Next time you look across at that pink filet calling you, remember where it came from.

It’s about time.  After decades of ordering pizza through undertrained teenagers or mexicans that can barely speak english, Domino has finally made it possible to customize an entire pizza with a few clicks.

It’s easy.  Just go to Domino’s BFD Builder (Big Fantastic Deal) and your pizza will be ready in 30 minutes for pickup.

You can choose from a bunch of different crusts, varying levels of sauce and cheese and several different meats and vegetables.  Best of all, it will only cost you $11.

I have to say that this is a great deal.  Ordering pizza over the phone is very very frustrating…especially if you want a variety of toppings and half and half combinations.  This way, at least your order will be accurately transmitted to Dominos.  Now you just have to hope that it’s made correctly.

Ever since I’ve been little I’ve heard every year that there will be a shortage of Ahi for the New Years Eve parties around the island.  This year the spin is a little different.  Supposedly because of the Sugar Bowl also on New Years there is going to be a shortage of ahi.  Take my advice, don’t worry about it you’ll get your fish.

Every time I come back to Hawaii, it seems like Ala Moana has undergone some dramatic remodeling.  This time, the center has a whole new section with Nordstroms, and a bunch of new shops where JC Penny used to be.

One of the new additions is a pair of japanese buffets - Kyoto Ohsho and Tsukiji Fish Market.  What’s weird is that they’re right across from each other, and have basically the same concept.

I can’t imagine why Ala Moana would lease like this.  I think in most malls in california a lease comes with a non-compete - so, a Subway and a Quiznos won’t be next to each other in a food court, for example.  I mean, maybe I could understand if they were at different sides of the mall or something…but right next to each other?

In any case, TJFKAK and I went to Kyoto Ohsho at 2:30pm, right as lunch service was ending.  This put us in a odd position where we had to pretty much take everything we wanted all at once, instead of making multiple trips.

The selection of food was ok.  They had a bunch of little japanese dishes, like tempura, tako poke, that chopped up burdock dish, katsu, and others.  And instead of taking food from a big container, each dish is individually plated so you kind of assemble this mix of little dishes on your tray.

The sushi selection was also pretty poor, partly because we came late but also because they just didn’t have much real estate for sushi to begin with.  Their nigiri selection was pretty sparse, mostly just tuna, ika, ebi and tamago.  They also had a few tiny rolls, but nothing to write home about.

So, we filled up two trays of food and stuffed ourselves.  The quality of the food was actually very good.  Even the sushi had pretty generous cuts of fish.  The japanese dishes were also pretty authentic, all the way down to the katsu sauce.

Compared to Todai, Kyoto wins on quality of food but loses on selection.  I’d suggest Kyoto if you’re big on traditional Japanese items that are done right.  Todai is better for plate lunch/chinese drive through style food that’s mass produced.

The sushi quality at Kyoto is also very high compared to Todai.  Kyoto actually had japanese chefs behind the counter, although they did have a sushi making robot back there as well.  The chefs seemed to have decent fish cutting skills, and gave generous portions.

It was a good meal for the money…but definitely go hungry to make the most out of it.  I’d also suggest going far before last call, so you get stuff that’s being freshly made, rather than left overs.

I’m not going to make this a full review, since we did come an a poor time for the restaurant.  But I will say that for those who like basic, traditional japanese food, you’ll be OK with Kyoto.  If you like a more typical buffet style meal with those large platters then stick with Todai.

I’ve got another bento blog to bring to the japadamus readers’ attention. Just Bento, via SeriousEats, is a relatively new blog by a veteran food blogger. There aren’t a ton of entries yet, but so far, she’s posted a few recipes for bento meals that contain both approximate calories per serving and estimated time needed.

Additionally, she’s got various useful how-to’s, like freezing pre-portioned rice. I had no idea you could freeze short-grain rice. Her posts are often focused on how to lose weight through making your own bento lunches, which seems sort of far-fetched because bentos always are heavy on the white rice component. But there is something to be said about making your own fresh from produce meals and maybe switching out to brown rice. Plus, if you’re so inclined, god, bento lunches can be very cute. Anyhow, I’m additing JustBento to my bookmarks and hope that there will be frequent posts. You should check it out!

I saw this at the Nijaya japanese market today, and really couldn’t resist.  These little mini choco croissants looks exactly like little turds - they even have turd folds and kind of a swirly turd-like brown color.  That makes them initially kind of unappetizing, but they actually taste great.  Check them out at your local japanese market.

During this weekend’s last minute trip to vegas we actually got to dine at some of the city’s better restaurants.  Not only that, but it seemed like a slow weekend, so we were actually able to walk in to restaurants or make same-day reservations with no problem.

On Friday night we walked in to Nobu.  I’ve already posted about my trip to Nobu with TJFKAK, so I won’t go into full detail, but generally the experience was so-so like last time.

Now let me say one thing, Nobu is a nice restaurant that has good food.  It just isn’t a great value.  With the exception of a few more fancy dishes like whole lobster sashimi, uni tempura and others, you will find Nobu-like items at most fusiony Japanese restaurants.  But at Nobu, you pay a high premium that in my mind is just not worth it.  I mean, ideally the service and ambience would make up this difference, but at the end of the day I would choose several bay area sushi bars above Nobu.

The next day we went to the Bellagio buffet, which was good as usual.  Sushi Attack has not been there before, and if you’re really going to try and compare vegas buffets you need to start at the Bellagio.  Since it was lunch we didn’t get the full offering of Kobe, venison and sashimi, but had a decent selection of different cuisines, as well as prime rib and lamb.

Still, I think I prefer the Rio’s lunch buffet more than Bellagio’s lunch buffet, just because the Rio does a better job of reproducing each cuisine.  The Bellagio was decent, but some dishes were a bit too generic for my taste.

On Saturday night, we got reservations for Bouchon, which was created by Chef Thomas Keller from French Laundry fame.  The restaurant is in a nice location in the Venetian with both indoor and outdoor dining.

The restaurant itself was kind of casual looking - I guess this is a standard kind of french restaurant design.  The tables were covered with paper table cloths, which seemed kind of cheap to me, but everything else, from the dinnerware to glassware, were high quality.  I don’t know why this stuck out to me - it kind of gave the restaurant both a comfortable and upscale appearance.

The menu also mixed both upscale and homestyle dishes.  There were dishes like ham sandwiches and steak with fries, which seemed out of place to me.  But really, I don’t know much about French food so it’s hard for me to say.

Anyway, we started with oysters, spanish mackerel (pictured) and a salami sampler.  The oysters were fine, and the salami was nicely presented.  I especially like their mustard.  The spanish mackerel was steamed with citrus, and served with sliced octopus.  This gave the fish a mild flavor, which is good since spanish mackerel is usually very fishy.  I thought the serving size was very small though, and not as flaky and tender as I would have hoped.  The octopus was nicely cooked though - it absorbed flavors well and maintained a somewhat crunchy texture.

For my entree I got the spareribs, and Sushi Attack got the veal.  I have to say, both dishes were kind of disappointing.

To start, my spareribs were a bit bland.  They seemed to be first pan seared then baked, so the meat had a hard crust on the outside while the inside was tender and flaky.  But for me, the outside was a bit overdone, with the crust being hard to eat and tasting a bit burnt.  The interior of the meat was nice and tender, but it didn’t really have very much flavor.

Sushi Attack’s veal was similarly bland I thought.  The meat was cooked perfectly, but it didn’t really absorb any of the flavors that it was served with.

And as a restaurant in the Venetian, our bill was a cool $100 per head including drinks - like Nobu, money that could be better spent.

A few notes about the pictures:  The top pic is my plate at the Bellagio, followed by the spanish mackerel, salami plate, spareribs and veal.  The pics at Bouchon didn’t come out very well due to bad lighting, unfortunately.

Michael Bauer in his blog talks about a growing number of diners starting to complain about amateur restaurant bloggers that are taking pictures during their meal.  As someone that loves blogging about food, I think its bullshit that I can’t take a picture of the food that I purchased.  In addition, the restaurant should encourage this behavior since it does create buzz about the restaurant and encourage other diners to visit the resturant.  Some resturants even go so far to comp bloggers to get some buzz going.  What do you guys think?

So you might recall japadamus posting about Morton’s 2 for $99 September promotion. It sounded too good to be true, so El Jeffe and I went to our local Morton’s last night to check it out. One interesting thing — all the Southern California Morton’s are called “Arnie Morton’s of Chicago.” According to the website, it looks like this is strictly a Southern California nomenclature. I don’t know why except that maybe SoCal people need to know beforehand that their steak has Midwest origins. That wouldn’t surprise me about L.A. people.
Anyhow, on to the food. My friends had gone the prior night, so they warned me that the Morton’s salad tasted “fishy” because of the anchovies on top fo the salad. Sounds logical. El Jeffe and I opted for the Caesar salads, which were a good sized portion and were falling off the plate there was so much salad. I got the crabcake, which is probably the best crabcake I’ve had with respect to crab meat: filler ratio. It was essentially 1:0. It came with a side of mayonnaise/mustard sauce on the side, which I prefer to having it dressed by the sous chefs. The boyfriend got the “Colossel Shrimp Alexander,” which was basically six pieces of shrimp thrown under a broiler. It was a good serving (6 pieces) and tasted good yet perhaps unremarkable. The only thing you didn’t have a choice of was the steak itself — each person go the single cut filet mignon, which was still a great cut done just right. No complaints at all. We got the baked potato and grilled asparagus topped with a balsalmic vinegar glaze. The potato was what you’d expect and the asparagus was amazingly good. We both got the key lime pie, which was easily at least 1/6th of a pie. Talk about good value. Anyhow, the food was great and the portions were very generous for $50/head. It’s awsaome.

The only down side to this deal might just be in my head and location specific. First off, the Beverly Hills location is kinda small and packed with diners, so it’s pretty loud. El Jeffe and I sat side by side in a booth for 4, so we didn’t have a problem hearing each other (my friends who had gone the night before were at a 2 top table and sat facing each other), but it was a little tough to hear the server. Also, this is the only thing that made me feel all ghetto, but the server brings out this fancy cart of meats and various fishes to show you and goes through this whole spial about their cuts, and then I had to whip out this coupon and tell her that I wanted the 2 for $99 special. That’s also partially why I didn’t take any photos of the food to post here. I already felt kinda ghetto, which normally I don’t mind, but it’s a piece of steak and a caesar salad,w hich you’ve all seen before.

Overall, if you can make it to Morton’s by the end of this month, definitelyt ake advantage of this promotion. It’s very good. Otherwise, I’d say that there are other steakhouse chains taht I’d prefer (Ruth’s Chris) or local joints that have more history and personality (Taylor’s in L.A.). But, this is a really great deal, and Morton’s is a good steakhouse. Anyhow, two thumbs up from us.

After reading Japadamus eloquently write about the virtues of Miller’s new Chelada style beer, I decided to take the plunge.  I set aside a Friday night out of of otherwise busy social calendar of dining out alone, shopping alone and watching movies alone (notice a pattern?) to have a Chill tasting at my apartment. 

Design:  The bottle is a lovely green color similar to a Pilsner Urquell.

Taste:  I’d describe the combination as being sprite meets keystone light meets Gatorade.  I definitely detect some added sweetness (corn syrup?)  I noticed the bottle states “No additives or preservatives” so I guess its safe to assume that there are salty lime flavored barley/hops growing somewhere.

Hangover:  This is an interesting question.  I think only by truly going over the top can one really know for sure.  Since I’ve already scheduled this block of time to scientific research, I decided to kill the entire 6 pack sans water chaser.  Here are the effects:

• I drank three beers and felt too full to drink the rest.
• I passed out tired after the third beer.
• This morning my stomach feels a little upset.  I did eat some chili last night which could reasonably be the cause of that.
• No hangover

Conclusion:  I think Chill is ok.  I don’t think its a substitute f