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.

How to Eat a Soup Dumpling

STEP 1: WHAT IS A SOUP DUMPLING, AND WHY SHOULD I EAT IT?

Dear Boo,

It's a well known fact that Soup dumplings are one of the world's most perfect foods. Okay, well known by me, at least. Please tell me you've tasted one. If you haven't, let me do my best to describe: a bite sized meatball of pork or pork and crabmeat, seasoned beautifully and swimming in a meaty and rich broth all tied up a thin dough pouch twisted elegantly like a perfect christmas package, and adorned with a spoonful of salty soy-based sauce mingled with ginger slivers like tiny matchsticks. When you bite in, the hot broth, chewy dough, and meaty center explode in your mouth, making for a singularly perfect bite. This is almost unbearable to type as my craving for a soup dumpling is now officially overwhelming.

STEP 2: IDENTIFY THE LOCATION OF SAID SOUP DUMPLINGS.

The Boyfriend and I are lucky enough that a paradise for soup dumplings, Grand Sichuan, is right near us. However, this story of Soup Dumplings doesn't take place at Grand Sichuan. No. It begins at home, after a late Saturday afternoon nap. It was 7pm and the sun was down when I opened my eyes. I reached across the couch to nudge the Boyfriend and said, "Let's go to the Dumpling House." Where this idea came from, I have no idea. But the thought of a cheap dinner in this chinatown hole in the wall seemed like a stroke of dream-induced genius.

STEP 3: ALL ROADS CAN AND SHOULD LEAD TO SOUP DUMPLINGS

Silly me. at 8pm on a Saturday night, the place was PACKED, with a line of people hovering over those lucky enough to snag a table, waiting for them to take their last bite before they swooped in for a seat. We resolved to come back another time. But now I had to have dumplings. "Joe's Shanghai!" I exclaimed. I'd never been, but had heard quite a bit about it and apparently it is THE place to go for....that's right...SOUP DUMPLINGS. By the time the Boyfriend looked up the address on his Blackberry, my craving had reached epic proportions. We set out through the dark Chinatown streets, our mouths watering.

STEP 4: LET NOTHING DETER YOU FROM YOUR QUEST. NEITHER HUNGER, NOR DISORIENTATION, NOR HUMILIATION, NOR LONG LINES.

Between the two of us, we've lived in this city for oh, about 15 years combined. And it's not a large island, this Manhattan. So would you believe me when I said after about four minutes of trying to outsmart the blackberry map, we didn't know which end was up/our ass from our heads/a pigeon from a porcupine? We were LOST. I am not kidding you when I say I saw streets I never knew existed, I walked down entire blocks without seeing one English letter, and asked directions like a tourist. We walked past Chinese banks and barbershops, old men squatting on the sidewalk slurping quart containers of noodles, packs of teenagers flying by on bikes, gray and mottled windows looking down into ground floor kitchens where vats of fish heads sat staring up at an old tv flashing Chinese game shows, and in the midst of it all, an imposing ancient synagogue out of which poked a head with long and shiny peyes, under a tall black hat. I've never felt so lost in my own city. "You wanted to get out of town this weekend," The Boyfriend said. "Well, here we are."

Finally, after much circling and some helpful hand gestures, we spotted Pell Street, leapt for joy and dashed across Bowery (or was it East Broadway?) to Joe's Shanghai. Emboldened by our adventure, I pushed my way through the crowd outside and into the packed restaurant. Instantly, the hostess directed to two empty mismatched chairs at a table for ten. The interior of Joe's Shanghai is set up like a rec room--brightly lit with low paneled ceilings, and crammed with the large circular tables and black chairs you might find in a conference hall. We sat down, sandwiched between a party of 8 who were finishing up their dinner. Before we had even picked up our menus, our no-nonsense waiter asked if we'd like dumplings to start. Duh. We quickly settled on the whole spicy fish (not spicy in the least, it turned out), ordered "crispy" as the waiter suggested, and a sesame pancake to go with our dumplings, and two beers. Soon, in a large bamboo steamer, our dumplings arrived. After our trek through Manhattasia, how sweet it was.

STEP 5: SERIOUSLY, THOUGH. THERE'S A TECHNIQUE.

I've learned, in my extensive soup dumpling eating experience, that there is a right and wrong way to eat these things. The wrong way can result in a ruined shirt, a scalded tongue, and an angry dinner companion. The right way will keep you from looking like a total fool, and maximize your taste explosion. Proceed cautiously. With the tongs they provide, gently transfer a dumpling to your large spoon, taking care not to puncture the skin. Holding the spoon in one hand and your chopsticks in the other, carefully, take a small bite out of the dough near the top of the dumpling. Now is your chance to get some points for style. You can either slurp out some of the soup inside, enjoying the broth and making the whole thing more manageable, or press down on the dumpling so the soup runs out onto the spoon. Blow a little on the opening you've created so the insides don't scald you. If you want to be like the delicate and graceful young woman who was seated next to us halfway through our meal, you can take a spoonful of the soy sauce and pour it in through the opening you made. Or if you're me, and not that coordinated, spoon a small amount over the top of the dumpling. Now, with the chopsticks pinching the dumpling to a manageable size, tip the spoon into your mouth, taking a bite and slurping the sauce and broth into your mouth at once. It should only take two bites to eat the whole thing.

Do NOT by any means, do what the gentleman to my right, on an evening out with his buddies, did to his poor dumpling, stabbing it with both chopsticks so the broth ran out onto his plate, and tearing it into tiny bits and pieces which he ate separately, one by one.

Do NOT do what I managed to do on my last dumpling: get greedy and skip a step, tearing right into the dumpling with your front teeth, causing a geyser of broth to shoot out onto your dinner companions plate.

DO go eat some of these immediately. And if you can help it, get a little lost along the way. Honestly, I think I prefer the dumplings at Grand Sichuan, but the journey to Joe's was more than half the fun.

Love,

The Mouse