Pan

I thought it was worth going to once. The crowds weren't off-putting at all. Then again, it's worth knowing that I'm a New Yorker and, thus, have a different perspective on what constitutes a crushing multitude than someone from a smaller town or city. The most I'll say about the garlic ice cream is that it was surprisingly acceptable to try once. The garlic-fortified wine was intolerable and my brother and I spat it out. But there was a decent amount of food cooked with garlicky sauces of various types that was quite all right for festival food and which I wouldn't hesitate to call good and tasty to a less demanding bunch than eGulleteers whose frame of reference may be Michelin 3-stars, the French Laundry, etc.

FYI, the word is nouveau. I wouldn't correct you except that you've used the wrong spelling twice. I hope you find the information useful and not annoyingly nitpicky.

By now, I wouldn't be sticking my neck out too far to say that no eGulleteers have eaten at this place. I've had some snack food at the former Saint's Alp, now Tea & Tea, on Mott St., and I don't think there's much reason to do so. At bubble tea places, stick to the tea: That's what they specialize in. But what's Moby?

I haven't been to SB in at least 3 years, but with that caveat, La Super-Rica is the best taqueria I've been to so far and better than all of the places I've been to in San Francisco by a significant margin. My cousins, who grew up in large part in SB, both feel the same way about the place, and so does my brother (my parents also like the place), so when any of us get to SB to visit my aunt, the first chance we get, it's off to La Super-Rica, and we usually go repeatedly on each trip. I can still remember the spicy quesadilla (I think) made with a large smoked spicy chili and beans. I really look forward to going back. Maybe I'll get to California again in January.

i'll let you go...this time. i've tried to read this article several times and i still have no effing clue what the author is trying to say. and, is wine ever bitter?!?!? for me, coffee gets a bit of 2% milk. no sugar, as i'm sweet enough already. Alcohol is bitter, but its bitterness can be counteracted by sugar and other tastes. I find most dry wines too bitter. I also can't drink coffee at all because it's too bitter, though I can eat things with coffee flavor, if it's not really strong. But I like bitter melon in Chinese dishes. Go figure!

Dill!

My friend reminded me that there were also sliced intestines in the meat platter. We liked those, too. Also, while the sausage was warm, some or all of the other cuts were cold.

Now, I have to remember to ask about the banquet menu the next time I have a large group at Congee Village.

Thank you very much, BlueSky. Your advice certainly sounds reasonable to me. And no, my physical features won't blend in. I'm a Mat Salleh. (That's a Malay nickname for white people.) But my Jewish nose may make me look similar to an Arab, for good or ill.

Yeah, that sums it up. But to Anil: Note that this was my first visit to Gam Mee Ok, so it could be that I lucked out, or perhaps their barbecue really is so-so, but some other dishes are good. Regardless, I and my friend had fun. He's been there at least a few times before and I think I'm paraphrasing him accurately if I say that his comment before we got there was that it has a short menu, unlike the nearly endless tomes one is given at places like Kang Suh and Woo Chon, but that the dishes it does cook are often not among the more commonly found items at Korean places with bigger menus and well-done.

Not by name, Roz. What is it?

A friend and I saw Khovanshchina at the Met on Monday (performed by the visiting Kirov Opera). It was a long, albeit great opera, and by the time we got out of the house, it was at least midnight. We walked down 9th Av. and found that most restaurants that interested us were closed, so instead of settling for something, we decided to walk down to Little Korea, where 24-hour restaurants are commonplace. My friend suggested Gam Mee Ok, an airy, comfortable restaurant with high ceilings on 43 W. 32 St. We weren't served a panchan of 7 dishes or anything like that, but were served a plate of excellent, nicely sour and only moderately hot-peppery but well-seasoned cabbage-and-radish kimchi and an oval-shaped plate containing long, thin, curved green peppers. One was very spicy, one not spicy at all, and another two which were brought later were somewhat spicy. A kind of black bean sauce was recommended for dipping the peppers. For a main dish, I was intrigued by the combo plate of different types of meat, and my friend also thought that could be a good choice. It was. It was plenty big enough for both of us, and we didn't even finish it, despite our best efforts. It was sort of like a cold cut plate, except that they were warm cuts. There was tongue; a fatty cut of meat; delicious Korean "chorizo," filled with glutinous rice and rice noodles; pig ears; and liver. All of this was accompanied by a good deal of lettuce and we were given a flavorful sweet/hot sauce with rice in it for dipping. All the meats were good. My friend found the liver too dry, but I liked it anyway because it tasted good. We both enjoyed the dish very much. Service was gracious and the whole experience was relaxed and pleasant. We left the restaurant at around 2 A.M.

Quietly, Mogador has become a reliable and worthwhile East Village restaurant. I've had 3 good meals there in the last few weeks, 2 by myself and 1 with a date on the evening of July 4. (We arrived that night just after the fireworks finished and the place was uncrowded and didn't fill up until toward the end of our meal.) Their couscous and tagines are tasty and accompanied by the fiery red harissa sauce that's important to me. The best tagine I've tried there so far was one with the spicy green sauce whose name slips my mind at the moment. I also like the Tomato/Ginger soup, and their desserts are sometimes very good and perhaps the restaurant's biggest forte. Their apple tart should use tarter apples, but was accompanied by cinnamon ice cream with a powerful cinnamon flavor that delighted me and my date. My date ordered ice cream as her own dessert. I forget the flavor, but she liked it and was really pleased with the food, generally. I've had other stuff that was good, such as a special - a delicious apple/rhubarb (or was it strawberry/rhubarb?) crumbly. Unfortunately, that dessert doesn't seem to have lasted. There is a wine list, and my date on July 4 got a Shiraz that I sipped and liked. The wine list is interesting, in that it features wines from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia (I think), and Lebanon, in addition to the U.S., Chile, Australia, and some other places I can't recall, but I have no idea how the wines on the list are, as I usually get Moroccan mint tea (and never wine) when I'm there. Only a few years ago, Mogador was too popular for me to go there (I won't wait 20-30 minutes for a table there, especially when I'm by myself), so I hope that doesn't happen again, but if you're in the East Village and want sort of French-influenced Moroccan food, consider Mogador as a possibility. It's open late, too. Here are the hours posted on the Citysearch site: Sun-Thu 9am-12:30am Fri-Sat 9am-1:30am

I went with 5 other people to Congee Village for dinner on July 5. Because I remembered that Fat Guy suggested asking for the menu with the lamb chops, I did so. They asked how I wanted the lamb chops made, and I said I didn't know what the choices were and would like to see what's on that menu. They brought it. It was all in Chinese because, they said, it was so new (which is probably a white lie), but they were happy to tell me what all the dishes on the two-sided, 1-page list were. As the waiter explained what was available, I asked the rest of the group whether they approved. This wasn't a group of really adventurous eaters, as the "Ewww!" at the mention of tripe showed (I told the waiter that I like tripe and will order the tripe dish some other time), but they were reasonably flexible and willing to take recommendations from the waiter, from both the special menu and the regular one. I think that's why we were served banquet-style, one dish at a time, and I also noted that we received the special treatment of being individually served each dish by the waitstaff. We started with Hot and Sour Soup, not my suggestion nor the waiter's, but what a majority of the table wanted. It was slightly sweet for me, but otherwise an excellent rendition: truly sour and with a nice bite and very good ingredients. A very large bowl of soup was brought and it was divided among the diners by a waitress. The lamb chops followed. We had ordered the breaded/fried ones (black bean sauce was the other choice). There were 7 small lamb chops, fried in a considerable amount of oil with leek tops, some kind of hot pepper (diced jalapenos, I think), and I think garlic. They were very tasty and the whole table seemed to express its approval. The next course was a fantastic Tofu and Mixed Vegetables dish, also from the special menu. The tofu was delicately fried and perfectly spongy inside, and there were various types of mushrooms in the dish. The white sauce was subtle and flavorful. I'm sorry I can't describe it better at this point, but when the waiter asked me how it was, I said "Wonderful!" (The waiter asked me what I thought after every course.) Following that was a wonderful roasted half of a chicken, also from the special menu. It had loads of sliced garlic and was deliciously garlicky, with a lovely, oily sauce. (My pronouncement to the waiter before being asked: "This is great!") The next dish was a shrimp and broccoli from the regular menu that turned out to have mayonnaise as the white sauce. I know that many Chinese people like this kind of dish, but I don't, so I let the others eat it, and they were happy to do so. We then had Beef with Chinese Broccoli Chow Mein. Congee Village must be one of the very few Chinese restaurants in the U.S. where Chow Mein is a real, authentic Chinese dish, and it was nothing at all like the gloppy Chinese-American stuff many of us know and loathe. Actually, we had this dish before (described as "beef with nicely crunchy and pleasantly bitter Chinese broccoli") at the previous meal some of us enjoyed at Congee Village, which starts this thread. The beef and Chinese broccoli in a tasty brown sauce are presented over a nest of fried and then dried thin noodles, the Chow Mein. A waiter's recommendation from the regular menu, it's a worthwhile dish and we all enjoyed it. After all that, one person was still hungry and I said I could pick at some more food, so we ordered flounder from the regular menu (some others picked at it in the end). As a special favor to us, it was brought cooked two different ways ("tasting portions," in their words), each on its own half of the plate. Both styles were quite tasty. One was breaded, fried pieces with shredded lettuce and plenty of little jalapeno slices; the other was in a white sauce with thin-sliced carrots, diced ginger, and assorted other goodies. Following our meal, we were all asked how everything was and expressed our appreciation. The waiter, obviously pleased that I, as designated orderer for the group, had shown an appreciation for good food and an eagerness to seek advice from the waitstaff, put his arm around my shoulder. For all of this, including a generous but in my opinion well-deserved tip, we paid only about $24/person. I look forward to the next time I have a chance to go there with a large group. Those who were there the last time noted that we didn't get the Lotus Root with Red Bean Sauce this time, but with all the other delicious dishes we did get, no-one really cared. ("We'll get that next time" was the sentiment.) Thank you for telling me about the menu with the lamb chops, Fat Guy!

And I figured it was some pretentious posturing by the restaurant about the chicken!

Does anyone have some recommendations for the East Coast from Kuantan on north (especially K. Terengganu, Jerteh/Besut, Kota Baru)? Is Kuantan worth visiting nowadays, from a standpoint of either food or general ambiance?

That was possible if I were travelling with my brother, but I decided I simply don't have time to travel so far afield from Malaysia on this trip, so it will be strictly Malaysia plus (most likely) southern Thailand. Thank you for your wonderful post, but one followup question: I'm a New Yorker and regularly walk around Manhattan and take the subway at all hours of the day and night. I also walked all over the place in Paris in the wee hours last summer. Do you think it would be more dangerous for me to be up and about after dark in the parts of southern Thailand you were talking about?

It seems an odd request in that context, doesn't it?

In what way has Jing Fong been slipping? And did you go to Golden Unicorn for dim sum or dinner? I've never found it expensive.

Thanks for the report, and I'm glad you had a good meal! But what is "hen of the woods"? I don't think there are wild chickens in the U.S. The only place I know of that has wild chickens is Malaysia, and I remember them being like Malaysian village chickens, only about half the size.

Hmmm...3-4? (I guess takeout doesn't count.) Usually "$25-and-under" (though I think some of those deserve 2 stars) and sometimes places that are up to $40-something. I don't know if the NYT has given any place like Il Bagatto 2 stars, but I think most are 1-star. 1-3 a year, I guess. During the past year, I had lunch at Bouley (and posted an unfavorable review here) and that's it from your list. Of course, this doesn't include the Michelin-listed and -starred places I ate at in France last summer, but that's about a year ago, anyway. I have regular takeout places; otherwise, it's a mix. But honestly, I do have a rotation of places that I go to regularly, even if it's a somewhat long list and susceptible to enlargement and shrinkage. Mostly either within a 25-minute walk of my home or near someplace I have to be for work or some errand. It sure helps to live in the East Village (and, therefore, also close to Chinatown). When I lived on the Upper West Side, various other neighborhoods were restaurant destinations.

That's not true. There is plenty of food to go around. The primary problem is terribly inequitable (and also often inefficient and corrupt) distribution of food, money, and resources generally. The rich virtually never starve, no matter how many people are living among them, nor are the places with the highest population density (the Netherlands among them, I believe) consistently the ones with the most starvation, nor the places with the lowest population density (notably including the Sahel and Angola) consistently the ones with the least starvation. It's true that there are some examples of thousands of years of overgrazing destroying the topsoil, e.g. in Ethiopia, but starvation is often caused by war and use of land to grow cash crops for export on large estates rather than subsistence crops on individual, peasant-owned crops - not by "overpopulation." I am by no means suggesting that the population explosion has no ill effects. It does. But starvation, for the most part, is not one of them, at this stage.

Elyse, I hope you're feeling much better today!

I've been having severe allergies. I don't think someone having hard coughing fits would have been fun at a party. I was sorry I couldn't make it, and I'm glad you all had a good time!

I don't ever recall seeing rambutan for sale in New York in any form other than canned in syrup and frozen. I once got some frozen rambutan from a store on Grand St. and Christie, and they were horrible! Where do you find truly fresh rambutan in New York, and are they bearable for someone who's had the real thing in Malaysia?