Lahore Karahi

Revisited what is considered to be one of the best Indian/Pakistani restaurants in San Francisco last night. As with most of the best Indian places, Lahore Karahi is a little divey. It's in the Tenderloin (one of the less nice parts of San Francisco) but it's worth the trip. Prices are reasonable verging on cheap for Indian food.


The thing that sets this place apart from your standard Indian spot, is that the food has much deeper more complex flavors and also feels less greasy. I tried a bunch of stuff including Tikka Masala and Vindaloo (standards), a few types of Naan, and a vegeterian spinach dish. The Vindaloo was my favorite dish of the evening with an earthy spiciness that maintained a lot of flavor with a lot of spice. The biryanis were also quite good and spicier than I'm used to- which, of course, I love.

Definitely going back here next time I want good Indian food and don't mind goiing out of my way to get it.

Adventures in Crock-Potting #2

The recipe for my second crock pot adventure came as a recommendation from a co-worker. It could not have come at a more opportune moment, as I found myself relishing some good, spicy, southern cooking. I used this recipe to make crock-pot Jambalaya with relatively successful results.

I didn't go shopping specifically for this dish, which meant I had to improvise a little bit with a couple ingredients. Most notably, I left out the celery (didn't have any, none at my little crummy corner store). Celery is generally used as an aromatic- a way to add a little flavor to stocks, broths, stews, etc. So I figured this dish would survive without it. I also didn't really like the idea of chunks of celery in my Jambalaya. Just didn't seem right to me. So that was out.

I also didn't have any pre-mixed Cajun/Creole Seasoning, but that was easily overcome by mixing up a batch of my own with spices I already had around (mostly Cayenne, Salt, Garlic Powder, Paprika, Red Pepper Flakes). In fact, this ended up working out better for me in a lot of ways, as I was able to add a little extra spice to suit my need for heat.

The one substitution that was a slight bummer was that I didn't have any andouille sausage. I thought there was some in the freezer, but I was wrong. Instead, I used spicy italian sausages. They worked fine, and had enough heat (spice-wise) to serve the function of the sausage, but definitely added a bit different spice flavor, whereas the andouille would have matched pretty well with the Cajun Seasoning. So not a huge loss, and I'd do it again if I needed to, but probably slightly less than ideal.

The other question was what to do with the rice. I didn't like the idea of serving my Jambalaya over rice. For me, the rice is an integral part of the dish and needs to spend at least some time stewing with the other ingredients and spices. I was too unsure to fully cook the rice in the crock pot with everything else, so I ended up taking the middle road and cooking the rice separately and then adding it to the crock pot for the last 20min (or so) of cooking. When I cooked the rice, I used half chicken brothe (I had extra) and half water for a little extra flavor. This ended up working out great and also helped absorb some of the extra liquid from the crock pot. Next time, I might try taking some of the liquid from the crockpot and cooking the rice in that (with some water). We'll see.

These last points highlight the main issue with this recipe- I ended up with a bit too much liquid in the crock pot. This isn't a huge deal, as I just scooped the good chunkies out with a slotted spoon. That said, if I try using some of the Jambalaya liquid to cook the rice it might help both add flavor to the rice and reduce some of the liquid in the pot.

I like this recipe and I would definitely make it again. For any of you who try this at home, if you like spice (like me) make sure you double (or more!) the amount of cajun seasoning or have some louisiana hot sauce (Crystal, Tabasco) on hand to add later.

The Lovely Bones

DO NOT SEE THIS MOVIE. There, got that out of the way. This is the worst movie I've watched in a long time. Seriously. Don't know what they were thinking. Movie suffers from mixed (and confusing) tones, poor acting (and casting, for that matter), terrible music choices, and general cheeziness of the bad variety. It's too bad, because I've been told that the book is pretty good.

The parts of the movie that were most successful were:
Stanley Tucci
The suspenseful parts

Things missing from this movie:
A real main character
A single compelling arch
A sense of when special effects stop being cool

Skip it.

Lots of Movies

The combination of slowness at work and the approaching Academy Awards has inspired me to watch a whole lot of movies in the last couple weeks. All told, and in no particular order, I've seen:
Serious Man (see previous post)
Julie and Julia
Avatar
The Hurt Locker
Brothers
The Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Informant
Up in the Air
Crazy Heart
...
oh, and Bruno. Ugh. Bruno. Don't ask why. The opportunity presented itself, and I watched. It was not funny.

Somewhat surprisingly, I actually really enjoyed all of these movies (except Bruno). In fact, its possible that my LEAST favorite was Fantastic Mr. Fox. Brief commentaries about the merits (and demerits) of each:

A Serious Man: See previous post.

Julie and Julia: I went into this expecting to not really like it, but I was pleasantly surprised. THe movie is sort of split in two- half is about Julia Child's past and how she became a chef (thumbs up) and half is about a woman who writes a blog about cooking every recipe in Julia's cookbook in a year (mostly thumbs down). I like food and cooking, so all of that was interesting. I though Meryl Streep was excellent- she NAILED the weird Julia Child mannerisms. Amy Adams, who I usually like, was less good and her character was not particularly interesting or likable.

Avatar: What can I say? A feast for the eyes and a whole lot of fun. Yes we've seen the story before (Fern Gully, Dances with Wolves, etc), but we've certainly never seen that world before nor have we seen technology used this successfully. I was skeptical about this due to the crazy hype, and I still think $500 million or whatever it cost is way way way too much for a movie. But it was a ride from start to finish and I enjoyed pretty much every minute- even the super cheesy parts.

The Hurt Locker: Really enjoyed this one- super tense, well developed characters, interesting look at the "new" kind of war. Focuses on the idea of war as a drug and makes the audience complicit by pumping up the tension to draw us in and make us "addicted" to the excitement.

Brothers: Heard mixed reviews and was pleasantly surprised. Acting was solid, although for some reason I don't like Natalie Portman (in anything). Super intense movie- not a feel good flick by any stretch. Something about family and super cute kids always gets to me... I had some issues with the structure and the music, but overall thought this was decent. I would be interested to see the same movie without knowing what happened to Tobey Maguier's character in Afganistant... I think it would have been more interesting for the audience to learn what happened at the same rate as the family...

The Fantastic Mr. Fox: It was fun, but something about it just didn't quite click for me. Wes Anderson has that tendency towards smugness and I think in this case it annoyed me. There were some clever parts, and, as usual in Wes Anderson movies the writing was the star. That said, I didn't particularly enjoy the animation style and thought the film was decent but not great. IMHO, "Up" is a much stronger film as a whole.

The Informant: Funny bits, but a bit too long. Matt Damon did a pretty decent job on the whole, but nothing in this movie is really worth talking about.

Up In The Air: I really enjoyed this movie and can't think of anything bad to say about it. Well made, well acted, thematically relevant... Yep, it's a good little movie. Does it deserve some of the best picture buzz it's getting? Probably not, precisely because it's a good little movie. For me, Best Picture needs to have something great, grand, or new. Not that dazzling eye candy should always win, but doing something new and different should be rewarded, and while this is certainly a good film, there's nothing "special" about it. Also, I'm a little tired of George Clooney. Too often I feel like he plays himself.

Crazy Heart: I love Jeff Bridges. He is a talented dude and is good in almost everything he's in. He was great in this role, and probably deserving of Best Actor. The movie itself is solid, although not super original- its sort of a combination of The Wrestler meets Ray/Walk the Line/any other movie about a musician's tough life. Bridges is the driving factor and the shining light of this film. That and I find Maggie Gyllenhal weirdly attractive.

Bruno: Skip it. Seriously. I maybe laughed twice.

I feel like there were more, but then again maybe not. That's a lot. I have a few more to see (most notably Precious) and I'll update when I do.

A Serious Man

This is one of the movies I wanted to make sure I saw before the Academy Awards. I have to start by saying that I'm a huge Coen Brothers fan- I think they're some of the most consistently excellent filmmakers of this era. And, happily, A Serious Man did not disappoint.

The film is a continuation (or perhaps an expansion on) a theme present in many if not all of the Coen's movies- the lack of order (or tendency towards chaos) in the universe. The main character is a man of science (well, math, but that's close enough) who, do to the ever increasing disorder in his life turns to religious authorities for aid and comes away with... nothing. The comment is clear- no one, scientist nor religious leader can explain why things happen. While the results of this chaos are painful for the film's main character (played convincingly by Michael Stuhlbarg), they strike the darkly comic notes that the Coen brothers have perfected over the years and end up being remarkably entertaining of the audience.

The film is something of an assault on organized religion in general through the lens of Judaism. And what a perfect group to poke fun at when so much of Jewish culture are about remembering the sufferings of the last few thousand years. The Jews are a perfect representation of a group of people who have, at least in their self-identification, been victims of the lack of order in the world. The film certainly plays on Jewish stereotypes, but there are also the fine details that reveal the Coen's familiarity with the culture. And perhaps more importantly, the Rabbis are meant to represent religious leadership in general in a hilarious yet poignant commentary on religion's ability (or lack thereof) to shed any real light on why bad things happen to people who have "done nothing wrong."

The film is well made throughout- well shot, well edited and successful in using the fate of one poor individual to represent the plight of mankind living in this crazy chaotic world.

For want of a food processor...

I tried (and failed) to buy a food processor during the holidays. Macy's had a sale, but apparently I arrived a day late and the sale was over. I've wanted one for a while, but its been a little hard to justify as I don't cook all that much (athough I'm trying to cook more) and I'm perfectly capable of chopping. So I found myself waiting for another Macy's sale to drop the price under $100, but really wanting to make a recipe from my first issue of Cook's Illustrated (thanks for the subscription, Mom!).

The recipe was for Spicy Thai Chicken with Basil. A pretty standard Thai dish made with minced chicken. Sort of like this (although I didn't take this):


The recipe is pretty simple... if you have a food processor. As discussed, I do not. Yet I was determined to give it a go anyway. That translated into about 45 minutes of extra work: finely chopping basil, jalapenos (couldn't find the thai chilies at my local corner stores), garlic, and chicken. And mincing chicken, with no cleaver, is not a lot of fun.

That said, once the everything was chopped the actually cooking time is less than 10minutes total. So this really is an easily prepared and flavorful dish. The ingredients aren't too numerous either- probably only need an extra trip to the store to pick up some fresh chilies (jalapenos worked fine if no thai chilis) and shallots (the recipe actually has a bunch of shallots) as long as you have the thai standards of fish sauce and oyster sauce.

A good back-pocket recipe when a quick dinner is needed- at least after a food processor appears in my kitchen.

Adventures in Crock-Potting #1

We received a crockpot/slowcooker as a holiday gift this year. It's taken us this long to finally get the thing out and start playing with it. Our first attempt came from a recipe found by mama Newman for Shredded Chicken Tacos. The beauty of this recipe (and slow cooker recipes in general) is that dinner can be ready when I get home. I tend to work late sometimes, add that to my decent length commute and sometimes its hard to find the motivation to shop and cook. Drop everything in the pot before heading to work, turn it on low for 6-8 hours, and voila! Dinner is hot and ready when I get home.

As a burgeoning foodie, I'm not sure if I should be offended by the idea of tossing all the ingredients in at the same time. The lack of technique involved goes against everything I've learned watching Top Chef or the detail-oriented care I tend to put in to my more elaborate cooking. That said, there are some nights when its nice to eat a home cooked meal without taking the time to cook it post-work.

The beauty is, on top of being almost absurdly easy, this dish was tasty and well textured. If I made it again, I'd add a little more spice (then again, there aren't many things I WOULDN'T add a little more spice to). I made tacos out of the meat, but it could just as easily be used as enchilada filling, nacho topping, taco salad topping, etc.

I intend to continue this series of Crock Pot adventures now that I've moved past the fear of leaving an electrical appliance on all day while no one is home. I'll have to continue to suppress the part of me that finds the whole notion insulting to the art of cooking, but that shouldn't be too hard if all the dishes that come out of the thing are as easy and tasty as this first one.

Speisekammer

I've been meaning to get out to Alameda to give this place a shot for a while. But Alameda is not particularly accessible and it took me until now to make it. Speisekammer is Alameda's bastion of German food and drink- like Suppenkuche East. I went for lunch with my coworkers as a celebration after a successful screening. And let me tell you, there may not be a better way to celebrate than a breaded, fried, meat cutlet.

To be fair, we started with potato pancackes (latkes to those of you from the tribe). They were beautiful and delicious:

For a main, all of us but one went with the Weinerschnitzel. And a good decision it was. On top of the two slices of breaded pork cutlet, we got roasted potatoes. They were delicious, and I quickly realized that was mostly because they had a whole lot of bacon mixed in. Bacon makes things good. Make a note.

My meal paired very nicely with my Weltenburger Kloster Dunkel (a dark wheat beer). Now my body wants a nap time, fortunately, things are slow at work so I might just take my body up on that offer. [NOTE: I don't sleep at work. At least, not on purpose.]