Restaurant: Fleming's

2405 W Alabama St
Houston, TX 77098

La lengua graduated from dental school this summer and to honor tradition, he had to treat all his friends out to dinner. We were lucky enough to get invited and accepted the offer. Who says no to free dinner? only nice and considerate people would be dumb enough to decline. Hah! So la lengua reserved the vip room at Fleming's for a Sunday, and told us to order the prime rib special. I think it was like $35 for salad, steak and dessert. I ordered other stuff, obviously. There was also this deal going on where everyone in the party gets a $25 gift card if the bill hits $500. I think our bill hit it twice but we only got one $25 GC. Everyone had a really good time. His friends made him give a speech before every course and by dessert, all he could come up with was creme-de-la-creme. Haha! So funny. His friends were also playfully pushing him to order all kinds of expensive things until he finally gave in and ordered not one but TWO of those super expensive chilled seafood towers. There were cheers all around. I think my favo thing out of it all had to be the creme brulee. OH-EM-JEE that shiz was insanely GUT! I crave it all the time. I don't normally like calamari but the one here is marinated in a sweet chile sauce and is actually pretty good. I would order that again mos def. Thanks la lengua for being such a big baller and including big poppa and I in your celebration!

This little girl was so darn cute! She reminded me of myself. I mean. Look at her stuffing her face with bread! That is so me. Haha.

She was also really scared of that guy in blue. So much so that she would start crying every time he sat near her. Girls can be so dramatic sometimes. Haha.

Everyone mostly ordered the chocolate lava cake, which I heard was one of the best.

But I think this was the best! That's it. I'm gathering a small group and we're heading there next week!

Musik Mundi: Silversun Pickups

I heard this song on the way to work this morning and I like it. I give you one line. That's how busy I've been as of late.

*photo courtesy of amazon.com*


Silversun Pickups
Album: Swoon (2009)
Song: Panic Switch

Restaurant: Feast

219 Westheimer Rd
Houston, TX 77006

Big poppa and I had date night with Rocco and Nestle the other weekend where they treated us at Feast. I've been hearing a lot about Feast from food blogs and my foodie friends and so I was excited about trying it out. They have a popular selection that is available all the time and the other part of the menu changes daily. As I was looking at their website, I started getting really scared, cos they offer the types of protein that is not typically eaten by most people here in the states. The owners of Feast describe their food as rustic european fare and nothing from an animal seems to be wasted. There's this dessert they have called the spotted dick which is basically a pastry of some sort. When we were seated, I looked around at the restaurant and there was mostly older fancy types. I had a moment of irony flash through my mind as would imagine that this is what the poor folks of the medieval times would eat and now looky here, rich and um, tall, people are fancying themselves some fine cuisine. I can't say I loved it. But I'm not one to appreciate this kinda stuff. I'm unrefined. In the end, big poppa and I just like to say we've tried it.

Appetizer. Snails in garlic butter and garlic butter toast. Oh this was just pure heaven. Cholesterol heaven. Snails to me really don't taste like anything. It's all about the butter and garlic. The toast part was freaking DELISH!

Second appetizer. This was like a rabbit meat quiche. Very cheesy. The rabbit meat was very chewy and gamey. I'm not a fan of rabbit. Literally. Hah!

Nestle and I both ordered the cock-a-leekie ($20.95). I love the name of the dish! Whenever there's a conceited dude around, I now describe them as cock-a-leekie. Haha. It is braised chicken with cream and leeks, plums, bacon and red potatoes. It was okay. I expected it to be more savory but was surprised by how the plum gave the sauce a much more sweeter taste.

Big poppa had this fish but I can't recall the name of it. He said the fish was good and very flaky but he still prefers the asian styled fish where it's steamed with soy sauce, ginger and scallions. We're so AZN!

Rocco had veal I think. Boo! I demand that people stop eating veal!

Musik Mundi: Catchpenny

Doncha just love it when you stumble upon good music? So the other day, Gilles sends me this link to this slideshow phenom site that she had been telling me about. I was like ok cool but didn't really think I would be putting together slideshows since I've already got my foto system down and I tend to be a creature of habit and routine. The site is called Animoto and instead of having your run of the mill slideshow, you get these awesome and professional slideshows that can be set to music and all you do is upload your pics and choose the song and BAM! Cool slideshow. But that's not what reeled me in. So as I was perusing the site, the thing that popped out at me was that they were now introducing video capability and to celebrate the launch, they were holding a contest to see who could put together the most creative video. I was down for the challenge. I never enter contests but I felt this was something that I would enjoy doing. Plus, I had all this untouched footage from NYC. The only catch is that the song for the video had to be from the Animoto library, which isn't a very good selection. So after working day and night and listening to almost every song in the Animoto library, I was able to produce something contest worthy. Well, it's good to me and the people in the video. Hah! And the cool thing is that I found a song that was perfect for the video and it's a song that big poppa and I actually like. OK. Enough blabber. The band is called Catchpenny and the song is Wouldn't Be The Same. Enjoy the vid! This one is purely for the contest. One of these days, I'll get to making a full length one. I seem to have some down time around the corner. Voodoo let me upload it onto his youtube, or rather, he requested it since he's featured all over it. I hope I become a finalist! Wish me luck! Anyone planning on starting an animoto account or just simply signing up? Please use this referral code: rflcjhuo. Danke! Danke!




*photo courtesy of amazon.com*


Catchpenny
Album: From Where You Are (2006)
Song: Wouldn't Be The Same

Trippin': Atlanta - World of Coca-Cola

121 Baker St. NW
Atlanta, GA 30313

I want to say that the number one Atlanta attraction that all visitors check out would have to be World of Coca-Cola. I completely made that up so there's a big chance that's just a bunch of hokum. For a general admission of $15, you get to enjoy coke from beginning to now. You start off with a brief intro. There were antique paintings and coke written in different languages. The speaker pointed out one sign in particular and asked the audience what language it was written in and of course me and my big mouth quickly blurted out Vietnamese! He wanted to know who said that and I yelled out, the Vietnamese girl! Haha. And here's the embarrassing part. He wanted me to tell everyone what it said, but since I don't know how to read VN nor do I know VN other than food and simple conversational phrases, I was like, uuuhhh ... don't know, sorry. Hah! Next comes a short film about Coke makes people happy. And then you get released on your own where you have several things to enjoy. There was this 4D movie about discovering coke's secret formula. I think the answer was like us Coke drinker's is/are the secret formula. CHEESE! You also get to see a fully-functioning bottling line, pop culture gallery and the world's largest collection of Coke memorabilia. The thing that everyone always talk about is getting to taste coke and coke products from all over the world. I tasted about five or six sodas before calling it quits. The floors were super sticky and my hands felt sticky so I was like, bail time! My fave part was getting to take a picture with the polar bear!

Restaurant: Gravitas

807 Taft St
Houston, TX 77019

The second restaurant that big poppa and I hit up for Houston Restaurant Week was Gravitas and we had the pleasure of enjoying Jacques and Gilles company as our dining companions for the evening. It was raining tigers and bears that evening yet we still drove and ran in the rain as if this was our last supper. What were we thinking?!? So to explain in more detail what the restaurant week is all about, restaurants all over Houston have agreed to offer a special three course meal for $35 per person. The website says that $5 from each CHECK will be donated to the Houston Food Bank. I hope that's not the case. I hope at least $5 from EACH special course ordered is donated. It wouldn't be right otherwise. It's like cheating the hungry! In any case, the food was so-so. Another case of the special menu possibly not representing the restaurant very well. The highlight for me was the appetizer and dessert. The four of us all chose the caramelized onion tart and oh boy was it super caramelized! A great way to start things off. Every bite was so good and so sticky. I was only able to eat about a quarter of it cos it was a bit much. I'm not capable of eating that much onion by itself and I couldn't shake the nagging feeling I had in the back of my head about how bad it was for my teeth. We also all chose the same item for dessert, the chocolate hazelnut panna cotta and it was simply DELISH! Well, I really liked it and gobbled it up very quickly. I'm not sure if everyone else liked it as much as I did. As for the entree, I wasn't too impressed and I think everyone else felt the same. The girls had the grilled paprika marinated chicken and the guys had the pistachio crusted salmon. Both were just okay. The hostess and our waiter were both very nice. Our waiter actually refilled our glasses of water even though we stayed well after the completion of our meal. You know how it goes. I mos def want to go back and try other things from their regular menu.

Trippin': Atlanta - Vortex

438 Moreland Ave
Atlanta, GA 30307

The Vortex Bar & Grill was the very first place that we ate at in Atlanta. I'm doing things a bit backwards and out of place. Vortex is located in Little Five Points and it was perfect cos I wanted to walk around the area for a bit anyways. If you're thinking it must be pretty difficult traveling with me, then you are CORRECT! I create these over ambitious itineraries that tend to overwhelm rather than relax. Must be born that way. Anyways. Vortex equals some crazy good burgers. Not the best but mos def up there. Where else can you get a coronary bypass burger or a double coronary burger. Big poppa got the coronary bypass. How does he stay so slim! Not FAIR! We indulged just a bit. The place tries to front as this rough and tough biker place but all the patrons are all average joe's so there's no feeling of uncertainty. The inside is full of junk that's been arranged to cover every bit of the actual wall and ceiling. We sat in this outside patio area. Unfortunately, it was a smoking area and the people out there were very attached to their cigs. Such a filthy habit! I had this old security guy give me his piece of cake today cos he lost his sense of taste years ago from SMOKING. Ugh! NOSMO KING PEOPLE! The first thing you'll notice about Vortex will be the larger than life skull head entrance with crazy eyes. Loves it! We took a gazillion pics in front with it, halting entering and exiting restaurant traffic. Once again, I have to thank monkhi girl for telling me to go here. It was a wonderfully good choice.

Mucho Mas Macho Nachos.

Fried Zucchini and cousin D of DnB.

Vortex veggie melt and big poppa with his coronary bypass.

A close-up of the coronary bypass.

I can't remember what else anybody else had but these onion rings look sooooo good right now!