moved again

So I have moved a lot in the past year or so - 2 moves (to and from a new city), a new job, 2 trips overseas, you name it.

I have also moved a bit on termsof my food-writing interests.

and as such, I have focused my sights (and rants) more and more lately onto mostly vegan, high protein, lower-fat dining. so much so, that it really became logical to move the blog, too:

c'mon now, follow me to the new locale:
Seitanic Verses shall be read by all!

Pizza wars continue!

That's right. A friend of mine would probably claim this is a sign on the coping apocalypse, but I am about to share the virtues of Ikea pizza with you.







As you (maybe?) can see, no particularly scary ingredients...
Vegetarian (not vegan) friendly.



Plus you can get a good chunk of your saturated fat requirements in one place!

Pizza wars!

How long have I been sleeping?

It's on!
The gauntlet: frozen pizza, readily available in my local megamart, no meat, no trans-fats, no doctoring by me.

Ready to meet the contenders?

A Hotel for All!

This evening, in an atypical suburban married-person moment, T and I went to a mall.
I know, right?
Horror of horrors.

But the thing is, we had a good time.
We went into Williams Sonoma and ate free little bites of Pannetone and Snickerdoodle panini (summary judgement - Pannetone = always good. Snickerdoodle spread = bad idea, way too sweet, slimey, and overwhelming) and spiced cider (good flavor, too sweet, not hot enough). We returned some stuff at The Gap (remember the old commercial? Fall... in..to... the.... Gap? well, I fell in and $60 fell out with me! wahoo!). We wandered a little...

to find...
something rather surprising and good.

Hotel Chocolat.


A British rebuttal against the idea that the UK is incapable of generating actual chocolate, Hotel Chocolat has taken over the previously weird and dank space occupied by Stoddard's (imagine the unabomber's basement, albeit a great place to have your knives sharpened, they do a perfect job!), and rehabbed it into a chic, sleek, temple of chocolate.



Mostly, the wares are displayed as potential gifts - gorgeous themed gift collections and boxes, in the event your holiday hosts have been very, verrrry good.

The single shopkeeper was enthusiastic and extremely knowledgeable about the brand, and (perhaps more importantly) very liberal with the samples. We tried a small piece of milk chocolate with caramel - I didn't really like it (it had good texture, but, and this often happens for me, I felt the milk chocolate was missing some vital chocogoodness in terms of depth of flavor and the caramel addition yielded a product that was just too sweet and undercomplicated), and was planning to walk out, assuming Hotel Chocolat made British-palate-tuned chocolate (sorry to my English friends, but I find most English sweets to be so overwhelmingly sticky, sweet, and monotone that I have been known to spit them out. Cadbury products (with two small exceptions - any guesses?) give me nightmares of my teeth falling out (no comments from the Freudians, mmm'kay?).)

then I asked the question that changed the melody,
"Do you carry anything combining chocolate with salt?"



This was the magic request, a la "open sesame."

From her top drawer, the lovely and devious chocoteuse produced giant samples of their The Purist 70-something % dark chocolate bar with salt. hurrah. This was delicious. Texture was stiff, glossy, with a distinct and pleasant snap, smooth melt against the palate, and a complex, floral chocolate flavor married (without grit) to a nice dose of the sodium I adore.

I loved it. This was one nice bar of chocolate. T was so impressed, he bought one, plus a 72% Ocumare Valley single origin bar with Chili and Cocoa Nibs. Which we tried last night with a few sips of Washington state cab... one square was all I needed to feel sated. It is delicious.

Summary judgement: Go, Hotel Chocolat, go. I dot know why you have a sort of witless French-inspired name for a British company making a mostly South American product, but I don't care. The shop is chic, the service was friendly, smart, and generous, and most importantly, the chocolate was really really excellent once I found what suits my palate. There are lots of choices, so I'd think there is something for everyone, even the dastardly Cadbury-milk eaters. Not that they should.

each The Purist bar is 75 grams and costs ten bucks. We went to Hotel Chocolat in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.

Tagine smarts!

So we did eat at Clio for our anniversary, and the food was awesome, as usual. I broke my usual meat-free lifestyle rules for the genius of Ken Oringer, and all I have to say is that everything we ate was nummy! I shared a foie gras app with a friend (no comments about gavage, I don't want to discuss it...) and the flavor combo was fantastic. But the superstar supper-star was the licorice lacquered duck with some kind of parsnip thing and fennel. They seem to blunt-dissect the skin off and crisp, then replace, it. Perfection.

I figure, if I am going to eat meat, I want it delicious.

One down spot: T ordered the chocolate dessert, which I found uninspiring. Pretty, but the test is always in the taste. I found it blah. I am wondering if there is a new pastry chef? If so, I imagine that person needs to step up his game to match the timbre of the rest of the orchestra or get out.

So, while Clio needs no more praise, particularly being that I am not a dessert person, I will state again for the record that noone has beat it yet, in my book. I still think Clio is the best restaurant in Boston, it was a lovely spot for our anniversary dinner.

As for the tagine thing: I got up from the table to the ladies' room shortly after my entree was served. When I returned, a white porcelain tagine had been placed over my dinner to keep it warm. A lovely and intelligent solution! Just another plus to the always fantastic service, I thought it was a classy and chic maneuver.

Kick the Colonel's Ass...

I have held, for some time now, the idea that Boston is one amazing dining city. For such a geographically small town, we really have some outstanding, "world class" (whatever the hell that means) eats. Particularly after my forays into "fine dining" at every level when I was living elsewhere last year, from apple pie to yogurt to salad to heights of gourmet molecular gastronomy, I appreciate that Boston has really come to offer a stunning array of tasty snacks.

At the top of them all, in all my tries and shared meals and bottles of wine in this city, my absolute favorite has been one singular restaurant: Clio.

Clio is rockin'.

Why so I mention this?
1) I had alluded to it before.
2) I have something new and interesting to share about it.
3) I am going there for dinner (about which I will tell you) tomorrow night.

I will take mental notes and share the deets of tomorrow's dinner then.
In the meantime, perhaps you might like to join me next sunday?

You can buy me a bottle and raise a glass in my general direction for my telling you #2 above:

Fried. Chicken. At Clio. for 35 Buckeroos.
Screw you, Colonel Sanders, 'cuz weezz cun getch real chickie, chickie!

hawwww-yeah!

Check THIS out. HOLY COW. I am definitely going and you should, too.
The high cuisine of Ken Oringer goes comfort-food-recession-chic? This is clearly a must-eat.

more to follow.

Unexpected Good Eats