FoodBuzz Fest Street Food Fare

The kind people at FoodBuzz (--> I am a featured publisher!) held the inaugural FoodBuzz Food Blogger Festival in san francisco this year. That was my other reason for going out there for this trip. On the first night, they had a street food fare at the Ferry Building. Street food... Ferry Building... put them together and it's like a dream! There were tons of local vendors who let us grub on their fine grub. It was a nice variety as well, and everyone was super friendly. Even though we only ate little plates, I was beyond stuffed by the end of it. And yes, all this food was prepared on the site!
What's a trip to sf without tacos? Beef, of course!
The food above is not only completely vegan, but also completely raw. Scary sounding, I know, but surprisingly tasty. The cheesecake was good, even though there was a slightly funny this isn't real cheese taste. I still liked it!
The star of the evening... the porchetta sandwich from roli roti. What is it? Pork belly rolled into pork loin with crispy skin rotisseried the crack up, with fresh herbs, onion marmalade, and curly cress stuffed in between bread. Oh. My. Word. Yes, it is that delicious.
Delicious thin crust pizzas. Yes, the oven was there!
Freshly shucked oysters from Hog Island Oyster!
Mini meat pies! These ones were steak & gruyere. This was my second favorite of the evening!
Adorable little mini cupcakes of various flavors from Mission Minis. So cute and so tasty! You can even find these at whole foods in the sf area! Schmancy!
Freshly fried chicharrones. Ok, obviously, this wasn't an event for the health conscious.
Ok, here's one thing that was slightly healthy... vegetables! I had the beet salad which I loved. You heard it here people, I love beets! I love street food. I especially love it when it's within one confined area so I don't have to walk far between gourd stuffings.

Fire Restaurant - Dublin

On my last evening, my colleague R and I got to talking about food. She recommended Fire as a place with excellent cocktails and steaks. Since I wasn't sure where to go, I decided to head over there. It's next to the Mansion House, which is some sort of event place, and the restaurant itself is kinda huge. It's in one giant room with extremely high ceilings. It's rather daunting, bordering on gawdy. It's another place that probably considers itself fine dining. It sure has fine dining prices, that's for damn sure. Did I get cocktails? No. Did I get steaks? No. So here's what I did get.
Some complimentary bread. It was only ok. They have their own brand of water. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not.
I got the soup, which was sweet corn and fresh tomato. Only thing though, I don't recall any tomatoes being in this at all. It was more of a creamy corn soup. I quite liked it, but the name and description was a bit of a misnomer.
For my entree I got the pan fried fillet of monkfish, served with a basil and lemon hollandaise sauce with asparagus and scallion mashed potatoes. This dish was quite good, but man, so just not worth the high price tag. It was three fairly teeny bits of monkfish, a small heap of mashed potatoes, and three asparagus. This is all you get for nearly 30 euros? It's slightly offensive. I said it was good, but it was way overpriced. The soup was a bit expensive too, but it was a lot of soup, so that price point didn't offend me as much. I was pretty stuffed though, so I didn't have room for dessert. The food was good, but it wasn't great. It wasn't good enough to have the price tags that it did. The high prices seem to be because of the ambiance, but for me, the ambiance wasn't that rich either. It was a bit showy and cheesy. So maybe I would have done better if I had gotten steak and cocktails as per the recommendations, but I have a feeling I would have found them not worth their price either. For me, I say skip this one. You can get much better food elsewhere in Dublin. Service was only ok. Again, for these prices, I expected much more.

French Fine Dining At Pearl Brasserie

After my fine dining experience the night before, I decided to treat myself for the rest of the trip and continue with the fine dining streak. So for my next adventure, I dined at Pearl Brasserie. It is a French brasserie located in a basement. But don't worry, it's a very nice restaurant, despite its underground location. From my first moment in, it was an extraordinary experience. And that's exactly what it was, an experience. It wasn't just a regular meal, it was an event. The place is very nice, but not snooty at all. There are light fixtures that look like pearl onions. I assume that's where the pearl in Pearl Brasserie came from.
Complimentary whole wheat baguette with pesto and butter. This butter was incredibly rich and amazing. And while I'm not normally a pesto person, I enjoyed it on the baguettes.
While waiting for my entree, we were all treated to a complimentary appetizer. It was pork with cumin with a horseradish sauce. Man, was this thing good. With a start like this, I knew my entree was going to kick ass.
And kick ass it did. I got the seared queen scallops and dublin bay prawns. It was served with curried gnocchi, and fresh garden peas, in a prawn bisque. Everything about this dish was amazing. The scallops and prawns were perfectly cooked, the gnocchi was tender, the peas had just enough crunch, and the bisque had an amazing flavor. I could have licked this plate. And if I wasn't surrounded by so many high class people, I totally would have.
I couldn't stop eating. Since it was french brasserie portions, I still had room, and a need to keep eating. So I got the creme brulee, and my server said it was a good choice. I love me some creme brulee, and if it's on a menu, and I'm feeling dessert, there's a good chance I'm going to pick it. This one was particularly great. It was made with organic free range eggs, and you know what, you really could tell. It had good texture, a lovely strong vanilla flavor, and a nice and crispy burnt crunch on top.

And let me tell you about the service. This place is run like a machine. But not in a cold and robotic way. Just in an incredibly precise and well-oiled machine kind of a way. Everyone worked as a team, and they were immaculate professionals. Everyone was nice, friendly, and great at their jobs. And you could tell they deeply cared about what they were doing. This was one of the most memorable meals I've ever had in my life. It was the type of meal where they spoil you a bit, and well, I enjoyed it. I wholeheartedly recommend anyone in Dublin to try this place out. You'll remember it for the ages!

Seafood in Toronto

The next night I entrusted yelp again, and found that Rodney's Oyster House had consistently good review. So I headed into the big city! After the GPS taking me through some of Toronto's most sketchiest neighborhoods (thanks GPS!) I finally ended up at Rodney's. It's actually in the basement, so you have to go downstairs. Once you're downstairs, it's completely unpretentious. It's just a comfortable place where they take their food seriously, not their decor. Come on, they have corrugated steel as design elements! This was the lone shucker they had. And man, did he shuck a lot. Behind him are the day's oyster offerings. I know nothing about oysters. And even though I went to an oyster house, I did not get any. Even though I do like oysters. I don't know, I just wasn't feeling it that night. The menu is fairly small. They obviously have oysters, and the oyster selections change daily. They also have a few daily specials. They have a few soups and apps, a few cold dishes, a few hot dishes, a few smoked fish dishes, and a few desserts. It's very simple. They give you complimentary bread, which was good, and it comes with a giant bowl of whipped butter. Yum. I'm a clam chowder fiend, so I had to try the one here. For a cup, it is actually quite pricey, but the cup itself is pretty decently sized. The chowder itself was ok. Nothing great, but perfectly acceptable. It had many tiny pieces of celery which really bugged me. I can't stand celery, and they're hard to avoid when they're that small. But the flavor was good and it had lots of clam in it, even though they were in teeny little pieces too. I really wanted scallops but their scallop offerings were slim. So instead, I got a half order of their pasta special which was scallops, shrimp, skate, and green beans served with fettuccini in a cream sauce. This half portion was actually quite big, and they did not skimp on the seafood. The scallops were perfectly seared, the shrimp was perfectly cooked, and the fish was delicious. It was a pretty plain cream sauce, but still an excellent dish. After a couple of twists with the pepper grinder, I hosed it.

The service here is excellent. Most of the servers were men, and they were super friendly, attentive, and definitely knew their stuff. I really wanted to end up trying some oysters at the end, but I was beyond stuffed. Even with my half portion of pasta, I was done. If you're into seafood and especially if you are a fan of oysters, head down to Rodney's. Oh, and ladies, and some of you men too, these servers were quite pleasing to the eye. So if you're in the mood for some seafood serving man candy in Toronto, check this place out.

Dinner Party Time!

On friday night, I had the honor of attending a lovely dinner party by R, teacher of young children and awesome dinner party thrower, extraordinaire. Can I just tell you how awesome his condo is? It's just awesome. I love everything about it. When I dream about the type of condo I would like to have, it's just like R's condo. Damn him. Not only the condo itself, but everything he has in it. If he ever wanted to trade, I would totally let him have my house. Really. No joke.
A variety of delicious cheese and crackers, pate, nuts, and olives. Wait till you see what else he made for this party. And he made it all himself. And the crazy thing is that he said he cooks like this every night. How can anyone cook like this every night? I'd need an extra 4 hours in my day! My jealousy grows...
A couple more appetizers... Chorizo with a shallot, onion, and apple reduction. Um, hello, can we say delicious? And some type of shrimp based appetizer housed in adorable little red endive leaves. Again, delicious. Who has time to make stuff like these? And we all adored the human pincushion toothpick holder.

A gorgeous antipasti with lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, mozzarella, artichoke, peperoncini stuffed with ham and cheese, and all of it topped with the loveliest and thinnest slices of proscuitto. I took this picture before it was drizzled with olive oil and balsamic. Goodness. If all salads are like this, then I could agree to eat salads all the time.

For the main course, R outdid himself. Slow braised short ribs with wine and an apple based sauce. It was super tender and so heavily flavored and amazing. It was served on top of mascarpone polenta. And served with some haricot verts. Again, can I ask, who cooks like this? I would end up eating at 1AM. Everything was amazing.
Just when you think you're done, he laid these little puppies on us. Lemons filled with lemon curd, topped with lemon meringue. And at the bottom of these tasty little treats, crushed graham crackers. Unbelievable. Truly unbelievable. If all dinner parties are like this, please, please invite me to your dinner parties. I am an excellent guest. I will sing and dance if you ask. I will bring cake (like the mocha cake). I will help clean. Really. And as for R, he can invite me over any time. It was definitely a dinner party to remember. My stomach won't ever forget it!

A Carnivolution Of Sorts

Each month in west philly, they hold a carnivolution at a "museum". And by "museum" I basically mean someone's house and their backyard and their adjoining neighbors' backyards. It's a hoot. The sideshow featured the siamese twin towers, sword swallowing, fire play, a fat guy with a purse dressed as satan, a stripping osama bin laden, and the list goes on and on.

They served a tiny bit of food this month. Rick's Raw Bar served oysters and clams. He also had vegan fruit salad soaked with alcohol. Some steamed shrimp as well. And he was hocking his own brand of horseradish.

H/A went and ordered one of the oyster shooters. Freshly shucked oyster, vodka, cocktail sauce, and horseradish. Rick told him to just swallow the thing, or chew it. H/A chose to swallow it.

He looked like he knew what I was doing, but there was no way I was going to risk my life buying oysters off a dude named Rick in someone's backyard. There's one more carnivolution left this year, so go check it out!

Hartford Hotel Lunch

Headed up to Hartford on Friday to go to a family wedding. It was a long drive. There was no breakfast. Needless to say, by the time we got to the hotel, I was beyond starving. The Crowne Plaza Hartford has Bistro Z, a fusion spot. I could have cared less what food they served. I would have eaten cardboard at this point.
Some spicy tuna rolls. For a hotel restaurant, these were super cheap! And pretty darn tasty, considering. The hotel is apparently owned by koreans, and the executive chef of this joint also seems to be korean. It's sort of obvious, because these spicy tuna rolls tasted korean! What do I mean by that? They had the flavor of gochujang, which is the korean red pepper paste. It has a distinct taste, and these spicy tuna rolls definitely had that flavor. And that flavor was good!
I also had a bowl of clam chowder. I know, random selections, right? This was ok. It had some decent clammage, so I can't complain, but it was also a bit heavy on the celery side, and I can't stand celery. But I easily avoided those and enjoyed this. For hotel food, not bad at all!

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.

Ombu Wood Fired Grill

After consulting my trusty yelp recommendations, I had my one dinner in Winston-Salem at Ombu Wood Fired Grill. I had a near mishap because this place is fairly new and on a new street, and when you try to get directions here, it takes you some where else. I didn't realize that until I followed my directions to a residential area. There was not a restaurant in sight. But one call to the restaurant and I got there fairly easily.
The place opened in October and it's quite beautiful. I loved the decor of this place, it was incredibly warm. The open kitchen's half wall had the most amazing tile, I was totally in love with it. And they had these beautiful wine racks. There are several dining areas as well, it's a sizeable place.
Since I'm a total lightweight, I stuck with my pink lemonade. The bartender was amazingly sweet and was a total pro.
Some complimentary bread. They just switched breads so the bartender had never tasted it. It was warm and delicious, with just a hint of some herbs. And paired with olive oil and balsamic for dipping, it was great. I told her she had to try it. With bread this good, I knew I'd be in for a great meal.
I had to get the lobster bisque. But it wasn't just any lobster bisque, it was velvety lobster saffron bisque garnished with blistered sweet corn, crème fraich, and bits of lobster. Whoo! This was excellent bisque. What's not to like about this soup? Everything in it was good. And I only ordered a cup but it was a very sizeable portion, for just a cup. It was nearly a bowl.
For my entree, I had the wood oven seared grouper with sweet potato-plantain hash, haricot verts, and a sweet chili gastrique. Again, amazing. This was a huge hunk of grouper, which is a thick and meaty fish. It was seared with a nice crust and cooked to perfection. The hash was also amazing, especially with the sweet chili sauce. And you know I love green beans of all kind.

This is an excellent restaurant, and would be an excellent restaurant in any city. Even if it were in a large city, let's say NYC or San Francisco, this would be an excellent restaurant. Winston-Salem is lucky to have a gem like this in their town. So for you locals, go and support them!

Shopping and Legal Sea Foods

After going to K of P to return a bunch of random crap that none of us needs, we decided to eat at Legal Sea Foods, because R had never been there and she loves her some damn seafood. It was pretty late, and the place is big, so there weren't too many people in there.
R got the rainbow trout with horseradish butter, rice pilaf, and mashed potatoes. Their choice of sides is uber heavy on the carbs. There should really be more veggie choices, pretty please. The trout was fine, but she really dug the horseradish butter. The thought of this revolts me, as I can't stand horseradish. But she loved it! She got the clam chowder too. At first, she ordered the lite clam chowder. We thought this would be a lighter version of the new england clam chowder. Wrong! It is a lite clam chowder, and definitely nothing like new england. One look at its weird watery broth and seeing nothing but chopped carrots and celery, she sent it back. Then she got the proper new england chowder. So be warned, they are completely different soups! She felt the same way about the new england clam chowder as I did. That's it's nothing special.
I got the scallops again, because I got them the last time and loved it, and I'm someone that likes to stick with what she know sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes. I got pilaf and asparagus. I had wanted sugar snap peas but they were out, but luckily, they had asparagus instead. I really love these scallops. They're just grilled but that's all they need. They're awesome. And it's a nice portion too. I had enough to take home and eat the next day with some noodles I cooked up.
R felt like dessert, so she got this gluten-free chocolate mousse. Ok, first off, this is not mousse. It's not light and airy and moussey. It's a thick and rich tort. You get three little hunks of these "mousse" and not only is it gluten-free, but it was also nonfat. All those things scream tasteless in my book (haha), but this was actually pretty good. A little too chocolatey for my taste! But I was still impressed by the flavor, considering how "healthy" it was.

Overall, another solid meal, but nothing super fantastic. I think this is what Legal is. Good food, not crazy prices, but not cheap either, with nice atmosphere. I think they want to be fancier than they think they are. And for whatever reason, our server really annoyed me. She was beyond fake and artificial and I think it oozed out her bitter food service worker pores.

Oceanaire

I'm in Indianapolis, yo! So I was chillin it, true midwest style. After driving around northern Indiana all day, once we cruised back into the big city, we had to eat real food. Sure, we were starving and had stopped at Arby's for a quick bite, but once we got downtown, we had to get a proper meal. After walking around a tiny bit, we just decided to go to Oceanaire. It's a chain, but I'd never been. And after looking at their website, guess what? There's one in Philly.

It's a fairly nice restaurant. They've got tons of seafood, a wide selection at the raw oyster bar, and an extremely large wall of booze. And lots of stuffed fish on the walls. We hung out at the bar during this visit. The bartender was very cool and treated us well.

They give you complimentary fresh baked sourdough bread. Dude, this bread is good! And it comes with a plate of random stuff - pickled herring, raw veggies, and olives. It's an odd mix, but I'm sure there's a reason for it, I just don't know it. I've never had pickled herring before, you know I'm not jewish or swedish, so I had to try it. Well, it wasn't bad. It just tastes like a really strong tasting fish that's been pickled. I wouldn't order and entire dish of it or anything, but I didn't mind it at all. I was proud of myself for trying.

While waiting for our food, the chef sent us a little appetizer which was basically a tortilla chip, topped with a salsa-like concoction which included crab meat. Oh man, this thing was awesome. I wish I could have had a whole bucketful of these happy chips.

We both got the oceanaire chopped salad and a bowl of clam chowder. The chopped salad was just the right size. Small, but not too small. It came with lettuce, tomato, hard boiled egg, a big ass slice of parmesan, bay shrimp, and crab, in a greek vinaigrette. The clam chowder was really quite awesome, some of the bet chowder I've had in a long time, and it was surprisingly large. Neither of us could finish our bowls! It's swanky seafood, so it ain't cheap, but definitely worth trying.

Asian At The Mall

My mom and I were supposed to eat dinner together on Monday night but the snowstorm stopped us. She won't drive if there's snow on the ground. So we postponed for a few days and then visited our favorite mall, K of P, to do a little shopping along with the dining. I wasn't in the mood for any of the chain stuff, so I just made an executive decision to eat at Blue Pacific Chinese Bistro & Sushi. I'd passed by it a gazillion times but had never actually eaten there. It was worth a shot. The place is pretty sizable on the inside, with a bar on one corner and a sushi bar along one wall. The menu is a mix of asian cuisines - chinese, thai, and sushi/japanese. And here I had thought it was only straight up sushi this whole time. I was pretty hungry so I got a spicy tuna roll to start. This was your standard spicy tuna roll. Nothing exceptional, but perfectly acceptable. My mom got the steamed tilapia with a ginger sauce. This dish was excellent. It was two huge pieces of tilapia, perfectly steamed, with a very light ginger based sauce. It wasn't heavy or greasy at all, and a very healthy selection. I got the dish called peking noodles. This was basically their version of the dan dan noodles dish at pf chang's. There's rice noodles, julienned cucumbers, sprouts, and ground pork in a slightly sweet and spicy sauce. The pf chang version has egg noodles and ground chicken instead. I liked this dish, and there was plenty of food for me to scarf down. Overall, we enjoyed our meal here. While dining, we saw the two sushi chefs working on at least 2 sushi boats. You know, the big ass huge ones, with like 100 pieces of sushi on them. Whoa. Service was fine, nothing out of the ordinary to report.