Han Dynasty Dinner and Darts With Friends

About a week or so back I met up with a few high school buddies for dinner at Han Dynasty. We had cumin lamb.

And garlic eggplant.

And twice fried scallops. Not pictured, but consumed, included green beans, pea shoots, cold noodles with sesame and spicy cucumbers. All very good.

Then we went to Buffalo Billiards where some non-high school folks joined us for dart times. I could have sworn that more photos were taken of me with people, but this is the only proof I have: E., me and  Mr. Ass. An evening that went quite well and allowed me the chance to see a few dart folks one last time as well as just other people I like. A successful night on the whole.

Christmas Eve in Tennessee

This holiday seasonwas like many before it, as far as the fact that I had lots of work to do. After a few years going elsewhere for the holiday, Dad and I decided to do it in Sewanee this year. I flew down Monday night and flew back Thursday, so it was very whirlwind and didn't allow for a lot of socialization. On Christmas Eve, we did have a thing. Cousin H. and his wife C. came by with the fixins for egg nog, the family recipe for which hasn't changed much in quite some time. I tried to take good photographs, but really didn't succeed much. Here are most of the relevant ingredients: sugar, egg whites, egg yolk, rum and bourbon...missing is the...

Whipped cream, to which I believe the liquor is being added? Though H. was quite good at giving me the step-by-step directions at the time, I didn't write them down. I know you need four bowls: three to mix the different ingredients (one for cream, one for egg whites, one for egg yolks, and one for serving) but where the sugar goes is, alas, lost to my brain at the moment.

Et voila, folding it all together into a magic, thick, peaked, wonderland of booze and sugar and glory. A.M.P and her son also joined us, as did C.'s son...but really there was a lot more nog than there were people to drink it.

I did my part by having three glasses. So thick. You could really consume it with a spoon as easily as you could sip it.

These two refused to have a decent photo of themselves be taken.

The house's architecture and relatively unique features are always slightly more impressive when the drapes aren't closed...but in the winter, it's also a much, much colder house when the drapes are open.

Cousin H. also brought a lovely selection of veggies, which he roasted in the kitchen. Asparagus, potatoes, parsnips, and carrots. Good stuff.

And Dad roasted a local leg of lamb, which turned out nice and pink...but not scarily so.

AMP contributed green beans and ham. Altogether a lovely meal.

Oh and AMP also brought flan.

Birthday Fun Times c/o Buffalo Billiards, Han Dynasty and Yakitori Boy

My birthday fell on a Tuesday this year, which isn't really ideal for a night of celebration given the propensity for the people I know to have jobs that require them to use their brains effectively on weekday mornings. So I sent out a call to birthday arms for the Saturday preceding the actual day of my birth. It was sort of a two-pronged call. To a slightly  more select group I suggested dinner and to a broader, more dart-loving group I suggested darts before that dinner. This was all a bit more last minute than might have been ideal, but I was still really pleased and grateful for the turn out...nothing worse than inviting folks to your own birthday celebrations and finding yourself totally alone. L. and Fat T. came down from Brooklyn a bit before our first scheduled activity. I made a little cheese plate and L. and I drank champagne while Fatty and A. drank beer. We all threw some darts. Then it was on to Buffalo Billiards, where our numbers soon allowed us to take control over all three boards.

Mr. Ass couldn't make dinner, but we did play a game of darts. It was a funny mix between the true blue darters and some of my less dart savvy friends. The majority of darters are legitimately better than me, and usually when I played them I lost. Meanwhile the friends who aren't throwing darts on a daily or weekly basis were quite impressed by my prowess. My dart ability: a sliding scale of awesome based solely on others' own abilities.

After a good amount of time playing the darts, it was time for our rather late dinner reservation at Han Dynasty's new Old City location, just down the block from its old one. I basically ordered for all of us after hearing certain suggestions or desires from the crowd. So our meal ultimately included dumplings in hot chili oil.

Cucumbers in hot chili oil...these suckers are sooo good .

Dan Dan Noodles. Not everyone ordered a sazerac, but I did and I loved it.

This was the cumin lamb.

This was L. reacting to her imminent turn getting the cumin lamb as A. scoops some on his own plate.

I think this is Fatty and LW with the eggplant.

Yep. Succulent, savory eggplant. Love it.

This was either the kung pao chicken or the garlic chicken,

I think this was the twice fried fish maybe?

String bean magic.

Pepper scallops if I recall correctly. SO GOOD.

The dinner was quite lovely and I was so pleased to share my birthday with such fun and funny folks. After that C. and R. went home while Fatty, L., LW, A. and I decided that we would try to do some karaoke at Yakitori Boy, which we did. I sang a Tom Petty song. We also just sang along with all the other people singing. A.'s gf G. joined us and the night went late.

Sake bombs did happen.

I don't really know what's happening in this photo except that LW and I both look quite taken aback, but from different things.

I'm a homebody for much of my daily, weekly or monthly existence, and the older I get the more okay I am about it...that said, every once and a while it's good to have an evening full of folks and fun, and this was certainly such an evening. A hearty thank you goes out to all who partook in my pre-birthday fun times!

Lamb Tacos

We had a properly late dinner as a result of our delicious afternoon cheese plate and the fact that it takes a more than a minute to put together taco fixin's from scratch (or at least mostly from scratch). The meat portion of the tacos was predominantly lamb with a little bit of beef thrown in for good measure. I must admit that while I did add a little salt into the meat, most of the flavor work was done by Rick Bayless's chipotle lime skillet packet.  I was also unable to find already ripe avocados, so I bought the grocery store's relatively fresh guacamole instead.

The pico de gallo, however, was entirely of my own making. I seeded the tomatoes and chopped them. Then chopped red onion and cilantro to add into the mix before adding lime juice, a smidge of olive oil and a tad pinch of salt. Let that marinate for a minute and you get magic man. Magic, man.

I also cooked rice and heated up some black beans.

Oh yes and also some fajita like peppers and onions for good measure.

I'd say a pretty satisfying eating experience. The leftovers of which made quite a number of additional meals for me in the days that would follow.

Fried Chicken Buns and Lamb Ramen c/o Dassara, Plus Darts

During our super busy season my job overwhelms my waking and sleeping life (oh the stress dreams) and makes it so that most all evenings are spent at home, alone, lying down with zombie eyes and preserving energy for the next day. I don't really mind how crazy it can be because I do enjoy some generous vacation days in exchange for my hard work, but work/life balance during these times is a pretty much foreign concept. So lying down and staying in was  pretty much what I planned on doing a Friday a few weeks back when I received a text from L. suggesting I come up to Brooklyn for her friend's annual big pig party the next evening. I think I surprised both of us by taking her up on that suggestion. I finished work later than usual and then packed myself up and hit the road, making pretty good time on the whole, though getting off the NJ Thruway and towards the Goethals and Verrazano bridges was especially stupid. Once I arrived I got loopy from the socialization of L. and Fat T. It had probably been far too many days since I had had any lengthy conversation with anyone about anything other than work. Though, of course, I also talked about work because when it's the only thing you really have going on, then it's really the only thing to talk about. In any case, after some much needed laughter and fellowship, L. and I went out into the world to have dinner while Fat T. stayed home because he is a party pooper and hates dinner. L. and I, on the other hand, love parties and dinner. So out to Dassara we went. It was a little on the late side, so we were pretty much the only folks eating, though there were a few people sitting at the bar. The lighting in the main dining room was challenging in a similar neon-like way to Morimoto, though I feel like I did a slightly better job dealing with it in this instance. We started by splitting the fried chicken buns, which I found to my liking. The soft and pliant buns made a nice contrast to the crispy chicken bit and slight saltiness of the pickle.

Dassara isn't a 'traditional' ramen spot like Ipuddo but its variations on the traditional ramen set up were definitely interesting. I ultimately found myself most drawn to the lamb ramen with braised lamb belly, market greens and a soft-poached egg. The thing I usually like about ramen is that the noodles have a little more 'toothiness' to them...Japanese al dente if you will. While I enjoyed the broth of the dish well enough, I will say that I found the noodles themselves not to have that especially good resiliency. They were a wee bit too soft and mushy for my taste. I feel like L. had a similar feeling about her noodles as well. So the conclusion I had was that the buns were good, the broth was good, but the noodles weren't very exciting.

After dinner I suggested/requested that we seek out a dart board and play darts with some strangers. And that is just what we did. Here you will see L. properly celebrating the double bull she threw that won us a game.

Good times.

Cheese and Tacos in the Country

The next day I did some work, and I'm not sure what M. did. Then I locked my laundry in the laundry room and we spent a number of hours trying to figure out how to unlock the door. This included M. getting a ladder, my trying to open the door with a card much in the same way, our trying a variety of old fashioned skeleton keys, and M.'s mother eventually suggesting that A. break down the door. So the day had some highs and lows. Perhaps the highest of the locked laundry room saga was when A. managed to open the door without breaking it down; that was pretty great. I brought a few cheeses up to enjoy before Saturday's diner, which included a black and blue blue cheese, an aged manchego and a goat camembert.

I made us taco dinner that night, which involved a lamb/beef meat mixture, homemade guacamole and pico de gallo, black beans with peppers, and rice. I also made a shrimp option in a green/tomatillo sauce, but its photographic qualities were found lacking.

After dinner we played a rousing and challenging game of Catan. I ultimately won, but it was touch and go.

Pierogies, Dumplings and Lamb Burger c/o North Third

LB and C.'s wedding was last weekend. In the days leading up to the big event, there were a few opportunities to hang with LB, C. and some of the other out-of-town bridesmaids and guests. This started with a Thursday dinner with the soon to be wed couple, BC, and N. who had flown in from Portland, Oregon. We met up at North Third for dinner, drinks and a few good yuks. We shared pierogies and dumplings. The dumplings were especially tasty treats.

I went with one of their specials for my entree: a lamb burger with goat cheese, roasted onions and red peppers..or maybe it was roasted tomatoes...I'm a little unsure from my own memory or the photographic evidence.

In any case, it was great to be in a small group in the days leading up to the main event, which was not quite an intimate affair. And very good to see N., as I hadn't seen her since our 10th year high school reunion in 2009.

Buying Locally, Walking Locally, Eating Tacos

I made a run into town to pick up some eating supplies for dinner on Saturday night, and for the rest of the weekend. But I held off on a few things because I knew I could buy them local at The Little Farm Store. Shout out to them! They have great eggs at certain times of the year (not now), as well as locally fed and raised beef in steak and ground form, not to mention cheese, ice cream and a few other tasty things. On my trip I picked up a pound of ground beer as well as half a gallon of raw milk. Such a beautiful day to drive around an area that is still more field and farm than subdivision and McMansion.

Once I got back to the house I took myself on a woods and stream walk. I carried a big stick, don't worry. No spiders offended this face. Props, also, to lending me her sunglasses for the last month. They were lovely.

Boots, creeks, boots, creeks.

And for dinner I made S. and myself lamb/beef tacos. I also made pico de gallo and guacamole. Additionally, I broke a blender. Dinner also included gazpacho that I made, which was quite delightful...but it just didn't photograph well on this particular evening.