Todo Sushi's sushi

Hi friends, I am here to rave about the sushi at Todo Sushi, a little Japanese sushi bar hidden away in a small corner of the middle of nowhere in San Diego. Oh also, did I mention that almost all the rolls are perpetually 50% off? Well, now I did.

Todo's specialty are sushi rolls (not unlike most of the Japanese restaurants in the area), but these rolls are of a higher class than its counterparts (I'm thinking of Nozomi's, Yoshi's, etc). It also serves regular food (bento boxes, etc), but I've never ordered them before. The ingredients are fresh and the sushi chefs are quite ingenious in their ability to meld different flavors together so that there is a 24/7 party happening inside your mouth.

My personal favorite roll is called...wait for it, the Sensual Pleasure Roll. Yes, there were many jokes to be made by our immature selves. Aptly named though, the pleasure you feel in your mouth really is quite sensual indeed. Spicy scallop, cucumbers, spicy tuna on top, and the finishing touch is a pale orange sauce drizzled on top. I have no idea how this orange sauce is made, but it's amazing. Like I said, sensual pleasure in your mouth.


Another roll is the Tuna Tatake roll: a regular CA roll topped with tuna tataki. Tataki is a method of preparing fish or meat. According to Wikipedia, the meat or fish is seared very briefly over a hot flame or pan, briefly marinated in vinegar, sliced thinly and seasoned with ginger. I'm not sure if this is how Todo does it, but it's delicious. This is saying something because I am not a big fan of raw fish (I'm trying to learn to appreciate it, but haven't made much progress so far). The first time I tasted it, my eyes lit up and I said "Mmm, this is really good!" Wonderful.


They have many more rolls that I enjoy: baby lobster crunch roll, regular lobster crunch roll (there is a difference in taste), spicy tiger roll, so on and so forth. The first 2 are unfortunately not 50% off (making them around $13-14), but it's worth it to get them at least once.

OH. And a note about the sushi chefs - they're really nice. The first time I went in, I sat at the sushi bar and one of the chefs made us a stuffed jalopeno appetizer and cut up an orange very nicely for dessert. So nice! So...sit at the bar if you want free stuff!
(Note: free stuff is not guaranteed)



9823 Carroll Canyon Rd
San Diego, CA 92131
(Tucked in the plaza behind Carl's Junior)

Yelp

Every College Student's Instant Ramen Lunch

Every student or young adult in budget has one time or another, or everyday, cooked a pack of instant noodle. The concept of instant noodle is one of this century's greatest invention, dating back to the Qing Dynasty of China, with the modern variety first marketed in 1958 [source]. The convenience of the instant noodle has, with no doubt, saved time and hungry stomachs for billions of people for decades.

This morning, I woke up from an 11 hour nap after surviving the last day of my summer internship. Needless to say, I woke up hungry and lazy like a fat little boy enjoying summer break with not a worry on his mind. To keep up the lackadaisical trend, I decided to cook a Shin Ramyun noodle soup with whatever I can find left in our empty apartment fridge.

The result:

What's in this bowl? First off, the noodles: 1 pack of Shin Ramyun instant noodle. I used everything included inside except for the pouch of dried vegetables. You are better off washing a fresh stick of green onions and snipping it straight into the bowl with a pair of scissors than to use that pack. Trust me, it'll turn out hard and adds no taste to your delicious noodles in the end. Unfortunately, my bag of green onions turned bad after 2 weeks in the fridge so I had to leave that out this time.

Second, the meatballs. After bringing approx. 2 to 2 1/2 cups of water to a boil, I dropped in 4 beef meatballs. I left them in the boiling water for about 5 minutes before placing the dry noodles into the pot to join them. If you prefer, you can crack an egg on top of the noodles to cook. But becareful! Don't let the egg fall off the noodles and sink to the bottom of the pot or else you will end up with lots of egg stuck to the bottom.

As I wait for the balls and noodles to soften, I heated a small glop of butter in a saute pan. Before the butter completely melted, I dropped in half a pack of washed, sliced mushrooms. You don't want the butter to melt completely, or else the part that melted first will evaporate and you will end up with a dried, butter-stained pan. I let the mushrooms stand for 7-8 minutes to cook. I prefer to have my mushroom retain a bit of crunchy snap to it, so I try not to overcook them.

After the noodles and beef balls soften, I empty the soup base seasoning powder into an empty bowl and pour the noodles, balls, and water straight into the bowl. The best technique to do this is to slowly pour the water into the bowl first, then quickly stir the soup base powder until it is completely dissolved before the balls roll into the bowl or onto the counter top, at which point you can still save them provided you have a relatively clean counter or the ball meets the 10-second rule. This time around, I was fortunate to have sustained no casualties.

When the mushrooms are finished, I slid them into the bowl along with the noodles and beef balls and voilà! It is done. A whole meal finished within 10 minutes.

Next time your stomach calls for food and you're left with only a few minutes to eat before going out to a bad date who wouldn't buy you food, eat this!

Serving you from the comfort of my home...
Sparta

"Anyone can cook." -Gustav

Brodard Restaurant's spring rolls

Spring rolls. We all know what's in them: noodles, lettuce, shrimp, and mint. Dip them in peanut+hoisin sauce. Nothing special, you think, while you let out a lazy yawn. Well let me tell you, Brodard's is here to turn your sheltered spring roll world upside down.


Bam! Feast your eyes on that. First off, let's take a look at the roll itself. What is this? No noodles! Huge chunk of meat! Ok let me tell you. These are heaven in your mouth. There are different rolls you can order, but this particular one has a vietnamese pork paste sausage in it. "Pork PASTE sausage?!" you exclaim. Indeed, and it's delicious. Something else to rock your world: they wrap the fried eggroll skins into the roll. Also cucumbers. These are no ordinary spring rolls, my friend. Next, the sauce. No, not peanut+hoisin sauce...I actually have no idea what this sauce is. It is not spicy and it looks like there is some egg floating around in it, and it has a very light taste. Which perfectly compliments the spring roll's more robust flavors. Indeed, it serves to make it even MORE delicious.

The restaurant is one of the most authentic Vietnamese restaurants (outside Vietnam) I've ever seen. Authentic Vietnamese cuisine is served here - this ain't an average Pho restaurant. I haven't had most of their menu items, but they all look quite delicious. Also, they serve many Vietnamese desserts, which is what it is all about. Do yourself a favor and go find it if you're in the Irvine area. Warning: it's hidden in the back of a big plaza and it looks really ghetto, but that is what deliciously authentic asian food is all about.

9892 Westminster Ave
Garden Grove, CA 92844

Yelp

Chocolate Souffle & Frankenstein Experiment, otherwise known as Snickerdoodle Cake

*this is a repost from my personal blog.

Last night out of sheer boredom, I attempted to make some chocolate souffle. There are plenty of recipes on Tastespotting.com, and the one I used serves two, which is perfect! One for mois and one for my roommie who's been working late. He decided to freeze his before eating it, and guess what? It's delish! Tastes like really rich ice cream.

Today, after finishing a wedding invitation design I'm doing for a friend, I wanted something cinnamony so I decided to make some snickerdoodles. But, I didn't feel like rolling dough and all that nonsense because, well quite frankly, I am a lazy turd. So I sort of just winged it and I got this thin semi dense cinnamon sugar cake. The trick tho, was to butter the pan and then dusting it with sugar, so that when the cake comes out of the pan, it has that nice sugar crust on it.

Scallion Pancakes 蔥油餅

My friend/fake brother, Jay loves scallion pancakes, and we were always talking about making some! Well the other day I finally found some chinese red pepper or 花椒粉. (Let's just say, chinese markets in New York aren't exactly arranged intuitively.) 

The funny thing about my friend is he says he doesn't really have a sense of smell or taste, but he loves the texture of these pancakes! So here we go!

For the dough

2 cups of multipurpose flour

1 egg

water (add to what you feel is the right consistency. I eyeballed it. ^^)

1 tsp of salt

For the Filling

1 bunch of scallions chopped

(and have the following at hand)

Chinese Red Pepper

Cooking Oil

Start by mixing the dough ingredients together, and don't worry about over-mixing because it actually gives it a nice chewy texture! Divide the dough into 5 little balls, they should be about the size of a handball. (I think..OMG I'm so not good at this, can't I just show pictures? heheh. I really don't like writing instructions. Sorry. Heheh)

Then we roll the dough out so it kind of looks like indian flatbread/naan. We drizzle some oil, I used olive oil, and sprinkle some pepper and scallion. Then we roll it up like a swiss roll, and after that we roll it horizontally so that it looks like a cinnamon roll. This way when we roll it out, we'll have lots of layers of dough, scallion and pepper. Good to know, right? ;D

Then we roll them out into perfect little circular pancakes-- it is probably a good idea to separate each with some cling wrap so that they don't stick together. Believe me, they sure are sticky!

When you're ready, you fry them in a pan, both sides on med. high heat. About 1 min on each side, or till golden brown. (I stuck them in the oven to keep them warm, because Jay was LATE to dinner!)

All in all, they turned out pretty good! (Oh yea, my mom called me and told me I'm suppose to add some sort of leavening...like yeast or baking powder. I will try that next time. I thought these turned out nice without it!) No need for any special dipping sauces because all the yummy scallion and pepper flavor is enough to make anybody's mouth water! Well except for maybe Jay, but he did say the texture is just like how his mom used to make them! So, I think will do my happy dance now. Excuse me. ::runs into the next room and does the cabbage patch and running man:::

Have a lovely nom nom filled day!

Lily

foodnomnoms on restaurant city

The idea of my blog actually came from a little Facebook game called Restaurant City. Heard of it? It's taking the Facebook world by storm. You should play. You start with a tiny little restaurant with 3 chairs and 2 workers (1 chef, 1 waiter). The objective of the game is to level up your restaurant so you can get a bigger store, more workers, and more monies in the bank. You collect and trade ingredients to make and level up your dishes in your menu. You serve 1 appetizer, main entree, and dessert dish. By levelling up your dishes, you gain more points from your customers. Sweet. If you look at the top right-hand corner of the picture, you can see that my restaurant has achieved the highest 50.0 popularity points. Because I am awesome.

Anyway, I started out the game by naming my restaurant Meateating Cow. I am a cow, and I thought it'd be funny to have a cannibalistic cow. Steak... After a while, I tired of the Meateating Cow name. Especially when I kept thinking I should be serving dishes with steak but I didn't have the ingredients for them. Meateating (I keep accidentally typing Meating) Cow was changed to Foodnomnoms. Because food should be nomm-ed. And the little characters totally look like they are nom-ing the food when they eat. And because I had recently seen this video. Such a catchy little tune.

And this is how this food blog came to be named FoodNOMNOMs.


Nomnomnoming-ly,
Carolyn

my bun cha (vietnamese pork w/ vermicelli) experiment

Moving posts from my regular blog on here where they belong!

Bun cha is one of the simplest Vietnamese dishes to make - it is grilled meat (usually pork) and greens (butter lettuce, mint, shredded cucumbers and carrots, etc) over dry vermicelli noodles. It's served with nuoc cham (sauce). I really liked the recipe I used! It tasted just like how the restaurants' make it.

Originally written 5/9/09
Last week, I saw that a friend was attempting to make this, and was inspired to try it as well. I love Vietnamese food - pho has always been one of my passions...my mother says I must have been Vietnamese in my past life. Which isn't such a stretch, I guess...actual Vietnamese ladies think I'm Vietnamese too. Like that one time I went up to the register to pay and the lady behind the counter started speaking to me in Vietnamese. And I smiled politely and told her sorry, no habla Vietnamese!

Anyway, back to the subject! Found this recipe online and happily set out prepping the night before my midterm. Needless to say, not much studying was done, but I did manage to finish the marinade for the pork and the nuoc cham (sauce) that night.

The next day came and I finished making the whole thing that night! Cooked the pork (no grill for me, unfortunately), noodles, washed the bean sprouts and mint, cut the carrots and threw everything together.


Great success!

Nomnomnoming-ly,
Carolyn