I know...this post is a little late because I forgot to transfer the pics from my camera to my computer. But here goes. Jon and I had lunch on Tuesday at a neighborhood place called Momoya. Boy, oh boy was I having a severe spicy tuna jones. My craving was soothed, but now I want spicy tuna for dinner!
On TV they say, "If it's Sunday it's Meet the Press." But on the Oatmeal CookieBlog I say, "if it's Sunday it's cookie tastin' and makin' time."
First stop: Myers of Keswick for some U.K. treats. Look...oatmeal Hobnobs biscuits!
...and a sausage roll and pack of Maltesers. (U.K. Maltesers = U.S. Whoppers)
Next stop: Royale Cafe + Pastry for some cookie taste testin'. (If you like pink or are a cupcake person, this place is for you.) We got an Oreo, a chocolate chip, and an oatmeal raisin. The Oreo was on the dry side and kind of bland. The cream filling, though, really did taste like center of a real Oreo. The chocolate chip was OK--a good amount of chocolate, but the cookie itself was missing something. The oatmeal raisin was pretty good. I especially liked the kind of extra-plump raisins they used. This one had walnuts and coconut, which I haven't seen in an oatmeal raisin cookie before.
Friday night we watched "The Ride," one of our favorite Sopranos episodes, which centers on the Feast of St. Elzear in Newark. Talk about timing. On Saturday Jon and I walked down to the Feast of San Gennaro on Mulberry Street in Little Italy. San Gennaro is the patron saint of Naples, so you know the food is going to be good.
The sights. The sounds. The smells. You can get everything from fried artichokes to fried zeppoles. And everything in between. (Who knew deep-fried Oreos were Italian?)
You can have a sausage, onion, and pepper sandwich and then go for a ride on the Ferris wheel.
Bring on the fried stuff! On the left, a fried softball-sized risotto ball stuffed with ground beef and peas. On the right, fried ravioli filled with ricotta and parsley. (I wonder if Mumma's nonna made food like this.)
Jon helping me out with my ravioli. You can even get healthy, vegetable-rich food at the feast, including fried spinach manicotti filled with ricotta and spinach. (Well...it is green.)
Scene at the feast. On the left, nothing's free, not even the bathrooms. On the bright side, though, you don't need exact change. On the right, so that's how you spell "bra-zhohl."
Surf and turf. On the left, a raw oyster bar. (Eating raw shellfish from a stall on the street? You'd better say a novena.) On the right, yet another stack of sausage and skewered meat.
A day at the feast wouldn't be complete without some zeppoles. And neither would one of these Autumn Saturday posts without a pic of me stuffing my face.
What to do on a slow Thursday? Go out to lunch...and take pictures of it!
Jon came down to my neck of the woods this afternoon to meet me for lunch at Mesa Grill. We started with spicy tuna and salmon tartares. I'm starting to think I could eat spicy tuna every day...for every meal.
Smoked lamb Cobb (or was it kabob?) salad for me (left). Chile relleno for Jon (right). I've got to hand it to him...Iron Chef Flay sure can make a pretty plate. Allez cuisine!
Saturdays are walking--and eating--days for us. Instead of heading south and through Brooklyn again, we decided to mix things up and head north to explore the Upper West Side.
This light on the corner of 19th and 7th signaled both walk and don't walk at the same time. Walk, don't walk, walk, don't walk. ("My sister, my daughter, my sister"...) The light went back to normal right after I took this pic. Up in Times Square, we saw people setting up the "Broadway on Broadway" stage, and we got to be part of the "on-the-street" intro/outro audience (with Harvey Levin) for a taping of The People's Court and the show's new "raw" online segment. (More to come on this soon, but here's the gist: a woman and I had a debate about Kanye West.) Yup...OCG is going to be on TV...and the interwebs!
Time Square and court shows have been good to us. Back on election day in 2000, we got picked to be in the audience for a taping of The Judge Hatchet Show. We saw a case about a guy who was beaten with his own prosthetic leg during a bar fight and a case about a guy who set his girlfriend's kitchen on fire by trying to fry food in a tea kettle. Fun times.
Our first food stop was H & H Bagels. These really are the best bagels in the city. (Nothing like those frozen, skimpy, bready Lender's bagels Mumma used to buy when I was a kid.) These guys are a meal in themselves. A little crispy on the outside, warm and chewy on the inside. Perfection. If you go to H & H, you've got to buy your cream cheese separately and spread it yourself. The lines at this place can get so long that the clerks really can't take the time to toast, slice, and schmear individual bagels. Truth be told, these taste great even without the cream cheese.
And across the street from H & H is Zabar's. Here's a shot of the world-famous Zabar's fish counter. You can pick up some bagels at H & H, then head across the street to Zabar's for some lox, and then head a few blocks east to Central Park for a nice al fresco snack.
We stopped at Chokolat Patisserie, all the way up at 122nd Street and Broadway, as part of our our city-wide search for the best chocolate chip cookie. These were biggie versions of your standard Toll House chocolate chip cookie: passable but not outstanding. The more cookies we taste, the more we appreciate the cookies from Eleni's and City Bakery. We did get to rest our feet for a few minutes, though!
All the way up at 148th street, right on the Hudson River, we got our beloved chimichurri sandwiches again. The strip of Riverside Park that runs along the edge of Manhattan right on the Hudson River is one of my favorite places in the city because it's quiet, beautiful, and still undiscovered by tourists. After resting a little bit and watching the river for a while, we headed south again. If it weren't for the rain at 59th and Amsterdam, we would have walked all the way home. As soon as we got in the cab, though, I started nodding off and slept for over an hour when we go home. Never underestimate the power of a good nap.
Looking for something to do on a rainy Friday in September in New York? Go eat something! We stuck pretty close to home this time, but it was nice to get out--even in the rain.
First stop: A Salt & Battery for some deep-fried Mars bars. Candy bars dipped in batter and tossed in hot oil. Now if that's not a heart attack on a grease-stained paper basket, I don't know what is. These were super sweet but tasty. This is definitely a once-in-a-while kind of snack.
Next stop: Birdbath Neighborhood Green Bakery, a creation of City Bakery. This place opened a while ago, but this was the first time we stopped in. (They use "green," low-wattage bulbs, so you can never tell if it's open.) I had high expectations for these cookies because City Bakery is supposed to have the best cookies in town. (And you know what I thought of the raved-about cookies from Levain Bakery.) The oatmeal raisin was pretty good. I liked the texture, but I think it could have done with a smidgen of cinnamon. The chocolate chip was pretty good as well, but I found that the chocolate was too bitter and the cookie itself wasn't sweet enough. But these are among the best we've tasted so far.
Holy Toledo! Jon told me we had plans for dinner, but I was expecting something more along the lines of pizza or maybe cheeseburgers from BRGR, not a full-fledged, jacket-required feast at Per Se. The place is beautiful and has an awesome view of Columbus Circle and the southwest corner of Central Park. I was a little bashful about taking pictures of my food here, but I did my best to snap each dish as quickly and as quietly as possible. Did I mention that jackets were required? Talk about cuture shock...I was wearing jeans and a T-shirt at work all day. But the food was amazing; the service, as Zagat's says, was "telepathic"; and the view couldn't have been better. The only problem is that I'm so stuffed that I don't think I'll eat for the rest of the week.
1. Oysters and caviar in a sauce whose name I can't remember. I'm usually not a fan of oysters or caviar, but this was really good. The few times I've had either of these ingredients, I've swallowed them quickly because I was afraid that chewing them would release all sorts of fishiness into my mouth. But this time I chewed, and boy was it good! Just bear in mind that Mumma recently outed me as a connoisseur of condiment sandwiches, so I'm really a white-belt foodie. At bottom, I'm just a smalltown boy with a love of ketchup and oatmeal cookies. 2. Sweet corn agnelloti. Pasta and corn. Carbohydrate addicts, rejoice! If I could cook like this, I'd be as big as a house.
4. A fish who's name sounded like "mai tai" with baby vegetables and a really tasty sauce. 5. Poached lobster (or lob-stuh, if your from New England) with fennel.
6. "All-day braised" pork belly with blackberries and baby turnips. Basically, this was a huge chunk of bacon. How bad could that be? 7. Steak with potato, green beans (haricots verts), and deep-fried bone marrow. The steak was good, but the potato was out of this world. The potato looked like a single French fry, but it was really a dozen or so individually sliced, fried, and then recombined layers of potato. (Mmmm...where's my ketchup when I need it?) The bone marrow didn't have much of a flavor, but it did have a fatty texture and mouthfeel. "Suck[ing] out all the marrow of life"? Check!
8. Cheese course. It was stinky. It was cheese. I ate it all. 9. Plum sorbet with gingerbread. A perfect follow-up to stinky cheese.
10a. My dessert was called "Blueberries and Popcorn" and had sugar-coated popcorn, popcorn sorbet, and blueberry parfait. I have to say this popcorn thing intrigues me. 10b. Jon had a more traditional dessert: chocolate and salted peanut butter. There were also several mini-courses of nibbles before and after the main meal. Oh my, I'm still full. The food was great, but I feel a little like a bear who's getting ready for winter hybernation. It's salads from here on out...for a while!
Katrina, a reader, real-life recipe user, fellow food blogger, and true-blue chocolate chip cookie lover from Kansas, is planning a trip to NYC this fall and wanted to know where to go for the best cookies. Our usual Saturday walk was interrupted by some nasty weather, so we decided to stay local and check out as many cookie places as possible at Chelsea Market to do some reconnaissance for Katrina.
Chelsea Market used to be a Nabisco factory, but now it's full of bakeries, restaurants, and food stores. It's also the home of Food Network, though this is the only sign we could find today.
Our first stop was Sarabeth's, where we tried three kinds of cookies: chocolate chip, cloud, and chubbie ($1.50 each). The chocolate chip was a little dry and tasted Toll House-ish--in other words, just OK. The best I could tell, the cloud cookie was a standard chocolate chip but with almonds. This one was moister than the chocolate chip. The chubbie had chocolate and lots of walnuts. The texture was a little dry and on the cakey side. It was more of a walnut delivery system than a chocolate cookie.
Next, we got oatmeal raisin and chocolate chip cookies ($2.25 each) at Amy's Bread. These were pretty good, but they had an anise aftertaste that they probably picked up from being stacked too close to pizzelles or something. (Kind of how Mumma's cinnamon raisin bread would corrupt the flavors of everything else in the breadbox.) The texture for both was nice and chewy, and they had just the right amount of raisins and chocolate chips.
At Ruthy's Bakery we got oatmeal raisin and chocolate chip cookies ($1.35 each). Let me put it this way...if you're looking for a really good cookie, try a cupcake. Enough said.
Our last stop was Eleni's, where we got--you guessed it--oatmeal raisin and chocolate chip cookies ($0.75 small and $1.50 large). These were the best of the bunch (and the complete opposite of Levain's cookies)! These guys were moist, chewy, and tasty. I especially liked that these came in two reasonable sizes.
Thursday night, Pam, In-Young, In-Young's friend "Amanda" (Hi, Amanda! In-Young told me to set you off with quotation marks), and I headed down to the East Village for dinner. Pam and In-Young hooked me up good last Tuesday with super-tasty cheap eats in Chinatown, so I knew I was in for a treat.
Our first stop was Village Yokocho for some Japanese tapas. Mmmm...spicy tuna. (Yes, Mumma, it was raw. And if eating raw tuna is wrong, I don't wanna be right!)
On the left, octopus balls...er, um...balls of octopus with benito flakes. On the right, deep-fried squid legs with mayo dippin' sauce. I wonder if this place delivers to Chelsea.
Our next stop was Cha-An Tea House for tea and dessert. In-Young and I shared a pot of green tea with puffed rice. Ok...I'll concede a point to Amanda. It did taste like the green tea you'd get from Costco.
On the left, toast with red beans, jasmine ice cream, and whipped cream. On the right, black sesame brulee. Y to the U to the M.
Jon couldn't wait to try out the places Pam and In-Young took me on Tuesday night, so this morning we planned a little trip to Chinatown on the way to Brooklyn.
Heading down Seventh Avenue--just across from Sheridan Square--we passed this scene. An art installation? The results of an overeager cabbie? Who knows, but I couldn't resist snapping a pic of this woman checking for a dial tone. (As Cindy Adams says, "Only in New York kids, only in New York.") Every weekend walk has to start with a stop at Doughnut Plant. But the place was shuttered, and our plan for a breakfast of doughnuts was foiled! Closed for vacation? Until September 5th? How could they!? Doughnutless, we headed for our next stop.
I must have told Jon "I think it's this block" at least three times before I found New Wonton Garden again. The food is so good and costs so little. These gigantic bowls of soup were only $7 apiece.
Noodle time...with chopsticks! And, as promised, I'm wearing the T-shirt that Pam and In-Young gave me. (Thanks again, you two!)
The next stop in our Tuesday night dinner redux was Teariffic for bubble tea and toast with condensed milk. Jon was so happy with his tea that he spent most of the afternoon talking about what we was going to order next time and the time after that...and the time after that. (Anyone know if there's a 12-step program for bubble tea?)
Our final stop in Chinatown before heading over the bridge to Brooklyn was at Fay Da Bakery for pork buns. Oh. My. God. These were dangerously good--the closest thing to linguica rolls I've ever tasted. Pam and In-Young raved about this tasty babies, and I needed to try one. Unfortunately, though, the bakery was closed when we three stopped by on Tuesday night. But it was open Saturday morning! The bun is slightly sweet and light as air. (It's very similar to the bready part of a linguica roll.) The filling was like a Chinese BBQ pulled-pork sandwich: a little bit sweet, a little bit savory, and just plain delicious!
And so, our bellies full, we waddled over the Brooklyn Bridge and up to Prospect Park. But with daylight shrinking, storm clouds gathering, and gnats swarming, we decided to take the train home. I hope it didn't rain on this bride's wedding day in Grand Army Plaza!
Last night, Pam and In-Young, readers and real-life cookie tasters, took me out to dinner in Chinatown. First stop: New Wonton Garden for noodles. Roasted duck and chicken with noodles in a super rich and tasty broth. Yum! My grandmother used to tell me I had chicken soup for blood...she wasn't kidding.
Our next stop was Chinatown Ice Cream Factory. I was hoping to try the wasabi ice cream, but it wasn't available last night. Instead, I got the black sesame. It had a light peanut buttery flavor, and it was the perfect little bit of sweet to have after the savory noodle soup. Be careful, though: only two samples allowed per customer! (Yes, I got the warning... I hope I didn't look like "that guy" who'd load up on free samples and walk out without ordering something.) When I got home, I ordered T-shirts online for me and Jon.
We topped off the night with some bubble tea. Me being the bubble tea newbie, Pam rightly warned me to suck up the tapioca balls slowly. We also got some mango pudding and toast topped with condensed milk. As Ina Garten might say, "Toast with condensed milk...how bad can that be?" Well, the answer is terribly, awesomely delicious! I think condensed milk is my new best friend. (Thanks, In-Young, for the following pics.)
Next time, we're going out for real ramen noodles--as in from scratch, not bricks of "oodles of noodles" you can get at the grocery store for 5 for $1. I can't wait... Thanks, Pam and In-Young! I had an awesome time!
On Saturday, Jon and I followed up Friday's really, really long Brooklyn walk with a shorter, intra-Manhattan trek up Madison into the 80s (or was it further north?) and then back home again. Along the way, we stopped off at a Le Pain Quotidien, which is a chain of schmancy-ish bakery/open-face sandwich stores, for a pit stop...and a cookie.
This chocolate chip cookie tasted pretty good--it had the crunchy exterior/chewy interior texture combo I like--but it was huge...and expensive. Blame this one on Jon. There's no way I'd pay $3.50 for a chocolate chip cookie, even for a cookie as big as my head!
Le Pain Quotidiens have sprouted up all over the place in the last year or so. Kind of like how Starbucks started appearing on practically every corner in NYC back in the day and how Jamba Juice and American Apparel stores are everywhere now. (Speaking of the latter, how many T-shirts can one single chain of stores sell?)
But even if you're not a fan of Starbucks, Le Pain Quotidien, or Jamba Juice, there is one thing they're good for: bathrooms!
This is it...our final Summer Friday of the year. (*Sigh*)
We couldn't start a summer Friday without stopping by Doughnut Plant, of course. I had a white peach yeast, and Jon had a triple chocolate cake. We'll definitely be returning for "Autumn Saturday" posts as well.
Cranberry Street in Brooklyn Heights, just across from the Fruit Street Sitting Area and the Brooklyn Heights Promenade. (I'm from Carver...of course I'd live on Cranberry Street!) In my scratch-ticket millionaire fantasy, we'd own a brownstone on this street.
Sometimes you just need some lemonade and cookies. We got the perfect snack at One Girl Cookies in Boerum Hill. This place was much more our speed--and taste--than Levain Bakery.
You know when fall's a-comin' when the leaves start a-changin' in Prospect Park. (See...trees do grow in Brooklyn.) I took these pics near Dog Beach.
End-of-summer ice cream cones--blackberry for me, mint chocolate chip for Jon--from Blue Marble Ice Cream on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. Just the right the snack. This was such a cool and mellow place...I wish it was across the street from our building in Manhattan.
Dusk on the Brooklyn Heights Promenade as we walked home to Manhattan. At left, the Brooklyn Piers waterfall. (The pic needed a little something else, so I Photoshopped in a sprig of lavender.) At right, the Brooklyn Bridge and the Empire State Building. It's getting darker earlier and earlier now.
I got inspired by a recent post on how to poach eggs over at Smitten Kitchen and decided to give it a go myself for dinner Monday night. It was really simple, actually. The secret is to use vinegar in the poaching liquid so that the egg white firms up and doesn't spread all over the place. (Otherwise, you'd probably end up with something that looks like a jelly fish.)
I grilled a couple slices of sourdough bread on my countertop contact grill and threw together a salad with a really simple vinaigrette of 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard, and 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar (the same vinegar I used in the poaching liquid).
I topped the poached egg with a grind or two of black pepper and a pinch of sea salt.
This was a super light, super easy, and super quick dinner for two that took five minutes...tops.
(On second thought, though, I probably should taken a pic with the yolk cut open and spilling all over the toast. Talk about perfect grill marks!)
If you're like me and Jon, you probably thought it was a joke when Bobby Flay's chocolate chip cookies lost to the Levain Bakery's chocolate chip cookies on Throwdown. We decided to test our hunch this afternoon.
Here's the "famous" Levain chocolate chip cookie. What to say? It's the perfect cookie...if you're looking for something that's simultaneously dry and underbaked. But, above all, this baby is bland. The cookie itself has no sweetness and absolutely no flavor. Except for an overabundance of chocolate chips and maybe a dozen or so walnut pieces, there's just nothing going on here. It's one of those cookies that has so much white flour in it that it leaves a glutenous film on your tongue. Thank goodness we got a couple bottles of water too!
Here's the Levain oatmeal raisin cookie. Hello...oatmeal? I think I spotted maybe four or five oats in this thing. And not a hint of cinnamon. You call this an oatmeal raisin cookie!? This one was slightly better than the chocolate chip cookie, but I have to say that neither is worth the cost: $3.75 apiece. Yes, you did read that correctly...three dollars and seventy-five cents...apiece! The cookies we bought at a kid's lemonade stand in Saratoga were 10 30 times better and were only a tiny fraction of the price: only 50¢ apiece. We think Bobby deserves a rematch!
Eleven Madison is our go-to celebration restaurant. (For some reason, we always end up there on a Tuesday.) This past Tuesday night, to celebrate the end (for now) of Jon's having to work 14-hour days for 9 days at a clip, we had the tasting menu. It consisted of 13 courses and lasted for about 4 hours. Gulp.
1. Predinner nibbles. 2. Baked potato ice cream with wild char roe. 3. Heirloom beet salad.
4. Tuna tartar with heirloom tomatoes. 5. Fois gras with cherries and pistachios. 6. Poached lobster with bacon panna cotta and sweet corn.
7. Turbot with a stuffed squash blossom. 8. Suckling pig with braised cipollini onions, baby leeks, and apricot chutney. 9. Lamb with roasted eggplant, fried sweetbreads, and sheep's milk yogurt.
10. Cheese course. 11. Raspberry sorbet and raspberries filled with balsamic vinegar and lemon verbena. 12. Chocolate and peanut butter "palette" with caramel popcorn and popcorn ice cream. There was also a bonbon plate that I forgot to snap. I think I'm still stuffed!
If basil is the new mint, then lavender is the new basil. Just check out this Google search. And if it's good enough for Doughnut Plant, it's good enough for me!
Lavender's got a light, floral, and clean-tasting flavor that can go either savory or sweet. Lavender paired with citrus would make a great cookie. Drizzling that cookie with a light icing would make it even better.
Lavender combined with other Provençal herbs like rosemary, basil, thyme, bay leaf, and marjoram would make an awesome base for a savory treat--perhaps even a "Provençal Fields" version of my Scarborough Fair Cookies.
Lavender is a pretty versatile ingredient. (And it doesn't hurt that it's really pretty.) Stay tuned...I'm sure I'll come up with something.
Don't just take my word for it. Check out this Google search. When it comes to dessert, basil is the new mint. I know...it sounds bonkers, but tastes really, really good.
Jon and I had a dessert called "Vacherin" at Eleven Madison earlier this month that paired little cubes of fresh strawberries with leaves of micro basil and basil, lemon, and strawberry sorbets. Neither Jon nor I knew what to expect, but when the plate landed on our table we dove right in. It was so light and refreshing--a perfect summertime dessert--that we could have eaten two more...apiece.
Don't worry: I don't foresee a basil-strawberry cookie in the future. (Hmm...or do I?) But if you're feeling adventurous, stop by the produce aisle, pick up some strawberries and basil, and taste for yourself.
No Saturday night in with an old movie on TMC--The Bad and the Beautiful is tonight's "essential"--would be complete without popcorn. But after spending all day in the heat and sun (we walked up to the Central Park reservoir and back), the last thing either Jon or I wanted was something salty. So what's the solution? Make our own salt-free microwaveable popcorn from scratch, of course.
I remembered reading this post on homemade microwave popcorn on Mark Bittman's New York Times food blog and got to work. I opted for a bowl instead of the brown paper bag, and I also opted for olive oil over peanut oil.
I used 1/4 cup popcorn, 1 tablespoon olive oil, and about a dozen grinds of freshly cracked black pepper. We also made a variation with cayenne pepper, but you could try adding any spice you want: chipotle, cinnamon, or even curry powder. Make sure you use a glass--preferably Pyrex--bowl with a lid, not a plastic bowl and Saran Wrap. (Trust me on this! It wasn't until my third attempt that I switched to a Pyrex covered casserole dish.)
Stir the popcorn, oil, and pepper well to make sure each kernel is coated. Cover the bowl and microwave on high. One thing, though: Bittman claims that you should microwave the popcorn "until the kernels stop [popping], which is high heat for two minutes in many cases," but this is laughably inaccurate. Maybe it was the kind of popcorn I bought (well, more accurately, I sent Jon downstairs to the store), and maybe it was my microwave, but it took a whopping 4:30 for my popcorn to reach that magic place where the majority of the kernels have popped without burning and stinking you out of your house.
However, you might want to park yourself close to your microwave to keep both an ear and a nose out to catch the popcorn as the popping slows down and before it starts to burn.
Summer Fridays in New York are nice and quiet and empty--perfect for going on a marathon-log walk and exploring the city. While we did make it from Chelsea in Manhattan to Prospect Park in Brooklyn, we didn't quite take as long a walk as we did last Friday because we cheated and took the train home. The sun really took the pep out of me. Maybe I should have had a second doughnut...
...from Doughnut Plant! Jon had the yeast vanilla bean (top left), and I had the yeast coconut glazed (top right). The breakfast of champions.
We stopped by 1 Centre Street again to see if we'd catch the Law and Order people filming like last week, when we saw Kathryn Erbe. (I was hoping to snag a pic of Chris Noth or Sam Waterston for Mumma.) When I saw Judith Light (top left), I thought we hit SVU paydirt. But then I recognized Rebecca Romijn (in sunglasses, top left) and saw the cast chairs (top right): Ugly Betty.
Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge. This time, I was the jerk holding up traffic by taking pictures.
As seen on the streets of Brooklyn: the Bed Bug Club in Boerum Hill and a white tiger in Park Slope. (Where were Sigfried and Roy?)
Lunch at Moutarde in Park Slope. Nicoise salad sans anchovies (top left) and a warm goat cheese salad (top right). The whole time I had Mumma's voice echoing in my head: "Ugh...goat cheese!"
Prospect Park. So empty, so wonderful! Jon and I spent the afternoon and early evening on the grass under a tree planning this week's cookies and daydreaming about Brooklyn brownstones. Scratch-ticket millionaires?
What to do on a summer Friday? Head down to Doughnut Plant for a blueberry yeast doughnut (top left) and a lavender cake doughnut (top right) for breakfast.
Walk past 1 Centre Street and see Kathryn Erbe (top left and right) during the filming of an episode of Law and Order: Criminal Intent. Then walk over the Brooklyn Bridge.
Traverse Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens (top left and right), and Park Slope.
Explore Prospect Park, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (top left), and the Brooklyn Public Library (top right).
Traverse Park Slope, Prospect Heights, Boerum Hill, and Brooklyn Heights. Stop off at Bacchus (top left and right) in Boerum Hill for supper.
Walk back over the Brooklyn Bridge.
Head home to Chelsea through the Financial District, TriBeCa, and the West Village.
Rest feet. Write blog post from bed.
What a coincidence! I just started writing this post, and the Throwdown
that pitted Bobby Flay against Mark Israel from Doughnut Plant is on Food Network right now. No kidding!
On day two of our staycation, Jon and I returned to the Lower East Side determined to get doughnuts at Doughnut Plant, and we succeeded. We got a yeast lavender, a cake lavender, a cake blueberry, and a cake tres leches. I like the yeast ones more, but Jon prefers cake.
The doughnuts were delicious, and the raspberry lemonade was really good too. Who knows...I might try a lavender cookie someday.
Eat pickles!
On day one of our staycation, Jon and I walked through the Lower East Side on our way to the Brooklyn Bridge. We were going to get doughnuts from Doughnut Plant, but it was closed! Too bad, too, because this month's flavors included lavender and blueberry. (We had to peer through the metal shutters to see the menu.) And I was so in the mood for a doughnut!
So we got pickles instead from The Pickle Guys, which, funnily enough, is always closed when Doughnut Plant is open. Go figure. These were a nice ¢50 snack to fortify us for our walk across the bridge, around Brooklyn Heights, and then up to, through, and around Prospect Park. I think I need a new pair of sneakers.
We went back again.
One of my favorite foods from home is linguica (lin-GWEE-suh) rolls, and the best form to have them in is a moon, and the best place to get a moon is Clyde's.
I found a recipe for linguica rolls online a few weeks ago and filed it away for future use. And there's nothing like an 80° day without air conditioning (don't even get me started) to make you want to do some baking.
My homemade moon came out well, but it's not nearly as good as one from Clyde's. The lightness and flavor just wasn't there. So rest assured, Mumma, I will be coming home again soon.
Just an aside: It was quite an effort to find linguica in my neighborhood. On the South Shore of Massachusetts, you can find linguica everywhere; in fact, it's a really popular pizza topper. I got my freshly made (whodathunkit) linguica from Whole Foods, but there's one major drawback to that store: the lines are ridiculous, and people try to cut like crazy. I swear I could have walked to Plymouth in the time it took to get to the register. And if one more person tried to slip in line in front of me, I would have been charged with assault and battery with 1 1/2 pounds of Portuguese sausage.
Whenever Jon and I head up to Massachusetts to visit Mumma, we have to have linguica rolls from Clyde's. Lucky for us, though, we don't usually have to buy them ourselves because Sheryle and Gary (hi Sheryle and Gary!), who are wicked good friends of the family--another aunt and uncle, really--pick up a moon (pictured here) for us.
The moon is comprised of seven individual rolls stuffed with linguica, a Portuguese sausage that’s made out of pork and that has mild heat. (Hmmm...kind of reminds me of a stuffed cookie...but not really.) The bread is light and yeasty and has a slightly sweet crust.
Today we stopped by Sheryle and Gary’s and surprised them with a moon of their very own. And we got one ourselves to take home. As you can see from these pics, it probably won’t survive our drive back.
I found a recipe online for linguica rolls, so stay tuned for my homemade version.
(And it's not that green sauce/marinade for steak, either...)
Jon and I took a walk on Saturday—a really, really, really long walk—along the Hudson River from 14th street all the way up to 155th Street…and then back.
At 148th Street, just a little north of Riverbank State Park right on the Hudson, we took a break and had one of the best burgers we've ever eaten. Oh, chimichurri. How come you taste so good?
These Dominican burgers smell amazing and taste even better. We had our first chimichurris last summer when we did the north leg of this walk. (We didn't have the feet to make the return trip home.)
Lucky for us, the chimichurri cart was in the same spot at 148th street in the park today as it was last summer. And lucky for you too, so if you're in the neighborhood drop by. Or go for a walk to explore one of the least touristy strips of Manhattan and to have a burger you'll remember for years to come.
Having lived in New York for 10 years, I can attest that the pizza here isn't all it's cracked up to be.
Famous Ray's? Please. The pizza from BR's in Halifax, Massachusetts, is my favorite. I could eat five of these little personal-sized pies...and then another five.
The crust is crispy on the outside but buttery and pastry-like on the inside. (I've tried replicating the dough at home, but I haven't quite nailed it.) The sauce is simple and fresh and has a clean tomato flavor that isn't salty or sweet. It's just right. And the cheese is the perfect balance of crispy and melty. In short, it's perfect. And better than any other pizza I've ever had.
Not this Delilah...this Delilah.
Jon and I are going to take a day trip to Philly tomorrow so that we can sample Delilah Winder's famous 7 cheese mac 'n cheese, which Oprah declared the best in the country. (Thanks for the idea, Alysha!)
Food Network (I'm borrowing the image at left from FN's website) and Throwdown fans will remember that Delilah lost to Bobby Flay in a mac 'n cheese challenge. But we'll be the judges of that...
UPDATE: We went for the mac 'n cheese, but we fell in love with the fried chicken.
