Category: Fried stuff

Red Rooster Overtown (Miami)

This past weekend, I visited Miami, the city where I grew up but never felt at home, for the first time in a year and a half.  I caught up with my parents and brother, then hung out with my best friend.  We saw the legendary hip hop group De La Soul (my second-favorite hip hop group of all time, after A Tribe Called Quest), performing at a nice concert hall in downtown Miami.  But before that legendary concert, we also ate what turned out to be one of the best meals of my life.

The restaurant was Red Rooster Overtown (https://www.redroosterovertown.com/), one of the many restaurants created by the Ethiopian-born, Swedish-raised celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson, who opened his first Red Rooster location in Harlem.  If you watched the Luke Cage TV series, Harlem’s badass hero for hire Luke Cage took his ladyfriend Claire Temple to eat at the original Red Rooster in season 2, episode 1.  Back when that episode dropped in 2018, I looked it up to confirm it was a real place, checked out the menu, and remembered it when I learned a second location opened in Miami in 2019.  But this was my first chance to dine there, and I’m so glad we did.

By the way, Overtown is a historic Black neighborhood in downtown Miami that has definitely undergone some gentrification in recent years.  The Red Rooster building is literally standing in the shadows of expensive-looking high-rise condos, and we saw a “Museum of Ice Cream” and a Savage X Fenty lingerie boutique nearby.  But make no mistake, this esteemed restaurant celebrates the vibrant history of Overtown and Miami’s cultural and culinary histories.  The décor inside Red Rooster Overtown features artwork and artifacts on display in the beautiful dining room that celebrate and commemorate Black culture, including original covers and pages from different editions of the Green Book, safety guides for Black motorists, framed near the hostess stand.


Right above our table, I dug a gorgeous accordion, a cool old projector, and a reference book about the Black Panthers (not the superhero, but the unfairly vilified political activist organization that did a lot of good in so many underserved communities from the late 1960s to 1982).

Unlike the original Red Rooster in Harlem, which serves “elevated” soul food, Red Rooster Overtown combines soul food with Caribbean flavors, creating a fusion menu that is a perfect microcosm for Miami itself.  Every dish on the menu looked amazing.  I literally wanted to try everything, but my dude and I did try a bunch of stuff on our first (but hopefully not last) visit.  We went to town!

We started with the best deviled eggs I’ve ever had, and I love deviled eggs.  This quartet came sprinkled with Aleppo pepper, used the most in Syrian, Turkish, and Armenian cuisine, and each egg half was garnished with a crispy chicharron, or fried pork skin.  We each got two deviled eggs, and like a good sushi roll, they were best eaten in one bite to ensure we experienced all the flavors and textures (soft and yielding, crunchy and crackly) all at once.

Next up, we shared another appetizer: cassava papas bravas.  Cassava is probably better known as yuca, a starchy root vegetable that is usually boiled or fried, not unlike potatoes, and papas bravas are a Spanish dish with fried potatoes served with really cool stuff on them, like a spicy red sauce.  I’ve tried yuca from countless Cuban and Puerto Rican restaurants, and I must admit I’ve never loved it, especially not when sweet ripe plantains (maduros) or good French fries are available.  But this dish changed my mind and made me realize the heights that a talented chef could reach with the humble yuca.

These were perfectly chewy little orbs with lightly crispy fried exteriors, almost like the love child of gnocchi pasta and tater tots.  They were served with red curry sauce, blistered tomatoes, cotija cheese (a salty, crumbly, dry Mexican cheese similar to feta or parmesan), and lime, so it was a feast of salt, fat, and acid that formed a perfect balance.  They were sublime.  Chef’s kiss, 10/10, no notes.

My buddy ordered the fried yardbird, because he likes fried chicken even more than I do.  It came with three pieces, and I got the leg, which was magnificent.  Juicy, tender, fried to perfection, crispy and well-seasoned breading, not greasy at all.  Better still, it came with chili butter, house pickles, and braised collards, which I was very tempted to order separately until we realized it came with the fried chicken.
The braised collards are made with smoked turkey, and they were so damn fine — no getting funky on the mic for this batch of collard greens!  I always order them whenever I see them on a barbecue or soul food menu, but these were the best greens I’ve ever had.  In fact, “the best _____ I’ve ever had” is a running theme for this review.

I don’t know if I am famous for my love of oxtails, but I do love oxtails, and anyone who knows me knows that.  However, my friend is not a fan, so I opted against trying the Guyanese oxtail pepper pot with sweet plantains, piquillo peppers, and coconut lime rice, even though that seems like a winning combination.  He doesn’t dig on catfish either, so I skipped the Overtown fish fry, with fried catfish, red shrimp, and oxtail fried rice.

But since I have a lot of love for other tender, unctuous, bone-in braised meats, I ordered a new dish that had recently been added to the menu, the smoked jerk short rib, served with butter bean stew and fennel slaw.  These short ribs were served sliced on top of the creamy butter bean stew, with with all the bones removed, and tender enough to cut with a fork.  They were pleasantly spiced, but not spicy.  The fennel “slaw” wasn’t much like any slaw I’ve ever had before — not creamy nor vinegary — but thin, almost shaved shreds of fennel bulb on top of the short rib slices added some crunch and herby-sweet flavor.
We both loved this one.  I must admit it wasn’t the best short rib dish I’ve ever had (that was the Montreal-style smoked short rib dish I had at Abe Fisher, an Ashkenazi Jewish restaurant in Philadelphia that closed about a month after my wife and I ate like kings there in 2023), but it was probably the second-best short rib dish I’ve ever had.

We shared a couple of sides, too.  We know how to party!  The crispy brussels sprouts with shallot vinaigrette, topped with a snow flurry of finely shredded parmigiano reggiano cheese, was a savory, tart, umami adventure.  I’m a sucker for anything with an interesting vinaigrette dressing, so that was a hit.  I wish my brussels sprouts came out that well, but now I just need to experiment more.

And the charred candied yams with chili crunch (the hottest condiment around these days, rightfully replacing old and busted sriracha) and lime aioli was another feast for the senses, as beautiful as it was delicious, and full of wild flavors and interesting contrasting textures.  I never would have ordered this one on my own, but I sure was happy to try it.

Finally, even though neither of us are the biggest dessert dudes, we split the key lime pie, which is always one of my favorite desserts anywhere.  Since my wife doesn’t care for it, I never order it when I’m with her, but this pie was yet another platinum hit.  It was served as a round tart rather than a typical slice from a larger pie, with a light graham cracker crust and topped with wonderful coconut meringue that went perfectly with the sweet, creamy, tart pie filling.  The best key lime pie I’ve ever had is right here in Orlando, at Sister Honey’s Bakery, but this key lime pie/tart was damn fine in its own right.

So that’s my rundown of Red Rooster Overtown.  I cannot rave enough about this place.  I’ve had a handful of restaurant meals where every dish and every bite is better than the last, culminating in a culinary crescendo.  The aforementioned Abe Fisher in Philly (RIP) was one of those for sure.  This was another.  Normally I would say that nothing could top a meal like that, but then we saw De La Soul, and Posdnous, Maseo, and special guest Pharoahe Monch filled that theater with love and joy.  It was a perfect meal for the occasion — soul food before De La Soul.  Upon researching more about Red Rooster to write this review, I discovered another connection: De La Soul founded The Spitkicker Collective, a group of Black musical artists and other creative people to engage in social activism, and Chef Marcus Samuelsson — the Red Rooster founder himself — also got involved.  So our evening seemed preordained.  I wonder if the group hung out and partied at Red Rooster Overtown after the show.  Regardless, I’m so glad we went there before the show, and I certainly hope to return with my friend on a future trip to Miami.

And on that note, Red Rooster Overtown also offers a weekend brunch buffet with a DJ spinning, as well as a Sunday evening buffet with live jazz, with both buffet menus on the restaurant’s website (linked at the top of my review).  Either of those would be a great excuse to go back, and buffets and jazz are two of my favorite things!

The Prince (Los Angeles)

The Prince (https://www.instagram.com/theprincela) is a classy, old-school Los Angeles Korean restaurant and lounge that is most famous for appearing in multiple movies and TV shows over the decades, including Chinatown (one of the greatest L.A. movies, neo-noirs, and movies in general of all time), Mad Men (one of my favorite shows of all time), and New Girl (where it was the characters’ regular hangout).  I’ve never actually watched New Girl, but now I am imagining Zooey Deschanel with bangs and glasses, singing a silly old song (maybe “Dream a Little Dream of Me”?) and strumming a ukulele in this dusky, dark red hipster hangout.

Back in November, I was on a work trip to L.A. and had a chance to join some of my amazing co-workers for dinner.  I always stay in Koreatown, where my employer is located, and where there seem to be hundreds of Korean restaurants to choose from, at all different styles and price points.  I am still very new to Korean food, but the more things I try, the more I feel inspired to branch out and try more.  The Prince was walkable from our campus, so since I was already aware of its cinematic résumé and timeless cool décor, I convinced this small group to trust and follow me.

I must apologize in advance for the photos that follow in this review.  It’s a gorgeous room, dark and anachronistic, but as soon as I took my first photo to set the scene, a server yelled at me to not use flash photography inside.  So I did my best, such as it is, to share the red vinyl booths, the dark wood, the dim lighting, and even these hale and hearty knights standing guard.

Also, I swear I saw Spike Jonze, director of super-creative movies and iconic music videos, dining there, but I wasn’t 100% sure it was him.  As much as I wanted to thank him for “Sabotage,” Adaptation, and Jackass, I didn’t want to be That Guy who disturbed his dinner… especially if it wasn’t Spike.

Anyway, our group was a mix of adventurous and unadventurous eaters, so we picked five things that looked good to everyone, and we all shared them.   That is my favorite way to dine with friends.

These are the onion rings (RING THE ALARM!) and cheese balls, because you know if I go anywhere and see onion rings on the menu, I have to order them.  They were crowd-pleasers, and it was not the first time I had really good onion rings at a Korean restaurant.   The cheese balls were even better — perfect, golden-fried, golf ball-sized orbs with melty cheese in the middle, under the breading.  I should have tried to get a shot of a bisected cheese ball to show you their molten, sticky, creamy centers, but they went fast!

When you’re introducing Korean food to unfamiliar diners, beef bulgogi is one of those perfect gateway dishes.  Bulgogi is a dish of thin-sliced beef (often sirloin steak), marinated in a savory-sweet sauce, and then grilled or stir-fried with onions and green bell peppers.  The bulgogi marinade contains soy sauce, sugar, sesame oil, garlic, ginger, and pear juice, which tenderizes the meat.  There is nothing spicy or “weird” to scare off the unadventurous diner, so it was another hit at our table. Just FYI: “bul” is Korean for fire, and “gogi” means meat.

We also ordered galbi (sometimes called kalbi), a very similar dish but with beef short ribs sliced cross-wise against the bones, rather than thin-sliced steak.  It has a similar flavor due to the marinade, but I already love short ribs in any form — not just the flavor, but the wonderful texture.  I especially like the chewy part of the meat right around the bones, which you can just pull off with your fingers if you don’t want to gnaw it off.  This was served over onions and scallions, and there wasn’t a morsel left.

I didn’t have any input in choosing this garlic shrimp dish, served with fresh, raw, shredded cabbage, but I was happy to try a couple of the shrimp, which came in their shells and had to be peeled.  It was delicious — different from scampi or any other garlic shrimp dish you might be envisioning, but still very satisfying.

I did choose this dish, though: thick, perfectly al dente udon noodles served with mixed seafood: shrimp, mussels, squid, and tiny crab legs (more trouble than they were worth to crack open).  The menu describes it as coming in a spicy broth, but it could be served mild upon request.  I honestly don’t remember what we decided as a group, but I think we went with spicy and almost everyone still loved it.

Real Korean food aficionados might be rolling their eyes, disappointed that we made relatively staid and familiar choices, but that’s often what happens in a “family-style” group dining situation.  I would have loved to try the soondae, since I always love blood sausage in all its other forms, from Argentinian morcilla to British black pudding, but nobody else was on board with this one.  It’s all good!

I have no regrets or complaints about The Prince, especially because it is such a part of Los Angeles and Hollywood history.  I would not be surprised if there are better Korean restaurants in L.A.’s Koreatown, but the vibes at The Prince are unmatched.  Every time I make it out there for work, I try to visit at least one historic, iconic L.A. landmark, whether it’s a tourist attraction, a restaurant, or both.  So far, I’m making quite a list.  I love my job, and I love L.A.!

Genghis Cohen (Los Angeles)

When I visited Los Angeles for work earlier this year, my supervisor and I went to the “New York-style” Chinese restaurant Genghis Cohen (https://www.genghiscohen.com/), which first opened in 1983.  In addition to the truly great name, I chose the restaurant because it has special significance to me as a comedy nerd.  There was an entire episode of Seinfeld where the characters were stuck at a Chinese restaurant, waiting for a table that never became available.  That episode was instrumental in forming that sitcom’s (somewhat overused) description of “a show about nothing.”  Co-creator, genius comedy writer, and awe-inspiring altacocker Larry David, the brains of the operation and the main reason anyone still fondly remembers Seinfeld today, was inspired by a similar experience at Genghis Cohen in L.A., so there you go.

We started out by sharing these excellent pan-fried pork pot stickers.  There was nothing unique about them, but fried pot stickers are always a delicious appetizer, and you can never go wrong with them.

My supervisor chose the happy family, a dish I never would have considered ordering myself, although it really looked and smelled great.  It included chicken, shrimp, barbecue pork, carrots, cabbage, onions, bean sprouts, and crunchy fried noodles, all stir-fried together.  He really liked it.

And while I had other dishes in mind, I absolutely had to order the shalom pork, with sliced barbecue pork (think char siu), onions, cabbage, and green bell peppers, all stir-fried together with barbecue sauce (not the sweet and smoky American style barbecue sauce, of course).  Not only was the Genghis Cohen name hilarious to me, but so was the shalom pork, so I couldn’t resist. 

Since I am lucky enough to take work trips to L.A. twice a year, I plan my restaurant excursions as far in advance as possible, considering I never rent a car out there and usually don’t have much down time to play tourist.  I don’t know if I’ll ever make it back to Genghis Cohen, but I’m really glad I went, and that my supervisor was willing to join me.  There’s a helpful hint for aspiring restauranteurs: if you open a place with a funny, punny name, you will probably get at least one customer.

Prato

The upscale Italian restaurant Prato (https://www.prato-wp.com/) is a mainstay of Winter Park’s tony Park Avenue for good reason.  Chef and co-owner Brandon McGlamery (also of the excellent Luke’s Kitchen and Bar in Maitland) has always served top-notch food in gorgeous surroundings.  This is not a typical “red sauce” Italian-American restaurant, so don’t expect spaghetti and meatballs or red and white checkered tablecloths.  But even though Prato is a cut above, it isn’t snooty or snobby, and the comfort food truly comforts.

I had not been back to Prato in years, due in part to the difficulty of parking on Park Avenue (ironic, eh?) and a lot of bad timing.  Sometimes I’d find myself there in the off time between lunch and dinner service, where Prato only offered a limited menu, and one of the most famous pasta dishes in Orlando was unavailable.  This review was from a recent visit with my wife for lunch, which I timed just so I could try the legendary pasta for the first time, after years of reading hype about it online.

We started out with pretzel-crusted calamari, fried to golden-brown perfection.  I always note that too many restaurants overcook their squid tubes and tentacles until they are chewy and rubbery, but these were really tender, as they should be.  We had tried these before, too many years ago, and these were just as good as they had always been.  I always appreciate dipping sauces (salsa rosa and grain mustard aioli), but this calamari didn’t even need them.  That didn’t stop me from dipping, though!

After how much we enjoyed the beef tartare on a recent trip to Luke’s, we decided to trust Chef McGlamery and ordered the carne cruda at Prato as well, to compare and contrast them.  It is raw beef (which tastes great and must be the highest quality to avoid safety concerns), topped with a farm-fresh egg, grated horseradish, and romanesco conserva.  I realize romanesco is a relative of the cauliflower that grows in stunning fractal patterns, but I didn’t see any of that vegetable, so I wondered if the menu might have meant romesco, which is a sauce made from cooking down tomatoes, roasted red peppers, garlic, and almonds.  It was also served with crunchy toasted focaccia bread slices for scooping up the meat or spreading it onto the toast.  We loved it, just as we loved the beef tartare at Luke’s.

Here’s a close-up of that amazing carne cruda.  The meat was so tender and flavorful in a way we rarely get to experience, since everyone cooks their meat (and should continue to do so, don’t get me wrong).

I forgot to mention that we came to Prato during weekend brunch hours, being sure to be there as it opened to avoid a long wait.  After the savory appetizers, my wife went with a sweet dish: perfect little pancakes topped with freshly made ricotta cheese and blueberry compote (which strikes me as more of a dessert than a breakfast dish, but millions of brunchers will disagree).  She adored it.

And I finally got to try the legendary pasta dish, mustard spaghettini “cacio e pepe.”  I fully admit to being a red sauce guy, since that’s the Italian food  I was raised eating.  I am always drawn to rich bolognese and spicy arrabbiata sauces, so I rarely order cacio e pepe on menus, even though it can be so luxurious and decadent despite its relative simplicity (just Pecorino Romano cheese — the cacio — and black pepper — the pepe).  This version was anything but simple, though.  It included mustard in there somewhere, but it’s subtle, and you definitely won’t detect the brightness of yellow mustard or anything horseradishy, so don’t worry about that.  I love mustard (and even review mustards on this blog), so that was the main thing that had me intrigued for so many years.   
This house-made pasta also includes balsamic vinegar (another favorite ingredient of mine), radicchio, a spicy and bitter vegetable that looks like red and white cabbage and is sometimes called Italian chicory, and speck, a cured and lightly smoked pork leg (think of ham or bacon) from the cold and mountainous South Tyrol province in northeastern Italy.  If you are familiar with geography, you might guess that there is some German or Austrian influence to this particular cured meat, and you’d be right.  Also, the mountains are called the Dolomites, but Rudy Ray Moore had nothing to do with it.

This was a gorgeous and delicious pasta dish that surpassed all the hype.  I make pretty great pasta dishes at home, but I had never had anything quite like this, and I was so happy to finally try it, after all these years.  It was one of my favorite things I ate in 2024, that’s for sure.

I don’t know when we will return to Prato, but as tempting as it always is to try new things on every visit, I am obsessed enough with the mustard spaghettini “cacio e pepe” that I will probably order it again and again in the future.  It’s like nothing I’ve ever tried before.  Leave it to me to be late to the party and then never want to leave!  But I’m sure Prato being great is no big surprise or secret to anyone else in Winter Park or Orlando.  It has a swanky vibe that would be perfect for a date night or just a nice dinner out.  The hardest parts will be parking nearby and figuring out what to order, but hopefully I have already helped you with the second challenge.

Sushi Yama

Sushi Yama (https://www.facebook.com/p/sushiyamaOrlando-61554754973187/) is one of a handful of all-you-can-eat sushi restaurants in Orlando.  I used to love Mikado Japanese Sushi Buffet in Altamonte Springs, but nobody else ever wants to go there with me, and I fully admit it isn’t as good as it once was.

More recently, I took my wife to another all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant, but one where you order off a menu and everything is brought fresh to your table, rather than grabbing premade sushi rolls and nigiri off a buffet.  That was a truly horrendous experience, to the point where it almost seemed like a prank or a comedy sketch — terrible food and cartoonishly inept service.  I love sushi, but that was the first time I ever “hate-ate” anything (similar to hate-watching a movie or TV show out of bewildered fascination or the hope that it might improve).  I never reviewed that place because I had nothing nice to say about it, but to nobody’s surprise, it did not last.

As a result of that execrable experience at a completely different restaurant, when I discovered Sushi Yama and wanted to try it, my wife wanted nothing to do with it.  I ended up going by myself for lunch, after checking in at the wonderful Gods & Monsters comic book and collectible store on International Drive.  Well, I had a grand time, and I will be happy to go back anytime, for any of my friends and acquaintances who also like sushi and good deals.

I had a good feeling when I was greeted by a human-sized maneki neko (lucky cat) at the entrance.

Here are photos of the menu.  At the time I visited, the all-you-can-eat lunch was $20.95 (the price of two to three rolls at most regular Japanese restaurants), and you can choose from so many great options.

In addition to the sushi on the previous page, lunch also includes hot, fresh appetizers, soups, fried tempura dishes, fried rice and noodles, and even teriyaki, all prepared fresh in the kitchen.  If you’re the least bit curious about going but don’t actually like sushi or have friends or family who don’t, there is plenty for you folks to choose from as well.

I was told that the kitchen would be faster than the sushi chefs, so I might want to order something from the kitchen to tide myself over.  Instead of ordering the vegetable tempura (with broccoli, zucchini, sweet potato, and an onion ring), since it was all one price for the lunch, I asked if I could just get onion rings, and that was totally cool.  Ring the Alarm!  Leave it to me to go out for all-you-can-eat sushi and still end up with onion rings.  But they were terrific, and the tempura batter was a perfect consistency and stayed in place.

I love ornate rolls with multiple contrasting ingredients (sorry, sushi purists!), so I ordered several Chef’s Special rolls, and they all came on this gorgeous platter, arranged beautifully.

This assortment included:

    • Rainbow roll – a California roll topped with tuna, salmon, whitefish, and avocado
    • Salmon run roll -a roll containing eel and spicy krab, topped with salmon, masago fish eggs, and eel sauce
    • Baby tiger roll – a roll containing spicy tuna and cucumber, topped with salmon, avocado, masago fish eggs, and tempura crunch
    • SnowMan roll – a roll containing spicy tuna, shrimp tempura, and avocado, topped with snow krab, masago fish eggs, tempura crunch, and and eel sauce
    • Spicy tuna roll (done as a hand roll, in the bottom left corner above)

Here they are again from a different angle.  Beautiful!

I also got three pieces of nigiri: smoked salmon, red snapper (tai), and eel unago), which were all fresh and tasty. 

I should note that you get a penalty for ordering a bunch of food and not finishing it (including the rice that is part of nigiri sushi), as you should, because I consider wasting food a shanda.  For the carb-conscious among us, Sushi Yama charges more at dinnertime, but you can also get sashimi — just the slices of fresh, raw fish without the rice underneath.

It’s too bad Sushi Yama is across town on the north end of International Drive, or I would go there quite often.  As it is, I will return whenever I can, which won’t be often enough.  But whenever I have a chance to stop by Gods & Monsters, I will make it a point to arrive hungry and head straight there afterwards.  I’ll try to go for dinner in the future to take advantage of that sashimi, too!

The Bayou Kitchen and Lounge

The Bayou Kitchen and Lounge (https://thebayouorlando.com/) is a New Orleans-style restaurant in Longwood, Florida.  I loooove Creole, Cajun, and New Orleans-style food, all tracing back to the four trips I got to take to New Orleans between 1998 and 2001, as a young lad obsessed with music and food.  Sadly, our options here in Orlando are somewhat limited to Tibby’s and Vietnamese-Cajun places like King Cajun Crawfish.  (I still remember the long-gone Crooked Bayou in downtown Orlando and Jockamo’s way out on Sand Lake Road and John Young Parkway!)  So needless to say, I was excited when The Bayou opened, and even more excited to read good reviews.

I recently made it over there on a weekend for lunch with my wife, and we were joined by one of her old and dear friends.  My wife and her friend both ordered cups of gumbo, which looked more like bowls to me.  (A lot of restaurants will give you a really puny cup, but not The Bayou!)  It comes with a scoop of white rice in the rich stew, but my wife’s friend asked for hers with no rice, and this was the better photo of the two of them.  The gumbo wasn’t very spicy (at least I didn’t think so), but it was loaded with chicken, shrimp, crawfish, andouille sausage, and both bowls came with a small crab leg sticking out, for dramatic effect.  (We ended up taking both crab legs home, along with a bunch of other leftovers, where I cracked them open for myself.  There wasn’t much meat, but I often think that even larger crab legs are more trouble than they’re worth.)

After becoming a huge fan of charbroiled oysters at one of my favorite Orlando restaurants, High Tide Harry’s, I thought I was being a cool, sophisticated guy by ordering charbroiled oysters for the table.  However, I ended up eating almost all of them myself.  I guess I can’t complain, even though I really did order them to share.
These were pretty big oysters on the half shell, fully cooked and covered with sizzling garlic herb butter and parmesan cheese, served with slices of toasted French bread dabbed with even more garlic herb butter.  Not exactly health food!

Here’s an extreme close-up of one of the oysters.  Was it delicious?  Yes, of course it was!  Enough garlic butter makes anything delicious.  But it reminded me how much I prefer my oysters raw and chilled, with maybe just a tiny bit of mignonette.  The Bayou doesn’t serve raw oysters, but they are so refreshing that way, and so heavy this way!

Our friend ordered a fried oyster po’ boy sandwich (the Bayou’s menu calls them “poboyz,” which I do not love) with a side of fried okra, and she seemed to really like it.  I was impressed that they bring in French bread from the Leidenheimer Baking Company in New Orleans, which is the best-known and most beloved po’ boy roll out there.  Unfortunately, the menu calls it “Linenheimer,” but I knew what they meant.

I couldn’t resist a po’ boy either, especially since they had the authentic rolls.  I got a combination of fried oysters and fried crawfish, which you are allowed to do.  The po’ boys come dressed with shredded iceberg lettuce, sliced tomatoes and pickles, and creamy, tangy remoulade sauce, as they should.  I got house-made potato chips as my side.

But I also got a side of onion rings, because I am The Saboscrivner, and I try onion rings whenever and wherever they are available.  Ring the Alarm for these big rings!  They had kind of a loose battered coating — not my preferred style, but pretty good nonetheless.  I thought they were very salty, even by onion ring standards.

My wife always loves chicken and waffles, so she jumped at the chance to order it here.  You can choose between jerk chicken and fried chicken strips, so she went with the fried.  It was served over a big pearl sugar waffle, which is definitely the new hotness when it comes to waffles.  While she was grateful she didn’t have to get spicy jerk chicken, we both thought the fried chicken could have used more seasoning,  especially at a restaurant specializing in such a well-seasoned, savory cuisine.

Since we were partying pretty hard (by our standards), she added on a side of fried lobster, which was only $11.  She liked it a lot more than the fried chicken, needless to say.

And adding to this wild, uninhibited festival of fried food and heavy carbs, we all shared an order of beignets for dessert.  It seemed like the thing to do.  These fried dough balls, topped with enough powdered sugar to look like they were partying in the ’80s, are similar to doughnuts, and they are a major treat in New Orleans, especially at iconic establishments like Cafe du Monde.

So that was everything we had at The Bayou, which turned out to be quite a lot.  I thought the food was better than Tibby’s and certainly different from the Vietnamese-influenced food at King Cajun Crawfish.  I did wish The Bayou had a muffuletta sandwich on the menu, but I wish every restaurant had those.  Nothing ever seems to compare to the food I enjoyed with dear friends in New Orleans almost 25 years ago, but for Orlando and its surrounding suburbs, this was pretty fine.  Plus, The Bayou is the kind of unique, locally owned operation we should all strive to support, especially on a day like today, which happens to be Small Business Saturday.  Tell them The Saboscrivner sent ya, and I guarantee you’ll have a great meal, but they will have no idea what you’re talking about!

Sarge’s Delicatessen and Diner (New York)

I recently took my wife on a whirlwind trip to New York City to celebrate our 15th anniversary.  Before that, we had gone there for our 10th anniversary back in 2019, where I reviewed six restaurants, and before that, we were last there for our honeymoon in 2009.

We made the most of this recent trip —  we saw two shows together, and while she saw a third, I made off to attend New York Comic Con, where I got comics signed by beloved writers and artists and posed for a photo with my favorite actress, Carla Gugino.  Food-wise, we enjoyed a fancy anniversary meal, visited old favorites Ess-A-Bagel and Junior’s, and I took a trip to the Bronx to visit several iconic Italian delis along Arthur Avenue (which will be the subject of a future Saboscrivner ‘sclusive).

As great as my Arthur Avenue adventure was (spoiler alert!), my single favorite meal on this latest NYC trip was Sarge’s Delicatessen and Diner (https://sargesdeli.com/), and not just because I was back with my wife after a day apart from her, mostly spent waiting in long lines with fellow nerds.  Sarge’s is located in Manhattan’s Murray Hill neighborhood and first opened in 1964 — not as ancient as Katz’s Delicatessen, but still an impressive run.  You will see why shortly.

I should note that on past trips, we had always gone to the historic Katz’s, a Lower East Side landmark and tourist trap known for its legendary pastrami (and legendary chaos).  But since we’ve been more than once, and since I’ve had equally fine pastrami at Langer’s Delicatessen in Los Angeles and The Pastrami Project right here in Orlando since our last Katz’s visit, I wanted us to have a new New York deli experience.  People always say that the pastrami at Sarge’s may not be quite as good as Katz’s (maybe an 8 or 9 instead of a perfect 10), but the rye bread is better (it wouldn’t take much), the menu is larger, and the entire experience is a lot more pleasant and relaxing, with booths(!) and table service(!) and no long lines.  It sounded amazing, so off we went, reunited after spending our longest day in New York doing our own things.

We were seated right away by a lovely and patient server (try finding one of those at Katz’s!), and there were no long lines to get in nor any weird rituals with tickets.  My wife started the meal with a magnificent chocolate milkshake, while I opted for a cool, refreshing vanilla egg cream (no doubt made with Fox’s U-Bet vanilla syrup, which I always keep on hand back home).  I had just walked from the Jacob Javits Convention Center to the theater district to meet her as her show let out, so I probably would have been better off with delicious New York City tap water, but I was caught up in the moment.  
For those of you who never read my reviews, an egg cream contains neither eggs nor cream.  It is made with seltzer water, milk, and a flavored syrup — traditionally Fox’s U-Bet chocolate syrup, but I also love egg creams made with Fox’s U-Bet vanilla and coffee syrups.  As a result, they are more like a soda than a thick, heavy milkshake.  Sometimes I even enjoy one at the end of a heavy meal to aid with digestion, but tonight I opened with the egg cream.

Like any good deli, Sarge’s quickly brought out free plates of regular and half-sour pickles and fresh, cool, crunchy cole slaw.  I devoured the cole slaw and had one of each kind of pickle, and they were all terrific, especially as the first real food I had eaten all day.  

We were blessed with blissfully cool October weather on our trip, so my wife got one of her favorite Ashkenazi Jewish comfort foods: matzoh ball soup.  It was a huge bowl with one huge matzoh ball in the center, but no visible pieces of chicken, no vegetable, no noodles, just the ball.  She said it was amazing soup, and after trying a spoonful of broth, I concurred.  

She ordered half a pastrami sandwich with her soup, and she loved it as well.  As you can see, Sarge’s serves huge, overstuffed deli sandwiches, but the main difference between Sarge’s and Katz’s pastrami sandwich is that Katz’s hand-slices the pastrami, resulting in thicker slices, while Sarge’s uses a machine, ending up with the much thinner, uniform slices you see here.  

Whenever I visit a deli, whether it’s Jewish or Italian, I always try to sample as many different house specialties as I can, especially when I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to make it back.  I certainly hope to return to Sarge’s one day, but that didn’t stop me from ordering a Custom  Combo sandwich with three different meats: the excellent pastrami (on top), its underrated cousin corned beef (in the middle), which was equally great, and rolled beef (the darker meat on the bottom), a mysterious, mythical meat I had only ever heard of, but never seen available anywhere else.   For those inquiring, I made sure to deconstruct the sandwich to taste and truly appreciate each meat separately.  So what is rolled beef?  I wasn’t entirely sure, either before or after eating this heckin’ chonker of a sandwich, so of course I did some research and found a Tablet article about the history of rolled beef.  It is cured and smoked beef navel (similar to pastrami in that regard), but less fatty, less peppery, usually served cold, and traditionally a cheaper option at delis.  It was great, but I still prefer the perfection of pastrami in the pantheon of salted, cured meats.

And me being me, I saw onion rings on a menu and had to order them.  I always try onion rings wherever I am, and I review them in a recurring segment on this blog called RING THE ALARM!  Well, folks, I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but our server turned every head in the dining room when she walked out this titanic, tremendous tower,  this massive, monumental mountain of gorgeous, golden-brown batter-dipped onion rings.  It was almost too beautiful to eat.  Almost. 
Dear readers, you stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, I can say without hesitation that these were the absolute finest, worthiest, all-time best onion rings I’ve ever had in my life.  They narrowly beat another New York deli landmark, the aforementioned Junior’s, which previously held the prize with their similar style of onion rings.  These are crispy on the outside (not quite crunchy), and almost cakey on the inside — kind of like fluffy funnel cakes, but savory instead of sweet.  I’ve only ever encountered this style of onion rings at iconic Jewish delis, and it is definitely my favorite.

So that was our first-ever trip to Sarge’s Delicatessen and Diner, but hopefully not our last.  There are over 200 items to choose from on that vast and voluminous menu, and I doubt any of them would disappoint.  In addition to the deli sandwiches they are probably best known for, Sarge’s offers the usual smoked fish you would hope for from a good appetizing store (nova salmon, salty belly lox, smoked whitefish, and even fancy smoked sturgeon and sable, plus multiple varieties of herring), a full breakfast menu, hot dogs and burgers, all kinds of diner classics, and even beer, wine, and liquor.  If you’re looking for comfort food in Manhattan and want to enjoy it in actual comfort, as opposed to the tumult of Katz’s, Sarge’s is the place for you.  Tell ’em The Saboscrivner sent ya… and they’ll have no idea what you’re taking about!

Chain Reactions: Torchy’s Tacos

Torchy’s Tacos (https://torchystacos.com/) is a fast-casual Tex-Mex chain founded in Austin, Texas, with over 90 locations across 16 states.  All my Texan friends love it, and so does my supervisor in Los Angeles, who recently tried a location in Arizona for the first time.  I had heard about Torchy’s for many years and was excited to hear they were starting to open in Florida.  This past Friday, I brought my wife to the Altamonte Springs location, which opened a few months ago, for our first taste of Torchy’s.  I bring home takeout a lot more often than we dine out, but looking through the online menu in advance and seeing photos, the intricate tacos from Torchy’s looked like they would be a lot better enjoyed immediately, on the premises.  I’m glad we did it that way, because I’m not sure they would have traveled well.

We arrived around 3:00 in the afternoon after a matinee movie and an ice cream snack at the Jeni’s in Winter Park Village (excellent ice cream), but it was my first real meal of the day, and I was hungry.  Tacos at Torchy’s aren’t cheap, ranging between $5 and $7 each, but I had a gift card burning a hole in my wallet, so we both had some fun.  Normally I’d be taken aback at those prices compared to so many wonderful, amazing, authentic Mexican taquerias in and around Orlando that are much cheaper (like my beloved Francisco’s Taco Madness and Tortas El Rey), but I’m pleased to say the deeply inauthentic creations at Torchy’s were all very fresh and tasty.

I was also very pleased that they walked our tacos out of the kitchen to our table, one or two at a time, and the guy very patiently identified what each one was — perfect for people like us who ordered a bunch of stuff without keeping track of it all in the moment.

This was the Brushfire, with spicy Jamaican jerk chicken, grilled jalapenos, diced mango, sour cream, and cilantro on a soft flour tortilla, served with fiery Diablo sauce on the side.  I thought the chicken was a little dry, but very well-seasoned. 

On the left, you see the Republican, a cheddar-jalapeno sausage topped with pico de gallo salsa, cheddar jack cheese, and creamy, spicy poblano pepper sauce on a soft flour tortilla.  It was delicious and delightful, two words I would usually never use to describe anything Republican-related.   On the right, I got the Trailer Park, with fried white meat chicken, shredded lettuce, pico de gallo salsa, green chiles, cheddar jack, and the same poblano sauce on the same flour tortilla.  There wasn’t a lot of chicken in this one, and I probably would have skipped it completely due to how similar it was to the Republican, which had more flavor and interesting texture from the snappy sausage.  But I got sensory overload while ordering at the counter, so that’s how I ended up with both of these.

These are both fried avocado tacos (one for each of us), with crispy breaded and fried avocado (the hell, you say!), refried pinto beans, shredded lettuce, pico de gallo, cheddar jack, and poblano sauce — another very similar taco, aided by the pleasant crispiness of the avocado — but on corn tortillas this time.  This might have been my favorite taco of all the ones I tried.  The combination really hits different, especially with that poblano sauce. 

This was the Crossroads, with smoked beef brisket, grilled onions, pickled jalapenos, cilantro, avocado, shredded pepper jack cheese, and tomatillo sauce on a fresh corn tortilla.  I got really full and didn’t get to this one until the next day, back at home, where it was still quite tasty.

My wife also chose these two tacos.  The Mr. Orange on the left (I’m assuming named after Tim Roth’s character in Reservoir Dogs) contained blackened salmon, grilled corn and black bean relish (a very nice touch she appreciated), crumbled cotija cheese, avocado sauce, cilantro, and a lime wedge on a corn tortilla.  I was worried the salmon might be either too dry or too fishy, but she loved it and gave me a little piece, which was better than I expected.   On the right, she got the Democrat, with shredded beef barbacoa, avocado, cotija cheese, onions, cilantro, and tomatillo sauce on another corn tortilla.  I don’t know how the Torchy’s folks came up with what goes into the Republican versus the Democrat, but at least they were good combinations of ingredients.

We both really enjoyed Torchy’s Tacos, and it lived up to the hype.  I should note that they are famous for breakfast tacos, but I didn’t feel like adding a bunch of eggs to my tacos for that very late lunch.  I was pleasantly surprised that they also had fresh lemonade, although they add turmeric to it for some reason.  But it was a scorching hot afternoon (aren’t they all?), so I couldn’t refuse, and it was perfectly fine.  We would go back, and with so many options for tacos in and around Orlando, that’s a big compliment right there, even with the prices being what they are.  A lot of places aren’t worth a return trip, but the Torchy’s empire has expanded for a reason.  Whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican (or want to order those particular tacos or not), give it a shot, and I think you’ll find you can agree on liking the food, if nothing else.

Royal Thai Cuisine

Royal Thai Cuisine (https://royalthai-orlando.com/) opened in 1996, and I started dining there with friends shortly after moving to Orlando back in 2004.  It helped that it was so close to the job I held for 15 years, but along the way, other Thai restaurants opened, and I got distracted.  I recently returned to Royal Thai with two friends — both former co-workers from that old job — and I realized it had been several years since my last visit, definitely before I started this blog in 2018.

It was nice to go back there after so many memorable lunches and dinners, including an unforgettable Halloween dinner over 15 years ago, where my wife (then just my girlfriend) and a group of friends and I showed up there in full costume.  My old roommate was dressed as a sleazy redneck in a sleeveless white T-shirt and a mullet wig under a ball cap, and he must have looked like trouble when we entered the crowded restaurant that night.  When he took off the cap and the mullet came off with it, everyone in the dining room cracked up.  Needless to say, my former co-workers and I were a lot more sedate on our recent visit.

We started with an order of crispy spring rolls, listed as #1 on the menu (completely randomly), but they might be #1 as far as spring rolls go.  Royal Thai serves an order of three spring rolls, each one bisected into six more or less equal pieces, perfect for sharing with two friends (or devouring alone).  The dipping sauce is plum sauce — sweet and sticky; not spicy at all — but I was the only one who availed myself of it. 

Here’s a cross-section of the crispy spring roll.  It is loaded with savory clear noodles, onions, cabbage, and carrots.  Some places sneak mushrooms into these things, but I was relieved Royal Thai doesn’t do that. 

One friend ordered a dish called param, which was completely unfamiliar to me: a protein (she chose chicken) served over fresh spinach leaves and topped with peanut sauce.  It came with a side of fragrant, nutty smelling jasmine rice that I didn’t photograph, but you all know what a bowl of white rice looks like.

Another friend, who happens to be a vegetarian, ordered pad Thai with tofu.  I love pad Thai, but I rarely order it for myself because I almost always end up with someone else who gets it for themselves.  The noodles were stir-fried with bean sprouts and green onions and topped with some fresh shredded cabbage and carrots, with crushed peanuts on the side.  I asked her if it was tangy or sour, because that’s how I really like my pad Thai to be.  She was kind enough to let me try a forkful, and while it was a solid version of the classic dish, it wasn’t terribly tangy.

After so many years without visiting Royal Thai, I was having a hard time deciding what to get, but I defaulted to my standard dish at any Thai restaurant: pad kee mao, or drunken noodles.  I love this dish of wide, flat rice noodles stir-fried with onions bell peppers, fresh basil, and a sauce that is usually a little sweet and a little spicy, but everyone’s version is a little different.  Royal Thai also includes bamboo shoots (I was intimidated by these until trying them for the first time five years ago at Susuru), snow peas, and baby corn — ingredients I don’t usually seek out, but they were perfectly fine here.   They also include mushrooms — my culinary Kryptonite — but were nice enough to hold them for me.  I got pork as my protein, by the way. 

To this day, I don’t know if I could identify the best drunken noodles in Orlando, even though I have ordered them at least once at every Thai restaurant I’ve ever been to.  Of course, there are still a lot more Thai restaurants I need to visit.  I usually order them with the hot spice level, but I was taking my wife to St. Petersburg the next day (see last week’s review of Ted Peters Famous Smoked Fish) and decided to go easy on my stomach and get these drunken noodles medium-spiced.  Whenever I return to Royal Thai (which I will, and I won’t wait as long either), I’ll probably order something different next time to work my way through the lengthy menu, and I’ll definitely try it hot instead of medium.  After all these years, I have the utmost faith in them to do a good job of anything.

Kiko Japanese Cuisine

Kiko Japanese Cuisine (https://www.winterspringskiko.com/) is an unassuming little Japanese restaurant next door to our friendly neighborhood Publix in the Willa Springs Village shopping center, on the corner of Red Bug Lake Road and Tuskawilla Road in Winter Springs.  So many similar shopping plazas have little sushi restaurants like this.  Since I moved to Orlando 20 years ago, there have been two that came and went in this exact location: Nagoya, and more recently, Kabuto Sushi & Grill, which I actually liked a lot, but it closed near the end of 2022.  The locals may appreciate these restaurants, but they weren’t considered sushi destinations.  Nobody was driving to our neighborhood from the cooler, hipper ends of Orlando.  Nobody drives to Winter Springs for anything if they can help it.

But they’re missing out, let me tell you.  My wife and I were blown away by how great Kiko was after our first visit to the restaurant, and we liked it just as much after bringing home takeout even more recently.  This is a place that seems to have a devoted local following, but it should be a lot more popular and beloved than it already is.

We definitely overordered on our first visit, which included this insane sushi sashimi combo “for one,” in addition to all these other beautiful rolls.  We didn’t expect the combo for one to come on this attention-catching wooden boat, or to be as pretty as it was.  I’ve eaten a lot of mid sushi around this city, but every piece of sashimi and every sliced roll at Kiko was crafted with love, care, attention to detail, and the freshest possible ingredients.  The combo comes with ten pieces of sashimi, four pieces of sushi, and one “crazy” California roll. 

My wife is bigger on sashimi than I am.  She worries about carbs, and I never do, even though I should.  Here are the ten pieces of sashimi she got in the combo, serve on a bed of finely crushed ice concealing a pretty turquoise LED light.  Aside from salmon at 12:00 and tuna at 3:00, I’m not sure what the other two kinds of fish were.

Here were the four gorgeous pieces of nigiri sushi that came with her combo, delicate slices of fresh fish served over rice.  The top two are salmon and tuna, obviously, and the bottom one was topped with wonderful ikura, salty salmon roe that pop in your mouth.

This was the “crazy” California roll, topped with spicy surimi krab, in addition to the krab, avocado, and slivered cucumber inside.  I’m a sucker for surimi and anything spicy, so I enjoyed this, even though I never order California rolls.  

Since we figured that combo “for one” would be just for my wife, I ordered some rolls for myself, keeping in mind things she might like too.  This was the mango tango roll, with tempura fried shrimp, cream cheese, and cucumber inside, topped with paper-thin sliced mango, mango sauce, and eel sauce.  I know, it isn’t authentically Japanese at all, but it sure was delicious.  The tempura shrimp was fried to perfection, and the sweet-tart mango, warm and crispy shrimp, and cool, creamy, refreshing cream cheese fit perfectly together. 

This was a double-spicy roll, with spicy tuna and spicy salmon, deep-fried and topped with eel sauce and spicy mayo.  I love crunchy stuff in my rolls, but I didn’t pay close enough attention when ordering to realize the entire roll would be deep-fried.  It was tasty, but I feel like that throws off the delicate texture of the raw fish, and then it isn’t even raw anymore.  And oh baby, I like it raw.

On the plate below, this is a smoked salmon roll on the left, with smoked salmon, cream cheese, and cucumber, a favorite of your cream cheese and lox-loving Jewish author.  The one in the middle is the Sunset Blvd roll, named for one of Los Angeles’ most infamous streets (and Billy Wilder’s brilliant 1950 film noir that is my dude David Lynch’s favorite movie).  It contains spicy yellowtail, salmon, and crunchy tempura flakes and is topped with spicy tuna, avocado, plum sauce, and tobiko (flying fish roe, which is the rich red color).On the right is the glamorous Hollywood roll, with tempura soft shell crab and mango inside, topped with a layer of spicy tuna, avocado, and scallions, then finished off with masago (the orange smelt roe), eel sauce, and spicy mayo.  Crunchy, spicy, creamy — this roll had everything.

The Sunset Boulevard and Hollywood rolls were my favorites, but everything was awesome, even the deep-fried double-spicy roll.  That was the only one I wouldn’t order again, but we were both blown away by how amazing everything was.  We didn’t set out to overorder or indulge like this, but we also had no idea Kiko would be this good.  A random weekend lunch turned out to be a huge treat and a feast for all five senses, and we ended up with plenty of leftovers for later.

I returned a few weeks later to bring home some takeout.  We didn’t go as buck wild this time, but we still had fun.  This time my wife ordered the smaller sashimi dish, which included tuna, salmon, tako (octopus), tamago (egg, essentially like firm slices of an omelet), and a fish with firm white flesh that I didn’t try and she couldn’t readily identify.

I ordeered myself an appetizer called the spicy tuna twister, not knowing what it included or involved, but figuring I couldn’t go wrong.  When I got home, I was surprised to see two pretty little clusters of spicy tuna in almost a paste-like form, surrounded by beautiful spirals of thin-sliced avocado.  But what were they surrounded with?  These were tempura-fried onion petals, almost like pieces of a Bloomin’ Onion, only not as heavily seasoned, and a hell of a lot less greasy.  Long-time readers, the stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, know I’m an onion ring aficionado, but I never expected this!  They were fried to perfection (I know, I know, but they were!), and paired perfectly with the ramekin of spicy mayo for dipping.  These aren’t onion rings if you stick to the literal definition, but since they were a pleasant surprise of breaded, fried onions, I still give them one of my Ring the Alarm! shout-outs.   

This time, I tried the salmon skin roll (on the left), because salmon skin is so savory and crispy and awesome, and the spicy yellowtail roll (on the right), because I don’t eat enough yellowtail (also known as hamachi or Japanese amberjack), but I always love it whenever I do.  These rolls were slightly less ornate and ostentatious than the ones I got on my first trip to Kiko, but I liked them just as much, and I was able to focus on their core ingredients more.

We also got that mango tango roll again, because YOU KNOW WE HAD TO DO IT TO ‘EM!  This time, enjoying our Kiko feast at home, it was just as inauthentic, but just as good.

I am thrilled that Kiko Japanese Cuisine opened in 2023, so close to our home.  I’m sure pretty much anyone reading this who likes sushi already has their own favorite sushi restaurant — possibly even one for “everyday” sushi and a more upscale locale for a splurge meal.  Well, I hope I have convinced some people to give Kiko a try.  It is a great place for an “everyday” sushi restaurant, and easily good enough (and affordable enough compared to some of Orlando’s Michelin-affiliated darlings) that you can splurge there too.  I’m going to keep returning, and I hope to run into some readers there as I become a regular.