eggbeater

most fresh, delicious lunch in NYC: City Bakery

I have so much to say about City Bakery I don't know where to start. Let me give you an image. One that moves. In a long shallow window that faces the street, an old tv plays one reel on loop. The camera is pointed into a 20Q mixer, moves to a table and ends up in the oven. The Croissant Movie. I watched it every day on my way to work in 1994.

Six years later Maury Rubin and hundreds of pounds of his cookie dough were in my place of work, Citizen Cake. Both nervous and bold I approached, letting him know how much I appreciated that movie, the humour and the ode. He couldn't believe I remembered it, and since then we've been friends.

Like Maury himself, City Bakery is whimsical, flirtatious, mischievous, efficient and has the business ethic and aesthetic of an old New York few of his customers might remember. A Willy Wonka gleam in his eye, he has the kind of eye contact that makes me nervous even when I have no reason to be. Other people I've met like this: Nancy Silverton, Thomas Keller, Claudia Fleming. NOTHING gets past them. Anthony Bourdain says, in Kitchen Confidential, that pastry chefs are the neurologists of the cooking world. But some are more shrewd than others.

What makes us want to eat sweet upon sweet? Salt.

Ilene Rosen is the talented savoury chef behind the innovative, beautiful and extremely fresh salad bar at City Bakery. On any given day every food group is represented, twice. Rosen's touch is light. She can cook from more than merely a western perspective and uses some off-the-beaten-track and heavy hitting ingredients well. I had lunch there twice in four days and would go every day when I'm in NY, if I could afford it. It ain't cheap, but in New York, what is?

My suggestion? Fill up your plate, take out the plastic, try a passion fruit Fizzy Lizzy and get a pretzel croissant for later. In the winter order a shot of hot chocolate with a homemade marshmallow and sit upstairs under the rows of big round light bulbs, to me, inspired by Coney Island.

City Bakery is located on 18th street 30 seconds west of 5th avenue.

Childhood Memories, in food.

When it rains it pours. First no memes ever, now two in a row. Farmgirl, a down-to-earth blog about life on a farm, has tagged me. The object is favorite foods=memories from childhood.

This is an apropos time as I am with my mother's family in Florida and we have discussed this a lot, how food is memory. In this time of crisis I have found that I put in my mouth what I remember that I like, what works. Rare roast beast sandwiches, onion bagel toasted with cream cheese, Nova and tomato, whipped unsalted butter. And there's another thing-- it's the mysterious food of childhood. The food we're fed before we know where we are geographically, or even before we understand that the food in our mouth depends on the people who put it in there.

I had this experience when I moved to Oakland in 1988. One day I ate these random raviolis from Safeway and my mouth stopped moving suddenly. I called my mother immediately and asked her about them. They were the exact raviolis she fed me in our Berkeley cottage when I was four. But had I never had them again, they may have dropped off my radar.

Childhood Food Memories:

Ice cream cone I will always order: Chocolate mint chip. Although I will say that few companies take the time to pay attention to how this flavour works. Any New Yorker's out there who remember Sedutto's? There's a way that the chocolate has to be in the ice cream. It's important that the two things meld. Strangely enough Baskin Robbins has the right idea---the chips are tiny shavings that melt right away. I could go on for too long about this, so I'll stop here.

Raw Clams. My mother fed me them when I was too young to object. Because I loved and trusted her utterly, and because this was a food she loved and had grown up with and maybe because I loved swimming in the ocean, I loved them too.

Artichokes. They're fun, participatory, silly and the best is really saved for last. With mayonnaise or drawn butter.

Chubs. A small shiny gold skinned fish, head on, open belly side up, smoked white fleshed fish interior. My grandfather Sam fed me this and sometimes I go to Bi Rite, buy two, and eat them alone. It's my quiet time with him, a secret conversation.

Malteds. There was a diner that Nanny (my mother's mother) used to take me to. The joke in my family is that Nanny used to chase me around the green shag carpeted livingroom in Long Island trying to fatten me up with malteds. The good thing is that it's a flavour I still appreciate and have used it a lot in my dessert making.

Candy. I really could have been a research assistant for that book on old school candy. I know the nuances of Sweet Tarts, the trajectory of Bubbleyum, and have the teeth to prove I ate too many green apple Jolly Ranchers. An enterprising young urchin I used to buy 5 & 10c Ice Cubes and Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, and sell them for 10 & 15c in the treeless PS 168 schoolyard.

tag, you're it next:

Lovescool

101 Cookbooks

David Lebovitz

Chez Pim

Cooking Fire

The Cook Next Door, a meme

I have always been a fan of making a "wave" in a sports arena, so it makes sense that I love playing tag and kick the can and having water fights in the summer. I am sorry to say that difficult family circumstances have made my writing a little flat, but here's my go at a meme that has been travelling around the food blogosphere for some time now. One of the funniest series of answers can be found on the scent of green bananas, my secret blog crush. I was tagged this morning by Will of Cooking Fire, a very informative and thoughtfully written blog about the foods and cookery of Mexico.

What is the first memory of baking or cooking on your own?

does making candles count? I made a lot of scrambled eggs in grade school.

Who had the most influence on your cooking?

cliche as it sounds, my mother. as an adult, Laurie Colwin and Jane Grigson.

Do you have a photo of your early foray into the culinary arena?

nope, not that I know of.

Mageiricophobia - do you suffer from any cooking phobia, a dish that makes your palms sweat?

I am frightened of puff pastry, wedding cakes and huge pieces of meat.

What would be your most valued or used kitchen gadgets and/or what was the biggest letdown?

love: red Kitchen-Aid, sharp peelers, my wide orange bowl scraper, and I have a heavy antique small to mid-sized cake pan that is my baby. letdown: nouveau whisks.

Name some funny or weird food combinations/dishes you really like - and probably no one else would.

rare roastbeast on cinnamon raisin bread with mayo and mustard. toast with miracle whip and heirloom tomatoes with salt and pepper.

What are the three eatables or dishes you simply don’t want to live without?

Three?!  shellfish, chocolate, stonefruit (runners up: foie gras, toast, stonefruit)

Your favorite ice-cream?

the ones I make, freshly churned. malt, verbena, butterscotch, chocolate mint.

You will probably never eat?

bugs, worms, eyes, chittlins, (most offal.)

Your own signature dishes?

roast chicken, roasted veggies, hot fudge sauce, egg babies, pot de creme.

Any signs that this passion is going slightly over the edge and may need intervention?

underpaid, overworked, sciatica, spider veins that beat my grandmother's legs, dreaming about desserts, almost unable to read about anything but food.

Any embarrassing eating habits?

you tell me.

Three people to pass it on to:

I think I'm the last one to get it.

who am I, what language do I speak, neighborhood where I live??? ANSWERS!

Thank you all for participating in my first quiz. My good friend Melissa, also a Native New Yorker got most of them right, but since, quizzically, no one attempted to answer all of the questions, here they are:

1. Kasha Knish from Yonah Schimmel's. STILL Speaks Yiddish! An eatery still in it's  original structure on East Houston (we pronounce that HOW- stun).

2. Mulberry Tree. Speaks an ancient language. Lives on Avenue C and third street in a surprisingly lush & breathtaking urban flower and vegatable garden, not to be missed if you visit in the summer.

3. This is where SHOPSON's used to be located. Speaks the language of a forgotten time. Lives in the West Village on Bedford street in a neighborhood shaded with trees and lined with densely packed brick buildings from another time. Shopson's still exists, a few blocks away, but its new quarters are too spacious and clean and airy for me. best described as a practically "underground restaurant", this highly unique and zany establishment has been memorialized in an erergetic messy documentary called "I Like Killing Flies."

4. Cupcake toppings at Magnolia Bakery. Speaks 1940's and Americana at its loveliest. Has it's home on a part of Bleeker street with large slate flagstone sidewalks and cobbled side streets. Hot and crowded inside, I used to go for black tea and coconut layer cake when it first opened.

5. Raspberry Blintz at VESELKA, a 24 hour joint conveniently located across the street from my father and step-mother's house. Speaks Ukrainian, means rainbow. Has taken up the Southeast corner of 9th street and second avenue in "The East Village", {A term created by real  estate agents in the 80's to sell property once part of the Lower East Side} for over 30 years.

6. STEAMERS at Pearl Restaurant. A food I grew up with. Steam clams, dunk them in the liquid that holds the essence of the mollusk, and finish with drawn butter. {I learned clamming with my grandfather on Long Island.} Speaks the drawl of Boston-Cape Cod mixed with salty-mouthed New Yawk-ese. Practically hidden on a tiny stretch of a street between Bleeker and West 4th, Cornelia. Lucky for us all, Pearl used to seat about 20 people and has now expanded into a long room complete with sparse maritime furnishings.

7. Apricot tart from Patisserie Claude. Thick, secretive French softly spoken here. On west 4th street where Christopher criss-crosses 7th avenue and is backed by Gay street. Hands down the best French pastry in NYC, Patisserie Claude will disappear when it's owner does. Old school ways have created a tiny one peopled bakery that quietly turns out perfect, sublime and always on the mark buttery croissants, tarts and eclairs.

who am I? what language do I speak? neighborhood where I live?

Reading left to right, like a zig-zag, this is the first shuna fish lydon  e g g b e a t e r  quiz.

#1. hint: my grandmother used to make a mean version.

#2. hint: warm clothes depend on it.

#3. hint: beloved and missed zany eccentric restaurant.

#4. hint: all the rage.

#5. hint: 24 hour, end of the Rainbow.

#6. hint: ONLY in the NorthEast.

#7. hint in the most unexpected of places. The best in NYC.

NYC, brief but satisfying.

Last year they told me 2 days wasn't enough time for Paris. But I made sure it was. I'm from New York and that means I can walk, and when I can't, subways are my friend. {I especially liked the way I could jump off the moving Metro in Paris.}

I had 4 days in nyc and it was very full indeed. I made it to most of my old loves and let in a few new pretty young thangs. I had some underwhelmed-ments and one or two fantastic surprises.

Coney Island is still going strong. My favorite new addition is "Shoot The Freak" a paintball game with the best barker on a mike. With sarcastic lines stretching out over the boardwalk like, "You don't have to wait in line here to shoot our live human target!" I liked this guy's lines so much I visited three times and shamelessly asked if I could have a photo taken next to him. In New York we say that you can tell who the tourists are because they look up, make eye contact and love pointing. Famous for having a child-like interest and never taking for granted the obvious, I decided to rejoice in intentional silliness of the highest order. I carried my favorite new digital camera in a front pocket, looked at everyone, engaged strangers, asked questions, smiled a lot and pointed. Summer can do that to me. I like being in a place where seasons are looked forward to with excited anticipation.

In a series of posts I will cover the foods and businesses and streets that I ate with all five senses.