IN SEARCH OF ...

A bunch of ideas are swirling about in my mind and I thought I'd ask you folks for guidance. Feel free to chime in on any or all of these topics.

1) Are you, or do you know someone who, is a devout hot-sauce lover, preferring an incendiary chile-licked squirt sauce to, say, ordinary ketchup or mustard? If you don't wish to offer contacts here in this blog, please call me at the Press at 732. 643. 4273 and leave a message or e-mail me at clurfeld@app.com with specific names and contact info.

2) In that same hot-sauce vein, do you know any boardwalk eateries that line up those hot sauces as condiments, alongside or in place of, ketchup and mustard? If so, please let me know either here or via phone or e-mail.

3) What restaurants in our reasonable vicinity strictly follow the seasons with their menu offerings, only serving tomatoes (for instance) in high Jersey tomato season or focusing on root veggies in winter, and so on? And, moreover, which of you area chefs and restaurants buy your produce from local farms and farm markets? Again, if you don't wish to use your names here, call or e-mail me ASAP. I'd like to call and speak with you, so anonymous postings are nice to read, but not of much help in this instance.

4) What are your favorite places for picnicking at the Shore? And what is your favorite picnic food?


Thanks for any/all guidance!

Meanwhile, where are you eating and/or what are you cooking this weekend?

cheers,
Andy
3.30.07

IMPATIENCE

I’m having a harder time than usual this early-spring, a harder time waiting for the first local crops to come in.

I’m hankering to have fresh English peas and mint and chives to use in a risotto or maybe even to top a bowl of little pasta shells. If I can score a few fresh morels – ohmigosh – that’d make it all the better.

When Vidalias come in from Georgia (I always seem to prefer them to the other sweet-onion varieties, probably because the Vidalia was my first sweet onion and it’s easy to be forever sweet on your first sweetie), I love adding them to any mix of local peas and mint, or peas and wild mushrooms. It’s then that the warm season begins for me.

When baseball starts next week, I think it’s going to get even harder. Heck, do you know I even popped the cork on a rose the other night? It was hardly a bone-chilling winter, but I’m ready for spring. Spring vegetables.

What crop jump-starts spring for you? (Any farmers who’d like to chime in with any forecasts would be much listened to, much appreciated. Any chefs planning local-crop specials at their restaurants also should feel free to jump in.)

Cheers,
Andy
3.29.07

WINES YOU CAN FIND

Frankly, we in chronic search of a wine that works with a Tuesday night at-home supper don't get much in the way of guidance from wine writers who focus on trophy bottles. So when I saw a story in the April issue of Food & Wine magazine called "50 Wines You Can Always Trust'' by my always trustworthy and charmingly down-to-earth pal Ray Isle, I knew this was a clip-and-save article.

Turns out, his picks and insider insights are so good, I decided to point out the entire spread (it starts on Page 115 and tours the value-priced wine world clear through Page 130) to all you wine drinkers who don't call a $57 bottle of California cab a "bargain'' simply because its wine-shop brethren are priced at $30 more.

I asked Ray how his trustworthy-wines package came to be. "My goal in producing it kind of comes out of feedback I've received from readers - people really want to know about affordable, good wines that (here's the key part) they can also find. By a good margin, the e-mail I receive most from readers usually runs along the lines of, 'You wrote about X, but I can't find it anywhere!' Part of the problem is that there's something like 30,000 different wines for sale in the U.S. Finding any given wine in a specific wine shop is always a complete crap-shoot, so I figured at least I could help the odds a little by doing a whole package on really FINDABLE good wines.''

He not only writes about wines you can find, but adds to your knowledge of these everyday bottles with well-researched snippets. Kendall Jackson is so big, he says, that "when you take a tour'' of its vineyards, "you do it by helicopters.'' The Chilean winery Casa Lapostolle was co-founded by Alexandra Marnier-Lapostolle, Ray notes, and if the Marnier in the name sounds familiar, maybe you've sipped some Grand Marnier in your day; Alexandra is the great-granddaughter of the founder of the famous liqueur.

Anyway, I figured Ray had to do a lot of spitting-style research to come up with this remarkably useful list of 50 wines.

"It's hard to say how many wines I went through,'' Ray says, "since it's partly based on my experience - I specifically wanted NOT to recommend specific vintages, but rather wines that perform well in almost every vintage - so I drew on a lot of tasting experience, and a lot of repeated tasting of those wines. That said, I did taste current vintages of everything I wrote about, and I'd say I cut at least half of the original candidates for the piece, if not more."

Ray, who is senior editor of Food & Wine, could be your new best wine friend. I know you'll find his story worth your reading (and quaffing) time. After you take a gander at it, please let me know right here if you have anything to add about your favorite everyday wines.

Cheers,
Andy
3.27.07

THE PIZZA QUESTION

You're not going to like my answer, I know, but I've thought and thought and I honestly can't do what you're asking.

Name my favorite place for pizza at the Shore, that is, now that Anthony Mangieri is mixing his dough up in the East Village at his Una Pizza Napoletana.

I know there are Pete & Elda's partisans, folks who swear by Vic's, Federici's, Freddie's, Panzone's - any of many pizza places in our midst. But I really got spoiled by Anthony, and his pizza is my manna. I can't name my favorite-now-that-Anthony-isn't-here place because I don't have one. That's the truth.

It's not that I can't love another pie. I fell in love with one just last night, only that thunderbolt hit me in Philly, at the new and irresistible Osteria at 640 Broad St.

"Have the one with the egg,'' I e-mailed another food-crazed pal early this morning. That would be Osteria's Lombarda pizza, which sports a runny egg waiting to be punctured over dots of sausage.

Osteria's pies are in the style of Puglia, with a thinner crust than Anthony's but similar charring and a wonderfully earthy-soulful flavor. There are also rustic and (I don't use this word lightly) perfect pastas: I can't choose a favorite between the gossamer ribbons of candele with wild boar Bolognese and chunky, yet light rigatoni with radicchio and Gorgonzola. Please don't ask me to choose a favorite. Please.

But I will ask you to consider ordering the wood-grilled octopus should you go to Osteria and the rabbit with pancetta served atop polenta. Italy isn't so far away when you sit in this dramatic high-ceilinged room whose side windows overlook a striking church complete with rose windows.

Where are you eating this weekend? And - or - what might you be cooking?

Cheers,
Andy
3.23.07

TOO-LATE-TO-COOK SUPPER

Sometimes it’s too late to cook supper, but I need to cook. For me, it’s the ultimate wind-down from a busy day.

So I do something special. Special, but quick.

Here’s my latest Too-Late-to-Cook Supper:

Rinse a couple 15-ounce cans of Goya chickpeas (garbanzos) in cold water. Put them in a pot with 1 cup of good-quality chicken stock or broth (if I don’t have homemade on hand, I use Pacific Organic Chicken Broth) and bring to a boil for a couple of minutes, stirring and reducing the broth to more of a thick syrup in the process. Squirt in the juice from 1 or 2 fresh lemons. Reduce the heat to very, very low and let sit while you do the next thing.

Which is cook shrimp. Chop 3 to 4 cloves of garlic and add them to a skillet filmed with good-quality olive oil and set over medium heat. When the garlic turns light golden brown, add a pound to a pound-and-a-half of large shrimp. If you want a shrimp-filled supper, add the max; if you prefer a more bean-y dinner, go minimum. Saute the shrimp over medium-high heat for 2 minutes, then remove from the heat and stir in a big fistful, about 1 cup, of freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley leaves. Do not use the curly kind; flat-leaf is far tastier.

Place the beans in a serving bowl and add the sautéed shrimp, making sure you scrape into the mix all the good garlicky oil. Season with sea salt and black pepper and serve right away. Feel free to add another squirt of fresh lemon juice and/or another drizzle of olive oil. This serves about 3.

cheers,
Andy
3.22.07

A FIRST FOR NEW JERSEY

It's a really big deal: Maricel Presilla, chef and owner of the restaurants Cucharamama and Zafra in Hoboken, this week became the first female chef in New Jersey to be nominated for a prestigious James Beard Award. In the food world, that's the equivalent of an Oscar nomination.

Maricel, a respected culinary anthropologist and former professor at Rutgers, started cooking professionally after she came to America from Cuba. For a dozen years, she juggled graduate studies with cooking at restaurants, most notably The Ballroom, the first upscale authentic tapas bar in New York City. In the intervening years, she taught, wrote cookbooks, magazine and newspaper articles. Then she ventured back into restaurants. First, she opened the Pan Latin Zafra and, three years ago, she christened Cucharamama.

It's a one-of-a-kind restaurant, a chic, yet comfortable corner storefront where Maricel turns out utterly personal artisanal South American food. What to eat at Cucharamama? Well, ordinarily I'd tell you to get the chicken with sour orange, the breads baked in the wood-fired oven, definitely the arepas, the potato dishes, the stews and, if you can plan ahead and special-order it, her roasted suckling pig. But when I called Maricel yesterday, she told me she was working on a bevy of new dishes. She's been traveling, learning, extending her culinary reach. Exploring, really, as she always has. What lies ahead on Cucharamama's menu will be an adventure for us all.

No question: Maricel Presilla, America's leading Latina culinary scholar, is absolutely tickled about her Beard nomination. But she's always going to be far more thrilled when she learns something delectably new about food.

Cheers,
Andy
3.20.07

P.S. If you would like to see a complete list of nominees for the 2007 James Beard Awards, visit www.jamesbeard.org

P.S.S. If you'd like to sample Maricel Presilla's food at Cucharamama, do call first for a reservation. The restaurant is located at 233 Clinton St., Hoboken; 201. 420. 1700.

CHICAGO RESTAURANTS (part two)

It’s awfully posh at Avenues. Our corner table seems remote, comfortably so, a world apart from every other table in the hushed dining room. A very proper man rolls a cart containing bottles of chilled Champagne to our table, then explains, in detail, the virtues of each. As he delivers the kicker comment to a good half the descriptions, he shakes his head in a reverent, rather shivery motion and notes “how privileged, how extremely honored” Avenues is to be able to make this or that bubbly available to its diners. By the glass, no less! (We order a much lower-priced whole-bottle sparkler for our party of six.)

But Graham Elliot Bowles is one accomplished chef and we enjoy our butter-poached lobster, Casco Bay cod, with its side of brandade, bison short ribs and something called a brioche “twinkie.” Well, to be sure, one of us scored a “twinkie” with his deconstructed Caesar, then the rest of us clamored for twinkies of our own. Avenues never says no to a diner, I gather.

We’d had more of the same focused, all-pro service the night before at Tru, the kingdom of chefs Rick Tramonto (savory) and Gale Gand (sweet). Here, there were “faux” gras (Chicago has a ban on foie gras, so butter-whipped chicken livers suffice – and deliciously), chestnut tagliolini, prawns with green curry, Moroccan-tweaked king salmon and beef short ribs with white figs. Everything comes dolled up, including the room, which is elegant and stately and sports some serious art. Unfortunately, I sat facing a truly ugly piece that looked a bit like a bumble-bee-colored Ikea cast-off. Actually, we all got a charge out of the thing.

At Blackbird, which is crowded, noisy and deliberately under-decorated, we were stymied by the food: “Myrtlewood aged cow’s milk cheese salad with roasted quince, fennel, kumquats, mache and hazelnut oil” was boring, with bare snips of the listed accents and a soul-less cheese. Though our primary server was professional and exceptionally kind, the only element on any plate we came away enjoying was a fried rabbit leg. Weird. Chef Paul Kahan has a big-time rep.

These were some high-priced eats, Avenues, Tru and Blackbird. I liked Avenues and Tru, but couldn’t proclaim a love affair with either. But on the plane ride home, I kept thinking about the smoked shrimp I’d had at Calumet Fisheries Inc., a takeout shack way, way, way south – “95th Street at the Bridge,” as they say on the no-frills menu. Smoked shrimp, smoked trout, smoked chubs. Kickin’.

P.S. Some of you want to know if I had pizza in Chicago. Of course. Friends who live in the Windy City brought me to Spacca Napoli on the north side of town. Don’t get on a plane, all you Anthony Mangieri disciples; Spacca Napoli has nothing on our beloved mecca, now in the East Village. Una Pizza Napoletana still reigns as No. 1.

Cheers,
Andy
3.18.07

GNOCCHI LOVE

The first question any restaurant critic is asked, when that critic's profession is revealed, is the one question that can't be answered with absolute honesty: What's your favorite restaurant?

Does such a beast exist? If you feel like eating sushi, if your hankering for toro is overwhelming, how could that lovely bistro with its brilliant cassoulet fare you well? If the desire for a prime burger leaves you suppressing a moo, can the spot with the engaging palak paneer actually satisfy?

So "favorite,'' for me and for many who eat for a living, is a relative term - relative, that is, to the craving at hand. (Or, rather, in mouth.) But for months now, I knew I wanted nothing but a big bowl of Marc Vetri's gnocchi as my birthday dinner. So last night, that's exactly what friends treated me to.

Vetri is a 34-seat humbly haute Italian restaurant on Spruce Street in Philadelphia. There is no restaurant I love more in this world, though there are dishes at other restaurants I certainly desire. If that speaks ""favorite'' to you, ya got me.

Now Vetri's gnocchi are spinach gnocchi and they're served in browned butter, sprinkled with slivers of sharp, tangy cheese. They're simple, they all but float away and they're the best, best, best I've ever eaten. I always knew I could eat them all night, and I almost did. But since the chef also had been having a field day curing all manner of pork products into exquisite salumi, since there was lamb and goat and bollo misto in the house, I did share my big bowl of gnocchi with my dinner mates to clear some room in my tummy. It was a spirited evening of eating.

Do you have a favorite restaurant? Craving-dependent or not?

Cheers,
Andy
3.14.07

OH BOY, WHAT A RESTAURANT (CHICAGO, PART ONE)

It didn’t take long for us to realize Avec, a skinny storefront of a restaurant on West Randolph Street in Chicago, was firing on all cylinders. The place was packed on packed and servers were shimmying with amazing efficiency along the sliver of an aisle between the long row of bench-like tables and the dining bar. But the plates, the plates sporting modest price tags and charismatic flavors, beguiled.

A bunch of us spent this past long weekend eating in Chicago. We went to some hoity-toity spots (Tru, Avenues, Blackbird) and some humble-eats places (a smoked-fishes shack, pizza, hot dogs), but Avec, a cross between humble and haute, snatched my heart. It reminded me of Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York (in fact, I suspect Ssam Bar’s design pays homage to Avec’s understated wood-modern décor) in spirit and style. The food was mesmerizing.

Creamy parsnip and hot-feisty horseradish crostini had a vivid flavor pulse. Chorizo-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon and surrounded by a piquillo-tomato puree touched every taste bud. A simple chicken thigh, so crispy, so energized by its marinade, was set off by a confit of complementing elements: potato, apple, garlic – all in a super-eggy mayo. The crowning glory? A juicy-crunchy splay of skatewing on the bone with a rush of accents – curry, preserved tomatoes, cilantro, lime.

The plates at Avec come with flourishes of herbs. As our new best friends (Avec regulars, from Oak Park) sitting next to us at the communal table noted, herbs are used as vegetables. Refreshing.

Anyway, I’ll talk more about Chicago grub later this week. What/where did you eat while I was away?

Cheers,
Andy
3.12.07

SUSHI, RECIPES AND CHEFS' SPECIALS

1) I've gotten lots of e-mails about my sushi essay in the Press a week ago Sunday. Where have all you sushi purists been? How come there's so much "cooked'' sushi out there if so many folks are clamoring for, and craving, pure Japanese sushi? I'd love to hear from the chefs at (and owners of) area Japanese restaurants.

2) Reader Lisa Watznauer (among many others) asks: "Is there a way to search recipes that have been printed in past issues of the paper?'' At this point, Lisa (and others), your best bet is to call my colleague Nancy Romanenko, who does bravura work putting out the Food section each week and who clips selected recipes for her files. Nancy can be reached by calling 732. 643. 4289. The recipes are not, at this point, archived in our Web site. If a recipe is mine - meaning it was developed by me and has my byline on it - please call me at 732. 643. 4273 and I'll help you.

3) Chefs: Folks want to know your nightly specials, particularly your weekend specials. They'd love to know, for example, on Friday morning that you're snagging some fabulous scallops and what special dishes you're cooking up that weekend spotlighting your catch. I'd like to use this blog as an open forum for chefs who want to post their weekend specials every Friday. I think readers (diners) will benefit from - and use - this info. If this is something enough of you would participate in, I'll queue up a specials' post every Thursday night or Friday morning so you can list your specials under the appropriate comments and readers can click on and start salivating. Interested?

cheers,
Andy
3.7.07

COOKING FOR ST. PAT'S DAY

St. Patrick's Day gets a bit cliched, in my opinion. I constantly hear from folks that they're tired of the same old corned beef-and-cabbage, but that's the standard offering in most homes and in many restaurants. Hey, I just finished writing a Foraging column for next week's Food section about a horseradish sauce I improvised to perk up the classic. A friend was begging me for something to dress up what he knows will be his supper on the 17th, so I gave it a shot.

I bet many of you out there have some snappy ideas. Restaurant chefs: What are you putting on your menus to celebrate St. Pat's Day next Saturday night? Home cooks: Do you plan on stirring the pot to toast the Emerald Isle?

cheers,
Andy
3.6.07

THE PROBLEM WITH KIDS TODAY

Ruth Reichl’s Letter from the Editor in the current (March 2007) issue of Gourmet magazine hits a bull’s-eye. She warns that she’s going to rant, and she does it extremely well in the course of doing the right thing: The problem with the picky way kids eat today isn’t kids – it’s parents and a society that sets kids apart as a “separate species who require a different diet from the rest of us.”

YAY! I cheered as I read it. About a month or so ago, I wrote here in this blog that I was ticked off by the notion that kids simply don’t like certain foods. Sure, I know it’s tough to deal with a recalcitrant 5-year-old at dinner time who demands mac-and-cheese and won’t eat anything but mac-and-cheese. But it’s the responsibility of parents to guide their kids through the wonderfully delicious, huge world of food and encourage wide-ranging dining by example and perseverance. Just as parents must persevere when kids resist bed time, bath time, teeth-brushing time, homework time.

The ever-eloquent, always insightful Reichl says it far better than me: “Children study their parents – that is their primary job in life – and one of the things they absorb is the way the grown-ups eat.” If Mom’s eating salad, but Suzy’s only given applesauce, if Dad’s eating pasta with Bolognese sauce, but Sam’s pasta is naked, Reichl says, “What we’re really telling our children is ‘You won’t like what we’re eating.’ ”

She also addresses the particular myth I personally abhor – that single-digits only will eat chicken nuggets, hot dogs, mac-and-cheese – with my favorite argument against such nonsense: “Japanese children are not born thinking that rice, fish and seaweed are breakfast foods any more than American children are born with an innate preference for cereal. We tell them what they like, even if we don’t say it in words.”

If your kids won’t eat the foods you wish they would, head straight to Page 24 of the March issue of Gourmet. Reichl says a whole lot more about kids and food in her good-to-the-last drop essay.

Cheers,
Andy
3.5.07

NO SLEEP TONIGHT

This morning, I bought Calvin Trillin’s “About Alice.” I bought it to read on the plane, when I take a short trip late next week, but I already know what’s going to happen: The book will tug at me the rest of today and its lure will win out just before I turn off the lights tonight.

I’ll stay up till I finish “About Alice,” I know I will. I’ve loved everything Trillin has ever written. His food stuff is brilliant, wittily honest. But his writing is that way because he gets people so spot-on right. This book, about his late wife, isn’t going to leave me.

Have you read “About Alice”? Any Trillin?

Andy
3.1.07