Bartley's Burgers

You can't visit Harvard Square without trying a burger at Bartley's. This iconic hamburger place has been grilling up burgers in this same location since 1960. Mr. Bartley himself is 78 years old and still works there sometimes. There is always a line out the door on weekends, and for good reason! After trying so many burgers in Boston, I still consider Bartley's one of my all-time favorites. Here are the reasons why.

1. The Menu is Irreverently Hilarious
The menu stays very current and lightly but equally makes fun of all. Choose from "The Viagra" (a blue cheese burger),  The "Ted Kennedy" (a plump, liberal amount of burger), or the "Deval Patrick" (will tax your tastebuds - includes japalenos, jack cheese, and salsa). Many of the burgers are named after local politicians, sports stars, or other people that just happen to be in the news at the time. For example, some more recent additions include burgers named after Harvard Professor Skip Gates, Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown, and US Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.

THE AMERICAN IDOL
(even Simon would love this) topped w/ bacon cheese, grilled mushrooms & onions, w/ fries) $9.99

2. The Burgers Are Freakin' Amazing
Let's start with the meat. I think a 7 oz burger is the perfect size. It's just big enough that it's filling yet not so monstrous that  I can't finish the entire thing. It's also super thick (East Coast style), which means the outside can be beautifully crispy while the inside stays juicy and moist. I also love the taste of the beef. I have no idea what grade or type of beef they use, but it has a fantastic beefy flavor that I just love.

THE YUPPIE BURGER

with boursin cheese, bacon, and french fries $9.49

3. A Huge Variety of Fun "Toppings"

The burgers change frequently, although many of the classics also stick around. They use many sorts of unusual ingredients, such as boursin cheese (pictured above in the Yuppie Burger), guacamole (see Tom Brady burger below), jalapenos, sauerkraut, and pineapples - not to mention most regular ingredients such as other cheeses, grilled onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, lettuce, and on and on and on.

You can customize your burgers too, and the staff is quite skilled at picking the closest "preset" burger that you need to modify.

4. Delicious Sides

You have to try their sweet potato fries. They are absolutely amazing. They come out hot, crispy, yet still moist on the inside, lightly dusted with a sprinkle of salt. I found them quite addictive, probably because of that perfect combination of sweet + salty. Their onion rings are also really really good. Bryan loves onion rings and always orders that as his side.

5. The Lime Rickeys and Shakes

I usually hate drinks that are too sweet, but I found this lime rickey to be perfect. It's basically soda water, fresh squeezed limes, simple syrup, and ice. Absolutely refreshing! They are also known for their frappes (milkshakes for those of you who don't understand Bostonian English), although I have never tried one.

THE TOM BRADY
(Ladies, make a pass at this) w/ cheddar, guacamole, lettuce, tomato, red onions, and fries $9.95

6. The Vibe
The decor of the place is super unique, and it really looks like it has not changed a bit since it opened in 1960. The walls are adorned with all sorts of fun knick knacks, like random road signs, funny posters, and even a random bust of Elvis. It looks like a crazy college dorm room on steroids! The tables are cramped closely together, and you can see the cooks making the hamburgers right there.




THE JOE BIDEN
(Hair Club For Men Member & VP) Bacon cheese & BBQ sauce, w/ french fries $9.50

Really, this is just a fun place to go. Yes, it's touristy (it calls itself a Harvard landmark, after all), and yes there are long lines out the door. But it's so worth it! It's such a fun, festive place and the burgers are really, really good.

Mr. Bartley's Burger Cottage
1246 Massachusetts Ave
Cambridge, MA 02138

Slow Roasted Salmon with Dill

If I could, I would eat almost all fish raw.  Why ruin something when it is already close to perfection in its natural state? Cooking too often dries out the delicate flesh of seafood, especially fish. Salmon especially tastes really different cooked compared to raw. However, you can't always guarantee that your salmon is fresh enough to eat raw. Therefore, sometimes you must cook it.

Well, if I must cook it, why not at least cook it minimally?

I've tried cooking salmon at low-temperatures once before, with my sous-vide technique that I tried several weeks ago. I love that method, but I also realize most people don't have a vacuum sealer, a Magic Cooker, nor their own Sous-vide machine at home. In the comments of that post, a reader suggested to me an alternate way to slow-roast salmon in the oven.

This version is very similar, but takes a little less time and uses a bit more heat. It all comes down to this: the lower the temperature, the longer the cooking time, and the lower the risk of overcooking. To save time, you can increase the temperature and reduce the time, but you run the risk of overcooking. This combination seems to achieve a decent balance between the two.

Some recipes suggest cutting small slits in the salmon to render excess fat. In my case I'm not sure if it made a difference. Has anyone else ever tried this?

Slow Roasted Salmon
Ingredients
1 lb Salmon filet, cut into 4 equally sized pieces
olive oil
salt (preferably sea salt or kosher salt)
pepper (preferably freshly ground)
herbs (e.g., fresh dill!)

Preheat oven to 250 °F. Cut salmon into equally sized pieces and allow the pieces to warm up to room temperature. Season salmon by lightly coating the meat in olive oil, salt, pepper, and herbs. Bake for about 20 minutes.

The resulting fish will still be very soft and moist and will retain its gorgeous bright orange color. I used wild Alaskan sockeye salmon here, which is leaner but is quite flavorful. I think my favorite is still Alaskan King Salmon, though, which I most recently prepared via sous-vide in a magic cooker. I find Alaskan king salmon to be wonderfully fatty, rich, but definitely more expensive!

In any event, low heat cooking, similar to sous-vide cooking, will ensure that your fish will not overcook into a sad, dry version of what it once was.

Enjoy!

Myers + Chang (and an unexpected surprise)

Totally unsuspecting. Completely oblivious. Little did we know what was actually going on.

Oh little did we know.

We had been invited to a lovely dinner at Myers + Chang hosted by My Blog Spark, a blog network I had recently joined. I was so excited. I have always wanted to try out this Asian restaurant by Joanne Chang (of sticky-bun fame) and her husband, Christopher Myers (founder/owner of various well known restaurants in Boston including Rialto, Great Bay, Radius, and Via Matta).

Joanne and Christopher, who met while working at Rialto back in the late nineties, are an interesting couple. Both studied at Harvard, yet left their original careers to pursue their passions for food. Joanne became a pastry chef, training in several prestigious places before finally opening up Flour Bakery in 2000. Chris has never had formal restaurant training, yet has successfully opened multiple restaurants throughout Boston.

Joanne and Chris felt that Boston really needed a fun, hip Asian restaurant that would serve the foods Joanne grew up eating and have a trendy and stylish atmosphere characteristic of Chris's other restaurants.

Would it deliver?

The decor was definitely very inviting. I loved the Asian accents all over the place, such as the beautiful paper lanterns strung in a line against the wall. The space was big, bright, with lots of light coming from the dragon-decorated windows.

Plus, the bar menu looked interesting. Nice drink choices, great, hip vibe. We were off to a great start.

Bryan and I settled into our cozy table and started off with some drinks. I liked how the dining space was an interesting mix of casual and upscale modern. One the one hand, they kept disposable chopsticks bundled up at the table reminiscent of casual noodle joints and used cut up Chinese newspapers as place mats. On the other hand, the surrounding decor was trendy and modern, and the food selection was definitely creative and unique.

Crispy Spring Rolls - garlic chives, bamboo, shitake mushrooms
We started out with these crispy spring rolls. Instead of the usual cabbage filling, these spring rolls were chock full of garlic chives. I personally loved the abundance of fresh vegetables in this spring roll, and I liked how the garlic chives gave the spring roll a unique flavor.

Mama Chang's Pork and Chive Potstickers
I'm a little biased when it comes to potstickers or dumplings because I  prefer dumplings that have quite a bit of vegetables. These potstickers were more reminiscent of your typical dumpling, which is mostly pork with a few bits of chives. The flavors were solid and they were fried perfectly. Of course, no comparion to my favorite dumpling places in the world or the US, but it was still enjoyable and definitely could compete with the best dumplings in Boston.

Wok Roasted Mussels - lemongrass, grilled garlic toast
Bryan though these mussels were really good. The sauce had a beautiful fragrant flavor that tasted great when dipped with bread. I personally thought it was borderline too salty, but again, I tend to think that a lot. Bryan thought it was fine.

Chilled Dan Dan Noodles with Fresh Peanuts and Chili Sambal
This was our least favorite dish out of all the appetizers. The sauce was very thick and rich, yet still managed to taste undersalted and a little bland. The noodle texture was alright, but overall I found the dish to be bit to thick and heavy for my tastes.

And then things started to get weird. After our appetizers, we just sat there and waited a long long time. The waitress came out and apologized using the the ever-so-famous-and-overused phrase, "the kitchen is experiencing some technical difficulties."


Technical difficulties? What kind of machines or tools are they using to cook our food???

She offers us another drink, which we gladly accept.
Shrimp Chips

Another 15-20 minutes go by. The waitress comes back again and apologizes some more.

"Would you like some shrimp chips?"

Sure. We looked anxiously at our watches. It had been well over an hour already. What was wrong?

Then finally . .finally . . the food arrived. Two large bowls, served family style. Sweet & Spicy shrimp and Szechuan-style chicken.

I remember remarking to Bryan, "these dishes are really Americanized." Earlier we had struggled to pick entrees that actually looked appetizing to us. After quickly picking out the appetizers, we had to choose between dishes like General Gau's chicken, Sweet & Sour Chicken, Beef and Broccoli . . . you get the idea.

Sweet & Spicy Shrimp

Szechuan Style Chicken

The Truth Revealed
And then just as we were about to take our first bite they sprung the surprise on us. Guess what? Our main entrees were actually frozen dinners! Could we tell? Did we think it was from Myers + Chang? In fact, it was not! This dinner was actually sponsored by General Mills, who owns the Wang Chai Ferry Brand. We were eating Wang Chai Ferry Frozen Dinners!They had set up this special dinner to see whether people would be able to tell the difference.

The people around us gasped in surprise. Some were amazed, thinking that this food was really good and "they had no idea." Even Bryan remarked, " you couldn't tell that it was frozen."

OK, I guess he's right. And I'll concede that the texture of the noodles were decent. In all honesty, the food didn't taste all that bad. It's not a bad weeknight meal, especially if your other choice is to get greasy  Chinese takeout anyway. It definitely tasted healthier than Chinese take-out, and it's probably cheaper and reasonably easy to prepare. Out of the two we tried, I definitely liked the Szechuan-style chicken better. I thought the sweet & spicy shrimp was way too sweet and totally reminded me of that saucy Americanized Chinese food you get at take-out restaurants. The Szechuan-style chicken was better. Like I said earlier, the texture of the noodles was decent, and it was reasonably enjoyable.

Having said all that, these dishes just did not taste like something Myers + Chang would make, which is why I wasn't that surprised. It totally explains why the menu seemed so weird when we got it. I still remember looking at other tables (who had received their main entrees well before we did) and thinking that the food just didn't look that appetizing. It was just too different from the rest of the food at Myers + Chang, which is presented in a much more delicate, artful way.

Chocolate and Cocoa Nib Terrine with Vietnamese Coffee Sauce

"Technical Difficulties"
And why did the kitchen have so much trouble? Turns out that (surprise!) the Myers + Chang staff was not used to cooking frozen dinners in bulk. In fact, MyBlogSpark had to purchase a microwave for the event. Unfortunately, that was not enough to solve all the problems. The commercial stoves were way too hot for your typical frozen dinner. The result? The cooks kept burning the food and having to start over.

Thankfully, they gave us dessert afterwards. These are two desserts off of the regular Myers + Chang menu. Both were fine, though neither really wow-ed me.

Coconut Cream Pie with Lime Whipped Cream

Epilogue
I thought the idea was really clever and it would have been really interesting to see how it would work if executed properly. Unfortunately for us, the experiment was fractured in many ways, starting from the kitchen "technical difficulties" to the fact that they gave away the surprise before we had a chance to really taste and evaluate the food objectively.

I still think the food at Myers + Chang is reasonably solid (everything else except for the entrees are actual dishes at the restaurant). Nothing is mind-blowingly amazing, but the restaurant does achieve what Joanne and Christopher wanted to achieve: a hip, trendy place in the South End that serves good Chinese food at relatively reasonable prices.

I'd be willing to go back and try an actual real meal there!

And the frozen dinners?
Don't worry. Myers + Chang is not serving frozen dinners on a regular basis. This was a one time promotional event sponsored by General Mills and MyBlogSpark.

You can get these frozen dinners (sold under the Wang Chai Ferry brand) at most supermarkets. They have several different types of Americanized Chinese dishes such as orange chicken, kung pao chicken, beef & broccoli, sweet & sour chicken, and shrimp lo mien. It takes less than 15 minutes to prepare, and everything is included (the rice, the meat, and the veggies). It's cheaper and healthier than ordering Chinese takeout, and it tastes decent.

MyBlogSpark was kind enough to give me five coupons for a free package of Wang Chai Ferry frozen dinner. If you're interested in trying one, just comment below letting me know you would like one. I will mail a coupon to the first five commenters who express interest.

Myers + Chang
1145 Washington St
Boston, MA 02118


Disclaimer: Time to time I receive products, meals, etc. for free. I do not receive any payment for these posts/reviews. The views expressed in the posts are completely my own. This meal, the giveaway coupons, and a $50 gift card to cover the cost of parking and other incidentals, was provided by 
MyBlogSpark.

Boston Luxury Chocolate Salon Tasting

Trying to avoid refined sugars? Ha! Forget it!

I had the pleasure of being one of the judges for the 1st Annual Boston Luxury Chocolate Salon. Judges were sent a huge package filled with various artisanal chocolates from chocolatiers all around the US. We then judged on various aspects such as best flavor, most luxurious, most delicious ingredient combinations, and so on.

I was amazed at the level of artistry that went into some of these chocolates, such as the beautiful gems you see pictured above by William Dean Chocolate.

I know you can't lick the screen, but I can at least give you a visual tour, and maybe a few descriptions of what we thought of these chocolates. :)

From left to right:PB&J chocolate, crème brule custard, fig, orange, and cheesecake

These were my favorite in terms of artistry, WOW factor, and all around presentation. Each chocolate truffle looked hand painted. The box itself was sturdy, shiny, and resembled an expensive jewelry box. Indeed, they were filled with edible jewels inside! Truly beautiful works of art.

I also loved their fancied PB&J bar, which was made with high quality peanut butter and dark chocolate.

Marti Chocolatt
I think these were overall my favorite chocolates. They weren't quite as dramatically beautiful as the William Dean chocolates, but they had more refined, sophisticated flavors (and they are still beautiful!). We had rose tea with raspberry in dark chocolate, purple yam in white chocolate, and a chevre (goat cheese) chocolate. I actually didn't like the chevre one (it tasted a bit stinky to me), but I loved the rose tea with raspberry and really enjoyed the purple yam in white chocolate as well.


Dean's Sweets
The chocolates from Dean's Sweets have interesting unique flavors that work really well. We tried lemon apricot chevre (very nice!), coffee, and Maine sea salt caramel.


Dolce Bella
I like Dolce Bella's philosophy of trying to preserve the "just-picked" fruit flavor. They pick their ingredients fresh off the plant and process them into chocolate within an hour of harvest. I have to say that the just-picked flavors were really nice and bright. We tried "just picked raspberry," "just picked chocolate mint," and "peppered rosemary orange" (which I actually did not like). I loved how the mint actually tasted like fresh mint leaves, not just mint oil.

Dolce Bella's Almond Toffee
This tasted like regular toffee -nothing particularly special, though solid.

The Chocolate Truffle
This company makes more "normal" traditional chocolates, such as chocolate covered pretzels, chocolate covered cookies, and PB&J bars reminiscent of the sandwiches you ate growing up. I thought the chocolates tasted fine, although they seemed a bit less refined than some of the other artisanal chocolates we had tried. This is comfort chocolate at its finest.

Similarly, The Chocolate Truffle's Cranberry Caramel Turtles were reasonably good, but nothing made them stand out above the rest.

These truffles from The Chocolate Truffle were HUGE and we were already getting a little tired of chocolate! In general, we thought these truffles were too big and too sweet.

Aphrodite Chocolates

We then tried some creative flavors from Aphrodite: matcha green tea (pretty good but a bit too sweet), Scotland cream (love the shot of alcohol inside!), cherry croquant (really enjoyed how the outside is crunchy, though it was a bit too sour), and cappuccino (nice flavors, but a bit too sweet).

Amano makes various hand-crafted chocolate bars with different, unique origins. Here, we have chocolate from Venezuela (smoky, toasted, almost woodsy), Madagascar (fruiter, creamy, less interesting), and Chuao (fruity).

Dark Chocolate Quinoa
The only Eco bar in my batch, this quinoa bar was "interesting." Here are some quotes from my fellow tasters.

“I like Nestles Crunch Better.”
“The chocolate is pretty good.”
“The rice is lacking . . .needs more crunch.”
“Kind of soggy.”

So there you have it. It was probably the most chocolate I have ever consumed in two sittings (we tried but we really really couldn't bring ourselves to finish it in one sitting!!).

Final awards will be announced in August! Stay tuned.

Smith & Wollensky $50 Giveaway Winners

View from the top of Smith & Wollensky

Thanks to everyone who participated in the Smith & Wollensky giveaway!

The first winner is Abbe who said, "my favorite steak place in Boston might be Grill 23. I'm all about the sides!"

Second winner is Cavitybuster who said, "my favorite steak place is Wolfgangs on Lexington Ave in NYC. The porterhouse for 2 is delicious! Very similar to Peter Lugar's in Brooklyn, but this restaurant is right in anhattan and easy to get to."

Please e-mail me your address at jen[a]tinyurbankitchen[dot]com. If I don't hear from you by this Friday, I will pick a new winner.

Have fun in Boston's castle and enjoy the summer grill menu!

For anyone who's interested in the tour: just make a note of it in your reservation and they will gladly take you on the same tour that I got.

Have fun!

Crenellations at the top of Smith & Wollensky

Tuna Tartare

One of my favorite sauces is spicy mayo. You know which sauce I'm talking about - the one they use for spicy tuna rolls or spicy salmon rolls. It has an addictive flavor of its own and works really well with all sorts of raw fish.

Granted, please don't waste the sauce on really fresh fish that can stand on its own. But for your ordinary everyday roll?  Why not?

Tartare typically costs less because it's made with inferior or uglier materials. The most beautiful pieces of fish are cut into sashimi or nigiri slices. The remaining bits, which still often have great flavor but possibly compromised texture, must be chopped up and served some other way.

The ones that don't have as good flavor can easily be enhanced with the addition of this magical spicy mayo. It's a great and simple way to dress up less expensive fish into something fancy and delicious.

I recently visited New Deal Fish Market to check out their fish selection. I asked if they had toro (tuna belly, one of my favorite foods in the world). Unfortunately, they had sold out of toro, but they did have this less expensive cut of fatty tuna (pictured above, bottom left piece with the stripes).

Carl Fantasia, the owner, told me that this cut was more flavorful than normal tuna (maguro) because it had more fat. You can tell too - it's got the classic pink color of toro and tons of marbling. However, this part of the fish has a lot of connective tissue (all those white stripes you see), and therefore the only way to really prepare this fish is to chop it up into small pieces or painstakingly remove the connective tissue.

I took his advice, sort of. I painstakingly removed the connective tissue AND chopped it all up into little pieces (once I realized that the tiny slivers of meat between the connective tissue were pretty much useless on their own).

I mixed it up with some spicy mayo and, viola! I had my own tuna tartare.


Spicy Tuna Tartare
1/2 tsp Sriracha Sauce (Asian chili sauce)
1/4 tsp Sesame Oil
2 T Mayonnaise

Raw fish, finely chopped

Combine Sriracha sauce, mayonnaise and sesame oil in a bowl and mix together well. Add more Sriracha sauce and/or sesame oil to taste. Combine with chopped up tuna and serve.

If you'd like, you can stuff the finished tartare into a small cup and invert it onto a plate for a more dramatic presentation. Top with something green, like scallions (as pictured), parsley, or chives.

Note: please make sure to purchase fish suitable for eating raw. This usually means it's really fresh (you can always ask the fishmonger) or it has been frozen for a specific amount of time according to FDA guidelines.

Enjoy!

Michelin Starred Tartare
Here are a few other tartares from some very nice Michelin-starred chefs. Can you guess where these are from? (click on the photo to find out).

Finally, A Note on Sustainability
Unfortunately, bluefin tuna is highly overfished and is not a sustainable choice. According to the Monteray Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch, all populations of bluefin tuna are currently being caught faster than they can reproduce. The better choice for tuna would be certain types of yellowfin tuna (also known as "ahi" sometimes), U.S. Atlantic bigeye tuna, or certain types of albacore tuna. You can see the entire list here.

I'm personally very guilty of being woefully unaware of whether the food I am eating is sustainable or not. The thought of bluefin tuna going extinct because of our current unsustainable practices makes me sad, and therefore I've decided to try harder to become better educated about the seafood I eat.

Related Posts
Spicy Chili Mayo
Homemade Chirashi (New Deal Fish Market)

Giveaway
Today is the last day to enter the Smith & Wollensky $50 gift certificate Giveaway. Just come here and tell me your favorite steak or burger place. Drawing occurs TONIGHT at midnight.