I suppose there are some Polish vegetarians, but not many. The Poles are largely a nation of carnivores and great butcher shops have defined Greenpoint for generations. No Polish butcher shop has been more popular than the West Nassau Meat Market located at 915 Manhattan Avenue, much more popularly known as Kiszka, but about three months ago it shut down without any explanation and no one seems to know much about its closure. The closure of the butcher has been a topic of intense speculation amongst the local Polish community. Continue reading →
Hearty beef & Guinness stew with carrots and mushrooms, over mashed potatoes
My mother is born-and-raised solid country stock from County Westmeath, Ireland. She remembers St. Patrick’s Day celebrations as chiefly religious, with the country going to mass with freshly-picked clovers pinned to buttonholes to honor their patron saint. Then there would be a shared family meal with special-occasion ingredients like beef or lamb, usually presented in roasts or stews.
Regardless of how you choose to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day (or whether you want to avoid all related shenanigans entirely), this traditional Irish dish is straight-forward, nourishing, rich, and perfect for spooning out among any group of friends and family (though with all due respect to my grandmother and her preferred method of just dumping everything in a big pot and leaving it, I’ve added and tweaked some steps to improve texture and flavor).
Hook & Cleaver, a new ‘beefsteak club’ had its official opening last night at 68 Greenpoint Avenue.
The steakhouse-cum-lounge-bar fills the space formerly occupied by Coco which closed its doors in October, just 10 months after opening in January 2014.
Hook & Cleaver is headed up by Chef Diane DiMeo, famed for appearances on TV cooking shows such as ‘The Taste’ and ‘Chopped’. She is partnering up with Brooklyn Meat Club to bring diners top cuts of meat in what she describes as ‘your old typical steakhouse’, where choice cuts of meat will be brought around on trolleys for diners to select. Continue reading →
(sponsored)Brooklyn Meat Club is a neighborhood butcher shop, without the shop. Targeting home chefs, the newest addition to the Brooklyn business scene provides restaurant quality meat at below market prices.
“We work directly with suppliers, plus we cut out almost all of the overhead, so our products are priced to let our customers cook incredible meals 7 days a week,” founder Jorge Viscarra Jr., was quoted as saying. Viscarra has been in the meat supply business for over 15 years, working alongside his father, Jorge Viscarra Sr., the founder of GV Food Service, a thriving family business that has been serving New York for over 25 years.
Brooklyn Meat Club’s website, www.brooklynmeatclub.com, lets customers choose not just the meat they would like, but also how thick they would like their pork and beef cut. The orders are then hand trimmed to insure tenderness. In addition, they carry organic poultry and seasonings, as well as lamb and game. Customers that place their orders by Wednesdays at 4pm can pick them up that Saturday between 12 and 6 at Brooklyn Safehouse (120 Franklin St) in Greenpoint. Fresh, organic Thanksgiving turkeys are available for pick up both Saturday the 22nd and Tuesday the 25th of November.
“We want to provide not just a great product, but also a great experience for our patrons,” said co-founder Shannon Clare. “Everything will be nicely cut, wrapped and boxed for you when you get to the Safehouse. If you want to grab a beer or two, we’ll keep it cool for you until you are ready to head out.”
Clare also developed the line of seasonings, made with organic herbs, for Brooklyn Meat Club. Iníon’s Seasons has 4 different rubs that were made specifically to bring out the flavor of the meats the pair sell. Iníon is Gaelic for daughter, and Izzy’s Herb Rub, one of the spices in the line, is named for Clare’s 1 year old.
The logo for both Iníon’s Seasons and Brooklyn Meat Club, as well as all of the art on the site, were created by Brooklyn artist Nathan Chase. Chase, Viscarra, and Clare are all friends and residents of Greenpoint, making Brooklyn Meat Club a true neighborhood endeavor.
The long-awaited sandwich store offshoot of beloved local butcher The Meat Hook is now open in Williamsburg at 495 Lorimer Street!
Sandwiches are around the $10-$13 mark and include such specialties as Roast Beef with Hash Browns and Crispy Pig Face with Chipotle Mayo, cilantro, jalapeño, and lime.
Gothamist gives us the full down-low on the goods here but it’s worth noting that they’re running a Father’s Day Special of Steak and Bottomless Beer from 4-7pm TODAY!! Continue reading →
Picnic season is here! And, just in the nick of time, brand new store Greenpoint Cheese + Meat (192 Driggs Ave) has flung open its doors to provide us with a dazzling array of treats perfect for enjoying in the park on a lazy summer afternoon.
The store is run by friends and business partners Ursula O’Hara and Jessica Mark and, as the name suggests, they’re focusing mainly on specialist cheeses and cured meats (along with some exceptionally lovely Italian olives). Continue reading →
There’s plenty happening in Greenpoint’s food and drink scene right now. Here’s a few things you should know about:
NOW OPEN: Greenpoint Cheese + Meat Greenpoint Cheese + Meat softly opened their doors last week. We will have full coverage of all their tasty wares soon but in the meantime you should pop in and check out their delicious meats and cheeses for yourself (not to mention the fresh loaves from Bakeri)! The store is at 192 Driggs Ave and is currently open from 12-7pm Tuesday-Sunday (though these times are likely to change in the coming weeks…we will keep you updated). Continue reading →
Spring meditation exercise: Close your eyes. Picture yourself clothed in billowing white linen, ocean waves spanning before you, skin kissed by rays of golden sunlight. One hand holds a frosty piña colada, the other a frivolous periodical. You gently rake your outstretched toes through the warm, white sand. Ahhhhhhh, Key West. Wish you were here, my friends… SMACK! Yeah, I slapped you. Snap out of it! A) You’re still in freezing-cold New York and B) since you’re still in the city, I’m guessing you don’t have time to meditate. But one lucky Greenpointer, Yana Gilbuena, of the Salo Project, has escaped frigid NYC and is in that crazy city of Key West, kicking off her 50 states/50 dinners series tonight! In celebration, she shares with us her recipe for sinuglaw–a spicy ceviche of pork belly, cucumber, fresh tuna, and spices– a dish native to Davao, Philippines. Continue reading →
Blizzard number two this winter season and we had a Greenpointers field day turned mission to check out the new Philly cheesesteak joint called Delilah’s Steaks, literally a narrow triangular outpost on a stretch of McGuinness Blvd deep in Greenpoint.
Technically not on “the other side,” the address is 55 McGuinness Blvd So. at Engert Ave – out there. It had us thinking up ridiculous neighborhood hybrid names, like SoMc? Or NoBQE? Continue reading →
Our friends at the Diamond are getting serious this Saturday (10/26). Serious about roasting a whole pig and letting you eat it.
Are you dreaming of getting back to your carnivorous Homo sapien roots? Find yourself fantasizing about trekking through a lone mountain landscape and wrestling a wild boar to the ground with your bare hands before devouring the meaty fruits of your labor?
If you answered YES, this is probably a good thing to do on Saturday. The best part is that the physical activity portion of the pig cooking is already taken care of (by the professional caterers). Instead of hiking to Bear Mountain and camping out in the cold before realizing you are ill-equipped, both physically and mentally, to kill a live animal and cook it, all you have to do is show up, buy yourself a craft brew, and eat that sweet, roasted pig. There will also be sides, something early man hadn’t even thought of yet.
