My Favorite Eating from 2008

I love making lists. Besides the added advantage of making me feel I've accomplished something just by telling myself to do it, lists also remind me to regroup and mull over things I really enjoyed and would like to remember.

My five favorite things from 2008:

1. Taiwanese oyster noodle. Thin vermicelli noodles in an incredibly thick, pungent broth scented with star anise and tripe, and topped with ribbons of cilantro and intestine, it's always delicious. But the best version I ever had was in Kaohsiung, Taiwan's second largest city and its seafood capital. Tiny, briny and tearfully fresh (I think of fresh shell juices as oyster tears - the mollusk sobs because it realizes it is not long for this world), the local oysters generously piled on top were the best I've ever eaten. Like many street eats, this was served in an alley with no signs or names to describe it (or how to find my way back...). Pic above.

2. Foie gras shavings at Momofuku Ko. I was an early Momofuku fan, but some of his more recent offerings (like the infant-sized Bo Ssam) have failed to impress me. The foie shavings are as marvelous as press clippings claim.

3. Ham and cheese belgian waffle at Bloom & Goute, in Seoul. The owner of this sophisticated cafe/high-end florist studied pastry in Paris and worked in Brussels. She now imports Belgian flour, and mixes equally good grated Swiss cheese straight into the batter, then tops with screamingly hot slab bacon. The result is a fragrant and chewy starch base, soaked with bacon fat, and occasional, surprisingly toothsome nuggets of cheese. Incredible.

4. Double-double animal style at In N Out. Sure, I eat this not just every year but many, many, times a year, but I never fail to look forward to it, nor to appreciate its existence and what it adds to my life (dreams, happiness).

5. Cherimoya, aka "custard apple", a ridgy green fruit indigenous to Central America and the northern part of South America. What looks like an inverted pine cone but tastes like a banana, pineapple and strawberry smoothie? Somehow, this unbioengineered, grown-in-dirt fruit. Finding oddities like this is why I love the farmers markets in southern California. The ones I hunted down in NYC were inedible.

Frank Bruni says 2008 was the best year for the New York dining scene since 2004. I can't remember what opened in 2004, but I do remember that 2007 was unwhelming. A glug glug for 2009 being more reasonably priced and even tastier.

Review: Grilled Cheese Night at Smith's

It's finally gotten chilly enough for me to look through pictures of summer meals with legitimate nostalgia. Here's to wistful sobbing for a meal I had at Smith's about a month ago.

Smith's (not to be confused with The Smith) is the first restaurant from Danny Abrams post-divorce from his Beanstalk group partner Jimmy Bradley. Anyone who's been to the Mermaid Inn, Red Cat, or my personal favorite of the three -- the Harrison -- will immediately recognize the vibe and sensibility. Apparently Smith's is supposed to look like a saloon car, but since I was born in the age of the aeroplane, I'm unable to confirm this for you. In any case, the space is certainly small, narrow, and glossily attractive without being slick (Nobu 57, anyone?).

Sunday Grilled Cheese Night is the Smith's riff on homey Sunday night meals being offered at a handful of newer restaurants around the city. Some clever local restauranteurs realized that deep in our jaded, smoggy hearts, most city dwellers nurture a craving for simple meals that bring comfort food to the table without making a big Chelsea scene about it (ahem, Cookshop).

Now, it's fair to say that a huge grilled cheese hog may not be in a position to offer a well-considered opinion on how delicious a grilled cheese sandwich is. But I defy anyone to look at that stunning specimen of edibleness above and tell me I should reconsider. Stuffed with soppresata, grilled red onion, summer tomatoes, and ossau iraty, on thinly-sliced, perfectly grilled sourdough bread, sprinkled with grated parmesan, and accompanied by a pailful of crunchy shoestring fries, this thing was GOOD.

Ossau-iraty is a firm sheep's milk cheese from the Pays Basque, a region in southwestern France. It's nutty, intense without being sharp, tastes distinctly of rind in the best way possible, and gifts you with a very lip-smacking, satisfying, creamy aftertaste. This was the first time I'd ever had it "cooked", and it was fantastic - an expensive upgrade from Cheddar, and more novel than Manchego.

There are a number of reasons why this meal is a taste of summer I'll have to wait another year for. Fresh summer corn, grilled and mixed generously with heaps of tender little chanterelle mushrooms, chives (erroneously called "green onion" on the menu) and bits of red onion made for a salad I'll be waiting for. It smelled strongly of butter and onions, which has always been a wordy way of saying "ravishingly delicious" (go ahead and OED it... I dare you). The other reason is this little buddy to our left, a bourbon-based 'lemonade' the very color of sunshine itself, not to mention the enchanting glee of the devil. Muddled mint, good bourbon, and freshly squeezed lemon juice with a bit of simple syrup made for a pleasing drink or four.


Smith's
79 Macdougal Street (near Bleecker)
New York, NY
212.260.0100

Greenmarket Foraging: Quattro's Game Farm and Oyster Mushrooms

Having grown up in Southern California, I have no intuitive sense of when things are in season, since most things are somehow available there year-round, regardless of whether it's January or June. It's sad, but one of the steps I've taken to rectify this native ignorance is by visiting greenmarkets for seasonal goodies and asking too many questions of vendors. Cooler weather inspires a craving for rich brown flavors, whether from frying, roasting, caramelizing or braising, and an instinctive desire to fill my belly full of hearty ingredients. And when the stomach speaks, I listen. Isn't that what it means to 'follow your gut'?

Saturday at the Union Square farmer's market is always a bit frustrating due to the sheer number of people who mill around without the intention to buy anything, not unlike cows at pasture. But it's also when the most vendors come out, making the weekly trip down to Manhattan. One of these weekly stands is Quattro's Game Farm, a poultry farm up in Dutchess County; a quick stop and I walked away with 1/4 of baby chicken. Ginormous wild oyster mushrooms, which sprout abundantly on tree trunks starting the early autumn, were everywhere, and screamed for a saute with butter and salt (and maybe a bit of liquified chicken fat, too, if for some reason you happen to have it sitting in front of you).

It was dinner for one, so I decided on an easy, one-pot dish. I cooked the chicken with olive oil, pimenton (apparently Mark Bittman's favorite spice, and maybe yours as well if chorizo is your favorite sausage), salt, and pepper. The meat was shiny with bird juices, and the dusting of pimenton lent beautiful color and a smoky sweetness. Farm-raised chicken is firmer, chewier, and yet more tender than its industrial counterpart, with the felicitous side benefit that the skin also crisps up better (I'll have to ask why on my next visit), and was so crunchy I was reminded of chicharron (deep-fried pork rind), my favorite 'chip'.

Dump the chicken into hot olive oil, sear thoroughly on all sides (tip: if the skin sticks, it's not crispy enough) till a nice crust forms, half cover the pot with slightly lowered heat, and less than 20 minutes later, a filling start to hibernation mode.

Don't be Afraid of Fresh Lychee

Ah, the aromatic lychee: honeyed, floral, and inextricably imbued with a silken exoticism from its roots in southern China, increasingly incorporated into Western-style desserts, and still primarily purchased in cans. Perhaps because it remains within the confines of ethnic grocery stores (or Chinatown fruit carts), many who count themselves as ardent fans are hesitant to enjoy it at its best: from May to late summer, straight out of its nubby little wrapper.

Don't be afraid! Though it may resemble a flora armadillo, the skin of the lychee is actually very thin, and when fresh, flexible enough to allow for fast peeling with greedy fingers alone. The texture of fresh lychee is closest to that of a large, juicy grape, and is best eaten in one full chomp. The mahogony stone is oblong, smooth, and easy to spit out, kind of like a cherry's.

Ripe fruit have vivid pink or red skin, and are slightly squishy to the touch. Brownish skin indicates a lack of freshness (though they are still edible), and the appearance of dried-out fruit has led to the misnomer 'lychee nut'. Buy by the pound and enjoy while you can, but take care: the Chinese say that eating too many of them will overstimulate your ch'i (life force).

Below is a picture taken last week in Chinatown. Lychees above were eaten in California about a month ago.

Review: Too Much Talking at Terroir

I like Marco Cancora even though he took his chocolate doughnuts off the menu at Hearth, and didn't respond to any of my emails begging him to bring them back. And even though I didn't enjoy Insieme, his stuffy midtown eatery in a stuffy midtown hotel, I decided to give his wine bar, Terroir, a shot. Despite its pretentiously evocative name, Terroir is a shoebox located right behind Hearth on 12th Street in the East Village, with a decidedly neighborhood treehouse atmosphere. Other than the bar, the only place to sit is a long communal table squashed up against the wall, leaving people to squash against each other to get to that undesirable seat in the middle of the table. Get cool with this closeness, quick, cause you're going to end up sitting nearly as close anyway.

Warm fuzzy feelings dissipated quickly when I opened the wine list. It's a wine bar with fun graphic design screaming "Summer of the Riesling", so someone, please explain to me how the proprietors decided THIS is okay. Yeah, that's right. It looks like an abstract for an academic conference. And this was only one page of many: every type of wine on the list came with its own verbose disclaimer. This particular page wasn't even about a wine, it's a mini-biography of Alvaro Palacios, a superstar in the Spanish wine world. I understand that it's a wine bar where patrons may wish to be informed about what they decide to drink, but how are we to decide what to drink when we can't even finish reading about the first two grapes? Keeping the language cheeky and personal doesn't prevent the actual exercise from being pedantic - or overwhelming.

BUT the wine list was interesting, the staff was very knowledgeable, and they offered half-glasses at no premium, allowing patrons to sample a wide variety at reasonable prices. It's a great place for a self-selected tasting, with a small menu of snacks to keep you company. The food is unequivocally delicious, but did I mention that the chef (whose name I didn't catch) had the smallest workstation I've ever seen? It was a tiny counter about 2 feet long, with with a hot plate. Seriously; this somehow makes the food taste phenomenal. Major kudos to her for managing to keep other people out of her way long enough to send out perfectly toasted LARDO! bruschetta - this is a picture of the second one I ordered. To photograph the first would've required an X-ray within 20 seconds. Below is the roasted tomato and egg bruschetta.

In addition to bruschetta, there's a small selection of charcuterie, salads and panini, many of which I remember seeing at Craftbar, though I bet even those favorites taste better here, coming as they do from that hot plate. I also sampled the wild boar sausage at our server's recommendation - it was better than I expected, with a rich, chewy texture and hunger-creating gaminess. Am I a hunting outdoorsman in my heart? Cause you know, I'd learn to shoot a gun if it meant I'd have a lifetime supply of that boar sausage. Sorry, no picture as it too would've required an x-ray.

Terroir
413 East 12th Street (between 1st/A Ave)
New York, NY
646.602.1300

Review: Bar Boulud

Bar Boulud wins, hands-down, for having the most attractive table accent I have EVER seen. See below to agree on the elegance of the centerpiece's lines, blooming colors, and delightfully robust odor.
I'd come back here just to visit the ham centerpiece again, the smart choice for a restaurant labeled a "terrine machine" by Frank Bruni. So happy was I to see Signor San Daniele that I nearly hugged it - then realized I'd probably be charged Daniel Boulud-pricepoint retail costs for soiling its porky magnificence. I contented myself with a beautifully arranged, but rather ungenerous serving (Lupa doles out at least 1/3 more of its fantastic prosciutto).

It was obviously delicious, but couldn't compare to this breathtaking concoction of brilliance: moist, uber fatty, lyonnaise sausage studded with bits of pistachio and black truffle... BAKED INTO A BUTTERY, FLAKY, BRIOCHE MUFFIN. WHY DON'T I SEE THIS EVERYWHERE? Tactically, it's a sure bet for unreal deliciousness-making. It's like... MSG.

Just in case you missed it, the charcuterie here, the work of Sylvain Gasdon (a protege of Parisian genius Gilles Verot), is UNREAL. It's absolutely as diverse and interesting as critics have said, and all of it as fatty and sublime as even a pork glutton like me could hope for (pork pork pork). My snacking companion and I didn't bother to order any entrees -- had to save room for dinner in an hour -- and instead, delicately and tastefully, stuffed our faces with this inspired selection of pork product, excellent, crispy frites, and a superb rose suggested by our waiter. The waitstaff was so gracious, we even managed to ignore the typically Lincoln Center atmosphere of the restaurant (stuffy, calcified, etc).

Bar Boulud
1900 Broadway (between 63rd/64th St)
New York, NY
212.595.0303

One more picture of the centerpiece, cause it's great eye candy.

Stove's Closed till September! V1

Last week, I committed myself to having a few friends over for dinner, my aversion to serious summer kitchen usage temporarily muffled by the screams of the heinously expensive, small-batch ponzu/soy sauce bottle I'd picked up somewhere near Kyoto. "Use me! Waste me!" - such were the cries.

"Stove's closed till September" is a genius maxim concocted by a friend of mine, who, incidentally, both came over for dinner and also refused to let us use his fancy kitchen for very same said reason. The idea is that here in NYC, where many of us rent indecently priced and indecently serviced apartments, it's way too warm to use appliances which get hot and might further smother us in our poorly-ventilated homes.

I planned my menu accordingly, excluding anything which would require the stove/oven be on for more than 15 minutes; here I must give acknowledge planning assistance from friend JW, a professional chef with a fancy restaurant pedigree. Note that I only had to break the no-stove rule to boil, pan sear, and blister stuff, none of which sent heat beyond the kitchen. Success! Keeping with a tradition of excellence!

Snacks to distract people while I was busy:
Blistered shisito peppers and edamame with Chardonnay oak-smoked sea salt, generous amounts of black pepper

For eating eating:
- Yellowtail hamachi sashimi, served in ponzu/dashi/soy sauce/freshly squeezed lime juice marinade
- Brown beech mushrooms, pan seared then lightly pickled in sake and mirin
- Cucumber pickle salad with jalepeno shavings

For stomach filling:
- somen noodles tossed with sesame oil and garlic chives, served with homemade tsuyu dipping sauce

Herbage:
- Maldon-salted Haas avocado and mache salad, yuzu/sesame oil dressing

Dessert:
- strawberry/watermelon skewers macerated in lime/mint, dusted with smoked paprika

Recipe: Homemade Tsuyu sauce
1 part soy sauce
1 part mirin (Japanese cooking wine)
4 parts dashi
1 teaspoon white sugar

Heat the mirin in a small saucepan; bring to a boil. Add soy sauce, dashi and sugar; bring to a boil, stir, and let cool. Leftover sauce can be frozen in ice cube trays for convenient use later.

Mid-Atlantic Eating: Baltimore Pit Beef at Chap's BBQ

It's not true what people say, that eating in the parking lot of a gentleman's club makes food taste better. Maybe this theory has resonated as strongly with you as it did with me... and for the same vulgar reasons. So imagine my googly eyes when GPS led us right to a sign advertising the next Miss Nude Baltimore competition.

Baltimore, as a kinda southern city, has its own version of bbq called pit beef. It's not "real" bbq, in the smoked, sauced, or rubbed way that other places do bbq. If you're a fan of 'The Wire', as every truly thinking up there person is, this dysfunctionality will strike you as oddly correct. Pit beef, similar in taste and appearance to roast beef, is beef round steak, grilled rare, left unsmoked, and thinly sliced like deli meat. It's typically served on a Kaiser roll, then pungently piled with raw white onion and tons of raw horseradish. I really don't care for horseradish, but it didn't seem fair to eat pit beef the wrong way: the artistic integrity of every sandwich deserves respect, on principle.

Sandwiches are always worth eating (another principle), but this one was a bit plain somehow, even with the heartburn-inducing toppings. In bland roast beef tradition, it was badly in need of salt and rather flat in flavor. Even the "tiger sauce" (watery sour cream loaded with horseradish) didn't make it taste like much. So I only ate one.

Smoky Sundried Tomato Ketchup

During last week's sweaty armpit heat spell, it occurred to me that the cold meats I enjoy eating during the summer might benefit from something besides salt and more salt. Having had my fill of Heinz at bbq's lately, ketchup was an obvious place to start. Another upside is my hope that all the ketchup fiends at these bbq's will gobble this stuff up, reliably freeing up precious fridge space for more experimenting.

This recipe is adapted from one on Epicurious.com. It's not exactly what I was expecting, but what's Heinz-at-home supposed to taste like? For more tang and less sweet, I replaced cider vinegar with red wine vinegar, cut back on the sugar, and for deeper flavor, added a tiny amount of Spanish smoked paprika.

1 (28-oz) can whole tomatoes in purée, I use San Marzano
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon sun-dried tomato paste
1/3 cup packed dark brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated white sugar
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon good salt

Purée tomatoes (with purée from can) in a blender until smooth.

Cook onion and garlic in oil in a heavy saucepan over moderate heat, stirring, until softened.
Add puréed tomatoes, tomato paste, sugars, vinegar, paprika, salt and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until very thick and dark in color, about 1 hour till (stir more frequently toward end of cooking to prevent scorching).

Purée ketchup until smooth. Chill, covered, at least 2 hours (for flavors to develop).