The Girl Who Ate Everything

'Ello there. I have a fairly stress-free life, but due to my inability to manage my time (I think I possessed such ability at some point, but lost it all as soon as I made the transition from "college student" to "adult who forgot everything she learned in college") I've dug myself into a slippery, muddy pit of work, and work, and no sleep, and work. (The work is related to the upcoming Serious Eats book—the publisher needs stuff now, pretty much, and I'm still working on the photos. Ah. Ahhhh. Aaaeeuuhhhhhhhfuckinpoopypoop.) For once, it's a somewhat legit reason for me to not update my blog (as opposed to those other times when I don't update my blog, which are usually caused by "dickin' around on the Internet...like, damn, did you see that video of the ducklings being blown over by the wind and rolling around like crazy? AHAHAHA HILARIOUS or sad NO, IT'S HILARIOUS"), but I feel shitty about it. Also, as I'm going on a family vacation to Orlando from Thursday to next Tuesday, I figured if I didn't say something now it'd be a hell of a long gap between my last post and the latest one.

So...this post...is so far...not very useful. Okay, here's some hummus. The best hummus in the city, perhaps.

All, glorious mound of creamy pulverized chickpeas.

It seems wrong to deem anything "the best [insert foodstuff]" if you haven't tried every possible contender in the category, but after you eat at Mimi's Hummus you don't want to try anything else because Mimi's has set an impossibly high standard of hummus awesomeness. Granted, I'm saying this as someone who's never been to the Middle East, nor someone who would characterize herself as a hummus expert. In general, I merely like hummus, but specifically, I love Mimi's hummus.

Whyyyy? It's silky smooth. It's creamy. It haz a flavor. It's thick and rich, but not too much of either. I eat it and think, "This is what I want all hummus to be like." I've never had such deeply satisfying hummus before.

This post originally took place on November 3. I think I started writing this post on Thanksgiving and then forgot about it. Oops. Better late than never?

Happy camera-toting eaters.

Sheepshead Bay. That's where Georgian food has been all my life. Aside from Georgia.

Thanks to James, I now have a reason to visit Sheepshead Bay: to eat at Pirosmani (named after Georgian artist Niko Pirosmani, whose full-wall murals of Georgian life you'll be staring into as you eat), home of thickly crusted breads radiating with fresh oven warmth; soft flatbreads stuffed and/or topped with pools of cheese and butter; heaps of fried potato slices and oyster mushrooms, crispy and tender in all the right places; and...blahdeblahblahblah, more delicious things full of carbs and fats.

I recommend reading James' post about the meal since it has more details than my post will ever have, and it features the same photos. So why even read my post? Because...instead of trying to describe these dishes in an eloquent way (not that I usually do), as I've decided that'd be pointless, I'm going to channel my brain's thoughts during the dinner on November 3 in all its "OH MY GOD"-filled commentary. It'll be just like sitting in my brainmeats, listening to my malformed thoughts. To separate brainfart-from-the-past from current notes, I'll italicize the thoughts and leave the rest un-slanty.

(Apologies to anyone who knows Georgian if I spell things wrong. Please correct me!)

This post took place on August 27, aka my 25th birthday. I wrote it a day or two after the party, but never got around to posting it...until pressured by the coming of 2011. The only people who'd care to relive the night are the ones who were there, probably, but I'd still like to give props to my friends and Shake Shack for an awesome birthday party. HERE YE GO four months too late.

Also...MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Tiny fires, totally appropriate for a birthday party. Photograph by Adelyn

"I'm wearing a green shirt," my brother said on the phone.

"Oh yeah, I see you." I waved to my brother standing near the south entrance to Madison Square Park. He came all the way from New Jersey for my little Shake Shack birthday party. Aw.

But as I got closer, I saw something...funny. A group of people lined up by a few tables pulled far from the main Shake Shack seating area. As I got closer, some of the people hastily propped large gray circles in front of their faces—faces that I recognized because I invited them to my party. But there were also people that I hadn't invited. And the gray circles confounded me so.

Wut. Photographs by Adelyn

"Huuuuh?"

I got closer.

"...Huuuuuuh?"

Then closer.

"Whaaaaaaa huuuuuuuuh?"

Then...I couldn't get any closer because I was right in front of them.

"OH GOD YOU ARE WEARING MANATEE* MASKS? WAIT WHY ARE THERE SO MANY PEOPLE HERE? HEY, YOU SAID YOU WOULDN'T BE HERE! OH JEBUS DID I GET TRICKED AGAIN, YES I DID."

* Oh hey, I like manatees.

Sometimes at the Serious Eats office, you'll find our central table strewn with random foodstuffs.

(Okay, you'll often find our table strewn with random foodstuffs. Last week we had Ed's leftovers from Primehouse, along with bits and pieces from a Citarella gift bag. Sometimes there's no extra food to be found. Dark days, those are. My body, so used to the jittery state brought on by an onslaught of excess fat- and carb-based calories, doesn't know what to do with itself.)

A few weeks ago we got the very best random foodstuff of them all. A loaf of semi di sesamo from Sullivan Street Bakery:

Dough blob. Photograph from sullivanstreetbakery.com.

If it were a human, it'd be that thick lump of a kid with a splotchy face strewn with acne. Luckily, it's a loaf of bread, so the craggly, sesame seed-encrusted look is a good thing.

Someone had already ripped a few chunks out of the bulbous loaf. I reached in to continue its destruction, not expecting much aside from a carb-laden snack.

Upon first chew: "Mm, this is quite good."

A few seconds later: "...Wait, this is, like, really good."

A few more seconds later: "Damn this...this is...wow..."

And later: "This is no ordinary bread." [grabs another fistful of bread]

And then: "This is the best bread I've had in ages." [fistful, another]

And a few chunks later: "I CANNOT STOP EATING THIS BREAD, MUST CONTINUE EATING FOREVER."

This post originally took place on November 6. Hahahaha yeah you are not surprised.

Menu

The title of this post is basically all I have to tell people to make them want to eat at Shanghai Tide in Flushing. Whether or not the quality is good is a secondary concern. BECAUSE YOU GET TO STUFF YOURSELF SILLY. So before I address the quality, let me show you what you can get for your $26*. At least, if you're in a group of ten like I was at Tom's 21st birthday dinner.

* I tried looking up other NYC hot pot prices online, but couldn't find much. I suspect $26 is not far off from what other restaurants charge for all-you-can-eat hot pot, but Shanghai Tide earns extra points with the dumplings and drinks.

MEAT.

Piles of raw thinly sliced meats: beef, pork, and lamb in this case.