Finally...

It feels good... I felt we turned a corner at the restaurant 3 weeks ago with the new menu. Glad people like Sarah get it. She caught a lot of the environment and staff. VV always keeps it a lil grimey and 3rd world so they know whats really good.

I definitely figured out at Dericious what I want to be cooking in the near future.



Big family, small house... no room/ they like oh god/ why he go so hard/ look what he's been through/ he deserves an applause

Wildin at Karaoke Boho. We are the World edition. Even white people got invited. Tyler Kord from No. 7 hit the floor and shut it down. Fire.

Madbury Club

This interview came out a week ago, but my computer was down and I forgot to post. One of the more fun interviews I've done in a minute. Exactly what I've been talking about. Look, Madbury Club is not Gourmet Magazine, but the writer that came understood more about the environment we've created at XY than a lot of other "food writers". Was dope. Not better, just dope.

They also got the ill heatmakerz article...

Stupid Fire

ooohhhhh weeeeee ... saw this on the homie Phil Chang's facebook. Duck Sauce video for Barbara Streisand. A lot of dope cameos... I made a playlist of the ones i caught just cause the kid was extra blazed tonite


BIG - Juicy
Chromeo - Grow Up
Team Facelift - Casual Encounters
Santigold - Still Tippin remix ft. slim thug & mike jones (southerngold)
Yelawolf - Wanna Party ft. Gucci
Biz Markie - Nobody Beats the Biz
Gangstarr - Work
Jay-Z - Hard Knock Life
Game - Heartbreak Hotel ft. Diddy
Yeezy x Pusha T - Runaway
Smif-N-Wessun - Bucktown
Roots - Dynamite
Black Moon - Freestyle (war zone)
Jadakiss - Top 5 Dead or Alive ft. Stylez P
Nas - Thief's Theme

Who did I miss? haha

This one's for u...

Chromeo – Grow Up found on Electronic

u know who yall are... there are MULTIPIZILE peoplez in my lizife for rizeal that need to lizen to thiz foshizzil... u fizzeel?

Eat that Wonton Soup

The hardest chef in the bay... lilbthebasedgod haha. Watch that boy chef. show u how to do this

"bitches suck my dick cause i look like jk rowling" LOL

Crunk Food

This dude Brian who wrote to the NYT is my new homie. He writes gramatically so we probably can't be friends, but respect! Cliffnotes: Brian thinks foodies/food nerds and the restaurants that cater to them are making food boring. Then Sifton asked the question:

Do you in fact notice an anecdotal trend toward restaurants that are intellectually stimulating while being emotionally distant? As important, do you think it is correct to think of a restaurant’s food as art and of its dining room as the gallery showing that work, as Brian suggests? Or is the culture of restaurants really one in which the diner’s whole experience is the art? 


I always felt serving food is like theatre. We get in at 1, put on funny uniforms, get our stations ready, ipod goes on, showtime at 6pm. If you get lucky, you find a way to pick up a girl at the bar with your crocs on still. "Wuts good baby girl? I may have crocs on but at least its not herpes." I wouldn't say food has gotten boring. I just think that like the NFL, NY restauranteurs are quick to jump trends. Oh you got running backs throwin touchdowns (wildcat)? Well, Chang got chefs serving food and I got dishwashers rolling blunts. How u luv dat? I went to Ko once. I wouldn't say Ko is boring, it's just not for every one. If you want to go experience food at a really high level in an almost museum setting, you gotta go to Ko. It's a "style" that definitely has a place and role in the food scene. You can't have all LES galleries with 80s arcade games displaying digital art. You need the Met. 


But conversely, you don't need foie gras or uni to be a dope restaurant. Whatever culture you're examining, there's a push/pull between ivory tower and the common man/whoa-man. Obviously, if you look at my restaurants, I believe the diner's "experience" is the art. It's interactive. The customer has a role and as much as I love my food, I spend just as much time on the interior, the staff, the drinks, and the playlist. Music is a huge part of the dining experience for me. I'll go to the Spotted Pig because they play hova in the dining room. I fux with Sammy's Romanian for Passover because there's line dancing, cougars and vodka in ice blocks. Kenka on St. Mark's is one of the most unique NY dining experiences, ditto for a night out at B.O.B. (no food, just drinks and big girls) Legs and Eggs at Perfections... definitely an event not to be missed. 90% of the time, unless someone is posturing, you ask them what their favorite meal was and they are going to say: dinner at grandma's, steak and bacon with friends at luger's after being laid off, that italian joint in South Beach where u had carbonara and xanex then proceeded to pass out, or that soup dumpling spot in Northern Virginia I first had xiao long bao. 


The customer is half the show. You bring yourself, your xanex, your agenda to the restaurant and we do our best to drop a mother fuckin heat rock. Last week, we had a dope party of 14 come in, everyone had a great time, I came out of the kitchen with a tray of ginger infused tequilla shots thinkin i was gonna set it off. Not tonight... BOOM, i drop a tray of shots on this girl and now she smells like Machete. Sometimes you'd rather eat at a museum, but other times, its worth the price of admission to watch the Lord of the Delivery Boys make em say ahhhh

The English Patient, Chinese Food, and German Wine

Loved this article in the NYT today. I sat down with some wine reps a few months ago to have some Austrian wine and it paired really well with our food at XY. And like this article talks about, Riesling works too. Especially with spicy foods and things like the General Tso's Head on Shrimp. I think white wines like pinot grigio work well with Chinese Seafood and chicken dishes as well.

I'm not a big wine drinker. You know the kid stays pounding four loko and hennessy, but when building our wine list, I definitely liked Austrian wine the best cause of the sugar content. We don't have it at the restaurant right now because we're working on terms with the distributor, but if you are eating Chinese at home, get a bottle. It's cheap. I like this one:

Hofer Zweigelt, Austria, 2008

Grape: Zweigelt (indigenous Austrian grape)

Body: Light-bodied

Taste: Bright, lively, red cherry, strawberry and spice- cinnamon and white pepper

Other Info: This certified organic estate is located just north of Vienna in a region called Weinviertel, which produces the top value wines in Austria

(obviously the description is from the sales rep, i would have just said it taste like grapes)

I also liked this article cause I'm interested in the localization of Chinese food. I think its cool if you tweak the food to fit local customs/preferences, while not bastardizing your cuisine. There's a fine line. People hate Chinese-American fast food and growing up, I hated it too because it displaced the more authentic Cantonese, Hunan, or Shanghainese restaurants, but if the market can support both, there's definitely a place for localized food. What this guy did pairing Chinese food with German wine culture is dope. 

But it's a very difficult thing to do. What bothers me are carpet baggers who see someone hit a cord with something like German Chinese, Cuban Chinese, or Kogi Truck (dope), and then they want to just band wagon. There are a million and one ways to localize food in an original and worthy manner. Unless its improving on the original, don't do it. Please, no asia de cuba from a giant restaurant group. I'd rather just wipe my ass with $100 and throw it in a trash can than eat that food. 

As for Thilo Sarrazin... Damn son, you a piece of work. I try not to express my opinions on immigration and integration in other countries because the rest of the world is sick of Americans telling them how to run their countries... but Sarrazin... you are wildin. If you read the English Patient, (book sucks, but worth the read for one paragraph), the main character talks about how he loves the dessert because you don't see the lines that divide us into countries. You just keep on keepin on like the Johnnie Walker logo and the dessert dissolves the lines that create countries. The lines we draw are artificial. I'm kinda on that tip. Obviously that's a pot head janis joplin with buckwheat in a headlock (yes thats a technical term for hippie) view of the world so it's kind of a worthless opinion for me to have but it is what it is.

I do understand when people in Germany want to resist attacks on the native culture. People feel like it's "their" country. I've never had that feeling as an Asian-American. I always felt like a tourist since my people stay rockin cameras and fake bags haha. I'm a citizen, but I still don't think my voice has the weight of a White American. Nobody's fault, just how I feel. I've never had a country to "claim". I rock DR hats during the world baseball games, I rep NY, I rep China, I rep Taiwan, I got love for Pittsburgh and Korea... Jet life.

But Sarrazin, stop picking on Muslims. What could possibly happen if Muslims hang onto their identities? Muslims influence German youths to go on an open toed sandal and acqua di gio binge? People start naming their kids Aasif Hasselhoff? I could understand if Muslims were opening Phantom Muchentuchems (zohan) all over and flooding the country with shwarma putting all the pork knuckle and black forest gummy bear vendors out of business but that's not the deal. I don't know the welfare situation in Germany (so i could be totally off), but the arguments Sarrazin makes sound a lot like the crazy arguments young republicans made in high school about black people. Stop playin...

On that note, we'll get back to the localization of food with a lupe quote: "did you improve on a design/did you do something new?" Lupe needs to come out soon.... Dude is top 5 talent still working

NFL Week 1 Picks

So this is what I took...

Browns +3
Colts -2
Niners -3
Chargers -5
Jets -2
Skins +4
Packers -3
Raiders +7
Steelers +3
Giants -7
Lions +7

And for the record... Top 10

While I was makin lists, I figured why not... One of the most common questions we get at the restaurant is: Top 10 dead or alive? Here it is. (disclaimer: i'm not sayin this is the top 10 to end top 10s, its just what I like. feel free to leave ur own in the comments.) Of course, with any list like this, there will be blood.... Let's keep it to a minimum haha

1) Biggie
Ready to Die is a perfect album. The closest second IMO is Illmatic, but it only had 10 joints... I just don't think there is anyone with 2 better albums than Big. If you took Reasonable Doubt, Blueprint, and Black Album then put the tracks side by side and compared it against Ready to Die or Life After Death, Big wins. If you look at each album as a complete work, Ready to Die still has a better throughline and narrative. From the INTRO, him and Puffy got you... intro to things done changed to one more chance to juicy to big poppa to unbelievable to suicidal thoughts ... untouchable.

Its the blueprint for a rapper introducing himself to the public. Quintessential rags to riches, against all odds, ashy to classy American story... To me, Big is a dude that America didn't want to come up, but he circumvented the system and got paid through hip hop. It hasn't been the same since. After Big, people were LOOKING for the next one cause the "man" saw he could get paid with hip hop too. The struggle was different. There will never be another BIG. Hip hop, feminism, and most other counter cultural movements is for anyone who couldn't get paid the same amount for the same amount of work. We all just tryin to get money, power and respect. Wall St. may not value what we do; we have to find our own audience and consumers. And we did. Big embodies what the post-Rakim era was about? Gimme the loot...
Favorite Track: Unbelievable or Things Done Changed

2) Jay-Z

Man... I repped Hova hard up till the beef with Nas and only recently can admit that he has the better body of work. I used to put more value in Nas because he always had "something to say". Back to Africa, political, philosophical statements, etc.  But after a while, I started seeing Nas as the Professor and Hov as the hustler. Jay is actually the dude gettin it in outside the ivory tower... He's a business, man. Most prolific rapper of all time. The Black Album put him over the top. Moment of Clarity is one of those tracks that really completes an artist's story... After hearing that track, Jay made a lot more sense to me.

Like Public Enemy birthed NWA and Rakim birthed BIG/Nas (rhymes w/in rhymes), Jay-Z birthed all these rappers that talk about hip hop as a business... What's next? Well... if we look at other industries, there's usually a movement to "independents" and "organic". The "boom" is over. I think rappers/labels will figure out how to commodify music once again (post-napster) and package it in a way to get the money more direct to rappers. Its always a push and pull between "state and federal" so to speak. I think Hova moved it federal and the artists will bring it more local in the future. With a move like that, we're looking at more experimental, less concentration of thought, and cultural divisions. I think it's a good thing. Big Krit, Currenssy, Whiz Khalifa, Kid Cudi, Soulja Boy (this dude blew up the myspace hustle, can't knock it), Wale, Jay Elec, etc.... All got skills.
Favorite Track: 99 Problems

3) Cam'ron

This is the most controversial of my top 10. "Tragedy is easy, comedy is hard." First off, Cam isn't even trying. Imagine if this dude WANTED critical acclaim. He just wants ur girl to wear the dipset chain. That's the extent of his ambitionz. During the Nas beef, "Show You How to Do This" was the hardest track that came out of the Roc. "Call me 10 10 winds/in 22 seconds I gave him the world/took his chick wit me/came back gave him his girl." No one got range like Cam... He had all of harlem wearing magenta, he shouts out king jaffe jo, spacely sprockets, ATM, MTA, and hood legends like steady b.

He can take "Oh What a Night" by The Four Seasons and remix it for all the homies on parole. He took "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" and had every one doin the two step. He will piss old mother fuckers off by rhyming over Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get it On" and I still bump that shit! Cam'ron on the politics tip? I see u Chuck D and I raise you the No Homo Lobby and the Stop Snitchin Movement. This dude had the greatest O'Reilly appearance of all time. He made JIM JONES relevant. COME ON! Beans one of the greatest to come out of illadelph all time and Jay couldn't take Beans platinum this dude Cam took a weed carrier Jones platinum. Where's Jungle Nas? Where's Spliff Star Busta? Nobody put they peoples on like Killa and 50. Don't make me put my two arms up...Touchdown.

But in all seriousness. How can I put Cam above Rakim? People have stigmatized hip hop as ignorant... Cam'ron embraces that, he eats it up, he plays bojangles, but in the end, he's laughing at you. He's got you being the stereotype. You're the one being bamboozled cause he's telling YOU to "sing" (killa cam on purple haze) and he's getting paid. The jester is the sharpest... He may not be W.E.B. Dubois like Dice Raw, but he is a reminder that hip hop for a lot of artists is still in that Booker T. Washington cast down your bucket in harlem mindset... Not every one wants to show the world who they really are, some just want to eat your lunch. He is one of the most selfish, independent, gully mother fuckers on the planet and I love that shit.

Favorite Track: can't say... he is missing that "moment of clarity" track and that's what people will hold against him... speak ya mind cam

4) Rakim - The original paid in full rapper who took hip hop from ABC rapping to what it is now... Pioneer shit.

Favorite Track: I Aint No Joke

5) Nas - pound for pound greatest album of all-time, made the comeback with stillmatic and god's son, but then I think fell back off. Marley carried the last album. It Was Written is a classic though. People sleep on that album. I think it's top 25.

Favorite Track: Ether or Halftime

6) Dr. Dre

I really didn't want to put Dre here, but as a kid, Chronic was my shit AND... as a producer, he had more influence on the 90s sound than anyone not named premiere and maybe even more. Lyrically, yea.... But content, production, style, etc. Can't put him any lower.

Favorite Track: Lil Ghetto Boy

7) Ghostface tied w/ Raekwon

Nobody does the stream of consciousness non-sensical but sensical flow like Ghost. When he gets on a track, he just demolishes the shit. Even on the slower joints, Ghost goes nuclear like "back like that". I like how he's mad random with the banana nutrimen, strawberry/kiwi/baked ziti, and of course blue and cream "ima rock it this summer" haha. He's one of the biggest personalities in hip hop and I give him points for that.

Rae is credited w/ having the quintessential NY flow and slang. I think Rae bridges Mob culture/style/word play and the hood better than anyone else and many a rapper shark bit him. That mid-90s tommy hill, polo, nautica style can be chalked up to Raekwon and Snoop's Letterman appearance. When listening to Cuban Link just picture yourself playin' c-lo at Rao's.

Favorite Tracks: Spot Rusherz (i know, i know... i just like it) and Triumph

9) Outkast

I can't split em up. Every one likes to say Andre is superior but I can't do it. They're just different. Yes, Andre got that metaphysical, soul, futuristic flow and content, but that doesn't mean Big Boi is cold pizza. He had the best album of the summer and you could see how much he brought to outkast. That Jazzy Belle, electric guitar, daddy fat sacks facet of outkast is all him.

Favorite Track: Elevators

10) Eminem

I really didn't want to leave off Big Pun cause he had the illest flow of all time but I think the white boy has more significance culturally. Lyrically, Eminem can't be touched. His last two albums are straight doo doo on a stick, but the first two are bonkers. His story has an important place in hip hop. He's the Jackie Robinson of hip hop... I'm not saying anyone "tried" to keep white people out, but Eminem kicked down a lot of stereotypes so give him his props. I don't think people were open minded enough to embrace acts like Kanye (every one was hating on his style when he first came out), Kid Cudi, Drake, or B.O.B. if Eminem didn't come first. He took hip hop from Hot 97 to Z100. It's not always a good thing, but there's historical significance and a lot of people got paid... He had the better verse on Renegades, he had the best verse on Forever, and he also completes Dre's catalog. Put the D on the map... Took a bunch of bums platinum with D-12 and 50 doesn't sell 15 million copies w/o Eminem putting him on.
Lastly, If you ask any rapper the top 5 rappers they don't want to battle, I think it goes: Nas, Eminem, Jada Kiss, Jay-Z, and KRS-One. At this point, I'm asking why he's this low on my list, but it's late and I need some sleep.

Favorite Track: Rock Bottom or Just Don't Give a Fuck

Most Slept on Album of All-Time ... Camp Lo: Uptown Saturday Night

My personal fave artists who won't make anyone's top 10: MF Doom, NORE, 50-Cent, DMX, Cool Breeze, T.I., Nature, The Clipse, Lupe, Keith Murray, Jay Elec, Gemini w/ Danger Mouse, Too Short, E-40, Master P (sorry), UGK, and Currensy.

And a question for yall.... at what point does Kanye enter the top 10 convo?

5 things FOOD needs

So, someone showed me this video recently. Its better than the time I ironed frozen chimichangas at a bachelor party and called myself an Iron Chef. True story. Watch the video... a minute in ur like, "is this girl making a cake with a cake? ... like she bought a angel food dutch, gutted it, stuffed it with sprinkles and called it a kwanzaa blunt?" Yes, Kwanzaa blunt FTW.


I know the video's from 2008, but I wasn't watching food network pre-death of rap city so bear wit me. The shit was so amazing it inspired me to make a list of things that the game needs. I mean, Sandra Lee is #1 with a bullet, but let's take her out of the equation cause we don't want to crush the competition like that. Kwanzaa Cake has the "greatest things to happen to the food game" on smash. Ima treat Sandra like a dead rapper, make a top 10 list without her....


5) Anything But French Schools - I don't know how culinary school works, but I do know that every cook I interview and went to school says that they were "french trained". They then proceed to put butter in all my recipes and fuck the shit up. There has to be another way..... But yea, because I know that someone will misquote me... I 'll say this. French is dope, I just think some diversity wouldn't hurt. Modern doesn't equal Western... all I'm sayin.


I can't wait till Charles Oakley opens a Cooking School next to his car wash (http://www.yelp.com/biz/oakleys-carwash-brooklyn) and students come to me saying "I'm Brooklyn trained." HIRED.


4) Young, Of Color, or Crunk Reviewers - This has gotten better in recent years. The homie Sam Sifton tweeted he had 8 .38s today, Ligaya Mishan is Filipino I believe, do you even need to ask why I fux wit the Times? BUT, its not enough... Jenny 8. Lee, is it too much to ask for you to become a food critic? Haha. Or even Kenny Powerz, Bill Simmons, or Al Bundy, they would kill it as food critics. "You have food like a dickhead." - Kenny Powerz


3) Duane Reade to Table Restaurants - This is the movement! Fuck locavore. I want that high fructovore shit. Cheeto Fried Chicken, Gummy Bear Casserole, Shaved Frozen Laffy Taffy on Lychees. Ohhh, that laffy taffy, that laffy taffy.... RIP Duane Reade, shopping for ingredients won't be the same without you. 


2) Asian Chefs x Ass Parade - Collabing with fashion night out is gonna be dope, but I'd rather collab with the internets' finest. Morimoto x Kelly Divine? How funny would it be to see this mother fucker roll up w/ Kelly Divine to the James Beard Awards? Someone with photoshop make this happen. Michael Bao x Alexis Texas. Me x Brianna Love. It was meant to be baby girl, don't fight the feelin...


1) Food Trucks on Dubs - Baohaus on Spinners. GAME OVER, it's the takeover... Chef Hugh, can we put the bus on sprewells and roll out to "off the grid" the right way? If I rode down to SF on spinners, shit would be over before it started.

My MAN (no homillz) Akira Back

Wuts good, Akira! Holla back, Paris! I never met Akira Back before today but we were on a panel at Asian Feastival (hyun got video tomorrow). Dude was hilarious. I like that he played ball and snowboarded before becoming a chef. Renaissance man steez gives you perspective. If you are ever in Vegas, try his thai (golden eye) snapper at Yellowtail. I had "live" golden eye snapper a few times before with a slight torch and it's one of the best cuts of fish I've ever had. The flesh stays firm because they paralize the fish. Sounds worse than it is... Trust me, fish love being paralyzed. It's their favorite thing to do besides stinking up ur fridge so don't feel bad.

On that note, my 5 favorite cuts of fish

1) Yellowtail Belly

2) Kanpachi (amber jack)

3) Sea Urchin from Maine

4) Golden Eye Snapper

5) Grouper Cheeks

Don't eat bluefin. It's the shit, but is it really necessary? Come on yall.....

Esq.

Yo they dont call me Eddie Huang, Esq. for nuttin... Mobi Munch tried to play da boy like he saccharin... hov already told u, this aint a problem for me

The work was over 10lbs? Naw, u gotta lose weight b. Child support on line 2? Couldn't be you... Trademark beef? Let the law offices of Yu, Dead, Huang hold you down. 

As you can see below, ya boy handled this matter from APT 1. Ground mo-fuckin floor. I did this shit with ratatouille and his homies outside lickin cans of four loko on the curb. 

"Oh four loko, u can wear the dipset chain, u taste better than rat poison."  - Ratatouille 

I stole the internet to file this shit b. But look what happened? You got Diane J. Mason at Suite 208 and yall still late... U shouldn't have stopped at Starbucks before work boo. Wash ur stankin ass, eat ur wheaties, and file the mark. That's how Esquires do... LOL

Don't worry yall.... rockin the lime green nba draft jump-off and being an upstanding member of society was an old hobby. This is more like it circa passover @ sammy's 2010

Obama and schmaltz.... wuts really good... fuck a desk job