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Fast Food

Sabei, sabei.

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Pad Thai

On our never-ending quest to find good value Asian food we followed the pointer of one of my food-loving colleague-friends to Chang’s on Grünwälderstraße. They had exactly two tiny round tables out front and we were lucky enough to catch one of them.

For starters, I had their satay gha, two chicken tender skewers with a dry rub spice mix and a nutty jelat peanut dip. Slightly dry but very tasty and good starting.

Next up were pad thai and fried duck in a savoury spicy sauce with chili, thai basil and vegetables. The duck was lovely crispy but still had a thin and jiggly fat layer sitting underneath that scrumptious skin. Sauce and vegetables were delicious with a good, yet not too unique taste to them. That pad thai though, it was, I’m not sure how to say it any other way but AWESOME! This was probably the best version of pad thai I had around here and since this is one of M.’s favorite noodle dishes we had quite a few. It had the right balance of tamarind, prawns were great and there was that certain tang. Loved it.

Get Your Grub On!

Chang Thaiküche
Grünwälderstraße 21
79098 Freiburg im Breisgau
Germany
p: +49 761 1379 684
http://chang-thaikueche.de/

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A new meister is in town.

Cheeseburger with curly fries.

Cheeseburger with curly fries.

There’s a new burger place in town and thankfully it opened up just a short 3min walk away from the office. The place is run by the guys from Mr. Döner at Eschholzstraße and since apparently their small selection of burgers went quite well over there, they decided to open a dedicated shop in the old halls of the former Hanselmann.

Quite a few colleagues and friends went during the opening week and I heard a wide array of feedback about the food and service, from delicious burgers to mixed up orders there was everything. As the feedbacks above suggest, kickoff weeks are not very representative of the standard of a newly opened place but I didn’t intend to wait any longer and so two colleagues and I went to pay the Burgermeister a visit, a little earlier too, to beat the lunch crowds. As time would tell, this turned out to be a rather clever move.

Closeup cheeseburger

Closeup cheeseburger

We had two cheeseburgers with sesame buns, one of the vegetarian options in a spelt roll and curly fries for everybody. The burgers have sort of the perfect size, manageable, neither tiny nor ridiculously huge but the 140gram patties could be just a notch thicker to allow for medium and rare broils as well. Anyhow, they still had a rustic charr, meaty flavours and were full of their natural juices. I truly enjoyed my sandwich and those crispy curly fries. Their signature Meistersauce, some kind of cocktail sauce, worked its magic nicely on the burgers and fries and gave it all a bit of refreshing lightness. The garlic sauce, however, should only be consumed, if you don’t have any meetings lined up in the afternoon or if you actually don’t mind having intense dragon breath.

No complaints really, our orders were all correct and came out quickly, the food was very enjoyable and the customization options – beef, bio beef, chicken and vegetarian | three types of buns | multiple side and sauce options – provide much more room to experiment for coming visits. A big table of colleagues across the room wasn’t as lucky with their ordering but I guess and hope this was because the daily routine hasn’t entirely settled in yet. I’ll definitely come back for some of that bio beef and chicken and wish you guys a great second start in the neighbourhood.

Get Your Grub On!

Burgermeister Beef & Vegan (former Hanselmann)
Klarastraße 46
79106 Freiburg im Breisgau
Germany
p: +49 761 7667 0430
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36hrs in Food Paradise – Hour 25, Curry

DSC01887-01After my delightful afternoon snack, I went on to pick up my friend at work, grabbed a coffee at his shared office space, enjoyed the view and moved on to stroll through Düsseldorf without any particular destination. Somehow we ended up at the urban harbor down at the Rhine river and just hung out at some pedestrian bridge for a bit enjoying the quiet Friday afternoon.

Since he didn’t get anything to eat since lunch he suggested a quick currywurst run to a shop around the corner and not being hungry at all myself I just went with it.  A 10-minute-walk away we sat down outside an obviously popular fast food joint with waiters that cracked me up every time they opened their mouth. I was still a little full from my second lunch so my friend managed the ordering. His choice fell on the spicy currywurst and, after a short dispute about necessary portion sizes, on the large fries with mayo and raw onions to share. The fries were good, crisp and plenty, and worked just great with the thick onion mayonnaise but the sausage lacked a bit of snap and wasn’t really spicy at all, more fruity actually. Since my mate comes here frequently though he confirmed this was not the usual, so it probably just got mixed up in the process. Happens.

There is tasty food here, a definitely entertaining bunch of people and the place comes with a nice little beer selection of local and ‘foreign’ brews like Zäpfle pils from Rothaus. A nice local hangout for pre and post-party grub and beers.

Get Your Grub On!

Curry
Hammer Straße 2
40219 Düsseldorf
Germany
p: +49 211 3032 857
http://www.curry-deutschland.de/

Currywurst & Pommes Schranke

IMG_20170713_122004-01We started coming to Casino Service Milz on occasion with some of our developer colleagues who are quite the regulars here. It actually serves as the cantine for the train (Deutsche Bahn) personnel, is located just down the road from our office and seemed like a good new option to further expand our ever growing catalog of lunch options.

Thursday is the day of the week here when the queue grows the longest, and the only unhealthy reason being, its fries and currywurst day. You can opt vegetarian but the standard set contains this massive red sausage buried under a mountain of fries. The sausage is good but the curry ketchup gravy was a bit thin yet still enjoyable and enhanced using the help-your-self-curry-powder-dispenser it actually got pretty tasty. The fries were crispy enough and I got them some creamy dippy company in form of mayonnaise and ketchup because what difference does it make now anyway right?

It’s a cantine charm no matter what and probably it’s also not your most healthy joint in these waters but it’s good food prepared and served by nice people in slightly too generous portions, and all that to a really good price (EUR5,20 for the dish of the day).

Get Your Grub On!

Casino Service Milz
Wentzingerstraße 7a
79106 Freiburg im Breisgau
Germany
p: +49 761 212 3327
http://casino-service-milz.com/

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What an amazingly beautiful day it has been yesterday and the city was full of locals, students, tourists, and shopaholics alike soaking up the sun and roaming the streets of Freiburg, filling them like ants. We were right in the middle of it and completely lost track of time until our stomachs started growling to let us know a lunch was way overdue. It was lunch madness and almost every place around the Bermuda Dreieck (= Bermuda Triangle; a corner area in Freiburg) was packed with customers and some fast food joints even had queues oozing out their doors. Thankfully I had done my homework so we didn’t have to go on another hangry food quest and just around the corner, nestled between a garage something and another restaurant, Burger Chalet awaited us. As the name tells it’s a popular little burger joint and luckily the queue was sort of short and two lovely ladies allowed us to join them at their table for one of the rare options to sit outside enjoying the sun today.

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Burger of the Month: Himmel & Ääd Burger (Heaven & Earth)

Beforehand I had made plans to get my grub on with that ‘Alpenfeuer’ (Fire of the Alps) burger that comes with a chili-cheese-sauce, firy jalapeños and a homemade chili powder. Well, plans are great, but then life happens and as so often I did let another menu special item distract me and lead me off my  destined path. Without even thinking I heard myself ordering a medium grilled burger of the month, the ‘Himmel & Ääd’ (Heaven & Earth). Himmel & Ääd or Himmel & Erde is a popular and regional german dish, which is mostly common in the Rhineland, Westphalia, and Lower Saxony. In it’s purest version it consists of blood pudding, mashed potatoes, fried onions and apple sauce and actually so did this burger. Together with that juicy beef patty and wedged between two appropriately sized and perfectly toasted buns this just worked. All these very different textures and flavors merged together wonderfully and created something new and delicious. My favorite, besides the remarkable standard items of the burger, was the thin slice of tangy blood pudding, that added a spicy, almost creamy component on top of the patty. The tart and sweet apple chutney gave some fruity notes and the onions, being sweetish as well convinced with a light smokiness. The only thing that didn’t do too much for the whole concept and the flavor palette was the mashed potatoes, and frankly, it made it all just a bit more difficult to eat. I do get it though, it completes the transition of the traditional plated dish to a hands-on inventive burger. Fries were good.

Additionally to the fact that they know how to cook their stuff it’s worthy to mention that they are sourcing most of their ingredients locally, aren’t using any additives, the meat is freshly ground every day and they are making all their sauces themselves and from scratch as well. A lot of craft and thought goes into every burger here and the entire menu is also available with an in-house made vegetable patty for the vegetarians out there. The shop is small and cozily set up for a quick meal in a relaxing atmosphere, however, the glass barrier in front of the grill can’t save you entirely from all the food smell, so don’t mind taking a bit of burger scent home with you. The staff seems to enjoy themselves, is friendly and the guy  behind the counter was particularly fun to chat to. I was super full and happily content when we left and already have the next visit scheduled in my head. This time hopefully trying my original choice of burger and those fabulous looking rosemary potatoes. Thanks for the great grub.

Get Your Grub On!

Burger Chalet (closed on Sundays and public holidays)
Niemenstraße 9
79098 Freiburg im Breisgau
Germany
p: +49 761 278 382
http://www.burger-chalet.de/

FreiBurgern.

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BBQ Bacon Burger

Okay, so I am actually gonna take up writing again. The great thing is I have a lot of material to practice on as I still took loads of pictures during my year off, made notes about almost every mentionable meal and also have collected a big library of audio reviews, that I’ll try to transfer piece by piece onto digital paper. So don’t be surprised if there are some backdated reviews popping up in between. This one’s a rather recent one and a place I wanted to try for a while now. derfreiBurger was one of the places leading the rise of burger joints (the newer ones are mainly food trucks) in Freiburg and is located conveniently in a side street along Schwarzwald City. It’s a pretty tiny place with only few seating options; some bar kinda seating, a big shared table or if you’re lucky enough a little booth area for 4-5 people. It’s like a little fast food restaurant, where someone put some extra effort in, giving it a bit of a more homely feel.

Against my instincts, I went for the BBQ-Bacon-Burger (EUR5.80), that comes with a fried onion ring and loads of bbq sauce. When it flew out the open kitchen my first impression was, that there’s something off with that patty to bun ratio. Don’t get me wrong the meat is definitely big enough for that price, it just gets a little lost in that huge roll, which doesn’t do it actual justice. They get the freshly baked buns from a local bakery and use only fresh, well-seasoned beef for their burgers and you can actually taste that extra bit of craftsmanship. I also enjoyed that sweet and crispy onion ring very much and absolutely loved their homemade smokey bbq sauce. That last one was important because there was loads of it, like close to sloppy joe’s kinda loads (so you better like it saucy). For me, the bacon strips could’ve used a couple more seconds on the flat pan to crisp up but were nice and salty anyway. Pretty good.

So the place is tiny but also not meant for you to spend hours in it, the people working behind the counter are genuinely nice and the food is mostly homemade, pretty tasty and for that very very reasonably priced. So to sum things up, I maybe would have wished for a thicker and juicier patty in general but in that price range this is a great burger overall and I’ll probably come back and check out some other menu items, like that Chilli-Cheese-Dog that caught my eye. Thanks for the delicious burger and all the best.

Get Your Grub On!

derfreiBurger (closed on Sundays and public holidays)
Schiffstraße 16
79098 Freiburg
Germany
http://www.derfreiburger.de/

The Hot Dog Lottery.

editDSC00360After Smorgasburg, we started exploring Williamsburg. We walked around for a while, had a cold one here and there and then came across one of Crif Dog’s shops. Not being overly hungry we still decided to go in and try them out. The place had an arcade / comic store kind of interior with some action figures sitting in glass displays on the wall and tables made from old pac-man machines and such. While my buddy went for their lottery meal including two dogs (the cook decides which dogs you will get) I just went with a classic crif dog with relish, onions, sauerkraut and mustard.

The smoked beef and pork wiener tasted quite nice with just a little snap to it. The sauerkraut was rather light in taste but nicely crunchy and the onions and relish unfortunately, didn’t add too much to it. I would say it’s a decent quick snack in between or a late night supper pitstop, but nothing I would really go out of my way for. There are many other dogs on their menu to try though and the chili dog, that my friend got actually looked pretty delicious so if I should ever pass a Crif Dogs again, I will most likely give it another shot. The guy behind the counter was pretty funny, though.

Get Your Grub On!

Crif Dogs (open daily)
555 Driggs Avenue
Brooklyn
NY 11211
United States of America
p: +1 718 302 3200
http://www.crifdogs.com/

Momofuku Tour – Part 1.

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Special Spicy Fried Chicken Sandwich (w/ Daikon)

We came to New York for a couple of days on our way through to Montreal to visit some great old friends from Singapore, who moved here about a year ago. Thankfully both of them are crazy foodies and so there were no arguments on how to spend our quality time together. Today we walked around the Lower East Side of Manhattan and passed Momofuku Ko, which gave our hosts the idea to start a little bit of a Momofuku sightseeing tour. It was getting pretty late for lunch so our first stop waited just around the corner in the form of Fuku, the popular fried chicken sandwich shop out of David Chang’s culinary empire. This place is tiny and if I remember it right, only has standing options for their customers.

We had to pay while going in and following the recommendation of my mate I purchased the special sandwich and one of their alcoholic beverages. I was kind of surprised that a fried chicken sandwich shop actually serves something, that reminded me of a pretty mean frozen margarita. Wow, that thing was strong. Anyway, I was half through my aperitif when the sandwiches showed up. The whole thing was huge, and the little soft bun was just big enough to keep everything together and your fingers sort of clean. The meat was breaded with a nicely spicy and crunchy coating and super juicy on the inside. I must admit I really liked this one, even though I would normally disagree with Mr. Chang’s view on the white parts of the meat being inferior. I actually love me some good chicken breast from time to time. White meat, dark meat, in the end it all comes down to texture for me, but this chicken thigh with its’ crispy coat did a very fine job. But what makes the special sandwich so special? A big slap of crunchy daikon shavings, which also made the otherwise fairly heaty dish a bit lighter for me. I did also get the chance to sample the famous Säam sauce, their take on a Korean chili paste with an angle. It was intriguingly addictive and I enjoyed it enough to use it on every other bite from that sandwich, I’m just not entirely sure if I actually loved it.

Anyway the concept works, fast food with great quality ingredients, nice taste with a different set of flavors and some booze to go with it. Why the hell not?

Fuku (open all week)
163 First Avenue
New York
NY 10003
United States of America
http://momofuku.com/new-york/fuku/

❤ tacos.

The Holy Taco Shack - Food Truck
I collected a huge repertoire of food memories and pictures since I have been back to Europe, mainly because I have been traveling a fair bit to the Netherlands/Holland, Switzerland, France, Spain and Italy, which of the two latter were very focused on the local food experience. That aside I think it’s only appropriate to choose a place in Germany for my first review since almost a year, not German cuisine however representative for what’s going on here at the moment. The Holy Taco Shack is part of the reinvention of the culinary scene in Germany right now. Many people put a totally different value on the food they sell and eat today with a lot of love for detail and appreciation for culinary skill. Some results out of this are the growing numbers of food trucks as well as street food festivals and markets that seem to have started in Berlin but already have spread into all corners of Germany. This particular truck, or actually more a food trailer, is run by a German-American couple that left their former jobs behind and started their own business filling the big gap of proper Mexican food in Germany and thankfully decided to do so in beautiful Freiburg.

The Holy Taco Shack - Classic Tacos Mango SalsaAfter many missed opportunities to try their food before, I finally managed to be in Freiburg at the right time for their weekly appearance at the Rieselfeld Market on Saturday. We went fairly early, as apparently their food sometimes sells out rather quickly and I wanted to have free choice. So here I was, ordering my first round of Classic Tacos – a set of three – with all the meats from the menu, chicken chipotle, beef brisket and my secret passion, the carnitas, medium spicy with some extra mango salsa on the side. They use their homemade corn tortillas, made from maíz azul (a black purple-ish type of corn) that have a bit more to them than the regular corn tortillas. It might be just the colour but I thought they were pretty great. Now on to the inner values and I must say that all of the meats were exceptionally delicious. The beef was super nice and tender like it was slow cooked for ages (which it probably was) and the chicken, which I expected to be either a bit on the dry side or drowning in sauce, I liked even more, just so juicy and fantastic. My other expectation though proved to be right; the carnitas are still my absolute favourite. They were wonderful moist with a good char on the edges that had touched the hot plate, an insanely good combination of meat and fats. The homemade medium salsa was just right, not too spicy but still gave me a kick on my tongue and the mango version for an extra €1 was the perfect companion and totally worth it. Fruity, slightly sour and refreshing in between the flavour party going on around here.

The Holy Taco Shack - Spicy Classic TacosSince I wasn’t sure when I’d be having another chance to eat here again I went for a second round of the same, just this time with the spicy salsa and the extra jalapeños. This salsa is fun and squeezed cold sweat right out of my head so that I wished I would have ordered this mango pineapple salsa again to cool things down a little bit. All in all amazing food.

It was busy that day, the queue got longer and they still stayed cool and friendly even that many people were asking a lot of questions about the food and the TV show they have just been part of. I hope I’ll be able to come here many more times, it’s good to have you guys around, keep it up and all the best.

The Holy Taco Shack
Maria-von Rudloff-Platz 1
79111 Freiburg
Germany
Tel: +49 176 329 70 414
http://theholytacoshack.com/

P.S.: This is their usual Wednesday and Saturday location but follow their Twitter or Facebook for the latest updates and additional spots.

Taiwan’s Famous Fried Chicken In Singapore!

imageSince a friend told me about this place in Taipei I wanted to try it, so when they opened a shop in Singapore my mission was clear.

When we went I ordered the “Spicy Chicken” with “Garlic Fries”. They fry up everything the same way and later sprincle different spice mixes on chicken and fries to give them their individual taste. My chicken was not too hot and quiet tasty on the breast part. To my surprise I found some neckbones in mine but the portion was generous enough to fill me up good anyway. The fat is well drained so the chicken does not taste greasy at all but comes along a tad dry because of the powder spice mix. Mine was alright together with a drink but my friend blew off garlic powder clouds everytime he took a bite. All in all a nice junkfood alternative but far from a culinary epiphany.

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