Harvard Square
Some food porn from Harvard Square
$1 Oyster Mondays at Rialto in Harvard Square, best with a squeeze of lemon
I adore oysters, the aftertaste of sea, the freshness and briny goodness cut through a zingy squirt of lemon. Add some good company, and it’s a party.
A turkey/avocado sandwich from Cafe Pamplona - so so
Also posted to the lovely 3 Buck Bites awhile ago.
I thought this was funny.
Found this on the walk between Central Square and Mulan, a great Chinese restaurant I ate at recently. Apparently they make candy.
Butter in Iceland, for real.
But of course!
Delightful, delicious Veggie Planet Pizza
Vegan Peanut Curry - with butternut squash instead of broccoli
Veggie Planet has made me sing songs of joy ever since I first visited a few months into freshman year and tasted the sweet revelation that is Lunch for Henry. Whenever people ask me my favorite restaurant in Harvard Square, the answer is invariably Veggie Planet… I prefer the cramped climes and uneven, sometimes crappy service to slick bars and charming beverage directors. It is the most dollar per happiness that you can find in Harvard Square, and being a poor student, that kind of economic calculation is irresistable. Veggie Planet is the kind of secret that I constantly push new people to discover – it’s the place I drag new and old friends to, and yes, I do judge people based on what they think of the food here. Which I don’t do so much. Or try not to, at least.
A few of my favorites:
- Portabello Redhead: mushrooms, red romesco sauce, feta cheese, caramelized onions
- Lunch/Dinner for Henry: butternut squash, goat cheese, caramelized onions
- Caesar on a Big Cheesy Crouton: Caesar salad with chopped kalamata olive and fried tofu croutons a cheesy flatbread crust
- Vegan Peanut Curry: a spicy curry on coconut rice with a smattering of peanuts, broccoli and fried tofu croutons
Roasted vegetables with brown rice - I killed this baby with a heaping of Sriracha hot sauce, and immediately regretted it... my taste buds are out of practice.
I tried this dish for the first time… was not too enthused about it. I also overloaded on the hot sauce, which was completely my fault. Too much hubris after writing this column for the Crimson.
Tiny tables, small stools, music fliers everywhere... Veggie Planet makes me extra happy and Asian.
Mini Red Velvet Cupcake
A mini red velvet cupcake ($1.95) from newly opened Sweet in Harvard Square before I demolished it.
How Lingbo Tried “Mouse Shit” Peppers; Emerged Victorious (Now with photos)
I had eaten everything from vegan bacon to blood sausage. Now it was time to seek a new holy grail of culinary extremes: a cuisine hot enough to hurt me.
I wanted to sear away my taste buds. I wanted tears to stream out of my eyes. I wanted something more wicked than wasabi and more nuanced than Tabasco.
What I wanted, in short, was real Thai food.
(This is an excerpt. This column appeared today in the Crimson, you can find the full text here.)
We started off with bowls of tom yum soup, filled with shrimp and slices of mushroom. Small chili flakes and a smattering of mean-looking oil floated about ominously on its surface.
The meal began abysmally. With my first mouthful, I choked on some chili flakes and spent a few minutes sputtering and speechless. Herzfeld’s wife handed me some Kleenex.
I had tripped on the starting line. Thankfully, the next two dishes—a beef satay with peanut sauce and “Tod Man Pla,” or fish cakes—were not spicy. I had ample time to recover.
In the meantime, Herzfeld imparted bits of Thai food trivia. The spicier Thai food got, he explained, the more you could taste the underlying ingredient.
“The metaphor I like is a fireworks display: an initial explosion followed by a fireworks display of the various flavors of the different spices,” Herzfeld said.
If in the course of adventurous eating you get burned, stay away from water. “Water weakens your saliva,” Herzfeld said. “If you’re being burned by something spicy, the trick is to eat rice.”
We then started on a platter of “Nua Yang Nam Tok,” or Waterfall Beef. The recipe calls for fish sauce and ground dried red chilis. I took a bite.
It had a bit of a kick, but I didn’t find it painful at all.
This was followed by a dish of green papaya salad, composed of long shreds of papaya with bean sprouts, green beans, shrimp, and peanuts, then dusted in ground chili. This was significantly spicier, like Ashlee Simpson, post-punk makeover. It actually got spicier as it cooled. I ate it with sticky rice served in a small woven container.
Noting that I had not collapsed, Herzfeld requested that our dishes be made spicier. “He’s worried about her,” Herzfeld said of the waiter’s trepidation. Maybe I should have worn khakis and combat boots instead of a skirt.
Then came a trio of delicious but unfrightening dishes: penang, with carrots, peas, and strips of chicken in a red curry, then ground chicken with basil (I doused it in sodium-laden fish sauce), and finally, “Stir Fry of a Shit Drunk Man.” You know, drunken noodles.
I wasn’t sure whether to feel disappointed or victorious. The food had definitely not been nuclear spicy, so I decided to make a final run for culinary extremes. I fished out a few infamous Thai “mouse shit” peppers from the pot of fish sauce. I popped them straight into my mouth.
The two professors looked at me expectantly. I chewed. And swallowed.
The burn was not a lot worse than a hit of Sriracha. They looked impressed. But later, as my body tried to digest the banquet, my stomach tingled and shuddered, a little angry at the introduction of straight-up chili pepper. I was proud. I felt that much more authentic.
Cafe Pamplona
Cafe Pamplona, a charming, yellow-painted cafe in Harvard Square, is the kind of place where you read your literature coursepack with a tiny cup of coffee (try the shot of espresso, shot of condensed milk combo). Due to its small space and close tables, this is a poor place to have a serious conversation or first date if it isn’t crowded enough and every awkward revelation is made very, very clear.
The food was pretty average to mediocre cafe fare, with a few pleasant surprises like a guava and muenster grilled cheese. Stay far away from the desserts, which were not worth the calories. The fruit tart was a hard, tasteless shell filled with a pedestrian vanilla pudding and topped with so-so fruit. 3.95. I’d rather have a Frapp.
The rum cake did a little better, but was nothing to blog about. Except for the fact I already have photos, so here they are.
