Aaron Z.
10 Eats.It Staff Recs
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Island Spice Jamaican Restaurant, Golden Hill
05/04/07 Dining Without BordersIf you’re in a hurry, visit a drive-through taqueria, but if you have time for a leisurely meal, go to Island Spice.
Gentle breezes, white sand beaches, tropical foliage ... you won’t find any of that at Island Spice. The small Jamaican restaurant overlooks a freeway from its perch in a dusty industrial neighborhood. Its surroundings don’t look very Caribbean. You won’t see doctor birds flying among coconut palms. You won’t see a steel-drum band playing in the sand. You won’t see anyone doing the limbo. You will, however, experience the relaxed hospitality and delicious slow-cooked cuisine that are hallmarks of island culture.
There’s a lot of activity at Island Spice: diners waiting in line for a table, butchers arriving to deliver meat, regulars dropping by for take-out orders. It’s a busy place, and it gets quite crowded. But there’s nothing hectic about what goes on in the restaurant. No-one seems to be in any kind of rush. The staff works at a steady but unhurried pace. The customers are calm. The food takes its time.
You see, Jamaican food, as the good people at Island Spice know, has its own schedule. The traditional staple ingredients of Jamaican cuisine (like the traditional ingredients of the cuisine of West Africa or the food of the American South) are humble, tough, perhaps even coarse. It can take time -- a long time -- to make lima beans or goat meat soft enough to eat. Meats and vegetables are stewed or roasted for hours. Nothing is rare or al dente. And yet, nothing is overcooked. The vegetables retain their structure and the meat retains its character.
The curry goat is spicy, rich with fat and strikingly gamy. The oxtail, cooked in a stew of lima beans, is so tender that it slides from the bone at the slightest prodding of a fork. The beans and rice are warm, fluffy and comforting. The jerk chicken, marinated, roasted over a slow fire, then smothered in jerk sauce, is dark, piquant, smoky, complex. The brown stew fish is flaky and mysterious. The callaloo and cabbage with carrots is peppery and supple, but not mushy. The fried plantains are slightly sweet and agreeably greasy.
Those are the lunch and dinner dishes. Island Spice also serves distinctly Jamaican breakfasts like run dung, salted mackerel gently simmered in coconut milk, and ackee and codfish, which features the non-poisonous seed coverings of Jamaica’s favorite mostly poisonous fruit and flaky, milky cod.
Most dishes are sufficiently spiced, but for those who like it hot, there’s a bottle of fiery, sweat-inducing Scotch bonnet sauce on every table.
I’m not usually one for soda, but Island Spice doesn’t serve alcohol, and while a cold bottle of Red Stripe would be perfect with a plate of hot Jamaican-style barbecue, a Jamaican soda isn’t a bad backup beverage. I recommend the malt soda, which tastes a little like toast, or the ginger ale, which is surprisingly spicy.
So take it slow. Don’t drink too fast. Don’t eat too fast. Take your time. Island Spice may not be in the islands, but with its mellow atmosphere and leisurely pace, it does sort of feel like it, and it definitely tastes like it.
I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here three to five times.
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Pho Ca Dao, City Heights
04/23/07 Dining Without BordersPho Ca Dao might seem confusing at first, but there’s nothing confusing about a steaming bowl of intense broth, tender noodles and flavorful beef.
It’s easy to get overwhelmed at Pho Ca Dao if you’re not used to how things are done at a Vietnamese noodle house. First of all, pho is something that people eat at every meal, so the restaurant can be quite crowded at any time of the day. Then there’s the menu. There are almost fifty entrees, and some of the items on the menu are inscrutable to the uninitiated. To wit, number 28, broken rice with fresh rind, steamed meatloaf; or number 13, rare steak and well done steak; or number 20 from the dessert menu, the mysterious “herbal drink.” There’s also the bill. The waiters don’t bring it to your table. Last but not least are the diacritics -- the little marks above and below the vowels. How does one pronounce them?
Have I scared you? If so, please allow me to unscare you. Eating at Pho Ca Dao isn’t as difficult as it might sound from the above description. In fact, the restaurant is full of tools, some obvious and some not so obvious, to help you order, eat and pay. And any confusion you might suffer is well worth it. The food is delicious.
First, the crowds: it’s true that at times the restaurant appears to be overflowing with people and you worry that you’ll never get a table. It’s an illusion. There are plenty of tables and there’s an army of waiters and busboys working fast to get you seated. Even at the most crowded times, the wait is short.
The menu: at first glance it seems impossibly extensive, but that long list of entrees really comprises only three dishes: noodle soup (pho), meat with rice (com tam) and meat with noodles (bún). The forty-eight items are merely slight variations of the three basic forms. For example, every kind of bún is a bowl of rice vermicelli with bean sprouts, cucumber and salad greens, with a small bowl of fish sauce on the side. The only difference among the eleven kinds of bún is the meat: beef, pork, shrimp or duck. They’re all good, but my favorite is the bún tôm thit nuong with sweet barbecued shrimp and pork. The smoky shrimp and pork pop out against the bland noodles.
The twenty-eight kinds of pho are similarly, um, similar. The basic framework of the dish, the star of the show at Pho Ca Dao, is beef broth and rice noodles. To that, you can add different cuts of (mostly) beef cooked to your preferred level of doneness. Pho also comes with a pile of bean sprouts, sliced hot peppers, lime and basil that you can augment your meal with. If you have any doubts, there’s a guide to the ingredients on the back of the menu.
As for the bill: in spite of the appearance of haste, they don’t want to rush you at Pho Ca Dao, so, as at other Vietnamese restaurants, the waiters don’t deliver your bill, that clear sign that your meal has come to an end. How do you pay, then? Look at your table. There’s a number on it. When you’re good and ready to leave, perhaps after a cold glass of soda chanh muoi (a salty and slightly ammoniac mixture of club soda and lemonade made with preserved lemons), or a sweet and bitter trà thái trân châu (Thai-style iced tea loaded with chewy tapioca balls), tell the cashier your table number, and he or she will give you your bill. Easy enough, right?
And what about the diacritics? I have to admit that this issue is a little more complicated. Vietnamese has six tones and ten vowels, each of which is represented by ... I’ll stop there. It’s rather confusing, and it doesn’t really matter. At Pho Ca Dao, all that matters is the food, and that’s not confusing at all.I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here five to ten times.
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Bird House Grill, Encinitas
04/19/07 Dining Without BordersIstanbul, Constantinople, Turkish food, Greek food … what’s the difference? Find out why Turkish food is so special at the Bird House Grill in Encinitas.
Turks and Greeks haven’t gotten along very well since the Turkish Sultan Alp Arslan defeated and captured the Byzantine Emperor Romanus Diogenes in the Battle of Manzikert in 1071. Alp Arslan let Romanus go, but he did take Anatolia (present-day Turkey). The Ottoman Turk Empire eventually swallowed all of Greece and held onto it until 1832. After that, Greece and Turkey fought four wars against each other and are still having a hard time resolving their differences over Cyprus. There are some bad feelings, to say the least, between Greeks and Turks. But with a thousand years of shared history, the two peoples have a lot in common. The similarities are evident in every part of Greek and Turkish culture—art, music, architecture.
Not surprisingly, Greeks and Turks eat a lot of the same foods: olives, feta, pita, dolmas, kebabs, gyros, tzadziki, baklava . . . the list goes on. The two cuisines are not identical, though. There are small but clear differences, variations that make each cuisine unique. A perfect place to taste those differences is the Bird House Grill Turkish restaurant in Encinitas.
Most of the items on the Bird House Grill’s menu look familiar. The spinach pie is something most people know from Greek cuisine. So is the grape-leaf dolma. Kebabs aren’t anything new, either. And everyone knows what a gyro is (although very few seem to know how to pronounce it). The Bird House’s Turkish versions of these dishes are a bit different, though.
Take the grape-leaf dolma, a tender grape leaf wrapped around a ball of soft lemony rice. The Bird House’s dolmas have a bit of honey in them. It isn’t much, but it’s enough to add a mysterious sweetness that makes the dolmas superior to what one would normally come across.
The tzadziki (cacık in Turkish), an appetizer enjoyed by Greeks and Turks alike, is another standout. It’s strained yogurt and grated cucumber seasoned with parsley, mint and dill. At the Bird House Grill, the tzadziki is loaded with garlic. The cool, tangy yogurt and the spicy raw garlic complement each other perfectly.
The “house specialty” (according to the menu and the owner, who might insist that you order it) is the iskender kebab, the creation of a 19th century Turkish chef named İskender Efendi. The iskender kebab plate is not for those who are counting calories. It’s a generous portion of sliced döner kebab (gyro) meat covered with a rich tomato sauce. This sits on butter-soaked triangles of soft pita bread. On the side are buttery rice pilaf, yogurt, a salad and a small bowl of tzadziki. The tomato sauce, butter and juices from the meat mix to create something implausibly tasty.
A beer seems like the only appropriate beverage for such a meaty (but surprisingly light) meal, but sadly the Bird House Grill serves no alcohol, no wine, no raki, no Efes Pilsen. But no matter —- ayran, a thick, salty yogurt drink stands up to any amount of butter or meat.
The desert menu is simple at the Birdhouse Grill. The restaurant only serves rice pudding and baklava. Either one is a good way to end a meal. Even better is a cup of Turkish coffee, a strong, black brew thick with coffee grounds and flavored with cardamom.
As the grounds settle at the bottom of your cup, make sure that you brought enough cash (no checks or credit cards accepted). If not, there’s an ATM at a liquor store up the street. You won’t need much, though, as the Birdhouse Grill is quite inexpensive (sandwiches are $3.99 to 5.99 and plates are $9.99 to 12.99). If you go on Friday or Saturday night, bring some small bills for the belly dancers.I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here three to five times.
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Red Sea Restaurant, City Heights
04/12/07 Dining Without BordersRed Sea Restaurant brings the best of the Horn of Africa to the heart of San Diego.
You’re in good company at Red Sea Restaurant. The pantheon of Ethiopian kings watches you from animal-hide portraits hanging on the wall. Foremost among them, His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie I, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, King of Kings of Ethiopia and Elect of God stares down, regal, powerful, presumably hungry.
Don’t be alarmed by the solemn presence of the kings. A meal at the Red Sea is a communal affair. As at most Ethiopian restaurants, dishes are served family-style, with everything anyone at your table ordered arriving on the same platter. Unless you’re well acquainted with the cuisine of the Horn of Africa, you might not know who ordered what and be forced to sample everything in front of you. You’re also expected to eat with your fingers. (Silverware is provided, but using a fork and knife takes the fun out of the experience.)
You need to be at least somewhat comfortable with your dining companions -- and they with you -- to eat from the same plate, and very comfortable to do so with your fingers. Thus, it’s best not to eat with a mysophobe or someone with personal-space issues. It’s better to visit the restaurant with someone you’re close to or someone you’d like to be close to, as the eating method engenders a certain intimacy.
And while the Red Sea can get quite crowded and a little loud, especially in the afternoon as Ethiopian transplants converge upon the restaurant for a taste of home, it’s also quite relaxing. The sweet smell of incense soothes your mind. The low din of Amharic dialogue provides a pleasant soundtrack. There’s no rush to finish your meal or pay your bill. No one seems to mind if you linger at your table for an hour or two or nurse a Hakim Stout at the bar.
The Red Sea’s menu is simple, with a dozen or so main-dish choices, all delicious and all inexpensive. I like to start with a lentil or beef sambussa (a type of fried stuffed pastry), with a dollop of hot sauce seasoned with berbere, the classic Ethiopian spice mixture. They’re only $1, so you might be tempted to order a few of them. Beware -- they’re huge.
Many of the main dishes are stews (wat in Amharic) of various sorts: yedero wat (stewed chicken), yebeg siga wat (stewed lamb in a thick red sauce), yebere siga wat (tender beef in clarified butter), gomen (tender stewed collard greens). My favorite is the mesir wat, dark red lentils that burn with berbere. There’s also tibs, sautéed beef or lamb with vegetables. If you’re the kind of person who orders his or her steak blue, try the kitfo, a spicier analogue of steak tartare, or the gored gored, very rare cubes of beef tenderloin in clarified butter.
All of the dishes are served with and on generous portions of injera, a tangy, spongy bread made of teff, an African grain that tastes a lot like buckwheat. The injera plays a couple of roles: it’s an edible plate/placemat; and it’s a sort of utensil that you can use to pick up your food. Its understated flavor is a perfect palette for the spicy food.
To wash it all down, there are a few excellent options. The best is tej, a mellow honey wine that’s served chilled. The beer, imported from Ethiopia, is also good. I like the Meta Beer, a dark honey-flavored lager. If you’re driving, there’s always Ambo, an Ethiopian sparkling water. I haven’t tried it, but I think it might taste like honey, too. The next time I go, I might order an Ambo, or I might ask whoever I’m with to order one. We’ll share it.I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here five to ten times.
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Espresso Pizza Ristorante Italiano, Ocean Beach
04/06/07 Dining Without BordersIf you want old-fashioned Italian food, look for old-fashioned chefs, like the old guys you see in the window at OB’s old-fashioned Espresso Pizza.
Many things get better with age: fine wine, beautiful women, European sports cars. The benefits of maturation are nowhere more visible, however, than in pizza chefs. A young pizzaiolo may have faster reflexes and more stamina that let him show off with acrobatic dough stretching and cheese grating, but only a seasoned chef has the wisdom to make the weighty decisions regarding topping combinations and oven temperature. The eyes may be cloudy, the ears deaf and the heart weak, but the fingers know how to chop, the hands know how to roll.
The people at Espresso Pizza Ristorante Italiano, a venerable Ocean Beach establishment, must know the value of age, and they must know that someone else knows, because they put their gray-haired chefs where everyone can see them. They’re on display in the window, rolling out dough, stirring sauce, boxing pizzas. When you see the deft movements of their leathery hands and the looks of concentration on their wizened faces, you know that your pizza is going to be good.
And it is. The pizza at Espresso Pizza is just as good as you thought it would be. The crust is chewy, fluffy and just the slightest bit crispy. The sauce is a work of art. It’s silky, tangy and savory. It’s hard to believe that tomatoes can be coaxed into tasting so rich. The toppings are plentiful, but not overwhelming. The choice of toppings is a little overwhelming, though: onions, peppers, pepperoni, artichoke hearts, tomatoes, bacon, anchovies, olives, feta, jalapeño peppers, pineapple, garlic, spinach, ham, shrimp, basil, eggplant, heat of palm, Canadian bacon, sausage, mushrooms and meatballs.
Curiously, the cheese is the topmost element of the pizza. There must be a good reason for that. It certainly saves you from chasing stray shrimp or bits of sausage. If you’re in the mood for a less conventional pizza, the fugazzeta pizza is a good choice. It’s topped with cheese and onions, but no tomato sauce, something like the Alsatian tarte flambée.
But the old guys at Espresso Pizza make more than pizza. They also make everything else you would expect to find on the menu at a neighborhood Italian restaurant. They make hearty sandwiches: meatball, sausage, veal cutlet, eggplant parmigiana. All are loaded and filling. They make great seafood dishes. If you like squid, try the calamari fritti, an enticing pile of delicate, golden rings of battered and deep-fried calamari. They make delicious pastas: gnocchi with tomato-cream sauce, pesto ravioli, baked manicotti. My favorite is the spinach ravioli with gorgonzola. The cheese is rich, strong, heavy, moldy and the spinach fresh and light. The pairing of spinach and gorgonzola is a classic in Italian cuisine, and the old chefs combine the two ingredients in the perfect ratio such that their flavors pop out from the background of thick cream sauce and soft pasta.
Espresso Pizza also has an extensive selection of veal. Calves raised for veal aren’t always treated well in life, but the old chefs treat them well in death, cooking them gently enough not to damage their tenderness or milky flavor.
As for dessert … those old chefs know how to do that right, too. There are plenty of choices (chocolate decadence, chocolate pyramid, cheesecake, etc.), but I like the classics, like tiramisu and spumoni. The tiramisu is rich and light at the same time. The spumoni is clean and fruity . . . and old-fashioned, which seems appropriate for Espresso Pizza.
I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here more than ten times.
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Zanzibar Café, Pacific Beach
03/29/07 Dining Without BordersYou say panini, I say panino. We can probably agree that Zanzibar’s grilled Italian sandwiches, and the rest of the menu, are delicious.
What is the correct way to order a panini? This question has been troubling me for some time now. Even before the grilled Italian sandwich became fast-food fare and panini presses appeared at Wal-Mart, I wondered: Shouldn’t it be panino?
My knowledge of Italian is limited, but I know that a noun in that language that ends in “i” is probably a plural. That’s certainly the case with pasta. Rigatoni, gnocchi, fusili, linguini, etc., are all plural and all end in “i.” So what’s with panini? Well, it’s wrong. If you want a grilled sandwich in Italy, you ask for a panino. Singular. Asking for a panini is sort of like asking for a sandwiches. It’s something that I don’t feel comfortable doing. But I don’t feel comfortable with the puzzled looks I get when I ask for a panino, either. It’s silly, I know, but I usually forego the hot, crispy flattened sandwiches.
So it’s a good thing that Zanzibar Café has more than panini (plural) on the menu. In fact, there’s no shortage of choices at the Pacific Beach eatery: omelets, scrambles, waffles, pancakes, hot and cold sandwiches, quesadillas, pizzas, salads and soups. Everything is quite good, and everything appears to be good for you. (It’s hard to believe that a hippy waitress would serve you anything that might affect your aura in any negative way. It’s also easy to convince yourself that bacon is healthy as you read the organic lifestyle magazine you picked up while you waited in line.) Everything is reasonably priced, too. Nothing on the menu is more than $10. Most items are about $7.
In lieu of a . . . ahem . . . panino, I usually order a pizza. Whether it’s the spinach and artichoke heart with kalamata olives and feta cheese, the bbq chicken with red peppers, fontina and fresh green onions, or the house’s take on the classic Margherita, with fresh buffalo mozzarella, tomato, red onion and pesto, Zanzibar’s pizza, with its toothsome focaccia crust, usually satisfies my craving for hot bread with melted cheese on it.
But sometimes I’m not in that kind of mood. Sometimes I’m in the mood for breakfast. Zanzibar can get busy in the morning, but breakfast is served all day, and I like to wait until the afternoon, when the crowds are doing something else, to eat foods associated with the morning. It’s often said that it’s hard to screw up eggs. I can’t say that I agree. An egg is a delicate thing and is just as hard to cook correctly as a chicken breast or a tuna steak. The kitchen staff at Zanzibar handles its eggs with care. The poached eggs are intact and not at all watery. The omelets are puffy, not rubbery. The scrambled eggs are moist and custard-like. I’m partial to poached, which Zanzibar serves simply on a crunchy slice of toast with a small bowl of fresh fruit; or Mediterranean style, with tomato, spinach and avocado; or Benedict style, with grilled tomato, bacon and basil hollandaise.
I do get over my punctiliousness from time to time and manage to order a . . . well, I’ll go along with it this time . . . panini. The toasted, buttery bread and warm, cheesy fillings are too hard to resist. In my opinion, the turkey and bacon melt is the best: roasted turkey, bacon, melted pepper jack, wilted spinach, sundried-tomato aioli and a few slices of tomato on sourdough. It hurts me a little to say the name of the sandwich incorrectly, but I suppose it’s worth it.I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here five to ten times.
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Rei do Gado Brazilian Steak House, Downtown-Gaslamp
03/23/07 Dining Without BordersDon’t let the weird fake meat out front fool you. Rei do Gado is the real thing: welcoming, authentic and beefy.
The first thing you notice about Rei do Gado is the fake meat. As you approach the restaurant, you see a backyard grill decorated with two big chunks of a substance that looks like something from a Halloween costume. On closer inspection you see that the rubbery chunks are fake meat. But there’s no need to worry. Get a little closer to the door and take a deep breath. That’s the genuine article. Wood. Fire. Smoke. Meat. Authentic Brazilian barbecue.
From the succulent cuts of meat to the sumptuous buffet to the pseudo-Baroque/space-age decor, Rei do Gado (“Cattle King” in Portuguese) is the real deal, a faithful rendition of the Brazilian churrascaria (steakhouse). Joints of meat spin slowly over a low fire. Waiters dressed in gaucho-style uniforms dart about the dining room cutting meat from long steel skewers. Chubby cherubs greet Portuguese conquistadors in the murals on the ceiling. Stuffed bull heads stare blankly from the walls.
About the steak: What you get at a churrascaria isn’t quite the same as what you would get at a typical steakhouse. Rei do Gado deals in cuts with exotic names like picanha, fraldinha, lombinho. You’ll see many familiar names on the menu (top sirloin, top round, filet mignon), but they’re often only approximate translations.
The portions are different, too. They’re . . . well, not very big. But don’t worry. Even though you only get small slices of meat, you get so many that you’ll leave wishing that you hadn’t eaten so much.
Another thing: You won’t find steak sauce on the table. Brazilian barbecue doesn’t allow for such adulteration. The meat is simply rolled in rock salt and grilled over a flame. Nothing else is needed. The fire imparts a subtle smokiness, and the salt creates an intensely flavored crust that brings out the internal beefiness.
The “top sirloin” (picanha) is my favorite cut. (It’s really a cut called the rump cover, one of South America’s favorite cuts of beef.) It’s fork-tender and juicy. The strip of fat that surrounds the meat is crispy on the outside and almost liquid inside.
But there’s nothing wrong with any of the other cuts of meet. The beef ribs are deliciously fatty. The pork tenderloin is soft and milky. The top round is rich and garlicky (yes, there’s more than rock salt on the top round . . . forgive me). The chicken hearts, which are served for dinner but not for lunch, are deliciously chewy. The tiny filets mignons, wrapped in tangy slices of bacon, are mouth-wateringly smooth. The baby back ribs fall off the bone. The pork sausages burst with melted pork fat.
There are some tricks to the service. If the waiters see an empty plate, they fill it, and you can quickly become overwhelmed. It’s easy to stop the onslaught. There’s a small cylinder of wood on each table. Half is painted red, half green. Turn the green side up if you want more meat, the red side if you need a rest. You also have control over the doneness of your meat. If you like it rare, ask the waiter for a slice from the center. If not, ask for a slice from the end.
As good as the meat is at Rei do Gado, it’s a good idea to save some room for the buffet. The quality is excellent, and the variety of dishes is staggering: fried plantains, sautéed collard greens, black beans, coleslaw, aipim (fried yucca root), fresh fruit, roasted vegetables, pickled vegetables, bread, farofa (toasted yucca root flour), pasta and all manner of salads.
The traditional way to end a meal at a churrascaria is with a light dessert of guava paste and firm aged cheese. If you have room for more than that, try the pudim de maracuja (passion fruit custard), which is like a crème brulée with a unique acidity; or the açai, a sort of parfait made of the rich, dark palm fruit of the same name.
Brazilians often express sadness when a good meal comes to an end. I, too, get a little weepy when I realize that I can’t eat that last bite of sausage. All I can do is say obrigado (“thank you” in Portuguese . . . if you’re a woman, you say obrigada), stumble out to the sidewalk and dream of the next time I can indulge myself at Rei do Gado.I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here five to ten times.
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Bale French Sandwiches, Linda Vista
03/15/07 Dining Without BordersSometimes a sandwich is more than a sandwich. When it’s a Vietnamese banh mi at Bale French Sandwiches, it transcends its classification.
I rarely go out for sandwiches. You see, I don’t like to go out for anything that I can make reasonably well on my own, and I can make a sandwich reasonably well. There isn’t anything easier than putting some meat and cheese between two slices of bread. It seems lazy and wasteful to leave the house and pay someone else to do something so simple.
But some sandwiches are different. Some sandwiches are special. Some sandwiches are beyond my abilities in the kitchen. One such sandwich is the banh mi, a light and subtle tidbit of Franco-Vietnamese fusion. The banh mi is a simple thing, just meat and vegetables on a French roll, but if it’s made correctly, it transcends meat and vegetables on a French roll. It has an elusive quality that cannot be reproduced in the kitchen (not mine, at least).
I don’t mind leaving the house for a banh mi. I don’t mind driving to the other side of town, braving the freeway, sitting in traffic. I don’t mind paying the banh mi masters at Bale French Sandwiches on Linda Vista Road $2.50 for a few bites of sandwich perfection.
At Bale, there’s nothing to get in the way of the sandwich, no waiters to talk to, no complicated ordering protocol to follow, no detailed menu to read, no awkward trays to carry to your table, (almost) no variation in price to consider, and no credit cards (it’s cash only). Acquiring a banh mi is as simple as selecting a sandwich from the photographic menu on the wall, finding some change in your pocket or purse, waiting a minute or two, retrieving your sandwich from the counter, removing the rubber band and paper and eating it (the banh mi, not the rubber band and paper).
The banh mi at Bale has a basic form: an airy toasted French roll with a light brushing of mayonnaise, soy sauce, crunchy strips of pickled daikon radish and carrot, a few thin slices of fresh jalapeño and cucumber, and some kind of meat. Most of the meats are of the porcine variety (shredded pork, bbq pork, sweet roasted pork, Chinese-style pork sausage, ham, etc.), but there’s also bbq chicken and tuna. For vegetarians, there are egg and vegetable banh mi. There’s also a “special” banh mi with a few kinds of pork for $3.00, for reckless spendthrifts.
It’s hard to go wrong with any banh mi at Bale, but there are a couple of standouts. The cha bong (dried shredded pork) is one. The hard, dry, salty pork and the crisp, cool vegetables create a contrast that brings out every flavor in the sandwich. The chau lua is another favorite of mine. Chau lua is translated as “pork bologna,” but it’s closer to Bavarian Weißwurst than Oscar Mayer, with the same grayish-white color, soft, spongy texture and hint of mace.
The perfect accompaniment for a warm, savory banh mi is cold, sweet bubble tea. Bale serves about a dozen flavors, from durian to coffee, for $2.00 to $2.75. I’m stuck on the avocado bubble “tea,” a thick, green milkshake served with a straw wide enough to accommodate the chewy black tapioca balls floating around at the bottom.
If, for some strange reason, you don’t feel like a banh mi, Bale also sells steamed pork buns, sticky rice in banana leaves, packaged lunches with rice, noodles, sausage, shrimp and meatballs, deep-fried bananas, boiled peanuts and deserts of bright green or red sweet sticky rice. All very tempting, but after I’ve eaten a banh mi, I usually want another banh mi.
If you buy five banh mi at Bale, you get one free. I’ve yet to take advantage of the deal, but I’m certain that even after six banh mi, the sandwich would remain unique, delicious, mysterious and much more than meat and vegetables on a French roll.I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here more than ten times.
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Brazil by the Bay, Point Loma
03/08/07 Dining Without BordersLocation, location, location? Not necessarily. Brazil by the Bay Restaurant & Sports Bar is a delicious exception to the rule.
Would anyone eat at a place called Brazil by the Freeway? Maybe not, but it doesn’t really matter. It’s easy to overlook Brazil by the Bay’s humble location and easy to forgive the alliterative fib in its name once you’ve eaten at the busy Loma Portal eatery.
Brazil by the Bay is as lively as its surroundings are dull. A favorite of San Diego’s Brazilian community, the restaurant is full of the sights, sounds and smells of South America’s largest country. Samba blares from a stereo. A soccer match flashes on a TV screen. Meaty smoke floats in from the kitchen. A few words of Portuguese rise above the din. After a few bottles of Brahma, it’s easy to imagine that you’re in Ipanema and not a dingy industrial neighborhood between the Sports Arena and Interstate 8.
The food at Brazil by the Bay is just as authentic as the atmosphere. From risoles do palmito (savory deep-fried pastries filled with tomato and heart of palm) to fish and shrimp marinara served over rice, the menu is legitimately Brazilian.
I like to start a meal at BBTB with an appetizer, maybe an empadaõ do frango (a small chicken pot pie will heart of palm and green olives), an order of kibe (a crispy meatball of ground beef, wheat and onion brought to Brazil by Lebanese immigrants), or a coxinha (a deep-fried packet of shredded chicken breast and cream cheese).
My entrée decision depends on how I feel; there’s something for every mood. For a light meal a misto is perfect. It’s a simple grilled ham and cheese sandwich on a French roll, typical fare for a Brazilian café or bar. The Brazilian salad, made “Brazilian” with heart of palm, peas and an olive-oil-and-lime-juice dressing, is a more refreshing option.
For more substance, there’s plenty to choose from. The Milanese, a staple all over South America, is an irresistible breaded and fried filet of beef, chicken or fish. The prato feito (“complete plate”) is grilled meat (the beef is best) served atop steaming black beans and white rice, and dusted with farofa (toasted yucca root flour).
Brazilian stroganoff is an interesting variation of a familiar dish. BBTB’s recipe includes traditional canned mushrooms and a cream sauce colored pink with ketchup. It’s served with crispy shoestring potatoes, rice and black beans. The beef and chicken stroganoff are tasty, but shrimp goes best with the tangy sauce.
BBTB doesn’t have the wide selection of meat of a churrascaria (Brazilian steakhouse), but its picanha (a tender cut of beef from the rump of the cow) is succulent, rolled in rock salt and cooked just enough to bring out the beefy flavor. The picanha comes in a cheesesteak-style sandwich with mozzarella and caramelized onions or on a plate with beans and rice.
BBTB is inexpensive (most appetizers are $2.25, sandwiches are $4.50 to 6.55, and entrees are $7.50 to 12.99) and informal, so it’s a good place to go on a weekday, but I usually hold out for the weekend. On Saturday and Sunday, BBTB serves feijoada, the Brazilian national dish, an impossibly rich stew of slow-cooked black beans, pork and beef. BBTB’s feijoada is made with two kinds of beef and six kinds of fresh and cured pork. The dish is hearty, smoky, silky and meaty. It comes with the traditional sides of farofa, orange slices and a heap of bright green, thinly sliced, barely sautéed collard greens.
I rarely have room for desert after feijoada, but BBTB has several delicious sweets on the menu. The mousse de maracujá com chantilly (passion fruit mouse with whipped cream) is my favorite, tart and sweet. The pudim de leite, a Brazilian flan, is a rich way to end a meal.
Brazilians are an optimistic people, and they tend to talk about the future with confidence and hope. It’s common for Brazilian diners to discuss their next meal before they’ve finished what’s on their plate. I don’t practice capoeira, and I’m not able to samba, but I do partake in the aforementioned dining tradition. I always look forward to my next meal at BBTB, in spite of where it is.
I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here five to ten times.
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Emerald Chinese Seafood Restaurant, Kearny Mesa
03/01/07 Dining Without BordersEmerald Chinese Seafood Restaurant’s dim sum brunch is a fascinating and delicious alternative to typical brunch fare.
Brunch isn’t something you eat every day. It’s a meal for a lazy weekend, for a visit from old friends, for a hangover. It’s a meal for a special occasion. So why bother with mundane fare like spongy eggs, dry toast and watery melon balls?
For a more interesting late-morning repast, I like to visit Emerald Chinese Seafood Restaurant, a dim sum jewel hidden in a clump of nondescript office buildings in Kearny Mesa. Instead of a bland slice of quiche, Emerald offers creamy baked egg bun. Instead of breakfast sausage, there are pan-fried crab-meat patties.
Just as notable as the difference in food choices between dim sum and a conventional brunch is the difference in service. If you’re still groggy from a late night, the brunch service at Emerald can seem a bit brusque. You don’t have time to chat with your friends as you wait for a table, sip champagne as you mull over the menu or daydream as you shuffle along the buffet table. As soon as you enter Emerald, the hostess rushes you to a table, and before you’ve had a chance to sit down, the servers are unloading steaming plates of dumplings from their carts onto any flat surface they can find.
The ordering protocol at Emerald, or at any Chinese teahouse or dim sum restaurant, is confusing to the uninitiated, but it’s easy to figure out how to get what you want after the first round of plates. The hostess might give you a menu, but it won’t do you much good. Nor will it help much to ask the servers to explain their offerings. Dim sum defies language. (Cantonese speakers, I don’t mean you.) It’s all about looking, smelling, guessing and pointing. At Emerald, servers walk through the large, busy dining room pushing carts laden with steamed, fried and baked items. If you see something you like, you tell the server, who puts the dish on your table and makes a mark on a chart to indicate its price. (Dishes range from $2.60 to $7.95.) If the server offers you something you don’t want, a simple “no thanks” will do.
Some dim sum restaurants are a grand guignol of organ meats and other odd bits. Emerald has a few exotic items, like ginger scallion beef tripe and shark fin gow, a translucent rice-flower dumpling with an unusually chewy filling. But most dishes are non-threatening, and all the dim sum classics are represented. The steamed barbecued pork buns are fluffy and delicate with a sweet, dense filling. The deep-fried bean paste balls are crispy and mouth-wateringly greasy. The stewed chicken feet are soft and flavorful.
Most satisfying at Emerald are the shrimp dishes. Shrimp is all too often … shrimpy. In terms of portion sizes, that is. It’s no wonder, of course—shrimp is expensive. But Emerald doesn’t scrimp on shrimp. Each har gow contains a fist-sized wad of crustaceans. The rice-paper shrimp, similar to a beggar’s purse, holds a similarly generous portion. The stuffed green peppers with shrimp are heavy with pale pink meat. Just as impressive as the quantity of the shrimp is the quality. Each fat shrimp is perfectly cooked, wonderfully tender with just a bit of resistance to the tooth.
Emerald has more to offer than brunch. The restaurant serves familiar (e.g., beef with broccoli) and not so familiar (e.g., abalone with duck webs) Chinese dishes for lunch and dinner. What draws me to the restaurant, though, is the dim sum. Every steaming, succulent dumpling is a beautifully formed culinary gem, and every meal at Emerald is a special occasion, even if there’s nothing special about the occasion.
I do not have any connections with this business. I've been here five to ten times.
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