NYC Restaurant of the Week: Shake Shack

July 5, 2009 in dessert, dining experiences, food review, restaurant review | by erikaneola | 1 comment

I’m really bad about blogging: I go to a great restaurant, eat amazing food, even take photos and then let them sit on my camera for months. Well, not anymore. Time to play catch-up. Let’s start with my most recent visit and a notorious Manhattan fixture: SHAKE SHACK.

Shake Shack is literally a little shack or kiosk in Madison Square Park located at 23rd and Madison in the Flat Iron District of Manhattan. There are a couple of other locations but this is the original. Here is a nice view of the Shack and the tables in the park. (Visit their cute website: http://www.shakeshacknyc.com/ – featuring a webcam live feed of the line. creepy cool!)

So when you get to the park you just stand in line. I went with 2 other first timers and we just went with it. There is one line and it is LONG so just stand in it. Unless you are getting only custard or concretes (their equivalent of a blizzard) then you can stand in the B-Line or Express Line. If you want burgers and dogs and shakes, suck it up and get in line. I suggest coming with people who are good conversationalists or bring a book or crossword. Maybe not a good idea for first date awkwardness. Or maybe if you like that kinda thing. We clocked ourselves at 1 hour, ten minutes to place our order. Once our order was placed we waited approximately 3 minutes. Very fast!

Eventually you get to one of the free standing menus. Then someone comes by to give you a taste of custard. Then you get really excited. So what’s the deal with this place? Best shake/burger combo in NYC is the rumor. If you like diner style, no bullshit burgers and dogs and custard, you have to try it. If you can read the menu you will see they have a small but varied selection. They are also reasonably priced for NYC: I got a Shack Burger, Fries and a Black and White Shake for 12.75. Not bad.

Krinkle Kut fries rule. I also found the portions to be just right for someone my size. I snack a lot through the day and when I eat a meal I prefer to be delightfully sated. Like, almost full. But not bursting, bellyache full. This was the right amount of food for that.

So as you can see I got a cheeseburger (Their Shack Burger) with LTMayo. I added ketchup and mustard as well. Good burger. Chargrilled. A bit greasy but not too greasy. Perfectly melted cheese. Not too thick bun. God, I’m salivating thinking about this again. It was really good. The fries were perfect – not soggy, not underdone, not old/stale – just right.

As for the shake…I can tell you a shake made with custard is thick, creamy, delicious, and very pleasing. You really need to suck it up your straw. I like that. I opted for the Black and White shack (chocolate vanilla) because sometimes all chocolate is too much. This was really good. Maybe it could’ve been more chocolately, less vanilla-y, but that’s what I get for not ordering a full on chocolate.

Happy customers!

Can you see the joy in my eyes? Truly, it was a beautiful thing.

So, was Shake Shack worth the long wait? Does it live up to the hype? My clean plate says yes.

Bun Rieu

July 2, 2009 in recipe | Tags: bun rieu, crab, noodles, shrimp, tomato, vietnamese | by Thu Tran | 2 comments

This is a tomato-tamarind soup, with pork-crab-shrimp-egg meatballs, served with rice noodles, fried shallots, scallions and water cress. This was my first boot leg attempt at making “bun rieu,” another amazing Vietnamese soup. Typically, there would also be fried tofu puffs, pork blood cubes, shredded iceberg and bean sprouts instead of water cress, etc… But man, it was really good! I’m still eating it on Day 3!

Okay, I will do my best to remember what I did, but the best part of bun rieu is definitely this meat part. These measurements are slightly arbitrary, but it consists of :

1 lb peeled, raw and minced shrimp (save the shells for the stock)
3/4 lb ground pork
1-2 cans crab meat
1-2 eggs (depending on how soft you want these feathery meatballs to be. I like them a little firm, so I use 1 egg)
chopped scallions
Very Important: 1 can of this shit (it’s minced shrimp/crab soaked in soybean oil with garlic, chilis, other stuff):

The broth, I filled a pot a little less than half way with water, and I started out by boiling the shrimp shells for about 45 minutes, and then I strained it and threw the shells away. I added maybe two more cups of water and added about 3 tablespoons (or more depending on how tart you like it) of tamarind paste to the pot, along with a handful of dried shrimp, about 4-5 plum tomatoes (wedged), and half of a vidalia onion (sliced). Let all this simmer for about 40 minutes or so.

If you want to multitask right now, you can also boil your rice noodles at this point.

The funnest part of making bung rieu is dropping in the meat balls. They do not need to be balls, if anything, the whole point is that they are loose. You can use a cereal spoon and spoon up a spoonful and drop it into the broth. Do this until your bowl of raw meat is empty. They will not take very long to cook. Once they are, you turn the heat down very low just so it stays warm, and you can season it with fish sauce and white sugar.

Pour the broth over rice noodles, top it with fresh ingredients such as bean sprouts, shredded lettuce, scallions, mint, shiso, whatever. Finally, I like to squirt with a wedge of lime, and add a little spoon of these two things right before I chow it down:

That first sauce is made with millions of ground up teeny tiny little shrimps that look something like this:

Oh yeah and of course they are fermented until they smell REALLY INTENSE!!!!!!!

SO GOOD!!!! Also try using this shrimp sauce as a dip for sour apples, it’s really really amazing.

A Surprise Gift, Clue: it’s a SWEET POTATO

July 1, 2009 in vegetable, wtf | Tags: sweet potato, weird | by Thu Tran | Leave a comment

So, someone from Dublin Ohio had sent me a Facebook message about a very special sweet potato that they had found at their local grocery store, and thought it was a good idea to send it to me. I agreed, and I didn’t believe she would really send me, but sure enough, it arrived today in a Fed Ex box. First I was scared because I forgot about this interaction, and I had no idea, nor was I expecting a package from anyone. It could have been a bomb or poison, or a variety of other things, but to my sheer delight, I was welcomed with such a wonderful gift. Luckily I had a digital camera at hand to document my reaction. Thanks Danny B for taking these pictures.

I thought instead of eating it, I would like to have it live forever. So I put it in my pot so that it can grow and flourish for as long as I am alive. Thank you sweet potato fairy, for giving such a unique potato baby.

HOT DOUGS!!!

July 1, 2009 in food review, meat, restaurant review | by davekrofta | 1 comment

So, this weekend my new beau and I waited in the extremely long line that is the no questions asked norm at Hot Doug’s, one of Chicago’s premire encased meat specialists.

there's a line.. count on it

Now, we waited in line for at least 25 minutes, but for how long the line is there, it is always moving, and it’s generally regarded as “all part of the experience.” And it wasn’t all that bad, honestly. There were these kids in front of us in line, and they seemed to be trying their damnedest to live as though they were doing a summer stock performance of “Superbad.” But I digress. Dougs features a few standard dogs, many of which are named after celebs.For example: The Keira Knightly (formerly the Britney Spears) which is just a spicy hot dog. HA! get it? I think this is dumb, but I like dick, so the whole “spicy ladies” thing is just stupid to me.. but hey, with all the weiner in that place, I really have no room to complain. Anyway.. in addition to their basic dogs, which come with the works, and either steamed or grilled, they have their specials, which are nutz. Here is what was on special when we went:

Very Special Specials

I opted for “The Dog” from their standard menu, which is the classic Chicago hotdog. The first time I was introduce to the idea of the “chicago style” hot dog I saw it represented like this:

chicago's hot dog

and here is break down of what is illustrated here:

the real deal

“Sausage is German in origin and so is mustard 1, but buns are American—Germans would eat it with bread, but not a bun,” Kraig explains. “Sport peppers 2 are basically giardiniera, as is relish 3, which is Italian, while dill pickles 4 are German. Tomatoes 5and onions 6 are Mediterranean, so that’s Greek and Italian, and these came from guys that turned their produce carts into hot-dog carts on Maxwell. Chicago was a major producer of celery until the ’20s, and celery salt 7 became a substitute. The poppy-seed bun, which is Jewish and was introduced locally by Rosen’s bakery, didn’t appear until after World War II.”

(PS: this is taken from this excellent article from the chicago reader… get into it.)

Again I digress, I figured where better to experience my first Chicago Style Dog than from Chicago’s very own Encased Meat Emporium? SO , I got that and the Smoked Crayfish and Pork Sausage, topped with remoulade and goat cheese. Shawn opted for the B.L.T. and the Blue Cheese pork sausage (however his exact words when ordering were “I’ll have the pork sausage” which landed him with the Cherry Pork Sausage topped with a black-cherry cream sauce and satori-raspberry cheese relish.) We also ordered a large order of fries to split. This cost us a whopping 30 plus dollars for four hot-dogs! Which is sort of fine considering the quality of hand cased sausages and carefully crafted bun borne dishes we were about to enjoy.

the meal

Here is the order. For starters, the Chi-town Classic style dog is Unbelievable, there is so much going on, but it is so well crafted, it’s no wonder it is a staple here. It also helps that every one of the ingredients on this is picture perfect, right down to the neon relish. It is clear that they make this constantly, because it is almost mechanically perfect. The Smoked crayfish and pork sausage was also unnecessarily delicious. I had to take some of the goat cheese of for fear of gagging on all of the flavor, but i am not complaining. I am simply explaining how i survived the onslaught of taste that was this dog. Shawn’s choices were also good, although he was mildly disappointed in them for various reasons. One the reasons was that this was not exactly what he ordered, and therefor not what he was expecting to eat. The other that he found the B.L.T. to be simply underwhelming. I thought it was good, but unfortunately inferior to the crayfish and pork grandslam. The cherry dog was good, but it actually was so sweet it made me think what an amasing pastry it would make, rather than a bun based confection.

In closing allow me to say that in the race for the best encased meat, Hot Doug’s is a real weiner!

PS.. Eat a Weiner!

Hot Dog Web Video

June 30, 2009 in video, wtf | by Thu Tran | Leave a comment

This was a really fun promo put together by really cool and fun dudes Jesse Hicks and Alessandro a couple weeks ago. I just found the dvd under a mountain of crap so I thought it was worth posting here, because it was a blast shooting this, especially because of all the keg stands. This is the long version, involving a love story between myself and a hot dog, and also taking the idea of “Food Party” extremely literally. Peter Van Hyning plays “gay grapes”, Hot Dog is played by Shawn Lovejoy, who was also Food Party’s makeup artist. Also, please excuse my extremely unflattering and flushed expression at the end. Enjoy! Oh yeah and new episode TONIGHT 11:15!!!

This Sunday at Deitch Projects LIC Space!

June 26, 2009 in events, sculpture | Tags: bad brilliance, deitch projects | by Thu Tran | 2 comments

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As part of the Sunday School Summer Workshop and Performance Program at Deitch Projects, I, along with a small team from the highly-skilled and talented Food Party crew, will be presenting a live cardboard prop-making demo. You will be able to see first hand our process of making most of our props and sets. We will also be screening some Food Party videos. For all of you who are in New York without access to a cable-subscribed television, this will be a great opportunity to catch up on the episodes that have aired so far!

This will be followed by a performance of BAD BRILLIANCE’s Red Carpet to Nowhere. People attending the event are encouraged to dress in FORMAL WEAR (ball gowns, tuxedos, little black dresses, basically look hot and expensive) for Bad Brilliance’s red carpet performance. Photographers with bright flashes on their cameras are also heavily encouraged to attend.

This Sunday June 28th !!!!!!!

Starts at 6 pm !!!!!!!!!

Deitch Studios
4-40 44th Drive
Long Island City, NY 11101
212 343 7300
WWW.DEITCH.COM

Also, if you come, you will get to see all the amazing art in the group show that is currently on view, featuring work by all these famous artists :

JIM DRAIN
PAUL CHAN
JEFF KOONS
MARIO GRUBISIC
PAOLA PIVI
GELATIN
SIMON MARTIN
ROBERTO CUOGHI
SCHUYLER MAEHL

Holy shit! I think this is going to be a very good event!

Freshest Shellfish Ever – from the deep and really raw

June 25, 2009 in exotic places, kinda gross | Tags: shellfish | by jessicalangley | 2 comments

Hello, everyone! This is my first post on Food Party ever, so go easy on me. Here I am in Iceland where I have been for the past year.

I recently went on a trip to Snæfellsnes where there is a tiny fishing village called Stykkisholmer. From here I took a boat around the islands in the fjörd. The boat tour was called the “Unique Adventure Tour” and we saw lots of cute birds and nests including Puffin (which I hear are very tasty), White-Tailed Eagles, Skags, and Eider Ducks. Aside from the variety of bird-life, the highlight of the tour was at the very end when the sailors drop the trawl and comb the seabed for fresh shellfish! Here are the highlights:

Pulling up the net/trawl

The catch

Grumpy sailor opening the scallops

A very confused scallop

The options include raw scallops, crab roe (EGGS!), and sea urchins with white wine to wash it down

Jess (the vegetarian) tries raw scallops for the first time. Mmm….salty!

Hay Qua!! Creative Viets, Banh Mi tasting, and more…

June 24, 2009 in events, sandwich | by Thu Tran | 4 comments

This Saturday, there is what looks to be an amazing thing happening that I was asked to participate in! It is called HAY QUA! Mini Fest, which brings together young creative Vietnamese people of New York City. “Hay qua” is a superlative that means a variety of things such as “so good!” “so interesting!” “so skilled!”, etc..

I will be on a food panel as an expert, tasting the best Vietnamese sandwiches New York City has to offer. All the speakers are extremely creative, talented, and Vietnamese. It’s an all day event, check it out this Saturday! Here’s the press release:

New York City, NY (June 20, 2009) – The elusive best Vietnamese sandwich, or bánh mì for fanatics, of New York will be within reach on Saturday, June 27th at the Bitter End (Greenwich Village). Some of New York’s top bánh mì creators are entering their wildly-popular masterpieces in the Tasting portion of “Hay Qua!” Mini-fest. The tasting will precede the decadent food-themed panel moderated by Serious Eats’ Tam Ngo, speaking to the likes of Food Party’s Thu Tran, An Nguyen Xuan of BEP, Food Blogger Mindy Lvoff, LUNCH blogger Yen Ha, and An Choi’s Tuan Bui. Audience members will have the chance to savor the passion that goes into each layer, slice, and spread of this new foodie favorite.

Hungry fans can register to taste and judge the bánh mì, amidst the exhilarating line-up of creative Vietnamese American thinkers, dreamers, and champions on The Bitter End stage. Join the room full of bloggers, designers, architects, writers, chefs — wide eyes, smiles, laughter, and that renewed sense of possibility and dreams. It’s going to be a good Saturday.

As with all good things, tickets are going quickly due to popular demand and limited seating. Register today to save your seat, as you won’t want to miss Tim Be Told bandmember Luan Nguyen, French-Vietnamese chef An Nguyen Xuan, Brooklyn Rail publisher Phong Bui, Obama campaign photographer Bao Nguyen, architect Yen Ha of LUNCH blog, filmmakers, singer/songwriters, among many others.

Get our $50 Combo Deal! Hay Qua in the day, KollabNY at night! That’s $25 to listen to over 20+ inspiring AA speakers in the daytime! (fashion consultants, bloggers, environmentalists, architects, publishers, film-makers, spoken word artists and more!) And for another $25, a chance to listen and watch Asian American Talent (singers/songwriters/comedians/hip hop groups/dancers).

Banh mi tasting at Hay Qua + Pink Berry reception @ KollabNY!
What more do you want?!

Follow us here:
Twitter: www.twitter.com/thatsneaat
Blog updates: www.thatsneaat.blogspot.com
Event Information: www.thatsneaat.carbonmade.com

Bitter End

147 Bleecker Street

New York, 10012

Saturday, June 27, 2009

from 10:00 AM – 11:00 PM (ET)

Jello-Mold Competition Results

June 24, 2009 in dessert, events, wtf | Tags: brooklyn, caviar, gowanus, Jello, jello mold competition | by Thu Tran | 1 comment

I had the honor of being a judge at this past Saturday’s Jello-Mold Competition at the Gowanus Studio Space. It was very exciting, this was my first time being a food judge, so I was careful to inspect each entry very carefully. Check out all these crazy entries::

This was cast from a halved plastic piggy bank. The flavor was nice– lime, chocolate and mint!

This black and white face is based on a character from Star Trek and has an underlying message about racial harmony. It is cast from William Shatner’s face. The flavor is coconut and rum.

This one is supposed to look like a little bird digging for worms. This is cast from tupperware.

This is one of the more experimental ones. The jello is used to replicate shrink wrap. The flavors were savory, pickly, and spicy. Interesting!!

I LOVED this egg carton.

This one was flavored with BEER!!

This one was called “Jello Roe.” It was made to look like giant caviar. There was roe in the jello balls. It tasted wild. And very beautiful!

This one had A LOT going on! It’s a jello cheeseburger with fries. Each color is a different flavor. Most notably, the ground beef is flavored with chocolate, and the tomato jello was very interesting as well!! The lettuce was cast in actual iceberg lettuce leaves! Nice attention to detail!!

Devilled eggs! Very accurate representation! I forgot what these taste like though, oops!

This one had QUITE the epic story behind it. It is about the story of how Vietnamese banh mi traveled on a boat to get to America or Vietnam, I don’t remember actually (nervously pulling my collar!) The forms are made with agar jelly which is a traditional ingredient in Vietnamese molded desserts. The artist had a disaster upon setting up and all that survived is the water and some rice noodle jelly fish. This shit is deep.

This was a very traditional take on jello desserts with different pie recipes. Let me tell you, these were so delicious. I really loved the banana cream one. Arguably the most edible dish at this contest, I would eat any of these slices in its entirety!!

Very interesting chess pieces!! Can you see the checkerboard underneath? Fruit flavored.

This is a boob. It was cast from the jello artist’s own boob. All the flavors were hand-squeezed. If I can remember, it contained watermelon, and peach, and then the inside was flavored with a creamy and smoky lapsang souchong. It was good!

This is cast from a fossil! Nice casting! Loved the white pepper flavoring in the white part!

This one had a really great tart and spicy flavor!!

This one was wild. It casts hollow jello spheres. Just think about it. It’s a spinning and rotating mold powered with a motor.

This one is a tribute to Jasper Johns’ lightbulb. This one also had a great flavor– a sweet creamy jalapeno flavor. Very delicious!

This was such a lovely tableau! Rainbow piano keys, martini glass, devilled eggs, ashtray, dollar bill, black plexi, this one definitely had a very strong jazz bar vibe to it! Very clean presentation!

This one was the ABSINTHE one !! Very strong intense flavor! WHOAA!!

This one was the GRAND PRIZE winner of the Jello-mold competition, and it looked meticulous as hell!! Even the gold parts are edible– it’s made with gold-leafed gum paste. The jello flavors were fruity and clean, and so were their gem castings. Nice Work!!

Sarah Lohman, who works with the Feedbag, and has a great historical food blog, put together this really great video about the event:

It’s on vimeo, click here!!

Doan Goes Back To Cleveland.

June 17, 2009 in dining experiences, exotic places, food review, restaurant review, sandwich | by doanbuu | 7 comments

I’m pretty sure that 95%+ of the contributors to this site have some sort of affiliation with the grey skied wonder that is Cleveland, Ohio. I would say that I grew up there (my family moved there was I was 8 from Dallas) and I still call it home. I don’t get back there as much as I used to, and I definitely haven’t had many chances to go out and explore the ever expanding gastronic community that Cleveland has to offer as I’m often eating dinner at home with the folks (which I should stress is not a bad thing). So a couple of weeks ago I went back for my 10 year high school reunion (yeah), and I made it a point to go out and get some food. Here’s how it went down.

Thursday
My mom picked me up from the airport and we went to Pho Hoa, formerly known as Superior Pho. My parents usually opt for #1 Pho (that’s where my mom initially wanted to go) and I think it’s mainly because it’s nicer. However, in the few times in the past that I’ve managed to get Superior, I always found it to be, well, superior. The broth just seems better and for me thats the deciding factor. This homecoming bowl was no exception as it was as good as I had remembered and definitely a great post-airplane meal.

It’s still got nothing on my mom’s though.
(sidenote: I notice that a lot of pho places use the thinner more vermicelli-esque noodles as opposed to the flat ones. What’s with that?)

Friday
I went to my high schooll reunion and they had pretty mediocre “barbecue”. I did get pretty drunk though.

Saturday

dad, mom, popeyes.
I had Popeyes with my parents. As my brother would tell you, my parents love Popeyes. The nearest Popeyes is by Randall Park Mall (RIP) and that’s like 20 minutes away, yet they make the drive every other week. When asked why, they cited the spicy chicken and just the overall quality. Recently when my mom was on her maiden trip to New York, I took her to Egg where reportedly one of the girls from Pies N’ Thighs makes the fried chicken. She ordered it, and when my brother asked her if it was as good as Popeyes, my mom said “No…but they’re different.”
I for one have always loved Popeyes because of their mashed potatoes, which has chunks of chicken and skin in it.
When explaining my parents’ love of Popeyes to my girlfriend, she said “Now I see where you get it from.”

Sunday
We ate at this pseudo-fancy seafood place at Beachwood mall. My parents and brother had eaten there before and said it was okay, and at first glance it was. I even ordered oysters and they were fine. But my entree, some Ahi Tuna dish, was an honest to goodness disaster. It was “Cajun spiced” and cooked rare, but it was served like sashimi, with the traditional sushi ecoutrements and some nori wrapped rice. Instinctively deciding to eat it like sushi I dunked a piece of tuna in my soy sauce, only I discovered that “Cajun spiced” meant “salty as F” and that combining that with the soy sauce was salt overload. And the rice rolls were too few to really matter for anything. Why would you Cajun spice a dish you’re serving and presenting like it’s Japanese? All in all it was a horriblely conceived dish and enough to not make me care enough to look up the name of the place.
There’s better seafood in Cleveland.

Monday
After a year or two of good intentions, I finally went to Melt in Lakewood. Original plans to go were often maligned by “There’s an hour wait” or “Mom’s making steak”, but this time I made it a point to designate one lunch for Melt, and I was not disappointed. I had long studied the menu in my off time to prepare myself for the day that I actually went, so I knew what I was in for food wise. However I was a little surprised to see that the place was a legitimate bar/restaurant, with decor not too far off from The Winking Lizard (only a little more focused on rock & roll and retro kitsch like a 1978 Cleveland Browns team photo in the bathroom). I always just pictured it as a greasy little place with some stools and a counter.

Accompanied by my pal Jim “Lil Shakespeare” Zadd, we sat at the bar and were promptly attended to by the bartender. We ordered our food and drink, I a Municipal Stadium (bratwurst, sauerkraut, american cheese, I asked for no peppers) with lemonade and Jim an El Diablo Burger con Budweiser. After a bit of a wait, our food came out and here’s what I got:
Municipal Stadium Magic
Each dish came with a side of handcut fries and slaw, both of which were pretty good (only I don’t really like sweet slaw). The sandwich however was obviously the real star, as it is the namesake, and it didn’t disappoint. I was a little skeptical prior to my Melt experience as I have had poor grilled cheese sandwich concepts before, but this was pretty much right on the money. They split the sausage so that it didnt slide all over the place, and they put just enough kraut so that it didnt squirt out when you took a bite. Honestly every bite had every ingredient in it, no joke, and I think that’s a pretty big plus in my book. The sausage was flavorful, as was the kraut, and the cheese being American did it’s job (I really like American cheese). My only minor complaint was that the bread was a little too thick, but it’s honestly negligible. Best of all, this pile of food that I did not finish (fries will always be my downfall) was only $9.
All in all, it was a great sandwich well worth the money, and I would definitely go back and try another. And if you haven’t been there yet, you should. Just check out the menu.

So that’s it. Tuesday I went back to New York with my mom and brother because my brother had this reading he was doing at Le Poussin Rouge. There are many more places in Cleveland I need to hit up, some new, most old, and I hope to check some more off the list when I’m back for the 4th of July. If you’ve got any suggestions, feel free to comment away.

Krystal

June 16, 2009 in exotic places, meat, sandwich | by Thu Tran | 2 comments

After doing Bonnaroo in Tennessee, before leaving for the airport, we stopped at a charming little hamburger place called Krystal, which is basically a southern White Castle.

I kept it pretty simple and ordered lite (I just had some Panera Bread only a few hours prior), a double cheese krystal, which is an unassuming little burger that packs a mean little punch. Their bread is maybe only a little puffier than White Castle’s, and they put mustard on all their burgers.

I enjoyed some of the concepts they featured on their breakfast menu, which was no longer served at the time we arrived. If you can see from the photo I took, quite a few meals are offered in a cup, which they call “scramblers”, which I assume is pretty convenient for your morning commute to work. The pancake, sausage and scrambled egg one looks especially enticing to me. It must be nice to experience a meal like this, maybe layer by layer.

I also enjoyed some of their aggressive graphics, including ones featuring testimonials from loyal customers. I especially loved the one from Everett Duke who aced his exams, all thanks to Krystal burgers and free wi-fi.

One of their current slogans was “DANGUS!” Which highlights their excitement for their new angus beef sliders. Gregg and Kendall jumped on this great oppurtunity to have a little bit of fun with the sign.

Tennessee is beautiful…

stills from last week’s wedding episode

June 15, 2009 in Food Links, stills | by Thu Tran | Leave a comment

Hi everyone, these are some production stills that our friend Josef Kraska took, who is an amazing photographer. These are from last week’s wedding episode. I hope you enjoy them!

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This is Charlie Tu, one of our special guests, who plays “hot cop”. Check out his cool food blog! It is hilarious, especially of you are azn.

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This is our other special guest, Vinald Franics, my old college roommate who plays my father. He is still one of my favorite people to cook with and cook for.

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Colin Alexander, our amazing sound guy! Everyone is amazing too!

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New episode tomorrow night!! Tuesday, 11:15pm!!! On IFC!!

FOOD PARTY IFC PREMIERE NIGHT PARTY!!!

June 10, 2009 in alcohol, events, meat, video | Tags: food party, IFC, matt fitzpatrick, monkeytown, party, premiere | by erikaneola | 2 comments

Dear Friends and Lovers of FOOD PARTY:

Here is a sneak peek from last night’s premiere at Monkeytown. It had to be a record breaking, standing room only turnout! Congratulations to Thu and the entire Food Party Crew. You are all superstars!! More photos COMING SOON!!!

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Thu and a FULL HOUSE @ Monkeytown!

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Live Transmission via cable via television waves via wonkavision!

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Thu on Television!!! HOLY S^@$#T!!!!

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Bad B was there!!

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Happy fans!

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Everyone had fun…

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Especially these dudes!

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Matt was there too! In spirit and on-screen!!

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See you soon!!!!!!!

REMINDER

June 9, 2009 in Uncategorized | by Thu Tran | Leave a comment

WATCH THE SHOW TONIGHT ON CABLE TV ON IFC!!!

11:15 TONIGHT!!!!!!!!

AND EVERY TUESDAY AFTER THAT AT 11:15PM. ON CABLE! ON THE INDEPENDENT FILM CHANNEL.

Los Angeles

June 7, 2009 in alcohol, egg, exotic places, meat, restaurant review | by Thu Tran | 2 comments

Peter Van Hyning and I were in Los Angeles very recently to promote our show, and I just wanted to review a couple places we ate at while we were there. We stayed in Venice Beach near the Santa Monica pier. The first place we went to was actually this little Hot Dog on a Stick!

The girl that works here hand-dips all the hot dogs in a very delicious cornmeal batter. Then she deep fries them to perfect golden brown perfection. We washed them down with these heavily dyed drinks. Cherry lemonade, and lime lemonade::

So SUGARY!!!!!!!!!!! I still have a headache thinking about these drinks. Anyway, moving on.

We went to a Johnny Rockets Diner later on in the day. The most awesome part of that meal involved pigeons. Very rowdy pigeons!!! They were having the best time with an onion ring! I was fortunate enough to be able to capture some of their action on video. The food here is otherwise terrible. I had sliders and a side of fries, both were very uninspiring.

For some evening cocktails we stopped at Trader Vic’s in the Beverly Hilton Hotel. I didn’t take a good photo that would even summarize what this place is even like, so I found this photo from the LA Times, which sums it all up:

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Except the night we were there it looked a little more like this (I took this photo):

Way more creeeeepy, but still cool. We all got tiki-style cocktails. They were very sugary and strong and delicious. Very fun names such as “the scorpion”, “the fog-cutter”, the classic “mai tai”, “honi honi”, “navy grog”, “pogo stick”, and “rangoon ruby.” We all got some cocktails and then shared a “scorpion bowl.”

Oh yeah, and how could I forget these DUCK TIDBITS! We accompanied our cocktails with fine snacks such as fried calamari and these totally weird “duck tidbits”. They were covered in a plum sauce which looked like chocolate and then dusted with crushed almonds. The duck meat was finely shredded and compressed into cubes. As a result, they looked like brownie bites. Not bad!

Day 2, we found ourselves at the most charming little breakfast place upon the recommendation of a good LA foodie. Cora’s Coffee Shoppe definitely is everything you want in a breakfast place: good eggs, good potatoes, good coffee, very friendly service.

We sat right at the counter, so we saw all the different varieties of delicious breakfast plates they had to offer as they were came and went from the counter in casual speed. We started off with a warm and buttery almond croissant and then did omelets. I had mine with prosciutto and cheddar, and my companions both got egg white spinach and mushroom. They were accompanied with one of the better preparations of a breakfast potato I’ve seen. It’s a 2 inch slice of an Idaho potato, fried, and as it cooks, they flatten it down a little the same way you would with a fried plantain. The result is this awesome little potato steak, that’s crispy on the outside, and dry and steamy on the inside. So goooood!!!

Oh yeah! And tomato jam for your toast! Unique flavor!

This is actually a little embarrassing to admit, but I don’t know how I’ve gone to LA so often in my life and never hit up In N Out Burger. It is the shit. Nuff said.

I got a 3 x 3 animal style, which is 3 patties, fried in mustard with grilled onions. They also offer an atkins-friendly “protein style” which replaces iceberg lettuce for the buns. Other not so secret menu items can be found here. I really don’t know what’s in these burgers that makes it so delicious, besides the simply delicious ketchupy mayo sauce, its thin beef patties grilled to perfection, its soft lightly toasted warm buns, the pickles, the grilled onions, it’s all very very very good.

We did a little event with the kogi taco truck people while we were here as well, I’ll cover that in a separate blog, so I’ll end my LA blog with some miscellaneous imagery that doesn’t really fit anywehere else, including awesome snaps from E3!