Cooking Keller - Double Chocolate Chunk Cookies

Wanting to test out my new USA Pans that I ordered, i leafed thru Thomas Keller's Ad-hoc at Home, and discovered the double chocolate chunk cookie recipe.  My traditional chocolate chip cookies are simply "chipit" based cookies. 

The chosen recipe calls upon a 55% sweet chocolate and a 70% sweet chocolate both of which I picked up from the Gourmet warehouse.

Dimsum at Rainflower Restaurant (粵之醉海鮮酒家)in Richmond

This morning we decided to head down to Richmond to have some dimsum before dropping a relative off at the airport.  As we headed out fairly early we were not overly concerned that we would have trouble finding a table.  Richmond has an abundance of dimsum eateries and we generally make a habit of trying a different restaurant each time.

From the outside the restaurant looks kinda dingy and run down and being right by the Skytrain tracks the building is partially blocked by a pillar.

Lunch at Nimby Burger in Kitsilano

After reading about Nimby Burger in last summer's Georgia Straight where it was rated one of the better burger joints in Vancouver we decided to give it a go at lunch, after reading reviews where Nimby Burger is compared to In-N-Out Burger and also the fact that they are only open during the summer we decided to give it a go.  Our usual lunchtime burger place is Fatburger or Vera's.

 Located at the corner of Cornwall and Yew it was a tiny almost "drive-thru" type eatery where there was not a whole lot in the way of available seating.  Thankfully the beach is right across the street and with the nice warm and being a weekday we can overlook this minor annoyance.

Blueberry Cookies

Seeing as blueberry season is finally upon us today was most definitely a baking day.  After several trips to the Gourmet Warehouse to get items (more on that later) I finally got around to baking some cookies.  Having tried a cookie from Momofuku Milk Bar in New York (thank you Elaine) and by luck stumbling across one the cookie recipes I decided to give it a shot.

The cookie I would be attempting, and attempting being the key word is a blueberry cookie with milk crumbs, ok first question WTF are milk crumbs.....

Espresso Adventures

At the request of Yas, I have decided to blog also about some of the other things that interest me, today after a very heated debate about the merits of a Baratza Vario coffee grinder I have decided to blog about espresso.  I have just finished 3 shots of espresso in the last 20 mins or so and I think that is about the limit of which I can handle for today.

Lunch at Anducci's Italian Kitchen

On June 25, I went out for lunch on a lazy Saturday with a friend.  Since he was in the mood for pasta we decided to hit up Anducci's Italian Kitchen located on Cameron Street in Burnaby.  Having been there several times I figured it was a fairly safe bet for lunch.  Having frequented Anducci's over the past decade it was one of the spots that could compete with Anton's for having a decent tasting pasta in a large portion at a reasonable price.

I was quite surprised that there were only 2 other occupied tables when we entered at right around noon, the decor has not changed much and it is a fairly casual sort of place, it has been almost 2 years since I last visited.

Wedding Banquet at Fortune House Seafood Restaurant

On Saturday, June 18 2011 we celebrated J&A's wedding banquet at the Fortune House Seafood Restaurant located at Metrotown in Burnaby (2199A-4700 Kingsway).  This being my first time going to this restaurant for any type of meal I did not know what to expect.  My wife having visited this establishment before had some preconceptions but kept them to herself as it was a number of years ago.  My ratings are in black, hers are in red.

If you were to visit the mall on a weekend, you would be hard pressed to miss the long lineup of people queued out the door and as such I was quite excited to give it a go.  Upon entering it is a decent sized restaurant with space for about 25 tables, with a fair bit of space to move around.  On closer inspection our first observation was dirty cutlery/dishes/glasses, for first impressions this is a definite no-no as smudges of leftover food, lipstick and what not make you go eww !

Anyhow, after getting that resolved we were onto dinner. Menu attached below, notice all the staples of the traditional Chinese banquet are included.  The order on the menu is not always the same as the order the food shows up but that is not unexpected either.

 

Sushi at Kamei Royale

Saturday February 12, was to be Kevin's belated birthday dinner.  The venue chosen was Kamei Royale self touted to be the largest sushi restaurant in Vancouver, and one of the few Japanese restaurants when it was established in the 1970's.  Located on West Georgia on the 2nd floor it certainly looked appealing let's see if it lives up to it's hype.

One reason for this venue was the inclusion of  karaoke lounge as our original plan had us watching the hockey game at one venue and then moving to a karaoke bar.

Belated Vacation Review - Day 6 - Civitavecchia, Italy

After taking a train ride from the Termani to the seaside town of Civitavecchia which is the cruise ship terminal that is located nearest from Rome, we proceeded to board the Star Princess to begin our 12 day voyage.

The planned* route that the Star Princess was expected to take, being at the beginning of November we were concerned that we would encounter bad weather.

Belated Vacation Review - Days 1-5 - Rome, Italy

The long awaited quick summary of the "Big Trip" in 2010.  From October 23 - November 14 the dear wife and I took our first vacation to Europe.  We embarked on a  whirlwind trip encompassing 12 cities in 4 countries over the course of 21 days.  Our first stop was Rome, as we had 5 days before we were due to dock embark the Star Princes for our Greek Isles Cruise we decided to visit the marvelous city of Rome and take a side trip up to Montevarchi to visit the Prada factory.  

Alas since this is a food blog, I won't bore you with all the boring details. 

A beautiful morning at Piazza Di Popolo (near our hotel), our 5 days in Rome were generally sunny with some rain showers in the mornings on 2 of the 5 days we were there.  The weather was in the low teens and was quite comfortable.

Superbowl Sunday, Chicken Strips

Seeing as I begged to buy some Panko bread crumbs the last time we visited Costco, I had to come up with something creative to use them on.  I have heard time and time again that making chicken strips is super easy and after watching something on the food network I decided to give it a go.  

Got my chicken breast's cutup into 1/2" thick strips.  So long as everything is uniform in thickness the length doesn't matter as it will cook the same.  My flour mixture is a combination of all purpose flour, salt, white pepper, and a touch of chili powder.  the Ziploc bags are amazing for anything that needs to be mixed.  No mess !  I used panko bread crumbs for the outside coating about 3 cups worth I  believe.

Dinner at Tojo's

On December 28, 2010 we booked dinner at Tojo's.  Tojo's, the proclaimed inventor of the California Roll and having heard great things about Tojo's being the sushi place in town.  Unfortunately I am not a seafood person, and was hesitant about going to a high end sushi place, the decision was made for me to have dinner there.  Located on 1333 West Broadway and being a night when the Canucks were playing we decided to have a 6:00pm meal.