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Ericandblueboy

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Everything posted by Ericandblueboy

  1. Ericandblueboy
    The bar at L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon in Vegas is built around the kitchen. It is definitely a part of the dining room, not a place for happy hour or waiting area for a table in the dining.
  2. Ericandblueboy
    [The Grand Sichuan is the restaurant my brother talked about. I'm not sure if the Jersey City location is particularly good or all of their locations are equally good. You don't really think about ordering xiao long tang bao at a Sichuan restaurant but there it is. Oh, the menu is laid out quite nicely, i.e., friendly for those who don't know what is or Sichuan or American Chinese.
  3. Ericandblueboy
    No, we had brunch at Hunan Cottage in Fairfield yeterday. Their soup dumpling wasn't anything special. They do have good youtiao, shredded daikon cake, scallion pancake, soy milk, etc. My brother said this place is in Jersey City. I suppose I can ask for the name of the restaurant. I didn't ask because I just assume I'd go with him and he'd know where to go.
  4. Ericandblueboy
    The pizzas at Otto were aweful. We tried 3 pizzas at the same time, all have very crispy bottoms, no chewiness to the crust though. The 3 pizzas were vongole, margherita, and cacio e pepe, The vongole was especially atrocious - small flavorless clams were piled in the center of the pizza which was covered with mozzerella cheese. At least the cacio e pepe was tasty despite its cardboard crust. The verdure were the highlights, spicy rabe, brussels sprouts, eggplant, and mushrooms were all tasty. The coldcuts looked good. The pastas - puttanesca, alla norma (eggplant), carbonara, braise pork shoulder, and crumbled sausage with escarole (this was a little weird, no sauce binding the plate together) were pretty good, a bargain at $9 per plate. I really love the decor of the restaurant - warm earhy colors with simple furniture. My brother says there's a place in Jersey city that makes really good juicy buns, better than Joe's Shanghai and as good as Din Tai Fung. I look forward to trying them on the next trip.
  5. Ericandblueboy
    We made a pit stop at Tony Luke's around 1:30 on a Friday afternoon when the temperature outside was just above freezing. The baby's been fussing so my wife commences feeding the rugrat while I scout out the scene. There's a line of people, around 10, waiting to order. The dining area consisted of picnic tables with one heater while the entrance door stood wide open. No high chair in sight so the decision was made to eat in the car. I got one roast pork broccoli rabe, one cheesesteak wit whiz, and curly fries. The wait to get the food was maybe10 minutes, and I hurried back to our car parked in their lot directly under I-95. Unfortunately my wife insisted that we finish feeding the poopymonster before I can take a bite of my sandwich. For that reason, I have no idea what a piping hot Tony Luke's pork sandwich tastes like. However, their lukewarm pork sandwich is still delicious. It's in the seasoning, which was sorely lacking at Dinic's in Reading Terminal. Second, the pork to rabe ratio was like 3:1, not 1:1 like Dinic's. I did try the cheesesteak, almost ordered the pizza steak but I chickened out at the last second because I wasn't sure if I would like the "red gravy." The steak isn't chopped but I don't think that improves or degrades the sandwich. It's a solid sandwich in my book, as good as the other Phily heavyweights like Pat's, Steve's, Jim's, etc. Blinded folded, I doubt I can tell the difference. The fries were flavored like Arby's except they weren't crispy. As I type away in the wee hours of the night while listening to the crying infant, I realize how soft I've become. I wish Tony Luke's wasn't under a highway and that the place isn't a basically a trailer with an enclosed porch. Why don't they get a stall at Reading or a storefront on South Street?
  6. Ericandblueboy
    We're actually going to Mountain Lakes, NJ and we'll take 95 all the way to Philly, then take 206 north through Princeton. We could go straight through but I l wouldn't want to pass up something good In any case, we'd probably have to stop to feed/change the baby and all that. Tony Luke's sounds like our best bet and I'll probably order what Daniel suggested. Thanks!
  7. Ericandblueboy
    A very thoughtful response. My response would've been "hell no you cheap bastard."
  8. Ericandblueboy
    Going to NJ to see my bro this weekend. Plan on having lunch on the road tomorrow. I really would love to stop in Lexington Market or Attman's but they're kind of a long detour. If we get on the road early enough, maybe we'll stop at Tony Luke's in Philly (it appears to be right off of I-95). Any other thoughts? Doesn't have to be fast food.
  9. Ericandblueboy
    Lots of people like Dale L. because he's flamboyant and outrageous but I didn't think he was really that great of a chef. A look at his performance on season 3 showed him winning quickfire once, was up for elimination 4 times, was in the best performance group 5 times with 1 win. I'll miss his funny lines though.
  10. Ericandblueboy
    What's the point of getting defensive and facetious about an obvious truth? NYC restaurants are better than DC restaurants in general - why get butt-hurt over it? When I go to NYC, it's like a kid in a candy store; they have so many better restaurants than DC that I turn into a glutton (okay, I'm already a glutton, for food and punishment). It's not just the NY Times that points out the faults in DC, one of our posters (Weinoo) recently pointed out that Estadio's bar is a free for all - how uncivilized is that? Are we living in the U.S. or Spain? There's nothing particularly snide about the junk food that's prevalent in our nation's Capitol - it is what it is - junk food. Heck, I wont' even drive from McLean to eat that shit (I get enough shit in McLean).
  11. Ericandblueboy
    The NY Times piece does put down the food at the "nation's Capitol." Just sayin'
  12. Ericandblueboy
    Website says weekends and holidays.
  13. Ericandblueboy
    Todd's chat:
  14. Ericandblueboy
    I agree with your review but I do want to point out that Mark's Duck House, across the street (Rt. 50) from Fortune does pushcart dim sum on weekends. I personally prefer Mark's over Fortune, but Mark's isn't significantly better.
  15. Ericandblueboy
    My point is that's too late if the choice had already been made. Explaining to someone the rules after the fact is absurd in my opinion unless a part of the show is about being cryptic, e.g., in the Amazing Race, I don't think they know the details of the challenge until after they made a choice.
  16. Ericandblueboy
    Since you think it's so clear, let me ask you whether team T-Rex could use salt, pepper, vegetable oil, or garlic? If you interpret the word "only" literally, then presumably they can't use any of the items I mentioned. They can cook the food anyway they want but they can't use any seasoning? Can team Brontosaurus use butter?
  17. Ericandblueboy
    from Tom's blog: I read this to mean that Tom's explanation wasn't very good, and Tiffani didn't know for sure what she could use until after she chose T-Rex. That's sandbagging in my book. In a high-stakes competition, I don't know why they (the producers, Tom C. ,etc.) can't be more informative.
  18. Ericandblueboy
    I went to Oriental Gourmet to check out their brunch. I ordered a youtiao, a shredded daikon pancake, a scallion pancake, and a bowl of beef with tendon noodle soup. Their pancakes are smaller but thicker, which gives them a crispy crust but softer center. The scallion pancake was chock full of scallions, which I really enjoyed. I also liked the daikon pancake. The youtiao had that chemical aftertaste and the beef noodle soup just wasn't that tasty (the soup wasn't particularly beefy and the noodles were lo-mein noodles). The staff was lackluster in the morning and parking was a bitch.
  19. Ericandblueboy
    Went to the downtown location last night. I thought the restaurant looked beautiful but a raw bar with little on it seemed out of place. Anyhow, I wasn't too excited by their selection of low cholesterol appetizer offering so we started with two sides of Brussels sprouts and fingerling potatoes (the sprouts were good because it was cooked with bacon, the potatoes were what we thought they were, nothing exciting). I had the branzino special at $32, which was a whole fish, butterfly filleted (deboned and splayed out on top of broccoli rabe) and pan seared with the head on. The skin was lightly seasoned with salt and very crispy. I thought it was simple yet tasty (perfectly cooked) but I did not touch the yellow (presumably butternut squash) sauce that covered half of my plate. My wife thought her fish and chips were terrific but she couldn't understand why the fish was served on top of the house-made tartar sauce which she thought was too watery and not very good. I didn't try the fish and chips since I already had a plateful of fish.
  20. Ericandblueboy
    Still haven't been able to try Komi's sea urchin pasta, but I've had a couple in this city (Corduroy and D'Acqua), at Esca and Marea in NYC, and I'm looking forward to trying Bar La Grassa's PASTA NEGRA with SEA URCHIN CHILI, MUSSELS and TOMATO in Minneapolis. Any recent spotting of this dish in the DC area? I've also had a bunch of razor clams, the best probably being the crudo at Esca or was it Marea in NYC.
  21. Ericandblueboy
    Sichuan Pavilion and Michael's Noodles have slightly better atmosphere than the others. I haven't been to Seven Seas in a long time and I've never had anything other than dim sum at New Fortune but those restaurants have more traditional Chinese decor. Again, I haven't been in awhile but Mama Wok locations are fine, as is Jasmine Garden but they're not especially good restaurants. I should add that New Big Wong was pretty good for Cantonese in Chinatown but it's in a basement.
  22. Ericandblueboy
    Taiwanese - Bob's Noodle Cantonese - Miu Kee, XO Taste, Vinh Kee Hotpot - Uncle Liu's Sichuan - Hong Kong Palace, Sichuan Pavilion Taiwanese/Sichuan/noodles - Michael's Noodles You need to be a bit more specific as to cuisine. All of these restaurants have some great dishes. And you should call to see if they're actually open.
  23. Ericandblueboy
    That's pretty much what she said (but I'm not eating bacon and eggs anymore, evah, in one sitting no matter who's cooking it). In one respect I agreed with her. If the bacon is salty enough, there's no need to salt the diced eggs on top. I don't know why the judges would taste each component of one dish separately.
  24. Ericandblueboy
    I don't know if any woman will make it to the top 4 but they looked like a train wreck tonight. Jen was especially defensive about what appears to be a terrible dish.
  25. Ericandblueboy
    On last Sunday I went to A & J in Annandale for northern Chinese brunch. I believe it is the only place in Nova that serves it? I had my normal fried cruller with sesame bread, and I dipped them in a bowl of beef tendon noodle soup. The tendons were so soft they have the texture of fat - I hope they weren't fat. I elected to go with the house made thick noodle but unfortunately the noodles were undercooked, thus doughy in texture. Fortunately I ordered more dough in the form of scallion pancakes. On Monday I went to Vinh Kee for lunch. They had a wonderful clam in black bean sauce special and I really enjoyed their vegetarian panfried noodles. Not everything is good but there's a huge menu to explore. On Tuesday I went to Four Sisters. The crab and asparagus soup had nice big chunks of crab meat and it was a tasty soup. The vegetarian crispy spring rolls were light and crispy but can't compare to a well seasoned meat spring roll. The tofu and mixed veggies in a brown sauce over soft egg noodles were as uninspiring as Chinese American crap.
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