The Great Outdoors

Dear Boo,

It's a well known fact that anything cooked or eaten out of doors tastes better. I'm not sure if it's the fresh air or the warm sun or the subconscious connection to our primitive roots, but whatever it is, it works.
I like to say that our family's two favorite things to talk about are food (what we're eating now and what we plan to eat next), and the quickest or shortest way to get from point A to point B. Both of these conversation points are really at a premium when you're spending any time in the Hamptons. Last weekend, we were lucky enough to get some uninterrupted time with our aunt and uncle and cousins in the relatively unspoiled splendor of East Hampton's back woods. The weather held out, the Mets won (mostly), and HO boy did we eat well.

We were greeted with cheeses, crudites and the all-american onion dip while the game played in the background and we sipped some prosecco. The grill was fired up and we bundled into our sweatshirts (it's always colder in the country, isn't it?), determined to chow down outside. Our cousin had made it clear that being the first bbq of the season, we required hamburgers and hot dogs, and I couldn't agree more. The burgers were juicy and perfect, the hot dogs charred with that satisfying snap, and the only vegetables present were covered in mayonnaise.
For dessert, s'mores on the grill and oh yeah--the aunt had a batch of cookie dough ready to go in the fridge. I stood in the kitchen and professed that I couldn't possibly eat another bite. By the time the warm cookies made it to the livingroom, I had already polished off a half.

We slept well that night. After weeks of running around, I was ready for bed by 10 and slept like a log. When I woke up the house was quiet except for our aunt, padding around in the kitchen, baking--BAKING, I TELL YOU--a black raspberry coffee cake for our breakfast. I should have known then what we were in for. Note from the Boo: It had CHOCOLATE in it, yo.

In an attempt to get food off of our minds for FIVE MINUTES, we piled into the car and headed out to the beach. It was lovely, wasn't it--lying under the blue skies, watching (but going nowhere near) the surf, smelling the salt and noodling our toes around in the hot sand? The beach was mostly empty for probably one of the last days of the impending summer before the masses descend in their marc jacobs sunglasses, malia mills bikinis, packing shrimp salad from the barefoot contessa...

There's something about the beach air that even if you've had eggs and toast and cheese and jam and coffeecake a few short hours before, makes you hungry. We had planned to hold out until dinner but after an hour on the sand our stomachs were grumbling and we just had to stop at the deli where they make the best italian hoagies this side of...wherever italian hoagies were born. We cut them up into little bite sized pieces (since everyone knows that releases the calories into the air) and nibbled out on the deck. Let me say that whoever thought to put artichokes on a roast beef sandwich is a genius and I'd like to shake his hand.
And then it was time to start dinner.
Ribs from Esposito's, perfectly done spice-rubbed chicken, all made by our uncle the Pit Master, salad with vinaigrette, roasted potatoes, and garlic bread. Oh, and one of the best blueberry crisps ever. Don't you agree?
After bagels and lox the next morning ('neath the sun, naturally), the Aunt announced we had to do SOME kind of activity lest we spend the entire weekend lying on the floor, groaning 'pass me just one more of those ribs'. So off we set to take a nature walk on a trail next to the duck pond we used to go to all the time when we were little. It took about fifteen seconds of watching the overfed birds paddle around before conversation turned to duck. As in--"How hard do you think it would be to catch that fat one over there?" and "I bet grilled duck would be good." "Peking duck is still my favorite." "I have this great recipe for duck with port sauce and sour cherries," "How about fried baby duckling? Nice and crispy...." It's an illness, Boo. And we have clearly inherited it.

Home we went to start the pizza process.

I don't want to go into too much detail since I think this deserves it's own entry in the near future, but suffice it to say that our cousin D, an honorary Italian after all the years he's spent living there, initiated a 24 hour process of dough-making and then grilling and topping like you wouldn't believe. Or you would, since you witnessed it.
There was mixing, and resting, and rising, then kneading (it's all in the wrist):
then this, to create air pockets:
Then the window pane test, to make sure the glutens have developed and the dough is elastic enough:
Then the grill was fired up and the tastebuds began to salivate. Unfortunately, we were aiming for 600 degrees but the grill refused to go above about 450. The oven might have been faster, but, as I mentioned, there's just something about cooking and eating outside, that we were willing to wait, wafting the charcoal scent, watching the sun make it's lazy arc, listening to the dog barking and the birds rustling in the trees.



A bowl of addictive corn salad, two focaccias with speck and arugula, 10--count em, TEN-- margherita pizzas with charred crispy crusts and creamy mozzarella, and a fluffy coconut cake later, fat-bellied and well-fed, we reluctantly packed up and headed for the train.

A beautiful weekend of good food, great family, fresh salt air, and precious sun. There really is nothing like it. I always laugh when I see New Yorkers, desperate for a little outdoor space, squeeze into tables under scaffolding, just feet away from idling cars and construction sites, eating their dinners. But you can't blame them for trying. Spring air makes jokes funnier, stories more exciting, your date better looking, and food, well, just BETTER.

Love,

The Mouse

Memorial Day Blueberry Crisp
(adapted from Martha Stewart by our gorgeous Aunt)

For the filling:

6 cups (3 pints) blueberries

1/2 cup sugar

1.5 tablespoon cornstarch

1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

1/4 teaspoon coarse salt

For the topping:
(This recipe yields 3 cups, enough for 2 crisps. Good to have extra on hand to turn any fruit into a crisp.)

1-1/4 cups flour

6 Tablespoons brown sugar

2 Tablespoons sugar

1/4 teaspoons salt

2/3 cup ground pecans

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

12 Tablespoons chilled butter

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375°. Make the filling: Mix blueberries, sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice, and salt in a bowl. Transfer to an 8-inch square baking dish.

Make the topping: Stir together flour, sugars, salt, cinnamon and pecans in a mixing bowl. Cut butter into small pieces and work into flour mixture with fingers, until crumbly.

Sprinkle topping evenly over filling. Bake until bubbling in center and brown on top, about 1 hour. Transfer to a wire rack, and let cool for 30 minutes before serving.

NOTE: If your brown sugar is hard as a rock, don't throw it out! Put in a bowl and lay a damp paper towel over the sugar. Cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and leave overnight. It'll soften up perfectly.

I Eat 14th Street

Dear Boo,

I know I said the next time I wrote I'd include a recipe, because it's been a while. I know, I know. It's not for lack of cooking, it's just that everything I've made recently has been either a standard go-to that you already know, or something I need another couple of goes at to perfect before sharing it. There will be plenty of recipes coming up for passover and easter (we're so multi-faith!), but before all that I just had to share the craziness that was my dinner this evening.

On my way to tutor today, I was walking down 14th Street between Union Square and 1st Avenue. Usually I avoid this street because, well, it's kind of gross, but today I just decided to go through the thick of it. As I walked down this one stretch between 1st and 3rd, something hit me.

14th Street is YUMMY.

There's Chickpea, which I've always wanted to try, although really do I need another falafel place after Taim and Maoz? There's Bite, which I have a special fondness for as the original opened right outside The Culture Project when I worked there and Ami was such a cool guy and the curried tuna salad was so awesome and the bread was so crusty and the black bean soup was so spicy you'd lose your ability to form consonants for about an hour, and they'd even make me a special salad if I asked. Oh and sometimes, the Boyfriend before he was the Boyfriend would meet me there on a sunny day and I'd run down from my office for a quick lemonade. sigh. And there's Beauty Bar, which I know is so 1998 but where you can get a decent manicure and a solid drink for $10, and Crocodile Lounge--sibling to Alligator in Williamsburg, where a free pizza comes with any drink you order, And Friendhouse where we'd order the sushi lunch specials for delivery down at the theater, and Artichoke Pizza, which I've always wanted to try but where the line always deters me especially after I heard our friend K-Fenn's theory that they move slowly on purpose to keep a crowd outside, and there's Curly's Vegetarian Lunch that I want to try simply for the name and the cute yellow interior, and there's Thai me Up, where they make amazing Thai/french sandwiches to order, and, I realized with a gasp, as I tripped down the street, Vanessa's Dumpling's, the same dumpling house as down in chinatown, advertising a "$1.29 recession special."

By the time I finished tutoring around 8:30, I was Hungry. So hungry that I actually let my tutee feed me a forkful of her roommate's specialty--angelhair with parmesan and ketchup. OMG. I decided I'd grab something on my way home and maybe something for the Boyfriend in case he hadn't eaten yet. My plan was to go to Vanessa's, once I realized it was the same as the dumpling mecca down in chinatown, but on my way to Vanessa's I passed Thai Me Up, where through the window I could see big black woks at work stirfrying the filling for their delicious sandwiches. I'd been once before, a couple of years ago, and vowed to come back and oh I'm so sorry Thai Me Up, never returned! Horrors. I had to go in. I ordered a sandwich with chicken and their white ginger sauce (coconut milk, ginger, and lemongrass). Apparently I ordered well since the gentleman behind the counter (quite a tasty dish himself, if I do say so) urged the next two guys after me to follow suit. A live Roots album played as I watched them stirfry my chicken and veggies (corn, cabbage, peppers), add the curry sauce, and then slap it onto a toasted baguette (hollowed out to fit more filling) with mayo, lettuce and tomato. It took a while, since everything is made to order, and there seemed to be a teeny bit of confusion behind the counter (turns out Mr. Tasty Dish is also Mr. Restaurant Owner Assface who waves meal tickets in his employees faces like they're handicapped, though from my personal experience working in food service, I'm pretty sure all restaurant owner/managers are similarly problematic), but everything looked so delicious and fresh and smelled so good, I could hardly care.

(nice nails, Barbie.)

Okay, I should have stopped there. Did I not recognize from the giant bag I had, just how enormous this sandwich was? Was I so far gone that I couldn't tell that at least 30 minutes had passed since I first left my tutoring? Whatever it was, I did not head home. Instead, I went a few doors down and turned into Vanessa's Dumpling House.

Okay, so the logo is the same. And the name. And probably the dumplings are all made in the crazy windowed room in the Chinatown location where you can see people folding and pinching, folding and pinching. But the similarities sort of end there. First of all, the sesame pancake sandwich looks totally different--round and overstuffed like a hamburger bun, and they don't even have duck on the menu. Second, this Dumpling House has sushi--why? And third of all, you know how in the original dumpling house, everything costs like ONE DOLLAR? Well here's everything's like 5 times that much (The $1.29 special was for a single steamed bun). Did this stop me from ordering 8 piece pork and chive dumplings and 8 piece vegetable and then throwing in a sesame pancake sandwich with roast pork? Nope. I sat and waited, wafting the smell of my quickly cooling thai sandwich in my bag. And I waited. And waited. And began to realize just how crazy I was. My stomach hurt. I was past hunger. I have a to-do list about the length of 14th Street that I could have been taking care of. But instead I was sitting there, under the harsh lighting, waiting for my second dinner. Finally it was packaged up, and I was on my way. The people on the bus must have thought I was having a party.

Well, as of this writing I've made it through 4 pork dumplings (not exactly the same as downtown, but really tasty nonetheless), 2 vegetable (why waste your time when you have perfectly delicious pork right there), and half the thai sandwich (SO good: a touch spicy, creamy, cool and crunchy with the lettuce and cabbage, sweet from the sauce and the corn, and (presumably) crusty from the bread which sadly, did not travel as well. Moral of the story, don't wait too long to eat this delicacy. Why torture yourself delaying the gratification anyway?).

I'm full.
Please excuse the sesame pancake sandwich on the left. It was too fat to fit in the picture.

Love,

The Mouse

P.S. Am I obsessed with dumplings? Probably.

Michael Phelps Could Eat You For Breakfast

Dear Boo,

I had heard tales of the 12,000 calories Michael Phelps consumes per day but it really is hard to fathom without seeing it all laid out in front of you. Watch this video of a UK journalist from the Guardian attempting to go bite for bite. One tip for you, sir, it might be easier going down if you SWAM EIGHT HOURS A DAY. Just a thought.

Someone give this guy a sandwich. He looks hungry.

xo, The Mouse