Bonchiri (chicken tail)
by Celia Cheng
October 13th, 2006
YAKITORI TOTTO
251 W 55th St
(B’way & 8th Ave)
212-245-4555
Since I am reviewing Torys this month and I never did a Tasting piece for Yakitori Totto, though there are entries in the Craving archive, I thought this would be a good opportunity to compare the two sister restaurants.
Yakitori Totto is my ideal comfort food restaurant. Whether with friends or alone, I know that the quality of the food will always be good, and its laid back atmosphere of a traditional grilled skewer restaurant puts me at ease.
On this occasion, it was a disgustingly rainy night — perfect for some Totto soup and yakionigiri (grilled rice ball). Unlike most people, what I crave most are not the chicken skewers that Totto specializes in, but I am in love with its other dishes like the soup, salads, fried-chicken, gyoza, etc. The list goes on.
I had the chance to really study the menu this time and noticed that there were several things I had not yet tried (probably because there are so many favorites that I must get each time). In fact, I would like to do an outing one night and order everything on the menu. Yes. I mean literally everything on the menu. I like places that give you that option, like “The Whole Shebang” at Alta, a great way to see the entire range of the restaurant. ☺
So I ordered my usual shochu (Japanese vodka) with water and plum, the goya chips, Totto soup, yakionigiri and a bonchiri skewer. Bonchiri — a cut near the chicken tail — is the fattiest part of the chicken, even more so than the skin. Nine out of ten times when I visit Totto, they are sold out of bonchiri, so when the waitress told that me they had it, I was surprised and ecstatic!
It takes some skill and time to grill the bonchiri, as the chef must alternate the skewer from the hotter and cooler parts of the grill in order to achieve the right amount of sizzle on the outside while the fat inside cooks away. And let me tell you, bonchiri is the best! You don’t taste any rubberiness in the skin, and the fat has dissolved so it’s a thin layer of pure crispy goodness. Three little pieces come on one skewer. It’s an indulgence of sorts and I never order more than one because it is a treat that I cherish and take in moderation.
The Totto soup is my favorite chicken soup in town. It is rich in flavor but not thick. There are little chicken meatballs, enoki mushrooms and leeks in it and you can add sprinkles of sesame seeds to your liking.
I like to pair my soup with a soy sauce based grilled rice ball to end — rice or noodle dishes always come at the end of a meal. The yakionigiri is rolled with takana (pickled mustard leaf) and the outside is brushed with soy sauce then grilled. It’s served with some pickles and hits the spot perfectly.
It was one of those rainy nights where no one wanted to leave home, and honestly, neither did I. But for Totto, it was totally worth it.
Posted in Chicken , Japanese , Midtown West
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Napa Cabbage Cole Slaw
by Celia Cheng
June 16th, 2006
DIRTY BIRD TO-GO
204 W 14th St
(7th & 8th Ave)
212-620-4836
It’s amazing how a chef’s name can carry so much weight. I have fond memories of chef Allison Vines-Rushing’s cooking from her days at Jack’s Luxury Oyster Bar. And hence I had high hopes for Dirty Bird To-Go, her new fried chicken take-out restaurant. I’m sure you know where this is going (and yes, this has not been a great month for me, gastronomically speaking)…. Dirty Bird failed to deliver on its expectations. The storefront is cute, but cosmetics alone will not suffice. Allison is a talented chef, but this venture seems to rely more heavily on her name than on her talents. She and her husband, Slade Rushing, are part owners of the store. The restaurant has a simple concept — high quality, carefully prepared fast food — that if executed correctly should take off, bring high profits and be relatively low maintenance. But the equation is not working out right now for Dirty Bird.
On 14th Street, there’s already a KFC and a Popeyes, so if you want to succeed, your chicken and sides need to not only boast of using organic seasonal ingredients, but they should also taste better than the other alternatives. I found the fried chicken to be rather tasteless. I don’t doubt that the quality of the chicken is better than the fast food joints, but the outside was not crispy enough and the chicken, while juicy, lacked flavor. I’ve heard complaints about the batter of the chicken being too thick, which was completely contrary to my experience — the layer of batter was too thin on my chicken. This begs me to believe that Dirty Bird has some consistency issues; I found that the chicken fingers were GIGANTIC. Ali’s chopped salad, which sounded wonderful, was a waste of $8.99, as it didn’t wow or even appease my taste buds. The cornbread was literally and figuratively flat, but I did really enjoy my napa cabbage cole slaw. The problem is, I’m not going to go back just for the slaw. There’s gotta be more draw than that.
Not to mention that the management, or lack thereof, at the store is alarming. The staff members didn’t seem like they wanted to be there, looking bored out of their minds, and that vibe made it kind of hard for me to get really excited about the food. It’s a small operation, and the menu couldn’t be simpler. I feel like with the proper training, this shop could run super efficiently. There are only so many options: fried chicken, rotisserie chicken or chicken fingers, some sides, salad, sweets and drinks. I think the other two chicken fast food competitors may have more extensive menus, so it’s hard to understand why the staff didn’t seem to have its act together.
Honestly, I am rooting for Dirty Bird. There’s a lot of work to be done, but I think that most of it can be figured out. Most importantly, Dirty Bird needs to show on all fronts that it really cares about what it’s producing. Right now, the act is not convincing.
Posted in American , Chicken , West Village
Chicken Soup w/ Herb Dumplings
by Celia Cheng
June 14th, 2006
BOUCHON BAKERY
10 Columbus Circle, 3rd Floor
@ 60th St
212-823-9366
Bouchon Bakery seems like an answer to our prayers: Thomas Keller’s causal café at plebeian fares, if you consider $11.25 for chicken soup “plebeian.” This is where I struggle. The chicken soup is excellent, a top in this city, and hence, the quality-price ratio for this dish is balanced. But on the whole, Bouchon Bakery is overpriced. I’m not saying that I would expect any differently, since it’s Thomas Keller and since it’s in the atrocious Time Warner Center. All I’m saying is that it’s not going to be my neighborhood mall hangout. Wait a minute… I don’t hang out at malls.
The chicken soup is amazing! The brown broth, which tastes richer than most chicken broths, reminds me of a nice beef consommé. The free range chicken should be the example to all of how chicken should be cooked, taste and feel. Most of the time, my issue with chicken is the dried out texture it gets when it’s even mildly overcooked. This one is not stringy, chewy or rubbery but just right. The vegetables were your staple carrots, celery and onions. There is also a distinct anise flavor, so I presume that fennel was added as a part of the vegetable mixture. Strangely, the dumplings were my least favorite part of the dish, probably because I felt like they were too heavy for such a pure soup. They did add a buttery flavor, but I found them unnecessary. At the same time, I am mindful that people have different palates, and I can see how the dumplings could liven dish for some.
You can’t eat at Bouchon Bakery and not try the desserts. I had the TKO — Thomas Keller Oreo — two flower-shaped chocolate cookies sandwiching a white chocolate ganache filling, accompanied by a single scoop of vanilla ice cream. While this is listed under “cookies,” it’s really a complete serving of dessert. It’s rather large and should be savored over teatime, rather than as a quick relief to satiate a temporary sweet tooth. And at $5.75, it’s hard to call it just a cookie. The cookie was yummy, but half way through, I got a little bored. It probably would have been ideal to share it with someone. The vanilla ice cream was too sweet. But overall, I really dug the concept. There is also a Nutter Butter version, which I hear is a true killer for peanut butter cookie fans.
As much as I dislike the Time Warner Center, I must say that sitting at the café on the third floor overlooking the atrium and entrance of the mall on a leisurely afternoon wasn’t so bad. If you are in the Columbus Circle area or at the mall, then at least you have a very good option for a light fare or snack. My experience left me feeling very clean, healthy and happy — that’s not something you say after leaving most malls, not even the fancy ones.
Posted in American , Chicken , Soup , UWS
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Austrian Fried Chicken
by Celia Cheng
January 21st, 2006
BLAUE GANS
139 Duane St
(W Broadway & Church St)
212-571-8880
Kurt Gutenbrunner’s latest German-Austrian bistro, Blaue Gans, has been high on my list of must-try restaurants. My eating buddy Jason Lee was in town, so we tried it together with a group of friends. I am honored once again that Jason has contributed the following review to Cravings (read Jason’s first Cravings review on San Francisco’s Quince). Two comments I would like to add: 1) The fried chicken was an unexpected knockout. I eat very little chicken these days and I couldn’t believe how tender, moist, and delicious it was. 2) A side note on the blood sausage dish — the flavor of the blood sausage when diced becomes so mild it is barely noticeable, but as a potato dish, it is perfect. So perhaps the dish should be renamed, because if you are really craving the flavor of blood sausage, you might not get your fill. The rest I leave up to Jason:
What most surprised me about the food at Blaue Gans was the remarkable cleanness of the preparations and flavors. Many of the dishes had a wonderful flavor balance that made me want to keep ordering more beer and more food, reminiscent of spending a long day at a beer garden or a long night at a Japanese izakaya.
My friends and I agreed that one of the standout dishes was the appetizer blood sausage with sautéed potatoes and sauerkraut. Although we expected the blood sausage to figure more prominently, combining it with the familiar richness of fried potatoes, the refreshing sourness of the sauerkraut and the subtle white heat of the horseradish produced a perfect flavor package.
Many of the dishes that I expected to be heavier or muddier in flavor were delightfully clean and at the same time richly flavorful. For example, the pork wiener schnitzel and the crispy fried chicken, which are both breaded and fried, were two of the most rewarding entrees: the meats were notably juicy, the levels of saltiness and flavoring were perfectly controlled and neither was greasy.
Touches to many of the side dishes — like the deep sweetness of the red cabbage that accompanied the roasted pork belly, or the refreshing (yes, refreshing) coolness of the potato salad that accompanied some of the other entrees — were carefully designed and executed. In particular, I thought the potato salad was a masterful vinegar-y, mustard-y, fennel-y treat.
I wasn’t a huge fan of every dish, however. For some reason, all restaurants seem to have a different interpretation of goulash, so I’m never really sure what to expect, but the heavy cumin flavor in Blaue Gans’ goulash was a big turn-off. I suspect the cumin flavor was from the generous use of caraway seeds, which are used in some variations of goulash, but I thought it overpowered the dish, turning it into something too reminiscent of American chili or a curry (both of which I love, but which are not goulash). In addition, I imagine goulash to be stew-like or soup-like in consistency, depending on the interpretation, and being served something that looked more like cubes of braised meat with a little reduction sauce — without any notable paprika- or vegetable-derived sweetness or heat — was also a bit disappointing. The preparation of the dish was still quite good, however (as was the case with all the other food we ordered), and others may disagree with respect to preferred flavors and consistency.
Comments about the goulash aside, Blaue Gans is a place I would eagerly recommend. Usually my main criterion for recommendation is whether I would go out of my way to go eat at a place. In the case of Blaue Gans, you can bet I’d be willing to go far out of my way to eat there. The combination of heartiness and refinement at Blaue Gans creates very accessible and satisfying food that is at the same time stimulating, delicate and smart.
Posted in Austrian , Chicken , German , Tribeca
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