lgo with mum, jen & stu

drove around. drove past lo lo's chicken & waffles, the roosevelt, cibo.

went to phoenix ranch market with mum as marina had to take a pit stop. had a horchata (always yummy), a limon (lime - yummy), a melon (very yummy) and a bannana drink (yummy). we also had fish tacos back at the back and they were very good.

after that we drove by el nopalito. definitely divey but so want to go back.

met jen, stu, sid & cammy at lgo after that. jen did a green chile burger which was great, fries for the girls (again salted/seasoned this time), we did the padre (superyum) and a 1/2 avocado 1/2 roasted corn. stuey liked the roasted corn. mum only tried the avocado i think. jen only tried the padre & avocado. didn't get raves from jen but she is weird like that. she doesn't get too excited some times when i think she will and she doesn't love other stuff that i think she will. she didn't try the roasted corn. she didn't have a coffee (stu & i did spanish, mum & heather did honey latte). stu & mum liked theirs.

marina & sydney had tangerine gelato from archellino's as well. great as always. jen also got us some banana tammie coe cupcakes which were great. very yum!

pane, lux for lunch; 1st time cyclo for dinner!!

after my gym (this time with mum), we decided we needed to reload on lux coffee beans.

we headed back to pane bianco and lux.

ordered basically the same as last weekend (bunch of market sandwiches - which happened to be lamb again; a couple mozzarella, tomato & basil sandwiches; the day's foccaccia; a $6 chocolate bar - actually way, way good; a cream soda; and several of the excellent rice puddings).

we did a bit of a spin on it today and bought some of the ash ripened goad cheese and spread it on the market sandwiches to great effect.

pair that with assoreted lattes and a velvet from lux and you've got a great saturday.

btw, if you do pane bianco without getting the rice pudding, you're missing out. : )


first time cyclo!

had our first visit to cyclo tonight. it was great. we all loved the food, including our 2 year old daughter. justina, who has been mentioned often, was super nice and very fun.

as my wife is pregnant, we had to skip the beef carpaccio that i'd read so much about. definitely will be trying that within the next month or two. we did the tamarind pork short ribs with the green papaya salad for the appetizer. the short ribs were super tasty (very moist as well as some had reported them dry). they also went beautifully with the green papaya salad as has been mentioned. the papaya salad was great from the get go and grew on us even more throughout the night - awesome mix of sweetness and heat - very refreshing.

for our entrees, we did...

the hong kong beef chow fun - as good as any we've had in town. with a canton, china born father, this is a family staple wherever we go. it's also one of the main things our dairy/egg/shellfish allergic daughter can eat. along with scarfing the short ribs, i think our daughter ate more without prompting than i've ever seen her.

the hanoi rice vermicelli - super tasty thought we weren't sure how to eat it at first. we first went at it lettuce wrap style (of which i had a bite) and it was awesome. justina later indicated that we tear the lettuce and herbs and put them into the bowl and eat it that way - yummy.

my wife had the seafood noodle soup and was very happy with it. she's a chile freak so when i tried it, it was a bit too spicy for me. she finished it down to the last drop.

i had the minced crab & shrimp soup (with tomato, egg & tofu) and thought that was wonderful as well. this also was completely gone.

along with dinner, i had the vietnamese coffee - superyum - and we also had the house made lemonade. i think this might have been the best lemonade i'd ever tasted. our daughter definitely agreed. when we gave her a sip (with about a third left in the glass), she drained it without taking her lips off the straw.

we were going to head over to angel sweet as i'd seen it on the board and with a dairy allergic daughter, we do a lot of gelato. justina mentioned what they had for desert and we caved though. we did the sticky rice with mango and the jasmine cream brulee. we all loved the sticky rice with mango and it was plated beautifully but our daughter commandeered the dish and finished the entire thing. we were quite full at this point so didn't put up a fight. we did have the jasmine cream brulee to split and that was unbelievable. very subtle but just awesome.

all in all, we loved it. a comfortable fun, funky place with great music and great food. it was busy as would make sense but was worth the wait. we were 4 down when we got there at 8 pm with everyone waiting outside. i think it took us about a half hour to get in but it didn't seem too bad.

living in scottsdale, we frequent noodles ranch quite often and love it. while we love the food there along with the ambiance and the service, we thought the food was a couple of notches better at cyclo. the prices were still reasonable and it was quite fun.

we'll probably be splitting time between the two from now on and we're looking forward to the upcoming old town scottsdale cyclo. while i expect this to be great, i bet it will be a little more funky, pricey (with the old town rent) and crowded. i expect we'll be making the trek down the 101 for a long time to come.

vallone's / pizza express

tonight we headed over to vallone's or pizza express on thomas & hayden. while the restaurant changed hands some time ago and we weren't expecting the old standard of excellence, we felt like a local casual meal.

so it was a bunch of us, 6 adults, a 3 year old, a 2 1/2 year old and a 7 month old. when we first got there, there were a few other tables filled but they trickled out after a while and we were left with the entire restaurant for a while. very cool with "can be loud" children.

we started with the antipasto platter which was very good, cheese, salami, meat & black olives (syd was stealing all the black olives) over lettuce with an excellent dressing. as this was one of jen's old haunts when she lived nearby, she asked them for an extra side of dressing. this was a great call as their dressing was killer and excellent for dousing on their excellent garlic and regular hot italian bread (free refills).

for dinner we got a couple of pizzas. thin crust for the aussies with chicken, brocolli, garlic, green pepper, canadian bacon, black olives, mushrooms and fresh tomatoes. they loved their pizza. jen, mom & i got regular crust wtih mushrooms, onions & meatballs. jen was less than happy as the meatballs were pretty much quartered so there were huge chunks on it (i guess they used to slice them). i thought they were good anyway. marina (being dairy/egg allergic) got an order of chicken caccitore which she liked. i also ordered an eggplant rollotini that we shared and everybody enjoyed.

all in all, the food was good, it was super casual, it was a good value and it was close.

molecular gastronomy info

ran across some interesting links:

http://www.chow.com/stories/10411

http://hungryinhogtown.typepad.com/hungry_in_hogtown/2006/02/sugar_high_frid.html

http://hungryinhogtown.typepad.com/hungry_in_hogtown/molecular_gastronomy/index.html

http://www.alacuisine.org/alacuisine/2004/11/molecular_gastr.html


Chef Grant Achatz is actually posting on this forum as chefg.

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=49670

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?s=67aa6a88758709302ed36915bcfff5d6&showtopic=49694

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showforum=91

One of his pieces of equipment: http://www.chow.com/stories/10167

Alinea dish pics and descriptions 24 course tasting menu: http://www.foodite.com/foodite/2006/09/alinea.html
Bigger pics, holy moly: http://flickr.com/photos/gsanjose/sets/72157594271893811/

Great article on Achatz & Alinea:
part 1 http://www.technologyreview.com/Biotech/17966/
part 2 http://www.technologyreview.com/Biotech/18043/


Chef Ferran Adria also posting as Ferran Adrià (has El Bulli in Spain which is super MG famous)

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=57873

lgo

did the lgo pizza roll tonight. man it was good of course.

we did a turn in the grocery and they had vanilla tammie coe cupcakes!!! while we love the ooey gooey and coconut, we like vanilla cake. these were vanilla toffee. ate them at home later and they were great. back to dinner.

so we started with a lemonade and a boylan's root beer. good. ordered marina a burger.

pizza. padre. roasted corn. sausage and fennel.

butterscotsh pudding.

houston's

was working at an act! gig until late in the evening. never did lunch so the client went over and bought me a chicken salad from houstons. tasted like it had an asian peanut dressing and had some crispy won ton strips on it as well. it was really nice.

first time china chili

marina's chuck episode. good food.

salt & pepper pork

chow fun

veggie chow fun

house chow mein

fried shrimp

pot stickers

beans

handicapped plates, traffic, courtesy

pane bianco, lux, borders

after my gym, jen, stu, syd, cameron, heather, marina & i made the trek out to central phoenix.

heather needed beans so a lux run was on the agenda. jen said she needed beans too and was up for a pane bianco try. this was the first for everybody but me so i was nervous and excited.

looking at the board, the market sandwich was lamb again! nice as heather and stu are lamb freaks. we got there a bit early so just to ensure we didn't miss out, i ordered 3 of the market sandwiches and a mozzerella, tomato & basil sandwich. jen and stu got there just as i'd finished ordering so jen came in and ordered the soppressata sandwich with aged provolone and olivida and the fococcia of the day with piave cheese and tomatoes (warmed of course).

stu, being mr. lamb, loved the market sandwich - being tender and flavorful. heather and i both thought it was very good but could have used something else - maybe some of that piave cheese to take it into the next realm? the soppressata sandwich was excellent as was the mozzarella, tomato and basil. for my own taste, i'll probably keep an eye out for meat version market sandwiches in the future with teh soppressata as a backup.

when we left we went back in to order some triple cream red XXX chese, another cream soda and the organic rice pudding. the rice pudding was awesome - possible taste of condensed milk??? yum. i will definitely be always ordering the rice pudding.

along with our lunch, we did order coffee's and of course our beans to go (ground espresso and drip). i had the typical velvet (always good). stu had a red eye (coffee with a shot of espresso) and jen and heather both had soy decaf lattes. all good.

ok so more errands followed.

then we ended up at borders for an errand. while i've had some excellent coffee shakes here in the past, i was a bit let down. the warmed white chocolate chip cookie did not disappoint as usual. superyum.

more errands. crash at home. try the triple cream cheese which was very good but a bit too blue-ish for what we wanted at that point, so finished the night off with 2 breakfast jacks and 2 cardboard tacos for both heather and i.

sakana

chicken cutlet

sakana lunch, sashimi lunch

andiamo

at our sister & brother's request, we shared a meatball panini with extra sauce. it was huge and super good. nice bread. the meatballs were great. the sauce was very yummy - the extra sauce was a nice call. there was also a salad on the place. it was definitely big enough for 2 people to split.

we also as a table shared an order of spinach ravioli. it was definitely good. i'd be happy to eat it again though i'd go with the meatball panini first for lunch.

they also served hot bread with an herbed butter that was nice.

the only negatives were that their tap water tasted like hell. it was bad enough that i noticed it and i knew for sure that heather wouldn't be able to drink it. their raspberry iced tea is also super sweet so jen had to swap that out for a regular iced tea.

all in all, a nice italian place right next door to work and close to home. i'm sure we'll be there many times again.

kampai

andiamo

chicken milanese

fiesta burrito

2 taco special. deep fried shredded tacos, rice, beans. carnitas taco (soft corn tortilla). horchata


2 taco combo - beans, rice; carnitas taco; horchata

noodles ranch

noodles ranch

green, lulus, kyoto

green

lulus

kyoto

az88

az88

arizona

you know what... i've had a complete turnaround. some lady wrote some article disparaging the az food scene in the republic. it stimulated a lot of talk on the chowhound board and i realized i don't think az is food-lame or character-inhibited anymore. it's pretty cool even if it doesn't have a beach.

below is the post i wrote in response to the thread...



You know what, Seth? I think that problem is that the food here doesn't get enough props. I don't think people do enough to promote it.

I was born (back in 1969) and raised here and I didn't fully appreciate what we have or even know about it until recently. I'm also not some put ketchup on your filet, completely food unaware schmoe. I've had my subscription to Phoenix Magazine (only for the restaurant reviews) for a while now and have been reading Seftel on-line for years. I've been totally into food my whole life as is the rest of my family. With my dad being one of the owners of the Glass Door and growing up working there, we live for food. Everywhere I've gone, I've searched out the great places.

How could someone with that great an interest in it who was born and raised here so miss everything??? How could my entire family be so unaware? I just think people don't know!
As I'm thinking about it, growing up and spending most my time in Scottsdale (now called South Scottsdale??), might have made it harder to see what we have here.

Over the past years I've lived in Washington DC, Huntington Beach, Kauai and Oahu. Though I've been back about 5 years and knew there were some great restaurants here and love many of them, I still thought we were not even close to the same league as the coasts (SoCal, San Fran, NY, etc.). I even kind of had a moderate disdain for the state in that regard - felt AZ was pretty lacking in character in general - the land of malls, strip malls and chains.

It wasn't until I found Chowhound (about a month ago) from searching on Binkley's after an incredible meal and landing upon your review, that I started reading about the hidden gems & started actively searching out places.

Since then, I (and my wife as well) have had a complete reversal in my/our opinion of Phoenix in general. I came back because my family was here & always kind of felt that I was missing out on stuff (food for one) by living here. I've done a 180 and have a much, much greater appreciation for the food we have here and for the character of Phoenix in general. Searching recommendations out from the board and driving through different areas of the city has let me see that there is much more to AZ than the malls & chains. There is a ton of character in the little places you mention.

In fact I'm totally indebted to Chowhound. I've gotten rid of that nagging worry that I'm missing out by living here. I'm digging the city I live in and grew up in. I just want to find the next great place to go.

Recent chowhound inspired hits - Rito's, Fry Bread House, Pane Bianco, Lux, DaVang, LGO, Binkley's, Carolina's, Galileo's, Arlecchino's, Phoenix Ranch Market.

Firsts on deck - Marcellino's, Tarbell's, Tradiciones, The Roosevelt, Richardson's, Pizzeria Bianco, Lo Lo's Chicken & Waffles, Barrio Cafe, Cyclo, Blue Fin.

sushi

while this is a very cool thread, i wish people had noted their frame of reference - what they like - when they were making recommendations. i think sushi recommendations come in wildly different flavors and it is because people like wildly different things.

for instance, sushi (and japanese food) is our favorite thing ever and a very serious deal. we're about one thing - quality. excellent, super fresh, authentic sushi. couldn't care less about the crazy, creative bonzai superman philly volcano roll. quantity is also not a big deal. don't care a whit for atmosphere or friendliness or chatter from the chefs. it's all about the food. always omakase.

don't know why but also seem to be more comfortable if the chef is from japan. loved the fact that sushi sasabune (in HI) had the sushi nazi thing going and was all about quality and keeping it authentic and want to hit sushi nozawa (in CA) for the same reason.

i totally get that people look for completely different things. i have friends that value an engaging chef as highly as the food. we go to the places they like and are happy to just order safely. i think that as you experience higher and higher quality sushi that it's impossible to go back. better to do a shrimp tempura roll (which i like) at a mediocre sushi place than to take a chance on being bummed out by a c+ order of uni.

with that being said, our 2 favorite local places to go are...

-sea saw for just flat out awesome japanese inspired food (thought it is priced way beyond us)

-kampai for awesome, fresh authentic sushi at an incredible value

at kampai, we always, always wait for yuki-san (gray haired chef to the right) though aji-san rocks as well. only sat with the apprentices once and yuki-san took over when one was going to give us some tuna that he didn't approve of. had them go into the back and get the other stuff... i don't think he likes it too much when we leave it all up to him but he's used to it. it's always stellar and unreasonably cheap when compared to other quality places.

shinbay was great as well so we're waiting and hoping to hear something positive out of the autumn court development. we've also had great food at shimogamo. the other valley place that stands out in memory was mikado (long gone from camelback and scottsdale roads). had some great sushi and even kaiseki-style there.

other than that, we do want to try sushi-ko as we've seen that the chef is ex-matsuhisa. don't know if that will mean a lick but the last ex-matsuhisa chef we ate at became our go to person when i lived in huntington beach (takashi abe of ristorante abe and now of blue fin)

so if anybody feels like qualifying/chiming in on what they like about the places they've recommended (fancy creative rolls, scene, huge portions, just plain fresh and unique fish), it might be super helpful???
pulling from thread...
-Ichi Ban - Central and Thomas
-Tokyo Lobby
-Fish Market
-Dozo-Akaihana
-Sushi Ko
-Mishima
-Sakana (hayden & indian bend): do lunches here as right next to work, decent quality, good vlaue
-Zen 32
-Sushi on Shea
-Mr. Sushi
-Sushi Eye
-Sushi Kee
-Sushi Ken
-Kampai: our favorite for excellent quality sushi, also happens to be a great value
-Kyoto: decent sushi, super, super, super, super cheap, first tried sushi here back in 1985??
-Shimogamo: very good quality, good variety, need to try again
-Sea Saw: not standard sushi but just flat out awesome japanese inspired dishes, don't question the value but still can't afford more than once or twice a year. been coming in at $400+ for 2 of us with no crazy wine.

just can't get my mind around listing Ra & Blue Wasabi, though in fairness i've never given them a chance.

and if any of those falls in the flat out awesome quality, authentic sushi (interesting selections imported in from japan or elsewhere always a bonus) category, would love to hear so!!!

sushi progression...
kyoto
ninja (chandler)
mikado
kampai
move to ca
matsu (recommended by yuki-san & aji-san)
the view at the marriott on fashion island
tsunami (don't bother for straight sushi)
daimon (don't bother for straight sushi)
ristorante abe
matsuhisa
ginza sushika
move to kauai
kintaro (stay away from kintaro's if you're a quality person)
tip top (only decent sushi on island)
heard hanamalu cafe was good
move to oahu
yanagi sushi
sushi sasabune
move back to az
more kampai
nobu in lv
nobu in ny
sea saw
kaygetsu (san mateo)
shinbay
tetsuya in syndey oz
shimogamo
hiro sushi
stingray (cool but don't bother for straight sushi)
blue fin (ca)

ultimate goal is to do masa in ny

non-sushi loved japanese: ca shabu shabu (ca)kappo honda (ca)ebisu (ca)

corleones

thinking about lunch, we debated on gallileo's (heather wasn't feeling adventurous), pane bianco (too far of a drive), rito's (too spicy for the pregger belly) and decided upon corleone's.

nothing special but how can you not like a good old fashioned cheesesteak with wiz. i went crazy and got a food long with double wiz and double meat. it was unbelieveably huge. super good as always. of course i finished it. heather got her standard foot long with extra wiz. we both had fries which are great and we were even given an side of wiz which we used to dip our fries in (as our servings of extra wiz had already done the job). pair that with a standby coke (sweet and salty) and how could you ask for more. the one diappointment was that they were out of the lovely butterscotch tastycakes. all in all, another satisfied corleone's visit.

wed night

phx ranch market

slc - day 3

lunch today was pizza at wasatch pizza. pretty good. nice crust. had a piece of bbq chicken and a piece of chicken pesto. the chicken pesto sounded like a great idea & was talked up. it was good but nothing exceptional. kind of dry. the bbq chicken was quite good though. good crust, nice huge chunks of chicken breast and green onions charred. pretty good.

for dinner, made it to red iguana. cool place. chips were good. hot sauce was very good. was pretty set on having one of their moles as that's what they were known form. deliberated for a while and the server offered to bring a taste. brought a plate with 5 moles on it. as described:

mole amarillo - good but a bit too spicy for me. menu description: a very spice mole, chile guajillo, chile habanero, fresh vegetables and spices, sauteed and simmered to perfection. a oaxacan treat. served with chicken.

red pipian - very good. seemed to lack heat so didn't order it but it was my alternate. after i ordered, detected heat so i kind of kicked myself. menu description: peanuts, pumpkin seeds, pasilla & guajillo chile transport to you Mexico, a delicious national dish. served with chicken.

mole poblano - this is what i chose in part because of the server recommendation. menu description: a rich blend of peanuts, walnuts, almonds and a hint of mexican chocolate make this puebla original the king of moles. delicioso!! served with turkey.

mole verde - this was good. would be happy if someone served it to me but when compared with the other moles, just didn't seem as distinctive. not much spice, no real bold flavors. menu description: a verdant pleasure from oaxaca of fresh green vegetables sauteed and blended with pumpkin seeds and spices. served with your choice of chicken or turkey.

mole negro - this was good too. some spice. some strong flavors. thought about going with it. menu description: chile mulato, peanuts, walnuts, almonds and fennel seeds fuse together with spices to make this oaxacan treasure unforgettable. served with chicken or turkey.

so i ended up ordering the mole poblano. i really liked it. had big chunks of turkey in it. came with rice, beans and tortillas. they were decent but nothing special. the tortillas at rito's and carolina's killed them. the beans at rito's killed them. if you put the mole together with a carolina's tortilla and rito's beans, it would be too good. the mole was pretty thick. the heat definitely built too. after a bit, i had to keep eating bites with the tortilla or with rice on the fork...something to offset the heat. wasn't too much for me but it was spicy. by the time i'd fished most of the chunks of turkey out (which were covered with the thick mole) and just had the mole sauce left, i couldn't do just the sauce anymore. too spicy and too much.

followed that up with arroz con leche - homemade mexican style rice pudding. this rocked hugely. it was basically rice cooked in a sweet milk with cinnamon sprinkled on top & shards of vanilla bean & raisins throughout. the consistency was pretty liquidy - not very pudding-like. still, i really, really enjoyed it. sweet but not too sweet, nice notes of cinnamon and vanilla. yummy.

slc - day 2

had a killer salad for lunch. they brought catered in. had rice, beans, lettuce, awesome crispy tortilla strips (very thin), seasoned chicken breast and a killer dressing. need to find the name of that place.

found out today (day after) that it was from a chain! the place is called costa vida and they even have one in mesa. http://www.costavida.net/swfs/menu.html had the shredded chicken salad. huge chunks of marinated, grilled chicken. as mentioned, rice beans, lettuce, great crispy tortilla strips all in a tortilla lined bowl. one of the stars was the killer cucumber ranch or tomatillo ranch. can't find the description on the website and the locals here disagree. anyway it was rocking.

for dinner went to crown burger. basically a fast food dive with a bit of a twist. they do gyros & some other interesting stuff. the crown burger is a cheese burger with pastrami piled on top. as it was suggested that it was pretty rich and greasy, went for a standard cheeseburger meal. the cheeseburger was great. could really taste the charbroiled. fresh lettuce and tomato. nice. the fries were great and the onion rings were super great too. also tried the "fry sauce". seemed to be a mixture of stuff - maybe mayo, maybe ketchup, ??? maybe a little in the vein of 1000 island but that doesn't do it justice. was very good!

salt lake city - red rock brewery

Got in too late to have much choice. Drove by Red Iguana at 8:00 pm + and there were probably 15 people waiting outside. Since they closed at 9 pm, will hopefully have better luck in the next 2 days.

Ended up at Red Rock as Settbello was closed. Had a tasty Nut Brown ale. Yummy beer cracker appetizer - flatbread w/roasted garlic, gorgonzola cheese, kosher salt & fresh sage. Followed by a respectable bowl of french onion soup. Finished with a good chicken schnitzel (could have done without the Italian parsley). Was also a bit letdown by the horseradish mashed potatoes - couldn't really detect the horseradish at all.

In addition to brewing their beer, they also brew cream soda and root beer. Went with the cream soda and it was the best I've ever had. Awesome.