Meg'sfoodandwinepage

How to get change for $2, and lunch, in NYC, and in less than 10 minutes, too

1.  Be riding a train, any train, that stops at W 4th St.  Since you are on a time budget, (15 extra minutes between appointments is usually my cushion) it will help to be in one of the front cars if heading downtown.

2.  Make a speedy exit at the W. 3rd st. end of the platform.  Bear left up the stairs by the handball courts.

3. Head to the first door on W. 3rd St.:  the Bing* store!!

4. Quickly choose your flavor (spicy pork?  Spicy beef?  Pork and cabbage?  Taro?  I haven't had the taro yet, maybe next time) and hand over $2.  Get handed change and a warm flat bun full of goodness, wrapped in wax paper.

5.  Grab one napkin and snarf down your bing while watching the handball game.

6.  Wipe mouth and hop back on the train, thinking that while the Bing-store bings are no Momofuku pork buns (because let's face it: the Momofuku pork buns have no equal.  More on these later) they are a pretty tasty lunch for less than two bucks.  Added advantages include superior proximity to a major subway stop, and lunch-on-the-run tidiness (it's a one-napkin lunch!).

7. Think also that while there is nothing that can comfort me for the loss of Joe's Pizza (my old W 4th St. lunch stop), the bing store comes as close as possible.

*Bing:  Chinese street food that is a cross between a pork bun and a pannini -- a bun stuffed with filling and pressed flat.

Totally enjoying the heck out of this book!

As an addendum to my last post, yesterday I picked up a copy of Ruth Reichl's Garlic and Sapphires.  And how much fun is this book? I had to force myself to put it down after several chapters last night. . . . and as many things as I have to do today, I am already looking forward to climbing into bed and reading a few more tonight.

What a wonderful picture this book gives of the restaurant scene 10 years ago in New York. . . .it brings me back to the time when I was reading these reviews -- living in Boston, working 3 jobs and trying to pay my rent . . . dreaming of working in a place that Ruth would give three stars, that would have the right kind of magic. . . . .

Reichl was (is) so good at capturing the particular Romance of New York and its restaurants -- the pure fun that eating can be.  How important it is to remember that (especially for me, as the end of the relaxed summer season approaches and the long hard slog towards December begins).

I had an acutual Ruth Reichl sighting earlier this summer while thoroughly enjoying a meal in my current favorite dining spot, by the way.  Which totally added to the magic of an evening that already had a festive air.  I'm going back one more time next week, after which I promise a full report. . . .

Meanwhile, for the rest of this week it's dining at home on pasta and drinking nothing more exciting than water with various  additives:  I'm running my first half marathon on Sunday.  While I'm certainly in the best shape I've ever been, this is still going to be a challenge.  I'm excited!

From Santa Barbara, the land of Tacos and Big Fish!

A quick post from Vacation. . .

Culinary highlights of this trip to be noted are the two HUGE Bonito my dad caught as we sailed back from our 3-day sailing trip to Santa Cruz Island -- each filet on these beauties weighed about a pound and a half. . . . we threw them on the grill and they were delightful.  We "ate like sea lions" (ie fish only!) two nights in a row, called in reinforcements (who we sent home with a doggie bag) and there's still enough left for the biggest batch of bonito salad of all time.

And, of course, while in Santa Barbara La Super Rica is a mandatory stop.  I've been known to stop there on the way from the airport, without passing go, without dropping off my luggage, etc.  Unfortunately this time I arrived too late at night, but a proper visit was made as soon as possible thereafter.  Freshest tortillas in the entire world -- they press the dough and throw the tortillas directly on the grill for your order.  There's nothing like it!

At any rate, in the midst of my morning run today (along the beach, in the blessedly cool Santa Barbara morning fog) I realized that one more week would just about fill my immediate vacation needs.  Alack, alas, it's back to New York on Sunday.

No poking fun at Frank today!

I love Jules, I really do!  I look forward to her weekly pokes at the overheated writing style of Frank Bruni, the Restaurant Critic We All Love to Hate.  But this week he actually voiced (albeit more floridly than I ever would) a TRUTH in his three-star review of my favorite restaurant in NYC, Blue Hill:

"Blue Hill is not for everyone or every mood. If it’s a full-throttle, free-wheeling feast you’re after — a vintage Brian De Palma movie of a meal — you should choose a different show. What Mr. Barber presents is more like a hushed foreign film with subtitles. You have to pay attention and heed the nuances, and you can get only so carried away."

This is the caveat I alway offer when people ask me about my favorite restaurants, seeking a recommendation.  In the interests of truth, I have to admit that Blue Hill (more specifically, the restaurant in Westchester, Blue Hill at Stone Barns) is my all-time favorite restaurant experience, EVER. Sometimes I wish I could just lie and leave it out of my list, being that this is not a restaurant for everyone.  It fails to impress certain people. The point is, this is a restaurant that is not trying to impress you with flash and technique.  The food here is about purity, about celebrating purity.  And not that the food is rustic in its simplicity -- not at all, it is very polished.  Only a skilled chef can pull this off.

This review made it clear that I'm due for a meditation on simplicity vs. rusticity in cooking. A meal recently eaten in Piedmont started this train of thought which I've been mulling over ever since in the back of my mind. 

I'm also long over-due for a return visit to Stone Barns, though -- darn it! -- it will now become impossible to get a reservation again. 

Tomatopalooza!

So the weather pattern has hopefully broken for good -- two whole days of cool after some very violent storms (that brought much-needed rain) this weekend.  After this Very Hot Weekend.  We couldn't even move, truly.

But the "Chernobyl Garden" (so dubbed by friends who visited this weekend and witnessed the size of our basil and our Prize Tomato) has been pumping out produce, encouraged by the heat as much as discouraged by the total lack of water. 

The tomatoes are in full swing, and we have collected some amazing ones so far.  Some of the plants that are planted on the flat area with less soil have suffered more mightily from lack of water -- the plants totally shut down and have started putting their all into the fruit that they put out already.  Can you say "did someone put sugar on my tomato?"  Funny how I've heard this so many times from winemakers and never internalized it. . . until now.  In drought years, the plants shut down and the sugars on the remaing fruit?  They go through the roof!  Yummy for Russian Black tomatoes, for sure.  Not so good for canning, though.  There might not be much canning this year.

We are tracking the progress of one particular tomato (we mixed up the plants somehow and are not sure what is what, but it is either a Jefferson Davis or a German Gold) that is now roughly the size of your head.  Hoping and praying it can attain ripeness for final photo at least.  Seriously, this thing is County Fair Worthy.

When it was cool in the mornings last weekend I cooked the first Ratatouille (although had to buy a pepper, as those have steadfastly refused to do anything at all this year).  And it was very, very good.  I modified my technique a la Lulu this year (vs. Elizabeth David last year) and Lulu rules.  This merits a full post once I make another and prove it was not a fluke.  Also made two summer-variations on Pissaladiere -- once with just tomato (spread slightly pre-baked pastry with mustard, strew sliced tomatoes minus a few seeds soas to be not too wet, plus anchovies, herbs, olives and a bit of olive oil) and once with onions (caramelized with some anchovies, then tomato slices on top with olives, olive oil, herbs).  Both good and consumed without argument by all present.

Life -- still a little testy.  Vacation to Secret Location at the beginning of next month will hopefully help matters.  As will regular trips to the gym come hell or high water to work off angst and (sadly) less time in front of the computer.

But I have many pictures to post -- new fence!  That prize tomato!  My long-promised garlic shots!  If I can only remember to bring the camera back from time to time, these will appear in the near future.  Meanwhile. . .  having the fan on is infinitely better than AC.  Long live cool nights!  Long live the rest of August!

It's not the heat, it's the humidity. . .

Or maybe it's both. 

I have come down with a severe case of the summer doldrums.  Symptoms:  feeling overwhelmed at the thought of launching into any sort of project.  Readily taking no for an answer (as in, you don't want to spend the weekend at our house, after all?  yahoo!  less laundry to do!).  Having no inspiration for cooking projects (especially after that meal of brined-then-smoked-then-grilled with homemade barbeque sauce ribs, with sauteed chard etc etc which I made on Saturday, when it was 95 degrees in the afternoon.  And humid, did I mention?  how can people live in the South, I ask myself?!)

Although I did find some inspiration today when I stopped by a customer to have some lunch and was served watermelon gazpacho.  I was skeptical, but it was in fact delicious and refreshing and I want to make something similar.  Which would involve boiled beets (as the sweet element) and basil (as the spice element) but most definitely include the raw carrots as the earthy-sweet raw element.  The version I had was watermelon, I think a little curry (or was it just the fried cilantro leaves, which when you think about it would taste like curry, wouldn't they a bit?), raw carrot, cilantro. . .  all pureed up smooth and tasting cool, refreshing, and delicious.  Maybe my version will contain some cucumber.  Although we'll probably have to keep buying cucumbers for a while, as ours have all been severely munched.  At least we trapped the mouse who was munching them sucessfully (for bait?  why, a leaf of lemon cucumber mwah-hah-hah).  So at least we will now know if the mouse was the culprit!  And may EVENTUALLY get some cukes?

I'm off next week for a little wine-tasting work voyage.  Hopefully by then we'll be harvesting some carrots and more beets and I can put this to the test.

That is, if everything in our garden has not withered due to lack of rain and extreme heat. 

Funny, if you think about it, how this weather has exactly the same effect on my brain.

Weeds for dinner

A random food note:  what is it with NY chefs and ramps this year?  I swear to god it's an epidemic; there are ramps four times on EVERY menu in this city (even a ramps Pizza at Otto last week).  Last night we had a wonderfully convivial dinner at Mas with the always-charming Andre Ostertag (few better dinner guests exist.  Note to self that I MUST somehow arrange a meeting between Andre and the Bret Brothers, who share so many of his philosophies) . . . . and at this dinner there was no getting around the ramps; they were in everything.  I'm not complaining; I like them and all but I'm thinking there must be quite a few farmers upstate who are laughing their ass off about all them fancy New Yorkers actually paying big money to eat. . .  weeds!  I'm thinking maybe we could capitalize on all those dandelions that grow in our yard.

The Idea of Extreme Dining Annoys Me

Today I think the NY Times Dining section was conspiring to make us feel collectively disgusted. Whether it made one feel disgusted at oneself for not managing to pull in a Wall Street-sized bonus this year, or disgusted with the NYT food writers for conspicuously freeloading (themselves and their friends) on the newspaper budget, they had us all covered!

Because, you know, I'd LOVE to eat at Masa (which is only possibly a 'Zen Thing' for the Very, Very Rich), I really would.  I'm sure it is a transcendent experience.  But let's do the math.  $350/person, just for food.  Add tax and tip and enough bottled water (want to guess $10-$15 a pop?) and wine to get you through 3 hours, and we figure more like $1200 for two people.  For lunch.  Probably more.  Definitely more for dinner.

Let's put that in perspective.  In my world, that's a MONTH'S RENT (cheap by Manhattan standards!).  That's like FIVE DAYS of our friend doing carpentry work etc. up at our house.  That's like THE REALLY EXPENSIVE BEAUTIFUL BATHROOM FURNITURE I've already decided we can't afford for our bathroom.  That's like 4 MONTH'S OF GROCERIES (and we eat pretty well around here).

I'm sorry -- I do consider myself relatively decadent, but  I just can't even feel anything but sick as I contemplate the idea of eating $1,200.  For lunch.

And the second big journalistic revelation of the day?  23 bottles of expensive champagne were all quite delicious! Wish we'd been there!

Where, oh, where did I go wrong in my career?  Because according to the New York Times, clearly I should have figured out how to become a staff writer for a paper with a Really Big Budget that needed to be blown out at the end of the year.  Either that, or a Wall Street broker.   Or, at the very least, the bosom buddy of one of the above ;->.

(Just another reminder that there are so many things in this city that are simply NOT for the rest of us.)

Writing from Rehab. . . .

After this weekend, we've had to check into a water-only facility with lots of treadmills.  Even professional drinkers need a couple of days off from time to time. . . thank goodness there's a high-speed internet connection ;->.

In truth, it was a great weekend!  (Monday came about, oh, two days too soon, but, whatever).

The Zind Humbrecht Pinot Gris 1995 was delicious.  Still young and vibrant, but the soft Pinot gris fruit had come into a nice balance with the wine's minerality.  That, and the fact that this was a leaner vintage made it oh-so-easy to swallow (sometimes I find his wines to be a bit heavy).  The hit of the dinner turned out to be the foie gras.  As our friend John said, "this is REALLY GOOD."  Rich yummyness spread on the plain white toasts, a little bit of oniony sweetness from the caramelized onions (as a result of which all my clothes will smell like onions FOREVER, due to the total lack of ventilation in the apartment, oh well) and a bit of tangy sweetness from the cranberry-orange compote (enough orange and clove and less sugar, so it didn't taste like Ocean Spray), plus some rich spicy crunch from the spiced nuts (Union Square Bar Nuts from Nigella Bites, which is the only thing I make from her because she just so annoys me, sorry).  Turned out to be a wonderful combination, and the sweetness drew out the wine nicely.

We had that, and then the pumpkin risotto and the pork roast, with the Pinot Gris.  We got really, really, full, but were having such a good time that two (TWO) further bottles of cru beaujolais (because our friend Phil refuses to drink anything else these days; he's so predictable and also owns several cases of LaPierre Morgon 2000 which IS awfully good right now) were subsequently consumed, along with cheese.  Fortunately we were too full to even consider the bottle of port.

After everyone left, I lay on the couch for a minute and groaned.  It was more food than Thanksgiving, even!  But before I surrendered to the coma managed to get up and do most of the heavy dishes.  Because there is NOTHING worse than having a trashed house and tons of dishes in the morning. 

Woke up feeling. . . amazingly good!  Thanked myself for stopping at one glass of champagne before dinner! Thanked Phil for making us drink pure, natural, fresh red wines! Washed the glassware! (I am She Who Breaks Glasses, so I am not allowed to touch them while under the influence) and skipped off to the gym.  I know, the gym on SUNDAY.  I am just so good sometimes I can't stand it.

Then a little light lunch of leftover fish terrine and salad, and a little Christmas shopping got accomplished, even.

After which I managed to get reasonably gussied up, or as as well as I could when needing a haircut, a week in a health spa, and, let's face it, an entire new wardrobe, and toddled off to the Company Christmas Party.

We all know from reading Dooce that one OUGHT NOT to talk about one's job online.  But I will just pause for a moment to note that I am fortunate to work for some of the most generous people out there, in the wine business or anywhere.  We didn't just have a Christmas Party, we had a wonderful dinner for everyone in a wonderful restaurant.  Perfect service, interesting food, and the usual dizzying parade of wines (you have to pour fast or the bottle gets housed by the people at the next table).  Everyone was giddy and glowing and having a good time.  (When we weren't sneaking out to smoke with the bad kids. Oh, wait, we're ALL the bad kids.  Oh well.)

Blue Hill at Stone Barns is one of my favorite dining experiences (as well as clients.  . . because did I mention how lucky I am!); I also often recommend the NY restaurant to friends and have eaten there several times, and think to myself yum, that duck! every time I even mention the place.  The food is fresh, clean, and seasonal.  Everyone says that about their food these days, but then they go and serve you tomatoes in November.  Not here.  It's early winter so now is the time for root vegetables and brussels sprouts and cabbage.  And that's what's on the menu.  There are no heavy sauces, no too much butter.  Pure flavors.  And everything is delicious. 

The highlight of Saturday's dinner was something so simple -- a parsnip soup that was made with rich stock and perfectly pureed, with no evidence of cream.  It was strikingly flavorful.  And there was a little raft of something floating in it, with a dab of caviar.  I popped it in my mouth and was totally surprised to find that it was a slice of crispy green apple!  which contrasted with all that smooth parsnip, and contrasted with the slight caviar saltiness.  It was a wonderful food trick that made me want to hold my bowl up to the server and say "Again!" like a 3-year-old.

And we were drinking the most surprising wine with that, a Boulay Sancerre Clos de Beaujeu 1996.  Again proving that good Sancerre can age well.  But this wine had also amazingly transformed.  1996 was a good ripe vintage, we all know that.  But the sweetness in this wine!  was amazing.  delicious.  light, still fresh.  But also toothsomely, palate-temptingly sweet.  It was great with the sweet parsnip (great with that one bite of apple, I still want more!).  And great with the next course, which was a little crab salad with some mint, served over one perfect slice of beet, so we kept right on drinking it.

After that, the wines started flowing by so fast they cannot all be recounted.  But there was some 1970 Lopez de Heredia, which was mushroomy and great.  Some Barolo (of course, when your boss is a barolo nut who shares) -- a too-young Giacomo Conterno Monfortino 1997; a much-more-ready-and-stupendously-good Monfortino 1985 (out of magnum, of course).  It went on sort of like that, with some California Pinots from Littorai, etc.  There was a course of baby lamb so tender it should be illegal served over braised cabbage.  There was some sort of weird dessert thing (I was out with the bad kids during that).  It was tons of fun, it was a school night, and they managed to herd us all out by 9 pmish so we even got home at a reasonable hour.

I awoke yesterday again thanking myself for that one glass only of champagne before dinner (if I haven't learned anything else, I've learned that lesson!) but cursing the impending doom of encroaching old age (I just can't carouse two nights in a row like I used to).  So I'm writing this from rehab, where I make myself run on the treadmill and won't give myself any wine.  That is, until the wine class I'm teaching later.  After which I may allow myself to change my mind.   

It must be Fall!

As we had the First Official Butternut Squash soup (enriched with a potato and some crazy turkey stock we made and froze in August from one of the remainders of the birds my mom cooked up for the hordes of people that turned up around our wedding). It was a good one. I added a leetle curry powder just for an accent, not too strong, and that was yummy. I forgot that butternut squash is sweeter than pumpkin, which I usually use for soups (roasted) but couldn't face as one little pumpkin makes A LOT of soup. Next time I'll go back to the less-sweet, vegetal pumpkin. Just for a different flavor in my autumnal orange soup.

Also Philippe was responsible for the first of this braising season's "big hunk o' pork" dinners. Pork picnic, you are braising looooove! Nice with some carrots and potatoes and (you guessed it) the rest of that defrosted container of turkey stock! I'll have to cook up some other stock soon, but the toik is nice for the hearty dishes we've been making. Rustic souls that we are.

Not that it's been cold, except at night.

I planted ALL my daff and tulip and dwarf hyacinth bulbs up at the house this weekend. It didn't ake as long as I thought, although I paid a little yesterday with pain in my hands from all the hammering of trowel and digging of little deep holes for the daffodils. But it was beautiful up there (I had a wonderful little view of a perfectly-turned copse of red maple and yellow poplar and brilliant hues of Poison Ivy -- see it is good for something -- from where I crouched on the bank where I planted 50 daffodils with grape hyacinths. Should have been 100 daffs, I now realize, but then again my hands could not have taken that much abuse and still ever type again.)

The weekend really marked the transition to Fall. We grilled out on Friday and Saturday nights (despite the lack of light! We grill with flashlights until it's really all over). And Sunday started very warm; I was out there in my shirt sleeves. Then the wind turned to the North and it got a little chilly! Had to bundle up. We're all wimps at this time of year.

A great dinner with friends old and new at swoon kitchenbar in Hudson on Sunday night. We all had different things, but everyone loved their food. I had an oxtail raviolo after a little tartlette of creamy leeks. . . all very good and better than I expected even from the descriptions. Great preparations to marry different flavors. For example my raviolo, which was a big loose piece of homemade pasta wrapped around a wonderfully savory/creamy concotion of reduced oxtail with perhaps some mushroom? came served over parsnip puree and with caramelized brussels sprouts. . . thought it might be carb-heavy or just plain heavy. But no, it all worked because the bs's were wonderfully very cooked and totally caramelized morsels and the parsnip puree was not overly buttery, and there was not too much of it, or anything. The dish was earthy but just right. Yay!

Now that it does stay rather chilly every night, we are glad that our heat is not cranking yet in the NY apartment. I actually like this because it helps one to toughen up and to remember to don warm clothing. In general the NY indoors are overheated. I'm glad our landlady has a sensible approach and the heat doesn't come on until it is really needed. We took the first step today of taking out our leaky air conditioners and actually closing the windows. it's great now if you wear long sleeves (yes, folks, from October until May there are no shorts and tee shirts indoors! don't laugh; in NY this is considered a strange way to live.) But with one of us raised in a drafty wood-heated Vermont farmhouse (that would be me) and another raised in energy-expensive-conscious France (you guessed it, the DH) and the other one rather furry (Chloe the princess-cat-who-is-full-of-love-and-hate) -- we're good cold-weather troopers who have dug out long unworn slippers, sweaters, etc. for the duration. I don't know, though -- I think about spending whole winters largely alone upstate and I guess still I'm glad to have the NY apartment. Until that changes I suppose won't be really ready to make a full move up there, as much as I love it (fairweather friend!! fairweather friend!!)

But, I still say -- it's fall! Braise me up some fatty pork!!!! (yumm yumm yumm with Alsatian Riesling).