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Welcome to the Warung Cafe

Warung is the Indonesian word for a small shop or food stall. I’ve eaten at such stalls in Bali and Java--simple places, open air, often a bit rickety, nothing like the Warung Café in downtown Los Angeles.

Dark, with a spare Japanese look, bamboo pole dividers inside and leafy bamboo outside, Warung Café is a smart new addition to the blossoming restaurant scene in downtown Los Angeles.

What it doesn’t have is Indonesian food. The name Warung was inherited from a previous place so inconspicuous that I never saw it, even though I worked nearby.

What it does have is small plates of Asian fusion food, wine, sake and soju drinks, including an espresso martini so powerfully flavored that the restaurant is likely to be mobbed by java addicts. It’s new, not on the printed menu yet.

The mojito, which is on the menu, isn’t bad either. It’s made with soju, a lemon-flavored  aloe vera drink from Korea, and fresh mint.

Warung’s food borrows from Thai, Indian, Japanese and Chinese cuisines. There’s a wonderful plate of crispy tofu bites, made with tofu imported from Japan.  Airy and dry rather than soft and moist, these addictive little nibbles are embedded with shichimi (a Japanese spice blend) and sesame seeds. They come with peanut sauce for dipping and sweet and sour cucumbers.

A pretty salad combines shredded baked tofu, green and orange papaya, red  bell pepper and cucumber with a spicy lime dressing.

Sometimes fusion food seems like a weak relative of the cuisines from which it borrows. Not so Warung’s Indian chicken salad.  It’s a fresh concept, hardly Indian at all, although it includes a hint of Madras curry powder and basmati rice along with greens, vegetables, crisp wonton pieces and a sesame dressing.

Warung could have resorted to the usual miso-glazed black cod  but opted instead for cod with curry sauce and Chinese five spice on a bed of coconut basmati rice. Tuna tartare with wasabi mayonnaise and avocado is delicious. And there’s a good tuna tataki salad.

Even premium meat comes in small plates. Warung’s grilled filet mignon is as good as it gets, a tender, thick cut of steak with a green apple teriyaki sauce. Instead of mashed potatoes, it is paired with fluffy mashed taro root, rich with cream and butter. 

Baby lamb chops are notable too. The three tiny chops are marinated with an Asian pesto (ginger, basil, mint, jalapeno). served with baby arugula and drizzled with yogurt-cumin sauce.

Can’t decide what to order? Three set combinations make it easy. But individual dishes are so reasonably priced, from $3 (baby vegetable crudités)  to $10 (the steak), that creating your own combination is affordable.

Then you’ll want to have dessert, perhaps a wonton-wrapped banana eggroll with vanilla ice cream and caramel walnuts or a luscious crème brulee that incorporates coconut strands so that it can pass as Asian fusion food.

Warung Café, 118 West 4th Street (between Spring and Main Streets), Los Angeles, CA 90013. Tel: (213)  626-0662. Lunch 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. Dinner 5 to 10 p.m. Monday through Wednesday, 5 p.m. to midnight Thursday through Saturday. Closed Sunday.

Feasting on Kalbi Chim

Getting invited to a home-cooked Korean dinner is a rare honor any time. But this night, the main dish was to be one of my favorites--kalbi chim, a succulent, slightly sweet and irresistibly good dish of braised beef ribs.

My friend Sejung Kim had offered to cook. Knowing how much I like kalbi chim, she had consulted with Seong Yeon, a friend in Seattle who is expert at this dish.

The ribs, rice and a salad would have been enough, considering that it takes three days to make kalbi chim properly. But no. Sejung cooked everything else she could think of to make an extraordinary Korean meal.

The food was beautiful, like art work. Just one example—kamja bokkeum, strands of potato and bell peppers woven into an artful design.

We started with a soup. toenjang jjigae, based on a delicate broth made from anchovies and kelp. Into this, Sejung had put cubes of beef and potato, tofu, zucchini, shiitake mushrooms and onions. And of course toenjang, which  is fermented soy bean sauce--Korean miso.

Most Korean restaurants serve marinated bean sprouts, sukju namul, and Sejung had made them too, seasoning the blanched sprouts with rice vinegar, sugar and sesame seeds.

We also ate dried young fern shoots (kosari) in an appetizing blend of soy sauce, sesame oil, sesame seeds and green onions—basic seasonings for much Korean food.

There were sliced Persian cucumbers marinated with spicy red pepper paste (kochujang), garlic and sugar. And white kimchi, mild and delicate rather than spicy with red pepper.

Plain rice would have been fine, but Sejung had made an ornate dish of short grained white rice combined with both sweet and regular brown rices and black beans.  This is called kongbap, kong meaning beans and bap cooked rice.

The vegetable dishes may sound simple, but some of them required hours of preparation. The kosari for example, had to be soaked, rinsed, boiled, soaked again, then sautéed.

The highlight, of course, was the kalbi chim (sometimes the dish is spelled kalbi jim,  kalbi tchim or galbi jjim), ornamented with Asian red dates and chestnuts, and sprinkled with  pine nuts and hairlike strands of dried red chile, called silgochu. 

In Korean restaurants, I usually drink Korean beer, but Sejung likes Sangiovese or Shiraz with Korean food, and by chance I had brought along a Mosby Sangiovese 2004.

We finished with fruit, a pretty dish of white nectarines in syrup flavored with white Zinfandel.

The following weekend, with the taste of kalbi chim still fresh in my mind, I went to a Korean market, bought the ingredients and started the three days of preparation.

The results were sumptuous. The procedure isn’t as difficult as it sounds. Much of the time is devoted to marinating the meat to concentrate the rich flavor. 

I’m not the only one who thinks that kalbi chim  is a wonderful dish.  In his column The Minimalist in the New York Times Dining In section (February 13, 2008), Mark Bittman  ranked  French style braised short ribs and “the standard Korean kalbi jim”  as “stunning classics.”

The kalbi chim that Sejung makes is far from “standard” though.  Its intricate flavors and painstaking preparation place it on a level that, as far as I’m concerned, is in the stratosphere.

SEJUNG’S KALBI CHIM

4 pounds kalbi  (beef ribs, labeled big beef ribs in the Korean market where I shopped), cut in short lengths
½ cup grated Asian pear
¼ cup sake
3 tablespoons sugar
½ cup soy sauce
½ medium onion, finely chopped
2 tablespoons minced green onion
2 tablespoons minced garlic
2 teaspoons sesame oil
2 teaspoons sesame seeds
½ cup water
1 inch ginger root, peeled and cut in thin slices
15 jujubes (Asian dried red dates)
15 fresh or dried chestnuts, optional,
1 tablespoon pine nuts
Fine dried red chile strands (ask for silgochu in a Korean market), optional 

Start the preparation 2 days before serving. On the first day, place the ribs in a large bowl or dishpan and cover with cold water. Let stand 2 hours.

Drain the ribs, rinse and pat dry with paper towels. Place them in a container with a lid. Grind the pear in a food processor or blender. Combine the pear, sake and sugar with the meat and mix well. Cover and marinate in the refrigerator 1 hour.

Combine the soy sauce, onion, green onion, garlic, sesame oil and sesame seeds in a food processor or blender and process until pureed. Add to the meat. Mix well. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

The next day, place the meat in a Dutch oven. Add ½ cup water, cover and bring to a boil. Add the ginger root slices. Reduce the heat, cover and cook over medium low heat 3 hours.

Meanwhile, soak the dates until softened enough to slit them and pry out the seeds. After 2 hours, add the seeded dates and the dried chestnuts, if using, and cook 1 hour longer.

Let the meat cool. If any bones have separated from the meat, remove them and discard. Return the meat and cooking juices to the washed storage container. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

The next day, remove as much of the congealed fat from the meat as possible. Turn into a Dutch oven and reheat to serving temperature.  Transfer the meat and juices to a large heated serving container. Sprinkle with pine nuts, and with dried red chile strands if you are bold.

Makes 4 to 5 servings.

A Splendid Soup at Paperfish

Paperfish’s puree of chestnut soup is as seductive and luxurious as a soup could be.

Executive chef Yianni Koufoudontis combines chestnuts, Port wine, vegetable stock and cream, then tops this mellow mixture with a white pool of smoked sturgeon mousse.

Dark slivers of winter black truffle make it even more impressive.

Puree of chestnut soup with smoked sturgeon mousse and winter black truffle is $13 at Paperfish, 345 N. Maple Drive, Beverly Hills, CA 90210. Tel: (310) 858-6030.

What People Say About Food

   “Cooks are alchemists, searching for ways to turn food into memories, nourishment, and joy.“

  --Katharine Kagel in “Café Pasqual’s Cookbook," a book of recipes from a restaurant in Santa Fe, New Mexico (Chronicle Books; 1993).

Really Good Chicken Enchiladas

The best Mexican food isn’t always in Mexico, but the good dishes that turn up here are usually just a step away from their place of origin.

And so it was with the chicken enchiladas that I came across recently at Miracle Springs Resort & Spa in Desert Hot Springs.

They were a special for lunch the day that I arrived for a short vacation, and because I adore Mexican food, I had to find out their origin and get the recipe.

The person responsible did indeed come from Mexico.  Cecilia Ortega, who is a sous chef at the resort, grew up in Acatlan de Osorio in the state of Puebla, Mexico. And she certainly knows how to deal with chiles.

Her sauce is simple and straightforward, just dried red chiles soaked until soft, then pureed with onion, garlic and oregano. The filling is shredded chicken, mixed with a little of the sauce. The remainder goes over the top along with plenty of cheese and a scattering of sliced olives and green onions.

The recipe is long, but not difficult. The best procedure is to make the sauce one day, then cook the chicken and assemble and bake the enchiladas the next day. I’ve broken the recipe down into stages to make it easier to follow.

The California chiles that Cecilia uses are mild, so if you want a spicy dish, try blending a jalapeno chile with the sauce. Cecilia serves the enchiladas with beans and rice. Or you can lighten up as I did by substituting a lettuce and avocado salad for the heftier accompaniments.

CECILIA’S CHICKEN ENCHILADAS

12 dried California chiles (about 3 ounces)
¾ onion
3 cloves garlic
½ teaspoon oregano
7 1/2 cups water, about
½ cup plus 1 tablespoon oil
1 tablespoon flour
1 ½ teaspoons salt or to taste
4 bone-in chicken thighs (about 1 ¼ pounds)
6 black peppercorns
8 corn tortillas
2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese
2 large green onions, including some of the tops, chopped
¼ cup drained canned sliced ripe olives

The Sauce:

Place the chiles in a deep saucepan and add water to cover. Bring to a boil. Press the chiles to submerge in the water. Turn off the heat and let them stand until softened, about 20 minutes. Drain

Remove the stems from the chiles and rinse out the seeds. Place the chiles in a blender container or food processor. Add 1/2 onion, cut in chunks; 2 cloves garlic, the oregano and 1 cup water. Blend until thoroughly pureed.

Place a sieve over a large bowl and pour the pureed mixture into the sieve, about 1/3 at a time. Press to extract the chile mixture and eliminate the skins. Rinse out what remains in the blender with another 1 cup water and put through the sieve.

Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large saucepan. Stir in the flour and cook, stirring, 30 seconds. Add the chile sauce and bring to a boil. Rinse out the chile sauce container with a little more water and add to the pan with 1 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, 10 minutes. The sauce can be made in advance to this point and set aside for later or refrigerated overnight.

The Chicken:

Remove the skin from the chicken thighs. Place in a deep saucepan and add 5 cups water, ¼ onion in one piece, 1 clove garlic, ½ teaspoon salt and the peppercorns.  Bring to a boil and skim. Reduce the heat and simmer, loosely covered, for 1 hour.

Drain the chicken and reserve the broth for another use. With 2 forks, shred the chicken and discard the bones. There should be at least 2 cups. Stir 1/4 cup of the chile sauce into the shredded chicken and set aside.

Enchilada Assembly:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Heat ½ cup oil in a small skillet. Add 1 tortilla and fry just until softened. Drain on paper towels. Repeat with the remaining tortillas.

Place 1/8 of the chicken mixture (about ¼ cup) on each tortilla. Roll and place seam side down in a 10x6 glass baking dish or other oblong baking dish.

When all the enchiladas are assembled, cover with the sauce, then with the Cheddar cheese. Sprinkle with the green onions and sliced olives.

Cover the dish with foil and bake at 350 degrees until heated through, 45 to 50 minutes. Uncover and let stand a few minutes before serving.

Makes 8 enchiladas or 4 servings.

A Chance to Taste Sake, Sushi

Imagine tasting chrysanthemum mist, man’s mountain or “nothing.”  These are sakes, competing for attention with imaginative nicknames and clever bottle shapes. The one called nothing, or zero, simply claims to be the purest and best, with nothing to mar its classic flavor. Another goes to the other extreme and calls itself “amazing.”

I tasted these at a garden reception at the home of the consul general of Japan in Los Angeles. But you can taste them for yourself at the Japanese Food & Sake Festival March 13 from 6 to 8:30 p.m. at the Hyatt Regency Orange County in Garden Grove.

There will be cooking demonstrations and  food to sample from restaurants such as Katsu-ya, Kitayama, Mishima, Musha, Sushi Roku, Sushi 345 and Tokyo Table.

The number of Japanese restaurants in Southern California has grown to almost 2,000, twice the number as in New York, and the demand has dramatically increased Japanese seafood exports, while sake exports have doubled in the past few years.

From what I saw at the garden reception, which was a festival preview, there will be plenty of sushi and other beautifully arranged food at the festival, along with many brands of premium sake and also green tea and other beverages.

Tickets purchased in advance are $50, or $55 at the door. The number to be sold is limited, so order as soon as possible. For reservations and further information, go to http://www.JapaneseFoodCulture.org, email to [email protected] or contact Nikki at (213) 509-3701.

The Hyatt Regency Orange County is located at 11999 Harbor Blvd., Garden Grove , CA 92840.

French Food in Palm Springs

Le Vallauris is dazzling, not just the food but the illuminated  tumbleweeds set high in ficus trees around the patio.

On a cold night, I thought the patio would be deserted in favor of warmer quarters indoors. But a friend insisted we eat there.  Thanks to heaters, we were as comfortable as if bathed in glowing sun. And the glittering tumbleweeds turned the patio into a magical garden. 

Le Vallauris has long been Palm Springs’ most elegant restaurant. Years ago, when a friend was dining there,  Frank Sinatra walked in. The designer James Galanos was having dinner the night I was there.

The desert is overpopulated with formula restaurants, steak houses and fast food chains. Le Vallauris offers an escape from that sort of food. Situated in a historic house, it’s the sort of place where you would order foie gras or escargots, sweetbreads or sole meuniere, drink a fine French wine and finish with a soufflé or mousse.

This is not to say it is old fashioned. Chef Jean Paul Lair adds regional touches, such as slivered dates in the sweet sauce for sautéed Perigord duck foie gras. And he offers such contemporary fare as seared ahi tuna with wasabi beurre blanc and roasted Peking duck with a tangerine and orange reduction.

I was especially pleased with pommes soufflés—light as air inflated potatoes that accompanied my lemon-infused sweetbreads and remained crisp even as they cooled.

The sweetbreads are a signature dish, crisp at the edges and, on this night, accompanied by asparagus as well as the potatoes.

Thanks to my companions, I sampled enough food to know that ordering here is not a long shot. We tasted a delicious creamy white asparagus and wild mushroom soup; Burgundy style escargots with Pernod, garlic, lemon and butter; a Roquefort-stuffed pear;  silky hickory smoked salmon, and, among the entrees, grilled venison,  grilled Chinook king salmon, whitefish with a Dijon mousseline, the sweetbreads and Peking duck.

Then we passed around crème brulee, mousses and other desserts. I liked the vanilla ice cream in a crisp cookie basket that accompanied my tarte tatin almost as much as the thick layer of caramelized apples on the crust. 

Owner Paul Bruggemans helped with choosing wines, among them a Chateau Mouton Cadet 2002 and a Benziger Syrah from the same year.

Chef Lair was away on a catering job that night, but the restaurant is so well managed that we wouldn’t have known the difference.

Le Vallauris restaurant, 385 W. Tahquitz Canyon Way, Palm Springs, CA 92262. Tel: (760) 325-5059. 

What's Best with Barolo?

What would you serve with a $400 bottle of wine?

That’s something I don’t have to worry about, so I asked Luca Currado, owner/winemaker of Vietti, whose Barolo Riserva Villero 2001 sells for $400—if you can find it.

(If not, you’ll have to settle for Vietti’s estate-bottled single vineyard Barolos. Those from the 2004 vintage, due out this spring, cost only $130.)

Currado’s ideal Barolo menu starts with steak tartare or carpaccio. A salad with fresh greens and chicken breast or quail eggs and tomatoes would also work, he says.

The next course would be pasta, homemade and sauced with cream and fresh mushrooms.

The ideal meat dish would be grilled lamb or veal marinated with Barolo and then braised. Lamb is obviously Currado’s choice, because grilled rack of lamb accompanied Vietti wines at a lunch that Currado hosted at Paperfish in Beverly Hills.

A bowl of luscious seasonal fruits such as peaches and apricots is enough for dessert, accompanied by a sparkling Moscato d’Asti, some of which would be poured into the bowl with the sliced fruit.

If you’re a high-end wine buyer (I’m not. Severe rain damage and crumbling foundations have preempted my budget this year), the Vietti Barolos to look for are the 2004 Rocche, Brunate  and Lazzarito, each named for a vineyard, as is Villero. The 2004 and 2001 vintages are the finest in years, Currado says.

Why do these wines cost so much?  An acre of Barolo land  (Barolo is produced in the Piedmont region of northern Italy) is worth $300,000 to $400,000, for starters. Vietti harvests only .8 to 1.2 tons of grapes per acre, which adds up to about one bottle for each vine.

The Riserva Villero? Don’t even ask. Vietti has made this wine only seven times since 1982, and the little that is available is allocated to collectors.

A Beautiful Bowl of Red

The beef in red chile sauce that I ate at La Michoacana in Desert Hot Springs was so delicious that I determined to copy it. One taste simply wasn’t enough.

The restaurant provided enough hints to give me a start, and I filled in details based on long years of studying and cooking Mexican food.

The result is very good. It’s not quite as tangy as La Michoacana’s version, which is not a fault. The next time I might add a couple more tomatillos, the small green tomatoes that add an acidic note to Mexican salsas.

The color is the same vibrant red. And the flavor is slightly spicy. I think I was using the same dried California chiles as La Michoacana, because I bought them in Desert Hot Springs, down the road from the restaurant. 

Other California chiles might be milder, but you can always doctor the sauce to make it as spicy as you like. You can also use the sauce as a marinade for thin cut pork chops or milanesas. Grill or shallow-fry them and you have another delicious dish, carne adobada.

CARNE DE RES EN CHILE COLORADO
Beef in Red Chile Sauce

2 ½ pounds beef for stewing
5 cups water
1 medium onion
3 cloves garlic
2 ½ teaspoons salt, or to taste
10 dried California chiles, about 2 ½ ounces
½ pound tomatillos
¾ pound tomatoes
1 teaspoon dried oregano
6 black peppercorns
4 whole cloves
¼ teaspoon ground cumin

Cut the beef into bite-size pieces. Place in a Dutch oven. Add the water, a wedge of onion (about 1/3 of the onion), 1  clove garlic and 1 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil and skim the surface. Lower the heat, cover and simmer 1 hour. Drain the meat, reserving the broth. Return the meat to the Dutch oven.

Meanwhile, spray a large heavy griddle with nonstick spray or coat lightly with oil. Heat over medium high heat. Place the chiles on the hot griddle and roast a minute or so, until fragrant. Do not allow them to darken and burn.

Remove the chiles from the griddle and place them in a large saucepan. Add water to cover. Bring to a rolling boil. Press the chiles down into the water. Turn off the heat and let them soak until softened, about 20 minutes.

Cut the remaining onion into 2 or 3 pieces and remove the husks from the tomatillos. Peel the remaining 2 cloves garlic.

Place the onion, tomatillos, tomatoes and the garlic on the hot griddle and roast until spotted with brown. Remove and let cool.

Drain the softened chiles. Remove the stems and rinse out the seeds. Place the roasted onion pieces, tomatoes, tomatillos, garlic cloves and the chiles in a blender container or food processor. and blend until smoothly pureed. You do not need to add liquid in order to blend.

Pour the mixture in batches into a sieve over a large bowl. Press to extract as much liquid as possible. Discard the solids. Rinse out the blender with ½ cup of the reserved beef broth, and strain into the bowl. Strain the remaining broth. Set aside 1 cup and reserve the remainder.

Add the chile mixture to the beef in the Dutch oven. Add the reserved 1 cup beef broth, the remaining 1½ teaspoons salt, the oregano, peppercorns, cloves and cumin. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, 45 minutes. If the sauce should become too thick, thin with a little of the reserved broth.  Taste and add more salt if needed.

Serve with rice. Add refried beans to the plate if wanted.

Makes 6 servings.

Memorable Mexican Food

I spotted La Michoacana right after I turned off the 10 freeway and headed toward Desert Hot Springs. Set back in the desert, it looked like the sort of modest place that might have great Mexican food, and I knew that I had to eat there.

It was heavily barred, though, and appeared to be closed. Fortunately, the forbidding red bars turned out to be decorative. Inside I found a small, cozy restaurant with booths upholstered in bright stripes, a long menu of popular Mexican dishes and, on the front counter, big jars of the fresh fruit drinks--aguas frescas—that go so well with spicy food.

La Michoacana  is a genuine mom and pop place. The cook—too shy  to give his name, his wife said—is from Los Reyes in the state of Michoacan. She is from Aguascalientes.

What to order with so many choices?. Chiles rellenos made the proper way with poblano chiles? Tacos and enchiladas on lunch specials? After some thought, I chose carne de res en chile colorado--beef in red chile sauce. This would give me a chance to observe the cook’s skill with sauces.

There was a risk. The sauce could have been ordinary, made with canned red chile sauce or chili powder, and the meat could have been tough and dry.

But my instincts were correct.  The dish was wonderful, the meat succulent, the sauce a vivid red and the flavor different from any chile colorado that I have tasted or made myself.

The distinctive acid note came from tomatillos, the small green tomatoes with papery husks. Dried California chiles added spiciness and rich color. Tomatoes contributed yet more redness. Onion and garlic, cloves, black pepper and oregano rounded out the flavor without being obtrusive.

It was, as I had hoped, a very good meal and a substantial one, including rice, cheese-topped beans and tortillas. And there was sweet, mellow cantaloupe water to satisfy my thirst before tackling the dry desert air again.

Carne de res en chile colorado is $8.49 at La Michoacana, 16760 Palm Drive, Desert Hot Springs, CA 92240. (corner Dillon Road). Tel: (760) 251-5312. Open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., Sunday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.