Chinese and Japanese, Together Under One Roof? (aka the “No, Not Fusion… Something Else” Post)

“Hunan Delight Matsuya
Chinese & Japanese Cuisine”

One phone number, one address. And then there’s the matter of the handwritten sign that reads “FREE WINE” in the window.

What.

I’ve been perplexed by this locals Upper East Side restaurant since I moved into the area last spring. What is this, Chinese and Japanese fusion?*

The take-away menus make certain that it’s two restaurants — Hunan Delight, a Chinese restaurant, and Matsua Japanese cuisine — in one space.

Again: What! How can two such disparate cuisines — different ingredients, techniques, cultural histories — cohabit? How can this possibly work?

Well, except, it does. The food’s actually really good.

We came for the free wine, the Chinese food (after I found out Hunan Delight gets rave reviews online, to my surprise) and maybe a California roll. (It’s hard to mess up a roll made of crab stick, avocado and cucumber.)

What we discovered:

— Free wine offer is truly free: one glass of cheap, but crisp and very drinkable white wine, per person at dinner

— One of my new favorite Chinese dishes, called Green Jade Chicken ($11.95). Plump white meat pieces woked over high heat in “chef’s spicy sauce” (not really that spicy) along with matchstick-sized pieces of fresh ginger and string beans.

In the heat, the sauce caramelizes into a crisp, light glaze on the beans and chicken; the fresh ginger adds a welcome kick. This dish is the exact antithesis to the soggy, fatty, greasy Chinese food of styrofoam yore. It’s just lovely.

— And the sushi? You can find far worse sushi in supermarkets everywhere. Entranced by the platter of Dragon Rolls the sushi chef was putting up on the counter (see below) … so we ordered one.

It turned out to be a cooked roll (I still haven’t tried the raw sushi here) — shrimp tempura and cucumber on the inside, wrapped in eel and avocado on the outside.

— Doting, attentive service, of the sort you only get at a restaurant where the proprietors are that hands on, that involved, with everything.

There was a certain activity in the restaurant the night we were there, tables being reconfigured, the sushi chef turning out dragon rolls like nobody’s business, a party of young twenty-somethings turns up with a bottle of Johnny Walker.

Turns out, on this particular night the restaurant was hosting a friends and family Chinese New Year feast of epic proportions after the restaurant closed (11p).

Being the last guests in the restaurant, and obviously geeking out about the Chinese New Year food, they kindly invited us to join … we didn’t, and in hindsight, wish we did.

Still, this sit-down dinner for two totaled just $42.30 … also known in New York City as cheap.

Hunan Delight, a Chinese restaurant, and Matsuya Sushi, Japanese cuisine, share 1467 York Avenue, at 78th Street, 212-628-8161

*One rainy day, I’d love to really study and dissect the menus, to suss out any unintended fusion that’s happening.

Sunday: How To Make a Perfectly Crispy Quesadilla (the Secret’s in the Water)

Damn, it’s been a long since I bought a package of tortillas. Way, way too long — because I made a seriously good quesadilla.

It’s a matter of market demand: The average grocery store here (in Manhattan, at least) is more likely to stock great, locally-made pita or lavash bread than tortillas, and not to be a snob about it, but I haven’t touched Mission brand tortillas in years.

So I was intrigued to discover these La Tortilla Factory Smart & Delicious Tortillas at a health food store in my neighborhood. Sure, I’d take a large, white, almost-devoid-of-nutritional-value, giant burrito-sized tortilla over this low-carb, high fiber, whole wheat option, given the choice, but at least these tortillas are from a smallish company based in California. Read: Potential.

This is going to sound counter-intuitive, but the secret to a lovely, golden-crisped quesadilla, I was taught years and years ago, is to run the tortilla under a light stream of water just for a few seconds on each side, so the tortilla is damp. I don’t know the science of why this works, but it works.

A quesadilla can really be a kitchen sink dish — leftover chicken, spinach, fresh vegetables, etc. You can really throw in anything so long as its diced small enough and there’s enough cheese to bind it all together. In addition to cheese, I added some diced onion and tomato, a light smear of beans and wilted spinach. On top, I finished it off with a dollop of plain yogurt (sour cream alternative that was already in the fridge) and an excess of simple guacamole, which goes something like this:

Simple Guacamole

Ripe avocado, check.
Lemon juice squeeze, check.
Salt and pepper shake, check.

Mash, mash, mash.

Thursday: Móle, Móle, Móle! (aka the “Margarita/Guacamole/Carnitas Nirvana” Post)

This is how I remember Mexican food: The margaritas are strong but balanced, easy on the sweet and sour; the guacamole fresh and vibrant, with a heat that sneaks up on you; the carnitas tender, glistening and … [insert guttural noises] excellent.

Carnitas is my barometer. More precisely, the crispy carnitas as I remember it from Old Town Mexican Cafe in San Diego is my barometer: Pulls-apart-with-your-fork hunks o’ pork, browned and crispy on the edges, accompanied by a basket of hot, just-made tortillas (a couple of women make fresh tortillas all day long in a kitchen with large, street-facing windows), and a plate of simple, fresh, DIY taco fillings: sliced onion and tomato, avocado, fresh cilantro, lime wedges. (For photo, see here.)

When in doubt, just order the carnitas. And that’s exactly what I did at Móle, the utterly charming, seats 25ish Mexican restaurant in the Lower East Side that I’d previously blown off because of the sort of obtuse neon sign they’ve hung out front.

After a lovely, bubbly happy hour at the Living Room bar at The W Hotel in Union Square, after an all-star appetizer lineup of not one, but two orders of guacamole prepared tableside; an order of queso fundido, that molten, cheesey, chorizo-y, goodness, and an order of flame-grilled asparagus topped with melty sheaths of manchego cheese…

…I was stuck in an infinite loop of indecision. Do I order:

a.) The diver scallop tacos special. Hands-down the most intriguing item on the special board, I just couldn’t commit. Too many sketchy scallops have made me skittish about eating any that aren’t seriously vetted. (I’m sure I’ll come around again.)

b.) The fish tacos. My friend was looking to share an order of her favorite tacos — Baja-style battered-and-fried tilapia fillets, topped off with a creamy sauce and some serious lettuce plumage (they were beautiful). Yes, we had all consumed our fair share of guac, fundido, and more guac, and cheesy asparagus (not to mention tequilla) — but would it be enough? I couldn’t commit.

and c.) The conchinita pibil? The pollo en mole poblano? Camarones al mojo de ajo? One of the other, “fancier” items from the especialidades de la casa list that I ordinarily wouldn’t order, except that it was a special occasion? But which one? What if I got this fish Veracruz … and then realized that all I really wanted was …

“Um, I’ll have the carnitas plate, please. With corn tortillas.”

After the jump: Asparagus.

Lunch: Green Symphony, Back For More (the Avocado Delights Post)

On my first visit to Green Symphony last week, the $7/lb. hot/cold buffet (verdict: excellent) barely beat out this Avocado Delights sandwich: Two pieces of flatbread, smeared with hummus, and stuffed with a salad’s worth of lettuce greens, sprouts and avocado, priced at $3.95.

This has to be one of the healthiest, cheapest meals in Midtown. Needless to say, Avocado Delights had gotten into my head. I knew I’d be back soon.

… which means, less than a week later. Avocado Delights is as healthy and as fresh as you’d expect, but there’s a fundamental flaw with its composition: It truly IS a salad’s worth of lettuce — only, this salad has no dressing.

I’m generally a light-on-the-dressing sort of girl, but this much lettuce has got to have something. If I had a bottle of dressing at my desk I would have given the greens a quick toss and rebuilt the sandwich.

As an alternative, I doctored it up with some black bean and avocado salad, you know, the one with bits of cilantro, bell pepper and onion, and a few extra strips of bell pepper. Did the trick — and still for less than $6.

TIP: Green Symphony has a bunch of premade sandwich and wrap options, all under $5, including a chicken curry wrap (free range white meat chicken, mesclun salad, roasted tomatoes, raisins and cashews) and an organic turkey salad wrap (whitemeat turkey salad, fresh tarragon, pecans, tofu, lite mayo, granny smith apples).

Lunch: So Close to Excellence, But Not Quite (The “$6 Artichoke Cafe Sandwich Special” Post)

Just look at it there in the case: That gorgeous seeded bread, such a welcome departure from the offerings at so many delis and sandwich shops in the neighborhood. Thick slices of turkey, crisp bacon.

All for $6, which includes chips?! It’s damn near impossible to find a decent deli sandwich in the city for less than $6, let alone one that comes on bread like that and chips.

Soo … what’s the catch?

I’ve wandered in and out of Artichoke Cafe a half-dozen times since it opened earlier this year, each time wondering the same thing. As far as I can tell, other than being a little negligent on printing up or posting an official menu with prices — there are no prices or descriptions posted anywhere, which makes me feel a little weird because I’m constantly asking questions — Artichoke Cafe appears to be doing moderately well at offering affordable lunch fare that tends towards the healthful — pick-your-ingredient salads, sandwiches, paninis, a rotating selection of hot entrees, a  juice bar — without being overbearing about it.

Now about that sandwich. The bread was excellent: dark, nutty, fresh. I found slices of avocado tucked inside (bonus!), which bumped the sandwich up a notch, approaching club sandwich classification … until I saw the bacon.

Here’s where Artichoke Cafe’s healthful tendencies veer off-track: The bacon was not bacon. It might be turkey bacon or mock bacon, I’m not sure, but definitely not regular bacon. I love a lot of veggie fare, but mock meat isn’t one of them. By all means, use mock bacon. Just let your customers know.

*Yet one more argument, and a strong one at that, for printing out little placards to place in the display cases adjacent the options — had I known, I’d have gone for the tuna melt, or the turkey cheddar number, or the pesto chicken, and been equally as satisfied, if not more so. So close to excellence, but yet, not quite.

Artichoke Cafe, 240 W 37th St., btwn. 7th and 8th avenues, 212.695.9086

Sunday: So This Is the Appeal of the Diner

Some people looovveee diners, you know, those little local joints that sell omelets all day, serve bottomless cups of coffee and use a lot of  processed cheese food — those individually-wrapped single slices by Kraft, etc — and that are usually run by a handful of people who have been there for years and years (and sometimes look like it, too)?

You know, the setting of Edward Cooper’s “Nighthawks” painting? That have an atmosphere and customer loyalty that places like Denny’s are trying to emulate, the same way that Subway longs to be a hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop?

Well, I’m not one of them. I like diners okay, but it’s a rare day that I’m craving that sort of food, specifically. I think I’m an anomaly, because on any given weekend between the hours of, say, 11 am and 3 pm, nearly every diner you walk by in the city will be full or nearly full, with crowds spilling over onto sidewalk seating in the warmer months.

I think I figured it out today, the “why” part of the appeal of diners, as I was enjoying my plate of fries and my tuna melt (which was not so melted. Better when the cook throws the slab of tuna salad onto the grill itself so that it crisps and browns a bit, heats through and melt the cheese).

For those of us who generally eat well and don’t need to eat fast food, (that is, unless by choice) — diner fare is our riff on fast food. It’s cheap, service is efficient, there’s an emphasis on sandwiches and other dishes that involve some sort of fryer or griddle, comfortable in that familiar way.

[ED NOTE: As I think about this more and more, maybe I have it backwards. I think fast food evolved from the culture of diners, a la Chapter One of Fast Food Nation. Good food for thought.]

Missed: The Friday Food Kerfuffle

Eating regularly and generally healthfully is difficult enough, let along blogging about it 17 times a week. Sometimes, it just doesn’t work out.

That’s pretty much what happened on Friday; I had a strategy for the day, and it failed, multiple times.

First, I forgot to take a photo of the vanilla Instant Breakfast mix that, mixed with milk, was my “breakfast” because I had a big lunch adventure planned. However, I got so caught up with work that I ended up missing lunch entirely, and about 4:15p I broke down and went fridge-scavenging, devising this plate of fresh mozzarella, salami slices, avocado and water crackers, which I promptly devoured. But by the time I ate, it was so late that then I wasn’t hungry for dinner at the regularly-appointed time. I ended up meeting up with friends out and about later, unintentionally skipping dinner because I was too busy socializing.

And that’s the Friday food kerfuffle.

Saturday: The “This Is Why Summer Is My Favorite” Post

Reason no. 1 of what is going to be a fairly long, running list: impromptu barbecues! 

After about an hour browsing the (amazing) cookbook section at the (also amazing) Strand bookstore, I was really hungry. I called a friend, who, as it turned out, was hungry too and happened to be at our friend’s apartment in Brooklyn that has a backyard BBQ area (this is where we barbecued last weekend, too). 

A short 10-minute subway ride later, we all rendez-voused at Sunac Natural Foods,  just off the Lorimer stop on the L Train if you take the exit where you pop up by Union Street. We picked up some curry chicken salad, potato salad, a package of hot sausages, requisite buns, and two of the most perfect avocados I’ve ever purchased in my life. Really, they were absolutely perfect: Soft and ripe without being bruised, mid-to-large sized, smooth like butter. Just beautiful. I would pay $1.99 for an avocado every single time and have no qualms about it if avocados were always like these ones. 

The rest, as they say, is history. Since I’ve been raving about the avocados, which were turned into my picnic table (play on tableside) guacamole, here’s the recipe:

Picnic Table Guacamole 

1 ripe avocado
2 Tbls. salsa
1/2 lemon
garlic powder
salt and pepper

Scoop out avocado into a bowl; add two spoonfuls (or more, to taste) of salsa. Squeeze juice from half lemon; add healthy shakes of garlic powder, salt and pepper. (estimate 1/2 teaspoon?) Mash, mash, mash, with a fork. Eat. Savor.