Yes, please.
Thanks Jason!
October, 2009
31
Oct 09
The Cuisine Festival: Shanghai: Nov 7 & 8th, 2009
The Cuisine Festival is coming to Shanghai next weekend – a food festival featuring a bunch of local restaurants. Tickets start at $120RMB/$200RMB at the door, and events like cooking lessons, cocktail hour, and wine tastings cost extra. Check out their website at thecuisinefestival.com.
I’m excited to visit the bistro burger stall after hearing some good & bad things.. can’t wait to try it out for myself.
29
Oct 09
Phat in Shanghai: Yakitori Fukuchan
Shanghai has a great Korean & Japanese expat community, so we definitely get hooked up with some bomb KBBQ & sushi. Yakitori is another fantastic import from our island neighbors. Monday night after work, Sam, Mike, Adrian & I met up for meat on sticks + beeeer at Yakitori Fukuchan.
This place is really small, and feels like a real yakitori joint you’d find in Japan. Plus it helps that the clientele and staff are Japanese. Yakitori items hover around 6-8RMB a skewer, ramen is around 30RMB.
Started off with something a little special. Pork liver & chicken skin. The chicken skin is so good. A little crispy, a little fatty. Yum!
Chicken with salt
Chicken with sauce. I prefer this one!
Their chicken meatballs are seriously to die for. Flavorful and melt-in-your-mouth soft.
Shoyu ramen with hunks of porky goodness.
What a good looking pair.
Next up: gotta try the talked-about & highly regarded Toriyasu.
$$
Yakitori Fukuchan
223 Changle Lu at Shanxi Nan Lu
+86 5403 6270
28
Oct 09
Phat in Shanghai: Lost Heaven
I had the opportunity to eat out at another Shanghai culinary institution this week: Lost Heaven. My boyfriend took me here the first night I arrived in Shanghai, and yes, I was impressed.
The food is inspired by the fusion of flavors in Yunnan, a province in Southwestern China. Yunnan is home to 26 minority tribes, and shares borders with Burma, Vietnam, and Laos. So basically, Yunnan food is crazy delicious. Think lemongrass, chilis, goat cheese.
a dj dinner
Yunnan wild veggie cake. Vegetable not specified on the menu. Pretty good but nothing special.
Lost heaven spring rolls. Super light and crispy outside, might be tofu skin?
Pan fried fish medallions smothered in a creamy tomato sauce. This dish was a winner!
Roasted chicken (skin was still a bit crispy) thighs topped with a Yunnan-style tabouli. Very garlicky, very good.
A potato and beef stir fry flavored with lots of lemongrass and chili. spicy!
The atmosphere is really nice – dim lighting, fresh flowers, costumed greeters – definitely a good place to take ya girl!
$$$$
Lost Heaven
38 Gaoyou Lu at Fuxing Xi Lu
Shanghai
+86 6433 5126
www.lostheaven.com.cn
26
Oct 09
Phat in Shanghai: El Willy
It was Li’s birthday and a lovely October night (i’m talking 75F, peoples!) so we had dinner in the garden at Shanghai institution, El Willy.
Sorry for the yellow photos.
Happy Birthday Girl!
Started off will several delicious tapas, including the requisite Spanish style bruschetta, meat plate featuring jamon iberico & chorizo, and a few more lovely starters:
Super fresh, meaty oysters
Scallop ceviche over guacamole, topped with fried shallots.
A classic tapa, patatas bravas, or potatoes with a creamy spicy sauce. I think this had cheese too!
Cochinilla, or roasted suckling pig. Yummy chunks of tender meat, a layer of fat, and a thick crispy skin. I mean it was no BOTIN or anything.. but pretty fantastic.
Seared foie gras served on toast with a bit of apricot, topped with grated cheese. I know foie is cruel and everything, but this tapa was just amazing. the savory foie just went so well with the sweet apricot.
in addition to tapas, El Willy also specializes in rice. We enjoyed a fragrant porcini risotto alongside this superb paella. Really rich in flavor, especially since it was laced with chunks of melt-in-your-mouth pork fat! Yes, pork fat!
$$$$$
El Willy
20 Donghu Road
Shanghai
+86 2154055757$$
26
Oct 09
Phat in Phu Quoc – Grill + Beach = WIN
So after our stint in Saigon, we were ready for some rest & relaxation. We took a one hour plane ride to Phu Quoc, a relatively “untouched” island west of Saigon. Phu Quoc is a pretty cool place and is famous for three things; fish sauce (explains the ripe smell hanging over some parts of town), black pepper, and their dogs!
Cute huh? Phu Quoc dogs are known for their razor sharp teeth & claws, as well as a fierce-looking ridgeback of fur. I had to restrain myself from stuffing this little guy in my bag.
We stayed at a place called Beach Club, which is situated at the end of Long Beach. Nice accomodation, mediocre food. Luckily, we ran into our friends, Drew & Yaya, (big ass coincidence) and they gave us the run down about this beach on the southern end, called Sao Beach. Untouched! Hammocks! Amazing grilled prawns! Delicious ribs!
Curious, we booked a night at the only resort on the beach, called My Lan. This place is basically a bunch of wooden shacks, but it is served by a fantastic restaurant.
Drew & Yaya were right about the prawns. Grilled tableside! These babies were monster size, lightly marinated, and extremely succulent and juicy. I can’t stop using the word succulent on this blog. SUCCULENT!!!
Drew & Yaya were also right about the ribs. Marinated in a slighty sweet sauce, they grilled up real nice.
Drew & Yaya were also DAMN right about the hammocks.
Beach Club on Long Beach
Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam
+84 77 3980998
Email: info@beachclubvietnam.com
www.beachclubvietnam.com
My Lan on Sao Beach
Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam
+ 84 77 3990779
24
Oct 09
Terminology: Sous Vide
Sous vide means “under vacuum” in French. It’s a method where food is sealed in a plastic bag, then slow-cooked in water thats heated to around 60 degrees F. Cooking things in this manner often takes hours, even up to a day. Umm, hungry NOW!
I just started reading up on this technique and realized I’ve had a dish a la sous vide before…
in the form of a Flatiron steak at Nios in NYC. The chef cooked it using the sous vide method, then charred the outside. The result was one of the most tender and flavorful steaks I’ve ever had. Yum!
NIOS
130 West 46th Street
New York, NY 10036
****EDIT**** 10/27/09
Serious eats has a fantastic write up of a sous-vide-anator demo!
24
Oct 09
Pho with Oxtail on Serious Eats
Photo credit: Tam Ngo
Serious Eats has an amazing recipe for Phở Đuôi Bò (Pho with Oxtail). Droool.
21
Oct 09
Phat in Saigon: Ben Thanh Market
Saigon is a crazy place. Really crazy. Lots of interesting people just hustling and trying to make a living. The trick is not to let the hustle YOU! Here are some quick tips:
-Don’t pay 50,000 dong for a coconut.
-Don’t get in fake taxis, they will rape you. Look for Vinasun or Vinataxi.
And when you are done getting ripped off for the day, you can suffocate yourself with food at Ben Thanh Market. It’s pretty lively at night, with lots of touristy shopping stalls and restaurants setting up shop on the streets. Look for the ones with the most SMOKE. yep – more smoke = more food grilling up! We were drawn to this one spot that was grilling whole red snapper on the street.
The outdoor kitchen was poppin, a sure sign that good stuff was coming out. This place had tons of seafood and even some frogs strung up. Yeah, cruel. But delicious.
Of course we ordered the main draw – red snapper grilled simply with lots of salt. Served with lime dip (salt & pepper, wedge of lime) on the side. This fish was cooked perfectly, with crispy skin and super tender, juicy flesh. So fresh and perfect!
Steamed clams with plenty of fish sauce, green onion, and chopped peanuts. Tasty! The only misstep on the menu is their fresh summer rolls, or goi cuon. Really awful. They just let those suckers sit in the open air so its like gnawing on a piece of plastic by the time its actually served.
We had all of the above with an order of seafood fried rice (fuckin fantastic!) and shrimp cooked with tamarind and loads of onion. Sweet & savory, mmm.
All this food, with icy cold Saigon 333 beer – for two of us! We were stuffed to say the least.
Pinoyfoodcritic , 9000 Hours in Saigon & Miss.Adventure in Vietnam also did some writeups on Ben Thanh, ch-ch-ch-check it out!
Peace!
21
Oct 09
Phat in Vietnam: In Search of Banh Mi
Ok, so obviously by now everyone knows what the hell a banh mi is.
I remember getting $2.25 combo special banh mi from Lam’s Vietnamese on Taraval in SF. (sucks that its closed now). That was good, but I’ve always been on the search for something better.
First there was Banh Mi So on Broome st in NYC. Good, but the bread was a little too dense. But I liked the red pork and the guy behind the counter. I tried a few other places around NYC Chinatown. The Sau Voi (VCD & bra store) was close to my office, Banh Mi So (the jewelry store place) was good, Paris Sandwich was oookay but lacked SOUL… and then i found Ba Xuyen in sunset park. I’m really hesistant to blow up this spot any further, cause seriously, they serve the BOMB banh mi. I only hope the 40min subway ride will keep all you other foodies from crowding it up and buying all the grilled pork sandwiches before i get there!!
Ahh, the perfect sandwich. smear of pate, generous spread of homemade mayo, gratuitous fillings of headcheese, cha lua, godknowswhatelse, all topped off with perfectly pickled daikon & carrot. Finished off with cilantro and stuffed in a crispy and light baguette. Gimme a jackfruit shake and i’m golden!
Anyhoo, you can see how passionate I am about my banh mi. So when we got to Vietnam, I was pretty determined to find some damn good banh mi.
First attempt at banh mi was in Pham Ngu Lao (backpacker’s district) of Saigon. It was quite good, the bread was an appropriate ratio of light crust to bread innards. The fillings were a little meager tho. But of course this is Vietnam and apparently thats they way a banh mi should be. And for 20,000 VND (~$1.12 USD), can’t really complain. It seems the banh mi in Vietnam all come wrapped in recycled paper. Dunno what this paper was about.
Second attempt at banh mi in Pham Ngu Lao. This banh mi lady offered a much better sandwich. The bread was nice and crispy and this banh mi offered the additional green onion and pork floss. Yum!
Paired with a nice ca phe sua (ice coffee with milk), its a perfect lunch.
The best banh mi I had in Vietnam was acquired on a street corner in Nha Trang. And I’m not just saying this because the photography is the best! (thanks adrian) Look for this vendor! This banh mi was way better than the others because of the bread. It was superbly crispy, comprised of almost all crust! So light and the perfect wrapping for tasty banh mi fillings. Didn’t hurt that this banh mi lady had a toaster in her cart. Also, this particular sandwich, wrapped in Microsoft installation instructions, had plenty of pork floss and some kind of ground meat in sauce topping. AMAZING.
So in conclusion, the best banh mi? I feel like its hypocrisy saying this.. but… BA XUYEN! I guess i like my sandwiches big and beefy (err, porky). and brooklyn style.
The Porkchop Express has a fantastic banh mi guide for NYC, go get schooled.
