A 3-on-3 Geneva Macaron Duel

As mentioned previously, I am rather fond of macarons, much more so than gooey coconut macaroons. Laduree, the Paris-based, original creator of the double-decker macaron, has an outpost in Geneva, which meant I had an obligation to indulge myself. I bought three macarons at CHF 2.20 each: bergamot orange (their limited-edition, seasonal flavor), violet-cassis, and fleur de sel (salted caramel), plus a mint-green tote bag adorned with a giant macaron photo (because where else are you going to get a macaron bag?)

Rather ceremonially, I removed my bag of macarons from the tote (for the record: if you buy six macarons, you get them in a cotton box), carefully removed the sticker, and slid the macarons out. Of course, this epic display of propriety was shattered when I opted for my passion fruit juice as accompaniment since I had neither coffee nor milk on hand.
Top to bottom: fleur de sel, violet-cassis, bergamot-orange.

So now, the single-bite rotation, beginning with the violet-cassis. In short, simply beautiful: the grown-up, glorified equivalent of the patty cake. The compote had melded seamlessly into the macaron double-decker, making a cakey-jammy interior; accordingly, the macaron didn't break on the first bite. The cassis flavor was powerful but not overwhelming, while the violet played the backseat rather delicately.

Of course, excellent first bites make for rather impossible expectations; the bergamot orange, while a sound concept - citrus and bergamot go hand in hand, and bergamot is the scent behind Earl Grey, my favorite kind of tea - lacked the kick of the violet-cassis. Rather, I was left with a concentrated bergamot scent, which gave the macaron a bitter aftertaste and which the orange could not redeem.

Finally, the fleur de sel. Equally as good as the violet-cassis, but in a different way (I silently agonized for five minutes in deciding on a favorite). Neither jaw-breakingly chewy nor Hershey-thin, the caramel bound itself to its macaron hosts in a tight symbiosis of styrofoamy, rich sugar rush. At the same time, the caramel had enough salt to stop me from gagging and to enjoy each tiny bite I took. (I managed five bites from the fleur de sel's two-inch diameter).

After my first Genevan exposure to the macaron, I needed more. And so I found myself drawn to the Pougnier storefront, six blocks from Laduree, for "research purposes." Again, I bought three macarons (CHF 2.10, each): rose, Earl Grey and apricot-hazelnut. (The two stores only overlap on classic flavors - chocolate, strawberry, pistachio - though Earl Grey and bergamot-orange should theoretically have been similar.)

Another photoshoot was in order, and then tasting. (I should probably note that the macarons I happened to pick at Pougnier happened to match color better, although the packaging was comparatively lackluster on their part.)

I started out with the apricot-hazelnut. Overall, I was pleased with the flavor: notably, there was a piece of apricot in my filling and the hazelnut flavor was subtly pleasant. However, the fundamental problem was the texture of the macaron - as soon as I bit into the apricot-hazelnut, I felt how hollow the macaron was. And then I saw the hollowness, once the macaron immediately separated from the apricot filling. Once that happened, it was like eating a deep dish pizza layer by layer: good, but not great. And the macaron, apart from the filling, wasn't that impressive - it actually tasted a little stale.
You can visibly see the separation of the double-decker in this photo. Top to bottom: rose, apricot-hazelnut, and Earl Grey on the bottom (it actually was flaked with gold leaf, why it was red I don't know).

This review got a small boost from the rose macaron; because creme filling was used, the macaron structure held fairly tightly. However, I wasn't too impressed with the filling - though the rose flavor was distinctly and deliciously rose, the cream was curdlike, but not like jam-curd like, it just happened to be lumpy. I would have liked to see a rose jelly instead.


Finally, the Earl Grey. I actually liked the taste of the macaron more than that of Laduree's bergamot-orange. It was clear that the macaron was Earl Grey-flavored, which I gave a prompt thumbs-up to. At the same time, Fougnier infused a bit of chocolate flavor in the filling - which not only made it sweeter but also moister - enhancing the cookie's texture. Still, the outsides of the macaron sandwich were brittle.

As a consistent problem, texture was the deciding factor from which Pougnier couldn't recover. So for me, Laduree wins; it's still worth their CHF .10 premium.

But while these are the two major macaron producers in Geneva, there's more "research": Because Geneva is on the French-speaking side of the Confederation, it sticks mostly to French-style macarons, but luxembourgli, a Swiss variant on the French macaron, were invented in Zurich.

And if I manage to go to Paris later this summer, there will be lots of competition with Laduree's three-story flagship store, including La Maison du Chocolat (they specialize in combining chocolate filling with basic-flavored macarons), and Gerard Mulot. Hopefully, a macaron tour will be in store, and if so, I'm most excited about Pierre Herme, known as much for his savory macarons (including foie gras and ketchup) as his "high king" status in the macaron world. But for now, I'll be sticking with an occasional violet-cassis...though I'd love to see the new seasonal flavors.

Review: Lausanne-Moudon Restaurant

Hunger is the best pickle.
-- Benjamin Franklin (via stanfood)

When guidebooks lead you astray and there is nowhere to eat in town, the end of your two-hour search will always taste pretty good. That is not to say that you should discount the restaurant's own skills - because the meat at Moudon was pretty darn good, not to mention super reasonably priced by Swiss standards.

To elaborate: after hitting up Vevey (and spending a lot more time reminiscing on the lakeshore than expected), we train'd back to Lausanne and went to the other half of the city to check out the Olympic Museum, in hopes of catching the last three hour ferry to Geneva and being the next Andy and Akiva. Then, we encountered the most disgruntled teen employee ever: he looked like Josh Peck (yeah, I watched All That! growing up) but with unwashed hair and a monotone voice. Clearly, he wasn't getting paid on commission, as he explained that we wouldn't make the boat, there was no student discount, and the boat was really long and really boring. No kidding, a three hour boat with no T-Pain on board...so we did it his way and left.

Since we could now stay a few hours longer without the constraint of the boat, Erin and I decided to grab dinner. The goal: not to have to walk a mile uphill, again. But plans change. When we realized that our choices for dinner in the shopping district were limited to the Cactus Bar (fajitas for $34 and the ambience of a Hooters) or the classic fondue place (only with a man screaming "N'entrez pas! C'est terrible!") we decided uphill was the way to go. Specifically, we headed to La Pomme de Pin, in the Old Town, only to realize that it was closed this particular Saturday night. And our consolation prize, the cafe with curry gelato, refused to serve us a couple minutes before closing time.

Mild cursing ensued on the walk downhill.

We regrouped to find la brasserie Moudon, which was described in the Lausanne book as "a culinary experience for Lausanne gastronomy." But at this point, we were just relieved that the Cactus Bar was no longer an option.

The exterior of Moudon is a porched house, though it is located on a corner of a public square that tops a highway tunnel. That said, the house alone looks like something that could be plopped down in the Disneyland version of Liberty Square. A little kooky - haunted - but hospitable. We got our menus and raced to find suitable meals, but our timing did not match that of our waiter's, who arrived twenty minutes later. My stomach growling, I ordered the jambonneau roti au four (baked ham hock) while Erin ordered la filet du canard (duck). Again - another twenty minute wait - and then, gloriousness.

That is, a giant ham hock on my plate, coated with a grainy honey mustard sauce and accompanied with steamed veggies (not from Costco, but close enough) and potatoes. The ham was excellent; it fell off the bone and never necessitated a knife; add sauerkraut and you would had the perfect German meal. The relatively thin texture of the honey mustard didn't really match the robustness of the ham, so I stole Erin's honey-black pepper sauce periodically throughout the meal.
Speaking of Erin's honey-black pepper sauce, it coated, surrounded, and redeemed her duck, which was perfectly sliced if not rather tough. That sauce was the MVP of the game, really, followed by the au gratin that accompanied it (ten times richer than any dhall au gratin).
Both meals were at a good price (CHF $29.50 for the ham, $34 for the duck). As we found anecdotally, the further from Geneva, the cheaper the food - at least on the French side. Vevey actually had dinners starting at $17...

Accordingly, we ordered dessert; Erin went "weird" this time and went for the cigares du phraron, the most "exotic" item on the menu, which turned out to be nutty, hazelnut and almond
stuffed wafers in a Greek yogurt and honey dip. I went for the moulleux du chocolat, because it was the only word I didn't know on the dessert menu...with the 10-minute prep warning, I deduced that it was molten chocolate cake.

I actually preferred Erin's cigars to my own cake; her combination of nut-honey-cream was light and refreshing, though CHF 10 was pretty pricey for the quantity (3 small wafers). My molten chocolate cake (also CHF 10), of course, was the opposite of that; it was very rich, and while the chocolate was excellent (we are in Switzerland, after all), the cake was a little too floury and a little overcooked to provide a gooey consistency. The shot-sized vanilla ice cream was a good buffer for the richness though, if lacking in quantity.
Moudon left a positive stamp on our trip to Lausanne, but probably more from the recency effect. Meanwhile, we left Lausanne happy to return to the bevy of restaurants open Saturday night in Geneva.

Rue du Tunnel 20, 1005 Lausanne, 021.329.0471

Review: Hotel les Armures

My friend Erin, who some of you may recall from her guest post on Yale d-halls, came out to Geneva for a weekend visit. Her history skillz compelled her to photograph all the Genevan fountains (free water for all!) and other ancient fixtures and signs, but I still managed to convert her into make the weekend a pseudo-culinary tour. (Pseudo, only because because I had an obligation to bring her to regular touristy things.)

Hence, the next series of posts will be reviewing our chock-full-of-food weekend - from chains to fine dining to the Alimentarium (a museum specializing in food and culture, and which I've been plotting to see ever since I've gotten here).

To begin: after Erin got here Friday night, we scrambled to get a stash of food before everything closed at 7. After a quick tour of Old Town, we wandered Bourg de Four for dinner before settling on Hotel les Armures, whose claim to fame is that diplomats and "three Democratic U.S. presidents" have stayed there. (Translated: those darn Republicans.)

Hotel des Armures is well-known for its cheese fondue, but although it was rather cold on the patio, we wanted to get some red meat into our systems for the rather lengthy day trip tomorrow. Erin chose the traditional saucisson-rosti combination (CHF 19), which consisted of a Swiss-cut sausage coupled with rosti, a round cake of shredded potato that can be compared to soft, non-crispy hash browns. I went for a house specialty, the cold roast beef with tartar sauce coupled with fries and a spring mix (CHF 24). We split a wild mushroom soup as a starter (CHF 14).

(You get CHF 1.05 for every US$1 exchanged here, so we just think about it heuristically as one-to-one.)

The mushroom soup was my favorite part of the meal, though Erin relinquished the majority of the bowl to me. As a bisque, it was neither cream-of-mushroom nor chunky broth; although the color was a bit off-putting, it tasted like mushroom sans the bitterness (I silently compared it to the mushroom tart at Porter Square's Chez Henri).



My roast beef froid was pretty good; lots of the red at the center. I usually try to steer away from tartar sauce in the States, but homemade tartar is a different story...plus there were no capers in the tartar. The chunky raw chive added to the top of the tartar made it a little more crisp. The salad was lackluster, and although shredded potato was a good idea in theory, drowning it in a creamy mayonnaise dressing and tossing it on top of the salad was not the best idea.


Fries...hmph. I'm already slightly disgruntled with fries here in Switzerland; they're too potato-y (potatoe-y looks better, but I don't want to pull a Dan Quayle just in case) and yellow colored for my McD sensibilities. To make matters worse, I asked for ketchup and was never served it, and the already-brusque service went downhill from there. Yes, I know I'm hopeless - so please, the ketchup. I can't do it with cracked black pepper, alone. (I could have done with some aioli, too.)


On the other hand, Erin's sausage was amazing. Lots of dense flavor permeated it, and the casing wasn't obnoxious. I prefer Perkins pan-fried hash browns to rosti, but that's probably just because the chewier texture is acquired.

Throwdown: go for the lunch specials at CHF 19. You can get a main plate with risotto/rosti and veggies on the side. And don't ask for the ketchup.

Review: Le Syracuse

(Note: if there is erratic timing between my posts, it's because of the quantity of photos I'm uploading. Accordingly, blogposts often have some delay - apologies!)

As I mentioned, last weekend my friend Tomo - an intern at CERN - came out to visit Geneva, and I got to be his pseudo-host. Both of us were relieved that we had a travel buddy for the day trip, mostly because someone else got to take photos of us for our families back home.

We decided on lunch at the Bourg de Four, the liveliest part of the Old Town here. Tomo had heard me complaining of the definitely not-stipend-worthy prices here, and then realized I was serious when I said $25 was the average price for a sit-down lunch. (Apparently CERN partially subsidizes dinners in their cafeteria, since I gave him a dirty look when he said he got steak, veggies and a dessert for $15.) We found La Syracuse, though, and promptly were charged $3 each for a shared bottle of mineral water, but to our surprise, the water was crisp, and not just because it was chilled.

Tomo ordered the prosciutto pizza ($18), while I noshed on the steak des calamari, paired with pesto linguini. Both were solid choices. The pizza was a fairly good size for its price, though it was noticeably lacking on prosciutto (Tomo would consistently redistribute the prosciutto on the pizza, saving most of it for the last two slices).

The steak des calamari, true to its name, was two small slabs of calamari, and were well-grilled - I was surprised by their size, since typically, I eat my calamari in strips (I also had the brief fear that my lunch would result in a giant deep fried steak of calamari rings, held together with breading - not unlike country steak). The tomato sauce that accompanied it was a nice touch, though a bit too thick and salty. The pesto continued the lightness of the lunch, but also could have been less salty.

The summary: a restaurant that I might repeat, for the sake of price, but given that there are so many great places out here, probably not more than once.

New York, Day .5: Shanghai Moon House

My intersession trip to New York began with a harried rush to the legendary Fung Wah bus. And by legendary, I mean notorious. It’s no surprise that I was a little fearful of the Fung Wah – but the only negative story I personally heard was from a philosophy student I met on the T, who pointed out that one trip, his foot, straying in the aisle, was sprayed with Febreze. And even so, that wasn’t that terrible.

And the bus ride, in reality, wasn’t that terrible either. Granted, I played the role of a “yuppie seeking validation of and legitimacy in his or her life” (aka: the plotline of Love Story) through a cheap bus ride adventure, but really. My only worry was the strict ten minute allotment for the McDonald’s stop; rumor had it that the driver would promptly pull out regardless of missing riders. Whether that happened this time…I don’t know. The bus was fairly speedy in the 4.75-hour trip, but my brother-in-law had to point out to me that the driver almost crashed into a car upon arrival.

Whoops.

In any case, it was around 10:30 pm when we finally sat down at Shanghai Moon House Restaurant (67 Bayard Street/New York, NY 10013/212.766.9399 or 212.766.9098 ), a repeat visit for my sister and brother-in-law. They had been raving about the pork steamed buns (8 for $2.99 – ridiculously cheap by most standards) and the aromatic beef cold noodle ($4.50). We ended up ordering a few other things as well, as the dining and packing schedule had been a little harried to say the least. (I beat my roommate’s packing record – fifteen minutes. Take that.)

The food came quickly, and we started off with appetizers. The pork steamed buns were just as I had expected, and even a little bit larger-sized. A quick note on the buns: the kind that we got weren’t dry or sandwich-y, bread-based buns. Rather, these buns were what are called tang bao, “soup” buns, meaning that they were filled with the same broth used to cook the pork filling. The overarching goal of eating tang bao is to not let the soup leak out, since it’s really the best part of the bun. The way to do this is to use chopsticks to maneuver the bao into a soup spoon, dip the spoon into the gingery vinegar sauce, and to eat the bao in one bite, letting the ingredients soak against your tongue.

We followed this up with a combination of three appetizers ($9.95): sliced aromatic beef, wine chicken (aka drunken chicken) and jelly fish. The sliced beef was thin and had a good proportion of jelly, which added to the meat’s chewy texture. And yes, it was aromatic – but the spices were subtle. The wine chicken tasted like any other drunken chicken, but the chicken meat was a little leaner and there was less fat and skin. The jelly fish, although vinegary, was a little less flavorful. However, a generous portion of it was served, and it was nice and chewy. For those of you who are a little less adventurous with regard to jellyfish: don’t worry, it’s good. And it doesn’t really look like meat; it’s just clear.

The sautéed water spinach came ($7.95), followed by the aromatic beef cold noodle ($4.50). The water spinach’s sell comes from its crunch – it also goes by the name “hollow vegetable” because its stems are indeed hollow. Typically water spinach is drenched in oil and lots of garlic, but Shanghai Moon’s rendition was a little bit more delicate. Yes, there was plenty of oil, but at least it looked like it wasn’t reused oil (a heads-up: if your egg rolls ever look dark-colored, it’s probably because it was the tenth batch to be deep fried in the oil). The fresh flavor of the spinach really stood out, but I wished there was a little more garlic flavor in the dish. The cold noodle (shown above – with close up of the meat) was topped with a creamy, light-color peanut sauce that could have been thicker. Combined with the noodles – which had a wavy, fettucini-like texture – it was really quite tasty.

Finally, the surprise hit of the meal was something I didn’t realize we’d ordered – pork and vegetable strips in garlic sauce (admittedly, I don’t have the price because it was a last-minute order). It consisted of thinly shredded pork with green peppers and water chestnuts, topped up with sliced garlic cloves under a brown gravy. Although it looked out of place in a Shanghai-style restaurant, next to the pork steamed buns, it was my favorite dish of the evening; the flavors were bold and the peppers were sharp.

Knowing the huge quantity of restaurants in Chinatown, you could easily head from one to another for a month without repeats, and during visits to New York, I’ll have more on the list to try. But this one may warrant another trip.

Review: Wagamama

57 JFK St, Cambridge, MA 02138/617.499.0930

I figure I'll state it up front: I am not a fan of Wagamama.

I ordered the ginger chicken udon ($10.50) both visits. Actually, the udon was fairly flavorful - the ginger was strong. However, despite accepting the fact that udon does and always will have a pasty texture when stir-fried, but if anything, it meant that something - some sort of additional ingredient - had to supplement it. That didn't happen: the chicken was really bite-sized. My taste buds could not overcome the "overstick" of the udon noodles, conglomerated together in one mass.

The funny thing is, my dining companions and I agreed that my dish was probably the best tasting of what we had ordered - the yaki udon ($10.75), the chicken chili men (noodles in a spicy sauce, $11.75) and the aka-taka chicken salad ($9.95). To Wagamama's credit, the yaki udon was not a clone of the ginger chicken udon; the chicken in the salad was tasty, but the sparse quantity of it seemed out of place on the plain "mixed" lettuce leaves.

Wagamama takes your orders using an electronic reader, which means the food came fast. Unfortunately, we were ordered to leave fast (as in, less than 30 minutes). At one point, our server came by and pointed out: "Maybe I'm crazy, but didn't I give you the bill five minutes ago?"

And the opportunity cost of this: a (better) meal at any other Harvard Square establishment. So I offer alternatives to Wagamama within two blocks:

- Uno's, individual Farmer's Market vegetarian pizza: $8.79
- Penang, family-style: $10-12
- Felipe's, nachos: $5.35

And if you're willing to trek a little more,
- Bartley's, the Mitt Romney burger (including onion rings!): $9.15

In short, overhyped and overpriced.

Yale: A Dining Hall Primer

In light of the fact that it is finals week at Harvard (but in two years, it won't be!), I asked my friend Erin, a freshman at Yale, to guest-post about the dining hall system there. As follows, her response:

After coming back from break where I heard horror stories about other colleges mealtime fare, I can say without a doubt that I hit the gastronomic jackpot in attending Yale. Our dining halls are second to none, and the options for places to eat are endless. In addition to the 12 (or rather 11, since one college is always undergoing renovations) residential colleges, which each offer their own atmosphere, there is also Commons, which has the longest hours, and the widest variety of food. For lunch, the choices are even more varied, as students can use their lunch swipe to eat in the Law School, Kline Biology Tower or School of Management.

Before I start on the residential colleges, where I eat almost all of my meals, I’ll give a brief statement about Commons. It is huge, and similar to Annenberg at “the other school.” It is the only place that serves hot breakfast during the week, with daily menus of pancakes, sausage/bacon/ham, eggs, and potatoes. I’m not much of a breakfast eater, but when I do manage to crawl out of bed before 11, it’s a good place to go. All the other residential colleges have a cold breakfast of cereal, bread, bagels, waffles, etc. One thing that is unique to Commons is the Y waffle-maker, which I have yet to try, but have heard good things. Commons also has longer hours than any other dining hall, staying open past 7. It has a pizza bar, a main line, a pasta bar, a salad bar, a sandwich bar, a dessert bar, a cereal bar, and a wide variety of drinks. There has never been a time where I haven’t been able to find something good to eat at commons. Also, Commons is a great place to see people, as it is centrally located to most classroom buildings, and many people eat lunch there.

I however am a much bigger fan of the residential college dining halls. They are much smaller, more intimate, and normally have very good food. Last night for example, at Branford, dinner was southern fried or grilled chicken, some stuffed squash thing that I’m sure vegetarians would have loved, glazed ham, garlic flavored green beans and mashed potatoes with gravy. Yale’s mashed potatoes are some of the best I’ve ever tasted, and I would like to think myself somewhat of a mashed potato aficionado. They are creamy with little bits of potato skins to give them texture, and chicken gravy is great. In addition, my friends also had spinach soup, colorful and delicious salads, various cookies, and ice cream.

Every dining hall has unique specialties that you discover as you sample different ones: Pierson has a soft-serve ice cream machine that sometimes works, Davenport has their precious gnome in the middle of their dining hall, Calhoun, much to the delight of one of my friends, has fresh pineapple, and Berkeley, the famous dining hall that is always PACKED with freshmen because the foods so good, has different tossed salads every day.

Although I’ve been in many of the dining halls, this is most likely only because my own beloved college, Jonathan Edwards, is under construction this year. Many of my other freshmen friends eat most of their meals in their own college. This is because each dining hall acts as a meeting place. By eating in your college, you are guaranteed to see people you know, and also, to meet some new people you may not have seen before. The table set-up creates a great environment for discussion, assuming there aren’t too many people, and you will often see people stop at tables talking to different friends as they walk to their seat. The dining hall workers often become close with the students, and the card swipers memorize new freshman names in their respective college, so they can greet them by name. Being in JE, this has not yet happened to me, but I hold out hope.

In addition, colleges have family meals every week in which only people in the college can use the dining hall, so as to increase the solidarity and camaraderie amongst students. Do not fear if you are sans dining hall, as JE students this year are welcome in any college, although, the food tends to be absolutely amazing on family nights (i.e. sundae bars or high class meats), thus you will be accused of stealing other college’s food.

I cannot think of one meal where I have been able to find nothing to eat. My biggest problem is that I often find one thing I like, only to realize that there’s something else that I want even more, and I end up with too much food on my tray. This is the main hazard of Yale’s all-you-can-eat policy. Many ingredients in our food come from the Yale farm, which I am told is on the edge of campus, and one of their most prolific crops is a green herb which is liberally sprinkled over many foods, including my mashed potatoes, and whose name utterly escapes me at this moment. Every meal has at least one organic entrée, which I suppose is a good thing, but I’ve never noticed a difference in the taste of food. There are always various vegetarian options, and desserts are normally amazing.

Basically, I can’t say enough good things about Yale’s dining options. Everyone comes to have their own favorite dining halls. I personally really like Trumbull for lunches and sometimes dinner, and TD for brunch on the weekends. Also, Silliman, the newest renovated college, has an amazing dining hall that I bring my pre-frosh to, to show off Yale dining. Berkeley’s a good option, but always packed, although this is due to its great food, and perhaps to its animal head décor. You will never feel entirely let down by Yale food, even in Morse & Stiles, which are so far away (relatively speaking) and appear to me to be caves. Regardless, you can’t go wrong at Yale, in eating or anything else imaginable.

Now that the advertisement's over (kidding - thanks, Erin), I'll point out that Yale is a well-publicized leader in the locavore college scene - a trend that Harvard seems to be following up on. (My opinions on that later.)

Especially as a freshman at Harvard, I'm intrigued by upperclass dining (and indeed, I get emailed commentary on it by my classmates), so it's fairly interesting to see a different version of a house system. And of course, eating options, like different (read: copycat) Veritaffles.

Dining-wise, the main difference is really that Harvard offers the same daily menu across all dining halls. Which can be great if you're in the Quad and still want the same herbed orzo offered at Adams...or bad if it's turkey night. And we also all have soft-serve machines.

If you're an inquisitive Yale prefrosh, Erin can be reached for questions (dining or otherwise) through the comment boxes (below) or by email (erin.fackler@yale.edu).



Want to complain about your d-hall system? Comment or drop me a line (heidi@foodivia.com).

Ice Cream: the Gateway Drug to...Froyo?

Once upon a time, it was a balmy September week in Boston: orientation time. As the freshmen scurried along from one social event to another, one thing stayed constant: Herrell's. Though distinguished with its rows of "Best of Boston" plaques, the Boston institution was omnipresent:

Back tables of Annenberg? Check.
Dorm social? Check.
Club raffle? Check.
The pile of $1 coupons I got off the street? Check.

As a young, eager freshman, I remember the feeling. It was only a few months ago that my September consisted of Herrell's, Herrell's and more Herrell's (and thankfully not the effects of the freshman fifteen). I must have had Herrell's ice cream an average of six times per week. After the first day of orientation, I knew that in Herrell's flavor-speak, malted chocolate really meant "haute Ovaltine" and oh! that chocolate pudding flavor was to swoon for. Not to mention the thick, almost chewy-caramel texture of the ice cream...and the fact that their peppermint flavor looked natural (that is, it sure wasn't green like what I had been used to). I unabashedly pronounced Herrell's the best ice cream in Boston - nay, the world.

Well, that opinion hasn't flip-flopped yet...but my consumption has.

-------

In mid-September, I received an invite (through Facebook) to try out Berryline. A new frozen yogurt store that had recently opened, it looked like a Pinkberry knockoff to me.

I wasn't impressed. After all, my first time trying "legit" froyo was at Yo!Berry. Which was refreshing, but sour and "healthy-tasting" enough for me to imagine that active cultures were gnawing my way through my intestine. And this place had even incorporated the "berry" into their name, again. In any case, I halfheartedly emailed my sister (a Yo!Berry fanatic), and she decided to try it.

She ended up hooked.

And...well, me too. The colorful paintings lining the walls made the place feel like the hip Harvard version of the Digital Bean, in which I once envisioned spending my peppy, Disney-saturated adolescence. (The Digital Bean is to Lizzie McGuire as Central Perk was to Friends.) Thanks to the 125-calorie-for-five-ounces small serving and the "buy ten, get one free deal, " I reasoned that I was probably losing calories and getting a free froyo on the ten-minute walk over.

Let's not forget the yogurt, too: the crust was icy, but the interior was so creamy that it almost felt like ice cream. But not typical ice cream goodness: flavors I sampled over the semester included mango (my personal favorite), green tea, acai (the new, trendy berry), blueberry and pomegranate. Sweet and healthy.

Later towards the holiday season, they handed out their first non-fruit flavor besides original vanilla: peppermint. (In fact, upon discovering this, I jumped up and down and screamed "peppermint!" My roommate hasn't stopped telling this little anecdote.) And yet the draw for many of my friends was the fresh fruit: after fighting each other for the remaining grapes at Annenberg, they suddenly found that they could get mango, raspberries or even blackberries on top of their froyo - in December.

So it's suddenly easy to understand the addiction: all the 10 pm rendezvouses, study breaks and roomie trips you can imagine (that's right, at one point pulling in at five times a week). And with their promise of free Wi-fi access, I suddenly had an excuse to go by myself. (Even if I didn't bring anything except my wallet, which at this point was being used exclusively for Berryline expenses. By the way, thanks to Peer Advising Fellow - PAF - John, who funded one random trip when he saw my roommate and I there on a Thursday night.)

In essence, I started - to put it bluntly - stalking Berryline, finding out what their flavors were and memorizing store hours. I wasn't the only one: the owners (post-docs at Harvard and MIT) and the store got press, press, press. (The story of how Berryline happened to be is feel-good. I daresay the froyo's better.) When I headed to Berryline at night, there'd be a line stretching outside the door. In one case, a 10:30 pm Friday craving with my roommate put me behind a inebriated girl who needed two extra larges to satisfy her and a couple friends' own cravings.

And now I have a purpose for my Secret Santa gift certificates, because of this week's specialty flavors. Despite being at home, I immediately sent out an email to a few dormmates:

"Um, could we schedule a Berryline run sometime this weekend? Current flavors are original, raspberry and choco cookies 'n cream..."

The result: immediate responses within an hour.

"How do you know that?? Is there a website or something? and YES i NEED
raspberry!!!! HURRY AND COME HOME!!!!!!!!!!!"

"YES we SHALL GO!!!! HIP HIP HOORAY!"

"I would really, really, like to experience the RASPBERRY flavor..."

You said it.

-------

I don't mean to say that Berryline has converted me into anti-ice cream...or anti-Herrell's. But in Ec10, we learned that frozen yogurt and ice cream are essentially substitutes for one another. It's hard for me to say goodbye to Herrell's, so I won't. (In a case of dairy polygamy, I might get some pumpkin cheesecake ice cream when I return. It's hard to say though; I didn't check their flavors like I did with Berryline.) But the raspberry froyo beckons me: hello, hello again, Berryline!

the obligatory Thanksgiving post

Not unsurprisingly, my Thanksgiving involved quite a bit of food from the get-go, and then some. My original intention was to grab a quick meal at Quincy House (since the freshman dining hall, Annenberg, was closed today) and then catch my flight. Although my alarm clock caused me to forgo that plan, I found a well-hidden (though extensively bruised) in a corner of my backpack and consequently escaped short-term starvation.

Upon arriving at the airport, I headed towards Au Bon Pain, colloquially known as ABP. ABP
is my East Coast-fairly-cheap-and-fast-culinary-friend. Though PETA activists have protested the Harvard Square's use of "innocent eggs," I take a sympathetic stance towards the company. Especially since their ubiquity ensures almond croissants on every corner. I bought a piece of Southwestern cornbread ("it's spicy," the cashier warned me), and chewed it fast.

Maybe this rush - or the anticipation of real Thanksgiving food, whatever that may mean - caused me to appreciate the cornbread less this time, but I found myself losing affection for the spicy Southwestern cornbread. First of all, it wasn't that spicy. The small green specks on the interior might have been jalapenos, but for the most part, the cornbread tasted like a hybrid of jalapeno kettle chips and red pepper flakes - not a terrible combination, but selective enough to be only fitting for a craving. In addition, the cornbread had a strange texture on the outside - crusty, but not entirely so to be crisp - which made it taste like an overcooked muffin.

I wanted something more, which is why - of all things - I found myself in front of McDonald's.

(To clarify my stance on Mickey D's: yes, I read Fast Food Nation. Yes, I realize the extent to which McDonald's branding has penetrated society, especially children: in fact, my junior high science project was on that topic. And yes, I enjoy their French fries and soft-serve (which I daresay, is their best-kept secret). I even occasionally delight in a discreetly hidden and textureless McChicken sandwich. So in short, I'm still confused.)

Airport menus are particularly limited, so I encountered some difficulty in finding a snack-sized item. Then I had my decision made for me: a poster on the side declared "Snack Wrap." Since the word "snack" was in the title, I ordered that.

In short, I finally got a Chicken Select (capitalization not mine) wrapped in a limp wrap, with a ranch dressing the consistency of tartar sauce and a few scattered cheese strips that looked as if they had been stolen from a Taco Bell...there went my $2.

My next stop on my food quasi-adventure was the plane. Don't get me wrong - I actually didn't consume any food on the plane - not even a flimsy aluminum bag of cocktail peanuts. Especially since they too, like my snack wrap, were $2. Instead, I read The United States of Arugula by David Kamp.

When my pundit friend lent me the book a few months ago, I originally thought it referred to the campaign speech where Obama complained about the rising price of arugula. Actually, the subtitle of the book is "How We Became a Gourmet Nation."

The book is quite cleverly written, and for its size it goes into a good amount of historical depth. Kamp does trace the evolution of the American gourmand through the twentieth century, but ultimately his book seems to imply that cults of personality are what really caused this change. It is interesting to see the culinary world as one big, dysfunctional family full of juicy affairs, occasional cocaine usage, and entirely different perspectives on who contributed what to the field, all of which Kamp covers eagerly and footnotes with asterisks. Having read other food history books and memoirs first, it was rather pleasant to read through the chapters and automatically recognize the "big critics" of that era by their first name, although Kamp does take a different perspective on culinary disputes than those memoirists themselves.

Ultimately, The United States of Arugula serves as a breezier, introductory book for the history of food writing and cooking. While it was nice to finally read through a sampler of interviews and to actually form a timeline of food in America, I wish less emphasis was given to the celebrity status of cooks. While I understand that the business and publicity aspects is often overlooked in the recent history of food, it would have been nice to see more of what the American consumer was becoming interested in, instead of how foodies were catching onto the biggest trends.

I finished the book just as the plane landed, and shortly after arriving home, I was treated to Thanksgiving dinner. A family friend brought handmade wraps that tasted like naan. We wrapped the turkey, along with Hoisin sauce and green onions, up in the wraps to make "Peking turkey." And of course, we had plenty of veggies - roasted, corn-on-the-cob, and my absolute favorite - green bean casserole. I have no qualms about green bean casserole, even if it looks spartan grey. Sure - when it's made badly, it can be rubbery. But when it's good, it's amazingly comforting - and for the most part, the french-fried onions will cover any mistake made during the preparation.

The sweet potatoes were quickly cooked to retain a crispy-carrot texture and tossed with cranberries for extra tanginess, and the mashed sweet potatoes with the mushroom gravy (Mom's somewhat-classified recipe, of course) topped it all off, with fruit tart and pumpkin pie for dessert.

Delicious. It was wonderful and fully satisfying (maybe too much - I definitely ate my share) to finally sit down to a home-cooked meal, and the company made it great. Happily enough, my day started from a mediocre banana-on-the-run and reached its climax to an amazing dinner. If there wasn't evidence already: there is something transcendent when food and family collide.

(I think we call it joy.)

Culinary Photo Tour: Part I

KS Seafood, 2163 S. China Place, Chicago

If you're wondering about the recent dearth of posts, it's not for lack of material - I've been eating my material. That said, I tried to run through the photos I've taken this summer, and admittedly, most of them were of food - I've been trying to hone my steady-shot technique, and what better subject than my lunch.

Here's one of the restaurants I tried during then: located in Chinatown, KS Seafood is a bit more upscale than its peers, but its major difference is that it serves Taiwanese food. (On a side note, it also has a wireless service button on each of its tables.)

Shown above is the gua bao, steamed bun ($12.95) - what I crudely call "taiwanese hamburger." In fact, gua bao is more than that - it's stewed pork in a thick, sweet soy glaze, wrapped in a steam bun and garnished with chopped peanut, pickled mustard greens and cilantro. The mustard greens give the gua bao a sweet and sour feel without being overwhelmingly sweet or sour.

Another highlight was the preserved pork and leek dish. Although it initally looked simple, the pork had a complex flavor and chewy texture. Lastly, the hakka was a standout. Since most Taiwanese people - and therefore Taiwanese restaurants - are of Holo ethnicity, it was quite interesting to have a Hakka dish at the table. A mix of vegetables, including bamboo and thin Chinese celery, plus strips of meat and squid and small fish, the dish was garlicky and seasoned with chopped, spicy peppers. Despite their size, the red peppers were really what added the heat to the hakka.

NYT: Food press day!

It continues to be a good day for reading New York Times...with my stomach. These two articles, relating to food, were on its online front page today:

American Food Writing

Sushi for Two

I particularly liked the latter article; I remember sixth grade when a girl ridiculed the kids in our class that dared to enjoy tofu. It's - in sixth-grade-terms - cool that we're approaching an era of more adventurous eating. Even if it's one that began long ago.

Three quick observations about the Food Channel

(Apologies - it looks like this didn't post through the first time.)

1. As much as I love Food Channel (and despite the fact that it makes everyone hungry), it strikes me as a little strange that they don't call their hosts "cooks" or "foodlovers," they're personalities.

2. Tyler Florence kind of looks like Bobby Flay.

3. I read this article in the New York Times about the growing trend of female food personalities to wear V-necks (cashmere and three-quarter sleeves) in order to allude to some sexuality. We don't note that most men on the Food Channel are in chef's whites or plaid button-downs, but rather, the article's interesting to think about in juxtaposition with the fact that despite the idea of the kitchen as a "female domain," the majority of executive chefs at restaurants remain male. I doubt this piece will ever be a controversial moment in the NYT, but to what extent does it really help the advancement of female cooks (or food personalities)? And does it have to?

Review: I-Mei Black Sesame Ice Cream Omochi

I
After a review of chocolate, I felt like continuing on the ol' dessert route. I-Mei Black Sesame Ice Cream Omochi ($5) did the trick. It was the last box in the Chinese market freezer, so I was a little bit suspicious, but I decided to interpret that as overwhelming consumer demand rather than the possibility of being a guinea pig. My mother also told me that I-Mei, as a well-known Taiwanese brand, would be reliable with taste.

I opened the box - there were five packages of 2 mochi (called "omochi" here) each, filled with black sesame ice cream. Each ball was relatively larger and heavier, compared to other ice cream mochi brands: about 2 inches in diameter. I did like the individual packaging of the ice cream mochi (above), but the tiny two-pronged fork, while cute, was useless. I used my fingers.

Some freezer burn was evident on my mochi, but again, my observation may have been based on my "guinea pig paranoia." Holding the mochi (still dusted with rice flour) seemed to get rid of the burn; I found that if I waited a little longer, the shell as well as the ice cream took on a softer, more "authentic" texture.

As for the ice cream center, it initially tasted like vanilla, with small pieces of sesame grit, but as time passed, I tasted some (but not much) black sesame as it began to melt. I did like the texture of the mochi better than other brands, and I did like the fact that it highlighted an Asian flavor. In fact, this mochi reminded me of a Chinese dessert - much smaller "mochi" with sesame or red bean filling, boiled in hot water. This particular omochi seemed too "sophisticated" to be a novelty (like a chocolate mochi), but would be improved if the black sesame flavor was stronger.

I'm back, and I'm still a Chocolate Snob.

Apologies - graduation (and the barrage of activities that go along with it) have held me captive for about the past two weeks. That isn't to say that I've stopped eating, though. Incidentally, three of the more memorable experiences this week involved food:

• The post-commencement reception - besides the jumbo cocktail shrimp, my personal favorite was the Craisin/bleu cheese endive "boats."
• Playing Apples to Apples - which really doesn't have to do with food, but for the fact that it's named after a food...or an idiom. Whew, I finally figured that out.
• Accidentally eating rum-soaked pineapple at one open house. Because I've never had alcohol, I thought the pineapple was canned in sugar water. Until after my third piece, I wondered why the chocolate fountain was so...bitter.
  

That said, I absolutely love dark chocolate. For the past few years, I have had trouble eating Hershey's chocolate (with the exception of recently-released Coconut Hershey's Kisses) as a result of its sour milk taste.

Last week, I made a trip to Whole Foods. Not including local chocolatiers (e.g. Bellaria Bakery, Just Truffles, BT McElrath, etc.) this is the place to go for good chocolate - to clarify, chocolate bars that don't empty my wallet.

Or at least, where I took a pilgrimage a la Steve Almond. His hilarious book, Candyfreak - specifically, the chapter on Lake Champlain chocolates - took me on a search for Five Star Bars to celebrate the end of finals.

My first find, the Fruit and Nut Bar ($2.49) was beyond brilliant. A quick disclaimer: the bar is about the size of a tiny 1" by 2" brick. But it's also as dense as one, which makes it about $1.25 an ounce - a fairly reasonable price. The Gianduja chocolate cut easily with a butter knife and melted in my mouth; there was just the right amount of fruit and nut (dried cherries) so that it didn't taste like trail mix. It also held well in my Tupperware for a few days - the chocolate was (enjoyably) rich enough to consume in three sittings.

The alleged crown jewel of the Five Star Bars, the Hazelnut Bar ($2.99), was more difficult to find. Before I searched Whole Foods, I tried to custom-order a box from Byerly's (which didn't work out). Unfortunately, as my search continued, my expectations had grown so high that when I finally found the Hazelnut Bar, it was a letdown. Steve Almond's account of the chocolate absolutely made me swoon, but in actuality, the chocolate seemed more cream than actual chocolate, and the sugar content made it hard to swallow without the chocolate coating my throat. The feuilletine (or "vanilla-infused geometric planes" as Almond calls them) were a nifty, crunchy little touch, especially when I cut the thick bar into cross-sections, but overall, the bar was too rich for my taste.

Moving on to different brands, I tried the Chocolove 55% cocoa with raspberries bar. Initially, I was attracted to the fact that 1) it was on sale ($2 for 3.2 ounces) and 2) it had a love poem as an insert.

I was also disappointed with this bar. The chocolate wasn't a problem, but the raspberries were a distraction. What had been advertised as "crispy bits of raspberry infused to flavor" was basically the same freeze-dried stuff found in Special K berry cereal, only in less generous quantities. The love poem was just English and obscure enough to seem trendy, and to apparently "accommodate" the poem, the large paper wrapper had made the chocolate bar seem thicker than it actually was.

Finally, I bought the Dolfin Chocolate Noir au the Earl Grey ($3.99 for 2.47 ounces). This 52% cocoa minimum came in a checkbook-sized, plastic-covered envelope. Major points for presentation (although it was covered by the price). There was no signs of caloric content, and so I cheerfully indulged over the past week. It was good, but try as I might, I could not taste the Earl Grey tea in the chocolate. There was no sense of bergamot (which gives Earl Grey its distinctive taste), although the chocolate did have some "grit" to it. Some of the bar tasted like coffee grounds - which wasn't a bad thing, texturally. The problem was that they were just tea bits without flavor.

Although most chocolate bars come in squares, I have a problem with this. First, squares are hard to remove from a bar. You have to break the bar in one direction, and then in the other. The Dolfin solved this problem by simply dividing the chocolate in little vertical chunks. I would also argue that triangle shaped pieces (not like Tolberone, though - those things are tough!) on a flat plane would do the trick. They tend to break the bar "naturally" and are easier to nibble on.

Lastly - now that we're on the subject of Earl Grey tea - did you know that Twinings makes a female equivalent called Lady Grey? Kind of sounds like the reverse situation as Men's Pocky.

Remembrance of Things Brat

After a one-year hiatus, I finally returned to the Minneapolis Farmer's Market.

The reason for this is simple. I had, after all, been following a perfectly logical extension of Newton's first law of motion: a teen in bed stays in bed during the weekend. That is, until I was bribed with a bratwurst from the market stand...in which case I set my alarm for 8:30 am.

It was rather cool when I arrived around 10:15, several snooze alarms later - the perfect time to shop and carry vegetables without being too exhausted. I was particularly excited because
recent trends in food writing had pointed to organic food and locally-grown produce. One Minneapolis example is an article in which someone followed well-known chef Brenda Langton (the chef of acclaimed Spoonriver) as she bought her ingredients from the market last year.

But while the fiddle music bolstered my spirits that day, I didn't end up buying any produce.
The market was different from how I had remembered it. This time around, more vendors were selling strawberries and raspberries out of Driscoll's boxes. The sugarsnap peas weren't in their "usual" place, in the green boxes resembling egg cartons.

Maybe it was just too early, or it was a flower day. (After all, I did end up buying a carton of pansies.) I headed to the roasted corn stand, where a woman traded me a ear of corn hastily slathered in butter mixture for $2. I shook lemon pepper on it, and let its sourness dissolve into the sweetness of the corn; it was good.

Next, it was time for the bratwurst. I edged up to the counter. "A bratwurst with vegetables, please. And a lemonade." The man yelled to the other side: "Bratwurst, not naked!" then slid a cup down at me. The lemonade consisted of a half lemon squeezed and thrust in the cup. I took a sip, catching the powdery sugar on the bottom. My bratwurst arrived. I could see in the huge heap of vegetables that none of them were grilled, like I had thought years ago. "$6.50." Digging for quarters, I handed the money over.

The market was crowded as ever; I managed to get a spot with six other strangers at a red picnic table while soon figuring out my small apprehension over the price, though. Everything - corn, brat, lemonade - had gone up exactly a dollar since I had last came. But the brat was amazing; it probably tasted better since I had learned to appreciate red peppers. Even more, it brought me back to memories of other brats as I began to mentally compare this new "best brat" to other incidents. After some hesitation, I finally ranked it number one, beating my eight-year-old marvel at the beer-and-cheddar brat served at the church retreat (or mainly the fact that the brat had beer).

I still enjoyed coming to the farmer's market and might enjoy it some more in the future. I must admit that I wonder a little bit if the prices are compensating more for higher quality or more for the atmosphere, and I was disappointed in the dearth of fresh vegetables that week. Many things have changed, and not just in the price.

It could be me, too.

Review: Ming Dragon Chinese Restaurant

Encouragement to find lesser-known places in the Twin Cities led me to, in typical-rebellious-adolescent fashion (well, not really), head out of Minneapolis and into the south suburbs. Aside from Mandarin Kitchen in Bloomington, the south suburbs aren’t really known for Asian cuisine. Case in point: I searched Google Maps first with “asian restaurants,” but an initial search yielded Leeann Chin and…Hooters.

Not to be discouraged, I called someone else who lived around there. Might they know of a Asian restaurant? She did, and to boot, added that it wasn’t too bad. It was somewhere…in Savage, but she didn’t remember the name. I searched Google Maps again. A detailed “Chinese restaurant” search this time resulted in three Chinese restaurant listings. Interestingly enough, two of them bore the same address, only with different names.

My “logical skills” deducted that a Chinese restaurant would still be at that location, so
enter my drive to Ming Dragon Chinese Restaurant (4391 Highway 13 W, Savage). After some five miles past gas stations and a Famous Dave’s, I hadn’t seen it yet and was about to turn in the opposite direction of the road. Fortunately, the turn we looped into was actually the side street where Ming Dragon was located; I almost missed it as it was on a strip mall corner.

The restaurant was clean, but as it was past peak lunch hour, around 1:30, there were only about four customers inside. All of them were having the lunch buffet; they seemed relaxed as they read the newspaper. I checked the food at the buffet, but it was dry, probably because it was too late to cook for potential customers. Instead, I asked for a menu, which only came in a dinner version.

The food arrived fairly quickly. I had ordered the “fish filet with green vegetable” ($10.50) and the “mapo bean curd” (a traditional Szechuan dish with chile, ground pork, and tofu, $7.95). I was slightly apprehensive about ordering the former, not because I did not know what the green vegetable was, but because it was American broccoli. That said, the presentation was very nice, as seen above. The fish was well textured, with bits of mushroom and tiny ginger squares in the thick sauce for flavor. However, the small portion did not seem worth the $10.50. I wondered whether I was paying dinner prices for a lunch portion – not a uncommon situation at other restaurants.

As for the mapo bean curd, it never came; the kitchen had made the wrong order of tofu. This was initially disheartening because I had wanted something spicy; in addition, the waiter had shrugged the wrong order off. However, the braised tofu with shitake mushroom (also $7.95) was our replacement, and more importantly, was not a disappointment. The shitake mushrooms were large, and there was a slight taste of ginger in the garlic sauce (which was the thick enough to spoon onto rice). Furthermore, instead of having been bought pre-fried, the tofu had been deep-fried in the kitchen. (You can usually tell if tofu has been pre-fried if it tastes like a sponge. Also, store-bought tofu is usually cut into triangles.) This allowed it to remain hot at the table with a soft texture.

My summary: while I would probably not make a special drive (at risk of getting lost again) to go to Ming Dragon, if you’re in the south suburban area, it's good enough to stop by and try for yourself.

Thursday's here, which means...

the arrival of the Star Tribune's Taste section on my doorstep. I love the Taste section, for several reasons:

1. It provides a rationale for me to eat at new restaurants. "But...it was reviewed by the Strib!" And sometimes, to buy new products (read: pomegranate chip ice cream).
2. I can cook vicariously by marveling over the pictures that accompany the recipes. (This is actually a reason why I've started to begin reading Martha Stewart Living.)
3. If Foodivia was a word (in the same vein as truthiness), then the Eat Your Words game is definitely foodivia (remember, food + trivia?). Tucked into the corner of one of the pages, it's a word game that tests your knowledge of food/cooking terms.

Today's Taste featured the "Taste 50," subtitled "Fifty people, products, places and ideas that make Minnesota the place for food fans." This time, nothing related to the State Fair was on the list, which makes me relieved that I hadn't missed out on deep-fried Snickers bars last year. (But...did you know that deep-fried Snickers bars are not unique to the Minnesota State Fair?)

The Taste 50 is an listing I annually pore over, and as usual, there were plenty of things I didn't know about. I'm hoping to try them soon (perhaps another quest for this blog?) -- but I was particularly excited at the second entry: Dong Yang. I would yell "Scoop," but judging from the fact that Dong Yang's always packed on weekend lunches, I don't think I was the first one to find out...

Review: Whole Foods'/Byerly's Asian selection

My friends know that I dislike Leeann Chin (the Midwest fast food restaurant chain). I should probably note that I have had some success with their Peking Chicken Stir-Fry (mainly because it has jicama). (Yes, for the most part, these informational links lead you to Wikipedia.)

That said, I complain often enough about Americanized Asian food, although I have gotten accustomed to it. Another complaint that I have is regarding the dearth of vegetables in my entrees at Americanized Asian fast food places. More often than not, I get meat in a tasty brown sauce over my rice. No veggies - unless they involve a (not-so-very) special fungi. That said, I began a quest for vegetables, and for really good - not just edible bordering on vaguely tasty - lemon chicken. Or something to that effect.

I went to Whole Foods first and bought some sweet and sour tofu ($7.99/pound) and teriyaki sweet potatoes ($6.99/pound). Following that, a trip to Byerly's yielded me Big Bowl Chinese Express, in the same spot where Leeann Chin had been a year earlier. And my Big Bowl Chinese Express choice was the teriyaki chicken ($6.99 regular size, $5.79 small).

The sweet and sour tofu was not really typical tofu, but bean curd, a tougher, denser version that explained the more expensive price. It was nowhere near sweet and sour, and not particularly Asian, but was vaguely sweet and salty. The bean curd, because of its texture, did not absorb the sauce but was nonetheless pretty good, especially if you treated the sauce as a light dip. Chopped green onion added flavor, though I wished the red pepper slices were thicker to contribute more sweetness.

The teriyaki sweet potatoes were long, quartered and covered in sesame seeds. They also looked shriveled. Nonetheless, the interior was moist, although some potato pieces were clearly less cooked than others. The teriyaki sauce was slightly sweet and even a little bit spicy, a good complement to the chewy texture.

Finally, the teriyaki chicken. While I enjoy Big Bowl as a sit-down restaurant, its Express chains in Byerly's don't match the main restaurant's flavors. For example, the kung pao chicken on display had a significantly lighter tone than that served in the restaurant. In addition, the entrees are limited, and in particular, none of Big Bowl's noodle dishes are available via Express. Instead, a refrigerated peanut noodle salad was in the case. The teriyaki chicken that I ordered was standard Teriyaki, but the sauce was a little too sweet and rich for my taste. Green peas added color to the chicken, but were few and far between, and didn't soften up the tough texture of the chicken.

My verdict? I would pass on the teriyaki chicken, but I think it's up to you on the teriyaki sweet potatoes and the sweet and sour tofu. Of those two, I preferred the latter; I could see myself becoming bored with the teriyaki sweet potatoes after one serving.

Review: Dong Yang

735 45th Ave NE, Minneapolis (Google Maps tells me that this is in Minneapolis, but I know better...well, it's somewhere in or between the towns of Columbia Heights and Hilltop, next to Fridley.)

When you drive into Dong Yang's parking lot, you're immediately confronted by a giant hardware store next door. That's okay - because Dong Yang is just as big. In fact, Dong Yang's official name is Dong Yang Oriental Foods and is the largest Korean supermarket I know of in the Twin Cities.

Walk in and don't take a cart. You should probably shop after the meal, when you're not hungry. (But Dong Yang has a lot of food - from the Korean equivalent of Pocky to aloe vera juice.) Head to the back of the store and turn left at the meat counter. You'll find an opening with tables, chairs and a counter. This is Dong Yang's restaurant: the decor is lacking, but clean. On Sunday lunches, it's full. It's also self-service, so choose what you want from the signs on the wall surrounding the counter that comprise the menu and pay up.

In general, when I go to a Korean restaurant in the area with friends (for example, King's, Mirror of Korea, or Shilla-turned-another-name-I-can't-remember), I order at least one of the following three dishes because they tend to be friend-pleasers:

1) Bibimbap. This is the dish pictured above: it's a large serving of rice covered with cooked vegetables and thin sliced beef, then topped off with an egg. If you request it to be served in a stone bowl (which usually amounts to a $2 price increase), it's a showpiece as it sizzles in the pot. You would also be required to do some cooking work by adding hot sauce to your taste and stirring the rice in the bowl so that it's evenly browned and not too wet.

2)Bulgogi. Thinly sliced, it is Korean barbequed beef with a slightly-sweet marinade of mainly garlic and soy sauce. The secret ingredient, though? Grated Asian pear. At times it is also stirfried with sliced white onion for additional flavor. With large orders, it is often grilled tableside. Bulgogi can be eaten by itself, or wrapped in a lettuce leaf with hot sauce.

3) Japchae. This dish consists of clear cellophane noodles made up of sweet potato flour (like transparent vermicelli). Vegetables (zucchini and mushroom seem to be popular in Minnesotan restaurants) and sliced beef are added, and the japchae is stir-fried in sesame oil and soy sauce. This makes for a smooth texture to the noodles without them being slimy.

In general, these tend to be consistent good dishes to try for your first time at a Korean restaurant. They will also come with a set of small dishes (about six) that you eat with your meal. At Dong Yang, at least two will be some form of the infamous kimchee (one lettuce, one daikon). Another might be mung bean sprouts; all six dishes will have been chosen for the day. If you are lucky, you might get slices of fish paste slices (there is no overwhelming fishy smell to them) in sesame oil. If you're really lucky, you'll get their batch of marinated potatoes, which are coated in a sweet pseudo-crust. Dong Yang does allow take-out orders, but make sure that you specifically request the small dishes; otherwise, they will not be included.

The ordering process at Dong Yang:
1. Pick your meal. In general, dishes are written in Korean with English translations in small text on the side. I've written down these translations below as best I remember.
2. Pay.
3. Get your chopsticks, napkins, etc. from the containers adjacent to the register. Some of you may have qualms about this; they are clean.
4. Make sure you get some of the roasted barley tea from the coffee machine to the left; pour it on your own from the stacks of styrofoam cups.
5. If you order bibimbap (described below), grab a tube of hot sauce from the counter as well for your table; return it when you're done using it.

When waiting for your food, it pays to be observant. Your food will come to the counter and the cook will yell the order, in Korean. The small dishes (read below) will come in a tray just before your actual orders. When in doubt, you may want to ask if that is your order. After your meal, you'll want to bus your trays to the cart in front of the kitchen door.

Over my (frequent) visits at Dong Yang, I've tried about seventy percent of the menu. The bibimbap ("rice in hot stone bowl," $9.99) is excellent; in particular, they tend to give a large quantity of one ingredient, the bellflower root/fern stems (I'm not exactly sure what a bellflower root is, but I'll find out) which adds a tough, crunchy texture to the mix. Their hot sauce is also not too watery but not too thick, which means it evenly spreads throughout the rice mixture (see additional picture).

While the bulgogi ("sliced beef") is reasonably priced at $9.99, flavor (salty/not as much flavor) and quantity tended also to be inconsistent; sometimes, there was a greater proportion of onions versus beef. The japchae ("clear noodles with vegetables," $9.99) was also not a standout. Unlike other restaurants, there was also more vegetables than noodles sometimes, which took away from the dish. The noodles tended to have less flavor and were drier as a result.

That said, Dong Yang is probably my favorite Korean restaurant so far. The quantity is usually quite generous, and if you experiment off the menu, the results tend to be great. My mom's favorite was the noodles in black bean sauce ($7.99); the dish is very similar to another Taiwanese dish. In general, the sauce contains chopped pork, onions and carrots slathered in the dark sauce over noodles. (Warning: if your taste depends on your food's appearance, don't order this dish.) The dish is probably a acquired taste, as the noodles became less sticky and the sauce a little bit more flavorful the second time.

Another notable dish was the seafood pancake ($9.99). Typically, most Korean restaurants create a circular, crepe-like patty with squid, shrimp and onion decoratively placed in a circular design. Dong Yang's rendition, by these terms, was radically good. Think a 9"x13" rectangle cut into 2"x2" squares. Each square is filled with squid and green onion, like the others, but more so. The batter (I believe cornstarch-based) that holds it together is deep fried and served with a soy sauce and sesame seed-onion dipping sauce.

Finally, the mackerel in spicy sauce ($11.99) is a slight misnomer. It's not all that spicy, and it doesn't just contain mackerel. Rather, it is a mackerel covered in a spicy-sweet sauce that goes well with plain rice. Large chunks of daikon and carrot, also marinated in this sauce, surround the dish. It had a complex flavor that I got seconds for.

Update on senior program: I am eating.

Thanks for the comments. I just realized that they were getting "blocked" by my account, but feel free to post - they should be working fine now.

After two messages, one plane trip (!) and three voicemails, I got my first lunch scheduled - for a half-hour. Hurray! (Anyone I actually know: if you'd like to be part of any additional trips, please email me to schedule a time.)

Review: Chin's Kitchen, 1533 Larpenteur Ave West, St Paul
It's hard to find authentic Chinese restaurants in the Twin Cities, but Chin's Kitchen is one of them. It's even harder to find a Taiwanese restaurant in the area (with the exception of Evergreen on Nicollet Avenue), but Chin's Kitchen is that, too.

Like most Chinese restaurants, Chin's Kitchen has a full dine-in menu with chow mein, but the real deal is on the back page. "Hot dishes" and "cold dishes" are both labeled in Chinese and English. I tried favorites that the majority of people I had talked to had recommended to me.

First up was the seaweed salad ($2.40). Taiwanese seaweed salads are unlike Japanese seaweed salad (bright green, stringy) in that they are darker in color. While some seaweed salads feature thick strands of seaweed tied in knots, this salad was cut in thin, smooth strips. The texture worked well with the flavor, which was pleasantly more "garlicky" than soy-based, but did not overpower the actual seaweed taste. The assorted roasted sampler ($6.35) contains this as well as some other appetizers and was generally very good over my trips.

Next was the beef stew ($5.70). Chin's Kitchen is known among family friends for its soups, so I didn't exactly need a repeat visit for this. I ordered it anyway. That said, it was excellent. Note that unlike American beef stew (read: biscuits and thick stew), this beef stew is more of a soup. The texture of the noodles was wide enough and hearty for the stronger flavor of the beef broth, and the beef was pre-cut in manageable pieces. Carmelized onions also added to the flavor.

I custom-ordered the pork stew (above photo, $5.70), the beef stew's equivalent, with rice noodles (a popular option) instead of the typical wide noodles or rice. It also came with an additional five-spice egg, a traditional Taiwanese appetizer. While the staff was flexible enough to accomodate me, changing the noodles probably was not a good idea on my part. The rice noodles absorbed nearly all the soup, making it more delicately flavored than it needed to be. However, on a later visit, the pork stew was rather tasty over rice. The egg was nicely flavored.

Finally, I went to the extreme: I went off the menu. That is, I asked the owner about any new dishes that would soon be on the menu. She came back with a large bowl of a traditional Taiwanese recipe she was trying out. I recognized it as a soup that my mother made. Pronounced "bah gay" (nasal "n" overtone on the "gay" sound), the dish consists of pork covered with fish paste, then boiled in a shiitake mushroom-black pepper soup with Napa cabbage. Chin's took a different route - while they did the same thing, they also boiled taro and ginger (both roots) together for their soup base. The ginger flavor was particularly strong and added a heated flavor to the soup without making it sour (a problem that can occur when making it). I'm not sure when this will be added to the menu, but I ordered a bowl home for the road.

Chin's isn't made to be a banquet facility, but it does offer authentic homestyle Taiwanese food - a rare occurence. Portions are also generous, especially at the price. The restaurant also offers a take-out, but not with the more Chinese menu. However, if you asked, it probably would be fine with the friendly staff. If not, go for the juicy potstickers (10 for $6.00). One particular pro is that the bottom of each is evenly browned.

Did you know?
"Smarties [the British, Nestle equivalent to M&M's] are oblate spheroids with a minor axis of about 5 mm and a major axis of about 15 mm." - Wikipedia

This fact just needed to be heard because I have never used the phrase "oblate spheroids" before (hello to all math teachers!). And despite having collected M&M dispensers for fourteen years of my life, I have never measured an M&M nor Smartie...so I'm impressed.