Food Poetry 13: For Our Anniversary

Greetings from Park City, Utah, where my only niece is getting married today. In honor of her wedding I'm republishing one of Jason Tandon's fabulous poems, which I thought was fitting for this Very Special Edition of Food Poetry. Many thanks to Jason for the poem and for letting me use it.

Congratulations, Lisa and Joshua; may you celebrate many a happy anniversary in the years to come.

For Our Anniversary

Now that the flowers have dried and withered,
I will tell you that they were a re-wrapped
bouquet—severely discounted—
which allowed me to purchase
those two salmon fillets I glazed
with a bottle of maple dressing,
the crab cakes I served with a spoonful
of spicy mustard from the housewarming sampler
your mother had gifted us,
the package of pre-mixed chocolate chunk
cookie dough I baked from scratch,
and from a fundraising ballet troupe,
that banana nut votive candle
which lasted just the one night.

~From Give Over the Heckler and Everyone Gets Hurt. © Black Lawrence Press, 2009. Reprinted with permission. Buy the book on Amazon.

Bumps in the Road and Thai Food in Amarillo, Texas

Hi, all. We're on the road to points west, specifically the Grand Canyon and then my niece's wedding in Park City, Utah. After a sketchy day yesterday and the day from hell today (involving changing a blown-out tire on the side of the Interstate with one semi truck after another whizzing by in 100-degree heat), the dinner we had tonight in Amarillo, we're hoping, signals that the worst is over and the best is yet to come.

You'd have thought that a dispatch from north Texas would describe barbecue, or a gargantuan steak, or something along those lines, wouldn't you? Not at all; we were lucky to find, just feet from our motel, Thai Town restaurant. There our nerves were calmed over plates of pad kee mao and pad see-ew. The pad kee mao (pictured), which I got with a combination of chicken and shrimp, was pleasantly spicy, with large pieces of jalapeno pepper plus fresh mint in the mix. It was definitely comfort food after a rough day on the road.

We're hoping to hit a funky New Mexican joint in Flagstaff tomorrow; if it pans out, you know I'll tell you.

Quick Bite: Paella at V. Picasso

Have you ever had paella? I like to think of it as the Spanish jambalaya: rice with seafood and/or meats and sometimes vegetables. The version I had at V. Picasso was "mixed"; that is, it included seafood (shrimp and mussels), chicken, chorizo sausage, and green beans.

The paella was served in a traditional two-handled metal pan, and it was a very large portion (I took half of it home, having eaten the complimentary olives we got with our drinks and a tapa of tempura'd asparagus beforehand).

I liked the paella, though I have a couple of criticisms of it. When it was served, there was still unabsorbed liquid in the rice and it was extremely hot; I think they could have let it rest in the kitchen a bit before bringing it to the table. Also, while there was a large amount of tasty chicken in the dish, it was overcooked and therefore dry. That was too bad, because if it had been juicy and tender, the dish would have been outstanding. The large shrimp and the mussels were nicely cooked and were not overdone, and I thoroughly enjoyed both. In fact, I would've liked to see a few more mussels and maybe an extra shrimp instead of so much chicken. The thin slices of chorizo provided an extra bit of spice and texture, and I loved the fresh green beans.

Once the dish cooled down to the point where I could really taste the subtle flavors, it was quite good, except, again, for the dry-ish chicken. I asked for lemon to squeeze over the paella; it would be great if V. Picasso served a couple of lemon quarters with the dish.

At $18, the paella is not an inexpensive dish, but it's a lot of food and it could easily be shared by two or more people, which is probably the way to go. Have some olives or other tapas, then share the paella. I was using a $25 gift certificate that I'd bought from CU Savings (watch for half-price deals from V. Picasso on the CU Savings site; you can sometimes get $50 of certificates for $25 for this restaurant), so our meal was cheap when all was said and done.

Cocktail prices at V. Picasso are reasonable. Keith's martini set us back $6.50 (with a call brand of gin); if you compare that to the price of a martini at many other places in town, it's a good value. My bloody Mary was only $4.50; they need to work on their Marys, as mine was very bland, with no kick, but if they fixed that, I would be very happy with it for the price (there are establishments around town charging $7 and $8 for the same drink).

V. Picasso Tapas Bar and Lounge
214 West Main Street
Urbana, IL
217-328-0122
You can find out the latest on the restaurant's Facebook page.

French Onion Dip

This is a great party dip. I've made onion dips before—there was the Carmelized Onion Dip last September, which had goat cheese in it, and of course we've all made the Lipton Soup variety. I'm pronouncing this version The Best of All.

The only thing that takes any time is the browning of the onions, and that does require about 20 minutes of cooking time. But it's worth it. This is the way the onions should look when they're all browned up:

You cook the onions with salt, so they're nice and seasoned before you stir them into the sour cream-mayonnaise mixture. Worcestershire sauce, a clove of garlic, and a bit of cayenne pepper add further flavor, and that's about all there is to it. (Please, only use Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce; other brands are not worth talking about. Although, if you want to make this dip truly vegetarian, you'll have to get Annie's or some other brand like that, which I'm sure Strawberry Fields carries.)

On the side, I served sliced orange bell peppers, celery sticks (of course), sliced radishes, and Lay's potato chips (of course).

I'll let you go to the Williams-Sonoma Web site to get the recipe. That site, if you've never visited it, has a BOATLOAD of great recipes for everything from soup to nuts. Here's a link to the one for the dip:

French Onion Dip recipe

Quick Bite: Noodle Bowls at Xinh Xinh Cafe

This post is from last summer; I'm putting it back up because the noodle bowls are such a great hot-weather dish, and Shai is offering a special this summer: five different bowls for FIVE BUCKS each at lunch time. All of the bowls come with a chopped (fried) veggie spring roll, and then you can have your choice of grilled beef, pork, or chicken (or, for a veggie version, you can have double the veggie rolls or stir-fried tofu ). Enjoy a cool noodle meal-in-a-bowl on a hot and humid day! ~Lisa

Shai over at Xinh Xinh has been bringing out one new dish after the other this summer, and one of the specials is this noodle bowl: rice vermicelli with your choice of grilled beef, roast pork, grilled chicken, broiled shrimp, stir-fried tofu, and chopped veggie egg rolls—or any combination thereof. The price for these vermicelli bowls ranges from $6.95 to $7.75, depending on the toppings you choose.(Update July 2010: As mentioned above, five varieties of noodle bowls are currently on special every day at lunch for just $5.)

But it's not just meat and noodles, oh no. It's really a noodle salad in a bowl; there's plenty of red-leaf lettuce, thinly sliced cucumber, green onions, bean sprouts, a bit of carrot, and chopped herbs, all showered with crushed peanuts. The bowl is served with a special sauce/dressing, which your pour all over the noodle mixture.

Even though the bowl was huge, I found that I could easily eat the whole thing; while you do get some meat (I tried the beef bowl), there's a lot of veggie matter in there, so it's both light and filling.

For you non-meat-eaters: Note that the vegetarian version of the noodle bowl entails ordering double the chopped veggie egg rolls or fried spring rolls as toppings instead of one or more of the meats. (Update July 2010: You can also get stir-fried tofu as a vegetarian topping option, and the vegetarian noodle bowls come with a vegan sauce.) And as a side note, Shai also offers a vegetarian version of pho (noodle soup) on Saturdays (I'm not sure if he's doing this every Saturday, so call ahead if you're after the veggie pho).


Xinh Xinh Cafe
114 North Vine Street (next to Schnucks)
Urbana, IL
217-337-7600
Open Monday through Saturday 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. and Sunday 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Credit and debit cards accepted.

Beer-Braised Pulled Pork

I just have to share this recipe with you, because it's great! Saw it on CHOW; the pulled pork was an ingredient in a delicious-sounding recipe for nachos.

First I'm going to give you the recipe as it appeared on the CHOW site; afterward, I'll tell you how I made it even easier.

Beer-Braised Pulled Pork
From CHOW

2 tablespoons kosher salt
1 tablespoon ground chili powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
4- to 4-1/2-pound boneless pork butt, butcher’s twine or netting removed
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
8 medium garlic cloves, smashed
2 medium habanero chiles, sliced into rounds
2 medium yellow onions, halved and thinly sliced
24 ounces brown ale
1 tablespoon cider vinegar

Heat the oven to 300°F and arrange a rack in the middle. Place salt, chili powder, and cinnamon in a small bowl and stir to combine. Coat pork butt with 1 tablespoon of the vegetable oil, then coat all sides with all of the spice mixture. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Heat remaining 1 tablespoon oil over medium-high heat in a Dutch oven or a large, heavy-bottomed pot with a tightfitting lid until just starting to smoke, about 5 minutes. Add pork and brown on all sides, about 15 minutes total. Remove pork to a plate and discard all but 1 tablespoon of the fat in the pot.

Reduce heat to medium and add garlic, chiles, and onions. Cook, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot, until softened, about 15 minutes. Increase heat to medium high, add reserved pork and beer, and bring to a boil. Cover, transfer to the oven, and cook until pork is tender and falls apart when shredded with a fork, about 3 hours.

Place a large strainer in a large bowl and pour the contents of the pot into the strainer, reserving the liquid. Place pork and strained solids back in the pot and shred pork with two forks, removing any large pieces of fat. Measure 3 cups of the reserved braising liquid (you may not need all of it). Use a fat separator to remove the fat from the liquid until you have 1 cup. (Alternatively, let the pork and braising liquid cool, then refrigerate both overnight or until the fat solidifies on the surface of the liquid. Once the fat has formed a hard layer, scrape it off and discard.) Add liquid to the pot and stir to combine. Add cider vinegar and stir to combine.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . .
NOW: That's the original recipe; I used the Crock-Pot, so I first browned the meat and put it in the slow cooker, then cooked the garlic, chilies, and onions in the pot I had browned the meat in, added the beer and brought the mixture to a boil, then poured the whole shebang into the slow cooker along with the meat.

I cooked everything on High in the slow cooker for about 3 hours, then removed the pork to cutting board and shredded it. Then I put the meat back into the cooker and stirred in the vinegar. I didn't bother with all of that stuff in the last paragraph of the recipe above—the straining, removing the fat, etc., etc., etc.—because pork fat doesn't scare me (in fact, I browned the meat in lard instead of oil in step 1).

For the meat, I used a small (around 2 1/4 pounds) shoulder roast that had a bone in it instead of the pork butt. Also, I used jalapenos instead of habaneros because that's what I could find at Schnucks. Oh, and for the beer, we got Newcastle Brown Ale. That ale was wonderful in the recipe, and it was pretty fine drinking on its own, too.

The pulled pork was super tasty, and I highly recommend it. The first night we had it in tacos, putting some pork, homemade salsa, and cheese on top of small, doubled corn tortillas that had been heated in a greased skillet. Wowie. On the side, we had the vinegar-and-oil coleslaw that you can get from the Schnucks deli.

Then, as you see in the photo, I reheated some pork in a skillet,  pushed it to one side, poured beaten eggs into the pan, and had scrambled eggs and pork topped with fresh tomatoes, Tabasco brand chipotle pepper sauce, and snipped chives, with tortillas on the side. A gorgeous breakfast, if I do say so.

If you try this, I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. There are so many things you can do with the pork: tacos, nachos, burritos, sandwiches. And it's pretty easily made, to boot.

Meeting the Need: Hunger Awareness Fair and Walk-a-thon

If you sampled the Caribbean Grill's food at the Taste of Champaign event recently and it left you wanting more, I have good news. Your next chance to eat some of their tasty offerings is coming right up.

Next Saturday, July 10, Caribbean Grill will be one of the food vendors at a fair and walk-a-thon sponsored by local organizations and businesses including radio stations Q96 and WGKC, the U of I Athletic Dept., Common Ground Food Co-Op, Corson Music, and others. The fair will be held at the location of the former Hobby Lobby store in Champaign, and it will run from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The fair is open to the entire community, and, in addition to food, you'll find arts and crafts vendors, games, raffles, and entertainment. There is also a walk-a-thon going on; it will start at 10:30 a.m. and will cover about 2 miles of the Greenbelt Park District trail.

According to the organizers, this event is designed to promote awareness of hunger issues in Champaign-Urbana and to raise funds for the Midwest Outreach and Distribution Center (MODC) food pantry. Information about the MODC and its mission will of course also be available at the fair.

If you want to take part in the walk-a-thon, you'll find registration forms and more info on the MODC's Web site. If you simply want to go out and enjoy some good food, music, and more, that's great, too.

Midwest Outreach and Distribution Center
First Annual Hunger Awareness Fair and Walk-a-thon
1916 Glen Park Drive (where Hobby Lobby used to be)
Champaign, IL
More details, including registration form for the walk, are available on the MODC Web site.

Quick Bite: Cuban Sandwich at Radio Maria Restaurant

I love a Cuban sandwich. I mean, ham, roast pork, Swiss cheese, and dill pickles layered  between slices of fresh bread and then grilled until warm and melty—if you're a meat eater, what's not to like? In my quest to try all of the Cuban sandwiches offered around C-U, I recently sampled the version made at Radio Maria in downtown Champaign.

It was a good sandwich. It contained all of the necessary ingredients, and then the RM cooks add their own twist: Instead of the traditional butter and/or yellow mustard, it's got a mildly spicy Thousand Island kind of sauce on it. And it's served on a ciabatta-type bread that has been toasted or grilled.

With those deviations (the Thousand Island, and the fact that the sandwich as a whole had not been pressed), the sandwich definitely was not a traditional Cuban. And obviously, that was the point; Radio M wants to take the idea of the Cuban and put their own spin on it. Nothing wrong with that. I prefer mustard to mayo-based dressings on this sandwich, but I have to say, I really enjoyed the RM version.

When it came to the table, it was—well, it was a big mess, as you can see. But a delicious mess. Once I scrunched everything together and did some realignment (as in the photo at the top of this post), it wasn't as difficult to eat as you might think. The ciabatta bread was really too thick, but it was tender and soft enough on the inside so that I could take bites with no problem. The slices of smoked pork seemed to have come right off of a roast, the ham was great, the cheese was nicely melted, and there were two long, thick-ish slices of dill pickle in there. Here's a shot of some of the pork, which lurked on the sandwich's bottom layer:

The pork was succulent and flavorful. I chose "Haitian slaw" as my side; it was mildly spicy, crunchy, and fresh tasting. Very nice with the sandwich, though if you prefer fries, you can get those instead.

I'll mention also that my lunch companion chose the lunch special that day, a Wagyu beef burger topped with mango salsa and served with hand-cut fries, and she quite enjoyed it, though the burger was a bit overcooked for her taste.

Our sandwiches were so large that we both took half home. I was very happy to see that Radio M uses paper to-go containers and not styrofoam; accolades to them for doing that.

The Cuban sandwich ($7.00) is available every weekday on the Radio Maria lunch menu; you can peruse the entire menu on the RM Web site.

We enjoyed our lunch on the breezy side patio; Radio Maria has lots of outdoor tables, and with the beautiful weather we're now having, dining alfresco on Walnut Street would be very pleasant.

Radio Maria
119 North Walnut Street
Champaign, IL
217-398-7729
Open daily for lunch at 11:30 a.m. and on Sundays for brunch at 10:30 a.m.