Latest Yakitori Boy

Before heading out to a cabaret show, R and I stopped by Chinatown to grab some vittles. I hadn't been to yakitori boy in awhile, so that's where we ended up. R went with sushi and I went with non-sushi The rolls at yakitory boy have fewer pieces than at other restaurants, but that's ok, because the price tags tend to be smaller as well. Here are two philly rolls. And a couple sets of tuna and salmon nigiri. Even though it was actually fairly warm out, I still wanted noodle soup. So I went with the tempura soba. This is a fairly small sized bowl, but it's a decent portion for the price. One big piece of tempura shrimp and firm soba noodles. I like their udon broth here. I also got the tatsuta age, which is a deep fried marinated chicken dish. These were super duper hot! As in temperature hot. This chicken is awesome. And I totally dug the dipping sauce that came with it. I would put it on everything if I knew how to make it or if I could buy it! The food here comes out as it's made. There's no waiting for everything to be ready or appetizers showing up first. It just comes out when it's been made and ready. My chicken didn't come out until we were pretty much both done with everything. Which is bad timing, but that's part of their concept. And all the dishes are delivered by different people as well. Service is ok. Nothing bad, nothing great, somewhat inconsistent. But it's not fancy dining so it doesn't really matter to me. I did order a side of rice though and I had to ask for it again before they brought it out.

Mifune Japantown

I walked like a fiend this day (as google maps calculated, about 6 miles... that's on foot people!!!) in light misty rain and rewarded all this hard work with some japanese food. Located in the Japan Center San Francisco, Mifune Don is a tiny offspring of Mifune, a japanese restaurant (duh) specializing in udon and soba. Whilst roaming japan center, there were so many restaurants I didn't know how to choose. I simply chose Mifune on the name alone. And simply because of the Mifune of Kurosawa movies. I'm strange, I know.
It's a teeny little lunch and take out spot, or so it seems. They do have these built in burners, so you can cook your own stuff. Hot pots and what not.
I wasn't in the mood for hot soupy noodles, so I went with one of the lunch specials, which was zaru soba and curry. The curry was just plain, no real veggies hunks and certainly no meat, but it was still pure delicious japanese style curry through and through.
For those of you not familiar with zaru soba, it's a cold noodle dish. You get a pile of cold soba noodles, which are buckwheat noodles. These are topped with some shredded nori. You get a little bowl of cold broth, soba tsuyu, and you dip your noodles in and then eat away. You can also season your broth with green onions, grated daikon, and japanese mustard, if you so choose. It sounds odd but it's quite delicious. Just ask my mom. When I was a wee lass, we used to have to go for weekly doctor appointments for her. And when we did, we would always stop for some eats. And even at my young age, I would eat platefuls of zaru soba. Who knew a little kid could pack in so much noodles? Not much has changed. I still love zaru soba!

This is a no frills place with simple and tasty food. It's all cooked by one dude in the little kitchen, and you can watch him do it the whole time. It's not a secret. The service is just fine. The prices are alright too. For a place selected on its name, it wasn't a bad choice.

Katana-Ya Ramen

After snagging a deeply discounted ticket for the show at the orpheum, I walked through some choice areas of SF for a coveted bowl of ramen at Katana-Ya. I had consulted yelp and it had gotten good reviews.
It's a teeny little place with a tiny sushi bar with 4 seats and a handful of small tables. It's definitely not made for big parties. And you will wait during lunch. They have ramen and udon and soba and tons of sushi, as well as other japanese treats. The menu was actually surprisingly large. I figured it would be ramen, ramen, and more ramen.
I went with the buttered corn ramen. Why? Because I was clueless, and the chick next to me ordered it. So I figured I'd give it a go. And plus, I love corn in just about anything. I got the soy broth, and you can order the broth is a certain strength. I did not indicate, so by default, I think they give you light. This is a big bowl with a good sized helping of noodles. And the noodles were awesome. The broth however, was a bit on a bland side for me. It definitely tasted pork-y, but there wasn't much actual flavor. It was underwhelming. But the noodles definitely rocked it. And the corn was great. Like I said, you could put corn on just about anything and it would make me happy. I haven't had enough authentic japanese ramen in my life to know whether this was good or not, but I was definitely a fan of the noodles and the value. Perhaps I would need to try the miso or the salt broths to know more. But it was definitely a good and hearty bowl that filled my belly plenty. But I certainly have a feeling there are much better bowls of ramen out there.

Katana-Ya
430 Geary St.
San Francisco, CA
415.771.1280

Burmese In Burlingame

I met up with A in Burlingame after cruising around Monterey and the south bay. Burlingame is another cute little ritzy town with a strip of shops and restaurants. We decided on Mingalaba, which is burmese. I've only had burmese, years ago, and don't remember too much from it. I think I remember that it was like thai food. The menu is a strange amalgam of indian, thai, and other asian cuisines. Which makes a helluva lot of sense when you look at a map of burma. It's a rather large country, with india and the bay of bengal on its left, and thailand and china on its right. We ordered mango lassis, and we all know that's traditionally indian/pakistani.We didn't really know what to order, so we picked the House Special Noodle with chicken. It was a flat rice noodle dish with coconut chicken, lime leaves, cilantro, yellow pea’s powder, onion, and fried thin noodle on the top. It comes unmixed and then the server mixes it in front of you.
And here's the result. We both enjoyed this a lot. I'm usually not into anything with coconut milk in it (like this chicken), but I still liked this. The one thing I absolutely did not care for was the lime leaves. I found them to be absolutely disgusting. They were sliced extremely thin but still gave off an extremely strong taste. Luckily, after realizing their awfulness, I was careful to avoid them.
We had to order something else so we just threw the dice and went with the Asparagus Spicy Chicken. This was pan fried chicken breast with asparagus, fresh basil, eggplant, fresh mushroom, and green chilies in a spicy sauce. This had a straight up thai basil flavor, reminiscent of many thai dishes. So if you're into that, you'll be into this. This also was not spicy at all, so don't let the name fool you. It's just a nice chicken stir fry dish. The asparagus were of the extremely fat variety, and I'm partial to the scrawny spears.

Service was fine, if not seemingly cold and robotic. But I think that was just the server's personality, or lack thereof. One could not describe her as warm and fuzzy, but the service itself was fine. And the meal actually turned out to be quite a bargain! On this tuesday night, the place was packed! If you're a fan of thai food, then you should definitely give Mingalaba a try. Heck, I can't stop saying mingalaba!

Chinese In A Casino

I headed off to vegas for a short work-related visit. For our first night there, we had a rough time finding food. We went to the Rio to eat at an italian place that C had been to before, but when we got there, we found out it was no longer there. So then we walked to a different italian place there, but it was too expensive and the advertisements for the restaurant were too creepy. Several other places we tried to go to were already closed. This is why we resorted to eating at Mah Jong. It's a fast food chinese spot. I went with the beef chow fun. It was ok. The hot and sour soup was awful. It's hard to describe why it was so bad, but it was neither hot nor sour nor good. And this food was horribly overpriced as well, for less than mediocre chinese. I like the Rio, but not for this place!

I Only Want Hot Soup - Nooch

It wasn't my plan to eat so much non swiss food while I was in switzerland. But damn it people, it was so cold there. While I was in Dublin, the weather was stupendous... in the high 50's, low 60's. As soon as I got to switzerland it was in the 30's. Yeah, the 30's. I could see my damn breath. So I only wanted hot soup. This is what I kept craving. So I ended up at Nooch. It's a small chain of asian noodle restaurants. So I ordered the fujiyama noodle soup - udon noodles, dashi broth, tofu, veggies, and such. This thing was kind of a mess. They took japanese noodles and broth, and then tried to bastardize it with things clearly not meant for japanese food. Cilantro? Thai basil? Seriously, have you ever seen those things in japanese cuisine? It was almost blasphemy. And they threw in a giant heap of pickled ginger into the soup too. Luckily, I was able to fish it out. The broth was ok, and the noodles were ok, but similar to the ramen, there weren't enough noodles. And unfortunately, I could still taste the ginger in the broth. The rest of the veggies were ok. But similar to the ramen, it was an underwhelming bowl of overpriced noodles. Hot, but otherwise just blah.

The Most Expensive Ramen In The World

While looking for some restaurants prior to my trip, I found out that there's a japanese style ramen bar in Basel. Ok. There isn't even a ramen joint in Philly, but there's one in Basel? There's something wrong with this. We need a ramen joint in Philly! Anyways, enough of my ranting. But again, please, someone open a ramen place near home. Pretty please. I thought I'd try this place, because really, what the hell?

This place is pretty adorable. Not too big, with the kitchen and bar area in the middle, and then some tables on the outer edges. It's modern and clean and cute. They have ramen and udon, some sushi rolls, and some japanese appetizers. That's it. And some drinks and booze and perhaps a few desserts. I decided to pick the ramen with chicken in a miso broth. The server told me that the most popular bowls were the ramen with gyoza and the ramen with chicken. Can other Namamen eaters be wrong?
The food comes out fairly quickly. They cook the noodles and then pour it into the bowl which has miso paste in it. Then they throw the fixins on top. So, the verdict? Meh. Basically, it's just a bowl of miso broth with some mediocre ramen noodles topped with mediocre chicken and really inexpensive and flavorless vegetables. For a bowl of ramen, there was actually not very many noodles. And they're extremely thin. The broth itself is fairly boring. The chicken was ok, but nothing special, and without much flavor. It looked like boiled chicken. And they put shredded carrots, shredded big green onions, spinach, and some mushrooms in it. Oh, and half a boiled egg. All of these fixins were blah. The egg was the best part. But you know, it was freakin cold as soon as I got to Switzerland, so a bowl of mediocre hot broth and noodles was just fine with me. At least it was warm in my otherwise frozen body.
Ok, now let's talk about how expensive Switzerland is. This thing cost 22CHF. That's about $22. That's right, I ate a $22 bowl of ramen. And no, it didn't have gold or diamonds in it. And it wasn't chock full of hand pulled ramen noodles made by the premier ramen noodle puller in all of japan. But this is the frightening thing about Switzerland. This type of pricing is normal. $22 for a bowl of ramen is not that big of a deal. Isn't that CRAZY?!?!?! It actually offends me a little. For $22, I'd expect something amazing, along with maybe a song and dance number, or a foot massage. But no, for $22, you can get your own bowl of mediocre noodles in Switzerland. And dont' get me started on the $5 sodas.

Thai Noodles In Dublin

I was staying in a fairly central part of Dublin centre, but I decided to roam around a bit to explore my surroundings. I ended up walking into a fairly residential and cute part of town, Ranelagh Village. It had a little strip of shops and restaurants and in general, life! I had read about Diep Le Shaker and saw that it had sister restaurants Diep Noodle Bar and Diep At Home so I decided to stop into the noodle version after all that walking. It's a thai place. They bill themselves as Thai and Vietnamese, but I'm sorry, there's nothing Vietnamese about this place. It's straight up thai.
I started with some spring rolls. These were nice and hot, but they were pretty boring. The dipping sauce was straight out of a bottle, and you didn't quite get enough of it. And for how little the rolls were, even though you got so many, these are expensive. But that's Dublin for ya, and that's the Euro.
For my entree I got the bangkok noodles, which was basically thai basil chicken with rice noodles. There was nothing extraordinary about this dish, but it was perfectly fine. It was certainly on par with other ok thai food I've had in the past. I haven't actually eaten that much thai food in my life, so I can't call myself any kind of connoisseur, but this was just ok. All the ingredients were fresh though, which is really fine by me. Again, this was expensive, if you think about it in dollars. You certainly couldn't charge $22 for something like this back home.
The service was good and the place itself is very nice. Attractively decorated, just the right amount of mood, and they play amazing music. Again, no problem with the credit card here as well.

Wagamama

The first and last time I went to Wagamama was when I was in London. This was forever and a half ago. I have no idea what I got that last time, but coincidentally enough, this place looked exactly like the last one. It's in the basement (do they only build restaurants in basements?) and has cafeteria type seating. I actually don't mind seating like this. I think whatever I ate that time years ago, I was underwhelmed. But I was willing to try it again.
They sell asian-esque food here. The options aren't that many. But it comes out pretty fast. I went with the spicy chicken ramen bowl. I also got one of their special fruit juices, which was freshly squeezed with various fruits, including apple, orange, and a few other delicious things I can't remember. I had to keep stirring it so that the apple pulp wouldn't just be floating at the top.To my shock (because I had extremely low expectations, and remembering my past Dublin meals to be so meh in the past, I was simply being realistic) my bowl of ramen was great. There wasn't anything fancy or complicated in here, but the broth was fantastic. Super zesty and full of flavor with a hint of spice. The chicken was well cooked and good quality, and the fixins were fresh. It was simple, yet delicious. And I was thankful it was so. I happened to pick something good that I liked, but that doesn't mean their other dishes are going to be as good. I'm pretty sure I got one of their noodle dishes last time, and it was probably pretty bland.The service is ok. Various people help you. One person takes your order and writes it down on your placemat. Another person might bring out your food. And then someone else may give you your check. But it's a pretty efficient system.

* A note about credit card usage. In preparation, I found a bunch of articles related to the credit card technology in europe being different than in the US, and that many businesses in europe would no longer take US credit cards since they do not have chip and pin technology. I have not had any issues so far. Everywhere that takes cards, that I've tried, has been fine in giving me a receipt to sign. So as of now, I would say no worries. They'll happily take your money.

Momiji Sushi, Eh

On a recent trip to Toronto, I was staying in some outlying suburbs. Whenever I'm somewhere new, I like to consult my trusty friend, yelp. It has treated me very well when travelling to new places. I wanted some japanese food, so that led me to Momiji, in Etobicoke. Try saying that 5 times.
It's located in a cute little downtown strip type of area. The place is rather unassuming and dark and dank looking from the outside, but the inside is lovely. It's modern, yet comfortable. Swanky, but not snooty. I really liked the decor. They even had some odd christmas lights hanging down from the ceiling. Rather out of place, but I liked it. And amongst the swank, an oddly placed flatscreen tv, where they played football, soccer, and cage fighting. It was amusing.
I started off with some agedashi tofu. I love me some agedashi tofu. This portion was ginormous. It was practically an entree. There was a giant heap of nori and bonito shavings on top. And a teeny tiny bowl of dipping sauce. Most times when I get agedashi tofu, it gets served within the sauce. So a separate dipping bowl was a first for me. It was ok. My favorite agedashi tofu still remains at Sagami. But this dish was ginormous and quite a bargain. The server even offered to bring me another tiny bowl of the dipping sauce. I appreciated that, as there clearly wasn't enough.
It is a sushi joint, so I had to at least try something. So I got a spicy california handroll. Man, was this good. I couldn't quite figure out what made it spicy. I was thinking it was the sauce, but it also seemed like that perhaps there were super thin slices of jalapeno or something else spicy in there too. Whatever it was though, it was good eatin.
I was super hungry, so I got a bowl of the nabe yaki udon. It came in this lovely earthenware bowl with a bunch of seafood and chicken breast and a bunch of veggies and egg. The broth itself was a little bland, but I still enjoyed it. The chicken breast was suprisingly good and grilled. Aside from some dark mushrooms, there wasn't even anything else offensive in this. It was a nice bowl of udon.

This was a great meal. I would highly recommend it to anyone in the western Toronto burbs looking for some good japanese food. And it was also affordable. It was reasonably priced, even in canadian dollars, so you know it's even better in US dollars.

The service was also good. It took awhile for my server to come over initially, but after that, it was smooth sailing from there. This place is also run by koreans. You remember me saying this before. There's probably a 50/50 chance that a sushi place is run by koreans. I think what gave it away was the k-pop playing on the stereo along with bulgogi and "spicy seafood noodle soup" being on the menu.

Oh, and the other thing that gave it away. The majority of the servers were male, all dressed in black, and tall, slim, and attractive, and all looked like they were part of a k-pop boy band. Seriously. They all had extremely trendy and stylish hair (for korean hair) and were extremely well groomed and polite. The styling gel use ratio of these boys was 100%, that's for damn sure. Later in the evening, when most of the guests had left, the servers all started gathering around. And in my head, they busted into a well-choreographed dance routine and started lip-synching to some good bubblegum k-pop. Like this.

Seriously folks, it was uncanny. Can you imagine getting served sushi by these guys? Maybe they ARE part of the next up and coming k-pop act, and they all happen to work at a sushi restaurant as their day jobs. Because really, I can't imagine every day regular folk looking like this on a regular basis.

But yes, back to my point... the food and service here are good! Give these boys some love and help them pay for their guyliner!

Tampopo

The plan was to have lunch at Kong, but Kong is not yet open for lunch. So our plans were dashed. H/A and I had been talking about getting ramen, and didn't really know a good place to get it, so we thought we'd give Tampopo a shot. I had also gotten my haircut a day earlier, and my stylist is adorable and japanese. I had asked her about ramen in philly and she said there is no good spot for it. Things were looking ominous.

There are three Tampopo locations, and we went to the one in west philly because it's the only one open on sundays. It's actually quite a cute spot. It's also the newest one. You order your food, get a buzzer, and pick it up when it's ready. There's plenty of dining space and cute little stools. They serve mostly japanese food and some korean dishes as well. I have a feeling they're run by koreans.The day actually turned out to be super hot, so I wasn't in the mood for ramen anymore. But H/A and D both got the tampopo ramen. There is no choice, just one ramen dish. It has pork and chicken broth, chashu(braised pork), bok choy, fish cake, egg, and scallions. And the broth is shockingly super hot and spicy. It's fine at first, and then it totally hits you. I liked it! It's unlike any ramen you've had before, but because it was so different, I have to give it props. D thought the noodles were too doughy. H/A wolfed it down like he hadn't eaten in days. Seriously, he ate the whole entire pile of noodles in one spoonful, it seemed.
J got the yakisoba and the miso soup. The yakisoba portion is a bit on the small side, especially for dudes, so beware. He got it with chicken, and he liked it very much. H/A also got yakisoba (yes, he was eating multiple meals) and he also liked it. The miso is just fine.
Since I wasn't feeling the hot food, I wanted something cold. So I picked the fresh tuna bibimbap. Mine came with brown rice, raw tuna, avocado, Korean pear, cucumber, lettuce, and red and white cabbage in a slightly spicy/sesame oil dressing/sauce. Everything in this dish was raw, except for the rice, which was obviously cooked.Here's the slop after you mix up all the goodies. I loved this! The flavor of this dish is quintessentially korean. But it's something that everyone could like. You can get it without the raw tuna, so for those of you wary of raw fish, you can still enjoy this. It's fresh, crunchy, and quite healthy. The texture is amazing. And the tuna is a nice touch. Others enjoyed this dish as well. I think the portion of rice was a bit on the paltry side, but otherwise, a perfect dish. I'll definitely be back to Tampopo.

Suburban Pho

While pho places abound in the city of brotherly love, its sisterly suburbs are mostly devoid. But there are a few spots... emphasis on the few. One of them is Pho Tai Nam, and we headed out there on one of the annoying rainy nights of this week to check it out. It actually turned out to be a perfect day for pho as it was cold and dreary. It's like a pho/vietnamese/thai joint. So definitely a mix of cuisines. It's in a nondescript strip mall. The inside is bright, sizeable, and clean.

Three of us got various bowls of pho, and H/A went crazy and got the pad thai. Which he didn't really like very much.

We also got some dumplings, as C had mentioned they were good here. And they genuinely were.

The pho did not dissappoint. While clearly overpriced for pho, it was still a sizeable bowl and the broth had good flavor. The meat was nice quality, and overall, I enjoyed it.

C got some mango ice cream for dessert and S got some green tea mochi.

I never leave room for dessert. I was too busy stuffing myself with a long awaited bowl of suburban pho. So for those of you afraid of venturing into the city, head up to Blue Bell and get yourself a bowl in all its suburban glory.

Always Busy At Sang Kee

I was totally hankering for some noodle soup the other day, so I dragged T along to Sang Kee for a quick dinner. He'd never been there before. Can you believe that? And he lives down the street from me. And I've been to Sang Kee way too many times.
T ordered the salmon with black bean sauce. If you want to eat right away, never ever order this dish. It took FOREVER for our food to come out, because they had to cook this. I saw people get seated way after we did, and they got all of their food before we got ours. It was depressing. Especially because we were both starving. Watching everyone else eat and get their food, even though they sat and ordered way after us, was very upsetting.
When I go to Sang Kee, I'm beyond predictable. I get the noodle soup with roast pork and dumplings. But there's no reason for me to stray. I was craving noodle soup, so that's just what I got. And it's good every single time. It's a big portion with tons of delicious roasted pork and just the right amount of dumplings. And with some veg too, so it makes me feel a bit on the healthier side.

Service was ok, as usual. And also as usualy, this place was pretty darn busy. It was a weekday too. But it doesn't really matter when you show up. It's always busy here. But there's good reason, because it's always good food, big portions, at very reasonable prices. I'm so lucky I live so close to this place.

Japanese Noodles!

We kind of ate a lot this day... but we started with lunch at Sanuki Sandon Udon, one of the food court selections. It's a noodle place. I love the fake food displays. Every restaurant in the universe should have one.
H/A got some curry beef over noodles. It was very liquidy, like a curry soup. He also got a piece of shrimp tempura.
I wanted to leave plenty of room for lots of food, so I just got a nice bowl of kitsune udon. Kitsune actually means fox, so technically, this is fox noodles. The kitsune are the sweetened deep fried tofu slabs. I love kitsune. It's just the best. And it's perfect in udon noodle soups. This was the perfect noodle meal to start our day of feasting. And it was super cheap!

Oodles of Noodles

After running around to potential customers and not having any time to eat, I finally had a chance to grab a bite before heading back home. I stopped by this chain, Noodles & Company, because when you're in the middle of suburban Maryland and starving, you just go to something that seems like it can't be that bad. So there you go.
And I love me some noodles, so I had high hopes. That's what they have here - noodles! Lots and lots of noodles. Asian noodles, mediterranean noodles, and american noodles. And some soups and salads too. And a little bit of dessert.
It's a nice, bright, and airy space, and I think they have free wi-fi! I got the japanese pan noodles - broccoli, carrots, shiitake mushrooms, sprouts, sesame seeds, cilantro, and udon noodles in a sweet and spicy soy sauce. You pick your meat and I went with sauteed beef.
The things that make up this dish are so good. How can you go wrong with udon noodles, beef, veggies, and sauce? Well, apparently, in many many ways. The noodles were overly flavored. The sweet and spicy soy sauce wasn't particularly a good flavored sauce. And it seemed to be only on the noodles. The broccoli was severely undercooked. I don't like mushy broccoli, but this was practically raw. And the meat, which was really tasty and extremely tender, did not have any of the sauce on it at all. It's as if they cooked up the noodles and veggies and sauce, and then just sort of dumped in some heated up meat afterwards. The meat was of high quality, and just tasted peppered, but had absolutely none of the sweet and spicy soy sauce flavor. So the components of this dish had tons of promise, but it was extremely poorly executed. But due to my starvation, I scarfed it down. Needless to say, I was highly disappointed. Oh well. It's always a crapshoot when you go to a chain.

Noodles In Japantown

We had walked around japantown a little bit before catching our movie at the kabuki, but we stopped by on Friday for a proper visit. Whence in japantown, one must eat japanese food!

By the time we got there, we were absolutely famished, so we pretty much just stopped at the first place we saw. That was Suzu Noodle House. So glad we did!

It's a noodle house, so get noodles! We both ended up getting some lunch specials. J got a tuna over rice bowl along with a lovely udon soup. I love udon noodles. I love how thick and chewy they are.

I got some chicken curry, which was super good. I love me some japanese style curry! If you haven't had japanese curry before, please try it. Beware, it's not like thai curry or indian curry at all. There's no yellow, green, red, etc. variety and there's no coconut milk in it. It's quite different. And by different, I mean better. And the curry itself is thick. I grew up with my mom making it so it's something that I've loved for a long time. And to this day, it's still my favorite style of curry. I don't like coconut milk, so in reality, it's not much of a contest.

I also got some soba soup. I was in the mood for some soba noodles, for some reason, so I went for it. Typically, I enjoy my soba noodles cold, in the zaru soba dish. This was the first time I'd had it hot. And it was delicious! They make their own noodles here, and while we didn't try the ramen noodles, the soba and the udon were great. Tasty and cooked well. The broth on our soups were also nice and strong and flavorful. Service was nice and polite. The food came out fast! And since we got lunch specials, we got tons of food for a great price.

Suzu Noodle House

1825 Post St

San Francisco, CA 94115

(415) 346-5083