and Yum Yum 2. *shrug*

Anyway, we got the lunch special, which consisted of a choice of soup, an entree, and a dessert or drink.

I went with the Thai Iced Tea

the coconut soup (Tom Kha Gai?):

and the Spicy Basil Noodle:

while E had the Pad Thai:

and Y had some sort of spicy stir-fried chicken with green beans (Pad Prik King?):

The food was okay: the Thai Iced Tea was very sweet: much sweeter than I am used to, so it was a bit surprising at first. I gradually got used to it, since I don't have any particular aversion to sweet drinks while dining. (Probably the ice melting helped to dilute the sweetness a bit.)
The coconut soup was rather sour for my tastes. It masked any flavor that might have been apparent in the broth. For this type of light soup, I think there should be a strong broth flavor with subtle hints of other flavorings (maybe lemongrass, leek, etc.), and then any flavorful component should be a solid object, like the mushroom or chicken.
The noodles were good. It wasn't overly greasy, and I am a big fan of spiciness, basil, and broccoli (either separate or combined).

Overall, I would say this is a decent place for a quick and cheap Thai meal, although one would think it rather upscale from the plating. However, the flavors, as a whole seem rather muted; neither the in-your-face goodness of homestyle cooking but not the fanciful combinations of a high-end place. It felt very much like some sort of Americanized Thai food, though the chef apparently was born in Thailand (but emigrated here at 20).

Anyway, I don't remember the exact price of the lunch special, somewhere in the $6.95 ballpark. I think you can get a pretty good indication of the restaurant by the last line in the "Story of us" page on their website: "Our special is a five-course prix-fixe meal for $13.95."

Apparently those five courses (dinner, of course) are:
Soup
Spring Roll
Salad
Entree
Dessert

I wouldn't exactly call that a prix-fixe so much as the dinner special, but hey, whatever floats your boat. I should suggest to Sammy that he call his bento a seven-course prix-fixe:

1. entree
2. california roll
3. miso
4. rice
5. tempura
6. salad
7. ginger

Yum Yum 3 Thai & Vietnamese Restaurant
658 9th Avenue (corner of 9th and 46th)
New York, NY 10036

Oriental East

Somehow, I made it all the way to February and still have quite a few posts I need to make regarding East-coast food. Luckily, it looks like I might have some free time this weekend to churn this stuff out.

We used to go to Oriental East a lot when I was younger and we went to church in Silver Spring. I'm not quite sure what the correlation is between going to church in the area nearby since you can't really time dim-sum to be before or after church when there is lunch service and then Chinese school in the afternoon, but whatever.

The main problem with this place is the horrible parking, there's a tiny lot right in front where people triple park and block you in, so usually it's better to go to the side lot if there is space there.

Anyway, this place apparently does a lot of business, so one would expect the food to be quite delicious. As it turned out, I felt kinda queasy afterwards; I think the amount of grease combined with just arriving after a red-eye flight got to me. Either way, the food was not bad: overall, it was above average, I just felt like there was a whole lot of grease to it.












































Oriental East Restaurant
1312 East-West Highway
Silver Spring, MD 20910
(301) 608-0030

Joe's Shanghai

Yes, I know, what a horrible name/translation for a Chinese restaurant. I guess, in some ways, it is similar to the food, really really excellent along one dimension and failing past mediocrity in others.

Some of you may know that I am a big fan of XLB. I think that's an acronym I picked up from Kirk. Anyway, Joe's Shanghai is well-known for their ridiculously good XLB. Seriously, Din Tai Fung had better hope to God that Joe's does not expand beyond its three stores in the NYC area. (BTW, we stopped by the Chinatown shop, but they also have one uptown and in Flushing, Queens.)

Before I begin my love poem, have a picture first:Leaving aside the issue of "does size matter", one must admit that 8 of these gigantic XLB for the low price of $4.65 is a f***ing steal. And as a side note, I should mention that my mom first ordered the version with crab meat, which had a strange taste. Also, it costs more. (crab is expensive?) However, I successfully argued that XLTB was significantly different from standard XLB. (After all, why does XLTB sell out so quickly at Dumpling House when XLB does not?) So what you see here is one of eight XLTB that we got. Yes, that IS a standard size Chinese-style soup spoon.

The broth you see starting to spill out is mostly from inside the XLB with a small amount of vinegar: as you can see the XLB is still quite plump, indicating quite a bit more broth inside. And the broth is soooo good... Such a perfect flavor. It's hard to compare the quality, but all the ones I had were as expected, rich and juicy, perfectly flavored pork inside, complemented by just as much vinegar and ginger as you desire. The wrapping was also done excellently, thinnish on the bottom, having soaked up so much broth on the inside, and yet the top part was dry and easy to grab with the metal tongs, indicating a very well balanced thickness that allows for comfortable eating while preserving the broth inside from spilling because the wrapper was too thin. Tastewise, I would say that Din Tai Fung is comparable in flavor, but Joe's wins along multiple fronts: broth quantity, overall size, and price.

If you ever stop by NYC and you don't have an aversion to XLB, I highly recommend you spend a paltry 5 bucks and grab yourself and excellent meal. Heck, it's cheaper than a decent combo at McDonald's.

My one and only complaint about Joe's (and a rather large complaint at that) is that the rest of their food ranges from mediocre to Teh Suck. The noodles we ordered (Shanghai Fried Flat Noodle, I believe, based on a suggestion from a review my Mom read) were mediocre: just soy-sauce flavored that could've used some more nutty flavor or veggies or Something. The fried rice we ordered for my brother was just crappy: cold, bland, mostly rice, with very little veggies, egg, or chicken. I made better fried rice the first time I made it. (And now my fried rice is even better still, tempered by years of cooking experience and knowledge of seasonings.) I should also mention that the noodles and fried rice were priced at $6.95 and $7.25 respectively. So with 8 XLB at $4.65, why would you want to order anything else? Get your variety some other day.

When we went, we managed to find a spot splitting a large table with two other small parties. However, as we left the place, there was a large line, so I suggest going early to grab a comfortable spot during the lunch time rush. Of course, the non-Chinatown locations might be less crowded, but I find that somehow hard to believe...

Joe's Shanghai
[chinatown]
9 Pell Street (off of The Bowery)
New York, New York 10013

[uptown]
24 W 56 Street
New York, New York 10019

[flushing]
136-21 7th Avenue
Flushing, New York 11354

Ba Ren (part I)

For some reason, I was in the mood for spicy food. Not just the standard spicy food that I knew how to make (via loads of black pepper, cayenne pepper, etc.), but stuff with actual peppers (that I am too cheap to buy and work with) that has a really pungent (in a good sense) flavor. Anyway, I figured I should probably go to Ba Ren at some point to get some food pics and do my thing. After all, it is well-known as one of the best places for authentic Chinese in the SD area. Luckily for me, they serve pretty authentic (read: numb-inducing spicy) Sichuan cuisine. So, if you haven't been scared away yet, let's proceed.

Ba Ren offers a very nice selection of cold appetizers that you can get to start your meal. You can choose between 2-n different dishes, and they give you quite a large portion on a small plate. I couldn't find a third dish I really wanted, so I settled for these two: a marinated seaweed mixture, and a spicy beef (?) tendon mix. (Note that there is actual lean meat in addition to tendons, which is always great.) For some reason, I love seaweed prepared in this fashion: I guess I must have a lot of love for the vinegary-flavors...

Anyway, as expected, it was excellent, although it is somewhat different from the Japanese preparations where they use a couple different seaweeds and seaweed-based products to give some variety to the textures. The spicy tendons were also great, not quite as numb-inducing as I am used to, but still very flavorful.

The other dish I ordered 口水雞, which my mom translated into "Saliva Chicken", using a 2-1 character split for translation. The rationale she came up with is that it is supposed to induce saliva on the part of the consumer. I find it interesting that in this case, a 1-1-1 character split makes for a more accurate and appealing translation of "Mouth Water[ing] Chicken", only slightly more poetic than what Ba Ren uses: "Cold Chicken w/ Spicy Sauce". Personally I think the latter is better off as a description, but such things are difficult when the menu has 500+ items (supposedly; I didn't keep track when I went).

If this dish looks scarily red, well, it's actually not that bad. Maybe? My good friend M, would probably die if he entered the same room as this evil-looking dish. (He has no tolerance for spicy heat whatsoever, unable to take a twice-diluted Orochan level 6. I, on the other hand, consider Orochan's level 3 to be a nice mix of heat and flavor, with level 2 starting to get overbearing.) Anyway, the chicken is very nice and tender, and the flavors are actually quite complex. That is not standard chili oil floating at the top: it had just the right flavor that I thought it would make some very nice cold noodles. (And later that week, I did exactly that using the roughly half I had left over, making quite a few servings of nice spicy soba noodles.)

Yes, I had half the dish left over. The other half resulted in me consuming all the rice they gave me. And I didn't just get the single-size serving of rice but one of those large bowls that normally suffices for a party of 3 or 4. Yes, this dish is quite spicy.

The other two dishes I ordered for takeout (I think it's a $25 min credit card order): Mapo Tofu and Dry Cooked Lamb will be covered in part 2.

Ba Ren
4957 Diane Ave
San Diego, CA 92117

Green St. Restaurant

Over Thanksgiving break, I drove up to Pasadena to hang out with friends from 'Tech. While I first had dinner with a high school friend at Matsuri, I forgot to bring my camera to take pics of the food. (yeah, I know, stupid mistake) Anyway, on my last day there, I went out to eat with some friends since it was Drock's birthday the next day. Due to various conflicts and time issues, we ended up going to Green Street Restaurant rather late (8:30). Apparently their kitchen was closing, so we ordered quick and for one of our friends who hadn't shown up yet.

BTW, Green Street Restaurant is known for their large salads, as you will soon see from the pictures.

Martin started out with a cup of corn chowder. He had originally planned to have the dinner Dianne (a smaller version of the Dianne salad, something of a signature dish) and a cup of clam chowder, but he can't read, so there you go. Eventually he settled for the corn chowder, as the soup of the day was tomato bisque, and there wasn't anything else in the same price range to accompany a salad.

(since the dinner Dianne is the same salad as the regular Dianne, just in a smaller portion, I'm only including the picture of the full-size salad.)


The Dianne salad:


The Cornucopia salad:


All salads come with zucchini bread. (two slices w/ the regular, and one w/ the small)

Drock had the parmesan crusted chicken, a dish I was eyeing until I spotted seafood further down on the list of specials. It looked and tasted pretty good (according to Drock), but he can't focus my camera worth squat, so all I have is this blurry picture:


I had the pasta primavera w/ seafood. It sounded appetizing and looked pretty good, but was overall pretty bland. There was a small pool of olive oil and melted butter at the bottom of my plate that I tried to dip food into with each bite, but I ended up just putting black pepper on everything. The shrimp and scallops were overcooked. (scallops especially, so I wasn't too happy about it)


But it was Drock's birthday dinner, and the kitchen was closed, so what are you going to do. One of my other friends thought that they don't do a good job cooking the chicken (for the salads), which may be true. I wouldn't be too surprised if it were. The last time I came I had a salad that I liked, so I guess the food is hit or miss? I would say the place is somewhat pricey given the quality of food, although the restaurant seems pretty high-class. The food just isn't up to par, even if the plating is quite good.

Green Street Restaurant
146 South Shoppers Lane
Pasadena, CA 91101

Ultra-rare Delicacies

In the interests of Thanksgiving, here's a food-based post based on the following conversation I had with a friend:

[18:32] lhopitalified: i wonder what [giant] isopods taste like
[18:32] friend: probably
[18:32] friend: delicious

in our discussion of deep sea organisms. Big-ass crustacean? It has to be tasty! According to wikipedia, all I need to do is travel to northern Taiwan to try some Giant Isopod. DELICIOUS!

Of course, there are other ultra-rare delicacies to be had based on the rarity or difficulty in catching certain animals. Panda meat, for example, is quite clichéd, so I have some others up my sleeve:

Foie Gras (Ankimo style) - Ankimo (monkfish liver) is delicious. I assume Foie Gras has a similar richness, though I've never actually tried it. Since monkfish naturally have fatty livers, probably as an adaptation for buoyancy underwater, if you force feed it for two weeks and then harvest the liver, I would imagine it would make for some excellent Ankimo. Of course, it should also be prepared in the standard foie gras styles (mousse, parfait).

Peking Duck-billed Platypus - This one is mostly on the list because of the ingenius portmanteau I came up with for the name.

Giant Squid Chowder - The key here is the serving. Instead of a bread bowl, I wonder if you could use a carved and cooked part of the Giant Squid itself. I'm not too sure how it would hold up with a hot soup inside, but I think it would be pretty neat.

Sammy Sushi

For the first couple months in SD, I languished without the comfort of relatively close-by Sushi Komasa back when I was at 'Tech and the summer when I took the metro to Long Beach for work. (Sushi Komasa is in one of the main plazas in Little Tokyo, a couple blocks east of the Civic Center Red Line Stop and the Walt Disney Concert Hall. Also, expect an upcoming post on Sushi Komasa.)

Googling for Sushi Komasa yields Kirk's website, which is lucky for me, since Kirk is based in San Diego. Hell, if his wife loves albacore as much as I do, then their sushi recommendation must be pretty good. They also love Ba-Ren, which dishes up some pretty good szechuan. (Expect that in an upcoming post, too.) [Edit: part 1 is up now]

Anyway, word has it, Sammy Sushi is on their regular rotation, so I decided to check it out. Overall, the feel of Sammy Sushi is more laid-back than Komasa, where there is what amounts to a musical chair-like rush for seats when they open. Sammy is slightly pricier, but on par for San Diego, where food is generally more expensive than in LA; in fact, I think Sammy might even be slightly cheaper than some other non-generic sushi bars. Regardless, I have always thought the nigiri at Sammy's is particularly fresh, especially whatever specials he happens to have. You can't go wrong with Albacore, Aji, or Toro when they're on special. Here is the Aji (Spanish mackerel, NOT to be confused with Saba, the standard mackerel) :


Aji has a creamier flavor, I think. Generally, I just don't like Saba, but Aji is totally different.

Because of his Korean ethnicity, Sammy also offers a Kalbi BBQ bento in addition to the standard teriyaki and katsu bentos. For $12.95, you get a lot of food. Here is the chicken katsu:


They ran out of pork, so my tonkatsu got turned into a torikatsu. It doesn't make that much difference to me, normally, but the chicken was overdone, not juicy, mostly tough inside, with a little too much crunchiness. I always enjoy the sesame-flavored salad dressing, the California rolls are standard, and the tempura was piping hot when this got served to me. This explains why there is half a tempura shrimp missing. :)

Oh yes, it also comes with miso soup.

I usually get the Tomato Roll (tuna on the outside, spicy scallop on the inside) since I am a fan of tuna, scallops, and spicy foods. I'm not sure who came up with this roll, as a friend of mine has mentioned that it is available in other sushi places, but it's not very common, but very very tasty. This time, however, I switched it up and went for #13 (shrimp tempura, avocado, cucumber on the inside, spicy scallop and tempura flakes on the outside with a sweet sauce):


If you see this on the menu, you will agree with me that the picture in the menu does not do this roll justice. It is quite delicious, although a little sweet for my tastes. I also recommend the Caterpillar, although what exactly is in it escapes my mind at the moment.

Sammy is also famous for his "One Night Stand" roll, where he or Kira (his sous-chef) comes up with something new, with the promise to not remember how to make it the next day. :)

Of course, this means, Sammy will also do custom requests, so if you have a particular roll you like that is not on the menu, they will be glad to make it for you.

BTW, I also had an order of Toro, which was some of the best I've ever had, very very melt-in-your-mouth creamy. Alas, it was so good, I forgot to take a picture. :)

Sammy Sushi
7905 Engineer Road
San Diego, CA 92111

Izakaya Sakura

One usually does not go wrong with a restaurant that Kirk recommends. When it became part of their "rotation" and I realized that it had received multiple posts, I put a visit to this place on my to-do list.

Apparently, Sakura is in the Izakaya style, which I guess is something similar to a tapas bar. Anyway, I went during lunch since I needed to do some shopping in the area. (namely, chives, ginger, and dumpling wrappers for some gorgeous ground kurobuta pork)

I was eager to try the beef in sesame sauce, but it appeared to be absent from the lunch menu I was given. I settled for the ribeye steak, which is something that is only served on Sunday. (My hypothesis is that they get their shipment of beef on Sunday, and any leftover steak is turned into something else for the week.) But first, I started off with some appetizers.

First up was the agedashi tofu: three smallish pieces of deep-fried tofu, topped with a generous helping of grated daikon and shredded green onion and in a light broth. My first impression upon tasting it was that it was much less flavorful than the agedashi tofu at Sammy's (that post is probably coming in a month). My second impression was "ouch, I think I burned my mouth". Weakly-flavored food usually means one of two things: either the cook thinks the patron can't handle the flavor (ala "weak" mapo tofu) or the cook is confident in the flavor of the ingredients and doesn't feel the need to mask anything. The latter seemed to be true here, as the broth for the chicken kara-age was very similar, but somehow, worked really well for the deep-fried breaded chicken.

While the mayonnaise w/ cayenne? pepper is probably a more traditional sauce for deep-fried meats, the light broth with daikon works extremely well. I am unsure what is in the broth, since the daikon is a little overpowering. It ends up tasting very similar to the broth when my mom makes a slow-cooked beef with daikon soup, so I wonder if it isn't some form of pork or beef broth given that Sakura does have a slow-braised pork dish on the dinner menu. Either way, it makes me sad to hear that the sauce does not accompany the chicken during dinnertime.

Last up was the steak special. It looked fantastic, and flavorful enough without the accompanying sauce. The sauce this time was a strong ponzu, again with grated daikon. What looks like mashed potatoes on the side there, is probably mashed mountain yam, as you usually don't get stringiness with regular mashed potatoes. The miso was a little bland for my taste; I don't think the light flavor works so well for the miso as it does for the agedashi tofu or the chicken karaage sauce. The salad came with a home-made sauce, which you might be familiar with if you've ever had that sort of salad in a Japanese restaurant. This one had hints of egg and daikon, so I'm guess the main ingredients are probably mayonnaise, rice vinegar, cooked egg, and daikon. Since the sauce for the steak was so strong, I ended up just straining it for the daiko and using that to top the steak, which worked rather well. The steak was pretty good, no $40 filet mignon, but pretty good for a restaurant steak, if just a little bit overcooked in my opinion. For a piece of meat that thin, it really only needs a few minutes to bring it to a nice medium. At least the garlic on top wasn't burned as that is usually what happens when I try to cook steak without a real grill.

Overall, I was very pleased with the food, and the service was excellent. I had a friendly chat with one of the waitresses when they realized I spoke some Japanese, and they were very apologetic and nice about fixing my bill when I pointed out the miscalculation (in their favor).

The crowd was pretty large for lunch on Sunday; I would say that it was about 3/4 Japanese, and 1/4 asian-looking students. I guess business is going pretty well, and that word-of-mouth works for them, as they do not have a sign on the outside denoting the location. At some point I will have to return for dinner, as it seems that their sushi is also pretty good and to see what the dinner menu has to offer.

Izakaya Sakura (in between the military recruiter and the chiropracter)
3904 Convoy St #121 (same plaza as the original pancake house)
San Diego, CA 92111

Balsamic Vinegar rocks my taste buds

The first bottle of balsamic I got was a cheap ($1.69 I think) bottle from Trader Joe's. It performs well on salads, and I use it to add somewhat more of a kick to a more traditional vinaigrette I make using a fruitier vinegar. Silly old me, I thought that this cheap bottle I purchased was representative of all balsamic vinegars.

Then I tried the $14 caprese at the Quarter Kitchen in downtown SD. If you think spending over $10 on a salad (without added chicken/shrimp/crab/lobster meat) is crazy, let me assure you that this salad is worth every cent.

A traditional caprese is made using mozzarella, plum tomatoes, and basil, seasoned with salt, pepper, and olive oil. Wikipedia also tells us that the ideal caprese has buffalo mozzarella, and ingredients from specific regions in Italy. Also, balsamic vinegar may be added.

The Quarter Kitchen does their version of the caprese using two types of tomatoes, a very nice buffalo mozzarella, and oh yeah, a balsamic vinegar aged 25 years!

Unlike wines, where I can really tell the difference between crappy and good, balsamic vinegars are a whole 'nother story. Whereas my opinion of wines is relegated to either "I like it", "I don't like it", or "damn, this could get me drunk", the complex flavors of a balsamic vinegar really stand out. It seems strange to use this metaphor to describe food, but whereas my cheap bottle of balsamic vinegar tasted relatively flat, the aged balsamic vinegar was extremely deep, with a flavor that changes as you hold it on your tongue.

After going home, I did a little online reading about balsamic vinegars. Like wines, they also get really expensive (> $100 for 100mL), but I guess they don't quite approach the spectacle that is counterfeit Thomas Jeffersons.

Unfortunately I was unable to find what I wanted (a good, but still relatively cheap) bottle at the local stores, having to settle for a $11 bottle of three-leaf balsamic vinegar. (Don't get me started on why there is both a leaf system and an age system for classification.) While not quite the syrupy goodness I had at the Quarter Kitchen, I think it will serve very well in my homemade caprese.

For those interested in the Quarter Kitchen, I was inspried to go after reading this review. I think next time I will try the Lobster Club and maybe the Kobe Beef...

Recent innovations:

Flat XLB Policy: similar to an LCD manufacturer's dead pixel policy, restaurants should have a flat XLB policy where you get a refund or another batch made if a certain proportion of your xiao long bao (steamed pork buns) come out flat (i.e. the inside juice has leaked out through the wrapper). Because batches are usually 8 or 10, the most likely policy is going to be 0 or 1 / batch.

Inverse Costco Effect: when buying something in bulk is more expensive than buying in smaller quantities. (e.g. a whole pie sells for $12, but individual slices, closer to a quarter of a whole pie are $2 each)