Recently, I hace discovered a new favorite taqueria, El Cochinito Contento in Redmond Oregon.
A small Mexican market on 6th, tucked in it's back corner by the butcher counter is a little taqueria, that serves some absolutely fantastic, and really authentic tacos and menudo that is simply to die for. The taco selection is a smörgåsbord of nasty bits, from tongue, to tripas, to cabeza, my personal favorite. Fatty, tender head meats on a warm corn tortilla with some chopped onion and cilantro, all it needs is a little squirt of lime to be one of the best things I've ever eaten. For the less adventurous, there's also some fantastic adovada, azada, and al pastor as well.
And the best part? Tacos are a mere $1.50 each. The amazing menudo, which takes me two sittings to finish? $5.50. It's an absolute steal, for some of the best damn REAL Mexican food you'll find short of travelling there.
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The other night I found myself with a strange craving for fish. I don't often eat seafood these days, largely because I've been quite broke, and any sort of seafood has a tendency to cost an arm and a leg.
But the power of one of my strange cravings is not to be trifled with, and rather than find myself fighting off said craving for the literal weeks it was likely to linger, I instead wound up going to the nearby Safeway to take a look at their seafood stock, hoping actually that they had gotten a share of the massive shipments of smelt that the Redmond Safeway has been getting of late.
They did not turn out to have any such, but they did have some surprisingly nice, surprisingly fresh, sole, which I acquired immediately, and then set about wandering through the store, trying to come up with a recipe for it. Wandering through the "ethnic food" aisle, I somehow hit upon the concept of poaching it in some kind of green salsa.
A brief perusal of my available options in the store, led me to promptly check out, and rush over to the Colima Market to acquire some real ingredients, in the form of two tomatillos, one each of pasilla and Anaheim peppers, two limes, cilantro, shrimp boullion, and bistek.
A sudden flash of inspiration on the way back home led to me swinging back by the Safeway for a can of coconut milk for which I was horridly over charged, and a can of Jumex mango nectar.
Once home, the tomatillos and the peppers were roughly chopped and tossed in the food processor, along with the juice of both limes, a healthy dose of cilantro, a sprinkling of bistek, salt, pepper, and Tapatio. this all got pulsed until very finely chopped but not quite pureed, essentially making a nice mild tomatillo salsa.
This then went into a saute pan, along with the coconut milk, a cube of the shrimp bouillion, more bistek and tapatio, a splash of the mango nectar, and salt and pepper. Into the resulting liquid went about 3/4 to 1 lb of sole fillets, on a high flame until the liquid just started to simmer, then reduced to a very low flame, covered, and them simmered for about 15 minutes, then removed from the flame and let to set for another 10 while the rice I intended to serve it over finished cooking.
For the rice, I made a 2 cup helping, substituting some of the liquid for half a lime's juice and some more of the mango nectar, and also adding a touch more bistek, tapatio, a couple whole sprigs of cilantro, and some salt and pepper. This gets brought to a boil and then covered and reduced to a very low flame for about 20 minutes, then taken off the flame and left to sit for about 10 minutes with the lid still on.
Once it's all done, fluff the rice with a fork, serve some out over the plate, and then top with sole and the left over cooking liquid.
The sole is positively melt in you mouth tender, and the sauce is tangy, sweet, savory, all at once, and almost no trace of heat surprisingly enough.
It was a great meal, and my dining companion said it was the closest to Yucatan style cuisine he's had since living there.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Thursday, February 14, 2008
A fine evening.
Last night I finally got another opportunity to make my chicken Alfredo, and I must say, it was quite possibly the best batch of the stuff I've ever made.
The chicken was a little bit different this time. Usually I would go for fresh chicken, cut into chunks, and then sauteed. Once cooked through, in would go the butter, cream, cheese, and fettucine.
This time however, we'd gotten a killer deal on a rotisserie chicken from the nearby Costco. $5 for a whole chicken is rather tough to pass up. So I took the breasts of the chicken, pulled them apart, and then took the shredded chicken and tossed it in the saute pan with a whole stick of butter, a couple cloves of minced garlic, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder.
The chicken, by itself, was already incredibly delicious once it had been cooking in the butter for a while, and soaked up all kinds of wonderful fat and flavor. Once tossed together with the pasta, a pint of heavy cream, and about 5 oz of grated Asiago cheese, and then simmered for a while to thicken, it produced a rich pasta dish that felt like it was making love to your mouth.
Now, to cap the night with a cocktail, I continued my experimentation with cachaca. I havent' had the budget for my regular trips to Hola lately, and when I found that the East Bend Liquor Store stocks the stuff for about the price of two caipirinhas at Hola, I figured I would give a shot at making my own caipirinhas.
The first experiment was atrocious. For one, I couldn't find any decent limes at the shops we went to that day, so I wound up having to settle for lime juice. For two, I just plain fucked up the recipe. Not enough lime juice, too much brown sugar, too much cachaca. It was unpleasant to drink, and neither myself, nor my drinking buddy, were able to finish them. There were brief moments that almost tasted like the real thing, but mostly it was awful.
So last night, I basically gave up on trying to do a traditional caipirinha, with the intention of trying again at a later date with some real limes perhaps. Instead, I wound up doing something similar, only this time, I cut back a hair on the brown sugar, only used about a shot of cachaca, and finished it off with some 7-up.
The resulting mix was fantastic, the same kind of refreshing, mellow, "I-can-drink-this-all-day" feeling you get from a caipirinha, it just doesn't actually taste much of anything like one.
The chicken was a little bit different this time. Usually I would go for fresh chicken, cut into chunks, and then sauteed. Once cooked through, in would go the butter, cream, cheese, and fettucine.
This time however, we'd gotten a killer deal on a rotisserie chicken from the nearby Costco. $5 for a whole chicken is rather tough to pass up. So I took the breasts of the chicken, pulled them apart, and then took the shredded chicken and tossed it in the saute pan with a whole stick of butter, a couple cloves of minced garlic, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder.
The chicken, by itself, was already incredibly delicious once it had been cooking in the butter for a while, and soaked up all kinds of wonderful fat and flavor. Once tossed together with the pasta, a pint of heavy cream, and about 5 oz of grated Asiago cheese, and then simmered for a while to thicken, it produced a rich pasta dish that felt like it was making love to your mouth.
Now, to cap the night with a cocktail, I continued my experimentation with cachaca. I havent' had the budget for my regular trips to Hola lately, and when I found that the East Bend Liquor Store stocks the stuff for about the price of two caipirinhas at Hola, I figured I would give a shot at making my own caipirinhas.
The first experiment was atrocious. For one, I couldn't find any decent limes at the shops we went to that day, so I wound up having to settle for lime juice. For two, I just plain fucked up the recipe. Not enough lime juice, too much brown sugar, too much cachaca. It was unpleasant to drink, and neither myself, nor my drinking buddy, were able to finish them. There were brief moments that almost tasted like the real thing, but mostly it was awful.
So last night, I basically gave up on trying to do a traditional caipirinha, with the intention of trying again at a later date with some real limes perhaps. Instead, I wound up doing something similar, only this time, I cut back a hair on the brown sugar, only used about a shot of cachaca, and finished it off with some 7-up.
The resulting mix was fantastic, the same kind of refreshing, mellow, "I-can-drink-this-all-day" feeling you get from a caipirinha, it just doesn't actually taste much of anything like one.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
For whom the bell tolls.
Well, it seems my time has come at the Japanese restaurant.
I was informed today, whilst in the midst of my lunch I might add, that my employer no longer desires my services for the dinner shift, leaving only the now ever so brief morning period (currently a whopping two hours on average), and thus cutting my hours to roughly enough to buy me a hell of a lot of ramen.
Ultimately, I think it comes down to culture difference. Put simply, the kind of kitchen culture and attitude which comes naturally to me is one that more resembles Gordon Ramsay's behavior or what Anthony Bourdain describes when he speaks of life in the professional kitchen, while what they are expecting is apparently some coddled little whelp who takes a heap of shit and asks politely for more. These are the kind of people who probably watch Ramsay on Hell's Kitchen and think "What an awful man", whereas I am the type of person who would be sitting in the audience and probably beating him to the punch.
I admit, unwaveringly, that I am an ill-tempered bastard when the chips are down. I swear like a fucking sailor, I'm constantly in a near or outright rage, and I quite simply have no patience nor do I possess any capacity to put up with much shit. I swear at myself, I swear about the customers, about the orders, about the prep, about fucking everything. As Bourdain put it in an interview at the Google campus, the kitchen becomes a world of hyperbolic black and white, only in my case, things have a far greater tendency to be evil horrible bastards than great saviors, with the sole exception of my sous chef, whom I now realize I will not be working with again.
The engine of my rage however, had become downright turbocharged over the last several months however. Stuck, alone, fighting a seemingly constantly losing battle just to keep my head above water, working my ass harder and harder everyday it seemed, for less and less reward. Even on the two glorious nights out of my workweek when I actually had a second cook to assist, more often than not, he'd be stolen away to the sushi bar, leaving me alone trying to battle through a dinner rush, running what is essentially three or four stations at once. I had at least one episode which could be best described as a near nervous breakdown, complete with alternating bouts of violent destruction and near tears, and pushed through only by the sheer motivating power that is the call of "Order up!"
But for all that, I must say that in, say, Yoko's, my alma mater, the kind of furious temper that si known to overcome me in the heat of a hard rush or a massive prep crunch, never seemed out of place to anyone, never did anyone bat an eye. Certainly there were more than a few confrontations, with waitstaff, with fellow cooks, even the occasional one with the boss whom I otherwise got on quite well with. There were definite shouting matches, and in a few occasion, even threats of violence. But it's a high stress environment, and at the end of the day, everyone seemed to somehow accept that this was simply part of the job, the curse of the kitchen. The same son of a bitch who threatened to beat the shit out of me in the middle of the kitchen, and whose face I was sorely tempted to slam into the the hot grill, would wind up giving me a ride home a few weeks later. Honestly, I seemed to be the one who had the most problems with taking that shit home with me.
And for better or for worse, that's just the kind of environment I expect in a kitchen, and I know I'm not alone in this, or Bourdain wouldn't sell out so many damn book signings. It's liberating in a sense, and in some ways helps keep the blood flowing. The kitchen is a warzone, and you absolutely cannot let those bastards keep you down. The orders are the enemy, the tools of the trade your weapons, and the food your ammunition. It is nothing short of a battle for your own survival, but when you constantly find yourself outgunned, outmanned, ill-equipped, and poorly supplied, after a while the most battle-hardened soldier is gonna find his morale seriously tested.
The bastards nearly killed me this time, and for my service, I get bucked out. But this ronin doesn't know anything left but fighting the good fight, and that means it's time to find a new banner to fight for, and a more rough and tumble troop to serve with.
And I'm seriously thinking it might be time for some more advanced training.
I was informed today, whilst in the midst of my lunch I might add, that my employer no longer desires my services for the dinner shift, leaving only the now ever so brief morning period (currently a whopping two hours on average), and thus cutting my hours to roughly enough to buy me a hell of a lot of ramen.
Ultimately, I think it comes down to culture difference. Put simply, the kind of kitchen culture and attitude which comes naturally to me is one that more resembles Gordon Ramsay's behavior or what Anthony Bourdain describes when he speaks of life in the professional kitchen, while what they are expecting is apparently some coddled little whelp who takes a heap of shit and asks politely for more. These are the kind of people who probably watch Ramsay on Hell's Kitchen and think "What an awful man", whereas I am the type of person who would be sitting in the audience and probably beating him to the punch.
I admit, unwaveringly, that I am an ill-tempered bastard when the chips are down. I swear like a fucking sailor, I'm constantly in a near or outright rage, and I quite simply have no patience nor do I possess any capacity to put up with much shit. I swear at myself, I swear about the customers, about the orders, about the prep, about fucking everything. As Bourdain put it in an interview at the Google campus, the kitchen becomes a world of hyperbolic black and white, only in my case, things have a far greater tendency to be evil horrible bastards than great saviors, with the sole exception of my sous chef, whom I now realize I will not be working with again.
The engine of my rage however, had become downright turbocharged over the last several months however. Stuck, alone, fighting a seemingly constantly losing battle just to keep my head above water, working my ass harder and harder everyday it seemed, for less and less reward. Even on the two glorious nights out of my workweek when I actually had a second cook to assist, more often than not, he'd be stolen away to the sushi bar, leaving me alone trying to battle through a dinner rush, running what is essentially three or four stations at once. I had at least one episode which could be best described as a near nervous breakdown, complete with alternating bouts of violent destruction and near tears, and pushed through only by the sheer motivating power that is the call of "Order up!"
But for all that, I must say that in, say, Yoko's, my alma mater, the kind of furious temper that si known to overcome me in the heat of a hard rush or a massive prep crunch, never seemed out of place to anyone, never did anyone bat an eye. Certainly there were more than a few confrontations, with waitstaff, with fellow cooks, even the occasional one with the boss whom I otherwise got on quite well with. There were definite shouting matches, and in a few occasion, even threats of violence. But it's a high stress environment, and at the end of the day, everyone seemed to somehow accept that this was simply part of the job, the curse of the kitchen. The same son of a bitch who threatened to beat the shit out of me in the middle of the kitchen, and whose face I was sorely tempted to slam into the the hot grill, would wind up giving me a ride home a few weeks later. Honestly, I seemed to be the one who had the most problems with taking that shit home with me.
And for better or for worse, that's just the kind of environment I expect in a kitchen, and I know I'm not alone in this, or Bourdain wouldn't sell out so many damn book signings. It's liberating in a sense, and in some ways helps keep the blood flowing. The kitchen is a warzone, and you absolutely cannot let those bastards keep you down. The orders are the enemy, the tools of the trade your weapons, and the food your ammunition. It is nothing short of a battle for your own survival, but when you constantly find yourself outgunned, outmanned, ill-equipped, and poorly supplied, after a while the most battle-hardened soldier is gonna find his morale seriously tested.
The bastards nearly killed me this time, and for my service, I get bucked out. But this ronin doesn't know anything left but fighting the good fight, and that means it's time to find a new banner to fight for, and a more rough and tumble troop to serve with.
And I'm seriously thinking it might be time for some more advanced training.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
A piece of home, with a twist.
As a kid, one of our favorite cheap meals in my family was the wiener wrap. You roll up some hotdogs and grated cheese inside cheap canned biscuit dough, and pop 'em in the oven for however long the package directions on the can say. It's a bit Sandra Lee, and admittedly chock full of all kinds of artificial preservatives and everything else, but it's a tasty bit of homemade junk food regardless.
Tonight, while sitting about waiting for a diagnostic on a spare PC I had sitting around, I got a sudden craving for the things, and decided they'd be a cheap alternative to what I'd originally planned, which was having some of Abby's Pizza's delicious chicken and spuds delivered.
So I marched off through the winter wonderland to Ray's, and after wandering indecisively for half an hour as is my custom, wound up deciding to get a little more fancy with them.
For the meat, I went with some fresh hot Italian sausage from the meat dept., for the cheese, some grated Asiago, and for the dough, some croissant dough.
The dough concerned me a little, I think it may've been past it's shelf life a bit as it smelled fermented. But it was late, and I didn't feel like trudging back through the snow to go get another one or something.
It took me several tries before I finally figured out how best to roll the sausages up in the dough, but once I did, I put them in the oven at 350 for about 18 minutes or so. They still looked kind of pale at this point, so I gave them another 2 minutes to get them nice and golden brown.
They looked fine at first when I pulled them out, until I started trying to take them off the pan. They'd cooked together on the sides, and for some reason this caused the dough to not cook completely on the sides, so they had to go back in the oven for another 5 minutes to finish them off.
I finally got them done however, and they proved quite tasty. Probably could've used a bit more cheese I think, and they were very heavy, and kinda greasy, but still rather tasty and quite filling too. I was only able to eat 2, and the second one was rather pushing it I think. I'll have leftovers now for lunch at work tomorrow, and possibly dinner as well.
Tonight, while sitting about waiting for a diagnostic on a spare PC I had sitting around, I got a sudden craving for the things, and decided they'd be a cheap alternative to what I'd originally planned, which was having some of Abby's Pizza's delicious chicken and spuds delivered.
So I marched off through the winter wonderland to Ray's, and after wandering indecisively for half an hour as is my custom, wound up deciding to get a little more fancy with them.
For the meat, I went with some fresh hot Italian sausage from the meat dept., for the cheese, some grated Asiago, and for the dough, some croissant dough.
The dough concerned me a little, I think it may've been past it's shelf life a bit as it smelled fermented. But it was late, and I didn't feel like trudging back through the snow to go get another one or something.
It took me several tries before I finally figured out how best to roll the sausages up in the dough, but once I did, I put them in the oven at 350 for about 18 minutes or so. They still looked kind of pale at this point, so I gave them another 2 minutes to get them nice and golden brown.
They looked fine at first when I pulled them out, until I started trying to take them off the pan. They'd cooked together on the sides, and for some reason this caused the dough to not cook completely on the sides, so they had to go back in the oven for another 5 minutes to finish them off.
I finally got them done however, and they proved quite tasty. Probably could've used a bit more cheese I think, and they were very heavy, and kinda greasy, but still rather tasty and quite filling too. I was only able to eat 2, and the second one was rather pushing it I think. I'll have leftovers now for lunch at work tomorrow, and possibly dinner as well.
Monday, January 21, 2008
Try the caipirinha.
I have discovered a new favorite drink.
Hola! makes caipirinhas.
Yet again, Bourdain has failed to steer me wrong.
It was a couple weeks ago I had my first one. We were out for the evening's meal, and I decided to have a cocktail. Without really thinking about it, I ordered my usual gin and tonic, and noted a look of disappointment on the face of my waiter.
As I idly sipped my gin and waited for my food, I picked up the drink menu, and my eyes wandered down and immediately noticed something I had not seen the last time: caipirinhas.
In that very instant, I knew I had to try one. I could not pass up the opportunity to consume a beverage that my personal idol has spoken so glowingly of, so without hesitation, I ordered one.
The waiter brought me the fresh caipirinhas, which adds to the usual mix of lime, cachaca, and sugar, some hibiscus nectar, mango, grilled pineapple, and a few other things I've now forgotten, because the instant you taste it, a wave of pure bliss over comes all of your synapses, and the only thing you can think about at that point is moving to the beaches of Brazil and drinking caipirinhas all day.
It is one of those moments much like the previously discussed climactic moment in Ratatouille, where a food transcends beyond merely tasting great, but actually takes you somewhere else altogether.
So this recent Saturday, when it came time to make dinner plans, the first thing that came to mind was caipirinhas, as I was nursing a bit of a hangover from a night of pounding Henry Weinhard's and playing Rock Band all night, and figured, what better "hair of the dog" solution than the magical nectar that is the caipirinha?
However, a sudden craving for tempura in my dining companion led to us deciding to first take our meal at Yoko's. We wound up getting the veggie tempura, the spicy Thai roll, Batman roll, spicy albacore roll, broiled mussels, and some seared albacore sashimi. Phelan was our sushi chef for the evening, and, as always, everything he made for us was absolutely fantastic. I've known Phelan for years, I got my start in the business of food at Yoko's downtown years ago, and he makes some excellent sushi.
After we wrapped up our fantastic meal however, we decided to end the evening with a nightcap of caipirinhas. This time, a slight misunderstanding with our waiter led to us getting the regular caipirinhas, and I was initially concerned once I realized that we had not been served the same drink as before.
All such doubt of course, instantly disappeared from my thoughts the second I tasted it, because it was still every bit the heavenly drink the fresh caipirinha is, just different. More pure and simple, but no less amazing. You will be served fantastically by either, and I would have a hard time choosing any preference between them.
For yesterday's meal, I finally executed a plan I'd been intending to try for some weeks now. At work I had attempted to make a rolled, breaded veal dish, stuffed with a "Peppadew" goat cheese, but the veal I had used was largely dismal, and the breading didn't adhere well. However, the goat cheese itself, once it had melted and blended with the hint of honey mustard I'd added, was incredible, and I knew from that moment I had to do something with it.
My friend had mentioned that he had a ton of ham, and so this rolled about in my brain a bit before deciding that I wanted to do some kind of goat cheese cordon bleu dish. Eventually, I decided to go all pretentious fusion cuisine, and make goat cheese Cordon Bleu wontons.
So I mixed the remaining "peppadew" goat cheese, with some other three pepper stuff, shredded ham, minced chicken, some garlic, honey mustard, and a few spices. The mixtured got put in the wonton's crab puff style, and dropped in the deep fryer.
Unfortunately, they just weren't that great. The oil was on it's second usage, and it started going funky quick, and somehow, the process wasn't hot enough to get the goat cheese to melt properly. Plus my wontons weren't staying terribly well sealed, which meant the insides getting a lot of grease in them.
The filling also needed something else, like some vegetable of some kind, or some apple. Something light and crisp to cut through the heaviness of all that meat and goat cheese. I tried it in a panini this morning and, while it melted properly and tastes pretty good, it's damn heavy on it's own, and the buttery grilled bread only exacerbates the problem.
However, one thing all this experimentation has succeeded in is breaking me of a fear of goat cheese that came from some truly foul Carre du Berry that was my only previous experience with the stuff. In fact, I've come to rather like the stuff, in moderation of course . . .
Hola! makes caipirinhas.
Yet again, Bourdain has failed to steer me wrong.
It was a couple weeks ago I had my first one. We were out for the evening's meal, and I decided to have a cocktail. Without really thinking about it, I ordered my usual gin and tonic, and noted a look of disappointment on the face of my waiter.
As I idly sipped my gin and waited for my food, I picked up the drink menu, and my eyes wandered down and immediately noticed something I had not seen the last time: caipirinhas.
In that very instant, I knew I had to try one. I could not pass up the opportunity to consume a beverage that my personal idol has spoken so glowingly of, so without hesitation, I ordered one.
The waiter brought me the fresh caipirinhas, which adds to the usual mix of lime, cachaca, and sugar, some hibiscus nectar, mango, grilled pineapple, and a few other things I've now forgotten, because the instant you taste it, a wave of pure bliss over comes all of your synapses, and the only thing you can think about at that point is moving to the beaches of Brazil and drinking caipirinhas all day.
It is one of those moments much like the previously discussed climactic moment in Ratatouille, where a food transcends beyond merely tasting great, but actually takes you somewhere else altogether.
So this recent Saturday, when it came time to make dinner plans, the first thing that came to mind was caipirinhas, as I was nursing a bit of a hangover from a night of pounding Henry Weinhard's and playing Rock Band all night, and figured, what better "hair of the dog" solution than the magical nectar that is the caipirinha?
However, a sudden craving for tempura in my dining companion led to us deciding to first take our meal at Yoko's. We wound up getting the veggie tempura, the spicy Thai roll, Batman roll, spicy albacore roll, broiled mussels, and some seared albacore sashimi. Phelan was our sushi chef for the evening, and, as always, everything he made for us was absolutely fantastic. I've known Phelan for years, I got my start in the business of food at Yoko's downtown years ago, and he makes some excellent sushi.
After we wrapped up our fantastic meal however, we decided to end the evening with a nightcap of caipirinhas. This time, a slight misunderstanding with our waiter led to us getting the regular caipirinhas, and I was initially concerned once I realized that we had not been served the same drink as before.
All such doubt of course, instantly disappeared from my thoughts the second I tasted it, because it was still every bit the heavenly drink the fresh caipirinha is, just different. More pure and simple, but no less amazing. You will be served fantastically by either, and I would have a hard time choosing any preference between them.
For yesterday's meal, I finally executed a plan I'd been intending to try for some weeks now. At work I had attempted to make a rolled, breaded veal dish, stuffed with a "Peppadew" goat cheese, but the veal I had used was largely dismal, and the breading didn't adhere well. However, the goat cheese itself, once it had melted and blended with the hint of honey mustard I'd added, was incredible, and I knew from that moment I had to do something with it.
My friend had mentioned that he had a ton of ham, and so this rolled about in my brain a bit before deciding that I wanted to do some kind of goat cheese cordon bleu dish. Eventually, I decided to go all pretentious fusion cuisine, and make goat cheese Cordon Bleu wontons.
So I mixed the remaining "peppadew" goat cheese, with some other three pepper stuff, shredded ham, minced chicken, some garlic, honey mustard, and a few spices. The mixtured got put in the wonton's crab puff style, and dropped in the deep fryer.
Unfortunately, they just weren't that great. The oil was on it's second usage, and it started going funky quick, and somehow, the process wasn't hot enough to get the goat cheese to melt properly. Plus my wontons weren't staying terribly well sealed, which meant the insides getting a lot of grease in them.
The filling also needed something else, like some vegetable of some kind, or some apple. Something light and crisp to cut through the heaviness of all that meat and goat cheese. I tried it in a panini this morning and, while it melted properly and tastes pretty good, it's damn heavy on it's own, and the buttery grilled bread only exacerbates the problem.
However, one thing all this experimentation has succeeded in is breaking me of a fear of goat cheese that came from some truly foul Carre du Berry that was my only previous experience with the stuff. In fact, I've come to rather like the stuff, in moderation of course . . .
Monday, January 14, 2008
The Buffet of the Damned.
There is something about buffet restaurants that has always unnerved me as a cook. I was never quite sure what it was, exactly. Sure the food is generally frozen crap, and generally focused on pure quantity with quality of any sort rarely entering the picture except by pure chance, but the same could be said of much fast food or even the average chain restaurant.
Recently however, my eating companion and I visited a new restaurant, the King's Buffet in Bend, OR, and it was upon leaving that restaurant, feeling slightly unsettled, that I finally realized what it was that had been bothering me all this time.
Buffets are for people who hate food.
This might seem like a contradiction of basic logic. After all, what better place for a lover of food than a place where you can eat your fill of any of a staggering array of dishes. Selection, quantity, and all self service too!
This is of course, pure bullshit, but it is the kind of twist in logic that keeps bringing me back to the places from time to time, despite my almost irrational fear of them. However, there is another clue to the true nature of these places in the other reason I usually wind up in them: desperation.
And from this I return to the point that these are not places for people who love food, but rather, they are for people who see food as some sort of onerous obligation, and who would rather be done with it altogether were it not for that bothersome aspect of biology whereby the lack of consumption is liable to result in death.
So, rather than concentrate at all on what they eat, they take the route of the purest swine, and belly up to the nearest trough, and eat whatever vile slop flows past them until they can but roll about in the mud like an over bloated sow. How better to delay any further need for sustenance than simply cramming your gullet past it's limit. The goal is not satisfaction here, indeed, the goal is perverted into the reverse, to cram such massive slop buckets worth of garbage in your face that your body is now utterly repulsed by the mere thought of food.
You can see it in the faces of the patrons. The only ones who generally don't bear at least some hint of a depressing pallor are the children, who are by nature generally happy to eat basically anything. There is a strange, downtrodden grimace that afflicts the face of a buffet patron, as if the very soul of their palate has been drained from them, and they are now left only with a hatred of food and those who craft it.
The buffet is, to me, hostile territory, like the pious marching into the gates of hell. I cannot help but feel unnerved and out of place in a buffet, because it's very nature is poison to the pursuit of true cuisine. That sense of dread and fear is simply a manifestation of the very same bone chilling shiver that afflicts a man confronted with a place of pure evil, an infernal sacrificial altar upon which food is offered up for the slaughter in the name of a darker, twisted faith that worships only blind consumption and gluttony for gluttony's sake.
It may be that there are still buffets out there taken in a spirit of a love of food, I have heard good things about the true traditional smörgåsbord, but until presented with such, I can only intone that old saying, "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
Recently however, my eating companion and I visited a new restaurant, the King's Buffet in Bend, OR, and it was upon leaving that restaurant, feeling slightly unsettled, that I finally realized what it was that had been bothering me all this time.
Buffets are for people who hate food.
This might seem like a contradiction of basic logic. After all, what better place for a lover of food than a place where you can eat your fill of any of a staggering array of dishes. Selection, quantity, and all self service too!
This is of course, pure bullshit, but it is the kind of twist in logic that keeps bringing me back to the places from time to time, despite my almost irrational fear of them. However, there is another clue to the true nature of these places in the other reason I usually wind up in them: desperation.
And from this I return to the point that these are not places for people who love food, but rather, they are for people who see food as some sort of onerous obligation, and who would rather be done with it altogether were it not for that bothersome aspect of biology whereby the lack of consumption is liable to result in death.
So, rather than concentrate at all on what they eat, they take the route of the purest swine, and belly up to the nearest trough, and eat whatever vile slop flows past them until they can but roll about in the mud like an over bloated sow. How better to delay any further need for sustenance than simply cramming your gullet past it's limit. The goal is not satisfaction here, indeed, the goal is perverted into the reverse, to cram such massive slop buckets worth of garbage in your face that your body is now utterly repulsed by the mere thought of food.
You can see it in the faces of the patrons. The only ones who generally don't bear at least some hint of a depressing pallor are the children, who are by nature generally happy to eat basically anything. There is a strange, downtrodden grimace that afflicts the face of a buffet patron, as if the very soul of their palate has been drained from them, and they are now left only with a hatred of food and those who craft it.
The buffet is, to me, hostile territory, like the pious marching into the gates of hell. I cannot help but feel unnerved and out of place in a buffet, because it's very nature is poison to the pursuit of true cuisine. That sense of dread and fear is simply a manifestation of the very same bone chilling shiver that afflicts a man confronted with a place of pure evil, an infernal sacrificial altar upon which food is offered up for the slaughter in the name of a darker, twisted faith that worships only blind consumption and gluttony for gluttony's sake.
It may be that there are still buffets out there taken in a spirit of a love of food, I have heard good things about the true traditional smörgåsbord, but until presented with such, I can only intone that old saying, "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Yin and Yang.
So, I have gone through, what is essentially, a study in opposites in the last 12 hours or so of eating.
Yesterday, I was down with a massive hangover, and as is often the case, my response to this was to crave a big greasy burger. I for some reason passed on grabbing a Jody's melt, and wound up going all through my short work shift without eating anything but a bit of miso and rice. So when I got off work, and my friend arrived to cart me off to Bend, I implored him to take me somewhere for a big greasy burger.
So, we went to Kayo's Roadhouse, a cheesy oddly Western-ish themed, and remarkably large restaurant on the north end of Redmond. My friend remarked that the cheep wood and sheet metal decor reminded him of the Japanese internment camps, and this disturbing ambience would prove to foreshadow the entire meal.
After considerable poring over the rather disappointing menu, he decided on the 8oz. petite sirloin, medium rare at my insistence, while I stuck to my guns and ordered a burger with Swiss, grilled onions, and bacon, despite the rather idiotic pricing scheme (purchase the base burger, then tack on the extras for a dollar a pop).
We were first served a basket of rolls which were obviously cheap and frozen, served with a cinnamon butter, and a simple Caesar salad. My friend was suitably impressed with the cinnamon butter, while I found the choice to be a bit odd to accompany a savory dish. The Caesar was reasonably competent I suppose, if, like most, largely inauthentic.
Then came the entrees, and this is of course the part where everything falls apart. For starters, my burger is not greasy at all, in fact, it's dry as a bone. Because it's burnt. The bottom half of the pre-formed and obviously also frozen, pre-packaged burger patty is a layer of black char. The fries are OK, again frozen but this is a common state of affairs in most American restaurants. My only quibble with those was that they had rather inexplicably added cinnamon to the seasoning salt they were dusted with, which again seemed rather out of place.
My companion's steak was, of course, not actually medium rare at all. As my mother taught me as a lad, the vast majority of restaurants tend to overcook everything, so it is generally wise to order the next level of doneness down from whatever you actually want. As a result, the steak wound up coming to us medium, with only a hint of pink left in it. Thank God he took my advice, and didn't ask for medium as he'd originally intended, as I fear for what resulting slab of likely near-charcoal meat might've wound up on his plate. However, this was a minor injustice compared to what one experienced upon actually tasting the steak. Honestly, neither of us were actually convinced it was a real steak, the texture was entirely wrong. There was no realy fiber to the meat, the mouthfeel more resembled a finely ground hamburger that had simply been pressed into a shape vaguely resembling a steak. And the actual flavor bore a strong resemblance to that organ meat flavor one gets in a beef heart or cheap supermarket chuck steak. The capper on the plate was supposedly mashed potatoes, but I'm personally more convinced it was some kind of synthetic gum resin, given the amount of texture and flavor that was left in them.
A waitress eventually came around and replaced my burnt burger with a second offering, as well as another helping of the strange cinnamon fries, which again wound up being the lion's share of my consumption. I made a half hearted attempt at this second burger and while they had managed to at least not actively burn this twice-damned slab of ground beef byproduct, on the whole it was still largely dismal, and the cheese wasn't even properly melted. It was actually still cold on the corners that stuck out of the side of the burger. Something about the whole thing somehow triggered my nose's sense memory, and I found myself again smelling the unspeakably foul "sukiyaki" from my own place of employ, and my appetite basically disappeared at this moment. I'd managed to fill myself up well enough on fries at this point, so at least I'd managed to feed the hunger from my all day fast.
A manager eventually came around as we were leaving, and comped us for $9 of the bill, which still left us paying $20 with tip, which was still far too much for what is, quite undoubtedly, one of the worst meals I have ever consumed. I don't even know that I would've been entirely satisfied with a total comp, and I will not be returning there ever again.
However, this afternoon's meal, was far superior. Instead of a restaurant, we cooked at home. Instead of Western cuisine, we went with American Chinese, in the form of the crab puff.
I had discussed earlier in the week doing a sort of "deep fried weekend", setting up one of the pans as a deep fryer, and going to town with all sorts of fun things. My main driving thought was Buffalo wings, a personal favorite of mine, and one that's just plain better when it's fresh fried at home. My friend however had seen an episode of Good Eats and been left with a massive craving for anything involving wontons.
As crab puffs are one of my favorite appetizer dishes in the world, they seemed like a natural fit for the combined preferences and cravings, being both deep fried, and wonton related.
So we went to the restaurant supply store, got a fryer thermometer, some wonton skins, a big package of imitation crab and a bottle of Kikkoman sweet and sour sauce, and from the regular supermarket, acquired some green onion, cilantro and carrot. We already had a good sized hunk of cream cheese in the fridge, as well as a big jug of cooking oil that had been acquired earlier in the week in preparation for the "deep fried weekend".
The filling wound up consisting of, of course, crab and cream cheese, as well as peeled carrot, chopped green onion, and dashes each of chopped garlic, salt, pepper, malt vinegar, Olive Garden Fiamme hot sauce, and olive oil, and then mashed all together. This went, about half a teaspoon or so at a time, folded into the wonton skins, first folding them in half and sealing the edge with water, then crimping edge corner flap twice.
These got dropped into hot oil, about 350 degrees F, and cooked till nice and golden brown on each side, generally taking about 3-5 minutes at a guess, turning them at least once during cooking.
The sweet and sour turned out to be largely disgusting, so for a dipping sauce we wound up just using some sweet chili sauce with a splash of malt vinegar.
The sauce wound up being largely superflous however. They were, simply, the best crab puffs I've ever consumed, better even than any of the restaurants I've eaten them at that impressed me with their quality. They had enough of a good flavor all their own, that they really were better without the sauce as tasty as it was.
We ate an insane number of them, in the end splitting something like 30 or more of the things, leaving the both of us stuffed to the gills. I ate so many I don't think I'll be able to think of eating them again for a while.
Certainly made up for last night's pathetic excuse for "food".
Yesterday, I was down with a massive hangover, and as is often the case, my response to this was to crave a big greasy burger. I for some reason passed on grabbing a Jody's melt, and wound up going all through my short work shift without eating anything but a bit of miso and rice. So when I got off work, and my friend arrived to cart me off to Bend, I implored him to take me somewhere for a big greasy burger.
So, we went to Kayo's Roadhouse, a cheesy oddly Western-ish themed, and remarkably large restaurant on the north end of Redmond. My friend remarked that the cheep wood and sheet metal decor reminded him of the Japanese internment camps, and this disturbing ambience would prove to foreshadow the entire meal.
After considerable poring over the rather disappointing menu, he decided on the 8oz. petite sirloin, medium rare at my insistence, while I stuck to my guns and ordered a burger with Swiss, grilled onions, and bacon, despite the rather idiotic pricing scheme (purchase the base burger, then tack on the extras for a dollar a pop).
We were first served a basket of rolls which were obviously cheap and frozen, served with a cinnamon butter, and a simple Caesar salad. My friend was suitably impressed with the cinnamon butter, while I found the choice to be a bit odd to accompany a savory dish. The Caesar was reasonably competent I suppose, if, like most, largely inauthentic.
Then came the entrees, and this is of course the part where everything falls apart. For starters, my burger is not greasy at all, in fact, it's dry as a bone. Because it's burnt. The bottom half of the pre-formed and obviously also frozen, pre-packaged burger patty is a layer of black char. The fries are OK, again frozen but this is a common state of affairs in most American restaurants. My only quibble with those was that they had rather inexplicably added cinnamon to the seasoning salt they were dusted with, which again seemed rather out of place.
My companion's steak was, of course, not actually medium rare at all. As my mother taught me as a lad, the vast majority of restaurants tend to overcook everything, so it is generally wise to order the next level of doneness down from whatever you actually want. As a result, the steak wound up coming to us medium, with only a hint of pink left in it. Thank God he took my advice, and didn't ask for medium as he'd originally intended, as I fear for what resulting slab of likely near-charcoal meat might've wound up on his plate. However, this was a minor injustice compared to what one experienced upon actually tasting the steak. Honestly, neither of us were actually convinced it was a real steak, the texture was entirely wrong. There was no realy fiber to the meat, the mouthfeel more resembled a finely ground hamburger that had simply been pressed into a shape vaguely resembling a steak. And the actual flavor bore a strong resemblance to that organ meat flavor one gets in a beef heart or cheap supermarket chuck steak. The capper on the plate was supposedly mashed potatoes, but I'm personally more convinced it was some kind of synthetic gum resin, given the amount of texture and flavor that was left in them.
A waitress eventually came around and replaced my burnt burger with a second offering, as well as another helping of the strange cinnamon fries, which again wound up being the lion's share of my consumption. I made a half hearted attempt at this second burger and while they had managed to at least not actively burn this twice-damned slab of ground beef byproduct, on the whole it was still largely dismal, and the cheese wasn't even properly melted. It was actually still cold on the corners that stuck out of the side of the burger. Something about the whole thing somehow triggered my nose's sense memory, and I found myself again smelling the unspeakably foul "sukiyaki" from my own place of employ, and my appetite basically disappeared at this moment. I'd managed to fill myself up well enough on fries at this point, so at least I'd managed to feed the hunger from my all day fast.
A manager eventually came around as we were leaving, and comped us for $9 of the bill, which still left us paying $20 with tip, which was still far too much for what is, quite undoubtedly, one of the worst meals I have ever consumed. I don't even know that I would've been entirely satisfied with a total comp, and I will not be returning there ever again.
However, this afternoon's meal, was far superior. Instead of a restaurant, we cooked at home. Instead of Western cuisine, we went with American Chinese, in the form of the crab puff.
I had discussed earlier in the week doing a sort of "deep fried weekend", setting up one of the pans as a deep fryer, and going to town with all sorts of fun things. My main driving thought was Buffalo wings, a personal favorite of mine, and one that's just plain better when it's fresh fried at home. My friend however had seen an episode of Good Eats and been left with a massive craving for anything involving wontons.
As crab puffs are one of my favorite appetizer dishes in the world, they seemed like a natural fit for the combined preferences and cravings, being both deep fried, and wonton related.
So we went to the restaurant supply store, got a fryer thermometer, some wonton skins, a big package of imitation crab and a bottle of Kikkoman sweet and sour sauce, and from the regular supermarket, acquired some green onion, cilantro and carrot. We already had a good sized hunk of cream cheese in the fridge, as well as a big jug of cooking oil that had been acquired earlier in the week in preparation for the "deep fried weekend".
The filling wound up consisting of, of course, crab and cream cheese, as well as peeled carrot, chopped green onion, and dashes each of chopped garlic, salt, pepper, malt vinegar, Olive Garden Fiamme hot sauce, and olive oil, and then mashed all together. This went, about half a teaspoon or so at a time, folded into the wonton skins, first folding them in half and sealing the edge with water, then crimping edge corner flap twice.
These got dropped into hot oil, about 350 degrees F, and cooked till nice and golden brown on each side, generally taking about 3-5 minutes at a guess, turning them at least once during cooking.
The sweet and sour turned out to be largely disgusting, so for a dipping sauce we wound up just using some sweet chili sauce with a splash of malt vinegar.
The sauce wound up being largely superflous however. They were, simply, the best crab puffs I've ever consumed, better even than any of the restaurants I've eaten them at that impressed me with their quality. They had enough of a good flavor all their own, that they really were better without the sauce as tasty as it was.
We ate an insane number of them, in the end splitting something like 30 or more of the things, leaving the both of us stuffed to the gills. I ate so many I don't think I'll be able to think of eating them again for a while.
Certainly made up for last night's pathetic excuse for "food".
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