Akiko's Restaurant - San Francisco, CA

After a marathon day of eating, guided by my long time friends Pam and Alvin. We came across Pam's favorite sushi spot in San Francisco. Mind you, at this point in the day I've already eaten some 6-8 meals, but Pam insisted we stop in for some Uni(sea urchin). She spoke with the owner and convinced him to open up a new package of uni from Hokkaido. The uni was so buttery and smoothe, the flavor so barely briny, creamy, and not even a trace of fishiness.

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Sura - Providence, RI

A quick post about this spot in Providence, RI we came across while walking around. If you know anything about me, I get that itch for some comfort food while I'm on the road. While I'm all for some bacon mac and cheese, nothing can replace my craving for some good ole Korean food. Sura, fit the bill for some good ole deliciousness.


What is "bibimbap"? It's rice topped with all sorts of goodies from spinach, roots of various kinds, some sort of protein, and an egg. Then you pour over it a sweet and spicy pepper sauce. It's a great one bowl meal.

--Joe

Local Eats: Asuka Japanese Restaurant - Morrisville, NC

I'm constantly on the lookout for new noodle soups everywhere. I make it a point to order noodle soups in as many different places as possible from as many different regions as possible. Champong from Korea, boat noodles from Thai Land, ramen noodles from China, and of course, shown above, udon noodles from Japan. The most important components of udon are the broth and consistency of the noodles. The trimmings such as shiitake mushrooms, tempura shrimp, spinach, fish cakes, etc. are secondary. The udon from Asuka had a nice clear broth and a taut noodle. The trimmings were equally amazing. This is a great winter dish so I hope you'll try to find some in your area. If you're in my area though, go check out Asuka.

Joe Kwon

Miyake - Portland, ME

Miyake is a different class of sushi restaurant. In fact, I wouldn't even call it a sushi restaurant. Japanese fine dining fits the bill much better. From it's meager interior decorating, to the scant amount of seating, this place screams great food. You see, I have this theory, if a restaurant doesn't pump a lot of money into it's decor to try to draw you in with it's ambience, then it has to have excellent food. Otherwise, it would be easily overlooked. I actually did almost walk right by Miyake. It's in a tiny little house with a small sign on what seems to be a residential road. There was a voice inside me however, as soon as I walked through the doors, that said I would enjoy this meal.

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Recipe: Braised Tofu?

I found it difficult to name this dish because I don't know what the actual translation would be of the Korean word. For all your speakers out there this is my version of 두부 조림.

I took a sort of Japanese take on one of my favorite Korean side dishes. The process takes a while but it's not difficult at all. If you've never been a big fan of tofu then this is definitely the way to try it.

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