Bond Girl
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Posts posted by Bond Girl
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I've never been to the old La Cote Basque but from what I heard, it was more private and more romantic. The new place is just kind of cute.
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In connection with the Q&A and Workman Publishing, we will be giving away five copies of the Cheese Primer to members who asked the most interesting questions on this Forum.
Winners will be announced at the end of the Q&A week. So, fire away the questions!
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In Taiwanese, we called it dao-zu. I eat it with rice or plain congee made with water rather than stock.
I've always wanted to know, but have been afraid to ask until now. What is Taiwanese? Is this the language spoken in Taiwan before the Chinese arrived there?
If not, why isn't the language called Fujianhua or Xiamenhua? Or has it evolved so much in Taiwan that it justifies a new name? Just curious...
It's a derivative of Fujian-hua. I think it used to be a lot more similar but now it's very different. I can understand my fujian speaking friends but not completely. Lo-bak-kuo is a mixture of steamed taro, dried shrimp and rice flour right?
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In Taiwanese, we called it dao-zu. I eat it with rice or plain congee made with water rather than stock.
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Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific's terminal has an excellent noodle bar and sushi bar.
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Welcome to eGullet, ChefGEB. For those that have read the most recent issue of Food and Wine, ChefGEB is one of the top ten 2004 Best Chefs. I look forward to your contribution to the board.
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Brasserie LCB is most certainly open for business. On a saturday night, the place was littered with the crowd from the former La Cote Basque. From what I gathered, the place is very different from its former La Cote Basque incarnation. According to the couple next to me the old La Cote Basque had a lot of private booth and alcoves. The new decor was more like a Parisian bistro with penny tile floors, dark leather banquettes and art nouveau lighting. Food is traditional French and, from what I heard, very similar to the old La Cote Basque food.
I started my dinner with an amuse made of puree chick pas and tomatos, which has a lot of flavors in a very small portions. Next, I had a crab salad on sliced mango toped with lobster and caviar for appetizer. The crabmeat was complimented by the sweetness of the mangos. While the caviar made sense as it sweetned the mangoes, the lobster seemed rather superfluous to the whole dish. My friend had the escargot, which was nice and garlicky with an interesting topiing of pine nuts. For entree, I ordered the Salmon which was marinated and served with citrus burre blanc. May be it was the combination of a fatty fish like salmon with a butter sauce, may it was the overly sweet orange slices placed around the salmon, this dish didn't work for me. Thebster are was not enough citrus to balance the fatty taste of the salmon and the butter sauce made the fish taste cloying. Meanwhile, my friend's lobster and shrimp fricassee was a lovely and rich dish, though I wouldn't have want to eat it in such great proportions.
Dessert was a grand marnier souffle and profiteroles, both solid comfort food. The service was excellent and the staff was extremely knowledgeable about the food and wine pairings.
Brasserie LCB raised several questions for me: Although the food was undeniably authentic French, and expertly executed, there was so much butter, cream and fat in each of the dishes that it daunted even a habitually unhealthy person like me. While there is an older crowd that sees this style of cusine as the essence of fine food, I think the younger generations of Americans are not used to eating like this. Even though, many of the four star restaurants in NYC are still decidedly French, these restaurants are increasingly being influenced by lighter mediterranean and Asian elements.
So, are Americans redefining the concept of "fine dining"? If so, has traditional french food become "old fashioned"?
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Here's another crime - putting soy sauce in all Chinese food. Just because it has soy sauce in it, doesn't make it Chinese! Some of the best Chinese foods are flavored simply, so the flavors of the food stands out.
lorea i'm with on that one 150%!!!
being chinese i find myself constantly threatening my non-chinese friends with gbh if they dare pour soya sauce on their egg fried rice before they even tasted it.
silly side story here:
I was in a very busy chinese restaurant and the couple on the next table
asked for light soya sauce, the waiter came back with dark soya sauce which is the normal dipping variety. Light soya sauce is used for cooking as its more salty then dark soya.
The waiter explained this to the couple and then they went into a fit with the waiter that they always had light soya sauce and how were they expected to eat chinese food without light soya sauce???!!!
The waiter looked a bit miffed and did return with the light soya sauce at which point the couple complained that it wasn't like the normal soya sauce they had
That is a crime against restaurant and food! Being Chinese myself, I am still baffled over certain things like "duck sauce" which a lot of my non-chinese friends like to pour over everything.
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Flavorless tomato sauce.
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The low carb-ing of foods that are rightfully meant to be full of them.
I saw an ad the other day for new low-carb cookies. Maybe if you are on a low-carb diet, you should just stay away from the cookies in the first place.
Low-carb pizza dough...
Low-carb bread...
Low-carb wraps...
The low carb thing really makes me nuts! The other thing is redi-whip, how hard can it be to whip up some cream or make some creme friche.
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A rather unlikely combination but in the Beastie Boys' newly release CD "To the 5 Boroughs" there is a tribute to Sara Mouton. Apparently Adam "ad-Rock" Horovitz is a bg food TV fan. Does anyone has the CD?
Source: Bullfrog and Baum Press release
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chefs who forget to season their food so everything taste bland. A little salt to finish really goes a long way and should be beaten into them in culinary school.
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grilled vegetables particularly portabello mushrooms (which are STILL delicious though oft poo pooed, but i don't think you need me to tell you that...) that are DROWNED in balsamic vinegar
and for that matter
balsamic vinaigrette (tho' I had one today that was surprisingly delicious, but this is the first ever)
That really sends me over the edge. How's about this microwaved cream sauce that is greasy all over.
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The nice mesculin salad that is swimming in dressing really makes me crazy too.
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I hate all you guys. Now I am off to B&N to get that Mes Confiture book.
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Inspired by FG's al dante thread and my recent visit to Mastuhisa in Aspen, this is a thread about some of the things that restaurants do that really spoils the otherwise good food. The toro served at Mastuhisa in Aspen was so much soy sauce and miso that you can't even taste the richness of the blue fin tuna. It's silly because why waste money on perfectly good blue fin tuna when the customer can't even taste it.
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G, I guess I got on to this a bit too late, but congratulations and I am eager to hear your success. Keep us all posted.
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Awww! Thanks!
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Actually that is the actress Bai Ling, Not sure what she's been in recently.
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The book party was tonight and the place was packed with celebrities. I saw Michael Bloonberg, Rudy Giuliani, the Donald, Gray Kunz, Ruth Riechl, Twiggy among others. There were vintage champagne, lots of it. A red french wine from '82 and lots of other alcohols. Food wise, Le Cirque pulled out all stops. The guests were allowed to circulate through the kitchen and eat cod fish croquets and vegetable dumplings, slurp raw oysters, and sample the famous creme brulee. Sirio sat on his velvet sofa with wife and daughter, kissing ladies' hands and signing his book. The mood was so upbeat that you hardly knew that Le Cirque was moving.
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As a person who has eaten at the Spice Market four times since it opened, I'd say go with one of the other three. Unlike Jay, I think the service at the Spice Market was terrible. I was charged for entrees and desserts that I did not order, and my repeated calls to the manager after that went unreturned. The waitstaff was not very accommodating and seemed more interested in hurrying us out and turning the table instead of getting us what we wanted. The food at the Spice Market cannot be compared to Bouley or Per Se (I've not eaten at the Biltmore Room), because it's basically Asian Street Food, and not executed very well at that. Certain dishes lacks the overall finess of fine dining and a lot of the what came out of the kitchen was sloppily done. Having said that, it is a very pretty restaurant and the ambience is pretty trendy (if you are into loud places), and if you are a guy, the waitstaff is easy on the eye.
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I would even go so far as to say that I rather eat at a fast food place or a self service grease spoon than a restaurant with good food but bad service. Nothing irks me more than great food that has been damaged by bad service. The worst offense here is food not getting to the table fast enough, so you end up eating cold food (particularly awful when it comes to pizza) or desserts where the ice cream has melted beyond recognition.
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Having just read the book, I wonder the timing of the book release has anything to do with the announcement of the move of the restaurant.
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Yes, the ones available here aren't very good, even those obtained at chinese grocers. I once led a huge bag of them from Indonesia, but they end up spoiling in my fridge.
Lime Juice & Lime Cordials
in Spirits & Cocktails
Posted
I don't know jack shit about cocktail, but recent seminar in Aspen given by Dale DeGroff ordained that only freshly squeezed lime juice should be used. You get more juice from a lime if you cut off the nibs at the end and everyone should have one of those little contraptions that squeeze the juice from the lime. Don't know if this is true, but it's what I heard.