Cafe Kiev (Brooklyn, NY)

Despite how far food in Westminster has come (a tea bar! a place where most of the food is vegetarian! entire restaurants that don't even serve crab dip! real, honest-to-goodness Malaysian food!!!), when Noah and I visit New York we are itching for food that rural Maryland just can't provide. A few weeks ago, we spent the weekend in New York visiting friends and family and experiencing food from cultures we don't come into contact with at home. One of the standout restaurants we visited was Cafe Kiev, in Brooklyn.

Cafe Kiev is a small Ukranian/Russian cafe just outside of Midwood, where we were staying with friends. It's clean and attractive inside--a step up from the slightly dingy holes in the wall that Noah and I enjoy so much. The menu looked great, so we (four people, including our friends) decided to order as many things as possible. At this point, considering how many of them were in the dishes we ordered, it was clear that this meal was brought to us by potatoes.

We started off with a pitcher of Cafe Kiev's homemade fruit punch, which we all diluted with our waters because it was a bit too sweet for our tastes. Honestly, my sweet tooth is not what it used to be, so I laid low on the fruit punch altogether.

The first dish that came out was the herring appetizer, which was served with some lovely creamy mashed potatoes. I love fish, and this was excellent--very delicately flavored despite it being fish and there being chopped onions dispersed around it. I wouldn't have thought to put the buttery, creamy mashed potatoes alongside it, but they went quite well together.

Continuing on the potato theme, next we got their home fries with mushrooms. Now, as an across-the-board lover of potatoes in all their forms, I have to commend these potatoes for their excellence. These little guys were gorgeously friend and intensely addictive, a "burden" I took for everyone since the plate was right next to me. Even when I was full, I just could not stop popping those potatoes into my mouth!

We knew we had to get the vareniki with potato and mushrooms, since it's a very traditional dish and because we just can't resist dumplings in any form. These were very good, but not the star of the meal; as I described it, "they're not bad, it's just that everything else is SO EXCELLENT that they don't stand out as much".

We finished up with two different kinds of blintzes, one with red caviar and one with one with egg, onion, and mushrooms. The egg blintz was very different than the normal crepe-like texture of blintzes: a little sturdier, a little more textured. It was overshadowed, however, by the fact that the red caviar blintzes were the best thing on the menu. The caviar gave this dish a great fishy bite, and we were trying to spread it over every inch of the blintz to make sure that each person who took a piece got some. It was light and savory and delicious, and we left very happy.

The bonus draw to Cafe Kiev is the bizarre Russian pop music videos on a large screen that just happened to be right across from where I was sitting. I think the best thing we saw during this meal was this gem of a video. Enjoy.

Lone Star BBQ (New Windsor, MD)

I love barbecue. Real smoked not-made-in-the-oven barbecue. This presents a problem in Maryland, where 95% or more of "barbecue" has never seen or touched a lick of smoke. One of the few good options, the aptly-named Smokers' BBQ in Finksburg, closed a few months ago, leaving me with nothing short of heading to Virginia.

Enter Lone Star BBQ in New Windsor. It's been open for a year, but Florence and I saw it for the first time passing through town last month. We needed an easy lunch today and decided to check it out. The first thing we saw as we drove up was a smoker out front: a very good sign. Inside it smelled like smoke and meat: another good sign. I was very encouraged at this point, and given the name I went for the most Texas of barbecue I could find: the brisket.

The platter arrived with sliced brisket, French fries, coleslaw, and cornbread. We dismissed the cornbread out of hand as it was wrapped in plastic. I did try it and determined that it was Northern-style sweet cornbread, which was too bad. The brisket was lightly smoky, juicy, and very flavorful. While I like my brisket to be more smoky and somewhat more fatty, this was excellent barbecue for anywhere in the North. It did not need sauce, which is another point in its favor. The fries were thick, hand-made, and very good. The coleslaw was particularly good - extremely fresh, not too much mayonnaise, and not sweet at all.

Would I eat at Lone Star if it were in Kansas City? Probably not. But in Maryland, or anywhere in the Northeast for that matter, it is excellent and deserves to be tried. I'll be going back with friends pretty soon.

Drink of the Day: Boulevard Mid-Coast IPA

I have a soft spot for Boulevard Brewing Company - I lived in Kansas City for two years. (Also, they're a phenomenal brewery.) They don't distribute much to the East Coast, so whenever I see some in the store I snap it up. The Mid-Coast IPA is one of Boulevard's "tasting room" beers, which they recently started selling as part of samplers. The sampler I purchased had the Unfiltered Wheat, 80 Acre (mildly-hopped wheat), Westside Rye, and Mid-Coast IPA. The IPA is likely the best of the bunch, and one of the best beers I've had from the brewery behind Tank 7 and Grainstorm.

Mid-Coast is my favorite kind of IPA: very well-hopped but not too boozy. A lot of strong American IPAs go overboard on the alcohol, up to 9-12%. Not only do I feel like taking a nap after drinking those, they have a hard time tasting balanced. Mid-Coast, by contrast, is well-hopped at just over 100 IBUs, but is under 6% ABV. I feel like I can drink a glass rather than just sip it. It's also not overwhelmingly bitter, even with 100+ IBUs. The hops are slightly floral and round out the beer rather than simply making it bitter. One of the better IPAs I've drunk.

Buttersburg Inn (Union Bridge, MD)

The Buttersburg Inn is one of those places that every town seems to have tucked away somewhere. A simple, family-style American restaurant that does the classics and does them well. Usually, it's a pretty straightforward menu: fried chicken, roast beef, crab cakes, all the standards. Buttersburg Inn has those, and does an astoundingly good job with them. But the menu also has some food you don't see as much on your typical family-style restaurant menu--at least, not nowadays. Fried rabbit and Pennsylvania Dutch Hog Maw have been known to grace their menu on occasion, and some nights you can get liver and onions. (The menu also has an option to order this with "extra liver", which proves that someone at the restaurant has their priorities straight.)

Honestly, while everything we've tried at Buttersburg Inn has been great, you'd be wise to go with anything fried. Whoever mans the fryer at this restaurant knows what they are doing, and everything from fried chicken to fried oysters to french fries to corn fritters comes out fried to golden perfection. My favorite thing to get is definitely fried chicken--I don't know their secret ingredient, but I told them I'm pretty sure it's magic.

Buttersburg Inn is open all day most days (Tuesday-Saturday from 7am to 8 or 8:30pm depending on the day), but they are not open for dinner on Sundays. Like most restaurants around here, they are closed on Mondays.

The Buttersburg Inn
9 N. Main St.
Union Bridge, MD 21791
Phone: 410-775-9939

Drink of the day: Troegs Mad Elf

I've never been a huge fan of Troegs Brewing Company. But we got a bottle of Mad Elf as a present this past year, and I've been waiting for the right time to break it out. Today is rainy and gloomy: perfect.

Mad Elf is a very strong Belgian ale (11%) brewed with honey and cherries. It pours an unusual, almost artificial, pinkish-red color, theoretically from the cherries (although I'm not entirely convinced). The taste is much gentler and subtler than I was expecting - I thought it was going to be a fruit-splosion like the Black Diamond Grand Cru that Florence and I had several weeks ago. Instead it's slightly sweet and fruity but not overwhelming, and less boozy that I was expecting as well. It's surprisingly well-balanced, although it could do with a bit more bitterness to counteract the fruit and alcohol. Worth a try if you like fruity Belgians.

And it came with a tulip glass, which is most excellent.

Drink of the day: Millstone Gingeroot cider

The title of this series has already changed: tonight I'm writing about cider! Millstone Cellars is a small cidery and meadery in Monkton, Maryland, about 35 minutes from where we live. They've restored a beautiful 1800s grist mill and miller's house - it's worth visiting for the architecture if nothing else. Florence and I went with some friends last month for a tasting and tried several of their ciders and meads. The first one we're drinking is Gingeroot, which is (unsurprisingly) a ginger-infused cider.

At the tasting I remember it being okay, if not particularly great - it was slightly sweet and overwhelmingly gingery. The person running the tasting mentioned that Millstone's sparkling ciders, of which Gingeroot is one, can be aged for a few weeks to allow the residual yeast to ferment the remaining sugar. Not liking sweet alcoholic drinks, we did that and opened it tonight. It's very different from the version we tasted. Now the cider is slightly sour and more evocative of apples than strictly tasting of apples. It's hard to explain - I've heard it described as a French cider style rather than a British one. It's still gingery, but the sourness balances that flavor much better than the original off-dry version did at the tasting. Well worth the purchase if you live nearby - Millstone is also available at several stores in Baltimore City, Baltimore County, and Carroll County. They also ship to Maryland addresses in accordance with the state's new law on direct-shipping, but the shipping is fairly steep.

Millstone Cellars
2029 Monkton Road
Monkton, MD 21111
Tastings most Saturdays and Sundays 12-5pm

Beer of the Day: Allagash Odyssey

I've decided to start a new series on interesting beers I come across, inspired by my recent membership in the craft beer club of College Square Liquors, my Friendly Local Beer Store. Every week I get an email with a list of new beers they have in stock, and I happily head over to the store and buy a couple to try.

A few weeks ago, that list contained Allagash Brewing Company's Odyssey. I've known about Allagash since I visited Portland (Maine) a few years ago - they're an excellent brewery, so this was worth checking out. Some research told me that Odyssey represents one of my favorite beer styles - the dark wheat beer. It's sort of a hybrid dark wheat/Belgian to be more accurate, but I let that slide. Dark wheat beers (or dunkelweizen in German) combine two styles I love into a wondrous whole. I had one with my cousin in Toronto a few years ago - sadly, I can't remember if it was Erdinger or Paulaner, but it remains the best beer I've ever had.

So I had to try the Odyssey. It comes in a 750 mL bottle with a champagne-style cork top, which I've come to love. No special equipment needed - just wrist strength and care. It's ultimately much closer to a wheat than a Belgian - no syrupy, fruity, or boozy flavors that I normally associate with Belgian ales. Actually, it's remarkably clean and subtle considering the ABV is just over 10%. Instead, it's much closer to what I was hoping for - a dunkelweiss. It's slightly bitter, more dry than sweet, with the crispness I associate with wheat beer. It's also slightly oaked - not to the point of an Oaked Arrogant Bastard, but it's noticeable and blends very well with the other flavors.

This beer isn't cheap - I paid $15 for the bottle, more than I usually pay for beer. But it's worth every penny, and I'm buying another bottle this weekend if it's still in stock.

An Easy Sauteed Spinach with Creamy Yogurt Sauce (plus Leftover Yogurt Sauce Mashed Potatoes!)

Your drive-by recipe of the week: I sauteed an entire bag of spinach with a few cloves of garlic (instead of putting raw garlic in the sauce; raw garlic induces an upset stomach in some people), then made the rest of the creamy yogurt dressing from this recipe as written. I've been very into putting plain yogurt into everything lately! I've also been very into putting a fried egg on everything lately, which may have been partially spurred on by the fact that we participated in a meat CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program this winter and were thus given 3 dozen eggs a month...

There was a lot of yogurt sauce left over from this recipe, which got recycled into these a few days later:

The yogurt sauce just gets used in place of milk or whatever other liquid you would mix into your mashed potatoes at the end. I think I still used a little bit of butter to soften things up as well.

Delicious experiments with Hainanese Chicken Rice

I have wanted to try Hainanese Chicken Rice for quite awhile now, after seeing it on lots of travel shows and reading about it on lots of food blogs. Since there are approximately zero restaurants anywhere around here that serve something like that, we decided to go ahead and make it ourselves.

We used this recipe, in combination with some other recipes we found around the internet, and the results were great. Hainanese Chicken Rice seems like such a simple dish, but just under the surface it is more complex and delicious. We used lots of ginger flavors--in the chicken, in the rice, in the dipping sauce, and everything was kind of permeated with this gingery goodness. The gingery rice was so good that I was eating it with everything, and I used all the leftover ginger dipping sauce finding new and exciting things to dip it in. Plus the different preparation helps guard against any Roast Chicken Fatigue that we local eaters might have experienced in a long winter of lots of meat and not many vegetables.

Our finished product (garnished with some raw turnip slices). Deeeeelicious.

Squash soup

Just a short post to share a recipe and a few pictures of a squash soup we made last month. We used a recipe from Laylita's Recipes, a blog that I have been following for years. The only substitution we made was that instead of using tomatoes we used a bunch of tomato sauce that we had made in the height of summer and froze to break out in the dreary winter months.