La Verdad taco battle royal: carnitas v. tripa

In the continuing quest to discover which of the tacos at La Verdad rules above all others (the taco supreme, if you will), we turn to the face-off between the carnitas and the tripa.

Full disclosure: I love carnitas. Love love love. Would marry if legal in Massachusetts.

My previous experiences of tripe, on the other hand, involve the thin-sliced rubbery stuff encountered in pho dac biet (which The Boy loves), and the Devil's Tower-like gelatinous mass they used to keep on the counter of the pet store in my hometown (which dogs loved).

So yes, I did go into this round with a slight bias. But I tried not to let that color my judgement.

Here we go.

Carnitas:





A nice variety of parts of the pig: some good carmelized crispy roasted bits as well as the paler, fattier shreds. The green salsa verde sauce (TM) gave it a nice fresh zing.

But.

But.

One of the consequences, for better or worse, of being married to a Puerto Rican is that I've come to expect a certain level of salt in my pork (and in my rice, for that matter). And these carnitas, while juicy and fatty and otherwise delicious, were saddled with an underabundance of saltiness.

It didn't make it bad (she adds hastily); it just meant the flavor wasn't as bold as it could have been.

So, tripa, what have you got to say for yourself?





And thus I learned how good tripe can be when slow-cooked. It was not chewy or rubbery as I'd come to expect, but quite tender.

La Verdad's takeout menu (PDF) describes this as "grandma's tripe," which leads me to believe abuela was a feisty lady. The meat was smothered in a searingly spicy sauce, making it impossible to get any sense of the flavor of the tripe itself; the accompanying red onion and scallions pretty much got lost in the sensory chaos.

So although the carnitas didn't rock my world as much as I'd expected, the flavors were still closer to my preference. And while the tripe has made me think twice before eschewing it in future, it was too picante for my palate.

Winner: taco de carnitas

Okay, who's next?

A waste of good food

The following experience happened to a friend, who said I could reproduce it here if I omitted all identifying characteristics.

This friend of mine was attending a vendor-sponsored conference at an upscale hotel. During the day, there were seminars and case studies; in the evening, there was a team-building exercise called the "Chef's Challenge."

Attendees were divided into groups and seated at tables. On each table was a book about a famous artist (Dalí, Van Gogh, Manet, etc).

At the far end of the room were ingredients: cuts of raw beef, chicken, scallops and shrimp on ice; heirloom tomatoes, greens, fresh fruit; a table-top garden of live herbs. In my friend's words, "An obscene amount of food."

The teams had to use a selection of ingredients to create a dish that best illustrated the work of their given artist.

As my friend tells it:

"So one of the women at our table runs up, grabs a salad bowl, and just starts dumping stuff in it: raw shrimp, then these beautiful tomatoes, then some pasta, then mussels on top of that. Basically she made everything inedible. I just stayed out of it."

So what did she make?

"Some vaguely Mediterranean dish: seafood in wine. The winning dish was the table that got Dalí—they did a flatbread that was hanging off the edge of the plate like a melting clock."

And then what happened?

"We went into the room next door to have dinner. We left this room full of food—these expensive ingredients—and had more food served to us."

And the leftovers?

"Well, the stuff we cooked with was useless. And most people took way more than they ended up using, so I assume that's also cross-contaminated. Maybe some of the fresh vegetables would be salvageable, but the raw fish? No way. Basically, it was an enormous waste of food.

"Oh, and did I mention this happened on Earth Day?"

My friend returned from the trip and made a donation to the local food bank.

Lansdowne Pub: Magically delicious chips!

Remember how disappointed I was with the uneven, dry chips at the Battery?

It doesn't really matter any more. Because I found a place that does the closest thing to real, proper chips.

Last week, the Lansdowne Pub opened, so I went with lovely co-worker Sarah and new co-worker Eric to check it out.

In its corporate attempt to create the atmosphere of ye olde taverne from scratch, it's everything I dislike: 4,000 cozy square feet of faux-traditional, newly distressed, dark-wood bar room. A Pogues/Van Morrison/Cranberries soundtrack. Walls decorated with carefully distressed tchotchkes and cloth-bound books, Guinness posters and HDTVs showing sports.



I was all ready for a menu of authentic Irish dishes such as nachos and quesdillas and buffalo wings and chili.

But the Lansdowne's options were actually interesting. Yes, there were the usual bangers & mash and shepherd's pie and beef stew, but there were also pork chops, oysters, mussels, salmon—items that could easily appear on a trad/modern Irish menu but, at least in Boston, rarely do.

The Lansdowne also does the ubiquitious full-on fry-up breakfast on weekends, and what may be a proper Sunday roast. I shall investigate further.

But what gave me most hope was that they had chips with a variety of toppings: gravy, curry sauce, mushy peas, baked beans.

So Sarah ordered the grilled cheese sandwich, and was going to order a side of chips until the waitress explained they came with her dish anyway. And then this arrived:



"I thought you said it came with chips," Sarah said to our waitress, who rolled her eyes.

"You know, I keep telling them they should change the wording on the menu," she said. "People are always getting this confused."

Okay, so why didn't you clarify this before we ordered??

Eric went for the fish sandwich, which did really come with chips:



The fish itself was lovely:



And I ordered the ploughman's lunch. This was something of a test: in England, you can tell a lot about a pub from its ploughman's, which is, at its core, bread and a wedge of cheese, but can range from those ingredients alone to a feast of cured meats, pork pie, boiled eggs, salad and fruit.

And it turned out to be better than expected:



The bread was fabulous, light and nutty; the cheddar could have been stronger; the salad was okay (no one expects tomatoes to taste of anything in April anyway); and it came with an interesting tomato chutney, as well as Branston pickle, to which I am addicted.

And then there was the meat:



The camera doesn't lie: that's about how appetizing it was. Basically thin-sliced deli turkey and beef, it was cold, clammy, and completely without flavor. I'd seriously suggest that the Lansdowne ditch it and serve a couple of cold sausages instead.

Oh, and the chips?



As good as it gets without going to a proper chippy. Soft and pliant, not too dry or too greasy, held salt and vinegar well. Better than most late-night post-club takeaways back home, at least. I'm usually able to restrain myself from eating a whole plate of chips, but it took willpower not to finish the lot.

The Lansdowne Pub isn't the cheapest lunch option—my bread and cheese set me back $13—but I'm glad it's there for when I get the insatiable urge for real proper chips.