...more recent posts
The “Beer Kir” at Marco Moreira’s 15 East is a Japanese beer-based mixed drink: Sapporo is floated on a shot of honeyed sweet potato vinegar, adding a sweet-sour edge to the dry lager. For the purposes of home experimentation, we found Benímosu ($11.35 for 4 oz.), the same artisanal vinegar used in Beer Kir at Katagiri, a Japanese food store on 59th Street. Made in Kyoto from purple potatoes and koji rice, Benímosu has clean, rounded flavor that’s meant to be added to beer in a 1:5 ratio, which means a 4 ounce bottle of the stuff won’t even last a 6 pack. For more budget beer-vinegar drinks, Katagiri has a whole shelf of (mostly) fruit-based vinegar for cocktail mixing. There’s even one made from sake lees, the unfermentable dregs collected from the bottom of sake brewing tanks.
While the small store may not be decorated with antique fixtures or feature anything remotely resembling vintage, Katagiri’s grocery side (there’s an incense and kimono shop next door) has been in the same spot for 101 years, a piece of old New York food culture founded just 3 years before the cornerstone of the Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden was set in Astoria, and 7 whole years before Russ & Daughters started kicking the herring out of Houston Street. It’s worth a visit, even if the place doesn’t steep itself in self-conscious historicity, for hard-to-find fresh shiso, or to sample something from its tiny sushi counter. If you feel like hurting your mouth, pick up a small jar of Yuzu Kosho ($5.39), a super intense all-purpose condiment made from yuzu zest preserved in salt and chili pepper.
Katagiri & Co.
224 East 59th Street
(212) 755-3566
was microwaving up a bowl of lentil soup and i looked to the label for some advice on timing. no such advice was forthcoming. all it said was "please do not overcook." thanks a bunch, amy.
Flavor Tripping
miracle fruit parties and sundry grub fests
mad flavor science
Flavor Tripping is an ongoing series of Bacchanalian food tasting smackdowns that occur about once a month, beginning in February ‘08 in NYC and SF. Our events are smallish affairs held in an undisclosed location - not (only) because we’re wanted international criminals, but because we dig switching things up and matching the spaces to the events we’re hosting. The first series of tastings center on miracle fruit (Sideroxylon dulcificum if you want to get all scientific about it), a cranberry-sized West African berry that that numbs your sour and bitter tastebuds for a couple of hours after eating it. That means that everything that used to taste sour now tastes sweet. Fo’ reals. It’s like a candy Willy Wonka would have invented - after eating one stout beers taste like chocolate milkshakes, grapefruits taste like pixie sticks, cheeses taste like frosting, it will make even the crappiest tequila taste like lemonade (and strangely enough, it will make all wine taste like Manischewitz).
So if you’d like to sign-up for the miracle fruit parties — there’ll be a banquet of food, beer, liquor, and beats provided by our resident DJ, plus damn good company — drop us a line at supreme@flavortripping.com. We’ll send out an email informing you of the next party.
…and or those of you who can’t make the parties, or just wanna experience the deliciousness on yer own, we’re also selling ye olde miracle fruit. Hit us up for more details and pricing.
supreme@flavortripping.com
Flavor Tripping is a ruthlessly-badass bastion of good taste. We throw parties w/ food. These parties are in NYC and SF. The parties are monkey loads of fun. These parties often include rare and exotic foods you ain’t gonna find in no dumpy bodega. The parties are run by a loose-knit-but-also-badass group of friends with much experience organizing large events in the states and abroad.
To receive e-mail updates on our next Miracle Fruit party, drop us a line at supreme@flavortripping.com. It’s worth it. Promise.
((what do you drink, what does it do to wine??))
hood whopper freak out
love my new toy
the art of eating has almost no web presence. you have to subscribe or order back issues.
Recommended:East 15. Homemade tofu was excellent (better than Megu I thought) and the cod special with miso and mushrooms was amazing. Nice quiet room. Started by the owners of Tocqueville, which is right next door. Next time though I want to sit at the sushi bar.
Scandinavian Bacon Butter
1/4 chopped shallots
6 or so slices of bacon, chopped into rough dice
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 stick of butter, softened
salt and pepper
from gastrokid
groceteria a history of american supermarkets from the 20s through the 80s
Metzgete at Trestle on Tenth
Dear friends of Trestle on Tenth
Please come and join us for our first-ever metzgete any night from Tuesday, January 15 through Sunday, January 20. It will be a special offering in addition to our full dinner menu.
So, what is a metzgete? Loosely translated as “a butcher’s affair,” it is a very traditional Swiss celebration of the pig, customarily offered at country restaurants throughout Switzerland during the cold months. The metzgete follows right on the heels of the slaughter, which happens in late fall and deep winter, and originated as a way to use every scrap of the pig--especially those parts that would or could not be dried, smoked or pickled for later consumption. Resembling the choucroute garnie of neighboring Alsace, the dish starts with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes and is then heaped with all kinds of pork.
Next week at Trestle, our version will include everything from braised belly to homemade bratwurst to liver and blood sausages, for only $24 per person (it can be served family-style for a group). We would suggest pairing the metzgete with a glass of Switzerland’s most notable white wine, Chasselas, or a bottle of artisanal Swiss beer, both of which will be available as options.
We look forward to sharing with you a true Swiss experience in a modern American setting.
Ralf and the Trestle on Tenth team
242 Tenth Avenue, NYC 10001, 212 645 5659, trestleontenth.com
Has anyone been to Pure on Irving Place? Skinny? What did you think?
I kind of want to go check it out...
http://nymag.com/nymetro/food/reviews/restaurant/9670/
cooking with grappa
wild frozen blueberries
great for pancake sunday mornings! (and smoothies)
Had my first and last Burek from these guys , was tasty but i dont need a pile of filo and oil with a smidge of cheese and spinach.....these folks serve the Serbian and Bosnian types.....I predict the Bay Ridge Branch (#4 for them) will fail, as so much in Bay Ridge sadly does.....
Linda/Alex what did you think??
The men who ruled the world in the late 1950s, or at least six of the men who ruled publishing, rejected Peg Bracken’s manuscript, “The I Hate to Cook Book.” It would never sell, they told her, because “women regard cooking as sacred.” It took a female editor at Harcourt Brace to look at the hundreds of easy-to-follow recipes wittily pitched at the indentured housewife and say, “Hallelujah!” Since its publication in 1960, Bracken’s iconic book, which celebrated the speedy virtues of canned cream-of-mushroom soup and chicken bouillon cubes, has sold more than three million copies. That helped lift her spirits, her daughter, Jo Bracken, said, about her $338 advance.
Bracken had the nerve to say then what so many women felt: They liked cooking fine, as long as they didn’t have to cook all the time. There was scant takeout in postwar America, no prepared foods, certainly no men rushing home from the office to don an apron and help out. The job of a wife and mother was to put food on the table, three times a day, seven days a week. And not just like it — live for it.
dave, can you post some good smoothie recipes? i got a new blender and ryley was none too impressed with my cherry smoothie this morning.
anyone have a good gingerbread cake recipe?
indian gin