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mexican

No Thai! – Ann Arbor, MI

by John on December 15, 2010 · 0 comments

Before I start telling you about my first visit to No Thai, I should explain that I am completely head over heels in love with Thai food.  I love everything about it.  The (usual) freshness of ingredients, the mixture between heat and coconut milk, and especially the heat.  If you walk into a Thai restaurant and tell them to make it extra spicy, the chef takes it as a challenge to his manhood.  If you want it extra spicy, he’s not going to throw another drop of hot sauce on your food, he’s going to make it a fiery oblivion to make sure that you never challenge him ever again.

Just for the record, my favorite Thai in the area is served at TupTim in Ypsilanti.  For the longest time, Blacked out Sarah had been raving about this place in Ann Arbor called No Thai!.  For some reason, I never made it out to give it a shot.  Looking back, I think it might have been the name.  Why would anyone open up a Thai restaurant and call it No Thai!?  It always confused me.  I wouldn’t open up an Italian restaurant and call it No Italian!.  It might confuse people and make them think I was serving authentic Mexican food but making an attempt to be humorous with the name.  For this, I took to their website for an explanation.  It goes as follows..

This epic story begins on a cold winter day in February of 2005. On that fateful day, four close friends united to form a pact to bring a modern Thai restaurant to the University of Michigan campus. So the fellowship began, each person would bring to the table their own unique set of abilities. Ultimately, one partner, Noerung “No” Hang, rose above the rest to become the head chef, and so the restaurant came to be known as “No Thai!”. This name would come to bring amusement, confusion, and intrigue to the masses, but now you know No Thai!, or do you?

So it started making sense in those not making sense at all kind of ways.  Regardless, I love Thai food and I decided to make a trip with Blacked out Sarah to experience this food she had been raving about for so long.

No Thai(i’m sick of adding the exclamation mark) is kind of like the fast food of Thai restaurants, and in no way am I trying to badmouth the place by saying that.  If you’re an ethnic food snob, you’ll probably have a great time badmouthing the place to anyone who is willing to listen.  I, for one, am not.  It’s not incredibly authentic and the ingredients don’t taste terribly fresh, but they’re not advertising incredibly authentic food made with terribly fresh ingredients.  It’s a Thai restaurant that offers quick service and anywhere from above average to solid Thai food.  To me it’s a fun, light interpretation of Thai cuisine using basic Thai principles and dishes as it’s basing point.  As the website clearly states, it’s a modern approach on Thai food.

In my opinion, No Thai is a great place to visit if you like Thai food and don’t require an incredibly authentic experience every time you dine out.  You might call me a hypocrite for saying this when I trash Tios Mexican Cafe every chance I get, but if you do I just have to say that you’re kind of dumb.  Tios is an incredibly Americanized version of Mexican food that completely destroys the very idea of Mexican cuisine, while No Thai gives you a basic idea of Thai cuisine, that in my opinion, leaves you with a very positive outlook on Thai food in general.  It’s like the farm system of Thai food that gets you prepared for the big leagues.

I went with the Potato Curry with Chicken, which is described as Cubed potato, white onion, & bell pepper in our curry sauce. I got it at Yoga Flame spice level, which is the second hottest you can request.  I didn’t dare choose the Dim Mak, for reasons I explained earlier.  I paid $8.50 and got a very nice portion of what looked like a pretty tasty looking dish.  Not bad so far.

The food was solid, not great, which I expected.  The meat was tender, the potatoes were delicious(by far the best part of the dish), the vegetables were somewhat fresh tasting, and the “curry sauce” added nice flavor.  I was disapointed with the heat of the dish, but I really didn’t expect to have my tongue burned off.  I actually ended up adding Sriracha to this which did the trick.

All in all, not bad.  Exactly what I would expect from a plate of $8.50 Thai food.  If you’re into Thai food but don’t feel like paying $13-15 bucks per plate, check out No Thai.  Just don’t walk in there expecting to have a little Thai baby Jesus on your plate.  You might be a little disappointed.

No Thai!
1317 S. University
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
http://www.nothai.com/

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Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chili in Taylor, MI

by John on September 27, 2010 · 1 comment

For the longest time, my friend Sarah “Blacked Out” Caudill has been telling me about this down river restaurant that serves chili made with peanut butter and chocolate.  As someone who likes eating foods with strange ingredients, this had me interested.  I’ve made chili with all kinds of things, including chocolate and beer, but I had never heard of a chili made with peanut butter.  About a week ago, we finally got a chance to check the place out.  It involved going to Taylor, MI but I felt like it could be worth it. Hell, there was even a chance we would run into Steve Avery, who for some reason is not considered a hero in this city.  That baffles me.

I was surprised to find that the Matador, which is the name of the restaurant in case you were wondering, is actually a tiny Mexican joint. “Blacked Out” Sarah had only mentioned to me that the place serves peanut butter and chocolate chili.  Nothing about Mexican food.  She must’ve been blacked out every time we spoke about it, I guess.  The inside was small and dark, with no booths and a single TV hung from the corner of the wall.  I had no doubt that the waitresses were lifelong Taylor residents.

I gazed at the menu and saw the chili that I had come for.  It was described exactly as “Blacked” Out Sarah had described to me.  I demanded that the waitress bring me a cup of this black gold as quickly as possible.  Seeing the possibility that I had a career, a house and working plumbing, the waitress saw her opportunity to get out of Taylor and sprinted to the kitchen to retrieve my chili.  She brought it back and I thanked her for her kind service.  She stood there staring at me, which was a little awkward, so I had to tell her to leave for exactly 12 minutes while I enjoyed my chili.  She obeyed.

Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chili

The chili was actually incredibly delicious.  It’s not like the chili tasted anything like peanut butter or chocolate.  They both simply contributed to a chili that had a very unique taste.  It was a thick, dark chili and I have to come expect from Mexican restaurants.  Ground beef and cheese sat at the bottom of the cup, and when you mix everything together it lightens up a bit.  I was very impressed by the chili, but disappointed that I had only ordered a cup.  The waitress offered me a free chili refill, but I politely declined.  I told her that I would be having her finest Mexican sandwich for dinner. She sprinted off to the kitchen and I resumed eating my chips and salsa.

Mexican Sandwich AKA Pile of Slop

The Mexican sandwich is one of my favorite things to order at lesser authentic resutraunts.  It’s basically a pile of slop, layered throughout a few tortillas.  Matador’s Mexican sandwich certainly did not disappoint in the slop department. In fact, this is quite possibly the  biggest, sloppiest Mexican sandwich I have ever had.  The taste wasn’t too bad either. Their idea of a Mexican sandwich involved a pork stew that was poured throughout the sandwich.  The stew had large pieces of pork and was pretty flavorful.  Definitely more impressive than your normal shredded chicken or ground beef Mexican sandwich.

All in all, not a bad little joint.  Especially for Taylor.

Oh, and I married the waitress.

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Enchiladas.

by John on June 9, 2010 · 4 comments

Just a few days ago I had the day off from work and not much to do.  I decided that it would be perfect to make one of my favorite meals in the entire world, which is fajitas.  After much thought, it came to me that fajitas were just not enough for this glorious day lacking any sort of labor.  I decided to take my world famous fajita recipe and turn it into enchiladas.  You may ask yourself how I can claim that my fajita recipe is world famous.  I would direct you to Tios Mexican Cafe, where they have declared their wet burrito to be world famous.  Apparently anyone can now claim that any dish is world famous, so I will now freely use this title to describe any food I cook. 

My fajita recipe was one of the first things I posted on Epic Portions, way back in February of 2009.  My mom found a fajita recipe in the Detroit Free Press and made some changes based on our likings.  We lost the recipe in a move a few years ago so I took it upon myself to re-create it.  It’s not the exact same recipe that we used before, but I think I did an admiral job at putting everything back together to emulate a similar taste.  I did add a few things to add a little spice, which is more to my liking than my family’s, but it is fully adaptable if you’re not into that kind of thing.  I’ve had people say that this is more similar to a taco recipe than fajitas, but it’s my damn recipe and I’ll call it what I want.  Haters.

Remember that when I cook I’m more of a “throw everything together based on memory” kind of guy, but I’ve done my best to give you measurements where I can.  Like I said before, the best thing about this recipe is that it’s fully adaptable to however you like things.  If you don’t like your veggies cut as small as I do, leave them as larger slices.  Want to add additional seasonings?  Go ahead.  I’ve never been someone that ever uses or follows recipes.  I find it more fun to take an idea and make it my own.

Just a little heads up, my family eats A LOT.  This will make you a whole lot of chicken but you can seriously turn this into any dish you want.  The leftovers make great tacos, quesadillas, and nachos.

Ingredients:

  • 4 lbs boneless skinless chicken breasts
  • 1 cup tequila
  • 1/3 cup lime juice
  • Canola Oil
  • 1/2 White Onion minced
  • 4 cloves garlic
  • 2 tomatoes finely chopped (a can or two of Rotel will work as well)
  • 3/4 cup fresh cilantro — This is what makes the recipe, I think.  Use as much or as little as you like, but I usually keep it around 3/4 cup, finely chopped.
  • 2 jalapenos minced — I include the seeds and membranes because I like the heat.  If you don’t like the heat, just add the skins and throw away seeds and membrane.
  • Salt
  • Pepper
  • Cumin – 2 tsp — Don’t overdo it.  This adds a smokey element to the dish.
  • Cayenne Pepper – 1 tsp — Depending on how spicy you like it.
  • Chili Powder – 1 tbsp
  • Paprika – 1 tsp
  • Basil – 1 tsp

Directions

  1. Cut chicken into small pieces to your liking and place in bowl.
  2. Add tomatoes, onions, garlic, jalapenos, and cilantro to bowl.  Mix.
  3. Add all seasonings and mix.
  4. Add tequila, lime juice, and 1/3 cup of the Canola Oil.  Mix.
  5. Let sit, covered, in the refrigerator for a minimum of 2-3 hours.  The longer these sit the better they are.  I would let them marinate over night.
  6. When ready, cook on high heat until chicken is done.

With everthing has been marinated, your ingredients should look like this while cooking.  My apologies for the following pictures.  I did not have my camera so I had to rely on my Blackberry camera.

Fajitas

At this point, you could just throw these into some tortillas if you didn’t feel like doing the whole enchilada(HAHA!).  This, however, is an enchilada recipe, so I will keep going.

From there, get whatever fixings you want ready.  I added black beans and fiesta rice.  Roll the chicken, beans, rice, cheese, or whatever you’ve added into tortillas and line them into a pan.  Top with enchilada sauce and cheese then throw the pan in the oven on 350 for about 30 mins.  I like the cheese to be a little brown on top before I serve them.  This is why it looks like I used yellow cheese.  Please trust me, I did NOT use yellow cheese.

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Mission Accomplished.

by John on March 24, 2010 · 2 comments

After many months of attempting to persuade the city of Ypsilanti to rid itself of of Tios Mexican Cafe, it was brought to my attention this morning that I have won the first battle in my defense of Mexican cuisine.  Tios’ Ypsilanti location is now closed for business. 

 

I say this is simply a victory in battle, rather than a war, because there is still a Tios location open in Ann Arbor and while the seats stay primarily empty, it has managed to stay afloat.  Tios must be stopped.

If you have forgotten why we fight this bloody but important war, I urge you to review the Tios Battle Archives and renew your hatred for their attempted destruction of authentic Mexican cuisine.

Thank you, residents of Ypsilanti, for resisting their signs advertising a “World Famous Wet Burrito”, “Best Mexican Food in Ypsilanti”, and other propaganda aimed at destroying Mexican food in our community.  This city is host to many great Mexican restaurants, and I urge you to give them a try.

I now give you Tios on fire.  I love this picture.

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Los Amigos – Ypsilanti, MI

February 22, 2010

Los Amigos is a bit of a cruise down Michigan Ave into the middle of nowhere, but nothing ridiculous. It’s actually right past Gabriel’s Hoagies which almost lured me in and ruined Los Amigo’s second chance. They’re housed in a building that’s a little intimidating looking, but once you step inside you find yourself in a very friendly, clean atmosphere.

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Pacific Beach Burritos – Ypsilanti, MI

February 15, 2010

About a year ago, the old A&W location on Washtenaw that had been vacant for years had a sign out front advertising that a burrito joint called Pacific Beach Burritos would soon move in.  This caught my eye because I am a burrito fanatic.  They’re like beauty wrapped in a ...

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Taqueria la Fiesta – Ypsilanti, MI

January 4, 2010

In my continued effort to visit every authentic Mexican joint in the Ypsilanti/Ann Arbor area, I stopped into Taqueria la Fiesta in Ypsilanti.  This is a little hole in the wall that meets every single one of my criteria for a respectable Mexican restaurant.  They even serve menudo on the ...

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