Our Apartment...

...has neither chairs nor a proper dining table. 250 square feet shared between two people - it's lucky we get along so well, having gone to both middle and high school together. On the rare occasion that we dine in, we sit on plushy square pillows and place food on two feet high Ikea tables. When the weather is nice, we'll sit on the fire escape and watch people passing by down below. And on some nights, we use Shann's windowsill as a makeshift dining table, and her bed as one long bench.

Our last dinner took place on a particularly warm night this summer...

…we don't have an air-conditioner (and recently learned that we are the only apartment in the entire complex without air-conditioning), so we responded to the heat by spinning together ice cold seltzer water with a summery splash of Red Jacket Orchards's cherry-apple juice and a squeeze of lime.

And then out came a duo of tomatoes...

...followed by supple and creamy sweet burrata from the nearby DiPalo's.

And because one type of cheese is never enough when you can have two, we carried on with a pound of fresh ricotta.

For a bit of colour, we threw in pints of Greenmarket blueberries and assembled little creations of toasted baguettes, creamed honey, generous spoonfuls of ricotta and a sprinkle of berries...

...tadah! ^_^

On the savoury end of the spectrum, we chopped fresh basil from the windowsill in my room (yes the apartment is tiny, but we get excellent sunlight!)...

...and paired that with the tomatoes, pesto, and burrata, doing a rather thorough job of cleaning out the addictively creamy innards.

And there you have it, Monday Night Dinner. Two girls, a street facing window with most interesting passerbys, quality food, and good conversation. I'd say it was a pretty nice start to the week :)

A Sure Call for Celebration...

...a bounty of stone fruit at the Greenmarket today!! ^_^

The summer heat is quite draining (hitting the high 90s this weekend), but that didn't seem to stop the usual Saturday afternoon crowd at the market.

I purchased a bottle of water from a man circling the market with a cooler full of ice and Poland Springs. Curious as to how much water he could sell on this sticky day, I (discreetly) trailed him around for a bit. In no more than three minute, he sold nearly twenty bottles! Not too bad, eh?

The purple and yellow plums I purchased were a slight let down. The scent was wonderful and the vibrant colours positively mesmerizing, but a simple touch revealed a basket of overripe fruit near the point of mushy. I'll have to be more careful picking the fruits next time around.

Hope everyone is having a nice weekend :)

Cafe Gray

It's well known that Cafe Gray has already closed, but Don took me out on such a beautiful meal for my 22nd birthday a few weeks ago, and it would be a shame to not have our dinner documented in photos at the very least :)

Below, the tasting menu with two additional supplements: Skate Schnitzel and Roasted Pork & Crisp Belly.




Fennel-Sourdough Loaf

Amuse Bouche

Risotto, Mushroom Fricassée

Coconut Coated Red Snapper, Crabmeat, and Mango

Skate Schnitzel, Fennel, Blood Orange and Caper-Brown Butter

Roasted Pork, Crisp Belly And Pickled Ramps, Brussels Sprouts and Golden Beets

Braised Short Rib of Beef, Soft Grits and Meaux Mustard

Chilled Soup of Lemongrass, Yoghurt-Lime Sorbet

Hazelnut Souffle, Spiced Oranges, Cardamom Ice Cream

Petit Fours: L to R: Rose Petal Chocolate Ganache, Hazelnut Chocolate, and Fruit Jellies

Tidbits: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

1. Happy belated birthday to Debbie, one of my favourite co-workers! :) B, A, and I surprised her with a cake from nearby Buttercup Bake Shop to celebrate her 25th birthday.

Chocolate on chocolate with more chocolate is the only way to go when it comes to Debbie. While on the sugary end of the spectrum as far as American bakery cakes go, I enjoy Buttercup's cakes much more than their cupcakes which are made from the same batter but always disappointingly dry. However...everyone should know that the best thing to get at Buttercup is banana and chocolate pudding.

2. A typical Saturday night with Don ^_^

3. I simply cannot stop snacking on Ishiharaya's Ginger Senbei. I always make sure to bring back a few bags of these crunchy wafers from return visits to Hawai'i. Made right in Waipahu, Ishiharaya has been a local business since the 1920s - pretty amazing huh? The best part is that the third generation in the family recently took over the business! This is sadly enough, a rare occurance in Hawaii's rapidly dying mom & pop okazuyas and mochi shops.

You bet I did a little high five and dance upon hearing that good news - all the more reason to support local businesses. These senbei come in four flavours: original, sesame, ginger, and kawara. The ginger is my favourite of the quartet precisely becuase they employ a good bounty of fresh local ginger. What's not to love?

4. Darien brought over these Salty Oat cookies on her last visit from last weekend. I'm embarrassed to say that I ate four of the six cookies in just a few days (in addition to a daily diet of gelato, pudding, and cured meats).

One of the nicest cookies I've had in a long time, "Salty Oats" delivers a product true to its' name. The cookie builds a foundation with crumbly, and a happily not-too-sweet oat base. Simple and clean organic ingredients coupled with a tease of salt results in a cookie that borders the line of decadent oatcakes.

I'm partial to the Chocolate ones (though that's not to say the Oatmeal Raisin aren't delicious :)...take a closer look at the cookie pores, see that? The sea salt flakes? Gorgeous!

4. Curiosity lured me into Cecel Café Crepe just past midnight earlier this week for an Apple Tatin Crepe. The little storefront on 1st Avenue in the East Village is simply adorable but the interior is in slight disarray - both in organization and cleanliness.

The crepe was a disappointment. I placed the order and watched as the elder gentleman took a pre-made crepe (from earlier today, I'm assuming) from underneath a layer of plastic wrap. He warmed it on the griddle for a few seconds, rendering the crepe somewhere between room temperature and slightly warm. A filling of custard creme, cinnamon apples and a puff pasty stick proved to be a solid combination - unfussy and enjoyable. But the fact that it was tucked into a floppy, lukewarm crepe made hours before, resulted in a not so appetizing midnight treat.

5. $1.50 for a massive wedge of pizza bianca from Grandaisy Bakery? I'm happy to declare, with olive oil smeared fingers and faint linger of rosemany on my tongue - it's still delicious as ever :)

Hope everyone is having a great week!

Buttercup Bake Shop
973 2nd Avenue
New York, NY 10022
(212) 350-4144

Ishiharaya
94-064 Awamoku Street
Waipahu, Hawai'i 96797
(808) 671-3175

Salty Oats from:
Kayak Cookies

Cecel Cafe Crepe
135 1st Avenue
New York, NY 10079
(212) 460-5102

Grandaisy Bakery
73 Sullivan Street
New York, NY 10012
(212) 334-9435

Sunday: Organization + Rolling File Drawers & Chinatown Brasserie

Post: Part 4 of 4.
Weekend: 4th of July.
Day: July 6, 2008.

Note: Not food related - scroll further down for food...delicious food ^_^

The other day I bought my very first filing drawer. It's a rooollllling file drawer and I'm quite proud of it. The drawer takes up a good third of my room, which is already a very tiny 8' by 10'. I have exactly enough space for a twin bed, one filing drawer and not much else. At least I have a street facing window!

Between lunch and dinner last Sunday I spent all afternoon organizing - how wonderful it feels! I bought hanging file folders and now life is clean from top to bottom...in alphabetical order! I'm a sucker for good organization (though the messy state of my bedroom may suggest otherwise). I like to place things in boxes and document everything, everything in my planner. A obsession with proper documentation explains why I'm an accoutant - everything should be organized and easily accounted for. Traceable is the key word.

I haven't been blogging as frequently because time ran away from me. Time runs away when one becomes messy. Messy in the kitchen, messy at work, messy attire, etc. It starts off as a little mess, oh I'll take care of this tomorrow. Pretty soon tomorrow turns into next week, then next month and then you realized you're six weeks behind in everything. I got pretty messy. It was a good kind messy, but messy nonetheless.

What is the point? Is this making sense?

No point, no sense, none at all. Just lots of rambling. (Scroll down for food photos). Life got soooo messy that I woke up one morning and instantly thought: MUST ORGANIZE.

Hence the rolling file drawer - it's the best investment I've made in years.

Shann help me put it together (thanks Shann! :). And now that my life is organized and clean, I can get back to a steady blogging schedule...because that too, is part of good organization.


Pork and Shrimp Dumplings

Don and I had breakfast at Chinatown Brasserie on Sunday. I dim sum, or rather, yum cha, in Hawai'i at least once or twice a week. My favourite spot back home is Tai Pan, where standard plates run $1.95. Yum cha is the same price, maybe a bit more, in LA. But here in NYC, a typical yum cha place like Dim Sum Go Go sets you back $4 a plate. I thought that was a bit ridiculous till I learned of Chinatown Brasserie where $8 is the norm!

My goodness, that is crazy.

Some argue that the quality of the dishes at Chinatown Brasserie justify the prices. Others, like myself, have been rasised on perfectly delcious $1.95 dim sum - to even think of $8 dim sum is sufficient to induce a heart attack.

Crispy Taro Root Shrimp

We had quite a few dishes that morning, and I must admit they were pretty tasty. Okay, maybe even more than tasty. Pricey nonetheless! The most memorable dish was an adorable quartet of "Crispy Taro Root Shrimp" - a reinterpretation of the classic wu gok. Here, the minced pork filling is replaced with shrimp, and the mashed taro significantly is more delicate than what I am familiar with. The crisp exterior - greaseless and effortless flaky.

Tempura Shrimp Stuffed Green Chilies

We were in a deep fried mood that morning (as usual), and rounded out the set with Tempura Shrimp Stuffed Green Chilies. The lightly battered tubes of hollowed chilies with shrimp were served with a soy based sauce while the Fried Oysters were paired with a sweet & sour sauce.

Fried Oysters with Sweet & Sour Sauce

I'm not convinced that oysters and sweet & sour sauce makes an ideal combination, but those oysters were aiyah, sooo delicious! Fried oysters rank high on a mental food-I-often-crave list and would eat it everyday of my life if both health and money were negligible factors.

Turnip Cake with Ham and XO Sauce

Turnip Cakes were less special - I'm biased to my grandmother's homemade version. And the Pork & Shrimp Dumplings were lovely, but nothing you can't come across at a good Chinese restaurant. All dumplings should be at least this good.

Rice Noodle Rolls with Shrimp

Steamed Rice Noodles with Shrimp were a subtle, but well appreciated nod to attention to quality of food. The supple white noodles had just the right pull, a slight chew, breaking with smooth ease into warm tunnels of sweet shrimp.

E-Fu Noodles

By the time the E-Fu Noodles showed up we were rather full, but managed to eat half the dish. A clean fresh take on a common Chinese dish, quality was evidenced in both preparation (light on the oil, plain in a good way), and ingredients (a simple and solid selection of seasonal vegetables).

Chocolate Fortune Cookies

And of course, because this is $8 dim sum you're eating, they don't give you just plain fortune cookies, but chocolate ones ;)

Chinatown Brasserie
380 Lafayette Street
New York, NY 10003
(212) 533-7000

Hot Buttered Peas, Cheese Times Three, Berrrrries, Pasta & Garlic Scapes

Post: Part 3 of 4.
Weekend: 4th of July.
Day: July 5, 2008.


2:00pm
Woke up for an afternoon breakfast make from yesterday's leftovers. Pulled pork on a toasted bun with melted Canadian cheddar. Now that's a proper start to the day.

4:00pm
An invigorating walk with Don to the Greenmarket led to a bounty of berries...

...red raspberries, black raspberries...

...and blueberries - so beautiful.

We also picked up a few other ingredients - shelling peas, garlic scapes...anything that caught our fancy. While at the on the south east corner of the market, busy fetching a glass of basil & mint tea, we ran in Ian and Anne, and promptly decided to have a late afternoon snack-leading-into-dinner meal.

The night began in the backyard, on the hammock, on the picnic benches with Greenmarket grapes...

...then out came the berries, with Fage and local honey...

...moving on savoury, we broke out the baguettes. A quick toast and generous slathers of raw milk butter with a touch of Maldon makes for quite a taste.

The three baguettes piled at the side of the table slowly disappeared bite after bite, as we paired them with the trio of cheeses brought over by Ian.

We paced the eating (no point in filling up on hour one over the course of a five hour meal, yes? :) with a brief break shelling market peas...

...group effort is the way to go!

Halfway though, I realized this was the first time I've ever shelled peas. It's a rather relaxing process if you are not in a rush to go anywhere or do anything...and really, should you be in any sort of rush on a lazy Sunday afternoon?

Sugar snap peas caught in the tangle.

All pau! A bit later, we dashed off to the theater up the street for an evening screening of Wall-E. Like any good moviegoer, we made sure to first stop at the corner bodega and Saints Alps for drinks (green tea boba!) and snacks (strawberry ice cream and berry gummies!).

It was nearly 11pm when the movie ended, but dinner was just about to begin. First things first: blanch the peas...

...the colours are gorgeous, both pre and post-blanch - I could just stare at a bucket of peas all day long :)

We made hot buttered peas with the raw milk butter mentioned earlier...such simple luxury.

To round out the evening meal, browned sausages and pasta with tomatoes and basil from the garden...

...and a garlic scape spread made with cannelli beans, lemon juice, cracked black pepper, just enough salt and a handful of cilantro.

As with every home cooked meal, I'm constantly left wondering why we don't eat in more often. Yes, dining out is quite nice, but a dinner at home is at least a dozen times more satisfying.

Don Smokes, Cooks, Grills & Frys..Is There Anything He Doesn't Do? + Cake and More Cake + Pinisi & Oko Froyo

Post: Part 2 of 4.
Weekend: 4th of July.
Day: July 4, 2008.

12:00pm
Woke up four hours later than planned. I've never woken this late in over six months. Might this be punishment for staying up till nearly 4am the night before?

1:00pm
Stopped at Pinisi Bakery on 4th Street to see Andy and his wife. It's been over month since my last visit, a big drop from the old 2-3 times a week trips when I lived on a steady diet of blueberry strudels and red velvet cake. Ooh boy, those were sugary days.

There were at least a dozen new items in store but only one caught my eye. A plain brown round that looked to be a halfway cross between cake, cookie, and brownie. It turned out to be a flourless apple-carrot cake. Pretty interesting!

Just over an inch tall, the soft, plushy cake made moist with shredded carrots harbored a bounty of sweet apples, sliced and stewed tender. The cake is humble in sight, but taste alone suggests otherwise. After all, it's the plainest of sweets that always seem to taste best.

3:00pm

Robyn came by, and although she couldn't stay late enough for afternoon-barbeque-trailing-into-dinner-then-late-night-snack, we did manage to take a short walk over to the newly opened froyo shop, Oko.

I'm a staunch devotee of the froyo from Bloomingdale's 40 Carrots Cafe, but a sign in front of Oko proclaiming homemade Belgian Waffles was enough to lure us in. We sampled the tart plain yogurt, which was better than most with a pure, clean flavor, but I still prefer 40 Carrots. We split an order of a "fresh" Belgian waffle with their current special flavor, banana. I assure you the banana tastes much better than it sounds.

However the Belgian waffle was a double flop - neither freshly made (they had a large stack sitting under plastic saran wrap) nor warmed up sufficiently. The girl helping us offered to heat up the waffle, and we took her up on it, only to be sorely disappointed as we watched her pop the pre-made waffle back in the waffle maker and warm it for just under 30 seconds. It arrived in our cup a floppy lukewarm. You win some, you lose some. Nonetheless, the space is remarkably clean with a unnaturally upbeat, space-agey design that all these froyo places attempt to emulate.

5:00pm

In at 9:00am

Back in Don's backyard, the enormous quantity of meats Don put in the smoker eight hours before was near ready, and lucky me...

Out at 5:00pm

...I always seem to be strategically located near the food. Mind you, by the end of the night my clothes smelled of the ultimate barbeque party, but such is a small price to pay for...

...first dibs on that gorgeous rack of ribs, it positively glows!

The first of many rib pieces to come. Finger food at its best, all eaten while swinging on the newly hung hammock with glasses of bubbly tart limeade in hand. Ahhh, these are indeed the summers found in dreams.

Of course, when it comes to meat - the mooooore the merrier! Pulled pork anyone?

Don's pork shoulder was done North Carolina eastern seaboard style - applewood smoked then pulled, with a vinegar and red pepper sauce. The leftovers proved to make quite a breakfast the following afternoon :)

Vegetables? Of course we had our greens!

Brussel sprouts seared with Burger's ham, plenty of whole garlic cloves and bacon drippings in a cast iron pan, then finished with nuoc nam and cilantro...

...string beans blanched and tossed with balsamic and olive oil...

...and potatoes, roasted, and smashed with lemon zest-infused olive oil. Wouldn't you agree it was quite a well balanced dinner?

I was quite full by this time, having devoured much more than my share of ribs, hehehe. But silly me, how could I have forgotten that there would be burgers a few hours later?

7:00pm

With Don at the grill, Ian was in the kitchen working on the burgers...I've never seen someone shape patties so efficiently!

Pineapples sliced, ready for the grill...

Burgers on the grill and...

...tadah, all pau! Pretty awesome, no? Grilled medium-rare with plenty of char, melted Canadian cheddar, a duo of pineapple rings, and a crisp bun...it's been too long since I've had a burger this delicious from the first bite to the last. People always find it strange that I never put pineapples on burgers, "...and you say you're from Hawai'i?" I've always been adverse to pineapple on/with anything (think pineapple pizza), with the exception of li hing mui . This burger proved me a little, or rather, a lot wrong. But I'm betting a little sprinkle of li hing mui tucked between the two rings would make for a splendid touch.

9:00pm

Bellies full but always with room for dessert, we moved into a territory of sweets. Lauren baked an olive oil bundt with a chocolate glaze - the cake was extra moist and rich with double the egg yolks. Savory sweets are definitely the way to go. I first fell in love with olive oil cake at Abraco and olive oil gelato at Otto...is there anything that olive oil cannot do?

Sophia brought a darling Poppy Seed Lemon Raspberry Cake from Black Hound Bakery over on 2nd Avenue. The four layer cake was brushed with raspberry jam and lemon curd, then finished with a white chocolate buttercream. They don't joke around when they say poppy seed cake - there was definitely more poppy seed than cake going on in this creation!

11:00pm
Another round of desserts, Haagen Dazs's Green Tea, paired with a few episodes of Law & Order and This American Life...now this is how I like to end a night!