mash up

I made a sandwich today inspired by a few tasty dishes I've had in the past.  It was amazing, so I had to share!  One of my inspirations was this steak panini from Choice market down the street.  The service is awful, the food expensive, but delicious.  So of course I'm always going back for more.  The steak panini's special quality is their sauce that's so packed with flavor, the sandwich is just another steak sandwich without it.  And if I remember correctly, they dress it with arugula too, which I think you can never go wrong when it comes to steak, or any kind of beef sandwich for that matter.  It is however, a little on the bitter side (in a good way), so I think you'd have to have an acquired taste for it.  So that takes me to our next inspiration: Pret a Manger's roast beef sandwich.  It's fresh, it's full, it's fantastic!  The crispy French baguette is layered with roast beef, arugula (again), parmesan shavings, and mayo.  The bread is a little hard to bite through, but the flavors are amazing together.  Finally, I recently ordered my first beef carpaccio from Fig and Olive.  The raw beef was sliced so thinly, it was  almost translucent.  They threw on some shaved parmesan, a few leaves of arugula, salt pepper, and a drizzle of some wonderful balsamic vinegar.  It left me craving some more of those flavors for days.  See the pattern?  Beef. Parmesan. Arugula.  I finally had all of my ingredients today, but let me tell you, arugula is a very elusive vegetable!

I bought some half baked french rolls, but I'm sure any of your favorite breads will do.  I put those in the oven to finish baking.  Here are the rest of the ingredients:

Deli roast beef, a few slices per sandwich-- go ahead, add more if you're a meat lover
Arugula, a few sprigs to a small handful
Parmesan shavings
Red onion, THINLY sliced-- optional, but I highly recommend
1tbs Peter Luger's steak sauce, or other sauce with horseradish-- the key is sweet and spicy
1tbs Mayo

Layer roast beef, arugula, onions and cheese on bread.  Mix steak sauce and mayo and drizzle onto sandwich.  Top with another slice of bread and enjoy!  Another variation:  if you don't have bread or are laying off the carbs, toss all of the ingredients in a bowl and you have a delicious salad!  I did both :) Yum!

Brasserie

The "Catwalk": see and be seen

I had lunch at the Brasserie yesterday with my fellow NY friends, Esther and Sambo.  Redesigned by Diller + Scofidio in the base of the iconic Seagram Building (Philip Johnson and Mies van der Rohe), it is well known to anyone who's been exposed to the world of architecture and design.

We decided to try the restaurant week menu.  Because Yelp only gave the restaurant 3.5 stars, I went to check it out mainly for the design. It was much smaller than I had imagined, but waiters and patrons were bustling cheerily.

The staff was pretty friendly and they offered to take my coat after checking in.  We were a bit early for our reservation but we still ended up waiting an extra ten minutes.  After we were seated, the waitress came out and brought us a fresh baguette.  It was kind of strange though; she just plunked it on an unused menu... just sitting there on the table with a little wax paper tied around the middle.  If I were the OCD type, I'd freak out, but since I have eaten rats in a refugee camp and perhaps much worse things (according to my older bro), it was nothing to fuss over.

I started out with the Mushroom Veloute (soup), the Braised Spare Rib and the Lemon Tart for dessert.  My favorite part was obviously the lemon tart and creme fraiche.  I've actually made something similar to that myself.  The soup was good, but I have had much better.  The short ribs were cooked to a "fall off the bone" tender perfection, but the flavor was a little off.  Well, it was probably supposed to taste that way, but there was something tart in it... maybe vinegar, and I didn't like that.  It was a waste of some perfectly good meat, in my opinion.  Don't get me wrong, it was good, but I would have liked it much better without the vinegar taste.

My Lemon Tarte

Sambo's Creme Caramel

Esther's Flourless Chocolate Cake

Overall, the food was not impressive.  Honestly, the food was just OK, and the design was definitely much better than the food. It was as I had expected, so I'm glad I didn't pay full price for a meal there.  

I was probably more excited about the drink menus... no, not the drinks!  The design!  pretty cool, huh?

Burn, Baby, Burn

I was craving some creme brulee this weekend (literally burnt creme in French), so there was no choice but to bring out the blow torch and undust the ramekins sitting in the back of the cupboard.  I'm sharing with you Alton Brown's easy recipe.  It's amazingly simple to make and there really isn't that many ingredients.  If you think of it, creme brulee is just a fancy name for vanilla pudding/custard. :)  So here you go, and burn away!

Preheat oven to 325º

6 medium sized ramekins
1 baking pan that will hold all six ramekins and deep enough to hold water

1 qt heavy cream
1 vanilla bean
6 egg yolks
1 c sugar, divided
2 qt hot water

Scrape the vanilla bean to get the seeds out and add to medium saucepan along with the whole bean.  In the saucepan over medium heat, bring cream and vanilla to a boil.  Cover mixture, let it sit for 15 minutes and strain out the vanilla bean.

In a bowl, beat yolk and 1/2 c sugar until fully incorporated and it turns lighter in color.  Whisk in a little of the cream to the eggs to temper so the eggs don't curdle.  Continue adding cream a little at a time until it is fully mixed.  Pour mixture into ramekins and place into baking pan.  I usually pull out one of the oven racks halfway so I can place the baking pan on it.  Next, pour the hot water into the pan until it comes up the sides of the ramekins halfway.  Bake for 40-45 minutes until the creme brulee is set but still  trembling in the center.  Remove ramekins from pan and chill in refrigerator for at least 2 hours and up to 3 days.

When ready to serve, remove creme brulee 30 minutes before browning sugar.  Divide the other 1/2 c of sugar equally between the 6 ramekins and spread evenly.  Using a torch, brown the sugar until it forms a crispy layer.  Wait 5 minutes before serving.  If you don't happen to have a torch laying around the house just put the dishes under the broiler for a few minutes.

Garnish with berries, if desired.  I like mine plain just fine :)  Enjoy!