Restaurant Review: El Rey

I have had been trying to stay away from Stephen Starr restaurants.  You definitely tend to pay for the quirky ambiance, but over the past three weeks I have been to three: (1) El Vez for a margarita for a friend's birthday; (2) The Continental Mid-town to welcome that same friend back from Israel; and (3) most recently to El Rey, Starr's newest addition to his restaurant army, to visit with a dear, dear friend.

First Impressions:

Weeiiiiirrrd.  Either they are using everything from the old diner I think this used to be (the Mid-Town or Mid-City Diner II? - nope - it's been confirmed by grubstreet as having been the Mid-Town IV), or they bought new old-looking/cheap stuff and decorated with that.  We couldn't figure it out.  I think we finally settled on the latter.  We are talking wood paneling, chunky rock/stone walls, those rounded Christmas tree lights (not the cute little ones, the slightly tacky-but-I-still-love-them ones from the 70s/80s).  As entrance (or parting) favors, I halfway expected them to hand out any of the following: (1) bowling shoes; (2) stuffed armadillo dolls; (3) velvet elvis bobbleheads; or (4) my own summery lumberjack button-up shirt so I could match the servers.  It's like being transported to a 70s diner in the middle of the desert in El Paso, or just outside of it a few hundred miles, except the food is very, very good.

The Food:

The menu items are really reasonably priced.  And, everything sounds so good, so it's really hard to decide.  This all avocado-inspired combo was calling to me: Guacamole and chips, Nopales (cactus, pumpkin seed, avocado, and tomato), and Cabrito (braised goat with guacomole and some other stuff).  That would have been a little too much avocado, so instead I got chips and salsa (perfect and also perfectly unnecessary - like most orders of chips and salsa), chayote (a fantastic corn salad with corn, pickled onion, AVOCADO, and a lime vinaigrette), and lamb tacos (lamb = delicious almost any way you slice it).  My beverage was a mango margarita.  Marvelous.

The Service:

Except for the hostesses, each member of the waitstaff has an edgy down-on-my-luck-I-understand-the-economy-sucks look about them - dark eye makeup, messy hair, plaid shirts paired with denim, raspy voices.  Our server was really friendly and helpful, albeit a little busy.  It took twenty minutes to bring out the chips and salsa and twenty minutes to take care of the check.  This restaurant is brand spanking new, though, so once the kinks get worked out, the quality of service should improve more than a few notches.

p.s. He's reportedly opening another restaurant at 18th and Sansom, a bistro (to compete with Tria??), and I still kind of want to go to the speakeasy behind El Rey (but the entrance is on Ranstead).  Oh Stephen, I really wanted to hate you!

Food     mmmmm

Service     mmm

Decor     mmm

Je ne sais quoi     mmmm

Overall     mmmm

http://elreyrestaurant.com/

2013 Chestnut Street

Philadelphia, PA 19103

About the ratings:

mmmmm        would eat there again tomorrow

mmmm           looking forward to eating there again

mmm              not in a hurry to eat there again

mm                 likely not going to eat there again

m                    would try my best never to eat there again. ever.

I reserve the right to grade on a curve for the overall score, despite the average.

May Fruit Salad

Today I bought a ton of fruit.  At the grocery, pre-made mixed fruit costs $4.50 per container.  Mine was a fraction of that.  I took one apple, one banana, a handful of blackberries, two clementines, and two strawberries.  I cut up the stuff that needed cutting, squeezed the juice from half a lime over them, added a dash or two of nutmeg, a sprinkle of anise, and a splash of mango-orange-pineapple juice, and viola!  Instant fruit salad to take away the dreary day.

Oh I also added a little bit of fresh mozzarella and shaved goat cheese.

For some reason, though, I kind of wish there was chocolate powder sprinkled over the top of my fruit.  I guess next time.  

The Darker Side of Bon Appetreat: Exam Season Eating

Exams have been over for just a week, and I am still recovering from exam season eating.  When exam season hits any reasonable eating regime goes out the window in exchange for eating like a latch key kid left home alone on a Saturday with a cupboard full of treats, snacks, odds, and ends.  This means eat whatever you can find, and when you are not eating, watch copious amounts of television and/or sleep the entire day.

Usual regime = morning cereal and coffee, mid-morning Stonyfield yogurt, lunch from the "s" family: sandwich, soup, salad, or sushi, afternoon Naked Juice Blue Machine or Green Machine, dinner from the "s" family.

When exams come around, I wake up, eat cereal, watch terrible tv online (too embarrassed to say which terrible tv), eat pita chips and hummus, sleep, eat more pita chips and hummus, more tv, more sleep. I spent entire days sleeping, hulu-ing, and pita-chip-and-hummussing my way through days gorgeous and mundane alike.

To make amends (and because all of my pita chips and hummus was gone), I tried Bacchus Market at 23rd and Pine.  Even though I got two thin slices of seared tuna, really delicious - blackened only on the edges, and a Greek salad. . . an iced coffee later I was back to watching missed episodes of 30 Rock.  Nightcap road to recovery = framboise, mango sorbet, and chocolate quadratinis.

Post exam menus might include: A later-to-be-regretted cheeseburger.  An entire box of chocolate donuts with a side of two antacid tablets.  Roasted chicken overstuffed with cornbread-meat stuffing (this is from a student who's a chef savant).  Cinnamon-raisin toast and eggs for breakfast  and leftover Indian for dinner.

Exam season is now well over, and I think I gained 5-7 pounds.  No joke.  The next couple of weeks before  New York will require a reexamination of my eating habits.

Spring 4-Course Meal: Kiwi-Blueberry Salad, Potato-Ham-Cheese Hash, Scallop Ceviche, Tilapia

A tasty and easy meal for spring . . .
1. Zesty Fruit Salad

Ingredients:

-Kiwi (chopped)

-Pineapple (chopped)

-Blueberries

-Crumbled Feta

-Tiny Dash Chili Powder
-Dash Cinnamon
-Dash Nutmeg

Toss together and voila!

2. Delicious Ham Hash

Ingredients:

-Red and Yellow Fingerling Potatoes (1/4ths)

-Chopped Yellow Onion

-Minced Garlic

-Chopped Fresh Dill

-Chopped Fresh Basil

-Canned Ham (cubed)

-Butter

-Olive Oil

-Grated Organic Vegetable Farmers Cheese

-Grated Gruyere

Add all ingredients (minus gruyere) onto a baking pan and heat for 20 minutes at 400 degrees.  When done sprinkle the grated gruyere on top of the dish.

Sprinkle more grated gruyere about halfway through the cooking time.  Then, once the cheese is fully melted, the potatoes are ready to eat.

3. Scallop Ceviche

Ingredients:

-Scallops

-Smoked Oysters

-Quartered Radishes

-Pickled Shallots (chopped and placed in red wine vinegar for 5 min)

-Yellow Onion (diced)

-Poblano Chile (diced)

-Chopped Cilantro

-Chopped Dill 

-Orange Juice (splash)

-Lime Juice (splash)

-Olive Oil

Slightly cook scallops (cut in half) in olive oil  and garlic.  Mix all ingredients together in a bowl.  Let sit for 10 min in refrigerator. Keep ceviche ready to eat with next dish.

4. Tilapia in a Light Mushroom Cheese Sauce

For the cheese sauce:

Start a pot on medium.  Add butter and flour until it mixes.  Add light cream.  Add fresh basil, pepper, poblano chiles (chopped), salt and chile powder.  Add package of mixed variety mushrooms (buy from store).  Heat until almost as thick as you would like it to be and then add pepper jack cheese to finish consistency and taste.

Ingredients (Tilapia over Spanish Rice)

For this recipe I just used boxed Spanish Rice.

-Tilapia Filets

-Lime Juice

-Cilantro

-Black Pepper 

Season tilapia with lime juice, cilantro and black pepper.  Set aside for 15 min. Cook Spanish rice.  Put spanish rice and uncooked, but seasoned tilapia in a circular baking pan so the rice spreads throughout the bottom of the whole pan and the fish rests on top.  Cook on 350 for 5-10 min. This way the rice is crispy and complements the texture of the tilapia filets very nicely.

Plate the fish and rice on a plate and drizzle the cream sauce with mushrooms over it.  Place the ceviche on the plate as well. Put the ceviche over a bed of spinach for garnish (see below).  Enjoy.

Warm Quinoa Salad and Scallops

This was dinner.  

I had a version of quinoa salad from Bacchus recently, so I decided to try my own.  I made 1/2 C quinoa according to the directions on the box (making quinoa is like cooking rice - one part quinoa and two parts water).  I started the quinoa and removed it from heat, covered, once it was cooked.

While the quinoa began cooking, I quickly chopped a parsnip and began heating it in an oiled pan.  Then I chopped half a small yellow onion and added that to the parsnips.  After about three minutes, I added a splash of orange juice, a splash of apple cider vinegar, and a splash of rum.  I let the parsnips simmer for a couple minutes, and then I added a chopped gala apple, raisins, and chopped apricots.  I added a dash of the following: nutmeg, garlic powder, the tiniest amount of ginger powder, and tarragon.  I added a splash more of the orange juice and rum.  I covered and simmered until the parsnips were tender.

While that mixture was simmering, it was perfect scallops time.  In a small saucepan, I heated a bit of butter.  Once it melted, I added six scallops.  I sauteed the scallops in the butter for about 2-3 minutes per side.

To make the warm salad complete, I mixed the parsnip stuff with the quinoa, and I sprinkled crushed roasted hazlenuts atop the salad (the hazlenuts were roasted vestiges from an earlier recipe).  I placed the scallops next to the quinoa salad, snapped a few pictures, and that was that.  And I even have plenty of quinoa salad and scallops for another meal.

I think my dinner lacked something green.  Next time I will eat scoop the quinoa salad on top of a bed of spinach.  Or maybe I will add fresh basil.  Who knows.  There's always tomorrow to practice with the leftovers.

Visit from Long Lost Friend Reveals Food Snobbery

I wasn't feeling well today, and so I thought that having mac and cheese might make me feel better.  Maybe?  Annie's boxed Mac and Cheese, with the perky rabbit smiling (smirking?) from his perch, was something I had been waiting for.  I bought the box a couple months ago, and it was waiting for today to be consumed.  What started out as an American experience - the innocuous making of a box of mac and cheese - became something that made me slightly ashamed of what I have become.  A food snob.  My boxed mac and cheese needed a lot more cheese.

Here's what happened.  I sauteed some onions and medallions of chicken sausage, boiled my pasta, made my cheese sauce (from the box), and once I put together the cheese and the pasta . . . I tasted . . . and nothing.  No creamy, cheesy, pizazzy comfort.  Not at all.  Had my mac and cheese experiences from Stephen Starr restaurants and BLSA food sales really upped my expectations of mac and cheese?   Apparently.  I have sadly become a mac and cheese snob.  I guess this was inevitable.   But to turn my nose at boxed mac and cheese?  I might have my citizenship revoked.  My mother will be so ashamed to read this post.

So, I mixed in the onions and sausage, put it all on top of a bed of spinach, and added a final super hefty dose of grated gruyere.  And it was good.

Problem solved.

And yes, the rabbit is directing me to the complaints department.

Ode to the Champagne-O-Rama

The weather was gorgeous, and we were out on the rooftop bar at the Continental.  It was my birthday, so I decided I wanted my favorite over-priced drink - - - the Continental's Champagne-O-Rama.  The Champagne-O-Rama is raspberry vodka with champagne (or maybe champagne with a shot of raspberry vodka), and the glass is grenadine-sugar-rimmed.  I planned on just having one, but I went home having had three.  I think I'll start making my own at home, though, so I can save a little money while enjoying a favorite treat.  But, if I had my own champagne and vodka sitting around at home, I might never leave the house.