Fusion on a saucer

Cupcakes. Bacon. Only french fries. Only grilled cheese sandwiches. Exotically flavored ice cream. Eggs in everything. Offal. Pork belly.  (Pork belly, pork belly, pork belly!) What's next, crispy pig skin? (It should be, it's GOOD.)

Food goes through trends constantly, and I don't necessarily buy into many of them. To me, a good meal with ingredients that are fresh and thoughtfully put together, cooked well and obviously presented with care and pride is better than any deconstructed, foam-embellished, truffle-oiled morsel forced into a metal ring and laid out on a bed of baby greens/grains/flower petals/somethings. I'm not saying all food trends are bad, because many are not (see: cupcakes, eggs, anything pork-related), and as a matter of fact, I am quite fond of many of the foods that become trendy. But when I'm either cooking or seeking out a good restaurant, I don't tend to pay much attention to the trend factor. I just want a place with something delicious that I want to eat.

I recently went with a friend to a restaurant that is newish to my neighborhood. This place does Asian fusion food presented on small plates. The first concept I'm not so into. The second one I love.

I understand that fusion is a way to take familiar cuisines and mix them up with elements from other cuisines in order to make something new. Sometimes it works, with astonishing, surprising, pleasing results. Sometimes it just tries too hard, putting overwrought, overthought, and bizarre combinations on the plate, which makes one wonder: what was so wrong with the way things were that someone was presumptuous enough to believe that they could make it BETTER by completely changing it?

When we ate at this particular restaurant, some of the dishes really shone. They were satisfying, flavorful, and a true success. Tiny fried sweet potatoes? Yes. A pork ragout on a bed of noodles, a perfectly poached egg nestled among them? I could have eaten a second bowl. The pork belly on soft, cloudlike Asian buns? Perfection. Like a bacon cheeseburger slider without the cheeseburger. But the smoked tofu? Mediocre at best, and lacking robust flavor. The crab and jicama salad on a bed of egg custard? Disappointing texture combination, jarring and dissonant flavors. Overall, enough of the meal was good to keep it from being a completely mediocre restaurant experience. But what I really liked was the small plates concept (or Asian-fusion tapas, as I referred to it).

This is one of the reasons I love being Spanish. The cuisine is second to none, and the tapas concept, featuring Spanish food or not, has really caught on in the States. Viva foods on toothpicks! Americans embrace what many other food cultures already know works beautifully: small plates meant to be shared, so everyone can try a variety of foods, rather than eating a massive portion of a single food. It's a fact that after the first few bites of any particular food, our taste buds relax/disengage and the food's taste is just not as intense and satisfying as it was initially. The small plates concept is brilliant because the constantly rotating repertoire of foods keeps the taste buds engaged and primed for action. Small plates encourage eating to become a social event, with everyone getting a taste of each dish. Everyone can try more, and everyone can discuss how something tastes. I find that I much prefer this style of eating, because to me, food is at its best when it is about celebration, socializing, spending time with people we love. And when we graze, eating off these small plates of variety, I feel like we eat less than when we are presented with one huge pile of food at once. Keeping the plates moving keeps the conversation going and the lag between getting each dish allows you to really feel in tune with how your stomach feels physically. Eating more slowly lets you realize when you've had enough. And if you don't like one particular food, you can wait for the next one to come around.

I found that during my meal with my friend, we talked more, spent a lot of time talking about personal things, but also talking about what we eating, saying what we liked and why. So even though everything we ate wasn't fantastic, it was still nice to both be able to try things and talk about why certain things worked more than others. Any time I've ever eaten in a small plates style, or in a way where everything is shared and passed around, I find that I've just enjoyed the meal more. So fusion? I can take it or leave it. But small plates? Keep (many of) them coming.

El Bulli going on un sabbatical

This is what happens when you get a sinus infection: You feel miserable all the time because you can't breathe and the stuff clogging up your nose is too terrifying to even dwell upon, and you finally go to the doctor because your cold is getting worse by the hour. You start taking antibiotics that are the size of horse tranquilizers, which almost immediately clear up the horrors in your sinuses but which wreak havoc on your stomach and kill your taste buds, so that the only things that appeal to you in terms of food are soup, pasta, crackers, and cereal. Also, you can't drink for 10 days. And during that time, you don't put anything on your food blog because cooking consists of preparing a bowl of cereal and pouring ginger ale into a glass.

And now, friends, now I am finally off the antibiotics and getting back into the swing of enjoying, among other things, breathing through my nose and eating from all four major food groups. So here I am! Do excuse my absence; it's inexcusable, on one level, but on another, I feel like I owed myself a break while I was sick.

I am finally going to share the recipe for braised endive and ham that Jeremy and I tried and enjoyed so much, and I'll also include a recipe for a really tasty endive salad, but I don't have them in front of me at the moment so they will come later this week. Right now I wanted to share the news that El Bulli, Ferran Adrià's restaurant (possibly the most renonwned restaurant in the world right now), is closing, at least for two years for a "period of reflection."

Never mind that the restaurant is only currently open 6 months out of the year. Never mind that it is nearly impossible to get reservations to dine there because they only accept them during ONE DAY of the year. Now it will be even twice as impossible to get to eat there. I understand and appreciate that the restaurant is more than just an eatery, it's a place of food experimentation and learning, and this is why I want to go there so badly. Many great chefs have worked under Adrià's tutelage and have gone on to do amazing and creative things with food. But it just saddens me to think that in my lifetime, my chances of actually getting to eat there are extremely slim (while I am extremely not), and are probably going to be even slimmer thanks to this temporary closing. Because honestly, who knows if two years might not just slip into three, and then four, and then more?

We'll see. A girl can dream. Is it so lofty a goal to want to eat at the best restaurant in the world? Is it bad that I feel slightly more entitled to eat there because I happen to be Spanish? Sigh.

News that isn't really news

For some reason, there was NO Top Chef on last night. Boo! I guess we'll have to wait in suspense another week. Blargh. 

A few mornings ago, while sleepily having coffee and oatmeal in front of CNN and trying to wake up enough to get myself on the bus to work, I caught a factoid that interested me (and also didn't surprise me). CNN had taken some poll where they asked Americans how they were faring with the rotten economy. Over half of the respondents had said that the one luxury they didn't want to give up on was going out to eat.

Like I mentioned, I find this interesting and also not surprising, because I feel the same way. I haven't felt the economic meltdown quite so badly, and I'm still getting by, but I do feel the pressure to remain careful about my finances (though this has been ingrained in me since I was a tot by my frugal parents). I'm trying not to make frivolous purchases: I haven't bought loads of new clothes with the changing of the seasons, I've kept personal product purchases (a weakness of mine) at a minimum, and instead of buying books, I go to the library (well, except for cookbooks). But the one thing I haven't really cut back on is food, both in terms of groceries and restaurants.

What is it about eating out and eating well that is so hard for people to give up? Is it the luxury of having one's food prepared? Trying new things? Is it laziness? Or is it the social aspect? Something leads me to believe that this last one might have a lot to do with it. Eating is such a social experience. Getting together with others to share a meal is one of life's finest pleasures, at least that's how it seems to me. I'd gladly give up going to the movies, getting new books and clothes, and taking luxurious trips if it meant being able to have that many more meals out with friends. I'm sure that many more people are now cooking at home too, because of the economy, but I think the fact that people continue going out to eat regularly proves that it's too important of a social experience for us to give up on entirely. Perhaps it stems from the fact that eating is one activity all people must do and that almost all people enjoy, so it's the one thing that each of us has in common with all of our friends.

50 best things to eat: a list

I love lists. Maybe it's my obsessive nature or just the satisfaction I get from seeing a numbered/organized collection of facts, but I love lists of all kinds.

The Guardian recently published a list of the 50 best things to eat in the world, and where to get them. I'm proud to see that Spain makes the list several times. Woot!

Have you ever eaten at one of these places? I have to say that I want to try this bacon cheeseburger at Little Owl in NYC. I also am ashamed that I've never eaten a massive pastrami sandwich at Katz's Deli. (I could mail-order a salami to myself from there though.) I'll have to put these places on my must-visit list next time I venture south. And I must get myself to Gramercy Tavern to eat pork belly. Viva the pig!

But I have to say that I don't think this list is in any way comprehensive. It leaves off a lot of cuisines and seems to take sort of a scattershot approach to food. And of course, since it's a British publication, it seems to have somewhat of a British slant. What foods do you think are must-haves/must-eats that were left off this list? (CHEESESTEAKS!)

The Friendly Toast

So... The Friendly Toast! At last I can sit and write about it for a few minutes. Apparently this place is legend in New Hampshire, where its original restaurant is, and they opened a few months ago near Kendall here in Cambridge (a handy 10 minute walk from my apartment). I've been meaning to go and finally just went this past Sunday to celebrate a friend's new job in Baltimore.

There were 6 of us waiting for a table on a Sunday at noon... which was a problem. We had to wait over an hour and a half to be seated, because not only was there a 20-top in the restaurant that just wouldn't leave, but the emo-hipster doofus host sort of forgot we were on the list and had to put us back on. I was feeling wary about the place, having read mixed reviews on Yelp (most of the bad ones indicating that the service was terrible), and also having to wait so long, so I had low expectations.

The service actually wasn't that bad once we got in there, just a touch slow because there were quite a few people still in there eating at 1:45 pm. I got an herb omelette that had roasted peppers and brie in it. It was big for an omelette, and pretty good... not too greasy, still a bit moist inside, and just a tad browned along one edge (I'm an egg slut and I tend to judge a place on its capacity, or lack thereof, to make good eggs). The home fries are sliced red potatoes with seasoning, not really super fried, which was nice because that keeps them from sinking like a rock in your gut. The coffee is expensive. $2.15 for a cup of non-fancy, regular old coffee is ridiculous, but at least you get refills. My friend got the black tea, which comes in a cute individual teapot and is brewed loose in a metal filter. It was filled with almonds and smelled delicious, so I might actually get that next time I go.

Most of us got an order of toast included with our meals, but of course my toast (cinnamon raisin) didn't come out with my meal because the waitress said that "the machine" (did she mean toaster, maybe?) was acting up. Or some such thing. And by this point I was nearly done my meal and said it really didn't matter, but she assured me it would be out soon, and it was.

And oh my, am I glad that I didn't forgo the toast, because it was easily the best part of my meal. A huge slice, thick as a pillow, swirled with cinnamon and covered in sweet, melty butter. It was like eating a lighter, fluffier cinnamon roll. Oh, so delicious. So delicious! Really, that toast saved the place for me. The interior has all this diner-y, kitschy design, but so much so that you feel like the place is trying too hard. And everyone who works there seems too cool for school, though our waitress was very nice.

But the toast! I will go back for more of the toast. I would literally just order toast at that place. Not even French toast. Just toast. Just bring me two slices of delicious toast and some tea and I'm set. MMMM.

So in closing: it's not a bad place to go, and the food is decent, if a tad expensive, but the toast is amazing! Don't go if you're in a rush to get seated; better luck might come later on a weekend (like after 1 pm, when the brunch rush seems to be dissipating) or even on a weekday or an evening. But at some point do go, if only for the toast.