Hummus & Garlic Ice Cream
Caught a bit about Max & Mina's Kosher Ice Cream joint in Flushing, Queens (71-26 Main St) on FoodTV. I can't believe i haven't heard more about this place! The owners have created over 800 wacky flavors, like lox, horseradish, beer & nuts, sweet corn and hummus! Scroll down for
Wrapped in Dough's post about a visit there.
Side note: we just realized that Goldberg's Peanut Chews got bought out by the
Just Born company (of Peeps fame). I love those peanut chews so much, so i hope this doesn't mean changes or discontinuation. be was reminiscing about how his grandmother would either bring them each a box, or one box to share when she visited. Peanutty, chewy goodness! I need another box.
Spicy Pickles, Marmosets and Free Rides
Here's a recap of the past few days:
Sunday: i forgot to mention that we each got 2 pickles from the
Just Pickles stand on 33rd St, which we each saved 1 of to eat on top of the Empire State Building. be got 2 sours while i got 2 hot n spicys, very tasty. I would absolutely get them again. I was slightly tempted to ask the pickle man about their infamous "chocolate-covered pickle" but didn't.
Monday:
Bronx Zoo! Compared to other zoos i've visited as a kid, this one is very different. Their focus is on natural habitats and conservation, so everything is very green and lush (as opposed to strange concrete buildings) and there are factual signs everywhere about endangered species, not buying exotic birds and what you can do to help wildlife. We didn't eat anything special, just snacks and iced tea. Afterwards, we spent way too much money at Costco and Stop & Shop to replenish the food store. Most notably i purchased a 1.5 lb block of Gruyere cheese to make Gougeres - oh yeah!
Tuesday: We started our vacation day late since i was at work for a few hours! We checked out the
Guggenheim Museum, where besides some of the permanent collection and a new exhibit on radio and free speech, nothing really stood out.
Afterwards, we took a walk around
Central Park with some pretzels and headed downtown to
Next Door Nobu. Overall, everything was very good but expensive, but we knew we just had to eat there once. be really loved his tuna sashimi salad, where he described their cuts of tuna as much better than the best he'd ever had. He thought the Nobu style ceviche was very, very good but not the best ever. Finally, he enjoyed the maki rolls and rock shrimp dish. Now as for me, let's just say that Next Door Nobu is really for seafood-lovers. My various vegetable tempura were good but not spectacular, the eggplant with miso was good but not worth $8.00/2 pieces and the vegetable roll was tasty but not the best. In addition, the crowd there wasn't our type. The whole restaurant was filled with after-work business suits; i'm sure the weekends draw a celebrity and tourist crowd though. Note you can order 1/2 portions of many items on the menu, so the tab ended up less than expected.
On the way back home, we stopped by Jamba Juice, where i picked up a
Peanut Butter Moo'd smoothie = totally awesome. Like drinking a peanut butter and banana sandwich, without the bread. And cold and smooth. Yum! be was too cold so he didn't get one.
Wednesday: be's friend M bussed into town, so after a quick stop home we tried to get into the Tribeca Film Fest with the special vouchers from Q - no luck. Instead, we did some shopping around downtown and Herald Square. I must also say that there sometimes IS a free ride: as we were waiting for a bus, one of those double-decker tourist buses opened it's doors and the driver asked us where we were headed, offering us a free ride downtown! We rode on the 2nd level with a load of tourists, listened to the guide talk about the neighborhoods and buildings en route, and learned the about the difference between green (regular), red (historical areas), black (pre-Civil War streets) and temporary street signs. Yay for free rides!
Dinner was half price sushi at
East Village Sushi Park, where M really liked the tofu maki (avocado and cucumber inside-out rolls topped with inari (fried tofu) and a sweet sauce) and the tab was less than $35.00/3 people. The place gets some bad reviews but we've always had good service and decent, cheap food there. After CD buying at Virgin Megastore we headed back to Queens and called it a night.
I Could Eat 50
Day 3 of Vacation in New York:
- No Sunday is really complete without starting at
Vegetarian Dim Sum House. We ordered Mashed Taro Treasure Boxes, Rice Flour Rolls with Fake Ham and Cilantro, Monk Dumplings, Fried Bananas and a small Pan Fried Noodles with Mushrooms and Fake Ham. Surprisingly, we didn't have to wait for a table since Chinatown was uncharacteristically quiet. The food was very good and fresh, even the tea was more fragrant than usual. I love this place!
- After our yummy brunch, we headed uptown to
The Rose Center for Earth and Space. I mainly wanted to check out the Hayden Planetarium (where we saw the "Passport to the Universe" show) but i was most impressed with the "Scales of the Universe" exhibit - really ungraspable notions of large and small. The geology exhibits were really interesting, too. Most notable were the beautiful polished slabs of banded iron.
- Since the Planetarium is part of the
American Museum of Natural History, we spent the next few hours checking out exhibits on human evolution, mammals, dinosaurs, extinct animals and primates.
- A snack was much needed after so much walking, so we went to the
Chelsea Market at 9th Ave and 15th St. Some of the food establishments were closed/closing by the time we arrived, but it wasn't too late to follow our noses to
Fat Witch for brownies! The smell of baking chocolate was amazing AND the brownies were great, too! We each got a "Brownie Baby" (walnut and blondie) for $1.10 a pop. I really liked them because they weren't doughy and raw in the middle, yet still moist and chewy.
- Dinner was a cheese fest at
Artisanal. We started with a small order of Gougeres, 8 flaky cheese puffs that were soft on the inside, served in a paper cone. P recommended them and now i wish she told me to order a large cone for each person - i could've easily eaten 50 in no time! At $7.50 for 8 puffs, each a tad smaller than a donut hole, you do the math. We just need to find a cheaper source of Gougeres or learn how to make them ourselves; my new favorite food! Instead of a cheese and fruit plate + main dish, we decided to have the Artisanal Blend fondue. It's nuttier than regular Swiss fondue, super creamy with a smooth texture. We had bread, Granny Smith apples and fingerling potatoes to dip, leaving us full of cheesy goodness. Artisanal serves really good food, but go for lunch since the price difference is significant.
- Our final event of the night was the observatory deck of the
Empire State Building. I've been inside of it countless times for work-related issues but never to the top. Around 8PM the sky was clear so we trudged along with an hour's worth of line ahead of us to the top. Now that i've done it, i don't need to do it again, but it was actually a lot of fun recognizing buildings and seeing Connecticut off in the distance. We got one of those smooshed pennies, too!
Big Day
Day 2 of Vacation in New York:
-
Jacques Torres Chocolate. Our day began with walking around in a gray, almost-drizzle to this cute and cozy shop in Brooklyn. It didn't seem like we were in New York at all! Neither of us have been near the Brooklyn waterfront in ages and were unfamiliar with the neighborhoods under the 2 bridges. Items ordered: double espresso for me, a cappuccino for be and a pain au chocolate (dark chocolate-filled flaky pastry) for each. My espresso was fine, be's cappuccino could've been better* and the pastries were excellent. We unfortunately didn't get any chocolates but i'll check out Chocolate Haven and buy some then.
- Right after the chocolate shop, we headed over to
Grimaldi's pizzeria. Since it was early-lunchtime on a rainy Saturday, there was no infamous line so we got a table near the wall covered in celebrity photos. Grimaldi's is consistently voted "the best pizza in New York" even though their menu is full of NOs: No slices, No delivery, No credit cards. We ordered a plain small pie, which was 6 medium slices. There are a few key things that make their pizza different from your usual place: they use fresh mozzarella with a buttery flavor, they spread the tomato sauce on top of the cheese (not under), you can taste the olive oil in the crust and fresh basil sprigs are added to each slice. Overall i really liked their pizza and i can see why it's voted the best, but my preference is for a crisper crust. Their crust is very thin but it somehow seems thicker, probably since it's not baked crisper in the brick oven. We each managed to eat 2 slices.
- Directly after pizza, it was time for the
Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory. We opted for a more "refreshing" flavor since we had just consumed all the above not even an hour prior: peaches and cream. Since they don't use eggs, the consistency is lighter than your typical gourmet ice cream. The flavor of the cream is so pure, and since it's not overly sweet each bite tastes like drinking out of a little carton of cream. I regret not having some hot fudge, so on a nice sunny day it would be fun to go back since it's right on the water overlooking Manhattan.
- Our first non-food stop was the
Transit Museum. be really enjoyed hopping onto the old trains (me too!) and going through the various turnstiles. We didn't really bother reading all the historical stuff (i read it all once before, a few years ago) so most of our time was spent checking out the old ads and finding secret compartments on wicker chairs from 1904. My main complaint is how you get into the museum - duh! it should totally be a SWIPE from your Metrocard, not handing over $5.00 to the person in the booth, especially since it's in an abandoned station.
- The
Taste of Chinatown was our next stop. We got there around 4pm so we had a chance to check out all the places we wanted to: Vegetarian Dim Sum House (deep fried potato balls), May May Bakery (ginger lemon cider), Buddha Bodai (who RAN OUT of the wonderful "vegetarian snail" aka fried mushrooms), and Ten Ren Tea House (plum tea, pumpkin seed candy and smokey date candy). There were many more people than last year; Mott Street right below Canal was super crowded and Peking Duck House had a line that was about 1.5 blocks long. For about $5.00 you can totally stuff yourself!
- Next was the 5PM "Getting By" tour at the
Lower East Side Tenement Museum. It's a small world - i knew the guide AND another employee of the museum, which gave us some interesting insight into the place. I love things about the history of New York, but i wish the tour was more historical and i also expected to see more.
- Finally, we had a nice dinner at
Pukk - a new vegetarian Thai restaurant in the East Village. The decor is ultra-modern: 360 degrees of tiny white circular tiles, clear yellow chairs, hologram light bulbs and fancy sinks. We started with the Spinach Toast = 6 deep fried won ton wrappers filled with fresh spinach and served with sweet lime chili sauce, very tasty. be ordered the Son in Law Tofu = crusted tofu with tamarind sauce and bok choy, while i tried the fake chicken Pad Thai. We both really liked our dishes; the Pad Thai was very peanutty and slightly sweet, not saucy and a little sour. For drinks we each had the Lychee Thai Iced Tea, which used lychee juice instead of milk, a very interesting, sweet and good taste. Their prices are very low and the portions are good; lunch is only $6.00! I'm definitely going back to try other dishes.
* The best cappuccino we've ever had was at the Honolulu Coffee Co. in the
Ala Moana Shopping Centre in Hawaii. They guy who made be's drink warned him it would be the best - and dude did not lie. The froth was amazingly creamy and had extra-long staying power, and the coffee was strong, rich and fragrant. I usually stay away from such weak drinks as cappuccino, but that one had some serious flavor.
I'll See You on Mott, Pell or Mulberry
Reminder: the
Taste of Chinatown is Saturday, April 23 from 1 - 6 PM! And, while you're in Chinatown be sure to check out the awesome "
Have You Eaten Yet?: The Chinese Restaurant in America" exhibit at the
Museum of Chinese in the Americas. It runs until June, so don't miss it. The collection of old restaurant menus is insane.
Art N Eats
We're off next week but since we never found any good flight+hotel deals, we're having Vacation in New York! It officially started tonight, Friday, so here's what we did:
- Checked out all 5 floors of the
Whitney Museum of American Art. Both of us especially loved the
Tim Hawkinson exhibit - what an artistic genius! Using mainly found objects and ordinary materials, he melded visual art with mathematics, mechanics and sound, while commenting on the notion of the body. I loved the "Signature" piece, "Secret Sync" and the aluminum foil works. Definitely check it out.
- Ate the giant "Chef Special Emperor's Meal with Steamboat" at
Hangawi, a vegan Korean restaurant. It's pricey so we only eat there once every 2 years or so, but it's always delicious. Some people consider it the best vegetarian restaurant in New York. The interior is well designed, really warm and inviting; the service is quick even though your meal is leisurely and you always leave feeling very full but not barfy-full. The prix fixe meal has been slightly different each time i've had it; this time we received:
2 Starters: pumpkin and spinach & corn porridge; ginseng root salad with sesame dressing
3 Appetizers: Gala apple with pumpkin, water chestnut, pine nut and cinnamon filling; deep fried taro cake with tofu sausage and cinnamon sauce; lotus root, eggplant and mushroom with teriyaki sauce; Emperor's Rolls with mustard dipping sauce (fine shreds of assorted vegetables and seaweed, arranged for you to place into little wrappers)
2 Main: Sauteed mushrooms or Burdock Root; Steamboat Soup with jujubes, skinned walnuts and vegetables
Sides: multi-grain rice with red beans on a lotus leaf; kimchee (mild and hot)
Dessert: lemon-flavored tofu pudding with smokey pine nuts
The last time we had a meal at Hangawi, it was some special Valentine's Day prix fixe which included absolutely amazing deep fried, battered mushrooms with a sweet & sour sauce. Since we didn't get it tonight, i'm just going to have to order that for lunch one of these days. Other very noteworthy items i've had there: a yummy persimmon drink with pine nuts, the tofu patties and their japchae (glass noodles with vegetables and sesame seeds), which Q and i agree is the BEST japchae in all of K-town.
be and i realized that both Hangawi and
Vatan have a lot in common: vegetarian Asian restaurants, upscale, prix fixe (although Hangawi also has a regular menu), nice decor, and you take your shoes off to sit at low tables (with cut-outs so you don't have to site cross-legged if you don't want to - although Vatan also has typical tables & chairs).
- Misc notes: Earlier, i picked up a cheddar biscuit from the Union Square Farmers' Market, which was flaky and floury with a great smokey cheddar taste. I don't know the name of the bakery but i'll find out - and keep getting great organic baked goods from them. They also had a Guinness + cheddar biscuit so next time i'll try that one.
My Pyramid
The USDA just released the
new food pyramid. Now there are 6 "food groups," all with ultra-detailed descriptions and suggestions, steps for exercise suggestion and specific, varied pyramids depending on age/sex/activity level. The site isn't loading correctly, so unfortunately i can't check out "My Pyramid Plan." There's even a "
Vegetarian Diets" tips section that doesn't insist on "combining proteins" or loading up on dairy products. It's definitely an improvement on "The Four Food Groups," which was essentially backed by the meat and dairy industry (not that this isn't either, but at least it's advocating a diet with a heavy emphasis on vegetables, fruits and whole grains AND admitting that a vegetarian diet doesn't equate to instant death.)
I Love AB
I finally baked that sweet potato pie using
Alton Brown's recipe - and it's awesome! The toasted pecan and maple syrup topping really make the pie; i don't think i'd like it as much without it. The texture of the pie was firm and creamy, quite the opposite of the loose and runny filling from
attempt #1. Since his recipe called for plain yogurt, each bite had a tinge of tangy sourness which was a nice - you don't want each bite to just be "sweet." Perhaps this is why some reviewers claimed his pie wasn't "sweet enough," but as someone who has 32 sweet teeth (and almost just as many fillings) i found it just right. My only change to his recipe was the addition of about 1.5 T of blackstrap molasses; i only had light brown sugar instead of dark, so i added it to compensate.
Now for the bad news: i had enough filling to make 2 sweet potato pies. The recipe called for a deep dish pie shell but i used 2 regular ones instead, just filling each one a little less than normal. Since our oven is so small, i had to rotate the pies halfway through the bake time. As i was turning the baking sheet a pie slid off, face down onto the floor! I was so pissed, i'm actually still mad about losing that second pie! be exclaimed that if it was HIM that ruined the pie, he'd be dead.
Onto other news, O sent me another link, this time to a site about "
Cooking for Engineers." It looks really informative and reminds me of
Alton Brown. The latest recipe in the Recipe File is for "Baked Cinnamon Apples," which looks tasty. Thinking about Alton Brown-types and baked apples has me drooling for some baked apples i once made. I wrote the recipe down from "Good Eats" (
but here it is online) and i must say it's the best baked apple dish i've ever encountered. The oatmeal streusel is what elevates the recipe to another level.
Maybe it's time to invest in some of AB's books, since here i am raving about 2 of his recipes. Remember, independent bookstore!
Butter, Pepper and Garlic Notes
1) The
Kerrygold Garlic & Herb butter sure is tasty on a toasted baguette! I'm finding that fancy butters are usually not salty enough for my liking. The few times i had fancy butter with sea salt, it's been too salty. I guess i just have a salt problem.
2) The
OXO Grind It pepper grinder that i bought my sister for xmas sucks! When we first tested it out, it took a ton of grinds to produce a decent quantity of pepper. After a few months, it's broken and merely emits pepper dust, no matter how we adjust the grind. It's not jammed, it just sucks! A disappointment, especially since their other products (namely their peeler and can opener) are great.
3)
O sent me a link to
Garlicster, a site about all things garlic! Lots of recipes and interesting tips about garlic. (PS: the 2 heads of garlic i bought at the Union Square Whole Foods suck ass! Upon peeling and chopping, they were dry and staring to sprout. The BEST garlic can be bought in Chinatown off the street vendors, 5 hot juicy garlics for $1.00.)
Discovering the Orient
My mom and sister have been raving about
Wegmans, a new supermarket chain that recently opened in NoVA. This past weekend i bussed down to DC for a day, so i got a chance to check it out for myself.
First off, it's a nice shopping experience. The location we went to was the Fairfax store, but my mom says the Sterling one is even bigger. It reminded me of a cross between Whole Foods, a gourmet market and a typical supermarket: high industrial ceilings, warm colors, free samples, shopping carts, gourmet sections, a hot food bar and tons of checkouts.
The store is split off into sections or "bars," where the bakery is called a "Boulangerie" and the cakes/desserts bar is called a "Patisserie." They offer a ton of gourmet items and even a bulk tea section. Their natural foods section is a few aisles alone. The olive bar rivals any fancy market's, and when we went they had a "Mediterranean Bar" full of different hummuses, baba ganoush and the like.
HOWEVER, a sign over the hot Asian foods bar and the sushi section declared: "Discover the Orient." First off, who still uses this word? Secondly, the sign over the hummus bar didn't say "Discover the Mediterranean!" Third, i'm so sick of corporations using notions of discovery, imperialism, racism and exoticism to sell shit. I suppose someone in marketing thought "Discover the Orient" was a brilliant way to get white people to finally try Asian foods. Yes, playing into their deep-rooted racist thoughts does work! Finally, i'd like to meet someone who hasn't had an egg roll in this country.
They could've easily named it "Asian Bar" to be consistent with the rest of the store BUT i guess they needed different wording to sell chink/gook/curry-eaters/oriental foods. I'm going to write them a letter pointing out their racism - and see what happens.
Airline Meals
I'm totally itching to go somewhere. I get this way every few months. It's not that i don't like being home, but rather that i love long drives, packing my bag, looking at maps, listening to old music, seeing new places and most importantly, not being at work + the same old routine. be's been trying to find a decent online deal. There are so many new places we'd like to explore. It's also fun to re-visit a place, especially if you're excited about re-eating something (of which there are many, many.)
Upon seeing this site, i now want an
airline meal. Getting your little tray is part of the airline fun. Although not known for exemplary cuisine, sometimes i've been surprised - i always have to pre-order a "special meal" since i don't eat meat, and they usually look fresher & tastier than the "chicken or beef meals." Once, i got a hummus & arugula sandwich (surprisingly good) and carrots instead of potato chips (ugh). Pre-9/11, i was lucky enough to get bumped up to business class on a flight to San Francisco, and that shit was awesome! We had drinks and warm mixed nuts to start, then a plate of mango and strawberries, the meal ordered off a menu, and hot cookies and ice cream for dessert. The only bad thing was be's apparent "underagedness," which kept the attendants from offering him alcohol (but he says he didn't want any, anyways).
On British Airways, not only do you get tea in the cutest, transparent blue cup, but the meals were quite tasty. For lunch i got a trio of vegetarian sandwiches, all of which contained different yummy fillings. When we flew Air France, everyone got a mini slice of brie and a baguette. The meals on our transPacific flight to China were mixed; some of them were good while others pretty bad, but that may have been due to 20+ hours on a plane. If you're getting breakfast, lunch AND dinner on the same flight i guess you can't expect too much. But the absolute worst is when you're starving, and you just get soda and pretzels.
Right now, i don't care how the meal is as long as i get one on a flight to somewhere fun!
Three Bits
1) While getting superb customer service at
B&H yesterday, i helped myself to the yummy "Goi Goi" chewy fruity candies on the counter. They were much better than Starburst, not as hard as Sugus and the fruit flavors were really tasty. I tried the grape, pineapple and strawberry ones. If it didn't look so greedy, i would've filled my pockets! I did some research and Goi Goi is from the
Peccin company, seems to be made in Brazil, is sold in many countries and is "kosher." I'm assuming this means it's meat- and dairy- free (no gelatin). I'm totally going to check out the Brazilian markets by my house.
2) The maker of my beloved vegetarian fresh spring rolls,
Viet Nam Banh Mi So #1 on Broome Street, also makes vegetarian and vegan Vietnamese sandwiches! Who knew? On the menu, sandwiches #11 (pickled carrots, cilantro and cucumber), #12 (tofu, mushrooms, clear noodles, carrot and sweet radish) and #13 (vegan chicken with lemongrass) are meat free. The next time i'm downtown, i'm going to pick up some fresh spring rolls, a sandwich and a fresh-squeezed sugarcane juice!
3) I love Cape Cod potato chips but the "Nantucket Spice" flavor wasn't raveworthy. The cracked pepper and sea salt were nice, but the weird powdery, cheezy coating could be done without. The chips weren't as crunchy as the regular ones either, and the main reason i love Cape Cod chips is because of the kettle-cooked crunchiliciousness. The pepper was the only good thing. Is it me, or are CC chips not as good as they used to be? Did they get bought out?
Revised Top 5 Beverages
Happy Birthday to
Dude!
Last night i had dinner with be and
Florence at
Madras in the East Village. It's one of my favorite Indian restaurants; not only is the food really good, but they serve a lot of South Indian dishes, too. For drinks, be and i both ordered the Ginger Lemonade. After a few minutes, we were informed that they only had 1 Ginger Lemonade, that the 2nd glass would take a long time to make.
A long time for Ginger Lemonade? we thought.
How could that possibly be? Before we said anything, the waiter explained that fresh ginger is first ground up, simmered for a long time with sugar, made into a syrup and then finally mixed with lemon juice and water. They only had enough ginger syrup for 1 glass, so i opted for mango juice instead.
After trying some of be's Ginger Lemonade, i realized i made a grand mistake and should've had be get the replacement beverage! It was absolutely delicious - really gingery and refreshing. It beats plain old lemon-lemonade anyday. I'm going to try to make some ginger syrup myself, but meanwhile be sure to check out this great drink.
In other great drinks news: be and i got another carton of apple juice from Japan via his parents! I haven't seen the Takanashi brand of apple juice anywhere in New York. It comes in a "clear" version, which looks like American apple juice, and another version that's opaque and lighter yellow. Both of them are amazingly, salivatingly delicious. I know you must be thinking i'm a nut for raving about apple juice, of all things, but don't question until you get a chance to taste it. It's exactly like the freshest, sweetest apples. The only American brand that comes close is the old skool Elliot's Amazing Apple Juice, when they used to come in brown glass bottles - but even then, both Takanashi brands win hands down.
I must revise the Top 5 Beverages of All Time list:
OLD: Thai iced tea, horchata made with pumpkin seeds, Vitamin Water "Multi-V" old grapefruit flavor (discontinued), Gatorade "Orange Ice" flavor, homemade apple/carrot/ginger juice.
NEW: Thai iced tea, horchata made with pumpkin seeds, Vitamin Water "Multi-V" old grapefruit flavor (discontinued), Ginger Lemonade from Madras, Takanashi brand apple juice.
Taste of Chinatown
On Saturday, April 23rd from 1-6pm, check out the "
Taste of Chinatown!" be and i went last year and it's a lot of fun. Participating establishments set up tables on the sidewalk, and everyone sells appetizer-size portions for $1.00 each. We showed up on the later end and some places had run out of certain dishes, so go early if you want the best stuff. Our most favorite dish was the "vegetarian snail" at Buddha Bodai on Mott Street. It was button mushrooms, battered and deep fried until crisp, and sprinkled with salt. We loved it so much that we waited for the kitchen to bring out another tray of containers, all of which were quickly snatched up.
It's a great way to check out new restaurants and to support businesses in Chinatown.
Dairy Overlord
As many of you know, the Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream parlors have "Free Cone Day" once a year. Some of the branches place jugs for donations to a specific cause, others just pass out free cones. The lines in New York are always insanely long. One year, i was waiting with the 2-block long line in front of the East Village parlor when down came pouring rain. I kid you not, most of the line stood firm, getting pelted with giant cold raindrops while about 5 people ran for cover. I decided i didn't want ice cream that badly, but generally, a free cone is worth waiting for if you don't have anything better to do.
Darian is the king of free ice cream and dairy products in general. It was his goal one year to hit each and every B&J's in Manhattan on free cone day. He had a printout of the list of locations and used his bike as quick transportation. I don't recall if he actually accomplished this feat, but i do recall it was challenging. He made a few pop ins at work and updated us on his progress.
This year, free cone day is
Tuesday, April 19th - so mark your calendars! Plus, not as many people know this, but
Baskin Robbins usually has "Free Scoop Night" the day after B&J's. I haven't found mention of it online, but it won't hurt to check out BR on April 20th. That's two days in a row of free ice cream or sorbet!
Additional news:
April 11-20th is "Dine in Brooklyn"
Restaurant Week. For $19.55, enjoy 3 courses at participating restaurants. Out of the long list, i've only been to Brawta Caribbean Café, Corn Bread Café, Junior's Restaurant and The Park Slope ChipShop; all were good. Now i'm patiently awaiting the Queens Restaurant Week/Taste of Queens!
It's time for Girl Scout Cookies! Check the New York chapter's
site for the "cookie cupboard" schedules. Until April 28th, you can pick up boxes at locations in all 5 boroughs. Each year, i usually organize a huge order with my co-workers and friends. I'm a major fan of: Samoas, Thin Mints and Lemon Coolers.
Fortune Cookies
Whether you like the cookie or not, everyone read the messages! My sister started a practice where each person is given a fortune cookie from someone else at the table, as opposed to picking your own. That way, it sort of seals the belief that fate is given, not self-chosen. Otherwise, it wouldn't be fate!
Not that all fortune cookies hold your fate imprinted on little slips of paper, but when you get an accurate or amazing message, it does seem so. If you ever wondered about who wrote the messages, check out this
article. Apparently there's a 25 year old in San Francisco writing and editing dozens and dozens a week. Thanks,
AAM.
Modelminority has a great article about the
history of fortune cookies. It's an American invention, people! Although the exact inventor is unknown, this
article suspects it was the Chinese miners who built the Western half of the transcontinental railroad. Most people seem to conclude it was either Chinese American David Jung or Japanese American Makoto Hagiwara. The largest manufacturer of fortune cookies in the world is right here in New York: the
Wonton Food Inc, plus an
article about them. They were the first company to print lottery numbers and "learn chinese" on the backs of the fortunes.
All this research on fortune cookies has me drooling for Chinese food. No restaurant that i know of in Chinatown gives out fortune cookies, though. I'm sure the tourists are utterly confused.
Cool Dog
New food-related places abound!
1)
Jamba Juice. After buying my new pair of hot shoes i needed a refreshing beverage. Starting in the late '90s people were raving about Jamba Juice and i didn't have a chance to try it until tonight. There's a new shop on University and 14th St, which didn't have a long ass line so i went for a
Mango A Go-Go smoothie. You can choose a "boost" of vitamins to mix into your drink, so i chose the Energy Boost. My smoothie was very good: the consistency was smooth yet icy, sort of like a creamy perfect Slurpee. It was a little tart and freshly mango. I would definitely go back to try other flavors; the next one i'm getting is the
Peanut Butter Moo'd.
2)
F&B Gudt Food. be and i had plans to watch a movie in Chelsea so we headed there in search of dinner. Neither of us is familiar with the dining options there, so we went to a Barnes and Noble to check out some guidebooks. This isn't touristy, it's smart - no walking around aimlessly! We found a listing for a "European street food" place with many vegetarian options, F&B, on 23rd St and 8th Ave, which happened to be across from the theater. It's mainly a hot dog joint, serving them up with fancy toppings. They offer 6 different vegetarian hot dogs; we both chose the "Prairie Dog" with guacamole, chopped tomato and cheddar cheese. We noticed that the menu board had silly "dog" names for everything while the printed take out menu's names were based on areas of London or countries in Europe...be thinks the names might have changed due to stupid Americans. We really liked the guacamole dog but the frites were lacking. They tasted more like regular french fries instead of real Belgian frites. You don't even get mayonnaise to dip them into! (If you don't know the wonders of real Belgian frites, you must check out Pomme Frites on 2nd Ave and 7th St! My most favorite dipping sauce there is the "especial," ketchup, mayo and chopped raw onion = so good!) I totally thought of O when i saw the "Cool Dog" dessert: vanilla ice cream dog, sweet bun, whipped cream and chocolate.
3)
Brick Oven Pizza 33. Double dinner tonight! be and i went directly across the street, directly after F&B to 33 for a slice each. I chose a regular slice while be opted for fresh mozzarella and basil. Although better than expected, the pizza wasn't raveworthy. The crust was too soft for our liking. Until someplace proves otherwise, the best pizza is always in the boroughs.
4)
Smoothie Mix Skittles. be really wanted to try the new flavors. So did i, so i ate some even though they have gelatin in them. Now that i've had each flavor (peach pear is particularly tasty) i won't eat them again.
Super Ice Cream Pie
Alright, alright i didn't get a chance to bake the sweet potato pie today (hence, no super pie taste off), but i did try the ice cream pie - shit is good! And super easy. If you're interested in making your very own ice cream pie, it goes like this:
be's Super Ice Cream Pie1 cookie pie crust (premade or make your own, i used graham cracker crust)
1.5 quarts slightly softened ice cream (i used Breyer's Reese's Peanut Butter)
2-3 large handfuls of chocolate cookies, coarsely crushed (i used a mix of Newman's Own Alphabet and Addolorata Double Chocolate Biscotti with chocolate chips and almonds)
Optional: chocolate chips/candies/syrup, chopped nuts, whipped cream
Fill the pie crust halfway with a layer of ice cream. Cover with an even layer of the cookie crumbs (they add a great texture to an otherwise smooth pie). Top with another layer of ice cream, smoothing it to the edges and sealing the pie. Decorate with nuts, chips and candies. Cover the pie with plastic wrap and aluminum foil to keep out weird odors and freezerburn; freeze overnight. Serve with chocolate syrup and whipped cream if desired. Note: i made up this recipe in 2 seconds using what i had around; there are countless combinations of crust/cookie/ice cream that would be excellent, although i wouldn't make a pie with sorbet/sherbet since it melts watery.
A True Fortune Cookie
I was just wondering if anyone's
ever won! From AP:
A record 110 players won $500,000 and $100,000 prizes in Wednesday's Powerball drawing, most of whom apparently used the numbers included in a fortune-cookie message. Ordinarily the multistate lottery expects only four tickets to win at the Match 5 prize level. Several winners in a half-dozen states revealed that they got the winning number from a fortune cookie, said Doug Orr, marketing director with the West Des Moines-based Multi-State Lottery Association, which operates Powerball.
Inhaling
Products that smell absolutely delicious:
Coconut Lime Verbena Body Cream from Bath & Body Works
Key Lime Moisture Shave from Kiss My Face
Mango Body Butter from The Body Shop
Oatmeal soap from Sappho Hill
Orange Sherbet 3 in 1 from Philosophy
Papaya Body Butter from The Body Shop
Pieland
In about 16 hours i'm going to be eating two different pies! Oh yeah! I steamed 5 sweet potatoes and chopped & toasted 1 cup of pecans to prep for baking
Alton Brown's sweet potato pie tomorrow. For the second pie, i filled a graham cracker pie crust with
Breyer's Reese's Peanut Butter ice cream, with a layer of crushed
chocolate cookies and double-chocolate biscotti in the middle. Now it's in the freezer chilling; tomorrow i'm getting some whipped cream and chocolate syrup to top it off! I have no idea which pie will be better. It's like a super pie bake-off in here!
I was in a cooking mood so in addition to the pies, i made: roasted beets, sauteed beet tops, ramen (Sapporo Ichiban Miso flavor = pretty good but too salty) and pan-fried dumplings (Wang brand mushroom flavor = excellent).
