Lamb Testicles and Heart [Egyptian in NYC; Kabab Cafe]

Abbreviated entry!

Heart followed by testicles.

Taste:

Heart: somewhat lean. Testicles: slightly fatty, strange and slight irony aftertaste. Not bad, but wouldn't go out of my way to have more.

Brains of Lamb [Egyptian in NYC; Kabab Cafe]

For a brief overview on the restaurant, check out the Lamb Cheeks entry.

Brains. This was our quest. This was our White Castle in the never-before told story: Chris and Maryann go to eat Brains. This was the end of our months of planning. A reward for our time spent in the biomedical sciences.

The human brain has a neuron count of about 100 billion. What does this have to do with food? Well neurons are supported by another class of cells--glia--which are 10 to 50 times more numerous. A major subset (I think somewhere around 50%) of these glia are oligodendrocytes. These cells wrap the shafts of neurons with a fatty sheath of myelin, aiding transmission along the axon. The white that you see in a slice of brain (the white matter) is white because of these glia. That said, brains are composed of mostly fat. Which makes them delicious.

Oh and for those worried about it, diseases contracted through eating lamb brains are rare. Cow brains are another matter entirely.

Taste:



Looks a lot like a fried white fish. Taste-wise, think tofu, but slightly firmer. And very fatty, for the reasons I mentioned above. We spoke to Ali about how these were prepared. He basically said that they sliced up the brains, lightly breaded them, and fried/braised them. Simple enough I suppose. He serves them with a familiar set of unnameable spices and some peppers to balance out the textures.

Reflections:

Worth it. Definitely worth the trip over, just for the experience itself. The brains were quite good, and as I said, very reminiscent of tofu. I have to say though that after the third or fourth piece the fat really gets to you. Sort of like having too much mayonnaise on your sandwich--you just get tired of that fatty taste.

I'd do it again.

Sweetbreads [Egyptian in NYC; Kabab Cafe]

For a brief overview on the restaurant, check out the Lamb Cheeks entry.

Sweetbreads. In the Hannibal story, Red Dragon, Lecter is discovered because he has sweetbreads written in an anatomy book. As wiki tells me, sweetbreads refer to two organs of the body, the pancreas and the thymus gland. There is a bit of debate whether pancreas can be considered a sweetbread. Thymus is undoubtedly so.

Taste:

Not really like the name implies. Me being a naive little knucklehead, expected something sweet and starchy. The meat in sweetbreads is consistent, unlike something like stomach, whose fatty lining very clearly has two sets of textures. There is an element of sweetness in the meat, but it is quite subtle--something that resided more as an afterthought than an initial flavor. Of the dishes we had, this was the most delicate. That is to say, it didn't bowl you over with aromas, but won you over slowly, quietly, like slipping into a warm bath... (bonus points for whoever names that reference)

Reflections:

It's unfortunate that I can't describe sweetbreads better. When I was there, they were my friend's favorite. They're up there with Lamb Cheeks. I would try them again, in any kind of preparation. They really are a unique meat, and not in that politely unique kind of way--I mean legitimately unique, legitimately special and good.

Lamb Cheeks [Egyptian in NYC; Kabab Cafe]

This is the first in an array of dishes I had at Kabab Cafe, a small little restaurant in Astoria. It's run by a dynamic fellow who engages you in conversation as he lists the days specials. I like the place. It isn't like any dining experience I've had--no menus, no whiny teenage waiters or snobby foodies grimacing at your poor choice in edibles. Instead, you find yourself in a conversation circling around what you enjoy and what Ali (the chef) has to offer. And as the conversation progresses, food arrives as if to punctuate the end of each exchange. The upside? A fluid, natural dining experience. The downside: you can and probably will talk yourself into spending more than you want to.

I'm told tradition dictates that you serve the one cheek to the lady of the table and another to the guest of honor. Apparently, the cheek is the tenderest cut of most animals--fatty, but with enough muscle to make it something more than delicious mush.

Taste:

It's hard to tell what exactly went into this. Ali brought the mixture over in a skillet, cracking an egg over everything and mixing. He mixed it further on a plate covered in spices whose names I don't remember. And then he invited us to try it on the provided pita.

I salivate as I type this. To relate this at all with some form of ground beef is a disservice, but I have no other way of conveying the taste and the texture. Imagine then ground beef, but the most decadent ground beef you've ever had. And then imagine that distinct aroma of lamb. Then, instead of that crumbly texture innate in anything ground, unite that texture with a fatty film, perhaps eggy in nature.

I won't even try to describe the spices. That explosion of flavor is indescribable. I have nothing at all to relate it to. It also doesn't help that I am not at all familiar with middle eastern cuisine and am a shitty cook.

All I can really say is, "Heavily spiced, delectably smooth texture."

Reflections:

I think of all of the dishes I had at Kabab Cafe, this was one of the best, perhaps because it was the most familiar. The pairing with the pita was amazing. And I, being new to middle eastern cuisine, found the novel spicing to be a real treasure.

Pig Kidney [Taiwan]

What's up with these countries and the shitholes of the body? Liver, intestine, kidney…the list goes on. The most common explanation I've heard (and I tend to agree) is that these cultures have only recently been able to not waste valuable protein sources like vital organs. Western cultures have an abundance of food not found in other countries, and given the "acquired taste" of some of these organs, they just lost their popularity as simpler meats grew more accessible.

Whatev. On to taste.

Taste:

Kidney, like liver, has a very, very distinct aroma and taste. It might be a tad bitter (maybe a figment of my imagination). It's funny how our expectations of certain things can alter how we experience them.

In any case, I won't try to describe the aroma. Like liver, it is best called "unique" and "pungent." And also like liver, it is also very much an acquired taste.

The texture of kidney is a very interesting thing. You'll notice that there is a crosshatched cut pattern on the meat. Apparently, kidney is so easy to overcook into inedible toughness that cooks score the meat so that it cooks easier. The result is a meat that has a small, soft "snap" to it when bitten--there is relatively little give in the meat as you bite into it before a piece breaks off. It's an interesting texture, and altogether not at all unpleasant.

Reflections:

Not terrible, but not my cup of tea. I've had kidney on several occasions, and have never really gone to take that second piece from the lazy susan. The meat was prepared well as far as I can tell, but it's just too much of an acquired taste. Rather, it's too much of a foreign taste for my American taste buds. Not a bad experience though...

Whole Squid [Taiwan]

Emphasis on the "whole." Everyone has had calamari before, but this is the first time I've ever had the whole squid—gooey guts, head, and all. What most people eat (calamari rings) comes from the area between the eyes and the tail fin. Here, the restaurant gave us the whole deal. Times six.

Taste:

Kinda like squid. I started eating from the back—the tail fin end. The first bite was nothing extravagant, and tasted exactly like the rings I've had back home. One exception: an extra long piece of cartilage that slipped out with that bite, spanning the entirety of its main body. Ah yes. Mollusks and their cartilage. So I extracted that messy bit from my teeth and proceeded to take a second bite. This time, I tasted more than calamari. Bitterness. A slight mushiness. Those would be guts. All those things that let a squid keep on swimming. I was able to finish off the rest of it—head and tentacles—in the third bite. More bitter mushiness. More guts. Slightly awkward chewing of tentacles. Stuff stuck in teeth. But wait! That's not all! Two hard objects: circular, black things most assuredly unchewable. Corneas? I spit them out. Meh.

Reflections:

So now I know why squid is prepared in rings. The guts just aren't worth it. There's no real squiddiness to them that can't be tasted through the meat—just bitterness. All in all, whole squid was a disappointment. There's no reason to have the whole squid if you're not a fan of squid guts, and I can't imagine anyone who is.

Pig Liver [Taiwan]

Liver! Yay! If they ever run out of reasons to justify evolution, they can always fall back on the taste of related organs. Common ancestry by taste! Okay that was a stretch; I apologize to the scientists out there. Seriously though, there are remarkable similarities between the Chicken Liver Yakitori I had in Japan and the liver I'm talking about here. If you haven't read that entry, you should. I'll be referencing it for taste…

Taste:

So I've used the ambiguous "sweet soy sauce" line way too many times in describing Asian cuisine, but as I am lacking in culinary expertise, I'm going to have to use it again. Sweet soy sauce is what you taste as the piece enters your mouth. My tongue thought it was tasting a thinly sliced and fried beef jig at first. But then I bit down, and the texture just didn't fit—first, the meat was crazy tender. Then it started melting in my mouth with that hard-boiled-egg feel reminiscent of Chicken Liver. In fact, the texture it was exactly like the chicken liver once my teeth got past the outside of the piece. The only difference in that comparison was the aroma—Chicken Liver Yakitori was much stronger than this Pig Liver dish. However, I'm not sure if that's a result of the cooking style or the nature of the animal.

Reflections:

Surprisingly good. I really like the texture of liver—it's the aroma that sets me off. This type of Pig Liver (preparation?) takes out that aroma, and leaves you with a delicious sauce and a nice texture. Cool stuff.

Pig's Blood Tofu [Taiwan]

Ah pig’s blood. We meet again. I remember fondly the last time I experienced you…around ten years ago, when a family friend thought I would enjoy a Pig’s Blood Cake (gelatinized pig’s blood). I did not enjoy it. I did not enjoy it at all. In fact I almost puked.

So I face you again, friend pig’s blood, though you are less potent this time around. My grandparents tell me that this dish is made using pig’s blood mixed into tofu mix. The result is what you see here.

Taste:

Nowhere near as unpleasant as I thought it was going to be. The best way to describe this dish? Awkward tasting tofu. Tofu with a strange aftertaste. I think it might be described as a very slight metallic aftertaste. Ultimately, it tastes overwhelmingly of tofu, and had I not known the name of the dish, I probably wouldn’t have noticed that hint of whatever.

Reflections:

Just goes to say: some things are worth another try. While this wasn’t unpleasant, it wasn’t anything special either. That hint of whatever that makes the difference between Pig’s Blood Tofu and just Tofu just isn’t that noticeable. I think I’ll just have to try Pig’s Blood again in some other, more pungent form.

Fried Chicken Cartilage [Japan]

I never knew there was an aversion toward eating cartilage and tendons until my friend’s girlfriend shirked in disgust when I pointed out tendons in the Chinese meatballs that we were eating. So this dish isn’t that big of a deal to me.

I will say though, that I’ve never seen cartilage actually isolated and cooked separately before. Tendons yes, but cartilage no. In fact, isolated, the cartilage really looks like chicken popcorn or whatnot. My Japanese hosts who brought us to this restaurant described the dish as “between two bones.” Between two bones indeed.

Taste:

Fried chicken. Because it is fried chicken. Texture’s the game here. Think soft and crunchy at the same time. Or even better: the tip of the last drumstick you had, that last bite at the edge of the bone. That’s cartilage.

Reflections:

So damn straightforward it’s hardly worth an entry, hence why this isn't getting that "exotic" tag. It was a pleasant eat though. Crispy outside with a nice crunch interior. Like popcorn but better. And tastier. Yum.

Chicken Liver Yakitori [Japan]

One would think that the understandings in modern biology would put people off to organs like the liver, kidney, and intestines. Shit holes of the body. Then again, it also makes sense that all three organs (in my experience) are also the most aromatic. That’s the draw I suppose.

The Yakitori (Japanese shish-kabob) shown here may not have its skewer, but rest assured, it is still very much Yakitori. Unskewered before I could snap my photo.

Taste:

Think of this as everything in a chicken concentrated in the yolk of a hard boiled egg, disguised as a nasty looking piece of meat. It tastes like Yakitori—barbecued somesuch sauced with a light teriyaki jig. The texture really does resemble the yolk of a hard boiled egg, but the similarity is only a slight resemblance: there’s no question that you’re eating liver.

Aroma is what sets this apart. Pungency only begins to describe it. Liver has a very distinct aroma, and it tends to smash into the senses like no other. It’s the reason why the French adore their foie gras I suppose. Anyway, it’s an aroma that can only be described as “liver,” and I don’t really have the words to describe it.

Reflections:

Liver is an acquired taste. I imagine much of its allure comes from people seeking for the ultimate aromatic experience—there is really nothing like it. Yakitori doesn’t necessarily bring out the aromas. Rather, it just adds that barbecue crunch to the whole deal. Needless to say, I’m not a fan, at least not yet. The odor is a bit too much for me.

Chicken Gizzard Yakitori [Japan]

What is a gizzard you ask? Bird stomach! Trust me, it sounds nastier than it actually is.

The fancy change in nomenclature actually makes some sense anatomically. As seed eaters, a conventional stomach just won’t suffice for your average feathered friend. Instead, birds ingest grit (rocks) along with their normal fare to aid in the breakdown of hard shells, and have evolved specially designed stomachs to facilitate the process. The result is a particularly hardy alimentary system—especially around the gizzard itself. The result is a particularly unique texture.

Yakitori if you were wondering, is Japanese charcoal barbecue. Japanese shish-kabob if you will: the most primitive of cooking techniques rehashed for modern enjoyment.

Taste:

Like chicken. Mostly because it is chicken. This here is a thing of texture, and I for one, can’t figure out what’s the ho-hum about gizzards. People have told me how wonderful they’re supposed to taste; how unique their textures are. I suppose their textures are unique.

Crunchy meat. Awkwardly crunchy meat. That’s the best I can do. Gizzards are relatively tough, and make no attempt at being tender. They do have a grittiness that is probably the result of…well, grit. A strange experience overall.

Reflections:

Well it wasn’t bad. It wasn’t good either. I’d take normal chicken over gizzards any day.

Chicken Sashimi [Japan]

Salmonella anybody?

Yes, it’s raw. Very, very raw. Too raw even for salmonella. So raw that you can hear your chicken’s last clucks echoing from that not-too-distant kitchen. Cluck…cluck…cluck…

This isn’t a dish to be enjoyed anywhere. To be perfectly honest with you, I would never eat such a thing in the States—food isn’t taken seriously enough back at home. Actually, I take that back: food that costs less than forty bucks a plate isn’t taken seriously back at home. I guess I just wouldn’t trust a chef with Chicken Sashimi unless I was at some 5-star gig and dropping a hefty bundle per plate. Not that I would dish out forty for Chicken Sashimi…

Compare that to the mom and pop Tokyo Yakitori joint where I had this little masterpiece—something that was quite reasonably priced (I don’t recall the price exactly, but I do remember it being palatable). The Japanese take their products quite seriously, where each piece of whatever is not just another consumer item but a reflection of the producer’s technique and talent. You get that feeling a lot, talking to Japanese people and watching them interact. But I digress. This post is for the sashimi.

Taste:

So what you see in that saucer is quite simple: a very, very light soy sauce, thinly sliced seaweed, and horseradish wasabi. The chicken looks pretty much like what you’d find in your supermarket. Nothing remarkable there.

I expected an aroma of chicken, but I found little to nothing of anything. In fact, the piece had barely any scent at all. I expected some gaminess (a la chicken farm), but I couldn’t find a hint of bird. In fact, chicken sashimi is mostly reminiscent of salmon sashimi. Or if you can imagine it, the fattiest, oiliest piece of salmon sashimi you’ve ever tasted. Unlike salmon, a meat that can have some slight textural variations in the chew, chicken has a remarkably consistent texture throughout. I think that this may be more a reflection of the butcherer’s talent than the meat itself.

Reflections:

I bit into this morsel with a bit of fear. Salmonella sucks to have, or so I hear. I didn’t really expect to have a second. But I did. And a third and a fourth, until I sat staring at an empty bowl, looking at my sister’s for more. It must have been that oily quality, or that really wonderful texture. And maybe (or was it just my imagination?) just a hint of chicken aroma. Whatever it was, I think this may be my most favorite exotic food. Too bad I’ll probably never be able to have it again.

Sashimi [Japan]

Ok so I have to apologize for this picture. I was so eager to start eating that I forgot to snap a photo of the whole dish. What you would have seen were pieces of salmon, scallop, yellowtail, tuna, and fatty tuna sashimi artfully arranged over thinly sliced turnips and other green garnishes. Now this next picture is of a Chirashi type dish:

Unfortunately, this picture suffers the same fault as the last--I started eating before I took the photo. Clockwise from the left: tuna, yellowtail, salmon, shrimp, salmon roe, and sea cucumber. I had this Chirashi at a sushi bar just outside of Tsukiji Fish Market, the largest Fish Market in the world. And just to be thorough, here are some pictures:

From the auction block...

To the forklift...

To fish head. Rolly polly fish head. And tuna steak.


Taste:

Now I'll be honest: I <3 raw food. I <3 sushi. And not that American California roll shit, or that Dragon Kamikaze Philadelphia Roll stuff either. I like hunks of meat, untouched except by the chef's knife.

That aside, it's very difficult to describe how sashimi tastes. The best of sashimi has a very, very light odor of fish. The enjoyment comes primarily from different textures. Your classic pieces of sashimi are tuna and salmon. Tuna has a slightly fishier aroma, and a much crisper texture. It's the sort of meat that crumbles into your mouth in delectable little chunks of deliciousness. Salmon on the other hand is a bit fattier, and some would say, tastier because of that fact. There's a little bit more chew in salmon--just enough to keep the flavors flowing throughout the mouth. Yellowtail is a mixture of the two: fattier than the tuna, but slightly less than the salmon.

Now shellfish I'll adress separately. Scallop and shrimp are the two shown in the pictures above. If you like any of the two cooked, eating them raw might blow your mind away. Their flavours are magnified; their textures made perfect. There's a slick quality in shellfish that's just fantastic. The shrimp especially, though it is just lightly cooked just till there's a hint of pink. Again, what makes this sashimi perfect is that slick, shellfish quality. Dang I'm drooling as I write this.

The salmon roe (orange spheres in the second photo) normally wouldn't warrant much mention. But these are fresh roe. Completely different from the American, imported and stored variety. "Normal" roe bursts in your mouth as you crack that epidermal layer, unleashing a slightly fishy aroma embedded in a salty yolky liquid. The fresh roe at Tsukiji lacked that salty taste, but instead bore a savory and sweet quality. It went pretty well with the Japanese style rice.

Reflections:

I'm all about the shellfish. It's difficult to find raw shellfish in the states, probably because it looks so unappetizing. Now that's one of the worst things about the States--people are inexorably drawn to food that is familiar. There's not much business in marketing the novel looking or novel tasting.

Anyways, the quality of Japanese sashimi really does trump that of the States. There was also something else--something that I couldn't quite put my pallate on...an aftertaste that differed. Perhaps a bit of variation in aroma. In any case, the change was welcome, and the experience, unforgettable.

Green Pea Mousse [Japan]

Yes you read that right. Apparently this place's trademark is Pea Mousse. What the hell were they thinking?

Taste:

Terrible. Unless you really like peas. Really, really, really like peas. So from what I gather they took a whole lot of peas, blended them into pulp, and folded that mixture in with heavy cream, and beated the shit out of the whole mixture to achieve a mousse. And I'll give them credit: it felt like mousse. The texture was absolutely spot-on. The taste though...

Ack. It pains me to think about it. Imagine the voices of millions of peas crying out at once, suddenly silenced by the whirr of a blender. Then imagine you eating their mashed bodies, still feeling a shell here, a shell there. And the ubiquitous taste of pea. Oh dear God. The peas...the green, mushy, peas...

Reflections:

No.

Salted Sea Snail and Friends [Japan]

It's beautiful! It's delicious! It's snail! This was served in a long slew of little dishes in a hotel near the hot springs around Mt. Fuji. The white stuff of course is salt. The rectangular object on the right is some sort of combination of tendons, shrimp, and congealed rice. The left of course, is fish.

Taste:

I'll begin with the snail, since it's the most extravagant of the three. A sweet teriyaki sauce was lightly drizzled in to the shell, forming a savory combination with the salt bedding. The taste itself is quite pleasant as it first enters your mouth. There was no detectable "aroma of snail," though there was the tell-tale scent of the sea. Subtle though--nothing unpleasant. The texture was surprisingly consistent and homogenous throughout, unlike shellfish like mussels or somesuch. The dish was also surprisingly easy to chew, more resembling hardened dofu than the French Escargot kind of feeling that I expected.

The fish on the left side of the dish carried the same teriyaki-ish sauce as the snail, though the texture was of course dramatically different. In fact, it's difficult to describe a whole fish's texture in text--it's a complicated thing, with all those bones and meat involved. Chewy, crunchy, soft. It has it all.

The object on the right was not memorable, and my notes on it are sparse. If you've tried Chinese Dim Sum before, your imagination will probably suffice for how that one went.

Reflections:

I liked this meal. They provided us with a lot of little things to try in an idiot-proof way to try them, all packaged in a distinctly Japanese feel. There was a plate of fish later on that was pretty much a disaster, but aside from that, I have pleasant memories of this experience. Snail ain't nothing to be shying from.

Apple+Tomato / Spinach+Grapefruit / Orange+Carrot Italian Ice [Japan]

So here's an interesting treat from the Hilton Narita in Tokyo. From left to right: Apple+Tomato Ice, Spinach+Grapefruit Ice, and Orange+Carrot Ice.

This was an option in a rather eclectic breakfast buffet that tried quite hard to cater to both Japanese and Western tastes. I'm still not quite too sure who "Spinach+Grapefruit Ice" caters to, but I'm guessing it was a Japanese take on Western sorbets. Nice try guys, but please keep your vegetables out of my desserts.

Taste:

Not nearly as bad as it sounds. I tried a scoop of each flavor and was surprised at how tame the flavors were. In the Spinach+Grapefruit and Orange+Carrot, the fruit dominated the palate, leaving only a hint of vegetable as an after-aroma. The Apple-Tomato tasted primarily of apple, but with a slight citrus-y twang. Texture-wise, the dessert was identical to the melted-and-refrozen italian ice you'd find in the supermarket.

Reflections:

I was a bit disappointed by this. I wanted to be grossed out--to be bowled over by spinach-y flavor in a deceptively familiar icey medium. I got nothing. Just grapefruit ice with a weird aftertaste.