March 2005 Archives

This town needs another pseudo-hipster sushi/cocktail joint like I need a gall stone. But there we were, a mini-posse of three college buddies in Union Square, looking for an affordable dinner where we could sit and hear each other. We waited by the bar for about twenty minutes in this fairly loud two-level eatery, trying to drown out the vanilla sounds of the New Age-y sitar trance in the background, half-heartedly looking over the extensive bar menu of ho-hum lychee libations and lame "exotic" drinks with names like "Enter the Dragon." (Restaurants, please note: you cannot have a section on your menu called "Champagne cocktails" and then only list drinks made with prosecco. Just like you can't slap a Washington Square pigeon on the grill and call it poulet de bresse. So quit trying.)

We managed to get a table in the upstairs area, looking out over the rest of the gabby, squarish crowd in a long but narrow booth. We got hot steaming hand towels (which I think should precede every meal in any kind of restaurant) and looked over our menus. Or rather, we squinted closely at our menus because there was no light to read them by, except for the colored fluorescents highlighting the extensive selection of alcohol behind us at the upstairs bar. When we were able to spelunk our way through the whole menu, holding the little tealights up by our foreheads, we got a few apps to share and a few rolls each. We each got our own little black iron tetsubin of green tea, along with a small and civilized tea cup, but it was so damned dark in there that I couldn't tell how much tea I had poured in. I kept worrying that my cup would run over and spill all over the table.

The crispy duck spring roll with hoisin sauce came on an unexciting bed of dressed chopped romaine -- it was a little greasy, but the spring roll had a pleasant crispness. The agedashi tofu was perfectly fine, and the edamame were good enough. I ordered the crispy oyster roll, which was doused in that sort of sticky brown eel sauce and a spicy tuna roll, and both were just fine -- though you really could have put crispy fried shoelace rolls in front of me and I wouldn't have known the difference because I couldn't see a god-damned thing. Haru's greatest achievement is that it is completely indistinguishable from any other dime-a-dozen fusion sushi joint in this town. The food is pedestrian, the atmosphere dark and bland, the people-watching not particularly interesting. If you're really not a good-looking person and want to hide your frightening visage from a blind date while you get them shitfaced on fruity saketinis, this is probably the place to do it. Just keep an eye on the wait staff -- as our bored waitress cleared our dishes, a spent edamame pod slipped off the dirty dish and gently plopped into my companion's glass of water. When we asked for another glass of water, the waitress sent the busboy over with a pitcher for refilling, not replacing. But hey, she probably couldn't see a thing in there either.

Grade: C+ (The plus is for the hot hand towels)
Total per person with tax and tip: $35
Will I return? No. There are so many incredible eateries -- why waste my time on anything less? I'd rather spend my $35 eating a salad and an entree at Gramercy Tavern's front room where at least I can see what I'm eating. These poor eyes of mine certainly aren't getting any better, dagnabbit. Love, Gramma.

Haru
Park Ave. @ 18th St.
N R W 4 5 6 L to Union Square

Whole Foods is so dangerous, especially now that it's conveniently on the way home for me at Union Square. They should have a sign like they do for roller coasters -- "You must be THIS TALL to ride" -- only the sign should say -- "If you are broke and you need to pay rent this week, you may not shop at this time. Go buy yourself a Happy Meal, you shmuck." For the second or third time this week, I went in intending to buy a small snack for supper and wound up buying $40 worth of groceries, which all fit in one slim, light bag. I go in and I see 365 Mint flavored Sparkling Mineral Water on sale for 69 cents and I think, "What a bargain! I must try it! And now I must buy that $3.69 bottle of pomegranate juice to mix it with!" (Incidentally, mint sparkling mineral water with Pom is a GENIUS refresher.) Or I go to the cheese counter for my dinner snack and I see the Brillat Savarin on sale for a mere $18.99/lb. So I buy a little block for just over $2, and then I think, well I have to get some complementary cheese -- how about this $8 piece of Hoch Ybrig?! And then, hm, I should get some salami or soppresata or something to eat with the cheese and baguette. Hey, why don't I get prosciutto instead! And if I'm getting prosciutto, why don't I get the most expensive 16 months aged Black Reserve Prosciutto San Danielle?

Complete disconnect. I need some kind of anti-Whole Foods electronic collar because I am not to be trusted in there.

I'm working down the street from the Rickshaw Dumpling Bar and decided to pop in for a light solo dinner a couple of weeks ago.  I ordered six fried Peking duck dumplings with Shanghai noodles in shiitake soup.  The thick dough finally gave way to mushy, soggy cabbage filling with a meager allowance of sad, stringy duck.  Any spices purportedly swimming around got lost in the opaque brown shiitake soup, which tasted like those packaged Chinese brown mushrooms -- all musty, salty, and single-note.  The overcooked noodles were pointless.  I give better marks to the well-dressed $3 Asian greens salad addition, though the salad is not reason enough to waste a meal at this overhyped, overpriced joint.  I feel the same way about that press junkie the Dumpling Man.  You're better off with the five for a dollar fried half moons on East Broadway, or the lovingly rendered mini-mandoos at 32nd St.'s Mandoo Bar.

Grade: C-

Total: including tax (no tip required): $12

Will I return?: No.  If I'm in the area and need a snack, I'd rather hit the Whole Foods or walk a couple of blocks down to City Bakery for a cookie and a portion of mac and cheese.

Rickshaw Dumpling Bar
Asian
61 W 23rd St
Btwn 5th & 6th Ave
212-924-9220

F train to 23rd St.

**Regina Schrambling agrees.

After a successful trip to Century 21 in Brooklyn for bed linens yesterday, I needed a ladies' lunch to sate the hunger I'd worked up after some hard shopping. Since there is no Ritz-Carlton down in Bay Ridge, I settled on Pho Hoai, a little Vietnamese restaurant at the corner of 86th St. and 4th Ave., right by the R train station.

DECOR: Are all Vietnamese restaurants in the city decorated by the same person? Why do they all have the fake bamboo tiki counter with the Christmas lights? Well, whatever, it was clean and well lit enough for me to read my book.

SERVICE: I went to the ladies' room only to find that the industrial sized dispenser was out of T.P. I saw no TP rolls anywhere. I went to the guy at the counter.

ME: Hi, um, there's no more toilet paper in the ladies' room.
COUNTER GUY: (stares back blankly)
ME: Um, so, um, is there...any...toilet paper?
COUNTER GUY: (stares back blankly) Okay.

There was really no way for me to know whether or not my message made it through to central command. So I held it. Sorry, kidneys.

FOOD: The pho with beef balls was serviceable, though the broth was not as rich and marrow laced as others I've tasted. The beef balls were of the chewy tendon-filled ilk, which I don't really mind but I don't particularly like. As always, I burned my tongue on the hot spring rolls, which were so crunchy they scraped all the flesh from the roof of my mouth. I'm still healing. And I'm laying off the Listerine for a while. But with the complimentary pot of hot tea and a nice four-top all to myself, I can't complain. Hey, it's better than the McDonald's down the street.

Grade: B
Total with tax and tip: $11
Will I return? Maybe, if I need to shop in Bay Ridge again. Towels at the home store are hella cheap and will make good presents. And someday, they're going to have some Marc Jacobs flats in 39 1/2, and when they do, I'll be full of pho and ready to pounce.

Pho Hoai Bay Ridge Restaurant
(718) 745-1640
Cuisine: Vietnamese
8616 4th Ave/86th St.
Bay Ridge
R train to Bay Ridge

This cozy Japanese teahouse is tucked at the top of a walnut stained staircase on the Little Tokyo block of 9th St. & 3rd Ave. The dark wood bench along one wall is lined with still-green tatami; a silent stone fountain sits on the floor just off the center of the room; a hobbit sized replica of a traditional paper-screened Japanese tea room takes up a sixth of the precious real estate in this one room tea haven. Tea is served with all the rituals and flourishes a traditionalist would want, but the friendly gray robe clad waitresses are anything but stuffy. Try the Tibetan pu-erh tea, so dark and syrupy-rich it could cut through the most devoted coffee-lover's iron-palate. Cha-an also has a selection of alcoholic libations, including a green-flecked sake mojito in a delicate crystal tumbler and a sake based lychee cocktail. The desserts are definitely worthy companions for the top-notch tea -- we loved the crisp, feather-light, properly toque-shaped warm chocolate souffle, with its slender shotglass of fuchsia raspberry sauce. I ordered the superb black sesame creme brulee, which was topped with a melon ball scoop of black sesame ice cream, icy milk sliding down the tongue with the rich, warmer custard and the crackly brulee layer. The special of the evening was a sakura flan, more like a wobbly panna cotta, in the palest shade of spring green -- it was made with the leaves of the cherry blossom tree. And the best treat of all? Cha-an's bathrooms have specially imported toilets from Japan that you have to test-drive to believe.

Grade: A
Total with tax and tip per person: $16 for dessert and tea
Will I return?  Definitely.  I have to order that chocolate souffle for myself and put the walls up so I can really savor it.  Besides, I need another excuse to use the facilities again.

Cha-An
Hours: 10am-10pm (7 days)
Payments: Cash Only
Address:
230 E.9th St.
New York, NY 10003
212-228-8030

A very exciting tidbit from Gothamist: Trader Joe's may be coming to Union Square!  With Sunset Park Mexican restaurants and the coming of the Trader Joe's, I have fewer and fewer reasons to move back to California.

For those of you who haven't had the privilege, Trader Joe's is a hippie haven where you can stock up on everything from wasabi peas to dried strawberries, cheeses to cheap and drinkable wines, and all sorts of organic goodies, all at prices that will put those robber-barons at Whole Foods to shame.

I went to Prune recently with some friends, and one of my dining companions ordered the oatmeal with raisins and nuts.  I, the always mouthy skeptic, said, "Who goes out to brunch and orders the oatmeal?"  But when she switched plates for a bite of my eggs and merguez, I saw the light.  Plump, silky whole oat grains were bathed in warm milk, topped with brown sugar and sensually accentuated with bursting soaked raisins and toothsome nuts.  My companion had to wrest that plate back from my vice-like grip.

Old-fashioned, slow-cook oatmeal is completely different from its massacred quick-cook cousin.  It's like the difference between a nice steak and ground beef -- the whole grains have texture galore, so they feel less like baby food and more like barley pearls.  Both quick- and slow-cook oatmeal purportedly have cholesterol-fighting properties as well.  According the the Quaker Oats nutritionist, the oat fiber gels in your innards, trapping cholesterol-rich bile acids like fruit cocktail in an aspic.  That means one thing to me: more bacon, less guilt.

This past week I've been completely obsessed with oatmeal.  I've been buying it every morning in the basement cafeteria, but the quick-cook oats they use are not as satisfying as the whole grains.  Saturday night, my roommate and I decided to come up with something special to gussy up our morning porridge.  This is oatmeal at its sexiest (!) and most luxurious, and it will convert even the staunchest oatmeal agnostic.

Sexy Oatmeal with Caramelized Bananas and Toasted Hazelnuts

Preparation time: 30 minutes

2 cups old-fashioned slow cook oatmeal

4 cups water

1/4 tsp. salt

3 ripe bananas

2 tbsp. unsalted butter

1/2 cup packed light brown sugar

Juice of 1/2 an orange

1/2 cup hazelnuts (or nut of your choice: macadamia, pecan, walnut, etc.)

Milk

Cinnamon

Bring water to a boil.  Add oats and salt and turn heat down to medium-low.  Cook 20-25 minutes (yes, 20-25 minutes, I don't care what the Quaker oats box says), stirring increasingly as the oatmeal thickens and the grains plump.

As oatmeal cooks, heat a dry small saute pan over medium heat.  Add hazelnuts and toast until fragrant and slightly golden, stirring or tossing in the pan constantly so they don't burn.  Set aside when done.

When the oatmeal is done, turn the heat down very low and cover to keep warm.  Slice the bananas in half, lengthwise.  Melt butter in a saute pan over medium heat.   Add the brown sugar and orange juice til sugar has melted and mixture begins to bubble.  Add sliced bananas.  Cook for one minute on one side, then flip slices and cook for one minute more on the other side.  Break slices into thirds or quarters with spatula.

Fold bananas and nuts into oatmeal or garnish oatmeal with bananas and nuts on top.  Dust lightly with cinnamon and serve with milk on the side.

Serves 2-4, depending on how much you like to eat in the morning

My mae grew up in the northeast region of Thailand, also known as the Isaan region.  It is home to the country's poorest population, without the cool mountain air of the north nor the white sand beaches of the south to lure tourist cash.  My mae's family grew up in a tiny red-dirt road village called Ban Ponesawang, where everyone has the same last name. She and her eight brothers and sisters worked knee deep in the waterlogged rice paddies as their cone hat topped cousins still do today.  When I went to visit in November 2003, those g-d roosters woke my ass up at the crack of dawn, so my mae and I slipped on our flip-flops and made our visiting rounds s-l-o-w-l-y.  (As I once told a friend, walking with my family is like being stuck in traffic.)  The smell of burnt plastic permeated the cool air (there's no trash pick-up in that neck of the woods), and though it was only 6:00 a.m., it seemed like everyone was awake and on their way to work in the fields.  My mom would point out her cousins, her cousins' children, my grandmother's sisters, middle-aged childhood friends, always stopping to open up her Costco-sized bottle of Advil, doling out the American over-the-counter remedies like a teacher distributing candy at school.

When we were kids, my uncle liked to say, "We were so poor, you know what I had to do when I was a kid?  I lick the meat and eat the sticky rice!"  But it wasn't all hunger and heartache.  My mom recounted fond memories of collecting the most tender bamboo shoots from the side of the road to bring home for spicy bamboo stew, or gathering fragrant wild herbs to add to soups.

When I was in Ban Ponesawang, I went shopping with my aunt at the open-air market, where locals buy all of their dinner ingredients on a daily basis.  We picked up huge river snails the size of golf balls, their nautilus shells woven together on a single clackety string.  We looked over a bloody beef stand where it looked as though the entire animal was on display, sans refrigeration, the slick organs and bright red flesh under constant prodding by some eager flies.  One old lady laid out her gatherings on dinner-plate sized, spade-shaped leaves -- the tender, tiny green bamboo shoots my mom always spoke of dreamily, which looked as promisingly different from their canned cousins as a dry-aged porterhouse would look to someone who'd only ever had beef jerky.  My aunt haggled with another woman, whose lime-tinted grains were displayed in palm leaf lined baskets.  "Khao mao," she said. 

"What's that?"

"Your mae's favorite.  It's young rice pounded until the bran slips off.  Taste it."

As my aunt purchased 1/2 kg for our dessert, I put some of the flattened green kernels in my mouth -- they were tender, sweet, and fragrant, and I couldn't wait to see how they'd cook up.

Despite the fact that the region is the poorest in the country, many people (myself included, naturally) consider Northeastern Thai cuisine the best Thailand has to offer.  Khao mao is the perfect example of the culinary ingenuity of the Isaan people.  Rice is the staple crop of the region, glutinous rice in particular (which, incidentally, is considered a lowbrow food in Thailand), so rice is utilized in imaginative ways.  Young green rice is pounded flat and cooked for dessert.  Translucent kernels of sticky rice help fill out the tart grilled pork sausages I love.  And larb, the classic tart-salty-spicy ground pork salad, swa, and plenty of other dishes would not be complete without a generous sprinkling of khao kua, ground toasted rice.

Ground toasted rice couldn't be easier -- take a couple of tablespoons of uncooked rice (preferably the sticky variety), toast in a dry pan over medium heat until they are a nice toasty brown, the color of almond skin.  Grind with a mortar and pestle. 

Rice as a seasoning?  You better believe it.  A tablespoon or two is an umami agent, adding a fragrant, toasty savoriness to soups and salads.  It's totally indispensable, and once you recognize its flavor, you'll never be able to live without it in your yams again. 

Try it in this Chez Pim recipe for shrimp fruit salad and beef salad.  Or in my recipe for swa.

I'm blogstipated. 

A Public Service Announcement for all you drunken sots in the East Village: My friend Josephine is opening a taco shack on 3rd and Ave. B, open Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights to start, but open late.  It's called Dragon Shack and it opens tonight! 

(I'm sorry, that headline is so Post-worthy.  Thank you, thank you.)