West Village + TriBeCa – Writing With My Mouth Full

Khe-Yo

157 Duane Street between West Broadway and Hudson Streets
about $200 for 3 people, with drinks, without tip
212/587.1089
♥ ♥ ♥

What is Laotian food? I actually have no idea even after spending a week in Luang Prabang a couple of years ago. What I got from that trip, food-wise, was the same delicious flavors I crave in Vietnamese and Thai cuisines: fish sauce, Thai chiles, galangal, mint, and kaffir lime. Khe-Yo calls itself a Laotian-inspired restaurant but they should just really say they serve Southeast Asian-inspired food and drinks because they go beyond the larb.

Their different kinds of larb, or laab, the national dish of Laos, were all excellent. It is traditionally any meat minced and served with fish sauce, lime juice, chiles, and mint. We couldn’t help but order second rounds of the fluke and the skirt steak appetizers even though we had a whole mess of food still coming. We were shameless when we ordered two rounds of the crunchy coconut rice with kaffir lime-flavored sausages, dunked them in the fish sauce-chile dip from the larb dishes, and then wrapped each bite with a different order of sticky rice.

The braised pork belly would have been more excellent if I still had room in my stomach. I appreciated that it came with boiled mustard greens and turnips in broth; both tamed our salty and spicy tongues. I couldn’t resist the grilled sea bass even though it came with a thick peanut sauce that I’m not usually a fan of. I encouraged my dining partners to enjoy each bite in the same fish sauce-chile dip that we kept re-ordering. The pork curry noodles stood out because it was the only curried dish we ordered. Our waiter couldn’t identify the white stuff that was floating in our bowls. It had the texture of soft tofu and scrambled egg whites but I didn’t think it was banana flower. I could have skipped it if I thought about ordering more sausages first.

The dishes at Khe-Yo are meant to be shared and eaten family-style. This is what we (over)did between 3 people and we all came out of there full and very satisfied. The service was attentive even though we felt like we didn’t really need too much attention because we were continuously eating our food and drinking our Lao beers. It got a little warm in there and I knew it wasn’t just the spice; it was the good company, too.

Umami Burger New York City

432 6th Avenue between 9th and 10th Streets
$68 for 3 people, with drinks, without tip
212/677.8626
♥ ♥

I’ve tasted an Umami burger in Los Angeles before but the craziness that surrounded its New York opening sent me on a Citibike to check it out. Jase, Dash, Harry and I put our names down around 6:45pm. We went in to try and get drinks inside but because they have reached their room capacity, they didn’t let any more people in which I actually liked because then people are not screaming at your ear at the bar or hovering over you while you eat your burger.

We opted to walk down the block instead to take advantage of Happy Hour drinks and oysters for the next three hours. The crowd that was milling around in front of Umami died down then and we were seated as soon as the next table for 4 cleared. We wondered if the staff was also shipped from California because they were so nice even after they’ve had to deal with the crowd since they opened at 11am.

Our waitress gave us the speech about how Umami is different from other burgers because of science–the meat grounded in-house and the Portuguese-style bun–but all we wanted to do was order and eat! (None of those were scientific to me by the way.) We ended up ordering four different kinds to taste as much as we can: the original Umami with shiitake mushroom and Parmesan crisp, the Truffle burger, the Manly with beer-cheddar cheese and bacon lardon, plus the duck special. They were all good but it starts to get difficult to tell them apart when you’ve been holding out for 3 hours. The truffle and Parmesan flavor from the 2 burgers stood out, but everything else melded and tasted like, oh hey, regular (but juicy) burgers!

Skip the duck with peach-apple chutney (above) though. The chutney was a tad too sweet and just wasn’t burger material to me. The caramelized fennel and “Madagascar pepper” just seemed too silly: it’s California trying to fit in New York City. We New Yorkers are pretentious, but we’re not that pretentious! The beet salad is surprisingly good, a nice respite from all the meat. Don’t miss the fries and tots as sides but feel free to skip the special sauces to get more of the unadulterated meat taste of the burgers.

So was Umami worth the 3-hour wait? Of course not; nothing ever is. But go and be nice to our California friends and show them what New Yorkers are made of: we’re there because it’s the place to be at the moment.

Mulberry & Vine: The Whole Menu

73 Warren Street between West Broadway and Greenwich Streets
under $15 for lunch
212/791.6300
♥ ♥

I walked by this new spot in TriBeCa the other day and I had to stop and peek in because it looked like a cute IKEA cafeteria inside (in that yellow chair/wooden table kind of way). I’ve been working in the neighborhood for almost 3 years now and my lunch options are dwindling. If I’m not packing my own food, I almost always feel bored about the choices around me: the Whole Foods buffet that always seem to cost so much, the Halal cart right outside the Chase bank, Chipotle, or if I’m inclined to eat Vietnamese food, Nicky’s right off Fulton Street.

Mulberry & Vine is spacious and airy inside. The space’s cleanliness makes you immediately think that the food will be light and healthy. Some may think it’s a little too sparse which could translate to an impression that the food will be bland, but displaying everything in colorful enamel bakeware make it somewhat homey.

Prices vary but are comparable to the neighborhood’s: $13 for 3 dishes (1 hot, 2 cold), $12 for 3 cold dishes, $3 to $4 for soups and other sides, and a dollar here and there for extras (a bed of lettuce or arugula, a small container of green sauce, etc.)

Fourth visit, May 30, 2013
3 cold
– Farro salad – This was so much better today; the eggplant was not as tough as the last time
– Beets – The pomegranates were a nice touch and texture addition
– Roasted vegetables – Excellent and a little bit tangy because of the pickled cucumbers and onions, this actually made my day!

Third visit, May 21, 2013
1 hot, 3 cold
– Turkey meatballs – Tasty, but could use some texture. The finely grounded meat looked fake to me
– Soba noodles – Good and simple
– Farro and eggplant salad – I really liked this except for the tough eggplant skin
– Kale salad – I think it would have helped if the kale was shredded in smaller pieces so that it didn’t feel like you were eating big pieces of raw kale

Second visit, May 10, 2013
1 hot, 1 soup
– Chicken enchilada – Tasted more like a lasagna with white meat
– Lemon cardamom rice – Sounded promising but was a little too thin for me; needed some oomph

First visit: May 3, 2013
1 hot, 2 cold dishes
– Roasted cauliflower – Simple and clean; just like how you would make it at home, but it came with a so-called “green Sriracha” which tasted just like cilantro pesto.
– Curried freekeh with mango – The Arabic bulgur, this curried freekeh tasted healthy with the mango chunks.
– Spanish spice-rub roasted chicken – Although it was under the list of warm dishes, this was a little too cold for my taste. If it’s not cooked Hainanese style, cold chicken just tastes undercooked. I didn’t check what makes a rub “Spanish” but there was definitely paprika all over.

* And when I write “the whole menu”, I mean just about the whole menu. The menu changes according to the season’s ingredients and I will start writing about it this Spring 2013.

Final update: Mulberry & Vine is a great lunch option in the World Trade Center/TriBeCa area and is a better alternative to the salad bar at Whole Foods for the same price range. The food is good and is always fresh. It proves that presentation helps a lot, as well as a clean and airy space. I do find myself wanting a snack by mid-afternoon, but that’s just because I mostly chose their no-meat options. Watch out for your lunch budget as spending $15 on lunch everyday is not sustainable for me.

Perla

24 Minetta Lane off Sixth Avenue
$75 each for 3 people, with drinks, with tip
212/933.1824
♥ ♥

On a steamy Monday night, we were entertained by the Everybody Loves Raymond bartender lookalike at the bar.

Tastiest:
1. Fried pig’s ears – I can only cook pig’s ears Fergus Henderson style and they’re never this crispy and delicious
2. Squash blossoms – They’re usually bland and boring with goat cheese inside, but they used Caciocavallo and anchovies
3. Pasta with chanterelles and the pasta with tripe that did not taste like tripe at all

Underwhelming:
1. Braised octopus with oven-dried tomatoes – I can’t help but order octopus every time it’s on the menu, but with all their other decadent offerings, this was pretty tame.

Notable:
1. Great service at the bar – They make good Negronis
2. Splitting the primi pastas between two people

Warning:
1. $18 for half a dozen oysters! Yikes!

Sud de France’s Wine Lover’s Dinner at the James Beard House

After biking my third Century, I cleared my calendar the following week and stayed out of the gym and off my bike. I wanted a whole week where I can just veg and chill. I was on my way to the new extension of the High Line when Nate emailed me about a last-minute invitation to Sud de Franceâ€™s Wine Loverâ€™s Dinner at the James Beard House. How do you say no to that? I had 15 minutes to run to the west Village so I moved my sore legs as fast as I can and just recomposed myself as soon as I stepped in the townhouse.

It was a warm summer night in New York Cityâ€”one of those nights that make you fall in love with the city again even after 18 years of a steady love-hate relationship. A chilled glass of Antech Blanquette de Limoux Brut in my hand helped, of course. I sat in the garden and watched the other guests until we all had to move indoors and take our seats. I was seated under the glassed roof with eleven other people. I used to not do well eating alone, but I’ve since learned to enjoy the moment and languish on being on my own, especially if it means meeting new people with the same interest; in this case, a love for food and wine. The gamble is being seated with guests who have no qualms about picking up their ringing cell phones and actually carrying on with their one-sided conversations. One guest at our table had to finally ask the quatro to my right to remain quiet while someone was introducing the chefs to the rest of the house.

Sud de France invited Chef Charles Fontès of Montpellier, France, to cook for the guests with the help of Daniel Bouludâ€™s Feast & Fetes Catering chef, Cédric Tovar. (Some of the best wedding h’ordeuvres I’ve had were from them, and boy, I’ve been to a lot of weddings.) The chefs met for the first time the day before and they found out they actually grew up in the same neighborhood! Funny that; this city always brings people together–the second reason why I canâ€™t stay away from this place. Everyone seemed like they were in a good mood; the townhouse was abuzz and it even got too loud that I struggled to listen to the wine descriptions. There was a separate table in the entry hall plus a few more upstairs that were not viewable from where I sat next to the kitchen. They were awkwardly set, but how else do you accommodate all the paying guests in a townhouse-cum-restaurant? I was a bit taken aback that the servers stacked up plates every time they removed them from our table. I expect that from a Chinese restaurant, and perhaps from a smaller establishment, but not from the James Beard House.

An oyster appetizer in seawater gelée was fun to eat and looked so pretty on the plate with a small piece of zucchini stuffed with braised lamb, mint and almonds. The two small items were completed by a shot of tomato-basil velouté with small chunks of roasted eggplant–“eggplant royale” on the menu, natch. The zucchini ravioli for the second course fared much better for me, served with asparagus and beautiful morels in, gasp, tarragon-oil foam! Just when I thought Iâ€™ve seen the end of foams on dinner plates! A very memorable 2010 Domaine La Bastide Viognier perfectly complemented the asparagus. If I took home anything from the nightâ€™s event, it’s the fact that Viognier is now my favorite warm weather white wine.

A seared scallop was the third course with a slice of avocado in grapefruit vinaigrette. I felt like the dressing didnâ€™t match the soft avocado. The glass of 2008 Toques et Clochers Haute Vallée Limoux Blanc familiarly tasted like a California Chardonnay which was later confirmed because the grapes grow in a similar terroir as the Napa Valley. The striped bass, an already mild fish, could have used a heavier salt hand, though the bouillabaisse jus reminded me of those meals Iâ€™ve had by the Mediterranean. (Too fishy, the lady to my left said, as she pushed her plate away from her.) The duo of braised beef cheek–described as brisket by the same lady–and roasted tenderloin was delicious with the glass of the 2008 Château D’Aupilhac Montpeyroux and all its black cherry-ness. A nice panisse was warm and crisp and complemented the different textures of the dish. A bowl of (sautéed) cherries–ha!–with verbana ice cream and a delicate pistachio-orange tuile ended the evening’s event.

Chef Charles Fontès, as you can imagine, cooks in Montpellier using the freshest ingredients from the farms surrounding the La Reserve Rimbaud restaurant. Unfortunately, being far away from his original setting didnâ€™t translate quite well, so I was glad the wines paired with each dish more than made up for the food’s shortcomings. It was a wine lover’s dinner after all, not a food lover’s dinner.