I can die now.

Tonight I had dinner at Aldea on 17th street here in Manhattan. Mom is in town and she and I went to dinner with David and her old college roommate Laura, as well as Laura's husband Larry and Larry's sister Joan. We had a truly fabulous meal, which lasted well into the eleven o'clock hour. Wine, scallops, black truffles, octopus a la plancha, bacalao croquettes and so on and so on.... ending with a lovely we-closed-down-the-restaurant chat with the absolutely dreamy chef, Georges Mendes. Oh, and he's extremely talented/qualified too.

However, the crowning moment of the evening happened as we walked toward the Q train down 17th. We passed a group of 3 people standing around talking.... I did a double take. There, before my eyes was;



Yes, Jeffery Steingarten. Out walking his dog! With a very necessary push from David I went up and rudely interrupted the conversation (well, only sort of rude, it seemed like they were finishing up anyway) and just said " I just wanted to say that I LOVE your books and your writing. You have been a big inspiration for me, and because of you, and a very few other writers like you I am getting a masters in Food Studies right now at NYU." So began the BEST 20 MINUTES OF MY LIFE!!!!!!!!! I have been in awe of him for YEARS- his rigor, his natural and authoritative style. At once self-depreciating, and disarmingly honest, Jeffery Steingarten is one of if not THE very best living food writer.

And there we stood, talking about Delmonicos, about the lunch menu at the Harvard Club in the 1930's and how bland and horrible it was, about contemporary food culture, Marion Nestle, the Cooking Channel-- and by gosh, he seemed like he was honestly enjoying himself! Just talking to someone with such an encyclopedic knowledge and such a true love and true devotion to food; to food history, to cooking, to taste. I am inspired.

This was one of those nights. I didn't have to worry about catching the Q train after that-- I absolutely flew home.

Oh, and by the way, that couple I interrupted that were talking to Jeffrey first, and who had been sitting right next to us all night at Aldea? It was just good old Wylie Dufresne and his new bride.

NYC Food Film Festival

There is a revolution going on and it's all about ways of learning, showing, tasting. It makes so much sense, such an obvious thing! If you want to teach or show people something about food, shouldn't there be at least an element of something edible involved in the presentation itself? Enter the NYC Food Film Festival, a (literally) delicious event now in its fourth year, whose very tagline sums up this whole idea: "Taste What You See On The Screen"
It is basically a whole weekend of fun Food and Film events, and as you might guess most of the events have been sold out for months. However, I got SUPER lucky yesterday and scored 4 tickets at the last minute to last nights' event "Edible Adventure #001: Smokes, Ears and Ice Cream". Wowza! First of all, the venue. You watch the movies on a beach right on the East River in Long Island City, literally floating on the water as the sunsets, and the movies play on, the Manhattan skyline lights up before your very eyes. Oh, you think Long Island City doesn't sound so hot? Well, take a look at this place:





I won't waste too much time describing the videos, they're short so check them out for yourself! These were my two favorites:

Smokes & Ears (both of which we ate. I learned I do not like pig ears.)


Obsessives: Soda Pop


I am in the best field in the world. Goodness I love food people. and food movies. and food. And New York.

North Market

For all the time we've spent in Ohio, Mom and I had never really been to Columbus. We always arrived and hit the road towards the middle of the state. This past weekend, we found ourselves with a little extra time. Decidedly a bit the worse for wear, we needed a little lightness, a little time spent nurturing ourselves and each other. So we decided to spend the few hours before we flew our separate ways and poke around the big city a big. A bit of yelp research guided us to North Market, and it was just the thing.



We started our visit at the little coffee stand, a very short americano for me, with crema to rival the best of the best, made clearly with love and heart, and just a touch of barista-snobbery, which you've sort of just got to love, especially when it yields caffine like this.



Mom and I wandered the paradise of good food, heartened by the jovial, milling crowds and local, sustainable ethos that permeated the market. We slowly assembled a lunch, with two Ohio cheeses from Curds and Whey, a lovely little cheese stand manned by a young Ohioan who was way too attractive for his own good. And he fed me cheese samples. Oh my. Next stop was Omega breads, whose focaccia- dotted simply with garlic and rosemary- I found so deliciously addictive. You can watch a video about the baker herself here: http://vimeo.com/5999326. She seems pretty much cool. Lovely.



That tub of green looking things is Leek salad (!) which we picked up along with kielbasa and an ultra-garlicky chicken leg at a Polish food stand, which was also really really tasty. Leek salad is like potato salad, only slices of crunchy, mildly spicy leek instead of potatoes!



Scrumptious as all of this was, never far from our mind as we snacked on cheese and bread was the fact that we knew we HAD to save room for dessert. Arguably the highlight of the entire North Market is Jeni's Ice Creams.



In our initial browse through the Market, we passed the stand and honestly as we read the descriptions it was very difficult not to just go ahead and eat ice cream for lunch! I mean, look at these:








We settled on a modest four scoops: #1 wildberry lavender. #2 was lime cardamom yogurt, juicy with lime and warm with cardamom, this was our hands down favorite. #3 was Thai chile peanut, which, between the peanuts and coconut and chiles was sort of like pad thai ice cream. Scoop #4 was rhubarb rose, which actually tasted like rose wine! All were inspiring and mind blowing- I will be learning to make ice cream this summer, it is decided. Ice cream like this WILL be within my repertoire ASAP because I can't go running to Ohio every time I want ice cream, it just isn't practical.




Mom's expression sums up our experience of Jeni's ice cream.



Nothing a little mother/daughter time can't sooth.

Grandpa Jim

One of my very favorite people on earth passed away today, or, as I'd rather think of it, moved on to other astral planes. My Grandpa Jim was very, very special to me. He was a man in my life who always made me feel like I was going to take over the world. He loved me unconditionally, and I him. He could be cantakerous at times, with a lot of people, but never with me, and even when he was being a bit mischevious ( and thus driving my mom/grandmother/uncle/etc NUTS) I couldn't seem to help but side with him.



(Grandpa, mom, her brother Steve, David in Ohio in 2008)

An example of a bit of mischief (relatively low-grade, as these things go) a quite fancy cloth napkin from the chic restaurant Revolver. He couldn't believe the cost of the food, so I think this was him getting our moneys worth. And really, not a bad idea.


(resourcefulness at its finest.)

Grandpa was big on the video camera when I was little, and he always liked to keep up with technology (like another dashing fellow I know...) which is really lucky for me, because I can now watch videos of my (obviously adorable) 3 year old self, and the crazy hair my mom had in the early 90's, and most importantly, my amazing grandparents, who treated me like an absolute princess and whose presence every summer was a total treat. My Grandpa Jim and Grandma Becky taught me what a beautiful marriage was, and created another one of my favorite people on earth, my Mom.



Also, importantly, Grandpa Jim taught me to love cheese. If I ever have a sandwich shop, the James. O. Walton special would be a THICK slice of cheddar cheese (with more on the side for snacks), a slice of raw sweet onion, piled between two slices of squishy white bread.


(Amish Cheese. We went to Amish country often when I visited, mostly, I now realize, to load up on cheese!)

I got to see Grandpa Jim quite a bit in the last year or so, and I felt proud that my experiences in New York seemed to bring him so much joy. He was my biggest cheerleader and patron, and there was not a doubt in his mind that David and I were going take over the world. When I told him about Davids job at Starbucks, "He'll be running that place in no time" was his immediate and matter of fact response. In one of my recent visits, as I was leaving, Grandpa found the perfect words for our special closeness- one which I always felt was unique, like we just understood each other, and were always on each others team, but had never really found words for. A secret society of two.

As the car pulled up to take my mom and I to the airport, Grandpa took my hand and said simply "Why are you my favorite?". His clear green eyes were earnest and sweet, they winked at me without actually winking, something he did a lot.

I didn't really tell you all the amazing things there are to tell about James O. Walton of Ohio. I feel so lucky that he took the time during his retirement to write his autobiography, and maybe over time I will tell you about parts of it, but for now, I just wanted to write what was on my mind, sort of a toast I guess. This was really more for me than you, blog-ether. I just want the world to know that a wonderful man left us today, but he lived an enviable life, and he will live always in my heart, right at the center. I hope someday I can build a life and family as full and beautiful as his was.



I love you Grandpa Jim. You're my favorite.

i hope you like avocados.

because we sure do. whenever people come over, i like to put something delicious out to snack on.



My reasoning is twofold.
a) it's just what a good hostess does.
b) our friends like to drink. it's a good idea to eat if you're drinking.

mmmmmmm....



My favorite thing to make is guacamole because it is DELICIOUS and everyone loves it, everyone can eat it (vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, etc) and just one avocado makes enough for about 4 people.

All you do is slice up the avocado, squeeze some (I like a healthy dose) of lemon or lime juice (or both) all over the buttery green deliciousness. Dump some salsa on top (go easy, you can always add more at the end. At this stage less is more.)



Now, take your fork, and go bananas! MASH MASH MASH MASH!



Taste, and enjoy! Eat it on chips, celery sticks, or by the spoonful when no one is looking.

Then tell your boyfriend to stop taking pictures of you because it's making you BONKERS and party the night away!

Update!

Well, here is the as-promised update! I have successfully given up carbs of all sorts for (as of tomorrow) an ENTIRE WEEK! I'm pretty proud, and it hasn't really been that hard, if you can believe that.

That said, I am not going to do the whole 2 weeks. I feel like I got what I wanted, which is a resetting of the old bodily workings. I feel good in my body again, dropped a few poundages, and I'm going to continue to avoid the old carb family of foods, but I'm going to allow delicious alcoholic bevvies back into my life. It's going to be hot this weekend, I plan to do some park-sitting/picnicing with pink prosecco, and no goofy diet stuff is going to stop me!

Basically, I feel like this week has re-aligned all my insides, and my relationship with food and eating, therefore it was a great success! It forced mindfulness, which I used to be a master of, but lately had been slacking.

Anyway, enough of this. Less regime, more hedonism!

Confession.

I have gained 8lbs. 10 since my perfect happy place, and 8 since we moved out here. Confirmed today by my trusty new scale.

Ugh. What's a girl to do? Obviously, this cannot be tolerated. So, I thought I'd use you, dear reader, as a sounding board and check-system. I'm no-carbing it(sort of phase one of South Beach), and your job is to keep me honest. I'm not really too worried about it. I like and eat a lot of vegetables anyway, and dessert isn't ever very tempting. Plus, you can still eat good things like CHEESE when low-carbing it up, so that's something. Honestly, and I realize this might ring the alarm bells for some, the hardest thing to give up is drinks.

We don't drink at home much, not regularly anyway, but when we meet friends, it's usually for drinks at the super awesome pub down the street which I love with passion. And though I can still join David and co. there, I will be the weirdo drinking soda water. That's going to be sort of a pain. But small sacrifice for having my body back, and I've been missing it for a few months now.

What's odd is I really don't know how I gained the weight, it just sort of happened. Regardless, I know for a fact that low-carbing it works, and so I am going to stick to it! I'm in CRAZY intense summer classes for the next couple weeks, so its not like I was going to have that much fun anyway...

Well, you didn't really need to know all that, but I thought maybe writing it for all the world to see might make me stick to this for the whole 2 weeks that I hope to. So thanks. I'll still write about fun stuff and food etc. - maybe more than before! Or not...

I considered this regime, but ultimately decided it sounded a little dicey and with this 8lbs and bikini season looming, I couldn't afford to mess around.

AnthBo

I have owned the Les Halles cookbook since the day it came out. Have I ever once cooked something out of it? No.

Until tonight! After a long day of hard reading (Bourdieu anyone? UGH. But sort of in a good, brain-massaging way. Sort of. I digress. Finals, sorry) I came home, mentally exhausted. But my body was restless.

Moments like these are just made for a good cooking project, and as it happened there lurked in my kitchen 3 open, but barely touched, bottles of red wine. Clearly, this called for Boeuf Bourguignon! And not just any would do, oh no! I wanted to slave away for a while, I wanted exhaustion, anticipation, heat, slicing and searing, maillard reactions!

Clearly a job for my love, the guru, the self-effacing stud-muffiniest : Anthony Bourdian and his fabulous Les Halles cookbook. Most of the recipes in this book call for things that I will likely never go buy, like pigs blood. This one, however, is blessedly simple.

2lbs beef (I bought stewing beef, he calls for shoulder)
6 carrots, chopped in 1 inch pieces
4 onions ( I used 3, it was plenty)sliced thinly
1 bouquet garni
salt and pepper
1 cup decent red wine
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons flour

1. Get all your ducks in a row. Get the olive oil heating up, almost smoking.



2. MEAT. People like meat. Put salt and pepper on it.



3. Brown the meat. Don't grey it, get it good and maillard-y.



4. Take all the meat out. Drool at it for a sec.



5. Dump the onions into the meaty residue. Let them cook. 15ish minutes. After 10, add a little flour. This will smell very good.



6. Add the wine to deglaze the pan. Bring it to a boil, and simmer briefly.



Are your carrots and bouquet garni ready yet?



7. Add everything to the pan.



8. Add enough water to cover it all. Bring to a boil and then simmer, stirring occasionally, for at least 2 hours.

9. Serve. He says it's better the next day, so tomorrow night we're going to eat it with baguette and wine and cheese and salad and friends! You should too! Mmmmm.




10. Make like me and have a night of it! Put on some Bruce Springsteen and Bangles goodness, and your favorite cute apron, pour yourself a glass of wine and get cooking! AnthBo would.



Minus the apron maybe.

Cooooooookies!

I am particularly proud of these cookies. I spend a lot of time messing around with recipes trying to make them healthier, and while it's not always a disaster, the results often leave me wishing I'd just left well enough alone. Any doubters just ask David to recount the now infamous Whole Milk Will Probably Work Just As Well As Heavy Cream Carbonara Incident...ahem. Lesson learned.

Well, mostly. When it comes to baked goods, I learned from my mom that lots of times cookies, breads and muffins take well to healthification. This recipe started out as a Martha Stewart Chocolate Chunk Oatmeal Banana Walnut cookie (that's a mouthful). It being Martha, of course, it was chock full of butter and white sugar. With all that otherwise good for you stuff in them, I could just feel the little darlings begging me to tweak them.

First, I always like to replace butter with oil- it usually works just fine and makes the cookies stay moist longer. Easy enough. Then, I decided to substitute honey for the sugar. Actually, I was out of sugar, and had honey, plus, honey is much healthier. But, another neato bonus of using honey is that because it has a more intense sweetness than sugar, you can use less.The recipe originally called for 1 cup of sugar. I got away with 1/2 a cup of honey! Call me crazy, but this stuff really gets me going.

A little googling taught me that to compensate for its liquidity, though, you're supposed to lessen other liquid-y things in recipes when you sub it for sugar. Fingers crossed, I reduced the fat (butter in Martha's case, oil in mine) by half.

And guess what?! It WORKED! These are some killer cookies, if I do say so. Chewy, nutty, wholesome, but super satisfying. And they're not really so bad for you, so you can get away with eating them for breakfast, and cookies for breakfast is never a bad thing.





Martha Miranda Cookies

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole-wheat flour
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup honey
1 egg
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup mashed ripe banana (about 1 large)
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
8 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped into 1/4-inch chunks
1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts (about 2 ounces), toasted

Mix the oil and honey.
Add the egg and vanilla and mix well.
Mash in the banana.
Add the flour, baking soda and salt.
Add the oats, chocolate, and nuts. Stir.
Bake at 375 for about 10 minutes.

....in progress...

Sorry I've been away so long! Grad school is really great except for this thing called finals, which are partially to blame for my prolonged absence. That and doubling the size of our household and befriending famous people, but more on that later when I make a real post (which really is in progress. picture issues, but it's on the way, cross my heart).

But in the meantime I just had to post and let you know that this is really worth your while. What food is really about.