I had half a cabbage head and potatoes that I had to use up so this is what I came up with today. I made the kimchi and then I thought that it made sense to add the potatoes “Peruvian Potato Salad Style (partly mashed in)” so they’d just soak up all the yumminess from the well seasoned kimchi. That made the potato salad healthy style. This whole batch of kimchi potato salad only has one tablespoon of sugar and one teaspoon of sesame oil. Also the potato ratio is far less because it is a lot of cabbage too. Serving size is difficult to judge because I don’t know if you want a small side serving or a dish full. Based on the amount of potatoes in this I’d guesstimate this to be eight servings.
Ingredients for around 8 servings
2 lbs potatoes. – peeled, cut into large cubes ( I cut each potato into 6 big chunks 1/3 and half the third)
2 Tablespoons sea salt (to boil the potatoes)
1/2 cabbage medium/small – shred thin on mandolin
1 red bell pepper – shred thin on mandolin, rough chop slightly
4 radish – shred
1/2 cup scallions – sliced thin
1 Asian pear – peeled and shred (you can substitute an apple)
2 Tablespoons gochugaru (This needs to be kept in your freezer or it goes moldy….closest substitute is Aleppo pepper)
3 Tablespoons sriracha – (I like Shark Brand..It’s very smooth)
2 garlic cloves – ground to paste
2 Tablespoons soy sauce
1 Tablespoon sugar
4 Tablespoons rice vinegar
1. teaspoon sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
2 Tablespoons fish sauce (I use Red Boat Brand)
Directions
The peeled potatoes go in a pot with water covering them well. Add sea salt to boil the potatoes. Boil until very soft. (around 15-20 minutes…maybe a little longer if your potatoes are very large)
In a big bowl combine the cabbage, bell pepper, radish, scallions, Asian pear, gochugaru, sriracha, garlic, soy sauce, sugar, rice vinegar, sesame oil, ginger, and fish sauce. This mixture needs to sit and marinate it’s self for about an hour on the counter. When the potatoes are soft you can drain them and stir them into the cabbage mixture. You need to brake them slightly but you don’t want to completely mash them either…you want them nice and lumpy but slightly mashed and creamy for your salad. Liquid will come out of the salad. Mix it a few times gently so you don’t break the potatoes too much. This needs to get refrigerated. You can serve cold, room temperature, or warmed up.
When a new buffet opens up it is usually as great as it is going be so I like to check them out as they open when one pops up in the area. This particular one recently opened. It’s open everyday for lunch and dinner. They offer over a hundred dishes to choose from.
They have a small koi pond inside. It’s set up like the zoo. You can feed the fish for a dollar.
It looks very nice inside.
We pay on our way in and then get seated. And now we are off to try things.
We usually start with the sushi. They didn’t look the best so I only picked one to try. For some odd reason the fish felt hard and crunchy on the ends…..(ick!) …….Today it’s better not to eat the sushi.
Moving on…..
The food looks ok for buffet food.
They have all kinds of chicken dishes, a few beef dishes, a little shellfish. They have soups, lots of desserts and much more. It looks like everything is labeled today.
I took Sichuan chicken, chicken on a stick, one piece of orange chicken, mushrooms, green beans, flounder, and some noodles.
Oh my…….none of the chicken I took is chewable….The orange chicken is hard as a golf ball……The mushrooms and noodles have an unpalatable taste…..it’s so horrible it’s too painful to eat. ………It FORKING doesn’t even taste like food!*********When I get to the flounder.it is edible but is unseasoned and unflavored….Only the green beans are good….. (I was thinking that they must have purchased the green beans….I didn’t think they taste like they could have came from this place.)
My husband took different things with the same results….All the chicken, beef, and shrimp dishes were un-chewable. Everything we tried with the exception of the green beans tasted terrible….so terrible that I can’t even describe….so bad the food is just painful…..to eat.
We decide that we must try the Mongolian grill….It just has to be better……
I make a plate with chicken and my husband makes a plate with beef….
The beef came out hard and chewy.The chicken came out moist but the flavors are unpalatable…….ICK! I can’t eat this!
We left.
My husband left hungry and wanted to eat someplace else.
I felt kinda sick to my stomach and didn’t want to eat anything.
Maybe if you try this place as soon as they open for lunch there is a possibility that the meats might not be so leathery, hard and dried out. If you don’t mind leathery chewy dry meats and don’t care how food taste then maybe you might be alright here.
Based on just one visit I do NOT recommend Las Vegas Seafood Buffet in Phoenix AZ.
The Forking Truth is that Sometimes a Buffet isn’t your Best Choice when you go out to eat.
The Pacific Seafood Buffet is two locations again. They have one location in Chandler Arizona and One again in Glendale just two miles away from their old location that was torn down and will become a Cheddar’s Restaurant. The buffet is open everyday even holidays for lunch and dinner. They offer over a hundred different things to choose from.
Maybe you want to start with common sushi.
Or maybe you want some sashimi? Oh take both!
They have lots of fried tasty things. My favorite here are the little sesame balls stuffed with sweet bean paste.
They have dumplings, steamed buns and stuffed leaves and more! DIDN’T I TELL YOU THAT ALMOST NOTHING IS MARKED? Everything (almost) is a surprise. I took one of each steamed bun…Both I never had before. One was filled with sweet egg custard. The purple one was filled with sweet white bean paste. I saw a few different kinds of chicken feet here today and they added pizza as we were leaving.
They do offer several shellfish dishes. I took some mild whitefish with ginger scallions and a dish that I never had at a buffet before…The sweet and spicy mild fried white fish….It might have been the best dish I tried today. The other best dish I tried were the mushrooms….They were baby brown mushrooms that were really good. I also like the baby bok choy. They were smaller than what I usually find and were tasty and slightly still tender crisp.
That mackerel in the upper right was my least favorite today. I couldn’t stomach it.
The green beans were good. Next to it was a tofu stir fry. On the other side was some sort of stir fried tilapia that looked like chicken…..My husband tried it…….It was not great but edible.
Don’t remember what was in the pans below.
The desserts………..nothing too exciting. Fill up before you get here.
And the frozen desserts.
That was a little taste of the Pacific Buffet in Glendale AZ. It’s not high end but The FORKING Truth is that it is better than some places.
I had a lot of zucchini to use up so I was looking for zucchini recipes. The most interesting one that I found today was one by Great British Chefs called Harissa Hasselback Courgette Recipe with Dukkah. I liked the idea of the recipe but changed many things. The zucchini white bean dip I did not exact but from memory of a Michael Solomonov recipe of Brussels sprouts that I thought made sense….I also flavored it with his recipe for zhoug sauce since I have a jar of it that I made. The dukkah recipe from G.B.C. tasted ok but I thought it was missing something….. I happen to have Yotam Ottolenghi’s recipe for dukkah and I added the ingredients that he put in his and it tasted much better. I also didn’t use purchased harissa and have my own recipe for it so I used mine. So this recipe is a mash up of Great British Chefs, Michael Solomonov, Yotam Ottolenghi, AND ME! I had enough zucchini for a party. You might want to cut this recipe down in half or a quarter depending on your needs. I had 4 pounds of zucchini to use. It’s at least 8 servings.
Ingredients for around 8 servings
4 lbs zucchini
6 Tablespoons harissa – preferably home made (2 CLEANED UP roasted red bell peppers chopped, 1/2 teaspoon cumin, 1 teaspoon caraway, 2 Tablespoons e.v.o.o., 3 garlic, 1-3 hot peppers-chopped, 2 Tablespoons tomato paste, juice of 1 lemon, 2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar, s&p to taste Blend)
1/4 cup chopped cilantro (leaves and only the tender stems) for finishing
Directions
Set oven to 400 degrees F.
In a bowl (med-large bowl) combine the harissa, olive oil, and lemon juice and set to the side.
Hasselback 3 pounds of the zucchinii using either chop sticks or a wooden spoon next to the vegetable so that you don’t cut threw. You can pick up the zucchini and fan it open and dip it into the harissa to coat it.
After the zucchini get coated with the harissa the zucchini go on sheet pans.
They stay in till they look slightly caramelized. About 40 minutes..The other pound gets sliced up and drizzle a small amount of olive oil on it. Also give it a small amount of salt and pepper. This also goes in the oven with the rest of the zucchini.
While the zucchini is cooking make the dukkah. Combine hazelnuts, sesame seeds, coriander seeds, cumin seeds, sea salt, black pepper, paprika, and oregano. Mix and put to the side.
The sliced zucchini is done when it gets charred.
The last thing to make is the zucchini white bean dip. Blend but leave chunky the charred zucchini slices, beans, tahini, lemon juice, zhoug, yogurt. Add salt and pepper to taste.
SERVE! Put the dip under or on the side of the zucchini. Top with dukkah and fresh cilantro.
Harissa Hasselback Zucchini with Dukkah and Zucchini White Bean Dip
It’s FORKING Delicious!
Harissa Hasselback Zucchini with Dukkah & Zucchini White Bean Dip
Van Leeuwen French Ice Cream is a high quality rich smooth ice cream sold at my local Sprouts Store and Walmarts everywhere. It’s different and is made with a lot of eggs that make it richer. It’s not completely natural but seems to have far less chemicals in it than many of the other brands out there. This is the third flavor of Van Leeuwen Ice Cream that I have tried. The Limited Edition Pizza flavor was ok but didn’t really taste like pizza……..The chocolate hazelnut mini bars were really great (They are worth getting fat for)…..and now I’m Trying Bourbon Cherries Jubilee.
I open it up. It looks ok.
It a really nice creamy rich consistency.
I taste some……….It’s weird……..It almost taste like yogurt. I can taste bourbon but the cherries are sour…..YUK!
What’s in this?
I think that I don’t like the lemon juice, citric acid, and the magic acid…I mean malic acid.
I put the ice cream away and bravely try a little more a few days later.
It is slightly better further down (The vanilla swirl is very good) but not worth getting fat on so I throw it out. Should have bought one of the other flavors…BAH!
Those were my FORKING Thoughts on Limited Edition Van Leeuwen Bourbon Cherries Jubilee….I note that YOUR Forking Thoughts may indeed differ.
I read about a different method for crispy breaded eggplant that I had to try to believe. The award winning celebrity chef and food author chef Selin Kiazim said that for the crispiest eggplant to peel and roast it first before basic panko breading and to fry in ghee (clarified butter). Today I didn’t follow her recipe but I did sure try her method and it gave me the greatest results. Shattering crisp eggplant that isn’t soggy or oily at all. The inside is only creamy and meaty. This is the best eggplant that I have ever fried. I had to try it to believe it. *********A word of warning…To pull this off you will need a very good vegetable peeler. Not like one you buy from Walmart or the grocery store. You need a heavy duty vegetable peeler. I got mine from a home show. This thing can peel a butternut squash.
First the eggplant gets peeled and partially sliced…..(leave connected at stem) because the breading slides off of the skin sometimes.
Then do your basic flour, eggs, panko crumbs. Make sure that each bin is seasoned along the way.
I rubbed a small amount of non-stick spray on the bottom of my baking sheet…..Nothing else…no salt or added oil. This goes in a 400 degree F oven until the eggplant is soft……Timing can differ greatly……really TINY eggplants might only need 20 minutes and if you have a REALLY BIG eggplant it can take maybe up to an hour. I think for the best results you will want to use smaller eggplants that are a little sweeter.
After the eggplants were roasted I let them cool till I could handle them and dredged them in the flour mixture.
My trick for the eggs is to add a spoonful of Amore French Mustard….It’s mild but delicious and very smooth and does a great job to season the eggs and it also makes any breading stick better. Last is a coating of seasoned panko (I used whole wheat panko).
Then on just slightly over medium heat you fry up the eggplant in butter. It fries up pretty fast. Men were smaller eggplants and only took around 2-3 minutes a side.
A cooling rack is the correct way to let the eggplants cool.
I’ll be honest and admit that I didn’t use my coloring rack today and used paper towels on sheet pan and this still worked out perfect.
Then you get these adorable eggplants that might look like this.
FORKING Crispy Breaded Eggplant
What you do with your eggplant is up to you.
Today I reheated mine with a mixture of cheeses, tomato sauce on top of the cheese and fresh basil. Still CRISP not soggy anywhere and meaty not soggy eggplant.
A special THANKS!!!!!! to Chef Selin Kiazim for this eggplant method. This makes GREAT Crispy Eggplant!
Cala is described as a Modern Mediterranean Restaurant. It is in the small boutique hotel called Senna House in Old Town Scottsdale Arizona. The restaurant is led by celebrity chef Beau MacMillan. Parking is difficult but not impossible. It’s just like city parking. You can valet there or search for a parking spot somewhere. The nearby lots are tow-away zones but we’ve found a parking spot down the main road.
We’ve found the hostess desk. Eventually someone walks by and says that a hostess will be with us. We waited about ten minutes. During that time I could look around.
inside with patio view
Inside is comfortable looking, modern, airy, and visually beautiful. There are lots of live plants. It’s like a big patio inside and also they have an actual outdoor patio with another bar outside.
inside bar area
It’s impossible not to notice that NOT ALL but most of the females working there are wearing very little up top and not enough down below to cover their panties. Two servers today are wearing long jeans with a tank tops. I can’t decide if they are going for a beach in the desert look or a Hooters at The Senna House look?
This photo was the most family friendly of what was seen…..Other women I saw had the daisy dukes with their buns exposed.
Cala is for sure a great destination for younger men or any males that enjoy looking at young women in skimpy outfits……maybe even your grandpa…… But maybe not so great for most other women, young children, or grandma.
Eventually a brestaurant hostess seats us…..She looked like a teenager……..She wore hot pants and a top that exposed 49% of breasts…whole middle and part of stomach)………..She seats us at a table where I have to brush away what looks like a big spill of granola from my bench….(sorry now that I didn’t photo all that I brushed off)
I thought I bushed it all and then I found this next to me.
We look at the menu. They have cocktails for the table. They also offer sharables like flaming cheese, and mezze plates ($58…that one seemed steep to me?), Cala power bowls, brunch plates like a green Chile pork burrito, burgers, banana French toast, insalada pizza, and a few desserts.
I thought that the spiced lentil & chickpea bowl with added salmon sounded good so I ordered that and I received a very large bowl of food.
It’s suppose to contain lentils, chickpeas, carrots, tomato, beets, cucumber, feta, and tahini-citrus vinaigrette. I wasn’t told but found out that the carrots and beets were missing and were replaced with crunchy corn nuts. (would have ordered the other bowl if I knew) Crunchy corn nuts seems like a bar snack………..and I believe that corn nuts are a South American food and don’t seem Mediterranean and also are not a replacement for carrots and beets. ….In a nice restaurant they usually let you know if they are out of something……..
Anyways-
I taste the dressing. To me it taste like tahini and lemon…….pretty much nothing else. I would expect to taste cumin, coriander, salt, and at least pepper. I can only guess that ingredients are missing from the dressing? ……I DON’T KNOW if ingredients are missing but I think so because the the bowl had missing ingredients and also the food I enjoyed from the chef’s previous restaurant was flavorful and delicious……so I was expecting flavorful and delicious here………
Then I taste the salmon. It’s prepared nice like it seems like it was slow cooked. It has a very good texture but it is also unseasoned and unseasoned is at the very least UNDER-SEASONED. For some odd reason it’s slightly fishy.
not seasoned
It taste exactly like the bloodline all the way threw. This bowl is mostly unseasoned. The crunchy corn kernels add a little salt. The best thing in my bowl are the tomatoes. They are extra sweet today. I could have sent this back but I usually don’t send things back at restaurants….especially when I can’t see into the kitchen. I used to work in restaurants and most were professional but I did work at a certain restaurant that was one of the busiest restaurants in the country. That restaurant was unique and very different from all the rest. They didn’t hire culinary students there to work in the kitchen instead they hired their cooks fresh plucked from the local jail to cook the food. When you sent food back…The cooks got unhinged….. you’d be sorry if you saw what they did to the food…….I’m not kidding….. It was exactly like from that 2005 movie called Waiting. When I saw that movie I thought they stole a memory from my head for the movie. Don’t send food back unless you can see into the kitchen….”You’re welcome.”
My husband ordered the shakshuka burger with fried cheese instead of the whipped feta cheese. He said that the fries seemed good and he received a very generous portion of fries. Also the bun was grilled nicely. He asked for the burger to be prepared medium (because he thought it was going to be made out of lamb..((his error…it’s beef)). (red pepper tomato jam, whipped feta, cilantro, fried egg, and fries)
The bun was grilled nicely.
The egg was a little under with some runny white and wasn’t seasoned. No seasoning is UNDER-SEASONED.
He said that the jam had very little flavor and the burger was extra dry. It was very dry. We brought home a small piece for our dogs and it was so dry that it was hard for me to break up.
*******Summing things up.***********
I had to wait ten minutes for someone to seat us.
I was sat at a bench full of crumbs that I had to brush off myself.
My meal was a very large portion but was missing some ingredients (beets & carrots). However it did contain an unexpected substitute (crispy corn nuts). It also was under seasoned (no seasoning on fish and possibly missing seasoning in dressing?) and the protein was a little off.
The burger didn’t seem seasoned and the egg was under seasoned (not seasoned). The burger was also cooked till dried out.
Maybe dinners are better or I hit them on an off day? I don’t FORKING know.
The next day I got an email from Cala asking me to rate the food and to write about my experience there. I filled it out and briefly explained everything I mentioned here. Haven’t heard back from Cala as of yet (and that was over a week ago as of 5-4-22).
That was my trip to Cala…Under-Seasoned, Under-Dressed, and left Underwhelmed.
Tia Carmen is a high quality contemporary southwestern style restaurant. They use Arizona purveyors and cook with a wood fired grill. The restaurant is led by Michelin star chef, restauranteur, Bravo Top Chef, and cookbook author Angelo Sosa (pictured below in the white chef shirt).
The restaurant is airy and modern.
inside
They also offer a very large patio and for V.I.P.S. semi private cabanas.
Tonight’s menu started with appetizers in a section called Light Bright + Fresh . They offered things like a seafood platter, avocado aguachile, lamb ragu with mesquite noodles,(a really FANTABULOUS) tuna crudo, –
Tuna Crudo from Tia Carmen – corn coconut broth, smoked Chile oil, dill
and (really great) wagu kebabs (that might be twist on a Thai snack food called Miang Kham (stuffed perilla leaves).
They had three tostadas on the menu tonight. They were tuna, beef and beef bone marrow, and corn.
The entree section is called Charcoal + Wood + Fire. Some of the entrees that they offered tonight were mushroom menudo, whole mesquite smoked chicken, whole trout, third day dry aged tribal land Arizona grass fed New York Steak, Wagyu Tomahawk rib eye, (interesting and really good) Baja striped bass,-
Baja striped bass – Thai Basil, mole verde – The fish is encrusted with seeds, nuts, herbs and high quality sea salt. It becomes magical when you eat it with the foam and mole verde.
and Tia Carmen’s (the chef’s aunt’s famous chicken dish) Chicken Guisado with high quality olives, hard to find chimayo Chile, garlic, and turmeric rice.
Tia Carmen’s Chicken Guisado (very good stewed chicken)
They offered a selection of side dishes called Grains Greens + Roots. Some of those offerings were street corn, yucca brûlée, and tepary bean chorizo ragu.
The appetizers were delicious but very light. The striped bass also was very light so I did have room to try a dessert and tried the coriander torte.
coriander torte
Here is a better look.
coriander torte
It’s described as dulce de leche and orange cream. The tart is very well made with a perfect thin crust. It creamy but not very sweet or overly rich. I sort of want more orange but it still is very good and was a nice sweet ending.
That was a taste of Tia Carmen – Newly Opened and Worth a Fork!
Worth a Fork!
Tia Carmen at JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Phoenix AZ
The FANTABULOUS Dish means – Top of the line, Marvelously good, Peachy keen, and DYNAMITE! It also means that it is worth driving across town for. The Tuna Crudo from Tia Carmen is all that and more! It’s from Michelin star chef, restauranteur, Bravo Top Chef, and cookbook author Angelo Sosa.
Tuna Crudo from Tia Carmen
It’s described as corn coconut broth, smoked chile oil, and dill. The tuna is melt in your mouth silky fish with just the right amount of fresh dill,There is a little embellishment of roe that adds a little texture a little taste of the sea but THAT BROTH IS BOMB…….It amazing….It just turns all that very good into MAGICAL.
The only downside…..is that it is hard to spoon it all out. Maybe it should be served with a straw?
The Tuna Crudo from Tia Carmen is officially a FANTABULOUS Dish and is WORTH A FORK!
WORTH A FORK!
Tia Carmen at JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Phoenix AZ
