Summer Staple

For me, a summer staple is an avocado sandwich. The bread I prefer to get is from Trader Joe's. They stock two varieties I really like - Organic Multi-Grain Bread and Organic Multi-Grain Oat Bread. Hmmm, not sure about the second kind. Anyway, both of them sit in the bread section. Another kind I like to get is the Multi-Grain variety from Harry's Farmers Market, Marietta. I am not a big fan of the bread that Publix stocks. I have tried different varieties (7-grain, 9-grain, whole wheat, etc.) but they lack the heft of what I get from Trader Joe's and Harry's. They taste too squishy to me. Which means that I always have to plan my grocery route to include Trader Joe's or Harry's, both of which are a good 15-minute drive away. Well, the price we pay for taste... :)

Avocados are heavenly. I get them from anywhere and everywhere. Recently, I tried the giant green skinned one (not sure what it's called). Both P and I found that it lacked the richness of both taste and texture that the regular Hass ones possess. The mozzarella you see here probably came from Harry's too. What I love is that they clearly mark the cheese as 'VEGETARIAN'. No animal rennet in there, yay!

Ok, let's talk about tomatoes. Most of the tomatoes we buy from grocery stores are huge, pale red, and lack any juice or flavor. I like the heirloom kind but they're fairly expensive. Lucky for me, I have been getting tomatoes from Dekalb Farmers Market since a few weeks now. They come from North Carolina and I think that has a lot to do with the taste! Juicy, plump and loaded with flavor, I have been adding them to almost everything I cook! Well, the fact that it's summer (the right season to harvest tomatoes) also has much to do with the gorgeous taste, I guess.

Throw on some sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and you have a heavenly snack.

Here are a couple of pictures from a while back.

California Pizza Kitchen

In a nice little coincidence, while shopping at Trader Joe's a couple of days back, I passed California Pizza Kitchen and wondered, "Haven't been here in a long while! Wonder how that happened..." This evening, P remarked that he felt like a pizza for dinner. And so it happened that we drove there for dinner tonight.

So we ordered an appetizer from the newly titled 'Small Cravings' section on the menu. We went for White Corn Guacamole and Chips. Essentially a platter of blue and white corn tortilla chips served with a guacamole dip of corn, avocado, red peppers and black beans, it was pretty nice. Well, the menu also mentioned that the guacamole contained serrano peppers, green onions and jicama but I couldn't get those flavors. I am sure they were in there, though!

We also ordered the Greek Pizza and it so happened that it came to the table before the appetizer did. Our server girl went to find out what happened. Soon enough, an older gentleman came to our table, apologized for the delay in sending the appetizer across, and told us that he'd take it off the tab. Would you believe, that was EXACTLY what crossed my mind when we got the appetizer late. I thought - they should take the appetizer off the bill; now that's good customer service. And that's what happened!

The Greek Pizza usually has a cold topping of Greek salad made of cucumbers, tomatoes, feta cheese, red onions, fresh tomatoes and olives. Oh, it also has a topping of tzatziki sauce and chopped Italian parsley. Generally, the topping also contains Mediterranean spiced grilled chicken. Since we asked for the vegetarian option, they substituted avocados instead. Pure yumminess!

Since I hardly ever leave a place without dessert, we ordered the Key Lime Pie.

It was P's decision since he felt that it would be very summery and light. That I agree with. Frankly, I have never been a big fan of this dessert. It is too tart for my taste. And it was too tart. But P liked it. Since he is the kinda guy who hardly ever orders dessert, I let him do it this time. By the way, there is a new addition to the dessert menu - Butter Cake. Hmmm, maybe next time.

Cool stuff

In the midst of this sweltering heat, sip some delicious ice-cold relief in the form of

or

Rooh Afza is a sweet syrup made of rose juice. Add milk/water, thrown in some ice-cubes and gulp it down! I have seen another brand (possibly Dabur) that also contained cucumber juice extract among other juices. Need to see where I can get hold of that.

Rita's Ice has a branch close to our place. After a swim, it was a short walk away to indulge in Mango Italian Ice. Icy cold and delicious!

Btw, if you are interested (I am!), here's a recipe from NPR's Kitchen Window that combines Rooh Afza and a basic Italian Ice recipe. Read about the Soulful Granita here. Scroll to the bottom of the page.

Udipi Cafe in Smyrna!

If I have my facts right, Udipi Cafe had its first branch in Decatur, then another on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard, and now there's one in Smyrna. I haven't visited the one in Decatur much but the one on Peachtree, I have. I really like the decor (dark orange-saffron walls, wooden chairs, quietly festive, if I can call it that). The food is really nice; none of those scary-looking red gravies or overly spiced/greasy vegetable dishes. The food has an almost homely quality to it. In fact, I am guessing that the owner hails from Udupi, a region in Karnataka, India. A fact that registers rather well in the cooking although experts may disagree.

Anyway, we visited the Smyrna location for lunch yesterday.

It's open from 11 am to 3 pm for lunch, and we reached around 2:15 pm. There were few diners, and we almost had the place to ourselves. I have heard from friends that the place had been open for two days only, and people were thronging... makes me happy!

We made a beeline for the buffet which looked real good. I made a meal of all the South Indian items - idlis, masala dosa (that is served at your table as part of the buffet), onion pakodas (a tad tough, unfortunately), alu tikkis (wonderfully moist and crisp - at the same time - can you believe it?) and an amazing array of chutneys and sambhar.

P helped himself to some of the other buffet items - sauteed cauliflower and beans, zucchini and carrots in a tomato-based gravy, a mint-flavored vegetable dish with green peas. I was too busy slurping up the South Indian snacks on my plate to even taste anything from his plate.

What I really like about Udupi Cafe is, the food tastes authentic. You know all those Indian restaurants (put together an algorithm to create names, throw in 'India', 'Bombay', 'Delhi', 'Madras', 'Palace', 'Garden', 'Taj'... and you get the name you want) that serve the same red slop with the one flavor of onion-garlic-red chillies. That isn't Indian cuisine at all. Let me rephrase, that is the 'Indian restaurant in the USA' cuisine. Not authentic by any stretch of the imagination.

Thankfully, Udupi Cafe beats the trend. Btw, the location on Peachtree has this wonderful dish on the menu called Set Dosa with Kurma. A set of six (?) mini dosas arrive with the ubiquitous chutneys and sambhar in cute steel bowls and the piece de resistance, the kurma. Think vegetables (carrots, peas, beans) in a coconut-based gravy, intensely flavored with pepper, coriander, cardamom (and probably some other spices that my tastebuds couldn't register), the Kurma is a perfect foil to the oh-so-soft dosas. I should also mention the sambhar at Udupi is perfectly spiced, every time.

Since the restaurant was near closing time yesterday, the server got me a bowl of sweet and cool rasmalai. I would also recommend the South Indian filter coffee - a most excellent ending to a wonderful meal.

Loving Hut opens in Kennesaw

One of my favorite eating places to go to in Georgia, and not for the food alone but for absolutely everything else (atmosphere, servers, philosophy), is Loving Hut and now they have a branch in Kennesaw! I sincerely wish that the place does well - for their sake and ours too.

We went for lunch a couple of weekends back. Ordered some Jicama-stuffed Spring Rolls (they were gone before I could even take my IPhone out for a picture), Wonton Soup (yum!) and Vegan Fish Bake. Let the pictures do the talking.