Crispy Salmon Skin

Most people know of salmon fillets at the grocery store. These fillets are what most people are comfortable eating: huge boneless slabs of fish. However, my favorite parts of salmon are those parts typically discarded.

While doing some seafood shopping at Houston's 99 Ranch Market, I picked up a saran wrapped packaged labeled “salmon belly.” As the name implies, these are the chunks of salmon taken from the fatty underside of the fish. Salmon bellies come skin-on, full of bones, and glistening with fish fat. To my surprise, under the salmon bellies in this package were pieces of glorious salmon skin. These slivers of skin, which are typically discarded during the filleting process, have a thin layer of flesh and are used for those crispy salmon skin handrolls at sushi bars.


To cook the salmon skin slivers, simply panfry them skin side down in some oil for 6 minutes. Flip and cook for a minute just so the flesh side is browned. Sprinkle with some sea salt and freshly squeezed lemon. Serve with rice and vegetables and you’ll have a deliciously nutritious meal. With so many vitamin companies making so much money from selling capsules of fish oil, eating salmon skin is my way of sticking it to the vita-Man.

Desir Bakery

I did some weekend grocery shopping at 99 Ranch Market at I-10 and Blalock. On the way out, I noticed the Desir Bakery next to the checkout lines was not overflowing with people as it usually is, so I decided to stop in to pick up a small pastry to satisfy my sweet tooth. It was my first time in the bakery so I really didn’t know what to expect. I really enjoy going outside of my epicurean comfort zone and just following the crowds of people who know what they're doing...at least they seem like they do. For all I know, it was everyone's first visit.

The bakery itself was tiny. Everyone had to leave our shopping carts full of purchased groceries parked just on the other side of the rope dividers. Filling the wooden shelves were freshly baked goods, both savory and sweet. The comforting aroma wrapped me in a warm blanket of happy and induced an unnatural appetite considering I just had a big lunch an hour earlier. So instead of getting just a small sweet pastry, I picked all of the following.


These savory loaves were their green-onion rolls and golden garlic bread. Yes, the golden garlic bread was actually that disturbingly yellow. The bread itself was light and airy. Both items were a bit lacking in green onion and garlic flavors but that’s my personal preference. I like enough onions and garlic to cause my breath to be as offensive as my former neighbors.


The first of the sweets was coconut bread. Sweet coconut and raisin paste filled the inner cavities of this loaf the size of my face. The bread looked to be haphazardly folded over the filling but there must be some method to the madness since coconut was evenly distributed throughout this huge pastry.


Next was their “sponge cupcake.” This was simply awesome. Sure, the A-word is used too often these days but one bite into this soft, fluffy sweetness and you’ll use the A-word too. The cupcake is like angel food cake but more heavenly. The next time I pick this up, I’ll try it in strawberry shortcake or something similar.


Then I had their red bean mochi. Common in Asian cooking is the use of beans in desserts. This might seem odd to some but I assure you it’s delicious. This “cookie” was a sweet red bean filling wrapped in soft, flaky dough, covered with toasted sesame seeds.


Finally, I happily forced down the pineapple cake. This mini cake, the size of four dice, had a nutty crust enveloping its pineapple gel of a filling. My only problem with this item was that I only bought one.

So the next time you’re picking up some fresh fish from 99 Ranch Market’s superb seafood department, don’t forget to stop into the bakery on your way out.

Croissant Brioche

For breakfast this morning, my wife and I ventured into Rice Village to visit one of our favorite French bakeries, Croissant Brioche (2435 Rice Boulevard). This small, unpretentious bakery is always overflowing with the fragrance of fresh-baked goods full of butter and rainbows.


I got my favorite sandwich: smoked salmon on a fresh croissant. The lean smoked salmon, crisp lettuce, and fresh tomatoes helps me forget about the fact that I'm also consuming about 4 tablespoons of glorious butter.


My wife had her usual plain croissant and chocolate eclair all washed down with black coffee. We shared the eclair but only after a sneaky move on my part and some very dirty looks on hers.

Nippon Japanese Restaurant

One night I was craving some good Japanese and food and headed over to one of my favorite Japanese restaurants in Houston, Nippon. Bear in mind that I said Japanese, not sushi. Though sushi is Japanese, Japanese isn't necessarily sushi. I know too many people who mistake the two.

I love this place not only for its sushi, but also for its down-home Japanese cooking. This time around, I just got a few appetizer items to satisfy my craving.


Here are chunks of fresh chicken batter-fried. There's a bit of salt in the batter. With lemon squeezed on top, it's a deliciously simple appetizer.


This is one of my favorite dishes, ankimo, or steamed monkfish liver. Despite the monkfish being one of the uglier creatures in the sea, its liver sure is delicious when steamed and served in a mixture of ponzu and a spicy chili sauce topped with finely chopped green onions. It tastes like a milder pâté with a firmer texture. If you're a fan of pâté, definitely try this out.


This was Nippon's fresh aji, or Spanish mackerel. The small fish is filleted and its meat serve sashimi style with chopped green onions and sesame seeds on top of its bones.


One I was done with the aji meat, the bones were taken to the back where they were battered and deep fried. The frying makes the bones brittle and edible. In all honesty, I'm not exactly sure how much of this I'm supposed to it. I typically eat everything except the thickest part of the head, since its center is still very bony. But the rest of the bones are like crispy fish-flavored chips. Some might be turned off by that but I'm not sure why. There are vinegar flavored chips, which are nearly as yummy as this.


And the last thing I ate here this time was an order of amaebi, or sweet shrimp. It's two fresh shrimps, whose raw tails are served sushi-style. The heads are then battered and deep-fried. So like the aji bones, the shrimp heads become brittle, crispy shrimp-flavored chips.

Nippon rarely disappoints my cravings for Japanese cooking. Usually I come here for their more common Japanese dishes such as ramen or katsu don. But this night I just had a hunkering for little chunks of food.

Cava Bistro

The wife and I met some good friends for dinner at Cava Bistro, a quaint, rustic restaurant serving American fare. Our friends were planning a wedding and wanted to try this place out for their wedding reception.


This was one of the three appetizers we ordered. It was an awesome plate of steamed mussels served with tomatoes in a champagne lemon tarragon broth. I was glad we were amongst good friends because I had to use my hands to eat these babies, not because it was difficult otherwise. Rather, I was trying to eat as many of them as possible. With 4 of us at a square table, I felt like one of those chomping hungry hungry hippos fighting over food.


The buttery caper sauce that came with the escargot was addicting. These little gems were served over grilled flat herb bread. I grew up eating steamed snails dipped in a lemon-salt-pepper sauce. It wasn't until much later in life that I discovered that escargot is usually served with a butter sauce in French cuisine. Needless to say, I haven't looked back since I've had it with herb butter. Anytime I order escargot, I ask for extra bread so I can sop up all that incredible butter. Don't judge me.


Our final appetizer was this dish of chicken, spinach, roasted red peppers and leeks wrapped in crispy phyllo dough with a coconut chile sauce. But after having it, I could have simply described as "YUM."


Cava Bistro's take on French onion soup uses three onions. They're all braised in a red wine beef stock and then topped off fresh slices of baguette and Swiss cheese. By this point of the meal, I was satisfied and could have gone home happy. But Mama didn't raise no quitter.

After all the above, I continued the meal with Cava's succulent beef short ribs. The fork-tender beef was serve on top of fluffy, garlicky mashed potatoes. Where's the foto? Well...by this point of the meal, I also had quite a bit of wine and started eating as soon as the plate touched the table. If it makes you feel any better, I can still close my eyes and taste the moist meat melting in my mouth.


For dessert, we shared their white and dark chocolate mousse crepes. I could try to channel my literary side by talking about the juxtaposition of the two chocolates. Instead, I'll leave you with the following words: fluffy, chocolaty, fruity, and doughy. Close your eyes and repeat them 3 times slowly.

Food-filled weekend

Good food has many effects such as happiness and misery, depending on how much you ate. Another effect is extreme lethargy, which affected me most of the weekend. So now I have 3 days worth of good food to post about. Off we go!

Friday

I joined some friends for a long lunch at one of my favorite steakhouses here in Houston called Taste of Texas. This place has been around 30 years now and has only one location. As its name suggests, it's full of Texas pride. As you walk in, you enter what all non-Texans expect a Texas living room to look like: large fireplace, huge Texas flag hung with care, firearms and other paraphernalia hanging on the walls. Living here most of my life, I can say that not all living rooms are like this...though they should be.

After ordering the 6-oz filet mignon, I headed to the AYCE (all you can eat) salad bar. The salad spread itself is decent enough to appease any vegan. Ironically, however, it's famous for it's warm bread, flavored butter and enormous cheese wedges. That's right, ToT's venerable venue of veggie variety for devouring is better known for its cheese and bread. Shave off as much cheese as you think you need, grab as much bread as you'd like (there's rolls, jalapeño corn bread, cheese rolls and more) and your favorite butter (plain, apple or cinnamon honey). Usually, I have a hard time finding space for any veggies on my salad plate.

Even though my salad plate was mainly filled with bread and cheese, the mere act of walking through the salad bar line made me feel less guilty about the steak I was about to inhale.

Isn't she a beaut?

ToT serves its steaks with the option of two seasonings, which you can have one or the other or both. I chose both. The first seasoning is a dry lemon-pepper rub and the second is a sizzling lemon garlic butter. Neither seasoning are mandatory as far as flavor, but since there's no additional charge, why not? Ordering the butter will have your steak come out on this cow platter, which puts me more in touch with my prehistoric ancestors, who I'm sure ate directly from the side of animals with knives and forks. My filet was cooked perfectly and, as always, disappeared within 5 minutes.

Then came time for dessert. Good thing I ate my steak so fast because I had time to digest some before ordering the Snickers Pie.

How do you top off a meal of fatty red meat? With fatty sugars of course!

Fans of Snickers and cheesecake will enjoy this pie. The description will read whipped cream on graham crackers on cheesecake on Snicker crumbs on chocolate, but what it leaves out is "smile on your face." I personally can do without the whipped cream and cheesecake, so I eat it with the skill and dexterity of a surgeon performing heart surgery.

Saturday

The wife and I trekked to favorite Houston sushi place, Kaneyama. We went for lunch thinking that we'd be frugal and save some money. Yeah right. As soon as we looked over their menu, our eyes lit up like Brangelina in an orphanage. So $70 dollars later, here's what we had for lunch.

Seaweed salad starts about 90% of our sushi meals. The simple, clean taste helps our palettes prepare for the seafood to come.

Gindala, or miso-marinated cod, is another favorite appetizer of ours. The cod filet is marinated overnight in a miso mixture and then broiled. Great salty flavor and flaky texture.

Chawanmushi is listed under appetizers, but since it takes longer to prepare, it always ends up being served with the main dishes.

Clockwise from top left: hotategai (whole scallop), two uni (sea urchin), tobiko (flying fish roe), unagi (fresh-water eel), masu (sea trout), ika (squid) and sake (salmon).

Amaebi (raw sweet shrimp).

Most the time, this is prepared from frozen shrimp. However, sometimes we're lucky and there will be live shrimp. The difference in freshness is distinguishable, but frozen shrimp doesn't ruin the experience. This piece was from a frozen shrimp.

Nothing wasted: the head of the shrimp used for amaebi.

The best part about ordering amaebi is that she'll eat the tail and I get the shrimp's head! It's lightly battered and fried so the shell turns brittle and essentially becomes a crispy seal locking in all the good stuff inside the shrimp's head. IMO the better half of the order.

Sukiyaki, the food not the 4 P.M. song.

This was my first time trying sukiyaki. The description enticed me by listing "yam noodles" as an ingredient along with beef, tofu and veggies (napa cabbage and green onions). The broth was sweetly salty. The yam noodles, translucent and slightly chewy, weren't quite what I was expecting, but I wasn't disappointed. I not sure how exactly yams were included in its making since I didn't taste yam nor saw evidence of it. The wikipedia listing has a picture that doesn't look like the noodles I had. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the mix of just a few ingredients that worked well together. I would definitely get this again.

Sunday breakfast

Met some friends for breakfast at Avalon Drug Store and Diner. This was my first time here in all the years we've lived here. Since my wife and I were running late, we asked our friends to order for us. So here's what we got:

Pecan waffle

The waffle looked and smelled great and had the crispy, cakey texture expected. However, it was sour. Not slightly sour, as if it had buttermilk or sour cream, but overpoweringly sour. I'm not sure if this is intentional or if I got a bad batch. Needless to say there was a lot left over. I then turned my attention to the following.

Chorizo quesadilla, bacon and eggs

I'm a huge fan of chorizo. Like everything else, some chorizo is better than others. This chorizo was good, but I would have like to see twice as much in the quesadilla. BTW, it was my first time having quesadilla for breakfast.

The highlight the meal was definitely the bacon, which was cooked exactly how I like it, mostly crispy with a few pieces of chewy fat. I was tempted to order another 4 orders of the cured belly bliss.

Sunday lunch

The wife and I met with her father for lunch at his favorite Vietnamese restaurant, Tay Do. Whenever meeting him for lunch, he either chooses this place or a buffet. Lucky for us, after the breakfast above, he chose the option of less gastric misery.

Steamed chicken with ginger soy sauce

This is one of my and my father-in-law's favorite Vietnamese dishes. This order was served warm topped with green onions and cilantro. We received about half a chicken skillfully chopped. There's nothing more annoying than chicken chopped with little shards of bone scattered through the dish. The ginger soy sauce is actually diluted with other sauces, but the ratio of dilution and the other sauces are usually a guarded secret. One thing the soy sauce is definitely diluted with is chicken fat. The resulting dish tasted like juicy meat drenched in angel tears.

Canh Chua (literally translated to "sour soup")

This is one of my wife's favorite dishes. The broth is a tamarind base, hence the sour. This order was made with catfish steaks, celery, tomatoes, bean sprouts, okra, Thai chili peppers, pineapple and coriander. All these ingredients amalgamate into a spicy, salty, slightly-sour soup with tender catfish and enough veggies to satisfy a hobbit.

In conclusion, I had a weekend spent with friends and family over some delectable delights. All the ingredients for a great time. Hope yours was the same!

CRAVE the Good Life

Dolce Vita

As part of our endless quest for good food, my wife and I tried a new pizzeria for lunch today (new to us). Hearing it's Houston's best pizza, we had high hopes. Long story short, Dolce Vita's pizza delivered (no pun intended).

To accomplish a casual dining atmosphere, it's set inside a quaint historic house, where the first floor serves as the bar and the second floor as the dining room. The windows are the original antique glass, providing a slightly distorted view of the neighboring shopping center. White kitchen towels are used as napkins. The floors and stairs creak. The result is a step back in time to turn-of-the-century Houston.

Though we only had a few dishes, we didn't regret what we ordered (except the dessert). Dolce Vita's food is as simple and aromatic as what we enjoyed in Italy. Their focus on fresh ingredients avoids a dependence on spices. Each of our dishes were a balanced combination of a few natural flavors, which doesn't confuse the palette.

The restaurant's dining room. Warm and homey like grandma's house.

Pickled anchovies with marinated bell peppers, capers and Italian parsley. Unlike the anchovies on pizza, these pickled ones are slightly tart and salty and has a great meaty texture to balance out the soft, sweet peppers. The capers are overpowering, so avoid getting too many mixed in with each bite.

Eggplant and fresh basil in agro docle, a sour ("agro") and sweet ("dolce") sauce. Though I wasn't craving eggplant at the time (my wife's order), I could appreciate the preparation. Served chilled, the purple plant had been cooked just right. The agro dolce was also a nice balance, neither too sweet nor too sour, that complimented the eggplant instead of masking its flavor.

Taleggio pizza with arugula and pear in truffle oil - sounds weird, tastes great! No tomato sauce here, exactly how I like it. The thin crispy crust reminded me of Naples. This was our first time eating warm Taleggio. We're big fans of the cheese, but until now have only had it cold or room temperature. Though we refer to it as a "stinky cheese," its flavor is much milder than its smell. Serving it warm brings out more of its flavor, which seemingly reduces its saltiness. The mildly bitter arugula coupled with gently sweet pear on top of mildly salty Taleggio cheese worked wonderfully.

Pistachio, dark chocolate and mexican vanilla bean gelato. Despite sounding and looking good, the gelato wasn't great. The waffle cone was stale. The gelato was full of ice crystals, taking away from the creaminess we've come to love. However, the gelato had the expected density and rich flavors. Nevertheless, next time we'll try one of their other desserts.

CRAVE Cupcakes

Since my wife and I have an unhealthy need to end a meal with sweets that meet our satisfaction, the disappointing gelato lead us to try a new bakery in Houston that only makes cupcakes. We've been burned before by not-so-great cupcake-only places, so we approached this one cautiously.

To our surprise, the cupcakes are very moist and delicious. So moist in fact that, when peeling the paper off the cupcakes, a thick layer of cake sticks to the wrapper. This resulted in me spending several minutes scraping the residue off with my teeth. Also, another pleasant surprise was a crunchy ring around the edge of the cupcake just under the frosting where batter had overflowed and hardened on the pan. The additional texture increased the cupcake's Mm-Mmm Factor ®.

Our only quibbles are that (1) the frosting is too sweet and (2) there's too much frosting. We know we're in a small minority that enjoy mildly sweet desserts; but with such great cake, the frosting dulls the palette and takes away from the meticulous baking. After our first bites, we simply scrapped off the "excess" frosting.

Again, these are mere trifles in comparison to the deliciousness that is CRAVE.

Nutella

Dark chocolate