Two Years Later: Bringing The Blog Back

A lot has happened in the nearly two years that have passed since I abandoned this blog. I became occupied with actual food blogging for Miami New Times' Short Order, for instance. I took up coding and learned how to make my own website, which seems slightly cooler than using Blogger, in my humble opinion.

Soon, I'll become a well-traveled adventurer, as I explore Israel for 10 days and then move to New York City for two months shortly after.

Courtesy AngSarap.net

I can't believe I'll be headed to the Land of Milk and Honey in a little more than a week. When I return to the States – severely jet-lagged and likely missing the land of my forefathers – I hope to have enough energy in me to write at least one blog post about excessive falafel and shawarma consumption.

But it's in the Big Apple where my new food adventure will truly begin. As you may have been able to gather from the title and layout of this blog, it's been an ambition of mine to work (or intern) for a magazine – preferably a food magazine.

Although the media outlet I'll be interning for in NYC is neither a magazine nor food-specific, I'm inexplicably excited for the opportunity at hand. I'll be working full-time for Mashable.com, but I'd be remiss if I didn't take advantage of this great city that offers food from every country at every price point during all hours of the day and night.

Chinatown and Little Italy won't know what hit 'em. Hell's Kitchen, I'm comin' for ya. Chelsea Market – watch out; you're a short walk from my dorm, and it is quite possible I secretly plan to sneak my way into the Food Network's facilities. (In short, let's just make this my tantalizing to-do list.)

I hope I can keep up with the commitment of blogging about my food-ventures, and I invite you to follow me!

So Annoying

Please ignore the weird white highlighting on certain sentences in my recent blog posts. I'm really not trying to highlight those phrases. It's embarrassing. Bear with me as I try and fail to fix the problem. Thanks!

My Take on The Meatball Joint

Remember when I mentioned my dinner at The Meatball Joint oh so long ago?

Here's a recap of what I ate, followed by an article I wrote before it opened.

I shared a Calle Ocho Sandwich (pork ball with caramelized onions and mojito sauce) and the Lamb Ball Sammy (flattened on focaccia bread and served with tsatsiki sauce). Both meatballs were the day's special.

I suspect that The Meatball Joint will be one of those places where the special, very creative and very delicious, will always be too good to pass up and just go for the usual: Classic Italian (beef and pork), South Beach (turkey) or West Hollywood (vegetarian). But I still want to try them all - I wish they let you mix and match!

Also couldn't resist upgrading to the veggie of the day: deliciously roasted brussel sprouts along with broccoli, carrots and-- surprise-- pear! My friend also got the mozzarella balls with cherry tomatoes. Very fresh.

Oh and of course we had to get the ice cream balls squeezed in a sandwich of one chocolate chip cookie and one white chocolate macadamia nut cookie. Also sweet but hard to eat.

One of the most enjoyable parts of the night (besides eating! because trust me, that was certainly the most enjoyable part) was scribbling my order down on the dry-erase menu with a marker. Fun and whimsical.

Anyway I loved it all and want to go back. It's super cool how Chef Bernie Matz can put his spin on any concept and, in my opinion, it's a success!

Check it out at www.themeatballjoint.com.

P.S. The hostesses, waiters and staff are all very friendly! Yay.

So, as for the article, I wrote this prior to the restaurant's opening (on May 21) for a school project. Because it was never published, and I figure I might as well put it somewhere, it's going on my blog.

If you want more specific details on the restaurant, go somewhere else: Miami.com, Thrillist, Eater, etc. I sat down to talk with Chef Bernie Matz, so I'm hoping you find that this story has a more personal look at the thought process behind starting up the meatball concept.


Let me know what you think! And if you've eaten at The Meatball Joint already, feel free to tell me how you enjoyed your meal too.

---

April 9, 2012

Chef Bernie Matz brings meatballs to Miami Beach

BY LYSSA GOLDBERG

The Meatball Joint, next to Chef Bernie Matz's L.A. Cafe, has taken the spot of Alton Road's King Kone.
COURTESY MIAMI NEW TIMES

Bernie Matz sits at an outdoor table on Lincoln Road. Dealing with his waiters at the end of their shifts, Matz sips his ice water from a compostable, plant-based plastic cup—one of the many personal touches he brings to his restaurants.

Chef and owner of Bernie’s L.A. Café and the Café @ Books & Books, Matz connects his passions for nutrition and the environment to his work everyday. Fresh, natural ingredients and modern, South Floridian recipes are the key at his two Miami Beach restaurants.

Now Matz will bring his foodie flair to a third eatery this May.

The concept for The Meatball Joint was born just six weeks ago, meaning Matz has taken on the task of planning and executing an entire restaurant in only two months.

This is possible, Matz said, because he’s ready to embrace a more minimalist attitude.

While his two cafés serve various sandwiches and New South Florida-style hot meals, the focal point of The Meatball Joint menu will be combinations of meatballs and sauces.

“After having all these broad, creative menus, the beauty is the simplicity,” Matz said.

The Meatball Joint’s menu will be fun and encourage sharing, but the idea is also to keep a typically messy meal “girl-friendly.”

Matz settled on the meatball-themed restaurant after the landlord of the storefront—who will also be his partner in the business—challenged Matz to come up with something simple enough to operate out of the existing space. The Meatball Joint will be housed in a tiny space that seats 32 people, conveniently located on Alton Road, right next to L.A. Café.

Several fast food venues surround his location, but Matz is confident that this is a risk worth taking. Noting demand and excitement from friends in the food industry, he hopes to see the same success that New York City’s The Meatball Shop has had. This success has allowed the similarly run restaurant to open up three locations across the city.

“People’s eyes light up and they go, ‘Oh, it is a pretty cool idea,’” he said. “And there isn’t one down here.”

Matz wants The Meatball Joint to be a casual neighborhood hangout. He hopes that Miami Beach locals and tourists love The Meatball Joint enough that he can expand it around South Florida.

Keeping with his healthy food philosophy, Matz has designed special offerings in addition to the traditional meatball—all sorts of veggie balls with low-carb and whole grain options, too.

Matz has had a blast playing around with recipes for vegetarian options, with ingredients like quinoa, black beans and sweet potato. The challenge is making sure that they not only taste good but also hold together nicely and feel like a meatball, he said.

Although coming up with recipes can be a guessing game, he made sure to stick to what he knows.

“A real musician knows what it’s going to sound like before he starts to play,” he said, drawing a comparison to his culinary experiments.

Like at his other venues, the wine selection will be “cool, fresh and unpretentious”— keeping prices as low as $6 to $10 a glass. 

“I like value,” he said. “I don’t like making people spend $400 or $500 on a bottle of wine.”

Wines will be imported from around the world, primarily California, Chile, Argentina, South Africa and New Zealand.

Matz has been in the business since opening Wet Paint Café—one of the first restaurants on Lincoln Road—back in the late ‘80s. As a child, he loved food and loved to cook.

“My mother always encouraged me to be a chef, but I didn’t envision it at all,” he said. “Does a kid that paints very well dream of being a painter when he grows up?”

Matz, the type who is early to bed and early to rise, said the restaurant industry is not for people like him. Still, he was lucky enough to find the leeway to shape his cafés around his own lifestyle.

That means hungry patrons on Miami Beach are just as lucky to have a meatball place coming soon.

Mmm...Decorated sugar cookies

Look what I found at Epicure Gourmet Market in South Beach Friday night!

...The super duper cute Fourth of July iced cookies I've been learning so much about recently. I just had to buy the package of red, white and blue mini stars, of course. I couldn't resist once I saw them in person.

The store is clearly getting in the mood for the American holiday, but there are other adorable handcrafted cookies too! Cupcakes, snails, flowers. All very pretty and pink :)

By the way, you know how perfect-looking cookies never taste as good as they look? The ones I bought surprised me. They were sweet but subtle, not too overwhelming, especially since I think it was just after breakfast when I ate one the next morning. Such a treat.

That is all I wanted to share. Hope you enjoy this eye candy from the screen of your computer. Just a note, all Whole Foods Market stores across Florida carry them too!

P.S. I was in South Beach Friday night trying out The Meatball Joint. I might post about that in the future as well. IT WAS SO GOOD.

Recent Food Adventures Recap

Here are a few foodie facts I've learned recently.

1. Too much food isn't always a good thing.
A family friend made a huge country feast for my mom's birthday. We ate: chips and bean dip; cheese and crackers; jumbo shrimp cocktail; salad with hearty onions, tomatoes, cheese slices, banana peppers, red peppers and balsamic dressing; rare, juicy prime rib; baked potatoes with bacon, cheese, and sour cream; apple sauce; caramel apple pie and rich chocolate cake.

It was delicious but unbearable. It was simply impossible to eat it all. Yes, I wish I could go back right now and grab a couple of extra shrimp and maybe a few more bites of prime rib. My mouth is nearly watering just remembering it. But gosh - this could have made for three separate dinners. When I'm older and host my own dinners, I want to impress the guests just as my mom's friend did, but I'll make sure not to overdo it. Did I mention the potatoes were the size of rocket ships?

This potato is really as large as the one on my mom's plate.

2. Pumpkin seeds are a heartier and more flavorful salad topper than sunflower seeds.
A neighbor and another friend of my mom also invited us for dinner for the occasion of my mom's birthday - this time on the actual date of her birth. She made some healthy parmesan salmon, red quinoa with homemade basil pesto (I want to remake this pesto. It had such a sharp bite but it tasted so fresh and added some much-need flavor to the quinoa!), and an all-you-can-top salad.

My favorite topping to the salad - amongst the feta cheese, sundried tomatoes, and greek yogurt caesar parmesan dressing - would have to be the pumpkin seeds. Hands down. I'll have to buy some of my own and remake that salad. Or just munch on toasted pumpkin seeds during the day. I think I'm a new fan.

3. Bring your eggs to room temperature before baking.
With the help of my BFFL, I made yellow cake with chocolate frosting, along with similar cupcakes with red and white (and pink) sprinkles: sort of Miami Heat themed. Nothing fancy (as you can see below) since we were working with bare-bones ingredients that we gathered quickly at a convenience store, but they were quite a hit with my boyfriend's family at his Heat vs. Celtics Game 7 "watch party."

We let the eggs adapt to room temperature as patiently as we could, as per the advice of Wendy. The desserts came out great (despite a mishap in the message written on the cake). Check it out:

My friend thought the Heat would lose.

Red & white sprinkles!

4. I can buy ingredients for, make and eat tacos in less time than it takes you to watch a movie.
Sunday night I was tired. After coming home from a Marlins game, I just wanted to relax. But I was determined to have a home-cooked meal that night. And that meant I was the only one who could make that happen.

I decided on tacos so that I could get away with ground beef being the only thing I'd actually need to cook. I challenged myself to return from the supermarket in less than an hour (including drive time), and made it home in under 45 minutes (one of my life's greatest accomplishments)! By an hour after that, I'd already prepared the meal and served it to my parents as well as downed both the hard and soft tacos.

Not the actual tacos. Source: GOOGLE

Though I used pre-diced red onions and shredded iceberg lettuce, the four cheese Mexican blend and hand-scooped avocado guacamole really freshened up the meal. Those were some darned good tacos. I think the best part was that I didn't overdo it by adding refried beans or diced tomatoes or guilt-laden sour cream. I could actually taste every flavor and I loved it.

5. I love naan.
This is the first time I have bought and tried naan on my own. I never thought I'd really have use for it but it was on sale, and I couldn't resist. After all, this is a summer for trying new things. Garlic hummus (so much better than original) with naan brushed with olive oil and toasted in the oven - delish. That's all I shall say.

Oh and also that I had some more tonight as a midnight snack because I was craving the naan & hummus combo after eating a light dinner and some chocolates (which I received as a surprise from my boyfriend) for dessert.

In addition, here are a few of my desires inspired by my internship with foodie clients at a PR firm:

• Be rich and go to the Hamptons in NY and eat at high-end, trendy restaurants that charge $35 a plate!
• Stock up on decorative iced sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies and cookie sandwiches from Cookies by Shar.
• Go to fantabulous food events like the NYC Wine and Food Festival.

My avocado ripened

Me: ...I wanted an egg and avocado sandwich for breakfast but I have to wait days for the avocado to ripen.
Wendy: Ugh I hate when I find that out about the avocado. Mood ruiner...


And then a few days passed... and my unripened avocado became this:

I think the avocado became too ripe, actually. Either that or I was used to the Haas avocado I had eaten most recently (the one with dark bumpy skin). Maybe that variety isn't typically as soft and creamy. I'm not really sure. Ask an avocado expert.

Regardless, my avocado then turned into this...

Me: I made an avocado sandwich with turkey slices today.

Imaginary Person Reading My Blog: Don't you mean a turkey sandwich with avocado slices?

M: I'm not dyslexic. I'm just an awful sandwich maker. I kind of overdid it with my ripe avocado.

IPRMB: Oh.

M: Yeah.

Are you an avocado lover who doesn't believe that there's such thing as too much in a sandwich?

PROOF: The layer of avocado is thicker than the turkey.

In conclusion, this is what I learned:

• Buy an avocado ahead of time so that it's ripe when you want to use it.
• Don't wait too long because it gets too mushy and doesn't hold together the sandwich as well.
• Maybe even toast the bread a little more.
• And don't bother making a sandwich like this for a transportable lunch at all, for that matter.

And this is what you learned:

• Instagram makes food look better than it tastes. Don't be fooled by the Internet.
• This weird girl Lyssa really likes to tell stories using imagined dialogue and pseudo-hipster snapshots.

I'm glad I didn't promise anyone a post today

I made no promises so that I could maybe come home and relax today - possibly read a book, eat some good food. But after discovering a new blog today, I couldn't quite keep away from my own (By the way, check out the blog I'm referencing here. Food, quotes, movies, TV, music. Did I mention food?). I once told my best friend that I'd never get a blog because, once I started, there'd be no way to stop me. Too bad I didn't listen to myself.

I still have fun things to write, and I've been writing them in my head as always. (Is that normal or only something I do?) But I don't have much time tonight, and I do want to enjoy my nightly slice of chocolate cake before going to bed (Healthy, right? Don't worry. It's just a recent ritual. There won't be any left soon.). Anyway, so once again, my discussion of previous dinners and other items will have to wait.

However, I'll leave you with this: I would like to mention that, after visiting Sushi Samba's website today, I've decided that I will be eating there as soon as I am rich. Which I currently am not. What inspired this?

Gorgeous pictures.

Food porn worthy.

My goal in life is to eat meals with exotic ingredients and succulent flavors. Pictures of food are what drive me. It's the highway to happiness, I believe. In order to accomplish this, I will own a restaurant one day. Watch me.

Last thing: I promise not to use so many parentheses next time.

[Photos courtesy of Thrillist Miami]