nuttie_cat's Profile
Vegetarian Soondubu (soft tofu soup)?
I am looking for a nice, spicy vegetarian Soondubu soup at a Korean place that is NOT Hangawi. Any suggestions?
I have heard BCD tofu house will do a vegetarian Soondubu. Has anyone tried it. Is the broth truly vegetarian.
And out of curiosity, what is the composition of the Soondubu broth?
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BCD Tofu House
17 W 32nd St, New York, NY 10001
First Cinco de Mayo in NYC. Where should we go?
We moved to NYC from SF a few weeks ago and will be celebrating our first Cinco de Mayo in the city. We are looking for a fun place with great drinks, nice vibe and some good food near Canal & Varvick St (Tribeca I guess?) or in Midtown.
If there's somewhere else we should travel in Manhattan for the best experience, we are ready to so. Would love some suggestions on how we can make this Cinco de Mayo as much fun as those we had in SF!
Red Bamboo review: Not very good
We ate at Red Bamboo three weeks ago and had a similar disappointing experience. We got the chicken satay with peanut sauce and that was good. The 'chicken' was great butthe satay sauce could have been better. It wasn't very flavorful. Still overall pretty good.
The black bean stir fry was very bland -- just a mound of vegetables. The fake shrimp in it was dense and not tasty.
The worst was the mashed potatoes with corn. Awful and tasted like it came out of a box. We couldn't eat beyond two spoonfuls.
Overall, a very meh experience. I wouldn't recommend it.
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Red Bamboo
140 W 4th St, New York, NY 10012
Mexican restaurant with the best salsa bar?
I am still in denial. I keep insisting a good salsa bar and great California Mission style burrito place must be out there--atleast in Spanish Harlem. But I am fast losing hope. I will try some of the places you have recommended. But it looks like I may have to get my San Francisco Papalote salsa shipped to me in NYC!
Mexican restaurant with the best salsa bar?
Noooo.. NYC can't be so much of a wasteland when it comes to Mexican food!
Mexican restaurant with the best salsa bar?
Having moved from San Francisco just a few months ago, I miss the awesome burritos and tacos there. But more so I miss the amazing salsa bars that would be there at my favorite Mexican restaurants (the four main salsas: pico de gallo, roasted tomato, red chile and salsa verde in all you can eat-buffet style).
Are there any Mexican places in NYC that offers amazing salsa bars? Prefer Manhattan will travel for a good salsa bar.
Just moved to NYC. Looking for a place to celebrate our anniversary
Tocqueville and llili sound great. We will try both since we have a birthday coming up soon. Thanks! Coppola is something we hope to try on a Saturday night.
Just moved to NYC. Looking for a place to celebrate our anniversary
We just moved from San Francisco to Manhattan so we are still learning the restaurant scene here. I am looking for a nice dinner spot to celebrate our anniversary this week.
Our budget is around $75 pp without drinks. One of us is a vegetarian, the other a pescetarian. But we don't want to limit our choices to only-vegetarian restaurants. Any restaurant with stellar two or three vegetarian entrees is fine. Any cuisine is fine too.
Am overwhelmed by the choices in Manhattan so would love some Chowhound advice!
CSA for greens only?
I am looking for a CSA that will do a box of just greens or mostly greens with an occasional vegetable thrown in. Any combination of greens will work.
Anything in Bay Area-- preferably one with delivery or pick-up in San Francisco that does this?
Kokila's Kitchen in Cupertino closed
We went to Kokila's Kitchen on Sunday to try their awesome gujrati food and found the place is closed. Looks like it is gone for good. No sign on the door about what happened but when we peeked inside the tables and chairs were all gone, the kitchen cleaned out and the walls bare.
Am sad because I loved the place and we ate there at least once a month. When we were there late last month there was no sign that the restaurant planned to close down. There were plenty of diners and they were doing well.
Their website is still live so its rather puzzling about what led to their exit.
Recipe for candied pecans?
I am looking to make candied pecans to use in salad and so far haven't found a recipe I like. I want something that involves the oven (instead of the stovetop) and no egg. Anyone have a good candied pecan recipe that they can share? Thanks!
3/09 Mehi Wada- Can You Help?
The wadas you are referring to are called 'medu' wadas (not mehi). They are never fermented. The soaked dal is ground and fried immediately. Couple of things that you could to make it more spongy is use very little water while grinding the dal to make the batter. Also you need to keep the heat lower for the oil so when the wadas are dropped into the hot oil they will have enough time to cook through. If you google for medu wada recipe you should find enough pointers to troubleshoot.
Press Club
I have been to Press Club about five times now and here are my thoughts. The decor is great and its a very conveniently located space (near BART/Union Square). It's a nice place to spend an evening to relax and have some good wine. That said, I am no fan of the space. The pours are really tiny. I have spent $15 on a flight of three wines and gotten less than a cumulative half a glass of wine. The cheese platter is interesting but again same problem with the portions. You get three our four tiny bread pieces to go with the cheese platter. The whole press card business is pretty confusing too. You bill multiple items on it, have to sign for each of those and then take it back to the main counter to pay for it. Trust me, after a few glasses of wine it is difficult to keep track of the card and what you have had. Overall, i would say go for the decor but be prepared for everything being overpriced!
Make Yogurt/Buttermilk sour?
Okay, so I live in San Francisco where it doesn't get very warm and many recipes call for sour yogurt/buttermilk.
What can I do to make my yogurt/buttermilk more sour? Would just adding lemon juice give it that complexity of flavor? Is there something else I can do? A substitute maybe?
Millenium -- Very disappointing dinner.
I am vegetarian and finally made it Millenium tonight for dinner. The food and the service both were terrible! We had a 9.15 p.m. reservation and eventually seated more than 30 minutes later, around 9.50 p.m, and without an apology for the delay. We were hanging around the bar with a drink but got pretty impatient waiting for our table for so long.
Once we were seated, they never gave us the August Heirloom tomato tasting menu that we were interested in. I had spied one at the bar and had a chance to see it and though I asked our waitress she never came back with the menu once we were seated.
Anyway, we decided to order off the main menu. We started with the almond cauliflower frito served with tomato currant chutney and some dressed heirloom tomato/onions. The frito was pretty bland, underseasoned and dull.
For the entrees we ordered a grilled peach tempeh which was some smoked tempeh supposedly with some peach habanero barbeque sauce among other things. Mr. Cat said the tempeh was very dry, tasteless and he could never sense the heat from the habenero.
I ordered a mediterranean remoulade which turned out much like chinese spring rolls stuffed with some potatoes and greens and served with some crunchy cauliflower and pinenuts on the side and some chopped olive mixture. It was terrible! The spring rolls like effect didn't work and I could not eat more than half.
Our waitress was absent minded, ended up refilling one of our sparkling glass water with still water etc.
So overall, a terrible meal. It makes me sad because this is not how vegetarian food should taste like. The flavor of the vegetables never came through, most of the sauce was a generic tomato based one and it is heavy, dull, mostly flavorless food.
Plus, they have a $1 surcharge per person for water. Apparently they need to do that to offset the cost of filtration for the water. They don't serve tap or bottled water.
And oh yeah, don't bother checking out their menu on the restaurant website. It has no resemblance whatsoever to the menu at the restaurant.
What to do with a can of pickled jalapenos?
I have a can of pickled jalapenos sitting in my kitchen for more than a year now! How can I best use it up fast?
Any vegetarian suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
PF Chang --Disappointing meal
I try to avoid chain restaurants but after the first meal at PF Chang's with their vegetarian lettuce wraps and asparagus stir fry side that was pretty good, I decided to go back. Big mistake!
This time around we tried the garlic noodles. It was terrible! It was a sweetish gloop with just no taste of garlic. We tried to check with the manager to see if the order was mixed up. He said it was supposed to have a sweetish tinge but he would have the dish made again if we wanted.
We said okay. The second time it was even sweeter! We just couldn't eat it!! Worse, the manager billed us for both the dishes and never even checked back to see if we ate any of the second version.
So in the end we had two plates of "garlic" noodles that we just didn't eat at all and had to pay twice for it!!!!
Their service was all about having a plastic smile and limited to "how was your meal?", without really trying to understand we were having a bad meal.
Udupi Palace SF open
Udupi Palace opened yesterday in SF, a block away from Dosa. The menu looks very similar to their Sunnyvale location. Prices seem to be about a dollar higher than in the South Bay. Dosas are priced mostly at $7.75, Uthappams at $6.75.
Mr. cat and I had a Dosa combo deal that offers choice of dosa or uthappam with an idly and vada for $9.75.
I chose Special Rava Masala Dosa and Mr. Cat chose the Mysore Masala Dosa.
The dosas along with the idly and vada came with three kinds of chutneys--a mint, coconut chutney, a plain coconut chutney and a tomato-onion chutney---and a cup of sambar.
The Rava Masala Dosa was nice and crisp and the myore masala had a tangy, sour chutney spread inside the dosa. The potato stuffing in both were great, though I would liked it a little more spicy.
The vada was crispy and the idli soft but a little dry. They should be able to work those kinks out in the next few days.
I think they seem to be really going easy on the spice. Still the dosas tasted great, clean and very homey.
The place looks nice, clean and has a really friendly wait staff. I think its a great and much more reasonably priced alternative to its neighbor, Dosa.
And oh yeah, they only serve vegetarian food and no alcohol.
Save my Swiss Cheese
I bought a small block of swiss cheese a few days ago hoping to eat it with some bread or crackers. But once I openend it I realized I hated how it tasted and couldn't eat it raw. The cheese hasn't got bad or is off--just that it probably is poor quality cheese.
I feel bad throwing it out though. What can I do with it so I can mask its taste in some dishes or cook with it? Any suggestions? And I would prefer if any ideas you have are vegetarian.
Thanks!
Ubuntu Napa--Mixed Feelings
I later realized I should have complained. I was just shocked that it was so sour and kept thinking probably I was over-reacting to the tart taste. I later had Mr. cat and the friend taste it and they felt the same. So I just left it and didn't bother letting them know.
Ubuntu Napa--Mixed Feelings
Being vegetarian, I couldn't wait to go to Ubuntu and three of us (me, Mr. Cat and a friend) made it to Ubuntu on Saturday night. We had a 9 p.m. reservation.
We got there early (around 7 p.m.) and checked with them to see if they had anything available earlier. They didn't and offered us seats at the community table so we preferred to wait. At 8 p.m. we decided to get some drinks at the bar and wait for our table.
I got a glass of the made to order fresh lemonade. Mr. cat and the friend got a glass of wine each, which they said was excellent. The lemonade was a huge disappointment. It was sour as hell and tasted like drinking raw lemon juice. After a few sips I couldn't handle the tartness and added some sugar to it but it didn't get any better. I gave up about a fourth into it.
At 9.05 p.m. we were seated. We got some bread and butter, which was nice. When I asked if Ubuntu makes its own butter, our waitress said no. She said it came out of a package though she couldn't remember where from.
Here's what we ordered
---Fried sunchokes with romenesco sauce. It was fabulous. I have never had sunchokes before and it was wonderful bite sized pieces, perfectly fried.
--Chickpeas with Manchego and pepper quenelles. This was a disappointment. I wasn't expecting the chickpeas to be cold. And there was very little machego--three small shavings. The mint-olive oil vinaigrette didn't really enhance the flavors though the red pepper quenelles were good.
--Cauliflower in cast iron pot: Excellent. It lives up to its billing.
--Carta da Musica with truffled pecorino. This was great. Fresh greens, soft wonderful pecorino on a really crisp base.
--Wild Nettle pizza: This is was just average. A little on the salty side.
And finally the bergamot and white chocolate parfait with seasonal citrus for desert. This was fabulous. One of the best deserts I have had. Great tarragon flavor in it and wonderfully constructed.
Overall, it was a good meal. But I left with mixed feelings, because of the bad lemonade, chickpeas dish and the pizza. The service was good, but nothing to write home about.
Ubuntu was a very interesting meal but I am not sure about being one of the top ten restaurants in the country. For me, it was disappointing because I had expected a lot more. Maybe it was an off night, maybe they were swamped... maybe I had too high expectations.
What to do with paneer
You can also pair it with peas or white button mushrooms to make Mutter Paneer/Mushroom Paneer.
Here's a recipe for Mutter Paneer:
http://www.route79.com/food/mutter-paneer.htm
Replace peas with some sauteed mushrooms for the mushroom variation.
What to do with leftover bread?
I have about four rolls of chewy, tough bread. I would hate to throw it out since it is just about five days old.
Any suggestions? And oh yeah, I am vegetarian. Eggs are ok though.
Thanks!
Recommendations for a downtown spot
I am looking to meet with a friend today evening to get drinks/dinner and we are looking for a restaurant that's reasonably quiet, not too expensive ($$) and somewhere we can linger for a couple of hours.
Any recommendations? We aren't particular about the cuisine as long as there are a few vegetarian options on the menu. Bonus points if it is close to BART.
Thanks.
What to serve (vegetarian) with mashed potatoes?
I have a vegetarian friend for whom I will be making mashed potatoes. But I am not sure what to serve it with? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
I am also making a salad. What else do I need to round out my vegetarian meal?
Napa dinner suggestions for a vegetarian couple?
I would love to go to French Laundry but I don't think I can get a table there for the first week of October :(
Napa dinner suggestions for a vegetarian couple?
I am looking to surprise my husband on his birthday with a lovely dinner at Napa. Any suggestions on the places with the best vegetarian choices? I am not looking for a complete vegetarian tasting menu (though that would be certainly fun) but something that has enough choices on its regular menu (or will accommodate us) to keep us happy.
And since the celebration is for the first week of October I would like something I can get a table at if I reserve now.
Thanks y'all
Authentic Indian cooking at home
Indian cooking is very very forgiving. Since the book doesn't mention what onions, i would suggest red or yellow. That said, it doesn't really matter, especially in curries.
As for potatoes, anything should work. In India you don't really see the huge varieties of potatoes and onions you get in supermarkets here. Most people buy their produce from something that looks like a farmer's market and so they just buy whatever kind is available that week.
So feel free to substitute and use what you would like best in Indian cooking.
indian rice
I meant toast it in a dry pan. I
f you use a little oil/butter to saute the rice, then you can't wash the rice well. If you don't wash the rice well, the extra rich remains in there and once the rice is cooked it the grains won't be separate and fluffy.
So I always toast the rice lightly in a dry pan.
indian rice
The Yamuna Devi recipe is nice but terribly complicated for a rice that already has a strong curry dish to go with it.
Here's how I make the rice at home: Take 1 cup basmati rice, fry it lightly for a few minutes to bring out the nutty flavor of the rice. Rinse it well till the water runs clear. Add 2 cups of water and soak it for about 10 minutes. The soaking is important since it makes the rice soft and fluffy when cooked. Then cook it till the rice is done. I cook my rice in the microwave for 20 minutes. You can cook it on the pan. When it is done let the rice cool down a bit.
Seperately, take butter/oil mixture, add cumin seeds, a pod or two of cardamom (cracked open), a few whole cloves, a stick of cinnamon and a bayleaf. saute it all well. When done add it to your rice that has been cooled down. Add some salt and mix it all well.
It's done.
