Food & alcohol worldwide

[Lux]

this is for those who appreciate and enjoy fine cuisine. and wine. and champagne. feel free to name restaurants, dishes, or any other specialties you have experienced. or even anything particular to a place or a region that you care to recollect and make note of.

let's see. a restaurant on 2nd ave had great eggplant ravioli. mmm italian. i also love a good pesto sauce or a balsamic reduction. on friday i had lunch with a coworker at Havana (cuban food) and it was great, and also relatively inexpensive. last night a few friends and i went to a champagne bar that was delectable. bill came out to $200+ what else what else...i so enjoy a seared tuna, or a really good crab cake. a friend recommended an excellent wine bar somewhere in the city that "i MUST try"...there is also Chocolate Bar that serves all chocolate desserts, and to complement, it has a great alcohol menu. and this place where they do dessert before the main course. truly great, for a sweet tooth.


so...
any foodies out there?

[Rachel]

Nothing better than good ol' British fish & chips!

I'm easily pleased

[Lux]

yeah, this is not for fast food or junk food, but for fine cuisine and dining.

oooh i forgot. a restaurant in chelsea has reallly good hispanic food. it was excellent. the cilantro rice was sooo good

[Rachel]

Offtop:
I don't do expensive shit, hence the reason for my first post

[Lux]

it's not about the price, but about the quality of preparation, cooking, and presentation.
usually great food cost more but its not something i focus on. but not always. havana was rather inexpensive considering its location and quality of food.

[QueenBee]

Well I obviously live far far away from you so I can't really mention any streetnames.. But I went to a Turkish restaurant not too long ago, and the food was wonderful. Better than I expected. The Turks seem to have lots of meat, it was the first time I tried lamb (as far as I can remember, haha) and it tasted very good and was juicy and just perfect.

[Khartoun2004]

My favorite place in providence has to be a place called Paragon on Thayer Street. They have awesome pasta dishes, burgers and of course skinny hot waitresses. Their bartenders are pretty good too.

If you like coffee as much as I do.... Reflections Cafe on the corner of Wickenden and Governor has the best lattes and cappuccinos outside New York State. My favorite is their Snickers Latte. It has chocolate, carmel and hazelnut syrups in it. Reflections is also a must see if you want to check out Providence's Gay Scene.

The best Pizza outside New York is also on Thayer Street at a place called Antonio's. You can get it by the slice or get a whole pie. A favorite of the Zen Center is the Neopolitian Pizza (Tomates, basil, mozzarella chesse, but balls of it not shredded), but they have something for everyone.

[Lux]

what do you consider a good cappucino?
i don't consider any coffee cocktail to be good coffee. anything with more than one kind of flavoring is just liquid candy. and pretty american. don't get me wrong, i barista-d for a year and was great at it and i love making coffee drinks, but i don't consider coffee to be good coffee when it's derived from a candy bar. that's just me. i prefer espresso. if without good espresso i drink coffee black. and when it comes to roasts and blends it depends on the mood and/or time of day.

[rosh]

rachel : ah come on you left out dominos pizza i loved the thai green curry one they did for a little while in 2003. their garlic and herb dip is pretty good too

my philosophy about food is the following : i eat to live. so eat enough to sustain existance. thats pretty much its function in my life.

restaurants ive enjoyed tho : elephant royale , thai restaurant in island gardens, docklands london. they made the best satay chicken ive ever had in my life. literally melted in my mouth.
url : http://www.elephantroyale.com/ -- was a 5 min walk from my old flat.

browns in oxford : i liked the ambience. it was a trendy place that served regular kinds of food and was a good place for cocktails if you were so inclined.
url : http://www.browns-restaurants.com/index.html

santa fe in reading berkshire : ooo yummy mexican food ! their chips were the bestest ever.
url : http://www.santafe.co.uk/venues/reading/

in india i found that home cooked village food was actually much nicer than restaurant food, so i suppose i could quote the village my family's from haha nah just joking

but a good, no, great indian restaurant in cape town is

bukhara : divine ! http://www.bukhara.com/

but i agree with rachel about fish and chips. some days nothing beats going to the local chippy and then getting some

[Lux]

that may be your philosophy on food but, what to eat is important. i don't eat junk food, which is about 90% of all food here.

[rosh]

well lets expound on what i do eat when im exercising my "eat to live" theory :

lots of vegetables
lots of fruit
wholegrain rice
some chicken sometimes
some fish, mostly salmon
nuts excluding walnuts and peanuts [hate walnuts, and allergic to peanuts]

i dont drink alcohol, i rarely drink tea or coffee. my mainstays are juice and water really. and i love full cream milk cause anything thats low fat or fat free just tastes like cardboard.

i eat junkfood, but rarely.

[Lux]

ok. but fine cuisine is essentially all of those things prepared and cooked very well. taste and presentation, although i give far more weight to taste.

[freddie]

I don't really know what's wrong with fast-food places.

Here's something straight from McDonald's site:

We care about what you and your family eat. That’s why we take great pride in the quality of our food. Since our first restaurant was built, we have purchased quality ingredients from trusted, industry-leading brands. Every day, in every one of our restaurants across the world, our family promises to serve a quality meal every time to your family….we call it our quality promise.
We promise to use only fresh, wholesome ingredients when serving you and your family.
We promise to support agricultural and economic growth in our communities.
We promise to partner with leading industry suppliers and trusted brands.
We promise that our food safety standards will meet or exceed regulatory requirements.
We promise to monitor, measure and inspect the quality of our food, from farm to table, to assure freshness, quality and safety.

Doesn't that just make your mouth water?

Okay, to say my bid about expensive restaurants: I've eaten in a really expensive fish restaurant on the island of Crete. I had a sabre-fish and it really was awesome. Can't remember the name of the restaurant though. I also went to a few expensive ones in Nice, France. I never frequent expensive places in Slovenia, though. They're not worth it.

[coolasfcuk]

this thread is hilarious

but to participate in a way - lots of times when I have eatten at a place which you Lux classify here as 'fine cuisine', I've had upset stomach LoL
Here are the most recent places Ive had dinner that I enjoyed:
http://sanfrancisco.citysearch.com/profile/868206/
http://sanfrancisco.citysearch.com/profile/889332/
http://sanfrancisco.citysearch.com/profile/889408
http://www.lime-sf.com/Eat.html
http://sanfrancisco.citysearch.com/profile/868137/
http://sanfrancisco.citysearch.com/profile/889376/?
http://sanfrancisco.citysearch.com/profile/11346281/?
http://www.ramblastapas.com/about.html

yeah, you can see, i usually wine and dine in the Mission with the occasional going outs in Berkeley, such as http://www.chezpanisse.com/ and my very own fav, which is now 5 min walk from where I live: http://www.lamediterranee.net/pages/lamedberkeley.html

[Lux]

this isn't about price. it's about quality. i really didn't intend to talk about expensive food. but rather good, great, and fantastic food. price isn't the point because i can understand and appreciate cuisine..
some expensive food can be crap and some really great food can be inexpensive, so it's not about price, per se.

[Rachel]

Originally Posted by Lux

this isn't about price. it's about quality.

Good ol' fashioned British fish & chips = quality

There's nothing better than going down to the chippie

Food snob

[Lux]

snob? yes.

[ypsidan04]

Lux, you gotta get yourself down to Little Italy. I forget the name of the restaurant I went to there, but it was amazing. That has to be one of the top few dining experiences in my life. I'm sure that all the places there are very good.

[freddie]

Originally Posted by Lux

this isn't about price. it's about quality. i really didn't intend to talk about expensive food. but rather good, great, and fantastic food. price isn't the point because i can understand and appreciate cuisine..
some expensive food can be crap and some really great food can be inexpensive, so it's not about price, per se.

So by that definition... a well made, tasty fast food could qualify as great food, wouldn't it?

[coolasfcuk]

Originally Posted by freddie

So by that definition... a well made, tasty fast food could qualify as great food, wouldn't it?

not if it doesnt coast you $200, freds