Regalitos

I am a firm believer that the best gifts are edible/drinkable and don’t take up a lot of space. That being said, two of the best gifts I received this Xmas were a beer of the month club membership and a growler of a delicious American style barley wine a pint glasses from the Portsmouth Brewery.

Happy Holidays!

TURKEY FRY!

Merry Xmas (or happy holidays)

Basically, we are in the middle of the big three end of the year eating holidays: Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s. Since my family missed out on the FriendsGiving I had, I will fry a turkey in their honor this morning. I have the bird prepped on the counter, a tasty Hefeweizen (just in case you’re interested, it’s a Schneider-Brooklyner Hopfen-Weisse, technically a weizenbock )in the fridge and a big ol’ pot of oil waiting for me in the back yard.

MERRY XMAS!

CityDusk

I’ve recently started working with a company called CityDusk doing beer and food related events. The basic idea behind CityDusk is to put on interesting events in and around Manhattan with a common theme. Since am a self-anointed beer and food guy I am focusing on these finer points of life.

The first event is a down home, chill out sort of deal. In the future we will be doing some exclusive stuff regarding various breweries, including tastings, dinners and pairings, but for now, I’m just going for a good time.

The event is focused on Beer, Bowling and Pizza and is guaranteed to be a rollicking good time. Ten-Pin destruction and fine craft beers—is there anything more you need?

Check out the CityDusk site for complete information.

Space Beer Has Landed!

“Will fermentation work the same in weightlessness? What happens to carbonation when there's no buoyancy to bring the bubbles to the top? Can space beer form a proper head? Scientists who study the physics of gas-liquid mixtures would love to know!”

There are few questions that keep me awake at night more than “Can space beer form a proper head?” I often lie awake pondering the ability of a beverage brewed in the Milky Way to produce a voluminous, frothy cap of foam. If I ever got the chance to orbit the planet, you can rest assured that a tasty brew will be the first thing I am concerned about after dusting Mars for signs of human life.

All kidding aside, Space Beer has been a curiosity for a few years now. An article posted by NASA in 2001 describes the efforts of Kirsten Sterrett, a University of Colorado student and former Coors employee, who set to discover if brewing in space was possible. Backed by BioServe and the Coors Brewing Company, Sterrett produced 1-mL of Space Beer. The basic conclusion of the beer was that the space beer produced less live cells—the work of the yeast—than beer brewed back on Earth. Very interesting results, but I find the recent experiments by the Russian Academy of Science, the Okayama University in Japan and the Sapporo brewery much more interesting:

In May of 2008, Sapporo took barley grains that were being cultivated in space to brew beer. The barley was part of an ongoing experiment aboard the International Space Station to see if cultivating edible plants in outer space was possible. Whether or not the cabbage and other produce aboard the ISS tasted good is beside the point; Sapporo has officially completed 100 liters of their Space Beer!

Although the beer probably won’t find its way to your local super market, 30 lucky Japanese folks will get to try the brew. This really is one giant leap for mankind.

Brooklyn Beer Dinner

North Meets South: Brooklyn Beers, Latin Cuisine


Last Thursday I made my way to a small Brooklyn restaurant called Palo Santo. Beer lovers would recognize this as the aromatic, South American hardwood used by Sam Calagione for Dogfish Head’s Palo Santo Marron. In Brooklyn, New York, however, Palo Santo is a hidden culinary gem whose compact menu is dependent on what’s available at the market and is fittingly described as “eclectic-Latino”. Jacques Gautier, the Haitian chef, was celebrating his 30th birthday that night while located in the back room a puffy shirted Argentinean guitarist gave classic Beatles tunes a flamenco treatment. Despite all of this, the reason I ventured to Park Slope was for a beer dinner held by Brooklyn Brewery’s Garret Oliver.

Over the past fifteen years Mister Oliver has become a world-class authority on food and beer pairing while attempting to bring beer the same culinary respect as wine. As I arrived at seven o’clock, the brewer was hunched over the main bar, scribbling some notes and chatting with the chef about a few of the dishes. I gawked as I was escorted to my seat and poured a pale, frothy glass of Brooklyn Weisse. After catching up and clinking glasses with my friends, my eyes fell upon the small menu positioned in front of me.

My mother’s family is Puerto Rican, so I grew up with Caribbean and Latin tinged food. None of my grandmother’s simple dishes prepared for the onslaught of flavors I was about to sample: Braised Rabbit with Lemon and purple potatoes to compliment the Weisse; an IPA to ease the spice of a curried duck with coconut milk and mustard greens; vanilla ice cream in a pork reduction with lard cookies and Black Chocolate Stout.

The fine folks at Brooklyn Brewery have always been very helpful about pairing their beers with food. Their website is full of tips and recipes and Mr. Oliver wrote a book dedicated to the art of creating the perfect meal with a harmonious marriage of drink and food. Despite all of this, I was not prepared for the avalanche of flavors that were about to engulf me.

Conejo en Escabeche was the first course. Literally translated as Rabbit in Brine, the gamey taste of the meat was offset by the tart lemons. I’ve eaten rabbit many times and the classic Spanish dish of mejilones en escabeche was as familiar to me as the banana-tinged taste of Brooklyner Weisse. When combined, however, the brisk, bouncy tang of the beer played with the acidic lemon in the dish and really highlighted the dark, earthy flavors of the rabbit and potatoes. These taste bud enlightening moments only intensified as the evening went on and I learned about the beauty of a finely matched meal and beverage.

My favorite plate was Duck Buss-Up-Shut paired with East Indian Pale Ale. Although IPA’s are not my first pick for a drink, their compatibility with spicy food is undeniable and the Duck buss-up-Shut was the perfect foil for this beer. Crispy skin acted as the first layer of a symphonic display of flavors. The crunchy exterior led to a thin layer of gooey, savory fat before leading to the dark and juicy meat. A small mound of mustard greens contrasted the textures while a pool of spicy curry sauce enveloped the entire package in heat. The spice was intense, but not enough to detract from the flavors. Also, the East Indian Pale Ale—a beer more in tune with its English ancestors than its modern, American counterparts—was able to match each step, extinguishing the fire and fat while letting the flavors shine through. I could have eaten this meal forever, and you couldn’t imagine how both the beer and the food merged to create an entirely new flavor profile when experienced together.

Garret Oliver is an interesting and passionate individual. As he lamented on the fact that 10% of the beer produced in the early 1900’s came from Brooklyn and over 1400 independent breweries existed, he spoke optimistically about the emergence of fine foods and beers in this country.

The beers that Mr. Oliver brews are like the man himself, luxurious but down to earth, opulent but manageable. Brooklyn brewery aspires to pair its beers with lobster, quail, caviar and other big dollar meals but it never loses sight that nothing goes better with a smooth lager than a juicy hamburger. He, like his beers, marries old fashion dependability with flair. You can drink a Brooklyn in the finest restaurants in New York City just as easily as the cheapest dive bar. Fortunately for the beer enthusiast, both white cloth cuisine and deep fried tavern fare will benefit from a well-matched brew.







A bit of Dark Matter and some beer braised short ribs.
Both photos courtesy of Graham Kates

FriendsGiving

After taking care of 3 gallons of boiling peanut oil, washing the oil splatters from the floor and scrubbing the fried bacon smell from my clothing, I can look back and say that frying a turkey is something everyone should try.

My FriendsGiving started as a way to fulfill my goal of deep-frying large poultry and a means to get rid of the extra turkey sitting in my freezer. Once I found out that a co-worker had all the necessary hardware to do some heavy-duty frying, I made plans for Thanksgiving part 2. The idea was simple—provide the food and place and everyone else provides the beverages. Frying a turkey not only provides lots of food, it is an excuse to stand around a huge pot of hot oil while drinking beers in thirty-degree weather.

The procedure to transform a turkey from the heaping, pale mass of flesh and bone seen here:


…To the delicious mound of fried goodness seen here…

…is not too difficult. If you can get your hands on a frying setup, the cooking itself is a cakewalk. Granted, I wouldn’t want to do it everyday—cleaning it up is a hassle—but if you have a few good folks around it is worth the effort.

We quickly found that the worst part is waiting. Just like real Thanksgiving, FriendsGiving was full of grumbling stomachs churning at the scent of the forthcoming meal. Also like real Thanksgiving, your guests have the opportunity to eat oodles of cheese and crackers as they consume more libations in an attempt to ease the hunger. Unlike Thanksgiving, however, the delicious scent of fried meat will permeate your clothing and hair and stick around far longer than it takes to digest all the food. Who doesn’t want to smell like their dinner two days later?

Everyone I spoke to about turkey frying told me the same thing—submerge the bird slowly. There are more than enough horror stories about decks, houses and body parts going on fire to make sure I heeded the warning. After bringing the oil to a briskly bubbling 350-degrees, I used my high-tech nylon-rope-and-ratchet mechanism to lower the bird into the pot. There were all sorts of horrifying gurgles and billows of smoke, but the ensuing aroma was enough to know that the sacrifices were well worth it. The smoke smelled bacon-like at first, but once the bubbles returned my yard was full of the garlicky, pepper-infused scent of rub I used. Every time the wind picked up my nostrils were pummeled with the delicious sent of meat and spices. After experiencing this, I couldn’t imagine who wouldn’t put their limbs on the line to eat 22-pounds of fried fowl?


About an hour later we pulled out the bird. I probably could have left it in a bit longer to achieve are deeper brown, crunchy skin, but we were starving and all the booze was taking its toll. After making sure the bird was fully cooked, I pulled her out and set her up to rest. The turkey was a hearty bronze, crisp to the touch with a strong savory aroma. Being the methodical cook I am, I had trays of parboiled fries and breaded zucchini ready to go. As we waited on the resting bird, I stood out in the cold waiting for the oil to reach temperature; this is where I encountered a few problems:


Three gallons of turkey fat filled oil takes some time to reach 350 degrees. While this isn’t any ground breaking news, when there are 6 people waiting to eat it becomes a problem. I prematurely dumped the taters in the oil and pulled them out cooked but limp. As I spread them out under the broiler, I administered a similar slop-job frying to the zucchini (they were destined to be finished on the stove). The table was full of carved turkey, corn bread, cranberry sauce, bean salad and beers so I couldn’t keep everyone waiting. We sat down and dug in.

Again, all I can say is that you must fry at least one turkey in your life. The skin is unbelievable—dark, crispy and fragrant—while the meat is juicy. Even the traditionally overcooked and dry breast meat remains moist and flavorful. Combine the delicious crust with the soft interior and you have the makings of a great meal. Also, if you break it down 1-2 hours of frying is much quicker than the mandatory 3+ hours for a traditional roasted bird. Start convincing your family to bypass the oven and fry next year’s turkey. If you do, I’ll swing by to help and bring the beer.

Thanksgiving...take 2

There are a few interesting events coming up soon for me. To start, I am attending a beer dinner hosted by Garret Oliver of the Brooklyn Brewery on Thursday. Also, I’ve received word from CityDusk, a new events company in Manhattan that I’ll be working/writing for, that my first event will be going down January 20th. We are still working out some details, but I can guarantee you it will be awesome and involve delicious beer.

Despite these ridiculously awesome coming-soons, I am happier to report that I will be having some friends over for a GiveThanksAgainGiving Day. Basically, I decided that I really want to fry a turkey and since the Thanksgiving is now really far away—and I don’t think my family would want to stand out in the cold with me while attending a vat of hot, boiling oil—I am going to have some friends enjoy a delicious fried feast with me. A year or two ago I found this schematic for a safe way to fry turkey via Alton Brown. However, you can rest assure that I will be using a coat hanger to lower my turkey into 350-degrees of hot fat.

Pictures coming soon.

When ceases to be beer

There is an article in The New Yorker called, "A Better Brew: The rise of extreme beer." At first glance this article seems to focus on extreme beers—the super-hoppy, highly-alcoholic beverages lovingly called imperials, doubles and any other assortment of fear inducing titles. I was happy to find, however, that it delves into the relationship between craft brewers and other beer making entities. Focusing on Sam Calagione, head brewer for the extremely experimental but deliciously rewarding brewery Dogfish Head, the piece gives readers a hearty insight to the mindset of American brewers today. I definitely recommend it.

"Food is about to demand your attention"

Read this article immediately; it is a letter from Michael Pollan to Obama.

One thing I love of Pollan is his ability to bridge the gap between the past and present. Food is one of the most common denominators between every person, everywhere and in every time period…ever. We need to preserve some of our agricultural history while preventing more food related problems from popping up in the future. While I don’t think all of these suggestions will come to be, they sure would right a lot of wrongs. Even if you disagree with what Pollan is saying, you can’t deny that every will taste better.

Potatoes, Plantains and Beer

I would like to introduce you to the book pictured above—The Brewmaster’s Table by Garret Oliver, the honorable master brewer of Brooklyn Brewery and leader in beer education. I have been reading—studying, actually—the fine pages of the deliciously crafted book nonstop recently. My studies have prevented me from writing much but I think you’ll find it in your heart to forgive me since I’ve been meticulously testing out the beers mentioned in this indispensable tome.

Need to know what to serve with quail, wild boar or game pigeon? This book has it. Interested in the history of monastic Trappist brewery? It’s all there. Just about any question you may have on beer—from the history of styles to pairings—can be found here. I can’t heap enough praise on Mr. Oliver for this magnificent work of thirst-quenching delight.

If you are interested in learning more about Mr. Oliver, I have two suggestions. The first is to read this article on beer and the holidays titled Beer Trumps Wine on Holiday Tables. For the past few years I’ve noticed that the bottles of wine I’ve been drinking at Thanksgiving were being used more to wash the turkey down than compliment it. After a few experiments of my own in the past months, I feel that I am getting the hang of this beer/food thing and can’t wait to unleash my arsenal of tasty brews to my unsuspecting family.

The second suggestion—and one which I am almost giddy about—is an upcoming beer tasting featuring none other than the man himself. On December 4th at 7pm, Garret Oliver will be pairing up with chef Jacques Gautier of Palo Santo Restaurant in park Slope, Brooklyn. I made reservations but have no idea who will be accompanying me.

Five course of pure bliss; I can’t wait.

Mas

Dear Mas,

I just want to say thank you, thank you, thank you! You found it in your heart to give me another chance and sample the delights you create day in and day out. I know I got into that accident last time we were supposed to meet, so I left you hanging. However, you proved the better person and gave me another shot. You cannot understand how enthralled I was when I found out there was a reservation at 9:30 last Wednesday and all I had to do was show up with a case of beer for Matt and the chefs in the back.

Mas, everything was delicious! I want to thank you especially for the pork belly dish. Your charming interpretation of bacon and eggs makes me remember why I like you so much to begin with. Serving a juicy and sumptuous strip of pork belly with a poached egg yolk on top of Italian polenta—you’re so clever! I also loved the Pacific Halibut wrapped in leeks and that Yellowfin Tuna O’ccidental. That Chamblis you gave me just was spot-on with the fish, too. It made me think of how classy you can be without forgetting your foundations.

You aren’t like the others, Mas. You really know how to make me feel special. Who else would invite me in at 9:30 and let me stay until 1 in the morning? Or serve me 10-plus courses without making me decided what I wanted to eat? You really are top-notch and I look forward to our next date. Until then, try not to impress those other people too much. You know I have my eye on you.

Thanks again, I’ll never forget it,

Justin

PS: Sometimes I look at the few pictures I have when I miss you.

No Cooking Necessary - Radegast Hall & Biergarten

A year ago a close friend of mine traveled to Munich while studying in Italy. When he returned to the States, I was regaled with tales of hours spent in the beer halls abroad. Long nights in large open buildings, filled with old wooden tables, jovial people and heavy steins brimming with delicious frothy brew.

Ever since I heard of these stories, I’ve longed to travel to Germany and experience these mythical places for myself. I never made it to Deutschland while living in Spain and the miserable Dollar-to-Euro ratio prevented some shoddy plans I had to travel to Oktoberfest this year. Despite these setbacks, there was a silver lining on the beer filled cloud of my dreams. The lucky residents of New York—my humble self included—have not one, but two locations to indulge our—but more importantly, my—Germanophile and beer garden filled fantasies: Bohemian Hall & Beer Garden in Astoria and Radegast Hall and Biergarten in Williamsburg.

My fantasy was recently fulfilled at the Radegast Hall. This is the newer of the two (it opened this past year) and from what my I’ve-been-to-real-halls-in-Munich-friend tells me the less authentic of the pair. A man named Ivan Kohut has a hand in both of the bars, and super authentic or not, I had a great time. Apparently, Mr. Kohut’s wife, Joanna, is a personal chef who created the menu and I must give praise to the woman for the grub.

Although my party stuck to appetizers and I wasn’t able to sample any entrees (we were there to drink after all) I finally had the chance to chomp down some Steak Tartare. I tried the trout salad, the pate and the charcuterie and cheese plate but the tartare is what I enjoy spilling the beans about. I’ve heard about the dish before and have been jonesing to try it ever since I’ve read various beer hounds accounts of sampling the plate in halls across Europe. Although I’ve seen it multiple times on menus at upscale restaurants, nothing beats a big plate of beef to accompany your liter of dunkleweisse.


If you are unfamiliar with Tartare it’s very simple to explain: take good steak, grind it up, toss an egg yolk on top, season and serve with condiments. There is no cooking involved! You sprinkle on some onion, relish, mustard, Worcestershire sauce or whatever else is available, mix it up and toss it on some bread or other tasty vessel to transport the goodness from plate to mouth. While some my cringe and cry out the dangers of eating raw meat, I say try the stuff before bad mouthing it. As long as you can trust your sources and know you are eating good beef, you aren’t going to die. Granted, if I drop dead tomorrow you may have an argument against me, but until then, go order up some tartare, a stein and daydream about Oktoberfest.

Green Beer

I apologize for the lack of information lately but I was recently given a copy of Garret Oliver’s The Brewmaster’s Table and haven’t been able to pull myself from it.

Currently, I am working on an event with Mr. Oliver’s Brooklyn brewery for a new company called CityDusk so I’ve been reading up, getting my information straight and satisfying my unending quest for beer and food knowledge.

Speaking of beer—and organics, but we’ll get into that a bit later—there is an Organic Beer Festival this Saturday, October 25th, at Counter Restaurant in NYC. It’s a smaller fest located in a fine looking little vegetarian restaurant, but most people haven’t had the chance to taste more organic brews then Peak and Wolaver’s. At the last brewfest in NYC I attended Magic Hat was touting a new line of Organic beers which, unlike many other Magic Hat brews, had a taste as distinct as their marketing. Seems like this could be a tasty new movement in beer and it is gaining ground. Check it out if you can.

Drink it like you're Irish

I spent last weekend in Boston, Massachusetts and in honor of my trip I made the obligatory trip to a local brewery. Over debating with myself to head to the Boston Beer Company (a.k.a. Sam Adams) or the Harpoon brewery, I discovered that the latter does free tasting tours every Friday, precisely the day I was looking to indulge.

I’m going to put it right out there: Boston might be a better beer city than New York. This isn’t looking at New York State, but the city of Boston vis-à-vis the city of New York—it’s pretty close. Now I know that there are a lot of differences; Boston is much smaller, there are less people, etc etc etc. However, the Harpoon brewery is 20 minutes on foot from the financial district in Boston. I know that there are a bunch of Heartland Breweries scattered throughout the city, but it’s not like I can buy a six pack of Heartland around the block from my house, and the only way I can walk into the Brooklyn brewery is if I’ve taken the subway into Williamsburg. Also, every single bar I entered while in Boston had at least one Harpoon on tap. The same can’t be said fro Brooklyn, Six Point or Bluepoint beers in New York. Harpoon also coordinates four really, really big beer festivals in the city. At the last St. Patrick’s Day bash, they kicked 300 kegs while partying in the rain. While I now love both cities, the beer drinkers in Boston seem to be fiercely loyal to their local brew. This is definitely a good thing.

There are a few interesting facts about the Harpoon brewery. To start, it owns the first brewing license in the state of Massachusetts, making it the oldest brewery there. Also, their Winter Warmer seasonal is the 2nd oldest annual seasonal beer in the states (I’m still trying to find the first). They use their own proprietor yeast (meaning that you can’t find their yeast anywhere else in the world) and they are one hell of a supporter of the local beer scene. The giant beer fest I attended back in the summer was put on by Beer Advocate and Harpoon brewery. Speaking of which, Harpoon actually sponsored a teeny, tiny beer fest I went to back in Binghamton, NY. Way to go Harpoon.

Basically, I like this beer. If you are ever in the area, take the time to hit up the brewery for their Beer Tasting Tour. Unlike other breweries that schlep you around the beer vats and the bottling line and spit out facts, the people at Harpoon sit you down at their tasting bar, give out a bunch of samples and give you the details on each beer while going through the history of the brewery. It’s interesting, informational, and most importantly, delicious.

Fresh Meat

The New York Times just did an article on the restaurants owned by Mark Firth and Andrew Tarlow in Brooklyn. It wasn’t just any review or blurb about current hot spots; it focused on meat.

The restaurants—Marlow & Sons, Diner and Bonita—have begun ordering whole primal cuts of meat and butchering them on premises. The idea is both to serve local and fresh product, but it also requires chefs to get a little creative with the animal. While it’s easy to sell of strip steaks and short ribs, people are still squeamish about tongue, bones, heart and the like. The ability to masterfully prepare various cuts of offal is impressive in themselves, but to be able to make a profit from it to a cliental who normally wouldn’t eat the stuff is where the real skill is.

Chris Cosentino, chef of Incanto in San Francisco and creator of the very good website offalgood.com is quoted in the article, talking about the importance of head to tail eating. In honor of restaurants close to home putting more focus on the entire animal and culinary locality, I’m linking a clip Mr. Cosentino did for Gourmet Magazine about pig head preparation. This video is just one of the extremely informational videos Chris posts on his website. Even if you aren’t interested in eating a pig’s head (or any offal for that matter), it’s important to know where that filet mignon you are ordering came from. Browse through the blog on offalgood.com for some interesting videos and posts about the meat we eat.

An Apology

Dear Mas,

I’m sorry that I couldn’t make it out to dine with you tonight. You seem like a lovely and delicious little place and I know I must have let you down. I’m sorry that I’m an idiot and crashed my car into a median divider on the parkway last night and now can’t afford/get to the train station (or anywhere else for that matter) to sample your plentiful bounty.

I’m especially sorry since the people I was supposed to go with have connections with the kitchen and we were going to get styled out. You know how much I love meals that start with the directions to “bring a six-pack for the guys in the kitchen” and I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me soon.

Since I can no longer afford you—or any other restaurant—due to auto body expenses, I will be spreading the word that I am willing to prepare, cook and do the dishes at anyone’s house if they are willing to let me partake in the meal. My only requirement is that I must be able to ride my bike there.

Mas, I hope to see you very soon.

Tearfully,

Justin

Fine Dining and Led Zeppelin

A close friend went out of her way to get me a reservation to Babbo, Mario Batali’s restaurant in the West Village that many consider one of the best places to eat in Manhattan. Do a quick Google search and you will be bombarded with glowing reviews for the restaurant from legitimate publications (i.e. The New York Times, New York Magazine, Gourmet Magazine) and one not so legitimate (i.e. Tastychomp). In addition to this, you will see interviews with Bill Buford, the author Heat—the book which chronicles the life of Babbo’s kitchen--and photos of just about everything on the menu. For this reason, I refrained from taking any photographs and will hold my tongue from rambling off lofty adjectives to try and describe the food that Babbo produces. Instead, I will be terse and get straight to the point:

Babbo is quite possibly the best place I have ever eaten. (Emphasize that “.”)

I was expecting a lot from the restaurant ever since I was told we had one of the coveted months-in-advance-reservations, but every single one of my expectations were surpassed.

The restaurant is fancy without feeling stuffy. Halfway through my first glass of wine I realized the Led Zeppelin’s first album was playing in it’s entirety over the speaker system. Throughout the night I heard The Black Keys, Dinosaur Jr. and a few other albums you would never expect to hear in a 3-star restaurant.

The menu is compact and blows you away with unfamiliar ingredients hand-in-hand with Italian staples. Do you like lamb’s brains and sweet breads? Both are old-school Italian staples and well represented here. However, if the thought of these gross you out (although this would definitely be the place to try them) there are goat cheese raviolis, calamari and other delights to placate the minds of the timid but inspire the tongues of the faithful. I plan on going back as soon as I can to try as much as I possible can.

The wait staff is knowledgeable, helpful and will make you feel like a million bucks. Our waiter was fantastic and he could have sold me his wife and child if he wanted to. He knew everything about every dish and could answer any obscure question I mustered up. The sommelier provided us with a delicious Amaro tasting after the meal and I won’t even get into the amount of knowledge I picked from his brain.

All in all, Babbo knows how to take care of you. Whether you are coming in for a bite at the bar—which I saw many people doing. A shame they didn’t have anyone snagging reservations for them—or decide to sit and eat for three hours—this was my situation—the experience is spectacular. I have tried several of Batali’s other restaurants—Lupa, Otto and The Spotted Pig—but none have come close to transporting me to the euphoria that Babbo did. Mario Batali, I love you more than ever.


Following is a brief run-down of the meal:

-A bottle of a delicious Aglianico
-Bruschetta with garbanzos and olives
-Marinated Fresh Sardines with Caramelized Fennel and Lobster Oil
-Neci con Funghi Misti (a mushroom crepe with porcinis and oysters)
-Goat Cheese Tortelloni with Dried Orange and Wild Fennel Pollen
-Pumpkin“Lune” with Sage and Amaretti
-Spicy Two Minute Calamari Sicilian Lifeguard Style (Lifeguard style apparently is olives, capers, couscous, and a most delicious and slightly spicy tomato broth)
-Roasted Beet “Farrotto” (a type of cous cous/ risotto with beets)
-Ricotta and maple cheesecake (the absolute best dessert I’ve ever had. It was as soft as an angel’s wing and tasted what heaven must taste like)
-Amaro tasting (4 delicious glasses of various bitter after dinner drinks. Accompanied by a boatload of knowledge about each drink).

Eat here immediately.

Food for aliens

It seems that the French are everywhere lately in the culinary world. Currently, there are several very famous French chefs and numerous others hoping to give French Gastronomy UNESCO humanity heritage status. In case you are unfamiliar with UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), they are—to put it simply—an organization intent on preserving things that need preserving. This refers to both physical objects such as monuments, buildings and other structures, and not-so-physical-things such as cultural events, festivals, dances, and songs. A tour guide in Spain once told me that the idea behind UNESCO is that in case aliens come down to visit the earth, we have a running list of things we need to show them. I guess the French want to feed our intergalactic visitors some beouf bourignon.

This past weekend I attended an interesting discussion held by FIAF (French Institute: Alliance Francaise). The topic was—of course—food. The discussion consisted of a French chef, a French artist and the American chef-with-French-roots Wylie Dufresne of the restaurant WD-50. The guests were there to discuss the future of food with a heavy emphasis on molecular gastronomy.

Molecular gastronomy is not a new idea by any stretch, but recently it has been getting a lot of attention. Mister Dufresne is by no means the first to dabble in molecular gastronomy and has nowhere near the fame status as Spain’s Ferran Adrian, but since his restaurant won a Michelin star he has been on the forefront of the scene in the States.

The assembly was brought together to discuss whether or no molecular gastronomy is here to stay, or it is just a fashionable fad that chefs use to get attention and gain publicity. One big argument against molecular gastronomy is pretty simple: why mess with something that tastes good? Dufrense and David Zuddas (the French chef) both agree that food is an ever-expanding art and as long as you don’t lose sight of food’s main purpose (to taste delicious) then what is wrong with a little experimentation. If a bagel with lox and cream cheese tastes good, then why not make bagel ice cream, roll it in poppy seeds, dry cream cheese to a peanut brittle consistency and serve it with salmon sashimi? These are exactly the kinds of question Dufrense asks and exactly the kind of food he creates.

There is a lot to be said about our correlation between visual references and taste references. If we close our eyes an eat a bagel and cream cheese, but then open them to see we were actually eating ice cream, will our outlook on food change? These playful recipes are what Dufrense, Zuddas and scores of other chefs are trying to introduce to their customers. Food can be playful, intelligent and delicious at the same time. Just because popcorn shrimp tastes good, does that mean we can’t make popcorn soup and garnish it with fried shrimp?


This little gem is a spoonful of Parmesan cheese, an orb of risotto with tomato and basil. The risotto was made traditionally, calcium was added and then blops of it were tossed into a pool of some sort of seaweed liquid which reacts with calcium and molds the risotto into light little globs. Pretty neat, eh?

The World's First Beverage- 2nd Annual Manhattan Cask Ale Fest

“The mouth of a perfectly contented man is filled with beer.”
-Egyptian proverb, C 2200 BCE

I found this quote in a book by a fellow named Tom Standage. The book is called The History of the World in Six Glasses and it traces the development of six beverages through different epochs of human history. The reason I bring it up is because the book thoroughly explores the origins—and supposed origins—of beer. Origins that, Standage says, are “closely intertwined with the origins of civilization itself."

While this statement may seem a bit outlandish, it makes sense when you break it down. All alcohol was discovered by accident; grapes left too long turned into wine, honey left too long (when mixed with some water) turned to mead, and grains left too long would turn to beer. However, until the invention of pottery around 6000 BCE, it was impossible to store wine and mead since grapes were only available in season (no refrigeration yet!) and wild honey was available in limited qualities. Beer, however, is made from grains, which in are readily available and easily stored. Also, beverages made with prepared water (i.e. boiled) were safer to drink than straight water. These reasons may be the reason that the first written recipe—written in cuneiform—is for beer.

You may be wondering why I am spewing information about the birth of beer. Well, primarily, it is easy to justify the importance of the drink to those who find it distasteful or “gross.” More importantly, however, it is to divulge a bit of information about cask ales. I was fortunate enough to attend the 2nd Annual Manhattan Cask Ale festival this weekend at the Chelsea Brewery in Manhattan and feel that is my duty as a devout beer lover to share with you the deliciousness that is cask ale.

Since we’ve already established that beer goes hand and hand with the birth of civilization (and if you dispute this fact, please do get in touch. I would be more than happy to discuss this with you), let us examine how beer was traditionally served before the advent of Nitrogen and Carbon Dioxide.

The vast majority of bars and restaurants today serve draught beer from a keg. This keg is pressurized and has an opening in the top where a line can be attached. Without going into detail—and if you care for a more specific description, you can go here—the artificial pressure of the keg is sometimes coupled with nitrogen or CO2 tanks to force the beer from the keg to the tap and accounts for a portion of the carbonation in a beer. In bottled beer, C02 is forced into the bottle before capping to create the necessary “fizz” when you crack the bottle open (it is also added to prevent air from staying in the bottle, which would oxidize the beer and skunk it.)

Cask Ale, however, is beer served the way it used to be served. A cask is similar in shape to a keg, but there is no forced carbonation and the opening is towards the side of the cask, not in the middle. There are two ways to serve cask ale: a beer engine (basically a hand pump, similar to an old water pump) and gravity style (literally angling the cask on its side so gravity can do its work). Both of these styles irritate the remaining yeast in the cask and allow for a little bit of natural head (the fizz on the top of your glass) to form.

Cask Ale is by far my favorite way to enjoy beer. Some people say it is flat and warm, but since the beer is served at a warmer temperature (in order not to kill the yeast) it allows for a richer flavor. Also, while there is less carbonation, the full taste of the beer perfectly accentuates the natural carbonation. A well made beer will have enough carbonation to please the taste buds without leaving you yearning for canned CO2.

The festival at the Chelsea Brewery was serving up 47 different varieties of Cask Ale, the most ever put together in one spot in Manhattan! I went to the Cask Festival at the Brazen Head bar in Brooklyn a year ago, and while their stash of 20 plus casks was substantial, the collection at the Chelsea Pier was almost overwhelming. Patrons were allowed to choose from 8 oz or 16 oz serving sizes and after purchasing your beer, you could wander around the brewery or take a seat at the outside pier and watch the sunset over the river (and New Jersey, what fun!). Over all, it’s a great experience and a fantastic way to become acquainted with cask ale. If you ever see cask ale offered at your favorite neighborhood bar, definitely try it. You’ll be happy you did.


PS: I called up the Brazen Head in Brooklyn and they said that the next Cask Festival would be held sometime in October. Get your taste buds ready and call your drinking buddies!

Cheers!

Wylie Dufrense and the future of food.

Go see this.

I don't care if people find molecular gastronomy a positive for cooking or a disgrace, it sure as hell is interesting.

Let's think about what we put in our mouths!

There was good article in yesterday’s times titled “Instead of Eating to Diet, They’re Eating to Enjoy.” The piece talks about the recent decline in American dieting as more people are attempting to add food to their diets instead of avoiding foods.

The general idea—and I have no idea why this is so hard for people to comprehend—is that if you eat a variety of foods and focus on things that are natural, local (locality just helps assure freshness and a lack of chemicals and additives used for transportation and storage) and varied you will have no problem ingesting all the vitamins and nutrients necessary for a healthy life.

Let me leave you with another point I found particularly interesting:

“Also, the more time people spend on tasks like food shopping, cooking and kitchen cleanup, the more likely they are to be of average weight. The Economic Research Service of the United States Department of Agriculture found that people of normal weight spend more time on meal-related tasks than people who are overweight or underweight.”

Tara Parker Pope for the New York Times
September 17, 2008

Way to go College Grad...

Well, it looks as if I'm incapable of checking a simple calendar. The food fest in Jackson Heights was last week. Anyways, Cask Ale fest here I come.

Charity for the rich and famous

Here are the New York Times Dining Section benefit events for this week:

Autumn Harvest Dinner: $350 for champagne hour, $1,000 for dinner. Supports the Share Our Strength charity.

Women Who Cook: $300 or $500 for tasting. Supports woman with breast and ovarian cancer.

Mario Batali Dinner: $1,500. Benefits the Food Bank of New York City and the Earth Lab Foundation.

Taste of Jackson Heights and Film Festival: Admission is free and tasting plates for $1-$3. Supports…Jackson Heights?


Try and guess which event I’ll be checking out.

Dreaming of Gherkins

Unfortunately, I was unable to get off of work to attend the 8th annual Pickle Fest on Orchard Street today. Tomorrow I’m off to pick up a jar of Kosher Dills to ease the pain of waiting until next year. If you went, I hope you ate a pickle or two for me.

There's rain in my beer.

My clothes were sopping wet, my hair was pasted to my forehead and everywhere I went I there were puddles. Despite these drawbacks, the 3rd annual NY Brewfest allowed me to sample beers from over 100 plus breweries this past rain-drenched Friday. The rain couldn’t hold back myself or the hundreds of other folks drinking in the rain.

Heartland Brewery and the New York State Brewers Association came together to put on the event. For fifty bucks, beer lovers of all levels could sample to their fill and test out their tolerance level. As the night went on, most people seemed to adjust to—or at least forget about—the constant rainfall and enjoy themselves. However, I think this had more to do with the amount of craft brews that were being imbibed.

Unlike the American Craft Beer Festival I attended in Boston back in June, this festival seemed more about just drinking than learning about the brews. One pourer described it best as “an absolute shit show.” Most of this was probably due to the horrible weather, but the lack of actual brewer’s present makes me guess that getting drunk was the end goal of the festival. Not that there is anything wrong with getting sloshed on delicious beers, but it was a different atmosphere then other festivals I’ve been too. I rarely had a moment to learn anything about the beers I was drinking and when I did, the volunteers often knew only what was written on the placard in front of the top. I was able to chat with a few pourers—the people at Elysian Brewing Company in Seattle and Schmaltz in New York were full of great beer info—but for the most part I was hustled out of the small tents as soon as I got my pour.

One thing I noticed about the festival was that I tasted more beers that I found utterly terrible than that blew me away. Perhaps it is due to my tastes shifted towards lower alcohol session beers lately, but a lot of the breweries were showcasing extreme, high-alcohol beers or some ridiculous brews (e.g. The Crème Brulee from Southern Tier brewing. It smells delicious, but I won’t be buying a bottle any time soon). My favorite brews were the beers featured on cask. There is just something about that warm, rich and smooth taste of a freshly poured cask ale. The Denver Pale Ale by Great Divide Brewing Company was one taste bud pleaser that I will be making an effort to purchase in the future.

Despite the hurricane-like rains beating on my head and the occasional stab with an umbrella the fest was a success. I drank my fill, and the turnout proved that the people of the city will continue to appreciate delicious craft beers. Even with the rain, people donned ponchos, slickers and garage-bags to have a good time and cheers to the future of brewing in this state. This picture pretty much sums up the event:

****

The Brewfest was the kickoff night to NY Craft Beer Week. Until September 21, beer bars, breweries and restaurants will be uniting to celebrate good beer. Although I won’t be attending any of the neighborhood bar crawls, the 2nd annual Manhattan Cask Ale Fest will be taking place from the 19th to the 21st at the Chelsea Brewing Company. Hopefully the weather will be a bit drier since I’ll be getting there at noon.

Delicious Cask ale is here.

This Weekend's Events: Beer and brine

If you are in the NYC area, be sure to go here for drinks, and here to eat this weekend. It will definitely be delicious.

Burlesque shows + Jungle Animals x Fizzy orange beverage = SEX APPEAL

Head over to this post from Seriouseats.com IMMEDIATELY. The new Orangina ads are really looking to hook the Maxim demographic. After viewing the ridiculous television ad, you can gaze uncomfortably at the pinups here.

If you know where I can purchase these pinups, please let me know as soon as possible. If I ever end up having a den, they will be framed on the walls.

Put Down the Dish! Love, Upton Sinclair

Release in 1906, Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle is a graphic portrayal of Chicago’s meatpacking district and the pathetic—and often deadly—conditions that the industry’s big brass subjected onto European immigrants. The book is required reading for many students in this country, but somehow I managed to miss all the classes where it was assigned. I can understand why many contribute the passage of American food purity laws and overall higher food awareness to this book. However, until I read it myself—I finished this morning—I was completely unaware that the entire novel is one giant push for socialism. The last paragraph, an excerpt from a socialist rally, is particularly poignant:

“We shall bear down the opposition, we shall sweep it before us—and Chicago will be ours! Chicago will be ours! CHICAGO WILL BE OURS!”

Those are some big words from a book famous for its effects on the American food industry.

While I did enjoy the book, I would like to say that it was tough getting through the last chapter; the entire end of the novel is a socialist tirade against capitalism. Not that there is anything wrong with that, it was just something that I wasn’t expecting. Despite the typical stabs at the economic system, there were several points that broke the monotony and made me do a double take. My favorite is The Jungle’s take on that love chore in American households—dishwashing:

“…consider one single item, the washing of dishes…And note that this is the most filthy and deadening and brutalizing work; that it is the cause of anemia, nervousness, ugliness, and ill-temper; of prostitution, suicide, and insanity; of drunken husbands and degenerate children—for all things the community has naturally to pay”

Prostitution? Suicide? Insanity?? I wish I knew all these side-effects of cleanliness years ago. I am never washing another dish again!

La Familia

I’ve officially tasted my first “family meal” at the restaurant I work at. Yesterday morning, a few of the kitchen guys were collecting money and I inquired what they were pooling money for. Jose, one of the bus boys, told me they were going to purchase a giant hunk of beef to make something for lunch. I gave in my pesos, and two hours later saw a massive 25-pound piece of beef. Three hours later I was slurping down a delicious guisado with a few grilled tortillas.

Delicious.

It was more than 7, I definitely know that. I don’t think I made it to 30 but it was probably pretty close. I was at about 16 when the rain started…

The 34th annual Milford Oysterfest was definitely a success. Despite the downpours that occurred in the middle of the festivities Friday night, the bivalve loving citizens of Milford, Connecticut braved the weather to eat, drink and be merry. I certainly had my fill of oysters (I think I ate about 25 of the briny creatures) and wine and learned about what might be the most interesting pastime along the Atlantic Coast—competitive oyster shucking.

Despite the various booths selling numerous foods and treats, I decided to bypass the fried shrimp served up by the kids at St. Gabriel’s school and burgers and hot dogs from the Milford Republican Town Committee (In case you were wondering the Democratic Committee stuck to the maritime theme and had fried clams and oysters) and headed straight to the Pond Point Wines and Spirits tent for the 1st annual Wine and Oyster Tasting. For $40 I feasted on freshly shucked oysters, appetizers from local restaurants and some hefty pours of wine from Charlie, the pony-tailed ex-computer programmer-turned-liquor store owner/wine connoisseur. Although I sampled everything the tent had to offer, I made it a point to understand the subtle differences between the various oysters offered. Each was sampled without condiments and in order to cleanse my palate I made sure to wash away each distinct oyster taste with some of Charlie’s wine.


From left to right, my first plate consisted of Oysters from Nova Scotia, Milford, Connecticut and Lottsburg, Virginia. The only way I could visibly tell the difference between the brack water creatures was to label them in my notebook. Despite these guys looking pretty similar they all have very distinct flavors. The Nova Scotias were incredibly light and not salty at all. The Milfords were the exact opposite, meaty and dense while the goods from Virginia tasted almost like nothing at all, very neutral and clean, probably due to the private waters where they are cultivated. It shouldn’t have come as such a surprise to me, but after sampling all seven different varieties, it was easy to see how oysters from certain waters are prized for their taste. My oyster epiphany reminds me of the Emputido festival in Spain where I consecutively sampled chorizo and morcilla from 3 different purveyors and realized just how complex one type of food can be from its neighbor.


Plate two (from left to right) consisted of oysters from Norwalk, Connecticut, some from the frigid waters of Bath, Maine and little ones from Noank, Connecticut. Around the time of round two I began chatting with a few of the shuckers, asking about the difference in oysters and how to shuck.


More importantly, however, I was trying to figure out why these people traveled from festival to festival shucking for the hungry masses. After chatting with a few I met a fellow named Jason. He was an admirable fellow, born in Rhode Island and living in Canada. Jason had a pretty interesting story; he was washing dishes in a restaurant when one of the cooks asked if he could shuck. Growing up in a coastal RI town he had a penchant for the mollusks and began prepping the oyster for his restaurant. Soon after he realized how passionate people were about oysters and began working with the distributors. He got involved with the company and worked his way up, shucking oysters the whole time. Somewhere along the line he got into competitive shucking (the competition portion of the Milford was held on Saturday, so I wasn’t able to attend) and became the national Canadian champion.

I listened to his interesting story as I thoughtfully devoured my plate of oysters. The Norwalks were incredibly salty globs of oysters. The third Connecticut offering from Noank was much more balanced, with the salinity easing into an almost sweet aftertaste. The oysters from Maine, however, were phenomenal! I knew I was in for something special when the program described the York, Maine delectables as filled with “brine and brothy umami richness.” Besides that statement making me want to write food descriptions as a living, it was spot on; the oysters were sweet and salty at the same time, with a dense liquor that made them go down easy.


After trying a few more of the Maine oysters (pictured again on the right) I tried the final variety offered, this one coming in from Jason’s home state of Rhode Island (picture on the left). These critters were probably the second best I sampled, slender and slippery with an almost oily finish. The salinity was strong without overpowering and the oysters themselves with thin, almost as if someone flattened them within their shells. As I was slurping a few down I began talking with a heavy-accented Bostonian named Anton who gave me the low down about the interesting world of competitive shucking.

Anton was a wiry fellow. He had a slight stoop that I assume he attained from hours of shucking and wore high shorts with a pair of heavy, well-worn work boots. His words came out quick and saturated with an accent that sounded like mix of Canadian and Bostonian, but I did my best to understand. He told me about a large, bearded man who was the second best shucker in the United States. I had the pleasure of trying one of these man’s oysters and immediately noticed something—he shucked upside down. I asked Anton about this and he began to explain shucking technique to me. The majority of shuckers uses a long, dull knife and inserts the blade at the base of the shell’s hinge. After cracking the sucker open, they remove the flat top shell, cut the connecting muscle from the body and serve the oyster in the curved, bowl shell. This method allows the oyster to sit in a small pool of its delicious liquid, adding another flavor element to the oyster. After Anton took me over to watch the U.S champion shuck, he pointed out the small tipped knife he was inserting in the front lip of the oyster. After breaking the shell open, the champ cut the muscles and discarded the bowl part of the shell, presenting a flat oyster that filled the small top shell.

I could hear the passion in Anton words as he described this Baltimore style of schucking. He began going into knife composition and how the North American champion—unfortunately, he was not at this festival—has a custom made knife that forms to his fingers. Anton seemed to break out in a sweat as he went on describing the various festivals and how he saw the champion shuck twenty-four oysters in a minute and one second. I listened to him speak as I devoured another plate of oysters.

A few hours into the festival, the rain started pouring and the tasting tent was jam-packed. The food was devoured and the wines were all drunk. The flow of oysters never ceased, but after many plates of “research” it was time for me to leave. I thanked Anton and Jason and said goodbye to Charlie. Anton reminded me of several of the festivals coming up in the fall and I made my way out of the tent and into the rain. As I passed the oyster tent on the way to the car, I noticed a few grizzled looking old men comparing shucking styles and critiquing each other’s form.

The competition had begun.



Some Oyster Facts (Courtesy of the Milford Oyster Festival FAQ sheet and Jeffery Steingarten’s article, “Hot Dog”)

• Oysters have been on the Earth for 500 million years.
• American Oysters live in brackish waters, that is, areas where salt and fresh water mix.
• Baby oysters are free-swimming microscopic organisms known as planktons.
• An oyster’s shell is made of calcium carbonate. The plankton create their shells by taking chemicals from the sea water.
• The oldest part of the shell is the point or beak.
• Oysters can live up to twenty years but most live to about six.
• The oysters we eat are usually 3-6 years old. Cultivated oysters are younger and wild ones are older.
• Raw clams, oysters and mussels account for 85% of all seafood borne illness. However, the bulk of this threat is due to mollusks taken from March to October in the Gulf of Mexico. Broken down, only one in every two thousand servings of raw mollusks will get someone sick.

Connecticut, Part 1: Why leave NY for Pizza?

...for apizza, of course!

Well, what the hell is apizza? That question is a bit trickier. While I am no authority on the subject, I did spend the past two days in Connecticut sampling the stuff. I left Thursday to travel to the state whose only claim to fame, as my father puts it, is “the state between Manhattan and Boston.” I had only two objectives: try this apizza and eat as many oysters as possible at the 34th annual Milford Oyster Festival. As I sit in front of my computer screen with a belly full of research, I have to say that I’ve achieved both goals.

I arrived in New Haven, Connecticut on Thursday night around 8:30. Accompanied by my father, we drove around the city looking for Wooster Street, or what Connecticutians call “Little Italy.” After discovering that “Little Italy” consists of 2 pizzerias, a pastry shop and a handful of restaurants, we spotted the famous Frank Pepe’s Pizzeria Napoletana. There was a long line outside the entrance so after wandering the streets to see what the place had to offer we took our spots on line and waited impatiently.

Normally I do a lot of research before sampling a nationally famous restaurant for the first time, but I decided to go into Frank Pepe’s blind. I’ve heard about the place through a few pizza articles over the years; it is one of the oldest Pizzerias in the country, it is responsible for what is known as “New Haven style pizza” and that Jeffery Steingarten recommends eating “eight to ten white clam pizzas at Frank Pepe’s in New Haven, Connecticut, perhaps the single best pizza in the United States and certainly the best thing of any kind in New Haven, Connecticut” as a cure to clam phobia. Armed with this knowledge, I sat down at a small table with my father and proceeded to order a beer and some pizzas.


Frank Pepe’s was started in 1925 by Frank himself and since them has become a Connecticut staple. The pizza is cooked in a gigantic, coal-burning oven that can fit up to 15 pizzas and is helmed by men welding 15-foot pizza peels. The story goes that Frank’s aversion to tomatoes and cheese caused him to create the white-clam pizza that made Frank Pepe’s a staple and lead to its long reign as one of the best pizza shops in the country.

Despite the claim of many that Frank Pepe’s is the best, there is a small apizzeria down the block that has been challenging for that honor since 1938: Sally’s Appiza. Sally’s was started by Frank’s nephew 13 years after Frank Pepe’s opened and there is a lot of debate as to which is better. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to sample the pizza, excuse me, the apizza, at Sally’s but I’m sure I’ll be back soon to do so.

(As a little side note, this pizza rivalry reminds me of the citizens of Buffalo who constantly bicker about which is better for Buffalo wings, Anchor Bar—the original creator—or Duff’s. If anyone is from Buffalo or has insight on this issue, please let me know immediately! If you are from Buffalo and have a free couch, I’d be willing to make the trip up to decide the issue once and for all.)

While we watched in awe as the oven kept cranking out pizzas 20 minutes to closing time and contemplated why this tiny shop was so famous the pizzas arrived at the table. In order to sample all the pizzeria had to offer, we order three pies: the original tomato pie with mozzarella, the famous white clam pie and a cheese pie with half mushrooms and anchovies (to test their topping ability and as a way to indulge in the often ignored and wrongly ridiculed anchovy topping option).


The three came out on two metal trays and looked nothing like a New York pizza. Apparently, apizzas are very asymmetrical and can look more like amoebas than circles. They are hastily cut and have burnt, black blotches on the perimeter crust. They are anything but pretty, but I have to give it those New Haven folks, they are damn tasty. The pies were thin crust, flavorful and all the toppings were well proportioned. They original pie oozed with all those classic pizza flavors and besides the blackened spot peppering the crust—which some claim, “give more flavor”—the pizza was delicious. The mushroom and anchovy pie was spot on and the clam pizza tasted like…well, like clams. The hot grease from the pizza mixed with the salty brine of the clams to create a delicious liquid I’ve never had on pizza before. The clams themselves were on the chewy side, but if this was the price to pay for the salty ambrosia floating atop the dough then so be it. It was a tasty way to prep my taste buds for the oceans of oysters I’d soon be consuming. My only complaint about the white clam was that while I was polishing off the other pies, the temperature gets the better of its bivalve toppings; cold white pizza does not have the appeal of a cold regular pie.

After washing down the remains of the pies with a beer and washing my hands several times to get the grease, clam juice and burnt dough bits off, we set off to rest up for the big day that lie ahead—Oysterfest.



A little slice of history.

I Am Going to Eat So Many Oysters...

About a year ago or so my sister moved into an apartment in Milford, Connecticut. Since I have little knowledge about Connecticut as a whole, let alone a tiny town there, I wasn’t too excited. However, when I drove over there to help her move in a noticed a small building downtown that was home to the annual Milford Oyster Festival!

This Friday I will get to sample the briny delights of the town with a permanent committee dedicated to these bivalves. Let the excitement begin.

Free Range Good, Free Meal Better

In my quest to learn more about food—i.e. eating as much as possible—I regularly read the food sections of local papers, scan the periodical sections of convenience stores and stay up late reading obscure and mostly pointless food blogs. Over the past few years I have come to look forward to a few yearly issues, updates and publications. One of these, New York Magazine’s Eat Cheap issue, came out last month and while I was flipping through the pages I noticed that one of the restaurants mentioned was the new employer of my good friend. I had just eaten there for brunch one Sunday and was looking to delve deeper into the menu. Excited, I asked him about it immediately and was informed that the restaurant, Community Food & Juice on 2893 Broadway, has been receiving quite a bit of good press lately. While this was great news for the restaurant, I was much more excited to find out that the owners were offering free dinners for two to all of their current employees. Whether this was to celebrate the recent good fortune or mollify their employees for rotten treatment I am unsure. However, this problem failed to blemish the delicious free meal I had locavore-friendly restaurant.

Community prepares local and usually organic food. The menu proudly states that all the beef is grass-fed, chicken free range and fish caught wild. The vibe is laid back but classy and the food is served in a laid-back atmosphere complete with a brown-shirted waitstaff. I have no idea why management wants their servers to run about looking like a fashionable pack of well-groomed UPS employees, but one need not worry about such frivolous things when enjoying a delicious—and free—meal. The menu at community starts simple and slowly eases its way to what I would call accessorized. Appetizers are uncomplicated affairs, meant to highlight to ingredients more than anything else. The butcher’s plate I enjoyed was a polished plank of wood adorned with perfectly spiced chorizo, raisin toast, bobolink cheddar (a delicious cheese from a farm in Jersey) and a delicious onion jam to slather on it all. Our second appetizer was a plate of scallion and zucchini pancakes, fried thin and crispy and served with nothing more than soy sauce.



Although I didn’t sample any of the soups or bowls—the Bowl O Beets has been calling to me for a while now—I was assured that these tasty treats were as straightforward as they sound. The Bowl O Beets was nothing more than that: take pile of beets, season accordingly, place in bowl and serve.

I say that the menu becomes more accessorized for a reason; the ingredient list gets longer and cooking processes are introduced but the food never becomes complex. Flavors meld and compliment one another, but nothing is ever lost for the sake of complicated sauce or archaic cooking method. For entrees we feasted on pan roasted scallops and wild caught (of course) striped sea bass.

The scallops came beautifully seared and sitting atop of what the fine folks at Community call corn pudding. It’s a simple mix of corn, seasoning and oil and accents the sweetness of the fat bivalves sitting on top.


The sea bass had a deliciously crisp crust and leaned up against a sweet doughnut peach with a little sprinkling of foie-gras in the middle. Little splashes of mojito sauce dotted the plate and gave a refreshing zest to the meaty fish and savory foie.


Dessert was an equally delicious affair. A vanilla pannacotta was served in a jamming jar and topped with sweet berries and the wooden slate made a second appearance to highlight three deliciously ripe cheeses and a small cup of honey. The dessert menu mirrors the appetizer menu and brings the dining experience full circle, presenting delicious ingredients prepared in ways to emphasize the natural flavors. Overall, Community is a tasty little gem in Morningside Heights. While I may seem biased because I know employees of the place and was lucky enough to snag a comped meal, I may just have to return and pay full price the next time I want to indulge.