Ah, summer. These are the only reasons I stick it out in New York the rest of the year. It all began with my first summer here, as a wide-eyed, twenty-year-old college sophomore. It was every bit the definition of “salad days” – living in Alphabet City with my best friend in an apartment we rented ridiculously cheap because it was owned by her family friends, romping around the Village and Lower East Side, sometimes successfully sneaking into bars, sometimes … Read More
Unanimous “yes”es flooded my inbox from the crew. I am so glad I’m no longer dating a seafood-hater. Fish may thrive underwater, but I think they do smashingly well on a hand-ground corn tortilla against cool, creamy slaw and snappy herbs, and drenched with tangy lime juice. I overheard mention of “getting fish tacos” while on the boat leaving Governor’s Island two weekends ago, when the above ninety-degree heatwave was in full swing and the legendary Baja-inspired surfer food … Read More
I’m thinking it might be time to upgrade the ‘ol NEOINY hideaway with a Kitchenaid stand mixer, equipped with all the meat grinding attachment works. (I’m browsing them on Ebay right now.) The motivating factor is right above: luscious, freshly made, and deceptively simple sausages. Who knew that with the right tools, making sausage at home actually requires little time, prep work and just a few odd ingredients (i.e. hog casing and nitrate)? Matt Greco. A chef at Cafe Gray, … Read More
This is what I’ve been having for dinner lately. I don’t have an air conditioner and don’t see the point much when I can dip into a carton of homemade ice cream every once in a while. It does much more than cool the physical senses. It soothes and elates, bringing me back to the emotional state of being on a class trip in kindergarten, when every kid lined up at the local ice cream parlor and ordered the same … Read More
I’ve done some horrible plating in my time. That is, most of the time. Like many of you, I don’t have the space nor the patience to bother with appliances that are used only to improve the appearance of my food, like a piping bag, or one of those ring molds that you watch the Iron Chefs layer parfaits of crisp greens, juicy meat medallions and sauce with. But if you read between the lines, I really wish I did. … Read More
First of all: Holy heatwave! Bake at your own risk! I was kind of wondering when New York City weather would pull its annual trick of mutating overnight into a festering hotbox of city smog, in turn whipping us into hapless victims of stench. I’m still racking my brain for that clean water-saving alternative to showering twice or thrice daily.
Ughhh… I am not recommending you go into making this for the first time late on a Wednesday night. Ughhh… Of all the finicky nonsense that plagues much of gourmet, frou-frou, highbrow cooking, why this common street food snack so ridiculously delicate a process? I’ll chalk it up to two major things: my inexperience with the ingredients — the rice (or “vermicelli”) noodles and the rice wrappers — and with how to handle them. How wet can the wrappers get … Read More
Warning: If you make this at your next barbecue, your vegetarian friends may want to stand up on the picnic table and leap into your arms, proclaiming forever best friendship. I don’t know this from actual experience, but I can only imagine, after many summers of seeing glum-looking vegetarians skulking from the greasy-smelling fume clouds, nervously glancing at raw ground meat and drippy hot dog packages in the way that one cannot resist looking at a bug after squashing it … Read More
Oh yes, you heard it correctly. The Baked Brie Dog, which was born, baked, and eaten at a Memorial Day barbecue this weekend, will not be seen at the Great Hot Dog Cook-Off this July. But it only marks the beginning of the hot dog greatness that the event will doubtless inspire. Who said hot dog competitions were only about stuffing your face ’til you threw up into plastic cups? We, slightly north of Coney Island, have much more respect … Read More
Go East, young asparagus whore. That’s my motto for this salad, only the fourth or fifth dish this spring of what we should call the Asparagus Chronicles. I threw a dinner party last night, and this was one of the test salads I ultimately rejected for the night’s first course. That salad will probably end up in The Book, and the other unused salad was essentially the same as this one, only with olive oil and lemon juice instead of … Read More