Restaurant: Sushi Raku

3201 Louisiana
Houston, TX 77006

Groupon was offering a deal for Sushi Raku one day and since I had wanted to go and try it, I went ahead and bought one. Dining here made me realize something. I don't like fancy sushi places. I don't really eat at sushi places all that much but when I think about it, the only two places that I want to go to is either Oishii or Blue Fish. And that's it. Our waiter was pretty bad. My water was never refilled and he barely made an appearance at our table. Lucky for him, big poppa would never under tip. The decor featured lots of red and a nice, large sushi bar. The only food item that stood out to me was the pork jowl that I ordered. The sauce was really good but the taste of the meat is something that I'm not used to. Too animalistic or gamey yet tender. The negatives include big poppa's chilean seabass being rubbery in texture, probably the result of being over-cooked. Also, my rock shrimp did not have even the slightest crunch to it. On the ride home, I kept thinking to myself what an unsatisfying meal I had just had. My stomach was even feeling kinda weird. I'm the first to admit that I have no business critiquing a sushi place since I don't like most seafood so obviously my reviews on this don't have a lot of credibility. I've got lower class taste buds and I am content with that! I really need to encourage big poppa to stop eating chilean sea bass. It's been on the seafood watch list for a long time now for over-fishing and it's questionable method of fishing.

Trippin': New York City - Cafeteria

119 7th Ave
New York, NY 10011

My last meal in New York took place at Cafeteria. Now don't let the name of the place fool you. It's actually a really cool and trendy place to go eat twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. We got there pretty late and there was this line about five people deep waiting by the door. A door manned by a bouncer looking guy. A bouncer? He takes down the number of people in your party and relays it to the hostess inside. When the hostess is ready for you, he lets you in. So much pomp and circumstance! But whatevs. So after waiting for a short while, we were ushered in and brought down to this bottom floor where it felt like there was a party going on. The room was really small with maybe six cozy tables and a full service bar. There was a girl who was celebrating her last day working at Cafeteria. The bartender yelled out this crazy number of years she had worked there and then told everyone to buy her to drink. Uh ... that's okay I don't think so buddy. Their group was so plastered that they were dancing around and doing their own interpretive dancing. It was quite beautiful to watch. We had a good time talking, laughing and drinking. The best moment of the night had to be when one of the guys started cat calling and howling at some scantily clad 'lady' who was seductively dancing against this column with her back to us, and then his howling turned into a scream when the 'lady' turned around to reveal herself as a dood. Haha. It was hilarious! It was like LGBT night or something cos we saw guys in drag and even this guy in some type of scary queen of hearts make-up. The food was okay. For a twenty-four hour place, it definitely beats Denny's or IHOP.

Old school meatballs, roasted tomato sauce, grilled rustic bread

"Mac Attack": Macaroni and cheese trio sampler of cheddar and fontina, smoked gouda and bacon, and truffle oil. The one with truffle oil was the best, of course.

Silver dollar pancakes, fresh berries and chantilly cream

I want to say that this was a B.L.T.

Musik Mundi: Carla Bruni

I love me some French songs. Carla Bruni is probably best known to us Americans as the wife of Nicolas Sarkozy, president of France. She's a former model and current singer-songwriter with a scandalous past. She's not even French! She was born in Italy. Her voice isn't so spectacular but it's soft and sweet and good background music for hobby time.

*photo courtesy of amazon.com*


Carla Bruni
Album: Quelqu'un M'a Dit (2005)
Song: Quelqu'un M'a Dit

Trippin': New York City - Misc Day 3

I think the most memorable thing about this last trip in the big apple was being able to stay in Chinatown, right down the street from Joe's Shanghai. Like literally a block away. Our wonderful host woke up before us every morning to bring us back some delicious Chinese breakfast. One morning, he came back with some DIM SUM. Heaven! I love dim sum and this mos def hit a really satisfying spot. I had never had yow cha guai cheung fun before and this was frackin' GOOD. It had this really good sauce on it. OMGaud I'm drooling all over my keyboard. I wish big poppa would go pick me up some dim sum every morning. Hah!

Opening up our goodies from kidrobot and tokidoki

The little big kid riding the subway.

Stopping for some italian ice in soho.

Good ole Joe's and their racist against their own kind owners. Haha.