France + Food

Because, let's face it...going to another country, eating is really important. Important for nourishing the traveling body and soul. And important for understanding the place. Eat where the locals eat, eat what the locals eat.

Amazing sandwich at Fad'oli, a favorite sandwich shop here!

I was a bit homesick earlier this week, and for me, it was manifest in missing the food at home. I have a really strong idea of what a meal includes, and I felt like all I was eating was bread, cheese, and butter. Missing meat (particularly poultry...) and fruit/vegetables.

The peach that made me cry, it was so good. I kid not.

Which is crazy because the fruit and vegetables here are really fantastic, especially at the Wednesday/Saturday market, and protein deficiency fears are (I believe) an American socially-created need which helps all of those companies making protein bars.

Sandwich from our picnic. Includes jambon cru (procuitto), a sausage kind of similar to pepperoni, two kinds of cheese, and some beautiful ripe tomatoes

I eat bread at literally almost every meal here. And it's good bread, too!

Fun fact--bread is so integral to france's culture that the government has a whole bunch of legislature relating to it! It's traditionally just flour, water, salt and yeast, and they also dictate (or did dictate in the past) its price. Baguettes are always less than a dollar, and they always go stale (unless kept in the freezer).

quiche with chorizo at Les 2 Suds

And, without further ado, more pictures!

Camembert, honey, walnut sandwich with chocolate molleux at Au Monde de Sophie. Quickly becoming a favorite place to get a sandwich! They have great combos.

Fromage blanc, strawberries, and a phyllo-dough-like bowl. Dessert at Les 2 Suds.

Finally got some chicken! Lovely lemon flavor, on a kebab with carrots/zucchini and rice pilaf. At  Bar a Thym.

Pizza with artichokes and olives at La Dolce Vita...they have a great deal with half a pizza, half a salad for 8 euros!

Crepe with Nutella! Though apparently french people don't eat crepes in the summer, just in the winter. So much for eating like a local! (in Avignon, at I forget which cafe). It was delicious, comme meme.

A kebab sandwich from La Medina (kebab places are all over, this is the best one). The sandwich was basically a burrito sized pocket of MEAT.

La Medina also does Briques, which are phyllo dough pockets of potatoes, eggs, cheese, tuna, etc. mmm

Cherries from the market! What a lovely breakfast.

...and, to finish, something sweet. A tarte with caramel and walnuts, so so delicious.

More to come! Including pictures and recipes from a cooking class I did!

My first experience with Korean food

I recently went to a Korean dinner hosted by the Korean club on campus, and it was my first time ever having Korean food! I'm not sure mass produced take-out was the best way to be introduced to the genre, but it was still pretty delicious.

Here, the classic Bulgogi, a Korean barbeque beef. It was slightly sweet, and seemed very similar to stir fry to me except the meat had a different texture, more coarse but still tender. It's hard to describe, chewy, meaty, not spicy but spiced. 

I should also mention that they served the food family style, and I only got a separate plate because I didn't want to infect the rest of my friends with the cold of the week. There were also appetizers: kimchi (what? I thought it was fermented cabbage...this stuff is good!), jellied chestnut (I wasn't wild about it but some of my friends really liked it) and pickled veggies.

My favorites, though, were the pancakes and the dumplings. Dumplings were familiar, and the pancakes were like a big flat thick noodle laced with onions cut into big rectangles and pan fried. Delicious...chewy, starchy carbs with some slightly spicy (but not mouth-burning) sauce.

To sum it up, I would say that what I tried was good, and I think it would be even better in a restaurant. If you're worried about spice, this food at least wasn't too hot, and I have a pretty low tolerance. Give it a try. and go with friends or family to share a bunch of dishes so you can sample everything!

Frank Pepe's Pizza

Frank Pepe's is a classic, a tradition, a legend. And for good reason.

It's a pizza place in New Haven's Little Italy district, just down the street from its competitor, Sally's (which, according to my friend who has frequented both in under 24 hours, is better, but I'm not so sure after tasting Pepe's!).

Left: Sausage, Pepperoni, onions, cheese; Right: cheese

New Haven is known for its pizza because of these two restaurants. Pepe's pizza is made in a brick oven, just a few pies at a time, which means they are fresh and baked in a super hot oven. It also has the added benefit for of increasing the demand and hype--on weekends, lines can stretch a block or two and wait times are well over an hour.

It's worth it. Granted, we went on a Tuesday night of finals week, which is not prime time for lines and such, but the restaurant was full. We got a table quickly, though, just one or two families also waiting.

Let's talk pizza. I'm a Chicago girl. I get thick crust. It's amazing and bready and filling. My favorite at home is spinach pan pizza from Piero's...it's dense and rich and uber cheesy. The spinach is abundant and mixed with the cheese, giving the mouth-feel illusion of having twice as much cheese, and the sweet/salty/tart tomato sauce on top of the cheese necessitates eating with a knife and fork.

I'd always assumed that thin crust pizza meant the crackery, dry, thin crust of Domino's pizza parties. Little squares that never seemed filling.

Thin crust pizza is not that, let me tell you. Pepe's changed my view. The crust is still chewy, with charred, bubbly edges that leave ash on your fingers and cheeks. The toppings are out of this world, too. You have to ask for cheese separately, otherwise you get a tomato pie (which I've heard is also excellent, but we are hungry college students and want cheese and meat!)

This is the lovely group of people with whom I had my first Pepe's experience. The experience was amazing, half because of the food and half because of the company.

It's finals week...judge not our crazy expressions!

We ordered three large pizzas, one bacon, one plain, and one with sausage, pepperoni, and onion, all with mozzarella. There was plenty left over, and we ate quite a bit.

My favorite topping was the bacon. Thick, salty, smoky, and greasy, it was lush and decadent to have the dairy fat melding with the meat fat but also a little disgusting, in the best way possible. As in, disgustingly delicious.

Everything's better with bacon.

If you're in New Haven, pizza is a must. There are plenty of good places besides Pepe's or Sally's, though those are the traditional town favorites and live up to and exceed to their glowing recommendations.

Cambridge!

Yesterday, Yale fought valiantly against Harvard in their 129th "The Game."

It was close. There were fumbles and field goals. Tough luck and touchdowns.

And ultimately, Harvard won. Truth is, neither of our teams is very good, but since the game was so close, it was super exciting to watch!

So, I was in Cambridge, supporting Yale. A couple of tidbits from my 24 hour trip:

Look at this banner I saw walking around...I'm not the only one who's thought of that pun.
That's okay, not everything has to be original.

You want to hear something else unoriginal?
You do?
Banana
banana
banana
orange
orange who?
orange you glad I didn't say banana?

Well that was an awkwardly one-sided riddle.

Also while in Cambridge, I got to finally see my friend Skylar again, whom I hadn't seen in over a year. I am so thankful we had the chance to reconnect in person!
It's great to be able to keep in touch over Skype and the facebooks and such, but as my friends and I spread out over the country for college, being able to see each other in person is such a luxury!

She took me to her favorite brunch place in Cambridge, Cafe Luna.
The owner even recognized her name, that's how much she likes this place. And I can see why.

I had this chocolate stuffed french toast with sauteed bananas and walnuts, and it was out of this world.

Two pieces of brioche, very lightly battered (I have to admit, usually I'm a fan of denser, more custardy french toast but this variation was very good) with chocolate between the layers, and a huge pile of buttery bananas and walnuts on the side.

Oh, and a chocolate drizzle.
Decadent and amazing, let me tell you. Skylar's pumpkin pancakes were fantastic too...we shared bites, because that's what friends do!

Make a reservation for brunch if you're in the area. I highly recommend it!

Bond 45 Review

This past weekend I was so so lucky to be able to go see Once in New York with my residential college.

It was amazing. All the actors play instruments on stage, so there's no orchestra, and the whole performance was very genuine and beautiful. It's no wonder the show won 8 Tonys.

This is probably the best known song from the musical. It's been on the radio a bunch from the movie, which was also super popular.

Anyway, before the show, we had a fantastic brunch at Bond 45. It's a fancy Italian place right near Times Square, and the food was incredible.

I had minestrone soup to start, which they claim has 21 vegetables. It was a clear, light (not tomato-y), hot vegetable broth with distinct vegetables in a huge bowl. I loved how there were strips of kale and other wintery greens cooked perfectly floating around like ribbons

Then, I had a pizza with their homemade Burrata Mozzarella, thick slices of prosciutto  and arugula. It was huge, and delicious. The prosciutto was hard to eat because the pieces were a bit big for my mouth, which made for some amusing bites with meat just hanging out of my mouth.

Bear in mind I had just met the people I was eating with. We had a good laugh about it, though. And the restaurant isn't all serious...one of their pizzas has "A Lot of Pepperoni and Arugula."

And then, dessert. Oh, lordy, dessert.

The sense of humor continues with our joking waiter (maybe an actor?) and a menu item called "Bucket of Chocolate Mousse."
Which we of course had to try.

They bring out two connected buckets, one with mousse and one with whipped cream, and serve probably a cup and a half of each onto a plate with two shovels.

So. so. so. so good.

The NY Cheesecake was fantastic as well (served with a flourish of chocolate sauce drizzled from a copper pan...what a presentation!)

Recipe coming soon! I'm home from break, so baking is going DOWN.

That is, after we finish my dad's apple pie :)

Taco Food Truck Review

Yumola.

3 tacos al pastor. Comes with lettuce, beans, and rice, all for $5!

After the dining hall food day after day, three times a day, it was a nice change to pick my meal off a menu and have it be something someone had personally taken pride in developing the recipe for.

Common Scents: they put the tacos on the lettuce and rice part of your lunch so that they don't get the beans all over them. They stay nice!

Not so common scents: After a 20 minute walk from class to my dorm (science hill is far), the tacos were no longer warm despite a seemingly insulating Styrofoam container, and even though they were clever about laying the tacos so they didn't get on the beans, they still got soggy from the stuff inside so the bottom half of the (soft corn) shell got kind of gross.

As inauthentic as it is, I'm more of a flour tortilla person than a corn tortilla person...

It's like eating fish. Like, I wish I liked fish, and I feel like I should be able to drink coffee black and enjoy it and all.
I feel like eating corn tortillas fortified my authenticity as a person.

Definitely going to be trying out more food carts! They're all super inexpensive, and the smells waft enticingly over the parking lot.

Go for it.

Honey Tasting

Women, Food, and Culture.

It's my writing class, and it's awesome. The professor's great, she's been teaching it for several years and has her history down pat. When was fire first discovered?

Oh, around 800,000 years ago.
#casual.

An optional field trip last week was up to the Yale Farm, where we sat around a long, wooden communal table and sniffed and tasted artisan honeys with pairings straight from the farm.

It was amazing! We tried 5 different kinds of honey, ranging from light to dark.

My favorites were the pumpkin blossom honey and the goldenrod honey. The former was dark, spicy, reminiscent of fall and molasses cookies. We had it with brie which was a deliciously rich pairing. The latter was agressively sweet in aroma and lightly perfumed with the scent of flowers to taste.
It smelled super sweet.
It tasted perfum-y.

My senses are all askew.

The goldenrod honey also reminded me a bit of chamomile, the way it's got a golden flavor.
Sight, too, now? Really, this is just getting confusing.

Every single one of my senses loved the goldenrod honey, in a different way.
On opposite day.

We had it with carrots, which I felt was kind of a weird pairing. The carrots were delicious, and the honey, but given they were both raw, neither had melded with the other so it was disorienting to eat together. Maybe that's why my senses were out of whack.

The pairings (from 12 o'clock and clockwise): goat cheese and mint, green beans, brie, carrots, and beets.

The other honeys we tasted were a blueberry blossom honey (with goat cheese and mint--my favorite pairing of the day--it was a classic, fruity, sweet honey), a linden honey (earthy and light), and a buckwheat honey (bitter, musky, dark--it polarized the group into haters and...not haters. I'm in the first group).

The beekeeper who spoke to us, Marina Marchese, runs Red Bee Apiary. Her honey was great!

She was full of facts about honey's properties, one of the most interesting of which was that honey contains an acid which reacts with some chemical our digestive tracts produce and makes hydrogen peroxide, so that would be one reason honey is often used on wounds and can be an antibacterial. It also has such a high concentration of sugar that bacteria literally cannot stay alive in it, so no need to refrigerate!

From left: propolis (a kind of resin), beeswax, and pollen (which is apparently great for your health and has a super strong but nice taste)

Love you, honey!

You're so sweet. Thanks for reading, y'all.

Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies with Sea Salt

These cookies were inspired by a visit to my dad's cousin's restaurant in Berkeley, The Elmwood Cafe. It's a beautiful place, right next to a bookshop, and the food is beautiful too!

That little heart card is a ballot to vote for the charity you want half of Elmwood Cafe's profits to go to. They have boxes up on the wall and you can slip the card into one of them to cast your vote.

There are so many windows, and the decor is homey, with tables outside, lots of mason jars, and a huge wooden sidebar.

Those glasses in the picture above? Yeah...that's homemade soda. I had ginger soda (SO not like Schwepps Ginger Ale, but delicious all the same) and my dad had rosemary. There are a whole bunch to choose from, plus cappuccinos, teas (see above), and all the usual culprits.

The food is really, really fresh. Their menu changes seasonally, and they buy a lot of local, organic produce.
My sandwich was a croque monsieur with pear and whole grain mustard. Yum!!

And, of course, what would lunch be without dessert? Her chocolate chip cookie with sea salt is what inspired this post, but also on this plate are a chocolate croissant half and a bit of coffeecake!

My goodness, did we leave feeling nurtured :)

So, on to these cookies. Last time I posted a chocolate chip cookie recipe, it was for crunchy ones. And don't get me wrong, I love them, but this here is the chocolate chip cookie recipe I have made so many times that I have the double batch measurements written into the margin. It's the one I bring to school to impress people.

It is chewy.
It is delicious.

And this time, I added walnuts and sea salt. Walnuts because I like 'em and my mom's out of town (she's not a fan), but also because I have a very vivid memory of giving my English teacher a cookie with walnuts last year and he remarked on how they made the cookie special. Since these were to thank my teachers for writing me college recs, I really wanted to include walnuts.

(people, I promise this isn't creepy. It's just a weird thing I remembered)

Oh plus, I used good chocolate. Always a good investment. Apparently Costco carries big bags of Callebaut chocolate now, which makes me Oh So Happy.

Just look at dem walnuts.

Make these cookies...and spread the love!

Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies with Sea Salt
Yield: about 30 cookies, depending on how big you make them!

Ingredients:
2 cups 2 tablespoons AP Flour (10 5/8 ounces)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) butter, melted and cooled until warm
1 cup packed (7 ounces) brown sugar--light or brown is fine
1/2 cup (3 1/2 ounces) granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 1/2 cups walnuts, toasted and chopped
sea salt, to top

Method:

1. Adjust the oven racks to the upper- and lower-middle positions and heat the oven to 325 degrees. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper or spray them with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl; set aside.
3. Either by hand or with an electric mixer, mix the butter and sugars until thoroughly blended. Beat in the egg, yolk, and vanilla until combined. Add the dry ingredients and beat at low speed just until combined. Stir in the chips and walnuts.
4. Roll a scant ¼ cup of the dough into a ball. Break it apart and try and mash the halves back together so the craggy broken surface is on top (see this website for illustrations...and by the way this is basically the same recipe). Place on baking sheets 2 inches apart and sprinkle with the sea salt.
5. Bake until cookies are just starting to turn golden at the edges, with still soft and puffy centers, about 15-18 minutes, rotating top/bottom and front/back midway through baking. Cool on the sheets.

Impress people! Thanks Kara for the inspiration!

Recipe from Baking Illustrated.