I didn’t catch this discussion on hummus the first time around. My favorite is at Mazzat in northern Red Hook (close to Carroll Gardens), but I haven’t tried Karkanni’s, assuming they still make it there.
When I make my own, it’s a much lazier process than that impressively involved recipe Small H posted, which contains, to my eyes, a terrifying amount of tahini! I’m too wimpy for that much tahini and generally go with a tablespoon at most! 
Somehow it works!
Im with @small_h on this one. Plenty of tahini turned to cream first with lots of lemon juice, fresh garlic and a bit of water. Then add the chickpeas and other seasonings. Particularly like this method because if i make a lot of tahini I can extract part for tahini sauce, much less watery than the restaurant version.
We had a smaller group than expected for our trip to Curry House and the Chinatown Night Market, just me and @DaveCook and @Ike, but we rallied and managed to try a fair number of dishes.
We ordered an oyster omelette, which appeared on the table as a Roti Canai. I’d never had this before, because it involves meat. I learned tonight that it also involves potato, and you can get around the meat pretty easily. The roti was hot and fresh, and the gravy was pleasant, but this didn’t make a strong impression on me.
I was more fond of this, the Penang Kueh Teow, which had an addictive smoky flavor.
The other two dishes, Sambal Shrimp and Eggplant with Okra and Petai Bean and String Beans with Belacan, struck me as under-spiced. The shrimp and vegetables were well-prepared (the okra crunchy, the eggplant soft), but I missed the assertiveness I’ve encountered in other Malaysian restaurants, like the late lamented Skyway.
We got our oyster omelette after all. This was a decent rendition, a bit dry and light on the oysters. My current favorite oyster omelette is at Kopitiam.
And then we headed over to the night market, arriving at the absolute perfect time - the vendors were opening, the crowds had not yet arrived. No pix from me, 'cause I was busy stuffing my fat face, but I know Dave took some. We had mung bean noodles with spicy peanut sauce, sugar cane shrimp, and that sticky rice pyramid wrapped in a banana leaf (zongzi - just looked it up).
A really nice evening, and great to meet Ike and to see Dave again - it’s been a minute!
Upon further review, my first visit to Curry House was in October 2022, not long after it opened. It was good to make a second pass, but I agree with Helen that (service issues aside) the food was underseasoned. Nice enough, some of it, but nothing wowed me. Malay and Satay, both in Flushing, and especially Taste Good, in Elmhurst, will sooner get my business another day.
It was a beautiful evening at the Chinatown Night Market, where we arrived just as it opened, ahead of the crowds. I don’t have a photo of our zongzi (from Yan Wo Dou Bun, inside Mott Street Eatery), but here’s one of the bean jelly from Heaven Noodles and Buns …
Whose namesake ingredient was shaved from a large jiggly block …
And here’s Helen’s chạo tôm, shrimp paste on sugarcane:
Too bad that was the last Chinatown Night Market of the season!
3 posts were split to a new topic: NYC burger recs
That sugarcane shrimp looks scrumptious!
Too bad the food was underseasoned — never a description I would have thought of for SE Asian.
I think our Curry House food was white-ified.
And the sugar cane shrimp was indeed awesome. I got the to the stall before the first batch was ready and just stood there. Like a stalker. Waiting.
I would love to join a future Chinatown outing if you continue to do those through the fall.
That’s a bit surprising. Maybe I can convince @vinouspleasure, @SteveR and the rest of the crew who couldn’t make it to go back and see if they spice it more heavily for me 
Or maybe a return to Kopitiam to eat a lot more of the menu than we did last visit on a crawl, but we’d have to time it right to get that middle table.
Though I will also say I’ve never been disappointed by the flavors at Nyonya, though my visits have been many years apart (and I’m long overdue).
Keep your eyes on the NYC board! Are you planning a trip here at some point?
Hopefully more than one, since I’ll be so much closer to the city this fall — but I have no specific dates at this point. Are these outings limited to weekends?
Oh. That’s a bummer.
Nope. Some of us are available lunch &/or dinner, weekdays or weekends. Others, I hear, have life responsibilities, like that work thing, that interfere with some outings. Just say when and there are probably some who will be available.
p.s: if you want to avoid the possibility of meeting me, I’ll be gone for just about all of October, so plan accordingly.
Is there something I don’t / should know about you? I won’t know my own work schedule until… well, until I find a job. My PIC who likely would want to join us is mostly tied up on Wednesdays and Fridays, I have a few weekend gigs in Sept & Oct, but I’m hopeful we can join an outing or two before the semester is over 
Dishoom takes over breakfast at Pastis, 8-11am through 8/30. Reservations went in a flash, but I heard walk-ins were possible, and I scored a bar seat this morning at 9:45. Excellent Parsi omelette with very buttery bread (served with extra butter in case you live on butter or something) and three incarnations of tomato - grilled, ketchup and juice in my Virgin Mary. Unlimited delicious chai, also. Glad I rolled the dice on this one!
Would like to go but I’ve seen reports of long lines for tables, did you have to wait?
Food looks great!
I had to wait zero minutes for a bar seat, and there were at least two or three available throughout my visit, including the one next to me, so I had space, even.
@SteveR and @JenKalb and @FlemSnopes I am late to the Brooklyn conversation. I am between your demographic and the 20-30 year olds. But share the perception that the diners in general skew younger than my lovely wife and me when we got out in Brooklyn. The one place that we joke about where we are the young people in the room is when we have to use our monthly minimum at the Heights Casino dining room. @SteveR I think you are familiar with it? My sense is that a lot of the older diners are heading into the “City” when they go out and are less likely to head further into Brooklyn. Having put the kids through the private school system in BH and meeting the people, the assorted sources of affluence is a fascinating anthropological tale.
@Ziggy - If you have moved on from TCI to Anguilla, you should check out SBH as its just a short flight the other way. Fascinating mash up of Caribbean and French as long as you stay away from most of the new places that have opened post covid.
Heights Casino…LOL
