mjc
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Posts posted by mjc
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Also I ordered the seafood salad with yogurt sorbet, but didn’t care for it at all, so switched it for the heirloom tomato salad with tomato sorbet.
You just said you didn't like it and they took it away and gave you something else instead? Or did they ask you how everything was and, when you were so prompted, told them? How did this all work out?
I don't remember exactly, but I'm pretty sure that we called the waitress over. I said that I really didn't like it and would like to try the tomato salad instead
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I've made these cookie, which call for vanilla powder, and they have a great flavor. cookies
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Went to blue hill on Thursday night. We had a great meal and the highlight for me was definetly dessert.
Started with an amuse of corn soup with coconut foam. It was served in a tall shot glass. The corn soup had a very nice corn flavor along with some fall spices (nutmeg, etc).
For appetizers we had the crab meat lasagna, which was excellent.
The foei gras with duck consommé and root vegetables. This was really fantastic the broth had a great flavor and the vegetables (like water chestnut I think) provided a nice crunch.
Also I ordered the seafood salad with yogurt sorbet, but didn’t care for it at all, so switched it for the heirloom tomato salad with tomato sorbet. I really liked the tomato sorbet, which I believe had mint added.
For main courses we had the sea bass with fingerling potatoes and Savoy cabbage. This piece of fish was extremely well prepared. The grass fed lamb and an excellent Berkshire pork dish.
This was really a great meal, but the highlight for me was really the desserts.
I’ll write about those in the pastry forum.
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Stopped by Pomme Frites on Sunday afternoon and sat for a long time watching them make the frites. We never saw them fry the potatoes more than once, but the ones that came from the back did look like they may have been fried very very briefly or perhaps just coated in oil. Overall we thought that these frites were nothing special and not very crispy, though the place is incredibly popular.
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Stopped in here on Sunday evening. This place is amazing. I think it’s the cleanest place in NYC. There is one person whose job it is, to just clean. I caught her cleaning the trim of the main counter. I’m not really a big rice pudding fan, but one of my friends got the strawberry and it was very good.
It was also pretty crowded.
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Two friends and I were near chinatown on sunday night and I remember reading about this place and thought to stop in for a light snack, as we had spent the entire day eating.
We had the wonton noodle soup which came in big bowl and was only 1.99. The wontons were filled with shrimp and my friends really liked it, but to me it was nothing special. Then we ordered the snails in the special house sauce, which were present every table. They were very good. The special house sauce was a sweet brown sauce with spicy peppers and some other flavor that kept it from being too sweet. We also had some sautted water spinach which was good. Finally we had an order of the two sausage fried rice they wrote about in the times. I agree that this was the best friend rice I’ve had in a long time, perhaps ever.
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Six of us went to Yang Tze River on Friday for lunch. We got there about 1:30 and were the only people there, but by 2 it was pretty full. Two of the friends I brought with me speak Mandarin, so we let them order, but there were still some problems with getting what I wanted. ( I’ve noticed that people in my generation (other than myself) have a big problem with asking for what they want in a restaurant, if it requires talking to the waiter, asking a question, asking for something not on the menu, or sending something back, etc.)
Anyway we ended up with:
Crab and Pork Soup Buns: These were excellent, everyone enjoined them. The broth inside was indeed excellent. I went with one of the same friends to China 46 the previous week and had these too. We both agreed that they were about the same. I would give Yang tze a slight edge for taste and China 46 a point for appearance.
Pan fried Pork Dumplings: These were also very good
Scallion/sesame pancakes with beef: These were excellent. It was like a sandwich of sweet beef with scallions and cilantro.
Vegetable noodles shanghai style: This is what we ended up with instead of lo mein sautéed with garlic and greens. It was a good dish with bok choy and some other vegetables.
Spicy shredded beef: This was my favorite dish. It was filled with peppers and It looked like it was going to be too spicy, but it ended up being a perfect balance.
Lion’s Head Meatballs: These were good, but didn’t really impress anyone.
Clams with basil: This dish was the result of poor communication, but I noticed it was present on several other tables. No one liked it at my table though. The sauce was good, but the clams were quite poor.
Braised water eel in brown sauce: For some reason the waiter was against us ordering the Fresh Fresh Eel, so we got this instead. It was Eel in brown sauce with one thousand cloves of garlic. The Eel was very good, but the sauce was a little to sweet for me.
Overall I say that we all thought this restaurant was good (and cheap—lunch was 60 bucks with tip for the 6 of us). Although none of us were really impressed enough that we want to drive right back. I would like to try it again, and try to some of the other things suggested though.
I also wanted to mention that at our trip to China 46 the week before we ordered a bunch of things which the waiter rejected and replaced with what he thought would be better choices and he chose very well. The two of us had:
the soup buns,
a special of pork belly and tofu in a brown sauce which we both really liked
lobster shangaii style, which was a lobster that was cut up in piece and served in a brown sauce with edame. We both really liked this as well, but it was a little to sweet for my taste.
Rice cakes sautéed with pork. The waiter said this would go well with the lobster and I’m not sure if it really did, but it was a great dish.
We are definitely interested in driving back to China 46 again.
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I'm going to go to this place tomorrow for lunch with a bunch of friends. From this thread it looks like you guys reccomend:
pork-and-crab soup dumplings/buns
pan-fried pork buns were also great
sesame-scallion-pancake
deluxe rice cakes
shredded beef with yellow leeks
braised pork in casserole/lions head meatballs
fresh fresh eel
razor clams in black bean sauce
whole fish
spicy shredded beef
handpulled lo mein noodles sauteed with seasonal greens and garlic
is there anything else you reccomend?
thanks, I'll report back on how we liked it.
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I went to Blue Smoke this weekend and had the burger and thought it was very good, especially the smoked bacon on top.
We also took a tour of the smoker which was cool.
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Went to ChikaLicious this weekend, for the 2nd time, with a large group as part of a birthday celebration. Everyone really enjoyed everthing. This is a really cool place and a great concept and I look forward to returning again.
I don't remember exactly what we had, but . . .
amuse: mango and lime salad with white pepper gelee
Dessert: Fromage Blanc Island “Cheese Cake”, Poached Figs on Creamy Polenta with Port Wine Ice Cream, Seared Plum with Vanilla Sorbet and Lime-Ginger Granita, Warm Chocolate Tart with Pink Peppercorn Ice Cream and Red Wine Sauce, White Chocolate Mousse with raspberries and (a cocoa tuile?), golden kiwis with lemongrass soup and yogurt sorbet.
Petit Fors: Coconut Marshmellow, Mini Chocolate Chip Cookie, and what i Think was an almond disk with butter cream and a caramelized almond.
Again everyone really liked their choice. I tried the fig dish which was excellent and the "cheescake" which was quite different and had a great flavor. My only critisism is that the flavors in the gelee and the ice creams are to timid for my taste--I would like them to be more bold.
Here are some pics:
"cheese cake"
figs
kiwi and white chocolate mousse in the back
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Does it seem inherently wrong to anyone else that donuts should be made with the "finest" ingredients? Artisan donuts?
Gimme a DD or a KK donut any day of the week. Fried sugary dough should taste like...well...fried sugary dough.
If I want fine pastry, I'll go get some. But I don't imagine that ever coming in the form of a donut.
Doesn't seem wrong to me at all. If someone can take something we take for granted and bring it to a new level than I think thats a good thing.
If you can create something that someone else couldn't even imagine-well thats even better.
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Also, there is a vendor in the Union Square greenmarket that garies game and on saturday they had venison. I assume they'll be in the market on monday.
thats a good Idea, the stand at teh green market has always had venison, from what i've seen.
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Otomanelli on Bleecker St. has had it in the past. Not sure if it is seasonal, though.
I believe Ottomanelli carries frozen game year round. I don't know what might be in stock at any given time, but venison shouldn't be impossible to find in NY if you're willing to buy farm raised venison and particularly if you're willing to buy it frozen.
I have had absolutely no experience with venison before this, so buying farm raised wouldn't be something I'd turn my nose up at.
I made it his problem -- I asked him where I'd obtain it. He also suggested Citarella, but I'll check at Otamanelli. He also said Balducci's, but they've closed, yes? (I'm much more used to Key Food...)
I'll try Otamanelli tomorrow (it's closest to where I live). Now I just have to find a way to prepare it....
There is a citarella where balduchi's used to be. Which is also near ottamenlli.
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Try citarella too.
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This topic reminds me of a good line in the movie Dinner Rush, where the waitress Marti comes to the table with the obnoxious art guy Fitgerald, and she says, "Hi my name is Marti and I'll be your server tonight." And then Fizgerald Responsds "Hi I'm Marti and I'll be your customer"
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I've done a number of things from the book, but it may be best for the tidbits of wisdom one picks up at random points - his approach to using salt, for example.
For example, I use his technique to cook salmon fillet ("whole grilled salmon fillet with red shallot sauce" in the book) but instead of making his sauce which contains 16 tablespoons of butter (I did try it ONCE) I make a simple chive oil. Perfect salmon (or arctic char if you reduce the cooking times) every time, with a minimum of effort.
There are other recipes, like the Provencal Roast tomatoes, which are great but you'll find serviceable versions of them in Patricia Wells' other books.
Certainly his techniques for leg of lamb and salt crusts are handy. But if you ever had the lamb he served at Jamin you know it is one of those experiences you will NEVER duplicate at home.
Not to pick on you, but your posts makes me laugh. I have this book as well, but not for too long and so haven't actually tried anything in it yet. However, I do enjoy the introduction and some of the tips throughtout.
My favorite part of the intro is on p. 24 under the heading Why Recipes Fail. In this section Robochun basically says if you don't want to follow my recipe exactly then don't bother with it at all. He even says "if you don't want to eat butter, select another recipe that doesn't require butter".
Of course your recipe is a success and I don't necessarily agree with him, but find it amusing.
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there are a lot of other posts about butter's. In this one, nightscotsman talks about an article in cooks illustrated that tested different butters.
Why don't you try making the cookies with plugra and another butter and seeing if you can taste the difference? I'm sure we would all be interested in the results.
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Why not make it an even more challenging collaboration, and instead of each of you doing four courses, you should both do all eight courses together. Each of you contributing a component to each course.
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I remember seeing someone selling these in boxes, don't remember who, at the Fancy Food show at the Javitz center this year.
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cool, thanks for the amazon.ca tip. Its much easier to navigate.
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Night:
You can order it from amazon.fr for about 40 euros with shipping, which is about 43 bucks I think
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Internal Revenue System
As for the rest, why not hire some college kid as an unpaid research assistant?
Don't child labor laws exist to prevent this possibility?!?!?!?
Only if you "hire" the doogie howser type.
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I don't know if you would consider it world class, but I think that Michel Willaume is doing more interesting work at Mondrian, than you can find at payard.
Blue Hill (NYC)
in New York: Dining
Posted
Just to say a little more. This was the only negative to an otherwise excellent meal. When I got this dish I tasted the yogurt sorbet, which did not taste as all fresh. It was very icy and my companions suggested that it was freezer burnt. This left me with a rather negative feeling about the dish and then with a taste of the other element I decided that I just couldn't eat it. My first thought actually was not to send it back, but my companions suggested that in a restaurant as good as this one, the chefs/staff, would want me to enjoy my meal so I sent it back.
It was indeed nice of them to exchange in for me, but I don't feel that it was exceptionaly gracious. In fact I believe this is exactly the way a restaurant should respond. If you don't like something, you can send it back and get something else. For example if you get a bottle of wine, they give you a taste first, and not that I've seen this happen (except maybe once), if you don't like it, back it goes. Same thing applies for the food, especially at a restaurant of this caliber. And with what I consider to be excellent (well above average) service.
I think we left a very good tip, but I don't think we thought at all about this particular exchange when leaving it. It didn't really occur to me at the time (probably because we had sort of forgotten about it), but in the future I will take it into consideration.