Emma's Pizza in Cambridge, MA

When I started thinking about going to Boston, I got a very strong recommendation that I go try Emma's Pizza in Cambridge. Turns out the person who gave this endorsement worked for Emma's Pizza at one point, but let's not let that invalidate the recommendation. They had some tasty pizza...

I couldn't decide what type of pizza to order. Lots of the menu choices sounded really good, so I split the pie in half. One half of the pizza was topped with The Coop. This consisted of garlicky green olives, cracked black pepper, garlic olive oil feta, and goat cheese. The other half was The Red Line. This side of the pie had hot sausage, roasted tomato, scallions, traditional sauce, mozzarella, and goat cheese. Both were good, but I think I preferred The Red Line. The flavors on this side of the pizza were a bit more balanced, while The Coop was a bit of a salty overload with the olives and feta.

It wasn't exactly traditional pizza with a thin crispy crust and creative toppings. I know a couple NY style pizza purists that would have hated this pie, but I very much enjoyed my meal at Emma's.

Boston Asian Food (Pho Pasteur & Kim Kim BBQ Truck)

I arrived in Boston on a Monday evening. I decided to explore the city a bit and get some dinner. After wandering around downtown, I was surprised how little was open. Boston apparently has an early bedtime on a Monday night for a city of it's size. I did notice this gets better later in the week, but apparently everyone eats home on Mondays here. Chinatown seemed to be the neighborhood where everything was open, but almost every restaurant was completely void of customers. I didn't want to be the lone diner in wherever I ate, so I chose Pho Pasteur since there were a few other customers eating here. 

Pho Pasteur:

I ordered the Tai Gau. This was a big bowl of noodle soup with rare steak and brisket. It was a cold night in Boston (by Floridian standards), so a hot bowl of soup was very satisfying. This was a pretty standard bowl of pho. The broth was tasty. There was a good about of vegetables in the soup (scallions, onions, and other greens), along with the side dish of bean sprouts, basil, jalapeno, and lime. Overall a very good dinner of Vietnamese food!

Kim Kim BBQ Food Truck:

I found this truck parked in a greenway going through Downtown Boston at lunch time. They shared the spot with a few other trucks, and this truck was one of the busier options.

I ordered the Spicy Pork Rice Bowl. It was a bowl of brown rice, topped with the pork, carrots, lettuce, cucumber slices and a fried egg. The pork was pretty tasty, but it didn't have enough sauce to cover the other ingredients in the bowl. The fried egg was a nice touch, that is until I found a long hair cooked into it. Kind of ruined the meal for me...

Boston Desserts (Omni Parker House Hotel and Modern Pastry)

During my adventures in exploring Boston, I had desserts on a couple occasions. This blog post chronicles these desserts...

Omni Parker House's Boston Cream Pie:

I took a guided tour along parts of the Freedom Trail. One of the stops on the tour was the Omni Parker House Hotel. Our tour guide spouted out all kinds of interesting facts about this historic hotel, ranging from the presidents and celebrities who have stayed here to the hotel's ghost stories. The one fact that made my food blogger radar perk up was that the dessert known as a Boston Cream Pie was invented in one of the hotel's restaurants.

I decided I needed to try a Boston Cream Pie from the place it was created. I later returned to the hotel and found out their coffee/gift shop sold the pies without having to go into the pricy Parker's Restaurant. The price almost scared me away. Eight dollars and change for a small dessert that was three inches in diameter. Still, I had walked across town to try the pie, so I splurged.

I think I may have had Boston Cream Pies and Boston Cream Doughnuts mixed up in my head. I was expecting much more cream in here. Instead, the pie consisted of two layers of cake with a thin layer of cream sandwiched in between. It was topped with chocolate icing. After the initial surprise that this was more of a cake than a cream filled pie, I enjoyed the dessert. The cake was moist. The small layer of cream provided a little change in flavor to mix things up. Although it was tasty, the Boston Cream Pie definitely wasn't worth the price and I wouldn't spend that money again. Still, I can say I've tried the original Boston Cream Pie!


 

Modern Pastry:

During the same tour where I found out about the Boston Cream Pies, the guide also recommended checking out Little Italy. I took up that advise and found myself getting dessert at a bakery called Modern Pastry. For a place with modern in the name, they had a very retro neon sign.

The place was filled with cases and cases of delicious looking pastries, cakes, cookies, pies, and other sweets.

I had a sfogliatelle. This flaky lobster tail-like pastry was filled with a delicious cheesy filling. I ate the sfogliatelle in a nearby park where a flock of sparrows really enjoyed eating all the crumbs that fell from the flaky crust...

Boston Seafood (Boston Chowda Co & Beantown Pub)

I was told that while visiting Boston, the two foods that are absolute must eats while in the city were New England Clam Chowder and Lobster Rolls. The person behind the desk of where I was staying told me Boston Chowda Co was the best place to get these foods for affordable prices.

Boston Chowda Co:

Boston Chowda Co was is located in the Quincy Market/Faneuil Hall. This was basically a big food court in a historic building. It turned out lobster rolls were really expensive here compared to prices I saw elsewhere in the city. I guess the person who recommended this place was saying it was affordable because it was fast food.

I did have a cup of New England Clam Chowder. It was okay, but I would have expected a bit better from a place called Boston Chowda Co. The soup was creamy with lots of potato. It had a typical creamy flavor, but nothing really memorable. The clams were really chewy, so that was disappointing.

Beantown Pub:

In order to check the lobster roll off my list of Boston foods, I ended up at the Beantown Pub. Beantown Pub was a very busy place with very few open tables. Luckily I didn't need to wait too long. Something I noticed about Boston, including this restaurant, was that I felt underdressed. Almost everywhere I went, the majority of people in here were wearing business attire. Do people dress like this all the time in Boston?

The lobster roll here cost much less than Boston Chowda Co's. It also came with fries and coleslaw, while the more expensive roll came with nothing. I'm honestly not a lobster connoisseur, but I'd much rather eat the crustacean in sandwich form like this over plain lobster dipped in butter. The sandwich was tasty enough, as were the fries and coleslaw.

Amtrak Acela Food

I was in New York and wanted to extend my travels a bit by going to Boston. I wanted to do this in a way I have never done long distance travel before: by train. When booking my train tickets through Amtrak, I saw that the Acela high speed rail was an option. It was expensive compared to the other choices, but I decided to go for it. I wanted to say I've rode the fastest train in the Americas!

I left from Penn Station in New York and traveled to Back Bay Station in Boston. While on the train, I explored a little bit. I made my way to the Cafe Car and bought myself some food. I had low expectations for train food, and my low expectations were met.

The pizza that I ordered was frozen and microwaved. I think it was a Digiorno brand pizza. The crust was a soggy mess, and the tiny size didn't make it worth the price. This is not a pizza I think I'll crave any time soon.

While waiting for my sad little pizza, I was talked to the employee working in the cafe. I was sad to find out that my high speed rail experience wasn't exactly high speed. The train had the capabilities of going 150 mph, but only reaches this speed for about ten minutes on the trip from New York to Boston. Average speed was about 50 mph. Apparently the Acela trains are much more high speed along the route between DC and NY. Regardless, I guess I can say I've been on high speed rail during that ten minutes. I still like the idea of traveling by train, but I don't think I'd spend the extra money for high speed rail again (especially when I found out there's a $30 bus between NY and Boston that makes the trip faster than the train)...

Long Island Asian Food (Chaba Thai Cuisine and Tony's Sushi)

Here's a couple more restaurants from my travels. Today we're going to be visiting a couple restaurants in Long Island, NY serving Asian food. We'll start in Long Beach for some Thai food...

Chaba Thai Cuisine in Long Beach, NY:

Chaba is located in downtown Long Beach. They were a small restaurant but they were very busy with both people dining in and take out.

I had the Chicken Curry Noodles. I was a little afraid that this might be a boring dish of chicken, noodles, and sauce from how the menu described it. Luckily, this turned out to be a beautiful bowl of deliciousness. There was plenty of variety with lots of vegetables mixed in, arranged in a very structural fashion. The sauce was very tasty. No complaints about this meal.

Tony's Sushi in East Moriches, NY:

I had dinner on another evening at a restaurant called Tony's Sushi. They had the menu split into three different sections. One each for Japanese, Chinese, and Thai food.

I had the Singapore Mei Fun. There was a nice presentation with an orchid served alongside the mound of noodles, but the portion was a bit small for the price. The noodles tasted fine, although there really wasn't anything that made them stand apart from other noodle dishes I've had either. The annoying part of this meal was the employee's apparently urgent need to clear the tables. From the beginning of the meal when we were served noodles with duck sauce, all they wanted to know if they could take that away for us. Someone else ordered soup and salad with their meal. They were delivered at the same time, and the servers wanted to take away the soup before it was touched while the person was finishing up the salad. They did eventually take away someones plate before they were finished with it. It was strange. It seemed like they wanted us out really quick, but there wasn't a wait or lack of empty tables. Some manager probably told the servers to make sure they clear the tables and they really took the advise to heart...

NY Jewish Food (Regal Kosher Deli in Plainview and Russ & Daughters in NYC)

In my travels around the New York area, I ended up eating at two restaurants serving Jewish/Kosher style foods. One was Regal Kosher Deli on Long Island and the other was Russ & Daughters in Manhattan.

Regal Kosher Deli in Plainview, NY:

Regal Kosher Deli is located in Plainview, NY on Long Island. They are a kosher deli serving pretty standard jewish foods. I ended up eating here on two occasions.

Pickles are delivered to every table upon being seated. They serve half sour and full sour pickles. Being that the half sour pickles were devoured before I could take a picture, it's obvious what everyone's favorite type of pickle is.

Bowls of coleslaw were also served with the pickles.

I tried two different types of knish on my visits here. My first knish was a plain potato filled knish. This one was square with mashed potatoes filling the flaky crust. Pretty tasty.

The spinach knish was my favorite of the two. It was round (I'm assuming the different shapes are so they can tell different fillings apart easier?), filled with a potato/spinach mix. It had more going on in terms of flavor compared to the plain knish.

On one visit I tried a corned beef sandwich. This consisted of a whole lot of sliced meat between sliced rye bread. I have to admit that these jewish deli style sandwiches are a little boring for my liking. I know cheese can't be added because of the whole kosher thing, but they are too much of the same thing.

On another visit I tried what they called a stuffed sandwich. I ordered the Corned Beef, Tongue, and Hard Boiled Egg. When the sandwich was delivered, the waiter informed me that they were out of hard boiled egg. I'm also pretty sure the menu said there should have been coleslaw on here as well, but that was missing too. Without those components, this was basically a corned beef sandwich stacked on top of a tongue sandwich. I did enjoy the novelty of eating sliced tongue. That is not a cut of meat that I eat very often.

Regal Kosher Deli was enjoyable. They may have boring sandwiches, but that's expected in a jewish deli. That aside, I did like the rest of the dining experience in here...





Russ & Daughters in NYC:

I first heard about Russ & Daughters several years ago and they have been on my list of New York foods to try ever since. It took me several more visits to the city before I finally made it to Russ & Daughters. They've been around for 101 years, so the amount of time it took me to try the restaurant was probably nothing for them.

They specialize in smoked and cured fish. Their cases are filled with all sorts of lox, smoked salmon, mackerel, sable, and other seafoods. There's also a large selection of cream cheeses, bagels, desserts, and other jewish foods for sale. Russ & Daughters was a very busy place. I waited over a half hour to put in my order. People were buying quite a bit in here as well. Almost every order placed that I heard was at least $100. Russ & Daughters is a little gold mine...

I had an everything bagel with pastrami salmon with goat cream cheese. The salmon was thinly sliced with a peppery coating on the outside. The goat cream cheese was new to me. It still had the consistency of normal cream cheese, but with the distinctive earthy flavor that seems to be in all goat cheeses. The combination of it all was delicious...

I also tried a pickle. A customer in front of me was ordering gallons of these pickles, announcing that she takes the train from Vermont to replenish her pickles every time her supply gets low. With an endorsement like that, I decided I must try one. It was a very tasty pickle, although I don't know if I'd travel from out of state for a pickle. 

Nathan's in Coney Island, NY

Everyone knows Nathan's in Coney Island for their hot dogs. I've been there. I've tried their hot dogs. Hot dogs are boring. There's Nathan's franchises all over the country where you can pretty much get the same hot dogs. When I found myself at the Nathan's in Coney Island yet again, I decided to try something that couldn't be found in other locations, that being the seafood.

I started out with an order of the frog legs. The cashier said that they had never tried them and looked a bit disgusted about the thought of eating frog. Regardless, I split an order of them. The large frog legs were deep fried in an almost funnel cake-like batter. It was a bit different from the times I've tried the frog legs on Chinese buffets. The batter was the best and tastiest part. The meat tasted fine, but the veins and tendons in the meat got a bit chewy after the first leg. As of right now, amphibian isn't going to become a regular part of my diet. This was served with fries, cornbread, and coleslaw. Nathan's coleslaw was interesting. Instead of using normal cabbage, they made it from their sauerkraut. I really liked sauerkraut coleslaw. Frog legs being served at this Nathan's is interesting. I can't imagine they are a huge seller, but yet they are on the menu. I'm guessing they are a hold out from another time. Perhaps frog legs were a more accepted food for Americans in the past? Or were they a novelty food item then, and they have stuck around, still being a novelty food item for this Nathan's.

I also tried the Lobster Salad Sandwich. I had a choice between the plain lobster roll and the lobster salad. The lobster roll was served on a hamburger bun with no mayonnaise. The lobster salad sandwich came on a hot dog bun with mayonnaise and lettuce. I like foods with mayonnaise, so I went with the salad. It was pretty good. There was enough lobster in the salad where you could still see the pieces and taste the shellfish, but had a nice creamy flavor from the rest of the salad. Would have been better if it was served on a nicer bread than a hot dog bun.

NY Street Food #3 (Halal Carts & Mister Softee)

Street food in New York City is fun. Some of my recent New York street food adventures started at a Halal cart at the foot of the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge...

Brooklyn Bridge Halal Cart:

I had a Chicken Gyro. Several pieces of chicken filled a pita alongside lettuce, onions, and the standard halal cart white and hot sauce. This particular sandwich left some room for improvement. The chicken had lots of chewy pieces of tendon/fat. Even with the sauce, it was also somehow lacked flavor.

Times Square Halal Cart:

I visited another halal cart a few blocks away from Times Square. I had the combination of lamb and chicken over rice, topped with white and hot sauce. Lettuce was served on the side as a salad.

Brooklyn Mister Softee:

I took part of a long distance unicycle ride from Manhatten to Coney Island. Somewhere in Brooklyn, the horde of unicyclists waved down a Mister Softee truck.

I ordered a Nutty Merlin, meaning a vanilla cone dipped in chocolate and topped with peanuts. The truck was out of the chocolate dipping sauce, so I ended up just getting the ice cream topped with nuts. They charged me the same price with or without the chocolate. Oh well...