Going Dutch

Much to my surprise, The Dutch, Andrew Carmellini's SoHo hotspot, actually had a table for two available around 7 on Sunday night. The man certainly does know how to create a buzz. Wine list: adequately priced. Service: forgettable. Food: delicious, but way too much for what you get. Take, for example, a delicious fried oyster bun, served with mayonnaise and lettuce. Five dollars, and the thing isn't even a little bit shareable. A plate of chicken wings? Nine dollars. For three wings.

But about those wings... They were crispy and delicious and spiked with honey and dill. They reminded me entirely of southern fried chicken and not at all of the Buffalo variety. In a larger serving, I would have happily eaten this chicken for my main meal. But alas. No such option exists.

Peel and eat shrimp were sweet and salty and just barely cooked--I've never had better. A plate of French fries didn't disappoint, either, and a juicy medium-rare pork chop was lathered in smoke and spice and sugar atop a bed of baked butter beans and bacon. Say that sentence twice. It was the kind of chop that impels you to pick the bone up and chew through until everything is gone.

But what I really wanted more than anything--what everyone hails as the holy grail of The Dutch--was the pie. I ordered lemon meringue. The curd was good. The meringue was cloyingly sweet. I liked the addition of poppy seeds, but the crust was anything but fork-tender. Bad batch? I have to believe that the pie itself was not the best example of what the place turns out; if it is, I have serious concerns about critics everywhere.

And then there was the bill. Way high for an incomplete meal. Chef, isn't it still a recession?

*

The Dutch

131 Sullivan Street

New York, NY 10012

212.677.6200

The New Adventures Of Old Cuisine

After an evening run on Thursday, followed by a quick stop at the New York Sports Club, which I often consider my public shower, I found myself in the city with time to kill before meeting a friend downtown. Wandering the wasteland that is midtown at 8 pm on a weeknight, I ruled out the following: bad pizza from one of the many take-out joints on Lexington; a bad sandwich from one of the ubiquitous, lunchy chain restaurants; anything from McDonald's. It was cold and I was hungry and then hungrier when I happened to duck down 45th Street, passing a small Japanese restaurant that advertised ramen on a plastic-covered menu affixed to the window: Menchanko-tei. Ramen seemed the perfect antidote to a cold and hungry midtown night. I found a place at the bar.

Like Ippudo, Menchanko-tei serves a variety of different types of ramen. They have tsukemen, broth made from roasted pork bones, my personal favorite. They also have soy and chicken-based broths, also traditional species of ramen. I ordered a plate of cucumber pickles, briny and salty little disks. I ordered a plentiful bowl of pork bone ramen, toothsome noodles floating in a milky broth and topped with a tea-smoked egg, pickled bamboo and ginger, sesame seeds, scallions, and a rolled slice of cooked pork belly. I was surprised at the soup's quality, noodles just as fresh as the Ippudo version. The broth was sufficiently porky and the restaurant, as a whole, doesn't suffer from the relentless popularity that makes a trip to Ippudo tantamount to waiting in line for Space Mountain.

On that aimless walk that night, I also happened past a place I've been reading a lot about lately, a French import by the name of Le Relais de Venise L'Entrecote. Please don't ask me to pronounce that. It seemed to fit the bill for what I had planned Saturday, an inexpensive meal with my sister. In Paris, throngs of people line up nightly for L'Entrecote's $24 prix fixe menu, which includes a salad dressed with mustard vinaigrette and walnuts, crunchy French bread, an abundant plate of French fries, and a thinly sliced steak. Oh, and the sauce. Don't forget the sauce. The sauce is shipped from Paris and the ingredients remain secret. I could identify lemon and pepper and butter and something darker and earthier, possibly liver. If you ask for a list of ingredients, restaurant workers will not divulge, so don't bother. It would be worth it to come back just for a $24 jar of sauce.

The steak at L'Entrecote, something approximating a hanger steak, comes very thinly sliced and bathed in that sauce. At meal's beginning, a waitress, wearing a French maid uniform (black top, short skirt, tiny white apron) asks you how you like your steak and then writes your answer on the paper tablecloth covering your place setting. After your salad is cleared, the steak and frites arrive, served twice. Until you are ready for your second helping, the steak and potatoes stay nearby, atop small candles on a metal chaffing dish. The dessert menu makes up for the lack of variety posited by the restaurant's set playlist. Given over ten options, we chose three tartlets: cherry, lemon, and chocolate. They were small tarts indeed, buttery and fine and hard to justify sharing. Lemon tasted of a meringue pie filling and cherry was topped with three plump versions of the fruit. At night's end, our bill was so low, I considered staying for an encore.

*

Menchanko-tei

131 East 45th Street

New York, NY 10017

212.986.6805

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Le Relais de Venise L'Entrecote

590 Lexington Avenue

New York, NY 10022

212.758.3989

Where It's Hip To Be... Hip

Williamsburg. Proverbial home of the hipster. If you don't have bangs and a pair of skinny jeans, may I suggest sticking to Park Slope?

I guess somewhere along the line, I, too, became a hipster. Note what my friend C. said as we walked in the door at Rye last night: "See, if you don't have a haircut like that girl [pointing at the waitress with really dark, shoulder-length hair and straight down bangs], or like Genavieve [noting that I also have really dark, shoulder-length hair and slightly overgrown straight down bangs], you'll never fit in here." That comparison scares me a little. Our waitress was dopey to the point of common thievery. Our bill, which arrived after a good long period of our party of five sitting around and staring at empty water glasses, exceeded what we had actually spent by $80.

But nevermind. The food was good. C's mother kept talking about how bare and unclean the walls were. In Williamsburg, that's cool. Maybe I would have minded if the lobster bisque hadn't been so rich and lobstery with a hint of spice at the finish. Maybe I would have been staring at the walls, too, had I not been digging into my endive/apple/bacon/walnut/blue cheese salad. Everything was julienned, turning the salad into a giant, cheesy cole slaw. Maybe I would have felt less satisfied if the meatloaf sandwich--suitable for at least three hungry eaters--hadn't actually tasted like the duck, veal, and pork from which it hailed. Or if the pickles hadn't been perfect. Or if the French fries had arrived late or cold, which they did not.

Beausoleil oysters were clean and fresh and a dozen didn't punish our pocketbooks the way a la carte oysters do in Manhattan. Our teeny tiny quail came with bittersweet radicchio and a precious mold of polenta. The only disappointment came in the form of macaroni and cheese, which is rarely a disappointment. But despite the lardon and the tasty noodles, the cheese sauce was insufficiently creamy, a rookie mistake.

For dessert, we headed to Penny Licks, a half-vegan/half-regular ice-cream shop on Bedford. Considering the fact that they still had over an hour left until close time, they were out of a good number of things, including the "penny lick" size cones and all of the sundaes. I had a half-dairy-half-vegan ice-cream, which amounted to mint chip ice-cream (regular) topped with a scoop of pumpkin pie ice-cream (vegan). I have no idea what is in vegan ice-cream and I prefer to remain in the dark. The baked goods looked promising. I probably should have gone for the red velvet cake instead. My ice-cream was fine, but nothing to write blogs about.

*

Rye

247 S. 1st Street

Brooklyn, NY 11211

718.218.8047

*

Penny Licks

158 Bedford Avenue

Brooklyn, NY 11211

718.384.0158

You Really Do Need The Fifth Napkin

 Burgers are back.  It's probably the economy.  I like burgers well enough, but I don't eat them various often.  (I'd rather eat pizza.)  

Well, hey.  It's important to stay abreast of trends.  I heard good things about Hell's Kitchen's Five Napkin Burger so west it was.  

A few notes: 

1. The menu is insane, and I don't mean that in a good way.  I want to know who's ordering the maki rolls at a burger joint.

2. Really, really, are you serious?  $13.95 for a burger?

3. I've never been a fan of brioche-as-burger-bun.

The fries were thin, salty, passable.  The meat was tasty but a bit mushy and guilty of slipping from the bun.  The cheese completely overwhelmed the burger and it came with no lettuce or tomato, or mayonnaise, a big no-no in my book.  Also, I'm not crazy about caramelized onions on burgers.  I like them raw, for the crunch factor.  

The best part of this overpriced experiment was a side of pickles, the bread and butter kind.  They were sweet, salty, and flanked by onions, coriander, and mustard seeds.  If you're watching your wallet--or your figure--I'd suggest opting for the side over the entree.  

*

Five Napkin Burger

630 9th Avenue

New York, NY 10036

212.757.2277

French Fries

My father says French fries are the perfect food.  Keep in mind that this man also despises eggs, so I'm not sure how much attention you'd want to pay to his culinary declaration, but still.  I'm finding it harder and harder to resist the giant and constantly freshened bowl of French fries that sits on the pass at work.  I like them when they're so hot that they rip the skin off the roof of my mouth.  I like them when they're floppy and fleshy on the inside.  I like them when they're burnt to a crisp.  I even like them when they've been in the pass for a while and are about to be thrown away.  

I just love French fries.  Evil little sticks of heaven.  

Ok.  For a food that possesses virtually no nutritional value, French fries might actually be the perfect food.  They have all the right textures and just enough salt to raise one's blood pressure.  

It's an ongoing battle between me and the silver bowl, and the bowl usually wins.  It's hard enough to pass up the beautiful, crusty Sullivan Street Bakery bread that sits in the basket near the Stumptown coffee station (an indulgence I choose to honor rather than ignore).  It's a real challenge not dipping my hand into any of the plastic bins containing the Belgian dark chocolates that we serve for dessert ("eat all the chocolate you want," my boss says, as if I need another devil on my shoulder).  

I'd be worried if my pants weren't a bit baggy, so I take it one fight at a time.  Yes, the fries are winning, but so is my resolve not to eat white flour or refined sugar, so take that, my lovely little potatoes!

As a social experiment, though, I'd like to point out that every member of the staff at my restaurant fesses up to having gained ten or more pounds since the place opened, attributable in great part to the free fries.  I'm going to have to come up with a better method of self control, because standing in the pass and willing my hand away from the hot fries just isn't working.  

Late Night Menu

I waited too long to eat dinner, relegating me to selection's from the late-night menu.  

I shared bitter ballen and a burger with my co-worker, a feeble attempt to get something in my body without eating too much bad stuff.  Luckily, the hungry staff was quick to attack the French fries.  

Bitter ballen are small, breaded meatballs, pan-fried and served with the Belgian take on dijonaise (whole-grain mustard and mayonnaise).  The burger, supplemented with fatback, arrived on a plain McDonald's bun, adorned with gruyere cheese, pickles, onions, and a fried egg.  Ketchup on the side with steak fries.  You probably couldn't imagine a tastier burger.  

And nothing could be worse than having said burger at one's disposal on a nightly basis.  I feel like I should repent, but I'm Jewish. 

I'm No Harold McGee

But man, do I work hard with what I have.  

On Monday, I walked down to one of the fish markets on 30th Avenue, looking for bay scallops.  The first market I happened upon was selling the baby scallops, for a paltry $5.99/lb.  Yes, you read that right.  I paid a scant $3.00 for my half pound of bays.  

Next door, I hit up the vegetable market, allowing myself to succumb to whatever looked fresh.  That afternoon, it was baby bok choy, tiny yukon gold potatoes, green beans, fresh shitake mushrooms, and one hearty leek.  

At home, I made foil packets and chopped the veggies (minus the green beans, which I steamed separately, and the potatoes, which I boiled until fork-tender) and tossed them with toasted sesame oil, salt, pepper, ground ginger, tamari, olive oil, and rice wine vinegar.  I sliced the cooked potatoes and added them to the mix.  Finally, I seasoned the scallops, divided them between two packets, and added them to the veggies with a healthy pour of sake.  I sealed the pouches and put them in a 400 degree oven for just under 30 minutes.  

Here's the thing: the veggies steamed perfectly and the scallops were cooked through and just short of turning rubbery.  And the veggies tasted good, though I should have added more salt at the start.  But the scallops?  They were terrible.  Inedible.  So fishy that I couldn't understand why I hadn't noticed it before I'd cooked them.  

Bay scallops are generally sweeter than divers, but these reeked of bad and still salt water.  I had to throw the half pound away to salvage the vegetables, which, now lacking protein, didn't provide as satisfying a meal as I'd originally hoped.  

Well.  You can't win them all.  Last night, I opted for foods that were already in my refrigerator.  I mixed ground chicken (leftover from last week's stuffed peppers) with worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper, minced onion, and minced garlic and formed them into two patties.  I cut two russet potatoes, skin-on, into thick fries and tossed them with olive oil, kosher salt, and fresh-ground pepper.  I put the patties and the fries on a baking sheet and in a 400 degree oven and left them for 15 minutes.  In the meantime, I sauteed wide rings of Spanish onion in a little olive oil, allowing them to char on the bottom.  Then, I added ketchup, Frank's hot sauce, and molasses.  Cooks beware: tomato products burn on high heat, but this was what I was looking for, a variation on a barbecue sauce replete with the burnt taste of actual barbecue.  

I flipped the chicken burgers and fries and kept them in another 10 minutes or so, long enough for the juice to run clear from the burgers' center (you can't cook ground chicken to medium-rare; it has to be cooked through).  I ate the burger atop a whole-wheat English muffin with those ketchupy onions and a half-sour pickle. 

I'm not blaming myself for the fiasco that was scallops-gone-bad.  I honestly believe it was quality of product that marked this dish's failure.  Next time, I'll hit up a different fish market.  As for the chicken burgers, I'll keep that fly-by-night recipe for later low-fat use.  

Burger And Beer Nite

When my personal trainer learned of my plans to participate in Burger and Beer Night on the upper west side, the first things she said to me was, "don't eat the French fries."  As if holding back on the fries would in any way mitigate the fat and calories consumed by the burger and beer.  Anyway, she would be proud.  By the time my burger arrived at Community Food and Juice, the hand-cut, skin-on fries were of little concern.  

Even though Community Food and Juice lies smack in Columbia University territory, and even though school is out of session until Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, and even though last night marked one of the coldest of the year, Community was packed.  Like many other restaurants aiming to beat the recession, Community has recently added a burger promotion to their menu: on Thursday nights, from 6-7 pm, you can get a farm-raised burger, fries, and a beer for a paltry $15.  We missed the bargain, which made it easier to consider the rest of the menu.  Comfort foods, from macaroni and cheese to panko-breaded chicken abound.  For the health-conscious, Community offers a selection of rice bowls and veggies.  

But we came for burgers, so burgers it was.  To start, we ordered a flatbread pizza topped with two cheeses and fat slices of duck bacon.  And then... the burgers.  Community serves their patties on glossy, buttered, brioche-like rolls.  Accoutrements include house-made sweet pickles, caramelized onions, white cheddar (which I skipped) and watercress.  I could have used a tomato, but 'tis not the season.  Anyway, the patty is full-flavored enough to enjoy in a minimalist manner.  

In lieu of beer, I enjoyed a bourbon apple cobbler, basically a strong marriage of bourbon and fresh cider, garnished with a slice of green apple.  Community places an emphasis of locally sourced and fresh foods, evidenced by their clever drink list.  Even the cranberry margarita comes with real cranberry juice, a departure from the burgundy stuff to which we've grown accustomed.  

For dessert, we sampled both the chocolate and butterscotch puddings, as well as the warm cookie plate.  Butterscotch pudding was tasty but watery and unset.  The dish's best feature was its accompanying toffee chips.  Chocolate pudding, on the other hand, was firm, rich, dark, and garnished with chocolate whipped cream and shaved chocolate.  We made a parfait from the remains.  Chocolate chip cookies were better than Toll House, served three to a plate, still warm. My trainer would be proud to hear that I was too full to do much damage; I didn't even finish dessert.

*

Community Food and Juice

2893 Broadway

New York, NY 10025

212.665.2800