Bread – Page 3 – The Saboscrivner

Zeytin Turkish Cuisine

Let’s face it — dining out is usually an impersonal, almost mechanical experience where you pay for food, you get your food, you eat, you leave, and you go on with your life. That’s the bare minimum of what we expect, and sometimes that’s what we crave. But how often do any of us visit a restaurant where you feel a warm welcome, like you’ve stepped into someone’s home and they are legitimately happy to see you? There are a few places like that around Orlando — Mediterranean Deli and Se7enbites immediately come to mind.

Another one is Zeytin Turkish Cuisine (https://www.facebook.com/ZeytinTurkishCuisine), a restaurant that has been around for eight years, but I only recently discovered it for myself. I’ve been a late bloomer throughout my life, but finally trying this wonderful food, prepared with skill and love and accompanied by some of the kindest, warmest hospitality I have ever encountered, I wished I had made to this College Park eatery long ago.

This was the lavas bread ($4.95), which you have to order at any Turkish restaurant, and especially at Zeytin. It usually arrives to your table in a dramatic fashion, huge and round, puffed up with hot air, which you then pierce with forks and knives to deflate. Then you tear off pieces of the warm, soft bread (kind of like a pita, but so much better) and dip it into various dips. It was packed in a brown paper bag and mostly deflated by the time I got home, but still just as good as we’ve had before, from elsewhere.

The main reason I went to Zeytin was because my wife was craving babaganush, that smoky, creamy dip made from roasted eggplants, sometimes with garlic, tahini paste, and olive oil added to it. She asked me to find the best babaganush in Orlando, and I received several helpful suggestions on the Orlando Foodie Forum presented by Tasty Chomps!, the burgeoning community of local foodies founded by the civic-minded mensch Ricky Ly. One suggestion stood out to me, from Michele Bourassa, a familiar name from the Foodie Forum. She was the co-owner of Zeytin, and she invited me out to finally try her restaurant. How could I refuse such an offer? I had read great reviews for years and always meant to try it, but I’m rarely out in the College Park area. I called in my order on the way there, and it was all ready by the time I arrived. Michele could not have been nicer, and the babaganush ($8.50) could not have been better. Seriously, I’ve never had its equal, and my wife was over the moon with happiness.

But Michele (a true ray of sunshine and the perfect “front of house” person any restaurant would be grateful to have) and her husband, chef and co-owner Zeynel (everyone calls him “Z”), threw in some extras for us, which they did not have to do! Despite just ordering babaganush, they sent us home with the equivalent of their mixed appetizer platter, with multiple dips to accompany our lavas bread. (I tipped above and beyond, the least I could do for her unheralded generosity.)

This container held their two creamy, yogurt-based dips: cacik, yogurt blended with cucumbers, garlic, dill, and fresh mint, and haydari, thicker yogurt blended with crushed walnuts, garlic, and dill. Both were so refreshing, but I personally preferred the haydari.The word “Zeytin” is Turkish for olive, a favorite delicacy of Chef Z, and we noted that each dip was topped with a kalamata olive. I made sure my wife ended up with all of those.

This container held two separate dips as well: esme on the left, a spicy melange of tomatoes, bell peppers, hot peppers, onions, cornichons, parsley, garlic, crushed walnuts, lemon juice, and olive oil, and soslu patlican on the right, my personal favorite Turkish dip, with sauteed eggplant, tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, and garlic. My wife isn’t into anything spicy or overly tomatoey, so I got to enjoy both of these myself — and let me tell you, I enjoyed them. That was such an unexpected and unnecessary bonus, and we were both so grateful.

Because I wanted to try a meat dish and see how Zeytin handled one of my favorite Turkish dishes from elsewhere, I also ordered the Iskender kebab ($24.95), ground lamb mixed with seasonings, shaped into a loaf, broiled, and served as thin slices. Unlike the more common doner kebab, which uses the same meat, the slices in the Iskender kebab are served over cubes of sautéed, buttered bread so the juices and spices saturate the bread. Normally it is topped with tomato sauce and yogurt, but I figured that might make the dish a soggy mess by the time I got it home.

I asked for both the tomato sauce (see above) and the yogurt (see below) on the side, so I could apply my own, and also my wife could enjoy the sliced lamb plain, free of tomato-based sauces, as she always prefers. The yogurt was cool and creamy, and they gave us so much of it! Back at home, the cubes of bread crisped back up very nicely in our toaster oven, and I chopped some pickles and sprinkled some Penzey’s Turkish seasoning blend into the yogurt. Whatever yogurt I didn’t use with three separate servings of the Iskender kebab, I enjoyed with some chicken later in the week.

I asked if the Iskender kebab came with rice, and it does not, because of the crouton-like cubes of crispy bread underneath. But I figured the rice would be really good at Zeytin, so I asked for a side order of rice. As my wife and I both hoped, it was a buttery rice pilaf with chewy orzo pasta, much like the rice from the dearly departed Beyti Mediterranean Grill, our friendly neighborhood Turkish restaurant that opened in 2020 and closed in 2022. Even when my wife didn’t feel like eating meat, she would send me to Beyti to bring home lavas bread, babaganoush, and that rice. This takeout meal from Zeytin was like revisiting some old friends who were a little different, but had become even better.

Michele also included four pieces of freshly made pistachio baklava for us, a truly sweet and unexpected treat that wowed us in every way possible. It was some of the best baklava we’ve ever had, and not just in Orlando, either.

The following weekend, I took my wife to see an awe-inspiring stage production at Orlando’s Renaissance Theatre, Josephine, a one-woman show about the incredible life of American icon Josephine Baker, starring a local icon, triple-threat (actress-singer-dancer) Tymisha Harris. Afterwards, we headed on to dinner at Zeytin, a mere week after bringing home that bountiful takeout order. I had forgotten that you need to make a reservation for the small dining room, but we were so lucky a table was available, and Michele was able to seat us right away. I introduced Michele to my wife, who quickly and rightfully pointed out that she loved Michele’s kind heart. The only reason you wouldn’t agree is because you haven’t met her yet.

The dining room was pretty full when we arrived that Sunday evening. It seemed like a lot of the crowd was made up of regulars, and we could both understand why. Natural light streamed in and reflected off the beautiful hanging lights made of multicolored glass mosaics, which Chef Z had gotten from Istanbul. There was a fish tank near the entrance, close to our table, and we entertained ourselves throughout our dinner watching the aquatic antics of a tiny turtle.

Michele asked her husband to get our lavas bread ready even before we placed our order. As great as our feast was at home the previous week, most restaurant food is so much better consumed hot and fresh in the dining room itself, and Zeytin was no exception. Here was the steaming, soft lavas bread, fully puffed and fluffed up, ready to be deflated, dipped, and devoured.

We had to order the finest babaganush in Orlando all over again:

And Michele was kind enough to hook us up with small sample dishes of haydari, esme, and smooth, creamy hummus (which I always try to say in a sexy voice like Gal Gadot, but it sounds more like an old man with phlegm caught in his throat, coming from me).

I suggested we order moussaka ($21.95) to share, figuring we would have leftovers that would heat up well. The baked casserole of sliced eggplant, ground lamb, tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, and garlic was topped with a bechamel sauce and molten-hot, melty mozzarella cheese. It was very similar to lasagna, but with layers of eggplant instead of pasta sheets. For this reason, I like the tomato-based Turkish version of moussaka better than Greek versions that don’t have the tomatoes. And while I’ve had a similar version of moussaka at Cappadocia, another Turkish restaurant, Zeytin’s version is definitely my favorite in the city. The moussaka came with a mountain of that wonderful buttery rice pilaf with orzo, which we both loved.

Since we were dining here on a Sunday evening, I couldn’t resist ordering one of my favorite Turkish dishes: lahmacun ($19.95), a throuple of soft baked flatbreads topped with ground lamb, tomatoes, peppers, onions, and spices. I figured I would end up with plenty of leftovers that would heat up well in the microwave at work, but they were so good, they never made it into my workday lunches. I loved the lahmacun (pronounced “llama-JUNE,” but with a soft “j,” as in “bougie”) from Beyti while it was open, and I have even made it from scratch before. But Zeytin’s version blew me away, filling a hole in my heart and staving off my regular Sunday evening despondence for a while. I was impressed that it essentially came with a whole side salad, with chopped romaine lettuce, tomatoes, red onions, cucumbers, and parsley tossed in a very light vinaigrette dressing, which you can roll up inside the lahmacun to eat, like a veggie wrap with meat on the inner wrapping. But there was so much salad, that even after eating all three lahmacun pieces with it, I was able to pack the rest in my work lunch the following Monday. (I also ate the lemon wedges like orange wedges, which is what I usually do with lemon wedges.)

Here’s a close-up of one of those decadent discs. I just loved them. The thin outer crust was nice and crispy, but not overly crunchy, and the lahmacun dough got pleasantly soft underneath the cooked lamb and vegetables.

If you put a gun to my head (please don’t) and forced me to name my five favorite world cuisines (excluding regional American foods like barbecue, Jewish-style delicatessens, and Hawaiian), Turkish would definitely make my top five, along with Italian, Mexican, and probably Japanese and Cuban. That’s a hard decision to make. What about Indian? What about Chinese, in all its varieties? Greek? Vietnamese? I love them all, and so many more, but the local restaurants in Orlando made me a true devotee of Turkish flavors, and Zeytin reminded me what I love so much about them.

On top of that, I can’t get over how kind and sweet Michele was. I didn’t get to meet Chef Z, but he sounds like a pretty amazing person too. The fact that she reached out to me to invite me to their restaurant was such a nice gesture. I had been meaning to visit for far too long, but that personal touch is what finally made it happen. They hooked us up on that first takeout trip — I would be impugning whatever journalistic integrity I have if I failed to admit this — but they did it because they are such nice people, not asking for anything in return except for us to return. And it only took a week for us to do so, because it was that damn good.

Some Turkish restaurants may have expanded too much in recent years and aren’t as consistent (or as good) as they used to be. You may find others closed at random times throughout the week when they’re supposed to be open. But I can’t imagine Zeytin disappointing in any way, not after our recent experiences. All of their meats are halal, and everything is prepared from scratch — fresh produce, fresh everything. I am thrilled to consider myself a Zeytin convert now, and the next step is to become a regular. Please join me in doing the same!

So much of College Park has minimal parking (ironic), especially the stretch of Edgewater Drive closer to Princeton, but this is the north end of College Park, and Zeytin has its own parking lot. The restaurant is located at 4439 Edgewater Drive, just off Fairbanks Avenue, and very convenient to access via I-4. It is only open for dinner, and if you intend to dine in, definitely call 407-988-3330 to make a reservation. Plan your next date night or family dinner here. The extroverted, effervescent Michele and her husband, Chef Z, will make you feel like family, or probably even more welcome, depending on what your family is like.

I swore I wouldn’t end with this, but I can’t resist: HAIL ZEYTIN!

Jaleo

Jaleo (https://www.jaleo.com/location/jaleo-disney-springs/) is an upscale Spanish restaurant, founded by the successful celebrity chef, restauranteur, and humanitarian Jose Andres. When he’s not feeding people in international crisis zones with his World Central Kitchen charity, he runs several other restaurants, including China Chilcano, the Peruvian-Chinese-Japanese restaurant in Washington, D.C., which I ate at and reviewed in 2019. But Jaleo, featuring the tastes of his native Spain, is probably his most famous, with locations in D.C., Chicago, Las Vegas, and right here in Orlando.

The two-story Jaleo location at Disney Springs is absolute huge and beautiful. It is almost like sensory overload in there, with so much to look at even before your senses are overwhelmed by the tapas coming your way.

The design really is busy, but stunning.

Peep these gorgeous hanging hams. As Michael Jackson might have said, “JAMON!”

This location opened in March 2019, and I had been wanting to go since the beginning. But with COVID, major medical stuff, a job change, and lots of other life stuff getting in the way, I finally made it to Jaleo earlier this year, back in May, which seems like a lifetime ago. I went for a leisurely lunch with three colleagues from work, all top-notch librarians I don’t get to work directly with anymore, but I think the world of them. None of us had ever been here before, so we shared almost everything, which is the best way to do Jaleo — in a group with friends who understand sharing is caring. Each of us ordered a few dishes and paid our own way, so I will present our epic meal more of less in order of how things came out from the kitchen.

Two colleagues shared this pitcher of sangria, which they seemed to like. I don’t know how much it cost and didn’t try it because I don’t drink, but it’s Spanish red wine mixed with fruit, so I’m sure you can’t go too wrong.

This is pan con tomate ($14), toasted slices of bread rubbed with fresh tomato, which sounds too simple to be good, and definitely too simple to be worth $14. But it was worth it, even split four ways. Better than tomato-rubbed toast has any right to be! It was so good, another person in my party ordered a second portion for the table.

This was the coca Idiazabal ($10), a handmade rosemary and olive oil cracker topped with membrillo (a jelly-like paste made of the quince fruit, so rich, sticky, and sweet!) and Idiazabal cheese, grated into soft, silky strands. I had never had quince before, but it reminded me of the guava paste that is ubiquitous in pastelitos and other Cuban desserts from growing up in Miami. We cracked the coca cracker into quarters as best we could and enjoyed the blend of sweet and salty, crunchy and gooey.

This was my vegetarian colleague’s manzanas con hinojo y queso Manchego ($13), a salad of sliced apples, fennel, Manchego cheese (a Spanish cheese made from sheep milk), walnuts, and sherry dressing. I don’t remember much about the bite I got, but I do love fragrant fennel (I like to use it in pasta con la sarde, a dish of pasta and sardines) and salty Manchego. It would be a great palate cleanser to take bites of between heavier, richer, meaty dishes.

I definitely ordered this dish, which I swear looked a lot more appetizing in person: the cebolla asada ($11), a huge roasted sweet onion topped with pine nuts and funky-but-delicious Valdeón blue cheese. Everyone knows how much I love onions, especially when they are marinated and/or caramelized. This was magnificent, especially with the blue cheese on top. Part of me imagined enjoying a gigantic, juicy burger topped with this bad boy, but that wouldn’t be Jaleo’s style.

So many months have passed, I think this soup my one vegetarian colleague ordered is the gazpacho de remolacha con queso de cabra ($11), red beet gazpacho with goat cheese, oranges, and pistachios. It was the only thing on the table I did not sample, but if that’s indeed what it is, it sounds good enough to even win over Lisa Simpson’s gazpacho-mocking family at that one cookout.

Me being the connoisseur of cured meats, I couldn’t go to Jaleo and not order the jamon Serrano ($13), a platter of the most delicious Serrano ham, cured for 24 months. These paper-thin slices were served with these delightful little crispy bread twists to wrap them around. Like the best prosciutto, this jamon was salty and unctuous and could melt away in your mouth. My one male colleague seemed to like it; the ladies wanted nothing to do with it, so more for me!

This was the espinacas a la Catalana ($14), sautéed spinach with pine nuts, raisins and apples. Once again, I can’t take credit for ordering such a healthy, wholesome dish, but it was so amazing. I think we had leftovers of a few things at the end of our lunch, including this, and I took them all home because I am shameless. My wife tried it and loved it, and I attempted a copycat recipe not long after that was okay, but not nearly as good as this. I mean, look at this! I do love cooked greens, and the slight sweetness from the fruit made such a difference, especially with the tender crunch of the apples and the chewiness of the raisins (“Nature’s candy,” as my mom would say, trying desperately to convince my brother and I as little kids, and probably herself as well.)

Next up we have the gambas al ajillo ($19), or according to the menu, “The very, very famous tapa of shrimp sautéed with garlic.” I don’t really care how famous they are, but they were some of the tastiest shrimp I’ve ever had. I can’t rave enough about how perfectly every dish in this epic lunch was seasoned, and the gambas were no exception.

My mighty colleague ordered this paella of the day for himself, and our patient server warned us it would take about 45 minutes. It came toward the end of the meal, when we were all visibly fatigued, but I honorably and dutifully helped him get through it. Constant readers, I wish I could tell you what this exact paella of the day was, but that memory is lost in time, like tears in the rain. The menu narrows down the kind of rice to “Bomba rice from Valencia or Calasparra from Murcia,” and it definitely included tender chicken, some kind of pork, and also shrimp, with a swirl of garlic aioli on the plate, as if it wasn’t rich enough already. Not everything is worth the wait, but this paella was.This is where I admit I’ve had bad experiences with paella elsewhere. Usually you pay a lot and wait a long time, and the rice comes out underdone. Just disheartening experiences overall, which is why I didn’t order a traditional rice-based paella for myself, even in this temple of Spanish cuisine, with a menu created by one of the greatest chefs in the world. Because the rice was tender and everything came together, it was probably the best paella I’ve ever had.

This was the last dish I ordered myself: rossejat negra ($32), a different kind of paella made with toasted Catalonian fideos pasta instead of rice, head-on shrimp, squid ink, calamari sofrito, and dollops of creamy, garlicky aioli. The picture isn’t great, because it looks like some burnt crud on the pan, but that was actually pasta dyed black with squid ink, a gourmet treat that always impresses my wife and me whenever we see it, maybe because we are goths at heart. I cannot vouch for the placement of the huge shrimp in this dish, but I’m sure there was no ill intent. The pasta was al dente in places, but the edges that touched the pan were crispy like pegao, the crispy rice from the bottom of the rice cooker that some people dismiss but others (like my wife) love. The dollops of creamy, garlicky aioli stood out against the blackness of the pasta and the blackness of the pan, reminding me of a line Alan Moore wrote in the comic book Top Ten #8, later plagiarized by Nic Pizzolatto in the first season finale of True Detective, about seeing stars shining in the night sky, and how there is so much darkness out there, but just to see any light at all means the light is winning. Well, nobody else wanted anything to do with my rossejat negra, which means I was definitely winning!

My colleague who is a huge Disney fan ordered this dessert, and I honestly don’t remember if I tried a bite or not. It is the Selva Negra ($14), created to celebrate Walt Disney World’s 50th anniversary, lasting throughout 2022 and into March 2023. The menu describes “a decadent mousse made of Manjari 64% chocolate atop a crunchy feulletine base with black cherry chocolate sponge cake and topped with a chocolate glace.” That’s pretty impressive to me, considering my favorite dessert is a creamy citrus pie in a crust made of crushed Ritz crackers. This right here is some serious gourmet… stuff.

I don’t know why it has taken me over half a year to finish writing this review. Needless to say, the four of us ate like royalty this day. But the fact that it was four generous and mostly adventurous people made it the ideal situation at Jaleo. The tapas-style portions aren’t gigantic, but most are bigger than you think, definitely big enough to share with a group this size. And that’s the way to do tapas correctly — to order a bunch of different things and share them. Share with friends, with family, with dates and mates, even with former co-workers. A meal like this lends itself to sharing, so as many people as possible can experience the majestic flavors of Spain and the creative brilliance and love of Chef Jose Andres and his talented kitchen staff. You could go alone and order a couple of dishes, but I don’t know if that experience would be the same. That’s why it took me so long to finally make it to Jaleo, and why I won’t return until the circumstances are right, and I can bring more people I care about to share with. Sharing food (and even information about food) is one of my love languages for sure (you’re welcome!), and one of Chef Andres’ too, as he continues to lead World Central Kitchen to feed people at disaster sites and war zones around the world. He’s a true mensch, and he deserves our support. You can donate to World Central Kitchen, AND you can also enjoy a sumptuous, unforgettable meal at Jaleo next time you’re down near Disney.

Friends Indian Cuisine

Friends Indian Cuisine (https://friendsindiancuisine.com/) is a new halal Indian restaurant on South Semoran Boulevard, just north of Curry Ford Road in South Orlando, south of State Road 408. It opened earlier this year (2022) and is building a loyal following due to excellent word of mouth. The location has hosted a handful of restaurants before, but hopefully Friends is here to stay. I have dined in twice and brought home takeout another time, so I couldn’t wait on this review any longer. The short version: Friends is fantastic. It’s another great recommendation to Orlando’s Indian restaurant scene, which I am slowly but surely working my way through.

From my first takeout trip, I brought home the two dishes I know my wife likes: butter chicken (left; $13.99) and palak paneer (right; $12.99) — both mild, for her sake. The butter chicken is a delicious dish that was her gateway to appreciating Indian food: shredded dark meat chicken (all leg meat) stewed in a creamy tomato sauce. It is very similar to chicken tikka masala (also on the menu for $14.99), but I’ve brought both to my wife before, and she prefers the butter chicken. I love it too. The palak paneer is cubes of cottage cheese (the paneer part) cooked with spinach in a creamy sauce. It is another great gateway dish for people unfamiliar with Indian cuisine, especially vegetarians. I’ve ordered an extremely similar dish called saag paneer at other Indian restaurants, but I just researched the difference: palak paneer is always made with spinach, while saag paneer can be made with spinach and/or any other leafy greens, particularly mustard greens. Mystery solved!

I ordered lamb karahi ($14.99) for myself: boneless lamb strips cooked with tomatoes, onions, and green bell peppers in a curry sauce, served over basmati rice that came on the side. Normally I order hot lamb vindaloo at Indian restaurants, but I switched it up to try the karahi for the first time. I still got it hot, but it was a lot less vinegary and pungent than the vindaloo.

I brought home an appetizer portion of vegetable pakoras ($4.99), a serving of six mixed vegetable patties dipped in chickpea batter and fried until golden-brown and crispy. I thought my wife would like them too, but I ended up enjoying them more than she did, especially with tamarind sauce for dipping.

This was an order of tandoori paratha (top; $3.49), which is whole wheat bread layered with butter, and regular butter naan (bottom; $2.49, or you can get it with your entree as an alternative to plain basmati rice). I wanted my wife to be able to compare and contrast them, but they were very similar. Both breads were soft and warm from having been baked in a clay oven called a tandoor, and we really enjoyed both. I am more used to buttery, flaky Malaysian-style parathas than the Indian variety, so this tandoori paratha was much more naan-like. But trust me — I could eat these naan-stop.

If you don’t feel like ordering off the menu, or if you’re a newer convert to the wonderfulness of Indian food, Friends Indian Cuisine offers a daily all-you-can-eat lunch buffet for $12.99 on weekdays and $14.99 on weekends, from 11:30 AM until 3:30 PM. I’ve had the lunch buffet twice now, and it is terrific. The dishes on the buffet are all mildly spiced for a wide range of palates.

Here are all the options from my most recent visit:

You grab your plate near the naan bread, aloo pakora (crispy battered and fried potatoes that were replenished right after I took this photo, of course), a lentil soup, that I did not try, and sweet gulab jamon, a dessert dish of cake-like balls in a sugary syrup.

Here you have plain white basmati rice, palak paneer (which we have already established is awesome), mixed vegetable curry, and aloo cholay, a dish with cubed potatoes and chickpeas cooked in a spicy curry sauce.

Moving down the line, they offer vegetable rice pilaf, chicken biryani (terrific), chicken curry, chicken korma in a creamy cashew sauce, butter chicken (I love this so much), and moist and tender tandoori chicken thighs and legs.

And finally, you can get cool, creamy raita (a yogurt sauce that is perfect for neutralizing spicy dishes), green chutney, tangy-sweet tamarind sauce, intimidating-looking green chili peppers, chopped red onion, lemon and orange wedges, a green salad, and rice pudding, another sweet dish.

This was my first plate, where I sampled a little bit of everything. The butter chicken, tandoori chicken, palak paneer, and chicken biryani were my favorites from the lunch buffet.

On my most recent trip to the buffet with two work colleagues, I got an order of vegetable samosas ($4.99) for us to share. These were perfect potato pyramids, with seasoned potatoes and peas in lightly fried, crispy crusts. They split one and liked it, and I was too full to try mine until the next morning at home, but it was still great then.

Since Friends Indian Cuisine is so convenient to my job, I look forward to becoming more of a regular over the months and years, even as I branch out and continue to try other Indian restaurants throughout Orlando. My family NEVER ate Indian food when I was growing up in Miami, and I never ate it that often until the last few years, in my quest to discover the best food anywhere and everywhere and share my thoughts on it. Now I’m making up for lost time, and I’m thrilled to recommend one more great local Indian restaurant to expand my palate and my experience.

And hey, if you were expecting a Friends reference since I always make pop culture references in my restaurant reviews, sorry to disappoint you, but I always hated that show.

Chain Reactions: Eataly (Chicago)

Eataly (https://www.eataly.com/) is like heaven for foodies: a massive Italian food store that contains several restaurants, from sit-down pastarias to wine bars to counter-service bakeries to grab-and-go snack shops. As a result, it is kind of like a massive food hall, with so much to see and do, smell and taste, experience and indulge. But most of all, Eataly feels like a temple to Italian food — truly a place of worship — and well worth a pilgrimage at least once. There are ten Eataly stores in Italy (the first one opened in Torino in 2007), nine in North America, and eight elsewhere in the world. I don’t know how different they all are, since I’ve only been to the Chicago Eataly (https://www.eataly.com/us_en/stores/chicago/) — first with my wife in 2014, and again on a recent business trip to Chicago. I had to venture back there, to make sure that first visit wasn’t just a wonderful dream, but the kind of place where dreams come true.

It had been so long since my first visit, I had to explore everything in the store before deciding on my first bit of food. I made my way to the second floor to a familiar kiosk that beckoned: the land of cured meats and cheeses. I felt like a weary traveler who had finally made it to my destination, yet also feeling like I was home.

Since I was just staying in Chicago for two nights, I couldn’t buy anything fresh or perishable or requiring cooking, but I’m sure some fancy Chicago locals bypass the local supermarkets and buy all their meats at this gleaming butcher’s counter. You can’t see the price labels in this photo, but take it from me: if you have to ask, you probably can’t afford it.

Here’s a shot of huge tomahawk ribeye steaks, slowly dry-aging to perfection in a clear refrigerated case:

The seafood counter was equally sumptuous. On my first visit to Eataly back in 2014, I made an indulgent purchase of bottarga here: the salted, cured, pressed, and dried roe sac of a fish (usually gray mullet, but sometimes tuna). I had read about bottarga before, and it sounded irresistible to me, as a connoisseur of the cured, a scholar of the smoked, and a professor of the pickled. So many cultures created their own versions of this delicacy, and I’ve still never found it in Florida. The bottarga I bought at Eataly made it back in my luggage without any problems, and it lasted months in the fridge, as I finely grated it over so many pasta dishes. It added a salty, savory, umami flavor to everything, and pretty much melted in my mouth. If that sounds good and not gross, I highly recommend it.

But all this browsing made me hungry, so I returned to the restaurant my wife and I dined at on our original trip to Eataly here in Chicago: the creatively named La Pizza & La Pasta. You can’t go to a restaurant like this and not know what you’re getting! They take reservations, but I arrived relatively late in the day, after a long training workshop and an architectural boat tour down the Chicago River, so I had my choice of seats and opted for a solitary barstool, far from any other diners.

The kind server brought out this wonderfully fresh, crusty bread with olive oil that was much sweeter and more flavorful than the kind I keep at home that regularly goes on sale at Publix. I’m not sure if every party gets “table bread,” or if it came with the dish I ordered, but if you’re visiting Eataly, hopefully you’re not obsessed with counting carbs, so you should definitely take advantage and enjoy this brilliant bread.

As a solo diner, I knew I couldn’t justify ordering two entrees, so it was difficult for me to choose. My server helped me break a tie, so I went with a fresh pasta dish, tagliatelle alla Bolognese ($24), topped with real-deal parmigiano Reggiano, not the shaky-can stuff I’ve bought my entire life. The fresh tagliatelle pasta was kind of eggy (not in a bad way, just not exactly what I expected), but the savory Bolognese sauce was awesome, with plenty of chunks of meat. I get that this was a pretty basic choice, and I make “pasta and meat sauce” quite often at home, but it is real comfort food for me, and I wanted to see how Eataly’s kitchen would present such a timeless classic. They knocked it out of the park, needless to say.

As an aside, here’s a photo I found of the dish I ordered here back in 2014, in those pre-Saboscrivner days: my favorite pasta dish anywhere, bucatini all’amatriciana ($21). This thick bucatini pasta (long, hollow tubes) was not fresh like the tagliatelle I had just tried, but there’s nothing wrong with good quality dried pasta. I think I prefer it, in fact. All’amatriciana is served in a spicy tomato sauce with guanciale (cured pork jowl), and this version from La Pizza & La Pasta was perfect in every way, even better than the tagliatelle from this most recent visit.
I make pasta all’amatriciana at home as a treat once or twice a year, but since guanciale is hard to find, I usually substitute cubed pancetta, which you can find at Trader Joe’s, Publix, and even Aldi sometimes. If you’re not into bucatini, pretty much any other pasta works well, except for weirdo choices like tri-color wagon wheels. What is the deal with those, anyway?

After dinner, I wandered around the store a little more and gazed at beautiful Roman-style pizzas on display at the Pizza alla Pala kiosk. I was tempted, but I had just eaten dinner, and I knew they wouldn’t be that great eaten cold in my hotel room the next morning.

But I saw these gorgeous foccaci farcita sandwiches, with cured speck ham, provolone, and arugula on fresh focaccia bread, and I thought “One of those would be awe-inspiring eaten cold in my hotel room the next morning!” Maybe because I got to Eataly relatively late in the day, they charged me a much lower price for the to-go sandwich than what you see pictured, more like the price of an individual slice of pizza.

Here’s an extreme close-up of the lovely sandwich. Speck is very similar to prosciutto. I could tell they brushed some olive oil on the bread, but I thought a tangy vinaigrette of some kind would have really put it over the top. (But I think about that with most sandwiches.)

And to go with my beautiful Italian breakfast, I found an Italian brand of potato chips, San Carlo la Vita e Buona, with a flavor that was too interesting to turn down: mint and chili pepper! If I recall, this bag was under $3. Since I love trying new potato chip flavors and reviewing them in this very blog, I felt obligated. I did it for YOU, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos!

San Carlo was a bit stingy with the flavoring, a marked contrast against many American chip manufacturers that really cake it on there, but they tasted very fresh and potatoey, and the mint subtly shined through. They were barely spicy at all.

I also brought home a salami from the cured meat counter that sounded amazing (elk, pork, and dried blueberries?!), but it wasn’t worth the price I paid. I would have loved to try so many more things at Eataly, but again, I was limited by what I could safely store in my hotel room and bring back in a carry-on bag, with TSA’s continuing rules banning liquids. That said, if you ever find yourself in a city grand and lucky enough to have its own Eataly location, I implore you to make that pilgrimage and try it for yourself. You will be tempted by all sorts of treasures, and it is just a pleasure to wander around and explore, treat yourself in one of the many restaurants, and bring back mouthwatering mementos, succulent souvenirs, and tasty trophies from your travels.

Alessi Bakery (Tampa)

Alessi Bakery (https://www.alessibakery.com/) first opened in Tampa in 1912. That is older than any bakeries in Orlando, by several decades. Founded by Italian immigration Nicolo Alessi, it is now run by the fourth generation of the Alessi family: Phil Alessi, Jr., who expanded the bakery and started a huge catering side to the business. I think stories like that are beautiful, and I love supporting family-owned restaurants and businesses, especially with that much history behind them. Orlando locals might have even tried Alessi’s baked goods without knowing it, because they make all the king cakes that Publix sells around Mardi Gras, at least here in the Orlando area.

I first discovered Alessi Bakery on a brief Tampa trip in 2017 and fell in love. You can get overwhelmed browsing the gorgeous cakes, cookies, pastries, pies, cupcakes, breads, sandwiches, snacks, and prepared foods in the glass cases. There is even a dining room for you to enjoy things right there, rather than packing everything up to go.

Here is an assortment of coconut macaroons, rugelach cookies filled with fruit preserves, and beautiful danish pastries I brought over to a gathering of Tampa friends back in March, our first time hanging out post-pandemic:

I also brought over four beautiful sfogliatelle pastries, an Italian bakery classic sometimes called “lobster tails.” Light and crispy and flaky, these shell-shaped beauties are dusted with powdered sugar and filled with a slightly lemony custard:

And here is an assortment of Italian tea cookies I brought home for my wife after that March visit. She loves these little dudes. I remember cookies like this from small, mom-and-pop Miami bakeries from my childhood in the ’80s. My mom always loved cookies like this too.

This is another assortment of goodies I brought home: pound cake, New York crumb cake, zucchini bread, and multicolored birthday cake. The pound cake slice at the top was by far the biggest hit.

Remembering this, we got two more wrapped slices of the pound cake on our June trip today:

I couldn’t remember what this thing was, but one of my good friends (who is also an Alessi fan, after I introduced him and his family to it) told me it is crème brûlée bread pudding. He said it is his favorite dessert from here. I’m sure I liked it too, because come on, look at it!

In addition to all the pastries and sweets, another Alessi Bakery specialty is scachatta, a kind of bread that looks like pizza and smells like pizza, but brother, it ain’t pizza. It is a soft, yellow, egg-based flatbread (kind of like focaccia, but softer), covered with a slightly sweet tomato sauce full of very finely ground beef, but no cheese except for a light sprinkling of parmesan. It is then cut into squares or rectangular slices and served at room temperature. If this sounds weird, I cannot disagree with you, but it’s a thing, and it’s so much better than it sounds or even looks. Saveur wrote a neat article about scachatta, and so did pizza blog Slice.

This is a half-sheet ($19) that I bought to share with my friends when I caught up with them back in March. Everyone really liked it.

When I returned to Alessi in June, I had to do one of my Saboscrivnerrific “Dare to Compare” experiments with the Alessi Bakery scachatta and the scachatta from Tampa’s other legendary Cuban bakery, La Segunda Central Bakery, which was founded three years later, in 1915. I reviewed La Segunda back in October 2018 and tried the scachatta then, but for the sake of good food writing, I dragged my poor, patient wife to both bakeries back-to-back today and got a few items at La Segunda too. The sacrifices I make for the stalwart Saboscrivnerinos out there!

Here is a photo I took back at home earlier today, with a small slice from a quarter-sheet of Alessi’s scachatta ($11) on the left, and a single slice of La Segunda’s scachatta ($2.29) on the right:
I love Alessi’s scachatta, really and truly. But I have to give a slight edge to La Segunda here! Their version was more savory and less sweet, and it had more flavor, perhaps due to the visible green pepper chunks in the sauce. But I’d order either again, any time.

The only place to order anything remotely similar to scachatta in Orlando is at my favorite Italian restaurant, Tornatore’s — or to be more accurate, at their Italian market next door. They serve an upstate New York delicacy called… STEAMED HAMS! No, no, sorry, I kid. Tornatore’s serves tomato pie — another soft flatbread spread with tomato paste and served at room temperature or chilled, but no cheese to put it into pizza territory. It’s interesting how different regions came up with their own pizza-adjacent specialties.

Anyway, here is another delicious treat I’ve only ever found in Tampa: devil crab, a crispy croquette full of shredded, seasoned, savory crabmeat, coated in Cuban bread crumbs and deep-fried. I had my first devil crab on my first-ever trip to Alessi in 2017, introduced a pescatarian pal to them back in 2018, and ordered two to share with my wife before our drive home from Orlando today:

In case you’ve never had a devil crab yourself, here’s an interior shot, to show it bursting with tender crab that melts in your mouth.

Since we were sitting down to eat in Alessi’s dining room, I decided to try their macaroni and potato salads ($2.50 each). I might not have bothered to drive back to Orlando with those mayo-based salads, with a 90-minute drive ahead (that ended up taking over two hours due to terrible traffic in the middle of a Saturday), but I’m so glad I treated myself to them. This was one of the two best macaroni salads I’ve ever had in my life. IN. MY. LIFE. (The other is from Poke Hana, my favorite poke spot right here in Orlando.)

Both Alessi Bakery and La Segunda Bakery prepare fabulous sandwiches on fresh-baked bread, including Cuban sandwiches, yet another Tampa specialty, always served on Cuban bread and pressed in a plancha. Yes, Miami people, I know Cuban sandwiches are a major Miami thing too. I’m from down there, and I grew up eating them. But Tampa did them first, due to an earlier Cuban population working in the cigar factories of Ybor City alongside Italian, Spanish, and German immigrants. That’s how the original Cuban sandwich (called the “mixto” at the time) was born: a combination of Cuban roast pork marinated in sour orange juice, garlic, and herbs, Spanish sweet cured ham, Italian Genoa salami, and German mustard and pickles. (The salami is a Tampa thing, specifically — Miami people are always outraged by it, except this Miami person.)

This is the hand-carved Cuban sandwich I brought home on my trip to Alessi back in March, with really thick slices of roast pork and ham. It was good, but almost seemed like a little much. I’m guessing this was the 12″ sandwich ($13.95).

On my June trip with my wife, I brought home the regular Cuban sandwich (a 9″ for $8.95, which is me showing unusual restraint), and I thought it was a lot better than the hand-carved version. The pressed Cuban bread was less well-done, and the meats had a better texture with their thinner slices. It was so much more pleasant to sink my teeth into, literally and figuratively. Even eating it at room temperature, standing up in my kitchen immediately after driving back from Tampa, it was an excellent Cubano.

One thing to note about both Alessi Bakery’s hand-carved and regular Cuban sandwiches: they come with both yellow mustard and mayo, which was fine with me. Some Cubanos are too dry, even with high-quality ingredients, and I think the mayo makes a fine sandwich lubricant here. Also, even though the menu says they contain Genoa salami (Tampa’s gonna Tampa), neither of these Cubanos, ordered on two separate trips three months apart, had any. (The Miami people are breathing a sigh of relief here, but I was looking forward to having a little salami, as a treat.)

I also brought this Italian sub ($11.95) home from my March trip to Alessi, and it was top-notch as well. Thrill to the sight of Genoa salami (nobody can argue it doesn’t belong in an Italian sandwich), ham, spicy capicola, provolone cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, awesome hot pepper relish, oil, and vinegar on nice, soft, fresh-baked Italian bread.

Backtracking to Alessi’s Cuban bread, I brought this loaf over when I visited my Tampa friends in March, and everyone ripped into it with gusto. The Cuban bread they sell at Publix cannot compare. It doesn’t even come close. I don’t think any Cuban bread I’ve tried in Orlando does, and I’ve been gone from Miami for far too long.

Once again, I wanted to DARE TO COMPARE Alessi’s Cuban bread to La Segunda’s, so during this busy morning of bakery-hopping, I bought a THREE-FOOT-LONG loaf of fresh La Segunda Cuban bread (left; a real attention-getter!), a new 18″ loaf of Alessi Cuban bread (center), and some buttered Cuban toast from La Segunda (right) for my wife, since she loved it so much on our 2018 visit when I reviewed it. As you can see, La Segunda’s bread is double the length (and also thinner and softer), and Alessi’s is thicker and has more of a crackly outer crust. By the way, that is a six-inch Cobra Commander action figure from the G.I. Joe Classified toy line, for scale. COBRAAAAAA! RETREAT AND EAT!

Boy, that’s a lot of Cuban bread, you may be thinking, and you would be right. I already know both Alessi and La Segunda are famous for their Cuban bread for good reason, and I have already enjoyed it in plenty of their sandwiches. I will be making several sandwiches of my own in the week ahead, and because of some other ingredients I’ll be using, you will read all about them on The Saboscrivner in the next week or two!

In the meantime, if you are ever in or near Tampa, I’d say Alessi Bakery is definitely worth a special trip. You can feel four generations of history and love in everything you eat there. That’s a rare thing in today’s world, especially when so many experiences and sensations are fleeting and ephemeral. Oh yeah, I almost forgot — the fresh lemonade is exceptional as well, especially today, driving home in temperatures over 100 degrees that felt like walking through warm Jell-O between the bakery and our little car. If you go, don’t miss that lemonade, on top of all these other treasures!

Kohinoor Indian Restaurant

Kohinoor Indian Restaurant (https://www.kohinoorfl.com/) in Altamonte Springs is the first Indian restaurant I ever tried in Orlando, back when I had only ever had Indian food a few times in my life. I was newly dating my wife, and I met one of her good friends for lunch there to ask her advice for some gifts to buy her — I forget if it was for our first Christmas or first Valentine’s Day together. The food was really good, but for whatever reason, I never made it back there. Not until recently, when after almost 13 years of marriage, I embarked on a quest to get my wife into Indian food.

You see, my wife loved the “butter chicken tikka masala” at Cafe Tu Tu Tango, where we celebrated her birthday earlier this year. After that, it became my mission to introduce her to more delicious Indian food, and to discern the difference between butter chicken and chicken tikka masala, two similar dishes that share a lot of ingredients, but are ultimately different.

This is Kohinoor’s version of butter chicken, also known as chicken makhani ($18), boneless cubes of chicken tikka cooked in a “tomato-based creamy sauce.” She loved it! I tried it and liked it too, but I was thrilled that I was finally getting her on board with Indian food. That creamy, rich, almost velvety sauce is a perfect gateway dish for anyone a little skeptical or squeamish about trying Indian food. (See also: a lot of people’s parents.)

Rather than be redundant and also order chicken tikka masala, we switched it up and ordered the bot kabab (lamb) masala ($19), so we could both compare and contrast the butter/makhani and masala sauces. The menu described this one as “cubes of lamb cooked in a creamy butter sauce with onions, spices, and bell peppers.” Yes, I get that they look the same, for all intents and purposes. I know the ingredients are similar too, but I wanted her to sample both dishes, to see if one stood out as her favorite. She liked the butter chicken better, so I was more than happy to eat the majority of this lamb masala.

This was another dish my wife chose: saag paneer ($14): “freshly chopped spinach and homemade cheese cooked in a mild sauce.” She said she had tried this dish once or twice a long time ago, before I was in the picture, and liked it back then. I was so proud of her for branching out and giving Indian food another chance with me. It was also delicious, as if you couldn’t already guess.

Back home, dishin’ it out! I always appreciate restaurants that serve takeout food in plastic trays with removable lids that are microwave-safe, dishwasher-safe, and recyclable. As you can probably guess, I keep a bunch of them, but the crown jewels of my takeout container collection are two round, segmented plates with lids, molded with perfect little compartments that I think came from a long-gone restaurant called Stonewood. They were ideal for portioning out our huge lunch, especially so my wife could try everything without different dishes touching each other. The butter chicken, bot kabab masala, and saag paneer all came with basmati rice, so I served up sample portions of all three over rice for her. But wait — where did that samosa come from?

I couldn’t resist the allure of the Kohinoor Special Appetizer platter ($14), which includes two potato-filled samosas (the large, triangular pastries with their crispy, flaky crusts), vegetable fritters called pakoras, aloo (potato) pakoras, chicken pakoras, chicken tikka (the orangey-red meat on the right, coated in a blend of yogurt and spices), and seekh kabaab (the most delicious sausages, on top). It is safe to say I liked all of these more than she did, but you have to try new things! That’s what keeps life — and marriage — interesting.

I always order soft naan bread ($3.50) at any Indian restaurants, to sop up all those incredible sauces. This is typical Indian flatbread made from refined flour and baked in a tandoor, a clay oven. I’m sure most of my readers know exactly what it is, so I apologize for naansplaining.

I decided to try the roti ($3.50) as well, which the menu described as whole wheat bread baked in a clay oven. Now I am used to the Malaysian-style roti from Hawkers Asian Street Fare (which is called a paratha elsewhere), as well as the two kinds of huge, fluffy roti from West Indian restaurants Singh’s Roti Shop and Vindi’s Roti Shop: the dhal puri and “buss-up shot.” This roti wasn’t much like either of them — it was more like an oily, lightly fried version of the naan.

We got one little ramekin of sweet, tangy tamarind chutney and another ramekin of spicy tomato and onion chutney. Once again, my wife impressed me by trying and liking the tamarind chutney, and she usually isn’t into condiments and sauces at all. I was so proud of her for trying new things, and overjoyed that she liked almost everything. But she’s not a fan of tomatoes or onions, so she wisely avoided the other chutney.

So Kohinoor was a hit! I am thrilled that the person I love the most in the world has come around on a cuisine that I’m still relatively inexperienced with myself. Lately I’ve been obsessed with Indian food, trying new dishes and ranking different restaurants’ versions of my tried-and-true favorites. This isn’t our only recent Indian meal, so I promise more reviews to come over the next few weeks and months.

Ming’s Bistro

I recently met a friend at the Chinese restaurant Ming’s Bistro (https://www.mingsbistro.net/), in the heart of Orlando’s Mills 50 district, full of Asian restaurants, markets, and shops centered around the busy intersection of East Colonial Drive and Mills Avenue, near downtown Orlando. This was our first time at Ming’s Bistro, but we had both heard for years that it specialized in dim sum, and that’s what lured us out there — better late than never.

What is dim sum, you ask? It’s a Cantonese tradition that started in teahouses that served little snacks with the tea, now most commonly served as brunch (yum cha). A lot of restaurants push carts around the dining room, allowing diners to point and grab what they want, while other places have you check off your choices on a paper menu, like how some sushi restaurants do it. Ming’s Bistro mostly does it the latter method, with an illustrated menu to give you ideas and a paper menu you check off next to each item. The prices are listed, which helps, since you can get in some real trouble grabbing too many dishes off the rolling carts. But they push some carts around too, and we picked a few random things that came by our table, just because they looked good. And just to clarify, Ming’s also offers a whole regular menu of Chinese food to choose from, in addition to the dim sum menu. So all your usual favorites are probably available here, too.

Ming’s opens at 10:45 AM (every day except Thursdays, when it is closed), and I was there right when it opened to grab a table. We didn’t have to wait at all, and it was slammed by the time we left, a little after noon. I have written many times that I’m not a brunch person, but dim sum is a unique brunch experience, where you ideally go with a group, hang out for a long time, order a bunch of small plates, and share everything, including good times. Even though it was only two of us, we shared nine different dim sum items, and we chose wisely. There wasn’t a dud in the whole bunch!

We started out with an order of steamed roast pork buns (top; $4.50) and an order of baked pineapple buns (bottom). The roast pork buns are a dim sum classic for good reason. For the uninitiated, the steamed buns are kind of like soft, bready rolls, and the pork inside is in a red sauce, savory but also slightly sweet.I love pineapple anything, and these baked pineapple buns were a subtly sweet treat that would have been ideal as a dessert, but they came out early, so we enjoyed them early in the meal. I was expecting something more like sticky pineapple preserves in the centers, but it was creamier than I thought. Still good, though.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Two sharp-eyed Saboscrivnerinos confirmed my suspicion that dim sum pineapple buns don’t contain any pineapple, but get their name from the crackly crust. I still liked them, but thought it was odd they were generically sweet without any obvious pineapple!

We didn’t even order these, but a nice lady wheeled a cart next to our table, loaded up with several dim sum dishes already on plates, and asked if we wanted any. These looked like jalapeño peppers stuffed with something, which is all good with me, so we went for it. It turned out to be a shrimp filling, but the shrimp was processed into a soft, savory paste, and the peppers were lightly roasted. I make similar roasted jalapeños once or twice a year, stuffed with light cream cheese and sometimes topped with bacon, chorizo, or prosciutto. They are a delicious, keto-friendly snack, and these were equally delicious. I’m not sure what the sauce on top was, but it added to the experience of flavors and textures without overpowering the shrimp or the peppers. They weren’t very spicy at all, so don’t worry about that if you’re the type who sweats when the heat is on.

These are pan-fried pork pot stickers ($5.50), which had a wonderful crispy shell and a strong ginger flavor inside. I always appreciate pot stickers, but my friend liked these even more than I did, so I only had one.

Another foodie friend introduced me to rice paste dim sum during a feast at another great local Chinese restaurant, Peter’s Kitchen, a few years ago. I probably never would have tried them on my own, but now I recommend them to everyone else. This is beef rice paste ($4.75), where the rice paste itself is kind of a slippery, chewy crepe wrapped around a filling — almost like a thicker and more slippery manicotti pasta. I’m not a fan of things that are too chewy and starchy, like certain bao buns and Jamaican boiled dumplings, but these are terrific, especially swimming in the soy-based sauce. It’s a challenge to keep them from sliding out of your chopsticks, but we both persevered like the functional adults we are!

We also randomly picked these off a later cart that came by our table. Some kind of fried dumplings that are both crispy and chewy. I think they are crispy taro dumplings ($4.75), and they were yet another pleasant surprise.

Here’s a cross-section of one of them. They were stuffed with shrimp and green vegetables, and we joked that these were the healthiest part of our dim sum brunch, despite obviously being fried.
EDITOR’S NOTE: A sharp-eyed Saboscrivnerino informed me these might have been pan-fried chive dumplings ($5.50).

I always like beef short ribs — I rank them up there near oxtails on a list of favorite meats. This was beef short ribs with black pepper ($5.80), which I enthusiastically ordered, despite not knowing exactly what to expect. It was great. It was a relatively small portion, like so many of these diverse dishes, but still plenty for two people to share. The short ribs came chopped into tiny chunks of rich, succulent, moist, fatty meat, braised until they were very soft and easy to pull off the shards of bone. They were extremely flavorful and easier to eat than I expected. I wished I had saved some of the doughier buns and dumplings to dip into the short ribs’ sauce.

I ordered us the pan-fried sticky rice ($5.50) because the couple at the table next to us got it, and it looked good. That was another pro move on my part. It was sticky and savory, with maybe the tiniest bit of subtle sweetness you get from Chinese five-spice powder, a blend of Chinese cinnamon, fennel seed, star anise, cloves, and peppercorns (or sometimes ginger). It also would have been good to soak up some of the short rib sauce, but the rice was so flavorful, we ate it on its own.

The last dim sum dish we ordered was another winner: fried meat dumplings ($4.75). I can’t tell you if the meat was beef or pork, or maybe a combination of both, or something else entirely. It was ground, spiced (but not spicy), and saucy, and served in these awesome dumplings that reminded me of Indian batura, Native American fry bread, hand pies, lightly fried empanadas, or even funnel cakes at a fair. That perfect flaky dough that is lightly crispy but mostly soft, that leaves your fingers greasy and your soul happy.

Like I said, not a bad dish in the bunch. It was a great meal, and while we probably could have done more damage, it was the perfect amount of food for two people, with some leftovers at the end. I’m guessing most of my readers are already familiar with the joy of a communal dim sum brunch, and many know the wonders of Ming’s Bistro. But if you don’t know, now you know! I hated crowds and lines long before there was a pandemic, so in addition to recommending all these delicious dishes we tried, I also strongly suggest getting to Ming’s early — ideally in that golden half hour between 10:45 and 11:15 AM — to beat the lunch rush and avoid having to wait.

Pom Pom’s Sandwiches

EDIT: In December 2025, Pom Pom’s founder Pom Moongauklang announced that she is no longer involved with the current Pom Pom’s Sandwiches location in Sanford. If she is disavowing the new restaurant that bears her brand after a few months, I will too.

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EDIT: Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria is reborn as Pom Pom’s Sandwiches! It reopened in a new location, the Henry’s Depot food hall in Sanford, in June 2025.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: After 15 wonderful years of being one of Orlando’s most beloved homegrown eateries, Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria closed its doors permanently on October 4, 2024.

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Way back in December 2005, chef-owner Pom Moongauklang founded Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria (http://pompomsteahouse.com/), located in Orlando’s Milk District neighborhood, not too far from downtown Orlando. Pom studied as a pastry chef, and she cooked in several trendy and high-end New York City restaurants (including the famous Nobu and also an infamous BDSM-themed French restaurant that no longer exists, but sounds fascinating) before striking out on her own here in Orlando, serving up some of the city’s most creative sandwiches and eclectic tea drinks for over 15 years. That was about a year after I first moved to Orlando, and right when I was changing careers and going back to school. Things seemed really hopeful at the time, and all food tasted better to me. I remember Pom Pom’s being one of our first really hip and cool locally owned restaurants. For me, it was love at first sight… and first bite.

The restaurant is a hip, funky space, full of artwork by local artists that is rotated regularly. All the art is displayed on consignment, so if you fall in love with a piece of artwork, you can buy it. Pom Pom’s is open until 4 AM on Fridays and Saturdays, making it an oasis for hungry and restless partiers, back when it was safe to be out partying. In addition to the sandwiches, salads, and tea drinks, there is also a breakfast menu, only available Friday night through noon on Saturday, and then Saturday night through 4 PM on Sunday.

On a visit a while back, the special tea (heh, “specialty”) of the day was strawberry-kiwi, so I impulsively ordered an iced version for $3. I’m not a big tea drinker, although I sometimes appreciate a good, strong, sweet Southern-style iced tea. I am not into hot beverages at all, but you can order any of Pom Pom’s teas hot or iced. The strawberry-kiwi was sweet, but not overly sweet, and very refreshing. I was glad that it tasted like real fruit juice, not artificial or chemically. I’m not a big tea drinker in general, but I’ve had the chocolate cream tea there before, and that’s always really good.

One one particular visit, I ordered two sandwiches, just so I could write a more comprehensive review here. I’ve been going to Pom Pom’s since shortly after Pom opened the place, and I have my favorites, so I decided to choose an old favorite and try something new too. This was my old favorite, the Woody ($9.95), with hot pastrami, Swiss cheese, honey mustard, Thousand Island dressing, Southern slaw, and red onion on pressed pumpernickel bread. I always love pastrami, and the pumpernickel goes so well with it. (You can choose sourdough, whole wheat, or rye with caraway seeds as the other bread options.) All the sandwiches at Pom Pom’s are pressed, so they’re served hot. Especially with the Woody, you get the crispiness of the pressed bread and the melty, crunchy, meaty, creaminess of all the other ingredients, warm and sliding around.

This was the new sandwich I hadn’t tried before, the Billy Chang (also $9.95). It sounded a little weird, but just weird enough to work: sliced smoked beef brisket, blue cheese, red onion, and strawberry jelly, and I got it on pressed sourdough bread. This sandwich had everything: salty, smoky, pungent, sweet, funky, crispy.
I love savory and sweet flavors together, but I think the smoky brisket and sweet jelly would have worked together with something spicy uniting them, like a pepper jelly instead. I would have also preferred goat cheese or cream cheese to the crumbly and funky blue cheese, and it also would have made for a more cohesive sandwich that held together better. But those are my own personal hang-ups, not meant to take away from the sandwich at all. There was a lot going on, flavor-wise, and it was also the messiest sandwich I’ve ever eaten, on one of the very rare days I ate lunch in my office at work. It had already soaked through the paper wrapping by the time I got it back to my desk, and eating the half I tackled at work was a multiple-paper towel job. Would I get it again? I don’t think so, not that it was bad! There are just so many other sandwiches at Pom Pom’s I either like more, or that I still have yet to try.

On a more recent visit, I got my old favorite sandwich, the smoked salmon ($11.25), with thin-sliced nova salmon, bacon, cream cheese, cheddar cheese, arugula, tomato, and and lemon caper aioli. This is an intense rush of strong, smoky flavors, and I just love it. I ordered it on pumpernickel and it came on sourdough, but I couldn’t complain because it was still awesome.

On my previous visit, I tried the daily special sandwich, a spicy mac tuna melt. I grew up eating tuna salad sandwiches, but never buy canned tuna anymore, and rarely order it out anywhere. Pom’s regular melt includes capers, celery, red onions, lemon zest, and your choice of a domestic cheese, which sounds good on its own. But I loooooove the macaroni and cheese here (more on that shortly), and I figured adding it to any sandwich would take it to another level — like hipster tuna noodle casserole, only a thousand times better. I didn’t think the combination would disappoint, and it definitely did not.

Putting their delicious macaroni and cheese in a sandwich is a recurring theme at Pom Pom’s, because here is a special from this very weekend, the Chez G, with spicy crumbled chorizo sausage and mac and cheese on sourdough. I took this one home, so the bread wasn’t crispy anymore, but it was still really good.

Pom Pom’s offers a few sides, including my absolute #1 favorite macaroni and cheese in Orlando, the spicy turkey mac and cheese (on the right; $2.25), with cheddar cheese, diced tomatoes, scallions, and that most overrated of hot sauces that nevertheless works so perfectly here, sriracha. There are always nice cubes of tender turkey in it too. When I make mac and cheese at home, this is the consistency I aim for — not a liquidy, cheesy soup, and not barely-melted cheese shreds that look like they came straight out of a bag. It’s the ideal “middle way.” Melty, not soupy, not greasy, not dry. I love it, and I would happily eat a much larger portion of it. On the left, you can see Pom Pom’s German potato salad ($2.25), which is different from most American-style potato salads, which are usually mixed up with mayo and served cold. This potato salad is served warm with crumbled bacon, scallions, and vinegar, and it’s so, so good if you’ve never had it before. I love potato salad. In fact, it’s probably my second-favorite thing to do with potatoes, after chips, and just edging out fries. That’s my spicy hot take on potato salad, that underrated side order. And as much as I love the mayo-based varieties (especially Southern-style potato salad with chopped hard-boiled eggs, pickles, and yellow mustard added), German potato salad is a nice change of pace, especially as a rich side dish in the fall and winter.

Pom Pom’s also has soups of the day that I rarely order, but I’m usually happy with the ones I try. Waaaaay back in December 2020, Pom had cooked up a pot of dark chocolate duck chili, and there was no way I was going to miss that. They were selling it by the cup for $5 or by the bowl for $7. I ordered a bowl for myself and a cup to bring home to my wife, who doesn’t like my chili at all, but sometimes surprises me by liking professional chefs’ better versions of chili. Both were served in coffee cups as part of my takeout order, and mine was topped with scallions and smoked gouda cheese. It was a rich, hearty chili with at least two different kinds of beans and plenty of shredded, stewed duck.

You can get a better view of everything here, after I caused a stir. It was quacktacular!

When I returned today, I tried Pom’s beef lasagna soup, which sounded perfect on a cooler day leading into a very cold night. It was a savory tomato broth with crumbled, seasoned ground beef, lasagna noodle sheets cut into squares, floating pools of melted mozzarella cheese, lots of garlic, and a surprising amount of chunks of zucchini and yellow squash.

So this is a review after at least three separate visits to Pom Pom’s Teahouse and Sandwicheria, even though I’ve lost count of the many times I’ve been here over the past 16 years. Follow Pom Pom’s Instagram page for daily specials, and time your visit so you can try something new that may never be seen again. But the old classics stick around for a reason — because they are loved and treasured throughout Orlando.

Banh Mi Boy

Banh Mi Boy (https://www.facebook.com/banhmiboyorlando) is a counter in the back of Tien Hung Market Oriental Foods, a Vietnamese grocery store in Orlando’s Mills 50 district, at 1112 E Colonial Drive, Orlando, FL 32803 (directly southeast of the major intersection of Colonial and Mills Avenue. There is no shortage of places to get delicious banh mi, French-inspired Vietnamese sub sandwiches on crusty baguettes, in the Mills 50 district, but I had been hearing good things about this place for a while. As much as I love Paris Banh Mi Cafe Bakery and always sing its praises to anyone who asks (and plenty who don’t), I also love branching out and trying new restaurants to discover different takes on favorite foods or brand-new favorites.

You may notice immediately that the Banh Mi Boy Facebook page I linked to above doesn’t include any information, or even a menu, so I took the liberty of photographing the menu above the counter. Make sure you right-click both photos and open them in a new tab for larger images.

On my first visit, I bought two sandwiches. For $6.99 each, you can’t go wrong. They aren’t exactly foot-longs, but they are substantial enough (no pun intended) to get two meals out of one sandwich — although I usually eat a whole banh mi in one sitting. The top one is the #1 Tien Hung Special (banh mi đặc biệt), usually the “special combination” with a variety of cured meats: pork roll, pork belly, head cheese, and pate (I’m assuming; I could be missing one or be wrong on one of the others). If you’ve never had a banh mi before, this is the one I’d recommend, for the most interesting blend of flavors, textures, and colors. The meats may be unfamiliar to American diners, but if you like deli meats and cold cuts, these really aren’t that different from various hams, salamis, bolognas, and other porky cured delicacies.The bottom one is the #3, cured pork belly, which was also really good. You can see how they both come dressed with sliced fresh cucumbers and jalapeño peppers, fresh cilantro, and pickled shredded carrot and daikon radish, making everything taste very cool, refreshing, and crunchy. What you can’t see are the smears of creamy mayo (or possibly even butter?) that lubricate the inner baguette surfaces, plus the rich, savory pate (think liverwurst, but better). I would definitely order both in the future.

Well, I might not have returned so soon, but I forgot to photograph the menu on my first visit, and since there are no menus online, I wanted this review to be useful. And as long as I was there, I decided to get two more banh mi sandwiches for two more meals!

This was the #8, the fried fish roll. It contained slices of a processed cold cut made of fish, almost like a fish bologna. It didn’t smell or taste overwhelmingly fishy in a bad way, and had an interesting chewy texture that I didn’t expect, but liked. But then again, I’ve made no secret on this blog of my love of cured, smoked, pickled, and processed seafood.

And this was the #14, the pate banh mi. Pate is usually my favorite ingredient on just about any banh mi, but I rarely see it offered alone. I figured that if I like the pate so much, why not finally try a sandwich with just that? Honestly, I was hoping for a lot more pate because the usual meats on the đặc biệt weren’t there to accompany it, but it wasn’t spread on very thick. It still tasted good — that rich, almost livery taste that I appreciate.

So yeah, that’s Banh Mi Boy. They offer some other prepared Vietnamese snacks and foods that are unfamiliar to me — things I have yet to try — but when you go to a sandwich place, you probably want to try the sandwiches. I know I do. Like I said, I liked it enough to go two times, relatively close together, and I would definitely return again. Tien Hung Market Oriental Foods may not be Orlando’s nicest or more inviting Asian market (that would be Lotte Plaza Market on West Colonial Drive and John Young Parkway, which has an entire food court), but it’s worth a visit to try some of the great banh mi sandwiches here. And I’m always a fan of restaurants “hidden” inside other businesses, from grocery stores to convenience stores, office buildings to bowling alleys.

Christner’s Prime Steak and Lobster

I’m not usually a big steakhouse person, but if you ask me, Orlando’s best steakhouse is Christner’s Prime Steak and Lobster (https://christnersprimesteakandlobster.com/ ), located at 729 Lee Rd, Orlando, Florida, 32810. Christner’s is very old-school and classy, with impeccable service and prices to match, but you get what you pay for at a place like this. When I was still just dating my wife, her parents took us all out to Christner’s, and I must admit I had never been to a restaurant like this before. I got sticker-shock from the prices, even though her generous father, a stand-up guy, treated us all. But the steak was the finest I’ve ever had in my life — even better than the steak at the vaunted Bern’s in Tampa — and the sides were all top-notch as well.

Well, we’ve returned to Christner’s a few times in the intervening years, but we’ve canceled just about as many reservations just due to a lot of bad luck — someone always getting sick or injured right around the time of an anniversary, a birthday, or some other event worth celebrating. This year we decided to treat ourselves. Our anniversary and my in-laws’ anniversary are a day apart, so a while back, we finally returned to Christner’s for the first time in quite a few years, and everyone was healthy and safe and somehow stayed healthy and safe. It was a lovely night out with three of the best people in the world, and we ate like kings.

I have made no secret of my love for oysters on this blog, and Christner’s has the absolute best fried oysters I’ve ever had. Seriously, I’ve never had anything this good. They would make a fine, filling meal in and of themselves, even if we didn’t get steaks. This sharable appetizer portion comes with tartar sauce, which is really good, and cocktail sauce, which I didn’t even bother with. But the oysters are so plump and well-seasoned, and the breading is so perfectly crispy, that they didn’t need either.

My mother-in-law ordered lobster bisque, and she was willing to share. I just got a spoonful, but wow, was it good. Lobster bisque is an all-time Top Five soup, even if it’s hard to make it look exciting in a photo. Was this the best bisque? Best believe it’s the baddest bisque, bro!

My father-in-law ordered a Caesar salad. I didn’t ask to try any of it, but those croutons looked pretty fantastic.

The croutons are probably made from the fresh-baked bread that is delivered to your table with soft, spreadable butter as soon as your party sits down. The photo I got of the bread didn’t look nearly as good as it actually is, so I left it out of this review. It is a round loaf you have to cut yourself, but it is so soft and fluffy and warm, and I challenge anyone to try it and not like it.

My in-laws aren’t used to me always playing the food photographer, so I didn’t get a chance to take pictures of everyone’s main courses. I did capture mine, though — Russ’ USDA Prime strip, a twelve-ounce steak seasoned with a nice amount of cracked pepper and cooked to a perfect rare, just like I like it. I regret not taking a photo of the red center, which meat lovers would salivate over. That would have been pure “food porn,” though. This steak is one of the cheaper ones on the menu, and I still get sticker-shock after all these years, even when someone else is generous enough to treat. But of course, at Christner’s, even the cheapest steak is relative. But that’s not all! I usually choose it because it is one of the only steaks that comes with a side item; almost all the rest come a la carte. Russ’ USDA Prime strip is accompanied by the richest, creamiest, most buttery chateau potatoes, which are just very posh mashed potatoes. Best mashed potatoes ever, though!

We also ordered the skillet potatoes and onions for everyone to share. This is one of the best potato dishes I’ve ever eaten in my life. Sliced thin and fried, these aren’t crispy-crunchy like potato chips, but more like thin, disc-shaped steak fries, seasoned with lots of good cracked pepper. As a notorious onion fan, the onions are practically caramelized and so, so perfect. Everyone loves the skillet potatoes and onions, even my onion-averse wife!

And speaking of onions, I finally got to try Christner’s legendary onion rings, which I had only stared at longingly on our previous (rare) visits. I always hesitate to request extra stuff when someone else is being generous enough to treat, but onion rings are kind of my thing. I even have a whole category on this blog called RING THE ALARM! (no air horn sound effects this time, because this is a very upscale restaurant), so here are Christner’s huge, thick, mountainous onion rings, at long last. At least my father-in-law tried some, which made me feel less guilty for asking, and even my wife (yes, the onion-averse wife again!) tried one and really liked it. You can get these rapturous rings in orders of five or nine, and I was glad everyone was okay with getting nine. These were definitely opulent, ostentatious onion rings!

Everyone enjoyed their dinners, but we all ended up with plenty of leftovers to box up and enjoy the next day. By now, we knew enough to save room for one of the most delicious, decadent desserts I’ve ever encountered: mandarin orange cake. My photo doesn’t communicate the size of the slices nearly well enough, but each one is gigantic. The icing is a “tropical pineapple-orange whipped cream icing,” and the cake is always moist and rich, with a subtle citrusy tang. It is served a la mode with a nice scoop of vanilla ice cream (quality stuff) and a little ramekin of chilled orange sauce that might be my favorite part, because it tastes like melted orange sherbet with chunks of actual orange in it. I always pour it over the ice cream and eat it first, because I’m usually pretty full at this point.
Fruity desserts are my absolute favorites, especially anything with citrus or tropical fruit. I believe Christner’s mandarin orange cake is an all-time favorite restaurant dessert anywhere, and you can easily get two or three servings out of each stupendous slice of cake.

Well, after not doing anything at all last year due to the pandemic, this year my wife and her parents were (relatively) healthy and fully vaccinated, so it was so nice to celebrate our back-to-back anniversaries with this sumptuous feast at Christner’s. Everything felt normal for a little while, and everyone left very full, satisfied, and happy. I think all the time about how lucky I am to be married to such an amazing woman, and to have amazing in-laws too, who I love and get along with, and vice versa. I know not everyone has that privilege and good fortune. And to be able to enjoy a fancy meal like this at a fancy restaurant like Christner’s speaks to our privilege and good fortune too. We rarely come here — only every few years — but each time we do, we are all reminded of how consistently excellent it is, and how lucky we are.