Week 9 - One Color

I was pretty excited for Week 9 of the challenge with its one color theme. I love thinking about color and the colors of food, and am usually trying to cram as many colors as possible into our weekly diet. I decided to do green, but I didn't want to do something that seemed too obvious to me, like a salad of green ingredients or a big pot of braised greens. I had been looking at a green lentil recipe already for that week, so I decided to pair that with a green tofu patty. I figured it would be a great green meal with green lentils, leeks, green onions, salsa verde, jalapeños, and cilantro.

Ignore the tomato paste ... Look at all that green!

For the lentils, I adapted this recipe on Bon Appetit for Canal House lentils a little and used:

- 2 small trimmed leeks, thinly sliced ($2.99)
- 2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced ($0.05)
- olive oil, about 1 tbsp ($0.20)
- tomato paste, about 1 tbsp ($0.40)
- 1 cup green lentils ($0.50)
- 4 cups of water ($0)
- 1 heaping spoonful of vegetable bouillon ($0.30)
- 3 scallions, chopped ($0.30)
- soy sauce, about 2 tbsp ($0.30)
- salt and pepper, to taste ($0.08)

I didn't follow a recipe for the green tofu patty but came up with something on my own. The ingredients I used for the tofu patties were:

- 1 package of firm tofu ($1.32)
- 2 large spoonfuls of salsa verde ($0.35)
- 1/2 bunch of cilantro, coarsely chopped ($0.50)
- 1 jalapeño pepper, finely chopped ($0.08)
- 3 scallions, chopped ($0.30)
- Italian-style bread crumbs, about 1/2 cup ($0.35)
- 2 eggs, beaten ($0.40)
- olive oil for pan-frying ($0.20)

All together, that comes to about $8.62. Not that bad for dinner for 2, except over a third of that was for the leeks! I had no idea the leeks cost so much in comparison to everything else when I picked them up at Trader Joe's. Sure, they're trimmed and much cleaner than most of the regular leeks you'll get, but that's kind of crazy to me. The leeks were good, but maybe next time, I would just use the frozen ones.

I started the lentils first, figuring they would need to cook for quite a while in order to be tender. In a pot with olive oil, I sauteed the leeks, then added the garlic and the tomato paste (yes, I know tomato paste is not green, but it was so little and I figured it wouldn't really show up in the color later). After that was all softened, I added the lentils with the water and the vegetable bouillon. It was much more water than the original recipe had, but I followed what was on the lentil bag instead, figuring Whole Foods should know what their lentils needed.

I brought it to a boil, lowered the flame, and let it simmer for 45 minutes with the cover on, checking it once in the middle to see how everything was doing. It didn't look especially green when it started or partway through, but I figured that, no matter what, they were still green lentils and maybe I could just call them a dark shade of green, like army green or something. After most of the water was absorbed, I added the soy sauce, salt and pepper, and let it keep cooking, cover off, on the lowest flame possible, while I worked on the tofu.

At that point, it didn't really look green at all. It was brown, no question about it. Maybe a little green from some of the leeks, but otherwise it was brown, just brown. A said that I should just say I was doing brown for this one color meal, but I still had to add the chopped scallions after I shut off the flame, so it wouldn't be all brown. I really should have known since the original recipe photo was brown with green scallions. Green fail.

For the other part of the meal, I didn't follow a recipe but tried to construct a "green patty" in my own head. I figured I could use tofu, since tofu will often take on the color of whatever sauce you mix it with, and decided I would use salsa verde along with peppers and herbs. Lots of green! First, I drained the tofu and mashed it up, then added the salsa verde, chopped cilantro and scallions and jalapeño, bread crumbs, eggs, and seasoning. I expected it to be green.

Apparently salsa verde is not enough to turn a box of tofu green. It was still very white, even with all the green herbs. I tried forming patties, figuring that if they were loose, it might still be okay, since the carrot pancakes were pretty loose but still worked beautifully. Not so here. They only sort of stayed together, but not very well. Not only were they not really patties, but once they browned in the pan, they, like the lentils, were not very green. They were like brown and white with flecks of green. I gave up on the patties for the second batch and just browned/cooked it in the pan in a flat layer. Another green fail.

This meal was a complete failure as far as the one color theme (brown or green), but the dishes themselves weren't bad. I wouldn't make that green patty experiment again, at least not like that, since it was fine but nothing special. The lentils however were quite good and we would definitely eat those again. For now though, I'm going to go back to my attempt at making colorful multi-color meals. Trying to make everything one color was such a challenge!

Double Cooked Pork with Dried Bean Curd

So now I know I've gone to Hunan Manor a lot. Last time I went I thought the lady at the counter nodded as I was saying my name. Today all I said was, "pickup," and she responded with, "A?" So yeah, pretty sure I've been there a lot. Today I got the double cooked pork with dried bean curd.

This was a flavorful dish. It had pork that tasted similar to the preserved pork from the aforementioned previous visit, but this was sliced smaller and more thinly. That allowed the meat to be a little more tender though a few pieces were on the tougher side still. The rest of the dish consisted of the dried bean curd slices, leeks, garlic, and a lot of sliced green chilis.

The pork and the sauce are a little on the salty side, but the dried bean curd helps to cut that and balances out the dish really well. The green chilis offer heat, but they also add a subtle sweetness that's really nice in this dish. Overall I liked this dish, though I still think I like the sour string beans with yam cake the best.

American Icon Grill

Our third dinner on the Quantum was at American Icon Grill. We had visited American Icon during lunch the day before and had been quite underwhelmed, so we hoped that dinner would be an improvement on lunch (would be hard to get much worse). We also hoped that the food allergy issue would finally be resolved since M's parents had spent some time during the afternoon talking with the dining staff and getting all of the allergies that we had previously notified them about put into the computer system again. Basically, we approached dinner with a lot of cautious optimism.

We were seated somewhat quickly (nothing really moved that quickly on that ship) with a waiter and head waiter who would end up being our favorites on the entire trip. They paid special attention to dietary restrictions and allergy requests, were quite personable, and really tried to make the dinner experience pleasurable. We really felt like this was how it should have been the previous 2 days and hoped things were taking a turn for the better.

The meal started with the same bread basket as lunch, full of corn muffins and "cheesy" bread. We didn't really feel any differently about it this time around.

Appetizers

There were 8 appetizers on the menu to choose from at dinner. We ordered 4 of them and 3 others were repeats from lunch (the shrimp po boy we greatly disliked, the reuben turnover that we kind of liked, and the beet and goat cheese salad that we liked a lot). That meant that, by the end of our dinner, the only untried appetizer was the Louisiana chicken wings. We probably should have tried that too for the sake of completing the whole list, but we must not have noticed it was the only one left.

(NB: Earlier in 2015, Quantum switched up the menus. We've only seen the new menus from January, so if they changed since then, we don't know anything about it. Whenever we can, we've made notes about the new menu alongside our review of what we got.)

M really liked the beet and goat cheese salad at lunch, so she picked the heartland salad (now called the "baby spinach salad" on the new menu) which came with baby spinach, hard-boiled egg, button mushrooms, and bacon vinaigrette. The menu description was a little off as there were also tomatoes, for some reason not listed, and the bacon was less a dressing and more actual pieces of bacon (no complaints).

This was a great salad and we really liked it. Not sure if we preferred this one or the beet and goat cheese salad, as they were both good. The spinach was fresh, the tomatoes were juicy, the eggs were cooked right, the bacon was crispy and added tons of flavor, the mushrooms provided earthiness, and the dressing complemented everything well. We decided that if we made it back to American Icon for lunch on another day we would just get both salads, since this salad was also on the lunch menu (with shrimp).

M also chose the New England clam chowder with homemade oyster crackers. This was fine, very rich and creamy, but definitely not the best clam chowder we've had. The crisps added nothing and were unnecessary, but the soup was fine. (The current menu says the clam chowder has "chunks of potato, onion, and herbs." We don't recall the chowder being that "chunky" but maybe they've changed the recipe.)

A started out with the Yankee franks, pretzel-wrapped smoked sausages (aka pigs in blankets) with cheddar cheese sauce and whole grain mustard. We liked these. We found the cheese sauce wasn't that necessary, but that was probably because we're much bigger fans of mustard, especially whole grain mustard. The pretzels were a touch on the bready side, but they had good, buttery flavor to them. Overall this was a pretty good appetizer, but unfortunately it looks like this has been taken off the menu.

A also ordered the buffalo chicken mac 'n cheese with spicy chicken, blue cheese, and celery. The first thing we both noted was that there really wasn't any blue cheese taste. This wasn't a horrible thing, though, since M doesn't like blue cheese at all. A doesn't mind blue cheese, but at the same time he doesn't think it belongs in mac and cheese. Unfortunately, there wasn't much flavor at all to the dish. It was heavy and creamy, but just not that flavorful. The chicken was also a little on the dry side. Overall this was just okay as a dish, and this also seems to have been taken off the menu.

Overall, considering both lunch and dinner, our favorite appetizers at American Icon were the 2 salads, followed by the pretzel franks. We would get any of the 3 of those again (except 2 out of 3 are no longer on the menu). 

The changes they've made to the menu since we were on the Quantum are interesting. Some of the best appetizers we had at American Icon were the salads. On the recent menu that we saw, the beet and goat cheese salad was gone and replaced with a Cobb salad and a traditional wedge salad. As much as we would like to try those, it's disappointing that the tasty beet salad is gone. We don't remember there being a ton of other dishes with beets in them, so maybe it was a purchasing decision more than a culinary one. Not surprising that they replaced 1 salad option with 2 though, since quite a few people did mention the lack of salads on the menus.

Some of the new appetizers also sound good and certainly fit the theme of American Icon. In addition to the franks and the mac and cheese, they've ditched the reuben turnover and shrimp po boy. In their place, they've added potato pancakes, fried calamari, Maryland crab cakes, and Southern style fried shrimp. The Southern fried shrimp doesn't sound quite like the shrimp from the old po boy, as this one comes with mashed potatoes, so hopefully that turned out better than that sad po boy shrimp. We'd definitely go for the crab cakes, as we had a good one at Chic later in the week (a story for another day). 

Entrees

Unlike appetizers where we both usually get a couple and share them, we usually only get one entree each, with maybe an extra to share if there's something we really want to try. For her entree, M chose the pistachio-crusted salmon with green beans, Oregon mushrooms, and grain mustard sauce.

This entree wasn't quite what M was expecting, but it turned out to be a pretty good dish. The salmon wasn't overcooked or dry, and the string beans and mushrooms paired well with the salmon. The part that was unexpected was the mustard sauce. M was expecting more of a dijon-type sauce, but it was a pretty creamy gravy. That made the dish a little richer than we were expecting, but it was still quite tasty. M would order this again.

A got the Southern fried chicken with sauteed smoked bacon and spinach, cheddar cheese biscuits, and chicken gravy for his entree. A is a huge fan of fried chicken, so he was really looking forward to this.

Unfortunately, A was really disappointed with this dish. While the spinach was good (it's hard to mess up spinach short of horrid over-seasoning), the rest of the dish wasn't very good at all. The chicken was dry and flavorless, and the "Southern biscuit" wasn't a biscuit at all. It was just a flat, cylindrical dinner roll. We had heard this complaint about the biscuit before we even boarded the ship, but thought it couldn't have been that poor of an imitation of a real biscuit. Sadly, it was. A didn't care much for this dish, and Royal Caribbean must not have either as this was yet another dish they removed in the recent go-around. M tried a little bit but thought the salmon was much better.

There are some interesting entrees on the new menu that we would have tried - cajun blackened snapper, roasted lemon rosemary chicken, and a surf and turf of shrimp and filet mignon (which should please all those people who were mad that surf and turf was on the sample American Icon menu but not the real one on the ship). The pistachio-crusted salmon is also still on there, which M was happy to see.

Desserts

Everyone in our group of 4 got a different dessert, although we did try bits and pieces of each other's. M went for the grilled banana sundae with vanilla ice cream, fresh blueberry syrup, and chopped Georgia pecans. This was pretty good. We didn't really taste the blueberry syrup, and the ice cream and pecans were fine, but the best part was the grilled banana. It was so full of banana flavor, soft and sweet. This was probably our favorite dessert on the menu, although M thought the dessert would have been even better if she could have paired the grilled banana with the vanilla ice cream and smashed honeycomb from the previous night at Jamie's Italian.

A chose the French quarter coffee and doughnuts, which were described on the menu as coffee-creme beignets with espresso sauce. A was really interested in this dish as he's a huge fan of beignets. After all, he's a doughnut fiend, and these are basically just New Orleans style donuts. However, these were just okay. They weren't as light and airy as a beignet should be, and the espresso sauce wasn't anything special. You also couldn't taste any of the coffee cream. If it was piped into the beignets, we certainly didn't see/taste it. As excited as he was for these, A was once more left disappointed. M was much more interested in her grilled banana sundae.

M's dad got the warm skillet cookie with vanilla ice cream. We thought we would love this, as we love warm cookies. But this cookie was way too rich. It just tasted like butter. It was all butter and richness without any depth whatsoever. We kept trying cookies on the Quantum, thinking we would love them, but you would think we would have learned our lesson after the Windjammer cookies.

M's mom needs dairy-free desserts, and the only real option at American Icon was a fruit plate. It was by far the healthiest of the desserts and it was nice to have some fresh fruit. We were puzzled as to why Quantum wouldn't list a fruit plate as a dessert for everyone on its dessert menus, but they seem to just keep them in the back for dairy-free or special requests. We guess it's one of those things where you have to know it exists in order to ask for it.

Overall, our meal at American Icon was pretty good, far better than our first dinner at Silk was. The service was much, much better. We didn't run into a whole mess about food allergies or dietary restrictions after dealing with it at the start of the meal. We had some good dishes (like the salad, salmon, and sundae), and most of the ones we weren't that fond of weren't that awful, a little disappointing but not as mediocre as our Silk dinner. We weren't "wowed" (which we only mention since Royal says the whole experience is supposed to be a WOW) but it wasn't bad.

Óxido

We're big fans of fast casual. A lot of the new ones that have been opening up lately follow the Chipotle mode of DIY combinations, but it's just nice to see so many new places and so many different cuisines in the fast casual space. One of the newest ones, Óxido, a "modern Mexican" fast casual spot from Chef Jesse Perez, opened last week, so we headed down to Flatiron to try it out over the weekend. As a bonus for it being their first weekend open, we were welcomed with some free chips and salsa samples outside the shop. What an excellent start!

Óxido, similar to Chipotle, has burritos, bowls, and tacos. You get to choose your main - garlic steak, chicken poblano, pork carnitas, beef curry, or mushrooms - and then customize it with rice, beans, vegetables, toppings, and sauce. It's basically just like Chipotle with different recipes.

So that we could try the various options at Óxido, we both got different things for the most part. M got the chicken poblano and A got the chile lime pork carnitas. M got the white comino rice and A got the brown comino rice (both are basmati). M got the charro pinto beans and A got the chipotle black beans. M got the fire-roasted tomato sauce (what they suggested would go well with the chicken) and A got the chipotle crema sauce (what they suggested would go well with the carnitas). From a top down view, our bowls looked identical, but the only things our bowls had in common were some of the toppings - vegetables a la plancha, pico de gallo, sweet corn relish, lettuce, and cheese.

A's review of his pork carnitas bowl: This bowl had a good overall flavor. The black beans were moist and paired with the brown rice to form a good base for the bowl. I didn't really taste the chipotle in the beans, though. The flavor of the carnitas was good, but it was a touch on the dry side. The salsas and vegetables were nice and fresh, especially the salsa fresca. There wasn't much cheese on bowl, and I wasn't sure if I was able to ask for more. The chipotle crema was nice and smoky and added a really nice flavor to the whole bowl.

M's review of her chicken bowl: This bowl really felt like the exact same thing I order from Chipotle, but with different chicken, so I focused first on the chicken by itself. The chicken poblano is really flavorful, drawing much of that flavor from Ancho peppers, and definitely stands apart from Chipotle with its special recipe. The fire-roasted tomato sauce that was recommended was really a great match. The beans, salsa fresca/pico de gallo and corn salad, while different recipes, are pretty on par with Chipotle (a good thing in my book). Personally, I prefer the fajita vegetables better from Chipotle, since the onions and peppers are left to grill much longer and aren't as crunchy, but these were fine and that's just a matter of personal preference. Overall, it was a good bowl.

Generally, our meal at Óxido was pretty good, and we were glad that we stopped by. Between the 2, we both preferred the chicken, but are looking forward to trying more options. The only thing that we could see as being challenging was the seating. There were 5 booths/tables and some seats at the counter, but everything was taken by the time we got our food, despite the fact that we were there at an off-peak time. It wasn't really the restaurant's fault that 80% of the people squatting had already finished eating and were just slow to leave, but we can imagine it might be a challenge at the height of the lunch or dinner rush and once more people have realized they're open.

We'll definitely go back to Óxido. We are often looking for fast casual options in Flatiron and Chelsea to combine with our grocery runs to Trader Joe's, so we're glad to have another option in the area.

March Spotlight Win

We didn't pick up the February spotlight cheese at Trader Joe's (since I'm not that big of a fan of some Neufchâtel and you couldn't get smaller sized packages), but we were super excited to see the March spotlight cheese, the Isle of Man Vintage Cheddar with Scallions and Roasted Onions. Scallions, onions, and cheddar? It wasn't even a question if we were going to try it. Those are some of our favorite things.

According to Trader Joe's, this cheddar cheese is produced by a small co-op of family farms in the Isle of Man and aged for up to 12 months. They describe the finished cheese as a "semi-hard cheddar that's distinctively rich, with a sharp aroma and a subtly sweet taste." I'm not good at describing cheese, but that sounds about right. The thing that we noticed most were the scallions and roasted onions, which made this cheese different from a regular cheddar cheese. They were so rich and sweet, embodying some of the best of spring's flavors, and we really enjoyed this.

Buy Again? Yes! Hopefully we'll be able to snag another package or two before March is over. We're also hoping that cheese like this will become a permanent part of the TJ's cheese selection!

Lemon Chevre and Spring Asparagus

Last week, as promised, I went back to Hale and Hearty to retry Chef Daniel Boulud's Curried Cream of Cauliflower and Apple soup when I got healthier. I went back and tried it, but I didn't note that much new. I did get heavier hints of each flavor, and there was a little more sweetness from the cream, but overall I seemed to get most flavors the first time.

This post is all about the sandwich I tried, though. My guess is that it's the March monthly sandwich, but I can only hope that the Lemon Chevre and Spring Asparagus is a constant Spring time offering. It's described as "Asparagus, baby spinach, tomato, and a blend of goat cheese and our signature Lemon Vinaigrette."

Wow, this is a really light and refreshing sandwich despite the chevre. The asparagus, tomato, and spinach are all really bright and fresh. The asparagus is crisp and delicious. The chevre adds an element of creaminess, and the lemon vinaigrette mixed in adds a bright citrus note and acidity. This sandwich is like a trumpet heralding the coming of Spring and its delicious bounty of fresh vegetables. I will definitely get this sandwich again.

Tomato and Basil Hummus

Continuing our journey through the Trader Joe's hummus department, next we tried the tomato and basil hummus dip ($1.99). The main ingredients here were pretty much exactly what you would expect from a tomato and basil hummus - tomatoes, garbanzos, onions, basil.

M's review:

I didn't find this hummus very flavorful at all. It was creamy like hummus should be, but the tomato flavor was pretty subdued and I didn't taste any basil at all. Making it tomato and basil flavored didn't improve on a basic hummus at all, and I would have rather had plain hummus than this one.

Buy Again? It's a no for me.

A's review:

I really like hummus. It's creamy, it's garlicky, and it has a nice, subtle nuttiness to it. This hummus had almost none of that. By adding in the tomato and basil flavor it lost all of the garlicky, nutty flavor, and the tomato and basil weren't even that heavy. It had very little tomato tartness, and it had absolutely no discernible basil flavor. It also came out a touch grainy so that was also disappointing.

Buy Again? I wouldn't get this again.

TJ's Hummus Rankings

Spicy hummus dip > Roasted garlic hummus > Beet hummus > Tomato and basil hummus

Chocolate Vegetable Tarts

For our second "chocolate night" during the Week 7 challenge, we went back to the Superfoods for Life: Cacao cookbook and made some rich chocolaty vegetable tarts. This was another one of those recipes that jumped out at me the first time I read through the book because it was such an interesting idea. You make the dough using cocoa powder and have bits of chocolate sprinkled inside the tart. I was so curious to see how well all that chocolate would match up with the savory ingredients.

First up, the ingredients for the dough:

- 1 tbsp sugar ($0.05)
- 1/4 cup cocoa powder ($0.60)
- 1-1/4 cups flour ($0.70)
- 1/4 tsp salt ($0.05)
- 1/2 cup melted coconut oil ($0.80)
- 4 tbsp cold water ($0)
- 2 tsp garlic powder ($0.05)

I added a little more garlic powder than the original recipe suggested, and used melted coconut oil instead of vegan margarine (one of the alternatives they offered). All together, the dough cost somewhere around $2.25.

Besides the dough, we also needed:

- 1 box of white mushrooms, chopped ($1.79)
- 1 yellow onion, thinly sliced ($0.60)
- 4 garlic cloves, minced ($0.08)
- 1/2 batch of chives, minced ($0.85)
- 1 tsp low sodium soy sauce ($0.05)
- 1-2 cups of artichoke hearts, chopped ($2)
- lemon juice ($0.10)
- salt ($0.05)
- 3 cubes of basil ($0.30)
- 2 tomatoes ($1.15)
- 2 oz of dark chocolate ($0.60)
- olive oil ($0.20)

The total for the tart contents was about $7.77 (the artichoke amount is more of a guess than anything else since we've had that jar for a while), making the grand total for our tart experiment approximately $10.02. Part of me wants to raise that total another $2 for the fresh basil we bought at the store that completely went bad before we could use it (and it wasn't even that long after buying it). It wasn't from Trader Joe's (with their awesome return policy), so we were just out the $2 and it really was just for this dish. If we just say it was about $12 then, it would be about $1 a tart (a little less, since not all of the vegetables made it into the tarts (more on that later)). Not exceptionally cheap, but fine.

There were a lot of steps involved in making the tarts, none of them exceptionally hard unless you're not used to working with the dough (like me) but together pretty time-consuming. They were:

1. Prep - chop mushrooms and onions, and mince garlic and chives. Mix them all together in a bowl with the soy sauce.

2. Make the dough - combine all of the dough ingredients together in a bowl and mix together well. [The consistency of the dough wasn't what I expected at all, but this was my first time making vegan dough. It was a little bit drier and less sticky to the touch, but I don't know if it was supposed to be like that or not.]

3. Separate dough into 12 portions. Take each portion of dough and roll it out flat.

4. Place each rolled out piece of dough into a greased muffin tin. [I did a really poor job of splitting the dough into equal portions... obviously. So I ended up moving some of the dough from piece to piece while in the tin. Oops.]

5. Slice up the artichoke hearts and add those as the bottom layer to each muffin cup.

6. Add the mushroom mixture. [NB: The mixture isn't cooked first according to the recipe. I was concerned about how much water this would release and considered a light saute first, but ended up just following the instructions. It turned out fine.]

7. Add a spritz of lemon juice and some salt to each muffin cup.

8. Add a little basil to each muffin cup. [Normally this would be where you place one basil leaf in each cup, but yeah... rotten basil leaves. So we microwaved the basil cubes for a little bit and then spread a little in each cup, kind of like pesto, which probably would have been a better idea.]

9. Slice the tomatoes and add one slice to each muffin cup.

10. Chop up the chocolate and add to the top of each cup.

11. Drizzle olive oil on top of each cup.

12. Bake at 425 degrees for 12 minutes and then lower the heat to 375 degrees and bake for 15 minutes.

Similar to the green beans, the tarts didn't quite look like the cookbook photo, but in this case, it didn't matter. The tarts were so interesting and really tasty. I wasn't sure how a cocoa-heavy dough would go with the vegetables but they were a great match. We actually had some mushroom mixture and some tomato ends left after putting together the muffin cups, so I lightly sauteed that with whatever chocolate bits were left, and it tasted really great. In my opinion, that actually tasted better than the tarts, probably because it was a little lighter. Chocolate just seems to match up well with tomatoes, mushrooms, and onions. Who knew? Not me.

Although they were tarts, they were a little too heavy at first to actually pick up and eat like a tart. Maybe I put too much of the mushroom mixture and other vegetables inside, but we ended up eating them with a fork which was fine. A was eventually able to lift and eat them by hand, but that was after they cooled a bit more. I was actually impressed that they came out intact, since it was my first try making tarts and I thought they would be a huge broken mess. We ended up eating all 12 that night. Probably not a great idea, but we were hungry and they were so good! Not a short process to make them, mostly because of the rolling out of the dough and all the vegetable prep, but it was definitely worth the effort to test this out. More of a weekend cooking project than a weeknight meal, in my opinion, but we would consider making these again.

Our favorite recipe from the cacao cookbook was the cocoa jerk tofu, but these tarts were quite good. Can't wait to experiment more with cocoa powder and adding chocolate to savory dishes, because this experiment was great. I've learned through this challenge that chocolate isn't just limited to mole and chili in the savory context. It's so great in so many other things! Very happy with these experiments.

City Kitchen

A couple of days ago, Times Square got its first permanent food hall, the 4,000 square foot City Kitchen in the Row NYC hotel (formerly the Milford Plaza) at 44th and 8th (diagonally across the street from the Theater District Shake Shack, if that helps you place it). We didn't have anything planned for tonight and we like food halls, so we decided to check it out for dinner.

In the previews of the place, we kept hearing that it would be "massive" and "gigantic" but it really wasn't a huge space. Located on the second floor of the building, there were a few tables in the center and seats at counters along the windows, as well as a small seating area in the hotel lobby/bar area. Definitely not as much seating or space as the nearby Gotham West. Since it was only the second day, it wasn't insanely busy and we didn't have any trouble getting seats around 8 pm. (They close at 9, which seems early for the Times Square area, but maybe that'll change over time).

There are currently 9 vendors at City Kitchen - Gabriela's Taqueria (tacos and rotisserie chicken), Ilili Box (an offshoot of the Flatiron Lebanese restaurant), Whitman's (meat sandwiches and similar stuff), Luke's Lobster (part of the growing Luke's empire), Kuro Obi (a fast casual spinoff of Ippudo), Azuki (sushi), Wooly's (shaved ice that we first tried at the Vendys), Sigmund's Pretzels (an offshoot of the East Village pretzel shop with the cutest cart), and Dough (one of our favorite doughnut spots). Some vendors are permanent but others are apparently seasonal, so there may be some changes in the line-up sometime in the future.

Between the opening of City Kitchen and A finding an article on upcoming food halls the other day, we've had food halls on the brain this week, and it occurred to me that we haven't actually posted about our visits to other food halls on the blog at all. (The only one we've really ever mentioned that we can think of was Food Gallery 32 over 4 years ago.) We have posts on Hudson Eats and Gotham West still languishing in our drafts, and now 3 new spots to review from City Kitchen. Maybe it's time we focus on food halls for a little bit. Hopefully we finish all the posts before Bourdain Market comes to town!

Sauteed Preserved Pork with Dried Turnips

I feel like I've started being recognized at Hunan Manor since the same lady gives me my takeout each time, and I'm pretty sure today before I even said my name, she was nodding and bringing out my receipt to sign. Anyway, today I opted to try their sauteed preserved pork with dried turnips dish.

So when I first opened this dish, I thought the smaller, thinner pieces were the pork. I don't know why, but I did. I was incredibly wrong. Those smaller, thinner pieces were actually the dried turnips. Those larger, darker blocks? Those are the preserved pork. Also as with many of the dishes I've tried from here, the dish is full of garlic, ginger, and green and red chilis, but this one is also loaded with leeks. They added a really nice flavor to the dish.

The turnips had some bite and a bit of bitterness to them, but that was balanced out with the saltiness of the preserved pork. Due to the fattiness I'm guessing that it's pork belly, but it's not listed so I'm not 100% sure. My only gripe is that the pork itself is tough to chew. I could eventually get through each piece, but it was a struggle with some of the pieces.

Overall this was a good dish. I don't know that I would get it again, but I'm really happy that I tried it.

Chicken and Sausage Seafood Paella

So yesterday I had every intention of going to Hale and Hearty to get Daniel Boulud's Chef Series soup offering as I admittedly didn't have all of my full tasting faculties the first time I tried it. However, I called an audible after seeing the Chicken and Sausage Seafood Paella on the menu. I'd been thinking about paella for a bit ever since M and I looked at the pics of our paellas from our Barcelona trip. Unfortunately, since I didn't write this yesterday I don't have their website description to add here as I usually do. I think it said something about chicken, chorizo, and "Spanish spices".

Now, I don't know what "Spanish spices" are, but I have had paella before in Barcelona so I at least know what that should taste like. This soup is full of chicken, chorizo pieces, onions, peas, rice, shrimp, and mussels. It's an incredibly flavorful and tasty soup, but it's not a paella. It does not taste at all like any paella I have ever eaten before. What it does taste like is gumbo. It's a tasty gumbo, but it's still a gumbo.

Overall, I like this soup. I would get it again for sure. The shrimp and mussels are really great in the soup, and the chorizo adds a nice saltiness and spice to the soup. It's still not a paella, though.

Saiguette

We're always on the lookout for good banh mi spots, so when we were up by the north end of Central Park in the fall looking for a late afternoon snack, we decided to stop by Saiguette, a place we had heard good things about. 

Saiguette is a small Vietnamese spot with only a couple of seats, but they have a pretty extensive menu, including pho, bun, and banh mi. It was pretty crowded when we got there, so we just got a sandwich to share, figuring that would be easy to split at the counter.

There were a bunch of banh mi options but we decided to go with the grilled chicken tenderloin. The banh mi had the usual carrots, cucumber, cilantro, and jalapeño (don't remember any daikon), and a generous portion of chicken, which was so juicy and flavorful, and not the least bit dry. Although it wasn't our favorite chicken banh mi ever, it was certainly close and a very solid choice. We were actually surprised by how much we liked the chicken.

We really liked our lunch/snack at Saiguette and wish we lived closer so we could drop by more often for some Vietnamese food. But at least we know if we're in the neighborhood, there's a great place to stop by for banh mi!

Saiguette is located at 935 Columbus Avenue (at 106th Street/Duke Ellington Blvd).

Curried Chickpea and Potato

So I've been following the development of the Rhong-Tiam near my office for a bit now, and I've been anxiously awaiting its opening. I'd heard good things about the food truck as well as their other location so I was eager to try this out. They don't have anything that they label as a lunch special, but they have things called rice bowls that come with a salad and half a hard-boiled egg so that seems like a rather close approximation. I opted for the Curried Chickpea and Potato rice bowl.

First things first, the egg is an egg. It's a tasty egg, but it's still just an egg. I like eggs, though, so I did like that they gave one. There are hints of seasoning on the egg, but I'm not sure if that's just the other food in the dish that are adding that. In the end, I did enjoy eating the egg.

The salad was shaved carrots on top of iceberg lettuce. The carrot ginger dressing reminded me a lot of the dressing on the salad from Sachi, and since Chef Andy Yang is behind both it's not that surprising. Like Sachi, this dressing was a bit creamy for a carrot ginger dressing, and it also didn't have a heavy ginger flavor to it. It was tasty, though, due to the sweetness of the carrot. The iceberg lettuce was pretty bland and pointless, but it's just iceberg lettuce.

The entree of the curried chickpea and potato was really tasty. It tasted a lot like Massaman curry, and the soft potato and mashed up chickpeas were extremely flavorful. There were also chopped up onion and carrot to round out the dish, and everything just tasted of the delicious curry flavoring. There was a wonderful curry spice to the dish, and there also wasn't a ton of heat as well. The dish is full of amazing flavors.

Overall this is a very solid lunch. The flavors are incredibly robust, and the egg is a really nice touch. I do wish the salad was in a separate container as the flavors of the dressing don't really mesh well with the flavor of the curry. Because of the healthy, fresh ingredients, this is on the slightly more expensive side of Thai restaurants in the area, but it's still a good amount of food. I'd like to try some of their noodle dishes, but that will come with time.

Masak

Back in early 2013, we visited Masak, a Singaporean (influenced) restaurant down in the East Village. Sadly, a few weeks after our visit, they closed. When a restaurant has closed up and we have a draft post still languishing in our list, we'll often decide to abandon the review altogether, but (1) this would count for Singapore WorldEats and (2) sadly there isn't any Singaporean food in NYC right now that we know of (since Singapura, the only other place, closed later that same year). Since our Masak post was partially done back in 2013 (we really need to get better about completing them...), we're going to finish it up and dream about some delicious chili crab dip.

We really loved the food on our only visit to Singapore over 5 years before our Masak visit and had wanted to try Masak for a bit, so when we saw a voucher offered online for them, we jumped at the chance. With so many restaurants to try in NYC, it's hard to make it to everywhere we want to go, so in some ways, we used the voucher to give us a little bit of a push there. Our voucher gave us 2 appetizers and 2 entrees for a set price ($39), and we could order anything on the menu without restriction (which was really liberating, compared to some other places).

The one appetizer we knew we were getting before we got to the restaurant was the chili crab dip, which was accompanied by fried mantou.

We had chili crab back in Singapore and years later, we still think about how good it was. The subtle sweetness of the crab and tomato-based sauce mixed with a very mild hint of heat makes chili crab so special, and it's such a delicacy in Singapore. The chili crab dip here really captured the essence of chili crab using only the crab meat itself and not whole pieces of crab. The fried mantou that came with it added even more sweetness and a light crispness as well. Masak's offering wasn't quite as good as the one we had in Singapore, but it was still quite delicious.

There was still a lot of dip so we got more mantou. That stuff was so filling, but so good. If only there were a place to get mantou now...

For the second appetizer, we chose rock shrimp tempura with spicy aioli. When M hears rock shrimp tempura, the dish that comes to mind is usually the one from Nobu. Crispy fried shrimp coated in a spicy mayo sauce. This rock shrimp tempura was fairly similar in style. It was good, from what we remember.

For the entree course, M got the devil chicken which came with fried fingerling potatoes and a small side of kale. The chicken was cooked well, and the vegetable sides were good, but outside of the sauce, which did have Asian notes to it, nothing about this dish really screamed Singaporean to M. It looked like something you could get at any bistro. From what we remember, it was tasty, but the thing we remember most about this meal wasn't the chicken.

A went with the babi assam tamarind braised pork belly with fried black rice. It's been a couple of years, so we really don't remember very much about this. Clearly, the entrees did not make much of an impression on us.

We were too full for dessert, so even though the tang yuan dumplings sounded interesting, we had to pass. We really enjoyed our meal there and would have considered going back, so we were sad when we read the news that they had closed. Considering how great Singaporean food is, why can't we get a lasting Singaporean restaurant out here?!