Oh Mile End, I like how you bring a TON of people onto Hoyt Street every weekend during brunch hours. No I don’t actually. I hate waiting with big crowds, I’m hungry and I want to eat right away but for some odd reason I don’t mind waiting for dim sum. Weird. Anyways the only time I’ve been to Mile End was just to go and pick up my Montreal bagels.

Yes I’ve been wanting to go try Mile End for a while now but they close too damn early everyday and with the crowds over the weekend I’ll never get to go! Oh wait they just did announce their brand spankin new dinner hours! w00t! Maybe now I can get my smoked meat finally?

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Hype is a very dangerous thing. It can help or hurt you. I have heard a lot of great things about Egg and the crazy wait during brunch hours. I have also heard that its only an okay place and its just all hype. Still I couldn’t help but be curious after staring at their menu. Fried chicken! Duck hash! Biscuits and gravy! Yes yes yes please!

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So whats the big dealio about ramps? I keep hearing people talk about ramps ramps ramps. They’re like crack to some people. Okay so they’re like leeks and taste a little bit like garlic and when cooked down they kind of look like spinach. To find out what’s all the craze over this little vegetable I asked Howard to pick up some ramps for me at the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket. I had this grand idea for a ramps tasting where I’ll cook it few different ways but I ended up only making 2 things.

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I keep hearing about Defonte’s and their incredible tasty sandwiches. But both their locations being not near me at all has kept me from trying their sandwiches. Finally on a beautiful March Saturday I walked down with Steph and met up with Howard at Defonte’s in Red Hook. Steph suggested that I get the hot roast beef sandwich which has roast beef, mozzarella and fried eggplant. We walked in around 1:45pm into a near empty Defonte’s and by 1:50 it was packed! Weird. I actually wanted to try their cubano but their hot roast beef sandwich seems to be their signature sandwich so I got that. Steph got roast pork with hot salad and provolone and Howard got potato and egg with cheese. We all got the 1/2 size, which I later realized that it was enough sandwich to last me the whole day.

We took our sandwiches and ate it in the park just few blocks from Defonte’s. It was great! The sun was shining and a light breeze was blowing. Let me just say, the sandwich was HUGE! It was packed with roast beef and cheese and fried eggplant, how was I going to eat this damn thing?

I took one bite and loved it! I don’t really like eggplant but how do you make me eat eggplant? By frying them and sticking them into a sandwich with cheese and roast beef. I quickly finished half of the half sandwich and was contemplating about finishing the other half. Should I? Do I dare? Oh heck yeah I did and because I ate the whole thing it kept me full the whole day and skipped dinner.

I am ready to go back for the cubano now.

Last week I bought a bag of baby potatoes and was going to make a mixture of mushy potatoes with chopped pork crackling for tacos but in the end I got lazy. So one morning I was hungry, as usual, and started to look through the kitchen for things to eat or cook. Well I had eggs and a loaf of bread so eggs and toast. But first I got the pot of water boiling for the coffee. Then I thought about running out to Trader Joe’s to pick up a pack of their wonderful hash brown but I did not want to stand in line just for hash brown. Thats when I remembered I had those baby potatoes sitting on the dining table, patiently waiting for me to eat them. I didn’t wanna take the time to boil them so I sliced them up really thin so that I could just pan fried them. I wanted to JAZZ them up but how?! Spices! I have an unopened bottle of fennel seeds so a dash of that. I really enjoy the flavors of cumin seeds so a dash of that and what the heck a dash of coriander seeds. Mix mix mix and dumped it into a pan with some olive oil and then the potatoes.

It actually came out kinda good but gotta remember next time to crush the coriander seeds a bit.

Couple weeks ago my friend Anh had her “Breakfast in Brooklyn” get together where she made breakfast for everyone. I was pretty excited because she promised to make a Vietnamese omelette! What’s a Vietnamese omelette? It’s an omelette with diced onions, chicken liver pate and pork roll! Genius! Its everything I love in 1 dish. I had tried to make this couple nights before but I wasn’t sure about the proportions. Also the recipe she gave me didn’t include the pork roll, what da? Anyways, this was a really yummy omelette, I wanna eat it all the time.

Texas omelette, home fries, baked eggs and Vietnamese coffee were also on the menu. I brought the St-Viateur bagels and others brought biscuits and pastries from Ladybird Bakery.