Formaggio Kitchen Barbecue

We've had a gemstone hiding under our nose this entire summer.

Of course we've known about Formaggio Kitchen the store. How could we not? It's the most famous cheese shop in Boston and likely one of the best gourmet markets as well. It's not a surprise that Julia Child (who would have turned 100 this August) was a loyal customer of this market.

But Formaggio Kitchen is not just a store. On Saturdays from March to October, they serve a mean barbecue right outside the store.

Bryan and I decided to stop by one Saturday late morning (around 11AM) and were floored by how good it was.

There's tons of prep work that goes into all this fantastic food. Starting on Thursday, grill masters smoke the ribs and pulled chicken, pork, beef, and lamb over a variety of wood, such as apple wood chips. On Friday, whole chickens are split and marinated while the ribs begin their long 3 1/2 hour slow cook. Meanwhile, the pulled meats begin an even longer 10 hour slow grill.

After the crazy 10 hours of cooking, the grill masters manually pull apart the meat (which can be quite labor intensive!) and cook everything in large pots with seasoning and sauce.

On top of all this, they are baking cornbread, stewing baked beans, making cole slaw, potato salad, and all the necessary sauces to go with the barbecue.

In short, for what they charge, it really seems like a ridiculously good bargain.

Let me tell you though, the lines can get really long. It may look deceptively short, but because there are only two people manning the entire grill, each order takes quite some time. The same two people take your order, (sometimes) quickly grill your item to heat it up, make your sandwich, pack it all up for you, and then handle payments as well. You can imagine how the line could get backed up really quickly.

See the picture above? That's where I was standing, and I waited about 45 minutes before ordering. I showed up around 11:20AM, which is pretty early (considering they open at 11AM).

When I finally got to the front of the line, I had a hard time deciding what to get! 

Here's their huge tray of cornbread.

Homemade potato salad

Apple Jicama Cole Slaw
BBQ half chicken ($9) and grilled peaches

BBQ Pork Ribs (1/2 rack) for $12 (full rack for $24)

Texas Style Beef Ribs - $3 each

You can get various types of pulled meat sandwiches, such as pulled chicken, pulled lamb, pulled chicken, or beef brisket ($6 for a small, $10 for a large). All of these are served on Iggy's bread, which is grilled on the spot.

Check out these pots of gorgeous pulled meats, all of which have been smoked, cooked, and stewed for hours on end.

Everything is served in a takeout container, so you can conveniently take it with you wherever you need to go.

One of the more unique things they serve is lamejun, an Armenian flatbread topped with ground meat, garlic, and parsley paste. It's grilled on the spot and topped with cheese and a tomato salsa.

So What Did You Try?
It was really hard to decide (and we still ordered way too much food), but we finally settled on trying a pulled lamb sandwich, beef brisket sandwich, grilled corn, lamejun, and a beef rib.

The pulled meat sandwiches were fantastic. I was floored by their beautiful, melt-in-your-mouth tenderness as well as their rich, intense flavors. If you've never had pulled lamb and like lamb a lot, you'll love this sandwich. Yes, it was quite messy to eat (I think we used a fork and knife!) but so worth the cost!

The rib was nicely charred and flavorful but not exactly fall-off-the-bone. We thought it was definitely solid but it did not blow us away in quite the same way as the pulled meat sandwiches did. If we came back again, we would probably skip this one and try something different.

The grilled corn was great - solidly made with quality ingredients. I still prefer my own Taiwanese grilled corn (perhaps I'm partial to Asian flavors after all), but if you like corn with cheese, chili, and lime, you'll probably enjoy this.

I really liked the lamejun, which was quite unique and not something you would typically find at a BBQ joint. It turns out that the owner is from Turkey, which may have influenced the decision to offer some Mediterranean foods on the menu.

The lamejun come from Eastern Lamejun Bakers in Belmont and are grilled and topped with Formaggio's own cheese and salsa. I'd never had one before, so it's hard to compare it with others, but I will say that I loved the balanced contrast between the crispy flatbread, savory meat paste, and bright salsa on top. It was also a nice "break" from the heavy barbecued meats we were eating.


Thoughts
I absolutely loved the barbecue here. My favorites by far were the pulled meat sandwiches and (surprisingly) the lamejun. The ribs were fine, but I don't think they were necessarily the best I've had. Similarly, the corn was solid but nothing particularly spectacular.

Is it worth the wait? Well, depends on the weather, I think. 45 minutes is quite a long time. Bryan sat at one of the outdoor tables (there are a handful of seats) while I waited in line. We would text each other periodically throughout the wait as we tried to decide what to order. If you're short on time, you're arguably much better off heading to Blue Ribbon in Arlington and getting barbecue that's still pretty darn good.

I think it's sort of a chicken and egg problem. If the weather's bad, less people will come out, and then the wait isn't so bad. I think it's better to come either really early (like right at 11AM), or pretty late, like at 2PM. However, if you come late you risk them running out of certain items.

You can order ahead, which might alleviate the line problem. Also, outside is cash only. If you don't have enough cash, you'll have to go inside the store and wait in another line to pay.

In short, it has become one of my favorite barbecue places in the city, and I'm not the only one who thinks this. They won Best Street Food by Boston Magazine in 2007 and Top Ten Best New BBQ Spots in the US by Bon Appetit magazine.

And all this is just a 12-minute walk from my home. How awesome is that?

Formaggio Kitchen Saturday BBQ
menu
244 Huron Ave
Cambridge, MA 02138
 

64 Pints of Ice Cream Delivered

It was around 9AM when the doorbell rang.

I wasn't surprised. After all, I had been expecting a delivery. 2nd St. Creamery had contacted me a couple weeks before asking me if I wanted to sample some of their premium ice cream. They were about to enter the Boston market, and wanted to give me a chance to taste it.

How could I say no? Ice cream is one of my all-time favorite foods, and I'm always on the lookout for new premium ice cream.

They said they would send me 8 pints so that I could hold a small party and share it with friends, family, or coworkers. I had given myself about 15 minutes in the morning to put the ice cream away before heading out for a work meeting in the morning.

I opened the door.

There stood the delivery man, holding a box about the size of a small freezer.

"I got one more in the truck for you!" he chirped as he ran back towards the truck.

I stood at the door, stunned.

He soon drove away, leaving me with two huge boxes at the base of the staircase leading up to the kitchen.

They were so heavy, I could not lift them by myself. I pushed them up the staircase to the living room area where I opened them up.

Why would 8 pints require such ridiculous packaging?

Whaaaaaaattt??!!

They had accidentally shipped me eight 8-pint packs.

Yes indeed. I had SIXTY-FOUR pints of ice cream and just a normal-sized refrigerator at home.

What's a girl to do?

At this point I knew I was going to be late for my work meeting. There was no way I could put all these away in 5-10 minutes.

Seriously, how does one deal with 64 pints of ice cream?

I emailed the person at work and asked for a reschedule, which he kindly obliged.

Meanwhile, I tried pushing the boxes up to the level of the kitchen. I eventually was able to get some of the ice cream pints into the freezer. I left the rest in the styrofoam box (filled with dry ice) knowing the ice cream would last at least one day.

Later on that evening, after desperately calling a few friends and giving away about 15 pints of ice cream, I managed to squeeze the remaining 50 or so into my freezer.

Yes, I had to throw away a bunch of old stuff and move other stuff into the refrigerator, but I somehow managed to get it done.

A couple weeks later, as promised, I had a party at my house for about 30+ people who all sampled the three flavors that were sent to me.

Guests munched on ice cream while I asked them their opinions about the three flavors.
Tons of Brownie 
This first flavor is a simple vanilla based ice cream with "tons of brownies" mixed in. Those that liked it enjoyed the generous chunks of brownies that were relatively evenly spread throughout. Out of the three flavors, however, this one was the least popular. More than one person thought the brownies did not give the overall ice cream enough of a deep chocolate-y flavor. Several people found the ice cream too sweet.

Personally, I also found the overload of brownies a bit too sweet for me. The brownies did not necessarily contribute much of a deep, quality chocolate flavor to the ice cream. Instead, it mostly added unnecessary sweetness.
Copper Kettle Caramel
This second ice cream was pretty popular with the guests. More than one person liked the surprisingly "pop" of caramel flavor you get when you bite into the chocolate covered caramel pieces. People liked the rich, creamy texture of the ice cream overall.  Some guests also found this ice cream to be overall a bit too sweet.

Personally, I had expected to like the Copper Kettle Caramel the best out of the three because I'm a huge caramel/burnt sugar fan and typically love anything made with those ingredients. Surprisingly, although I thought it was reasonably tasty, I also found this flavor to be a bit overwhelming. I think the generous amounts of chocolate covered caramels inside the ice cream was too much, causing a sort of in-your-face saturated sweet experience that didn't quite suit my preferences. 

I may be in the minority here since I am quite sensitive to desserts that are very sweet. The types of people who love desserts that are full of sweet and gooey chocolate-y and caramel-y chunks of stuff may really enjoy this (and there were definitely guests who picked this as their favorite).

Black Hills Strawberry Rhubarb
The Black Hills Strawberry Rhubarb was a clear winner out of the three that we sampled. It was by far the most popular ice cream served that night. The strawberry ice cream had an authentic and solid strawberry flavor. The small pieces of pie crust mixed throughout the ice cream added a complex, cookie-like texture that I liked. It also tempered the sweetness of the ice cream. There were frozen bits of jam spread throughout the ice cream - something I was not a huge fan of because, again, it made the ice cream a bit too sweet. Interestingly, no one could actually taste any rhubarb flavor in this ice cream (though, to be fair, most people admitted to not knowing exactly what rhubarb tastes like).

At the end of the night, I gave each guest a pint to take home. Almost everyone requested the Strawberry Rhubarb, and I actually ran out of that one before all the guests had left.

A funny comment became, "if you want the Strawberry Rhubarb, you should leave the party NOW before it runs out."

General Thoughts
Second Street Creamery is making some unique flavors of ice cream, many of which have cute, personal stories attached to them.

The ice cream is reasonably dense and quite creamy. It is definitely better than your average supermarket ice cream (e.g., Hood, Breyers, Dreyers, Edy's, etc), although it do es not quite reach the level of the highest level premium ice creams, such as Haagan Daaz, Ben & Jerry's, and any of the local artisanal brands.

 In general, the flavors are good, but not as refined and subtle as the best premium ice creams I've had. They seem to achieve "bang" from intense, bold flavors such as the chocolate covered caramel pieces, large chunks of brownies, or a mish-mash of strawberry jam, frozen strawberries, and pie crust.

The biggest consistent feedback is that the ice cream is a bit too sweet, at least for the Asian palate. At the same time, most of those same people told me they thought the strawberry rhubarb ice cream was very good - the least sweet of the bunch.

Would I buy this in a supermarket? Depends on the cost. I think if they price this somewhere in between the super premium ice creams and the more "ordinary" supermarket ice creams, they will do quite well. However, if given the choice between 2nd Street Creamery ice cream and Haagan Daaz or Ben & Jerry's, I might still pick one of those brands. Of course, these days I usually make my own or get them from my favorite ice cream place.

In any event, it's still a perfectly fine ice cream. As I said, my guests absolutely loved the strawberry rhubarb ice cream, and several really liked the other two flavors as well. If you have a sweet tooth, you may not think these ice cream flavors are too sweet at all. You may, in fact, think they are perfect.

Epilogue
I'm so relieved. I now only have 10 pints left in the freezer. I'm thrilled to get my freezer space back.

Thanks to all my guests for happily eating the ice cream and each taking home a pint to enjoy! You've all helped me immensely!

Scenes from the Ice Cream Party


Disclaimer - I received the 64 pints of ice cream for free from 2nd Street Creamery. All the opinions are my own.

Ippudo

This is the fourth post in the Eating the Big Apple series. Other posts include Soba Koh, Sylvia's Restaurant (Gospel Brunch), and Torrisi Italian Specialties

There's one ramen place in New York that I keep hearing about over and over again.

That's right -  the Japanese export, Ippudo.

We knew friends who made it a point to eat there every single time they visited the Big City. In a New York Times article, top New York chefs listed it as a favorite go-to spot to visit during their off nights. Plus, we'd heard about the insane line and long waits.

What is it about ramen that causes such craziness to ensue?

And has it always been this way?

Surprise surprise - ramen traces its origins back to China. In the late 19th century when Japan finally opened its doors to outsiders, Chinese immigrants gravitated to Yokohama and started opening noodles shops. Furthermore, Japanese soldiers returning after the second Sino-Japanese War brought back knowledge about Chinese noodles, many set up Chinese restaurants in Japan.

As time went by, the Japanese incorporated their own flavors into noodle soups, such as miso, tonkotsu broth, and nori (seaweed), thus creating "ramen", their own unique version of this noodle soup. The invention of the instant noodle in 1958 (from a Taiwanese-Japanese guy named Momofuku Ando who eventually founded Nissin) made ramen accessible to all at home. After "Top Ramen" was introduced to the US in 1970, ramen even became an American staple for fast food.

In recent years, however, a new obsession around handmade, dare-I-say "artisanal" ramen  has been on the rise. People are keenly interested in ramen made with intensely flavored broths (cooked for 10-20 hours!), special pork of particular heritage breeds, and fresh, handmade noodles.

New York was one of the first cities to fuel this obsession, partly due to the entrance of Ippudo in 2008.  Ever since Ippudo opened in New York, it has been consistently crowded, always harboring long lines and hour-long waits. Even though there are two locations in New York now, we still had to wait 45 minutes on a random Thursday night at 10PM for a seat at the original East Village location.

Maybe there's something about ramen that makes it more and more appealing the closer you get to midnight?

Hirata Buns (2 pieces - Pork or Chicken $9 / Vegetable $8)

In any event, we finally scored a seat around 11PM after waiting seemingly forever in the crowded bar area of the hip, trendy restaurant.

We began with Hirata Buns, steamed buns filled with pork and cabbage served with Ippudo's original spicy buns sauce. The buns were decently soft and the pork was flavorful. Bryan still much prefers the pork belly buns from Momofuku, but these were fine as a starter snack. For those who don't like pork, you can also choose chicken or eggplant & eringi mushrooms.

Akamaru Modern $15

Bryan ordered the Akamaru Modern, which consists of their thick and creamy "Tonkotsu" (pork) broth topped with their secret "Umami Dama" miso paste, pork chashu, cabbage, sesame kikurage, mushrooms, scallions, and garlic oil. The menu suggested topping the soup with nitamago (seasoned salted boiled egg) and kakuni (braised pork belly). Bryan opted for both (of course).

The broth was absolutely beautiful - full of umami and deep, creamy, intense flavors.  It was rich, but not overwhelmingly so. Just about perfect. The noodles, on the other hand, were a bit on the soft side, and we wished for something just a bit more al dente.

I believe my ramen was a special and thus not on the normal menu (arghh - which means I can't tell you exactly what it was because I did not write it down!!). Alas, I do remember that I got it topped with an onsen egg (poached egg), which was awesome.  Though the overall dish was quite tasty and enjoyable, I similarly thought the noodles were a bit too soft.

Bryan was thrilled when he read about "Kae dama", described as "a way to get extra noodles." Bryan thinks the noodle to broth ratio is wrong in virtually every noodle dish under the sun. Yes, there's never enough noodles and always too much sauce or broth (I'm the exact opposite, by the way).

According to the menu, when you have almost finished your first serving of noodles, order by saying, "Kae-dama, please". In a few minutes the server will bring you another 'ball of noodles', and put it in the soup.

Bryan was so excited he made sure to leave plenty of broth behind so that he could order another set of noodles. Even though we were both stuffed by this point (after all, we had just snacked on all sorts of goodies at the Saveur Food Blog Awards Celebration earlier that night), he still finished all his "Kae-dama" noodles.

General Thoughts
Overall, Ippudo is a fun place and definitely worth visiting. The menu alone is full of so many different kinds of cool Izakaya-type dishes (not just ramen) that I'd love to return just to try some of the other things (think fried lotus root chips, shishito peppers, and Japanese cucumber salad). 

The ramen is also very good. True, we were a bit disappointed by the texture of the noodles. However,  I think most people won't care as much as we do. Clearly, the place is mobbed, and many, many people are perfectly happy with the noodles. 

In any event, the broths are still excellent, and overall the noodle dishes are still very, very satisfying to slurp.

Ippudo New York 
65 4th Ave New York
NY 10003

Taste of Kinsay with Chef Jason Doo - Take 2

Do you remember Jason Doo?

I wrote about him a couple months ago. Chef Jason Doo is a rising chef who worked at Menton as a chef de partie before traveling to Asia for more culinary exploration and research. Back in February, I was invited to an incredible dinner at his home where I got to taste fascinating renditions of royal imperial cuisine, Asian street food, and creative fusion off-shoots inspired by Chef Doo's rigorous training at places like Menton.

Imagine my uncontainable excitement and utter curiosity when, in June, I was invited to a second dinner by Jason Doo.

I knew from the last dinner that this guy's creativity has no bounds and his food is really like nothing I've had at restaurants in Boston. Better yet, he had just returned from an extended journey in Asia where he had explored street foods, tea plantations, and even Michelin-starred Asian restaurants.

I couldn't wait to see what he had to offer.

I almost gasped when I saw the incredible kitchen at this house. This is Jason's grandmother's kitchen (isn't it gorgeous?). She's half Italian and half Chinese, so she has a love for both types of cuisines (evidenced by things like a dedicated wok burner and two huge ovens!). Here's Jason and his crew hard at work getting everything ready for the meal.

Pre-Dinner "Snacks"
As the kitchen hummed away with activity, the guests mingled in the living room and enjoyed some light "bar snacks".

Here, we have white Sesame and Cocoa Nib Tuiles.

Though they look black on the plate, when you hold them up to the light, they change completely.  Chef Doo had made a black sesame version of this snack last time, which was one of my favorites snacks at that meal. This time, the "cracker" has become more refined. It's a lot thinner and it's also circular. Buttery, crispy, and sweet, it was the perfect bite to whet the appetite for more.

The Pork Cracklings (Puffed Style) with Black Lime and Coconut Cream Powder were savory, crunchy, and airy, inspired by a pork crackling appetizer Jason had enjoyed at a Mexican resturant.

These gorgeous large rice crackers, Xianbei with Chili Threads and Dried Shrimp, were definitely one of my favorite snacks this time around. I'm a sucker for rice crackers to begin with, but this handmade version was incredible. It had the perfect, (addictive) ratio of sweet and savory plus a bit of kick from the chili and fragrant umami from the dried shrimp. The cracker had a nice, substantial "crunch" that made it very satisfying to eat.

Honestly, I went back for seconds a few times, even though each chip was quite large and I knew deep down inside I needed to save room.

Other handmade chips, such as these Homemade Shrimp Chips, were also quite tasty.
I'm a huge fan of cashews, so it wasn't hard to appreciate these Caramelized Nuts with Cardamom, which were crunchy and slightly sweet.

The last item we had before dinner began was a Char Siu Roasted Octopus with Garlic and Parsley Vinaigrette. The octopus was tender and really, really flavorful. We loved the fusion of Eastern and Western flavors in this dish, which was Bryan's favorite of all the pre-dinner bites.

The Dinner

Jason impressed us beyond belief last time when he offered us a wide assortment of bread that included a Boule of Nine Sacred Grains; the Dowager's Corn Cake, Tangzong 65° C Milk Bread, and Scallion Pancake. This time, we munched on golden-brown, buttery multi-grain loaves that reminded us of corn bread.

We began this meal with a gorgeous Tomato Salad with preserved persimmon vinaigrette, pickled green tomatoes, and sea kale.

The tomatoes were served alongside an elegant assortment of House Pickled Vegetables.
Next came a Chinese classic, the Luo Buo Gao, or Turnip Cake, presented in a very non-classic way with homemade X.O. sauce, local turnip, pickled turnips, and turnip greens.

You can't see the actual turnip cake that well in the first picture, so here's a picture of the turnip cake while it was still being prepared in the kitchen.

The next course, the Wild Black Walnut Soup, was one of my favorites, and, according to Jason, consists of very, very hard-to-find ingredients. This creamy, intensely flavored cold soup is hard to describe, but it was extremely fragrant, slightly sweet, and oh-so-decadent. The portion size was small (each guest only had an ounce or two), which made it that much more to precious as we savored each velvety sip.

We briefly visited some Chinese dim sum classics like these delicate and flaky mini-scallion pancakes.

Jason also made his own version of "Snowflake" Pot Stickers made from crysanthemum and squash leaves. Aside from in Beijing, I seldom see pot stickers served this way here in the U.S. These were fantastic and totally reminded me of China.

We had some vegetarians in our party, so Jason kindly made certain vegetarian dishes for them. The first one was a Taiwanese inspired "Oyster Omelet" made with oyster mushrooms, salted oyster root, and Sweet Autumn farm eggs.  The traditional Taiwanese oyster omelet is made with oysters, not oyster mushrooms. Everyone raved about this dish.

Jason used a combination of the sous vide technique and super-hot oven glazing in order to make several maltose roasted ducks. We had a duo of duck enjoyed in two different ways - a duck "slider" (West) as well as a duck bun (East).

The next course was one of my favorites. Jason deep fried an entire Witch Sole and served it with Garlic Scapes. I believe the fish was marinated in Chinese "yellow wine" (a grain-based alcoholic drink - 黃酒) and possibly miso and something sweet. Whatever it was, the flavors were fantastic. You could eat the bones as well because the frying process made them so brittle it was like almost like eating candy.  
  
This has got to be one of the most beautiful fried rice dishes I've ever seen. Made for the vegetarians (although they were so kind that they shared it with everyone), this exotic Bamboo Fried Rice consisted of a mix of pickled bamboo, salted bamboo, lemongrass, smoked tofu, and Johnny Jump Ups (the purple flowers).

The food was phenomenal (again!) and after all the hard work was done, Jason came out to greet us and talk to us a little about the food.

We finished the evening by tasting a lovely homemade strawberry sorbet (served with both fresh and dried wild strawberries), which served as a great palate cleanser and segue into the crazy, overwhelming dessert spread that followed.

From top left, clockwise: Macanese Custard Tart, Pate Fruits, Pineapple Cookies, Almond Cookies, Longjing Tea Cookies, Okara Doughnuts, Milk Candies, Chocolate Panda Cookies.

Macanese Custard Tarts are inspired by the custard tarts sold in Macau, which are heavily influenced by Portuguese egg tarts (yum!). Longjing tea (or Dragon Well Tea) is a Chinese pan-fried green tea from Zhejiang province in China. It's a high-end tea known for its complex flavors. Okara is the pulp from soy beans that is left over once soy milk is made.

Just like last time, Jason overwhelmed us with this immense tray of mignardises: Hong Kong Orange Candies, Sichuan Peppercorn Bon Bons, Salted Kumquat Chocolates,Kaffir Lime Chocolates, Sesame Bon Bons, and Black Sugar Chocolates.

 As always, super kudos to the tireless helpers who made this evening possible.
 
As a good-by present, Jason gave all the guests small containers full of his homemade Lady Apple Wine as well as his Homemade XO Sauce! What a cool take-away gift!
I was thrilled to be able to enjoy Chef Jason Doo's creative Chinese cooking again. It's a fascinating exploration into so many areas of Chinese cuisine with which I am just not that familiar - namely royal imperial cuisine, exotic Chinese teas, regional snacks, and fusion dishes he's created drawing from his diverse training and background.
Thanks so much Chef Doo and all who were involved for an unforgettable evening.