James Reynolds, a British graphic designer, has a very interesting food-related project in his porfolio: a series of photos documenting the last food requests of former death row inmates.
I liked the stark focus of the photographs — it really translated the somberness of it being a “last meal”. I found them haunting which was a new way to look at food. Take a look at his work here.
Truth be told, I feel a little sad.
Bacon flavored rolling papers:
So before you light up and inhale all that cigarette smoke, you can flavor your mouth with bacon flavor by using this rolling paper? I guess the end product is a well smoked bacon taste? I like smokey bacon but this just made me gag. It’s wrong.
Buy here.
Actually not so much. Had brunch with PublisherGal and Chicken Sunday at Yerba Buena.
FYI — $12 gets you unlimited brunch drinks. Pick from mojito, margarita, mimosa, bloody mary. You like your boozy brunches? Come here.
I had the beef and suckling pig sliders for brunch with a side of fries and salad.
Little sliders were super juicy and bite sized. A little heavy on the salt though. The accompanying salad was delicious! Whatever vinaigrette dressing they used worked really well to cut the grease of the burger. There was chopped jicama in the salad too which I really liked — it added a nice sweet crunch.
Lunch was good but nothing spectacular. I dunno why but I guess I expected something different from a burger that had suckling pig in it. I did have some food envy. Chicken had this amazing looking sparerib arepas that I wanted bad. I’m going to have to come back to try those. PublisherGal had the huevos rancheros. I’m not a fan of that dish so I didn’t even try it.
*sigh* I am totally “meat-ed” out from this weekend.
Yerba Buena, 23 Avenue A, New York, NY
Friday was gorgeous out — not too humid, warm, breezy and sunny. Dragged a coworker to Shake Shack with me as we have summer hours on Fridays and get out at 1pm.
I have been hearing about Shake Shack and how great it is and judging from the long lines of people waiting, I had to wonder if it really was worth all the hype. We headed over to the Madison Avenue Park location. Lines snaked around the park. We each ate a banana to curb the appetite. 1 and 1/2 hours later we finally make it to that little window to place our order.
Alright — before I get into the gluttony that was our meal — you have to understand, we waited almost TWO HOURS. By the time we got to the teller we were ravenous — it was 3pm!! We were going to get everything our hearts desired.
My coworker (this boy can seriously put down) got the Chicago style hot dog, the cheeseburger and cheese fries. Yes — he ate it all and loved every moment of it.
I got the double stack and fries.
Double stack is the fried portabello mushroom stuffed with cheese AND a cheeseburger patty on a bun. Here’s another shot pre-bite:
Looks pretty good right? Check out the innards:
Portabello mushroom was piping hot and the cheese literally oozes out with every bite. Anything fried tastes pretty good so I can’t really complain about the mushroom patty. The actual cheeseburger patty was better than I expected. It was moist and juicy and full flavored. Although I enjoyed my choice in hamburger, I really think next time I’m going to stay pure and have just the cheeseburger. I found that the fried mushroom overpowered the actual flavor of the entire hamburger. Plus, it’s sort of hard to eat as the burger itself is quite thick.
Now let’s talk about the bun. I personally like a soft hamburger bun. The combination of the moist cheesy hamburger patty with the soft bun pretty much sold me. Everything is fresh and delicious. I woke up Sunday craving the cheeseburger but the line deterred me. Worth the hype? Indeed.
For dessert, being the Hungry Korean, I got the custard of the day:
It’s a watermelon tomato custard and yes it was weird. First lick and you get sweet followed by a savory and it just sort of reminded me of meat? Not so good and I did not finish.
So until next time, Shake Shack — most likely on a rainy day to avoid the lines. (AND i HATE the rain!!! 
)
Shake Shack, Madison Avenue Park, New York, NY
Sushi pillows!!!!
Shrimp sushi:
Edamame body pillow:
California roll:
And those were just a select few. A wider selection and purchase can be made here.
90 degrees in the dead of summer, boss is out of town and my friend Chicken just happens to be around the block from my office getting a passport renewal. What does a girl do? She takes a long lunch of course!
I took her to one of my fav’s in midtown east for sushi, Sakagura. (Yasuda was fully booked unfortunately). Sakagura is not a place you’ll find walking down the street as it’s in the basement of a typical midtown office high rise. You need to go back near the elevators, down a flight of stairs and after a couple of turns, you are in what looks like Tokyo.
We were seated at the bar and started with the two sake tasting.
Our waitress informed us that the sake to the left is very famous in Japan. I had to agree it was the better tasting of the two: refreshing with a crisp citrus taste to it. It went down very smooth and easy.
Next we had the chicken meatballs:
Four (we each picked off two before I remembered to photograph) ground chicken meatballs topped with teriyaki sauce appear on a banana leaf. The meatballs were fresh off the grill, very tender and incredibly moist. I burnt my tongue in my haste to eat these.
Chicken wanted tempura after seeing a couple next to us having them so we ordered the shrimp only tempura.
As I’ve mentioned before, the Japanese have a way with fried foods. They seem to have the ability to make fried taste light and airy and not heavy and greasy. The tempura was deliciously crispy. What doesn’t taste good fried?
I ordered our mains for both me and Chicken. She told me she’d like to have exactly what I order because I always order the best. What a nice compliment! So I ordered us both the sashimi over seasoned rice and cold hand made soba noodle lunch special.
The handmade soba is made of buckwheat and has an excellent springy-ness to each bite. The pot you see to the left with scallions and wasabi sit over a mini barrel of brown soba broth served cold. You mix the condiments with the broth, dip the noodles into the mixture and eat. It’s a very clean flavor that you get that really speaks to the essence of Japanese food. The fish was exceedingly fresh and what surprised me the most was the salmon roe. Rather than a burst of really fishy flavor, you could tell they were marinated the roe in teriyaki — so instead you got this delicious salty sweet rush in your mouth.
The meal was perfect for a hot summers day. We were definitely both full but not in that “I overate and feel disgusting” sort of way — it was a very clean and satisfying meal.
Sakagura, 211 E. 43rd Street, New York, NY
I know there are ppl that are absolutely obsessed with their dogs. But would you want to emulate your dog? I have a dog, I love her but I would not say I would go so far to eat this: Dog Kibble for humans
Look I can understand why dogs would want to eat human food but what human actually wants to eat dog food — or in this case — cookies that look like kibble?
