It is officially Spring – well I think it is Spring and it is warmer now and I didn’t wear a hat today, so it must be. Must be time for ice cream. I have tempted the Spring fates by eating it in March, but hope I’ll be forgiven. NW3 had pretty good ice cream places, one in Hampstead was in the old butchers, but you’d never guess; Gelato Mio in St Johns Wood and Holland Park, to name two, was good, bit too creamy for me, but fine after a wander through the park. But here in NYC ice cream is an art. We have a really good place called Emack and Bolio nearby. It is small and funky inside with the wackiest named ice cream with Deep Purple Chip (black raspberry with white and dark chocolate chips) and Caramel Moose Prints (caramel with mini peanut butter cups) giving you enough calories to take up your entire daily allowance in one sugar cone. We ventured to Greenwich Village last week and found Cones. My, my that was good. They open until midnight! Impressive. They serve ice cream laced with Johnny Walker whiskey which led R to remark “Yeah, it’s ok, once it’s numbed your mouth”. Not sure that’s really a recommendation. And the search will go on.
Category Archives: Food
New York’s gone Irish mad
It’s St Patrick’s Day tomorrow, but New York is in full Irish mode today as the St Patrick’s Day Parade is underway. Unfortunately it has just started snowing here, but I doubt that will stop any of the enjoyment and excessive Guinness drinking. I saw people going into Irish bars early this morning, bedecked with green clovers and flags. Even in Fairways they are in the same spirit with these rather fetching cup cakes!
A note to Mr Sainsbury
So I noted the obsession with cleanliness that seems to exist here in NYC. It has just gone one step further. Presenting wipes for your supermarket trolley (that would be ‘cart’ in the US). The photo below was taken in Target, a massive retailer of food, clothing and home stuff across the US. In one section you pull out your wipe, use on your trolley and then bin it in the hole next to it. What a brilliant idea. No more wet trollies to plonk your toddler into; no more disgusting gloop on the handlebars for your oral 15 month old to gnaw and slobber over. Sainsbury’s take note.
Tea talisman
I don’t drink coffee. In fact I have said on this blog before that I love tea. Big time. But I don’t feel the need to walk the streets holding a cup of it all the time. I like it at home, in a mug, sometimes with a biscuit. Nothing fancy. But here, my goodness holding a styrofoam or some other kind of cup, it’s like a fashion accessory. I was in the 42nd Street area earlier today, this is the busy bit around Grand Central Station, and I think that pretty much every person I went by was clutching a cup from all manner of places, slurping or just holding it like a talisman. It’s encouraged: the small silver coloured carts sit on most street corners dispensing drinks for a bit over a dollar and a range of artery hardening sugary snacks to boost the energy levels. They are cheap. Very cheap. But gone by midday to be replaced by the hot food vendors: caveat emptor, that’s all I can say about that. So off I go to my 10am appointment and I am strangely driven to go into one of the many food places that will make the enormous bagels (blogs passim), get a cup of tea, English Breakfast, black, and clutch it hoping some of the magic will rub off on me too.
Jazz it up
Introducing the salt and sugar combo of Jazz It Up Mix from my local Fairway. I’m thinking birthday bacon all over again. It is strangely salty and yet sweet. It contains chocolate, raisins, some form of pretzel, peanuts and cranberries. So far, so normal. Silicon dioxide, bulgar wheat and turmeric a bit odd. But salt beef powder – what??? Really, what benefit does it have to include salt beef powder in a tasty snack? Doesn’t stop me eating them but my god I am very thirsty afterwards, they can’t be good for me. Pass the water, would you?
Bounty hunters
And can someone please tell me why New Yorkers are so obsessed with Bounty kitchen towel? Every time I walk down First Avenue there are the poor Fresh Direct delivery guys wheeling huge trolleys with massive multi packs of Bounty kitchen towel perched on top. When I am in Fairways, practically every trolley (except mine, of course) has a 6 or 9 or even 12 pack of them. I don’t get it.
Can you tell what it is?
Obviously it’s a drink, but what kind of drink? What is that mysterious substance at the bottom of the glass? Any ideas?
Answer below:
Answer. It’s a lychee flavoured milk bubble green tea. The stuff at the bottom is tapioca. It’s huge and chewy and a bit like frog spawn. You need a really fat straw just to drink it. Quite nice really.
A tasty treat for your special day?
Presenting Birthday Bacon! And for that extra special birthday some Chocolate Bacon with Bacon!
A hierarchy of gourmet
Gourmet must be the most overused word in New York. The corner shops selling everything claim to be gourmet, the pizza joints do the same. But there really is a hierarchy of food here. It starts with the independent deli, ubiquitous and fairly generic, selling sandwiches, bagels etc. Then there are the supermarkets, starting with Gristedes, which has been around since 1888 and here is open 24 hours, great for a quick in and out to get odds and sods. D’Agostino around since 1932 is ok, but a bit over priced. Morton Williams, founded in 1946, is similar but so tightly packed with goods it is a real challenge with a buggy, especially on Tuesdays when seniors get their ten per cent discount. My regular haunt is Fairways, huge, with great fresh produce and big on organic. The Food Emporium is similar, but I rarely go in as it is hidden by the horror of the Second Avenue subway construction works. I did go to Trader Joe’s once, out of my way, but as so many people had raved about it I went and had a look. I didn’t think it was anything special, especially the queues, so long they have someone specifically to indicate the end of the queue with a white paddle saying ‘end of the line’.
Then you change to the fancy specialist supermarkets cum deli shops. This is where the true meaning of gourmet comes to life. There’s Eli’s and its West Side relation, Zabar’s. Wonderful cheese counters, great on Jewish food but hefty on price – definitely treat territory. Agata and Valentina is a real favourite: mouth watering cakes and the best liquorice all sorts. There is also Citarella with its famous fish counter – don’t count on much change here.
And top of the hierarchy? It has to be Dean and Deluca. It is incredible. Located on Madison Avenue and very close to Central Park and the Met, its clientele don’t need to look at the prices. It has amazing cakes, bread and the best sushi I have had so far. Its white understated bags undersell quite how expensive and upmarket this place is. When you see the local private school girls buying their lunch here, you know you are in Gossip Girl territory. Best not go in with a credit card and a post run appetite, that’s for sure. Now that really is gourmet.
Tea total
I love tea. I don’t drink coffee at all, never have. I love tea so much that I subscribe to a tea delivery service called Teahorse (check out teahorse.co.uk to see how great it is). I take huge pleasure in opening the long, slim box of tea that arrives at the end of the month with its green tissue paper covering 4 new teas to love and sometimes chuck in the bin (that’s you, lapsang burning mouth tea). I am disgusted when I order tea in a cafe here in NYC and I get a tall glass of hot water with a teabag in a sachet for me to put into the water. This just isn’t right. I think I may have gone too far with trying to maintain my Britishness through copious consumption of tea when after only 4 weeks in New York my teeth are stained. This results in a very expensive trip to a dentist for 45 minutes of scraping horror to reveal my teeth’s true colour. Must find other ways to maintain my Britishness.
nw3 to nyc 