Monday, 7 April 2014 – Lunch

What did I eat? Tuna teriyaki on rice and a bowl of hot soba for me. Pork belly don for HH.

Where from? Soba Totto

How much did it cost? $20~

How was it?
HH had her usual pork belly don. It’s always a lot of food for lunch considering it’s a bowl of meat and rice followed by a bowl of noodles. I tried the tuna teriyaki on rice for the first time. To call that sweet would be an understatement. I enjoyed it though but certainly you’ll need it to wash it down with a bowl of soba noodles. The soba noodles were the usual fare and paired well with the sweet tuna. I always enjoy Soba Totto’s little side dish of mashed potatoes.

Just a word of advice on lunch diners in Midtown. If you go around 12:30pm, just expect a bit of a wait on some days. Also the host/hostess can be real grouchy on some days. We used to have a favorite waitress there who’s Burmese but she left so no more freebie appetizers or desserts!

Rate it!
7/10

Saturday, 1 February 2014 – Dinner

 

 

What did I eat? Hotpot

Where from? Shanghai Tide

How much did it cost? $27 per person, includes tax/tip, also drinks and appetizers

How was it?
Starve yourself the whole day and spend the evening here. 2 hours to eat as much hotpot as you want, paired with “America’s Choice Cola” or Budweiser. They make decent soup dumplings and pork buns too. The downside is that the waiters don’t like to give you too much food after the first hour. They pretend to forget your order or bring you less of the stuff. Just keep nagging them and you’ll be fine.

If you eat a lot of the spicy side, your butt will not be forgiving the next day 🙂

Rate it!
8/10

Tuesday, 21 January 2014 – Lunch

 

 

 

 

 

 

What did I eat? Chicken with basil, papaya salad, tom yum, BBQ sliced pork salad and Chan’s noodle soup

Where from? Sripraphai

How much did it cost? $40

How was it?
Thanks to the impending blizzard, we got to leave work at 1pm. So what do we decide to do? We decide to venture out to Woodside for lunch at our favorite restaurant in town. In spite of the snow coming down hard, I must say the trip was worth every flake of snow blown into our faces.

As usual, HH had her favorite noodle soup. Apparently she was going to write the review for it since I don’t know much about it. All I know is that she puts in a lot chilli, even though she orders it spicy. And as usual, I always steal one meatball from her soup. That’s the tradition.

We started off a BBQ sliced pork salad. Sripraphai makes really good meat salads for appetizers and this one did not disappoint. The flakes of rice powder adds a tingly feeling, like you’re munching some sand. The level of spice was perfect too and went well with the sour flavor of the sauce.

I debated between my usual chicken with ginger sauce on rice or BBQ chicken over coconut rice but went with the something on their lunch special. For $13, you get an appetizer, soup, main dish and a drink. You can’t be that value! I chose my usual Thai iced tea, a papaya salad and a shrimp tom yum soup, together with chicken with basil on rice. Since we had the other BBQ pork salad on spicy, I requested the papaya salad to be medium. The tom yum had more sour than spicy flavor with a liberal dose of mushrooms which I enjoyed. The server asked if I wanted the chicken minced or sliced; I picked the minced version. The minced chicken holds flavor much better than the sliced version; the fillets don’t absorb the flavors as well.

We took home some dessert, as well as some sticky rice and pork jerky for dinner, which will be mentioned in a subsequent post.

Rate it!
10/10. Rarely will Sripraphai be rated below this so get use to it!

Friday, 17 January 2014 – Dinner

      

What did I eat? Hotpot

Where from? Homemade. Ingredients from US Supermarket and Sky Foods in Elmhurst

How much did it cost? $50 for the pot, probably $30 for the ingredients

How was it?
This was a spur of the moment dinner. While going to Elmhurst Aunty to get food, we decided that it would be good to have some hotpot. On the way back, we stopped by the grocery store and bought ourselves a steamboat (hotpot pot) and some stuff to boil. I don’t remember the brand of the steamboat but I think it worked out pretty well. The pot is pretty large and we could probably have about 5 or 6 people eat at the same time.

We got some sliced beef, shrimp, assorted fish balls, some mushrooms, pea leaves and some Chinese cabbage, I think. I can’t tell the difference between lettuces and the cabbages; to me, they all look green and same. The beef came in thick slices which gave it a bit of a texture when chewing. The shrimp were unbelievably sweet. Among the assortment of fish balls, my favorite was the tofu fish cake (the yellow cubes in the photo). I should have gotten more mushrooms though; we tend to go through a lot of mushrooms when doing hotpot. We used two soup bases since we have different hotpot connoisseurs at home. HH likes the Little Sheep brand but I think they’re too “spicy”, as in full of spice. I picked a random packet at the grocery store and it turned out pretty good too.

Lastly, on the way back from US Supermarket, we decided to stop by Sky Foods which was on the way. We stopped to buy some beef tendon since HH wanted to put in the hotpot. BAD IDEA! The tendon did not cook well and they all hardened. Maybe we needed to slice the tendon into thinner slices, rather than chunks. Sky Foods will be our Asian grocery store of choice. It’s not busy as US Supermarket and it’s much bigger and cleaner. Only down side is that you can’t access this via subway unless you’re willing to a longer walk.

The hotpot at home was a success and now my stomach is growling from all the spice!!

Rate it!
9/10

Wednesday, 15 January 2014 – Lunch

 

What did I eat? Pho Saigon and dumpling soup

Where from? Boi

How much did it cost? $8 for the pho, $6 for the dumpling soup

How was it?
I did not have the dumpling soup so I can’t comment. I just figured I add this since the pho looks boring.

The pho today was exceptionally well made, even compared to other days. The noodles were at the right level of firmness and there was plenty of meat, assortment of sliced beef, stomach and beef balls. Since this was a fast food place, the sliced beef were served well done, and for good reason; I’d be wary eating a rare piece of beef. For a bowl of pho being served in a plastic container, Boi does a pretty good job. Their sandwiches are pretty good too.

Rate it!
7/10

Tuesday, 14 January 2014 – Lunch

What did I eat? New England Clam Chowder and a piece of bread

Where from? Cafe Olympia

How much did it cost? $4.90

How was it?
Clam chowder is one of my favorite western soups. I love the rich and creamy texture of the soup, plus the bits of meat and potatoes.  Buying this from a deli, I’m fairly certain it came from a big bag of ready made soup which had to be reheated; I’ve seen these during my tenure as a cook’s help in the college dining hall.  Having said that, I still enjoyed the soup. I think it’s one of the better tasting ready to serve soups. The only down side to this soup is the level of saltiness. I don’t recall New England clam chowders to be this salty, and I mean it’s SALTY! I’d rate it higher if the salt level was toned down a bit.

The bread was fine. I mean, it’s a piece of bread, not much more I can say about it.

Rate it!
6/10

Sunday, 12 January 2014 – Lunch

What did I eat? Sul Long Tang (white ox-bone soup with rice and noodle) and Soo Yook (thin beef brisket)

Where from?  Gahm Mi Oak

How much did it cost?  ~$30

How was it?
I’m a fan of Korean food, except when it comes to their noodle dishes. I think they do their meats very well but I’ve yet to acquire a taste for their noodles such as naengmyeon or japchae.

The dish came in a very white broth as you can see. The soup is very bland, as indicated in the menu. This is good as well as bad. For those who like to fix their dishes according to their own tastes, this is perfect; add as much salt, scallions, kimchi, etc til you perfect it. For a person like me who prefer to eat what’s given to me, this is a chore. Regardless, I added some salt and kimchi to add some flavor to the soup. The noodles were delicious but… there was rice at the bottom. I DISLIKE RICE IN MY SOUPS! I like congee/porridge where the rice turns to mush but I don’t like it when you can still feel the rice grains. All in all, I think the noodle soup was pretty light but it’s definitely an acquired taste.

On the side, we ordered some thinly sliced brisket. This was top notch. It paired very well with the kimchi and I enjoyed it. It would go well over rice too.

Rate it!
5/10 for the noodle soup and 8/10 for the brisket

Friday, 10 January 2014 – Lunch

What did I eat? Dumplings, fried spare ribs, pork stew, Singapore mei fun and hot and sour soup

Where from? Shih Lee

How much did it cost? $9.00

How was it?
Relax, I didn’t eat all of the food. Htike Htike and I split this regular lunch combo. Previously, I would have finished all of it myself but in light of recent efforts to reduce a bit of weight, I’m splitting my lunches with the wife.

The regular combo of noodles with 2 sides come out to $8 but I added an extra side of dumplings for $1 (I think) more. HH picked out the mei fun; I’m not a fan of curry flavored noodles. I just don’t think masala and noodles mix well. The pork stew at Shih Lee has been going downhill over the past year but it was surprisingly good this time. My current favorite is the fried spare ribs. They’re fantastic! Similar to what you get from some hawkers in Bangkok. These would go well with a sauce of tamarind, chilli and fish sauce, and a bit of sticky rice. I did not have the hot and sour soup but from past experience, it tastes like any other hot and sour soup.

Rate it!
5/10

Thursday, 9 January 2014 – Dinner

 

What did I eat? Coconut noodles

Where from? Elmhurst Aunty

How much did it cost? $6

How was it?
A few warnings about plastic containers before I go on about the food. As I was emptying the coconut curry into a pot, I was squeezing it a bit too hard since I was too lazy scoop out the chicken that was clumped up at the bottom. Turns out, the normally soft plastic gets very brittle when taken out of the fridge and when I was squeezing the chicken down, the container shattered. Fortunately, I did not cut myself but made a mess in the kitchen (which was quickly cleaned up before the wife returned home).

Normally a container of the coconut curry is sufficient for 2 servings but this time, Aunty didn’t give us enough curry so I added a bit of water before reheating it; also add the fact that I spilled a bit when the container shattered. It’s not the best coconut noodles but it was tasty. It needed a bit more coconut flavor and be more creamy, but I like that there was a lot of chicken. I had some noodles left over since I prefer my noodles soupy.

Rate it!
6/10