Five Guys is easily the best of the bad hamburgers.  The bun is the kind of bun you find in the supermarket.  The beef tastes like the beef you buy at the supermarket.  The mustard tubs are of the cheap yellow kind.  All burgers are well done with a bit of crispiness to the beef.  The servers seem like they were lured away from the employment pool of the Alfred Joyce Kilmer rest stop on the New Jersey Turnpike.  But they look like they know how to barbecue.  This is how a fast food burger chain should be: unexceptional and cheap.  It’s your hamburger.

A theme restaurant gone awry

Just a regular hamburger

As if an explanation is necessary

Good riddance to Burritoville

Nestled at the long-neglected corner of Manhattan Avenue and Bedford Avenue, the Brooklyn meeting point of the two formerly distinct but now inseperable worlds of Greenpoint and Williamsburg, lies Five Leaves, a diner with the carefully and successfully constructed ambiance of an imaginary simpler American rustic past.

On to the hamburger:

Five Leaves Burger

The beef is grass-fed, which calmed my own stomach considering my very recent screening of Food, Inc., in which an industrial cow researcher sticks his hand elbow-deep through a port drilled into the side of a fully-conscious cow, giving him access to the contents of one of its stomachs, where he mashes around and shows off the rotting corn (i.e. not grass) inside.

But for full disclosure, I am working on the assumption that, as I believe is necessary for gastronomical honesty and integrity, judgment lies mostly in the hamburger, not in the contents of the cow’s stomach (which is nowhere to be found at Five Leaves) at the moment of its murder.  And in this department, the Five Leaves Burger is a great mashup, regardless of whether the long dead, extruded and now medium-rare cooked cow of questionable upbringing had arugula or rubber tire as its last supper.

The bun at Five Leaves was very well educated, and had a crispiness to the outermost layer of refined white flour that did not seem to be the result of any significant toasting.  The innards of the top bun were doused in mayo mixed with red pepper powder.  Then came the perfectly cooked sunny-side up egg with no evidence of any frying visible on either top or bottom.  Beneath the egg was a solitary slice of beet, lying astride the meat patty itself.

The first bite released the unfertilized juices pregnant within the egg, which flowed through the home-made prophylactic of mixed salad I surreptitiously inserted directly beneath, and were eventually lapped up greedily by the soft absorptive inner lining nascent in the bottom bun, spilling out the overflow mixture of blood and amniotic fluid onto the fresh green side of salad.  The meat patty was crispily overcooked on a few rough outer edges, but soft and tender medium rare on the inside, exactly as requested.

Conclusion:  delicious burger, but the meat was oversalted such that I would be remiss in not mentioning it in this otherwise perfectly good review.

Last nights’ Gastronauts expedition was the largest ever – 80 or so people descended upon  Engeline’s in Woodside, Queens for a night of Filipino fare.  Ben and Curtiss had pre-ordered a series of delicacies off the menu, and we took over the restaurant.

Bitter melon is indeed very bitter and swims in a sort of egg-drop soup goo – will take some more acclimatization.  The “ruffle fat” pig skin was a bit cardboard in texture, slightly bitter, and not as tasty as memories of my momma’s fried chicken skin – I think they need to be eaten straight out of the frier in order to truly appreciate their natural texture.  String beans are always delicious, and the Adobong Sitaw were a fine variety in a pleasant sauce.  The pig heart and intestines were very good, almost a staple, and I found myself returning to them between other dishes.  But it was the the Dinuguan, stewed pork in a pork blood gravy, that made the night.  This was nothing like Chinese pork blood jello, which I’m not crazy about, although it did share that metallic iron flavor which is inevitable when manging healthy animal blood.  In this case the sauce was thick and viscous, but perfectly complemented the tenderness of the cubes of pork.  The two whole suckling pig lechóns were impressive in presentation, and perfectly crispy skinned, buttery meated, and tasty, yet somehow unspectacular.   Engeline’s chefs have managed to cook them in an oven mimicking the result of an open fire spit, but the unevenness of a fire-roasted animal was missing.

A true spit-fired suckling pig at a Marlyand wedding

It was a little disappointing not to have a chance to retry balut, which was the first thing I ate with the Gastronauts group upon joining at Krystal’s Cafe on 2nd Ave.  At that time, years ago now, I had shown my mettle to the small group by being the first to crack open the egg and drink its amniotic fluid before crunching the bones of the innocent fetus inside with relish, picking soft feathers from between my teeth.  Courtney, one of the co-founders, ran out of the restaurant and threw up on the sidewalk.  Then we sang karaoke in Tagalog.

Gastronauts has changed a bit.

Mention your love of hamburgers, and some people will proselytize about Shake Shack the same way America’s Generation X enthralls itself with the seamless digital/analog convergence found in Avatar, the 3D feature film.

Shake Shack is a half block from my current workplace, but the lines are far too intimidating for me to ever venture near in temperate climes.  Given my inexplicable love of cold weather and far more easily understandable Christmastime goy aversion, today, the freezing day before the day before the two thousand and tenth year anniversary of the birth of our savior (when will he finish battling the aliens and come back?), seemed like the perfect opportunity to skip the fuss and buy a slab of ground meat.  Even my office, teeming as it is with dollar bill-eyed Jews from New Jersey, was relatively empty.  And so, there was no line at Shake Shack.

Shake Shack in Madison Square Park

A brief survey of the menu made my order clear: one Shackburger, and a Shackmeister Ale.  In exchange for $10, I received a vibrator and a receipt.

Unsanitized Shake Shack Vibrator

I gripped the vibrator tightly, and waited.  About five minutes later, I felt a single prolonged buzz, then nothing.  My food was ready.

Shackburger and Shackmeister Ale

Quite the presentation.  The bun was extremely soft and pliant, so much so that the bread was depressed and obliging before I had even had a chance to put it in my hot and steamy mouth, anticipating, as it was, its own unavoidable absorption into my greedy Semitic stomach.

First impression: the taste of American cheese.  Second bite: lots of mayonnaise….  and so it went.  The meat replicated perfectly the texture and flavor of the textureless and flavorless bun.  A swig of beer:  market research indicates that Generation X likes hops.  No discernible flavor, good or bad, beyond the uber-infused hop essence.  Further reflection on hamburger: lettuce was latticed on top of the burger in clear full-leaf form, and a real slice of a real tomato was purposefully placed between.  The meat looked very fatty and pale, well done.

The aesthetic and genius of Shake Shack couldn’t be clearer.  Shackburger is a McDonalds burger made with upscale ingredients.  That is its ironic design, get it?  Shackmeister Ale is Budweiser pumped full of hops, i.e. microbrew.  Compared to the eating habits of the typical office worker, this is gourmet food at its finest.

Within minutes, I had retreated back to the comfort of the office.  I emailed the client and my entire team a new user flow diagram with the image of a cute girl representing their company’s typical “content editor”.  This based on a conversation I had had before lunch with the client’s chief technologist about the flow, not about the girl.

User Flow

The client immediately sent a response, insisting that their content editors were not nearly as happy nor as enthusiastic as this girl, and demanded that this fact be properly accounted for in future revisions.  I quipped in response that this was because they had yet to use the system I was designing, and asked him to be patient.

At Benny’s troubled request, I removed the inappropriate girl from the next revision.

Neuter Actor

Then Benny invited me to join him and Brian, the front-end developer who loved Avatar, in a three-way of Super Mario Brothers on the Wii by the jelly bean machines.

At 6, I left, encountering our Director of Emerging Technology twiddling his phone by the elevator.  I asked him politely what his plans were for the holiday.  He’s clearly Jewish, but kept reticent about that fact.  We entered the elevator with a black man and two goyim.  I explained my own modest plans: “I’m heading up to Westchester, where it’s safe for Jews on Christmas”.

No response.  The doors opened.  I wished him well, and exited.

The Vilniaus Universitetas‘ Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics has a tantalizing array of Lithuanian traditional food recipes.

Solid foods notwithstanding, the recipes are highly manageable by unskilled labor.  Mead, beer, kvass, and herbal teas are standard fare. But fermented tree saps covered in sprouted oats, poppy milk, hemp seed milk, beet pudding, acorn coffee, and carrot coffee deserve further investigation.  Baltic soups, including sauerkraut soup, sorrel soup, pickled beet soup, blood soup, and the rest represent all that is good in life.

Birch sap kefir

I have been fermenting birch sap using milk kefir grains the past few days, and it is very delicious – the most palatable non-dairy fermented drink so far.  The grains transitioned relatively smoothly to a non-dairy environment.  Will have to try a tree sap yeast fermentation with sprouted oats as soon as I come across a food grade plastic container in which to do it.

Shortly before Olives, the most amazing Russian supermarket ever to glimpse the balmy shores of Brooklyn, went out of business, I had purchased a compote that I believe contained peaches among other fruits.  It turned out to be mildly fermented, probably due having sat neglected on Olives’ overstocked shelves for too long (supermarkets and Russians mix as well as oil and water without an emulsifier).  It was the most delicious drink I’ve ever had.  More experiments in that direction to come.

Homemade pie fillings at Olives

Midway through teaching Saturday, it was time for lunch.  I instinctively hurried to 1st avenue – just far enough that there was little risk of meeting a lunching student on the street.  Walking past Setagaya Ramen, I decided to go in.  Sure, I had just been there a week before and had had a thoroughly mediocre ramen in the mostly empty space (nothing else to report), but Menkui-tei is too close to class and anyway I had just eaten at their midtown spot with Gruber, Gruber mother, and Manzo a few days before (Gruber hesitatingly ordered a pork-based Ramen with no scallions, Marjorie ordered chicken on rice, and Manzo had beef over rice), I cannot eat at delicious Plump Dumpling until I write a long-overdue review on Yelp for the friendly owner who personally requested my help publicizing his new large space on the corner of 2nd Ave, and I was not in the mood for any of my usual heartily overcooked East Village Polski-Ukrainski haunts.

Thoroughly mediocre Setagaya Ramen from a week before

Fortunately, Setagaya Ramen was packed, and I do not like to wait on line.  I noticed a partially obscured narrow doorway in the back of the restaurant with a paper printout on the wall saying Bibimbop Tapas Bar.  I curiously stuck my head in.  It was a lovely totally empty Korean restaurant.

I asked the waitress – the only person there – what kind of food they had.  She said, “Korean food”.  I’m not ignorant, but given the billing as a tapas bar, I was worried they wouldn’t have untapas food.  The menu came, it said Bibim Bar at the top, and I ordered the hot bowl of bibimbop.  She stuck her head through a window in the wall to the Setagaya Ramen kitchen and muttered some unintelligible Japo-Korean syllables.  Soon the raw egg came in a bowl.  Then the kimchi.  Minutes later, a hot bowl of cooked rice arrived with a few greens on top.  I poured in the egg and stirred.  It was good.

Back in class, I continued the discussion of Javascript until 6pm, at which time I had 2.5 hours to kill until Curtiss’s birthday party in Williamsburg.   I picked up a bottle of Slivovitz for Curtiss, a bottle of wine for the party, and hungry again, went in search of food.  Determined not to go back to Bibim Bar, Plump Dumpling, Menkui-Tei, Little Poland, or the Ukrainian East Village Restaurant  (and God forbid Vesulka), I found myself treading concrete towards Rai Rai Ken – the not good ramen.

Rai Rai Ken was packed with a mix of Asians, Americans, and Asian-Americans.  It’s a cozy place and inviting.  I found a seat near the door next to three pan-Asian men speaking English and ordered the Takuwan radish pickles and Curry Ramen.  I agree with Handy that the ramen experience depends significantly upon the right order, and I wanted to order correctly in order to be able to agree with Big Dan about Rai Rai Ken so as to reduce tension in the defense on the soccer field.  If we all like the same ramen, perhaps we will play better as a team.

Mediocre Rai Rai Ken Curry Ramen with Slivovitz wating behind

The pickles were a bit chewy, but very nice.  The Curry Ramen was good.  I enjoyed it.  Far better than the Shio Ramen I had sampled in a previous excursion.  The curry broth had a nice flavor and was not overdone with salt.  It seems that the meat is the weak point for Rai Rai Ken.  It’s overcooked and doesn’t ingratiate itself well with the pork broths.  More of an afterthought than an integral part of the dish.

Rai Rai Ken is mediocre ramen, but a nice enough place if ordering is done correctly.

The ocean wind slaps Main St. like a camel herder slaps his beast’s behind.  Two yarmulk-porting conservative young Jews furiously maneuver themselves to what are presumably their worried sleep-deprived mothers in the up ahead in the unimaginable future.  A backpack burdened night laborer and I trudge along behind. It’s late.

B&H is closed, not only because it’s 2am, but because it’s also Sukkot until Monday.  But that’s far away.  A Mexican sorts vegetables behind the Big Banana’s “Closed until 7am” sign.  My Korean laundryman is no doubt sleeping soundly.  King’s Bagels is open, not because it’s not Jewish, but because it values most highly the harvest yet to be cullled.  This is known, which is why I am here.

One short backpacked guy is doing some kind of dance for the behatted white guy behind the counter.  Another young guy in light white tee shirt and parachute pants has probably never seen Greese as he parades up and down the glass refrigerated display, searching for the night’s treat.  “You want me to buy a fridge for $150?,” he asks his almost invisible friend in a thick Brooklyn accent.  I can’t hear the response from his Semitic young male companion.  “Should I return this tee shirt to Target,” he pleads, oblivous to his surroundings. “The tags are still on it.”

“Aren’t you cold” asks the burly hispanic man behind the counter. “Yes, I am” he responds.  “What’s this, is it chocolate?,” he asks.  “Yes, it’s truly excellent,” responds the older guy behind the counter.  Night shift workers are not paid on commission, so he must be serious.

The boy orders the chocolate pudding.  I slowly canvas the glass case hoping to sneak a peak of the truly excellent offerings I am missing in the otherwise desperate environs.  No chocolate pudding to be seen.  In fact, there’s nothing remotely chocolate at all, just some miserable precontained strawberry yogurt and vanilla ice cream.  Has this all been a farce?

My turn comes.  I order a toasted poppy bagel with scallion cream cheese.  Dinner.

Lunch was a small lamb kebab at Kings Highway Grill.  The Turkik guy behind the counter initial addressed me as “Sir”.  He gestured for me to take a seat.  I watched an exaggeratedly outraged Fox News correspondent lambast the liberal takeover of American political life on the flat screen t.v. for the ten minutes it took my lamb to baste.  Then the Turkik called for me.

“What would you like with it?”

“What can I have?”

“Whatever you like”

“Kasha and Shepherd’s salad”

“I have a boxer”

“Angry dogs…”

“No, he’s very sweet.”

“You know Portuguese Water Dogs?”

“You mean the one Obamas have?”

“Yeah, that one.  They have webbed feet…  swim fast.”

“Obama should have big pit bull with studded collar.  We need a president like this,” he gestures, miming obesity, thick lips, and sunglasses.

“A big black guy!”  I’m excited to be playing Charades.

“Yes.  Have you ever seen black guy like Obama?  He’s not even black!”

“He’s a nerd”

“Nobody take him seriously.  We need a big black guy with pit bull.”

Back to Kings Bagels at 2:15am, John Travolta and his friend exit, and the backpacked boy somehow has found a connection with the servers.  I hear “Rob Zombie“, “System of a Down” proposed by the white man behind the counter.  To which the the boy responds with “Devil’s Reject.”  The age difference between the two must be close to 20 years, but it seems not to matter.

The boy leaves, and I hear the two servers discuss.  “He’s mellow”, says the one.  “Pretty cool,” says the other.  Somehow they move on with the conversation, and I can’t keep track.   “It’s exactly what I’m talking about,” the one says, imitating someone.  “I ain’t goin to lie to you.  I tell it like it is,” says the other.  “He’s not at home with it.”  “She’s cute, right?”

I lose track.  My bagel is ready.  I buy a coffee too, anticipating the time spent on the blog post to come.  As I fill it at the self-serve station, the one says, “It’s cold out isn’t it?”  In a place and a time like this, I feel like he actually isn’t sure, and is not simply trying to make conversation.  “It’s getting there,” I say.  “The weather’s changing,” he says.  “It’s about time,” I say.  “Summer is nasty.”

“I’m just the opposite,” he says.  “I like the warmth and sun,” he says.

“You’d better move somewhere else,” I say.