Dine for Darfur March 4, 2008

The title pretty much says it all. See the website at www.dinefordarfur.org.

For those who don’t know, this event began with and is wholly organized by Chow Foods. So eat and enjoy and know you are helping out!

Thanks

What’s up with Oaxaca at Endolyne Joe’s

In a delicious foray into Mexico, Chef Janel and her crew served up a tasting last week. The menu, featuring food and appropriately paired wines from the Oaxaca region of Mexico will begin on March 5, but here is the down low from the staff tasting.

The appetizers showed terrific range starting with the simple but crowd pleasing tamales with mole sauce. The Chayote Salad was a huge hit, fresh, clean and wonderfully palate cleansing. Chayote, squash and coconut milk vinaigrette–who know these would go so well. Lastly, there was the staff favorite, the Botanas platter.

As you can see, this was an array of tasty morsels, starting with the fresh masa molotes, stuffed with chorizo and potatoes–they were similar to empanadas and topped with sour cream. Then there was a Oaxacan slaw, fresh masa botas stuffed with Oaxacan cheese (its a little like a delicious string cheese). The botas are topped with a warm beet and corn mixture, which gives a bright color scheme to the plate. The grilled nopales salad was fun, especially for those who had not had the cactus vegetable before. There are also the requisite chips and two salsas, all topped off with some spicy pickled jalapenos for that final zing.

Then came the entrees…We started with s skirt steak which was topped with a very vinegar-y salsa, which turned out to match the richness of the meat perfectly. They were served with garbanzo cowboy beans (by cowboy we mean ‘cooked with bacon fat’ Yee-haw!) and red rice. A delicious chile relleno stuffed with goat cheese was next. The crust was great, made of cornmeal for extra crunch, and goat cheese and mozzarella inside. Also, the Chile came with pozole and two salsas. This was a big hit with the staff.

A few other dishes that should get your mouth watering are the leg of pig–slow roasted, shredded and wrapped in a banana leaf, Chicken Mole Negro with the house made mole sauce, and a Veracruzana Rockfish.

Look forward to seeing you at Joe’s!

Opa! To the Hi-Life

The Hi-Life’s Greek tasting last week had a bit of a buzz around it. It doesn’t start until February 20th, but Greek food is commonplace here in America and much loved by many of the staff members. The challange that Chef Robin faced was to transform those classic Greek comfort foods found all over the world into dishes that reflect the individual style of the Hi-Life. She did a wonderful job, each dish was presented to oohs and ahhs of the staff. Flavors that we knew we certainly present, but each dish was a journey from island to island.

The spring salad was garnished with cucumber wrapped quail eggs and fried potatoes, which gave it a richness that was cut through by the pickled red onions. For those of you who have had Kaseri flash-fried before, Robin took this to a new level, serving it with roasted red grapes and brandy flambeed figs, served up in a fried grape leaf (which makes for a tasty munch).

Of the small plates, my favorite was the Skordalia stuffed artichoke.

Half an artichoke is steamed, then stuffed with skordalia, a thick, garlicky mixture, then served with lemon parsley oil. For seafood lovers, in honor of Greece being an island nation, there is a small plate of squid two ways, which I enjoyed, one of them being grilled, the other being fried, all served with an olive and fried lemon salad.

 The large plates were equally impressive, featuring mountains of seafood, classic cuts of lamb and pork, and the crispiest, most delicious chicken in town.

Stuffed with mizithra cheese, golden raisins, greek sausage and pinenuts, this was amazing. An entire chicken comes on this, along with saffron rice, watercress and a red pepper coulis. As I mentioned to another staffer, the Hi-Life has an amazing way with chicken.