August 2009
33 posts
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Crabcake Corndogs: A Revelation
Within the past month, I’ve been lucky to reconnect with a chef whom I’ve long time admired. Once manning the kitchen at his restaurant Wyanoka, then Mojo and then a slew of other oft overlooked gems (Lure, Suba) Chris Santos regained his footing in 2005 when he opened Stanton Social. The big, boisterous Lower East Side four corners has consistently put out inspiring, lighthearted...
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Tasty iApps
Having trouble keeping up with all the latest foodie iapps? I am! Luckily, my boyfriend reads Gizmodo. Last week he came across this wonderful post. The usual suspects like Yelp!, OpenTable and Epicurious are reviewed, but there are also lesser known projects worth taking note of: VegOut is a vegetarian’s guide to eating out in NYC; Global Eater Food Dictionary helps you to amp up the...
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Monkey Bar
A few weeks ago, I enjoyed a lovely dinner hosted by The Supper Club at Greydon Carter’s Monkey Bar. Menu, service and company were all wonderful in their own right. Take a look at our line up.
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BLT Wraps
A few nights ago at BOBO, CHef Patrick sent out two dishes that blew my face off. The first is a dish currently on the menu - Crab Dip with Fried Cornichons. A dish layered with cream cheese then cocktail sauce then flakes of numnumnummy crab. Piled alongside like Lincoln Logs was a wall of fried little pickles, ideal for dipping. I highly recommend. Soon after, CP sent out some individual BLT...
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OOOO Yummy!
This looks good and mellow!
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Grandmother's Birthday Poem
My Grandma Sylvia emailed this Birthday Poem to me today. I am a lucky girl. Since I could not sleep last night I thought I ‘d stay awake and write a little poem for my precious Jill Whom I love dearly and always will Hope I can hang in there so we can celebrate many more After all- what are Grandmas for? Happy birthday xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Love you
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My Birthday White Board
Taylor and I have a white board on our fridge and every few weeks we craft a picture. I usually start by drawing something like a flower doodle or something else along the lines of a 3rd grade level stick figure. Then Taylor comes in and doctors the image up to look professional. Once I drew a Christmas tree and then the next day the board was a gorgeous mountain scene filled with evergreens. ...
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Fifth Avenue Shoe Repair
Today, one of my favorite brands opens their online shop. A whole new world of What To Wears has been revealed.
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The perfect espresso
My boyfriend and I spent the month of July eating our way through Italy. We had countless three hour lunches followed by five course dinners and late night gelatos. How did we manage, you may be wondering. Espresso is the answer. This phenonenon has not quite caught on in the States, but Italians swear by a shot of espresso at the end of a meal. Espresso, in Italy, is about three tablespoons of...
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Neighborly Neighbors
When new tenants moved in across the hall from me at the beginning of August, I wanted to make friends. And so, like always when I want the make an impression, I made brownies. Two weeks later, the couple returned the Tupperware… filled with tomatoes and cheese. The orange tomatoes, I was told, came from the boyfriends parents kitchen garden in Hadlyme, CT. Taylor described them as...
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Duryea's Lobster Dock
Taylor and I subsist on lobster rolls in summer and, craving a new spot, we tried Duryea’s in Montauk. It’s deep on the island and on Thursday was incredibly mellow. We sat on the dock with an excellent view of the harbor. Skeptical at first of the roll - sesame bun? Dill in the salad? Also, the salad to roll ratio was about 45/55… As opposed to the usual 30% roll to 70% salad....
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Two Hamptons Essentials
A mid-week trip to the Hamptons reminded me of a few of the best things in life- beachy picnics and lobster rolls. What’s a perfect day for me? Well there’s sunshine and exercise to start. My hair cooperating makes a difference as well. But even a bad day stands no chance when indulging in an Oceanside spread from Schmidt’s. Taylor and I stopped at the crowded country grocer in...
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Kasadela Summer Gift
Last night it was about 85 degrees, 100% humidity. All I could really think about eating was some Japanese food - light, clean and to the point. My friend and I popped into Kasadela on East 11th, a time-tested, five year old isayaka. Our first choices - Kyo Ya and Kajitsu - were closed Monday, but sometimes an oldie is a goodie. And such was the case with Kasadela. We had a pretty ideal meal,...
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Fried Green Tomaters
Yesterday, after being at Soho House all day, I needed some fried food. Huh? You might say… Well, I’d been eyeing the fried items on the menu all afternoon (not to mention Hugh Jackman in the pool with his kids). From calamri to julienned zucchini, bowls of golden bron were dancing around me. My friend and I decided to attempt fried green tomatoes. It ended up being easy and...
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Shake Shack Sweet Corn Custard
Yesterday was sweet corn frozen custard day at Shake Shack. It’s the second one I’ve tried and it’s officially my favorite thus far. At first the corn was too subtle for me to taste but as I ate and ate, the flavor began to rise. It was indeed subtle but defined itself in the after taste - a pleasant surprise. I am still holding out for dark and stormy flavor and watermelon...
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EZ Hammock
I’ve always loved hammocks - occasionally sleeping on one in Madagascar and picking one up in Nicaragua a few years back even though I knew I’d rarely have a chance to use it in NYC. But I think I’ve found the perfect nest. The EZ Hammock from Royal Botania. Sleek and aerodynamic, the EZ Hammock won’t flip you out of it’s pocket. It’s also sexy-to-boot. Did I...
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Party Spaces
Lately, I’ve been sussing a lot of party spaces. I’ve got a big birthday coming up and I’ve been put in charge of planning a potluck for the NYWCA. I’ve seen some pretty cool spaces, like 230 Fifth Avenue Rooftop and The DUMBO Loft but so far my favorite has been on Mulberry Street: OpenHouse Gallery. These are good venues to keep in mind when throwing a party.
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The Hudson @ Charles
Even though Charles has taken down the newspaper that once covered their windows, the place is still a sexy stop for a drink. Taylor and I stopped in for a seasonal sampling of booze: The Hudson. The drink consists of Leblon cachaca, sweet as ever raspberries and a wedge of lime. Perfect for taking the edge off. I found a cool, cheap cocktail shaker on Amazon to start making my own. (pardon le...
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Hawaiian Island Grill
On Sunday night, my boyfriend Read was working late in midtown east so I decided to pop down and surprise him with some take out. I did a quick search of restaurants in the area when I ran across Hawaiian Island Grill- a new Hawaiian style take-out place on 53rd and 2nd. For most mainlanders, Hawaiian style food is a very misunderstood concept. It’s not the pineapple spiked poultry and...
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Aldea-licious
Last night I was lucky to have have dinner with my grandma Thelma at Aldea. I’d be wanting to go since I’d heard about this sea urchin toast. My grandmother is a gourmand-to-boot, so she was the ideal dining partner. Her palate has been honed after years of elegant dining as well as cooking each night for upwards of 8 people. I arrived to the subdued, modern, adult space after my...
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Leftover Salad
Last Sunday, I cooked meals for the week. I followed my company guidelines and pulled off a pretty impressive roster of dishes… smoked paprika mac and cheese, quinoa tofu sunflower salad, tabbouleh, spicy mushrooms I learned from La Palapa… the list goes on. So when I was cleaning out my fridge this week, I came across the remnants of ingredients. A few cucumbers, tomatoes, basil,...
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I'm Melting
Today in the 90 degree weather I was fortunate to come across shake shack before I melted. They’ve got an excellent line up of daily custard flavors for August. Monday is salted caramel day. It was quite delicious… But I will taste them all and then decide.
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Pancakes 2000
My dad sent me a link to ChefStack a few days ago. The company offers a product for “Perfect. Panless. Pancakes.” The website equates their invention to the iPod for music and the toaster for bread. These people like their pancakes. And they like them auto-made. They claim it’s already a hit in Australia and New Zealand and are expecting the same thing in the US. The...
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Southampton Sant Ambroeus
When I lived in the West Village, I never really understood all the hype around Sant Ambroeus. It seemed sterile, old-fashioned and all together too expensive. I’d been a few times for lunch meetings, seen a few celebs and begrudgingly paid $25 for a tuna salad that had been composed of underipe tomatoes and overly oily, yet very dry fish. So it was to my surprise on Sunday when I stopped...
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Cheap Green
Pretty basic be-cheap-and-green advice from Serious Eats, but nonetheless always good to hear. Bringing your own bag to the grocery is always a good idea… but WOW! I never thought of coming across a $5 Le Crueset at a yard sale. Excellent call. Read more here. Photograph from rusvaplauke on Flickr
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Cowgirl Seahorse
Last night, my buddy Bradley and I went to Cowgirl Seahorse. He and I are both big fans of Cowgirl in the West Village so we wanted to check out what their take on seafood would be. We both expected the place to be mellow, based on its middle-of-nowhere locale (our view was of a municipal parking lot and the underside of the Brooklyn Bridge) and yet somehow the place was packed to the gills....
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Meal Planning with Martha
Yesterday I was on Marth Stewart Radio. It was a fantastic experience and we had a great converstaion about meal planning. We discussed how The Dish’s Dish helps people eat more homemade meals as well as how people can cook more efficiently for themselves. We also chatted about Culinista Kitchen, our new video venture! We are revealing the secrets of our Once a Week Cooking Technique™ in...
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Mission to Mars Mac n' Cheese
Last week, my buddy James forwarded me information about a Mac n’ Cheese contest, offering $5,000 to one lucky, talented chef with a damn-good recipe. Since $5000 is nothing to sneeze at (his words, I liked), I decided to enter. I’d been cooking with hot smoked paprika the previous day and it provided inspiration for my rendition of Freakin’ Awesome Macaroni and Cheese also know...
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I'm on the radio, like, NOW!
Remember all that hype about Sirius radio a few years ago? Satellite radio. A place where Howard Stern could be as vulgar as he liked. Well, now might be a pretty great moment to test-drive it. Why? – You may ask. Well, because I am on it! No, no I haven’t registered my own show but I am speaking today at 2:30pm on Martha Stewart’s channel. I’ll be chatting it up with Mario Bosquez on Living...
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Culinista Kitchen- A New Product
Hey! Hey! Three years have flown by for The Dish’s Dish and heading into our fourth year, we are launching Culinista Kitchen, an instructional video series about how to cook meals for the week in one extended session. Each video covers 6-8 dishes and walks the viewer through the process of menu planning, shopping, cooking, preparation and instructions for storage and reheating. That’s right – we...
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WTW - Martha Radio
Alright, so I am aware that when you do radio, no one actually sees you. But this morning, when I checked out Living Today online, the radio show on which I’ll be speaking this afternoon (more to come on this later), I saw that the other guest on the show would be Jacques Pépin! Mon Dieu! Pépin is nothing short of a legend. So I decided I need to look angelic, just in case we pass each...
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Blueberry Cream, Berry Sauce
On Sunday, I cooked like a Culinista®, making enough meals to last the week. I was using my most favorite kitchen tool - the Cuisinart hand blender - for butternut squash soup and since I had it out, I decided to make blueberry whipped cream as well. Fruity whipped creams is something I learned to make quite a lot of in Sweden. Simply pour the berries of your choice into a bowl, add a little...
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Liége at Last!
The result of my waffle craving was a first official meal back in NYC at Resto. After a little online research, I discovered the gaufre du Liége on the brunch menu and promptly called my Grandma Thelma for a Sunday date. Rain had cooled the city and we both found that to be reason enough for waffles. I scored the classic version and she (balls to the wall!) went for the eggs benedict which came...
