Spaghetti and Mama’s Meatballs. Photo by Molly Tavoletti.
Echoes of the Cozy Royale catering hall can still be heard in the warm dining room in the back of the bar at Humboldt & Jackson (434 Humboldt Street). The Royale’s former owner, Joanne Perrotta, had turned down many other offers when she was looking to retire. For years, families and neighbors gathered for dinners there, and Perrotta wished to pass on that sense of community along with the space. Perrotta cared more about who was going to take the place over rather than what it was going to be.
The first time I set foot in Humboldt & Jackson was the very day it opened. I followed the renovation of the Cozy Royale into this place, a newly-titled “American Tasting Room,” step-by-step on my daily walk to the Graham Avenue L train and was thrilled to have a prospective place to call my own—my Cheers, if you will. I would cement my status by getting in right at the beginning. Over the three years since their opening I realized that the feeling of ownership and comfort that I felt is exactly what Bill Reed, the bar’s charismatic owner, wants for all his guests.Continue reading →
Baste it, taste it and tweak it again. Showdown is a cookbook about feeding the conversation along with the person.
This week, we sat down with Greenpointer and self-described “meat-head” Jenn de la Vega to talk about how competing (and winning) local competitions sparked Showdown, the cookbook.
GP: Hey Jenn! Tell us about Showdown.
De la Vega: Showdown is a compilation of 100 recipes I’ve entered into competitions. It’s not only about the ones that won. I think the big part of the story is the failure and journey along the way, building a strange cooking career out of competition, creativity and personal challenges.
GP: Did you always want to be a chef?
Jenn breaks out into a big grin. De la Vega: Actually, I never had intentions of being a chef.Continue reading →
Ok, so the headline is a bit of a misdirect. A few years ago on a trip to Barcelona, after stuffing myself silly with salty cheeses, meats, olives and wine for a week I actually did split my pants—and with a sweatshirt tied around my waist, I had to make an emergency run to H&M to appropriately clothe myself. So before I headed to Humboldt & Jackson’s Black Tap takeover on Saturday it actually crossed my mind that all the calories might cause another trouser explosion—but thankfully my will, and my pants, held strong.
Humboldt & Jackson during the Black Tap Popup
Humboldt and Jackson (434 Humboldt Street) has been delighting the neighborhood with popup chefs and restaurants since they opened their doors three years ago—so if you’re a foodie you can get in the know and impress your friends by following their Instagram, which is where they announce all their events. And on this occasion, they teamed up with Black Tap. In case you’ve been living under a pile of fancy foodstuffs (or you’re not a millenial), the restaurant is famous for their epic and Instagram-worthy #crazyshakes boasting lines that can get up to six hours long. It’s a next level burger and shake joint and on many tourists’ Manhattan-must-do lists. Continue reading →
This Saturday (4/8), Videology (308 Bedford Ave.) will be screening the film BUGS, along with a Q&A session with the film’s protagonist and the film’s director. The event starts at 11am, with the film beginning promptly at 11:15am and running for 75 minutes. Your ticket includes a welcome drink, a packet of edible crickets from Aketta, and a pipette tasting of grasshopper and bee larvae garums.
Sunday, March 26th, 7:30-10:30pm
Clara Cakes CookBook Pop-Up Adelina’s | 159 Greenpoint Ave.
19-year old LA chef Clara Polito will be in Greenpoint today to celebrate her new vegan dessert book. She’ll be serving up some of her amazing vegan cannoli & cakes and a pizza special at Adelina’s (159 Greenpoint Ave.) tonight from 7:30pm-10:30, . No tickets required, just show up hungry!
Sunday in Brooklyn’s Grain Bowl $12, Charred Avocado Toast $9, Spicy Roast beef Sandwich $12 Photo by Graham E. Burns
Sundays normally bring brunch to mind for any New Yorker. Sunday in Brooklyn (348 Wythe Ave.) is much more than that. Open daily for brunch, lunch and dinner this tri-level restaurant is like a fashion house of food. At “Sunday” there is creative use of fresh ingredients—even the scraps are utilized in new dishes, drinks and marketplace items. The restaurant opened for dinner in November, rolled out brunch shortly after and opened the marketplace in December. So yes, something good did happen in 2016. The marketplace features a takeout menu and pantry items to make any home chef take their game up a notch. Chef Jaime Young is passionate about sustainability at Sunday: “The marketplace gives us the opportunity to utilize everything that we’re buying…it kind goes with our whole ethos of trying to utilize as much as we can in this restaurant.”
This Friday, December 16 at 7 pm, at Archestratus Food and Books (160 Huron Street), Ankur Parikh will be creating five vegetarian courses plus a cocktail celebrating and highlighting ingredients classically described as “bitter.” The dinner will explore the bitter part of our palate through items ranging from coffee to fenugreek to bitter melon to dark chocolate, and more.
The cost is $60 for the whole menu and all of the proceeds will be donated directly to an organization called The Young Center. They are a small but special organization doing important work with the most vulnerable of the many thousands of undocumented immigrants in this country—children. The Young Center serves as expert advocates in a relatively specialized line of work that many are just learning about now, in light of our recent political climate.
Get tickets for the dinner here, and check out the Facebook event and menu here.
Spice master Chef Lior Lev Sercarz gave a zestful talk about his life, career, the art of flavor, and his new book The Spice Companion at Williamsburg’s Museum of Food & Drink (62 Bayard Street) this past Thursday night. Lior was an engaging speaker, and it’s obvious that when he’s talking about spices, he’s speaking directly from his heart.
He asked the audience how many times we’d actually tasted the spices in our cupboards, by themselves. I cook a lot, but I’ve probably never shoveled a lone spoonful of paprika into my mouth. Lior’s point: these are ingredients we’re putting into our cooking every day, so why aren’t we tasting them? Why aren’t we smelling them? We should be giving ourselves a sensory vocabulary of spices so that we know how to use them as creative culinary tools. He passed a few spices around to the audience for us to taste and smell—turmeric, cayenne, ancho chile powder, ginger, cinnamon, cocoa powder. I noticed that when confronted with the spice itself, it allowed me to really get to know the depth of its personality, while imagining where I could go with it in a way that just wouldn’t happen if I muddled it into a recipe. Continue reading →
Fall cabbage, beets, and a handful of sugarloaf just because…plus arugula, mustard mix, and salad turnips under that white cover (via @lineagefarm Instagram)
When you are a member of a local CSA (Community Supported Agriculture), it’s easier than ever to eat local. It’s healthy, supports the local economy, and reduces your carbon footprint. There are a few CSAs around Greenpoint, including this one from Lineage Farm in upstate New York. They offer pickups at the Greenpoint Reformed Church (136 Milton Street) on Saturdays from June through November. And December may seem a little early to start thinking about next summer’s groceries, but for most CSAs the earlier you sign up, the cheaper it is. Lineage Farm is offering $20 off if you sign up by December 15th. Not to mention, early signups help keep the farms running.
Lineage Farm is located in the Hudson Valley, which is a little over 100 miles from Brooklyn. If you’re a current member, you’ve likely met Jon Ronsani who mans the CSA pickup every Saturday, sometimes with his dad Carmine. They’ve been making the trip to Greenpoint the last six seasons to deliver the CSA Shares.
Jen Ronsani, one of the Lineage farmers, says: “It is quite amazing to think that a small farm two and a half hours upstate can find its niche in Greenpoint. We would not be doing this if it were not for the support of the community, both of the CSA members and the Greenpoint Reformed Church, who has let us set up in their backyard for the past five seasons. We love growing food. The CSA allows us to do something we love and share it with people in different communities.” Continue reading →
Meyers Bageri’s (667 Driggs Avenue) first stateside bakery began as a Saturday pop-up, in the space they now occupy full-time—the former home of Margo Patisserie. Back in February, word began to spread of Saturday’s pop-up and the lines quickly followed. In late July, Meyers Bageri took over the space completely and has subsequently been introducing North Brooklyn to Claus Meyer’s brand of New Nordic Cuisine. Continue reading →
