food treks

General Tso's Sesame Chicken

2011-11-29T06:13:00.000-05:00

I've been living in Germany for the past two years, and I have to say, I am fairly embarrassed that I haven't made any more posts on here. I blame it on Facebook and how easy it is to just upload a photo on there with a short caption. :-) I'll try to update more, especially since I have a lot of material to work with. :-)

One of the things I have missed greatly about New York City is the food. Mind you, it's not the fancy schmancy stuff, but the simple everyday dishes you get from (one of) your neighborhood chinese take-out place. The running joke with me and my friends who travel back home to the US is that they were going to bring me General Tso's or Sesame Chicken in their luggage. No one has done it yet, and it seems like I don't need for someone to do it anymore.

I found this quick recipe for General Tso's chicken online, and decided to make it yesterday. I think the most challenging part of this dish was deep-frying the chicken. In my tiny studio apartment, I didn't want all my stuff tainted with oil and smelling like fried chicken strips after! lol. Also, since I can't always seem to follow a recipe, I used the linked recipe as a guide. :-)

I used chicken breast that I sliced to bite-sized pieces, then seasoned with salt and pepper. Then I dipped it in the cornstarch/egg mixture before frying. Also, for the sauce, I added a bit of water to the rice wine, rice vinegar, soy sauce, sugar and cornstarch mixture. Here's how it came out!

Bo Luc Lac

2010-06-22T20:38:00.001-04:00

I have been craving steak for a while and decided to make Bo Luc Lac. This is something Dino and I ate a lot of when we were in Vietnam and Cambodia.

Who knew steak meat in Germany was that expensive? I certainly did not! The butcher I went to charged me 5.40 euros per 100 grams of beef. I got 300 grams, then went to a grocery store and got 200 grams more of rump steak for 2.99 per 100 grams.

They both tasted the same.

I ganked this recipe from the Ravenous Couple. Instead of serving it as a salad, I served mine over steamed white rice.

Pho in Hue, Vietnam

2010-01-25T16:24:00.000-05:00

Our first meal for our two week long trip across Indochina happened in this tiny cafe called Cafe on Thu in Hue. Being in Vietnam, I wanted something very Vietnamese for food. This, for me, was pho.

Wikipedia describes pho as a "Vietnamese rice noodle and beef soup". The soup is usually served in a bowl with white rice noodles and clear beef broth with thinly sliced beef, basil, lime leaf, bean sprouts and peppers.

I have had pho in NYC before, and I tell you, this one in Vietnam was different. It had a very clean taste to it. I believe it's in the peppercorns that they use to make the broth. The broth had a very distinct peppery taste, not offensive or spicy, but very good.

I believe that all the pho I've had in Vietnam were superior over any of the other ones I've had anywhere else. Duh.

If you ever get to Hue, go to Cafe on Thu. They have really good and cheap bike tours too! It is located at 10/2 Nguyen Tri Phuong in Hue, Vietnam.

on hiatus...

2009-12-04T12:51:00.000-05:00

currently on a backpacking and food tasting trip across SouthEast Asia with foodtreks' new contributor, Clyde London!

It's been 4 days, and the food has been great! Hoi An (Vietnam) is a great eating city!

Stay tuned for when we get back!

Chinese bakery goodies

2009-11-23T00:24:00.001-05:00

I was in Cebu last week and was at Breadtalk.

Chicken a la King!

2009-11-16T08:57:00.000-05:00

One of the few dishes that I love that I remember from college, that I could only have when I had family visiting (because it was too expensive for even my bloated student budget), was chicken a la king. I first had a taste of this creamy chicken dish at the French Baker in SM North EDSA. In the 9 semesters that I spent at UP, I believe I've only had this dish about 3 times.

This is a creamed chicken dish with carrots, celery, bell peppers, chicken chunks and spices over a pastry shell, and served with a side of a garden salad and carrots and corn. The French Baker used to only serve this with the carrots and corn, and frankly, the side salad didn't amount to much gastronomically for me.

I still remember how I love this dish - how the multi-dimensional cream sauce played with my palate, and with my trips to Manila the past month, I have been able to indulge myself and have this wonderful dish again.

turkey leg!

2009-11-11T11:27:00.000-05:00

One of my indulgences when I lived in the United States were theme parks. There wasn't a year when I didn't travel to Florida and go visit Islands of Adventure, Universal Studios, Disneyworld, Sea World and the water parks. Almost always, I would only have enough moolah on the budget to spend for admission to the parks, and some money for food. Being on a tight budget had me spending on sensible food, and not on whims.

Well, a totally different thing happened last year. My cousin (in NY) and I went on vacation with family in Central Florida (Kissimmee, Orlando area), and we went to Tampa for a couple of days. Our family treated us to free admission tickets to Busch Gardens, and for the first time, I was able to buy something to eat out of curiousity! We got turkey legs! It's not like chicken legs that are soft and easily eaten. These are huge drumsticks of meat, with a lot of connective tissue that sometimes gets in between your teeth. I wouldn't say I hated it, but I wouldn't say I liked it either (Althought the photo doesn't look like I didn't care for it much.) I guess turkey leg is a bit of an acquired taste.

Italian food in White Plains, NY

2009-11-10T01:40:00.001-05:00

When my Florida family visited over the New Year (2009), they stayed at the Ritz Carlton in White Plains, NY. I commuted to them a couple of times, and the good thing about visiting family is the great food that you get to have.

One of my staples is fried calamari. For a non-fish eater, I am surprised at myself for loving fried calamari. My first encounter with calamari was at Carmine's in the Upper West Side, and I have to say, it was love at first bite. :-)

The Zanaro version of fried calamari came with marinara sauce and a chipotle mayo dip, and half a lemon on the side. Squid when cooked wrong will be leathery. This calamari was perfect, the right amount of crunch and seasoning. It didn't have a fishy taste either. All in all, a good calamari in my book.

I had the Veal Parmigiana for my entree. The meat was tender as veal should be. The pasta on the side was well cooked. The Sunday sauce it came with was red-wine based, and had the right amount of tang and flavor.

Zanaro's is located at 1 Mamaroneck Ave. in White Plains, NY.

Rodic's tapsilog!

2009-09-22T11:17:00.004-04:00

Tapa! Sinangag! Itlog!

TAPSILOG!

In my culinary adventures, nothing beats Rodic's tapsilog as a breakfast (or even anytime) meal. I first encountered Rodic's tapsilog as an 8 year old listening to my uncle's stories of their bar review classes at UP Law. Little did I know that 8 years later, I'd be in the same campus, walking the same halls (of the UP Shopping Center) and partaking in the same dishes!

I was in Manila the past couple of days to interview for a German/Schengen visa, and with my spare time, decided to traipse around my old stomping grounds in UP Diliman. Of course, food would be on top of my list, and boy, did we do food! Rodic's tapsilog was one of the highlights of the visit.

This is a type of tapa that I still have to learn how to make. It's all savory and sweet shredded goodness! And the way they cook the sunny-side up eggs are perfect! I'll have to replicate this somehow. Any ideas?

Drool.

arroz con pollo!

2009-09-13T08:37:00.000-04:00

Due to the dearth of international food in Dumaguete (especially Latin American cuisine), I have been forced to make do with what I have. Yesterday, I had a hankering for Colombian-style arroz con pollo (literally chicken with rice). My favorite Colombian restaurant in NYC, La Pollera Colorada, in Sunnyside, served a great arroz con pollo that hasn't been surpassed by any of the other Latin American restaurants I've been to in the US (and trust me, I've been to a lot!).

So, I made up my mind and came up with my version of arroz con pollo. It was a little difficult finding turmeric and cumin in the city. Thank goodness Fortune Mart had it. :-) And luckily, I was able to find most of the other stuff I needed at the supermarket.

As for the dish, the flavors were true to its origins (yep, definitely no soy sauce!), and I have to say, I'm impressed with what I made. All I could ever add is that vinegar condiment and the platanos that La Pollera Colorada serves it with, and I should have been set! But this is Dumaguete, I'll take any foreign flavors I can get!

Kaon ta! (Let's eat! in Cebuano)

Cimbali goodness!

2009-04-15T19:24:00.003-04:00

One of my finds here in Dumaguete is Cimbali's Cinnamon Nut Raisin loaf at the basement of Lee Super Plaza. One of my family's favorites, it is especially tasty when you get it still warm! Ah! The gooey goodness of cinnamon sugar!

banana cue!

2009-04-08T23:28:00.003-04:00

One of the things I have missed for being away so long are these delicious deep fried caramel-coated goodies on sticks. They're good piping hot and you can buy them for about PhP 5 - a far cry from the PhP 1 I used to spend when I was in grade school more than a decade ago.

We've tried recreating this in NYC, but it was just too difficult. We somehow couldn't get the sugar to caramelize AND coat the bananas the same way as here.

Yum!

home and Taster's!

2009-04-07T12:12:00.001-04:00

It's been 2 weeks since I got back home on an extended vacation. Sabbatical, if you may. I have been trying to decide changing the tag line on this blog, however, I believe I'll always be a New Yorker at heart, so it'll stay the same. This will just be a more worldly journey at this point, as I don't know where I'll end up in the next couple of months.

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Two weeks and I've already been around a ton of food. First and foremost is my favorite burger of all time. Taster's Delight Sandwich Style Burger. My family has a long history with Taster's Delight. We've been going since I was in kindergarten, I think probably after N's Pizza Plaza closed down. Even when my brother and I were in Manila for college, we'd get our monthly/weekly ration of Taster's siopao frozen via Air Philippines. The lady who takes orders there (who's been there 18 years at least) knows all of us and has known all of us since us kids were.... kids. And she tells us so too.

mobile posts

2009-01-07T21:11:00.001-05:00

So the past 3 mobile posts I did didn't really go through. Once I get to a real computer, I'll edit them and post the photos.

Right now, on to Maricel's for some birthday food!

Sushi post 1C

2009-01-07T18:37:00.002-05:00

This was Nic's sashimi lunch special. He got tuna, flounder, salmon and one
other fish I forgot. Maybe shark? Just kidding. After some cajoling, he got
me to try the tuna. It was my first time having sashimi, and I have to say
it was a good experience.

I have always been afraid of raw fish, and my greatest fear with sushi was
that it would be rank with the fishy taste. The sashimi at Maru was good
though, although I'm not sure I'll order it on my own.

- sent from Gelo's google phone

Sushi post 1A

2009-01-07T18:02:00.002-05:00

My friend Nic and I went to Maru Sushi (2nd Ave bw 33 and 34 Sts) for lunch
a couple of weeks ago. Nic was visiting from Abu Dhabi and he mentioned
that he liked sashimi. I know that there are other places I could have
brought him to, but for our purposes that day, Maru fit perfectly well.

I ordered a spider roll (soft shell crab roll) and a shrimp tempura roll
(shown here). The sushi was great! Both seafood in my rolls were cooked and
fried, so I can't really attest to it's freshness. I applied what I learned
from one the sushi books, and that is, to eat sushi with my hands.

Nic ordered sahimi which I'll talk about in the next post.

Bon appetit!

- sent from Gelo's google phone

(edited using Gelo's computer)

French Toast at Bakers' Dozen (blech!)

2008-12-28T14:14:00.001-05:00

After not being able to sleep due to a warm winter night (yeah, 18 degrees celsius in the winter! Hooray for global warming?), I decided to walk down the street to my neighborhood bakery for breakfast.

I was feeling french toast and coffee, and seeing that they had it on special ($3.25 including tax), I ordered it! The food came out a couple of minutes later, and I'm sad to say, I didn't enjoy it. The french toast, albeit served in a huge portion, came out with a heavy dusting of cinnamon and with (I doubt it was maple) syrup on the side.

My first bite made me choke, and subsequent bites weren't about to redeem it. So, I threw it out and just had coffee instead. Blech!

This is not to say that Bakers' Dozen is a bad place, since I love their Manhattan special (hot pastrami with swiss cheese and sauerkraut on rye), it's just that their french toast sucks! They do have other stuff like bagels and muffins and other baked goodies, so I'll still go back for those. They also have a good selection of flavored cream cheeses and salads too.

Bakers' Dozen is located near the intersection of Lefferts Blvd and Austin St in Kew Gardens.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T00:36:00.000-05:00

Happy holidays from the city that never sleeps!

(Vodka Cranberry at midnight)

Authentic Lechon Paksiw (bisaya-style)

2008-12-24T04:03:00.001-05:00

For the holiday party with my Filipino friends, we ordered lechon (whole roast pig) cooked the bisaya way.

I haven't had lechon in more than 3 years, and neither have my friends, so this was a treat for us. About $30 well spent for each.

The lechon was just as we all remember it, cripy and very tasty! No one could resist picking on scraps of meat left on the tray after the lechon was all chopped up. However, we all know that what's good with the lechon after the feast is paksiw.

So, in the wee hours of the morning after the party, my friend and I cooked two different versions of paksiw, reflecting the culinary traditions of the different regions we are from. I made mine bisaya-style, stewing the lechon in vinegar, bay leaves, peppercorns, garlic and a touch of soy sauce. The other version was similar to mine but with liver sauce added.

Both paksiw dishes came out really good. Mine was sour with a hint of sweet in the thin sauce, while the other balanced sweet and sour with the added liver sauce. Both dishes are best served over steamed rice, like pictured above.

We all savored it!

Happy holidays!

Snow in NYC! (not food related)

2008-12-24T02:22:00.001-05:00

In the past week, New York City was inundated with a ton of snow AND THEN a cold front brought the city into a deep freeze. This was taken just after the heavy snowstorm (Austin).

I didn't think leafless tress would be pretty, but with the snow, they are beautiful!

Mobile blogging!

2008-12-22T03:55:00.001-05:00

This will hopefully help me keep this blog updated more than it is now. :-)

Vietnamese food in Chinatown-NY!

2008-12-22T01:49:00.009-05:00

A couple of weeks ago, a friend and I went down to Chinatown for some Vietnamese food, my style. He's partial to this restaurant close to the subway, while there's this place that I like that has pretty good vegetarian and seafood fare in addition to the regular meat options, but which is a little bit of a trek, especially with the unpredictable rain during the Fall.

We went to my favorite Vietnamese place in C-town called Pho Viet Huong on 73 Mulberry St. (N, R, Q, J, M, Z and 6 trains to Canal St.)

View Larger Map

For appetizers, I usually order a shrimp summer roll, however, this being fall, we decided to get salt and pepper calamari. The squid rings were lightly floured and and fried crisp while maintaining the tenderness of the meat. A mixture of spices including chopped chili peppers was then tossed with the fried calamari. A lot of restaurants overcook the calamari, however, we got ours perfectly cooked, with a good spice and heat.

We ordered two different entrees for our meal. One was a vegetarian dish called Fresh Gluten with Hot Peppers and Lemongrass. The good thing about New York City is that I get to meet a lot of people with a wide range of interests, and this allows me to explore an even wider range of cuisines and dishes that I myself would normally not try out. Such is the case with this dish.

Gluten is favorite meat substitute used in vegetarian/vegan diets and it is a protein product obtained from the endosperm of some grains including wheat and rye. The gluten in this dish tastes and has the consistency of real meat, but it's not. :-) The combination with bell peppers and lemongrass makes for a very aromatic and tasty dish. Definitely one of my vegetarian favorites (even though I'm not vegetarian!).

The second entree we ordered is Yellow Curry Shrimp with String Beans. This seems pretty self-explanatory. However, the yellow curried shrimp at this place (relative to the other Vietnamese places I have been to in NYC and elsewhere) is pretty good. The curry brings out a sweetness in the shrimp that I can't describe. The accompanying string beans were also perfectly cooked, crisp and not soggy.

To wash things down, my friend ordered the Salty Plum drink, which basically pureed (or mashed up) salty plum with soda water. The drink comes in a tall glass with the mushy salty plum on the bottom topped with ice cubes. You then have to pour soda/carbonated water into the glass and then stir to mix the soda water and the plums. I have never had this drink before, and I doubt I will ever order it on my own. He had me taste it, and all I can say is that it is really sour and salty.

(The photos in this post were taken by Daman's iPhone.)

Ack!

2008-10-26T05:34:00.002-04:00

I have been really bad at making posts on here, however, that's about to change. I hope. I do have a number of photos of new food places I've been to that I want to write about, so, I'll get to that as soon as I can.

Please bear with me.

Yakitori (plus dessert)!

2008-10-26T04:53:00.004-04:00

After having a hankering for grilled meats in an otherwise not-grill-friendly city, a couple of friends and I from college met up and had dinner at Yakitori Taisho, in the East Village several months ago. According to wikipedia, Yakitori (焼き鳥やきとり), or grilled bird, is a type of skewered chicken in Japan . In other words, sinugba.

At Yakitori Taisho, they featured on their menu a variety of grilled meats and veggies, including pork, beef , liver, chicken, scallions and mushrooms. Having all met at the University of the Philippines, we've all had our share of isaw (grilled chicken or pig intestines) and atay (liver), so we ordered what was familiar to us. We got a platter that included, among others, chicken liver, chicken skin and pork belly. I think there was balon-balonan (is it gizzard?) too.

It was yummeh! Yakitori Taisho has been one of my favorite restaurants in the city since I discovered it a couple of years back, and I've been coming back every time I get a good group of people together. I'm guessing business has been good to them too, since they opened another restaurant a couple of doors down, and every time I pass by, there's almost always a line.

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After dinner, we all decided to hit the Dessert Truck, that we all passed by when we were walking towards Yakitori. This truck is a new concept here in NYC (and there's a bunch of them new ones, gastronomic concepts that is), so we just had to try them out. These aren't your run of the mill desserts, but are essentially gourmet. They sell individual desserts for $5, and servings are usually good to share. We ordered the molten chocolate cake, the vanilla creme brulee (real vanilla) and the goatcheese cheesecake. Holy cow! or goat! These were good! My personal favorite is the goatcheese cheesecake. Be warned though, goatcheese is an acquired taste!

Here's a photo of the MBB folks (all grad students at SUNY-SB, BrownU, SUNY-SB respectively) enjoying their desserts! I think I'm the only one not pursuing a PhD here, but oh well. lol.

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Yakitori Taisho is located at 5 St Mark's Place (near 3rd Ave) in NYC.
The Dessert Truck makes it's rounds of NYC, however, from 6pm onwards, it can be found at the intersection of St Mark's Place and 3rd Ave.

German and Bavarian fare

2008-06-24T17:46:00.007-04:00

Last week, my volleyball team and I went to Zum Schneider in the far East Village for beers and food after our game. At this biergarten (beer garden), we had large beers (1 liter mugs) and the Riesen Schlachtplatte, which is this huge platterful of sausages.

There were five different kinds of sausages served with roasted potatoes over a bed of sauerkraut. And I do mean a bed of sauerkraut. That was good! And then we had the apple fritters with vanilla ice cream for dessert.

I have to say, that platter was no match for 6 grown men after a volleyball game. lol.

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Zum Schneider is located at the corner of Ave C and 7 St in NYC.

Elmhurst tour

2008-05-20T12:17:00.012-04:00

Elmhurst in Queens is one of the most ethnically diverse neighborhoods in New York City. As expected, the variety of food and restaurants here is as diverse as well. Mare and I have been frequenting (more her than me) this quaint Thai place on Broadway called Boon Chu, and I would say they're up there amongst the best Thai food places in New York City (together with Sri Pra Phai and Ubol's Kitchen).

However, on the way to Boon Chu from the Elmhurst stop on the R, V and G lines, you get to pass by one of my favorite all-time drinks. QUICKLY! Within the past two years, Quickly has opened about four locations in New York City. I found out about Quickly in NYC about two years ago when I was walking around SoHo, and I spied a girl/lady carrying the familiar Quickly drinks. I ran after her and stopped her (I must have nearly given her a heart attack), and politely asked where she bought her drink from. She told me, and that's the start of my Quickly adventures in New York! Me and my foodie tendencies!

I got me a taro ice (slushy) with pearl (tapioca, or as the Filipinos know it - sago) and lychee bits. Mare had a lychee slush with the same add-ins. Having Quickly reminded me of college back home when I couldn't not buy Quickly on the way home because the store was on the way. Yeah, I was a Quickly guy in college, not Zagu or Orbitz, but Quickly. :-)

After Quickly, we then walked down the block to Boon Chu. It's a small space, with 7 tables seating 2 people each. The decor is nice, and the staff friendly. I like the way their menu looked. I liked the menu contents even better! They had a good selection of appetizers (from thai steamed dumplings to satay), entrees (chicken basil, etc), noodles (pad thai, pad see ew, etc) and curries (green, red, jungle, penang, etc). I was disappointed that they didn't have the crispy fried watercress salad that Sri Pra Phai has, but whatever. lol.

Whenever my friends and I eat out, we usually get down to business right away. No more starters. If we do get appetizers, we have them served together with the rest of the entrees. Last night, Mare and I ordered the Kana Moo Grob, Chicken larb, Penang Curry with Beef and Jungle Curry.

There is something about the Kana Moo Grob that Filipinos love. It's basically a sauteed chinese broccoli dish with crispy slivers of pork. The crispy pork and the veggies are a good mix, plus, the taste! Sweet and just a bit tart. I think there's oyster sauce in it, but Maricel thinks otherwise. She says it's soy sauce and fish sauce. Regardless, it was very good!

I also liked the Penang curry. Even though I think it's origins are Malaysian, I tend to go for coconut based curry dishes, regardless. We originally ordered the jungle curry, but it turned out to be not what Mare liked (she does not like bamboo shoots), so we ordered the Penang curry.

The larb on the other hand felt out of place. I guess it's one of those things where you have to have it before the entrees. Larb is a meat salad with roots in Laos. It is unofficially the national dish of Laos according to wikipedia. Larb is made with raw or cooked meat that is then minced and mixed with chili and mint, and then flavored with fish sauce and lime. Our larb was made with minced cook chicken and spicy! almost fiery! But still good!

As I said earlier, I think Boon Chu is one of the up and coming Thai restaurants in the city. Dinner last night was great, and I definitely will be becoming back.

(Boon Chu is located at 83-18 Broadway in Elmhurst, NY and Quickly is only a couple of doors down.)

I'm back!

2008-05-20T12:13:00.004-04:00

A bunch of my friends have expressed interest in my food blogging, and because of that, I'm going to start blogging again.

I can't believe it's been almost three years since I last posted. WoW. Now, armed with my camera phone (my apologies in advance for the crappy photos) and a penchant for good food, happy eating!

Coming up next... Quickly and Thai!

a favorite... (or two)

2005-12-30T13:05:00.002-05:00

My aunt makes these wonderful food for the gods. I like to say it's food for me. :-) not food for the gods. get it? i'll try to get her recipe for it.

Another favorite of mine that I recently was able to have is fresh lumpia. I had this at Rene's in Woodside last week.

i'm almost back...

2005-12-30T12:56:00.000-05:00

Hello there. I still don't have my computer on me, although I got my camera back a couple of weeks ago. Having just a camera and no computer to upload photos to makes for no blogging. :-)

There's a restaurant I frequent in the Times Square area of New York City that I believe hasn't been discovered by tourists yet. It's a very cozy Japanese noodle shop that has really good noodles (ramen) among others. It's also very cheap, a downside though is that they don't take credit cards. I was there last night with my friend Michael, and I had the Sapporo Special Ramen which contains among others a variety of sliced meats and fish cakes, while Michael had their Yakisoba. We also shared an order of gyoza for appetizer.

my apologies

2005-10-02T15:16:00.000-04:00

I have to apologize to everyone. It's been a while since I last updated this post. I have kinda been in a blogging depression. Reasons are, first, I didn't have a computer, and second, I didn't have my camera either. I sent in my computer and camera for repair the day after the previous post. I had to make that decision because I was starting school in a couple of weeks, and I wanted everything revitalized and in good working order. I underestimated the time for it to get done, so, now, six weeks after, I still don't have my camera. I did, however, get my laptop back though.

I will be back to updating this again soon.

middle-eastern dinner

2005-08-24T23:57:00.000-04:00

To continue on with the middle-eastern/mediterannean theme of the day, my friend Seng and I had dinner at The Olive Tree in Greenwich Village. The Olive Tree is one of my favorite Middle Eastern restaurants, and I absolutely love their lamb combination platter. This dish is basically a sampler of their other entrees. There's a kefta kebab (skewered ground lamb), a shish kebab (skewered lamb chunks) and shwarma (sliced lamb) with mashed potatoes or rice and an Israeli salad on the side plus caramelized onions. We got there around 1130pm and found out that they ran out of shwarma. (Alas, it just wasn't my day! lol) We ordered the lamb combination, but instead of having shwarma i got another shish kebab instead. Also, we had the traditional Russian borscht which was served hot with pumpernickel bread and sour cream on the side. The borscht to filipinos would be a cross between caldereta and nilagang baka. Think nilagang baka with tomato sauce. :-)

Now, this was yum! Thanks Seng!

gyro

2005-08-24T23:26:00.000-04:00

For lunch today, I had a gyro from the middle-eastern cart on First Avenue. It was cheap, $4, and it actually was good. A gyro is to Greeks (maybe) what subway sandwiches is to Americans. From what I've read, gyros actually are almost interchangeable with souvlaki depending on where you are and who you are talking to. Essentially though, the gyro is meat with tomatoes, lettuce and spices with tzatziki sauce. I had my gyro with slices of lamb, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, tzatziki and hot sauce on a pita bread.

three cheese ravioli in creamy pesto sauce

2005-08-23T23:41:00.000-04:00

I didn't come home until late again tonight. Luckily, I still had food which was supposed to be for lunch in the fridge. This was a three cheese ravioli that we got from Costco. Last night, while eating dinner (the tacos), I started cooking the ravioli and the sauce. Now, I could have just doused it with canned pasta sauce, but I remembered having ravioli with a pesto cream sauce at a restaurant in midtown, so, I set about to doing that. For the time-pressed urban dweller, thank goodness for sauce mixes! I was able to get a creamy pesto sauce mix from Foodtown, and all I had to do was stir it in milk and olive oil, let it simmer, and voila! instant creamy pesto sauce.

One thing I know though, i need to learn how to plate. These pictures could use a little more aesthetics. :-)

tacos con pollos y carnitas

2005-08-22T23:35:00.000-04:00

I don't know if my spanish is right, but it should read as chicken and pork tacos. :-) I was at Bryant Park tonight for the last film of the HBO Summer Series. The movie didn't end until late, so I had to grab dinner somewhere on the way home. One reliable source of food in my neighborhood is this taco truck on the corner of Queens Blvd and 41 St. They're always there! You can get a variety of South American fare including burritos, tacos, sofas, tortas, etc and also drinks. My roommate swears by their chorizo torta, which is like a burger, while I prefer their chicken and pork tacos. For $2 each, the tacos are a great buy!

The tacos I got tonight were chicken and pork. The chicken and pork are grilled/fried and seasoned and then placed on two flour tortillas that have been heated on the griddle. A mix of cilantro and some other greens are then added. I also like guacamole, red and green hot sauce on my tacos, as well as a slice or two of jalapeno.

chicken & beef teriyaki

2005-08-22T23:21:00.000-04:00

Lunch today was chicken and beef teriyaki which I got from Go Sushi, a japanese fastfood place. It was not really japanese food, it was more like americanized japanese food. I've had the same dish from a real japanese restaurant and it tasted different. The lunch box came with a side salad and two shrimp dumplings, and the serving was huge. Not bad for $9.

bbq dinner

2005-08-21T23:44:00.000-04:00

Tonight, my roommate was craving for barbecue and said he knows of this place on Vernon Boulevard that has good food. For lack of a better option, we called in for pick-up and I went to get the food. The total came up to around $28. We had pulled pork, bbq ribs and bbq chicken. For sides, we had corn on a cob, mac and cheese, coleslaw and baked beans. The bbq ribs and chicken were substandard, a little dry, butthe pulled pork was ok, nothing spectacular though. The meal is supposed to be good for two people but it only came with one corn-on-a-cob! The mac&cheese was not cheesy at all and the baked beans half cooked! How's that for value? argh. Over-all, the food could have been better. We've marked off this restaurant as one which we'll never order bbq from again.

(almost) Filipino brunch

2005-08-21T22:52:00.000-04:00

I was feeling very lazy today. I was supposed to go have brunch with friends but nobody called so I just decided to cook my own brunch. I had a can of Palm corned beef which I sauteed with onions. Then, I made two eggs over easy and smothered it with Jufran banana sauce. I paired these with steamed rice, making it an (almost) pinoy brunch. If I took the time to cook sinangag (sinanglag in Bisaya, garlic fried rice in English) from the steamed rice that I had, it would have been an authentic pinoy meal. :-)

first post!

2005-08-21T22:29:00.000-04:00

yay! first post! this blog is going to chronicle my journeys through the world of food. the way i see it, since i live in new york city, there should be a lot to blog about. i figured, i'll post whatever i had to eat, this way, i'll also be able to keep track of the food that i've had.

my food tastes are very varied (from mediterannean to continental american to east asian to southeast asian). so far, i've had food ranging from the staple chinese, to afghani cuisine.

this should be very interesting. :-)