Another Reason to visit Le Bernadin...

When we visited Le Bernadin in March, everything from the food and wine to the service was impeccable. While I thought the sommelier did a fantastic job paring wines for each course, I had no idea he was considered the World's best until I read this article from Food & Wine magazine. The publication hired Frank Bruni to become the most difficult diner imaginable, challenging poor Mr. Sohm to think on his feet. While we were all very happy with the parings he gave us, it's pretty cool to know he can come up with an aged rum to match the Kobe beef and a beer to match a chocolate dessert.

Like you needed another reason to visit Le Bernadin!

Where to Buy Cured Meat, Cheeses, Coffee, Fish, etc.

Like I mentioned before, Rob and I hosted our first Thanksgiving this year. We were determined to make it the best tasting Thanksgiving ever, so when shopping for the big event we had to rely on a few old favorites while seeking out a few new places, too.

I know Murray's is pretty much the standard as far as NYC cheese shops go, but Rob and I usually prefer the East Village Cheese Shop instead. Even though its cash only and they don't give out tastes, its easier to get to and (usually) less crowded than Murray's. They have a great selection, great prices, and the smaller space bumps up the funk factor. For Thanksgiving appetizers we bought some bleu cheese, a hunk of brie, walnut-studded gouda and my current cheese favorite, manchego. I gave the brie and gouda a little pre-Thanksgiving test with crackers the night before. All four kinds were wonderful, and just like I suspected, the walnuts worked great in the smoked gouda.

East Village Cheese Shop

40 Third Ave (Betw. 9th and 10th)

212-477-2601

Greg was in charge of the pork this year, and hit Emily's Pork Store for pre-meal soppressata and pancetta to spruce up the brussel sprouts. I haven't actually been in here before, but both meats were fantastic. I HAVE, however, been to the nearby Model T. Meats and cannot recommend their huge $5 skirt steak enough. They also sell excellent whole chickens (great for roasting), huge and juicy pork loins, and standard stuff like eggs, butter and frozen octopus.

Emily's Pork Store

426 Graham Ave (between Frost St & Withers St)

Brooklyn, NY 11211

718-383-7216

Model T Meats Corp

404 Graham Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11211

718-389-1553

And while we're on the topic of meats, I have to spotlight the Nassau Meat Market for its insane collection of kielbasa. I wish they spoke better English there, but it's part of the charm to be the only non-Polish grandmother in their huge Saturday morning lines. We've tried to ask a few questions about what they have, but so far all we know to ask for is "double-smoked." Can anyone come with us and translate sometime?

Well, in case you're wondering, the double-smoked works great in mac 'n' cheeses, red sauces, potatoes, scrambled eggs and pretty much anything else that could use some cured, salty meatiness.

Nassau Meat Market

915 Manhattan Avenue (between Greenpoint Ave & Kent St)

Brooklyn, NY 11222

718-389-6149

Two days before Thanksgiving and we set out to buy our Tom Turkey in Red Hook, at Fairway Market. Rob had been before so I knew that I should brace myself for grocery store madness, but I was not expecting a full-on food funhouse. This place had everything and anything. Like bizarre looking tomatoes.

And jars of pink Himalayan rock salt (remember when I had some in my gelato at Grom?).

They had a huge cheese selection. They had a crazy olive bar. They had cuts of beef so big I'm fairly sure they were whole quarters of cows. They had oysters. They had lemon salt. They had all kinds of truffles. They had our organic, never-frozen turkey too, of course ("Murray") and a crazy selection of house-roasted coffees for post-dinner sipping.

Fairway Market

480 Van Brunt St.

Brooklyn, NY 11231

718-694-6868

Thanksgiving came and went in a blur, and Friday morning we woke up hungry and exhausted. Since it is very rare that we have Fridays off, we made our first trip to Acme fish market for smoked fish to go on our bagels. We've had Acme fish at Roebling Tea Room and probably at a lot of other places, but they only open their wholesale warehouse to the public on Fridays. They have a few samples out and I tried a bit of smoked tuna. We stuck with the salmon.

Acme Smoked Fish Corp
30 Gem St.
Brooklyn, NY 11222
718-383-8585

Omakase at Kanoyama

Well, it's that time of year again: Rob's birthday month. And by now I feel it is tradition to start looking for a suitable place to take Rob for an above-average place for sushi.

When I started doing my research earlier in the month, Kanoyama kept popping up. At first I didn't really want to go there, it seemed too obvious. It was reviewed in the same Frank Bruni article that inspired me to take Rob to Sushi Azabu last year. But then I started to realize what he meant when he called both these places "bargains." It's super difficult to find an omakase deal with fresh sushi, flown from Japan for under $200 a person. And in some cases, its nearly impossible to get reservations. Luckily, its easy to make a reservation at Kanoyama, and their lowest "omakase" starts at $32 (which really just means an assortment of fish on one plate). The price range beyond that is limitless. Just tell them how much you're willing to spend, and they'll bring you as many courses as that price range allows.

Since we're stressed out with hosting our first Thanksgiving this year -- and since Kanoyama is closed for renovations next week -- we did the birthday dinner early this year. The fish was great and very fresh, the sushi chefs were very skilled and fun to watch. It was a little hard not to compare this experience with Sushi Azabu, though. Last year we tried a bigger variety of food, we were given a good deal more, the service was nothing less than completely hospitable, and the ambiance was unbeatable. This year, the service was a little unsteady; our second course came before we were done with the first and then we waited a good while for #3. Most of what we ate this year was sushi, even though that's what we specified when they asked if we wanted more sushi or more kitchen appetizers. We shouldn't have to make decisions like that! I felt like after we said that, we limited ourselves in terms of variety.

Those slight complaints aside, here's an overview of the fantastic meal we shared:

1) Kaki GomaAe (Winter Persimmon with Sesame Tahini) -- The presentation of this was beautiful -- melonballs of persimmon lightly coated in tahini and served in its own core. I've never had persimmon, but I couldn't even distinguish its flavor from the tahini it melded together so well. It had a crunch kind of like a pear. I expected its flesh to taste softer since it looks so much like a tomato. This was a great starter.

2) Cod Roe with Ponzu -- I always think of tiny, bright, glasslike balls when I think of roe, but cod roe is different; its more like a chicken egg. This was lightly fried, like tempura, with runny whites in the middle. The ponzu definitely played a key role in the flavor here.

3) Sashimi -- Here we each were given a finely adorned selection of three things -- striped jackfish, white yellowtail and pike eel roe with dashi. The plate (and by "plate" I mean giant shell from a mollusk on ice) contained a small dish of dried kelp, and we were instructed to unroll the sushi, put the kelp inside, re-roll and dunk in a small amount of house made soy sauce. The kelp was oddly chewy but it gave the fish a new dimension. I didn't like the eel roe; it came like a square glob of jello and I still don't get what made it this way. The flavor was nice and light, kind of like champagne-flavored jello, but the texture was too weird for me.

4) If you take a look at the post I wrote on Sushi Azabu last year, I called what comes next as "grand finale of sushi." However, it came too soon this year to be a grand finale; this time it was more like the main event. They served it the same way, though: one piece at a time. Last year they plunked each piece right in front of us. At Kanoyama, they put it up on the counter so you have to make sure your chopstick skills are steller, lest you drop your fish during the 12 inches it travels from its dark granite home to your outstretched neck.

There were quite a few similarities from last year, which I enjoyed. Many of these things I haven't had since last year, and now I'm somewhat familiar with them to know what a treat they are. Namely, uni and toro. I would like to find a way to incorporate more uni and toro into my life.

Here are the seven fishes:

a) Fluke -- Topped with a little bit of salt and lemon juice. Great flavor, but very chewy.

b) Japanese Mackerel -- This one was the fishiest of all and therefore, probably my least favorite.

c) Sea Scallop -- I love the texture of fresh, raw scallops. A little citrus and wasabi hid beneath the fish and the rice and made it even better.

d) Jackfish -- Topped with lots of sesame seeds. This combination was surprisingly good.

e) Toro -- It's always a treat to have the non-translucent tuna. The way it hugs and rice and then melts in your mouth... wow.

f) Uni -- I thought of a passage from the book Motherless Brooklyn when I saw this. Somewhere it is mentioned that uni is the national food of Japan and that a Japanese family must eat it at least once a week to maintain self-respect. That sounds as good an excuse to indulge as any; I LOVE the taste and texture of sea urchin. It goes down so easily without being slimy or too wet. How does it do that?

g) Sea Eel -- We each got a whole, huge eel. I know these are delicacies but I wish we could just stick with the good, cold stuff. The glaze they put on top is too sweet for me and I don't think it helps that I can never get the creepy grimmaces of those things out of my head.

5) We ended with a bowl of matsutake mushroom soup. It smelled sort of like an old wood cabin; in a good way. Apparently these mushrooms are delicacies as well but I really don't like the springy texture of most mushrooms.

Well, we should have been done here but we wanted one more thing: an oyster we saw going out a few times with uni and orange roe on top. It was a huge bite, but so good -- a great combination of wet uni and oyster and popping, flavorful roe. Oysters are a relatively new thing to me and having bizarre combinations like this is a good getting-to-know-you exercise. One of the things I'm liking about oysters are the way they linger in your mouth, kind of on the back roof of your mouth, like you just jumped into the ocean, face first. In a good way.

We finished with a scoop of ice cream -- red bean for him and green tea for me.

While I don't think we'll be doing any more omakase at Kanoyama, I do think we'll be back at some point to try a few things we didn't get to have here -- lobster miso soup, sliced duck, and the ankimo, which looked amazing. I may have to get a little toro and uni, too. You know, for self respect's sake.

Kanoyama

175 Second Ave (at 11th St.)

212-777-5266

Cafe Grumpy at its Grind

Remember last fall when I talked about how great Cafe Grumpy was? You probably don't, but I did. And I just found out, they're even better now!

Rob and I stopped in on Friday night for a sweater movie. What is a sweater movie, you ask? It's their fall season movie celebration where you win a prize for the best woolly top (in Friday's case, a pack of glow in the dark stars). A nice festive way to spend the evening. Cafe Grumpy was projecting Coraline that night, and I must admit I haven't been that scared by a kids' film... ever. What kind of fearless kids are we bringing up these days? Wasn't the Wizard of Oz bad enough for most of us?

Anyway, we happened to notice the presence of a new counter in the back room we hadn't seen before, with an industrial-sized roaster. Naturally, we asked the barista if they were roasting their own beans now. Yup, he says, we just started last month. As of right now they are roasting two kinds of beans: a Finca Chichupac (from Guatemala) and Finca El Carmen (from El Salvadore). How cool! I would have opted for one had I not really been in the mood for a sweet mint tea. Probably a good choice... I think caffeine + Coraline would have been a bit much for my faint heart.

I'll be back to see Christmas Vacation. Until then, I'm on the hunt for the best holiday sweater I can find. Maybe one with reindeer?

Chasing Cupcakes

New Yorkers love moving targets. The fact that gourmet trucks are always so popular is proof of this. You feel a sense of pride when you finally locate that elusive banh mi cart, you feel lucky when the falafel cart regularly parks along your commute. And when the cupcake truck graces you with its presence, maybe you dash down the street like a little kid that heard the faint ringing of the ice cream truck.

The Cupcake Stop truck finds a new home each and every day, and fans can track its location on Twitter. Last week the truck happened to be a few blocks away from the office, so I went out and got a red velvet one. The cupcakes were much smaller and far less sweet than Crumbs, which was a welcome surprise after a big lunch. They bake them fresh every morning and you can tell, the cupcakes were way moister than any cupcake I've ever gotten from Buttercup.

Here's hoping the Cupcake Stop truck and I cross paths again someday.

Fresh Air and Fiery Chili in Portsmouth

I think most people in NYC can understand the need to get out of the city and breathe sometimes. For Rob and I, that place of refuge is Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It's the perfect New England port town with eclectic shopping, cozy coffeeshops and, of course, great food. We probably pay our sanctuary a visit about once every eight weeks or so. I can't think of many places I'd rather be.

We almost always start our day off at Colbys. This cozy little establishment has a fireplace, warm red walls and local art hanging on the walls. We partially come here because there aren't many other breakfast choices in the area -- the Friendly Toast always has a wait and isn't even very good, and while Popovers has puffed pastry the size of your head, they don't offer table service, or much beyond your standard bakery fare for that matter. Colby's it is, then.

But aside from the lack of choices in the area, Colby's has something very special to offer -- Lobster Benedict. It's on the specials list about 80% of the time, so there's always the fun anticipation of waiting to see whether or not it will be a lobster benny morning. They give you tons of lobster meat and top it off with lots of hollandaise, and for $12.99 a plate I can tell you that you'll pay a lot more for a lot less in Brooklyn.

Colby's

105 Daniel St.

Portsmouth, NH 03801

Our most recent visit was a perfect fall day, with the sun shining, a tiny chill in the air, and beautiful folliage abound. And because Porstmouth is a real-life Pleasantville, that Saturday just happened to be Portsmouth's Chili Fest day.

The chili here came in all shapes and sizes. Some were beef-based, some were chicken-based, some were made from pork, one was even made from steak (and, it should be said, not that good). They came with beans and without, with or without scallions, any variety of salsa, with or without cheese. Some had onions. Some had stations where you can add cheese or sour cream til your heart's content. Some were served with tortilla chips. One even had a zinfandel reduction sauce (it was actually served on the steak chili and again, not recommended). The chilis here saw no limits. My favorite was a simple ground beef chili, with beans and a lot of chili powder, that left me breathing fire. Oh, you wanted a water? You'll have to wait in that gigantic line over there to buy a ticket for $2. Well, everything has its price I guess.

On the plus side, we did meet some pretty nifty new friends.

There is so much more to say about Portsmouth's dining scene. Espresso-coated filet mignons at the Green Monkey, lobster rolls at Lobster in the Rough, pizza at the Flatbread Company, crab cakes at Cafe Mirabel, fresh flounder at Jumpin' Jay's. I'll have to save those for future Portsmouth installments. Or maybe you'd like to join us for our next getaway?

Sandwich Obsession Deconstructed: Marlow & Sons (& Daughters)

My sandwich kick went strong for awhile, and now here I am at what I consider stage 2 of sandwichiritis: the deconstruction. Cured meats and cheeses are now best enjoyed separately, so as to enjoy the subtle differences that come with preparing the same foods in different ways. And restaurants always throw in some chewy bread, so you still get the sandwichy effect. It's a happy disease.

A few weekends ago Rob and I finally went to Marlowe & Sons in Williamsburg. It's gotten so much hype but I never really felt like going. Their specialties of charcuterie, oysters and soup just seemed like a boring way to spend the evening. I was so, so wrong and I'm glad. It was one of the most memorable meals Rob and I have had in a long time.

We went on a Saturday night and they don't take reservations, so we had to wait at the crowded bar for quite awhile. It was annoying being right in the servers' way but as soon as we got a stool at the bar, we were treated well during our wait. They asked if we wanted to start with any appetizers on the house, so we went with the olives. Two minutes later we were presented with a huge bowl of all sorts of shiny and briny olives in all shades and shapes. They were some of the meatiest olives I've ever had. In a good way. The perfect accompanyment to our 1/3 bottle of wine.

After waiting a little over an hour we get a seat, and luckily its towards the back of the room. Lots of people are sitting about four feet away from the bar. There's not a whole lot of room for personal space here.

Marlow & Sons switches up their menu every day based on what's fresh in their kitchen that day. I think there are a few constants, like the brick chicken. We decided against the idea of getting any of the three entrees and went for a little bit of everything else. First, a meat plate and two kinds of cheeses. The memorable cheese was a Point Reyes from California. We savored this stuff like it was the last thing we were ever going to eat. It was a little smokey with a familiar aftertaste that neither of us could identify. We would alternate taking bites, trying to nail down what it reminded us of. We couldn't come up with anything. The other cheese was good but not nearly as mystifying, so I guess it lost out on the allure of its brother cheese.

The meat plate was made up of five kinds of cured porky wonder: toscano, soppressata, finnochiona, nostrano and prosciutto. Finnochiona is a salami with fennel, or finnochio (one of the few Italian words I actually know and use!) Each and every type of meat blew me away with its lush spices and meltiness.

To finish our deconstructed sandwich, we ordered the crostini of the day. On this particular day the crostini was topped with housemade butter, goat cheese and Concord grape compote. Before we tried it, we were thinking "Bread and butter with a little cheese and a little jelly, sounds kind of boring and maybe a little weird." The crostini was neither of these things by a long shot. After one bite, both of our eyes shot up. First the warm, sweet housemade butter runs down your throat. Then the strong, acidic taste of the supergrape fills your mouth. You crunch on the grape seeds while the taste of the goat cheese comes through, a bit overpowered but still present. It was truly amazing. The idea that these simple ingredients can form into something so powerful was nothing less than inspiring. I almost cried a little.

But we're not done yet. We had read pretty stellar reviews of the Parmesan soup, another constant on the menu. We were expecting a rich, cream-based soup, but it was actually cloudy broth with housemade croutons and greens, though I don't remember what those greens were. The soup wasn't much to look at but it was light, salty, cheesy, buttery. Score.

And since we were there, we might as well try their oysters. We tried one kind from New York and another from North Carolina. I've never been too fond of oysters but this place has converted me into a full-on oyster believer. The New York oyster was a bit overpowering in its briny punch but I found the North Carolina ones to be just right.

At this point we were both too full for dessert. But this didn't stop us from getting the chocolate tart with sea salt and caramel to go. I think it may have lost something in the way of texture (and temperature) after a day in the fridge, but the flavors were still there. They definitely did not skimp on the sea salt, making for a sharp contrast with the rich chocolate and smooth caramel. Even non-sweet toothed Rob enjoyed this one. Well, at least the bites that I let him have.

I can't wait to go back so I can try the pork belly, the brick chicken, the fried corn and chicken liver pate. That is, on top of everything else that we have already tried.

Until our next visit, there is always Marlow & Daughters, the small grocery store/butcher next door. Like Marlow & Sons, the prices are a little steep at the store devoted to the female of the Marlow offspring, but I bet it's worth it.

Marlow & Sons
81 Broadway
Brooklyn, NY 11211
(718) 384-1441

Marlow & Daughters
95 Broadway (between Bedford Ave & Berry St)
Brooklyn, NY 11211
(718) 388-5700