Broadway's "Fun Home": Setting A Very High & Necessary Bar For The Future Of Musical Theatreby Randi / June 15, 2015
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Love From Philly: My Grandmother Does the Most Amazing Thing With Polenta
To kick off the next few posts dedicated to Philadelphia, I wanted to start with something I made as a challenge from my grandmother. She’s is a real Philadelphia eye-talian, and therefore she is the greatest cook. This summer, she told me how her mother (a Calabrese, from the toe of the boot) used to make polenta for breakfast in the most amazing way you’ve never considered: fried in maple syrup and butter and covered in powdered sugar. I mean, polenta is one of the most amazing foods ever, but as a sweet food? Incredible! I am not usually up for sweet foods for breakfast (unless we are splitting it ‘for the table’ and we all get savory items in addition, because that’s always a great plan and it’s how I suggest everybody do brunch from now on you’re welcome), but this is something I would happily wake up for. Well, I don’t happily wake up for anything but you get my point.
Polenta frying in pools of syrup
Grandmother said you have to use the polenta that comes in tubes for this (and nothing else!), so it holds its shape and sustains the flipping and the frying. There were no real measurements shared; you just add ‘enough’ of everything so it cooks up and tastes good. But I’ll share what worked for me below! I was very skeptical of turning one of my favorite dinner foods into a breakfast (or dessert; I actually made it for dessert) treat, but what a treat it was! You must try this! I think it’s so much better than French toast or something like that because it can’t get soggy and it’s actually good as leftovers. Also, this is the perfect sweet treat for ushering in the new year tonight on Rosh Hashanah! Add a few apple slices and it would be heaven!
FRIED SWEET POLENTA
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Ingredients:
Directions:
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 This is the kind of polenta you want. In a tube. It’s so beautiful. Naaaaaht.  Don’t overstuff your pan; you need spatula flipping room!  Fried sugarrrrrrrrrr  Bubbly fried sugarrrr |
Have you ever heard of something like this? Or tried it? Are you going to try it and tell me how delicious it is? I know I can’t wait to have it again. Let’s all thank my grandmother and Italians in general for their culinary wisdom. Happy new year!
Lucky Leek, Berlin: Fantastic Fancy Food With A Few Minor Hurdles
To celebrate our engagement, husband and I decided to treat ourselves to a fancypants dinner at Lucky Leek, an upscale all-vegan restaurant in Berlin. The food was stellar, but there were a few issues that prevent me from completely raving about it. However, based on the food alone I would definitely have to recommend Lucky Leek if you are looking for something lavish and delicious.
The restaurant itself was decorated simply and nicely, with lots of fresh plants and clean white and black decor. The menu options sounded delicious and was heavy on the spargel (asparagus), because it was spring and spargel (our new favorite word to say) was everywhere. We decided to each get the Chef’s Menu, which offered about five solid courses and several additional items. We got this for one good reason and one dumb reason (restaurant’s fault): Good reason: It sounded delicious and we were doing what Retta was telling us to do. Dumb reason: Only with the two of us getting the expensive 50 euro Chef’s Menu would we be able to hit the restaurant’s incredibly lame and stupid 100 euro credit card minimum. I mean…what restaurant on earth has a credit card minimum that high? That is super lame.
The only thing dumber? The restaurant would not give us tap water – you had to buy bottled water. I have never encountered this shittiness anywhere in the world. Even in cities where drinking the tap water would kill you, restaurants would still happily give it to you for free. Okay that’s a bad example but still. I am still battling rising blood pressure thinking about how stupid this is. If the food wasn’t so good, I would say let’s picket Lucky Leek with fire hoses until they give us free tap water. I mean, let’s do that anyway because I am starting to super hulk out again, but still, you should eat here because it is so damn good.
The only thing dumber? The restaurant would not give us tap water – you had to buy bottled water. I have never encountered this shittiness anywhere in the world. Even in cities where drinking the tap water would kill you, restaurants would still happily give it to you for free. Okay that’s a bad example but still. I am still battling rising blood pressure thinking about how stupid this is. If the food wasn’t so good, I would say let’s picket Lucky Leek with fire hoses until they give us free tap water. I mean, let’s do that anyway because I am starting to super hulk out again, but still, you should eat here because it is so damn good.
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We began with a really delicious amuse-bouche sent out from the kitchen with “our compliments”, which was nice but I was like “a better compliment would have been free tap water, yo. Or at least tell me I’m pretty.” Anyway, the amuse was a toasted carrot sandwich with a pepper and a pickle on top. It was delicious! I could have had 100 of them!
Our first real course was this fantastic salad that featured a raw zucchini roll-up filled with amazing truffled cheesy cream (I think the phrase cream cheese is disgusting even though I am from Philadelphia (snaps)). The salad was arugula, fancy carrots, and salted almonds in a potato dressing. I don’t really know what that means, but it was delicious. The main focus of the plate aside from the zucchini roll-up was kohlrabi carpaccio which was fantastic. Fanciest salad ever!
* Next up was this ‘spring consomme’, which was a lovely French-oniony soup with like wonton balls in the middle. Delicious wonton balls! It said it came with herbed pancake strips but I don’t remember that being the case, unless those little squares are the strips. The wonton was a cheesy semolina dumpling that was really yummy. * The standout dish was next, the pasta. I wrote in my notes that this ravioli dish was perfect! It had a ridiculously large spear of spargel across the top, and the ravioli was filled with more spargel! (Remember spargel is asparagus. We learn languages on this show!) The ravioli pasta itself was superb with that perfect chewiness and taste. It was in a Hollandaise sauce that was not disgusting; it was in fact delicious. The dish was spotted with beluga lentil samsa (which Google tells me is just a misspelled samosa, which wasn’t the case here) that was the perfect spargel accompaniment. It also was topped with ‘sage panache’ but that just sounds like a dapper old wise man. Like the nicest way to describe a dandy British man. That bloke is full of sage panache. Hahahahah. * THEN THEY GAVE US FRUIT SORBET TO CLEANSE OUR PALATES LIKE WE WERE FREAKING ROYALTY OR SOMETHING. It was melon and rose hip sorbet and it was so lovely! It throws me a little though to have dessert before the main main. (As a vegan, even the blandest lightest sorbet is usually our dessert, so my brain was like, oh man it’s over? And then it was hard to get out of that.) * The main main, or piece de resistance, as the menu actually said, was a “Seitan and Onion Roast Joint“, which I assume is similar to a Spike Lee Joint, but more delicious and filling and less upsetting in most ways. It came with potato and carrot puree, which is the kind of thing I make a lot (a LOT a lot) but obviously not as perfectly as this was. It also came with pak choy, which as far as I know is bok choy, but in Europe they call it pak choy and I kind of love the discrepancy and kind of hate it. But I love love bok/pak choy! And I will always welcome more greens on my plate! It was the perfect unexpected Asian accompaniment to the meat and potatoes. The joint was also topped with a beet and walnut confit and just wow everything was perfect. * Then came real dessert, a trio of uhhhmazing cake and cream confections. In the center was the raspberry cake, which was good but fruit flavored dessert is not my favorite when it could easily be chocolate instead. Much MUCH better was to the left, the coconut and nougat tartlet. Yes, that’s right, this entire meal was sponsored by the first Jon Lovitz episode of “Friends”. The crust of the tartlet (hehehe) was a bit shortbready, which normally I hate because it feels like my teeth are hurting, but this was fantastic – and cold, which helps. That middle layer of coconut nougat was incredible. Oh man. Just the most perfect layer of cream imaginable. Lastly, probably my favorite component was the mocha banana ice cream with the chocolate praline sticking out of it. I don’t usually like mocha or coffee flavors, but this was mostly banana with just a hint of something deeper and bolder. And I love ice cream so much. I don’t like that the amount of ice cream in this and every single restaurant is just that little ball that is so difficult to eat because you end up smearing most of it around the plate and you’re like, am I allowed to lick the plate? And you are like no, but then they should have just given you a large bowl of it to begin with. Anyway, it was fantastic, and that chocolate praline was like those really thin and crunchy Pepperidge Farm doodads but sooo much better. Everything was delicious and perfect and we were extremely stuffed at the end of it, as it should be.
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Carrot sandwich amuse-bouche 
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All in all, Lucky Leek was an absolutely fantastic meal, and if you are looking for something fancypants in Berlin, I can definitely recommend it. But bring a bottle of water with you — which is the dumbest thing to have to say about a fancypants restaurant, but I do not like being forced to pay for water.
LUCKY LEEK, BERLIN
Water speed: UGH FFS!
Bathrooms: Hilariously, the bathroom is in the back of the restaurant through a freaking beaded curtain, like in 1970s dorm rooms. So out of place and funny. Bathroom was fine.
Service: They were pretty nice, those water selling bastards.
Food: Delicious delicious delicious.
Bonus: Decent location. & maybe by the time you go they will have gotten the memo about the water? Go for the food.
