Tag Archives: salmon

Press Reviews, Restaurant Reviews, Thai, Upper East Side

Bangkok Cuisine

April 14, 2016 Johnny Prime 0 Comments

Is it just me, or is Thai food in NYC starting to all blend together into an incoherent, blurry amalgam of “sweet coconut this,” or “spicy curry that?” I live right near what I like to call “Thai Town,” a strip of dozens of Thai restaurants that run up 9th avenue from the upper 30’s to the upper 50’s in Hell’s Kitchen. One or two joints stand out there as being different and good, but largely it’s all the same Americanized, overly sweet, unbalanced bullshit but with a different name slapped on the facade outside. The interiors even start to look and feel the same. Dim lighting, bamboo everywhere, and a subtle yet obnoxious house music beat relentlessly thumping in the back of your brain for the entirety of the meal. I know you’ve experienced this, and no matter how much X you drop beforehand, it just won’t work while you’re trying to fucking eat. Is this the perception of Thai culture and cuisine that we have here in America, to which Thai restaurants feel they must cater in order to draw in customers? If so, we need to change it, ASAP.

Stepping into Bangkok Cuisine on the upper east side was a refreshing change from that cookie-cutter Thai experience.

The space is bright, elegant and classy, with a gorgeous emerald Buddha as the centerpiece and focal point of the restaurant. It almost has a museum-esque quality to it, with high luxury style marble under foot and ornate chandeliers over head.

Hap, son of the chef and owner, invited me in for a press meal. He runs the joint and takes pride in the decor choices he made when designing the restaurant a year ago. He did a great job. I knew just from the decor alone that I was about to get into something very different and unique here when it came to the actual food.

This place is a perfect spot for a date, but it also has appeal to everyday neighborhood diners who want a great meal in a beautiful setting. It doesn’t hurt that the prices are very fair as well. During lunch hours (even on weekends) you can score a three course meal for just $9 or $10. That’s pretty much unheard of these days.

The bar is nice too, with cocktails inspired by Thai spice and herb flavors, and fresh exotic fruits.

Okay so let me get to the food. Hap suggested we try some of their best and most popular items, to get a good feel for his dad’s cooking style and the diversity of the menu.

First were the chicken lettuce wraps, with minced curried chicken, carrots, celery, shredded beet and cashews.

These were super light and healthy; a great way to start the meal without going heavy. The curried chicken was a nice change-up from what I usually expect in a lettuce wrap. It was almost like a Thai or Indian taco, if you will. The beets added a nice contrast of color with that pop of red, and the iceberg lettuce added a great textural element of crunch to the tender minced chicken.

Next were the BBQ pork skewers. These were my absolute favorite of the starters.

They were sweet, spicy, sticky and super tender. The spice/sweet balance struck here was right on the money, and the sticky and tangy sauce on top really fueled my addiction to these. With fresh cut herbs sprinkled over the top of these warm skewers, the air all around the table was filled with some incredible, mouth watering aromas. When you come here, these are absolutely a must-order.

Hap also brought out a small sample size of two other popular apps for us. First was the Thai crepe, a thin, wide, flat, homemade steamed rice noodle wrapped around chicken, shallots and peanuts.

This is similar in form to Vietnamese banh cuon, which my wife and I love. The flavors here are a bit different though, as they are sweet rather than tangy, and more peanut-forward than the Vietnamese dish. These are nice and light, and very healthy.

The second sampler app was the five-star Thai dumplings. These may look like Chinese dumplings, but they taste very different.

They have Thai-spiced chicken and shrimp inside, and are served with a sesame and soy dipping sauce.

We tried three entrees from the special chef’s tasting portion of the menu, all at Hap’s suggestion and based on popularity and his personal preferences.

The first was this stuffed salmon with panang curry.

First off, this was absolutely stunning to look at. It’s pan-roasted salmon with crab meat and shrimp stuffing, green beans, bok choy, peppers, carrots and onions in a thick and rich panang curry sauce. The sauce here, again, displays Bangkok Cuisine’s amazing ability to properly balance sweet and spicy. One could easily just spoon the curry up and eat it like a thick soup. And the salmon itself was cooked to perfection, with what was essentially a really good shrimp and crab cake added in the mix. It’s no wonder that this is one of their signature and most popular dishes. Absolutely delicious.

Our second entree was volcano duck.

This is a crispy, boneless half duck served atop tempura carrots and celery, and topped with a fluffy egg and homemade chili flake sauce (pad pong karee). Just to beautify the plate even more, there are a pair of fried lotus root slices on top. The dish consists of traditional Thai ingredients that have been treated in non-traditional ways. For example, the duck is prepped and cooked in a notably French style, with butter under the skin to get a certain level of crisp before finishing, as opposed to just frying the fucker to holy hell. I haven’t seen or tasted anything like it here in the city. The duck itself was amazing. Tender, flavorful and with super crispy skin. And the fluffy egg on top lent a flavorful soft texture to offset the crisp of the duck.

The final entree was a true test of Thai food mettle: Pad Thai.

But this is no ordinary Pad Thai. This is seafood tom yum inspired Pad Thai. The sautéed rice noodles are adorned with shrimp, squid, scallops, mussels, eggs, peanuts, carrots, bell peppers, scallions and bean sprouts, all deftly tossed with just the right coating of a hot and sour lemongrass “tom yum soup” flavored sauce. Again; a very unique take on a classic Thai dish. It reminded me of the way this noodle dish my wife and I had in Hoi An, Vietnam captured the characteristic flavors of pho in a sauce for a non-soupy noodle dish.

Each bite of seafood was cooked just right. All tender, and nothing overcooked, whatsoever. What really got me, though, was the perfectly dressed noodles. Lots of times Pad Thai comes to you all watery and soupy. I hate that! This had just the right amount of sauce coating the noodles, and that helped make the noodles slightly sticky, so that all the spices and accompaniments clung to the noodles just so. This made it easy to pick up with chopsticks and stuff down my throat. If Pad Thai is your go-to dish when eating Thai, you won’t be disappointed with this. It brilliantly marries two very popular Thai dishes (Pad Thai and Tom Yum), executed perfectly.

Unfortunately at this point we were too full for dessert. But I will definitely be back to try the whole fried snapper, lamb chops and drunken noodles, for sure. They looked great on the menu.

I highly recommend this place, and even if you’re not regularly spending time on Manhattan’s upper east side, it’s certainly worth a trip up to the neighborhood.

BANGKOK CUISINE
1586 2nd Ave
New York, NY 10028

Japanese, Midtown West, Restaurant Reviews

Iroha

January 23, 2016 Johnny Prime 0 Comments

UPDATE: This place is closed!

Big Steak is king in the vast wasteland of Manhattan’s midtown “Bankville,” but Japanese cuisine is a strong and worthy adversary that’s rapidly encroaching on its territory (especially for lunch).

My wife and I stopped into one such Japanese joint, Iroha, for a quick dinner bite at the bar before seeing a Broadway show, and we were both pleasantly surprised by the quality of the food, the plating presentation and the price.

First off, there is a coupon for a free mug of beer online that you can use from 5-7pm. That was perfect for us, since our show was at 7pm.

We ordered a bunch of shit, and we could have kept going, because everything looked fucking awesome.

First was this amazing glass cup of rawness. Uni, salmon, salmon roe, tuna, yellow tail and avocado. Not only was it beautiful, but it was absolutely devourable. Get it. I can’t recall the name of it for the life of me, but you can’t miss the pretty picture in the highly visual menu.

Next was a pork belly and soft boiled egg appetizer, which had three generously sized thick-ass hunks of braised belly. Perfection. It’s ramen toppings without the soup and noodles, essentially. Can’t go wrong with bacon and eggs, ever.

I ordered a small version of the all-salmon Chirashi bowl (Salmon Oyako Don), which had four pieces of salmon sashimi and a good blob of briny and savory salmon roe. The sushi rice beneath was surprisingly tasty, and was topped with a good amount of fresh wasabi, ginger and sesame seeds.

My wife ordered a grilled eel dish that came with a LOT of eel (in the pic, there is an entire second slab of eel that is not visible because it is UNDER the rice). It is served with a miso broth of sorts, to mix in with the sweet-yet-savory flavored rice. There’s also a plate of pickled items and some puffed rice for a crunchy texture element.

In short, this place is great, and it is representative of the strong and growing force that is Japanese cuisine in midtown. We sat at the bar, and the guys were plating everything right in front of us. Some of the salad items were tremendous and included tons of proteins (fish). I will definitely be back here to try more shit in the future.

UPDATE: 7/17/17

AWESOME salmon don. Really good quality stuff.

IROHA
152 W. 49th St.
New York, NY 10019

American, Florida, Restaurant Reviews

Sarabeth’s

January 6, 2016 Johnny Prime 0 Comments

We visited the Key West location of this joint for brunch and liked it a lot. I had a poached salmon cobb salad with a side of duck bacon.

The salad was on point – salmon was perfectly cooked, and all the components came together nicely. The duck bacon tasted a lot like turkey bacon, and it had a similar texture as well.

Education

Cured and Smoked Salmon

April 13, 2015 Johnny Prime 0 Comments

Let me take a few moments to explain why I love this shit so much: Salmon that has been fucked with in some way (whether smoked or cured) is one of the few fish items that has an almost meaty persona. When you start sucking down slices of that beautifully bright colored shit, you almost feel like you’re eating raw beef. The texture of it, the chilled temperature, the addition of some capers, onion or a little olive oil… it’s difficult not to see the similarity to something like beef carpaccio. Just imagine this picture being a red color instead of pinkish-orange:

One thing I’ve come across in my chowing of this delicious stuff is that it is called by many names. Lox, cold-smoked salmon, Gravlax, etc… and then there is almost invariably a location element, which is sometimes just a way to add descriptive and fresh sounding words to a menu item: Nova Scotia, Scottish, Wild Alaskan, etc. What does it all mean? Check out the essentials below:

Lox: In the days of old, this was strictly sourced from salmon belly only, though now other parts of the fish are used. It is either brined or salt-cured, usually for a few weeks, but it is not smoked or cooked in any way. This would be the purist’s pick.

Gravlax: This shit is the Scandinavian version of lox. Dill, peppers, sugar, juniper berries, horseradish and even liquors like brandy or aquavit are used while curing to accent the flavor. It is not smoked, and it is often pressed while it cures, to eliminate moisture.

Nova Lox: This lox is cold-smoked after brining/curing, and, as the name obviously suggests, it hails from Nova Scotia. That being said, the words “Nova Lox” are increasingly being used to specify the curing process as opposed to being a strict geographical marker. Fuck that. Words have meaning, people. Let’s not get too crazy.

Cold-Smoked Salmon: Essentially it is Nova Lox that comes from a place other than Nova Scotia. Any part of the fish can be used (not just the belly), and “cold” is somewhat of a misnomer, as the temperature is typically about 80 degrees while it is exposed to smoke

Hot-Smoked Salmon: This is essentially BBQ’d salmon. The salmon gets completely cooked through. Like poached or grilled salmon would, the meat will flake apart. It has a smoky flavor but a more firm, dry texture.

So now you’re armed with the lingo, and you’re no longer a Nova Lox Novice: You’re a cold-smoked pro, and you know what to expect from your salmon. Which do you prefer?

What do I like? Pretty much all of it except for hot-smoked. I generally don’t like my salmon to be cooked, unless it’s on crispy skin. My ideal preparation would have all the spices and flavors from the Scandanavian Gravlax preparation, but it would also be cold-smoked to add a little more manliness. Fuck yeah… and with some capers, red onions and a little bit of olive oil or truffle oil on top…

Recipes

Four Course Meal

December 30, 2014 Johnny Prime 0 Comments

This is more of a pictorial of a psychotically awesome meal I made for my wife as opposed to an actual recipe.

I started by prepping the cold dishes. The first course was simple: slice up some red onion, take some capers out of the jar, unpack age the smoked salmon, and arrange.

COURSE 1: smoked salmon with capers and onions

As you can see from the detailed image, I added some cracked black pepper and some olive oil.

I popped that bitch in the fridge until it was go-time.

Then I blanched some asparagus tips and rendered some diced pancetta in a cast iron pan with some coarsely chopped garlic cloves. This will all come together in the end: I promise.

The majority of the pancetta was sprinkled over the chilled asparagus tips, which were then topped with crispy shallots and drizzled with a combo of oils (garlic oil, peppercorn oil, chive oil, onion oil, and olive oil).

COURSE 2: blanched asparagus tips with crispy pancetta and crispy fried shallots.

I popped THAT bitch into the fridge too. Both dishes were served chilled.

I saved the bacon-fried garlic and a few spoonfuls of the pancetta for another dish that will come up later.

I chopped off the top of a bundle of garlic and roasted it in the oven at 450º for nearly 40 minutes.

This is for spreading onto the next two courses.

My next task was to sear off some Mosner grass-fed rib eyes in the same cast-iron pan where all that nice pancetta fat was still hanging out. I threw in some more garlic, and some Greek oregano (since the grocery store didn’t have rosemary).

Flip:

COURSE 3: pork fat rib eyes with garlic and oregano.

As you can see, I started to overcook these.

There is almost no marbling in a grass-fed slab of meat, and the meat itself is tight-grained. The animals are lean, so intra-muscular fat is nearly nonexistent. Lesson learned. Next time I will cook for a much shorter amount of time on each side.

I opened a bottle of wine to let it breathe.

Right about now is when my wife got home from work, so I quickly set the table and put the cold items out. Then I sliced up some ciabatta bread and toasted it in the pan, which still had the steak drippings and garlicky bacon fat within:

What could this be for, you ask?

COURSE 4: truffle pate

I essentially just opened the package and added some olive oil and fresh cracked pepper. BUT… we spread that shit onto the pan-grilled bread, and then sprinkled some of the leftover pancetta and roasted garlic on top (which I had set aside above). Fucking delicious.

The meal was a hit, despite nearly overcooking the steaks. In any case, they turned out great, especially with the roasted garlic smeared onto each bite. Most satisfying, to me at least, was my planning and timing of everything. I think I nailed that more than anything in the food-execution realm (especially considering that three or four items were already half prepped for me – the pre-made truffle pate, the smoked salmon, the already-baked bread, and the pre-diced pancetta).

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