Travel

Ever since I ate the carrot-and-avocado salad at ABC Kitchen, Jean-Georges Vongerichten's new Manhattan bastion of "farm-to-table" cuisine, I've rekindled my passion for this most common root vegetable. Fear not, I will soon be posting my interpretation of this salad, which involves coating the carrots in a light film of cumin, chile and lemon juice before roasting them to tender perfection. It's truly extraordinary how they become almost meaty. But this is about another carrot salad. It's not wholly unlike the one you'll be presented with at virtually every meal in Morocco, though that tends to be sweeter, more cumin-intensive and full of raisins. This carrot salad is bright with mint and cilantro and spiked with harissa, a wonderfully complex North African spice paste you can find in specialty grocers or online. Or you can whip up a batch yourself; it keeps for ages in the fridge. Either way, the point it to make this salad soon as it will become a new favorite.
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I’ve heard it said that truffles taste like dirt and I can’t really disagree, though to me they also have a distinctive musky perfume that is vaguely erotic. These hotly coveted fungi develop underground, generally in close association with certain types of trees. There are hundreds of kinds, though the most prized are those of the genus Tuber, the ones referred to by my hero the 18th-century French gastronaut Brillat-Savarin as “the diamonds of the kitchen.” The white truffle, Alba Madonna, comes from the Piedmont region in northern Italy. It grows symbiotically with oak, hazel, poplar and beech trees, and fruits in autumn—as in right now. Their flesh is pale and creamy or brown with white marbling. Prices vary from year to year according to the harvest, which is rooted out by the famed truffle-hunting pigs (and dogs, and men). This year, I've seen them at Eataly in Manhattan listed at upwards of $3,000 a pound. A counter woman was passing a white truffle the size of a small potato to a man who held it up to his nose, inhaled deeply and nodded. "Somebody's going to have a good dinner," I said. "My-a wife-a," he answered in a thick Italian accent. Better than diamonds.
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Saw The Social Network last night. I think Fincher's best movie thus far. He really got out of his own way for a change, and Aaron Sorkin's screenplay will probably win the Oscar. It's a great portrait of tortured soul and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, whose stupefying mix of arrogant brilliance and crippling insecurity reminded me of half the people I encountered at Harvard, especially the genius-geeks whose shameless misogyny stemmed from never being able to get a date. The film is  less about the phenomenon of social networking than it is about the irony that the dude who creates it is a social outsider. Jesse Eisenberg gives a flawless performance, his face a motionless enigma that rarely jerks into a grimace we come to recognize as a smile. Movie night was preceded by yet another trip to Eataly, this time at the sub-prime hour of 4pm. The place was buzzing but  not overcrowded, and G and I slipped right into a couple of seats at the counter of Pesce. An appetizer of razor clams bathed in olive oil, parsley, garlic and hot pepper was delicious, a harbinger of things to come. Both G's whole branzino, infused with lemon and roasted on a thin crust of half-crispy-half-velvety potatoes, and my smoked black cod with a crackling skin and salad of watercress were fresh off the boat and perfectly executed. A quick trip to the gelato stand (chocolate for G, equally smooth and unctuous pear-vanilla sorbetto for me) and we were off to the races. I love a dose of the city on an unseasonably warm fall day.
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This seductive soup is pronounced "fuh," like the word for fire in French. I had wanted to post a gorgeous "pho"-to of a big, steaming bowl of it, but we ate the entire pot before I got the chance. So instead, here's one of a woman in the market in Saigon scarfing down this wonderful national dish. Pho is traditionally eaten for breakfast in Vietnam, but it goes down like a charm for lunch and dinner, too. It's great stuff for cold weather eating, but that doesn't prevent South East Asians from having it in the raging heat. A rich but clear beef broth, infused with star anise, clove, cinnamon and ginger, it is traditionally served with slices of raw sirloin, shallots, bean sprouts, cilantro, Thai basil, mint, lots of slippery, chewy rice noodles, a squeeze of lime and maybe some chile. It's not so complicated; mostly, it just takes time. I love how you char ginger and onions directly over the flame of your burner; it imparts just a hint of smokiness that is very reminiscent of outdoor cooking in Asia. As with all stocks, you make this ahead so you can skim off the fat, and it's quite a healthful and nourishing dish because of the good nutrition from bones. Of course, I urge you to make this with meat from a happy cow, please. For its sake, and for yours.
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This cast iron casserole by Timo Sarpaneva is one of the many gorgeous and intriguing pieces in the exhibition, Counter Space: Design and the Modern Kitchen, which is at MoMA through March 14, 2011. As the museum describes it, the show "explores the 20th-century transformation of the kitchen and highlights MoMA’s recent acquisition of an unusually complete example of the iconic 'Frankfurt Kitchen,' designed in 1926–27 by the architect Grete Schütte-Lihotzky...Prominence is given to the contribution of women, not only as the primary consumers and users of the domestic kitchen, but also as reformers, architects, designers, and as artists who have critically addressed kitchen culture and myths."But back to the cast iron pot, an award-winning cult object of Finnish design that is much sought after by collectors and is now back in production. It has a detachable wooden handle that allows you to lift and move both the pot and its lid. As we say in our house, "I wish it."
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I've now made two trips to Eataly, New York City's new temple of Italian gastronomy, and although I haven't actually eaten anything on premises, I'm able to give you my initial impressions. On my first visit, shortly after it opened in late August, I muscled my way through the throngs of gaping tourists and irritated locals in what looked a lot like an Italian airport, barely able to check it all out before fleeing to the relative calm of 23rd Street. Porca miseria, I texted G. What a mob scene! And for what? A small, bedraggled-looking produce section (and alleged "produce butcher" Jennifer Rubell nowhere in sight); aisle after aisle of dried pasta; very pricey imported salume (culatello for $65 a pound!); walls cluttered with the kind of boxed biscotti and candies you find at most corner delis...well, you can see I was underwhelmed. (And the thought of the carbon footprint on much of this stuff gives me pause.) Still, I did get a glimpse of what looked like a very impressive selection of fresh pasta. Pat La Frieda's meats caught my eye, as did whole fresh duck, sweetbreads and tripe—not a common sight in most butcher shops. And the seafood counter, curated by the master David Pasternak, was flawless. La Verdura, a counter serving vegetable-based dishes and the only menu I eyeballed, seemed very promising. Now if all those people would just fuck off...
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Still haven't made it to Momofuku Ko (can't seem to perform that Pavlovian task of logging on every day at 10am and frantically pecking at the keyboard in hope of getting a reservation) but finally dined at David Chang's latest outpost in midtown, Mà Pêche. It's what you might expect from an uptown version: roomier, sleeker and slightly more soulless. As chef, Chang has installed Tien Ho, formerly the boss of the kitchen at Momofuku Ssam Bar, which still remains my favorite of the empire. As Sam Sifton put it in in his review in the Times, "The food is not quite as precise and magical as it often is in the downtown restaurants, but it is recognizably Changish and strong: big flavors tied together with herbs and acids." I killed some time in the dimly-lit bar first and things started off with a bang. There was a bar snack of what looked like pork rinds and turned out to be large, crunchy cassava chips dusted with salt and spicy shichimi togarashi, a favorite spice blend of mine that was also used to spike a yuzu-infused sake "sour." Needless to say, I was very happy to sit there devouring Jonathan Franzen's "Freedom" and the entire bowl of chips along with my cocktail.
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It's here again: fall, the season of transition. It bridges the vast chasm between sultry summer and winter's austerity. Nature's gorgeous swan song, fall reaches a grand crescendo before its blazing colors are finally extinguished. The leaves have begun to turn, with bursts of ochre and russet punctuating the drive from country to city. I have always found this time of year especially poignant, for we are witnessing the demise of all that we saw come to life these past months. It is the natural order of things, and it is bittersweet. My dear friend, the talented illustrator and creative director Jan Richter, captures the intensity of fall's colors in these gorgeous illustrations of the season's glories.
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I'm so excited to have my first guest on GFL! Especially since it's the über-erudite aesthete and man about town Christopher Voigt, whose own blog, vetivresse, taught me (more than) a thing or two about wine and fragrance, and their convergence on the palate. He's been on hiatus from posting (though rumored to be returning soon), but not from gadding about eating and drinking to his heart's content. While this might mean burgers and beer to some (or broccoli and bourbon, as the case may be), Christopher tends to take the high road. So without further ado, I present the first in a series he's writing for us on tea.

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Outstanding in the Field is a very unique organization whose mission is "to re-connect diners to the land and the origins of their food, and to honor the local farmers and food artisans who cultivate it." Every year they organize big farm-centric dinners, and then about 8 people board a bus and drive around the country making them happen. The dinners average about 150 people and take place on farms, on mountaintops and sometimes indoors in museums or barns. The one we attended was at Mountain Sweet Berry Farm in Roscoe, New York, and the guest chef for the evening was Jim Lahey of New York City's Sullivan Street Bakery (and the fantastic pizza restaurant, Co., also mentioned here.) He did an impressive job of putting fresh, delicious food on the table for 150 eager diners seated at one long table along a riverbank. It was a gorgeous setting and a lot of fun to break bread with strangers. The atmosphere was informal and highly convivial.
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