I'm Back!

We'll see how long this lasts.

Lame Update

For the holidays, I went to San Francisco to attend my dearly loved cousin's wedding. I don't have that many pictures because I only have my iPhone and I refuse to take pictures unless it is an Nikon SLR. We went to the Fisherman's Wharf, which was rather close to the hotel we were staying at.

As you can see, this is a picture of one of the best burger joints on the West Coast, In'N'Out. Unfortunately, because this was a family trip, we had to eat where it was consensus for everyone (mainly the older generation). And that part was fine because we mostly ate good food (and I didn't have to pay for it he he he). Although, my clandestinely cool brother saw an In'N'Out joint near the airport on the day we left and we made a quick stop and ate while waiting for the plane. I don't know if it was because we had such high expectations, but the burgers and fries were so-so. I would actually prefer Fuddruckers.

We didn't get to go on the Golden Gate, but we did get to take awesome pictures. The picture tells you of the weather down there. It was quite dreary the whole trip. Our flight to San Fran was so early in the morning that I didn't pack everything that I needed (which included a thick jacket! and my glasses... I had to wear my contacts the entire trip).

The Fisherman's Wharf was awesome. I just love being in that location. Everything is expensive because it is a huge tourist attraction but the view was great, even on a rainy day.

Wherever you went at the Fisherman's Wharf, you can smell the faint aroma of sourdough bread from Boudin Bakery. We didn't eat inside, but the bread characters that they created were so cute.

That's it for now.

I remain the Ninja.

Korean Buffets are the Ka-Best

Recently, I went to Garam, a Korean Restaurant in Beltsville. They offer a lunch sushi buffet, with other delectable items on their buffet line. Although this was my first time to this place, I believe that Garam is one of those places that will last because the food is good. I say this because the location is, in a word, crap. The place is right off of Route 1, but you can easily miss it, because it's part of a strip mall and it's a little hidden away from plain sight.

I don't have many pictures of this place, but please appreciate these pictures like me.

The sushi was good. There was quite a variety and I love the cute ahjumma making everything behind the bar. The salmon nigiri sushi was delicious (which is what I really care about anyway).

From the picture, the buffet line is not that impressive, but what it contains was so delish. Let's see if I remember all of the food:

Not shown in the picture was a table that laid clean plates, bowls, spoons and forks/knives for non-chopstick eaters, a large rice cooker with Korean sticky white rice, large soup containers of one miso soup and one a variation of poor man's galbi tang.

The buffet, for lack of a better word, thing on the left had gampoongi (sweet/spicy chicken lollipops), dukkboki (spicy rice cake), mandoo (fried pork dumplings), fried rice. There were more choices, but my mind is being selective right now and can't remember half of what was in that table.

The buffet table in the middle had various cold dishes: your standard kimchi (pickled cabbage), spicy soba noodles, sliced pork feet (I think?), lettuce seasoned with sesame oil, and orange slices for dessert.

The buffet table on the far right not pictured had the more meaty items: galbi (marinated beef short ribs), Japanese style BBQ chicken, spicy pork, onion and sweet potato tempura.

There were definitely more foods that I am not including in this post, but those are the ones that I remember trying and was pleased.

Below is the information for the restaurant. They have a Lunch Sushi Buffet Mon-Sun 11:30am - 2:30pm and a BBQ Buffet at night after 5 pm.

GARAM

5027 GarettAvenue, Beltsville, MD

301-595-4122

Farmers & Fishers, oh my!

I think my new favorite restaurant has to be Farmers & Fishers at the Georgetown Waterfront. Not only is the food amazing, the ideology is just so different from other restaurants. The following blip below is taken from the F&F website.

Welcome to the new Farmers & Fishers – an evolution of the “Farmers” brand – where we continue the delicious farmer-approved fresh flavors established by our sister restaurant, Founding Farmers! We offer a great, casual approach to enjoyable, easy to eat, and flavorful foods and drink inspired by the best of American regional cooking, from coast to coast.

Owned by Founding Farmers and the North Dakota Farmers’ Union, Farmers & Fishers brings the same casual farmhouse and farmer-inspired attitude and dedication to the use and promotion of sustainable agriculture to the waterfront. The menu features original, meticulously crafted delicious dishes inspired by culinary regions of the U.S., from the New England coast to the great Southwest, Napa Valley to the mid-West. The dining experience here is relaxed and delicious, and a great value. Families, groups, and parties are always welcome to our unique spaces, in the front dining room or in any of our special private dining spaces. Wherever you are, we’ll make sure you’re comfortable and well taken care of!

I had the pleasure of sitting at the bar with my house-mate. She knew the bartender and he entertained us with how his experience has been at the restaurant. The view was incredible. It was really cold and slightly wet that day, so we didn't get to explore as much, but just the view was enough for me. So unto the meal ..

We started off with hand-made guacamole and home-made tortillas. Eddie, the bartender, did most of the ordering for us. He made the guac in front of us and talked about how customers will come and trust their servers more when they see their food mixed right before their eyes. I agree with that statement. I'm taking a second look at the picture and realize that you can't really see the dip. Please forgive me... I took the pictures rather late into the appetizer and most of it was gone. But believe me when I say the guacamole was quite enjoyable. You can taste the freshness and ripeness of the avocado. The tortilla chips was home-made as well, with bits of sea salt and fresh ground pepper sprinkled on them.
While we were waiting for entrées, Eddie charmed us with F&F's in-house infused liquor/wines. Spirits are infused with various teas, juices and syrups. The "Tiger Woods" is a sweet tea infused vodka. The first carafe is infused with chai tea leaves. Eddie was telling them that the tea leaves are handpicked by a specialist, as well as their coffee beans. We didn't try any of the spirits, but one day I will...

From the breads to the drinks, many ingredients in the restaurant are made in-house. Being the awesome bartender that he is, he made us the house-made Ginger-Ale. I'd like to say that after drinking his ginger-ale, I would never go back to the same old Canada Dry, but I can't drive all the way down to G-town for such luxury. Farmers & Fishers don't believe in using the fountain soda method, so far most carbonated drinks, they will use bottled soda water and add their fresh juices and syrups. He also made a concoction of raspberry juice and cucumber water, which was very refreshing. Now, that I will have to try at home.

By the time the main foods came out, I was so full and entertained that I only ate half of my meal. But it was so delicious. Everything just melted in my mouth. I ordered the Farmer's Butter Burger. It is ground top sirloin grilled on melted butter, then sandwiched in between one of the best breads I ever had in my life, brushed with a special sauce and topped with lettuce and bread&butter pickles. Even without the special sauce, the burger was so flavorful that you do not need any condiments. The fries were okay. Out of the whole experience, my only complaint was the fries, which were too salty for my taste. My house-mate had the bartender choose her main dish which was this great crab cake sandwich (sorry, picture not included).

This was a rather long post, but I hope you enjoyed the pictures and hope you try this place out. The price wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It was fairly decent. Some menu items were a little pricey, but there are delicious dishes that is easy on the budget.

Next time, I want to try their Chocolate-dipped Bacon Lollipops ...

Click on Farmers&Fishers for address, menu preview and more information.

I remain, for now, as the Ninja.

New Korean Experience

It's not that I don't eat Korean food all of the time, but my friends and I tried this new Korean restaurant at Bethany Shopping Center in Ellicott City. Please forgive me because I do not have the name or exact address of the restaurant. All I can do to point you in the right direction, should you choose to go, is that the restaurant is underneath Miroc Jo.

The first thing you have to appreciate about this place is their very expensive menus =P Their menu was more extensive than I expected. They had various casseroles, jigaes, typical dishes such as galbi (short rib beef), bulgogi (marinated slices of beef that is typically stir-fried) tonkatsu (pork cutlet) etc. Their tonkatsu was so fun to look at! My friend sitting across from me ordered the tonkatsu, and I picked off from his plate. He had a huge cut of meat, loads of rice, slaw salad with thousand island dressing, and french fries! French fries! That was the most important part of his meal. I have to say I was glad to have sat across from him, har har har.

The next thing I noticed was the ambiance of the place. It reminded me of being at a street vendor sit-down place. It was so cozy. The servers could not speak English very well, but were able to communicate very easily through various pointing at the menu and body language. I give the service thumbs up. I liked how we could pay for our meals separately without the hassle of giving our credit cards all at the same time. Each diner can go to the cashier separately to pay.

This restaurant makes their own banchan (side dishes to accentuate your dining experience), so everything tasted rather fresh. And they had an assortment of banchan, not just your everyday kimchi and radish.

I only took a picture of my own meal since everyone else had dug into theirs and it wasn't quite as pretty anymore. I ordered Kimchi Jigae, a stew with kimchi, thin slices of pork, tofu blocks, and dukk (rice cake).

Overall, this place was good. The atmosphere was very homey. While the food was delicious, beware of the MSG overload. I am sensitive to MSG, but push my way through meals because it's hard to find places that do not serve their food without the much needed seasoning. But after this meal, I had a difficult time fighting off sleep and a threatening headache.

If even just for a new environment, I recommend this place. There are other Korean restaurants that I can review and recommend in the Howard County/Baltimore area. But I hope you try out new places and you can recommend to me =)

Boat(s) of Sushi and Ice Cream on Fire

This past weekend, I went to Katana, a Japanese Restaurant with very amiable servers and delectable sushi.

My friend and I started our meal with the "Spring Torch Appetizer." Not only was it surprisingly delicious, the presentation was so pretty! This picture doesn't do it justice, but I really appreciated the "flame" they made with the sprig of parsley.

Inside the delicately layered avocado slices, was a blend of spicy tuna and seaweed salad. Surrounding the Spring Torch was a bed of fried panko pieces, which you can coat your morsel before taking a bite into its crunchy goodness.

This is the second time my friend and I have gone to Katana, and this is the second time we have gotten the Sushi for Two, which comes in a boat.

The Sushi for Two includes my favorites of a Japanese staple diet - miso soup and salad with ginger dressing. The boat comes has a random amount of nigiri sushi and a Chef's Special roll. I don't know where they get there salmon, but it is absolutely ambrosial! The texture is like butter, seemingly melting in my mouth (as I remember the taste, I can feel my eyes lighting up at its awesomeness @_@). The boat is enough to feed more than two, because we have been leaving the restaurant with leftovers. Actually, we stop a little bit before we are just full so that we can save room for *drum roll please* Fried Ice Cream!

The sushi is great and all, but there is something about having a ball of ice cream being deep fried that is unexplainable. They were out of our favorite flavor, green tea ice cream, so our server compensated by flambé-ing their chocolate ice cream. This dish seems easy to make, but I am not sure if I dare to try it. The ice cream is formed into a ball, wrapped with, what I think, a thin layer of pound cake, dipped with tempura batter and deep fried until it is just crisp.

As usual, my friend and I left the restaurant, full and satisfied.

Click on the link Katana to find out how you can get to the restaurant and to preview their menu.

The End is just the Beginning

The title to this post is rather dramatic, which you will find that many people can be drama queens for no apparent reason.

I shall start with a brief introduction of myself. I am half Chinese and half Filipino, and have been exposed to many diverse cultures. I am currently a student with no end goal except to finish her degree before the year 2020.

I like walks on the beach at sunset -- actually, I don't. While I do love walking on the beach, it's not my default thing to say except for when I feel extremely cheesy. My hobbies include reading random things, hence my favorite book being The Best Book of Useless Information Ever; washing dishes; whatever is happening at the time; attempting to cook/bake and eating. My default activity is to eat. Everyone has to eat at some point in order to stay alive; why not eat good food in the mean time?

The reason for this account is to start a blog about really good restaurants with delicious food that I love and would like to share that love with others =)

Next post will be on Katana, a Japanese restaurant right here in my very own Elkridge. Pictures will be included.

As for now, I remain the Ninja (please note that I am not a ninja, but someone with delusions of grandeur, but with great taste!).