good point, I lost forgot it was halal.
Splurged on an oden omakase at Dashi Okume in Brooklyn. I wasn’t as blown away as I expected to be - this was, in my opinion, a missed opportunity to showcase several different formulations of dashi, and perhaps some more exotic ingredients - but it was a lovely meal nonetheless. My favorites were the flatfish, the onigiri, the shrimp satsumaage and the daikon. The nori deserves a special shout-out, as it was excellent.
Pix are in the order listed on the menu (except the bonus red bowl of mochi and I think grated yam). We shared some sake carafes but did not get the paring (I wasn’t feeling THAT splurge-y.)
Although we were a party of four, seated at two-tops pushed together, the staff somewhat hilariously treated us as if we were two separate couples and served us at slightly different times. I wonder what they thought when we all piled into the same Lyft.
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Corima was almost flawless. Weird corner of Chinatown, right next to Manhattan Bridge. After much deliberation I settled on the a la Carte instead of the coveted tasting menu. The two are very different. I’ll start with the age old HO question Seregama dying to know
Is the $9 Tortilla worth it? YES!!.. and no! Its a solid, thin sourdough flatbread, like the Druze bread if you had it at Gazala’s or Lavash. But since its Mexican it’s “Tortilla”. Probably made with some sort of fat. Good enough to eat on its own, but even better with the accompanied butter where they added roasted onions, mushrooms and chili to it. Not worth $9 but appropriately priced bread course for an ambitious one star Michelin where you spend roughly $120-150 pp. Supply and demand no brainer for the lone single digit menu item.
Beef Cecina Tlayuda - Very good cured beef, like a moist carpaccio. More of a sum of all parts situation with the crunchy tortilla and Edamame Guac. Decent size for a small dish
Tetela - This was excellent! Replacing the fried Quesadilla is this fried masa based triangle, reminiscent of Pupusa. Stuffed with Maitake, Quesillo (Oaxacan cheese) and winter greens, and topped with thin truffle puree. The only flaw was that the greens were not evenly spread out.
Monkfish - As good as the smaller plates were, the bigger were even better. Perfectly cooked firm monkfish, topped with paper thin potatoes, and a foamy seafood bisque. Just wished the fish was a little warmer.
Duck Enmoladas - More Excellence. Like duck enchilada topped with Black Garlic Mole and Cotija cheese foam. A spoonful of pure bliss
Desserts didnt quite continue the momentum. Took a major step back in fact. When you feel nothing can go wrong and you order two instead of the usual one. Chocoflan with truffles. These are real truffles, not chocolate truffles. I’m a truffle junkie. We travel for truffles. They dont belong in desserts, full stop. Give me one of those Mexican flans with caramel any day. The Funnel cake with roasted pears and pistachio was more like it, but considering the place, still a little basic.
The drinks were fine. Out of the 4, one clear winner was the Tequilla based Sinaloa Sling that she had. The rest not super balanced but fine. Got Sotol after the meal. Thank you but not a fan.
A very enjoyable meal, helped in part by Ivan, one of those super waiters you just want to talk to and know better. The entire staff was in fact great. According to the wife who had a better look, half featured “Porn Mustaches” After 32 years I’m still learning new things about her.
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Taboonia (Chelsea) - Our first fast-casual Druze I believe. Opened by a survivor of the Nova Festival. He was helping his brother run a food stand at the festival, selling pretty much the same stuff he’s selling here. Excellent, fresh potato Bourekas. Manakish, essentially Druze pizza with Za’atar. And “Pita Labneh”, flat Saj bread stuffed with Tabule, egg, labneh, and Harrisa cooked on the Saj oven. All good, including the olives and one heck of a spiced Chai he gave us to start. All vegetarian, small menu, looking forward trying the rest of it.
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BANH ANH EM (east village):
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That bread looks wonderful
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Because we were hungry again 24 hours later, the same lunch crew as before (me, @Saregama, @DaveCook @Dean) went out to the New York Food Court in Flushing. I had never been there, because Flushing, and I was amazed by the expanse of stalls and how good the food was. First up, razor clams, much smaller than the kind I’m used to, with mushrooms and cabbage and all manner of other things.
Next, what I suspected would be my favorite (and it was), snail noodle soup. The snails are implied. The noodles are beyond fantastic - seemingly a yard long, making splitting this dish among five people a challenge. Nice and spicy, with (maybe?) fried wonton wrappers, bamboo shoots and greens.
This seafood mala bowl with cellophane noodles was very good, but also something I can get closer to home. And very much ready for its closeup.
I was in the minority in not being that enamored of these crab and crab roe buns. I found the filling a little muddy-tasting and the wrapper too doughy (which it’s supposed to be, obviously, I’m just not a huge fan). Everybody else seemed to love them.
I ordered these tiger skin eggs because I didn’t know what the hell they were. Hard boiled marinated eggs. Very hard boiled. I liked these a lot, but I ordered too many, not knowing that two of us were nutjobs who don’t eat eggs 
.
And liang pi, another favorite of mine. But also something I can get closer to home.
I am missing a couple of pix, and hopefully someone else can post them: the eggs and buns cut open, and a plate of lion’s head meatballs that I missed because I was wandering around.
Whew! I’m eating way too much these days.
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Continued on the Queens thread where we usually crawl
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Very interesting. At what stall(s) were the razor clams, snail soup, and tiger skin eggs being offered?
Okay, lemme try: With your back to the entrance, the tiger skin eggs were at the last or the second to last stall on the left before the room opens up; the snail soup was on the right side two stalls before the bathroom (#13, I think). @DaveCook got the razor clams, so he can help you with that.
The razor clams came from the right side as you walk in, something like Tasty Duck Vermicelli. We have had another item from them on a previous and it was superb.
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Very Good Eats at Tashkent
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That’s Mr Duck to you. Mr Duck Vermicelli Soup, in full, is the name of stall number 8. Here’s the menu for their full-sized storefront in Sunset Park, Brooklyn:
https://order.mealkeyway.com/customer/release/index?mid=477355367067476a776d446c616356776a54305970673d3d#/main
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The first time we ate there we had duck noodle soup and Mr Duck was quite tasty! Hence the confusion.
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Thanks both to you and @small_h.
I looked over the menu, was the duck you had offal? or was it just fowl?
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Since I do not want Kay to quack about it, I am sure there was duck meat in the nest but gizzards et all were harmed in the consumption of the dish.
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As @small_h wrote, our snail noodle soup at stall 13, Cousin Snail Noodles (although that English name isn’t immediately evident at the stall itself). Typically the dish doesn’t contain snail meat, only a broth made from it; any pungent flavor that might make you think “river snails” is actually pickled bamboo. Our bowl, though not particularly pungent, was very tasty nonetheless.
We got our tiger skin eggs at Wuhan Foodie, stall 25. Happy to have tried them once, don’t need to try again. The more definitive Wuhanese dish — which I’ve enjoyed here and at previous other locations of this business — is a bowl of hot dry noodles, but at this point in our session we’d had plenty of noodles already.
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Kisa (Allen & E Houston) lunch w/ @Saregama. A steal at $18, I had soondubu with chive, radish and onion banchan, plus rice. I could’ve stood more heat and more variety in the seafood (it was just tiny clams and I think cuttlefish), but I am stuffed now, so I must’ve liked it.
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That looks so good! I used to throw the rice into the jjigae but a friend from Korea corrected me, basically calling me a barbarian, and showed me how she was taught to eat it at home 
