Varutha Moolai and other specialities

You haven’t really eaten in New York unless you’ve eaten with the Gastronauts. This club enables New Yorkers to eat things at restaurants that typically aren’t on those restaurants’ menus.

Last month, I joined them for an evening at Southern Spice in Flushing, Queens. Every time I attend one of these meetings, my excitement level goes through the roof. The regular members are fun to talk to and conversations are informative and interesting. It’s always a pleasure to take part.

First the Rabbit Masala. While most pieces of rabbit were of the regular size and shape variety, I had strong urge to grab the one and only skull. The meat wasn’t better nor worse than the rest, but there was much less of it. Most of what can be seen here was bone and I had to move on. Sort of gamey, venison-like, tasty. (7)

Vowvaal Mean (pomfreet steamed in banana leaf) Tender fish came right off the bone, although I prefer other fish flavors over this one. (5)

Sura Puttu (Shark Scrambled) Not bad, not great either. Again, something with the flavor just wasn’t like the shark steaks on the grill I remember growing up as a kid. I think it was the flavoring. (5)

Crab Masala Uthappam Like crepes filled with masala crab meat. I could have eaten fifty of these. Absolutely heavenly! (10)




















Varutha Moolai (Goat Brain) Very rich and tender. A salty, creamy sauce covered the zombie food. Compared with the brain quesadillas, I would make a second trip back to La Superior as opposed to giving varutha moolai a second go. But overall, it was a very tasty dish worth trying. (8) Continue...

Weird Drinks Party Part 1

The Soviet Chemistry Lab

Buratino, Baikal, and Tarkhun are brands of sugary carbonated soft drinks usually consumed at kids' birthday parties but I'm only now discovering their dark secrets!

Buratino (6/10)


Named after the Russian version of "Pinocchio", this drink has no equivalent that I've ever tasted in any other culture. It's somewhere between faint apple and orange soda, but neither one of the two in particular. This drink is the least sugary of the 3 Russian sodas, and scores points for stirring up nostalgic memories of my last birthday in Russia.

Baikal (4/10)


The Soviet answer to Coca-Cola, this drink is sweeter than Coke, but it doesn't have that umph! of the secret ingredient in Coke.

It is named after the Olympic star of all world lakes: Baikal Lake is at once the most voluminous, the deepest, and the clearest of all freshwater lakes in the world, and is located in Siberia. I love the label on this drink showing a muddy-brown tidal wave of Coke imitation soda threateningly hovering over the pristine waters of Baikal.

Tarkhun (4/10)


It looks like it came from the Chernobyl nuclear plant and tastes equally radioactive. Its 26g of sugar per 250 ml serving do not really mask the chemical flavor of the drink. The scary part is that the contents do not list any food coloring so the radioactive green color must be the effect of mixing all other ingredients (or maybe they just forgot to list it).

I've always thought that the word "Tarkhun" had no meaning, but the English translation "Tarragon" on the label led me to discover that the primary flavor in this drink is tarragon, an herb related to wormwood, which is used to make the most famous green drink of all - absinthe. So Tarkhun must be the kids' version of absinthe.


Like absinthe, Tarkhun needs to be properly mixed with a complementary mildly-flavored liquid in order to be enjoyed. Independent of all my absinthe-related realizations, we fortuitously discovered that Tarkhun and Birch Tree Juice complemented each other very well and made an actually tolerable, even enjoyable cocktail (5/10).

Natural

Birch Tree Juice (4/10)


Birch sap, much like maple sap (used to make maple syrup) is collected by drilling small holes in young birch trees and by letting the sap drip out into a bottle. It contains water, enzymes, proteins, amino acids and sugars and is considered a healthy tonic. On its own it tastes like sugar water.

Kvas (8/10)


This is a fermented drink derived from rye or rye bread. It is very dark brown in color and tastes a bit like carbonated yeast. "Kvas" is derived from the word "acid" in Polish and the origin of the drink dates to 5000 years, around the same time humans discovered beer.

Although it contains up to 1.4% alcohol, Kvas is considered suitable for children. It is popular in all post-soviet republics and is ubiquitous in Eastern European groceries and restaurants. Kvas is similar to non-alcoholic beer.


In the spirit of Russian feasts, we "chased" our fabulous drinks with sumptuous red caviar sandwiches.




All of the above can be procured at most Russian/Ukranian/Eastern Bloc food stores, such as:
B & B International Food @ 12-17 River Rd Fair Lawn, NJ or
Net Cost Market @ 608 Sheepshead Bay Rd, Brooklyn, NY 11224 Continue...

Grasshoppers, Huitlacoche, Cactus Fries @ Toloache (251 W. 50th Street)

The other day we ventured out beyond our biggest fears by going to a restaurant that had grasshoppers on its regular menu. We figured if we want to be taken seriously as a Weird Food Club, we have to have tried at least 1 insect in our lives.



Yes, grasshoppers are horribly scary-looking, but not that much worse than crawfish (if you think about it), and people in Oaxaca, Mexico eat them like popcorn. Besides, they're a great source of protein!

So we asked for a bowl of crunchy grasshoppers as a starter at Toloache.

In this picture, Rob demonstrates how tiny the little fried buggers were. They were so small we could barely see the head and the legs, which made it that much easier to put them in our mouths and swallow. They were very crunchy and sour (we debated whether that was the actual taste of grasshopper guts or just lime juice).

We also got 2 portions of the grasshopper stuffing used in Toloache's tacos, fruit guacamole, cactus fries, avocado fries and Huitlacoche.

Grasshopper Taco Stuffing (4/10): was hot, moist, and even more sour than the dried grasshoppers. The cooking and stirring of the stuffing chopped up the grasshoppers into smaller pieces, so it was difficult to find one with its legs and head intact. We had to spoon the stuffing onto our chips and eat it like a choppy paste. You could only sometimes detect a crunch of a leg, but the stuffing was mostly uniformly hot, moist and incredibly limey.

I've learned that eating insects is not so bad, and I'm going to continue my search for bigger and scarier insects in New York (comment if you know where I could get some!)

Cactus Fries (6/10): tasted just like you'd expect cactus to taste - a little bit like aloe in texture, and somewhat tasteless.

Avocado Fries (8/10): this was a lesson that everything can be deep fried... and occasionally come out amazing. Avocado fries were more succulent and flavorful than cactus fries.

Fruit Guacamole (9/10): the individual ingredients were not unusual at all - avocado, strawberries and pomegranate seeds, but the combination was absolutely heavenly.

"You don't like this? It tastes like truffles!"

Huitlacoche (2/10): literally means "raven shit" in Nahuatl, and is sometimes referred to as "corn smut". Both of those names are exceptionally appetizing so there was no way we'd pass on it.

It smelled like sweaty socks. And the texture was pretty... shitty. If it smelled like excrement with the same texture, I probably wouldn't be able to eat it. But I could do "shit texture" plus "smell of dirty socks" for a couple of bites.

Huitlacoche was almost as bad as natto (the worst food I've ever tried). Ok, to be fair, huitlacoche had more of a rotten mushroom texture - a little bit chewy and sometimes gooey.

I had 2 spoon-fulls of huitlacoche on a piece of tostada chip, while Felix was swallowing the stuff like it was jam! He said it tasted like truffles. I've never had truffles so I can't compare the taste/texture/smell, but if it's anything like huitlacoche, I'll need to organize a Weird Food Club outing just for truffles.

Luckily for us in the States, the demand for huitlacoche among high end restaurants is growing and the USDA recently allowed some farmers in Florida and Pennsylvania to intentionally infect corn with huitlacoche. There shouldn't be any shortage of it any time soon!

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Pork: The Other White Cheek

Sure, there are pork chops, bacon, and even pork brain Mexican food, but none are finer than pork cheek.

My girlfriend and I dined at Thomas Beisl, which serves up some classic Austrian dishes at respectable prices.

For starters, get the chicken liver terrine w/ cranberry compote. A word of caution: it’s very rich and since my girlfriend is not the pate type, I was forced to gorge on this heavy concoction which I could have used less of. In other words, it’s necessary to share, ideally with three or four people, but two will work if you have a craving and plenty of bread, which your server will bring you at will.

Then, finally, with great anticipation, came the cheek. It was succulent and delightful. It had a that fatty pork taste, like a pork chop, but even more tender. It was served over sauerkraut which was essential for my enjoyment of this dish. Overall, it was absolutely delightful.

Rating (1-10)

6 for the terrine, 9 for the cheek.

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I’ll Have the Other Duck

Geoduck (gooey –duck) is not really duck at all but a large, strange-looking freshwater calm indigenous to the Pacific Northwest. Mirugai, as it is known in Japan, is hard to find in the city, I was excited when my girlfriend took me to Soto as a surprise.

Soto is perhaps one of the best (and affordable) sushi restaurants in NYC and my new favorite. It’s not Masa and it’s by no means cheap, close to $100 for two, but considering the quality and relatively inexpensive pricing, it was well worth it. I preferred the atmosphere here to Megu’s gaudy space, and the service was satisfactory.

Aside from the incredible freshness of everything served, the most exciting part of the evening was when the Mirugai came. With a texture like squid, and natural flavor masked by the sauce, it wasn’t the sashimi experience I had hoped for, but it was fantastic none-the-less.

The Mirugai earns an 8/10.

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Alligator at Mara's Homemade (342 E. 6th Street)

In a long row of Indian places on E. 6th street, Mara’s Homemade can easily be missed. But this small place that serves Cajun specialties deserves some attention, at least for the fact that its regular menu lists alligator.


Gator Bites 6/10
Gator Bites is an $11 appetizer that is easily shareable among 3-4 people. The gator bites consisted of small pieces of white Louisiana alligator meat marinated in a Cajun sauce, dusted in seasoned cornmeal, fried and served with Remoulade Sauce for dipping. Our waitress informed us that the alligator is shipped from Louisiana, fresh, and is deep fried on premises.

The bites looked and tasted like chicken nuggets, but were slightly smaller in size and a bit tougher and sinewy in texture. They went very well with beer.


Fried Pickles 7/10
Fried Pickles ($6) were prepared and served the same way as the alligator bites. I was actually more in love with the fried pickles than the alligator. The pickles were deliciously sour, and that burst of flavor was a real surprise each time you bit into something deep fried because our brains are trained to expect some kind of meat rather than a pickle in breaded/deep-fried form.


Crawfish, the southern name for crayfish 6/10
Crayfish/crawdads/crawfish are freshwater crustaceans resembling small lobsters, to which they are related. 98% of crayfish harvested in the US come from Louisiana, where the standard culinary terms are crawfish or ecrevisses. Louisiana crawfish are boiled live in a large pot with heavy seasoning (salt, cayenne pepper, lemon, garlic, bay leaves, etc.) The crawfish at Mara’s Homemade were as red-hot as they looked. They were unbearably spicy but really fun to play with. I personally liked to dangle them by their little feelers and looking them in the eyes before eating them. They look like tiny lobsters the size of shrimp, and are really good in $16 crawfish cheesecake (quiche with pieces of crawfish) but not so great on their own.

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Congee Village Part 2

To follow up on our previous post, more needs to be said about
Congee Village (100 Allen Street). Congee Village is a goldmine for the culinary adventure seeker. Half of their menu consisting of 250 original Chinese Cantonese dishes should be listed on this blog. Duck Tongues and Congealed Duck Blood featured earlier are just scratching the surface of the ridiculously long list of bizarre items that they serve daily:

Sea Cucumber, Abalone (sea snails), Geoduck, Conch, Live Shrimp
Duck’s Blood, Pig’s Blood Porridge
Shark Fin Soup, Turtle Soup
Bird’s Nest
Frog
Roasted young pigeon
Goose Web (goose feet)
Jelly Fish
Duck Tongue
Goose Intestine, Baked Fish Intestine in Clay Pot (which must taste a lot like kani miso – crab intestines)
Pork Stomach, Pork Stomach Porridge


Duck Tongues
Our greatest surprise was that duck tongue had a little bone in it, and overall didn’t taste that great. While I am a huge fan of cow tongue, duck tongue tasted nothing like it. We preferred the taste of goose intestines to the duck tongue!

"Eating duck tongue feels like you're making out with a duck"

Alex of www.guanabee.com and veteran Weird Food Club member felt like she was “making out with a duck” and found it so freaky she couldn’t have more than one. I was able to swallow 5 tongues, and Arseny laid waste to about 10 tongues.


Pig’s Blood Porridge
This rice porridge with floating cubes of congealed blood tasted similar to the duck blood dish described earlier. The cubes had a defined iron taste to them, and were fairly inedible. If you like blood sausage, it doesn't mean you'll like this.

Kevin believes duck blood is almost as bad as kani miso, the worst thing he has ever tried. I would like to nominate natto to the “worst thing I’ve ever tried” contest. Eating natto feels like you’re chewing on excrement. Apparently, we’re not the first to nominate these two items as the worst food ever. This lively discussion is way ahead of us.


Shark Fin Soup
We intended to get the $13.95 bowl of shark fin soup, but we were accidentally given a $45 bowl of “supreme” shark fin soup. There may be a subtle difference between the supreme and the poor-man’s shark fin soup, but we certainly couldn’t tell them apart.

Shark fin soup is considered a luxury dish in Chinese culture and is served at special occasions like weddings. Like many unusual things I’ve tried (jellyfish, bull penis, sea cucumber), shark fin has very little flavor of its own and is used for its noodle-like texture and ability to absorb flavors from soup broth and sauces, as well as for its rarity.

The practice of shark finning is controversial due to its brutality and its contribution to global decline of many shark species. Shark fins are removed from the shark and the rest of the still living shark is thrown into the ocean. The finless sharks are unable to swim, sink to the ocean floor and die.

If ever faced with the choice to get shark fin soup, we do not recommend that you get it. The taste, texture and the entire experience do not justify supporting the shark finning industry. I truly regret that I tried it.
Additionally, shark fin contains high levels of mercury and is dangerous for young children, pregnant women and may cause male sterility… so that makes it really not worth it!

Conclusion:
Congee Village is a place to check off a bunch of crazy food on your “to try” list, but none of it was a truly satisfying experience. Our best advice is don’t order just the weird stuff at Congee Village, unless you want to leave hungry. Continue...

I'll Have the Duck (Congee Village Part 1)

Chinese isn’t just General Tso’s and Beef & Broccoli anymore. Congee Village is a staple in the LES and this week, I ordered Duck Tongue & Sugar Peas with XO Sauce as well as Duck’s Blood with Chives. The Duck Tongue was slightly chewy but the XO Sauce made it tasty. Also, the name is a misnomer since the dish actually consists of many duck tongues, around 30 of them.

The Duck’s Blood was gelatinous and had an unpleasant smell to it. That and the aftertaste made the blood less appetizing and ultimately the “loser” of the night.

Rating (1-10)

I have to give the duck blood a (1). It was absolutely terrible. It has a smell and taste that ensured my consumption of only a few pieces. It wasn't the worst thing I had ever eaten, which was kani miso, but it definitely wasn't appetizing in the slightest. It was a big let down. I had drank turtle blood fortified with sake in Tokyo and the experience was amazing for two reasons: 1) Drinking blood sounds hardcore and 2) the sake-turtle blood cocktail tasted good. Okay, it tasted okay, but it was tolerable. Congealed duck blood didn't blow me away like I was hoping it would.

The duck tongue gets a (6) but that's probably generously attributed to how refreshing the greasy XO sauce-covered fatty tongue meat was in comparison to the blood. Think raw clams/oysters texture meets marinated chicken flavor.

Recommendations: Share an order of duck tongue between 4-6 people with plenty of beer, skip the blood.

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Pigeon at Blue Ribbon Brasserie (97 Sullivan Street)

Ever since I spotted one of these alien-like pigeon coop structures in Egypt, I've been meaning to try pigeon. Pigeon is a national delicacy in Egypt, and is consumed in other countries, including France. Because most people associate pigeon with dirt and disease, pigeon meat was re-branded as "squab" and can be found in quite a few places in New York.

It is on the regular menu at The Egyptian Kitchen (35 1st Avenue), a sketchy little hot-food bar in the East Village, but they don't have it every day. If you want good hamam mahshi (pigeon stuffed with rice/wheat), you'd need to go to Queens or get a special order for a group of 50+ at Casa La Femme (140 Charles Street). Congee Village (100 Allen Street), the mother of all weird food, has a pigeon dish as well.

We wanted a high-class pigeon experience, so we went to The Blue Ribbon Brasserie where we ordered:
Rating(1-10)
Beef Marrow & Oxtail Marmalade 10/10
Steak Tartare 9/10
Sweetbreads 8/10
Pigeon 9/10
Rack of Lamb 9/10
Red Trout 8/10
Flounder 8/10
Duck 9/10

All of these dishes were stellar. The pigeon dish came with 2 legs and a couple of small slices of breast. It tasted much like duck, although actual duck was juicier.

Pigeon was the reason we went to Blue Ribbon in the first place (and it was worth it), but the highlight of the evening was the bone marrow & oxtail marmalade. Benjamin, our server at Blue Ribbon, was kind enough to explain the long cooking process for bone marrow:

Bones cut by the butcher -> Bones cleaned -> Bones put in brine for 1.5 days to drain the blood -> Bones baked -> Bones arranged on plate -> Oxtail marmalade added (there's a long process of preparing that as well) -> Parsley, bread added.
The eating process was equally fun: the bones come with wooden sticks that are used to scoop the marrow and push it out of the bone. The texture was delightfully gelatinous and paired well with crunchy slices of toasted bread.



We loved our food at Blue Ribbon so much, that we forgot to ask the burning question on all of our minds: "where does the restaurant procure its pigeon?". Now we'll never know! One thing we do know though is that if the economy gets any worse, we'll be able to survive by hunting in the city... at least until there are no more pigeons left.

Lesson Learned at Blue Ribbon: pigeon is perfectly edible and now we know we can survive in this city if all hell breaks loose!


Afterwards we checked out honey wine (the generic modern word for mead) a few blocks away at Camaje (85 macdougal st). The wine smelled and tasted like honey but had the usual consistency of white wine. I was hoping it would be a bit more dense. Nothing of the sort. Just a regular wine that smells and tastes like honey!

The best part of Camaje was the awesome living-room like furniture arrangement they've got in the front. It felt like we were hanging out on a couch at someone's house with a coffee table full of magazines, books and even a chess board -- great hang out spot. Continue...

Wild Game at Les Halles (15 John Street) limited time only

We went out with a few coworkers to celebrate the end of a project, and we chose Les Halles [pronounced: "leh al"], which is our go-to place for nice lunches on the company card - it's delicious and only a block away from the office, and there's no f-ing way we'd pay for it ourselves.

They are having a whole menu of new wild game specials until Nov 13, including wild boar, which has been on my to try list for a while. They also have pheasant. An entire Wild Boar entree sounded like too much to handle for lunch, so I got the wild boar terrine and the petatou de chevre (a tower of potatoes and olives with some chevre on top). I am now in a food coma. My coworker and I are looking for a nice quiet conference room to take a nap in.


Those two look like they're having fun, no? This is what my terrine was made out of.

So now I can cross off "wild boar" in my list of foods to try, but honestly the wild boar terrine didn't taste any different from regular terrine. So next time you see it: pass.

I'd love to try their pheasant though. Continue...