Tiny Urban Tidbits #2

Tiny Urban Tidbits is where I share with you some insights, "tidbits", or just random encounters from the week. I carry my camera with me everywhere I go, and I love capturing photos of interesting things that I discover. These may include new dishes from a restaurant that I've already reviewed, updates on what's going on locally, or encounters I've had in the kitchen. It could even include a beautiful sunset, a funny sign, or just stuff I find amusing. Think of it as snapshots (literally!) of my weekly experiences with food - intertwined with stories, of course.
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Daniel, New York City

Top 50 Restaurants
San Pellegrino released their annual Top 50 Restaurants this past year.  Number 1 was Noma, a restaurant in Denmark, knocking E Bulli of Spain down to number 2.  Daniel, the highest climber, rose 33 to become 8th.  The French Laundry, the third largest drop, fell 20 slots down to 32.  The entire list can be found here.  A few days later, they released the "bottom 50", in other words, 51-100.

Here are my experiences at some of these restaurants. I do want to note that, out of all my amazing dining experiences this past year, I actually think Daniel was my favorite experience overall, so I'm not surprised that it's doing so well on this list.

8. Daniel	10. Per Se
15. Le Bernardin	32. The French Laundry
29. L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon, France *post is about the Las Vegas Joel Robuchon	52. Jean-Georges *linked post is about Market by JG in Boston * above photo is from JG in NYC

Boston News

Why I love living next to Harvard Square . . . .
Korean fried chicken place Bon Chon Chicken is moving from Allston to Harvard Square!  And rumor has it that Pinkberry is considering the old Alpha Omega space. Yoberry closed not too long ago, and Berryline has been in Harvard for years. Don't feel like paying close to $5 for some yogurt?  You can always try making your own.

And Little Q, my favorite hot pot (shabu) place in Boston, appears to be moving to Chinatown, and (maybe?) Arlington. They were essentially forced out of their Quincy location by the city several months ago. According to their new website, the future location will be in Chinatown (660 Washington St) and will be called "The Q Restaurant."  They're hiring now, so if you're looking for a job . . .

It also looks like a restaurant named "Little Q" is moving to East Arlington, at 196 Mass Ave.  We drove by it the other day on our way to Tango.  So are there really two now?  It's odd how their website does not mention the Arlington location. I even wonder whether the Arlington one is still going to happen.

In any event, more delicious hot pot coming closer to Boston very soon!

Keller vs. The Pioneer Woman?
I read an entertaining article where a mom cooked a traditional fried chicken dinner for her family from both The Pioneer Woman Cooks by Ree Drummond and Ad Hoc at Home by Thomas Keller.  It's interesting to see her family's reaction, especially her kids.

Washington D.C. Mini-Series

Next week, we'll have a mini-series on some really interesting eats in Washington DC!  I was there over Easter for the cherry blossoms and tried some great food, from iconic chili dogs to Belgian moules frites (mussels and fries).  Stay tuned!

That's it folks.  Have a wonderful weekend!

Soda Maker Winner

Thank you all for participating in this Giveaway. It was SUPER helpful reading all of your comments about the blog. I really appreciated all the encouraging feedback, and the suggestions were GREAT! I am seriously going to start implementing some of them soon!

The winner of the Giveaway is . . . . #16 - Brit! Brit writes the blog Yuppish. Brit said, "I love the pictures, they're absolutely fabulous!"

Brit, please contact me so I can get the Soda Maker sent to you!

Thanks again everyone for participating.  I can't express how thankful I am for the constructive feedback and wonderfully encouraging comments you all left for me.  Thanks again,

Jen

Formosa Taipei

Why is it that Chinatowns tend to be Cantonese, and the Taiwanese/Northern Chinese restaurants always seems to be a bit further out?  OK, granted, I don't have that many data points.  I'm thinking of New York and Boston in particular.  In New York, the best Taiwanese food is definitely in Flushing, not in Chinatown.  Similarly, in Boston, the best Taiwanese food (with the exception of Taiwan Cafe), is also outside of the city.  My two favorites are basically in the burbs: Shangri La in Belmont and Chung Shin Yuan in Newton.  Even Jo Jo Taipei (Allston), Mulan (Cambridge), and Wisteria (Allston) are not in Chinatown.

More recently, some former members of the Jo Jo Taipei team left to open up a new restaurant in Lexington (another suburban Taiwanese spot!).  This location is literally a 5-minute drive from my church.  After church we are always looking for good places to eat in Lexington (and, honestly, there aren't that many), so we were excited to check this place out.

First thing's first. It's important to know that this is really just a take out place.  There are a couple stools and benches along this table on one wall, but that's it.  It's pretty hard to go with more than one person if you want to have meaningful conversation while you're there.  Unless if you don't mind all sitting in a line facing out the window.

They even serve everything in takeout boxes.

The first thing that tickled us were the super authentic fobby lunch boxes. This is the box that is holding the pork chop over rice (quintessential Taiwanese dish).  My friend, Emily, was like,

"they're importing boxes all the way from Taiwan!" For some reason, it really added to the authenticity of the experience.  I could almost feel like I was sitting on a train in Taiwan, ordering a "bian dang." (lunch box)

And inside, the pork chop over rice.  Despite its authentic exterior, we were underwhelmed with the pork chop.  It was a little soggy, the meat was kind of dry and overcooked.  The flavor was decent, but overall it was quite average.  The entire dish is pretty authentic, though, down to the soy sauce egg, the pickled radish, and the sour mustard greens.

I got the beef noodle soup, which is supposedly one of their best dishes.  It comes packaged separately, which is pretty nice.  You pour the soup & beef over the noodles when you get home.  This prevents the noodles from becoming overly soggy.

The flavor of the soup was pretty good - deep, rich, with a slight kick.  I thought the soup itself was quite oily, to the point that it detracted from my enjoyment of the dish.  The pieces of meat in this soup are quite fatty.  I would say it's only about 50% meat, while the rest is tendon, fat, and other cartilage.  Perhaps the authentic version of this dish requires some fatty pieces, but I thought it was just too much.  I ended up throwing out large chunks of gelatinous stuff.

My vegetarian friend got the 3-cup tofu, which actually has pretty good flavor. "3-cup" dishes typically have a 1:1:1 ratio of soy sauce, rice wine, and sesame oil.  There's also tons of basil, garlic, ginger, and sugar. This dish had nice, fragrant pieces of tofu infused with that beautiful combination of flavors.  I've actually had this at Jo Jo Taipei before, and it's pretty similar.  I think the former chef of Jo Jo Taipei is actually here, so that makes sense.

Sesame Beef: I think our friends who got this felt that this dish was a bit more Americanized than what they were expecting. I actually did not try this dish so I can't comment on it.

Bryan got this sesame flatbread (shao bing) with stewed beef shank and onions.  This was a very, very disappointing appetizer. Maybe I was expecting something else, but the flatbread was really dry and not really crispy at all.  I'm so used to the flaky and crispy ones (probably made with lard) from places like Shangri La. This tasted like a diet or lowfat version of the normal sesame flatbread.  Dry, no fat, kind of hard to chew.  I would not recommend getting this.

Boba tea was solid, and is really a must have at a Taiwanese place, right? ;)


Overall Thoughts
*SIGH* I really really really wanted to love this place.  It was so close to church.  It was Taiwanese.  It was opened by the Jo Jo Taipei folks.  I'm not sure what went wrong.  Did we order during an off time?  Or did we order the wrong things?  I still love the concept of having a Taiwanese take out place in Lexington, and considering that Lexington has a woeful selection of Chinese restaurants, this is actually a nice addition.  I might go back and try the dumplings (I think they even have soup dumplings!), and maybe something like the three cup chicken or something.  Bryan did originally want to order their "Ro Geng Mian" (Pork Bamboo Shoot Noodle Soup), but they had run out, so maybe we'll go back and try that.

As it now stands, though, I would rank many places in Boston, including Shangri La in Belmont, Chung Shin Yuan in Newton, and Taiwan Cafe in Chinatown above this place.  However, if you are in Lexington and in the mood for Taiwanese food, this is still a decent option. It IS quite authentic.

Formosa Taipei
315 Marrett Road, Lexington, MA 02421
Lexington, MA 02421

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GIVEAWAY
Today is the LAST DAY to enter to win a Sodastream Soda Maker!  Drawing will occur TONIGHT (April 29, 2010) at midnight.

Fiddleheads

I dusted off my violin last night for the first time in probably 2 years. I usually forget about it, but once every year or two, I am somehow inspired by something, or someone, to pick up my violin and start playing.  Usually, it's a beautiful violin performance that I've heard, or perhaps something that reminds me of an orchestral piece I used to play.

Last night, however, was quite different. I picked up my violin because I had bought fiddlehead ferns at the market just a few days before.  I was tickled how similarly the fiddleheads resembled an actual violin top.  Of course that's why they are called fiddleheads.  How cute, and how funny I never consciously thought about that before.


What are fiddleheads?  Fiddleheads are the unfurled fronds of a new growth fern, typically the ostrich fern.  Some species of fiddleheads (e.g., the Bracken fern, popular in Canada, Japan, and Korea) actually have been linked to stomach and esophagus cancer. Thankfully the ostrich fern (which is mostly what is sold in the US), does not carry this cancer risk.

But wait, the sign at the market had a little warning that said to boil or steam these babies before eating.  DO NOT EAT RAW! Apparently a bunch of people suffered food poisoning from eating undercooked fiddleheads in New York and Canada back in 1994.

I decided to take my chances and try cooking these little violin tips. So cute, and yet slightly dangerous at the same time!

Make sure to wash these REALLY WELL before cooking them.  Some instructions say to soak it multiple times in water.  Others say to wash until the water is clear.  Make sure to remove any brown bits, scales, etc.

Instructions varied with respect to what cooking time was necessary to make the fiddleheads safe to eat.  I saw times as short as "blanch for 1-2 minutes" all the way up to "steam for 20 minutes!"  At the same time, other recipes said not to overcook the fiddleheads, as you lose texture, nutrients, and taste.

What to do?  

Well, I thought steaming was a bit less harsh than boiling, so I opted to go that route. I was also really afraid of food poisoning, so I went a little overboard and steamed for 15 minutes. In hindsight, I think that was a bit too long. I might try the "blanching for a few minutes" approach next time.

Once you've cooked the fiddleheads, you can treat them like you would asparagus or broccoli.  The taste reminds me of asparagus, and in some ways, they are similar in that they are both the young shoots of a plant.  This time I just sauteed the fiddleheads in a bit of oil and sprinkled with salt.  The flavor is mild, so you don't want to overpower it with a sauce that is too strong.

You can easily enjoy it in salads, pastas, or any other dish that would typically use asparagus.

Enjoy!
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GIVEAWAY
It's still not to late to enter to win a Sodastream Soda Maker!  Drawing will occur on Thursday, April 29, 2010 at midnight.

Tango

When the first page of a restaurant's menu is littered with phrases like "if there is a single food that represents Argentina, it is beef" and "Argentine beef is highly prized for its flavor and tenderness" you quickly realize they're trying (not so subtly) to tell you what to order.

Tango is, as far as I know, the only Argentinian restaurant in the Boston area.  They focus heavily on meat, and the menu is full of various grilled meat options.  Of course, there are traditional Argentinian appetizers too, as well as salads, pastas, and desserts.

We had the privilege of going with a friend who actually grew up in Argentina. It was great - he spoke Spanish with the owners, arranged to get a huge table for our party of 10 on a busy Saturday night, and ordered a bunch of traditional Argentinian dishes for us.

Appetizers

We started with a variety of interesting appetizers.

Top Left: Matambre Casero Con Ensalada Rusa
Stuffed Rolled Veal with Russian Salad - $9.95
Our friend said this dish was very authentic. It's a cold dish made of veal rolled around hard boiled eggs, marinated vegetables, and spices.  It comes with Russian potato salad on the side.

Top Right: Empanada de Carne
Beef Turnover-Ground beef, onion, eggs, raisins and regional spices
This was delicious - a fried pastry filled with flavorful ground beef.  Here's a closer look at the inside.


Bottom Left: Ensalada de Palmitos con Salsa Golf
Heart of palm salad with the chef's special sauce ("golf sauce")
Canned palm hearts drizzled with this traditional yet simple sauce consisting of mayonnaise, ketchup, and mustard.  This sauce (originally a mixture of ketchup and mayonnaise) was supposedly invented by Argentinian Nobel prize winning biochemist Luis Federico Leloir in 1920.  So the roots of McDonald's special sauce was invented by an Argentinian??! I found this dish to be uninspiring, personally much preferring the lighter, less saucy palm heart salad at Muqueca.

Bottom Right: Beef Carpaccio
I'm not sure if this is an actual Argentinian dish, although it does focus on beef.  This dish was solid, though perhaps there are better renditions of it at other places in Boston.

Main Dish

Of course, meat is the focus of Argentinian restaurants, so virtually everyone ordered meat, with a majority of folks ordering beef.

Top Left: Ostillas de Cordero
Tender Lamb Chops. Marinated in our chimichurri sauce and grilled $22.95

Top Right: Churrasco
A 12 Oz sirloin Steak, Seasoned and grilled to liking $21.95

Bottom Left: Medallon Roquefort
Filet Mignon. Seasoned and grilled to liking. Topped with a layer of creamy pepper sauce $28.95

Bottom Right: Vacio a la Parrilla
Flank Steak. Grilled to perfection adding chimichurri sauce while grilling $20.95

In general, the flavors of the meat dishes are great.  You won't go wrong ordering beef.  One thing, though - they do tend to overcook their beef.  A "medium rare" becomes more like a cross between medium and medium well, while a "medium" becomes close to well done.  On the other hand, the lamb chops were reasonably medium rare. The vegetables are crunchy and fresh, and the mashed sweet potatoes are fine, though nothing to write home about.

What is the most interesting thing to order . . .
The most fascinating dish, and really the best value and most fun to watch someone eat:

Parrillada Para Dos (Grilled Meat Variety for two)
Short ribs, sausage, black sausage, kidney, chicken, sweetbread. Served with fried potato. $39
This is not for the faint of heart. We had two guys share this, and they totally could not finish. I saw another family of three order this, which might be a little bit more do-able. The parrillada para dos, which translates to "grill for two," is a feast of various slow-grilled meats. It's set up in a way to allow you to enjoy different parts of various animals.  In this particular version, there are short ribs (a quintessential ingredient in any parrillada), sausage, blood sausage, kidneys, chicken, and sweetbreads. It was definitely an interesting experience to try so many different things. My favorite was the sausage, although the sweetbread wasn't bad.

It comes on a portable charcoal grill. You can eat your meat with chimichurri sauce (olive oil, parsley, and hot pepper) or just enjoy it plain.

The side of fried potatoes was pretty good - kind of like thick cut potato chips.


General Thoughts
I've read that there are much better restaurants in Argentina.  But we're not in Argentina, and Tango is the only Argentinian restaurant here. I think it's a great place to visit. It has a nice, lively vibe, authentic dishes, and delicious food. The service can be slow. In fact, it took us over an hour to get our main entrees, which is a bit ridiculous. I hope that it was just an off night, and that it's not always so slow. Definitely go with a large crowd so you can try different things. I would recommend trying the Parrillada Para Dos, at least one of the steaks, and a few appetizers, such as the empanadas.

End on a cappuccino note . ..

Note: Arlington, right across the border from Cambridge, is about a 20-25 minute drive from Boston without traffic.

Tango
464 Massachusetts Ave
Arlington, MA 02474

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GIVEAWAY
It's still not to late to enter to win a Sodastream Soda Maker!  Drawing will occur on Thursday, April 29, 2010 at midnight.

Sparkling Blood Orange + GIVEAWAY!

Homemade Sparkling Water with a Splash of Blood Orange Juice

It's no secret that I love love love sparkling water.  I've been a huge fan of San Pellegrino, and I even had the amazing privilege this past year to attend the San Pellegrino Almost Famous Chefs Competition in Napa Valley, where we learned a lot about mineral water, how it is made, and how it pairs with food!

More recently I found out about Sodastream, a company that sells a make-your-own-soda device from tap water. I was intrigued with this idea. Sodastream says that their sodas only cost 25 cents a liter (as opposed to > $1/Liter for most bottled seltzer water). The plain sparkling water is probably even cheaper.  Furthermore, you help the environment by reducing the number of plastic/glass bottles that you would otherwise be consuming.

Sodastream was kind enough to send me one of their soda-making devices to review.  Better yet, they are offering another one for me to give away to one of my readers!
Sodastream offers a variety of different soda makers.  Internally, they function all the same way.  They vary mostly in their external design, the types gas canisters they take, and whether they use glass or plastic bottles.

I ended up opting for the Penguin (shown below).  I mostly chose this model because it was one of the two models that uses glass carafes instead of BPA-free plastic bottles.  I figured, if I was such a fan of San Pellegrino, I should at least try to approximate it as closely as possible, right?

The Penguin only takes the smaller CO2 cylinder, unlike some other models, which have the option of taking the larger 100 L aluminum cylinder.

He's super cute!  He almost fits in with my other stuffed animals.  :)

The glass bottles come with a nice top with a rubber stopper that keeps the gas in.  The unit is mostly made of plastic, with the exception of the bottom half (the part that holds the glass carafe) being made of metal. You press on his eyes to open his belly, which holds the gas cylinder.  You push down on his beak to fill the water with gas (more on that below!)

It's pretty easy to set up.  I think I was up and running within 15 minutes.  Basically, the unit runs on the pressurized gas, so there's no need for electricity. You just attach the gas canister, and then you're ready to go!

Fill the glass bottle with water, put the bottle in the metal holder, and then press down on the silver "back," making sure the white spigot on top goes into the glass bottle.

Lock the unit and press down on his beak.  It takes a few presses before the penguin starts whistling.  It can whistle up to four times, although I found that two whistles worth was plenty of carbonation for me.

And viola, carbonated water!

It's refreshing and quite good.  The bottle is labeled as a one-liter bottle, though you can only fill it up to the line (for safety reasons).  Up to the line, it's closer to about 3/4 L of water that you're actually carbonating.

Ease of Use
I found this unit extremely easy to use.  As I said earlier, set up really takes only about 15 minutes (and that's including the time it takes to unwrap the box and read the instructions).  Because the unit does not require electricity, I have easily moved it around depending on where I have space (realities of a tiny kitchen and all).  I like to keep the two glass bottles full of cold water in the fridge and "gas" them whenever I feel like having some sparkling water.  I have found that, even with the unique rubber-stopper tops, the sparkling water in the glass bottles still loses fizz relatively quickly, and tit usually does not taste nearly as good the next day.  Therefore, since it takes less than a minute to make, I have found that I prefer to just making it fresh on the spot. I can go through one bottle pretty quickly in one sitting!


It's nice to be able to control the carbonation level.  As I said earlier, I've found that two "whistles" is good for me, although I would consider trying three or four whistles if I wanted to dilute the water with, say, orange juice or something.

Design
I thought this unit was well designed and very easy to use.  Though the Penguin is super cute, it is a bit tall for a tiny urban kitchen such as mine, and I actually had a hard time figuring out where to put it.  It's just a bit too tall to fit under any of my cupboards (see penguin's head at the bottom picture), which means I had to leave it out on the dining table.  If you have a small kitchen, I would recommend getting one of the other models (which I think is shorter - not positive though!).

Flavors of Drinks
Sodastream sells a bunch of syrups to add to their water. I served a bunch of these drinks to some dinner guests the other night.  We tried flavors such as cola, orange soda, Pete's choice (Dr. Pepper equivalent), and grapefruit soda (or pop - a shout out to my Ohio roots).  We also tried Soda stream's "Mywater Essence," which is essentially like adding a calorie-free fruit splash to the water.  I received mixed reviews on the sodas.  One thought the orange soda tasted like the real thing, while another thought that the Pete's choice tasted awful.  Most people were relatively pleased with the way that the sodas tasted, although many just preferred to drink plain sparkling water.  I personally thought the grapefruit soda was only OK, although the cola was decently convincing.  I liked the fruit essences, and I would choose that over the sodas.

One nice thing is that none of their syrups are made with high fructose corn syrup, although a lot of them are made with sucralose (Splenda).  In fact, out of the 12 syrups I received in the sampler, only two (Pete's Choice and lemon-lime) were made of sugar. The rest were diet.

You void the warranty if you try carbonating anything other than water, though people have tried all sorts of things, such as, my favorite idea - making prosecco from cheap white wine. In the end, I'm not much of a soda drinker anyway, so I would stick to plain sparkling water, optionally dressed with my own fruit juices.

CO2 Refills
After doing some internet research, I learned that Sodastream has a proprietary CO2 cylinder head. This means that it's harder to get the canisters refilled elsewhere.  In fact, the canisters are technically on loan to you only.  You license the use of the canister and essentially buying the gas.  Once the canister is empty, you can exchange it for a full one either through mail order or at a local participating store, such as Williams-Sonoma.  I have yet to replace a canister, but it apparently costs $30 each, which is a lot more than the market price for CO2.  In the end, this still comes out to be cheaper than buying your own bottled water, but just keep in mind that if you do get this unit, you are, in a way, stuck with getting your refills at a higher price through Sodastream.  Some people have tried replacing the proprietary head with an industry standard head, while others just go to non-approved third party CO2 fillers.  As I mentioned earlier, I have not tried any of this myself, so I can't really comment much more on this topic.

Environment
Of course, a lot of people get their own soda machines not so much for the cost, but for other reasons, such as for the environment or for the luxury of having access to sparkling water at any time. You can save on a lot of plastic bottles, no question. I have made sparkling water with the Penguin and then transferred the water into a Nalgene bottle for transport, and that works beautifully.

Taste
This water tastes pretty good, though in the end taste of the water will be governed by the quality of the water you put in.  I did a 3-way taste test comparing Brita-filtered water, water straight out of the refrigerator (filtered), and San Pellegrino.  Bryan thought that the San Pellegrino had the most flavor (most likely due to the mineral content), and that the Brita filtered water tasted the most flat (which makes sense - the Brita probably filters out a lot of the minerals). We both agreed that the differences were somewhat subtle, and if you're going to be adding a flavored syrup anyway, it really won't make that much of a difference.

Giveaway
Finally, to the end!  The folks at Sodastream were kind enough to offer a SodaStream Soda and Seltzer Maker Starter Kit to one lucky Tiny Urban Kitchen reader!  This particular version is their most popular and best-value soda maker.  It has the flexibility in that it can take on the larger 100L aluminum CO2 canister.  This particular one uses the BPA-free bottles, which are actually much more convenient when it comes to taking it along with you.

It includes the winner's choice of black/silver, white or red/silver Fountain Jet, CO2 to make over 100 liters of soda, 2 reusable carbonating bottles, a sample pack of flavors, and 3 full-sized flavors of the winner's choice.

The winning prize can only be shipped in the continental US.

How to win . . .
I am always looking to improve this blog, so I would love feedback about it. To enter the Giveaway, please leave a comment below telling me what aspects of this blog you like the best, and/or suggestions for improvement/change.  Some examples of aspects on which you can comment: restaurant reviews, recipes, photography, length of posts, frequency of posts, number of pictures, cuisines covered, types of dishes, layout of the blog, giveaways, trip series (e.g., The Big Apple, A New York Birthday, Napa Valley, A California Christmas), and the new series "Tiny Urban Tidbits."

If you absolutely have no comments but still want to enter, please give me your favorite sparkling water recipe. I loved reading your egg recipes last time, so keep those ideas coming!  For an extra entry, you can tweet about this giveaway.

Giveaway! Win a Sodastream Soda Maker Kit @tinyurbankitchn! http://bit.ly/cAXh5V

Good luck!  Drawing will occur on Thursday, April 29th, 2010 at midnight!

If you want to support Tiny Urban Kitchen, you can get one at Amazon (Here are links to the Penguin Starter Kit ($199.95 - what I got), Genesis Starter Kit ($99.99), and the Jet Starter Kit (what the winner will receive).
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Disclaimer: Time to time I receive free products from vendors to review. I do not receive any payment for these posts/reviews. The views expressed in the posts are completely my own. For this post, I received a Sodastream Penguin Starter Kit and a Jet Start Kit for a giveaway.