Chef Boy am I Hungry!

I visited some friends in New Jersey recently and told them about my food blog, Chef Boy Am I Hungry!, and I also admitted its been a long time since I’ve written anything, so finally, I’m creating an entry!

We came upon the topic when discussing interesting topics about food. Here are a few of the amazing food factors I’ve come across recently:

Mushrooms

Mushrooms, including and especially the shiitake, explode in vitamin D content when exposed to… you guessed it - ultraviolet light! For shiitake mushrooms, more vitamin D is created when the gills are exposed to ultraviolet light. Its vitamin D type “2”, which is different than (but reportedly equivalent to) the type of vitamin D our skin creates when exposed to ultraviolet light. Shiitake mushrooms also contain a bunch of other interesting stuff, like

Eggplants

Eggplants are amazing plants and unique sources of nutrition. First of all, I was amazed to discover that they are perennial, in the right environment (as are tomato plants). When it comes to nutrition, they have a variety of interesting vitamins and minerals, but what surprised me the most was that they have the highest concentration of nicotine of any vegetable. Nicotine is arguably an anti-nutrient, but it does have some benefits for some people - there is research into using nicotine to help Parkinson’s victims. Regardless, there is a negligible amount of nicotine in eggplants; otherwise we may see folks firing back ten, twenty, or more eggplants a day!

Broccoli

Broccoli is also an amazing vegetable. It has something called indole-3-carbinol, which purportedly helps DNA repair itself, and includes possible benefits like reduce the risk of prostate cancer and heart disease. The really interesting factor I find about broccoli is that there is reportedly a gene in some individuals that allows them to taste a foul component of broccoli - which may contribute to why some people really dislike broccoli.

Grapefruit, Olive Oil, Tea, and Cocoa

Some other interesting factors of foods I’ve stumbled across recently include:

• Grapefruit juice can interfere with some prescription drugs
• Olive oil is a mild monoamine-oxidase B inhibitor (MAOI-B), which inhibits the breakdown of catacholemines such as dopamine; MAOI-B inhibitors are used in the treatment of anxiety and depression
• There are many different types of tea, and many different interesting aspects to its ingestion, of which I find green tea (especially matcha - finely ground green tea originating from Japan) to be astounding. Green tea contains something called epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) that is currently being researched for a variety of medical uses, but may also contribute to oral hygeine!
• Cocoa has a wide variety of interesting components, including theobromine, of which cocoa is one of the only foods that contain it. While poisonous to some animals, theobromine is similar to caffeine in that it is a stimulant, but it is also scientifically found to act as a cough supressant!

Last night my girlfriend and I redeemed a Groupon for Addie’s restaurant. Little did we know - it was Sunday night family dinner at Addie’s.

We had a taste of so much! Take these treats for example:

• Fried chicken
• Tri-tip
• Pan fried trout
• Candied carrots
• Mashed potatoes
• Fried okra
• Salads
• Blueberry and peach cobbler

I had never been to a meal like this before, but both my girlfiend and I really enjoyed it immensely!

If you haven’t been to Addie’s, I suggest giving it a try. It is located on the Rockville Pike, just over the border from Bethesda, in Maryland. The prices are around average or slightly above average for a solid restaurant.

Personally, I would not drop almost $100 for a knife to slice my bread, because that would mean that I would have to have some really delicious bread to slice!

Sure, I truly enjoy Spring Mill bread, but they can slice it for me. Its expensive, but it is delicious.

Shun Knives

Apparently, however, there are some people who will drop some serious dough on a bread knife! Amazon has a Shun bread knife on sale for $90, marked down from $160!

This must be an incredible knife, it has twelve positive reviews:

They have another one for $135, marked down from $175:

If I had enough money to buy a Shun knife, I’d probably start with a standard chef’s knife, like this one:

B0000Y7KNQ

Well, I’m convinced. Shun knives must be truly awesome. When I become a multi-millionaire, I’ll buy one. Maybe two, or three…

Thanks to a restaurant.com coupon, I gave this place a try. It was just OK, but I’ll go back next month too - because there were some definite pluses. There was one piece of sushi I hadn’t tried before - uni - that I ordered by accident that was very good. Haha.

I also tried their spicy tuna roll which I will skip next time. Actually next time I will stick with nigiri sushi - tuna, yellowtail (theirs was great), but no salmon. I accidentally ordered smoked salmon and it was just not what I expected.

Their unagi (what I meant to order instead of uni) was very good too. I ordered only one because I had ordered so much other stuff.

I also bought an order of toro for $8 - it was OK, but not worth it.