A lot of work goes into these bad boys: The kitchen marinates boneless pork butt for 24 hours in 12 ingredients, and then cooks it for 50 minutes, constantly basting the pork to create a candy-like exterior, and then the meat gets all chopped up.
THAI GREEN CURRY HEALTHNUT FULL
But let’s focus on the new dishes, shall we? The Snacks section of the menu is full of many of my new faves, including the deeply flavorful char siu pork spring rolls ($10.75), a must-order. Tolentino knows the loyal Betelnut audience wants their goddamn Szechuan green beans and Cecilia’s minced chicken lettuce cups, goddamn it, so you’ll find those in the new Classics section on the menu. He’s keeping the focus on Southeast Asia but is adding touches of refinement and lightening things up. While he may not have Ong’s sensei-like knowledge of Malaysian cooking, Tolentino has very good technique, creativity with ingredients, and definitely has a passion that can bring Betelnut into its next era. Some may recognize him from his victorious 2010 appearance on the Food Network’s Chopped. He has worked locally with Michael Mina and Laurent Manrique, and was the chef at Juliet Supper Club in New York, focused on international street food. The new chef steadying the boat is Mario Tolentino. When everyone went bonkers, it hastily flipped back to Betelnut six weeks later.
After 18 years in business-12 of them with the very talented chef Alex Ong at the helm-the restaurant recently went through some sweeping changes, including a short switch to the Hutong/street food concept. Man, that poor ~BETELNUT~ has had a tumultuous year, like it wants to get on the cover of the Enquirer or something.
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