Review : Chicago Curry House

While we were in Chicago for the International Home and Housewares show, we decided to hit up the Chicago Curry House, located in Chicago's South Loop.

Chicago Curry House serves authentic Indian and Nepalese cuisine. I've had some Indian inspired dishes before, but this was my first experience with real authentic Indian food. Their food is naturally low fat, packed full of flavor, and they have a lot of vegetarian-friendly dishes.

We decided to start off with two appetizers; Cheese Pakora and Aloo Chat. Cheese Pakora is a home-made cheese marinated in a mix of spices and dipped in a garbanzo batter, then deep fried. I didn't really care much for this. The cheese was dense and had a higher water content and reminded me of a dense tofu. It wasn't a very flavorful cheese either.

Aloo Chat is cubed boiled potatoes, mixed with minced onions, cucumbers, cilantro, green chilies, and chat masala. Chat masala typically consists of amchoor (dried mango powder), cumin, coriander, dried ginger, salt, pepper, and other Indian spices. It has both a sweet and spicy flavor. It was REALLY spicy. It was a little too spicy for me and I was only able to take a few bites. I was very intrigued by all of the flavors I was encountering up to this point. Everything was so different from what I normally eat and played up all of the senses of the tongue.

For dinner I ordered Shrimp Madras. It was shrimp cooked in a mildly spicy gravy and coconut. It came served in a little personal chaffing dish. I'm not quite sure the actual name for this contraption, but it was really neat.

I also ordered some Garlic Naan with my meal. You can't eat Indian without having Naan, it's just too good.

I really enjoyed my meal. The shrimp were huge and very well prepared. One of my favorite flavor combinations is coconut and curry. This had such a slight coconut taste that it read as a very light sweetness. It was the first thing you tasted before the fire of the "mild" gravy set it. This dish was a bit too spicy for my taste buds. I had to constantly stop and try to put the fire out of my mouth. It was very good, but could've used a bit less heat.

I had to take a picture of my friend's Tandoori Lamb Tikka. It was so beautiful when it came out. A tandoor is a cylindrical clay oven used in cooking and baking. Chicago Curry House has an entire tandoori section on their menu. Looking good!

I would very much like to visit here again to expand on and learn about this cuisine. The menu is very expansive, so I would never get bored. The prices are fair for the area too. If you're near South Loop I would definitely recommend it!

I give Chicago Curry House 3.5 stars, out of 5!

★★★½

Starstruck (Again)!

This year's International Home and Housewares show in Chicago had a dynamite schedule of chefs at the KitchenAid Goho Kitchen Theater. I went with the intention of being able to see three of my favorites do a cooking demo; Cat Cora, Mario Batali, and Todd English. Little did I know is that I would actually get to MEET all of these chefs, and see Guy Fieri as a surprise guest! Sometimes my life is pretty incredible.
We arrived in time to see Cat Cora talk about her book "Cooking from the Hip". The thesis of this book is about always being prepared to throw anything together at any time that is fabulous and fresh.

Cat Cora and Suvir Saran.

Cat also was doing a book signing that day, and the first 100 book were free! A friend saved me a place in line so I could gets shots of her demo while the line grew longer. Afterwards, I joined my friend in line and got to meet Cat and get a signed copy of "Cooking from the Hip"!

Me with Cat Cora.

I've read through half of this book. Which is odd for me. I'm not the type to sit down and read through a cookbook. Usually, I'll flip through the pages waiting for a recipe to jump out at me, but this one I'm actually reading every little thing. It sounds so amazing, and I can't wait to try some of the recipes. Stay tuned for some recipes from her book.

Right after Cat Cora was finished, Mario Batali was scheduled. I was on a high from meeting Cat, and greatly anticipating seeing Mario. I was disappointed to see that he was not doing a book signing, so I thought there was no way I'd get his autograph for my Food Network Collection. Abruptly, on of my friends who happened to be working the Goho kitchen that day, ran up to me and said "Come ON!" and grabbed me by the hand. I grabbed my camera and was quickly whisked back stage. There he was. I was floored. I was going to get to meet Mario Batali. The whole thing was very fast, and it felt much like an out-of-body experience. I'm pretty sure I made an idiot of myself, but Mario was genuine and friendly. He even had an orange sharpie to match his Crocs!

Some coworkers of mine with Mario Batali.

After meeting him, I was shaking and light headed, but managed to get back to my seat in time for him to present. He demonstrated a pasta dish and a pizza, both of which smelled and looked delicious. He recommended some quality, genuine Italian ingredients. I fully believe that a final dish is only as good as the quality of ingredients that go into it. Mario is a great presenter and such an eloquent speaker.

Mario with his finished Pizza.

At the end of his presentation SURPRISE!!! Guy Fieri comes out for an unexpected appearance. I knew he would be there for the Ergo Chef booth kicking off a new knife line, but I had only a glimmer of hope to see him. And then there he was!

The crowd was going WILD!

After all of that excitement, I thought the day could not possible get any better. The icing on the cake: Todd English. Todd's presentation was about his new Juicer and how it could be used in cooking.

I snapped a few pictures of him and then queued up to get his book too. Again, this was unplanned and a great opportunity.

He was SO personable when signing books. He had a personal conversation with each person. It was great! He was signing his book, "The Olives Dessert Table".

I have only but glimpsed through this book, but it seems pretty amazing! I can't wait to try some of these delectables. Stay tuned for some killer dessert recipes from him.

It was a dynamite day full of wonderful, unexpected surprises!

Review : The Cygnus 27

Any excuse for me to try a new fine dining restaurant is always exciting. So the Sous Chef and I decided to have our Valentine's Dinner at The Cygnus 27, which is located in the Amway Grand Plaza hotel in Grand Rapids. Because he actually had to work on Valentine's, and a holiday is never a good day to try a new dining experience, we went the following weekend.

One of the main draws of The Cygnus is that it's on the 27th floor of the hotel, one of the highest floors in the city. The views are fantastic, and even a bit disorientating. It's such a unique view of a city that I'm very familiar with. Just about every seat in the house has a nice view with dinner.
I loved the atmosphere of the restaurant as well. It's very hip and chic. It still retains an upscale flair, but is easily a hot spot for dinner and drinks with friends.

Another thing I like about this restaurant, is it's utilization of OpenTable.com. I love how easy this website is to use, and I wish more restaurants in the West Michigan area would use it. It's a serious draw for people who love to dine.

We made our reservations on OpenTable.com for 9:00pm. (The only reservation left for that Saturday.) We didn't mind the late hour because we could take our time getting ready and enjoying the rest of our Saturday without having to rush to dinner.

We got there a bit early, and enjoyed views from the lounge area while we waited for our table. We didn't have to wait long, and we were soon seated. We dove into the menu excitedly discussing what we would order. I'm always challenged by all the things I want to order and try vs. how much I can actually eat. I fill up very quickly on a small amount of food, so I always am very careful not to eat much before dining out at places like this.

We ordered drinks, which were very well mixed, and placed an order for our appetizer. We decided to go with the Raclette Cheese II. It was Leelanau Cheese Company Raclette in an herb batter and slowly fried, served with remoulade sauce. And it was divine.

You can never go wrong with fried cheese. Raclette is a semi-firm, salted cow's milk cheese. It was very savory. The herb batter was crispy, flavorful, and was not greasy at all. The remoulade (similar to tartar sauce) was freshly made and very tasty. It had thinly slice pieces of dilled green beans and other spices that complemented the cheese perfectly.

Because I knew that I could not eat an entire salad with all of the other food I was expecting to order, we decided to split the grilled romaine salad. So here was my half:

The grilled romaine salad featured dried heirloom tomatoes, poppy seed crusted goat cheese, yogurt-chive dressing, and balsamic vinaigrette. It was a perfect balance of fresh flavors. It made me miss summer. Grilling the romaine released it's oils and flavors in a way I have never tasted. The dried heirloom tomato was a treat in itself; reduced and concentrated flavor in a wafer slice. The goat cheese was creamy and rich, and was a perfect complement to the romaine and vinaigrette. It was a generous slice, and it would have been nice to have some bread or crackers to eat the remainder with.

That was one odd thing about our dining experience. We never got any bread. We had bread plates and butter knives, but never bread. Other tables got bread. Why not us? Was it because we ordered an appetizer and a salad? Or was it merely an oversight? It was not enough to ruin our delightful evening, but it was puzzling.

They did serve us a nice intermezzo of fried polenta in a mushroom sauce. I was so excited to try it I didn't take a photo! It was a very good texture and the mushroom sauce was very buttery and yummy.

On to the entree! I ordered the Balinese Duck. It was duck breast rubbed with a mixture of macademia nuts, tumeric, and cilantro served with a root vegetable mash and fruit salsa.

The last time I had duck, it was at Bistro on the Boulevard. I had gotten the duck confit, so it wasn't very fatty since the fat was melted. This time, it was roasted, so there was quite a bit of fat under the skin and a fatty texture in the meat. It was done to an exquisite temperature, and beautiful color, but a little fattier than I like in my meat. The root vegetable mash was slightly sweet and very full of flavor. I could've eaten all of it if I wasn't so full. The fruit salsa had sweet and savory elements as well. Pineapple and garlic is a good combination.

For dessert we ordered "Lava". It was a fudge cake wrapped in phyllo and topped with melting whipped cream that spilled over the sides like lava. The whole thing was topped with 18K gold leaf.

Sorry, these pictures are so orange because of the low lighting in the restaurant. This dessert was really good, but had perhaps a bit too much phyllo dough layers. It was fun to tear apart and to eat the gold leaf. By this time we were pleasantly full and getting sleepy.

Out came our check for the evening with a lovely surprise: chocolate fondue. Perfect squares of moist pound cake and fresh strawberries. The chocolate was a high quality dark chocolate that was so perfect, I used the bare toothpick to scoop chocolate directly into my mouth (classy, I know).

All in all, we had a wonderful evening together. I would definitely recommend The Cygnus 27 to friends, and eat there again. I give this chic restaurant 4.5 stars, out of 5!

★★★★½

Chocolate Crepes with Raspberries

I decided to try something different this Valentine's Day and made a chocolate crepe breakfast for the Sous Chef. I had seen the recipe featured on BrightIdeas.com. I used the recipe posted on there as a jumping off point.

For the Crepes:

• 1½ cups flour
• ½ cup cocoa powder
• 6 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 2¼ cups lowfat milk
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
• 2 large eggs
• ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• Vegetable oil as needed

1. Combine flour, cocoa powder, sugar and salt.
2. In another bowl, 2 cups of milk, butter, eggs and vanilla until blended.
3. Combine butter and flour mixtures, whisking until smooth. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
4. Cook crepes: Before cooking, whisk remaining ¼ cup of milk into crepe batter. Lightly brush skillet with oil and heat over medium high heat. Once pan is hot, remove from heat, pour in ¼ -cup of batter and swirl pan around allowing batter to evenly coat bottom. Return pan to heat and cook for 40 seconds. Flip crepe over and continue to cook an additional 20 seconds. Repeat process with remaining batter, stacking crepes. Set aside.

NOTE: This recipe makes A LOT of crepes! Probably enough for four or more people, so cut accordingly. Also, stacking your crepes in a 150ºF oven will keep them nice and fresh until you're ready to garnish and serve.

So I was getting excited as I assembled the crepe batter into bowls, loving the person who wrote the recipe for separating their wet and dry ingredients. I put it in the refrigerator to chill out for an hour and then started getting everything else ready.

When I was finally ready to actually start cooking the crepes, it was then I had a "what did I get myself into?" moment. I'm NOT experienced with crepes. I know the theory, but don't have the practice. My girlfriends and I had a crepe party last summer and I learned quickly that I am not good with crepes. Those devilishly sticky disks of goodness are hard to flip. But then I took a deep breath and decided there's no hurt in trying.

The key to crepe making is getting your pan heated through. Then you drop the batter in and take the pan off the heat and swirl the batter around the edges, coating the bottom of the pan. (As demonstrated by my friend Nicole below.)

Crepes are supposed to be thin, so a little bit of batter is the way to go. By the time you evenly coat the bottom of the pan with the batter, it should already be mostly cooked. Set it back on the burner for a few seconds until the top is almost a matte finish. Then the hard part...the flip. These thin little guys are amazingly sticky. I had the best luck propping the edges up with a rubber scraper, and then tilting the pan while getting my spatula under the crepe. This is the part that will take the most practice. After a few clumps of crepe disasters, I finally got the hang of it down.

For the filling:

• 2 cups part skim ricotta cheese
• 1½ cups raspberries
• ¼ cup sugar
• ¼ cup toasted almonds
• Zest on orange

1. Combine ricotta cheese with raspberries, sugar and orange zest.
2. Spread crepes with filling to within ½-inch of the edge. Fold crepes into quarters and place two on each serving plate.

Here is where I got off the recipe train. I should have gotten off the track all together. I did not use almonds or orange zest. I did use the ricotta. Right out of the refrigerator. These little crepes are no where near thick enough to heat up that ricotta, so if you don't like eating cold crepes, use room-temperature ricotta. It was not very appetizing. (You can also use frozen raspberries, just make sure they're thawed.)
I personally feel like ricotta is not the right filling choice here. A cream cheese- or yogurt-based filling would be much better served with the raspberries and orange zest. I don't really care for ricotta, but even the Sous Chef agreed that it wasn't quite the right combo. Bleh!

Chocolate sauce:

• ½ cup chopped Dove Dark Chocolate
• ¼ cup lowfat milk
• ½ cup raspberries
• 1/3 cup Raspberry Almond M&M’S® Brand Premium Chocolate Candies

1. Before serving, melt chocolate and milk together.
2. Drizzle sauce over crepes, garnish with raspberries and Raspberry Almond M&M’S Premiums.

I departed from this recipe a bit too. I used chocolate chips instead of Dove, because they are just as good for this application in my opinion, and I didn't want richness overkill. I also did not us any M&Ms. The idea of hard shell candy on smooth melty chocolate crepes did not appeal to me, although I'm sure they taste yummy by themselves.

All in all I have to say this recipe is definitely good for the crepes. They are chocolaty, and maybe a bit rich. Definitely filling. As for the filling, make your own! Come up with new creative applications for these. They would probably be fantastic with bananas in the middle. I think they were good for a special V-Day breakfast, and with a few slight modifications, they are something I'll make again.