fussycouple's Profile
Best Indian in the Triangle - Vimala's Curry Blossom Cafe
We got takeout from Vimala's this past Friday night. I have now sampled all their homemade "chutneys" (achaar). These are intense, and a little goes a long way. They taste awfully good but trying to eat a lot of one of them is like trying to eat butter, you can only eat so much.
We got a pork vindaloo special, and a chicken thali. We got raita, and bhakura bread, and papadam, and samosas.
When I was a boy, a man from northern India came to work with my father at the textile plant -- he was here to study how to make women's underwear. When we'd go over to his house for dinner he'd let me hang out with him in the kitchen while he cooked. It was there that I learned to mix my own spice powders, including ingredients like "these hot peppers that grow in the mountains that I brought here to America because you don't have them here". That was a long time ago.
Vimala's cooking reminds me a great deal of his. The spicing is not typical of what you get in local Indian restaurants, so if that is your standard, be prepared to adjust the thinking cap a bit. It is however, very very good.
Vimala's sources a lot of ingredients locally, they will feed you if you need to eat, and their prices are very very reasonable. I'm concerned if they will be successful at their experiment --for our sakes, I hope so (not just for the food).
I will point out in passing that while there I saw two local farmers eating with their families, and another group that included people who I know are members of Southern Foodways Alliance and Slow Food. To me, this is like finding out where the best coffee and donuts are by cruising to see where the police stop, i.e., it's a sure fire way of figuring out where to go.
Seeking one lunch in Durham, NC
If I could only have one lunch in the area, right now I'd pick Vimala's Curryblossom Cafe in Chapel Hill, in the old Sandwhich location.
A lot of local ingredients, great food, amazing pickled chutneys, a local girl "who dun good". Certainly not something you can find just anywhere.
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Vimala's Curryblossom Cafe
431 W Franklin St, Chapel Hill, NC 27516
Country Ham for Christmas Dinner
I grew up in rural North Carolina, and I actually don't remember ever having what I to this day call "deli ham" (anything that wasn't a country ham prepared in some way) until I was like 14 years old and we were vacationing in another state.
Typically we just cooked a country ham for those occasions where you want to serve cold ham (on thin biscuits at church dinners, pot lucks, picnics, or large family gatherings). We did nothing to it, we just baked it.
For a "sweet" baked ham in those days, my family also soaked the ham in a big pot overnight before we baked it, and after any mold had been trimmed off the exterior we would cut deep slices in the fat and the children got to stick in cloves while a grown-up smeared on a thick glaze made of substances that could include (but rarely had more than a few) brown sugar, butter, molasses, pepper, assorted herbs or spices (like rosemary, or mace), peanut oil, more salt (which always struck me as kinda "huh"?), dr.pepper, ketchup or tomato paste, and who knows what.
At my grandmother's house, inevitably after baking a ham or a turkey, they were relegated to the (unheated) dining room for a couple of days before the actual meal, and you could be scolded just for going to look at one -- the penalty for snitching from one was so dastardly it couldn't be spoken, but was accepted by us younger folk as being worse than having a dog eat your fingers.
To this day there is no better ham to my eye or my tongue than a country ham, sliced razor thin and eaten with a hot biscuit and some red-eye gravy.
Panciuto Community Dinner - Wednesday, December 15th
I'm torn. I want to say:
Shssssh. The good people here have managed to ignore Pancuito pretty well so far, compared to the quality of what you get there, so let's not impinge upon their awareness and keep it our little secret.
and I want to say:
If you haven't gotten up and gone to Pancuito yet, now is the time. The community dinners are family dining at its highest and more than worth it, plus they tend to be educational. I totally agree with the OP, easily one of the top five restaurants in the Triangle these days for the food.
Go ahead, quibble and nitpick about the location, the dining area, the bar, the service if you want to, but the food is just darn good, and it's primarily local and raised by farmers the chef knows in person from sustainable farms where "organic" is just a leaping off point.
So I'll say both, and hope that the old adage "a word to the wise" is in fact, sufficient.
Country Ham for Christmas Dinner
I recently bought some of the biscuit-slice packages sold by AB Vannoy, and I find the ham to be most of what you'd want in a traditional country ham. It has excellent flavor and texture, and it is plenty salty without salt being the dominant characteristic of what you're eating.
I initially thought the slices were a bit thick, but the texture was tender enough to allow the thickness to be toothsome without being tough.
If I have any criticism at all, it's that in the biscuit-slice packages the ham is fairly lean, and therefore I can't trim off any extra ham fat to melt to make enough red-eye gravy without adding butter to the pan after I take the ham out. I strongly suspect the primary reason for this is the modern pigs they use which are ultra-lean. If this ham was from a more traditional pig, it would be all things to all ham eaters.
Where to order a fresh turkey in the Triangle?
I'm not sure what the "Cha-ching" you used above is supposed to mean, but Whole Foods, Fresh Market, Weaver Street, and Southern Season are the cheapest whole fresh birds that you can buy locally, as expressed by meatn3.
If you think that's expensive, I can't imagine you'll order a pastured, heritage-breed bird from any of a number of local great farms that raise them, like Coon Rock.
So perhaps Food Lion or Harris Teeter can help you.
Gourmet Vegetarian in Triangle for Husband's Bday This Sunday
This is a hypothetical test, right? Let's take a set of requirements, any one of which wouldn't be trivial, and pile them all together and see what people can come up with?
To my knowledge there is no purely vegetarian restaurant that is a) really nice, b) open Sunday evening, c) toddler-friendly in this area, d) nice but not "a bit pricey".
If you choose to limit yourself to restaurants that have a couple of vegetarian options, I'd recommend you do a search here for those threads that talk about the limited number of restaurants open on Sunday, and see if you can find something that suits you. But that's all I got.
Group dinner in Chapel Hill - need ideas!
I went to one brunch after Il Palio got rid of the big buffet, haven't been back. That being said, they have rooms, and are used to business folk. A dinner there might suit your requirements, but they're no longer at the top of my local rotation, not until I hear that they're doing well.
Honestly, the best place locally for what you want is probably Fearrington House, though I never go there in less than a suit and tie, and sometimes wear a tux. But that's just me. I see people there in attire that I'm not overwhelmed with.
In a different direction, the tasting room at Angus Barn would be a truly memorable dinner, and you fit the dress code, etc.
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Angus Barn Restaurant
9401 Glenwood Ave, Raleigh, NC 27617
Fearrington House Restaurant
2000 Fearrington Village, Pittsboro, NC 27312
Group dinner in Chapel Hill - need ideas!
Call Bonne Soiree and/or Pancuito (in Hillsborough), right away. Give them the date and ask if you can reserve the whole place for 30 people, and ask them what options can they give you on a chef-planned prix fixe "eat what the chef wants to make" or family-style dinner.
Both are fabulous, and you might get lucky.
I have NO IDEA if they do this kind of thing, it's just a crazy whim.
Panzanella - Lunch
While I am a devoted fan of the food at Panzanella, today's lunch service needs comment.
We arrived, and when the host came up to us, he actually *frowned* when we asked for one of the open half-booths on the wall.
There was a 25 minute wait between ordering and the 1 appetizer salad. Sandwiches and fries and salads at a lunch place that hopes to cater to business people shouldn't take 40 minutes to obtain, and an hour to process and get out of.
People in our proximity who arrived before us or concurrent with us got their food even later. I watched several other tables complain about various aspects of the service in our time there.
It was difficult to arrange to get more water. The table right next to us, the waitperson only asked him if he wanted water when it was clear that he had been waiting for a check for over 10 minutes.
It was not possible to accommodate our request on a salad for the *other* salad dressing. If you only have 2 salad dressings, it surely should not be an issue to get the other one, unless all your lettuces are pre-tossed sometime before lunch. In a restaurant which likes to be known for its freshness and local food, this really shouldn't be the case.
Asking for shredded parmesan instead of black pepper on the oil&balsamic served with the bread resulted in getting neither.
Another frown when I asked for another tiny ramekin of ketchup.
Staff were arguing where customers could hear them, with raised voices and tension.
It took over 10 minutes for the waitperson to pick up the check *after* we placed the credit card on top of the folder.
The food better than good overall, as one expects there. The rest of the meal was a distraction and a real come down. I blame owners and management, with the most likely explanation being "you get what you pay for", particularly with staff.
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Panzanella
101 E Weaver St, Carrboro, NC 27510
Pancuito
In re: other replies.
Pancuito has always been a fusion kind of place, I guess. But it's an actual fusion, not just 2 things from different cultures on your plate. I'll always remember the duck leg confit served on grits with red-eye gravy.
Pancuito is in the same general price range of Jujube, Lantern, and places like that, but a bit cheaper than Bonne Soiree or Fearrington.
Pancuito
Pancuito remains one of the better restaurants in the Triangle. I always get the feeling they get short shrift from being located in Hillsborough, but I find it worth the drive.
Tonight we had:
Beef carpaccio, with polenta fries and greens.
Salad with fig vinigrette, fried goat cheese, figs, and prosciutto
Meat and Three: Pork shoulder with creamed corn, green beans with basil, heirloom tomatoes, and cornbread
Duck sausage with farfalle, wilted greens, and a light sauce
Chocolate Chess pie
We had wine and iced tea and cocktails and espresso.
This is real chess pie, accept no imitations. Was neck and neck with my grandmother's chess pie.
All of it was "oh god oh god" good. The chef remains the best creative force to hit Orange county in a restaurant since Bill Neal. Authentic southern done high class with a twist.
Most of what we ate was local. The grass-fed beef was from a local farm, so was the duck. Most of the produce was as well. Most of what we ate was produced sustainably by farmers we are familiar with, if not know.
The creamed corn was very nearly corn puddin'. The green beans had just the right small amount of crunch to them, and the tomatoes were real tomatoes with flavor.
Service was casual and well done. My martini was made exactly the way I asked, the wine was fine, refills on water and tea were frequent without being intrusive.
Pancuito definitely belongs on anyone's regular restaurant rotation.
I hate the new release
one more reason not to even come here, never mind post. why does this site consistently get worse instead of better?
I could deal with the new site design if ....
this design is poor compared to the previous one. sad.
NC BBQ recommendations...
Historically, Naco and I argue a lot on these boards. In this case, he is 100% on the money.
Chapel Hill Recs
Sunday and Monday are the worst two days to try to eat out around here.
I'd have to say "no" on a recommendation for La Residence, unless you really can't find better.
If "Kitchen" is open, I'd like to recommend them for you. I've already had 2 different local chefs comment that they enjoyed them a lot, and they're new. Bonne Soiree and Lantern are excellent recommendations as well.
Sandwhich, Panzanella, and Neal's Deli are all decent places as well. Gourmet Kingdom for Chinese food for lunch is in walking distance and you want to order off the Chinese menu (translated) not the American menu.
Carolina Inn shouldn't be dismissed from consideration.
There are no *great* breakfast places around here since Il Palio quit doing their brunch buffets. If Sugarland is doing beignets, they're very nice, but I've found their hours and availability a bit too random for me. Honestly Carolina Inn might be your best breakfast, though Breadman's and Carolina Coffee Shop are *adequate*. Merritt's down the hill a bit has excellent breakfast sandwiches if you don't mind minimal place to stand or sit and eat and you should take cash because they don't do credit.
Who has best hotdog in NC?
It doesn't ring any bells with me, honestly. Unless maybe it changed the name, but there is a paucity of info on the place you mentioned on the net.
Who has best hotdog in NC?
When I was a child, there was a place in downtown Goldsboro that we would pass on our way to the beach. I remember coming down 70, then turning right in downtown, and it was on the left.
I cannot for the life of me remember the name of this place, but it was already an institution in the 1960s. Does anyone else remember this hot dog joint?
help - headed to Hilton Head
I'm not chewing on the OP, merely confirming some of his fears about the nature of the area. I wasn't chewing on you, merely disagreeing with your assessment, and agreeing with the assessment of sisterbeer. Oakatie is "on the highway", not "on the water", and my detailed assessment of the food there is already in another thread on these boards -- has been for quite a while, long before you posted about it. It's like an upscale chain joint, but imho there is better on the Island.
I don't know of any "barbecue restaurants" in or near HHI that are "fit to eat" at. Therefore I remained silent. Southern food is not equal to "country cookin'" in my book, and while I suspected that was what the OP was hinting at, I really don't feel that it is my place here to try to convince folks otherwise. Nonetheless, my silence on Pepper's Porch may be taken as assent.
Sunset Grill and Old Fort pub both serve southern food, neither are what I'd describe as "country". Sea Shack and the new place by Chef David are both worth going to.
HHI is a resort area. It's a good one, and I like it, and there is nothing wrong with that. But if the OP doesn't like "resorty" areas, isn't willing to research these boards, and isn't willing to look at the list of related discussions that mention HHI (just below this thread on my browser), I don't know how to help them.
help - headed to Hilton Head
Oakatie Ale House is generic chrome and fern bar food, nothing to write home about. There are a number of HHI threads on these boards, most of them still have some relevancy, and I recommend you to them. You are however going to a very "resort-y" area, and most of your good choices are going to be upscale.
Recommendation for Anniversary Dinner? (Raleigh area)
Fearrington House is open Sundays from 6-8 pm, and is exactly the kind of place you want to go to for an Anniversary.
If you really can't find a place you want to go to on Sunday, then open the festivities on Saturday night by going out, and then make her a fancy dinner on Sunday night at home. Last time I did this, I made steak, pan-seared scallops, steamed fresh haricots vert, baked potato, and a frozen lemon cream cheese pie for dessert, just to leave an example.
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Fearrington House Restaurant
2000 Fearrington Village, Pittsboro, NC 27312
NC Barbecue and Fried Chicken near I-95
In Smithfield, 1 block south of the intersection of Bus. 70 and 301 is the Chicken Barn. Nothing fancy, a few plastic fast food tables, but good chicken.
The parking lot has Hills of Sno Snow cones, which is gulf-style snow cone place with real shaved snowy ice (not that cheap crushed stuff), and he makes his own flavor syrups from scratch because he is a nutty perfectionist.
Across the street is Millie's, a stand up, order outside, hot dog and country cooking place.
Raleigh - Chinese?
For years the Canton was the only Chinese restaurant in this area, pretty much like Irregardless (later) was the only vegetarian, and The Intimate was the only bookstore (until Mall bookstores came along).
We had one real grocery store in our town, Fuquay, run by a great local family.
We'd drive to Raleigh to eat Chinese (such as it was) rarely, and we would drive to Chapel Hill once a month on a Sunday to visit the Intimate. IIRC, Canton was pretty much at the intersection of Peace and Hillsborough. I remember the color and taste of the sweet & sour coating at Canton to this day, which is not really a good thing.
Gluten-free bbq in Chapel Hill, Raleigh, Durham
None of them are going to "advertise" gluten-free sauces. And when you go in person to ask them, you are going to have to do a lot of explaining about what can't be in the sauce and why. It is simply not in their radar in a lot of cases.
I will note that I have a limited food allergy that can put me in the hospital, and I have given up trying to be coy when I'm talking to restaurant folks about this. I explain bluntly that if the food item in question is affected then it will put me in the emergency room. This is the only way to get some of them to treat the issue seriously, so if you need gluten-free, then be sure they are understanding why you are asking.
And since I think you are going to learn that a lot of folks don't only put vinegar and pepper in their sauce, I would love it if you took notes and reported back to us on what is actually in some of these sauces. I've seen people who are publicly known for doing "authentic traditional NC BBQ" reach over and put ketchup and other things in their sauce while claiming "it's just for the color" or "its just for the texture".
Any rec's for decent food in Hot Springs and Black Mountain NC
We are interested in eating at the Mt. Magnolia Inn this fall, so if anyone has commentary regarding that, it would be appreciated.
We plan to be staying there, and the restaurant looks good on paper.
Allen and Sons or Bullocks?
If there is enough mayo in the slaw to notice it is there, there is too much. This is true for a) hot dogs, and b) bbq.
If I go somewhere and there is mayonnaise in the bbq slaw, I know that on some level they don't know what they're doing. Of course, as the years go by and the old places fade and the new places have come in, more and more use mayo in the slaw. I don't know if this is because of the influx of non-native population since 1975 (in 1975 in the triangle, 75% of the population had never lived in NC before 5 years previous -- it has only gotten worse since), or the nationalization of food and taste, or because the young folk don't have any respect for tradition.
So no, real eastern style slaw does not have mayo in it, not if we're talking bbq or hot dog slaw.
AUTHENTIC (fill-in-the-blank) in North Carolina
Stop in any grocery store and buy Neese's Liver Pudding. Eat it sliced cold on saltines or water crackers. Or you can fry it in a pan with a bit of butter and make a nice white-bread liver pudding sandwich with Duke's salad dressing.
You can make it yourself and there is nothing more "authentically North Carolina".
If you can find an old country store, they might still sell pickled pigs feet and pickled whole eggs. Eating a "red hot" country sausage from a jar along with that is one of the classic lunches of working folks from when i was growing up in the remoter parts of this state.
And I haven't seen one in 20 years, but a braised pig ear sandwich is probably the original inspiration for baloney.
Allen and Sons or Bullocks?
I didn't say "no smoke", I said theirs was "overly smoked". I've been cooking whole hogs for over 40 years, and I learned from my father and my grandfather. We always cooked our hogs over the embers from a wood fire which only consists of dried hickory or white oak. Shoveling embers from the burn barrel to under the pig was one of my first jobs. The reason you do this is to minimize the "smoke" flavor of the pig, which was one of the consistent objectives of the old time pit masters. The sign of a well cooked hog was one in which you primarily taste the meat, not the smoke.
Since 1975, I see more and more people who think that "smoke" = "bbq" which just ain't necessarily so. I realize that this is probably an irreducible conflict -- partly because of the nationalization of food tastes along with everything else. Smoke figures more heavily in a number of other styles, but smoke on Eastern North Carolina Pork Barbecue is not an historical imperative.
