Come SALSA with Me!

Dance your way towards downtown and give this new spot a chance to delight you.
It is so grey outside I decided to try this new Venezuelan restaurant Arepa and Salsa.
What a great splash of color and an interesting new taste to discover right on Madison Ave.

The party vibe prepared me for a treat and they did not disappoint me
First they have really cool glasses and super nice plates. I am interested in plating now so I was really impressed. They have this lively music playing and bright color walls. It is really nice. I loved it.

I tried the UFO empinads which I did not personally like but the topas cups were so yummy I wanted more. The spicy plantain cup- (a type of banana) filled with a spicy meat, diced tomatoes and a cilantro mayo they were just so good.

I tried 2 sandwiches one plantain and one Arpes.

I preferred the Arepa with the roast pork. It was a big cornmeal disc filled with yummy shredded pork and garnished with a garlic mayo. It came with thin homemade chips also nice. The plate looked great and we dived in!
The plantain sandwich was good, it had a beef filling. It had a mustard coleslaw on it. I personally don't love mustard. So the Arpes was just better.

The Flan with cake was our dessert choice. It had a complex taste and was very good. Very velvety. The plate was so lovely too you could just tell it was a treat.


All the details are just perfect and very impressive. Since I originally wrote this I have been back and tried more items. I loved the Mango juice and the big plate of food was nice but the Arpes sandwich is still the best!

OH, Now for the best part.... they have a video game machine with FREE games!!! Who doesn't love Asteroids!!!
Go try it!!!

Love the Cabbage,

Leaf

Bleu , its not just a color it is a Cuisine!

 Blue- cool, fun, vibrant, and relaxing. Bleu, cool, fun, vibrant and its own cuisine! 

If a kid could have a best friend Chef Robbie Cirillo is mine. He is the Chef at Bleu in the Westin Hotel in downtown Memphis. I got to go there for lunch last Saturday and it was phenomenal!

 

    

 

 

I had clam chowder for starters and it was the best I have ever had and I have been to Boston. It was light tasting and the flavors blended together perfectly. I detected hint of bacon and dill as well as some other good stuff. It was not from a can.

They brought some bread knots with a special olive oil with a red wine reduction. It was spicy with an unexpected sweetness. I did like it.

They have a cool small menu that you got to check for B.Y.O.B. or Build your own Burger. I chose a big angus burger well done, chipolte mayo, garlic aloi, a grilled provolone cheese bun (the signature), tomato, lettuce, bacon, pickles, and a side of fruit salad. When I say a grilled cheese bun I mean 2 huge grilled cheese sandwich OMBLEU!
  I did get to try the mushroom topping and the fries too. They were both very good. I am sorry to say I forgot to take a picture of the burger. Wait can I say it was too good to not devour. 
My best friend Chef Robert let me go into the kitchen and see the inner workings of Bleu. He showed me how he makes a fancy sushi lobster roll. That was just the best! He also showed me the grill station-the most expensive station it looked like fun.

Chef Robbie invited us to come back for dinner sometime soon, I would go tonight but my parents probably will not take me. Nooooo Fair! Now I need a car and a passport. 

Love the Cabbage,
Bleu Leaf

Osaka to Memphis 6,816 miles or just around the bend

I just watched a great documentary about SUSHI. It was really cool to see someone make the sushi. The star was Jiro, he is 85 years old and a sushi samurai. His restaurant seats only 10 people and his sushi sells for $300 a plate.He earned 3 Michalean stars. This is an honor. The Movie Jiro dreams of Sushi is all in Japanese, I really liked even though I could not understand a single thing they said. Reading subtitles is hard they go b quickly. After the movie was over I was so hungry and not for popcorn. I begged to go for Sushi, well, really to go to Japan but I settled for sushi.

A new restaurant opened close by my house called Osaka (Not in Japan). It is beautiful and the price was not not 35,000 yen either, just $2 a plate on this really awesome conveyer belt. I got to try several great rolls. My favorite was the Dino dynamite I ate it so fast I cant tell you what was in it but it was great. The sushi dude was extremely friendly and he made some rolls just for me. I also really liked the tornado roll which has salmon, cream cheese and avocado fried just a bit. The Sushi Chefs have been making sushi rolls for more than 8 years. My Mamma cant eat too much seafood and he was very careful to make some items just for her.

What I like best about sushi is the seafood is experly cleaned and cut. I like seafood so much but it has to be clean. Huge bites of mushy raw fish not too good but perfect sushi is FABLULOUS. The wasabi, pickled ginger and seaweed just add to the yum factor.

I am getting hungry for some right now....
I am dreaming of Jiro dreaming of Sushi...
Love the cabadge of the sea
Leaf

Ps. I really need a passport....

Round up yer Lil' Corn Dodgers

Once every 365 days a huge festival happens in Grand Junction Tn., Aka, the middle of No-where. This is the gold standard of Festivals for me and every other festival is judged by it. The Ames Plantation Heritage Festival!

First the Food then the Fun.



Every festival has burgers, hot dogs and some kind of Nacho, but I have to find the Good food. Ames has A CHUCK WAGON! They cook like a real chuck wagon , serve food like a real chuck wagon, look like a real chuck wagon, and they are a real chuck wagon! I tried the beef stew which was flavored by Beef. Yum! Huge hunks of carrots and huge chunks of onions and huge chunks of beef.  Also I had a favorite Corn Dodgers!! Fried corn meal, crispy, fried,  hot...yum! Her Pots are Hug! The strangest part is when we went back for a second plate she was almost out. Did I mention she also made hot dogs, chicken and dumplings, pinto beans and ham and cobbler, well she does.

They had a demonstration on hog butchering, not for the faint of heart!  I don't like anatomy and blood, so it was a bit creepy. However, I got to try the fresh sausage they made out of that HOG and it was tasty; very ,very tasty. there was only one problem they were not selling it so I could not take any home. The nice lady did give me a bunch of samples. I now want to try and make my own sausage too.

I had some Amish ice cream that was just so yummy. Made from cream and turned by an old fashion engine. it was worth the rather long line. It was not really the best thing there- that was the sausage but it was a great cool treat right before I had to leave.

The Fun-

They always plant a field of Cotton so you can pick your own bag right from the brush and then take it over to the Cotton gin and catch your seeds and gather your lint. How cool is that!  this year they had heirloom rust color cotton and Green color cotton and some traditional white cotton. I did gather a whole bag of only green and I got myself some really green cotton. You could have a nice lady spin your lint into string! My brown and green looked cool together.

I found the blacksmith shop and he made a skewer and he answered all of my questions. it was cool. He had a huge bellow, and a hot coal fire. At the end of the day he let me back into the smith area and I got to make a horse shoe into a fish. I used the bellows. I had a lot of fun with him doing the blacksmithing. 

They had a group of Alpacas which were very very fuzzy! So cute and soft! they had alpaca balls that you put in the dryer to help it dry faster and dewrinkle your clothes. I did not get any but I sure wanted to. 

Here are some other things we got to do and see











Civil war renacting, flint knapping, goat milking, early farm house cooking, the Stencil house, archeological dig, leaf pounding, story telling, music, vintage engines, horse shoeing, bee keeping, candle making, tobacco harvesting, brick making, and just a bunch more- the gold standard of festivals!

See ya next year!
Love the Cabbage,
Leaf

The Burger Olympics

It was all fun and games Sunday at Minglewood hall. The Best Burger of Memphis Challenge, started by a local food blogger, was all crazy burger hats and burger mania. They even had a truck with a TV in it. I so want one of those.  The event has grown to around 15 to 16 tents all serving Burgers.
 



In one of these tents I met local Chef Robbie Cirillo from downtown's Bleu Restaurant. This courageous young chef let me help him plate the burgers for the judges. His pecan smoked bacon, grilled cheese bun creation looked so delicious, I wanted to just eat it up! I am sure he won- even though I have not heard who really did win. Chef Cirillo invited me to come to the restaurant and get a tour of his kitchen and enjoy his cooking. I cant wait to be Bleu at his restaurant. Know what my favorite color is? Blue!!! I know it is gonna be great.

I did try one burger sample from another tent,but sorry to say this it was way over seasoned and just not my favorite. I hope they did better for the judges. 

I did know some of the judges too. Ms Biggs was there, she did the article on me going to the White House. I also saw Mame Shannon from Local Color, a cool show on local events on PBS. 

All the money they raised went to the Memphis Spay and Neuter clinic. Helping animals that did not unfortunately get to try a single burger!

I hope to enter the Challenge next year. It looked like so much fun! 
Look out Robbie cause here I come....

Love the Cabbage,
Leaf

Hug From The First Lady PRICELESS! 

We flew into Reagan Airport in DC and took the Metro to our hotel. In the lobby we found all the other contestants and we got a room. It was an exercise room with a stationary bike and a weight ball. How cool is that! It was a great room.  I love hotels they are the best.

We could see the pool out the window. 

We went to the Smithsonian Muesum and we saw Julia Child's Kitchen. The curator gave us lots of secret behind the scenes information. I liked how she wanted her stuff in the same place and she had pictures so that people would put stuff back in the right place. We had time to poke around the muesum and it was really cool.

Next up was a great healthy pizza party. All the kids were there and we had fun. Sam drew a finger mustache for me, I wish I had a picture of it! We did a big cook book signing. I felt like a star! I am in a cook book! It looked like a great party. Thanks Epicurious for the amazing pizza party. 

I know what you are hungry for - 

The hug-
Love the Cabbage,Leaf

Tuna Quinoa Salad $4.00..........

 

Well, You all know that I love to cook, and I have tried a contest or two, so it shouldn't surprise anyone that I entered The Epicurious First Kids' State Dinner contest and that I won for Great State of Tennessee. 

I found out about this contest while Mamma was looking for nutritional facts for the Cub Scouts. I really was not sure I wanted to enter it, but after some convincing I decided it could be fun. The prize was extravagant. 

First, I wanted to make one of my favorites a Grits Bowl,
 I will give you a recipe for that one day soon. I did learn that grits are not a whole grain, they did not met the My Plate Standards. I saw Quinoa on the list and got curious, epically curious. 

I learned to cook it like rice, it is not hard. I tried lots of different ingredients before I realized that just plain Tuna was the tastiest. I added my favorite veggies and one I don't like onions. I had a great salad but no ideas on how to plate it! We tried a lettuce wrap, or carrot chips and the salad as dip but they seemed boring. My Auntie came and she thought to stuff a pepper acept what kid wants to bit through a whole pepper! Mamma and I sliced them in half and they looked like boats so my Tuna Schooners where discovered. They sailed me all the way to the White House. 

My recipe is in a cookbook available for free from the USgov web sight, along with the other great healthy winners.

More on the great trip and the White House tomorrow-

I promise

Love the Cabbage

Leaf