Another Amazing Birthday

Over the weekend, the wife and I traveled to Austin to celebrate her aunt turning 60. I dare say I was more excited about the get together than her aunt. Why? Because of the food, of course. Her aunt is an amazing cook whose poor bookshelf is under undue strain from all the cookbooks she owns. Put the same amount of weight on the back of a pack mule and you'll be charged with animal cruelty. So in tried and true Vietnamese tradition, a birthday celebration means the birthday girl hosts an elaborate meal for everyone traveling from afar. Needless to say, I was giddy with excitement.


For appetizers, my aunt-in-law (AIL) and my mother-in-law (MIL) rolled these picture-perfect spring rolls filled with lettuce, rice vermicelli, Chinese sausage, grated carrots, and fresh-picked happiness. What is it about mothers that everything food related ends up being near perfect? While rolling these, the two of them were gossiping like school girls and bickering like nemeses, both seemingly not paying attention to the food. However, this photo shows spring rolls that look more appetizing than those at most restaurants. I guess it's the secret superpowers of moms.


For soups, we had a choice of two options. And, yes, I chose both options. The first was the wonton soup made with a pork/shrimp mixture. The broth, unlike commercial versions that are basically salt water, was a flavorful orgy of fresh chicken stock, sweet radishes, and pungent green onions. The wontons were cooked perfectly so that the dough was not a mushy mess.


The second soup option was a tradition Vietnamese beef stew called bò kho (pronounced baw caw). Chunks of beef shank and tendons are slow cooked until melt-n-yo-mouth tender in a broth infused with lemongrass and star anise. The carrots are in the mix to successfully alleviate any guilt for the indulgence.


And for the main course we had crab fried rice and fried shrimp patties. Now don't go thinking it's patties of ground shrimp, which can also be delicious. These patties are made with fresh whole shrimp and mung bean both melded together with batter. So when it comes down to it, it's battered fried shrimp. The inclusion of mung bean, like the carrots in bò kho, is really just there to break up the richness of the oily fried goodness. This foto only shows two patties but I easily consumed half a dozen. The red peppers helped kick the party into gear. Take a bite of the shrimp patty, take a bite of pepper, stuff my mouth with fried rice, wash it down with beer, repeat until physically incapacitated. So many meals of my life follow these simple steps.

Believe it or not, this was only lunch. My AIL prepared enough food with a dozen people in mind but there were plenty of leftovers. But as always, the leftovers end up being like socks in the laundry; it all eventually mysteriously disappears.

Singapore Cafe

Today my wife and I dined at Singapore Cafe (12345 Bellaire Blvd near Cook in Houston). For those unfamiliar, this area is on the outskirts of Houston's Chinatown...the real Chinatown off of Bellaire, not the old Chinatown near downtown which is all but dead now.

I traveled to Singapore nearly 12 years ago with my brother and buddy. I fell in love with the place because it was extremely clean and the food was amazing! I was particularly overwhelmed by the 2-story food court nestled inside a parking garage. You read that right. Take a two-story parking garage, prevent cars from entering it, set up hundreds of food stands and you'll have yourself an unforgettable food court. Part of why this place was so impressive was the fact the food was amazingly cheap. At the time, a dish of rice, meat and veggies was approximately the equivalent of $2 US. So instead of saving money on food, I just ate 3 meals in one sitting. I would walk around and order whatever looked odd and/or appetizing, though not necessarily both. What else was I supposed to spend the money on?


So back to Singapore Cafe. I ordered their Singaporean/Hainanese chicken rice. Typically, to make this dish, a whole chicken is boiled and the rice is cooked with chicken stock but I understand the stock used to cook the rice isn't the same used to boil the chicken. The two are served with assorted pickled veggies with a side of several yummy sauces. In this case, the chicken was covered in one sauce with a side of hot sauce. The hot sauce is the kind of sauce I could eat with rice and nothing else. The spicy red stuff is vinegary and salty and limey and could potentially lead to world peace. The chicken was a free-range chicken, so it was slightly gamy and chewy. Though this might turn some away, I believe it's an essential part of the dish, not necessarily because the dish has roots in lower class society where the chicken is stretched to make an entire meal. No, the extra chewing is essential for me to prolong my enjoyment of the red happiness.


I washed it all down with an order of iced milk Milo. Milo is basically the lovechild of chocolate milk and Gatorade...at least that's what all the marketing wants you to believe. I really don't care whether or not it's good for me. I just know it's chocolaty goodness in a glass. It doesn't taste like "American" chocolate milk either. It has a distinct grainy flavor...I guess it's all the vitamins and nutrients at work.

Eating here made me feel like I was back in Southeast Asia perusing the aisles of countless food vendors. And with the impressively long menu they have, I'm definitely visiting this place again.

Acme Oyster Co

For the extended Christmas weekend, the wife and I decided to visit New Orleans, since we had never visited NOLA before. Though we had planned on going weeks ahead of time, we did not make reservations until the day before we left. This was mainly to try and get a better deal on the hotel for the weekend. And it paid off. I got the hotel in the French Quarter to agree to a reduced rate with free parking that ended up saving us over $100 on hotel for the weekend. Of course that $100 still went towards food instead of savings, but c'est la vie. So on Christmas day we drove east on I-10 in virtually no traffic in search of some Cajun goodness.

Our favorite meal there was at the Acme Oyster House. Sure, it was just fried seafood but it was some of the best fried seafood we've had.


We got a dozen of their chargrilled oysters as an appetizer. The wife was happy because she can only eat cooked oysters (she's pregnant) and I was happy because it was full of butter, herbs and cheese. It was like the oysters were seasoned escargot style and then thrown on top of a flame grill. It's an amazing sight when they're cooking these babies because as the butter drips the flames dance higher. If you can get a seat facing the grill, you'll be entertained for the meal. And since it was herb butter, I used the table bread to sop up the remaining butter and cheese left inside the empty shells. It was so good we ordered another platter of these buttery beauties.


I got their Peace Maker Po' boy which is designed to prevent the turmoil that one experiences when debating between the shrimp and oyster po' boy. What you get is half of each. In all honesty, I was originally disappointed because I was expecting a po' boy with both shrimp and oysters mixed through out the entire sandwich. But that was easily remedied by alternating bites between the two halves. So what distinguishes a po' boy from a sub sandwich? It's the bread. Po' boy bread is a French-style baguette specific to Louisiana. I'm no bread expert so I can't tell you the specifics of the po' boy bread. I just know it's not as chewy as a French baguette because of a thinner crust but it's crispier than an American baguette with a fluffy interior. There. Now you know exactly how much I don't bake bread.


My wife got their two soft-shell crab plate. Not only were these the biggest soft shell crabs we've ever seen, it was also the most delicious. Just look at how the crabs dwarf the thick-cut french fries. The crabs tasted extremely fresh and were full of plump meat and flavorful crab mustard. That's right. The yellow mushy stuff in the middle of the crab's body. The mustard is by far our favorite part of the crab. It's almost like digging for gold since I eat every crab hoping for mustard but don't always get any. We both were glad she ordered two crabs so that we could each have one.


We also had a plate of their red beans and rice. That's char grilled smoked andouille sausage with seasoned red beans and white rice. Though there was nothing spectacular about this dish, it's still as authentic as it comes.

We ended up eating here twice over the weekend. Between the herb butter and colossal soft shell crab, it was hard to justify eating anywhere else.

Bush's Chicken

I had a business meeting that resulted in me driving through Waco. So I took advantage of the opportunity to stop into my favorite place fried chicken to date, Bush's Chicken. As told in lore, the Bush family started this chain in Waco and is well known by all Baylor alumni. I've actually started spreading the word to my friends in Austin and San Antonio so that they drop in on their way to Dallas.


So why is this place my favorite? It's all in the gravy. Every order of chicken fingers or other fried chicken parts come with a heavenly rich and peppery white gravy. Nearly everything is dipped in the gravy, the chicken, the fries, the mashed potatoes, the okra, and even the corn. I haven't tried dipping the coleslaw in the gravy but I'm sure it wouldn't be horrible. For all I know, the slaw might be made with the gravy. The chicken is lightly battered...well, as lightly as it gets for fried chicken. And some how, Bush's always seems to serve a fresh batch of chicken. Unlike other chicken chains where you can get a hot piece of stale chicken, at Bush's I've always gotten a hot piece of fresh juicy chicken. And that's considering the years I spent there at Baylor. They've branched out quite a bit since I left Baylor, so check out the website and if you're ever near one of their locations, namely the one in Waco off Valley Mills, make sure you stop in for some gravy. And chicken too.

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.