Rice – Page 2 – The Saboscrivner

Thailicious

Thailicious (https://thailiciousfl.com/) is a very casual Thai restaurant in the suburbs of Longwood. The building looks like a house, complete with outside tables on a covered, screened-in front porch. My wife and I have gone three times so far, and we really like it, enough to already consider ourselves semi-regulars. I want to work our way through the entire menu, but their dishes are so good, it is hard to not default back to past favorites.

My best advice for going for dinner is to arrive early, because it always gets super-busy. The people of Longwood know what’s good, and they also may not want to drive far and wide for newer, trendier Thai restaurants, knowing they have a wonderful, well-kept secret in their own back yard.

On all of our visits, my wife starts out with sweet, cool, creamy, slightly smoky Thai iced tea, her beverage of choice:

She usually orders summer rolls, one of her go-to favorites at any Vietnamese or Thai restaurant. Thailicious’ version comes with shrimp, rice noodles, carrots, and Thai basil leaves, wrapped in fresh rice paper for a chewy texture and served with a sweet peanut sauce.

On our first visit, we also ordered a crab rangoon appetizer, just for the heck of it. I hadn’t had crab rangoon in years, probably not since the days of the all-you-can-eat China Jade buffet on East Colonial Drive near Fashion Square Mall, but these were better than I remembered. They were fried to crispy perfection, not greasy or heavy at all, with sweet cream cheese inside (but nary a hint of crab, as usual).
These were so good, we got them again on our third visit.

The first time in, my wife ordered her go-to noodle dish, pad Thai, since we are now on a quest to discover all the best versions of pad Thai in and around Orlando. This was one of the best versions either of us have tried around here. The rice noodles were sauteed with pork (but you can also choose chicken, tofu, or beef or shrimp for a small upcharge), eggs, ground peanuts, bean sprouts, and green onions. The sauce was actually kind of tangy and citrusy for a change. A lot of places serve pad Thai that is too sweet, and it never has that tangy funk that I love.

I ordered my own go-to noodle dish, pad kee mao, also known as drunken noodles. These are wider, flatter noodles, sauteed with onions, bell peppers, carrots, zucchini (a nice touch that nobody else seems to add), fresh basil (so important to the overall flavor of this dish), and scallions, and I asked them to hold the bean sprouts. I also got pork as my meat of choice, and it was a wise choice. This was a delicious version of drunken noodles. The dish is always sweet, but I ordered mine medium-spicy, because I like my Thai noodles like I like my women, sweet and spicy. Next time I’ll try Thai-spicy, now that I know I can more than handle the medium-spicy baseline.
Well, my wife was brave enough to try the drunken noodles, and she loved them so much that she ordered them (mild, of course) on our second visit, and again on our third! I tell ya, this dish is a crowd-pleaser. If you’ve never tried them before, either at Thailicious or your Thai restaurant of choice, give them a chance, and you won’t be sorry. She wasn’t.

I tried something completely new and different on our second visit: a noodle curry dish from northern Thailand called khao soi, made with egg noodles, napa cabbage, pickled sweet peppers, and pork (instead of chicken or tofu). The noodles came in the creamy, medium-spicy curry kind of like a thick soup, and our very friendly and patient server gave me chopsticks with it, utensils you don’t usually get at Thai restaurants. It was nice gambling on a brand new, unfamiliar dish and enjoying it so much. I’d totally order it again, but that would also defeat my purpose of making my way through the Thailicious menu, as I intend to do in the months and years to come.

Get ready for the noodle pull!

It was so good, it inspired me to start ordering this dish elsewhere, to compare other restaurants’ versions to the first khao soi I’ve ever had here at Thailicious. You know what they say: You never forget your first time!

Then we got coconut sticky rice for dessert on visit number two, which we never order, but we loved it so much that we wondered why. What a delicious, sweet treat, especially topped with a huge scoop of creamy coconut ice cream! We haven’t been living right, avoiding sweet sticky rice, but better late than never.

On our third visit, I ordered the laab gai, a dish of ground chicken seasoned with lime juice, shallots, roasted rice powder, and scallions, served at the hot spice level, on a bed of fresh, crunchy iceberg lettuce. I am still relatively new to laab (sometimes called larb) after being introduced to an incredible version with ground pork at Isan Zaap Thai Cafe last year and then trying a chicken version at Lim Ros Thai Cuisine earlier this year. I would rank this one between the two.

I also got the spicy basil from their traditional spicy Thai dishes menu, with sautéed pork, sweet basil leaves, onions, zucchini, and red and green bell peppers, at a hot spice level. It came with a bowl of jasmine rice on the side, which I mixed in to soak up the delicious flavors. They always get the pork so tender here at Thailicious. In fact, not only are the flavors fresh and strong, but everything is the perfect consistency.

It was delicious, but I always return to noodle dishes, so I’ll give the edge to the fabulous drunken noodles, pad Thai, and that amazing khao soi from visit #2. Now that I’ve written a review with a good bit of variety, I will start returning to those old favorites, because I will definitely return to Thailicious.

Orlando has several Thai restaurants, many of which are new, hot, and trendy. This Longwood mainstay isn’t hot or trendy, but it is so damn good, without any pretension or attempts to be the new influencer-illuminati destination. That makes me love it even more. It’s a friendly neighborhood sort of place with next-level food, comfortable booths, and warm and welcoming service. Just don’t get there too late on Friday or weekend evenings, because the locals know what’s good, and you will have to wait!

Moa Kai Hawaiian Diner

Moa Kai Hawaiian Diner (https://www.moakaidiner.com/) just opened the week before last in the old Mongolorian location at 2217 East Colonial Drive in Orlando, just west of Bumby Avenue. The restaurant is still in its soft opening phase, but it is fully open for business every day except Sunday. Sunday brunch hours will be added in due time. It is owned by the same owner of my beloved Poke Hana (honestly one of my favorite restaurants in Orlando since 2018) and Korean fried chicken joint Chi-Kin, which I still haven’t been to yet.

I love Hawaiian food, and Poke Hana is a big reason for that, since I’ve never actually been to Hawaii. Even before that, there was a short-lived Hawaiian restaurant in Oviedo called Hawaiian Grindz that introduced me to most Hawaiian dishes. Unfortunately, it didn’t last very long, perhaps because the owners seemed to be very laid-back, to the point of not always opening when their posted hours said they would.

Anyway, Moa Kai Hawaiian Diner is a very professional setup with a busy, happy-looking staff, all in festive aloha shirts. It is a classic diner layout with booths along the window, tables, stools overlooking an open kitchen (separated by a plexiglass screen) and more stools at the bar. For my first visit earlier this evening, I sat at the bar and placed my takeout order with the very friendly and welcoming Olivia, the bartender.

While I waited for my takeout, I ordered a POG juice. I remember how popular Pogs were in the early ’90s, especially at the comic book shops I used to frequent, and how quickly the Pog fad came and went. But don’t worry — POG juice is passion fruit/orange/guava juice, and it is so sweet and tangy and tasty. It is surprisingly thick and heavy, as fruit juices can sometimes be, but I already love all tropical fruits, especially passion fruit and guava, so I enjoyed it and highly recommend it.

(That is the ever-patient Olivia’s arm back there.)

After that, I also tried the lychee lemonade, since I am now a lemonade connoisseur. It was also wonderful, and a lot lighter and more refreshing than the POG juice. I would definitely order that again.

I placed a large order, figuring my wife and I would get four total meals out of everything, and it was ready quite quickly.

My wife requested the shoyu poke bowl, with cubes of raw ahi tuna marinated in house shoyu (soy) sauce with Hawaiian salt, shelled edamame soybeans, macadamia nuts, chili flakes, sweet onions, and dried seaweed called ogo. These are all flavors she likes (except the onions, which she figured out after one harsh bite), so she was really happy with it. She said she liked this poke even more than Poke Hana, where we have eaten dozens of times, so that’s high praise coming from her.

I couldn’t decide between a few things, so I ordered an assortment, hoping to share, and if not, knowing I’d have leftovers for tomorrow. These were the kalbi ribs, beef ribs marinated in shoyu and fruit juices, sliced across the bones, and grilled. They had a lot of flavor from the grilling process and were so tender. I always love peeling the flat bone slices out of kalbi and enjoying the almost chewy meat around the edges of the bone. Even my wife liked the piece she had.

All “plate lunches” at Moa Kai come with two scoops of white rice and one scoop of macaroni salad, but you can also choose different sides, and some require a nominal upcharge. I already know I love Hawaiian-style macaroni salad, including from Poke Hana, so I was looking forward to this, but instead of white rice, I got garlic pan-fried noodles, hoping my wife would want to try them. We both loved them! As great as the kalbi and macaroni salad were (and they were), these garlic noodles were the truth. Whenever we return, we will split a full-size order of them.

Kai Asian Street Fare on the edge of Casselberry and Winter Park makes the closest thing in town to these garlic noodles, and theirs are also awesome, just a little more buttery-greasy. But I had a lousy phone camera back then, so forgive the ugly, blurry shots in that early review.

I got a second plate lunch, the mix plate, where you can select two house favorites. For one of my choices, I went with the spicy ahi poke with cubed, marinated ahi tuna, sweet onion, masago, and crushed macadamia nuts in house-made spicy sauce (think spicy mayo), topped with scallions. This was fire! Poke is one of my favorite foods, whether from Poke Hana, Rion’s Ocean Room, or even Costco, and I especially love spicy ahi or salmon poke like this. It was a small serving, but that’s what happens in a sampler platter like this. I could eat this by the bucketful.

The other thing I ended up with was the grilled shoyu chicken, which was a shoyu-marinated, grilled boneless chicken thigh, topped with teriyaki sauce and scallions. It was so tender and juicy and well-seasoned, and I always say chicken thighs are the best part of the chicken, aside from the oysters. Thick thighs save lives! (And if you were intrigued by the garlic noodles above, the full-size order comes topped with this shoyu chicken.)
The only reason I said I “ended up with” it was because I ordered the Korean chicken instead, which sounds like it would have been similar shoyu-marinated chicken, but cubed, battered, fried, and tossed in house-made Korean garlic sauce. I am not disappointed at all that I ended up with the grilled chicken instead. It was a slightly healthier option, and so damn delicious, I would happily order it again. I don’t own a grill, merely because it is so blasted hot and humid in Orlando nine months out of the year, I know I wouldn’t use it much. Knowing myself, that would lead to all kinds of cognitive dissonance and self-resentment, and I deal with that enough already without feeling guilty about buying a grill and not using it often enough. But I always miss the flavor of good grilled meats, and the grilled shoyu chicken thigh was a perfect piece of chicken. WE HAVE SUCH SIGHTS TO SHOYU!

I got macaroni salad with this plate lunch too, but instead of the white rice, I got Spam fried rice for an upcharge. Spam is so good, y’all! It is the very definition of a “sometimes food,” as heavily processed and salty as it is, but fried up with rice or noodles and wrapped in rice and seaweed as a Spam musubi, it is tastier than you would believe. The Spam lovers know what’s up, and the squeamish among you will just have to take my word for it. This Spam fried rice didn’t have anything else in it (no eggs or vegetables), but just Spam and fried rice were great by themselves.

But wait, there’s more! That old Hawaiian restaurant in Oviedo introduced me to saimin, a Hawaiian noodle soup similar to Japanese ramen, but with Spam. Saimin soup with Spam is on the menu here at Moa Kai, but we’re still in August, and I couldn’t conceive of ordering soup. But I still had to try some form of saimin, so I got the local style stir-fried saimin noodles with char siu (Chinese-style barbecue pork with a slight sweetness that you may know and love from Kai Kai or Tasty Wok), Spam, sliced kamaboko (cured surimi, similar to the fish cakes in ramen), scrambled eggs, carrots, and scallions, seasoned with shoyu and dashi, a Japanese cooking stock flavored with fish and kelp.
I’m going to enjoy this tomorrow, but I couldn’t resist a few bites while it was still fresh and hot, and it was on point. It reminded me of a Hawaiian version of lo mein (but better) or Filipino pancit bihon. The char siu pork was sweet and tender, and the Spam was sliced into tiny cubes and perfected by the stir-fry process. You could enjoy these local style stir-fried saimin any day of the week, not just on stir-Friday.

My wife had requested an açaí bowl for a bit of a dessert tonight and breakfast tomorrow. This was a huge helping of açaí sorbet blended and topped with fresh strawberries, blueberries, pineapple, and kiwi, shredded coconut, peanut butter, and granola. Knowing it was sorbet, I brought a cooler in the car with a couple of reusable fake-ice blocks to keep it cold on the drive home, but it still got a little melty. The tiny taste I had when she had enough for the night was soooo nice and refreshing, though.

I had never even heard of açaí until a few years ago, when everyone started touting its benefits as a healthy “superfood.” I can’t speak on that, but the dark purple sorbet made from the açaí berries is a nice blend of sweet and tart, especially when mixed with other, sweeter fruits.

And finally, we were both curious about the ube haupia pie, so I guess that makes us pie-curious. I couldn’t resist ordering a piece for us to share. Haupia is coconut pudding, a popular Hawaiian dessert made from coconut milk, sugar, cornstarch, and water, and it is surprisingly jiggly and bouncy like Jell-O. Poke Hana serves haupia in crispy fried spring rolls, which are terrific, but this was different. Moa Kai serves their haupia in pie form with a macadamia nut-graham cracker crust (superb) with a layer of creamy ube pudding in between. Ube is a purple yam with a vanilla-like flavor, common in Filipino and Vietnamese desserts and sweet drinks, and it is as tasty as it is beautiful. Someone call Yam Grier and send me to Yamsterdam, because these were some sweet-ass yams under that haupia, with more bounce to the ounce.

Folks, I am thrilled to report that Orlando has another winner. We first heard earlier this year that Moa Kai Hawaiian Diner was coming, and months passed with no updates. The menu surfaced online back in April, and it all sounded so good, I hoped plans wouldn’t change, since some announced restaurants never see the light of day. It was so worth the wait, and all the time and effort and money they put into it are paying off. You can see we tried many things so I could write a worthy review and share as much information as possible. Yeah, that’s the ticket. The diner setting is going to be a fun, welcoming atmosphere for dining in, and the location, right in our Mills 50 district with so many other fantastic restaurants nearby, will hopefully help keep them busy and garner them the success they deserve. I don’t know if I’ll ever make it to beautiful Hawaii, but at least we can all have a taste of it right here in Orlando. Whether you dine in or order takeout like I did tonight, look for Olivia, who might be behind the bar. She is awesome, and even in the brief time I waited for my takeout order at the bar, she made me feel like a valued customer, patiently answered any questions I had, asked if I needed anything, and represented the restaurant so well.

The Cairo Express

The Cairo Express (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61577118088141) is a brand-new food truck that first opened last month, on July 12th, 2025. It is always set up in the same place, next to a hair salon at 658 Wymore Rd, Winter Park, right off Lee Road facing the I-4 exit. After a friend brought it to my attention and I looked at the menu online, I went straight there the next day, after seeing the Fantastic Four movie at nearby Winter Park Village. The Cairo Express is a family affair, with a pedigree of serving delicious Egyptian food in Orlando years before opening this truck. When I ordered, I noticed some uncommon menu items that I tried way back in 2019 when I reviewed an Egyptian restaurant called Makani, out on International Drive. I caught up with an old friend and bandmate and had a fantastic dinner there, and we shared several dishes I haven’t seen anywhere since. The fella in charge at the food truck confirmed his mother worked at Makani, and those were her family recipes they prepared there and again here at The Cairo Express. That food was awesome, and I knew I would be in for a real treat, trying it again so many years later.

Here is the menu, kindly provided by The Cairo Express after I forgot to take a photo and reached out to them on Facebook. You can see prices are very reasonable, and I can tell you everything is totally worth it:

This was the beef shawarma, which I devoured in the car while it was hot and fresh. It’s a wrap with beef, onions, tomatoes, cilantro, pickled turnips, and tahini sauce (creamy sesame paste), then grilled on the flattop grill to add some crispiness to the outer texture of the thin flatbread, like the best burritos. I love crunchy, tangy pickled vegetables, and the pickled turnips really made this shawarma something special. I’ve been disappointed by a lot of shawarma with dry, bland beef (or chicken), but this beef was really tender and juicy.

Here’s a cross-section, so you can see that tender beef for yourself. I always say that gyros are to tacos as shawarma is to burritos, in terms of shape and structure. I wouldn’t dare eat a gyro in my car, but the shawarma held up just fine.

I love liver in all its forms, from chopped chicken liver at a Jewish deli to liver and onions at an old-school diner. So I was surprised and excited to see a sandwich with marinated beef liver with green bell peppers, garlic, cumin, coriander, cilantro, and tahini sauce on a hoagie roll. I could not turn that down! Looking in the food truck window, I saw they use Cusano’s hoagie rolls, which I make a special trip to Gordon Food Service to buy. The nearby LaSpada’s Original Philly Cheese Steaks and Hoagies uses them, and I believe Gabriel’s Subs might as well. Great roll, and the entire sandwich was superb. The liver was so rich and tender. I personally would have loaded the sandwich up with onions too — sautéed with the liver, as well as some crispy fried ones — as well as some spicier peppers and/or hot sauce for some acid to cut the salty richness, but that’s just me.

Just as gyros are to tacos and shawarma is to burritos, the lesser-known Egyptian street food hawawshi is to quesadillas — except there is no cheese in hawawshi. Instead, it is spiced ground beef with onions, garlic, and parsley, stuffed into pita bread and grilled on the flattop grill to get that great crispy texture. Hawawshi is magical. You get four equal wedges, and mine came with a little cup of tahini for dipping. The menu mentioned I could have gotten hot sauce instead, which I would have preferred to try, but I was a little overwhelmed when ordering and didn’t think to ask. I had hawawshi for the first time at Makani back in 2019, and it was just as good there. I think the outer texture was crispier, almost like it had been fried, but this was great too.

Koshary is a famous Egyptian street food that I also tried for the first time at Makani. How could I resist a mountain of rice pilaf, lentils, spaghetti, elbow macaroni, tomato sauce, crispy fried onions, and chickpeas? It’s a carb-lover’s dream and a perfect snack for vegetarians and vegans too. The version of koshary from The Cairo Express came with an extra ramekin of tomato sauce and two ramekins of a vinegar sauce. I didn’t add any of either, because I wanted my wife to try it, and she doesn’t care for saucy, spicy, pungent foods (while I, on the other hand, can’t get enough of ’em). Once I ate the tomato sauce and onions off the top, we shared the rest of the koshary, and she enjoyed it as much as I did.

This baba ganoush was my wife’s sole request, since the smoky, creamy roasted eggplant dip is one of her favorite foods. She’s not a dipper like I am, but she will go through it with a spoon! She has high standards for baba ganoush, and she said Cairo Express’ version was one of the best in Orlando. I tried a tiny taste too, and I detected a lot of tahini (sesame paste) in there, while some go harder on the actual eggplant.

I returned to The Cairo Express the following Saturday because they had a weekend special that was another dish I was introduced to at Makani. These are mombar (pronounced with the emphasis on the “bar” rather than the “mom”), savory sausages made of rice seasoned with various herbs and spices, stuffed into a chewy lamb intestine. I swear I tasted cinnamon and clove in them. I believe the mombar are boiled and then fried until their texture is lightly crispy but also chewy. They are so delicious and fun to eat.

And I got a little piece of baklava that was good, because you can never go wrong with baklava!

On my second visit to the truck, I met Gigi, the matriarch of the family who cooked at Makani for years, then left after new owners took over, and is back in action at The Cairo Express. She was so sweet, and her son was very affable when I met him on my first visit. I’ll definitely be back. You should check them out too, as soon as possible. Even if you like Mediterranean and Middle Eastern food, the unique Egyptian dishes they offer like hawawshi, koshary, and mombar may be completely new to you. I think people will especially love the hawawshi and koshary (and vegetarians and vegans, don’t sleep on the koshary!). You can also try familiar favorites like shawarma and falafel and compare them to other versions you’ve eaten elsewhere. I highly recommend The Cairo Express and wish this lovely family all the good luck in the world.

Finka Table & Tap (Miami)

Finka Table & Tap (https://www.finkarestaurant.com/) is a Cuban-Peruvian-Korean fusion gastropub in Miami. If that sounds too good to be true, trust me — it’s real, and it’s spectacular. My best foodie friend took me there on my a recent trip to visit him and my family down in Miami. It is one of his favorite restaurants in the city, and he knew I would dig it too.

Finka is probably considered to be off the beaten path in Miami, far from the tony and trendy areas like Wynwood, Brickell, South Beach, and Coral Gables, but tucked away in the West Kendall suburbs. But just like another kick-ass Miami restaurant my friend brought me to, the award-winning, Cuban-inspired barbecue paradise Smoke & Dough, which is only five minutes away, Finka is worth a trip to Kendall to discover and experience for yourself.

It has been a while since our visit, so I didn’t remember what impressive-looking cocktail my friend ordered, but he identified it as a mai tai, one of his favorite drinks. He said it was a particularly good one, too, since Finka uses orgeat syrup.

It was your typical sweltering Miami summer day, and I have become a true lemonade connoisseur. Finka’s lemonade hit the spot.

Finka serve croquetas de jamon from the iconic Islas Canarias Cuban restaurant in West Kendall, and they are the absolute best croquetas anywhere in Miami. If you don’t believe me, my best foodie friend reviews Cuban cuisine and especially croquetas all over the city in his Croqueta Diaries, and he agrees. I admire his focus, and he is an excellent food writer. He’s brought me to the Islas Canarias ventanita before, to try croquetas straight from the source, but it felt like a bonus to be able to order them at Finka. They are never burnt or greasy — just fried to golden-brown perfection, smoky, creamy, and rich. A squirt from the lime wedge brought a nice acidic tang to cut the savory richness.

We set to work sharing those as well as the malanga nachos, crispy malanga (taro root) chips smothered with ribeye picadillo, a three-cheese sauce, maduros (we both love sweet fried plantains), pink pickled onions, leche de tigre sour cream, Fresno peppers, and scallions. It was a fusion feast.
By the way, leche de tigre is the spicy marinating liquid left over from marinating ceviche, so don’t worry — no real tigers were milked for this sour cream. Can you imagine?

I don’t think this is on the menu anymore, but my friend ordered the gochujang noodles, a dish with spicy sweet potato noodles, shrimp, snow peas, bok choy, squash, carrots, and mushrooms. I didn’t try it (I avoid mushrooms), but he seemed to like it.

I got “dak-galbi”-style chicken fried rice, with queso frito (fried cheese!), pineapples, red peppers, seasonal veggies, maduros, sesame seeds, spicy gochujang sauce (which I have become a huge fan of), and pickled cabbage. It was hard to choose, with so many interesting dishes on the menu, but this seemed to exemplify Finka’s commitment to fusion cuisine, while a few other things seemed a little more “normal.”

I know tourists, hipsters, and bon vivants probably avoid Kendall for their grand nights out in Miami, but there are more top-notch, destination-worthy restaurants there than when I left that area for good and moved to Orlando, at the end of 2004. My best foodie friend and I grew up in Kendall. We survived Kendall. Whether you’re a Miami local or just passing through for a good time, if not a long time, you could do a hell of a lot worse than venturing into West Kendall for a memorable fusion feast at Finka. Maybe plan accordingly and hit Finka and the outstanding Smoke & Dough on the same trip — possibly dinner at one place and takeout for lunch the next day from the other!

Yamasan Sushi and Grill

Yamasan Sushi and Grill (https://www.yamasanorlando1.com/) is a beautiful little Japanese restaurant that has been around for a decade or so, in the Mills Park complex on Mills Avenue, just north of Virginia Drive. I have driven by it literally hundreds of times, but never stopped in to eat until this past Monday, a rare weekday off. My wife and I were already nearby and craving sushi, so we decided to try it, not knowing anything about the place. (Longtime readers know I usually research restaurants and study menus in advance, but not always!) Anyway, I’m so glad we did, since we had a wonderful experience.

Yamasan’s menu is absolutely huge, and they have all kinds of Japanese food, not just sushi. They have hot and cold appetizers, bento boxes, noodle and rice dishes, poke bowls, hibachi grill options, and even a Japanese/French fusion menu. The thing is, I’m a roll guy. I love ornate sushi rolls, especially with raw fish and lots of ingredients to keep things interesting. Most of the “Yamasan special rolls” are in the $15-$25 range, and some are even more expensive than that, so I figured it would be an expensive meal, but probably worth it.

However, our lovely server Maggie let us know that Yamasan recently began offering an all-you-can-eat menu, where for the price of $47.95 per person, you had a pretty large variety of selections to choose from — not the entire multi-page menu, but still a lot. There is a 9o-minute time limit, and everyone in the party must choose the all-you-can-eat option. Even my wife was on board, because if you were even thinking about ordering three rolls, you come out ahead, and we each ordered more than that! If you show up hungry, it would be foolish not to.

I took the liberty of photographing both sides of the all-you-can-eat menu, since it isn’t available on Yamasan’s website as of now:

I am going to include the regular menu prices with each description below, just to show you how much money we saved by doing all-you-can-eat instead of ordering a la carte.

I started out with the tuna carpaccio appetizer ($21.95 on the regular menu), which was very small, but it’s all good, because we had a lot more food coming. This was two pieces of lightly seared tuna topped with creme fraiche, black caviar, grated pecorino Romano cheese, fleur de sel (very posh sea salt), truffle oil, and capers, with wild field greens drizzled with raspberry dressing on the side. Needless to say, there’s a lot going on in this little app! It was so magnificent, I implored my wife to try the second piece, and she liked it so much she ordered another portion for herself (also $21.95).

She got one piece of escolar sashimi ($12 for three pieces on the regular menu), and I got three pieces of mackerel sashimi ($12 for three pieces on the regular menu). I love mackerel, because it is always lightly pickled, and I grew up eating pickled herring (one of the foods of my people).

This was the Japanese mentaiko udon ($18.95 on the regular menu), a decadent noodle dish from the Japanese/French Fusion part of the menu. These super-thick, super-chewy udon noodles were topped with salty salmon roe that pop in your mouth, finely shredded nori (roasted seaweed), more grated pecorino Romano cheese for an umami punch, and what I’m guessing was salty, punchy cod roe mayonnaise on the right side of the photo below. That’s what they put on the mentaiko fries I tried many years ago at Susuru, anyway. This was another dish that was as gorgeous as it was tasty.

I loved everything about this, and I was even considering ordering it before we discovered the all-you-can-eat menu (and that this was included in it). Again, my wife impressed me by trying it and pleasantly surprised both of us by liking it. But what’s not to like… unless you already don’t like salty, fishy flavors?

The rolls started to show up next. This was a Dynamite roll ($11.95 on the regular menu), with tuna, yellowtail, wasabi, and scallions, a nice opening act for the superstars about to arrive. It was dynamite!

And here’s a gorgeous tray with three of my selections: the Salmon Tower roll in the front, the Capitan roll in the middle, and the Unforgettable roll in the back. Lord have mercy!The Salmon Tower roll ($19.95 on the regular menu) is pressed into that rectangular shape, and it includes green shiso (perilla) leaves mixed with sushi rice, smoked salmon, salmon roe, kani (krab), mayonnaise, and eel sauce. I wasn’t sure what shiso/perilla leaves were supposed to taste like, but my research tells me the flavor is a cross between basil and mint — both good flavors to go with the salty, smoky richness in this roll.

The very traditional Capitan roll ($18.95 on the regular menu) includes fried calamari, avocado, Cajun seasoning, topped with smoked salmon, wasabi, creme fraiche, mango salsa, and eel sauce. Okay, so it isn’t traditional at all, but I love fusion cuisine, and I already said I’m a sucker for sushi with a lot going on!

I really should have turned the tray around for a better pic of the Unforgettable roll ($18.95 on the regular menu) in the back, but I forgot. Yes, I forgot the Unforgettable roll. I’m here all week, folks. Anyway, it includes spicy tuna and barbecue eel, and it is topped with avocado, seafood sauce, eel sauce, crispy fried noodles, and masago (red flying fish roe). Each of these was mighty fine.

Here were my wife’s first two roll choices, which curiously came out some time after my first three. In front, you can see the Mango Tango roll ($17.95 on the regular menu), with tempura shrimp and cream cheese, topped with mango, shredded coconut, and eel sauce. It’s always a crowd-pleaser.Behind it is the Sweet Sixteen roll ($17.95 on the regular menu), with shrimp, krab, cream cheese, and a rice paper wrapper, topped with mango and strawberries and drizzled with a “mayo sauce.” I like some sweet flavors with my sushi, like eel sauce, and I’m never sad to see mango show up, but that one was a little too desserty for me.

This was her next roll, the Lover roll ($18.95 on the regular menu), with krab salad, topped with tuna, spicy mayo, a tiny Hokkaido scallop, and red caviar (masago) on top. There was something else in this Lover roll that wasn’t listed that was brown and had kind of a funky flavor that didn’t fit. At first, I feared the chef sneaked mushrooms into this roll, because it definitely wasn’t a fish. The menu listed tempura flakes, but we didn’t see any or feel their familiar, pleasing crunch. It turned out that it was inari, also known as bean curd, or fermented and fried tofu, a common sushi ingredient which she likes, but I don’t — especially when I’m not expecting it. But once she got too full, I poked the inari out of each piece with a chopstick and dutifully finished the rest of the Lover roll.

And this was my last stand: the Dream of Dream roll ($20.95 on the regular menu), which you have to say in the old-timey newsman voice of the late, great David Lynch, as you can bet that I did. It was a fitting way to end our unexpected feast at Yamasan, with tuna, salmon, shrimp, krab, tempura flakes, regular AND spicy mayo, eel sauce, and black caviar. Back in 2009, David Lynch quoted The Upanishads on Twitter, in those days before it became one of the worst places on the Internet: “We are like the dreamer who dreams & then lives in the dream.” Later, in his brilliant third season of Twin Peaks in 2017, Lynch’s character Gordon Cole had a dream in which Monica Bellucci repeated the line. And that’s all I could think of while I ate the Dream of Dream roll.

So if you add up the prices of everything we got, had we ordered a la carte:

Two tuna carpaccio appetizers ($21.95 x 2) +
Escolar sashimi ($12 for three pieces, since we would not have been able to order just one piece) +
Mackerel sashimi ($12 for three pieces) +
Japanese mentaiko udon ($18.95) +
Dynamite roll ($11.95) +
Salmon Tower roll ($19.95) +
Capitan roll ($18.95) +
Unforgettable roll ($18.95) +
Mango Tango roll ($17.95) +
Sweet Sixteen roll ($17.95) +
Lover roll ($18.95) +
Dream of Dream roll ($20.95) =
A whopping $232.45 (plus tax and tip)!

We would never run amok like that if we were ordering off the regular menu… or would we? I always say we know how to party, and why doesn’t anyone ever party with us?

But instead, we paid $47.95 x 2 = $95.90 (plus tax and tip, of course). YOU’RE WELCOME. And thank you to Yamasan Sushi and Grill!

Well, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, I am thrilled to report that our first visit to Yamasan surpassed my wildest dreams (or dreams of dreams). I would happily go back, because even if it isn’t a cheap dinner, you will eat like a king and go home satisfied and ready to crash for the night. I feel like we got our money’s worth, and then some. And it’s such a nice little restaurant (with comfortable booths!), I would recommend it even if you don’t go with the all-you-can-eat option, even though I personally think it’s a no-brainer. Ask for Maggie — she was the only server on duty, so she was slammed, but she will take the best care of you, as she did for us.

Istanbul Grill

I love Turkish food. It might be my second-favorite cuisine of all time, after Italian, and the insidious social media algorithms are always sending me reels of the most amazing-looking Turkish street foods that always make me hungry. Unfortunately, Turkish restaurants don’t always last here in Orlando. I was a big fan of Beyti and Cappadocia, but they didn’t survive. Luckily, I have a new favorite, Istanbul Grill (https://istanbulgrillorlando.com/), but unfortunately, it isn’t close to home like Beyti was or close to work like Cappadocia was (especially because my work and home are now one in the same). It is way far south on Orange Blossom Trail, south of the Florida Mall, south of the 528. It’s a haul — about 45 minutes each way in good traffic on a weekend during the day. But I’ve brought home takeout twice from Istanbul Grill, and it was so worth it both times.

It is a big attention-getter to order lavas bread in a Turkish restaurant. They walk it out to your table, this big, beautiful bread puffed up with hot air like a football, and then you stab it with utensils to deflate it (and watch out for the hot steam escaping). It is very soft, and you rip off pieces and use it for dipping and scooping. Of course, if you get lavas bread to go, it deflates on the long drive home, but if you’re lucky, it stays warm and may stay soft overnight if you have any left.

And why do you need soft bread for dipping and scooping? For this mixed appetizer platter! Almost every Turkish restaurant offers a variety of cool, fresh, refreshing dips, and you can usually order some kind of assortment. My favorite is spicy ezme in the top left, almost like Turkish salsa — a combination of fresh tomatoes, onions, parsley, green and red bell peppers, hot peppers, garlic, tomato paste, and lemon juice. My wife wants nothing to do with ezme, so I get it all. In the top right, the tabouli salad is all hers — crushed bulgur wheat, parsley, scallions. and tomatoes with olive oil and fresh mint. She told me this is her favorite tabouli from any restaurant, Turkish or otherwise.In the bottom left, we have baba ganoush — fresh smoked eggplant puree with tahini (sesame paste), olive oil, labneh (strained yogurt thickened into a cheese-like form), mayonnaise, garlic, and lemon juice. We both love this one, but it is her absolute favorite. In the cup in the middle, we have cacik — a dip of creamy yogurt, shredded cucumber, mint, dill, and garlic, perfect for cutting spice and mellowing out rich meats. And in the bottom right, we have the old classic hummus — chick peas, tahini, olive oil, garlic and cumin.

As great as this mixed appetizer bounty is, I do wish Istanbul Grill served two more dips that I rank even above ezme: soslu patlican (eggplant sauteed with tomatoes, onions, and peppers, like a spicy ratatouille) and taramasalata (a creamy dip made with salted, cured fish roe).

For my first visit, I made sure to order lahmacun, one of my Turkish favorites. These thin, round flatbreads look like pizza without cheese, but they are much thinner than even tavern-style pizza and not as crispy, and aren’t sliced. They are topped with a delicious mixture of ground lamb, tomatoes, onions, and peppers, and then baked. Here you get three in an order.
I’ve made lahmacun from scratch before, and I think I’m going to have to do it again soon, since I have ground lamb in the freezer and want to use it up before hurricane season gets hot and heavy. Mine are pretty awesome, but not quite as perfect as Istanbul Grill’s.

Instead of eating lahmacun like pizza, you are supposed to roll it up and fill it with sliced tomatoes, red onions, fresh cilantro, and a squeeze of lemon juice. It is so refreshing and light, much moreso than you would think a pizza-looking thing would be.

My wife ordered “mosakka” (often called moussaka on other restaurants’ menus), an oven-baked dish of eggplant with ground beef and tomato sauce, topped with mozzarella cheese. If you’ve made it this far, you might be more familiar with the Greek version of moussaka, which is often assembled in layers and topped with a bechamel sauce, but both of us really love the tomatoey Turkish variant. I tried a bite, and folks, you have to try this some time! This is actually my preferred moussaka/mosakka.

It was hard for me to choose, but I made the game-time decision (standing at the counter placing my order) to go with lamb adana, grilled kebaps of ground lamb seasoned with red bell peppers. Think of it as a grilled meatloaf with a firmer texture. These were fine, especially when I added some of the house-made hot sauce, but I was hoping they would be a little more exciting, flavor-wise. I almost always gravitate toward lamb dishes at Turkish, Middle Eastern, and Greek restaurants, but I probably would have been happier with the special beef adana, grilled ground beef shoulder kebabs tender seasoned with mint, red bell pepper, onions, chili flakes, and cumin. There seems to be more going on in that one. Leave it to me to choose the lesser adana! Or maybe I should have tried a different lamb dish. Luckily, there would be a next time. They came on a bed of rich rice pilaf (which gets so much better with all the meat drippings soaking in) with a small salad and crunchy pickled red cabbage.

My wife had asked me to pick her a dessert, so instead of baklava, I brought home this kunefe, because she is in her pistachio-loving era. This Middle Eastern dessert is a large “patty” of very fine shreds of dough that almost look like vermicelli strands, often with a sweet cheese filling, soaked in a sugary syrup and topped with crushed pistachios. It looks a bit dry in this photo because the sugar syrup came in a separate little ramekin (not pictured) for us to pour over the kunefe when we got it home. That definitely improved its looks, texture, and most importantly, its taste. I didn’t try it, so I don’t know if this one had cheese inside or not, but she liked it, so that made us both happy.

For our second visit, we got Istanbul bread instead of the fluffy, puffy lavas (that is actually quite thin once you rip it apart). This was very similar to a thicker pita bread or a good pizza crust, minus toppings, and much thicker than the lahmacun. It held up well dipping and scooping the mixed appetizer platter I brought home again.

My wife asked for an order of falafel, which came with four decent-sized discs and a little cup of tahini, which really surprised me when I took a big dip, expecting it to be hummus. I like hummus (who doesn’t?), but straight-up tahini, not so much. These looked darker than your average falafel, so she thought they were burned and ended up not having any after all. I ate them a few days later, so I can vouch for them not being burned and actually being delicious. I made them into two separate sandwiches (two falafels in each) on onion naan bread with homemade pickled cabbage, homemade pickled red onions, tomatoes, Istanbul Grill’s own hot sauce, and Flavortown Secret Sauce from my giant collection of condiments. I should have taken a picture of one of those, because they turned out pretty.

One thing my wife ate with gusto was this order of four beautiful grilled lamb chops, seasoned to perfection. I asked them to grill them as rare as possible. Despite being very thin (much thinner than the thick lamb loin chops I buy at Costco), they were delicious, and seasoned so well. The rice pilaf underneath them got better and better as it soaked up all those savory drippings. She actually got four separate meals out of this, with one lamb chop and a little rice in each portion!

She surprised me by taking a big bite of the grilled pepper on the left, before I could warn her it would be too spicy for her. It was. She won’t do that again! And I ate all the crunchy red pickled cabbage, of course.

This was my lamb shank, a tender, braised chunk of meat barely clinging to a large bone, which was stewed in a tomatoey gravy. This is one of my favorite dishes to order at Turkish or Greek restaurants, but because I love it so much, I learned how to make braised lamb shanks myself at home, and my sauce is a lot thicker, spicier, and more robust overall, especially since I braise mine in the oven for five to six hours. This was perfectly good, but just like I’m exceptionally picky about restaurant lasagna because I love my homemade version so much, I also like my lamb shanks a lot more than this one. Sorry, Istanbul Grill. It’s not you, it’s me.

It came with a big styrofoam container of rice pilaf, which I dumped into the lamb shank’s somewhat thin gravy to soak it up.

And this was the iskender style kebab, a dish I was introduced to a long time ago at Bosphorous, the first Turkish restaurant I fell in love with, and then Cappadocia (RIP) raised the bar even higher. I didn’t eat this until the following day, but it consists of “signature house prepared meat” sliced thin over “garlic bread” (I’m thinking fried Istanbul bread) topped with a tangy, tomatoey “special sauce” and served with yogurt. It is mildly spicy, acidic, and also creamy, and you get the crispiness of the fried bread underneath catching all those meat and sauce drippings. The other Turkish restaurants used their doner kebap meat (think sliced gyro meat, all salty and garlicky usually grilled to make it a little firmer), but this was definitely different from those.

Like I say at the end of too many of these reviews, we both really liked Istanbul Grill, but it is too far from home to return with any regularity, and too far to even drag my wife down there to dine in the restaurant. But I recommend it, and I will challenge myself to keep ordering different things off the expansive menu whenever I return. And FYI, there is a second location in Kissimmee, which is even further from me, but might be more convenient for some.

Lim Ros Thai Cuisine

Lim Ros (https://limrosthairestaurant.com/) is a new Thai restaurant in Maitland that opened in the fall of 2024. According to the website, “Lim Ros” means “to taste” in Thai, and there is plenty to taste on the menu. It is located on the bottom floor of a fancy-looking apartment building on the corner of State Road 17-92 (aka Orlando Avenue, which turns into Mills Avenue as you head south) and Lake Avenue. The interior of Lim Ros is modern, spacious, and upscale, with high ceilings and lots of natural light that make the dining room look even larger. When we went for lunch a few weeks back, it wasn’t very busy, but I imagine it is poppin’ on Friday and Saturday nights.

My wife started her meal with a Thai iced tea, as she will at any Thai restaurant. This one was sweet, creamy, slightly smoky, and refreshing, as they should be.

She also started with an order of summer rolls, her go-to appetizer at any Vietnamese restaurant we visit, so she wanted to try them on a Thai menu. The soft rice paper wrappers held massive amounts of finely shredded lettuce, chewy rice vermicelli noodles, julienned carrots and cucumbers, Thai basil, and shrimp , but vegetarians and folks who keep kosher can also order them with tofu instead of shrimp. That is peanut sauce on the top, even though it looks like it could have been cocktail sauce.

I’m not a big summer roll guy, but she insisted I try half of one, and these were a lot more substantial than the usual summer rolls at Vietnamese restaurants. Thicker. Girthier, if you will. Okay, that’s enough of that.

After being introduced to life-changing larb last year at Isan Zaap Thai Cafe, my favorite Thai restaurant in Orlando, I decided to try the larb gai here at Lim Ros. It is a spicy, tangy, refreshing, cool salad made with ground chicken and various crunchy vegetables and fresh herbs: carrots, red onion, cilantro, mint, kaffir lime leaves, roasted rice powder, and served with cucumber slices for scooping and crisp iceberg lettuce leaves for making lettuce wraps. Dig this gorgeous plating:

I must admit I preferred the taste and texture of the larb at Isan Zaap, which was made with ground pork and pork liver, as opposed to the ground chicken in this larb gai. This one also seemed to have a lot of funkiness from fish sauce. Trying to roll up some larb gai lettuce wraps was a messy business, and my fingers smelled like fish sauce for a day or two after this meal.

For entrees, we both ordered off the lunch menu, which has some nice specials. Everything comes with a house seaweed soup and a crispy fried spring roll, so you get a filling meal with a couple bonus items for less than the price on the regular menu.

My wife defaulted to pad Thai, a safe choice for her because she isn’t into spicy food at all. If the classic dish of rice noodles, eggs, bean sprouts, chives, peanuts, and pork sounds basic or unadventurous, I would disagree, because every restaurant’s pad Thai is different, and a truly great one can be a monumental discovery. She said this one was just okay. I tasted it, and she agreed with my criticism, that it lacked the acidic tang from citrus it needed to achieve perfect balance. To be fair, that is my biggest complaint about most versions of pad Thai that I try.

Since my go-to Thai dish, drunken noodles, wasn’t on either menu at Lim Ros, I decided to try something totally new (to me): Panang curry. Here is the whole lunch platter:

This is the actual Panang curry, with Thai eggplant, Thai basil, kaffir lime leaf, chili, and pork (which I chose, but you can also choose chicken, tofu, or vegetables, or beef or shrimp for a $2 upcharge). I wanted something spicy, and I would have to describe it as “medium hot,” but next time I will challenge myself with “Thai hot.” I added all my rice to the bowl of curry and mixed it all up, so that alone dampened the heat level.
I was surprised that the Thai eggplants were little, round, and green, not at all like the huge purple-black eggplants all of us are used to. They looked like tiny round watermelons on the outside, and they had a texture similar to zucchini.

This was the house seaweed soup, which reminded me a lot of the standard miso soup served in Japanese restaurants, but with a delicious “roasted” flavor from the seaweed. Umami? Maybe your mommy. There were tiny little white tofu cubes in there, along with all the seaweed, carrot, onions, and scallions. It was a very nice soup, and it reminded me that I never order Thai soups, but I should branch out.

And the spring roll was a standard spring roll — no big surprises there — but you can’t go wrong with a spring roll! I took the shredded cabbage and carrots home, mixed in with most of my larb gai, so I had a whole meal for the following day.

We both thought Lim Ros was perfectly fine, but there are other Thai restaurants we like more, including another recent discovery I will be reviewing soon, so watch this space. It’s a very nice restaurant and would probably be great for a date, a business lunch, or for bringing family and friends who are unfamiliar with Thai food and nervous about trying it. If you want Thai and you’re already in Maitland or surrounding Fern Park to the north or Winter Park to the south, you can’t go wrong. However, the next time my wife and I are craving Thai, I might drive farther in other directions.

Baar Baar (Los Angeles)

Baar Baar (https://www.baarbaarla.com/) in downtown Los Angeles (the locals call it DTLA) is the most upscale Indian restaurant I’ve ever been to, with a gorgeous dining room and a large, eclectic menu of gourmet dishes that definitely seemed “elevated” above the standard Indian cuisine I’m used to. This memorable meal goes back to late summer, 2023, when I was invited on my very first trip to L.A., joining our dean, an associate dean, and my director, only about a month after starting my current job. I definitely felt like the odd man out, hanging with these big shots, but their warm welcomes and lack of pretension convinced me I belonged there. Our dean, a very classy lady who knows how to throw a dinner party, ordered several dishes, mostly small plates meant to be shared.

These puffs were dahi puri, topped with tamarind, mango, yogurt mousse, and raspberry chaat masala. These were very light and crispy (similar to pani puri I’ve had elsewhere), but the toppings added sweet flavor to go with the savory, lightly fried puffs.

These beauties were Kashmiri duck tacos, served birria-style, shredded with cheddar cheese, cilantro, and red onion — true fusion cuisine! Instead of Mexican tortillas, the crispy taco shells were more like roti or parathas. The four of us each got half a taco and savored every morsel.

These six gorgeous oysters came with guava and chili granita (almost like a sorbet), pickled cucumber, and shallots. I love oysters, and these were so fresh and refreshing. I would have been happy just having this platter to myself and nothing else, but of course we all shared these and everything else.

This fun and frizzy dish was sweet potato chat, an appetizer served with tangy-sweet tamarind chutney, sweet and sour yogurt (or “yoghurt,” according to the menu), and kale.

These were two lamb chop burrah kebabs (the second one is underneath, and you can see the bone), served with fresh mint, hemp seed chutney, and lachcha pyaz, a bright and pungent salad comprised of thin rings of red onion rings, ground spices, lemon, and fresh herbs. I love onions, but raw red onions are intense, and so is the onion breath they create. I was desperate to make a good impression on these three powerful, professional women, so I didn’t mess with the lachcha salad the way I normally would, dining on my own. The lamb was wonderful, and the fresh mint really worked well with it.

This dish doesn’t seem to be on the menu anymore, but it was tandoori butternut squash, served with asparagus, millet khichdi (instead of rice as the base of this dish, it was a combination of millet and yellow moong dal, or mung beans), and rice papad, which are like very thin, airy, crispy crackers or wafers.

While these look vaguely desserty, they were savory paneer pinwheels (notice how they look like three slices of something longer, rolled into a spiral), with makhani (a creamy, buttery, tomato-based sauce), topped with dollops of red pepper chutney, and pistachios. I loved them.

These were beef short ribs, always one of my favorite meats from any cuisine, served in Madras curry (a spicy British-Indian creation with a base of tomatoes and onions), with bone marrow Khurchan and baby vegetables. Between the tender short ribs and rich, unctuous bone marrow, which is like “meat butter,” I was in heaven with this decadent dish.

At Baar Baar, even a simple side of saffron rice was still cooked as perfectly as any rice could be.

And this was a side of pomegranate raita: cool, refreshing, creamy, tangy yogurt topped with pomegranate seeds.

This gorgeous dessert doesn’t seem to be on the Baar Baar menu anymore, but it was called mango ghewar, and it consisted of malai kulfi (Indian ice cream flavored with cardamom, saffron, and rose water), mascarpone cheese mousse, mango jelly, and crushed pistachios.

Needless to say, this was a sumptuous feast, even shared by four people. Like I said, our dean is a class act who knows how to party! Few things bring me as much joy as sharing a bunch of different dishes with people over good conversation, and that’s what our dinner at Baar Baar turned out to be. Not only was it the finest Indian meal of my life, but it was a reminder that all the decisions I had made in my life to get to this moment in time — this job, working remotely, getting to visit our gorgeous school in L.A. once in a while, collaborating with these amazing people, even being part of this grand gustatory gathering — turned out to be right. This dinner was almost two years ago, and ever since then, I have been grateful every day for the new direction my life has taken. I’ve also been falling more and more in love with Los Angeles and its culinary culture. Even though Orlando is my home, I’ve had so many great meals in L.A. (sometimes solo and sometimes with colleagues and friends, like this one), and I have so many more L.A. restaurant reviews yet to come!

Kai Kai

This week, I want to talk about Kai Kai (https://www.instagram.com/kaikai.bbq/), Jerry and Jackie Lau’s stall that serves up Cantonese barbecued meats, as beautiful as they are delicious. Kai Kai is located inside Mills Market, the new Asian food hall on East Colonial Drive between Mills and Thornton Avenues in Mills 50, arguably Orlando’s best foodie neighborhood. Last week’s review recipient UniGirl is one of Kai Kai’s neighboring stalls inside Mills Market, and so is former favorite Banh Mi Boy, that Vietnamese sandwich stall sandwiched between UniGirl and Kai Kai.
Before Mills Market opened last year, Kai Kai was located inside of iFresh Supermarket, the Asian market on the corner of East Colonial and Bumby Avenue (next door to Chicken Fire and Lam’s Garden!), but since then, Meng’s Kitchen has moved into the former Kai Kai space inside iFresh Market.

I swear I’m going to move on, but I feel the need to say that Kai Kai is not to be confused with Michelin-recommended Kai Asian Street Fare, one of my favorite restaurants in the Orlando area (just over the Casselberry border in Winter Park). Everybody still with me?

Well, I dare you to walk up to Kai Kai and not be entranced and enthralled by the barbecued ducks and chickens hanging on display… unless you’re a vegetarian, that is.

I appreciate that they have photos of all their dishes on display. I honestly wish more restaurants would do this.

Something else I appreciate about restaurants is when they offer some kind of sampler plate with two or three items to choose from so you can try a few things. I will almost always choose this option, whether it’s an American barbecue joint or a Cantonese restaurant like Kai Kai. If you order a “rice box,” you can choose two or three of the six house specialty meats. I, of course, went with three meats, which only costs $2 more than the two-meat option, so it seems like a no-brainer. I treated myself to roast duck, honey barbecue char siu pork, and soy sauce chicken (from top to bottom in the photo below).

The sliced meats are served over white rice with some garlicky sautéed bok choy, but you can pay a small upcharge for either fried rice or Hainanese garlic rice. I chose the garlic rice, and I have zero regrets. I strongly encourage my readers to do the same. But look at this gorgeous plate of food! It is huge and heavy, so much so that even *I*, chronic overeater that I am, easily got two and a half meals out of it.

Just because this is a feast for all the senses, including the eyes, here is a close-up of that lovely roast duck with crispy, crackly skin, and the tender, sweet, slightly sticky char siu pork beneath it:

And here is that soy sauce chicken, with lightly crispy skin as well.

They also offer honey barbecue chicken, honey barbecue ribs, and “crispy pork,” either in these rice boxes or by the pound or half-pound, but I feel like I made great choices. I’ll have to try the ribs next time, though!

I also brought home an order of beef chow fun — chewy, wide, flat rice noodles (made from scratch by Jackie Lau herself!) wok-fried with tender sliced beef, onions, and green onions in a savory brown sauce. Forgive me for not snapping a “noodle pull” pic, but I ate it too quickly. This is one of my go-to dishes at any Chinese restaurant, especially as a way to evaluate places that are new to me. If they have beef chow fun on the menu, I consider it a good sign, and if they do a good job of it, I feel more confident that anything else that comes out of the kitchen will be equally solid.

Spoiler alert: they did a great job of it.

On top of everything else, Kai Kai also serves Singapore rice noodles (another dish I love, the spicier the better), char siu pork lo mein noodles, young chow fried rice with shrimp, chicken, and pork, duck fried rice, and Chinese sausage fried rice, which I love so much that I will definitely try their version next time. But that’s not all! They also have an entire scratch-made dim sum menu featuring siu mai, multiple dumplings and bao buns, spicy Szechuan wings, and even cucumber salad (regular or spicy) that is probably super-refreshing to balance out all those heavy barbecued and roasted meats and fried noodle and rice dishes.

Obviously I enjoyed the food at Kai Kai, but I’m far from the only one. The latest round of Florida Michelin awards were announced on Friday, April 5th, and Kai Kai received a vaunted Michelin recommendation, alongside its Mills Market neighbors UniGirl and Banh Mi Boy, which both received Bib Gourmand awards. Congratulations go out to Jerry and Jackie Lau, who are absolutely killing it at Kai Kai. I look forward to returning, but in the meantime, there is magic happening in the stall kitchens of Mills Market. Whatever restauranteurs Johnny and Jimmy Tung of the Bento Group are doing to build their brands and spread the word, it is paying off!

UniGirl

UniGirl (https://www.unigirlfl.com/) is an whimsically named food stall in Orlando’s relatively new Asian food hall Mills Market, located inside the former Tien Hung market on East Colonial Drive between Mills and Thornton Avenues. It is even more adorable when you learn on the website that it was named after chef/owner William Shen’s shiba inu, a super-cute Japanese dog breed that looks like a fox. A cartoony shiba inu appears as the official mascot of the restaurant.

UniGirl specializes in onigiri, tasty triangles of lightly salted koshihikari Japanese short grain rice (nicely chewy and sticky; the same kind of rice used for sushi), molded with some kind of filling, sprinkled with furikake seasoning (diced roasted seaweed and sesame seeds), wrapped with a piece of roasted seaweed to use like a handle. They are served warm and best enjoyed that way. I first tried onigiri a few years back at Ramen Takagi, still my favorite ramen-ya in the Orlando area, but nobody else has focused on onigiri until UniGirl opened in November 2024. I had some fun on my first visit very recently!

This was the refreshing “daily mocktail” — so perfect on an unseasonably hot day in early April. It was a blend of calamansi and passion fruit juices and jasmine, served over crushed ice, which we can all agree is the best kind of ice. Calamansi is a tart little citrus fruit, similar to lime, that is very popular in Filipino cuisine, and passion fruit is one of my favorite fruits and flavors in general.

I got an order of three fried oysters while I waited, which were fried to order and to perfection. These were listed on a chalkboard as a konbini special, with konbini serving as an abbreviation of konbiniensu sutoru, or “convenience store.” Japanese convenience stores are supposed to be truly special places, 24/7 paradises where weary shoppers can pick up a variety of premade, fresh, tasty grab-and-go foods that are quite good, not just reheated junk food thrown together from the lowest-quality ingredients. Even the 7-Eleven chain, ubiquitous in Japan, is known for really great food and snacks, far more over there than they are here.

Just as an aside, I am obsessed with lemons. Whenever I get a lemon wedge served with my seafood, I eat it whole, just like normal people would eat an orange slice.

Anyway, the creamy, cool, slightly herby dipping sauce worked well with the golden, crispy exterior and almost creamy oyster centers. The fry guy warned me they would be boiling lava hot, so I might want to wait a little while once they came up. That was wise advice. About five minutes later, they were still hot, but no longer capable of burning my mouth. Did you hear about the hipster who burnt his tongue? He ate UniGirl’s fried oysters before they were cool!

On to the star of the show: the onigiri! I brought four onigiri home with me, but they had more than that to choose from, all individually wrapped and labeled.

As you can see, all the perfect little onigiri look similar, so thank goodness their disposable outer wrappers are labeled. Once I got home and opened them up, I made a note of which was which.

The tuna onigiri in the top left was more like tuna salad, mixed with mayo (probably the eggy Kewpie brand) and a bit of mustard, rather than the raw ahi tuna I always expect, like you get in sushi or poke. The miso tan tan (spicy crumbled pork) in the top right had a lot of flavor, including some mild spice.

The unagi (eel) onigiri in the bottom left was by far my favorite. It was sweet and savory, not fishy at all. In the bottom right, mentaiko (Alaskan pollock roe, from a fish in the cod family) was salty and spicy, with a subtle umami quality. I first tried mentaiko years ago at Susuru, another unique Japanese restaurant here in Orlando, where they served mentaiko fries.

Finally, UniGirl advertised potato-egg salad as anther konbini special on the Saturday I went, and I thought it would be a nice little treat, especially since I’m such a fan of delicatessen fare. I find it comforting that the Japanese like potato and egg salads too, and of course their versions are excellent.

Everything from UniGirl was a real treat — savory Japanese snacks meant for comfort and convenience, but so different from the conventional, familiar landmarks of Japanese cuisine like sushi, ramen, and udon. I’m definitely not the only fan, because just the other day, on April 17th, 2025, UniGirl was awarded a prestigious Michelin Bib Gourmand award for “good quality, good value cooking.” That is a huge honor for Chef William Shen (who also got an interview feature on the tire company’s website), for UniGirl, for the Mills Market (which houses a few other Michelin award-winning food stalls… STAY TUNED, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos!), and for Orlando in general.