Tag: fish

Dish O' The Day
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05/07/13 2:08pm

Superb Streetside Ecuadorean Ceviche in Corona

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Jorgito’s ceviche is topped with crunchy, salty maize cancha.

Jorgito’s ceviche is topped with crunchy, salty maize cancha.

The best ceviche de pescado I ever had came from a sweet Peruvian lady’s cooler. She sold it streetside in the Diamond District. Every Friday I’d buy one for lunch, and devour it greedily at my desk, She’s long gone now, but my soft spot for fish cooked in lime juice served streetside remains. Last weekend when I saw Cevicheria Jorgito, a cart on 111th Street just off La Roosie, my heart and stomach lept up. About half an hour and 30 blocks prior I’d had a Mexican style coktel, and was starting to feel hungry again.

Jorgito’s cart is a corn kernel's throw from the 7 line.

Jorgito’s cart lies a corn kernel’s throw from the 7 line.

I was a little disappointed when I found out Jorgito’s ceviche is the soupier Ecuadorean style. I prefer the Peruvian version, which is more of salad. This disappointment did not deter me from handing over $6 for a small container of ceviche de pescado. Bits of cooked corvina bobbed in the cool tomato soup, alongside a surprise ingredient, chewy morsels of yucca. Topped with salty toasted corn kernels and a squirt or three of bright orange hot sauce it was a nice snack. It’s great to find Mexican and Ecuadorean ceviches on La Roosie. Now if I could just find a Peruvian one all my streetside seafood needs would be met.

Cevicheria Jorgito, 111 St., north side of Roosevelt Avenue, weekends only

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Dish O' The Day
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03/07/13 1:08pm

The Crunchtastic Cumin Flounder at Flushing’s Rural

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It's the pescatarian response to the Muslim lamb chop.

It’s the pescatarian response to the Muslim lamb chop.

PLEASE NOTE THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED

It’s a good thing I don’t have a cumin allergy. Otherwise I’d never be able to enjoy the many delicious Dongbei dishes that liberally employ the spice. Perhaps the most famous is a meaty marvel that goes by the name Muslim lamb chop. It is an entire rack of lamb that’s been braised, deep fried and then rolled in cumin, black and white sesame seeds, and hot pepper. And it is spectacular. The other night at Rural I learned there is a fish version.

All the crunch of a potato chip with one million times the cumin.

All the crunch of a potato chip with one million times the cumin.

Cumin flounder ($15.99) lands on the table coated in plenty of its namesake spice, plus a copious amount of chilies. Gawk at it for a moment and Instagram if you must, but then let the waitress cut up into rectangles using a spoon. Crunch into it while it’s still hot. Each swatch of flounder is perfectly fried. In addition to cumin there are pickled chilies lending a nice flavor to what I’ve come to think of as a Dongbei potato chip of sorts.

 Rural, 42-85 Main St., Flushing, 718-353-0086

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Dish O' The Day
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02/12/13 12:15pm

Zabb Elee’s Pla Som is a Funky, Sour Fried Delight

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Jackson Heights
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Zabb Elee's pla som brings the awesome.

Zabb Elee’s pla som brings the awesome.

PLEASE NOTE THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED

Fermentation is gastronomic alchemy. It can turn grains into intoxicating elixirs and cabbage into kimchi. And squid guts into something so foul it should be weaponized. Japanese home-style squid guts are not my cup of sake. Thai fermented fish, pla som, on the other hand, is one of my favorite things.

It’s made by taking a fish, salting it, and packing it with rice and garlic and leaving it unrefrigerated for three days to let nature take its course. I do not intend to undertake what’s  probably a very simple  process in my home kitchen. So in Queens I like to eat pla som at Zabb Elee, the wonderful Northeastern Thai spot.  A fried piece of tilapia pla som runs $9. It’s crunchy sour, slightly funky and absolutely wonderful with the accompanying fried  shallots, galangal, and chilies.

Until I get to Thailand Zabb will likely remain my go-to spot for this dish. Lucky for me they’re open quite late and are only a short subway ride from my place.  One can never tell when that late-night fried fermented fish craving’s gonna hit.

Zabb Elee, 71-28 Roosevelt Ave, Jackson Heights, 718-426-7992

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Dish O' The Day
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02/07/13 12:05pm

Tiny Fried Taiwanese Fish and Peanuts aka ‘Funny Fish’

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Taiwanese fish fry with peanuts and chili peppers is a great beer snack.

Taiwanese fish fry with peanuts and chili peppers is a great beer snack.

“This we call funny fish,” my Taiwanese-American college buddy Rick’s father said as he plopped down a bowl of small fried dish interspersed with peanuts and dried hot peppers. “It’s good with beer.” At the time I was not nearly as adventurous an eater as I am now, but the Taiwanese fish fry was way better than any chips or pretzels. Salty, crunchy, spicy, and nutty, and very, very good with an ice cold Budweiser.

Years later I found myself snacking on it at Mingle Beer House an ill-fated Flushing beer bar. Mingle is no more but  I’m glad that I can still find what I like to think of Taiwanese beer nuts at most any Chinese supermarket. Best of all there are variations some with a bit of sweetness in addition to the spice. For those who’d like to try to making this crave-inducing snack at home there’s a pretty easy-looking recipe over at Eating China.

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Dish O' The Day
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02/05/13 12:04pm

Ceviche de Pescado Reminds Me of Summertime

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There's nothing quite as refreshing or summery as a nice plate of ceviche.

There’s nothing quite as summery as a nice plate of ceviche.

Ceviche, that refreshing Peruvian concoction of fish cooked in a lime juice marinade is one of my favorite things to eat during the summer, or really any time of year. I am so enamored of it that I used to cop a small plastic container of ceviche mixto from a sweet Peruvian lady who sold it out of a cooler in Manhattan’s Diamond  District. She was even kind enough to bring me a block of a Peruvian shortbread confection known as King Kong from her home country.

Last time I checked my sweet streetside ceviche vendor was gone. I’m OK with that though.  Here in Queens, there are many places from which to score ceviche, from full-blown cevicherias to coffee shops that have a side line in ceviche. Heck there are two Peruvian restaurants in walking distance from C+M headquarters in Rego Park that serve serviceable versions.

With winter in full effect you’d think I’d be in the mood for soup. The dish I crave today, though is ceviche, spicy and bracing with a side of that steroidal corn and plenty of eye-opening lime juice to slurp down as a chaser afterward.

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Flushing
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01/03/13 10:10am

Flushing’s Sichuan Snack Queen Pops Up at a Bakery

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Sister Zhu and her amazing Chengdu fried fish. Note the duck heads at right.

Sister Zhu and her amazing Chengdu fried fish.

PLEASE NOTE SISTER ZHU IS NO LONGER SERVING AT THIS LOCATION.

“Savor Fusion’s been DOH’d what shall I do w/o Sister Zhu,” I tweeted in no small amount of distress after Flushing’s newest food court was shut down by the Department of Health in September. I’ve been eating at Zhū Dà Jiě  Chéng dū  Xiǎo Chī  (Big Sister Zhu’s Chengdu Snacks) in one incarnation or another for about three years. I’ve tried everything from springy dàn dàn miàn, noodles in fiery pork sauce, and homemade pork sausage scented with orange to the poetically named fū qī fèi piàn, husband and wife offal slices, actually cold ox tongue and tripe in an incendiary sauce, to Sichuan hacked rabbit. At Savor Fusion I became enamored of her má là yú, deliciously crisp fried fish, and a quite a deal at $6 for six.

Coated in Sichuan peppercorn and hot pepper these fish are killer diller delicious.

Coated in Sichuan peppercorn and hot pepper these fish are delicious.

I’d given up finding her ever again, and then she reappeared, in a bakery of all places. I’d stopped in with a friend to grab a coffee milk tea and a pork bun and then I saw them. There was no mistaking the cook behind the hotel pan of chili crusted fish on the counter. “Zhū dà jiě!,” I exclaimed pointing to the fish. And out she came from the back. “Hey, my friend. How are you,” she asked with a broad smile.  The pork bun was quite good, but what I really wanted was some fish. That crunchy, fiery fish that calls to mind Wise BBQ potato chips, had they been created in a Chengdu snack shop.

Sister Zhu has a new home.

Sister Zhu is lucky to have a new home.

I’m pretty sure my big sister from Chengdu has never heard of a pop-up restaurant, but I am ever so glad that she popped up where she did. The other week a buddy and I stopped in for some of that fish and an order of tofu skin with hot peppers. The crunchy coating of the fish sang with the classic  má là,or numb-hot flavor that comes from the combination of chilies and tongue-tingling Sichuan peppers. And the  hot peppers and chewy tofu skin called to mind a flavor from my childhood, hot sopressata.

I have a feeling that if Sister Zhu moves again I’ll be able to find her. Not because of some cosmic culinary connection, but mainly because I’ll be sure to keep tabs on her. It’s not every day one finds fried fish that good after all.

 Zhū Dà Jiě Chéng dū  Xiǎo Chī  ,Lucky Bakery ,44-35 Kissena Blvd., Flushing, 718-888-7771

 

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