Cuban in LA

I went out with a friend for dinner to Versailles in West LA the other night. If you ask someone where to go in LA to get good Cuban food, this is where you'll be recommended to go nine times out of ten. I've been in LA several years now, but since I live on the east side of town (Silver Lake), I've never had a good enough reason to go here. That was until a friend who lives close by invited me to dinner.

Good company, a restaurant I've wanted to try for a while, and a cuisine that I genuinely enjoy... Sounds good to me!

Like many other Cuban restaurants, this is a casual dining establishment where the focus is on a good home-style cooking. For a Tuesday night, it's pretty busy, which definitely bodes well for the food that's coming my way.

First up, the obligatory Croquetas. $2.50 gets you two of these tasty treats. Croquetas are deep-fried mashed potato balls with ham in them. Versailles does them just fine. Croquetas can sometimes be overpoweringly salty, but not these. Just the right crunch, lightness, and just a nice ham flavor throughout. Perfect for an appetizer at just two bites each.



At the recommendation of my friend (and the menu), I order Versailles Famous Garlic Chicken. It's a gargantuan serving of half a chicken smothered in a citrusy garlic sauce topped with onions, lots of fried maduros (ripe plantains), white rice, and a bowl of soupy black beans. The chicken is good. Cooked well, the legs and thighs practically fall off the bone, and are succulent. The breast meat is slightly overcooked for my taste, but still edible. Overall, the flavor is fine. If the setting were slightly more intimate, I'd say someone's mom made the chicken especially for me. The rest of the sides are ok. The white rice is a little dry, but it's fine once you spoon some of the tasty black beans over it.

My friend had the Sandwich Cubano, which is described as:
SLICES OF SMOKED HAM AND ROASTED PORK, SWISS CHEESE, SWEET PICKLE AND MUSTARD, SERVED ON CUBAN BREAD - ENTIRE SANDWICH IS THEN GRILLED

I didn't try it, but my friend said it was good.

Overall, I thought the food and service was fine, and the prices were very reasonable. I would go back, but I don't think that I would make a special trip to go that far for me. Unless, that is, I have a hankering to eat something really hard to come by elsewhere like Vaca Frita. Unless I'm really craving something that obscure, there's a perfectly good alternative right in my neck of the woods on Glendale Avenue in Atwater Village.




I've been going to Baracoa Cuban Cafe for about three years now. Like Versailles, it's a casual establishment the serves up good home-style cooking, with generous portions and reasonable prices. Baracoa is a much smaller restaurant than Versailles, and tends to be more quiet/intimate. The decor is bordering on the God-awful, but this is not the kind of restaurant you go for to be dazzled by the million-dollar contemporary art collection. Besides, being LA, there are PLENTY of chi chi restaurants where one can go to for that. You'd go to a place like Baracoa because the food is good and cheap.

The menu is much tighter than Versailles here. The way I look at it, instead of being the Cuban food emporium that Versailles tries to be, Baracoa makes a select few dishes very well. Well enough that a good Cuban-American friend of mine who was visiting from out of town, called over the waitress and told her that the food was every bit as good as he got at Mama's table at home (and of course, he would deny ever having said that if his mother ever were to hear about it).

Having been to Baracoa many times, I've tried many of the items on the menu.

I always start out with the Empanadas. I get one each of the meat and the cheese. The texture of the pastry is flaky without being greasy, and has an almost biscuit-like quality. The meat filling is a traditional picadillo which is a ground beef flavored with green olives, tomatoes, and spices. The way I see it, it's kind of like a less sweet and drier sloppy Joe mixture. Delicious! The cheese is a mozzarella-like white cheese which is very well melted, and slightly sweet.

If it's your first time here, ask if they have Arroz con Pollo available. They almost always sell out this by 7PM, but it's worth it. It's a quarter of a chicken and yellow rice that is just succulent and wonderful. You'll feel like you've gone to Cuba with this one.

If you're wanting something more meaty, go for the Bistec Empanizado. It's a marinated and flattened top sirloin steak that is breaded and deep fried. It comes with black beans and rice, as well as a few pieces of maduros (plantains). It really is a huge plate of food and very reasonable at $13.95.

I almost always order the Tilapia with tomatoes and garlic. The fish itself is quite bland (well, it is tilapia after all) but the tomato-garlic relish is great. A meal for a lighter appetite.

If you're in the Silver Lake/Atwater Village area, this is one place you can't go wrong with. Just don't expect to be dazzled.

On the topic of Cuban eateries, Porto's Bakery on Brand Boulevard in Glendale needs to be mentioned here briefly. All I have to say is this. Go, and now. Great breads and hot foods. I usually go by here when I have a party, and need to supplement the finger foods section. Their Croquetas and savory pies are great (and CHEAP!!!), but the show stopper is their Potato Balls. It's a breaded and deep-fried mashed potato ball filled with picadillo. At 80 cents (!) a piece, I buy a boat load for party nights. You won't find the quality of the breads and cakes you can get here easily, and you definitely won't at the rock bottom prices they charge. Just be patient, and remember to take a number when you enter if you want to be served. :D

Happy Eating!

Risotto

Risotto... it's one of things that I find relatively easy to do when I'm not inspired to go to the store. The ingredients are simple, and the basic recipe can be made from things I tend to have in my fridge or pantry.

Not only is it easy, the basic recipe can be adjusted in any number of ways depending on what ingredients you have, or what you want to do with it.

---

Basic Risotto

Serves 2 as a main course, or 4 as a side dish

1.5 cups short grain Rice (I actually like to use Japanese short-grain rice or CalRose because of the texture and starch content, but Arborio and Carnaroli are the traditional rices used)
1 quart Chicken Stock, kept hot in either a pot or thermos
1/2 medium Onion, diced
1 cup white Wine
1/4 cup Heavy Cream or Milk
1 cup shredded Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
1/2 cup shredded Mozarella
2 tablespoons Unsalted Butter
salt and pepper
optional White Truffle Oil
optional 1/4 cup Orzo Pasta


In a saute pan, melt the butter and sweat the onions until translucent. Remove and reserve. Melt some more butter, and saute the rice for 2-3 minutes, seasoning lightly with salt and pepper. Once the rice looks uniformly pearly, add back the onions and stir together. Add in the orzo if using and white wine, and stir over medium heat until it is completely absorbed. Then in small batches, add in the heated chicken stock, stirring constantly with a wooden spatula to break down the starch in the rice, and wiating each time until the rice has absorbed almost all of the liquid. It should take about 25-30 minuted total until the rice is creamy and soft. The correct consistency should be rich and creamy, with just a hint of a bite left in the rice.

At this point, add in the cream, and remove from the heat. Then in batches, add in the shredded cheeses and then stir until completely incorporated. Taste and then season with salt and pepper to taste. If you like, drizzle a little white truffle oil over it, and enjoy.

---

This is the master recipe. While the base technique is always the same, adding different herbs, vegetables, cheese or meats makes it a completely different dish. One of my favorite ways to work with risotto is to do a wild mushroom risotto.

All you have to do for that is to soak some dried porcini in white wine, saute up a variety of mushrooms in olive oil and some garlic, and then mix into the rice mixture at the point you would add in the white wine. It's delicious.

Another idea is to do an asparagus risotto, with both asparagus chunks and puree. It comes out green, and awesome.

Or add in saffron for a Risotto Milanese to go with your next Osso Bucco.

Your imagination is the limit. You could even try to do a vegan version if you like with soy milk and cheese instead of the dairy.

Happy Cooking!

Hummus, a mi moda

I like hummus. It's one of those things that I like to keep around along with some pita bread or pita chips to munch on while I idle away in front of the TV or computer. I know that it's readily available these days in most supermarkets in a variety of flavors, but I decided that I needed to try making my own. Really. As long as you have some key ingredients, it's actually not that difficult, and you can flavor it as you see fit. So here's my home-made version of Hummus, and with one little change (the lemon confit I added), it's a very traditional hummus. Change it, add more things into it, or even change the kind of beans you use (edamame works great for this, and it's so pretty!)

---

Hummus with Lemon Confit

1 1/2 cans of Chick Peas (ok, use fresh and soaked peas if you have the patience)
3/4 cup of Tahini (white sesame paste available at your local Middle Eastern market or Trader Joe's or Whole Paycheck, er, Whole Foods)
10 slices Lemon Confit* with some of its oil
1/4 cup Lemon Juice
Peeled Garlic (start with 3, then ramp up if you like it more garlicky)
Sea Salt
Cayenne
Smoked Paprika
Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Boil drained chick peas in a pot of salted water for about 20 minutes. They should be very soft at this point. Set aside.

In a food processor, add the tahini, lemon confit slices (remove the rind from half of them), lemon juice, and some of the oil from the lemon confit. Puree over high heat until it's incorporated together. Pass the chick peas thought the fine setting of a food mill into a bowl. If you're lazy, just add the beans into the food processor and buzz with the tahini mixture. Mix everything together, and thin out with the water you boiled the beans in until it reaches the consistency you like. Season with sea salt to taste, and then sprinkle the cayenne and paprika over the top. Drizzle the olive oil on top as well.

Serve with warm pita bread wedges.

Lemon Confit

5 lemons, thinly and evenly sliced, preferably with a mandoline
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
3 Shallots, finely diced
5 Garlic cloves, finely diced
Sea Salt

Arrange a single layer of lemon slices in a non-reactive storage vessel that has a lid. Sprinkle lightly with sea salt and then top with a layer of shallots and garlic. Repeat this process until all the components are used. Pour olive oil over top until the top layer of the lemons are just covered in oil. Cover and refrigerate. The lemon confit will be usable after about three days, and will keep for about a month or two in the fridge. When needed, just let sit on the counter until the oil becomes liquid again, and remove lemon slices as needed. The oil will also be fragrant and nice for use in sauces and dressings, or even to saute with.

---

In about 30 minutes of little work, you have wonderfully rich home-made hummus. It'll make you not want to buy the prepackaged stuff again... It's also great with a good rich Feta cheese (I love the Garden of Eden brand Israeli feta they sell at TJ's -- it's so buttery and rich without being overly salty).

Something easy and oh my... VEGAN. Shout out to my girl Shelby on that one. :X

Happy Cooking!

Giving up on Mac&Cheese

I've been trying to perfect my Mac & Cheese technique. For some reason, it seems that no matter what I try, I just can't get it right. Well, I did get it right the other day, but I found out the hard way that baking the dish even to get a little crust can mean the difference between velvety smoothness, and well, an overgrown hockey puck. Dammit, I should have taken it and just eaten it out of the pot, but no, I had to get a crust on it. Well, live and learn. At least I salvaged deep fried mac-fromage out of that one, which actually, wasn't bad once you melted more cheese on top. Mmmmmm

In an effort to redeem myself here, I went back to my roots. I pulled out a dish that I grew up with in Japan that really is similar to a good 'ole American Mac & Cheese although the technique is really much more traditional French.

---

Macaroni au Gratin

1/2 lbs. Macaroni or other tube shaped pasta

5.5 oz Chicken or Shrimp
1 medium Onion
1/4 cup White Wine
optional 6 Button Mushrooms

1 tablespoon Unsalted Butter and 1 cup Grated Cheese for topping (I like a combination of parmegiano-reggiano, mozzarella, and gruyere, but anything with flavor that melts is fine)

Mornay Sauce:

3.75 tablespoons Unsalted Butter
3.75 tablespoons Flour
3.75 cups Milk or Half-and-half

1/2 cup grated Parmegiano-Reggiano
1/2 cup grated Gruyere cheese
1/2 cup grated Mozzarella cheese

Freshly grated Nutmeg and White Pepper, to taste


Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Chop up chicken or shrimp into bite-sized pieces and salt and pepper them. Dice the onion and thinly slice the mushrooms if using. Bring a pot of water to a boil and add salt. If you decide on the shrimp, skip the instructions for chicken and add it once you fold all the ingredients together before baking.

In a large saute pan or skillet, melt butter over medium-high heat, and saute the chicken until it is nicely colored. Remove the chicken and reserve. Add more butter to the pan and saute the onions (and mushrooms) until translucent. Return the chicken to the same pan and add the white wine. Stir and cook until the wine is almost completely gone.

Add pasta to the pot of boiling water at this time. Because of additional baking in the sauce later, you will want to slightly under cook the pasta. If the directions give 9-10 minutes, take them off at 8. The pasta should still be slightly hard in the middle, but not quite al dente yet. If the pasta is done before the sauce, drain and add a little butter to prevent sticking.

Meanwhile, make the sauce mornay. In a sauce pan, melt the butter over medium heat, being careful not to burn it. Once all the butter is melted, remove the pot from the heat and slowly sift in the flour. Both sifting the flour and mixing off the heat help prevent the formation of lumps. Cook the mixture (roux) over low heat while stirring to make sure that the roux is completely cooked through. Do not allow the roux to brown. Once the roux is cooked through and the flour is completely incorporated (it will smell less like flour) remove from the heat and bring the milk or half-and-half to a scald. Placing the roux back over low heat, add in the heated milk and whisk vigorously until the sauce thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon. This should take approximately 4-5 minutes. Remove the white sauce from the heat. In small batches, add in the grated cheese, making sure it is completely melted before adding more. Place the pot back over low heat if necessary. Once all the cheese is melted in, add in a small amount of freshly grated nutmeg and white pepper.

Fold the components together. Place pasta, chicken and sauce mixture into an oven safe baking dish that has been buttered or sprayed. Top with the reserved grated cheeses and add dots of butter. Place in the oven and bake until bubbling and nicely browned, about 10 minutes.

Let cool for a few minutes (important, it's like napalm right out of the oven!) and serve up.

---

Now, folks, I may not be able to make a great American Mac & Cheese that's better than the blue box, but this... just try it once. It's gooooooood. Just don't complain to me when your cholesterol figures go up. :D

Happy Cooking!