Camberville Cuisine

Bonding over technology with my local farmers and artisans is awesome, even in a torrential downpour. The sandwich guy at the Harvard market this week and I geeked over our iPhones together and exchanged app recs. (He also melted Taza chocolate squares into my Elvis sandwich, so I am a big fan of his right now.)

Of course, technology has its drawbacks when it is not quite ready to deal with a situation. Such as Hyoun trying to look up the ingredients for gang poongi, aka Korean fried chicken. Because this is transliterated, there is no established English spelling – the g’s could be k’s (or multiple g’s or k’s), the “oo” could be “u” or “o” (the Korean alphabet has too many variants on the o-vowel, in my opinion), the ng might be just an n, there might be spaces between each of the syllables or there might not be.

For the spelling “gan pong gi:”

Hyoun: “I found a menu so we can order it if we live in LA, but not actual instructions on how to make it.”
Hyoun: “I also get ‘YuGiOh hardcore sex,’ so that’s, uh, pretty awesome.”

We eventually found a recipe labeled ggan pung gi, and Hyoun’s knocking it out in the kitchen right now, but man, language is hard.

It was Hyoun’s birthday today (well, last night at this point), so I treated him to a meal at Icarus before it closes for good next month. Grilled shrimp appetizer with mango-jalapeno sorbet and chili-glazed pork loin for me, potato gnocchi and bacon-wrapped beef tenderloin for him, and we split the passionfruit baked Alaska for dessert.

Working with hot peppers is one thing I’m still shy about in the kitchen – given that chopping onions can still be problematic for me sometimes, the idea of something with even more need for caution concerns me, to say the least. But I would love to replicate that mango-jalapeno sorbet. Maybe I can get Hyoun to deal with the jalapenos …

Icarus. 3 Appleton St, Boston. 617.426.1790.

YOU GUYS, I’M ON YOUTUBE. I’M, LIKE, FAMOUS OR SOMETHING.

So a couple of weeks ago, I hadn’t decided what to have for dinner that night.

Then I got a message from my friend Martha, looking for a volunteer videographer for the Taste of the South End happening that night.

I think you can all guess how quickly I responded back. ;)

I consider being paid with pork and beef rillettes, kitfo, steak and tuna tartare, various flavors of mousses, bagna cauda, profiteroles, assorted cookies, and Picco’s cinnamon ice cream a more than equitable exchange. ;) If Micha hadn’t introduced me to Picco last month, that ice cream would have shot it up to the top of my MUST TRY list. It’s better than even Christina’s, and I ♥ Christina’s.

Also, I got to see Mumbles Menino slurp down an oyster. That was amusing.

Thursday: lengua quesadilla from Anna’s on my way home. Mmm, tongue.

Friday: garlic shrimp and country-style pad thai from Thai Moon

Saturday: roasted lamb sandwich from Om

Sunday: brunch buffet at Tavern in the Square, tangerine shrimp and pad see yew from Pho ‘n Rice. In addition to these fine meals, I also went over to Steve’s, and between him and Cris and Fran and Cathy and Jen and Laura and Jack, we made twenty-eight dozen hamantaschen. (Baby Nathan mostly yawned and burbled through the proceedings, but he is only about five weeks old. I believe he slept through any shaking of the grogger that occurred, which is kind of amazing.) This means I have a container full of COOKIES sitting on my counter in the following flavors: apricot, blueberry, cherry, raspberry, strawberry, ginger, and various combos of Nutella and peanut butter. Nom.

Monday: tea-smoked duck and black pepper scallops from Zoe’s.

Tuesday: I should figure this out, shouldn’t I; I can’t just have cookies for dinner. OR CAN I?

Wednesday: My traditional Fluffernutter and a Nutfield.

Anna’s Taqueria. 822 Somerville Ave, Cambridge. 617.661.8500. Thai Moon. 663 Mass Ave, Arlington. 781.646.3334. Om. 92 Winthrop St, Cambridge. 617.576.2800. Tavern in the Square. 1815 Mass Ave, Cambridge. 617.354.7766. Pho ‘n Rice. 289 Beacon St, Somerville. 617.864.8888. Zoe’s Chinese. 296 Beacon St, Somerville. 617.864.6265.

*crickets*

I’m still eating, really! I’ve just been talking more succinctly about it on Twitter. (Ironically, I started Twittering shortly after I started this blog. Heh.)

Micha came up to visit this weekend, though, and he dragged a crowd of us to a restaurant he hasn’t been able to stop talking about: Picco. Shaula and I got the grilled cheese panini (oh melty mix of cheddar, gruyere, and taleggio, my heart); Hyoun and Micha both got the house mac and cheese (same three cheeses plus gorgonzola); Melissa and Adam split the Alsatian pizza, and Cathy got the two-pork pasta special. We all kept stealing from each others’ plates. It was one of the best comfort-food meals I’ve had out in a long, long time.

And then we topped it off with their ice cream! They scoop their ice cream and sorbet generously – most of us ordered the samplers, expecting the promised espresso-cup scoops. Hah. Best pear sorbet I’ve had in awhile, true in flavor and texture and aroma and that slight sweetness; the chocolate sorbet was dark and potent and rich, and the malt chip ice cream balanced that nicely. Also, between the Lily Allen and Regina Spektor background music, as Hyoun said, it was as though they’d plugged my iPod into their stereo.

Picco. 513 Tremont St, Boston. 617.927.0066.