88 Lan Zhou Handmade Noodles

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Instagram Post 7/25/2019

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Sometimes, you just need to go back to basics. No roof to raise. No lilies to gild. Just quiet, reliable, mood food. These are fried pork dumplings from 88 Lan Zhou Handmade Noodles, 40 Bowery in Manhattan’s Chinatown. The waitress approached. I made my request. Silently, she walked to the back. She emerged with my order in less than a minute. Because when you’re famous for something, you’re prepared to provide. Very Zen.


The obligatory I-took-a-bite-and-of-course-it-was-delicious shot.
 
 

Angela’s Ice Cream

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Instagram Post 7/24/2019

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Angela’s Ice Cream at 151 Allen Street on the Lower East Side has brought freshly made, small batch, Filipino ice cream flavors to New York City and each one is delicious. The story behind the story is that Angela had been making these at home for her husband who has a passion for the stuff – so much so that they decided she should share her talents with the rest of us, hence, her first business venture which opened on June 15, 2019. Lucky us!

Dense and creamy, hand crafted with no artificial flavors (in others words, jackfruit is jackfruit, not a concentrate), it’s the first Filipino ice cream actually produced here in NYC. It’s currently available in mango, langka (jackfruit), ube (purple yam), choc-nut, vanilla, avocado (yes, and it’s the real deal), pandan, and buko-macapuno (the short but less than perfectly accurate definition is that it’s a variant of coconut). Slushies to come, calamansi flavor ice cream if we ask her real nice 😉!

Masarap! 😋
 
 

Paradise Sweets

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Instagram Post 7/23/2019

While doing reconnaissance for potential venues to visit on my Little Levant food tour in Bay Ridge, I checked out one of the newer kids on the block, Paradise Sweets at 6739 5th Ave in Brooklyn. It takes a certain amount of intestinal fortitude to launch a new Middle Eastern bakery along that strip considering the number of existing well-entrenched similar establishments but they seem to have a handle on serving the standards and coming up with some innovations as well.

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Case in point, this Nutella Kunafa (no, I won’t provide alternate spellings you might see since this was originally an Instagram post and Instagram only affords us 2200 characters per post). It’s a flat foundation of noodle-ish knafeh pastry suffocated by an ocean of Nutella topped with a thicker layer of vermicelloid kanafeh; a final fillip of adroitly squirted Nutella along with a trio of cherries and some ground pistachios grace the top gratuitously.


A cross section of this awe-inspiring architectural wonder so excessive as to give even my prodigious sweet tooth a run for its honey.

Problem is, I liked it.


As for the canonical litany of Middle Eastern sweets, along with an authentically cheesy, Kunafeh Nabulsiah, they do an acceptable rendition of Halawet el Jibn (sweet cheese rolls), cheesy dough stuffed with cheesy cream shown here, as yet unanointed by the accompanying supply of sugar syrup.
 
 

Mama’s Kitchen

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Instagram Post 7/22/2019

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A few weeks ago, I wrote that Mama’s Kitchen, Stall 28 at Elmhurst’s HK Food Court, 82-02 45th Ave in Queens “continues to hone their menu and it keeps getting better with each iteration”. This time the ascent is a significant order of magnitude higher.

My understanding was that part of their repertoire is Cantonese (from whence the chef hails) and part is Shanghai, so when Rui Lee Liu showed me their newest menu abounding with Sichuan delights, I was understandably surprised. I had intended to hold this post until I tried a few more of the latest entries, but the Lamb with Cumin, ostensibly a universal favorite these days, was so good that I didn’t want to wait lest it disappear from the list before you’ve had a chance to taste it yourself. More to come soon though….
 
 

Royal Queen

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Instagram Post 7/20 & 21/2019

Dim sum is one of my favorite meals because it affords the opportunity to taste so many diverse dishes at a single sitting. The tricky part is coordinating schedules with a group of good friends to actually converge on a restaurant at the same time for the experience. We finally succeeded in congregating at Royal Queen on the third floor of the New World Mall, 136-20 Roosevelt Ave in Flushing. As we proceeded to load our tabletop, I realized that it might be prudent to stop taking pictures and actually eat something because, well, FOMO. This accounts for the fact that you’re not seeing everything we ordered. But here are some examples from the prosaic to the unique.

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First photos are from the unusual category; a peek inside revealed a sweet peanut/sesame filling.

Tofu Stuffed with Shrimp

Beef Tendon

Xiao Long Bao

Lotus Leaf Wrapped Sticky Rice with shrimp, lap cheong (Chinese sausage), pork, and salted egg yolk

Flaky crust with a sweet ginger/custard filling inside

Fish Cake

Shrimp Balls on Sugar Cane

Roast Duck

Fried Silver Fish

Shrimp and Chive Wonton

Nian Gao (glutinous Rice Cake) made with Jujubes (dried red dates)

 
 
Serious question: what’s your favorite place in NYC for dim sum? Leave a reply below.
 
 

Paleteria Los Michoacanos

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Instagram Post 7/18/2019

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Every now and then, I write about something or someplace that I fervently want you to try because it’s Just That Good. Paleteria Los Michoacanos at 101-06 43rd Ave in Corona, Queens specializes in the most amazing, intensely flavorful paletas (Mexican ice pops on a stick) that I have ever encountered. Ever.

[1] They offer twenty-eight outstanding milk based flavors like arroz (rice pudding), rompope (eggnog), mamey, strawberry cream, pine nut, chocolate, chongos zamoranos (a Mexican dessert made from curdled milk and rennet), and queso con zarzamora (cheese and blackberry, shown here – which I highly recommend). And of course, you’ll find peach, raspberry, vanilla, pistachio and other familiar favorites.

Or choose from among twenty-two water ices like chamoy (tamarind with chili), guanabana (soursop), cactus pear, and grosella (currant) along with the customary orange, lemon, watermelon, raspberry, mango and the usual suspects.

[2] A peek inside just one of the freezer cases. (BTW, they have ice cream, batidos and more.)

There’s actually some confusion about locations with similar names and branding. There’s a Paleteria La Michoacana in Yonkers (my introduction to these stores) with a comparable product line. I learned from Wikipedia that “La Michoacana” is an informal group (not franchises) of family-run ice cream parlors, comprising thousands of venues in Mexico and the US. Three Mexican brands claim ownership of the name, “Paleterias La Michoacana”, “La Nueva Michoacana”, and “Helados La Michoacana”. But ¡No importa! The only one you need to drop everything and rush off to immediately is this one in Corona. Prepare to be blown away.

🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦
July is National Ice Cream Month, and every year I update my epic post about ethnic pops (with a little storytelling thrown in for good measure). It’s everything you always wanted to know about international ice cream all in one place. Please check it out here!
🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦 🍨 🍦
 
 

Battle of the Burgers – Chinese Food Court Edition

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Instagram Post 7/16/2019

A burger, in the culinary sense of the word, consists of ground or chopped meat served on a split bun (at least for the purposes of today’s post). In my ethnojunkets to Queens Food Courts, it’s evident that there’s no shortage of “Chinese Burgers” and they differ radically from one location to the next, both in terms of definition and quality. A few examples:

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Shaanxi Tasty Food, stall #27 in Super HK Food Court, 37-11 Main St, Flushing, boasts a Cumin Fried Beef Burger (item A3 on the menu), one of the best of the bunch IMHO, along with…
…Chinese Burger (item A2), pork and onions, a little less intense than its mate.

This is Cumin Lamb Chinese Hamburger from Liang Pi Wang (item 5) because cumin and lamb. There’s a proliferation of Liang Pi Wang venues, specifically stall #3 in Super HK Food Court (above), stall #10 in New York Food Court at 133-35 Roosevelt Ave, and stall #22 in Elmhurst’s HK Food Court at 82-02 45th Ave.

Yuan Muwu occupies stall #30 in Elmhurst’s HK Food Court. Although they don’t use the word “burger” I’d be hard pressed to call this by another name; they’ve opted for “Pork Pancake” (the menu reads “Poke Pancake” but we know what they mean). This one is pork belly on a sesame seed bun. When I tried it, the bun was over-toasted and its contents was a little dry; they may have better offerings.
 
 

Omonia Café

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Instagram Post 7/15/2019

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The venerable (established in 1977) Omonia Café, longtime fixture for Greek and Italian cookies and pastries, is still going strong offering a more wide-reaching menu than its original mission – but for me, it’s still the OG (original Greek) bakery in the neighborhood. Three classic cookies followed me home from 76-12 3rd Ave, Bay Ridge, Brooklyn; clockwise from the top:

Tulumba, deep fried until golden then drenched in sweet syrup, these are spongy in texture despite an appearance that promises a touch of crackle.

Melomakarona are made from flour, sugar, walnuts, honey and the usual suspects lurking in a Greek Christmas cookie; they’re distinguished by the addition of olive oil to the dough. This cookie must surely be healthy because olive oil is good for you, right?

Kourambiedes (you might see kourabiedes) are Greece’s entry in the international wedding cookie competition vying with Mexican, Italian, Danish, and Russian contenders. All are fragile shortbread cookies and rather similar to each other (shhhh!). Off topic: Why is it that all the wedding cookies I’ve encountered crumble and fall apart? Just sayin’.
 
 

Feijoa

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Instagram Post 7/12/2019

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One of the things I love most about doing ethnojunkets is introducing my food tour guests to international treats they’ve never tasted but soon won’t be able to live without. (That’s what puts the junkie in ethnojunkie 😉.) So I was unusually pleased during a recent jaunt through Brooklyn’s Little Odessa when a participant whose birthplace was Colombia gleefully recognized a favorite fruit in the gourmet produce section of Gourmanoff, an upscale Russian market, that she hadn’t seen locally elsewhere – feijoa. She happily instructed the others in her technique for selecting a ripe one as well as consuming it – which made my job easier!

Also known as “pineapple guava”, “Brazilian guava”, “fig guava” and “guavasteen”, the fruit’s flesh is soft in the center growing firmer and a bit grainier (a little like a pear) approaching its thin green skin. In the same family (Myrtaceae) as the guava but not the same genus, the aroma is almost perfumy. Its flavor is full-bodied and tropical, intensifying nearer the skin which itself can be eaten but has a decidedly different character, floral in nature.

So what was the connection between my exultant Colombian guest and this posh Russian market? Turns out that the feijoa is native to two regions of the world: Colombia (and other parts of South America) and Russia (and former Soviet Union countries)!

🎶 Reunited, and it feels so good! 🎶
 
 

Khanom Thai – Sweets

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Instagram Post 7/11/2019

When I approach Khanom Thai’s stall (number 10) with ethnojunket guests in tow and they ask, “What’s good here?” I can honestly answer, “Everything.” With a focus on sweets but not to the exclusion of savories (that’s another post), Khanom Thai obviates the need to seek out another venue for dessert after eating our way though Elmhurst’s HK Food Court (82-02 45th Ave in Queens).

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These are Bean Cakes with Salted Egg. Soft, flaky, swirly layers of creamy, tissuey dough swathe a confection of mung bean paste surrounding a heart of salted egg yolk. But don’t deconstruct it: just take a bite and taste why it’s remarkable. When you look closely and stop to think about it, these are really a sweet metaphor for the egg reimagined, its white shell protecting its two-tone sunny contents.


Coconut Pancakes, griddled fresh, right before your hungry eyes, warm and chewy. The color difference isn’t chocolate vs something else; it’s merely two different types of ground rice batter.


Obscenely decadent dessert: rich vanilla ice cream, sliced bananas and chocolate sauce oozing onto a warm roti, rainbow nonpareils for a bit of crunch. ’Nuff said.