Catchin' Up

Took these a while back.. but givin not having too much time/me being lazy.. they've kinda just been sitting.. so i'll just post them all now :)

The Adventures of MU dinner at Bentara in New Haven for restaurant week. Malaysian food = spicy but I was a little underwhelmed by the spiciness at this place.  Overall good food... appetizers and dessert were the highlights.

Popia (Spring Rolls)

Roti Chanai (unleavened ghee bread w/ curry sauce)

Rendang w/ Chicken (some curry based lemony dish)

Kelantanese Kerutuk w/ Chicken (rando mix of spices w/ green beans and potatoes) eh.

Grilled Banana with Vanilla Ice Cream

Coconut Creme Brulee (YUM)

Homemade Orange Chicken? So my friend M and i were trying to be adventurous and cook some chinese food from scratch. Since we would be cooking for her entire family, we decided on something familiar. What's more familiar than Orange Chicken! (except for i guess general tso's chicken..) I forgot the exact recipe/steps but i have pictures :) yay

Orange Sauce before reduced

Water chestnuts and Onions cooked in some orange juice and set aside.

Orange Sauce reduced w/ water chestnuts

Chicken and Cilantro added

Orange Chicken w/ water chestnuts and cilantro over white rice :)

It was even better than in restaurants! (I'm only saying this because I made it haha but no really it was good) The picture above is deceiving but our chicken-to-sauce ratio was way off so we cooked up some leftover veal afterwards and threw it into the sauce for seconds. 

Sorry for the lame post. I'll be better next time :) bai!

Thali Too : Restaurant Review

Another adventure of MU.  So we had created a list of basically all the different types of foods we could think of based on cooking styles, ethnicity, and culture so that we could eventually hit them all.  One of the obvious ones was Indian cuisine so we decided to try this little restaurant in an alleyway of Yale University and come to find out, it's a vegetarian restaurant!  Now.. I consider myself a devout carnivore, but these are adventures! Stepping outside our comfort zone. Also, a vegetarian restaurant was also listed for places that we had to try.  So why not kill two birds with one stone?  A vegetarian Indian restaurant. sweet!

So we get to this restaurant for dinner, and after playing some musical tables because of indecisive me, we ended up at a table right across from the ceiling-to-floor patio doors which were open to the 70 degree weather outside.  Everything on the menu was very reasonably priced, with plenty of variety (vegan, non/spicy, app/snack/entree, etc.)  We both started with drinks called "lassi" which is a traditional Indian beverage made by blending yogurt with water, salt, and spices until frothy.  Can also be mixed with fruit purees.  I had the original and M had the banana.  So yummy! When M spilled her cup of lassi on herself mid-meal, she told me she was more disappointed that she couldn't drink the rest of her lassi rather than having a yogurt-based spill all over her lap. Now that's what you call tasty. :)

For an appetizer I got Masala Papad, which is basically a salsa pizza in my mind.  Spicy, yummy, overall satisfying.

For our entrees, I ended up getting Baigan Bhurtha, a smashed eggplant and veggie based dish served with rice.  The tastes of peas overpowered the eggplant flavor I was looking for.  M got Haldiram Chole Bathuraa, a spicy chick pea dish served with deep fried naan bread.  Honestly, I liked M's dish better, I kept stealing her food throughout the meal.  Very intimidating when your food comes out and it looks like you have two huge basketballs on your plate.  Deep frying naan apparently does that.  

Tasty foods but I wouldn't count on going vegetarian anytime soon.  Until next time :)

Thali Too, 65 Broadway, New Haven, CT, 06511 203.776.1600