roflhouse

082511 –

Chris Frankel of Anvil Bar and Refuge and Giacomo Collab Dinner.

one

polpo e ceci
braised octopus and chickpea salad with celery heart, scallions, lemon, sundried tomato, chickpea puree

cocktail: rosato vermouth, kiwi, lime, turbinado, lambrusco bianco

two

radicchio ripineo alla griglia
grilled radicchio stuffed with mozzarella, roasted sweet red pepper, and prosciutto, served over wild arugula with a drizzle of aged balsamic vinegar

cocktail: cardamaro, cocchi americano, pineapple, lemon, anvil house grenadine, peychaud’s bitters, tonic water

three

tortelli di bietola
half moon ravioli stuffed with red swiss chard, goat cheese, parmigiano reggiano, and ricotta with butter and sage sauce

cocktail: vermentino, bianco vermouth, basil and cardamom-infused cardamaro, boston bitters, celery bitters

four

polpettine d’agnello piccante con lenticchie
savory and mildly spicy lamb meatballs with green lentil stew

cocktail: dopplebock, dry marsala, clove, vanilla, hopped grapefruit bitters

five

porchetta e rapini
berkshire pork butt seasoned and cured with rosemary, fennel seed, black pepper, garlic, then slow roasted served with sauteed rapini

cocktail: barbera, brachetto d’acqui. maple syrup, chocolate-chili bitters

six

panna cotta
cooked cream, sweetened cream infused with lemon zest, cinnamon and vanilla bean and combined with yogurt and gelatin

cocktail: sweet vermouth, moscato dolce, strawberry, rose water, lemon, turbinado

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082111 –

What can you possibly follow up an epic birthday weekend in Austin filled with drinking, food, and fun with? If you answered more drinking, you’d be dead wrong. In our case, a filling and tasty brunch at Foreign and Domestic meant a nice 2 hour drive back to Houston and a few hours to vegetate and do nothing for a bit. Today is Sunday, and our night is only beginning. In a short few hours, we had to attend Chris Leung’s Dessert Tasting. 7pm came fast, and we all hauled our asses to Kitchen Incubator where we were the last ones there to claim our “vip” (lol) prep table seating.

In front of us sat a shit load of plates to serve the anxious diners, armed with some fernet, campari and st germain we all had adequate appetizers available, although none of us wanted any after the weekend. Enough talking, here’s the photos and menu for the night..

one
compressed watermelon
white chocolate x chili x bacon x cilantro x walnut x tea

two
brie cheesecake
buckwheat x black currant x fennel x st. germain

three
olive oil financier
caponata x tomato x yogurt x vanilla bean x almond x basil

four
buttermilk ice cream
peach x dulce de leche x jujube x egg yolk x matcha

five
mango sorbet
coffee x coconut x toast x popcorn x mint x olive oil

six
hazelnut cremeux
cheddar x milk chocolate x cherry wood x banana x granola

seven
madirofolo cloud
tamarind x mustard x peanut x cumin x ginger x lime

favorite one was the hazelnut cremeux. cornnuts and banana for the ultimate win.

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082011 –

One of my best friends, Amir Bushehri turned the ripe age of 33 on August 17th and we spent the weekend in Austin with some close friends. This was essentially my trip to make up for him not being able to attend the restaurant craziness in Chicago. Our plans called for the following:

Snow’s BBQ in Lexington, TX
Louie Mueller in Taylor, TX
Jester King Brewery in Austin, TX
Barley Swine in Austin, TX
Gourdough’s in Austin, TX
Partying Like We’re back in College (lol)

Our projected 8am depart time was loosely held, some of us had to get gas and fill up on Starbucks, our real depart time was 830am when all was said and done. We arrived to Snow’s BBQ around 10am with Raudel and Jacob running a bit behind. Annie, Amir, Ladan, Mo, Hunter, Frankie, Chreeno, Tu, Dimitri, and Kim all arrived together and I was surprised there was no line between us and the epic bbq. My first trip out here with Mo and Dimitri changed what I thought about bbq and how great it could be. This trip didn’t disappoint. Amir’s first taste of Snow’s and his life was forever changed as well. Super moist Brisket, Ribs and Potato Salad changed everyone’s outlook on BBQ.

We took the nice 30 minute run on back roads to Taylor, TX where all of our lowered cars battled the pothole ridden parking lot at Louie Mueller BBQ. I had one thing on my mind that I had last time, and it was the massively large Beef Ribs that run $12.99 per pound. Some of the bones that the group purchased came in around $20 for what they deemed was a “dinosaur bone”. Mine came in around $16, we added a chipotle sausage and some peach cobbler and we were done eating for a while. One large stuffed group later and we made our way over to the next destination.

Another 30 minute drive and we started going uphill only to be greeted by a nice unpaved dirt road, our cars had to take this super slow, I think Hunter hated me a bit for having to take this dirt road, but we all moved forward, for the Jester King Brewery was ahead of us. We walked into the room where 3 taps were waiting for us, all that was between us and some Commercial Suicide, Wytchmaker and Black Metal was a scant $10 for a glass to hold the Jester King goodness. Did I mention they had a special Wytchmaker Cask with Whiskey and Oak?

After our allotted 3 beers we all headed back to our respective hotels and chilled until 530ish, fitting 13 people into BarleySwine seemed more hassle than it was worth so we headed to Gourdough’s to enjoy some fat motherfxcking doughnuts. Along side Gourdough’s was Odd Duck and Trey’s Cuisine. Those 3 food trucks more than filled our stomachs to prep for the impending alcohol binge for Amir’s birthday.

Saturday night ended with some great cocktails at Haddington’s and ended with some shots at Malaia and 512. Food came from Rappolo’s and Chi’Lantro. No Drunk Photos, Sorry!

The next morning we woke up and headed to meet our friends at Foreign and Domestic. Fried Okra and Shishito Peppers, Crispy Beef Tongue, Fried Chicken Biscuit, Fennel Sausage and Oyster Po Boy and some Tripe Chili made for an epic brunch before heading back to once again regroup and head out for Chris Leung’s dessert tasting.

#birthweek was a success

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081811 –

Well, we’re back at it again and this time it’s dinner at Indika with some friends that love indian food. I went to Indika last year and had a blast, their take on street food, a nice juicy leg of lamb and some respectable desserts left me satisfied and wanting more. Would it be the same this year?

We walked through the doors to a full house at Indika at 830pm. After some drinks at Haven, we were feeling mighty good and awfully hungry. As we were ushered to our table, the service started off somewhat slow, we were handed our menus along with their regular service menu and we began to check out our options. Annie, Mo and I decided to stick to the HRW menu while Narmeen and Katie decided to go with their regular menu citing the HRW to be a bit boring for their tastes.

I decided to go with the Shrimp ‘Katatkat’ (Texas wild shrimp chopped & quick sautéed with onions & ginger served over spiced semolina), Pork Chop Vindaloo (Grilled pork chop stuffed with a paneer masala, ‘ghost pepper’ vindaloo, okra with fennel, onion pilaf) and Mango flan with blackberry puree for dessert. Annie chose Tandoori Quail (Stuffed with pine nuts & caramelized onions, sweet potato fries), Stuffed Chicken (Bryan Farms chicken breast stuffed with lime pickle, goat cheese and currants and tomato fenugreek sauce) and Saffron pistachio ice cream.

I couldn’t help but to be a bit disappointed in what was presented in front of me this year, the shrimp was this brown mess with more spice than flavor, the okra was the best part of the pork chop vindaloo and the half mango flan with berries seemed like a cruel joke. Annie’s quail was probably the best thing at the table the whole night. Her Stuffed Chicken was spicy to the point of being inedible. It was rather overwhelming for my tastes as well. Her pistachio ice cream was boring as well.

It really seemed like they went the cheap route for HRW this year. I’m not even going to bother attaching a rating to the experience since it was a huge miss and I think Indika is capable of more. I’ll be heading back to pondicheri for breakfast soon.

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With the old school newcomer to the Houston area, Eater has quickly poised itself as a new source of information about food in the city. As with the rest of the previous Eater iterations, there is always a list that showcases the new and up coming restaurants as well as the tried and true favorites. Those favorites manifest themselves in what Eater calls their “Eater 38″. This prompted me to even attempt to think of 38 places I go to that I would even dare to recommend to people that asked me. I challenged myself to come up with 38 places that I would walk into and enjoy with friends. The following is my “roflhouse 38″

1. Anvil Bar and Refuge
2. The Grand Prize
3. Liberty Station
4. Haven
5. Stella Sola
6. Pondicheri
7. Xuco Xicana
8. Beaver’s
9. House of Bowls
10. Nguyen Ngo
11. Pho Binh Trailer
12. Tandoori Nite
13. Revival Market
14. Kata Robata
15. Laredo Taqueria
16. Seoul Garden
17. Hubcap Grill Downtown
18. The Burger Guys
19. Apri’s Phoencia Deli
20. Arco Seafood
21. Hugo’s
22. Strip House
23. The Modular
24. Paulie’s
25. Tokyo One
26. Hong Kong’s Cafe
27. Hong Kong Food Street
28. San Dong Noodle House
29. Pho Binh By Night
30. Mam’s House of Ice
31. LA Crawfish
32. Melange Creperie
33. Vic and Anthony’s Steakhouse
34. Barbecue Inn
35. Moon Tower Inn
36. Rudy’s BBQ
37. Feast
38. Vieng Thai

What’s in your personal 38? Check out my Foursquare List below and check all the one’s you’ve done!

https://foursquare.com/mattchow/list/roflhouse-38

081311 –

Our next Houston Restaurant Week destination takes us to one of my favorite places in the Houston area, Haven. Most of our 11 top arrived at 1pm and decided to have a drink from the wonderful cheery Adrienne before taking our seats in the dining area. Adrienne made me an ‘I Love Negroni’ with mescal in place of the gin, I’ve been on a mescal kick lately so it merged Campari and Mescal in a single glass of amazing. Annie had a ‘Suffering Bastard’ as well as a drink with Smith and Cross. We paid our tabs at the bar and took to our table which coincidentally was right next to the bar.

Since it was Saturday we were given the brunch HRW menu option, my eyes immediately shot to the Hill Country Wild Boar Chili w/ Pepper Jack Cheese, Minced Onions, Crema, Corn Sticks for my appetizer and Migas, Wood-Grilled Chateau Loin, Mole, Crema, and Pico. Since I’ve had the Wild Boar Chili before, I knew what to expect. I’ve had the Migas as well, while I ordered the meat rare, it came out more medium rare, but that wasn’t enough for me to hold back cutting in and enjoying the dish. It seemed like most of the people went for this option as well. In addition to my HRW Brunch option, I added some Deviled Eggs and Homemade Tater Tots to compliment the meal.

Haven is probably going to be my go to restaurant until Rucker’s new restaurant opens up, great cocktail program and tasty food.

4/5: Campari, Mescal, Chili, Migas, Friends, Fun. I don’t think you can cram more awesomeness in a single lunch.

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081211 –

Houston Restaurant Week continues with a lunch trip to Philippe Restaurant and Lounge. Located in the Galleria area next to RDG + Bar Annie and Americas, and located right next to Hermes, it’s definitely in some expensive company. Luckily HRW allows us to check out the restaurant on a cheaper price point. I’ve wanted to check out Philippe before, but for some reason or another never had the time. With so many restaurants in Houston, Philippe wasn’t a restaurant that ever made it to the top of my list to go try first.

Annie and I arrived for our 1230 reservation and entered a gorgeous space overtaken by the huge staircase. The lower hostess as I’ll call her confirmed my reservation then instructed me to go upstairs to be seated. As I walked upstairs I noticed the space and how nice the lounge area looked, dark modern feel to it, I can only imagine how much the drinks are there. As we made our way to the upper hostess, I said hi and expected to be seated, but she gave me the most vacant look ever. I had to confirm who I was, I guess I figured that their reservation system would somehow communicate with each other. If they didn’t what was the point of the lower hostess? The space was a mixture of dark seats and bright tables with art depicting architecture elements, random glass with writing all over it, a ceiling fixture with what looked like cutoff shower curtains, strange space indeed.

We received our menus and a quick once over and we decided what we wanted:

Annie:

• Salad of Sweet Rock Baby Shrimp w/ vanilla citrus vinaigrette, garnish of mango, avocado, and fresh coconut on a bed of mesclun and mint
• Coq au Vin (Chicken braised in a rich red wine sauce, on foie gras mash potatoes, petite glaze onions, lardons, mushroom and baby carrots)
• Brown Butter Financier w/ roasted apricot and pistachio ice cream

Matt:

• Petatou of Coach Farm Goat Cheese on a warm potato salad with thyme and shallots, rosemary sabayon, black olives nicoise vinaigrette with basil
• Grilled Beef Brochette with Herbes de Provence w/ chilled couscous taboulé with peaches and almonds, harissa red pepper spicy sauce
• Profiterole (Cream puff pastry filled with vanilla ice cream and drizzled with warm chocolate sauce)

I also supplemented our HRW Lunch with an order of Venison Pate. The Pate seemed like it came directly from the fridge which made it a bit hard to get out of the jar, almost impossible to spread on their accompanying toast points.

The meal was good, at $20 it was a steal, portions sizes seemed normal and unharmed by restaurant week status. The black olives in my appetizer were completely overpowering to the point I couldn’t taste the goat cheese on top of the potato salad. The Harissa Red Pepper Sauce in my main course was tasty, it really brightened up an otherwise tame grilled beef brochette. The profiterole was a great ending to the meal, warm chocolate sauce to balance the cold vanilla ice cream.

Overall a great lunch value at $20, with service kicking it up once they saw the camera (lol).

3/5: Amazing Value for HRW with excellent service in a confused and tight space

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080411 –

It’s August in Houston and that means Restaurant Week! Last year a majority of the restaurants pushed their Restaurant Week menus a few weeks which I suppose spawned the new iteration with Houston Restaurant Weeks (now with more s!). As I’ve stated in the post below I’ve made a few reservations at a couple new spots as well as some of my favorites. The first restaurant week menu my friends and I decided to explore was Ava Kitchen and Whiskey Bar in the newly developed West Ave section of Kirby.

We arrived a bit late due to stupid traffic and were starving by the time we got there, a quick visit to the hostess and the 5 of us were seated at a semi awkward red velvet couch in front of the restroom. My tablemates commented about the uncomfortable chairs they sat in. I wasn’t terribly comfortable in the red velvet booth either. We had to ask for the Houston Restaurant Week menus since they decided to distribute their normal menus first. I’m kinda happy they dropped off their normal menu first. The one menu item that piqued my interest was the Roasted Stuffed Squid w/ Shrimp Sausage & Mediterranean Salsa Verde ($12). The Salsa Verde had some nice flavors and the squid was cooked pretty damn well, crisp and not spongy or rubbery. For my Houston Restaurant Week selections, I chose Crisp Ice Berg w/ Gorgonzola Dressing & Coppa Bacon ($9), Bistro Steak & Fries w/ Roasted Cippolinis & Herb Steak Butter ($18), and Dried Cherry Baklava w/ Pistachio & Vanilla Gelato ($8.5). Total had I ordered everything separately? $35.50.

Like all HRW menus and selections I always wonder how much they water down the portions. After watching the waiters bring out my Bistro Steak dish to non HRW members I can genuinely say, there is no dilution of portion size. I looked up pricing after getting home and sitting down to write this post, there’s a definite value for your money. After all was said and done with their included 20% gratuity, it was $115 for the both of us. The price included the two HRW menus, the squid appetizer and a rye julep ($9) from the bar.

At some point during my meal, I grew tired of the Rye Julep, it was simply too sweet and as Amir commented it tasted like a hybrid Margarita/Mojito. I attempted to order a sazerac from my waiter who 1. had no idea what the hell that was and 2. came back telling me they knew what it was, but couldn’t make it. Was I missing the point of the “Whiskey Bar”? Was I wrong to expect some number of whiskey cocktails on their ‘Creative Drinks’ menu? Here’s their specialty drink menu just for fun..

Creative Drinks

Ava Signature Margarita $13
Herradura Reposado, House Made Red Fresno Chile Nectar & Fresh Citrus Agua

West Ave Red Sangria $8
Seasonal Fruit, Fresh Juices & Orange Liqueur

Susan’s Sangria $9
White Wine, Fresh Grapefruit Juice, Lillett Blanc & Mathilde Pèche Liqueur

RoxoR- politan $12.00
ROXOR Gin & Hibiscus Syrup

Alto’s Island $12
Grey Goose La Poire, Deep Eddy Sweet Tea Vodka & Ginger Ale

Rye Julip $9
Bulleit Rye & Citrus Soda

Paris Texas $12.00
ROXOR gin & lillet blanc / served chilled or martini

Red Lavender $9
Tito’s Vodka, Pama Liqueur, Lavender & Maple

Key Lime Martini $10
Stoli Vanilla, Key Lime Liqueur & Pineapple Juice

Paloma Refinada $10
Cazadores Reposado, Fresh Grapefruit Juice & Grapefruit Soda

Classic Mojito $9
Bacardi Limón, Mint & Soda

RoxoRita $11.00
ROXOR Gin, Fresh Squeezed TX Grapefruit & Orange Juice

3/5: Maybe they should rename to Ava Bar and Kitchen?

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It’s August again and it’s about that time to set forth and harness your inner cheapass to explore places you thought were too expensive and plop down $20 for lunch and $35 for dinnner to get a 2 or 3 course meal (respectively). So my question is:

Where are you going for Houston Restaurant Month?

Here’s my schedule:

• August 4 @ Ava
• August 6 @ Masraff’s
• August 12 @ Phillipe
• August 13 @ Haven
• August 18 @ Indika
• August 25 @ Le Mistral

Trying out Ava and Phillipe to see if I should give them a full on try for dinner, Masraff’s because I went last year and it was underwhelming and I want to give it another try. Although I might be swapping that one out to give Stella Sola a try after Basye left. Haven, Indika and Le Mistral because frankly we all need excuses to eat at those 3 establishments more lol.

072811 –

Nestled away in the newly developed West Ave area on Kirby lies a new Indian place that goes by the name Pondicheri. It’s been open for a few months now, but I didn’t get a chance to check it out till today for breakfast and I’m glad I did. Early morning 9am arrival means parking right next to Pondicheri before the valet drones get a hold of their cones. I think they looked at my car a few times before figuring out that my car wasn’t moving anytime soon.

A few questions and answers from the helpful cashier and Annie and I each ordered the Masla Eggs Plate with Keema and Paratha. John and David both opted for the healthier option with the Saffron Yoghurt.

Cant wait to go back soon!

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