Food & Adventure

I have been to a lot of unique place to eat before in my life and I have tried a lot of different kinds of food. I have tried anything that was every put in front of me from raw filet minion that was pounded out to a thin slice covered with a different blend of oils and spices to deep fried Oreos that are gooey on the inside to squid that is cut freshly right in front on me and grilled almost instantly in a downtown Chicago market. Even with all of these crazy explorations of food I have found that I hold some foods higher than other the three highest being: Roy’s, Yang Chengs, & some of the Saudi Arabian food my friends cook me. Each one has its’ own cultural background that is different from our own and each one also serves authentic dishes from that particular culture.

Roy’s is a very unique restaurant chain that is located in a few larger cities. I got my taste of the cuisine in Chicago and New York. As claimed by Roy’s website they serve a fusion of the world’s finest flavors, with a Hawaiian state of mind. Meaning the cuisine consists of many usual American dishes with a little Hawaiian flavor added to them. The Hawaiian’s use lots of pineapple so most of the dishes either come with pineapple or are cooked with them. The restaurant specializes in more seafood dishes with its “From the Sea” section as well as the “From the Land” selection which is a very selected collection of original takes on finer dining meals such as filets, ribs, and duck breast. When I went the first time I ordered the Roy’s trio which had Chief Roy Yamaguchi’s three custom dishes all in one. It included grilled salmon, blackened ahi, and Hawaiian style butterfish. The dish cooked just right and everything tasted fresh like it had just been caught that day and the way the dish was prepared very meticulously so that every mouthful would be a burst of new favor to indulge in. The restaurant was layout so that the corners of the room would be a growth of the vegetation typically found in the Hawaiian atmosphere while the rest of the room would be a contemporary setting of formal table ware and dining utensils. The best part of the whole experience was the desert. There is only one desert availably at Roy’s, a chocolate soufflé with a molten chocolate inside that is perfectly crafted and rich with flavor. To enjoy the fine desert you must notify the waiter when you arrive so there is enough time for preparation of the delicate morsel.

Another favorite restaurant of mine is Yang Chengs. I cannot be found on the internet or even in some yellow pages. It is small “hole-in-the-wall” business right outside downtown Indianapolis on the east side. The chief in that owns the restaurant is not famous nor has he ever written a book. He has simply owned this nice quiet nook since he graduated from the CIA, Culinary Institute of America. The main reason I had visited the place for my early years was because my father had also graduated the same year as the chief who owns the restaurant. Within the Chinese culture of food preparation there are eight different cuisines, depending on what region the chief comes from, that can be focused on and within each cuisine there are two or three different styles of preparation. The cuisine that is used at Yang Chengs is known as the Shandong cuisine and the style that the chief uses is known as the Jinan style. This form of cooking is represented by a clean, non-greasy preparation of the food along with a unique style of soup, which play a large role in the Shandong cuisine. The lighters soups, like egg drop soup, are clean and usually very airy with fewer flavors where as the thicker soups which tend to be darker, such as hot and sour soup, are full of flavor and usually consist of more ingredients. The Jinan style of cooking uses forms of deep-frying, grilling, pan-frying and stir frying to create and more subtle taste and less fats than the other forms of preparation. Some of the few dishes I have tried include Prawns, which is very similar to shrimp, with a special blend of spices and a dish known as Pear Balls which are exactly that pears that have been constructed into little balls often covered with some sort of syrup, honey was the syrup I had on mine. The restaurant’s décor consists of many authentic Chinese artifacts and sculptures that the chief himself brought over when he came to America to study at the culinary even the mats underneath the plates are Chinese zodiac calendars with Chinese writings.

Although I have not visited a restaurant yet I have been able to partake in certain Saudi Arabian dishes that are very unique to the culture. Some people know this but Muslims are forbidden to consume any form of pork. Most Saudi dishes do not contain pork for that exact reason so they replace the meat with chicken or fish usually. I have grown close to the group known as the SSO, Saudi Student Organization, on my campus and most of the guys know me because I lived a floor above them all and one member roomed with me. One morning I was invited to participate in a breakfast with a few of the members so I went to the president’s apartment. The dish was prepared right in front of me on the stove and was served on a large plate so everyone could sit on the floor around it and consume the food. The dish was known as Kabsa it is a traditional Saudi food that contains rice, chicken, tomatoes, and green peppers. They are cooked with salt and pepper added to spice the dish. After being cook it is eaten with tortillas using your hands as utensils. My friend also served Hummus, a spread that is made from mashed chickpeas, with the meal which we would scoop then roll with the tortillas to create a filled almost pastry.

Fooooooood & School

Growing up my mother was a stay at home mom so I had most of my lunches packed for me because she had the spare time. What I do remember of my packed lunches is that even though my mother had the time to cook my meals it seemed like all she did was pack them since they almost always had pre-packaged food like Lunchables or the store brand versions. Whenever I did receive a “home cooked” meal it wasn’t usually from that day it would be leftovers from the night or two before. On some days I did however get to enjoy some of the spectacular school food that everyone seemed to give the nickname “slop”. Most of the time my grade school would pass out the usual fish sticks and crinkled fries on Mondays and some other typical school food the rest of week except on Friday we would have an almost mystery meatloaf that was actually not half bad as long as you put about half a bottle of ketchup on top. By the time I had gotten to middle school the food got a little better which such items as corn dogs and cookies along with drinks like soda and juice instead of milk every day. When I reached high school my eating habits changed a lot because the options to eat grew immensely. We had Pizza Hut on Fridays and McDonald Days the cooks would make homemade chocolate chip cookies. The cookies were so moist and gooey then we would add marshmallow syrup to them. Once I moved away to college I was fortunate enough to never get the “freshmen 15” instead I lost 15 pounds within the first year mainly because I never ate due to insignificant funds. Now I eat a lot more healthier and more balanced meals to keep my weight at a steady level.

Fooooooood & Family

My first memories with food and my family were with my dad. My father graduated from the culinary institute of America in New York instead of going to college. He has always had a passion for food and especially traditional foods with his own little spin. He has written two cook books of our family’s favorites that he has redone in his own way. My first memory was with him stirring the ice cold homemade ice cream in the old fashion metal mixer that came from my great grandparents. Although my dad is an excellent chief he does use a little help from my grandma who has all the family recipes known by heart. She has created dishes including to a pork chop with mushroom soup, mashed potatoes and frosted flakes that is slowly cooked in the oven for approximately one and a half hours. My mother on the other hand is terrible at cooking anything even the common household items such as macaroni and cheese. She often seems to think that the fire alarm is a cooking timer or that steak is really supposed to smoke that much while cooking it on the grill. Half the time all you can see is the center of whatever she cooks since the edges tend to be a charcoal black. I am a decent cook for only being 20 years old and never really trying to create anything elaborate. I stick to the more common college courses such as macaroni and cheese, simple pasta dishes, and of course the occasional grilled filet minion. If I really wanted to I could create a fine dining quiescence that would spectacular but I chose not to follow in the steps of my father. My fondest memory that I have wound is of picking fresh berries in the fields with my grandmother. It tends to be the one I most remember because it is one of the only memories I have of her. I still think it is the best because of the setting that we were in the fresh dew on the grass and the slight fog in the air the smell of a rain fall from that morning and I remember that the sun had just started to come up is we walked through the groves. It seemed like all the world was at peace and we were joining it.

Fooooooooood

I have an expensive taste in food with dishes such as filet minion and cedar plank salmon as well as fine dining at restaurants with the reputation of Roy’s and Eddie Merlots. Although I have eaten nice food at expensive restaurants I have had my fair share of unpleasant food situations. One of the worst experiences I have had with food was during part of my fraternity pledge ship. I along with five other of my pledge brothers had to indulge ourselves in the great American commodity that they give the military service men known as MRE’s. The beginning of the meal was not the most terrible but it seemed as though the meal had not completely became hydrated so it was dry and tasteless. Another experience that I have had with food came from an old family tradition with my grandfather. His father had been around during the depression and had learned to make an inexpensive dish that consisted of very little but was according my grandfather very filling. The dish included only two ingredients, milk and saltine crackers, that when once the crackers had been crushed and mixed with milk in a bowl it made for a paste like treat that had the texture of moist cardboard. The worst dish I have had by far was when I was forced to indulge myself in a White Castle Crave Case and over 4 liters of water. It basically an eating contest where I had to eat 30 of those little white castle burgers 15 had cheese and the other 15 were plain but five held a surprise such as Tabasco sauce or wasabi or some other sort of hot commodity. Then I had two 2-liters of water to down the sandwiches one of which was hot warm while the other was cold. Needless to stay half of the burgers ended up in the trash can in one form or another.

Intro & Story from high school

Hello World,

My name is Ryan. I am 20 years old from a small town up by nap town. I like girls. I like to ride little red tricycles. I like long walks on the beach. I am the treasurer, risk management chairmen, and IFC delegate of a fraternal organization known as Alpha Sigma Phi that has been on my campus since 1998.

I used to be an illegal street racer in Southern Indianapolis. The car I drove was my buddies 2001 eclipse gt with a custom cold air intake attach with an inter cooler a RIPP supercharger and of course an engine back custom exhaust that ending in a silenced MagnaFlow muffler. The car was an absolute sleeper, which means it had a lot of power that was not recognizable by the look or sound of the car, and it used to tear up the streets. One day we when to the usual place for illegal street racing known to the locals as "Balls to the Walls" and raced numerous tuned mustangs and civics but on the way home that night the whole world of our local street racing changed. Our car was labeled as the film car that night, the car that carries a video camera to record all the races and scout potential drivers to join our crew, when all hell broke loose. A completely blacked out Corvette Z06 with black rims and the darkest window tint I have ever seen pulled along side us and acted as if he wanted to race. I knew instantaneously that something had to be wrong with this car because as any real racer would know the rule is to never race the film car. The car pulled away from me and with tires screaming in at least 3rd gear sped up to my buddies 40th anniversary Porsche 911 which houses a 345 horsepower 3.6 liter flat six cylinder engine. This made the race easy for my buddy or decently matched depending on what the Z06 had under the hood. To everyones' amazement the Z06 pulled away from the Porsche which lead us to the obvious conclusion as the police officer driving the Z06 quickly flashed on his under body rotating red and blue neon lights as the rest of the car lit up a fireworks display of blue and red.