Going out to eat in NYC is so convenient but I get sick of it after a while. After spending some time in the kitchen, we realize there's nothing better than home cooked (and grown) food.

Dinner

Wonder Bread!!

My Peach Pop

Perfect for the hot weather!

It's been a while, I know. Have been cooking a lot at home. Tonight's dinner: mac & cheese. Yum.

Just relaxing on this Sunday afternoon, made this delicious salmon wrap for myself.

RAMPS!

First signs of spring has hit the green-market, picked up the first batch of ramps over the weekend! 

See what we did with them here!

Brooklyn Views

We were over at Jason's place down in Financial District last weekend, visiting Camille and their newborn Maddox!(amazingly cute!) We had a great night excluding the crane that almost fell on my car~ Was able to get on the roof and take pics of my favorite view!

San Francisco Treat

The wife and I headed to San Francisco for a little weekend getaway/food feast. On our trip we managed to try as much food as possible and the following highlighted our culinary itinerary:

Jai Yun - 12 Course prefix chef's selection dinner for 2 @ the $80.00/pp level. We had a restaurants.com $75 dollar voucher to make this meal a steal.

Mama's on Washington Sq - French toast sampler (amazing in-house bread), dungeness crab omlette with avocado's and Brie

R & G Lounge - Crispy salt and pepper dungeness crabs

Leland Tea Comany - Cream Tea: (organic chai) two scones, double devon cream and fruit!

The Slanted Door - Modern Vietnamese focusing on local and ecological farmed meat and produce. We had their Crispy Imperial Rolls, dungeness crab cellophane noodles, shaking beef (filet mignon), meyer lemon meringue tart and blood orange sorbet with thai basil sauce.

The Little Skillet - Fried chicken and waffles

Ferry plaza farmers market - Cow girl creamery / Boccalone Salumeria / Hog Island / Blue Bottle Coffee / Il Cane Rosso / Out the door / Acme Bread / Far west fungi /

Chez Panisse Cafe - Alice Waters famed restaurant - Pizzetta, sea bass tare tare, pork leg, chicken paillard, squid, lime sherbet, pink lady apple and sour cherry tart, and caramel cream puffs.

Check out Angie's Blog for more pics!

Ippudo + Minca updates

Update: 1/26/2010

I was able to get into Ippudo as a walk in single at the bar, with no wait. I promptly sat down and got to business and ordered a Sapporo, Hirata Buns (Pork) , and the Shiromaru Hakata Classic Ramen. Overall the bun's lacked the finesse of Momofuku's buns, and the classic ramen was good, great broth and nice textured noodles however over priced at $14 dollars with only a small portion of their simmered berkshire pork (you can get an additional serving for $4 dollars). Overall good quality but you are mostly paying for the atmosphere.

Update: 3/7/2010

We decided to hit up Minca again (no wait) for some ramen and to order their Toroniku Ramen (slow cooked pork belly with fresh cabbage) along with their basic (pork) broth and thick noodles, as it was sold out the last time we visited. I must say that it was the best bowl of ramen I have had in NY hands down. It is one of their more expensive items on the menu at $14 dollars but the portion was overwhelming, with a large bowl of soup, noodles and approximately 2-3 large pieces of melt-in-your-mouth pork belly. A must try if you want to get the best ramen in the city.

Menchanko-tei

www.menchankotei.com

131 East 45th Street

New York, NY 10017-3131

(212) 986-6805

We were in midtown the other night and still having the "ramen" craze I decided to go check out Menchanko-Tei. I heard they made very good hand pulled ramen noodles so I decided to give it a shot. Once we got there there was a 10 min wait, once we were seated we took a look at the menus and they had a big variety different Japanese food to choose from.

We started with their winter special $1.99 hot sake, a spicy salmon roe rice ball, agedashi tofu, and shrimp gyoza. The rice ball and tofu were excellent, however the gyoza lacked flavor and were stuffed only with 2 pieces cut up shrimp.

I chose the "Hakata Ramen", which was their ultra thin ramen noodles in a rich pork broth topped with simmered pork slices, black mushrooms, red ginger, and scallions. The broth was very tasty not overly porky, the noodles to  us tasted more like lo-mein then ramen, not sure if that is good or bad. The topping were just ok, the pork was a bit to lean for me, I prefer a little fat. We also tried a bowl of their "Shoyu Ramen"l, their traditional tokyo style thin ramen noodles in a soy sauce broth with the same topping as above. Again the broth seemed just ok and nothing to special, not overly salty. One thing is, I did not leave a MSG headache after dinner.

All in all Menchanko-tei is a good ramen shop, with a wide variety menu, and good prices.

St. Alps Teahouse

Addicted...

http://nymag.com/listings/restaurant/saints-alp-teahouse/

Neighborhood: East Village
39 3rd Avenue
(between 10th St & 2nd Ave)
New York, NY 10003

(212) 598-1890

www.saints-alp.com.hk/

Minca - 536 E. 5th Street + Ippudo update

Minca is a authentic Japanese Ramen shop in the east village. After being denied at Ippudo several times due to the outrageous long wait (average 2 hours+) we have decided to try out Minca in the east village, and boy are we glad we did as it did not disappoint. We have heard good things about Ippudo from the decor to the food, but we would never wait longer then 30 mins to eat ramen, the crowd and atmosphere also wasn't for us. Minca on the other hand, was more our kind of place, a small discreet shop at the far end of the street, the hostess greeted us with friendly and fast service. The open kitchen allowed us to watch the Japanese cooks put together our dishes.

The menu had a fair selection, that included appetizers, ramen, and special ramen's/donn.We started with some hot green tea, a few sapporo's and shrimp gyoza. The handmade gyoza was brought out hot and fast, it was a generous size portion with whole peeled shrimp inside(nice touch) along with their soy dipping sauce. They were very good~ We also saw orders of kim chee and radish salad being served which both looked very tasty.

For the ramen the menu had several options which allowed you to choose different types of stocks(pork, chicken, miso and spicy), noodles(thin, thick, wavy, whole wheat, and bean) and toppings(pork or chicken charshu). One our first visit I had the pork and chicken broth - Kambi (soy sauce flavor), Angie tried out the pork and chicken broth - Kambi Sio (salt & roast garlic flavor), and my sister had the Miso ramen.  The Kambi's stock was very rich with soy and reminded me of a adobo(filipino style) sauce, the Kambi Sio has a nice earthy salt and very garlic flavor(not overly salted i.e Momofuku), while the miso had a strong bean taste(not my favorite). I had the thin noodles which were cooked a little less then al dente giving it a springy texture, I am pretty sure their noodles are not handmade. Each ramen also consisted of sliced stewed pork, scallions, seasoned bamboo shoots, mushrooms, nori, and a half of an egg stewed in soy sauce.

On my second visit I tried the Charshu ramen, with pork broth and thin noodles. This stock was very very rich, that had a strong pork flavor and had a noticeable amount of pork grease, which gave the stock a thicker/gelatinous consistency. This bowl was generously fitted with about 6 pieces of charshu, which was melt in your mouth good.

Overall Minca was above average, the stock, noodles and topping are all done well. On both occasions there were several Japanese expats dining along side us, along with local neighborhood folk, which confirms its authenticity. I did however leave with a slight MSG headache. All in all Minca's ramen was satisfying and we we should be back again.

Picnic Garden - 14742 Northern Blvd, Flushing

AYCE - All you can eat for $24.95, budget korean buffet, lots of raw meat all the major korean bbq players which include, kalbi, korean bacon, bulgogi, spicy pork, chicken, gizzards, liver, shrimp and a host of other items are available, also included is a bounty of hot and cold items. The place, is a narrow restaurant with bad ventilation systems(leave your nice jackets and coats in the car). I wouldn't consider their food the freshest or most flavorful, but for $24.95(price of 1 bbq dish in k-town) AYCE you get what you pay for, worth a visit at least once a year.

Gahm Mi Oak

One restaurant we can always count on in consistency and availability is Gahm Mi Oak, as it is one of many of the 24/7 K-town restaurants down on Korean way row. Gahm Mi Oak does fail in one category service, as if you are not a fellow Korean, be prepared to wait a little longer for your food. But since their menu has a reasonable cost rate, no one can complain.

Gahm Mi Oak has a exotic and limited menu, mostly bar food type items that pair well with their selections of soju and beer, the menu consist of items such as oxtail, pigs feet, stomach, bossams(raw oyster asian burritos), bipimbob(rice stone bowl) and blood sausages, but the only thing we come in for is their ox tail soup "Sul long tang" and for me its the best I've tasted. Every table is first treated to their famous kimchi and kaktugi(radish), which are served and cut up table-side. Most begin with Sul long tang which are brought out on medium size stone bowls, filled with a beautiful white cloud of ox bone soup boiled for 12 hours and topped with layers of rice, rice noodles and beef brisket. Each patron then adds their own scallions, sea salt and pepper to taste. We truly love this soup and the perfect combination of ox bone soup, rice, noodles and brisket, its definitely seoul of a king~

43 W 32nd St, New York, NY 10001

nr. Broadway

212-695-4113

Philippe's and Roscoe's

While on our visit to LA, i insisted to stop at Roscoe's and Philippes

and they did not disappoint!








our trip ended with a quick lesson in mahjong