Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Moved Out, Move Along, Nothing to See Here...

As you may have gathered, dear friends who read this silliness, I got overwhelmed with work and let the Pittfoodness slide.

But the upshot is that I have moved - to Boston.

The fun continues, I hope you'll join me at eatbeantown.blogspot.com
subscribe!
make me feel the love!

until then...

Monday, February 9, 2009

Super Mister Potato Head

Tater Tots! (I ordered mine well done...)

Tiny fried crispy friends! Reminiscent of grade 4! Tater tots, in the able hands of the staff at the Waterfront location of Bar Louie, are as surprisingly great eats as were some of the other offerings we enjoyed from this little chain restaurant's kitchen. Some, not so much... but definitely not BAD, well priced, and right across from the movie theatre.

seriously?

I know that I have custom of disdain for chain restaurants, but this was decent.

seriously!

I had a black cherry mojito - which is actually more of a blackberry mojito. It was tasty but seemingly ethanol-free. T enjoyed a traditional mojito and was surprisingly buzzed after about 1/8th of it. So, ymmv. Fresh blackberries made mine tasty, though. Don't tell my mother, but I kinda pounded it, and still, nuthin.

For my main course, I ordered a "small plate" of pot roast sliders. Now, I do have a small gripe here - two, actually. gripe #1: these aren't sliders - they're a smallish sandwich on some weirdly mushy shite bread that has been cut into four pieces. gripe #2: the meat is supposed to be accompanied by horseradish mashed potatoes. Fascinatingly, this is yet another of the burgh's missing ingredients - no horseradish. As I have said before, kids, the nose knows. And horseradish is an easy one. So, the sliders were ok - a lot of bread, little meat, bland-ish flavor from the mysteriously missing horseradish, but the meat itself was tender, fat fully rendered out, and good if not stingy in portion.

BUT

I got a side of tater tots.

Which is precisely what you should do if you find yourself down at the waterworks and want a drink and salty snack. Definitely the finest iteration of this Reagan-era school lunch vegetable that I have ever seen. I suspect they're high temp deep friend to crispy perfection, and then dusted with a spice-salt mix that smells like it contains dehydrated tomato, black pepper, and I am not sure what else. Nummy. Crispy. Infantile. $3.50 bought more than two diners could down - we managed less than half. And no hair nets and lunch ladies. No detention if you throw 'em. But I wouldn't waste this junk food nirvana.

Just for completeness, T had a BBQ chicken pizza. I dislike chicken on pizza, it just bugs me. Oddly, not one but ALL except the sole vegetarian pizza have chicken as a topping! Not really a pizza, more of a squishy flatbread. Sauce was a little sweet. But T liked it overall, although he noted dough was soft and too fluffy and would have fallen into a heap if he hadn't cut and eaten it with a knife and fork.

Summary judgments for the Waterworks location of Bar Louie: ok for the price and location. Service was pleasant and efficient, drinks were tasty but inconsistent in potency, food was ok except for mystery ingredients and lousy job done in every iteration of bread. BUT a bright shining beacon of goodness, hope and youth would bring me back - go there for tater tots and beer. Seriously.

Monday, February 2, 2009

Cheesy and Wet (or, the Soggy Bloggy)

No, kids. I am not referring to a porno about tacky young things from Boca Raton. "Cheesy and wet" is the best way I can summarize the experiences that I have had at Pizza Sola (along the border of East Liberty and Shadyside) Which is sad, since it is pretty near to my apartment, the space is tidy and bright, the service is friendly, and the guy stretching dough in the window makes you think you are in for a treat.

but.

the thing is...

it is cheesy and wet.

Seriously, that dough looks perfect. But it gets overmoistened, undercooked, and ruined.

What I mean is this: there is too much cheese (something which I did not believe could be possible), and the result is that the pizza is extremely soggy. I have eaten at Pizza Sola three times. One heads up - all three times I had to add salt to my pizza, which may have had some magical hygroscopic effect and produced the deluge. So, maybe the "Hodgedonality" was my fault. In which case, instead I will criticize that the pizza, especially the sauce, is pretty to look at, but flavorless. Kinda like an ex (or six) of mine. Ahh, the "chain of fools" as a girlfriend of mine once said.

but I digress.

The first time, we ordered a whole pie, classic in style, with some veg toppings. Summary: smelled good, looked pretty, wound up tasting kinda dull, undercooked in the middle, and soggy..

Second time. I had a slice. This was plain cheese-n-sauce, reheated in the oven, selected from a wide array of gargantuanly sized, generously topped slices. This was the best pizza I had from Pizza Sola, which I have come to believe is for two reasons: 1) It was simple and lightly covered and 2) it was cooked twice, thereby preventing that dastardly undercooked and soggy center.

The third try was the tie-breaker, and sadly, we won't be going back. This time we ordered a ricotta and sausage pie (we tried something without red sauce since the prior two times I found the sauce to taste rather flat and simple. If you need a taste, you can whip up something similar at home by combining Campbell's condensed tomato soup, undiluted, with dried oregano and maybe two drops of household vinegar. Mangia!). We watched a sturdy young surfer-dude hand stretch a perfect orb of smooth white-flour dough into a lovely disk of pizza potential. It was topped and took a ride in the oven. It smelled luscious. It was served to us promptly by a friendly server. We waited a long moment. And then served it up. One taste...

and it was cheesy and wet.

soggy.

squishy.

and needed a horse-lick of salt. shocking!

I didn't manage to eat even one slice. I was so bummed out, since I love cheese (no secret) and had just had the life shattering discovery that, yes indeedy, you really can have too much of a good thing.

To make matters worse, that good thing had pissed all over my dinner. Only sorta figuratively. See for yourself.

Summary judgment for Pizza Sola: hard to wreck a pizza. They wrecked it 2 out of 3 times. Upshot: nice spot, nice service, and the dough guy is doing his job. Downside: flat flavors and moisture management issues. While it is still pizza (can't be all that bad, right?), it is pricy stuff when my neighborhood corner pizza joint is half the price, more consistent, and quite a lot better. Alas, Pizza Sola won't be my one and only. Looks pretty, though. Noneless, after three dates, Pizza Sola is out. Join the chain, my friend.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Cherry on Top

It is with great sadness that I learned today that my friend Chihiro (Cherry) Enoki died in a climbing accident in California over Thanksgiving weekend.

Chi lived her life to the fullest, although it was far from a full life.

As long as I knew her, her "signature" on personal notes and whatnot, in lieu of her name, was a little cartoon Cherry-shaped swish of her pen on the bottom corner. But today I like to imagine her before she died as Cherry on top of the world, if only for a moment.

You can learn more about my longtime friend all over the internet. It takes no romance nor fancy words to portray her the way she was: smart, capable, energetic, hilarious, motivated and cool.

No pizza blog today. Seems way too small and dumb given how I am feeling.

Take a moment to read about Chihiro Enoki, her life may inspire yours to be lived with greater love and aggressive vitality.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Pittsburgh is Pizza

(sing along now, everyone!)...you are what you swallow, so the next time you feel hollow, don't fill up with just any kind of treat! This goes for every kid or six-foot ath-e-lete, what you really are is what you eat! (wahoo!)

Am I the only one who remembers the little singing paleolithic Spongebob dude who would sing little songs about nutrition between Saturday morning cartoons?

If you believe the cartoon dude upstaging Picture Pages with Bill Cosby, then you know that you are what you eat. From the myriad signposts, awnings, restaurants, menus, bars, and outposts offering pizza, I can say one thing with confidence: Pittsburgh is Pizza. At least more than a little bit.

(My hometown is a pizza loving place, too, so I enjoy this)

But, while there are many decent pies available near me, I am not yet in love. Can anyone suggest what the best pizza in town might be, and why? I don't need anything fancy or whatnot, just great crust, with great sauce, and great cheese, cooked with greatness. And I am not into deep-dish. Just a preference thing. It is still pizza, which makes it not bad, but I prefer a lighter crisper texture.

Tomorrow, if I finish other things and get moving on stuff in my real life: a review of Pizza Sola. The truncated version: tried it three times, didn't love it.

Thursday, January 8, 2009

La Grande Citrouille

Veganism (well, nearly) in my kitchen...

I openly admit that while I tend to have an adventurous palate, quite often and depending on my mood, some meats can taste incredibly bad to me. That experience, in addition to my limited available time to locate great product, prep it, cook it, and eat it, as well as a growing belief that eating much meat is bad for body and planet, has yielded a great interest in vegetarian cooking. And I mean elegant, tasty, no-sacrifices cooking that is not of that 70's earthy-crunchy ilk (well, at least not all of the time). No mush, no chili, no rice 'n beans (well, at least not most of the time).

Just to complicate matters, a number of the usual vegetarian staples don't agree with me (I need to minimize dairy, eggs sometimes don't sit well, and I am allergic to avocados...), and my diet plan involves my eating about 60 grams of lean protein a day and very little simple sugars. Not all that easy without much meat. (Although I do eat a lot of Greek yogurt (which doen't bug my belly)).

So, I am still eating a serving of fish 1-2x a week, which I can rationalize by buying things that are more sustainable and aren't known to bioconcentrate mercury. I'll just admit it up front so that when you dine with me you don't think that I am a hypocrite. I also am still eating meat when I want it, particularly when dining out (still have a tough time resisting duck breast and bacon, but I don't need to keep them in the house...). And I loathe the sort of vegetarians (be they real, or, like me, not wholly committed) who preach their ethical crap to others, especially while eating.

Thus, the point of this is not to convert you to some religion in which even I do not believe, but to share with you tonight's feature in the ongoing saga: what I made for dinner.

My friend, Ross (shoutout to you, dude!), recently gave me the idea of using polenta as a vegetarian, fat-free "crust" for a quiche I often make. Likewise, my old pal and uber-carpenter Mike (shoutout atcha, too, baby!) has been giving me tons of higher protein, low sugar, low fat, still tasty, not mushblobs vegan cooking ideas, including the joys of silken tofu in lieu of dairy thickeners in recipes. So, guys, you (and the things going bad in my fridge) inspired tonight's recipe.

La Nuit de la Grande Citrouille, Charlie Brown!
(Aromatic maple pumpkin tart with sage-polenta crust and red wine laquered wild mushroom ragout with sage and brown butter)
(yes, I know the butter isn't vegan)
(and that that description is silly)

preheat oven to 350 degrees.

ingredients (all of this is rough, I didn't measure):
1/2 cup corn meal
1.5 cu water
salt
about a tablespoon of finely minced (back cut for dryness) fresh sage

one can, 15 oz., of Libby's pumpkin (just the plain pumpkin, not the preflavored pie mix)
3/4 cup of silken reduced fat tofu
about a teaspoon of finely minced Chinese ginger
a small dash of ground red cayenne pepper (I always put this in a pumpkin pie, as an aside)
a few shakes of five spice powder
one shake of nutmeg
salt
2 tablespoons maple syrup

2 cups of mixed wild mushrooms (we had shitake, crimini, and oyster)
2 tsp of olive oil
1 tsp of unsalted butter
the red wine (a medium bodied cab) that was left in my glass (I think a dry chardonnay would have been better, but I wasn't drinking that)
some more fresh sage (this is just rolled up and sliced finely into the pan with kitchen scissors) - circa a teaspoon
salt

maple syrup (and a little Pecorino Romano as a garnish would have been good, but I didn't want the fat)

easy:

in a saucepan, put the water and salt it to taste (I think I used about 2 tsp). boil it. whisk in the corn meal, cook it until it is done over medium heat (maybe a minute or so), toss in the sage, whisk it all together, and remove from heat. set aside to cool a bit.

spray a nine inch metal pie pan or whatever you have around with some cooking spray. I just use the olive oil kind since I like the taste.

Press, using a hand rinsed in cold water (no sticking), the polenta into the pie pan, then put this in the oven and cook it for about 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the filling: dump filling ingredients into a bowl and blend until smooth, then salt to taste. I used a stick blender. You use whatever you like.

when the "crust" is kinda set and dried a little, dump in the filling, smooth it out, and put it back in the oven.

I cooked it at about 350 (the oven in my apt is unreliable, but that is what my thermometer said. Incidentally, I set the oven to 390 F, so as ever, YMMV) for about 50 minutes whilst I accomplished other goals.

when it was done, I turned the oven off but left the pie in there while I made the mushrooms: put the olive oil in a skillet. get it warm but not super hot. put the mushrooms in, whole. toss in a pinch of salt. toss the mushrooms every so often to prevent sticking. when they're mostly done to your liking, toss in the sage. continue to cook. toss in the butter, let it brown very slightly, and lightly caramelize the outsides of the flat mushrooms. deglaze with whatever you were drinking at the time (kinda like a reverse monte au buerre), toss a bit more, the whole thing will thicken and be delicious.

to serve: cut a nice slice of your semisavory pie. put some of the mushrooms on top. pour on a teensy touch of real maple syrup, and finish with a sage leaf and a little Romano grana if you have it and are feeling fancy (or just eat it, if you are me, while watching William Shatner interview Jenna Jamison).

If you are a hungry person, 1/4 of the pie is a serving. roughly, this contains 14 grams of protein, 12.5 grams of sugars, and under 200 calories. plus the mushrooms, which, depending on how many you eat, are the source of fat in this dish.

Have vegetarian(ish) food ideas? a great recipe to share? tried this and it sucked? let me know!

off to Memphis tomorrow.