Eats around A2, part 3

And the final installment of my eating adventures in Ann Arbor!

R, C, and I had a farewell brunch at Cafe Zola which was amazingly delicious. I believe R said she liked both Cafe Zola as well as Angelo's and C and I hadn't tried Cafe Zola before we marked that as our destination for the day :) R and C both had the strawberry and banana crepe and I had the Istanbul omelette. The crepes sounded so tempting but savory wins over sweet for me when it comes down to brunch. The omelette was delicious, there was eggplant and other vegetables inside the fluffy egg, topped with a chunk of feta cheese. mmm...so good! Needless to say, if I were still in A2, I'd be going back there :)


Istanbul Omelette


Inside the omelette!


Strawberry and Banana Crepe

The RF research team and I had a farewell lunch at Sadako during my last week in A2. It was somewhat fitting since I think the first time I visited A2, my cousin and her family took me out there for dinner! I had the U of M lunch set which was 3 pieces of salmon nigiri and 6 pieces of California rolls topped with salmon. Mm I love salmon.. it was decent and pretty good for the price, also much more filling than it looks, as sushi always is. Sadako is definitely a decent alternative from Za's, Jimmy John's, and other places around S. University, and E. University.



On my very last night in A2, E was kind enough to respond to my distress call and come over after lab to help me clean my apt. We were at it for a good 2-3 hours! Thank goodness for friends is all I have to say :) To close out the night, at 11pm we ordered a bacon, chicken, and pineapple Sicilian deep dish pizza with a cajun butter crust from Cottage Inn. I couldn't leave A2 without trying pizza from the chain that first opened there! Pizza after working hard at scrubbing the bathroom, kitchen, floors, etc tastes divine... We had great fun sitting on the floor of my kitchen/dining room, using the pizza box and paper towels as plates, huddled around my comp listening to music and looking at my old photos. I like that when I have pizza, it usually comes with that laid back and relaxing atmosphere :)



I must say, looking back on it, I had a pretty good time in Ann Arbor, despite many stressed-filled nights and the incredibly long winter. I only wish I got to explore more of the eats while I was there!

Eats around A2, part 2

During my last few weeks in A2, E and I started having pretty regular walks 2-3 times a week. We'd either cook something at my place and then walk a few miles or go out to central campus to get dinner and then walk back to north campus. The last few times we met up, we made dumplings and we also went to TK WU for dinner! Ok so we went twice but I found it pretty good and satisfying for Chinese food in A2 :) The service was also not bad and we even got free dessert once :D

The first time we went, E had Rice and Roast Duck and I got the Rice with Chinese Beef Stew. I didn't try any of E's but mine was quite good..of course it helps that I <3 beef tendon lol.


Rice and Roast Duck


Rice and Chinese Beef Stew

The second time we went, we shared two dishes: Hunan Chicken and Kung Pao Tofu. Both were spicy, especially to me who is sadly very weak when it comes to spicy food. But nevertheless I thought they were good, but I preferred the tofu to the chicken though. There's just something about tofu that's crispy on the outside and yet still soft on the inside. Oh the wonders of frying lol. We were also pleasantly surprised when they gave out bowls of mango ice to everyone that night for dessert :)


Hunan Chicken


Kung Pao Tofu


Free mango ice!

Ok, well that's it for now. I think I have one more update and then I'll be done with A2 food...sadly. I wish I had gone out to eat more often :(

Eats around A2, part 1

During my last couple of weeks in Ann Arbor, my brother came and I had a few farewell meals here and there. After nearly 10 months in A2, I had hardly went out to eat so I got my fill during those last couple of weeks! I'm splitting this up into multiple posts, simply because I want to schedule more posts, and also because I don't want the post to drag out too long either :)

When my brother came, I took him out to the two places that I knew of that were must-go places in Ann Arbor for food. The first was Angelo's for brunch.



I had the eggs florentine. What can I say? I'm a sucker for hollandaise..and poached eggs... these did not disappoint! I thought they were quite delicious :) My brother had an omlette that came with a side of buttered toast, but I don't remember what he put in there. He rather enjoyed it and I think we had a pretty satisfying brunch :D


eggs florentine


toast not pictured lol

The second place we went to was Blimpy Burger. I really liked their patty. It was really thin, but made from freshly ground beef so it was really full of flavor and delicious. We also had the fried onion rings, which were ok, not spectacular. We would have been better off getting the mixed vegetables instead, in my opinion anyway. Since you can pretty much create your own burger and see it made for you right before your eyes, it is a good place to go for a good customized burger! My brother notes though that he thought it was a little pricey for its product but then you're paying for the 50's burger joint-esque experience maybe? Needless to say, it should be a definite stop for people going to A2.


my brother's burger, sadly the photos i took of mine were all blurry..


onion rings

And that's it for this post, stay tuned for more!

Za's

Mia Za's Cafe seems to be one of those places you have to try on campus at the U of M. Of course it doesn't hurt that it's right across the street from the School of Education, so it's very convenient (for us anyway!) as well. Mia Za's provides what seems like a million options for dining, from their set menus to creating your own combinations. They have 4 different menus, salads, pastas, pizzas, and paninis, to choose and customize from. I've had their pastas, salads, and paninis and I have to say it's pretty good for campus food. I don't think I'd ever wake up in the middle of the night with sudden hunger pangs for Za's but it's definitely one of the better alternatives to bringing a packed lunch to campus.


Half salad, half panini, both customized to my liking :)

Ajishin

To commemorate the end of our spring break, I went out with some friends to Novi for dinner at what can probably be considered one of the best Japanese restaurants in the area. We went to Ajishin, which apparently serves very good udon and sushi. I ordered the ikura and sake chirashi and it was quite good. I haven't had Japanese in a while so it was a welcome change from my usual dinner fare and the ikura and sake were pretty fresh and tasty :D

A Taste of the Caribbean

Mmm..sometimes being a graduate student isn't so bad! Rackham had a Food for Thought event today with the aim of introducing students to Caribbean food. Of course graduate students love food- especially the free variety- so tons of us registered and showed up for this event that promised us dinner lol. I've never had Caribbean food before so I didn't know what to expect. I have to say I absolutely <3ed the jerk chicken...mmm....but let me first describe what we were offered.

The night was catered by Irie, a Caribbean restaurant in nearby Canton, MI. The owner is Jamaican so I imagine that the food might be more Jamaican than any other Caribbean cuisine, but I might be wrong :X Anyhow, we had rice and peas, curried goat, curried chicken, curried vegetables, jerk chicken, fried plantains, and cut pineapple. The jerk chicken was SO GOOOD. OMG DELICIOUS. The owner gave a short talk about the food before we all stampeded over to the tables and he said that they used 20+ spices in the marinade for the chicken and let it marinate overnight before sticking into the oven (I think he said you can also grill it). SO DELICIOUS. That and the fried plantains and I was set for the night. Someday I'll have to figure out a good jerk spice combination and make my own...and fry me some plantains. mmm plantains.

Izakaya Sanpei

It was C's birthday today so 4 of us went all the way out to Canton for Japanese to celebrate her big 2-3 (so young!) Anyway, so this was the first time I've had Japanese out here in the midwest and I have to say it was better than I expected lol.

We started out with a chicken teriyaki + tempura combination dinner. This was pretty standard, not blow-me-away amazing but not bleck terrible. I liked how the teriyaki sauce they used on the chicken wasn't your standard sticky teriyaki. Tempura is always great...who can say no to deep fried shrimp and vegetables? :)


chicken teriyaki with potatoes and green beans on the side


tempura

We also ordered a red dragon roll (basically a dragon roll but with tuna instead of eel), a sumo roll (it had eel and other fish), and a 007 roll (it had shrimp tempura, eel, some other stuff...topped with unagi sauce it seemed like) as our rolls. They were..ok. I think the best of the three was probably the 007 roll.


red dragon roll


sumo roll + 007 roll

The highlight of the night though was the kamonabe (duck hot pot). Mmm the broth was delicious. C said they probably used duck broth and we all tasted some mushroom in it too but it was very flavorful and K wanted to drink all of it lol. I'm coming to love hot pot lol. There's no photo of it but we topped off the hotpot with 2 servings of udon, just like the Japanese do :) It was yummy!



For dessert, (of course we couldn't say no to dessert!) we got the 4 flavors of ice cream they had to offer. We also asked them to do a happy birthday thing for C, which they happily agreed to do :) So we had a plate of grapes and oranges, green tea, red bean, and vanilla ice cream, and a scoop of orange sherbet to bring us into food coma bliss.



I have to say it was an enjoyable night out with great company, good service, and decent food :)