Melons
And more melons.
Equal a “Melon” burger
At…
On Friday you were challenged with trying to Name That Place. I thought the photo hints gave away this 40-plus year old Upper East Side institution. But I was wrong. You were stumped.
And what of that famous burger? Where does it rank on your New York burger meter?
Every August or September, Goomba Joe, who I wrote about in these pages regarding his meatballs (Goomba Joe’s Polpette), would invite my family up to his apartment for dinner where one of the courses would undoubtedly be what he called “pasta crudo,” or tomato sauce in the raw. He had a small terrace where, with limited sun, he grew enough tomatoes for a few batches of this uncooked tomato sauce.
Goomba Joe is sadly gone, though now my family has a spacious sunny terrace where, using planters, we can usually grow enough tomatoes for more than just a few batches of pasta crudo. This year because of, let’s see, a cool spring, too much rain, a brutally hot early July followed by a cool August, culminating with an invasion of tomato hornworms—or any other excuse I can come up with—the terrace tomato crop has been paltry . As of this writing, however, they are making a strong late season comeback and their bounty has yielded enough for at least one good batch of pasta crudo.
The hornworms like their tomatoes raw.
There really isn’t much to making uncooked tomato sauce. If your tomatoes are ripe, in season summer tomatoes, you can’t go wrong. The sauce is not exclusive to pasta. It can be used as an Italian salsa or, even better, slathered on crusty bread as a bruschetta topping.
The ingredients are few:
3-4 baseball-sized ripe (but not overripe) tomatoes, chopped
1-2 thinly sliced cloves of garlic*
¾ cup of basil torn into pieces
½ cup of olive oil
1 teaspoon of sea salt
Crushed red pepper to taste
Parmesean Reggiano to taste
1lb of fusilli, rotini, or spaghetti
Put the chopped tomatoes into a non-reactive bowl (glass or ceramic).
Add all the other ingredients and mix delicately with a spoon.
Let the sauce sit or “macerate” for at least one hour. The tomato sauce can sit at room temperature for up to eight hours, any longer I recommend refrigerating and then pulling them out of the refrigerator at least an hour before serving.
Meanwhile cook one pound of pasta. For this, I used fusilli, but spaghetti works well too.
When the pasta is al dente, drain and add the sauce, mixing well.
Sprinkle generously with grated Parmesean Reggiano or Pecorino Romano.
Tomato sauce in the raw.
*If you have an aversion to raw garlic even though it has softened during the maceration process from the salt and the acid from the tomatoes, slice or chop it into bigger pieces before adding it to the sauce and then remove it just before serving. Why you would do this, I don’t know.
The kangaroo court was in session. I just wanted to enjoy my meal at Frank’s Soup Bowl in peace, but Eugene insisted on disciplinary action. He was adamant that Rick was in serious violation of the code and ethics of our loosely structured food group. “How can a guy just forget about the dates? What’s this, like the sixth straight he’s missed? He needs some sort of punishment for his actions,” Eugene clamored.
I was picking at the brownstew fish in front of me, doing my best to tune out Eugene’s bellowing. The fish at the tiny Jamaican, take-out mostly place, smothered in a light brown gravy was cooked to tender perfection. When Rick, the day before we were to meet and who was supposed to chose the eating venue, for the second straight time bowed out, Mike from Yonkers stepped in admirably and quickly chose Frank’s Soup Bowl in the Caribbean enclave of Gun Hill Road in the Bronx.
I deftly separated the meat from the bones pulling away the fish’s carcass. I took a bite of the moist meat. “He’s got a baby at home,” I said, in Rick’s defense. “I’ve been there. I know what that can do to short—and long term memory.”
“Oh, stop making excuses for him,” Eugene scoffed.
Brownstew fish
I shrugged and concentrated on the fish. Not only was it the second straight abrupt cancellation for Rick, he had been absent for most of 2013’s gatherings.
Zio, conciliatory by nature, after slurping a few spoonfuls of the red bean soup, agreed. “I mean, really, how do you forget? Even I saw the emails.” This from a man who is famous for not reading emails. See our last adventure at Hong Kong Café ( Cantonese Cappuccino).
Gerry didn’t let the proceedings diminish his enjoyment of the plate of fish escovitch, that Jamaican specialty, steaks of king fish marinated in pickled onions, cabbage, allspice, and peppers. “A lifetime ban?” he suggested semi-seriously but without a bit of rancor.
fish escovitch
“Rick’s a vital part of our group,” I said in his defense. “What would we do without him? Who could replace him?”
“Yeah, but he’s never here, so what’s the difference?” Eugene responded, his mouth still stuffed with jerk chicken. “Oh and by the way, this jerk chicken is excellent.”
Being a jerk aficionado, the chicken, though roasted slowly, the meat moist and pulling clean from the bone, lacked the fire and the smoky flavor found in Jamaican roadside jerk and what I come to associate with the dish.
Frank’s jerk chicken
I shook my head. “No a lifetime ban is too severe,” I said.
“A year? Six months. You gotta do something?” Eugene was insistent. “Come on, you’re the commissioner. Don’t let him slide. We have to send a message here.”
Mike from Yonkers thoughtfully added a plate of jerked oxtail, some codfish fritters and sweet plantains to our table. I grabbed an oxtail and sucked the meat from its hard, gelatinous tendon. The richness of the meat helped temper the heavy burden that had been placed on my shoulders.
Oxtails
“We’ve all made mistakes over the years,” I said, trying to get Eugene and the others to see that we should not be so harsh.
“Speaking of mistakes,” Zio said. “Did you see that Uncle George’s in Astoria closed?”
In our early years, Zio brought us to Uncle George’s Greek tavern and he’s had to live down the unfortunate experience ever since.
“Yeah and that place Gerry had us schlep out to in Sheepshead Bay?” Eugene said.
“That Turkish place was good,” Gerry responded.
“Yeah, but we had to go to the ATM after it was so expensive.”
“Who am I to say anything,” Mike from Yonkers replied. “I picked that place in the East Village with the tablecloths and candles. What did I know?”
“You’ll never make that mistake again,” I said wiping my face with one of the countless paper napkins on our table while eating the jerked oxtail with a plastic fork out of an aluminum take-out container. “The point is, no one is perfect. Rick has a lot on his plate these days. Cut him some slack.”
“Sheesh,” Eugene muttered.
“You can’t not penalize him,” Gerry stated.
“But is it fair that he is not here to speak in his own defense?” I asked.
Zio laughed. “That’s the point, he’s not here.”
I nodded. He was right. We were finished at Frank’s Soup Kitchen but I hadn’t come to a resolution concerning Rick. We headed outside to the street. It was a beautiful, cool Summer evening and we lingered outside the restaurant before going our separate ways.
Frank’s menu
“Well?” Eugene wanted a ruling.
“I’ll think of something,” I said, postponing my decision for the time being.
“You better,” he said. “Step up on this. The integrity of our food group is on the line here.”
Gerry turned to Eugene and raised a bushy eyebrow. “What integrity?”
Frank’s Soup Bowl
3580 Bronxwood Avenue
Bronx
Cafe Hong Kong
I was the first to arrive at Café Hong Kong in Chinatown on a steamy evening when the cramped sidewalks of Bayard Street were overflowing with black plastic garbage bags, their stench signifying the true arrival of summer. Rick had again passed on his appointed pick for our group, this time giving us a week’s notice instead of a day. Because of the semi-abrupt announcement, I suggested we convene at Café Hong Kong and resume our scheduled picks with Rick again attempting to commit to our next dinner, followed by Mike from Yonkers.
Café Hong Kong was packed when I arrived, but a table was put together for the five of us. When I sat down alone, a harried waiter immediately inquired if “my friends were coming.” I told them that they were. He quickly returned with tea.
“They coming now,” he asked again anxiously not daring to experience the ownership’s wrath by holding a table when other paying customers were waiting.
“As far as I know, they are on their way,” I said and then sent out urgent texts to Zio and Gerry to find out their whereabouts.
“Where are you?” Zio inquired via text. “I didn’t read the emails.”
I cursed under my breath. Zio had informed us that he had a commitment on the Lower East Side on the same day we had chosen. The Chinatown location of Café Hong Kong was picked in an effort to accommodate him. And he didn’t read the emails. Thankfully, Gerry responded that he was close and would arrive very soon.
While I waited, I flipped through the menu noticing immediately, the curious section titled “baked rice/spaghetti.” Also offered were bizarre—at least for Chinese food—options Chinese such as ham and egg sandwich, bacon and egg sandwich, and borsch (sic) soup. This was a “café,” however so allowances were made and along with Hong Kong-style milk tea, cappuccino, lattes, and macchiatos were on the full espresso bar menu.
When Gerry and Eugene arrived, our table was proclaimed legitimate and I was no longer harassed by the equally beleaguered waiter. Mike from Yonkers informed Gerry that he would be coming from the train and might be late. We were hungry and instead of waiting, ordered a soup, fish with bean curd, an appetizer, sweet and sour fish filet, and pickled sour radish.
Just as the reddish orange, sweet and sour fried fish filet, complete with the familiar pineapple chunks, arrived, Mike from Yonkers made his sweaty entrance. The hot soup came next, administered by a more patient waiter into four smaller bowls. The soup dampening Mike’s shirt even further and his perspiration creeping alarmingly close to my food. After a few sips of the soup, fragrant with ginger, the broth refreshingly light and with chunks of fish and tofu, I no longer cared about Mike from Yonker’s sweat.
Soup for a hot summer’s day.
What to order from the vast menu was our next business. Gerry warned me about the “baked” dishes when I asked if I should dare try one. “I don’t know—baked pasta?” he said dubiously. But I couldn’t resist. Where else could I have pasta, baked no less, in a Hong Kong-style café unless I ventured to Hong Kong and that was not happening anytime soon? I couldn’t, however, even though I was sorely tempted, choose the baked pasta Bolognese. Instead I decided on the baked beef stew. Eugene also picked from the baked section going with the coconut chicken. Sticking to more familiar and traditional Cantonese dishes, Gerry went with the salt and pepper squid while Mike from Yonkers decided on the fish filet bean curd casserole. Sautéed Chinese broccoli with garlic completed our order.
While we waited for our dishes to arrive, I noticed that there was a missed call from Zio. The sautéed Chinese broccoli came first. I quickly snapped a picture of the dark green, perfectly steamed broccoli on my phone camera and sent it to Zio. And then the enormous bowl of baked beef stew, the tomato sauce congealed on top of the spaghetti from the baking process. The baked coconut chicken also had a semi-hard topping, a few burn marks speckling the white exterior.
Chinese broccoli
Just as I sent Zio more of the pictures to remind him of what he was missing at Café Hong Kong, his rotund frame appeared in front of us, and to all of our surprise, with the Colonel in tow. There was no room at our table and Zio and the Colonel grabbed an adjacent table. I muttered a quick hello and then tasted the sweet and sour “tomato” sauce that was drowning the overcooked spaghetti. Complete with thick layers of gelatinous fat over morsels of beef along with chunks of bland tomatoes, even a few tablespoons of freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano, if offered, could not rescue this dish, Worse was Eugene’s coconut chicken featuring the same overcooked pasta with a white, sweet coconut cream Alfredo sauce, pieces of what seemed like canned carrots and peas, and chunks of chicken. The creation was like a Paula Deen nightmare. And you really can’t get much scarier than that.
Sweet and sour Chef Boy Ar Dee.
Gerry’s salt and pepper squid was good, but not up to nearby Great New York Noodletown’s standards while the fish and bean curd casserole Mike from Yonkers ordered was a true winner. I realized that ordering the baked pasta at Café Hong Kong was like going to a burger joint and then ordering linguini with clam sauce. I should have known better and had no one to blame but myself.
The winner: fish and bean curd casserole.
As we were leaving, Zio and the Colonel were about to order the coconut chicken. Despite the unfortunate baked beef stew experience, I was in a benevolent mood and warned him off it, instead I gestured to the beef stew; making it his penance for not reading his emails. We said our goodbyes and went to cleanse our palates at the nearby Chinatown Ice Cream Factory.
“Why didn’t you warn me about that spaghetti slop,” Zio wrote in a text the next day. “It was worse than Chef Boy Ar Dee. Sickingly sweet with globs of fat and tired pale tomatoes. You’re killing me!”
Coconut Chicken
“You should be grateful,” I wrote back. “I saved you from the coconut chicken.”
“Thanks for that,” he replied.
Cafe Hong Kong
51 Bayard St.
Chinatown
I’m sure you have often wondered what beverage might best be paired with a bowl of black ink fettuccine, cuttlefish, shrimp, clams and chorizo? Well wonder no more.
In my educated and borough-biased opinion, nothing brings out the briny goodness of the dish more than the frothy essence of a cold Bronx Brewery ale.
When Rick chose to continue with his fading softball career instead of taking on his obligation to provide our greedy and needy group with a food destination, we were in a temporary quandary. Though I would have preferred he hadn’t left us in such a precarious situation, I understood his decision. I did the same thing—for about ten years—before realizing only a visit to a “clinic” in Miami could help regain my youthful form in the field and power at the plate.
Eugene also deserted us when he announced, shocking all of us, that his girlfriend’s superiors had actually invited him to attend her retirement party. And he thought it wise that he not decline the invitation. We could not disagree.
We were four and though Mike from Yonkers was next in line to choose, we were given a unique opportunity. A fan of Fried Neck Bones…and Some Home Fries, and believe me, their numbers are just not that many, had reached out to me and remarkably, considering he had never met our motley crew, wanted us to assemble at his own eating establishment.
Now just because a restaurateur shows me some love doesn’t mean I’m an easy mark. I have my ethical standards and not just anyone who heaps praise on my work will get equal treatment on my very humble blog. Jonny, however, the Indonesian born, Singaporean raised co-founder and chef of Bamboo Tori, made a strong case for our attendance. As I said above, any restaurant that would blindly consider allowing our group to convene at their tables has already displayed remarkable valor. Another reason that we considered the offer was that we had not yet been to a Japanese yakitori place, not to mention one that, Jonny explained was also heavily influenced by the Singaporean snacks served on sticks he recalled growing up there. Finally, Bamboo Tori was located in Greenwich Village, a place bustling with restaurants but typically not one where our group’s frugal criteria could be fulfilled. We would be dining in virgin territory.
On its website, Bamboo Tori bills itself as specializing in Japanese yakitori, and though I’ve had yakitori, the traditional Japanese featuring the funky chicken body parts excepted, the concept here, Jonny explained was different. Jonny and his partners Christophe, from Belgium, and Hendy from Haiti, wanted to make yakitori more accessible; meaning chicken hearts, butts, necks, and gizzards were not on their menu. After an exploratory eating trip to Singapore, the partners wanted to create at their venture more of what can be found served as street snacks there.
Mike from Yonkers, Gerry, Zio and I squeezed onto a hard bench in the slender, take-out mostly, restaurant as Jonny presented us with a selection of meats on sticks. Behind a glass front, there was a conveyor belt like machine where meats were put on their sticks and rotated around a hot fire while intermittently being dipped into a marinade. Passersby stared raptly at the mesmerizing process from the street.
The yakitori machine in action.
Our first sample box of skewers included one stick each of asparagus bacon, chicken thigh, pork belly, and pork meatballs. Cooked to juicy perfection, each was coated with a bronze grilled yakitori glaze that Jonny informed me was provided by a close friend of his father’s, a Japanese chef of Hilton Hotels Indonesia.
The pork meatballs, made with ground pork, ginger and parsley had Gerry gushing and after a final tally, the consensus was that they were the standout among many standouts.
Pork meatballs
The next box included beef tri-tips, beef meatballs, chicken breast, and chicken thigh with scallions. And we made sure that every bit of meat was removed off each stick even if it meant scraping them with our teeth.
Finally, proving that Bamboo Tori can also satisfy the vegetarian, we tried skewers grilled with eggplant, zucchini, and grape tomatoes. From two seats down and over the din of the busy restaurant, I could hear Gerry gush again as he devoured the grilled veggies.
Grilled vegetables on a stick.
The final taste was a steamed pork bun stuffed with the aforementioned pork meatballs. The tiny sandwich epitomizing the term: street snack.
The used stick dispensary was stuffed with our skewers. We were done. We thanked Jonny and his partners for their service; very glad that we were introduced to their brand of yakitori, the trip to the heart of darkness known as Greenwich Village well worth it.
Steamed bun sandwich
“How’d you come up with that name, ‘Fried Neck Bones and Some Home Fries’ anyway,” Jonny asked as I was leaving. “It’s cool.”
I explained how I thought the title of the Willie Bobo song as well as the tune itself was as good a representative of what I wanted to achieve in the website as I could find.
“I never heard of it,” Jonny said. And why would a man in his twenties be familiar with a Latin Soul tune recorded in 1966? “But I’m gonna check it out.”
The next day I sent him the link below to better help him check it out.
Bamboo Tori
106 University Place
But you knew that, didn’t you. Where else would your burger be sent from the kitchen to your table via a dumb waiter?
Dumb waiter contraption
The Old Town has been around a lot longer than David Letterman, whose show helped bring it to recent (the last few decades) prominence.
Call me old-fashioned, as many do, but I guess even a bar/restaurant that has been around since 1892 is not immune to the allure of self promotion at the expense of a quieter, classy exterior.
Where am I this time?
If you can identify the contraption above, you probably will have no trouble naming the place.
Above is another relic from the past, so you know the place must be…old.
Men might be familiar with those wooden doors.
While for the ladies, after a couple of drinks it might get dizzying finding relief.
Eating always helps and at this place you will want the burger (with or without a roll).
Or a hot dog, because it’s just that kind of place.
You should be sufficiently armed now to rapidly identify the place in question. As always, leave your answers in the comments sections. The place will be revealed tomorrow.
When you read menus or recipes that claim to be classic American comfort food, meatloaf, hot dogs, hamburgers, fried chicken, turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes and corn on the cob are the usual suspects. I’m not here to debate what constitutes American comfort food. I am here to report that one of those items usually on the American comfort food list; macaroni and cheese, I recently sampled at a small take-out joint in the South Bronx called Landin Macaroni and Cheese and Pizza. And I can decisively state that what I sampled at Landin, prepared by Mexican chefs, was possibly the most comforting macaroni and cheese I’ve ever had.
The Mac and Cheese menu.
At Landin there are nine different macaroni and cheese options that come in three sizes: mini, small, and large. The mini, at $1.50 is the perfect portion if you want to try multiple macaroni and cheeses. And with nine to choose from, you will most certainly want to try more than one. I thought it was my duty to experience the Classic American to see how it might compare to other classic macaroni and cheeses. And it compared superbly. The elbow macaroni was rich with creamy cheddar and American cheese, the top, toasted to a golden brown.
The “Classic American”
Since Landin was run by the skilled hands of Mexican Americans, that more than justified my choice of the “Mexican” option. The combination of pepper jack and muenster cheese along with a few tiny bits of shredded chicken and chopped spicy jalapeno peppers was a revelation.
The devouring of the “Mexican.”
Eating two portions of macaroni and cheese, even if they were mini seemed decadent enough for me, but I couldn’t resist taking home the “small,” which was big enough to share with a family of four, of the “bacon,” option, mozzarella and muenster with pieces of chopped salty bacon. Again, Landin did not disappoint.
The “small” bacon to go.
Oh, and I can’t forget the pastelillos. There they were; glistening under glass; beef, chicken, cheese and spinach. How could I resist? I had a beef and spinach tossed into my bag as well.
Pastelillos
The damage was totaled on the cash register. All that creamy, delicious starch came to under $10. You really can’t get more comfortable than that.
In the previous installment of “Today’s Slice,” here on Fried Neck Bones…and Some Home Fries, I visited Full Moon Pizza on Arthur Avenue for the Spinach and Artichoke Slice ( see Artichoke and Spinach Pizza). In that post I mentioned Cafe al Mercato and the mini pies and square slices they sell from their booth inside the Arthur Avenue retail market.
The preferred slice at Cafe al Mercato is, undoubtedly, the broccoli rabe slice. And I’m not alone. When I last visited, the broccoli rabe was piled high on top of the booth counter in anticipation of being applied to many thin, square slices.
What makes Cafe al Mercato’s broccoli rabe slice so good starts with the broccoli rabe, cooked tender, but not overdone, topped with slivers of fresh mozzarella. All of this is applied to a thin, yet durable, crunchy crust cooked in a traditional “slice” pizza oven as opposed to a fancy, imported wood Neapolitan stove.
If you have an aversion to broccoli rabe or anything green, the simple, “regular” slice with tomato sauce and mozzarella will bring back memories of “homemade” pizza. And when I say homemade, I mean what my grandmother used to make in an old cookie pan, rolling out the dough, topping with her sauce and adding a few slices of Polly O Mozzarella. All of it cooked in her basement oven. It wasn’t pizza as we were used to from the pizzeria, but we never complained.
The unbeatable combination at Cafe al Mercato.
Cafe al Mercato
2344 Arthur Avenue
Bronx
Fried Neck Bones...and some home fries 