Archive for the ‘New York City’ Category

THERE’S PORCHETTA…AND THEN THERE’S PORCHETTA!

Posted: February 8, 2014 in Carnivore!, Food, Italian, New York City, pork, Recipes, restaurants, travel
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Porchetta is a savory, fatty, herby, delicious slab of pig that is slow roasted…a favorite in Italy. Porchetta is also the name of a small eatery on the Lower east side of New York City, the baby of chef Sara Jenkins, where they serve this Italian classic almost exclusively, with lines of people winding down the block, waiting for their taste of pig heaven.

porchetta1

Traditional porchetta is made from a hog that is butchered, boned and roasted. Porchetta in New York City takes the pork loin, wraps it with the belly and skin, and slow roasts it in their special Combi oven. The result is nothing short of fantastic.

porchetta2

Both methods are way too big for my kitchen, so I took a page out of one of my favorite cooking magazines, La Cucina Italiana , where chef Jenkins described how a homemade version of porchetta was possible using boneless pork shoulder.
Well, I didn’t have a boneless pork shoulder, dammit! I had two beautiful pork tenderloins…not nearly as fatty, and no pork skin to wrap them with. I knew that I would have to be extremely careful not to totally dry my pork out.

Before...

Before…

Ingredients:

10 small fresh sage leaves
3 fresh small rosemary sprigs, leaves only
1 garlic clove, chopped
2 tablespoons wild fennel pollen (see below)
1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt
1 1/2 teaspoons coarsely ground black pepper
2 pork tenderloins (2 1/2 to 3 lb total)
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 cup dry white wine

Heat oven to 250 degrees.

Finely chop the sage, rosemary and garlic. (I place them in a food processor.) Place mixture in a small bowl and add fennel pollen, salt and pepper. Stir together well.

Rub the herb mixture all over the 2 tenderloin pieces. Tie the tenderloins together with butcher twine. (Usually one end of the tenderloin is fatter and the other thinner. Line them up so that one fat end is tied with one thin end, making the pork package of equal thickness.)

Set pork fat side up in a roasting pan. Drizzle with olive oil.

Roast the tenderloins, basting with the wine and pan juices every 15 minutes. Cook until pork has an internal temperature of 140 degrees.

After!

After!

Despite that it came out somewhat awesome, I plan on using a pork shoulder next time. Leftovers make great sandwiches!

PANCAKES MADE WITH FRESH RICOTTA

Posted: February 4, 2014 in breakfast, curds, Food, Iron Chefs, New York City, pancakes, Recipes, restaurants, Uncategorized
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These pancakes, based on a recipe from chef April Bloomfield (The Spotted Pig and The Breslin in NYC), are made from fresh homemade ricotta cheese. Light as air…and really delicious! I made my first-ever batch of homemade ricotta cheese the other day, following a recipe from Iron Chef Michael Symon. He used lemon juice and zest in the recipe, which gave the cheese a stronger lemon profile than I had hoped for. But once I realized I could use that ricotta in a pancake, the lemon flavor really took the pancakes to a whole new level.

I use raw milk for my ricotta cheese. It’s not available here in Rhode Island, but it is in neighboring Massachusetts. If you can’t find raw milk, use organic milk. Just avoid anything that is ultra-pasteurized.

milk

Ingredients:

1.2 gallon of raw milk

juice and zest of 8 small organic lemons

salt

sugar

Always have top-notch assistants at your side to make sure you're doing it right!

Always have top-notch assistants at your side to make sure you’re doing it right!

In a saucepan, heat the milk to 180 degrees. Remove from the heat. Add lemon juice and zest, salt and sugar. Stir once and then let it sit for 5 minutes.

Pour the curds (solids) and whey (liquid) into a strainer lined with cheesecloth over a bowl. Discard the whey, if you choose, then place the remaining cheese in the fridge overnight to further continue drippage.

The next morning, the ricotta is ready to use!

Homemade ricotta cheese

Homemade ricotta cheese

Once you have the fresh ricotta, it’s time to put these beautiful rustic pancakes together…

 

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup yellow cornmeal

2 tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 cups milk

2 large eggs, separated

1/2 cup fresh ricotta

 

In a large bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal, sugar, salt, baking powder and baking soda. In another large bowl, whisk together the milk, ricotta,  and egg yolks. Fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients.

In a large stainless steel bowl, whisk the egg whites until they are stiff, but not dry. Fold gently into the batter.

Spray a non-stick griddle with a little cooking spray and drop about 1/4 cup of batter per pancake. Cook over medium heat for about 2 minutes per side, until golden and fluffy.

pancake

AN FAO SCHWARZ SECRET

Posted: December 20, 2013 in New York City, travel
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Anyone that plans a trip to New York City for the holidays with the kids (or even without the kids) better end up at FAO Schwarz, if they know what’s good for them! It’s a great store with loads of history and two huge levels of candy, toys, games, and the world-famous “Big Piano,” as seen in the Tom Hanks movie “Big.” Toy soldiers greet you at the door, inviting you into a world as far away from the hassle of Manhattan traffic as anything on 5th Avenue and 58th Street could be!

Most people don’t know that they can get a 45-minute private tour of FAO Schwarz, one hour before the store opens, guided by their own toy soldier. It’s a really fun experience that we had a couple of years ago, when my daughter turned 5 years old. But you can’t just show up. And there’s limited space. (We found that signing up for a tour after Christmas was the way to go.)

We found out about the private tours from a small ad in a local magazine: Time Out New York. There was no web address…just a phone number. I called…I made an appointment for the tour…it cost a ridiculously small amount of money…and we were in!

We showed up at our designated time and met our Toy Soldier, who led us through the entire store, giving us all kinds of information about the toys and the history of the building itself. The awesome part was that we were the only ones in the building, with the exception of store workers getting things ready for another day’s enthusiastic crowds.

toy1

And the best part of the tour: we got to dance around on The Big Piano privately, before the store’s doors opened up and the wild crowds rushed to get in line to take advantage of their 3 minutes on the piano. We got almost 15 minutes to dance around, take pictures and simply have a great time.

toy2

If you’re trying to think of what you can do to bring your next holiday trip to New York City to whole new level, this will make you a real hero with the kids.

Here’s a link I found with more information:

http://www.fao.com/shop/index.jsp?categoryId=3810526

And by the way…tip the toy soldier well. He still has to pay the rent!

ONLY DORA WOULD MISS HER BACKPACK MORE…

Posted: September 16, 2013 in Capri, Caribbean, ile de re, Maine, morocco, New York City, New Zealand, Paris, Rhode Island, Santorini, travel
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After years of unfailing service, my trusty backpack has decided that its days of journeying are over.

It was all so sudden…

Edges fraying, zippers jammed, stitching coming loose, rubberized grommets dry and brittle, mesh water bottle compartments sagging–their elasticity nothing but a memory–I suppose I simply refused to acknowledge the signs of a life well-traveled coming to an end.

BACKPACK

Over the past five years, my backpack has carried bottles of wine and bags of fava across Santorini…ocean-carved granite stones from Monhegan Island off the coast of Maine…conch shells from the beaches of Anguilla….an unlikely combination of amber and smoked fish off the Baltic coast of Lithuania…jars of pate from gourmet stores in Quebec City…questionable electronics purchased on a street corner in Times Square…crocks of magnificent Maille mustard from Paris…gurgling 5-liter cans of olive oil from Puglia…cryo-vacced sausages from San Sebastian…sacks of Fleur de Sel purchased roadside in Guerande, France…dried fruit and nuts from the Souk in Marrakech…and full-sized, stinky wheels of young Pecorino from an outdoor market in Faro.

My backpack cradled all the things that ensured my safety and comfort on my journeys: passports, wallet, pocket knife, flashlight, a few feet of rope, note pad, business cards for livethelive.com, water, energy bars, Valium and Ambien for those long plane trips, Pepto for those bad food choices, and Immodium for those really bad food choices.
It accompanied me while snorkeling in St John…loading up on pasties and smoked whitefish at the foot of the Mackinac Bridge in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula…swimming with dolphins in Moorea…riding camels along the Morrocan coast in Essouria…slurping oysters by the dozen in Pensacola Beach…flying in a hot air balloon over the vineyards outside of Barcelona…diving off the rocks in Capri…circling the dog track at the New Orleans Jazz Festival…boogie-boarding at Nauset Beach on Cape Cod…touring via helicopter over mountains and glaciers to Milford Sound in New Zealand…and relaxing poolside at the Four Seasons Resort in West Palm Beach.

Always behind me and never a complaint. A fond farewell. Thanks for watching my back, pack.

AN FAO SCHWARZ SECRET

Posted: December 10, 2012 in New York City, travel
Tags: , ,
0

Anyone that plans a trip to New York City for the holidays with the kids (or even without the kids) better end up at FAO Schwarz, if they know what’s good for them! It’s a great store with loads of history and two huge levels of candy, toys, games, and the world-famous “Big Piano,” as seen in the Tom Hanks movie “Big.” Toy soldiers greet you at the door, inviting you into a world as far away from the hassle of Manhattan traffic as anything on 5th Avenue and 58th Street could be!

Most people don’t know that they can get a 45-minute private tour of FAO Schwarz, one hour before the store opens, guided by their own toy soldier. It’s a really fun experience that we had last year, when my daughter turned 5 years old. But you can’t just show up. And there’s limited space. (We found that signing up for a tour after Christmas was the way to go.)

We found out about the private tours from a small ad in a local magazine: Time Out New York. There was no web address…just a phone number. I called…I made an appointment for the tour…it cost a ridiculously small amount of money…and we were in!

We showed up at our designated time and met our Toy Soldier, who led us through the entire store, giving us all kinds of information about the toys and the history of the building itself. The awesome part was that we were the only ones in the building, with the exception of store workers getting things ready for another day’s enthusiastic crowds.

toy1

And the best part of the tour: we got to dance around on The Big Piano privately, before the store’s doors opened up and the wild crowds rushed to get in line to take advantage of their 3 minutes on the piano. We got almost 15 minutes to dance around, take pictures and simply have a great time.

toy2

If you’re trying to think of what you can do to bring your next holiday trip to New York City to whole new level, this will make you a real hero with the kids.

Here’s a link I found with more information:

http://www.fao.com/shop/index.jsp?categoryId=3810526

And by the way…tip the toy soldier well. He still has to pay the rent!

TWO IRON CHEFS + TIPS FOR THANKSGIVING WEEKEND IN NYC

Posted: November 28, 2012 in Food, Iron Chefs, New York City, restaurants, Thanksgiving, travel, Uncategorized
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On Thanksgiving morning, we did what we weren’t supposed to do: woke up late and arrived just 20 minutes before the Macy’s parade started, huddled in the crowd just in front of Radio City Music Hall.

As fate would have it, a police barrier was opened up to the public–kids had the first row–with adults behind them. Our 5-year-old daughter got right up front, and my wife snagged a photo of Iron Chef Geoffrey Zakarian on the Food Network float. (I was a few rows back, taking family videos of the event.)

My advice if you ever plan on going to New York City for Thanksgiving: skip the blowing up of the balloons the night before. It is a madhouse that wraps around a half a dozen city blocks and once you are in, there is no way out until the very end. If you’re claustrophobic, or have a sick or tired kid, you are absolutely screwed. The police show no mercy because they’ve heard every excuse you can think of a thousand times before. Can’t say that I blame them.

We found a way out by heading down to the subway station below the American Museum of Natural History (where all this takes place) and came up the other side of the street out of another subway entrance.

As for Thanksgiving Day and the Macy’s parade: the weather was perfect and our daughter had a great time. We’ve done the parade once. And now we’re done!

Geoffrey Zakarian on the Food Network float.

On Thanksgiving night, we had our dinner at Zakarian’s restaurant, The National, located on the first floor of The Benjamin, our hotel for the weekend. Unfortunately, like many restaurants owned by Iron Chefs (Bobby Flay a prime example), the menus don’t reflect the creativity that you see on Food Network’s “Iron Chef America” show. Our meal was a prix fixe dinner that featured steak. And although it was beautifully cooked…it was steak. I can get that anywhere.

What did shine was the service. The manager, Noble, made sure that we were happy with our wine selection and that our 5-year-old daughter was offered something other than the adult prix fixe menu. And when our choice of a white Rioja tasted off, he quickly brought a bottle of another variety that absolutely hit the spot. As we were waiting for our table on that very busy night, a busboy saw that our little girl was hungry, so he brought over some bread, butter and jelly, and gave her a seat at a small table to enjoy  it while waiting. Excellent service.

Not that I’m an Iron Chef stalker, but the next night, we had dinner at Restaurant Marc Forgione, located in the Tribeca neighborhood of Manhattan. Everything about this restaurant told us we were in the capable hands of a creative master. The restaurant was beautiful. Our server, Brad: friendly and totally professional. And the food: absolutely amazing. Appetizers consisted of chili lobster on Texas toast, with a sauce so good, you wanted to soak every bit up with that thick bread. Kampachi tartare with avocado, Schechuan buttoms, toasted pine nuts and Saratoga chips to scoop with: rich and smooth. A that-day creation of trout on a cedar plank was out of this world. A main course of perfectly cooked squab, bacon, brussels sprouts was real cold weather comfort food. And the most challenging meal for me: the veal tenderloin with Boudin noir, a pork blood sausage that was really intense. But hey, I didn’t come here to have my hand held. I came here to get slapped around a bit! And that’s exactly what this dish did.

Desserts were equally incredible, my favorite combining my two favorite desserts, bread pudding and pecan pie, into one amazing sweet, gooey treat.

And unlike other high-end restaurants, there was no problem when we requested something simple for our fussy daughter’s meal. A plate of home-made pasta with butter and cheese arrived at the table, and my daughter called it “the best ever.”

Marc Forgione the restaurant was only half the story. Marc Forgione the chef was a really cool guy who stepped out of the kitchen often, checking on tables to make sure people were satisfied with their meals. We had a table right near the open kitchen door, so we saw him and his staff at work during our entire meal. And when my daughter handed him a drawing she made of him in his kitchen, he offered to give us a tour. We grabbed that opportunity in a heartbeat! He came back to our table several times more, just to see how we were doing. Great guy. Great talent. Great restaurant.

With Iron Chef Marc Forgione in his kitchen.

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