Tarbouch

Tarbouch opened in my neighborhood about two weeks ago. The small Lebanese restaurant sits next door to Curra's on East Oltorf.

At dinner on Friday night, I was lucky enough to snag the last empty table of the dozen or so in the dining room.

Being new, the service was a little frazzled, but all was absolutely forgiven when the food arrived.

I tried the vegetarian plate, a selection of 5 dishes (chosen from a list of 9).

I got (clockwise from the top left) baba ghannouj, grape leaves, Tarbouch potatoes, tabbouleh and Greek salad. I'm not sure I'd get the Greek salad again -- it looked like a bagged iceberg salad mix tossed with some fresh red onion and topped with feta, but everything else was really good.

The tabbouleh was very fresh and bright, the grape leaves creamy on the inside, and the potatoes flavored with lemon and garlic, but the standout was the baba ghannouj. I could probably eat a plateful of that stuff and still go back for more. It's creamy, lemony and smoky - why isn't my baba ghannouj ever smoky? Whatever they did, I think it's some kind of eggplant voodoo because that stuff is almost too good.

I tried a bite of a falafel, which I thought was just okay. But to get more of the baba ghannouj, tabbouleh and try more, I'm planning a return visit.

Okra Stew with Black-Eyed Peas

I brought this stew to a potluck dinner Friday night. With gorgeous okra from Finca Pura Vida, I thought an okra stew would be a nice, summery dish.

French Quarter Stew
3 Anaheim chiles, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
2 teaspoons safflower oil
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 28-oz can diced tomatoes
1 teaspoon tomato paste
1 15-oz can black-eyed peas, rinsed and drained
3/4 pound fresh okra
1/2 cup water
salt and pepper

Heat safflower oil in a large pot. Add the onion and chiles with a little salt and pepper and cook until soft, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic, and cook until beginning to soften, about a minute more

Add the tomatoes and tomato paste, and season with more salt and pepper. Simmer until the tomatoes begin to break down, about 10 minutes. Add black-eyed peas.

Cut okra into 1-inch pieces, discarding the stem ends. Add to the pot with the water. Cover and simmer over low heat until okra is tender-crisp, about 15 minutes. Serve over rice.

The chiles were much hotter than I'd expected, and much hotter than other Anaheims I've had this season, so I didn't have to add any more heat (I'd planned to use jalapenos). A little Sriracha on top would do, too.

Bananarchy

It's hot. Like I'm-not-kidding hot. I know this is Texas, but this is ridiculous—it's only June, and it's been pushing a hundred degrees for weeks.

Recently, I stopped by the new frozen banana stand Bananarchy to check it out. In the early afternoon, there was already a small crowd.

The menu is small, but it's really all you need, right? Bananas? Check. Chocolate? Check. For me, you can stop right there and I'd be just fine, but they give you even more choices. Vanilla or peanut butter coatings and a bunch of toppings.

You can make your own banana, or choose from a combo menu with Arrested Development-inspired treats, like the GOB or Afternoon Delight.

I chose to create my own, and went with a chocolate and toffee combo. The banana was cool and refreshing, but not frozen solid. I could bite right into it without gnawing at it, and the chocolate coating was crisp and sweet. Three bucks is a bit steep for one banana, but it refreshed and brought back memories of going to the Tastee Freez for frozen bananas as a kid. Good times.

bright sun and banana

Enoteca Brunch

After hitting up the Farmhouse Delivery farmstand at Sinners Brunch at Jo's, the man and I headed to Enoteca for brunch last Sunday.

Luckily, we got there just after 11am, so we were able to snag a table inside and away from the already very hot sun. Also lucky, there were a few open tables, so it wasn't a problem when we had to switch when the air conditioning began dripping onto the man's back. (This was after his espresso was spilled onto the front of his shirt.)

After getting settled into our drip-free table, we perused the menus and ordered. Along with a new cup of espresso, we ordered a bowl of the special soup to share - a delicious fresh peach gazpacho with creme fraiche and blueberry compote. He missed the rush of juice you get when you bite into a fresh peach, but I thought it was fantastic. The fresh peach flavor was fresh and strong, and went really well with the cooked blueberries.

I got pancakes. Semolina pancakes with fresh berries and vanilla gelato, to be exact. I was a little wary that there would be a huge mass of cold gelato melting over my hot pancakes, so I ordered the gelato on the side. They arrived, and the scoop of gelato was smaller than I expected, which was a good thing—it was just enough to sweeten the pancakes and make them creamy. The cakes themselves were fantastic - slightly sweet, and crisp around the edges. The berries were great, too. Fresh and sweet.

The man got eggs. Really good eggs. They were perfectly poached into round little balls, and served over toasted focaccia with brown butter hollandaise, roasted tomatoes and sauteed spinach. The eggs with hollandaise were pretty rich, but the tart bite of the roasted tomato cut right through it.

We got dessert to go. I love their almond macaroons, and they seem to have a different flavor each time I go. This time, it was ginger cookie with peach filling. They were incredibly good. They're always good - so good, I didn't get a chance to take a picture of them. The smear of peach filling was kind of thin, but full of fresh flavor. Very refreshing on that hot day.

Farmhouse Delivery at Sinners Brunch

I've been getting emails from Farmhouse Delivery, a local produce delivery service, for several weeks, but I've never gotten a delivery. I like going to the farmers market way too much, so I've been reluctant to order.

Last Sunday, Farmhouse Delivery hosted a farmstand at Jo's Coffee on South Congress, so I jumped at the chance to try their produce while choosing it myself.

There was just one table, but it was loaded with goodies - heirloom tomatoes (fortunate, because we'd eaten almost all of those we got at the Saturday downtown market), sweet corn, Texas mangoes and citrus, chard, potatoes, and more.

I got a bagful of tomatoes, sweet corn, two types of cucumbers, limes and a mango.

farmstand booty

I can't wait to eat a nice tomato-cucumber salad, one of my favorite summer salads, and juicy sweet corn. The tomatoes smell fantastic, and the sweet corn looks great with its tightly closed husks and moist silks.

Farmhouse Delivery's farmstand at Sinner's Brunch runs Sundays 10:30 am -1 pm.

Beans!

I have a confession to make: I am a dried-bean novice.

And I eat a lot of beans. After being vegetarian for about 15 years, I have only used lentils in their dried state. (Do lentils even count? They take no time.) Other beans just seemed like too much work.

I've been satisfied with canned beans—they're a great convenience food and really good for you. It's so simple to just open a can, rinse the beans, and add them to a recipe or salad.

While shopping last weekend, I finally decided to take the plunge and make dried beans instead of canned. I chose black beans, because they're one of my favorites and I could imagine using a whole batch in just a few days.

I was getting ready to soak the beans before going to bed Monday night. Just for good measure, I checked with the old standby, The Joy of Cooking, which suggested that black beans don't need to be soaked at all. Apparently, soaking them only eliminates a tiny portion of the gas-causing sugars.

So I went to bed and left the bean-making for yesterday.

After picking over and rinsing the beans, I just boiled them with a chopped onion and jalapeno, adding salt and pepper when they were almost done.

And the results?

Holy crap! My black beans are actually black! I've always hated how my black beans turn out brown after I cook them out of a can with other ingredients. Seeing perfectly black black beans in restaurants was frustrating.

Who knew all it would take was a super-simple method of cooking dried beans? OK, probably a lot of people, but whoa—I am so happy with these. They're prettier, have a firmer bite and taste better than their canned counterparts.

The only sad thing is that the process stained my favorite pot. It's enameled cast-iron, and its creamy interior has been stained before. I think the blue-black ring should come out with further cooking or a good baking soda scrubbing.

I am definitely going to be using dried beans more often. They're much easier to use than I thought, not to mention delicious.

Tam Deli & Cafe

Living in South Austin, getting up north to eat doesn't happen all that often.

But recently, I checked out Tam Deli and Cafe, a little Vietnamese place on North Lamar. The man and I split all the dishes so we could try everything.

We began with a veggie steam bun. It was much larger and fresher than most steam buns I've tried in the past. It was stuffed with a veggie filling that seemed heavy on taro. It was warm, mild and comforting.

Next came the Bahn Mi Chay. Stuffed with carrots and jalapenos, it had a great flavor. The bread was great—crusty on the outside and chewy on the inside, but the filling could have used something more hearty. Maybe tofu?

The special house egg noodles with vegetables and tofu tasted fresh, and the veggies still had a little crunch. The sauce on the noodles was quite mild, but was made much better with the vinegar sauce it was served with and the red sauce on the table.

Dessert is where we chose our own dishes. He got sticky rice with coconut sauce. The purple rice was well done and only mildly sweet, and the salty coconut sauce was fun to dip in.

I got the Che with tapioca and bananas, served warm. Suspended in a sweet-salty and slightly sour coconut milk, the tapioca was soft and comforting. I think more desserts should be served warm - it just gives me the warm fuzzies.

Overall, I had a tasty meal at Tam. The toughtest part was choosing dessert. They have amazing-looking cream puffs, more varieties of Che (including one with sweet corn, which I LOVE), variations on sticky rice and cookies - I had to force myself to put down a delicious-looking box of tuiles. I'll definitely be back, at least for dessert.