On a beautiful day, I get to check out Hillstone for lunch and sample some of their new menu items. Time for some food porn! ;o)

Read more about their dinner!

New Item: DEVILED EGGS 5

Topped with cracked pepper and parsley, this classic Texas family recipe is served with Crystal’s Hot Sauce. I am not a fan of deviled eggs but I know someone who does and they really like these bad boys!

New Item (Seasonal): FRESH FLORIDA STONE CRAB CLAWS

Served on a bed of crushed ice and paired with a house-made dressing. Hillstone gots the connection with some good seafood vendors. These claws were large, meaty and very sweet!

New Item: BRAISED CABBAGE

Simmered in balsamic vinegar and brown sugar topped with generous amount of goat cheese. This is not your ordinary cabbage.

New Item: BRUSSEL SPROUTS

Lightly seasoned, steamed brussel sprouts. To be honest, these are good but I have had better maybe they can dress it up with some chunks of pancetta or bacon or maybe some fried red scallions for a flavor contrast.

LEMON DROP MARTINI

FAMOUS FRENCH DIP AU JUS 18

Thinly-sliced prime rib served medium on a toasted French roll with mayonnaise. This comes in good bread but I don’t really care for sandwiches, perhaps they can kick up the fries with a little truffle oil!

SPINACH & CHICKEN WALDORF SALAD 17

Julienne apples, bacon, cashews and chopped egg. This is a very unique and memorable salad; it was well seasoned and evenly coated for a consistent burst of flavor and texture! I highly recommend this salad.

HAND FILLETED SALMON 27

Wood-grilled and served with seasonal vegetable.

PAN FRIED GROUPER

Served with dill tartar, Campari tomatoes and coleslaw.

New Item: BANANA CREAM PIE 8

A vanilla custard filling is the base of this delightful treat, which includes a walnut and graham cracker crust. This treat is topped with fresh bananas, homemade whipped cream, caramel sauce and chocolate dust.

They restrict the use of cell phone while dining with them. So if you are chatterbox on the phone, wrap it up before going inside. They want to offer their guests the best dining experience possible and I respect that.
Although it may sound a bit pretentious, the restaurant is casual. They also have an outdoor lounge where a guest and just hang out, relax, listen to music. Their luscious landscape is accessorized with lawn chairs and a covered dock where guest can take their drinks out to and watch the sunset.
The Hillstone family had us seated outside on the dock for sunset dinner. Unfortunately, it was a raining day so no sunset tonight.

For starters, we sampled their Chicago Style Spinach Dip, Wood Grilled Artichokes and Home Smoked Salmon.

Home Smoked Salmon

They smoked the salmon in-house which is neat…I think they smoke the salmon every . The good-sized salmon comes with little triangle toast with some white sauce. I obviously did not care for the white sauce because the salmon tasted perfect on the toast on its own. You can definitely tell that it was smoked. It was moist with a mild flavor. Very tasty.

Wood Grilled Artichokes

These little chard beauties pack a wonderful flavor. The trick to eating artichoke is to pull the petals and scrap with your teeth or you can just skip the petals and eat the heart. Grilling artichoke gives the artichoke hearts a tender and succulent flesh. It is a very simple dish but carries an extremely unique flavor. I would order this again.

Chef Special: Cajun Spiced Grouper with Mango Chutney

The menu offers burgers, sandwiches, soups, salads and plated dinners along with a handsome wine list to go with it too. I decided to go with the special of the day, which was Cajun Spiced Grouper with a Mango Chutney or Salsa. I was not very impressed with the Cajun Grouper. The dish embodied a more tropical flavor than the promised Cajun Spice flavor. It was mediocre and regretted not ordering the steak instead. By the way, if you order a side salad with your entrée be forewarned that it is not your typical size. This side salad comes in a big plate!

Hawaiian Rib Eye

Al ordered their Hawaiian Rib-eye, which was marinated for 48 hours in a blend of soy sauce and pineapple juice and then grilled over hardwood. This perfectly grilled steak not only looked good it tasted good too. The rib eye had a nice crust with a very juicy and tender center. I have to admin that I had total food envy!

At this point, I was full! I had all those appetizers along with my personal meal consisting of a big plate of salad, half of the grouper and half of the rib eye steak. I was done and throwing in my dinner napkin.
Of course, Hillstone wanted to make sure that we fully experienced their whole menu. They brought a parade of desserts, one of each, for us to try.

Desserts

One of each: Warm Five-Nut Brownie, Apple Walnut Cobbler, Key Lime Pie, and Hot Fudge Sundae.
Surprisingly, the Hot Fudge Sundae was my favorite. It comes in a large teacup filled with vanilla ice cream topped with whipped cream and roasted sugar pecans. The hot fudge comes served in a large gravy bowl for your complete indulgence. I was surprise to find myself hogging rest of the fudge seeing as that I am not a chocolate-lover.

Side note:
Vegetarian Friendly! They offer a vegetarian burger that has a mixture of brown rice. You won’t be missing meat eating this burger. The texture and taste was very much like a meat burger but if you eat the patty itself you will notice that it is not meat. Regardless, it was delicious! Best Vegetarian Burger I have ever tasted!

The name Hillstone comes from the parent group, Hillstone Restaurant Group, and also from their wine vineyard in Napa Valley.

For those of you who were loyal fans of Houston’s, you should know that Hillstone is Houston’s. Hillstone offers the same service with the same menu but with an added bonus of seasonal, inspired entrées. Executive General Manager Todd Martin explains that by changing their brand, it provides him and his staff to have more flexibility and creativity for the restaurant’s menu. So never, fear Houston’s is still here! Err… I mean Hillstone.

Luma in Winter Park was one of our picks for this Magical Dining journey (Hurry! Only a couple weeks left!). Luma is very stylish and trendy establishment located on Park Avenue on the corner of New England.

One thing to note is that their Magical Dining Menu changes daily depending on the freshest ingredients they are able to obtain. With our luck, they were out of the Ahi Tuna Tartare but we settled for the other two options for our appetizer. I got their Steakhouse Wedge and Pearleen ordered their Vidalia Onion-Fennel Soup.

Steakhouse Wedge
Iceberg Lettuce, Cherry Tomatoes, Applewood Bacon, Red Onion, Crocker Hill Blue

The wedge salad was an entire 1-inch cross section from a head of lettuce, topped with bacon and dressing for a slightly different approach to the usual wedge (triangular) shaped wedge salad. The dressing really stood out, it was rich and creamy, but not as creamy as the typical ranch dressing; it went well with the nice sized pieces of bacon.

Vidalia Onion-Fennel Soup
Creme Fraiche, Espelette Pepper Oil

Pearleen’s Onion soup was so flavorful and awesome! It was creamy and went really well with the complimentary bread. Pearleen was kind enough to share a spoon full with me… ;o)

As for our second course, I decided to order the schnitzel.

Vande Rose Farms Pork Schnitzel
Christmas Lima Beans, Anson Mills Polenta, Onion Marmalade, Red Wine Bearnaise

The schnitzel was crispy and moist. The polenta was a great accompaniment for the schnitzel and the two went together perfectly. It was a very unique and creative combination and I would highly recommend this entree to anyone who loves polenta or schnitzel.

Pearleen ordered the Trout as her second course.

Idaho Rainbow Trout
Black Beluga Lentils, Zucchini, Red Onion, Lemon Verbena Butter, Pickled Eggplant

She really enjoyed it. The fish was well seasoned and cooked to the right temperature; it was moist with a very crispy and savory skin. She really liked the use of lentils as the starch and how it tasted really nutty and complimented the fish really well. I think she is inspired to use more lentils for our home cook meals. She initially thought that the serving size was small but after sometime she realized that it was the right amont of food. Not too little and not too much. Perfect serving size… plus we still have dessert waiting for us.

On the third course of our Magical Dining at Luma is our dessert. I chose the  Devil’s Food Cake.

Devil’s Food Cake
Salted Caramel, Milk Chocolate Ganache, Vanilla Ice Cream

The cake by itself was a bit under flavored, however it tasted delicious when eaten together with the vanilla ice cream and/or salted caramel.

Buttermilk Panna Cotta
Compressed Plums and Nectarines, Almond Streusel

I have never been to Luma and I am glad that we had the chance to try them out during Visit’s Orlando Magical Dining Month. Both Pearleen and I really enjoyed ourselves and it was all for a great cause and for a good deal too! We highly recommend taking advantage of this “Magical” deal with Magical Dining at fabulous restaurants! We really like Luma and would return again to try other items on the menu.

RanGetsu use to be located on International Drive by the Orange County Convention Center. They recently relocated to Maitland in hopes to appeal to the local residences.
From what I can remember, the previous location on International Drive was much larger and it featured a Japanese garden and decoration seen throughout the space.
Now, at the new location in Maitland, RanGetsu has taken on a whole new look of modern sleek designs but in a much smaller square footage than before.

We took advantage of Magical Dining and drove all the way out to Maitland to check them out. We ended up getting the Chilean Sea Bass. It is one of our favorite fish to eat! I highly recommend giving this entree a try! It is a favorite and best-seller for a reason. Although the portion is a bit on the small side, it is filling with the side of rice and well worth it.

Chilean Sea Bass 
 Broiled fresh Chilean sea bass glazed with a miso teriyaki sauce

We really enjoyed this dish. I typically do not see Chilean Sea Bass served with the skin and now that I have had it with the skin… people should be serving this fish with the skin on! It has a rich buttery texture that just enhances the flavor of the fish. The fish was not over cooked and the flavor was mild and well seasoned with the miso teriyaki sauce. I would order this dish again

I ordered off the menu and had some of their sushi… and yes, it is on the pricier side. The sushi platter I had did not really impress me too much to justify the price so I would not recommend going to RanGetsu to get sushi but I would recommend it for their entrees.

Sushi & Sashimi Combo 
Chef’s choice of 5 nigiri, 7 sashimi and a Florida Roll

Now, we had to end the night with some dessert. I noticed that they had some interesting desserts featuring green tea. It was toss up between Green Tea Tiramisu or the Green Tea Creme Brulee…

It had a carmel on the bottom with the torched sugar crust at the top. It had a hint of green tea to make it a very refreshing dessert. It was like eating a flan and a creme brulee at the same time! My only complaint, it was too small to share! I was polite enough to let Al have the last bite but deep down inside me wanted take the entire cup and scrap every last bit and lick the cup dry… There was much restraint on my part.

RanGetsu
407-345-0044
901 South Orlando Avenue
Maitland, FL 32751

Their menu features a variety of ways one can choose their chicken & waffles, ranging from your typical fried chicken with gravy to a coconut chicken and waffle. Most of which are always on the menu, while others are more “experimental” flavors and may or may not always be on the menu, such as the coconut chicken, which is what I ordered. Their food is cooked to order, which means that they only make the waffles and fry the chicken when an order calls for it. Though it may seem like it would take a long time, it was actually pretty fast considering the time it takes to fry chicken and make a waffle.

My expectations for waffles have always been that there are crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside, which was not the case here. My waffle was pretty fluffy without the outer crispy crust. I think this may have been by design as their truck advertises being “home of the waffle sandwiches” displaying how you can fold the waffle around the filling in an attempt to make a sandwich. My attempt at turning my waffle into a sandwich was a failure thought; the waffle was much too thick to fold around the chicken. Either way, the whole thing was very enjoyable. The coconut chicken was delicious; it had a pineapple chili sauce that was a great match for the slightly sweet and fluffy waffle for a great combination of flavors and textures.

All in all, I enjoyed my waffle. If I had to change anything about it, I would make the waffles a bit crispier, but it is still delicious just the way it is now. We look forward to going to back to try other variations of one of my favorite dishes.

She baked and designed her first wedding cake back in 2009 and the rest is history because today she has been recognized by The Knot Best of Weddings 2011 and is now featured in Style Me Pretty’s Little Black Book of Vendors. A huge accomplishment for this local gal!

The Sugar Suite is, as they described, “a wedding and specialty cake bakery in Maitland, Florida that focuses on clean and contemporary design, while illuminating the personality of the couple.”

It is not one those bakery shops where you walk-in and buy 1 or 2 cupcakes  but they are an appointment-only shop. They make custom cakes and cupcakes for weddings and other special occasions. But with the demand from their loyal fans, they have started a “Cupcake Day” where they sell individual cupcakes to whoever wants them!

I was invited to go to one of their Cupcake Day which featured Manly-themed designs and ingredients such as beer flavored icing and bacon. These cupcakes were in honor of Father’s Day! They had 4 different kinds of cupcakes set aside for me to try. Take a look at how cool they look:

This was a chocolate cake with Guiness buttercream icing. It was an amazing combo. You can truly sense and taste the subtle flavors of Guiness icing and was a nice compliment to the moist chocolate cake. The cupcake was topped with a silver bottle cap made from some sort marshmallow fondant. Jennyfer describes how she demonstrated for her cupcake classes on how to shape the bottle cap with her fingers and used a fork to mimic the real edges of a cap.

Shock Top: Shock Top Buttercream on Orange Cake

This was an orange flavored cake. This cupcake was a very refreshing and creative reflection of the Shock Top logo. I really enjoyed this cake because it is not too sweet or too rich but full of flavor. I really like the cupcake cups she used for the individual cakes such a good idea!

This one was so creative. The use of ingredients to provide a golf-themed cupcake. Golf ball was 100% edible, I would know, I ate the entire thing. Again this cake was also moist and was not too rich or too sweet. The Sugar Suite provides some top-notch designs with top-notch taste!

 This was by far our favorite out of all the manly-cupcakes. It was a very interesting combination and concept. I was a little timid to try it but once I got passed the “candied bacon” I just dove right in and thought, “how could I have doubt the power of bacon?” It is still true that anything with bacon just taste better. I was pretty amazed by the moistness of the buttermilk cake with the maple buttercream paired nicely with the candied bacon. The bacon still maintained a hint of bacon salt for a super dynamic cupcake. This is the tastiest cupcake I have ever had!

I was a little thrown off when I saw that The Ravenous Pig was holding a pig roast towards the end of May since they are usually held at the beginning of each month. The reason for the date change was that they were able to work with Terrapin to put together something special, and by special I mean a cask of cured bacon infused Hop Karma. Wow!

We made reservations as soon as heard about the roast.

The menu: pulled pork, ribs, sausage, bacon braised collard greens, black eyed peas, jalapeno-cheddar corn bread, and a stout cup cake, plus a pint of one of Terrapin bacon infused Hop Karma (or any draught beer) for $20, or $15 with a soda instead of beer.

We, of course, had Hop Karma. The most notable difference from the addition of the bacon was a smokey flavor. The added flavor was very subtle and complemented that style of beer very well.

Our plate was served to us shortly after we received our drinks. The ribs were our favorite, they were well seasoned, tender and very moist. The sausage was also delicious, it went very well with the corn bread and black-eyed peas. The collard greens was my least favorite item out of them all, it was a little on the salty side.

The Hop Karma complemented the flavors of the food very well. Not to mention, the cupcake was also made out of beer. My only complaint, it should have been bigger! Overall it was a great meal. I would certainly go back to future roasts.

Today, I was meeting up with Droolius and had lunch with him at the Korean BBQ Taco Box. Droolius have been seen at multiple food truck events and very well known in the Orlando food truck community. He introduced me to Jay and Mina, owners of the Korean BBQ Taco Box, and it was nice to finally get to meet the faces behind the big yellow truck!

Some people wonder, “What is a Korean BBQ Taco Box?”

Well as the name would imply, it is Korean barbecue with a Mexican twist. Which means, they use tortilla wrappings for their taco and fill it with Korean style barbecue meats, lettuce, cheese and their special house sauce! It is pretty tasty!

The Korean BBQ Taco Box was first seen off of Colonial Drive but they have moved their place of business to the Marathon Gas Station off of University Blvd and Goldenrod Road. It is not at all hard to miss with that bright yellow paint they have on their truck.

As of lately, I have been consuming way too much red meat so I asked him if he had anything vegetarian and he said he will make something custom for me. –To all you herbivores, you can get vegetables lunches or dinners at the Korean BBQ Taco Box!

He ended up making me a vegetable stir fry with teriyaki tofu. It also came with two pieces of tempura cheese roll. It would come with rice but I asked for no rice. It was prefect! I did enjoy eating the delicious custom meal and I will have to visit them more often.

I also got to sample Mina’s omelette that also comes as a side. Here is a photo of Jay slicing it up! It was very well seasoned and it brings back those childhood memories of occasional omelette dinners at home. It like an Egg Foo Young but this is a light and delicate version and was very good!

Droolius got a taco but I forgot with what kind of meat, but in any case, this is what the taco looks like before they folded up…

Pretty cool, I asked about how they make their ginger dressing and they said it was a house recipe so that pretty much meant, “I can’t tell you my trade secrets!” All he could tell me was that it is made with with ginger… in case you didn’t know that ginger dressing was made with ginger. ;o)

I will have to make another trip and try out other things on their menu. Go give this place a try if you haven’t already.

If you have been wanting to try this place out, you can check them out at the Food pods (check their twitter, @koreanbbq_2011, for their most up to date locations.)

I got there right before noon and there was already someone there inquiring about the menu. Mike Freas, head chef, comes up with new and different sandwiches for the week so he recommended something with “Bacon Jam.”

Bacon Jam? Whatever the heck that is, I want it!

I initially had the thought to go there and try their Luther and their Chimoo but I did not want to miss out on their new items for the week. I was trying their new LT Burger and their Tonkatsu Pork Sando for lunch.

“The Burger LT,  Half pound of Angus Beef, Slow Roasted Bacon Jam, Blue Cheese, Arugula & Tomatos”

@MikoChu, thanks for modeling your Burger LT

This burger is a guilty pleasure! It’s like you know you should not be eating 2 patties for lunch but you just have to because otherwise what else are you going to do with it? I was expecting a strong bacon taste from the bacon jam but it was more subtle and was a nice compliment to the bitter taste of arugula and blue cheese crumbles. It was a bit on the greasy side for me but I can understand the circumstances of trying to crank these bad boys out for starving customers! –I wonder what that burger would taste like with potato sticks….

“Tonkatsu Sando , Pork Tenderloin breaded in Japanese Bread Crumbs with Carrots, Cabbage, Cucumbers served open face topped with Tonkatsu Sauce”

I like them both but if I had to choose, I would go with Tonkatsu Pork Sando because the flavors was much more unique and memorable while the Burger LT is delicious, the Tonkatsu’s flavors would be a very hard-to-find in other foods from other places. I would like to see the Tonkatsu pork, sliced up placed over top a bed of lettuce with the slaw or wrapped in green spinach wrap!

Luckily, I brought reinforcements for the job of destroying both sandwiches for lunch; because otherwise, it was just humanly impossible for me to eat both sandwiches and be functional at work!

Thanks James for helping me eat.

Al was pretty jealous after he saw what I ate on Foodspotting so then he suggested that we go check them tomorrow at the Food Pod at Firestone Live.

If you want to find out more about other trucks, check out these awesome sites for insight on where to locate these moving targets.

EatLocalOrlando.com

Droolius.com

I should mention that they get PACKED during dinner! So if you plan to eat there sometime soon, try making a reservations or come with a lot of patients! I know because I showed up without making a reservation. Whoops!

The place is  great place to take your family, friends, guest from out of town, or a hot date! This place will appeal to everyone of all ages! Cool hang out spot with wide variety of things to look at on their walls!  Super colorful and eclectic…

I didn’t know what to expect and I most certainly did not know what to order! I asked him to recommend me something and so he told me to get their…

“12-Napkins Roast Beef Po-Boy” described as “Slow-cooked top round smothered in gravy – MESSY!”

I ordered half a Po-Boy with extra MESSY and a side of cheese grits. I decided to pick a couple of other things to try from their menu. I ordered their:

“Seafood Gumbo” described as “Shrimp, oysters & andouille sausage simmered with fresh vegetables, okra & topped with rice”

Plus, I warned my waiter that I was determined to get a helping of their Beignets.

Mega Yummo Beignets!

While we waited for our food to come, Al decided to get a glass of Abita Purple Haze. Look at the thing he got!

We didn’t have to wait long for our food to arrive because their staff is fantastic! The service was attentive, prompt and everyone was bustling around to get the job done.

So when the food came, my mouth dropped. I thought to myself, “That is just half a sandwich??? That thing is huge?” (For those Office fans, “that IS what she said!”) Look at this spread!

Al ended up getting Half Fried Shrimp Po-Boy and Half Fried Oyster Po-Boy and it came with a side of sweet potato fries…can’t complain about the price here because it was a lot to eat!

Everything tasted so good! It was my first time having REAL New Orleans food and I will have to thank my friend Hector for the recommendations!  Not to mention, those beignets… are awesome! Oh my goodness, they are messy but it is so delicious! From now on, I am always going to order them when I am at Tibby’s again!

Mega Yummo highly recommends Tibby’s New Orleans Kitchen!