The Parlour Ice Cream Shoppe

     I would venture to call my friend Emily a connoisseur of ice cream, so when she recommends a place for the cream, I take it pretty seriously.  Some time ago I had sampled The Parlour's wares from their roaming food bus, and I was excited to relive the pleasure by visiting their brick and mortar location in downtown Durham. I was immediately taken by the olde timey feel of The Parlour, with its sugary pink walls, classy glass ice cream dishes and cake stands.  Even the mustachioed hipster soda jerk seems to fit the scene. However, the real allure of The Parlour is it's offering of unique flavors.  While they have the old chocolate and vanilla standbys, they also offer a rotation of more exotic flavors like quince or jasmine tea.  From the copious samples tasted (and by dipping my spoon into the dishes of others...) I've managed to taste quite a few flavors. I've sampled the delightful salted butter caramel (although it seems to melt more quickly than some other flavors,) which is my friend's favorite and one of the few flavors she claims they make better than she can.  The coconut brownie (creamy coconut flavored ice cream and chunks of legitimate brownie...the good stuff.) The Vietnamese coffee, is sweet with enough of the natural bitterness of coffee to make it best complemented with chocolate fudge.  The eggnog ice cream has the creamy spicy flavor of the holiday favorite perfectly captured. The Parlour even offers vegan-friendly options like a vegan chocolate or a grapefruit sorbet.  On my next visit I'm looking forward to sampling toppings like the espresso whipped cream, or their all natural sprinkles...maybe a sundae will be in order

So when you're craving the cream, hit up The Parlour, or go stake out their next bus stop.

Triangle Restaurant Week Reminder!

Fellow foodies, make sure you get out this weekend to enjoy the last two days of Triangle Restaurant Week! You can sample an appetizer, entree, and dessert from a prefix menu for $20 or $30 depending on the restaurant.  This is a great opportunity to get out and try somewhere new, even somewhere you may not ordinarily be able to afford to enjoy.  I'll be out there and will report back soon!
Visit the Triangle Restaurant Week website to check out the participating restaurants and menus.
Bon Appetite!

Serena Sicilian Influenced Cucina, Picky Eater Friendly

So, I haven't posted in quite awhile, but that certainly doesn't mean I haven't been eating! I'm working as a teacher these days and my schedule has been a little nuts.  Another contributing factor has been my super picky dining partner as of late.  My current boyfriend would just assume EAT A HOT DOG FROM A GAS STATION!!! Yes, unfortunately, you read correctly.  An unlikely pair we make indeed, what's a foodie to do?  I've been working tirelessly to expand his culinary horizons and have been met with considerable resistance, but many small victories as well.  Thanks to me Mr. Gas station "cuisine" can say he has now tasted the following items for the first time ever:

fresh raspberries
lychees (he didn't like)
mangosteen (I'm obsessed with these)
avocado (he didn't like)
pesto
honeycrisp apples (loves)
Korean barbecue
pomegranates
egg whites
cashew chicken
asparagus
fresh sauteed green beans
tofu
brussel sprouts
cilantro
chorizo
chicken tortilla soup
mushroom ravioli
homemade chicken noodle soup
......so on and so forth....

Every weekend is a battle to find a place that we are both willing to eat.  I stick my nose up at chain restaurants ( though I did take him to Outback Steakhouse for his birthday...because I'm a good person) and he breaks into hives at the mention of Indian or Thai food.  A compromise we can agree on, as with so many families with picky eaters before us, is Italian (provided it's good Italian.)

We recently visited Serena and both myself and Mr. Gagsatcurry were pleased.  The comforting Italian food was well executed and served up in good portions.

A friend of mine brought trays of Serena's eggplant rollatini to a holiday party I hosted.  Even, cooled off, the rollatini was fantastic, rivaling that of Gravy downtown.  After that tasty sampling and her Italian husband's assurance that everything he has tried there has been good, I was ready to head over with my picky man in tow.  The menu suited both of us well, he could get his comfort foods like pasta, pizza or even french fries, while I could play around with custom combinations of salads or pastas (pick the pasta, the style of sauce and an assortment of toppings from grilled octopus to Jail Island Salmon.)

Strangely we both settled on the lasagna at the recommendation of the waitress. The lasagna was made with Merquez ground steak, no ground chuck here, three cheeses and a nice tomato sauce. Mr. Bleedsfryergrease pronounced it the best lasagna he's ever had. I prefer Daniel's lasagna in Cary/Apex, but was still well pleased.  The salad and large piece of garlic flatbread that accompanied the meal were very tasty as well. I wasn't entirely blown away, but was certainly pleased enough to make plans to return. The prices are in the $10 to $20 range with the lasagna coming in around $16.  My boyfriend seemed to think this was a bit pricey, but he certainly got his money's worth since he went through two bowls of freshly grated parmesan that they good humoredly kept our table topped off with.


I do think Serena should hone in their concept a bit. Are they a gastropub? A pizzeria? A fine dining Italian Restaurant? Regardless of what they pick, the dance music they played needs to go. Otherwise, Serena is a safe bet to take a very "selective" dining companion.

Buku: Modern Interpretation of a Global Inspiration

     Buku called to me some time ago with the allure of global street food. Buku delivers on delicious globally inspired cuisine, but with a modern upscale twist that can hardly be considered street food. The first time I went to Buku was on a date with a previous boyfriend who was willing to pick up the check without a second thought.  Buku has a sleek upscale atmosphere that makes it the perfect place to impress a date.     I was still dreaming of the perogies from my first visit, but I hadn't been since because of the prices, until a recent date with the exotic food aficionado (as mentioned on my Bida Manda Blog) suggested going to one of my favorite places.  My first experience at Buku definitely had rocketed it toward the top, so I'd been dying for the opportunity to get back there with someone who would equally appreciate it.  Triangle Restaurant Week provided the perfect impetus to go sample Buku's thirty dollar pre-fixe menu.  We started with some of Buku's amazing cocktails, adorned with orchids they were as beautiful as they were delicious.  Off the special restaurant week menu, I selected the Baja Crab Flautas.  Kind of a Hispanic rendition of a crab rangoon, made with corn tortillas and filled with jumbo lump crab and cream cheese, then fried and topped with cilantro, pineapple, pickled chilies, and spicy guava-lime sauce. I was expecting them to be better than they were, I would have liked to have tasted more crab, but mostly they just tasted fried... nothing spectacular or particularly memorable.  My date decided to order Malaysian Roti, with one of the many global breads on the menu with a Malaysian style curry dip on the side.  The roti wasn't very traditional and the Malaysian curry sauce was considerably more sweet than savory with strong notes of cinnamon.  As a dip it had a nice flavor, but I doubt I would enjoy an entire dish with a curry that sweet.

       For my entree I selected the highly recommended duo of duck with a crispy duck leg and pan-seared duck breast with an Asian inspired savory sweet ginger soy glaze. The moist flavorful leg was considerably more succulent than the breast.  I generally prefer the breast, so this was somewhat surprising. The duck was served atop a perfectly cooked "forbidden" rice, a short grain rice of a purplish black hue that I had seen before in Korea, and accompanied by a pickled radish, cucumber and honeydew salad.  My date elected to forgo the restaurant week menu and order off of the regular menu.  He ordered the Steak Frites at a hefty $30 for the entree alone. Although I have had better cuts of meet elsewhere, the wine and mushroom sauce made the dish. The pommes frites served up with the steak were fried up crispy in duck fat, and were outrageously delicious when dipped in the sauce topping the steak.  If they bottled that sauce I would buy it to put on EVERYTHING.  My date was nice enough to give me a couple bites of his meal, and I'll admit I preferred it to my duck.  If the steak had been slightly less fatty and more tender I would have swooned.  Probably a good thing or I would have stolen his plate..and that wouldn't have made a very good impression, now would it?

Duo of Duck

Steak Frites

       As for dessert, I ordered the Argentine alfajores. I had no idea what that was either for the record, but apparently is was small soft baked shortbread cookies sandwiched together with, dulce de leche, toasted coconut, grapefruit-vanilla bean reduction, and served with a tiny scoop of house-made white chocolate-quince ice cream.  My date ordered a yummy little apple tart with an  almond crust and served a la mode with cinnamon ice cream. My dinner and dessert was certainly more exotic, but sometimes you can't beat the classics.

Apple Tart

     I went back to Buku recently for my friend's bachelorette party and was considerably less impressed with my selections. I ordered the Indian Aloo Chana Chaat, a small plate of a spicy potato cake, chickpea, cashew, cucumber, cabbage, raita, tamarind, and cilantro chutney.  It had lots of layers of flavor, but was a little too spicy to appreciate them all.  For an entree I ordered the shrimp pad thai.  The pad thai had a delicious tamarind sauce and probably the best fried tofu I've ever tasted, however the pad thai suffered a severe shortage of everything but the homemade rice noodles.  It would have benefited greatly from more of everything else, more tofu, more eggplant, more shrimp and more veggies, for $22 I would expect it.  I didn't find my meal to be worth the fifty dollars I shelled out.  However, the bride-to-be ordered better than I did.  Her Vietnamese crepe was an excellent "small plate" a crispy crepe filled with shrimp, sausage, and overflowing with fresh herbs. And she was ecstatic about her plantain crusted Chilean Sea Bass. You can love Buku one visit and dislike it the next as some selections are perfection that will make you forget your budget, while others are a wallet breaking disappointment. The perogies and Vietnamese crepes are great choices. Skip the sushi. I was trying to order on the cheap, but since that really isn't possible at Buku (underfinanced foodies beware,) you might as well go all out.

Argentine Alfajores

Cowfish's Quirky New Take on Asian American Fusion

When my sister visited Raleigh for my post birthday celebration, she had the fantastic idea of going to the hot new restaurant Cowfish.  Cowfish takes Asian-American fusion cuisine to the next level by dual featuring burgers, sushi, and some very unique combinations of the two. 

I was immediately won over by the quirky cool of Cowfish's atmosphere.  Custom graphic artwork mixing east and west, a meditating Elvis, and a giant fish tank creation by the underwater engineers on the t.v. show Tanked, hit home the quirky vibe.  I especially love the learn to speak English and Japanese audio guide playing in the bathrooms that translates American "country" colloquialisms into "proper" English and Japanese.  Hilarious!

The menu proved to be equally unique, featuring both a gourmet burger menu, a creative sushi menu, and...wait for it...burgerushi.  Yes, burgerushi, Cowfish's own remix of sushi rolls made with burger ingredients like ground beef and tomatoes. In a similarly innovative fashion Cowfish offers sandwich ingredients that have been packed between "buns" made of deep fried spring rolls. Clearly this is menu with entrees you're unlikely to find anywhere else.

Riggs R&R Crabcake Roll

We started our meal with some sake bombs, sake shots tenuously hovering on a pair of chopsticks over glasses of Kirin.  You've got to have birthday shots after all!  We encountered what must obviously be a frequent conundrum, burgers or sushi?  My sister and I each ordered a roll and split a burger to get the best of both worlds.  I tried the Riggs R&R crabcake roll, which sold me with the aforementioned crabcake mix on top. The R&R roll is filled with fresh tuna, avocado and cream cheese roll, topped with lump crabcake mix and baked. The roll was finished with masago, sesame seeds and a drizzle of spicy cream sauce.  It was very rich and unique tasting...in a good way.  My only criticism would be that I would have liked the crab cake mix to have been baked slightly longer.  My sister decided to try the burgerushi, opting for the "Taste Explosion Roll" filled with seasoned natural Angus ground beef, applewood bacon, fresh jalapenos and spicy cream sauce all stuffed inside of a sushi roll and coated with tempura flakes before being topped off with marinated Roma tomato slices and pepper jack cheese.  The rolls are then baked and finished with a cashew cilantro pesto drizzle. Presentation wise the rolls come out looking like immaculately constructed sushi, but the taste is all American. It was immensely clever for Cowfish to Americanize sushi in a way that makes it approachable to even the most Americana-centric eater.  Burgerushi integrates the sushi concept with American cuisine the way that kimbap does with Korean.

Close up of "Taste Explosion" Burgerushi Roll

As for the burger side of the menu, I twisted my sister's arm and we split the black truffle burger. The half pound antibiotic and hormone free beef burger was served up a brioche bun and topped with black truffle cheese, roasted shallots and truffle-infused sauteed mushrooms, lettuce and roasted garlic aioli. The burger came out cooked perfectly, juicy and well seasoned with earthy mushroom flavors.


For those who can't decide what to order, an undoubtedly common problem, Cowfish has got you covered with a compartmentalized bento box featuring a mini version of the week's featured burger, fries, four pieces of sushi, and edamame.

I was excited to go back for a second visit with one of my meat and potatoes loving guy friends who practically breaks out into hives at the thought of raw fish.  He humored me enough to tolerate the hour and 15 minute wait (on a Tuesday!) but he didn't take me up on the burgerushi.  Instead he opted for the giant Sreamin' Korean spicy chicken sandwich crusted in sesame seeds, fried up and topped with kimchi and sriracha sauce. It was giant, but the spicy chicken breading, sriracha, and kimchi made for a flaming hot combo indeed.  I ordered the Firecracker roll filled with shrimp tempura and kani, coated with tempura flakes, topped with fresh yellowtail and salmon and  finished with spicy cream sauce, tobiko and scallions. I never order just one roll of sushi as an entree, but at $15 bucks, I didn't have the option of ordering two.  Thankfully the specialty rolls are not only delicious but also pretty gargantuan.  It helped that we ordered the Togarashi Shrimp shrimp as an appetizer. I like that is came on a bed of spicy gingery dressed cabbage and greens that functioned as a yummy coleslaw.  Mr. Meat and Potatoes still prefers Bone Fish Grill's Bang Bang Shrimp to the spicier sriracha laden Cowfish version.

My favorite elements of cowfish are undoubtedly the atmosphere and unique menu offerings.  The food is delicious, but very pricey.  If they had BOGO sushi I'd be there every other week, but unfortunately at around $20 for one roll and half an appetizer this is a special outing kind of place.

Loving Laotion at Bida Manda

There was a time when I wasn't sure they ate in Laos.  Strange comment to make I know,  but after a several hour layover at a Laotian airport without any food or snacks available, (bad timing I presume, nothing was open) I had lingering questions as a the nature of Laotian cuisine.  When Bida Manda opened downtown in former location of the Duck and the Dumpling Restaurant in downtown Raleigh I was thrilled to finally have my my opportunity to try Laotian food.  Strange that the chance should arise not in Laos, but right here in North Carolina.  The Laotian food at Bida Manda is reminiscent of the cuisines of neighboring Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia, some of which are integrated into the menu.

My opportunity to try Bida Manda arose on a date with another ethnic food aficionado who was happy go with me to try something new.  We were both greatly pleased with my restaurant selection.  The restaurant space is elegant while in keeping with the Laotian influences and the integration of local materials.  The walls are crafted from woven sticks and feature beautiful photography of brightly robed monks.  Tables are fashioned from reclaimed wood and festooned with fresh flowers. Overall the atmosphere transports the diner to romantic locale, making it an ideal date restaurant.

I like to loosen up on a first date with a drink to take off the edge off.  Bida Manda offers a fantastic (although quite pricey) selection of innovative cocktails.  I ordered the pineapple Caipirinha and my date ordered the El Picaflor with Tequila, fresh grapefruit and lime juices, peppercorn infused honey, Angostura bitters and soda water, which we both loved.

Totally addictive crispy lettuce wraps

A co-worker of mine had recommended the crispy rice lettuce wraps and the saffron crepes with shrimp and bacon. My date and I took the suggestion to try the lettuce wraps as our appetizer. Deceptively simple, the crispy rice is well seasoned with the fresh flavors of lime, herbs like chives and cilantro, and chopped nuts.  When wrapped in the lettuce leaves and seasoned with the sweet chili fish sauce, the combinations of textures and flavors are mind blowing.

Green Papaya Salad with Crispy Trout

For my entree I ordered the Green Papaya salad with trout.  The Green Papaya Salad was a spicy and tangy shredded salad studded with peanuts and a fantastically well prepared trout.  The dish was topped off with sticky rice eaten by hand (as instructed) from a bamboo container.  I will say that the sticky rice was quite a bit drier than I find preferable. Possibly since it was intended to be eaten by hand.  My date decided to try something he'd never had before, and ordered a classic Laotian beef larb, complete with beef tripe (cows stomach.)  I've had tripe before and didn't like the texture, but I gave in to his request that I try it again. The beef larb could almost be compared to a Laotian take on a spicy lime cooked cerviche.  The flavors were great, but I still haven't been sold on tripe. 

I was, however, impressed by my date's adventurous eating.

Traditional Beef Larb.  It's not weird to take pictures of your
dining companion's meal on a first date..right?

The icing on the top of the cake was,  of course, dessert.  We ordered the the triple dessert sampler with a mini apricot cobbler, mango sorbet and a coconut custard in a crispy rice paper shell.  Each one seemed to be better than the last, and I appreciated my date's insistence that we order dessert regardless of how full we were.  My favorite was the rich and creamy coconut custard, his was the warm apricot cobbler. 

Our meal was than topped off by a complimentary shots of fresh squeezed citrus juice, the perfect top off to a great first date and an excellent meal. 

DELICIOUS Dessert Trio

I went back a few weeks later with two of my closest friends visiting town for the more limited, but less expensive lunch menu.  I had the vermacelli noodle herb salad "Manda's Herb Salad" with grilled shrimp and crispy portobello spring rolls, essentially the same as a Vietnamese Bun with the addition of tofu and tempura eggplant. The cool herb salad was the perfect fresh summer entree.  My friends tried the Pad Thai (very good) and the Kang Som Pa a Lemongrass Tamarind and Catfish soup.  Unfortunately even at the lower lunch prices, my meal consisting of another lettuce wrap appetizer, the herb salad, and a Thai ice tea cost me whopping $30 with tip!  For lunch!  Yikes!  My friends who just got entrees and
water fared much better coming out around $15.
When I go back I suppose I'll have to skip on the
appetizer...or maybe just get the appetizer.

Affordable Arepas at Guasaca

I first tried arepas at the last international festival in downtown Raleigh and became a fan at first bite.  These Colombian and Venezuelan corn cakes are pan fried and or baked and served stuffed with any manner of filling.  My first was served with marinated shredded beef and cheese.  I was excited to see an "areperia" open up in right here in Raleigh with these delectable corn sandwiches and was even more excited to see that around four bucks a pop the prices were well suited to my budget.  You can pick a one of Guasaca's signature combinations of fillings or design your own with choices like shredded beef, steak, braised pork, chicken, tilapia, or black beans.  Add toppings ranging from pinto beans or plantains to coleslaw and caramelized onions for a satisfying and reasonably healthy meal.  Creamy cilantro, mustard, or wine vinegar are the icing on the cake.  The best pick has to be the pricier, but worth it, signature sauce guasaco sauce reminiscent of a chunky guacamole.  My main criticism would be the saltiness of the dishes, most notable in the guasaco sauce.  The atmosphere is super casual and the food is served up fast in a Moe's burrito assembly line type fashion.  Two of my other income deficient friends likewise gave Guasaco positive reviews for cheap, healthy and unique options.