Buddakan

A couple Saturdays ago we (meaning my mother, step-father and I) went to Buddakan, a Chinese/Fusion restaurant on Ninth Avenue right next to Chelsea Market. The space itself is huge; two floors are completely filled with tables and it's so dark that you can barely make your way around.

As an appetizer, we ordered steamed buns with pork belly and cabbage. The softness of the pork belly mixed with the crunchiness of the cabbage made for a delightful contrast in the mouth; the cabbage was seasoned with spices which balanced out the fatty pork quite nicely. We also ordered taro puff lollipops, which basically consist of pork inside crunchy taro on a stick. The saltiness of the minced pork went quite well with the sweetness and crunchiness of the taro, making the lollipops one of my favorite dishes for the night. The last appetizer we ordered was scallion pancakes with short ribs and green apple. The concept was quite innovative, and had it worked out it would have been delicious, but the execution was poor. The short ribs were overly seasoned and tasted strange, which drowned out the scallion pancakes and the sweetness of the green apple. The apple itself was a wonderful addition to the dish, but the spices in the short ribs completely masked the texture and taste of the apple.

Now, on to main courses. It has been my personal experience that chefs spend all their time and creativity thinking up appetizers, and may sometimes fall flat on main courses. This was not the case that night. My mother ordered whole crispy fish with cabbage, apple (which seems to be a part of many of the dishes). The fish was excellent; the skin was crispy but the inside of the fish was tender and flavorful. The fish itself was very fresh and had its own flavor without any sauce; the sauce just made it taste better. My step-father had Mongolian lamb chops. The lamp was coated with crystallized ginger, which added a nice crunch and sweetness to the juicy meat. I ordered roast duck and noodle soup, with roast duck meat, noodles, and wontons. The wontons were so fresh that the vegetables in it were still crispy; not like those wontons that you get at your average chinatown haunt. The duck meat was fresh but it didn't have much flavor on its own. The noodles were good, but were a bit soft and thin for my taste. The broth was very flavorful and spices that were added into the broth enhanced the flavor of the duck, noodles and wontons.

For dessert, we ordered a coconut creme brulee. The texture was different from your average creme brulee; the creme was not as creamy as it usually is. We also ordered something called "crying chocolate", which was basically a chocolate cake filled with molten chocolate. It was very good, of course. After all, how bad can chocolate and chocolate together be?

Rating: One star

Life... just cuz i feel like talking about it =]

Yeah... I know... it's been ages since I posted last and I'm SORRY... if anybody is actually reading this.

SO... I HAVE BIG NEWS!!!!! I finally got my ears pierced. Yeah, I know, I'm fourteen years old and the fact that this just happened NOW is kinda sad. I get it. The funny part is, my step-dad hasn't even noticed yet. I wonder what will happen when I go to school tomorrow... either everybody's going to notice or nobody will. I'm hoping it's the former, just because I don't really like being the invisible person nobody sees.

On a completely unrelated subject, GO YANKEES!!!! They are so totally awesome this year... they just have to start WINNING the ALCS!!! I mean seriously, all they have to win is one more freaking game. They've had so many chances but they've blown it every single time. But this will be our year!!! The Yankees will prevail... hopefully.

I'm not sure if I'm going to go back to blogging about food. It's a good way to remember all the great meals I've eaten, but I feel like its a bit too mature for me to write about. There's also the fact that I'm a lazy procrastinator and can't go through with anything... but let's just ignore that teensy weensy little fact and move on.

Last night I went to see Jersey Boys and boy was that great!! The music was incredible, and in fact today I sat in front of my computer and listened to The Four Seasons for about an hour straight. (Ok, maybe that's an exaggeration, but I still listened for a very long time!)

My relationship status is a little iffy. To be honest, I haven't spoken with the guy for months now. I can barely look him in the eye (for whatever reason), and I avoid him whenever possible. I guess that we rushed into things... I still barely know a thing about him. I'm feeling kind of bummed out, but I guess that I started dating him just for the sake of dating someone, and not because I had any strong personal feelings for him.

On that melancholy note, good night guys!! And please, comment if you have something to say.

some random thoughts

I was looking through a friend's blog (click the title of the post to visit it; I highly recommend it) earlier today. The depth of her thoughts really amazed me and got me thinking. She's one of my best friends, but I don't think I've ever really seen this side of her before. I started thinking about the front people put on for the appearance's sake, and how it's through a computer that people can really communicate their thoughts. It's so much easier to be able to communicate without seeing people face to face or even hearing their voice, because you aren't able to see their reactions and you don't have to pretend to be something you're not.

Sometimes I wonder if it really is better to have all this technology... I think technology is brainwashing us! We can't imagine life without computers, phones, iPods... and I know this is nothing new. Anybody who's reading this has probably heard this a million times before, but I feel like ranting about this subject again =].

Anyways, onto slightly more uplifting topics... well, maybe not. I feel like I have to say this somewhere so I'll just say it here where the chances of a certain person reading this is much more unlikely. So... I'm in a relationship right? And... I used to like this guy. A lot. But now... let's just say we NEVER, EVER talk. Not on the phone, not in person. I don't know if he's just shy, or what, but it's KILLING ME. I can't keep "dating" someone who refuses to say two words to me. I know I should probably go up to him and talk, but I shouldn't have to. I think we just went from having absolutely no contact with one another to being in a relationship, and we just completely skipped the middle ground. I'm thinking of telling him we should step back and just be friends, but... I don't know. I don't think I should have to think this hard about it. I either like him or not, right?

Well, thanks for listening/reading my little rant. I feel all better now :).

Oh wait. Before I forget, my mom and I went to see the movie Julie & Julia. It's about this woman named Julie who decides to write a blog talking about how she cooked all 524 (or something like that) recipes in Julia Child's cookbook, and it's also about Julia Child's life and how she first got interested in French cooking. It reminded me of why I started writing in this blog again, and I don't want people to think I'm a copycat or something. I never even heard of this woman until after I started writing in here. Did I mention that the movie is based on two true stories? I guess I neglected to mention that, didn't I.

Ok. I'm really done now. I promise.

Saturday dinner

I know it's been a while since I last posted, and I'm sorry. I'll try to be better about posting in the future.

So, my mom, step-father and I went to this restaurant called Pranna. It's sort of fusion-ish, but it mostly includes dishes from southeast Asia. We decided to eat family style, that is, everybody shares all the food ordered. We started out with a bunch of satays: chicken, shrimp, vegetable, and beef, with lime mint, peanut, sour mandarin galangal, and lemongrass sauces. The satays were extremely disappointing. They were bland and ordinary; no thought appeared to have gone into their creation. Next, we ordered a bunch of "small bites". We got Penang chicken spring rolls, a lobster slider, and mushroom stuffed tofu. The spring rolls and tofu was average, and the lobster slider was overly ambitious and ended up being passed around from person to person looking for a final resting place. As main courses, we ordered braised Malaysian goat and Vietnamese clay pot chicken. The goat and chicken were both extremely tender. I wish they had given us a bit more goat meat, rather than all the fat and bones, but otherwise it was succulent and we enjoyed it very much. The clay pot chicken was excellent. The chicken was marinated very thoroughly in a very flavorful sauce, and it was probably my favorite dish of the whole night. For dessert, we had the Pranna bakery for the table. It came with chocolate cake, banana bread, peanut butter cookies, brownies, chocolate chip cookies, biscotti, and chocolate, caramel and peanut butter dippings. The confections were obviously preheated with the exception of the brownie, which was stone cold. Overall, the meal was rather disappointing and I would not recommend this restaurant.

Note: If you wish to view the menu on the restaurant's website, just click the title of this post. Thanks for reading!

ny times shang review

After posting about my saturday night dinner, I went back and read the review of Shang that was featured in the New York Times Dining Out section on February 18, 2009. The New York Times gave Shang one star, which I think was richly undeserved. According to the article, the food was too complex and all over the place. Maybe Shang has cleaned up its act in the amount of time between when the review was written and when I ate there, but the food I had was not complicated at all. The flavors were very clean, and the menu was mainly focused on Chinese food.

NOTE: To go to the New York Times review, just click on the title of the post. Also, the menu on Shang's website is not the one they are currently using at the restaurant.

saturday night dinner

This Saturday my parents and I went to this great chinese/fusion restaurant called Shang on 187 Orchard St., New York, NY. The food was great; the perfect mixture of chinese food and american influence. For appetizers, we shared Szechwan Slaw, a salad with carrots, greens, nuts and crunchy noodles, and taro and beef puffs. The taro and beef puffs were just right; crunchy and savory. As a side we ordered some whole wheat bread chinese style with condensed milk to dip it in. The bread came, steaming, and the condensed milk added the right amount of sweetness to the bread. For main courses, my mom had caramelized black cod. The fish was fresh and in itself very good, personally I couldn't taste much miso. My dad had mongolian lamb chops which he said were very good and slightly spicy. I had sweet and sour pork, which, delightfully, was a far cry from the sweet and sour pork you find at your average take out place. It was not overly sweet nor sour and had the right amount of crunch to it. As a table we shared a plate of cantonese pearl noodles. The noodles were perfect: chewy and slightly spicy, but also savory and with a slight crunch. For desert we had something they called "assortment of dim sum", which turned out to be a tasting of deserts that ranged from classic chinese sesame balls to banana and chocolate cake, and a mango panna cotta with chocolate mousse and a sesame wafer on top. Both deserts were exceptional, the perfect ending to what was a very good meal. I would definitely recommend this restaurant to all who love "authentic" chinese food, as opposed to the average chinese food takeout.

Wagner Reunion!!!

So guys, as of now the reunion is planned for 8/23. Anybody in Class 823 is invited and if you want to come just let me know!!

Some more writing... just some stuff i've been working on

I watched carefully as she detached from the group. Her black hair shone in the sun and I knew, even though I couldn’t see her eyes, that the gray would flash like lightning, like stormy gray seas. She made her way over to me, obviously disgruntled. But even her anger couldn’t take away from her natural grace, her unusual quickness of movement.

“What are you doing here?” she hissed at me through clenched teeth.

“Just seeing how my darling half-sister is doing in her own little world,” I replied lazily, knowing the veiled taunt annoyed her.

“Of course you are.” The sudden change in her expression startled me; Minerva was notoriously famous for her temper and the cool façade she put on did not match her at all. “Well, now that you’ve seen how I’m getting on, leave.”

“What if I don’t want to?” That stopped her in her tracks. She looked at me with a confused expression. Letting my smirk show on my face, I said, “Do you really think I would be here of my own accord? Dad sent me. He needs you.”

“Needs me?” she sneered. “I’m sure he needs me. That’s probably why he banished me in the first place!”

“Come on, Minerva-“

“I don’t go by Minerva anymore, Apollo,” she said abruptly. “I go by Imogene.” With that parting shot she turned to join the group of women again.

I stared after her in stunned disbelief. Obviously she had no idea what was going on in the real world, having locked herself up in her own fantasyland and named herself “maiden”, of all things. She hadn’t taken kindly to her banishment a couple decades ago, when she was accused of killing a god. Although she proclaimed her innocence vehemently, nobody believed her and eventually Zeus (my father) had to throw her out of Mount Olympus. She promptly disappeared from sight until one of her disciples inadvertently revealed her location, a land that Minerva had created for herself.

However, now Zeus was seriously reconsidering his decision. A group of humans called the Aegis was growing steadily stronger. The Aegis’ primary goal was to get rid of all the immortals and let humans rule for themselves. Their power had grown to the point where we could no longer hide our palace on Mount Olympus; it had been exposed for the entire world to see and jeer at us. Right now, our numbers were down and every god (or goddess) was crucial.

By now Minerva had turned around, her gray eyes scrutinizing me amongst the lush greenery of the land.

“You didn’t tell me it was that bad,” she said quietly.

“Yeah, well, I didn’t want to ruin your day,” I said sarcastically, taking off my sunglasses so she could see the ugly scar along my eyebrow. “They just took over Mount Olympus.”

“Well, I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to survive without me just this once,” she replied. Her eyes were tinged with sadness as she read my thoughts. “Bye, lil’ brother.”

“If you don’t join us there won’t be a next time!” I shouted at her retreating back. “Can’t you see that we need every possible person, god, monster, whatever, on our side? The Aegis are going to take over the world, damn it!”

“I care not what happens in your world anymore.” The gaze she leveled me with was cold and hard, with eyes glittering maliciously. “When all else fails, I will still be here. The barriers I have erected will hold no matter what.”

I suppressed a shudder. Gone was the laughing and carefree goddess; in her place a woman hardened by rejection and the loss of all she loved and was loved for stood.

After one last glance, filled with contempt and something else I could not quite fathom, she spun elegantly and strode back towards the group of her “friends”.

It was like I was possessed. Every cell in me wanted to follow her, pound her into a pulp… make her feel the pain I had to feel every day. It seemed like every time I came back from battle, I had lost another piece of my humanity, in addition to losing many of my friends and relatives. It didn’t help that we were already down one major god since Minerva (she shot me a dirty look), excuse me, “Imogene” had already killed Aphrodite.

I stomped after Imogene and grabbed her roughly by the arm. “What the hell do you think you’re playing at?” I hissed through my teeth. “Don’t you want to help?”

“Of course I want to help,” she tossed back, “but I will be treated like a traitor, like scum not worth walking on this earth.”

“You are scum not worth walking on this earth.”

She froze, and I could see her frantically retreating behind her mental barriers again. “I didn’t kill her.”

“Yeah, right. Now just-“

“Apollo! Please listen to me. I swear I didn’t kill her. You of all people, the almighty god of truth, should know that,” she said, reverting back to her mocking tone.

I looked at her, gazing into her clear gray eyes. I couldn’t see an ounce of guilt in them which disgusted me. All the evidence pointed to-

“Screw the evidence! I was framed. Why don’t you believe me?” Imogene’ eyes pleaded with me. “Why do you think I go by Imogene now? I need hope, hope that I could ever be invited back to Olympus.”

“That’s what I’m doing now!” I almost roared with frustration.

“But not like this,” she continued, ignoring me. “Not like I am the only one who could possibly save this war for you, because I can’t.”

“Minerva, the Aegis is committing these atrocities in your name. They claim that you came to them and gave them instructions on how to overthrow us.”

She was quiet for a minute, and then said, “So that’s why you came.”

My throat was suddenly tight and all I could do was nod. The sadness in her eyes was almost unbearable, and all of sudden the sun was going behind a cloud and the grass was becoming brown. I realized why she didn’t want to leave. If nobody could defend this piece of paradise, she would never be able to retain her separation from my world, and thus have to endure the hate of every single god who survives this war.

Tears were streaming down Minerva’s cheeks and I realized I had never seen her cry.

“He set me up,” she whispered unsteadily.

“Yeah I know-that’s why he sent me-“

“No. No! I mean that he set me up with Aphrodite’s murder. He was the only one who could have stolen my spear… “

“But… Zeus? What motive could he possibly have?”

“I don’t know… unless… he’s afraid of me… Maybe I’m a potential threat, or maybe… I’m the one who…” her voice trailed off.

“Minerva?”

“What if he thought that I might overthrow him like he did to Kronos? So instead of taking that chance, he framed me so everybody would hate me and not listen to me if I found out the truth about what he tried to do.”

“Which means he’s using the Aegis to try and get rid of the gods so he can rule alone.” My face was like stone, the features etched into marble until I was no longer in control of my own emotions. This awareness heightened my battle instincts until I was all but ready to run the traitor through, despite the fact that he was my own father. Because plotting to overthrow your own family, and not only overthrow but kill as well, didn’t go down well in my book. In fact, in my book that was a good cause to kill your father for.

Minerva shook her head as she processed my feelings. “I want to be the one who kills him.” Seeing that I was about to object, she continued hurriedly, “I want to be the one who unravels his plans whether I am believed or not. But first, we should meet with the Aegis.”

“We?”

“Of course I’m joining the war,” she said dismissively. “I am a warrior goddess, after all.”

I hoped my new stone mask hid my happiness at hearing those words. After all, I had missed ribbing her over who started the Trojan War and all that.

For the first time in a decade, I stepped out of the world I had created when I was banished from Mount Olympus by my father, Zeus. My half-brother Apollo watched me with a smirk on his face which he did nothing to hide, and his thoughts were filled with thoughts of revenge.

“Stop it,” I said sharply. “You will not be the one to kill him.”

That wiped the expression right off his face, the scar along his eyebrow distorting as he frowned at me. “So you’re going to do it?”

“Do it? You sound as if you’re about to slaughter a pig. This is our father we’re talking about here,” I declared, hoping he didn’t notice how my voice had wavered over the word “our”.

“So are you going to kill him or not?”

It amazed me how obtuse some of my siblings could be. It was like they had never heard of the word “subtle” in their amazingly long lives. “I’ll leave his fate to the Fates, Apollo. Right now, let’s focus on what we came here to do.”

“Right. Talk to the Aegis and figure out why they think it was you giving them orders.”

I hesitated and then turned back to him. “You do believe me, right?”

He looked at me over the tops of his sunglasses. “Of course. I’m the god of truth, right?”

We ended up back in Greece, the once clean air polluted irreversibly by human progression. As much as I admired some of their inventions, most of them did nothing but cause harm to the environment which we gods had worked so hard to keep from evil for their sake. The steep slope of Mount Olympus loomed ahead, and now I could see the magnificent palace perched on the top of the mountain. Gone were the clouds that hid us from unkindly eyes and our very walls were polluted by those who used the gods’ weaknesses against them for their own gain. Their own gain that would only bring them ruin.

Apollo led the way up. We discussed different ways of getting to our goal, and concluded that we should just let ourselves become caught and escape when the opportunity arose.

“Halt!” A group of men armed with swords and spears blocked our path. “Who are you and why are you coming up this way?”

I caught Apollo’s eye and nodded. Then we started running. The men chased after us, their armor slowing their ascent. More men eventually came up ahead of us as we expected, and we were trapped from all sides. Apollo and I were bound and separated to lessen the chance of us forming an escape plan, as I learned from the mind of the guard who was manhandling me on the way to my ancestral home. This was not exactly the homecoming I expected, but I supposed it would have to do.

I was shepherded through the giant, gilded double doors at the end of the entrance hall. There, sitting on his throne as if nothing was amiss, was the great and almighty Zeus himself.

“Daughter!” he boomed. “Welcome home at last.”

“Welcome home?” I asked. “It is some home when you find out that your father framed his own daughter just because he didn’t like sharing power.”

Zeus sighed. “Ah, my daughter, you were always so dramatic,” he said affectionately. “But do you really think that people will believe that I framed you?”

“No, but I’m sure they’ll wonder why all the other gods aren’t on their thrones,” I replied coldly.

“Come now, daughter, do you underestimate my powers so much that you believe that I can’t make the people see what they want to see?”

“Which is what, all the gods slaughtered?” came a familiar voice from behind me. Artemis, Apollo’s twin sister, stood there, an arrow poised to fly and armies flanking her back and sides. The other gods were also by her side, their expressions ranging from outrage to excitement (what can I say, Ares was always an idiot).

“Is it true that you framed Minerva?” Hephaestus asked.

“No, of course not,” my father said, stroking his beard.

“Well, I didn’t do it and you were the only other person who could had the opportunity to kill Aphrodite so I’d say there’s a pretty good chance that you framed me,” I said sarcastically.

“You can’t prove any of this,” Zeus started to say, but I interrupted.

“Actually, I can. You see, Aphrodite’s not really dead.” Shocked gasps came from my audience behind me, the loudest from Hephaestus.

“How could she not be dead? I KILLED HER!” Zeus roared.

I spun quickly to face him.”So you’re admitting that you framed me.” It wasn’t a question.

“Of course. You’re going to die anyway, so what’s the point of pretending any longer? You see,” he continued as he leapt down from his throne and started to pace around the room, “One of my children will overthrow me one day. It is in part why the majority of the gods are my children: so I can keep an eye on them, determine if they’re a threat. After thousands of years, I had finally made my choice. You were the threat. You were the only one capable of finding a way to bring me off my throne so you had to go away. And you will go away. Guards, attack! Leave none alive!”

Warriors were spewing out of everywhere, out of every possible nook and cranny in the hall. But they weren’t turning on us. They had surrounded Zeus’ throne and were preventing him from moving anywhere.

“What on earth is going on?” he bellowed, screaming out his lungs but no one would listen. Finally, I stepped forward and held up my hand. Quiet fell instantly.

Words spurted from my mouth, but I couldn’t hear what I was saying… All of a sudden something was cutting into my neck and I couldn’t breathe…

I woke up in a tangle of sheets. I rolled over and look at my electronic alarm clock’s light-up screen. It said 2:01 am.

Wagner Reunion!!!

So guys, as of now the reunion is planned for 8/23. Anybody in Class 823 is invited and if you want to come just let me know!!