Top 10 New Foods We Ate in 2010

With another year gone it’s time to look back and reflect on all the deliciousness that was. Here are the top ten new dishes the Endless Simmer team was lucky enough to stuff in our mouths over the past 12 months.

10. Fried Peanut Butter, Banana and Bourbon Sandwich

breslin peanut butter and banana

Breakfast at The Breslin in New York is about as ridiculously delectable as it gets. In their modern update on The Elvis sandwich, peanut butter, banana, bourbon and vanilla are all goo-ily encased in a fried-til-crispy puffed skin. (Photo: gsz)

9. Sustainable Sushi

sustainable sushi

Sushi is the modern foodie’s last major guilt trip — a dish that just can’t be done locally, sustainably, or ethically. Or is it? At Miya’s Sushi in New Haven, Connecticut chef Bun Lai is turning the sushi CW on its head, proving it can be just as tasty and exciting when overfished species like unagi and bluefin are replaced with sustainable, North American fish. If there’s one new food idea that turns into a 2011 trend, we hope it’s this.

8. Burrata Everywhere

burrata

This revelatory cheese wasn’t invented in 2010 (try 1920) but this was the year we saw the Italian delicacy pop up on menus all across America. Fresh curds of buffalo milk mozzarella are stirred into salted cream and kneaded and pulled until they take on a gloriously goopy texture that makes all other mozz look like lifeless balls of nothing. Burrata is such a perfect cheese that only a sliver of bread and a touch of olive oil are needed to make it a meal. The quality varies place to place, but we sampled particularly tasty versions at Roman’s in Brooklyn and The Lake Chalet in Oakland. You? (Photo: Chiara Lorè)

7. The Mighty Cone

the mighty cone

The Austin, Texas food truck scene is one of the most heralded in the nation, and this local ready-to-eat-on-the-street treat is the one we’re most hoping to see go national. At this year-old trailer, a tortilla cone is filled with cornflake-almond-chili-crusted chicken tenders, fried avocado, mango-jalapeno slaw and ancho sauce. The ice cream cone is dead. Long live the chicken cone.
(Photo: The Mighty Cone)

6. Malaysian BBQ

fatty cue

Usually by the time a budding chef-lebrity opens their third restaurant, they’re churning out a watered down, assembly line version of what made them famous. Not so for Zak Pelaccio, who branched out this year with Fatty Cue, a Brooklyn restaurant that ingeniously fuses traditional southeast Asian flavors into classic BBQ dishes. The never gimmicky menu ranges from heritage pork ribs in smoked fish-palm syrup and Indonesian long pepper to Manila claims swimming in bone broth with barbecued bacon and chili. (Photo: Fatty Cue)

Next: Top 5 New Foods We Ate in 2010

Feed Us Back: Comments of the Week

macaroons

Coconut macaroons (above), key lime pie and bread pudding — thanks for all the great recs on what to make with condensed milk! Ariel’s idea deserves a special shout-out:

Put the sweetened condensed milk in a double boiler or place the open can in boiling water, stirring frequently for about an hour (until the milk turns thicker and light, nutty brown). This is the short way to make dulce de leche.

Yum!

– As far as pie shakes go, Jenna is having none of it:

I still think that sounds disgusting. Pie crust getting all soggy mixed with ice cream? No, no, no. Pie is meant to be pie – crisp crust encasing a sweet and soft fruit filling. A milkshake is meant to be a milkshake – cool ice cream blended with milk and flavoring. Give me a piece of pie a la mode any day over this perversion of both the pie and the milkshake.

But averagebetty is willing to give it a try:

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Introducing the Pie Shake…Yes, That’s Pie. Shake.

pie shake

Walking through the NoPa neighborhood of San Francisco recently, the veggie gf and I stumbled upon a restaurant with a name so simple and enticing we couldn’t resist: chile pies (& ice cream). Yep, that’s the name of the restaurant. And they have just three basic menu items:

– Classic New Mexico-style frito pie (for the uninformed, that’s chili poured over a bed of fritos).

– Fresh slices of sweet&savory pie with outrageous varieties such as green chile apple pie with walnuts and a cheddar crust.

– Ice cream and frozen yogurt in creative flavors like bittersweet chocolate and horchata.

Obviously, this was already approaching a pretty perfect restaurant as far as I’m concerned. But then I scanned to the bottom of the menu and saw one more item that just about knocked me over…

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