The Adventures of Starry Kitchen

Auf wiedersehen my dear Braised Coconut Pork! Since today is...

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 08:40:30 -0800

Auf wiedersehen my dear Braised Coconut Pork! Since today is your last day with us (for a lil bit, prolly not too long, maybe… I think), I dedicate this video (of extremely questionable quality) from The Sound Of Music! “Why?” you ask? Well maybe cause I LOVE that movie, and you should just play the video foo’!

(yeah, I am a straight guy that likes The Sound of Music… btw, did you know… that… “the HILLS are aliiiive, with the sound of MUUUUUUSIC… LaaaaAAAaaAA”… is that so WROOOOOONG!)

So we bid Adieu (like how I’m saying “goodbye” in all these European languages, it makes me sound so worldly and wise! ^^) to my favorite dish, and today… we’ve made a whole SH-T LOAD of it too. (A “SH-T LOAD” IS a quantitative measurement in certain countries and districts of LA County if I’m not mistaken LOL)

So pack your bags, bring your appetites and get ready to be very confused by our parking structure (if you’re driving, it’s on Olive between 2nd and 4th labeled 350 S. Grand ^_^)

If you can make it, don’t be too shy to say “Hi!”

Au revoir (Coconut Pork!)

Team SK

"He ate my PORK"

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 11:50:00 -0800

Here’s a lil poem I wrote for my my ALL-TIME-FAVORITE dish that we make and will be saying...

“Check check.. is this blog working?” (clearing...

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 08:38:00 -0800

“Check check.. is this blog working?”

(clearing throat)

HELLOOOOOOoooooOOOooOOOooo… DTLA,

It’s week 4, and we’re still here. I know, right? HOLY CRAP WE CAN’T BELIEVE IT OURSELVES EITHER!

We’ve survived, grown and learned for almost a month now, and we’re still gonna keep the hope alive (or something like that)! =)

What’s the subtitle for week 4, I dunno = “Why the hell not? Let’s just keep this train a chuggin’ along!”

That’s kinda cheesy and doesn’t describe anything? Oh well, that’s what you get when you type up the blog before your daily baguette run, okay? sheesh! ^_^

SO, as promised, the VIETNAMESE BRAISED COCONUT PORK rain-check offer still stands. For the next TWO days, we will NOT rotate it out and will offer it today and tomorrow. Here’s a fun sign for the FIRST day we operated outta our… ummm… yeah, APARTMENT!

Starting Weds (that’s March 10th for those that want to try to pick a fight w/ me just to confuse me on what day we “said” we promised), we will start serving THIS (aka TAIWANESE FRIED PORK):

(*drool*)

Ooooh man, so much to say, but not enough time… I’ll update this post with all the changes in a bit… until then, enjoy this AWESOME OK GO video that was posted recently. I mean, SERIOUSLY, this video is EFFIN’ INCREDIBLE! ^_^

Xoxo,

TEAM SK

.. And THIS is from our staff (from today’s board)! Crazy...

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 11:32:34 -0800

.. And THIS is from our staff (from today’s board)! Crazy how they’ve adopted our personality so quickly too (maybe even better than ME LOL). Hafta admit though, we *hearts* our staff!

“Houston.. we have PORK!” And today, for those...

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 09:55:34 -0800

“Houston.. we have PORK!” And today, for those foodie connoisseurs, we servin’ it up extra special and juicy (JUST) today too: Braised Coconut Pork BELLY! You no likey, s’alright, we do and less for you. (But we still *heart* you) Toodles, Team SK!

New SK lesson: “CONSISTENCY IS.. NICE?!?!” What does...

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 08:34:00 -0800

New SK lesson: “CONSISTENCY IS.. NICE?!?!”

What does that mean exactly since it’s one of those weirdly posed half-question/statements, right? (<- that’s one of those too LOL) Well, let’s put it this way before we get into the slumber inducing details, shall we:

The BAD (you can casually skip this part and/or get bored enough to click on YouTube now if you would like ^_^): today, and there’s a possibility I could be speaking/posting TOO soon, we WILL NOT be serving the VN BRAISED COCONUT PORK.

The GOOD #1: We haven’t been running out of sides this week, and not one threat of someone kicking me in my “sensitive child-making area” has been sighted. (whew)

The GOOD #2: Assuming the Kitchen Ninja confirms the pork is NO GOOD today, we will be bringing back (in limited quantity) KOREAN SHORT-RIBS (“K/Galbi”) today to fill the void left by the pork (damn you pork!)

(FYI- my “sensitive” area is on guard again!)

WHY? (AGAIN!)

Like the first time when we took it off the menu for a day, the pork was/is “no bueno!” Or to be specific, we found this last batch to be TOO FRICKIN’ DRY! (why JEEBUS! WHYYYY)

So WHAT’S the lesson with all this again?

Well, we gotta serve you food as consistent in quality as we can get it (aka don’t be a greedy and cheap-O “D-Bag” and serve CRAP ^_^) And you know what, we can’t serve ya food we wouldn’t eat ourselves. (even though SOME of you push us to anyway, we can’t have that.. FOO’S)

The pork is quite tender, but still very dry. Not to go into too much detail, but we’ve been dealing with different vendors, different and yet similar cuts of pork and also working a non-fire based range (electric induction) which adds a lot of variables (which we think we’ve isolated in a very “qualitative” aka “boring” scientific way… FINALLY)

So TEAM SK, watcha gonna do?

I’m glad you asked oh mysterious internet reader: for every day we’ve MISSED serving the BRAISED COCONUT PORK, we’re going make up for those days next week!

So as of today, the total tally is kinda/sorta/IS: 2 DAYS! So we’ll serve that for the first 2 days of next week.

And since it’s on us (double DOH!), I’ll go ahead and tell you the dish we’re thinking of replacing it with (which we’ll start up RIGHT after the lost Coconut Pork time is made up ^^):

TAIWANESE FRIED PORK! (w/ some crispy-tastic pics below… *droooooool*)

We just tried these last night, and they’re SO good! Oh man, we can’t wait to serve these up to ya guys. :)

Well, I think that kind of sums it up for today kiddos. We ain’t perfect, and we never profess to be (or did I…hmmmmm). If you have any suggestions, wanna send me not-so-nice messages because you’re not happy, or found my money in that bank in Nigeria I’ve been lookin’ for (it’s about $20,000,000 USD or so if I remember correctly): just e-mail me or post on our Facebook wall.

Toodles (and hoping you don’t hate us… yet),

TEAM SK

I feel like I gotta keep up these daily posts again (which I do...

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 15:59:10 -0800

I feel like I gotta keep up these daily posts again (which I do thoroughly enjoy ^_^), but I’m so busy I can’t say much.. So, Cal Plaza.. HAPPY HUMP DAY from TEAM SKDT! (muah) .. Oh yeah, and only two more days of Braised Coconut Pork deliciousness too ;)

“SIIIIIIIIIIIDES!” Some people are yelling that...

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 07:42:00 -0800

“SIIIIIIIIIIIDES!”

Some people are yelling that because they love ‘em, and others are yelling that (at us) because we’ve been consistently running out of ‘em (DOH!)

For that, I write this apology letter, and no this isn’t a sarcastic F’ U letter.. we really mean it and think it sucks so…:

Dear DTLA’ers, new+old SK fans:

It has come to our attention that…. okay, I know, we just CAN’T make enough sides (& brown rice) to accommodate the shear MADNESS that ensues during the lunch rush. Very simply, I wanted to take a moment and say:

“DOH! We’re so SORRY!”

We profess to keep a “D-Bag Free Zone” and here we are… being “D-Bags” for running out of sides… OOOOOOOOH the IRONY!

Some of you may think that we’re gonna play that “newbie card” right about now…but I’m NOT! :) I know the consequences of that card (if one “consequence” were a free trip to the Bahamas I would probably then use that “card” all the time LOL), and in this case it isn’t that… entirely.

Honest to a higher-power (<- “higher-power” instead of “God” ‘cause everyone has different ideologies, and I don’t wanna be too narrow in this apology :D) TRUTH: We have actually been making MORE every day, but we can’t keep up or anticipate the amount of growth we’ve had since SKDT has opened. And THAT’S the truth.

It’s not a ploy, gimmick or some manipulative game we’re playing to make you mad, and risk me getting kicked full thrust in my very sensitive “child-making area” (“OUCH!”), I can promise you that. We wanna make you happy, not mad! We just never realized how fast word would spread about us.

So please accept this apology without completely playing the “newbie card.” We genuinely want you guys to try all our different food (since we have like 50 different dishes), so it’s in our best interest for you guys to try as much as possible so we can figure out what YOU love the best.

The Solution? We’re going to keep INCREASING the quantities until we find that sweet spot so everyone can have a taste.

Thank you DTLA. If you read this far, then I apologize for boring you and please accept my apology for your boredom as well. Thanks.

Much love,

Nguyen, Thi (<- the Kitchen Ninja!) and GQ Tran (<-SK Mascot Extra-ORDINAIRE!)

(end apology letter)

…

And on that note, I know I’ve used this before in a post a LONG time ago when I used to have 5 readers (3 of which were me just refreshing the screen 3 times to increase my stats ;p), but now “we so HAPPY… we do the dance of JOY!”

…man I used to love PERFECT STRANGERS. Am I alone on this… anyone, anyone?!?! ^_^

See you guys today… with MORE sides!

Xoxo,

TEAM SK

Quick note: my breath will be 1000% fresher these days as I...

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:45:35 -0800

Quick note: my breath will be 1000% fresher these days as I pitch, convince, persuade & charm you into eating our food (if you need any of that effort that is). I apologise if my breath was stinky.. That problem has been rectified (I think ^_^)

Welcome to Week 3 = “The Rotation Revolution” Is it...

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 10:34:37 -0800

Welcome to Week 3 = “The Rotation Revolution”

Is it THAT revolutionary to rotate the menu?? NAW! But for this area… ummm… YEAH!

As far as the rotation rules, we have come up with that we will keep ALL DISHES WILL STAY AT LEAST 2 WEEKS. So don’t fret, we won’t rotate TOO often if you find something you love. And once we figure out what people love the most… some MIGHT become more available than others. :)

So, we’ll make this short, but a quick re-cap of what’s new and what’s gone:

GONE!

Korean Short-Ribs
Crispy Tofu Balls (I know, I know you guys like this… soon… soon!)
Pineapple Fried Rice
Curry Fried Rice (from week 1)
Korean Glass Noodles (Japchae)

NEW

Japanese Meatball (aka Hamburger) Curry (uh huuuuh… CUUUUURRRY!)
- A short quote from a description of these from our former Underground mailing list: “As you get to know us, you’ll find that we love many a thing… and that includes honey panko and eggs. And this patty’s got plenty of those to give it a mouth-watering flavor that will send you home in a euphoric state, kick up your feet, and find you some FLAVOR-OF-LOVE on tv cause that sh-t’s hilarious.”
Stir-Fried Kimchi + King Oyster Mushrooms
- And another short quote on these badboys: “Hmmm… what’s the best way to describe this in as few words or sounds as possible… (KA-BOOOOM) <- that being an explosion of flavor and texture in your mouth of course! It’s a tasty veg especially w/ King Oyster Mushrooms giving it a high-class texture of Abalone (that’s an expensive sea food appreciated by Asians between you and me) but at a fraction of the price, oh BOY!”
Sliced Jalapenos!
- Many of you asked, so now you shall receive. If you want them, just ask! We offer than now for people that are like me because your food has to “hurt SO good!”
Chiles en Escaveche
- Our Sous Chef Juvencio thought this would be a good addition and option for customers… so we offer it starting TODAY! Let us know how you like ‘em, they’re PURDY tasty! :) Here’s even a picture for you ‘cause we loves ya so much:

LAST WEEK FOR:

VN Braised Coconut Pork (my personal fave)
- Them’s the rules, so come get it this week before we boot it (and trust me… I’m personally gonna be sad when we do, it’s my ALL TIME FAVE!!!)

Alrighty, let’s see what F’ Ups… ummm… I mean “LESSONS” week 3 brings us! Thanks everyone.

Xoxo,

TEAM SK

I opened a restaurant in my living room... Pop-up restaurants are the latest foodie trend, but would you open your doors? | Mail Online

Sat, 27 Feb 2010 12:44:00 -0800

I opened a restaurant in my living room... Pop-up restaurants are the latest foodie trend, but would...

WHOOPSEE UPDATE: Forgot to mention that today is ALSO the last...

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 07:31:00 -0800

Pre-crispification Tofu Goodness

Crispy Tofu FOOD PORN!

WHOOPSEE UPDATE: Forgot to mention that today is ALSO the last day for KOREAN GLASS NOODLES (Japchae) AND the PINEAPPLE FRIED RICE! We’re changing a whole LOTTA stuff next week (but it’ll be tasty… we promise ^_^)

An Ode to Crispy Tofu Balls

(aka Please don’t hurt us friends cause we might bruise easily emotionally and physically ^_^)

As many of you already know, today is the last day (prolly only for a lil bit) for the Crispy Tofu Balls AND the Korean Short-Ribs (everyone talks about the tofu, but no one remembers lil ol’ Mr. “K/Galbi” LOL), and will be the beginning of our attempt to rotate the menu and see… just SEE if Cal Plaza can take this kind of change that we experimented with back in the “old days” of our humble apartment beginnings. ^_^

If you’re around, stop by… today we made a whole LOTTA Crispy Tofu Balls… it’s gonna be a CRISPY TOFU BALL BLOWOUT, so we shouldn’t run out too early (hopefully ;D)

So in honor of some people being very vocal about us taking away the tofu balls, here’s a short montage of pics above that we’d like to share with you… next time we’ll add a lil music (maybe some nice Journey, Air Supply or even… Lady GAGA!) , some nice lighting… and of course top it off with some more spicy mayo for good and tasty measure (damn I’m drooling just typing this up!)

And I KNOW some of you guys are like,

“Is the Starry Kitchen couple CRAZY?!?! Why are they taking them Crispy Tofu Balls away from me? WHHHHHHHHHHHHHY?”

(ducking punches, kicks in the balls and possible tofu balls being thrown at me… but I know you wouldn’t waste our precious lil green babies like that, would you? ^^)

Well first off, it’s because we’ve already started prepping for next weeks dishes. We’d love to have the tofu balls AND what we’re making next week (the dish is not totally a secret if you read the LA Times Daily Food Blog, link below ^_^), but if you wouldn’t believe it we still stay at SKDT until like 10p or 11p every night prepping all the food! We’re still getting the hang of it, but making fresh food to be served FAST is no joke (but we are having a lot of fun doing it though :D)

Also because… well, we have around 50 dishes in our repertoire (I just love using that word for some reason, makes me sound distinguished!) and just maybe… MAYBE… you might like some of the other ones too. Can you blame us for wanting to shed a lil bit of light on some of the other culinary creations the Kitchen Ninja’s crazy mind has come up with? (Maybe I should finally get to that post about ALL the dishes we’ve done, huh?)

Plus if you’ve been by SKDT, then you’ve possibly heard my spiel about how we’re “Hot Shit” right now, but we’ll be “Not Shit” in “5 minutes” because… well, you/everyone gets bored after a while. We gots to spice it up in Cal Plaza and see what happens.

I will say if you guys are continually vocal about it after we rotate dishes once or twice… it could come back faster than you think! (wink wink)

WHOA the press!

On a quicky note, SCHNIKES it’s pretty crazy that we’ve been open almost two weeks now, and we’ve had more write-ups (Eater LA, Grub Street LA, LA Times Daily Food Blog+Print) and foodie blog reviews (MidTownLunch, The Minty) than we thought we’d have, get or even see… but it’s pretty cool and we’ll take it! LOL

On that note, here’s a lil song I’d like to dedicate to… CRISPY TOFU BALLS by your and my friend… USHER w/ this USHER-riffic classic… oh YES! Just imagine singing this song to the tofu balls… and HEY, if someone were to organize doing like an a capella version of this for the tofu balls, how could we say “No” to bringing it back then!?!?! LOL

Toodles,

TEAM SK

In celebration (and YES, celebration) of our FIRST 2-Star review...

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 10:58:03 -0800

In celebration (and YES, celebration) of our FIRST 2-Star review using the nick name that we coined first, “Sorry Kitchen”, I will be wearing THIS to make sure ppl know, “Hey, only SOME ppl love us.. Kinda/sorta/maybe!” (I LOVE fodder like this review ^^)

Whoa blog updates have been lacking: gotta pick up bread, greet...

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:38:10 -0800

Whoa blog updates have been lacking: gotta pick up bread, greet people, run the register, tweet, do FB updates, pick-up equipment and etc (blah blah blah). This AM’s post: THIS is what happened yesterday. 2 more days before we take away the tofu balls. =)

Happy Saturday SK fans! Our fan+friend, Danny Pesses, brought us...

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 21:38:00 -0800

Happy Saturday SK fans! Our fan+friend, Danny Pesses, brought us some more stuff from NOLA. SCORE! This time he brought us Cafe du Monde beignet mix (banana beignets, here we come!) Here’s GQ literally sniffing the box for 5 min straight. Hilarious! :)

Day 4: “The LINE must move forward.. and FAST!” WOW...

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 09:35:04 -0800

Day 4: “The LINE must move forward.. and FAST!” WOW we were so surprised and unprepared (ie long wait) by even more people yesterday coming in large waves. DOH! SORRY everyone, we’re still n00bs, BUT we’re gonna to fix that today. We promise-womise ;)

Day 3: “The Return of the Beautiful Banh Mi Bread...

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 10:11:35 -0800

Day 3: “The Return of the Beautiful Banh Mi Bread Baguette!” Our baker, went on Chinese New Year holiday RIGHT when we opened so we had to use someone else.. Until NOW! If you liked our banh mi before, get ready for this sucka (its so DAMN g00d!)

SKDT Day 2! Whew yesterday was busy & a learning experience...

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 09:49:08 -0800

SKDT Day 2! Whew yesterday was busy & a learning experience (w/ much more to learn). Were we perfect? Naw! Were we fast? Sure seemed like it! Was everyone happy? Dunno. We got a 5-star & 3-star review yesterday. At least no one was pissed (I think). =)

LATE NITE DELIRIOUS UPDATE: DOH, just updated the pic above to...

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:05:00 -0800

LATE NITE DELIRIOUS UPDATE: DOH, just updated the pic above to click-thru to a much more READABLE menu (just in case you wanna eat our food or something, right?!?!) Oh yeah, I wanted to include a video to tide you over at the end of this post (HINT: it’s my FAVORITE Karaoke song of ALL-TIME… YES!), but it’s LATE and it won’t let me so click this LINK for one of the best guilty pleasures of all time! (next to SK lunchie munchies of course ^_^)

So HERE we are SK fans, n00bs and family/friends alike. Our experiment gone RIGHT has made it this far, and since many of you may be new I’ve included a link the the current version of the menu for you (that and it’s cheaper than actually paying for an FTP host LOL).

Check it out, check out the links on the left… and if you work in DTLA in the Financial District… hopefully you’ll come check us and don’t hesitate to say “Hi!” either. I might be the shyest Asian guy you’ve ever met, but sometimes I come out of my shell and make an effort.

Thanks a bunch, and let’s rock it!

PS - FREE SOFT DRINKS FOR EVERYONE THIS WEEK! Why? Well, the answer to that is the same to why we started this experiment in the first place… WHY NOT?

Xoxo,

TEAM SK

Just thought it would be nice to post a video instead of just...

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 14:13:00 -0800

Just thought it would be nice to post a video instead of just a… ummm… text only post from US! Time to bring in that year of the Tiger (Grrrrrrr), and see what this m’fer called SK can do!

Thanks for everyone’s support thus far. We love you all (well, except for the D-bags… we only KINDA like you guys ^_^)

PS - when playing back the video, GQ howls WITH the video. HILARIOUS

Xoxo,

TEAM SK