Our office hasn’t gotten to celebrate in a while so we decided to do a Halloween potluck. I made some tortilla roll-ups that I tried to stack to look like a spine. However, the stacking didn’t work so well. I found the recipe on Taste of Home. The recipe calls for tortillas, ham, salami, garlic-herb cheese spread, baby spinach, provolone cheese, green peppers, and sweet red peppers. I used whole wheat tortillas and low fat garlic cheese spread. I also used some green chilis I still had instead of the green and red peppers. The rollups turned out delicious if a little unstackable.
One of the other coworkers made chili (or as she calls it "chili beans"). Another brought Frito's, cheese, and onions to make Frito pie with the chili. We also had a fruit tray, veggie tray, deviled eggs, larger tortilla rollups, and red velvet cupcakes. We had lots of tasty dishes. It makes for a well-earned afternoon slump.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Monday, October 29, 2012
Sushi Train
303.756.0708
Sometimes, friends just need to be kidnapped so they can have fun. I picked up my friends Tom, Amanda and Katie and took them to dinner at Sushi Train. Amanda’s birthday is coming up soon so I wanted to treat her to dinner.
Sushi Train is located near I-25 and Hampden in Denver
The special deal at Sushi Train is the all-you-can-eat sushi. At dinner, the cost is $24.99. It seems expensive, but if you’re very hungry, you’ll cover that cost in a couple of rolls. The last sushi restaurant I ate at I spent over $40. It’s not required to do the all-you-can-eat option. They do have regular menu items as well.
I started off with some miso soup because I was cold and I had to stay away from the tea. Last time I came to Sushi Train, I drank several cups of green tea and couldn’t sleep that night. I also started off with some steamed gyoza (pork dumplings with dipping sauce). The soup and gyoza are also listed on the all-you-can-eat menu along with other appetizers.
I ordered three rolls which is very ambitious because each roll is cut into eight pieces. I got the Aspen Roll: crab and avocado on the inside and topped with salmon and lemon. I really like having the salmon on top of the roll and the lemon makes it taste very fresh. The second roll I got was the White Dragon Roll: tempura shrimp, cucumber, and crab inside and topped with white tuna. This was the first time I tried this one. It was nice to try but I probably wouldn’t get it again. I don't think I'm a big fan of the tempura shrimp inside a roll. I'd rather just have the tempura flakes. The last roll I got was the Beef Lover Roll: beef teriyaki, jalapeno, cream cheese, and deep fried. Beef in sushi? Oh, it’s good. The beef has great flavor and the cream cheese with the kick of jalapeno is to die for. Since it's fried, it's served warm. It’s super heavy so it’s hard to finish, but it’s damn good. I was hurting by the end of my rolls and I had to stuff a few pieces in my face. Anything you don’t finish, you get charged $0.25 per piece. I may have pawned off a few pieces to my friends as well.
I also ordered pieces of nigiri. I got two pieces of salmon, two pieces of tuna, one tamago (egg omelet), one spicy scallop, and one of the yellowtail. I didn’t like the flavor of the yellowtail so I gave my second piece to Tom. I loved the other nigiri though. I stuffed my face with sushi until my sides felt like they would explode.
We got to cleanse the palate with a little orange slice when the check came. As we left, all of the chefs told us, “Goodbye! See you next week!” They’re only partially joking since I go there quite often with Amanda and Katie.
Friday, October 26, 2012
Cherry Crest Seafood Restaurant and Market
(303) 798-2600
On the Friday before all of the Halloween parties, I took some vacation time to play hooky from work. I had planned to have lunch with my parents before going to get some errands done. My mom sifted through her folder of Groupons to help us decide where to eat. I was craving seafood so we ended up going to Cherry Crest Seafood.
Cherry Crest is both a restaurant and a seafood market. Along with the dining tables, there is a glass counter with fish you can buy to take home. Even though we live in Colorado Colorado
My dad ordered a dish that he gets often. This was the Grilled Salmon & Thai Noodle Salad: Hot salmon fillets on a bed of noodles with cucumber, scallions, cilantro, peanuts, and spicy Thai dressing. You can also order it with grilled shrimp instead. I’ve always liked the taste of the salad when I’ve tried it, but I have yet to order it for myself. Luckily, dad’s generous enough to share with me.
Mom ordered the catch of the day which was Tortilla Crusted Haddock with rice and vegetables. The chef makes his own tortilla crust from crushed corn chips. It tasted pretty delicious. I can’t remember trying Haddock before. It was a mild white fish. Mom seemed to enjoy her plate.
The restaurant has a small town feel to it since most of the wait staff has been working there for years. They recognize you when you come in. I remember some of them from when I was a kid. I also remember a time or two in my childhood when we got one of the restaurant’s specialties: the lobster pot. You get a pot with live lobsters, catch of the day and other seafood to take home and cook. My family made the mistake of letting my brother and me play with the lobsters before we cooked them. It was a tearful dinner. It would be fun to try it again, as long as we kept the lid sealed.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Domo
303-595-3666
We continued Crystal ’s birthday celebration with dinner at Domo restaurant in Denver Japan
We all sat and tried to decide what we wanted for dinner. The menu is not as extensive as it used to be when I’d gone as a kid, but it’s still hard to choose just one of the options. I started off with some tea. I ordered the Matcha tea. It’s a green tea that they serve sweetened with cream or plain. I decided to try it with the cream and sugar. It was actually a little too sweet for my taste. It arrived in a tea cup that was more like a soup bowl. It was huge! The line of the night was when, in reference to the size of the cup, I said, “I want to bathe a kitten in it.” By the time I finished that cup, I was buzzing from the caffeine in the green tea and the sugar.
I ordered hot sake with the dinner. Yummy yum yum. All of our dinners came with seven family style dishes that were the chef’s choice. My favorite one was vermicelli noodles with cilantro and jalapeño pepper slices. It was light and tasty. The fish cake and mushroom dish was also good. We were also served okra with seaweed and orange bell pepper slices. I tried it but I kind of hate the texture of okra. There was a plate of inari (fried tofu) and vegetables as well as a plate of potato and vegetable curry. There were a few dishes that seemed odd to have at a Japanese restaurant. They were the beef meatballs and the pork stew with potatoes and carrots. Those seemed more American or Irish. They were freaking tasty though.
For my main dish, I ordered the Domo ramen noodle set. You choose your ramen broth style and meat as well as a smaller side dish (see above picture). I ordered the Sukiyaki Beef Shoyu Ramen: shoyu ramen (soy sauce broth) topped with sliced sukiyaki beef. For my choice of one mini donburi dish, I got the mini salmon teriyaki with brown rice. The soy ramen broth was amazingly rich and flavorful. I preferred it to the miso broth. The ramen also included the delicious egg noodles, peppers, cabbage, and other vegetables. The beef was tender from being soaked in the broth and it was seasoned with black pepper. Every bite of this ramen was bursting with flavor. The salmon teriyaki was also very good with the brown rice. I liked the sweet teriyaki sauce on the salmon.
I hope to return to Domo soon to try some of their other dishes. Crystal says she wants to try the nabe. It's served in a small cast iron pot.
Celestial Seasonings
303-530-5300
We started the tour with a video about the history of the company and then we got to go in and see the different stages of production. We saw the big sacks of ingredients they get from all over the world. In the adjoining room, they have a special way of cleaning the tea. They use something like an air hockey table to float the ingredients on air. Lighter things like pollen will fly off. Heavier things like sticks and rocks will fall down. That was an especially interesting fact to me. They use giant tubs to mix the ingredients of each tea together. Then they have a taster, a man who’s been working there for over 30 years, taste the batch and tell them what needs to be fixed.
The most famous part of the tour is the Mint Room. Since peppermint is so potent, they keep it sealed in a double-walled room. When you walk in, you can immediately feel the mint sting at your eyes. I was stuffed up from a cold and breathing in that mint helped soothe my throat and nose. It smells so good. Free aromatherapy!
Celestial Seasonings tea bags are little pillows with no tag or string. We got to see where they fill the bags and then put them in boxes. I can not even begin to describe to you how amazing that room smelled. Tea dust was everywhere and it made the room smell spicy and fruity.
The tour, of course, lets you out in the gift shop. It’s a dangerous place. I bought an armload of tea. I got the Sweet Harvest Pumpkin, Sleepytime Sinus Soother, Antioxidant Max Green Tea Dragon Fruit Melon, Sleepytime Decaf Lemon Jasmine Green Tea, Sweet Wild Berry Zinger Ice Tea, and Sweet Raspberry Zinger Ice Tea. I also got a set of square tongs that are used to remove the tea bag since there is no string to pull. It saves you some burned fingers. After the gift shop, we went back to the tea counter in the other building for a few last samples. Crystal and I ended up buying to-go cups of the Honey Vanilla White Chai Tea.
It was a great tour and I recommend it to anyone in the Colorado
Monday, October 8, 2012
The Original Pancake House
Phone: 303-795-0573
I don’t get up for breakfast often. When I do, it’s a very special treat. I had Monday off for Columbus Day and decided to have a fun day with my parents. I made sure to wake up early so we could go to one of my favorite breakfast restaurants, The Original Pancake House. Getting up early on a day off?! Quelle horreur!
The restaurant is always crowded on the weekends so I was glad we could go on a week day. The interior decorations are in a country comfort style. The walls are paneled in blond wood and blue paint. There are plates of all different sizes, shapes, and designs along the top of the wall on a shelf. It’s a chain restaurant with locations around the country. I don’t know if it has the same style in each one.
They do have a lot of pancakes on their menu. The ones they’re known for are the Apple Pancake and the Dutch Baby. I was looking for a relatively simple breakfast. I ordered the sausage and eggs. I got link sausages with over easy eggs. These were served with home fries and pancakes. The sausages were very tasty and the eggs were cooked to perfection. I love an over easy egg that spills its yolk at the touch of a fork. I really liked the pancakes too. They were very fluffy. I had a stack of three of them. I ended up taking some of them home.
I also wanted some bacon so instead of ordering a side, my dad ordered the Bacon Buster breakfast. This came with seven, count ‘em, seven pieces of thickly bacon. My parents like their bacon cooked to a crisp so they ordered extra crispy bacon. I personally enjoy my bacon with a little give to it. The cooks at the Original Pancake House cook it perfectly on their own. Dad’s breakfast also came with three eggs, home fries and three pancakes.
My mom ordered eggs and pancakes. She also tried some of the bacon. I’m a new coffee drinker so I tried a cup of coffee. It was too strong for me and I didn’t want to embarrass myself by dumping the whole pot of creamer into it. I would have been better off with my childhood favorite of hot chocolate.
The wait staff is always nice even when they’re busy. It’s a great place to sit down and have breakfast.
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Comfort Food
Our family had some sad news. Our cat Ripley, an outdoor cat, was eaten by some kind of bigger animal. He had been missing all day on Sunday and then my parents got the call that he’d been found in the neighbor’s yard that night. Ripley was about 16 years old. We’d had him since he was born in our garage when I was in middle school. He was a bony tom cat with the longest fangs I’ve seen on a cat. He would always welcome me back home to my parents’ house and would proceed to flop in my lap and purr. It broke our hearts to say goodbye to him. We’re going to miss him.
My mom decided to have a comfort food dinner so we could come together and say goodbye to Ripley. Family and food are a good way to grieve. My brother was able to join my mom, dad and me.
While my mom finished preparing everything, we ate chips and salsa. Dinner was meatloaf from Tony’s meat market. It was made with beef and pork. My mom made it heart shaped in honor of Ripley. The meatloaf was really flavorful. We ate it with tomato country relish from Ballymaloe cooking school. It’s a savory sauce that goes extremely well with the meatloaf. On the side, we had some heated frozen peas, carrots and corn. We also had my dad’s mashed potatoes. My dad boils the potatoes whole and then scoops out the insides into a bowl. He then adds butter, sour cream and milk along with Laury’s seasoned salt. His mashed potatoes are the best I’ve ever had. I’ve made them for my friends and they agree. We drank Wiley Jack cabernet sauvignon from California
Goodbye, Ripley. You were a good cat. I miss you.
India's Best
303-484-9535
Nothing breaks up the day quite like a trip to India India Littleton Boulevard
Lunch time has the best deal in town. They have an all you can eat buffet for only $7.99. Each time I’ve been there it’s been delicious. They switch up which menu items show up on the buffet but it’s always a good spread. You do have to order the Naan bread separate though. I shared one order of three pieces with my parents.
I started my plate off with some of the Basmati rice as well as the Biryani vegetable rice. (You need a nice bed for all of the delicious sauces to soak into.) I skipped over the salad bar and went straight for the hot dishes. There were some fried appetizer dishes there. I took the Punjabi Samosa. It’s a deep fried crisp pastry that is filled with mashed potatoes and peas.
Now onto the entrées, I took the Chicken Curry which had nice, big chunks of chicken in a yellow curry sauce. It had good flavor but I could have used a little more of the curry seasoning in it. They also served Tandoori Chicken which is the red, grilled bone-in chicken. It’s served on an onion bed. I had a drumstick and it was really good. I liked the onions with it too. They were cooked enough that they weren’t too strong, but they were still crunchy. I also took some Butter Chicken. This is smaller pieces of chicken cooked with herbs and ground spices in a homemade butter sauce. The sauce was red and reminded me of the Masala sauce. It was really good on the rice and with the Naan bread.
One of the interesting dishes is the Saag Paneer: spinach cooked with homemade cheese in cream. I’m not a fan of cooked spinach (as is evidenced by all of the uneaten spinach soufflés from my childhood) but I love the paneer cheese that is served in it. I just try to get a larger ratio of paneer cubes to spinach. One of the dishes I had not tried on the buffet before was Alu Gobi. It is a vegetarian dish of cauliflower and potatoes cooked with herbs and spices in a yellow sauce. The sauce makes the dish far from bland. Another vegetarian dish is the Dal Makhni: lentils cooked with garlic, ginger, tomato and spices. The lentils were very flavorful. It makes you forget you’re eating something healthy! There were a few sauces on the salad bar that I had overlooked. I went back during my meal to get Mango Chutney. I just love how tangy and spicy mango chutney is. I also got the rich, red Tamarind Sauce as well as the Mint Sauce.
I finished off the meal with some of the Gajjar Halwa. It’s sweet carrot pudding with cashews and raisins. It tasted like there might be rice or condensed milk in it. Either way, it was fantastic. I was sad I was so full because I wanted to go back and get more.
At the end of lunch, my parents and I all agreed that we have to do this again sometime soon. It’s too delicious and well priced to pass up!
Monday, October 1, 2012
Sushi Basho
(303) 730-9999
There is a wonderful sushi place right near Main Street Littleton Sushi Place
Once you enter, you’re welcomed by a glowing aquarium. It separates the fish eaters from the wimps right off the bat. The dining area is small but bigger than it appears from the outside. The tables have white table cloths on them at dinner and there are a few modern Japanese style art pieces on the white walls. It's very well lit during lunch and can be a bit dim at dinner.
My friend Crystal and I tried this restaurant before and fell in love with one of the items on their menu. This time, when we returned, I was in need of some comforting so I ordered it. It was the Inari Soup. It’s a soy sauce based broth with inari strips (fried tofu strips usually served sweetened and with rice like a piece of sushi). It also has fish cake strips in it. I was wary of the fish cakes the first time I tried it because I didn’t want a fishy taste. These are amazing though. The whole fish cake is a round circle that is white on the inside and pink on the outside. It doesn’t have much flavor on its own so it soaks up the flavors of the rich broth. It’s delicious. The flavor of the soup varies on the day. Sometimes it’s rich and salty. This last time I had it it was a little less so.
I also ordered a hot large sake since it was starting to feel cool outside. Nothing warms me up faster than some hot sake. I wanted some sushi too. I ordered the Queen Roll. This has smoked salmon and avocado on the inside with salmon on top. The avocado made it creamy and delicious. I also ordered 2 salmon nigiri and one piece of salmon sashimi. The nigiri is the little piece with rice on the bottom and fish on top. Sashimi is a piece of plain fish usually served with some daikon or some other pickled vegetable. I’ve found that I’m a salmon addict. I often satisfy my salmon cravings with salmon sushi.
The meal was very comforting and very filling. We kind of over ordered. That just meant we had some leftovers. The prices are a little steep but not outrageous. The bill adds up if you order a lot of different things. But usually, when Crystal and I share our regular order, it’s not too bad.
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