Tag Archives: cooking

The Indonesian Cold Remedy

20 Sep

Minang Asli
86-10 Whitney Avenue
Elmhurst

The snowflakes were falling heavily when I exited the Elmhurst Avenue subway station. On the other side of Broadway was Winnie’s Bar while across the street from the station was the Hong Kong Supermarket. It all looked eerily familiar and when I noticed Taste Good restaurant nestled next to the supermarket, it was like déjà vu all over again. I was in the exact same location when we last convened and dined at Taste Good.

As I navigated the dark, snowy streets to our next destination, chosen by Eugene, the Indonesian Minang Asli, I realized that our previous three restaurants were of the Asian bent, including the Malaysian, Taste Good, the Vietnamese Bronx find, World of Taste Seafood, and the Upper East Side fusion of  Korean, Japanese, Thai, Chinese, and Vietnamese, Buddha Bbeeq. Not that I was complaining.

Zio was shivering outside the small restaurant when I arrived. Why he was standing outside freezing when there were three very gracious Indonesian women in the otherwise empty restaurant gesturing for him to come in, was beyond me. To escape the cold, I needed no prodding and he followed me in.

A small electric heater struggled to add a little warmth to the chilly, non-descript dining room. We were told we were expected; Eugene had called ahead to reserve a table for what was to be a party of five. Rick had already excused himself on account of a corporate holiday celebration that, incredibly, did not require the guests bring their own bottle. Free food and drinks during these dismal days?* Who could blame him for going with the free stuff despite having to endure the obviously fake giddiness he would most likely encounter?

Zio and I waited for the others to arrive in the cold confines and then, after about fifteen minutes of waiting, Zio blurted, “I’m starving!” We ordered beef stew soup and pempek palembang, also known as deep fried fish cake in a sweet and sour vinegar sauce. Gerry, Eugene, and Mike from Yonkers, who commuted together from Westchester arrived just as one of the three aforementioned waitresses brought soup bowls and what we thought was soup.

Pempek palembang: soup it is not.

In our frozen delirium, not to mention our unabated hunger, we spooned the dish into the bowls and began to eat. I wondered why the soup was cold and then realized that we actually were spooning the fish cakes and sauce into our mouths instead of the soup, which came a few minutes later. Were the three Indonesian women giggling because we had just made fools of ourselves? Maybe so, but our gaffe didn’t faze Zio who continued to slurp at the cold vinegar sauce. I was less concerned about our faux pas when I glanced at Minang Asli’s menu and noticed its proclamation to “leave your manners behind, and eat your heart out.”.

The standard in Indonesian food was set a few years back at nearby Upi Jaya and, despite ultimately developing calluses on our intestinal tracks that have since come in handy when confronting the extreme heat of chili peppers that we so often endure in our adventures, we were initiated to the pleasures of Indonesian cuisine, and most notably, the signature dish, beef rendang. It was the gauge to measure an Indonesian restaurant’s authenticity. Would they prepare the dish in the uncompromising, harshly spiced manner it is meant to be prepared or would they soften the blow; alter it somewhat to appease the Anglo tongue?  We unanimously agreed to find out.

Beef rendang: the measuring stick of Indonesian suthenticity.

Maybe it was because my aforementioned intestinal track had been callused, but Minang Asli’s version of beef rendang seemed a tad milder than the one I remembered at Upi Jaya and only for that reason was it a close second to what we experienced years back.

You never quite know Mike from Yonkers’ reasoning, and when he resolutely put the menu down and said, “Gotta have the brains,” meaning the menu option of beef brains stewed in lemongrass flavored coconut milk, we knew better than to dig any deeper into his already complicated psyche.

One brain left

Gerry was disappointed the kale leaves were not available, but settled instead on the jackfruit, a starchy, blander and less juicy or tart version of a pineapple. To please Zio we ordered the whole fried red snapper in a lime and soy marinade and added another Indonesian/Malaysian staple; gado gado, a traditional dish of mixed vegetables in a peanut and sweet soy sauce.

The noodles we ordered, a lo-mein-like dish, was a disappointment but not enough to stop us from cleaning the platter. In fact, all that remained on our table was a solitary beef brain—its creamy consistency an acquired taste that, apparently, most of us, including Mike from Yonkers who ordered it, had not acquired.

No one had entered the restaurant during our meal and the owner/chef, her coat on, thanked us for coming and announced that now that we had finished, she could go home.

The food must have brought out Eugene’s reflective nature when, looking up at the television where Snoopy was decorating his dog house with Christmas lights, he sighed. “Imagine,” he said, “us all alone here in Queens, in this Indonesian restaurant with ‘Charlie Brown’s Christmas’ on the television.”

We didn’t have much to add to his comment so we slowly gathered our coats and headed out into the cold.

Dining entertainment

*This was December, 2008, and just months after the Wall Street meltdown of that year.

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A Considerable Taste

13 Sep

Taste Good
82-18 45th Avenue
Elmhurst, NY

 Taste Good was chosen by Gerry who usually sends us to the far corners of the tri-state region for better (Indian dosas in Jersey City, authentic Korean barbecue in Ft. Lee) or for worse (tacky Mexican in Yonkers and mediocre barbecue in Valhalla). This time he stuck closer to what Zio refers to as the “epicenter” of our food universe; the corridor around the number 7 train of Woodside, Jackson Heights, and Elmhurst, where Taste Good was located. But even this time, Gerry’s curse was not totally diminished when the roads close to the restaurant were closed due to a subway shooting. Still, no one was complaining and a few of us, Zio, Rick and myself even had a few extra minutes to browse the next door Hong Kong supermarket where baby bok choy was on sale along with a special on live frogs.

Frogs for sale.

All of us were in attendance including Eugene who displayed no side effects after the defeat of his Red Sox. In fact, he was suspiciously silent on the subject. To prod him, we made sure he was aware of the availability of sting ray on the menu and even our collective eagerness to order it in some preparation would not illicit any type of self-pitying response. Thus is the demeanor of the now jaded Red Sox fan.

The menu was large and our waitress intent on speeding up our ordering. Though her English was shaky, she was not shy about making suggestions, especially in the quantity of our orders. When we suggested an appetizer of  nasi lemak, a rice platter served with curried chicken, salty spiced pungent anchovies, and hard-boiled eggs, she wanted to know how many orders. When we asked if one was enough, coupled with two orders of roti canai, an Indian-style pancake served with a chicken curry gravy, and tahu goreng, deep fried bean curd stuffed with bean sprouts and sprinkled with a peanut sauce, she shook her head adamantly and said, “No. Two!”

Golden aromatic clams

When I, on name alone, wanted to order the “drunken clams” she shook her head. “This is no good,” she said. “Have this instead,” she said pointing to the clams in “aromatic flavor.” I wasn’t sure, but pretty confident that debating the choices was not an option. With the clams, the aforementioned sizzling aromatic sting ray, hokkien udang mee, a shrimp broth soup with noodles, fish cake, eggs, and greens, and one of our Malaysian favorites, beef rendang, here subtitled cleverly on the menu as “Love Me Tender,” which, of course, when it comes to beef rendang, is the only way to appreciate it, we thought we had enough, even for our crew.

“Not enough,” our waitress barked. Scrambling through the dense menu, the waitress and I collaborated on the choice of char kway teow, rice noodles with shrimp, fish cake, and egg. “Two orders,” she said. At this point she had taken over and all we could do was nod compliantly.

Char kway teow: Two orders please

As it turned out, we ordered so much that by the time the last dish, a huge platter that held the sizzling sting ray, arrived Zio was beginning to groan. Mike from Yonkers, who was seated next to me, however, was unfazed by the assembly of dishes. His secret to enduring the onslaught of food could have been his propensity to rise to a semi-standing position while piling portions from each dish onto his already congested plate; the physical act quite possibly serving to allow his stomach to stretch, creating almost unlimited consumption capacity.

Though he made a few disparaging remarks about the rapidity of the service as if he would be happy with more deliberate service, Eugene held no grudges to the sting ray, which was smothered in a spicy, muddy brown sauce, and dug in dutifully.

The clams were seemingly roasted in, as the menu suggested, a golden aromatic paste, and drunken or not, an excellent recommendation. There was so much that when a big bowl of soup arrived, we wondered if we actually ordered it believing that our waitress might have just “thrown it in” thinking we wouldn’t know any better. But in fact, it was the fiery hokkien udang mee and we indeed included it.

Hokkien udong mee

Quantity certainly did not detract from the Taste Good’s quality and the restaurant certainly lived up to its confident moniker.

And when all, with the exception of the bottom half of the sting ray had been devoured, Eugene looked at his watch, which he had been doing throughout our meal and then nodded. “All that food eaten in about a hour,” he said.  An impressive feat, but from the look on Eugene’s  face, we could do better.

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Linguini and Cape Cod Clams: Manhattan-Style

30 Aug

Nauset Beach Clams

Thanks to the hard work of the very generous owner of the 100-year-old house I rent with my family each summer in Cape Cod, a bucket of freshly dug little neck and cherrystone clams was waiting for us when we returned one day from the beach. I could make chowdah, New England-style with potatoes, milk, onions and bacon. I could just open them up and eat them raw. I could steam them and dip them in butter and broth. Or, considering I had several ripe, in season, tomatoes that I wanted to use before they became overripe, I could make linguini with clam sauce, Manhattan-style (meaning a tomato-based sauce).

Local tomatoes

Given the option at a restaurant between red or white clam sauce, I always prefer the latter; the hearty red tomato sauce usually obscuring the distinct flavor of the clams. White clam sauce works for me. The garlic, olive oil, white wine, some red pepper flakes, and then the broth from the just opened clams makes for the perfect complement to either spaghetti or linguini. It’s easy to make and really, the only danger to screwing it up is to overcook the clams.

But with those ripe tomatoes and the bucket of clams, I decided to take a chance and combine the two over linguini.

This is what I used for the sauce:

4 overly ripe fresh, large tomatoes, diced.

20 clams (Cherrystone and Little Necks combined)

3 cloves of garlic

1/4 cup of chopped white onion

2 tbs of chopped basil

1 ½ pounds of linguini

¼ cup of olive oil

½ teaspoon of hot red pepper flakes

I first diced the tomatoes not bothering with skinning or seeding them and put them in a bowl with a few sprinkles of Kosher salt. While the tomatoes macerated, I rinsed the clams in cold water to remove whatever sand was clinging to them. Once cleaned, I put the clams in a big pot adding about an inch of water to steam them.* Covering the pot and turning the fire on high, I steamed the clams just until their shells opened and then put them aside.

The clams now steamed open.

Using a large skillet, I added the olive oil and softened the onions and garlic sprinkling the red pepper flakes into the pan. When the onions and garlic were cooked, I tossed in the tomatoes adding the broth from the steamed clams and brought it all to a low simmer.

Cooking the tomatoes down

While the tomatoes cooked down, I removed the clams from the shells and roughly chopped them. Chopped clams, in my opinion, should not be uniform in size. I like the surprise of a big, juicy belly along with the tougher tail end of the clam.

The clams chopped.

After chopping the clams, I boiled the water for the linguini. Once the water boiled, I tossed in the pasta, adding salt to the water. Just before the linguini was cooked al dente I folded the chopped clams and the chopped basil into the sauce, keeping it on a fire just hot enough to heat them.

The sauce.

Using tongs, I tossed the linguini in the sauce and then into bowls.

The result was a light, fresh, briny tomato sauce where, in this case, the flavor of the clams and the broth balanced each other perfectly.

Linguini and Cape Cod Clam sauce: Manhattan-Style: As pretty as it gets after too much “limeade.”

*Before I began preparing the meal, I had told myself to save about a half dozen of the smallest of the little necks to steam open directly in the sauce. The clams in their shells would not only look nice, but because of their size, also remain tender. But while preparing the above dish, I began to consume multiple glasses of limeade spiked with vodka and when it came time to steam the clams, dumped them all into the pot including the few I was hoping to reserve.  Once I realized my mistake, it was too late. The little necks were cooked.

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The Bronx Banh Mi Incident

17 Aug

World of Taste Seafood and Deli
R.I.P

World of Taste Seafood Deli: Circa 2008

After several years now of conducting these eating excursions, most of us in our group understand that it is imperative to always double check on the status of the establishment chosen. And the more obscure it might be, the more diligence required. An African restaurant ballyhooed by the Village Voice in, say February, might no longer exist by July. This time it was my turn to choose our destination and always looking out for the oft-neglected food borough, the Bronx; I did my research and came up with the name of a Vietnamese restaurant situated in an unlikely location on a stretch of Jerome Avenue which runs just below the tracks of the elevated number 4 subway line.

The restaurant was named Phung Hung and, a few days before we were to meet, I called and spoke to someone who seemed to confirm I had found the right place. On the date of our scheduled dinner, I remembered at the last minute to call once more—just to be absolutely sure of its authenticity. This time there was confusion. Was this not, Phung Hung? Had I dialed a wrong number? Whoever answered lost patience with me and hung up. I quickly went onto the computer and typed in the address and found another option; a restaurant called World of Taste Seafood Deli. I called again and was told that the same restaurant was formerly called Phung Hung but its name had been changed. The man I spoke to also told me that he would hold a table for six for “Mr. Brian.”

Seeing the restaurant on the corner of Jerome and 193rd St, I realized why the name was changed. There were photos of fried fish, chicken wings, fries and other fast food Chinese items displayed in the window. It was an appeal to the demographics of the neighborhood to offer what was familiar and safe, but, thankfully, the Vietnamese menu was also available. Gerry and Mike from Yonkers had already arrived and seated at a small round table in the stifling, Vietnam-like climate of the restaurant where a ceiling fan and an enormous window air conditioner cooled only those in their immediate vicinity.

Jerome Avenue

Gerry had a six-pack of beer in a brown paper bag and, at first, was brusquely told he couldn’t bring it into the restaurant. A moment later one of the proprietors, a woman of color who seemed out of place working in an Asian restaurant, asked Gerry if he “talked to David earlier.” Gerry, understanding that it was I who must have spoken to David, who, we learned, was the person I contacted on the phone making the reservation for “Mr. Brian” nodded and, immediately, was granted permission to bring and drink the beer, as long as it was in a paper cup. Apparently “Mr. Brian” carries some serious influence.

Eugene was a late scratch and Zio and Rick were on their way. While we waited, I noticed that most of the cooking in the open kitchen was done by two tiny elderly Vietnamese women. The possibilities of what was to be created in the kitchen by their experienced and no doubt skilled and comforting hands immediately excited me. The anticipation along with the heat combined to form a growing sheen of perspiration around my face and neck. The proprietor, who mentioned she was David’s partner, must have noticed and offered us a table directly in front of the huge, loud air conditioner.

Zio, a dreamy, whimsical smile on his face, walked in just as we moved. Before even sitting down, he announced that he grew up in the surrounding Kingsbridge neighborhood. Glancing around the restaurant but not really looking at anything, he began: “My grandfather had a fruit stand a few blocks up. . .there was a diner right over there on the corner. . .my father used to send money to relatives in Italy. . .” and on and on the reminiscing went. It took a jolt from the Vietnamese iced coffee he ordered, sweetened liberally with condensed milk, to revive him from his stupor and begin concentrating on the present business of stuffing his face.

As we expected, Rick was lagging behind; this time caught in Yankee Stadium traffic. We knew the scenario and began ordering with the assurance that Rick would be grateful with the scraps from our first course. We started with three “banh mi,” Vietnamese sandwiches served in a fresh loaf of French bread. The sandwiches were individual-sized but big enough to share knowing that there would be more. . .much more to come. The three sandwiches arrived looking like they belonged on the cover of Saveur, a glossy food magazine I used to scribble for. The three were banh mi xi mai, a Vietnamese meatball hero smothered in a bright red chili sauce, mi thit heo nuong, stuffed with grilled pork, pate, with sprigs of cilantro and cucumber peeking out, and the phung hung, looking like a traditional hero with cold cuts of ham, ground pork, and pate, but with the added zest of cilantro, chilies and soy sauce. The only complaint about the banh mi came from Zio who lamely claimed he could not negotiate breaking the phung hung version into sharable pieces without obliterating the beautifully prepared sandwich. But it was accomplished and though difficult, we were able to save a few samples for Rick who had just arrived.

Beautiful Banh Mi

Though not much deters us from over indulging on our food adventures, that there was nothing over six dollars on the menu made it practically impossible for us to resist what was to be a very public display of gluttony. We circled numbers that corresponded to the items on the menu and I brought it up to the proprietor who made it clear that she wanted me to read off the items by the number not by the Vietnamese name. There was number 25, country style beef cubes sautéed with scallion and onions, number 16, spring rolls with grilled pork and vegetables piled on rice vermicelli, number 30, shrimp with string beans, scallions and onion in a satea sauce, number 10, seafood with rice noodles soup, 35, beef noodle soup Hue style, and number 33, sautéed mixed vegetables. Once she wrote all the numbers down, needing two pages of her small pad to do so, she began barking out the numbers to the two Vietnamese women who immediately got to work.

Seafood noodle soup

“You know, they filmed Marty around here with Ernest Borgnine,” Zio blurted over the noise of the air conditioner.

Rick looked at him and as if on cue, shouted back, “You’re just a fat, little man. A fat, ugly man.”

Zio concurred: “I’m ugly! I’m ugly! I’m ugly!”

What do you wanna do tonight? I dunno. What do you wanna do?

The screen test ended when the parade of platters began arriving and even with two round tables pushed together, there was barely enough room to hold them all. So impressive was the display that it drew a comment from two diners who had come in after playing basketball at nearby St. James Park, the man shaking his head in awe while his female companion gazed incredulously. “With all that food, I was saying you all must be food critics,” the male basketball player said.

I waved his assertion off. “No, being critical about food just gets in the way of our eating,” I replied.

And there wasn’t much to be critical about at World of Taste Seafood Deli. If you wanted to be picky, the sautéed dishes; the vegetables and shrimp were nothing out of the ordinary, but maybe that was because we had become jaded after the remarkable banh mi, the spicy, beef noodle soup, and the seafood with rice noodles. Closing time was 8:30 and the staff was cleaning up while we were still picking through the remains of our feast. As they were leaving with their take out order, the basketball players glanced one last time at the devastation we created on our combined two tables and shook their heads in awe.

It hadn’t gotten any cooler once we vacated the World of Taste Seafood. Zio got that gaze on his face again and pointed to the train tracks above us. “Martin Sheen and Tony Musante—you know the movie. . .**“ But before Zio could finish telling us about the movie, the uptown number 4 train rumbling above us cut him off.

Sheen and Musante frolicking on the subway in the Bronx.

*World of Taste Seafood Deli sadly closed in 2009. Soon after, Pho Mien Tay, another Vietnamese restaurant opened in the same spot, but was short-lived followed by Pho Saigon #1, which also did not last.  Across the street is another Vietnamese restaurant, called Com Tam Ninh Kieu that has survived the turmoil at 2614 Jerome Avenue that specializes in Pho but without its quirky charms or the magnificent banh mi. Now, at 2614 Jerome there is a nail supply store with signs in Vietnamese.

**The title of the movie Zio was reminiscing about can be found in the title of this post.

World of Taste Seafood Deli: Circa 2011

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Treichville Tasting Menu

9 Aug

Treichville
R.I.P

The path to Treichville was a circuitous one. Originally Rick’s pick and scheduled a month earlier, Rick chose the much anticipated Rudar Social Club in Astoria, but the date coincided with the closing of his newly acquired money pit in Atlantic Highlands. At first Rick did not think this would be a conflict; that the closing would be over before our dinner and it was, but seriously challenging his loyalty to his brothers in gluttony, he decided instead to take his lawyer out for a drink. That, coupled with Zio being stricken with a stomach virus so potent that just the thought of Croatian cuisine made him retch, led to us cancelling at the last minute. It took a month to reschedule and again, the Rudar Social Club was Rick’s choice, but this time thoughtfully, giving us a week’s notice, cancelled.

A restaurant posing as a car service

This time, instead of rescheduling, we shifted the choice to Mike from Yonkers, who was next in line. The short notice sent him into a minor panic and he quickly decided on African place in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. The problem, Eugene immediately pointed out via email, was that the place had closed several months earlier. After a few days, a replacement was chosen, a soul food joint in the heart of the trendy East Village, but after deliberating with an anonymous member of our group, Mike from Yonkers determined that the soul joint didn’t fit our criteria. For some reason, and after several years with our group, Mike was still struggling to comprehend our guidelines, loose as they are. But with a little counseling, again from the same anonymous source, he finally came up with another Treichville.  The Treichville we were visiting was not the one in the heart of Cote d’Ivoire, but in East Harlem, just a few steps from legendary Patsy’s Pizzeria.

Temptation around the corner.

From the outside on a block on east 118th Street, Treichville looked more like a car service operation than a restaurant. The only hint was the subtle sign above the door with the restaurant’s name and the proclamation of African cuisine. The windows were barred and a neon sign behind them flashed “Open 24 Hours.” I arrived early and hungry and Patsy’s was a serious temptation, but I thought it best to display some willpower. Soon the others arrived and we piled into the tight, low-ceilinged quarters where we were the only diners. The specialty here was West African, specifically the Ivory Coast, and the menu printed in both English and French. Drinks were the usual, ginger beer or sorrel, both homemade and satisfying. But it was the soups on the menu that interested us the most, particularly the pepe (pepper) soup; a combination of crab, cow feet, lamb, and tripe. The host/waiter announced that the pepe was not quite ready yet, but after nudging him wavered and said he would bring out soups for all. While he was at it, we asked for a sampling of Treichville’s specialties—kind of the poor man’s version of a “chef’s tasting menu.” He gladly obliged.

The five of us were first served huge bowls of soup with Eugene, Mike from Yonkers, and Gerry getting the pepe while Zio and I were given chicken soup. Noticing immediately that Zio and I were slighted, our host brought out two more bowls of the pepe.  I took a few spoonfuls of the chicken soup, which was more like a stew, enough to gush appreciatively over it and then offered it to the others for tastings while I sampled the pepe, which was not quite what was described in the menu—there was no meat, just fish, crab, mussels, and shrimp—more like a bouillabaisse with the sub-tropical addition of a whole, scotch bonnet chili pepper which Eugene ate inducing a bout of spasmodic hiccupping. Following Eugene’s lead and not knowing the pepper was a spicy garnish and not for eating, Mike from Yonker’s ate his and soon a fine sheen of sweat had formed on his forehead.

Meanwhile, despite my warnings to Zio to just taste both of the soups and not try to finish them all, I noticed the bones of the chicken from his soup picked clean and lined up neatly against the side of his now empty bowl and that he was busy extracting a piece of meat from a slender crab claw that was in his fish soup. When I warned him again, he threw up his hands defiantly. “What do you want me to do? I can’t just leave it!” he said.

Once the soup was cleared, we were all given salads with homemade vinaigrette which helped take down the heat from the soups. Following the salad, two platters of whole fish appeared; one, according to our host was grilled, the other fried, though I could tell no difference. Both were doused in a room temperature onion/mustard sauce and served with a mashed-like condiment of cassava and plantain called foutou. The procession continued with a platter of lamb shank, beef, and grilled chicken, all covered with the same onion/mustard concoction. With the addition of platters each of couscous, cassava, and white rice, our combined tables were overflowing.

The fish, whether grilled or fried, was perfectly moist and tender while the lamb shank, more than enough even for our colossal appetites. The beef and chicken were both fine, but really just pure excess at this point and after a few bites of the fish, I heard Zio groan repeatedly. “I can’t,” he stammered, “No more.” And so, for the first time in our long history of dinners together, Zio was done.  He was not alone. We were all pretty much done—the Treichville “chef’s tasting menu” just too much for us. So finally, with Treichville, despite the roundabout way he got to it, Mike from Yonkers nailed the concept of our group and deserved the accolades we heaped upon him at dinner’s end.

*Hoping to return to Treichville a few months ago, I came across thie signs, in duplicate, plastered underneath Treichville’s security gate and on its door.

I would have settled for a “C” grade, but this…

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The Double Dip Special

5 Aug

Grand opening of Jireh Meal: Home of the $3 meal on Adam Clayton Powell Blvd., between 123rd and 122nd Streets.  Sponsored by the Jireh Meal Ministry:   http://www.thejirehmeal.org.

And today’s Double Dip Special is:

 

 

 

 

 

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Hot Pot Time Machine

4 Aug

Minni’s Shabu Shabu
131-17 38 Avenue
Flushing

It had been almost three months since we last convened and in the midst of deadlines, I never reported on the dinner. The place was called Minni’s Shabu Shabu  (www.minisshabushabu.com) in Flushing, Queens and though my memory of that night has blurred somewhat over the past few months, I do remember that it was very cold and the steaming hot pots offered at Minni’s were a relief. Eugene, going on the advice of a friend, had chosen the brightly lit restaurant where each table had a built-in hot pot filled with broth. There were on/off switches with a temperature control and each of us was given a platter of raw vegetables, two uncooked eggs, some starchy provisions we could not immediately identify, and rice noodles. Apparently, it was up to us to cook the food, but the combination of technical savvy and culinary knowledge of what goes into a shabu shabu (the meal created with the hot pots) was complicated and looking to Eugene, who supposedly researched the place, for any advice was futile.

The waiter who was busy buzzing between tables in the crowded restaurant quickly helped us get started; we had to order a meat or fish to be cooked in the broth along with the accompanying vegetables and noodles. The offerings were plentiful—lamb, pork, beef, clams, lobster, squid, tripe; all of it making it even more confusing. I kept it simple by ordering beef, but the waiter mistakenly thought I wanted the tripe and beef so along with thinly sliced raw round steak, I had a honeycomb of tripe as well which I quickly donated to Zio’s already enormous platter of uncooked shellfish and vegetables.

Ingredients for the hot pot

After dousing the beef into the boiling broth, the red meat immediately turned a sallow gray and tasted as lifeless as it looked. Maybe adding a few of the vegetables would help? I threw some cabbage and the eggs in the broth and then wandered to a buffet where a variety of sauces were available; hot chili sauce, soy, sweet barbecue, a green, coriander sauce, red tofu and countless others. Without any guidance, I began adding a little of all of them. The result was more flavor, but minus any distinction.

The color of…

All of us were pretty much clueless on the art of making shabu shabu with the notable exception of Mike from Yonkers who was deliberately adding ingredients; slowly layering his soup with flavors. Whether it was an act or something he was a natural at, we will never know, but he certainly looked good doing it. So, though most of my broth had evaporated and the ingredients already devoured, I mimicked Mike from Yonkers’ technique, and, surprisingly, the last remnants of the soup was now a hearty, flavorful meal. Next time I visit a shabu shabu place, I’ll be better prepared though, in all honesty, that next time won’t be soon.

We last visited Minni’s in Flushing in 2008. It still goes strong and now, I believe, deserves a return trip.

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Rooftop Fried Eggs

22 Jul

They say it’s so hot out you can fry an egg on a city sidewalk. I tried, but not on a sidewalk. My egg frying experiment was on my roof. I used two methods; both fuel efficient. Method one was placing a frying pan on the roof and letting the100 degree temperature heat it up.

Method One: Note the slightly cooked egg whites on the edge

I also tried cooking an egg the old fashioned way; directly on the roof’s surface.

Eggs the old fashioned way: fried directly on the rooftop surface.

Though it was 100 degrees plus on this day, these eggs had no choice but to be slow-cooked.

Method one: 20 minutes later.

The sun was definitely cooking the egg, but unless you like your eggs very rare, it was not quite done yet.

Old fashioned eggs 20 minutes later

And after another 15 minutes.

Cooked, but…

I forgot to grease the “sidewalk.”

After scraping both out of pan and off the roof, respectively, this is what I got.

Unless you have too much time on your hands or are working on your summer in the city survival skills, I do not recommend frying an egg on a sidewalk or on a rooftop. However, method one could work if the pan is properly greased and allowed at least an hour in 100 plus degree sun before cracking the egg into it.

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Guilt Among Gluttons

19 Jul

Spicy Mina
(R.I.P)

Zio didn’t plan that we would be dining in a Bangladeshi restaurant at the same time that nation was suffering from the effects of a deadly cyclone; that we would be stuffing our respective faces while many Bangladeshi people were without food and water. It was just one of those ironic coincidences. Would the circumstances induce guilt and inhibit our appetite? The family that ran Spicy Mina, including sari-attired Mina herself, certainly hoped not. There were only two other customers, Bangladeshi men chatting over tea, in the small restaurant located on an isolated portion of Broadway in Woodside the night we were there.

We were all assembled on time except Rick, who seems to enjoy making a grand entrance midway through our appetizers. This time, however, Rick checked in via cell phone to say he was stuck in traffic on the BQE and to start without him as if we might actually consider waiting. But with the arrival of the appetizers, a gamey lamb dish in a thick stew called haleem, something that looked like puff pastry filled with ground chick peas, called alur chop, and “loly-pop” chicken, the Bangladeshi-version of the Buffalo chicken wing, Rick wasn’t missing much.

Buffalo Chicken Wings: Bangladeshi-style

But we just couldn’t wait any longer. Eugene was merciless: “The BQE is a block away!” he intoned in his typically brash manner. And Zio was restless—the promise of “mastard” (sic) fish, had him anxiously chugging diet Coke’s. So we ordered without Rick, but included a dish for him—something he would appreciate, fish kofta curry, or as explained in the menu: fish balls.

Mike from Yonkers, suffering from a gravely throat, thought the palak paneer might offer relief but when it arrived it look different than any paneer I’ve ever seen; the spinach shredded spinach with crumbly, feta-like pieces of cheese, along with a few whole dried chilies. The taste was something reminiscent, according to Eugene, to broccoli rabe, and I couldn’t disagree; there was definitely an Italian flavor to it.

Gerry’s idea of relief was a vindaloo, specifically lamb and Mina’s version was fiery in a light, oily sauce, again nothing like your cookie-cutter variety vindaloo. The dal fry Mina special, mung daal in special spices was a nice accompaniment to the nan and roti bread we ordered, while the chicken tikka masala, in a rich, creamy yet spicy sauce had Eugene swooning, which, to be honest, was not a pretty sight.

Fish Balls: A.K.A. Fish Kofta Curry

The fish balls arrived just as Rick called again, this time to say he was still stuck on the BQE in the vicinity of the legendary Kosciuszko Bridge and was aborting any further attempts to try to make it to Spicy Mina’s. And though we ordered for six and now we were only five, the fish balls, light and with just the faintest hint of fish, were made short work of. The waiter slowly cleared our table, allowing Zio sufficient time to scour the remains of the whole fish searching for any stray pieces of edible flesh that might have escaped our intense scrutiny. It was unanimous; the fare at Spicy Mina’s was nothing like the $7.95 Indian buffets we were used to gorging ourselves on.

By the time the waiter returned with complimentary half-orders of rose water-accented rice pudding—perfect to cleanse our over-spiced palates—any guilty thoughts about the human suffering in Bangladesh that any of us might have had going into Spicy Mina’s was completely forgotten. But why then do I feel guilty about that?

Unfortunately, Spicy Mina didn’t survive the recessionary cyclone that ravaged many small business in New York the following year and  persists today.

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Today’s Special

15 Jul

At least I know it’s special. Whatever it is.

 

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