From Vegas with love: Part .5

We returned home from Vegas last Friday, insanely jet-lagged but otherwise intact. Aren't you dying to know what we ate while we were there? Of course you are. So back to the beginning...

Our plane got in around noon on Superbowl Sunday, so after we checked in and scoped out the Bellagio sports book (goes without saying: I lost every bet I made. Damn Colts), we went in search of lunch. Or maybe it was dinner? See also: jet lag.

Regardless, we ended up scarfing a wonderful lunch at Mon Ami Gabi, at the Paris hotel. It was delicious and just what we both wanted-- burgers and salad and delicious fresh, warm French bread-- but I had forgotten my camera. Wah-wahh.

Fast forward to later that afternoon, when we decided we wanted dinner. Around halftime, we ventured forth from the hotel to find a meal, and perhaps a TV. We ended up deep within the Crystals mall, part of the new crazy City Center complex. (A photo of City Center follows, just in case.) We were both so hungry, we didn't really care where we ended up, so we parked our butts at Brasserie Puck, one of Wolfgang's newest Vegas outposts. We sat in the bar area, which had a sick clear flatscreen TV hanging from the ceiling.

Crazy architectural angles

Our server was clearly bummed about working during the Superbowl, and as such he compensated by being incredibly obnoxious. After desperately trying to upsell us on "specialty cocktails," he revisited our table so many times we were convinced that if we only gave him the slightest encouragement, he would have pulled up a chair and joined our party. But more importantly, our food: after placing our order, a cheerful runner brought bread. This was spectacular bread-- warm, and clearly just-baked warm just from the oven, not re-heated warm. There was butter and chicken liver mousse. We ate the butter.

Deeeeeeelish

Then the real food: AV chose an organic mesclun salad and a pizza margherita. He scarfed the greens, claiming if there were a greens-eating contest he could eat about two dozen of those plates. And then he set on the pizza, which I tried as well. The crust was whisper thin and cracker crisp, the most barely-there crust you could imagine. It made the pizza light but overall more like a tomato cracker than a pizza. Especially since the mozzarella was pooled rather than scattered-- as AV put it, there was about one delicious bite per piece. Oh well.

Greens & parm

Can you spot the six delicious bites?

I chose a roasted beet salad with candied walnuts and fromage blanc. This plate was beautifully presented, with all different colors of beets decorating the plate. The little dollops of fromage blanc were the texture of mayonnaise but had the mild flavor of cheese. The only part of the salad I didn't like too much were the stealth sections of grapefruit hiding among the leaves.

Like something out of Willy Wonka

Overall, Brasserie Puck satisfied our hunger, but the only truly standout part of the meal was the bread. A good introduction to the Vegas food scene, it primed our palates for the delicious meals to come...

Brasserie Puck
Crystals at CityCenter
3720 Las Vegas Blvd. South #240
702-238-1000

From Vegas, with love: Part I

This week, AV and I are in Vegas, and naturally there is much to relate on the food front. Approximately a million posts will be coming when I return home, but in the meantime, one quick dispatch from today's activities.

We've been extraordinarily jet-lagged, so after being awake for approximately three hours already, we showed up at the rental car place before it opened at 8AM to collect our car. And then we set off into the wilds of Nevada and Arizona, nimbly crossing the Hoover Dam, to seek our fortunes at the Grand Canyon. Midway through our drive to the South Rim I had a revelation, changed our course, and a mere three hours after we left Vegas, we arrived at the West Rim of the Canyon. Needless to say, it was incredible. A bit of photographic proof of our presence:

Colorado River and Canyon

Despite certain nameless naysayers among the crowds at home, who claimed a day trip to the Canyon couldn't be done with finesse, we were back in Vegas by 4PM after an entirely satisfactory exploration of the GC. Quite enough time to stop for a burger at In-N-Out in Henderson, don't you think? We do. Behold, a cheeseburger animal style, which AV devoured in approximately four seconds after having pretty much nothing but granola bars and animal crackers all day:

Animal style = sauces and mushrooms and onions, or something.

Oh, and a bit of the decor for those of us (me) who are (were) curious as to what at In-N-Out looks like.

Where the magic happens

The menu

So there you have it. Car dropped off, back in our hotel room by 4:30. In yo' face, Grand Canyon-- consider yourself conquered. In our faces, In-N-Out, consider yourself vicariously visited by me through AV's highly enjoyable experience.

Disappointed by the service at Kyotofu

This past Tuesday, Mom got out of work early, so we arranged to meet up for food and drink at Kyotofu. Now, I've written about how much I enjoy Kyotofu's soft serve; I've had their plated desserts once or twice before as well, but I hadn't been back recently for the dine-in experience. Well, turns out I wasn't missing much... at least experience-wise.

I arrived before Mom did and asked for a party of two in the dining room, which is shaped vaguely like a spaceship and is tucked behind the kitchen and take-out area. The waiter showed me to a table in the corner, separating a four-person setup into two two-person tables, one of which was for me. There was maybe one other occupied table in the room; the rest was empty. Seems reasonable, no?

Well, after I had settled in and removed my eighteen layers of outer garments, the same waiter came in and told me that table was reserved, so could I move to THAT table (points across the room to the opposite corner, which looks pretty much 100% identical to my table, only across the room). I actually laughed. Sure, I'll move, what the hell. So I started the rather laborious process of gathering my things, during which the party of two who had "reserved" my table told the waiter they didn't care and would sit in the other corner. So I was ALLOWED to keep the table. Woohoo.

That pretty much set the tone for the service that evening. Mom arrived and after a delay we were able to place our orders. I asked for a pot of genmai matcha green tea, which came in a beautiful setup, albeit with no place to put the basket of used leaves once I pulled them out of the tea to stop the steeping. Oh, and I was about two cups in before my requested sweetener arrived.

All very delicate

Mom's food finally arrived after I'd consumed nearly all of the tea. Kyotofu's savory menu is a bit confusing-- it's hard to tell how big the portions are, so it's difficult to judge how much food to order. Insider tip: they're small, get a lot. Mom went with three choices, and that was right for her. The first, chamame, was enjoyed; when the diners at another table asked the waiter what made it different from regular edamame, our waiter said "it's the same." Way to sell it, brother! Regardless, Mom claimed there was an interesting flavor-- not just regular salt-- atop the beans. Some sort of cheese? Who knows?

Beans in a bowl

She also ordered the warm Japanese mushroom salad. She liked this quite a bit as well, noting that I would probably like it too. I do like my salads, so I trust her judgment on this.

Greens 'n' fungi

Her final choice was the house-cured snapper nigiri. She took one bite and noted that she had expected the dish to have much more flavor. Too bad. From the other waiter roaming the room, I requested some soy sauce, which mercifully arrived quite promptly. I think the soy sauce rescued the dish to some extent.

Flavorless, but pretty

While Mom packed away her "real" food, I went straight for the dessert. Intending to get the soft serve sundae, I inquired as to what the soft serve flavors were that week and was told that the soft serve machine was out of commission. Wah-wahhhhh. On to plan B. I ordered the sorbet sampler, which I requested with one scoop of white peach and an extra scoop of coconut rather than the mandarin orange that completed the trio. The white peach was rather astringent, but the coconut sorbet was sublime-- preternaturally creamy with a texture like velvet and the strong and pure taste of coconut. There were three mini cookies on the side; two chocolate chip, which were forgettable, and one of an unidentified nature studded with what looked like white chocolate chips, which was actually quite good.

Strangely hypnotizing

At this point, dinner finished, my mom naturally wanted dessert. It took a good ten minutes or so for her to track down our waiter to request the dessert menu; a hasty order was delivered, and we eagerly awaited the conclusion of our meal. And a-waited. A solid half hour passed before she finally asked our server once again where the dessert might be. He said that the kitchen was "baking" the chocolate cake, so it takes a longer time. Uhhh, sure. Well, a few minutes later the cake emerged-- perfectly room temperature, of course (so maybe they had baked it and then the exorbitant wait was simply the time while it was cooling to room temp? Riiiight). No matter. What's important is that the cake was delicious. My mom particularly swooned over the pool of caramel in which it sat, and I took care of the dollops of "cream" on top-- I swear it was a dead ringer for the middle layer of an Oreo. Truly well done.

Worth the wait. Sort of.

We had wisely requested the check when the dessert arrived, and it came promptly, along with two heavenly finishing bites of complimentary mini chocolate souffles. Mmmm.

Final bites

As soon as our last bites were dispatched, we shipped out of there. I must say, while the food was quite good overall, I was pretty disappointed with the overall experience of Kyotofu. The service was bumbling and awkward, with terrible pacing and long stretches of inattentiveness. And have I mentioned that there are only about eight tables in the entire restaurant? Perhaps they simply need another server or two to staff the dining room. Let me be clear-- the food is good, but it's expensive, and for those prices, the service needs to be there as well. So the question is, would I return? I'll definitely be back for the soymilk soft serve when the machine is back in action, but I'll think twice before paying the price for the dining room. I guess that means Kytofu ends up on the wrong side of the two/three Offset Spatula divide.

Kyotofu
705 Ninth Avenue, between 48th and 49th Streets
212-974-6012

Back to Taboon, and equally delighted

My mom was in town for business this week, so as she tends to do, she graciously offered to meet up for dinner. I was feeling a little bit under the weather, so we ended up staying close to my nest. That meant we were treated to a delicious meal at a place I've been meaning to return to for a while: Taboon.

We arrived pretty darn early in the evening, so we were shown directly to an empty table by the window (it's worth noting that the place filled up by the time we left, though, which is impressive for a Sunday night in far west Hell's Kitchen). Our server was friendly and charming but prone to up-selling, which always gets on my nerves. Nonetheless, we made our decisions and were promptly rewarded with a plank of their outstanding bread, brushed with olive oil and fresh out of the oven. Gosh this bread is spectacular-- with a crunch crust deeply flavored with the herbs and the oil and a soft, yielding interior. Last time, AV had ordered tzaziki with the bread, which was a great addition-- I yearned for a bit of dip this time around.

Simply smashing

But we had more food coming, so never fear. In preparation for a potential dessert course, both Mom and I ordered in a rather restrained fashion. Her choice was the branzino, a whole fish served with rosemary, cauliflower, asparagus, and tahini. To say she enjoyed the fish would be an understatement; to say she picked the bones clean would be closer to the truth. Girl likes her fish.

Simply Mediterranean

Though I really loved the Haloumi salad last time, I wasn't spectacularly hungry, so I decided to take a gamble on the zucchini cake appetizer this time around. Our server promised me the cakes weren't leaden despite the fact that they were "pan fried" (usually code for crispy and delicious but sodden with oil), and she was actually right. These cakes were small, plump disks of highly flavored vegetable, herb, and cheese mixture-- the feta made the mixture nicely creamy, the crust was crisp but not over-fried, and the whole thing was strangely delicate. The side of yogurt was such a perfect complement that I only wished they had provided about twice as much. I find that as often as not my menu gambles don't pay off, but this one truly did. I was in heaven.

Oh so yummmm

But of course we were both just biding our time until dessert. Mom went with the chocolate lava cake with chocolate syrup and no ice cream (it usually comes with a scoop of Turkish coffee ice cream). I had a bite or two and it was incredibly rich, a pure and fudgy form of chocolate. The fact that Mom was able to polish this puppy off without the aid of ice cream or whipped cream to cut the richness was impressive.

Chocolate on chocolate

My dessert selection was the "silan," which was basically a Mediterranean ice cream sundae. A base of vanilla ice cream was adorned with caramelized rice krispies, date honey, caramelized pistachios, and a shower of shredded hair-like halva. It was great-- light and sweet while subtly rich.

All you see is the hair here

So, Taboon, you've done it again. With an inviting and serene dining room, a location close to home (but, let's be honest, far from everything else), and spectacular (though somewhat pricey) food, Taboon is the quintessential four Offset Spatula restaurant. If only it were just ever so slightly cheaper, I'd be back night after night. In the meantime... thanks Mom!

Taboon
773 Tenth Avenue, at 52nd Street
212-713-0271

Vivaaaaaa Las Vegas....

A brief digression this morning: Next week, AV and I are going to Vegas. We have one dinner planned, but the rest of our meals are up in the air. Any recommendations for restaurants we shouldn't miss? Leave a comment or email me at lifewithfoodanddrink@gmail.com.

Brunch adventures at Double Crown

Sunday was a different kind of weekend day, in that I had brunch. Loyal readers of this blog will know that I'm not much of a brunch person, but turns out it's a good excuse to convene friends one hasn't seen in a while. So I organized a girls' brunch at Double Crown down in that random neighborhood near Bleecker and Bowery (LES? East Village? Noho? who knows?). Despite the half-full restaurant, they wouldn't seat us until our whole party was here, grrrrrr, but once all four of us had arrived, we wedged into a table behind the host's stand. Mercifully, it was right next to an enormous space heater crowding the floor and toasting the back of my chair. Were I a normal person with normal metabolism, it would have been unpleasantly hot. As it was, with my skin nearly combusting, I was nearing tolerable warmth.

Our waiter ably responded to some of my jokes, so points for him. However, the fact that three of the four of us ordered teas seemed to be a little too much-- apparently, as we were told three times, the restaurant only has 20 teapots, and they were all in use. So he'd bring us tea as soon as the pots freed up. Note to Double Crown: buy more teapots. I mean really. When it's cold outside, people drink tea.

Anyway, enough of the drinks (for now-- more later...), and on to the food. YK and SL decided to share two of the enticing entrees: Mulligatawny soup and eggs florentine with curry hollandaise. The soup looked a little greasy but came with two big wedges of grilled bread (bonus!); YK noted that it had an intriguing flavor, spicy and sour all at once. SL oohed and ahhed over the eggs, which were certainly pretty to look at. Both ladies seemed pleased with their shared choices.

Soup with oil slick

Two eggs in a blanket

After asking our waiter for advice when choosing between the mackerel and green apple salad ("I hate it") and the endive and stilton salad ("it's standard"), KS went for the smoked salmon sandwhich, which the waiter recommended. She enjoyed the interesting flavors (coconut labne and piccalilli on the side), and for my part I enjoyed the creative presentation.

Sandwich on a spear

You'll notice that this review is somewhat (entirely) vicarious-- my stomach was feeling a little off, for some reason, so I stuck with my tea, despite an enticing-sounding fruit salad on the menu. Well, I'll amend that to say that SL and I shared a tea-- which was our server's solution to the teapot shortage. Since we both wanted green tea, he brought one pot, two glasses, and extra hot water throughout the meal. And then he charged us for two teas. When SL delicately but firmly brought that to his attention, he removed the second tea from our bill, but really.... $4 for what amounted to more hot water?

So yes, I don't have much of a leg to stand on in rating the food at Double Crown, but the girls rated it a solid three Offset Spatulas-- good flavors but small portions for the prices. If you make it over there, definitely head downstairs to check out the bathrooms-- they're Asian-themed and make you feel as though you're in a nightclub, even though it's 2 in the afternoon. But don't even think about ordering the tea.

Double Crown
316 Bowery (at Bleecker)
212-254-0350

Struggling at Landmarc

This past weekend, AV had a good friend from college in town. Since I had not yet met said friend, our big plan was to meet up for dinner at 7. When I called around 3:30 to confirm the location, the two of them seemed to be, shall we say, neck-deep in wings and beer at a bar on the UES. So suffice it to say that the planning of said 7PM dinner did not go... smoothly? I'll spare you the details; let's just fast forward to 7:30, when the three of us gathered at Landmarc in the Time Warner Center. Me: exhausted as all get-out. AV and ER: struggling.

Since Landmarc doesn't take reservations, we were fortunate that there was no wait for a table for three. We collapsed into a table that seemed to be smack in the middle of the restaurant's jet-stream, so AV and I sat shivering for the entirety of the meal. Well, I shivered, and AV eyed the door to the bathroom across the room should an a-la-minute escape be necessary.

We managed to discover the menus, which are folded pieces of paper tucked into the napkins on the table. Our server was friendly and accommodating, and she put up with our antics quite well. After vehemently declining the offer of drinks, we placed our order. A runner then brought a bread basket. ER noted that the bread was not warm. True, but it did come with room-temp (read: spreadable) butter and a bottle of olive oil on the table; given that I wasn't hungry, I took a couple of bites for research purposes, and it was definitely solid sourdough, the type you tend to see frequently around town.

Bread in a basket

We talked, mostly sharing amusing stories about AV while he sat gamely (and rather palely) absorbing the abuse. Our server popped by to let us know that our food was almost ready. And then it arrived. Starting with the poor battered males at the table, AV had ordered an appetizer portion of the Saturday pasta special, which was pasta bolognese. He said it was pretty good, but honeslty I think any carb-based food at that point probably would have done the trick. The only negative of note was that the server offered parmesan, which we all know AV loves, and their response to an eager "yes" was a tiny metal dish of powdered parm-- about two teaspoons' worth. Seriously??? That just won't cut it.

Pasta pre-parm

ER had gone with the Landmarc burger, which one of the reasons we ultimately chose Landmarc as our destination. He had asked to add bacon, a request eagerly accommodated. Sort of. The burger earned raves all around, despite the fact that the pickles crowning the overflowing mountain of accompanying frisee were not nearly pickled enough. The bacon, however, made its appearance in the form of bacon crumbles tucked in another tiny metal ramekin (pernicious little bastards, those) buried under the greens; ER didn't notice it until he was about 3/4 of the way through his burger. Landmarc, listen: if you're gonna add bacon to a burger, it's gotta be strips. I may be a vegetarian, but even I know that crumbles won't cut it, especially if there's not cheese on the burger for the crumbles to stick to. Nonetheless, bacon debacle aside, the burger was a winner.

See that tiny bit of metal peeking out next to the ketchup? Yeah, that's the bacon.

My choice (again, I wasn't hungry, so don't shoot me) was a side of sauteed spinach. This was a pretty small portion for a $6 side, and it came strangely swimming in liquid, which I suspected was chicken broth. Given that I didn't specify that I was vegetarian, I didn't necessarily hold it against Landmarc, but rather instead of inquiring about the liquid and making an obnoxious scene, I gulped the spinach as quickly as I could and then sat with it roiling in my stomach for a while. The spinach had slivers of pretty raw garlic and rings of what looked like shallots in it. It was salty. Not the most successful spinach I've ever had, but then again, I'm not sure anything would have wowed me given that I wasn't hungry.

Meh

At this point, when we were all done, another basket of bread landed on our table, right in front of me, as though it were the entree I had ordered. Whaaa?

No matter. When the bill came, a generous handful of homemade caramels also arrived-- I gulped about four of these in succession, because they were creamy and buttery and just the perfect thing to settle my stomach.

So what's the verdict on Landmarc? Well, I'm not quite sure we gave it a fair shake. Given the sorry state we were in, I don't think even Daniel would have wowed us. I've also been to the Tribeca location a while ago, and it provided a good time. I think, given the data points I have, that Landmarc is a solid place. The burger is good, the other food is hit or miss. But they have a cotton candy machine-- evident in the huge poofs of cotton candy making the rounds in the dining room as elements of dessert courses-- and how bad can any restaurant with a cotton candy machine be? Landmarc is a solid three Offset Spatula restaurant, not mind-blowing, but I'd return if the circumstances merited. And maybe next time I'm not hungry, I'll just skip right to the dessert course.

Landmarc
10 Columbus Circule, 3rd floor
212-823-6123