Entries Tagged as 'lobster'

Roka Akor

January 12th, 2012 · No Comments


Roka Akor


Red Miso Soup with Lobster


Butterfish Roll


Wagyu Beef and Kimchi Dumplings


Filet


Salmon Teriyaki


Pickled Cucumber


Steamed Rice with Furikake


Another look at Alden’s steak.

A several months ago, I earned enough Open Table points to get me $20 off any Open Table restaurant bill. Since a bunch of the points were earned when Alden and I went out for lunches in River North, I thought it appropriate that I take him out to use my check.

We decided to go to Roka Akor, a fancy schmancy sushi restaurant and Japanese robata grill that we probably wouldn’t go to at dinner because it would be too expensive. It was a bit expensive even for lunch, but at least we got $20 off. We both decided to get the Roka Akor Business Lunch ($24 each), which includes red miso soup with lobster, Wagyu beef and kimchi dumplings, spicy crispy butterfish sushi rolls, steamed rice, and your choice of an entree. The entrees offerred were salmon teriyaki with pickled cucumber, cumin BBQ pork loin with shaved vegetables and cilantro, grilled seasonal vegetables with truffle soy butter, a 6 oz. prime beef filet or prime skirt steak. The steaks were $6 more. Alden went all out and got the steak. I got the salmon.

Everything that we had was pretty good. My salmon was very tasty and the portion size was larger than what I expected, for sure. Alden gave me a piece of his steak and it was flavorful and tender. I’m not a huge steak person, but it was really good. The pickled cucumber wasn’t too pickled, really refreshing. I also really liked the butterfish rolls and could see coming here for sushi and not even getting things from the grill. I thought the dumplings were alright. Not the stars of the show. The miso soup was pretty good too, but not outstanding.

I never had food cooked on the robata grill (high-heat method of searing and cooking using expensive, imported binchotan charcoal from Japan) and it was great. The grill area at Roka Akor is really pretty and it’s wide open so you can see the cooks using this unique grill. I would come back to Roka Akor, but probably only for a special occasion dinner. Just because I’m sure it tends to get swanky at night and the dinner prices can get expensive, but the food was great and the service was good, as well.

[Read more →]

Tags:············

Legal Test Kitchen (LTK)

November 15th, 2010 · No Comments

Right next to the Boston Renaissance Waterfront was LTK, or Legal Test Kitchen. This restaurant is a part of the famous Legal Sea Foods chain, but at LTK there’s a new menu every six weeks.

On my last day in Boston I decided to check it out for lunch. Around noontime they were pretty packed so I just sat at the bar. The waitress gave me a menu and I ordered Legal Sea Foods’ clam chowder, of course. She also told me about something that wasn’t on the menu. It was a Caesar salad with lobster on it. SIX OUNCES of lobster. It was so much lobster…. as much as was on their lobster roll, but instead of in bread, it topped a salad. Here’s what it looked like:

Awesome, right? So awesome that the guy who sat down on my right and the lady who came in and sat on my right were both like “holey moley! what is that!?” and ordered it themselves! I should have gotten a commission on that salad. It was not a cheap salad, by any means, but it was so delicious!

[Read more →]

Tags:······

Mitch’s Fish Market

June 19th, 2009 · 4 Comments

Dallas’s friend Ryan took us to Mitch’s Fish Market for dinner. If you live in Hawaii and you’ve never heard of this place, it’s no surprise. It has to be the best hidden restaurant in Honolulu. Mitch’s is located by the airport off Nimitz on Ohohia St behind Avis Rent-a-Car in what appears to be a warehouse district. And it’s TINY. There are only enough tables to seat 10 and then 4 additional seats at the sushi bar. Reservations recommended, for sure. Ryan always takes us to these really fabulous little places, so I was excited for dinner that night.

mitchs_fish_market_mural

Also, Mitch’s is BYO. Ryan brought some Kirin beer and this bottle of sake. He got the sake from a colleague of his who got it in Japan. If anyone sees this sake anywhere, let me know. It was so good, but we don’t know what it is because none of us reads Japanese kanji.

mitchs_fish_market_sake

We each decided to get the omakase, which is a Japanese phrase that means “it’s up to you,” meaning that the chef chooses what to serve you. The first thing we got were small, individual servings of some squid salad with miso and a cucumber slice. Next, a guy came to our table and showed us a live lobster. We had approve of it. Then he took it to the back and killed it. We were then served this big placte of sashimi, including lobster sashimi (on the back right). Talk about fresh!

mitchs_fish_market_shashimi

This was the best sashimi I’ve ever had. There were things on the plate that I’ve tried in Chicago and vowed never to eat again that were delicious at Mitch’s.

The next course was individual servings of salmon miso yaki (grilled salmon with miso). Shortly after a half of a lobster baked with some sort of mayo-ish sauce came out for us to share. I don’t know what it was exactly, but it was so rich and delicious. While we were finishing these up, out came a big plate of nigiri. I was a bit overwhelmed with the camera so I don’t have photos of the salmon or lobster, but here’s the nigiri:

mitchs_fish_market_nigiri

Beautiful, huh? The uni (sea urchin) is the orange one in the front and I think it’s a bit of an aquired taste, but everything else was great. While we were eating our sushi, they took away the shell from our baked lobster. I wasn’t sure at the time why they did this, but turns out they were using all the leftover lobster parts to make soup. Miso soup. Lobster miso soup. The best kind of miso soup that exists.

mitchs_fish_market_lobster_miso

Seriously, this was so good. We also got some tools so that after we drank our soup we could crack open any remaining lobster parts and get the meat out.

mitchs_fish_market_miso_lobster

Mitch’s is definitely not cheap, but you get what you pay for. And you’re not paying for the ambiance or the location, it’s the food. All about the food. I’m no expert, but this was the best sushi I’ve ever had. (And the two Hawaiian/Japanese guys with me agreed!)

[Read more →]

Tags:·······

Portland Lobster Company

August 24th, 2008 · 2 Comments


Portland Lobster Company, Portland, ME

We just arrived back from the East Coast and are settling back in here at home in Chicago. We had a great time in Maine and so much fun seeing friends we don’t see often enough.

These photos are from Portland Lobster Company in Portland, Maine. Dallas, Killian, Liz and I flew into Boston and drove up to Portland, where we picked up Billy and Ging Ging from the airport. We wanted to sit outside somewhere and drink a beer after the long drive.. maybe eat a little seafood… lobster. Portland Lobster Company fit the bill perfectly. They had a long pier with tons of seating and pitchers of Shipyard, a locally brewed beer, on special. We split a few lobsters between us and sat in the sun. Very relaxing.

[Read more →]

Tags:·········

Rummikub at the Beach

July 16th, 2008 · 3 Comments


Rummikub, South Yarmouth, Cape Cod


Rummikub, South Yarmouth, Cape Cod

Our last day at the beach was last Friday. For lunch we headed to our now favorite restaurant, The Skipper, and got our now favorite clam chowder. This was our 3rd visit to The Skipper in just over a week (visit 1, visit 2). Julie got the lobster roll, I got a crab roll and Jess had a hankering for ribs, so that’s what she got. It was all great. I love The Skipper and loved that it was right across the street from “our beach.”

Oh, I almost forgot. On the way to the beach I got stung by a bee. I barely even saw it and for sure didn’t recognize to get away from it. My hand just like hit it and it stung the padded part of my palm just down from my thumb. I could see the stinger and it hurt really bad. Attached to the stinger was part of the bee’s body and it was moving. I kind of freaked because I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold still enough to remove the stinger. Luckily Julie heard my yelling and ran over, pulled the stinger out and saved the day. My brother and my niece are allergic to bees, so I was scared for a few minutes.. but then I was eating clam chowder and my face hadn’t swollen up or anything so I figured I was fine. And I was. I just held ice in my hand for a while at the restaurant. My hand was tender for a few days, but that’s about it.

After lunch we went back to the beach. We didn’t want to leave it!! The next day we had to drive back to Jersey and we wanted to prolong the beach time. We spread out our towels and blanket and played Rummikub, Jess’s favorite game of all time. I can remember playing this game on the beach at the Cape in 2002, when New York got 20″ of snow in 2003, and even during the blackout in New York that same year. I won the first game with that 7. Jess, the sore loser that she is, then had to cancel our second game … saying she had something in her eye or something and she had to leave. Just kidding.. her eye really was messed up. At least it was a real reason to make us leave the beach or we might have been there all night!

[Read more →]

Tags:············