Eating Out: Makoto

Japanese food tops one of my favorite cuisines in the world. I especially love the traditional multi-course dinners. An array of seasonal food items prepared using multiple ways of cooking techniques which allows diners to experience a variety of textures and flavor. I took my mom and sister to Makoto celebrating my sister’s graduation and my mom’s visit. We all had the 10 course meal. It was $60 and the food was delicious and well prepared! It was not a full blown Kaiseki Ryori 懷石料理 but it had most of the components that makes up Kaiseki. I give it a 4.5/5 stars!!

course #1 : Grilled Mussels w/ Wine 

course #2 : Left – some kind of raw fish mixed with fish roe. Right – Fish cake

course #3 : Sashimi

 

course #4 : Fried Soft Shell Crab

course #5 : Steamed Scallop, Shrimp and Shiitake Mushroom w/ Umeboshi (plum) sauce

course #6 : Left – Shrimp and Avocado w/ Spicy Miso Sauce. Middle – Crab Salad. Right – Grilled Eggplant with Chive flowers.

course #7 : Nigiri

 

course #8 : Filet with Mushroom Sauce

course #9 : Soba in Citrusy Broth with Seasonal Vegetables

course #10 : Grape and Grand Marnier Granita

NRM

All of my friends have a deep love for the Chinese Beef Noodle Soup a.k.a. NRM (牛肉麵). A few of us actually went to several Chinese restaurants around the Rockville area just to try their NRM. Many of the restaurants make their own noodles and the noodles for the most part were pretty good, but somehow most of their broth lacked flavor.

The past weekend I decided to cook up a bunch and shared it with some of my favorite people. I would really invite more people, but my pot only accommodates about 8 servings or so.

I made NRM two ways. The first one was a ginger flavored clear soup based NRM and the second was a spicy Szechuan style soy based NRM. Unfortunately, I don't really have recipes for these cause I just added seasonings as I went. But here were the results from me slaving away in the kitchen on a Saturday afternoon... which I totally enjoyed. I find cooking a very Zen activity!!

Eating Out: Michel Richard Citronelle

I visited 'The' Michel Richard Citronelle for a friend's birthday dinner last week. At first, I was hesitant to go cause of the price, but I was pretty glad I went. It certainly lived up to its rave reviews on yelp. And quite honestly, I've probably had the most delicious dish I've ever eaten in my entire life.

I ordered the three course meal. On top of the three course, it came with three amuse-bouches and also a small dessert shooter.

Amuse-Bouche

First Course: Lobster "Begula" Pasta

This was probably the best thing I've ever eaten in my life. I would totally go back just to eat this. Luckily I found a recipe online for this dish. I will try and imitate it one day, but I highly doubt it will taste half as good as the ones from Citronelle. Funny thing was, when this dish came out... I thought it was the Caviar Penguin that had a +75 next to the dish. I almost had a heart attack. When I touched the metal container and realized it was hot and the ice surrounding the metal was fake, I had a huge relief! The black circular balls are Israeli couscous coated with squid ink. In the bottom there's lobster meat, poached egg, and hollandaise sauce. This was phenomenal!

Second Course: Chateaubriand, Tater Tots, Mushrooms, Horseradish Veal Jus

This was just an okay dish. I definitely enjoyed the combination of the different wild mushrooms, but I really thought that Chateaubriand would melt in your mouth like that aged filet mignon that I got from whole foods for Thanksgiving. But, overall it was a satisfying but not as spectacular dish.


Caramel Foam topped with Pineapples and Rice Crispies


Third Course: Chocolate Degustation

A sizable portion of dessert. My favorite was the little balls on top of what I believe is a cheesecake of some sort. Those crunchy chocolate toppings should really come in a big bag so I can munch on them during work.

I would definitely recommend this place... maybe for some special occasions! The service was awesome and portions were generous. I really thought that I was going to come home hungry, but instead I was extremely stuffed. The room had a nice ambiance as well. The coolest part is that you can see through the kitchen and see all the chefs working on those amazing dishes. I give this a 4/5 stars. That one missing star goes to the just 'blah' Chateaubriand dish.

Taste Test: Buitoni Wild Mushroom Agnolotti

I have a strange love for mushrooms. So when I saw the commercial for the Buitoni Wild Mushroom Agnolotti, I really wanted to try it out! I hardly ever buy prepared food in the grocery store since most of it consists a ton of salt, but since making ravioli would take a lot of time and effort, I've decided to try it out and give it a gourmet-ish twist. I give these ravioli a 3.5 out of 5 stars! Not bad at all for a speedy date night meal!

Cream sauce goes perfectly with any mushroom pasta dish, but since I've been watching my weight lately, it was immediately out of the window. And marina sauce is just blah... then I thought, maybe some pesto... but pesto would take a lot of time since I would need to clean the food processor. Finally, I've decided to go with a deconstructed pesto sauce. Keeping all the flavor that goes into Basil pesto without sacrificing time.


Deconstructed Pesto Ravioli

Ingredients:
1 pack of Buitoni Ravioli
1 tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 bunch of Sweet Basil
1/4 cup of Leftover White Wine
1/4 cup of Toasted Pine Nuts
Grated Parmesan Cheese

Prepare the ravioli according to the package direction. In the mean time, toast the pine nuts in a saute pan. Remove the pine nuts when it gets golden brown.
Turn the stove on to high heat. Add extra virgin olive oil to the pan and add in the basil leaves. Let the basil wilt a little then add in the white wine and let it simmer for a minute. A pinch of salt and pepper, then add the cooked ravioli in. Stir and coat the ravioli with the sauce. Add in the toasted pine nuts and turn off the heat.
Grate Parmesan cheese to serve.

Love Spicy!

Life has been good lately. I started reading a lot more, going to yoga classes and even picked up my old racket for some much needed tennis lessons (Thanks!!).

With my mom arriving in less than a month, I have been frantically trying to clean out my apartment (not!). She is coming to the US to attend B's graduation. I am so proud of my baby sister and her achievements. I can't even imagine in a few short months, she will be all grown up and living in Jersey on her own. Although with her moving up to Jersey, it gives me more excuses to visit the lovely NYC and indulge in some serious Asian food. I am going to be a little sad though, because this means I have one less person to cook for!

I have a list of places I visit every time I go to NYC. This list includes Joe's Shanghai's soup dumplings (gotta get the crab roe flavor), Japanese Ramen (My favorite one is Batten Ramen at Ft. Lee, NJ), Taisho ( I love their fries with fish roe mayo), and of course that kabob meat stand at every corner of the city. This time G is going to take me to get some Pommes Frites! Yes, I cannot wait to try the gazillion types of mayo/sauce they have there.

Work has been pretty mind numbing lately. And with all the audits that are going on and the auditors' deadlines approaching, audit requests have been flying off the roof! I needed comfort... spicy, noodlely and most importantly.. quick! First thing that popped in my mind was the spicy baby octopus udon dish from Tofu Lighthouse. My solution of not having to drive to Rockville and eat alone was to make it myself. This dish was pretty easy to make and the best part was that it was a one pot meal (okay, maybe 2)! So here goes...



Ingredients:1 pack of frozen Baby Octopus, 1 Korean squash, 1 carrot, 3 scallions, 1 pack of enoki mushrooms, 1 large onion, 1 pack of udon noodles, and half a pack of these korean fish cakes that are rolled into a tube.




Cut the all the vegetables into bite size pieces.
Clean the baby octopus and cut them into pieces. I love octopus so I kept my pieces decently large.

The sauce:

5 tbsp kochujang (red chili pepper paste)
4 tbsp kochukaru (red chili pepper flakes)
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup + 1 tbsp of sesame oil
1/4 cup of minced garlic
2 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp sesame seeds

The sauce comes out to be a little pasty. I added half of it to the octopus and marinated for about 15 minutes.



Stir fried the vegetables in the order of onions, white part of the green onions, carrots. I put in the octopus and its marinade along with the squash, mushroom, rest of the green onions and some water to loosen up the sauce. Added the extra sauce to it and stir fry till bubbling. In the mean time, I heated a pot of water and loosened up the udon noodles. Drained the noodles and dumped it into the pot of octopus and vegetables. I added water as needed and extra flavoring. I like the contrast of the sweet and spicy a lot so I might have added a bit more sugar. Stir in the noodles and dinner is ready.

Celebrating Spring

One of my go-to meals after a long day of work is some Bacon Spaghetti. This dish is super simple and quick to make. The base of the dish consists of bacon, garlic and spaghetti.

I always have bacon on hand. Whenever I buy a package of bacon, I would group every 3-4 slices together in a plastic wrap then store all of these little packages of bacon into a double layer zip lock bag. When I need the bacon, I just take out a pack without having to defrost a whole package of it. The good thing about bacon is that since it's so fatty, with a decently sharp knife you can cut through the meat easily without having to defrost it.

I make different variations of it based on what produce is available. Since it's spring, I picked up some asparagus and zucchinis. In the winter time, I use frozen peas or I'll have it plain.

So here are the steps...

1. Follow the package direction to cook the spaghetti. Make sure you salt the pasta water!
2. In a good size saute pan, add frozen pieces of bacon cook till desired crispiness. I like my bacon a little soft. If you happen to have some skinny bacon, you can also add some more extra virgin olive oil. You want at least a tablespoon or so of grease to coat your pasta.
3. Add in your vegetable, garlic, salt and pepper and stir fry everything together. At this time, you may deglaze the pan with a splash of your left over white wine. Add the cooked pasta and combine on top of the stove for another 1-2 minutes. If you have some parsley or basil available, go ahead and throw some in there!

I fried up an egg and added some Parmesan cheese which I also keep in my freezer since I never use up the whole block. And then... it's dinner time!!

Chinese Pesto

To continue the Momofuku theme, I've decided to make some Ginger Scallion Noodles. Something about the warm weather and the cherry blossoms blooming gave me motivation to update this blog. I have been so lazy to make any food for myself after coming back from Vegas. My fridge has been without milk for days and I've been spending every minute of my time after coming home from work sitting on my bed with a computer or a novel. Anyway... I first heard about the Ginger Scallion Sauce from bubble7ea and apparently it's quite popular in Hong Kong. It's a lot easier to make than your Basil Pesto since this does not require the use of a food processor, which requires a tremendous amount of time washing it. This took me less than 10 minutes to put it together.

Chopped about 1 to 2 bunches of scallions, about 2-3 inches of ginger and mixed it with some vegetable oil, soy sauce, rice vinegar and salt. Wait about 15 minutes, voila... you have your ginger scallion sauce.





I added the ginger scallion sauce to some ramen noodles, topped with some Hoisin sauce then a fried egg. Anything taste good with a fried egg! And there you have it, a 20 minute meal. Tomorrow when I eat it again, it'll be 5 minutes! Now I get to sit back, relax and enjoy all the tv shows I missed cause I was too busy being lazy!