Restaurant Review NY: Xi'an's Famous Foods

For the entire time I have lived in NY, I have never been to Flushing, Queens until this weekend. My boyfriend and Andy and I went to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year last Saturday in Flushing. 4 train transfers and 1 hour later, we were on Main Street and browsing the Hong Kong supermarket which felt like...well, Hong Kong! We saw tanks full of different kinds of live eel, entire aisles just for Asian teas, tons of dried things and plenty of bakeries with delicious Chinese sweets. I have a big weak spot for coconut buns, steamed buns, red bean buns and I even had a Kaya bun which I haven't had since 2007! Our stomachs were growling and we were trying to maneuver the streets that were crowded with parade go-ers. Finally we came to a hole in the wall at 41-28 Main Street. Down a flight of stairs, neon lights illuminated a set of 6 small little eateries, each one with small tables low to the ground and couple of stools. Michael Jackson's "Heal the World" was playing in a CD shop that somehow was bundled with all this food shops. We settled at Xi'an, an eatery with walls that were covered with laminated 8.5 x 11 pictures of their foods. You could order 3 different types of dishes: noodles, soup or a sandwich, each one had a number of variations of what could be in it. The three of us shared two large plates of noodles and one spicy lamb "burger." The woman behind the counter made the noodles right in front of us from scratch! Everything was cooking in one pot. The picture above is our spicy pork noodle dish. It was delicious, flavorful, the noodles were a perfect texture, the meal was authentic and couldn't have been better.

After lunch we were sort of on an eating kick, what's new, and had to try a bunch of different street foods. One small space beneath the subway was making scallion pancakes fresh on a griddle! Andy bought one to share and they were very good! I will definitely be going back to Flushing to try more Chinese food!

Andy's Divine Carrot Cake

Andy made an incredible carrot cake. When he asked that I come over to try some after dance class I had no idea I was in for something that was beyond professional in appearance and freshly and deliciously moist in texture. It was perfect. Sorry I don't have a recipe to share! He created this from a combination of various carrot cake recipes online. Good luck!

Mushroom Barley Soup

I recently had lunch at 2nd Avenue Deli and one of the soups was mushroom barley soup which was delicious but overpriced for a very small amount. I decided to make a huge pot of my own mushroom barley soup that could feed eight and cost very little. I found this recipe on my favorite food site and worked from it. This soup is the perfect comfort food for a cold winter night and with some flaky and chewy bread it's fantastic!

Mushroom Barley Soup

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons butter

10 oz pound mushrooms, chopped

8 oz corn kernels

2 large carrots, chopped

2 large celery stalks, chopped

1/2 onion, chopped

1/2 cup pearl barley

2 tablespoons flour

8 cups mushroom broth, or vegetable broth

1 large handful fresh parsley, chopped

2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill

Directions:

1. Melt butter over medium high heat in a large pot.

2. Add the mushrooms, corn, carrots, celery and onion and saute until the vegetables begin to brown, about 20 minutes.

3. Add flour and stir for five minutes. Gradually mix in the broth and pour in the barley. Bring the soup to a boil, stirring frequently. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer until the barley is soft and the soup thickens, about 40 minutes. Add in the parsley and dill and serve warm.