you get, in addition, 1 grilled corn, and 1 order of mango sticky rice. but really, who GAF about the others, I was in it for the fried chicken, which, btw, was def better than the Hai Yat fried chicken @ luv2eat but… of course, left me hungry for a bowl of grains from Baroo.
That said, the licuado cocktail was FANTASTIC. Pok Pok’s cocktails are bomb. get tanked and uber to E Sea Fresh. Unless it’s late at night… then… Idunno, uhhh… Something something Cantonese something in Chinatown.
It was a salsa verde. The chicken was very moist and the steak was cooked perfectly. The chicken wings were a tad dry though. Ribs were very good and fall off the bone. Service was good and the place was packed around 7:30. However, nothing matched that damn perfect 21 day aged duck.
It’s the area of overcooked meat just under the surface. Ideally with beef you want a dark brown, crispy surface (the Maillard reaction) and an even reddish-pink through the rest of the steak or roast. This is accomplished by either using the reverse-sear method where you cook the meat to 110 over or in low heat and then sear it over as hot a fire or pan as you can get until it gets to 125, or sous-vide it to 115 and then sear it. In my experience sous-vide doesn’t produce as beefy a result as the reverse sear, but I don’t know why.
Here is a sous-vide rib-eye I pan seared afterwards. Almost perfect with minimal gray band.
Here is the tri-tip I posted last night. You can see the 1/4 inch gray band because I had the grill too hot on the indirect side and overcooked it slightly.
Here is a link to Meathead’s dissertation on the subject:
The more I Food Talk the more I realize how much I don’t know. Especially when it comes to beef.
Yah, I saw your tri-tip and the grey ring comment last night. But didn’t understand and thought it looked great. I see what you’re talking about now. But it still looks delicious.
Not as exciting as Charcoal, but I had lunch at Sambar in downtown Culver City. Two courses, $15.
First course was gazpacho. Kind of bland, I was surprised, it being tomato season and this being an Indian restaurant. I couldn’t even tell what the sprinkle of brown powder on it was; I put some on my tongue and it didn’t taste like anything.
Swami Thali plate for entree. I really liked the mushroom curry. The cauliflower and saag were good too, but once again, not much flavor. They did have a one-note spice kick. Rice was dry, bland and boring. Chapati was totally doughy and needed dcrisping up. The one chutney (dried mango?) was great!
Service was good, they kept my half lemonade/half soda water filled, but they left out the chutneys and chapati when I asked for my leftovers to go. No big deal, I forgot my food in the car anyway and had to toss it.
It seems like a decent place to go if you don’t like Indian food, which I don’t, but your friends do. Personally, I’d rather eat at LYFE across the street for my vegetarian fix.