Best Eating and Learning and Discovering

This weekend Annie came to visit Ali and that means I finally got to meet this famous Annie I've heard so much about--this important event was commemorated with a trip to the Noodle Bar, of course.

Look at how, if you looked closely at these Polaroids, you'd learn the story of the night.

Ali and I split the rolled pork belly ramen. For months I've wondered what "rolled pork belly ramen" meant. I means they take the pork belly, roll it up [so that means that the cinammon roll looking thing in the bowl is the pork belly], cook it, and then put it in your ramen. Who would have guessed! And, I don't know if you'll believe this news, but it was delicious.


Ali and Annie demonstrate what we did at the Noodle Bar: ate and joked and took instant photos. These tourists, sometimes they bring the cleverest toys along with them.


Something really important that I learned two days after this meal was that leftover Momofuku chicken ramen is DELICIOUS and the perfect Sunday afternoon meal.

Also, on Saturday I had lunch with at the Ssam Bar. It's always great to eat and catch up with Pete. We had the Brussels sprouts, the new version of the hanger steak, and ordered some scrapple with bacon and a poached egg off the Ssam Bar's new "Egg" section of their lunch menu (essentially they're rolling out a brunch menu). As unappetizing as scrapple sounds when you look it up online, this scrapple (my first!) sure was excellent...I think they took it easy with the face bits and heart and heavier with the pork shoulder. As Pete has lots of amigos at Momofuku, the kitchen sent us out their new egg topped buttermilk biscuit dish (excellent, such a perfect target for liberal applications of the rooster sauce) and their new, still in-development pho. While this was all happening, Pete's friend/colleague Dave came over and they had some interesting food and business conversations and another head chef came by to show Pete this new ham they had purchased that, although quite beautiful, he considered to be too salty and jerky like...of course, he explained this as I gobbled up as many slices as I could. And Dave ordered me a root beer. I'm practically speaking in code to downplay the experience, but talk to me about this in person and I'll be a little more effusive.