56 West

Heimlich and I visited 56 West [rewardsnetwork.com] again, which is a gourmet sandwich and salad restaurant near us. The last time we have visited, we were pleasantly surprised by the food, and wanted to go back to try more. Their entire menu [rewardsnetwork.com] is viewable on their website, by the way.

Heimlich started off with the soup of the day, which was cream of potato. And then she had the Romantic Interlude salad (mixed greens and feta cheese) as her entree. She said that she really enjoyed both.

I had the Large Plate ($10), which is a prix fixe menu in which you can choose an entree meat, a sauce, a salad, and a carb. I chose the Applewood grilled salmon with the chipotle honey glaze, the Caesar salad, and the three potatoes cheese casserole (for my carb).

The chipotle honey glaze was definitely a good choice as far as a sauce. It was so good that I was licking my plate when I was finished with my meal, because I couldn't get enough of it. It's a sweeter sauce, but it is intensely spicy. The Caesar salad was very good. It was not swimming in salad dressing -- actually, it was kind of on the drier side, which was fine. But the mix was heavy on the anchovies, which I enjoyed, but many will not.

And the three potatoes cheese casserole was delicious, although it seemed very fatty. It basically consists of home fries tossed in a TON of cheese, with corn flakes thrown over the top.

We were happy to find that our initial assessment of the joint was spot on (recommend).

Baked Mac & Cheese

As a typical bachelor in college, anyone who actually knew how to boil water and cook food (that didn't come out of a box) looked like Einstein to me. Back in those days, I could've written a book on all of my recipes whose sole ingredients were Frosted Flakes and frozen waffles. Ok, so admittedly, it would have been a short cookbook. And I suppose that I should admit to using Doritos as a spice, so most of the recipes would have had 3 ingredients.

What a difference a decade makes.

Heimlich and I just made baked mac & cheese (not even from a box!), and it was fantastic. We based our recipe on Three Cheese Macaroni with Tomatoes by KACAROO21 on AllRecipes.com. We modified it a little, by ditching the tomatoes, and adding chicken. We really like cheese, so we increased some of the amounts from 8oz to 12oz:

INGREDIENTS

• 2 pounds elbow macaroni
• 12 ounces Colby-Jack cheese, cubed or shredded
• 12 ounces Cheddar cheese, cubed or shredded
• 12 ounces white Cheddar cheese, cubed or shredded
• 1 lb chicken, cooked and shredded
• 1 cup dry bread crumbs

DIRECTIONS

1. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Place macaroni in the pot, cook for 8 to 10 minutes, until al dente, and drain. Meanwhile, boil chicken in another large pot, and then shred the chicken using forks.
   
   
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease two 9"x13" casserole dishes.
   
   
3. In the casserole dishes, mix the cooked macaroni, Colby-Jack cheese, Cheddar cheese, white Cheddar cheese, and chicken (or just throw the cheese on top). Sprinkle bread crumbs evenly over top.
   
   
4. Bake 30 minutes in the preheated oven, until bubbly and lightly brown.

Yummy!

Americano

Last weekend, Heimlich and I tried out a new restaurant -- Americano Original Great Lakes Bistro [americanocleveland.com] in Bratenahl.

Bratenahl is an interesting area of town. It's just a short hop from downtown, right off the highway, and right on Lake Erie. And there is practically nothing there but huge mansions. But it's also sandwiched between the absolute worst, crime-ridden parts of Cleveland. It's this beautiful island, in a sea of shit.

The restaurant itself is hard to find. It's located on the ground floor of a swanky high-rise condo building right on the lake. So, you have to drive up to a guardhouse and ask to be let in. And there are no signs (inside or outside the building) indicating that it is there.

Once you are there, you find yourself in front of a pretty ambitious menu. I know that I'm out of my league when I don't recognize a good percentage of the ingredients on the menu.

My salmon was pretty good, but Heimlich's salad and burger were fantastic. The salad was a mix of greens, with Pecorino cheese, highlighted by bursts of flavor from the fruit mixed throughout. And it had the right amount of dressing. Too many restaurants make the mistake of dousing their salads in dressing, to the point where the lettuce is swimming.

Definitely recommend.

Lunchn

Someone just pointed out Lunchn to me, which is a free site that allows a group of people to manage regular trips out to eat.

It utilizes Google Maps to show you where nearby restaurants are, allows you to flag your favorite locations, and allows a group of people to vote on where they are going to meet up for a meal.


It's a fantastic idea, although it could use a little more polish. I have had trouble selecting a restaurant in the Google Maps interface when the density of restaurants is too high.

The restaurant markers are categorized by restaurant type, but many are difficult to distinguish between. Others have symbols that don't seem to make sense. Nevertheless, it looks like a fun tool to use.

56 West

Heimlich and I recently tried out a restaurant that just opened in our city (Lakewood, OH). It's called 56 West [rewardsnetwork.com], and they appear to specialize in gourmet sandwiches and salads.

The location where the restaurant has opened might be cursed, because the last few restaurants that have opened at that storefront have failed pretty quickly. The last one was an upscale Italian restaurant called Venezia [metromix.com], which was just too expensive for the neighborhood. We hope that the fate of 56 West will be different.

I ordered the Hot Chick sandwich, which is a marinated chicken sandwich with curry mayonnaise. The sandwich was very good, but I expected it to be spicier -- if someone hadn't told me there was curry in the mayonnaise, I never would have noticed. Nevertheless, it was tasty, and I would order it again.

Heimlich had a build-your-own burger, and really enjoyed it.

Bottom line: we would definitely go back. It's kind of expensive, but worth it. And we are definitely going to try out the salads next time.

Stino Da Napoli

One of the restaurants that we have tried recently is Stino da Napoli [stinodanapoli.com] in Rocky River, OH. Several people have told us how great it is and how they enjoyed their experience there. We have been looking forward to trying it out for a long time, since we had heard so many good things about the restaurant.

We visited on a Saturday night, and unfortunately, it was a disappointment. We ordered salads, and they were swimming in dressing. Usually, I remember to ask for it on the side (which most of the time still works out ok), and it was definitely a mistake to forget at this place.

Heimlich ordered an entree with chicken, and it was swimming in butter. One of our other friends ordered the gnocchi, and it was gummy.

Not recommended.

Restaurant 'Open'

The other week, I mentioned that I had been in Holland. My favorite part about traveling has to be the food. One of the places that we ate was a restaurant called "Open", which was built on an old railway bridge.

Obviously, it was built on one of those bridges that is designed to rotate out of the way to allow boats to pass, and it's now fixed in the open position. When I visited, it was quite cold, so, they couldn't open the windows. But all of the sides of the restaurant are windows that they open when it is warmer (as in the picture).

The atmosphere was fun (although a little cramped). And the food was quite good. The English version of the menu was not really much of a help over the Dutch version, because of the piss-poor translations. We were lucky to have native Dutch speakers with us who could explain exactly what each menu item really was.

Here is another person's review [momondo.com] with additional pictures of the restaurant.

Velvet Tango Room

I'm envious of cleveland foodie [blogspot.com], which is an entire weblog devoted to eating out (which might be my favorite thing to do in the whole world). What a great idea. And... any time you need something to weblog about, just pick a new restaurant and eat there.

Anyway, Heimlich and I recently went to the Velvet Tango Room [velvettangoroom.com] for the first time. It's situated in the abyss between the Ohio City and Tremont areas of Cleveland, which is why we hadn't noticed it earlier.

The exterior is stark, and features only a tiny sign to indicate that it even exists. In contrast, the interior is very warm and luxurious; the waitstaff are friendly and attentive; and the drinks are heavenly.

At $15/cocktail, the place is no bargain. But the drinks are incredibly smooth. My favorite was the Rangpur Gimlet (being a gin fan), which I could not stop drinking. One of the things that Heimlich had was a Caipirinha [wikipedia.org], which is a Brazilian drink. Many places in the US sell versions of Caipirinhas, but they substitute in more commonly found alcohols, giving the drink a different taste. The Velvet Tango Room is the first place we have found in the Cleveland area that actually uses the correct alcohol so that the taste is authentic.

VTR is easily my new favorite place to drink now. There is also a back room, which can be reserved for groups.

Spice Labeling

If you look for spices in our cupboards, this is what you will see:


We don't have one of those new-fangled spice racks, and I prefer to have them hidden away anyway. But the problem is that you can't really read the labeling on the sides of the containers. For one thing, all of the containers would have to be turned in the right direction. And for another thing, each container blocks the view of the label on the next container.

Heimlich finally got fed up with having to lift up each and every container (thus performing a linear O(n) search) to find the spice that she wanted, and she wrote the name of the spice on the lid with a magic marker. It is so much faster to find the one that we want now (I suppose that it is still O(n), but with a smaller constant?).

Why don't they label the lids from the factory? We can't be the only people having this problem.

Maybe this post should have been labeled, "Kitchens of the anally-retentive"...

Whole Grain White Bread

I'm always trying to tweak my diet to be a little healthier. The latest part of my diet that is under attack is the bread. I eat a massive amount of carbs, most of which consists of bread (but there is also a lot of rice in my diet). I probably eat around 1.5 loaves of bread per week.

Years ago, all of the bread that I ate was white bread. I grew up eating white bread, so it was really difficult to switch to anything whole grain. A few years ago, I switched to alternating between eating loaves of white and whole grain wheat. Now I'm trying to switch entirely to whole grain breads.

A friend recently told me about a new product out on the market: whole grain white bread [usatoday.com]. The idea is to have the nutrition of a whole grain bread, with the texture and taste of a white bread.

If you go out and try to buy this type of bread, you have to look out [cbsnews.com], because many companies try to fool you into thinking that a loaf is whole grain when only a small percentage of the ingredients are whole grain.

We are trying out a local brand right now (as many of the competitors, such as Wonder, haven't made them available in our area yet). So far, the loaves seem like they are a step in the right direction, but maybe they're not quite there yet. From the texture, you can still tell that it is a whole grain bread, but at least the taste isn't so harsh.

Food Pairings

Here's an interesting article that I read recently: Food pairings: Working for or against you? [cnn.com].

Heimlich and I are fairly health-conscious. We try to stay fit, eat a balanced diet, and get enough vitamins and minerals. For instance, we eat lots of spinach, thinking that it is a good source of iron. Apparently, this is too simplistic a strategy, according to the article:

"Although spinach has lots of iron, your body doesn't absorb it well when spinach is eaten alone. (Sorry, Popeye.) But with vitamin C by its side, this vegetable becomes a true standout."

"That's because vitamin C converts the iron in spinach into a form that is more available to the body..."

This kind of has me wondering what else is wrong with our food selections.

Anyway, there are plenty of other interesting tidbits about food in that article.

Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies

A friend recently made cookies that he called "Oatmeal Scotties", which were a kind of oatmeal butterscotch cookies. They were awesome, so I tried to find a recipe.

One that I tried making was this one [allrecipes.com]. They were very good, although not quite what I was looking for. So, I don't know if I am going to stick with this one, or try another one.

If anyone does want to try that one, note that the dough will not roll into a ball, because it will stick to your hand. With normal cookies, I took a tip from my mother-in-law and roll the dough into a ball, so that it turns into a perfectly round cookie after it bakes. The dough from this recipe also expands by a surprisingly large amount while baking, so don't place them too close together on the cookie sheet. The other cookie recipes I have baked before have not expanded nearly as much.

My Pitiful Knowledge of Akron

Very shortly, I'll be coming up on my one year anniversary at work, which is in Akron. According to the entry for the city on Wikipedia [wikipedia.org], Akron is the 82nd largest city in the US.

Somehow, I have managed to work there for almost an entire year, and about the only streets that I have any knowledge of whatsoever are the ones that I use to get from the highway to the building I work in. It's sad.


Also, after an entire year of working there, I have eaten at a grand total of four restaurants in that city. Those four restaurants are:

• El Rincon [citysearch.com] - fantastic Mexican food, maybe the best I've ever had...


• Bricco [briccoakron.com] - yuppie-type restaurant, with bordering-on-unacceptably-slow service, but excellent food.


• Crave [eatdrinkcrave.com] - this whole place SCREAMS yuppie.


• House of Hunan [thehouseofhunan.com] - decent enough food, with sushi about as good as can be expected of a city this size.

I think that the moral of this story is that I really need to get out more. I'll be interested in checking out (Pretenders lead singer) Chrissie Hynde's new restaurant: VegeTerranean [ohio.com].

Picture of Main Street in Akron, OH, courtesy of kevinq2000's Flickr photostream [flickr.com].

Community Supported Agriculture

On one of our visits to New York this year, a friend of ours started talking about the CSA (or Community Supported Agriculture [wikipedia.org]) she was participating in. Heimlich and I thought to ourselves, "You get what from the who?" It is times like those that make me feel as though I must be living under a rock.

Since then, without even looking, I have seen articles about CSAs showing up in the news sources that I read anyway. Apparently, you pay up front for that season's worth of vegetables, usually to a small local farm. And every week or so, you get a share of whatever has been harvested lately.


Of course, there is good news and bad news. The main piece of bad news in my head is that you don't get to choose what vegetables you get. You get a part of whatever is harvested. So, if they are harvesting radishes (yech!) or whatever, you're getting a basket-full of them.

On the other hand, there are tons of things that I don't know how to cook, because I haven't done enough experimentation. Sometimes I feel as though I am stuck in a rut, and am not trying to learn how to cook new things. Lately, all I have been cooking with are green peppers, onions, and tomatoes. But there must be plenty of other tasty things out there to try.

Picture of vegetables courtesy of bullish1974's Flickr photostream [flickr.com].

Winking Lizard

So, I used to go to the Winking Lizard (Tavern) all of the time. There were a few years in there when I used to go at least once a week. The food was decent, they had a huuuge selection of beer, and they nad all kinds of NHL games on their TVs that I couldn't get at home.

But I haven't been there in a few months. Until this past weekend, when I stopped in to grab a bite to eat. They apparently have changed their menu. Now, I was only at one Winking Lizard, so maybe the one I went to was an odd one, but in my experience, all of the restaurants in the chain use the same menu.

Half of the pages on the menu were ads. You opened the menu, and the entire left side of the page was a huge add, and the food was listed on the right. It was incredibly annoying to me.

There is no way that you are going to tell me that they needed to make more money to pay the bills. That's just ridiculous. How can any place that sells alcohol and has as many customers as they do have any problems making money? They're just being greedy now.

I have to think that eventually, we'll get to the point where our environment is so saturated with ads that they are no longer really effective, but I have a feeling that it'll be a long time before we get to that point.