Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Korean Barbecue Tacos

"Until the city passes that food-truck ordinance, this is the closest you’ll get to Asian street food." -TimeOut Chicago

Read more: http://chicago.timeout.com/articles/restaurants-bars/88446/fall-restaurant-openings-fall-preview-2010#ixzz1C6gcvlVK


I started reading articles about the new Korean BBQ place coming to Chicago months ago.  My love of tacos and desire to try new foods meant this new place had my curiosity piqued.  I began following Del Seoul (http://www.delseoul.com/menu.php) on twitter to find out when they would open.  They opened in late October, but I just had the chance to dine in their fine establishment this past weekend with a few friends.  One of my friends was caught off guard because she didn't realize it was more fast food style than casual dining.  There are a few tables for people to sit, but on a Saturday night when we went, it appears a wait can be rather lengthy at times.  They seem to generate a majority of their business from people ordering food for take out/home.  I was set on trying to taste as many of the items with a check mark on the menu (their specialties) as I could.  I started off with the Kalbi, which is their grilled beef short rib taco.  And because I still love fries along with the fact that a Korean BBQ joint has fries on the menu (listed as Seasoned Gamja Fries), I definitely had to order them.  The fries arrived first and they were served with  "garlic-sesame aioli," which tasted very much like mayonnaise so I will definitely pass on the sauce in the future.  The taco was pretty good, but it came with much on top of it (cilantro-onion relish, chili-garlic "salsa" and a secret slaw are served on all of their tacos).  I tasted the taco in its entirety before I had to resort to pulling off some of the toppings, as one taco alone can be quite filling, and reassembling them with less toppings.  I enjoyed all the things I tasted (as you'll see in the pictures below), but next time I'll probably order one of the plates, because the tacos do not come with steamed rice which led to me having to "borrow" steamed rice from my companions' plates.


Seasoned Gamja Fries w/garlic-sesame aioli

Kalbi (Grilled Beef Short Rib Taco)

Seoul Style Street Dumplings
Bibimbop; my friend Monica orders this meal at other Korean restaurants and said she would definitely come back for it. It's pretty good and is eaten mixed together.  I actually ate a few forkfuls of this dish, while cautiously avoiding the bean sprouts.  For an extra dollar this dish can be served in a hot stone bowl which allows the food to stay warm for longer.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

A Small Taste of New Orleans

New Orleans food is as delicious as the less criminal forms of sin.
~Mark Twain 


Recently I made a less than twenty four hour trip to New Orleans.  Though it was a brief trip, it was my first and so I knew that I wanted to spend some time indulging in the delicious southern food that was often described in reference to New Orleans.  The first thing I did was call my friend Ketica once I crossed the Louisiana border on our drive south.  Right away she recommended a place called Mandina's for dinner.  She said I should order the seafood platter, which was enough for at least two people, and a cup of the gumbo. The server seemed pleased with our order and assured us that we would enjoy our meal.  I had always been weary of gumbo in my previous experiences.  All of the random ingredients and spices has always been a put off for me, I was sure I would find at least a couple items in the dish that I would not like and have to spend the rest of the time making sure I didn't taste another bite of that awful ingredient.  But the gumbo I had at this place was excellent.  If there was ever to be an ideal introduction to gumbo, this was it.  The flavor was full and the seafood and spices plentiful.  I started to wonder how and why I'd been avoiding such a delicious dish all my life.  The seafood platter was a mix of deep fried fish, shrimp, oysters and a crab ball and while I enjoyed all the food I tasted, I must admit I did find all the fried food a bit overwhelming.  Though my companion, Danielle, was more than pleased with everything on the platter.  When we were finished, there were still a number of the oysters left.  Honestly, fried or not fried the texture of oysters has never been appealing to me and while I did taste them, I definitely would have been okay if they had been absent from our plate.   The hospitality was great and so was the food, I will definitely be returning to explore more of this menu during my next trip to New Orleans.


The Menu


The most delicious gumbo, I tried another cup from another local bar the next day and while it was good it could not compare to the seafood gumbo I had at Mandina's.


The platter of fried seafood which was served with a very large cup of cocktail sauce.

Another recommendation of Ketica's was to make sure I tasted a beignet.  I wasn't quite sure where I would be able to find one, but we randomly took a trip through a mall near the hotel we were staying at and stumbled across a Cafe Du Monde, which is widely known for their beignets.  The smallest order is of three so Danielle and I prepared to share this delicious treat.  It was covered by a huge mound of powdered sugar, so much powdered sugar that I barely had to place any regular sugar in the iced tea I was drinking with it.  It reminded us of funnel cake or what some people call elephant ears, just in a more compact, square shape.  While I could not see myself eating beignets for breakfast every day, as a special treat while on vacation it more than fit the bill.

The sugar covered beignets.




Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Confessions of a Wannabe Foodie


foodie or foody  (ˈfuːdɪ) [Click for IPA pronunciation guide]

— n  , pl -ies
a person having an enthusiastic interest in the preparation and consumption 
of good food

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
HarperCollins Publishers. 18 Jan. 2011. 


I must confess: I've never been a fan of food. I mean of course I eat to survive. And most times I enjoy it. But I have always envied those who openly declare their love for food.  You know the ones, the people who are able to identify hints of this and that in their single bite.  The people who are able to tell that the meat was just slightly under or overcooked.  The ones that you know when they sit down to a meal it is clearly more than just about nourishment, it is the experience of the flavors and textures that they enjoy.  That has never been me.  Yes, I can appreciate a well prepared meal but I couldn't begin to tell you what made that particular meal great.  Also, I must confess, I'm picky.  I have been since I was a child.  So picky that my mother routinely made me spaghetti without the sauce.  Simply noodles.  And this made me happy.  I'm glad to say that I now enjoy various spaghetti sauces and hope to one day prepare a sauce from scratch, but I'm still picky and selective about what vegetables and meats are in the sauce.  I am also the girl that was known to exist off of four things in college: french fries, cheesesticks, skittles, and sprite.  My diet has evolved immensely since then, I make sure to incorporate green vegetables in to my daily meals, but I still have far to go.  So I primarily proposed this blog to challenge me to take the food risks I've always shied away from but also to explore the vast and varying amount of food that exist in the great city of Chicago.  There are so many smaller, non-chain restaurants that prepare great food.  People often ask me about restaurant recommendations in the city and I can tell them about all the great reviews I've read but I rarely can give a firsthand account of these places.  The Redeye and Metromix are my go to guides in discovering new places and I hope to fully utilize these resources during my food exploration.  I hope this blog will serve as both documentation of my developing relationship with food and a forum for my friends and me to discuss places to eat that should not (and sometimes should be) missed in Chicago and the various places we may travel.  Thank you for stopping by and I hope you enjoy the read and if you have any recommendations of places I should definitely check out, please let me know, I am always looking to add to my list!


Sincerely,


Your Future Foodie