Day two of me pulling my finger out is another local hero from our stay in New York late last year, and trades the buttery crusts of pies for another American obsession. Barbecue.
I’ve wanted to visit Fette Sau since I read about it three or four years ago. Last time I was in New York, I failed to get my ‘cue on, so this time I vowed not to fly home without coating my face in barbecue sauce.
Tucked away down a side alley in Williamburgh, Brooklyn, Fette Sau is a temple to meat. The walls are adorned with scrawlings of different cuts of various four legged beasts, knives hang behind the bar, the white tiled walls are all butcher shop, and they sell their wares by weight as opposed to portion, which is great from a trying everything point of view. It also exposed the tactical eaters we overheard rejecting anything on the bone as it’s “…dead weight, man…”, which means no ribs, which is crazy right??
I wanted to try as much as I could, so after much deliberation I pulled together what I figured would be a killer selecta. Black Angus Brisket, Spicy Berkshire Pork Sausage, Pulled Berkshire Pork Shoulder, Duroc baby Back Ribs, Burnt-End Baked Beans and some green stuff to keep my digestive system alive. Now I was pretty pleased with the ribs that I made earlier in the year, but this was some next level business. The words that follow are not going to do what I ate justice, because I loved every friggin’ mouthful so much, but here’s a taster.
So given my general writing uselessness over the past couple of months, I’ve got some catching up to do. So, here is the first of two quick fire posts of places I wanted to give a special biggup to that we visited in New York back in October. Jesus. That seems like an awfully long time ago.
The first of these is Four & Twenty Blackbirds in Gwanus, Brooklyn. Now, as I’m sure you know, ‘pie’ is an American institution. It’s an old school love affair that has outlived cupcakes, macarons, whoopie pies and whatever sweet thang is currently de rigueur. The Yanks love it, and the queue outside Four & Twenty proves the legend above the door, ‘this must be where pies go when they die’.
Run by two sisters who cut their teeth working at their family’s restaurant in South Dakota, before slinging pies from their apartment in Crown Heights, NY, they set up Four & Twenty almost two years ago, and have been rammed ever since. There’s nothing particularly unusual about the place itself. It’s got all the trademarks of your typical hipster cafe. Bare brick walls, stripped back wood, tattooed serving staff etc, but it has a really welcoming, homely vibe. I guess you could describe it as pie in atmosphere form.
The pie on the other hand is unusual. And in a good way. We tried a selection including the plum crumble, brown butter pumpkin and the salty honey. All the pies are hand made, and come with the same crust, which is totally the right combination of tenderness and crumble, with a great buttery flavour. The plum crumble was amazing. Sweet and crunchy with a tart punch of local plums, all smoothed out with some lightly sweetened whipped cream. The pumpkin was everything a pumpkin pie should be. Dense, deep, moist, pumpkin-ey custard filling spiked with cinnamon and the surprise addition of a nutty richness supplied by the brown butter. And finally, and I have to be honest my least favourite, the salty honey. Richer than Daddy Warbucks, the custard filling was packed with butter and honey, set off with a generous sprinkling of salt crystals on the surface. It wasn’t in any way bad, but just too much for me.
I’m not going to lie to you, Four & Twenty isn’t exactly in what you’d describe as a ‘handy mid-town location’ but Gwanus and neighbouring Red Hook are areas on the up and up and well worth a look around, and I’m telling you, the pie alone makes the trek a no brainer. Special Agent Dale Cooper would be a very happy man.
Been trying to write a few post US entries, but this baking malarky is busting my arse. I’m knackered!
Anyway, I have managed to pull my finger out a bit, so here are the first couple of things I wanted to share from New York, Smorgasberg & The New Amsterdam Market.
New York doesn’t really seem to have the same kind of street food culture as San Francisco. In SF there were trucks and pop up stalls on every corner, and sure NY has their regulated the hot dog carts for decades, but much less of a mobile scene that pushes the boundaries. That being said, the street food scene is far from undeveloped, in fact it has given birth to something a bit different. The closest thing I can think of to describe it are the Hawker Centres you get in South East Asia. Smorgasberg is one such example, a weekly event on the same site as the famous Brooklyn Flea which collects all manner of food vendors selling some fantastic, and if I’m honest also some not so fantastic, grub.
But I’m not going to dwell on the negatives, as there were two stalls in particular that blew our tiny minds. First up Bon Chovie, which has to be the best food stall name since I saw a kebab van called ‘Jason Donnervan’ in Essex many moons ago. A bit like large whitebait, these guys sell deep fried achovies and boy are they good (picture above). They dip them in egg and then flour seasoned with salt, pepper and paprika , and serve them up with a wedge of lemon, pickled peppers and a smoked paprika aioli. You can eat them head off or on (Jersey style), and they are the perfect combination of crunchy, fishy and salty. They are seriously nice guys too. They give fish a good name.
So…….back in time a few weeks we hit the last stop on our trip, New York. It’s been a couple of years since I was last there, and to paraphrase DOOM, it still is a hell of a finer town. Knowing we only had a few days of our adventure left, we rolled up our sleeves and ate our way right to the core. I’m probably going to do some longer posts on a couple of other discoveries, and I didn’t make it to The Dutch which I REALLY wanted to check out, but here are a few highlights.
Where to start…hmmmm. The first time I went to NY, probably back in ‘97, my mate Matt took me to The Oyster Bar at Grand Central Station. I vividly remember sitting in the back room saloon surrounded by brash New Yoikers shouting at each other and guzzling plates of oysters whilst I sat slurping a New England Clam Chowder in a happy jet-lagged daze. The wife and I decided to pay it a visit this time, and I’m happy to say nothing’s really changed. It’s certainly a tourist attraction, but it is still rammed with every shape and size of New Yorker having lunch, doing deals and chewing the fat (oysters). We sucked down a couple of zinc-ey Long Island Bluepoints, a bowl of that creamy, soothing chowder and a very tasty crab-cake sarnie all, washed down with a couple of glasses of super chilled Sauvignon Blanc. As far as classic New York lunches go, it’s hard to beat, and good to see an institution like this still chugging away.
That’s right, Hand To Mouth is back. Despite missing San Francisco like crazy, and Home Sweet Home not really feeling that sweet right now, it is good to be home. Kind of.
We got back to London a week ago, and its been a hectic. Along with flat hunting and catching up with friends & family, I’ve been lining up a bunch of interviews, meetings and trial shifts at bakeries across London. I had my first trial on Monday and have two more lined up this week, along with a couple of meetings. And I’m also meeting up with an old work colleague who wants to get me involved with a food based iPhone / iPad app he’s developing. Exciting times.
I’ve also got a bunch of posts to write when I get the chance, including a round-up of our New York eatathon, a couple of great finds from the city that never sleeps, and a killer rasberry tart recipe, amongst others.
So I promise I’ll pull my finger out and will be back here very soon.
I saw this video about New York based Mast Brothers Chocolate about a year or so ago, and have desperately wanted to visit their shop ever since. As someone who’s interested in starting their own business, I found the approach they discuss really inspirational. I love the romantic idealism of treating their business like a boys own adventure, and striving for something that feels nostalgic and hand made, as opposed to mass produced and uniform.
Anyway, yesterday afternoon I managed to satisfy my desire by paying their Williamsburgh shop a visit. I was hoping to take the factory tour they mention on the site, but alas they aren’t doing them at the moment as they are in the process of expanding their operation. However, when the lovely guy behind the counter saw we were a bit bummed out about not getting to do the tour, he snuck us in to have a look at their new space. It’s a really lovely big, open brick walled warehouse unit, but what hits you first is the smell. It’s like being in a chocolate cloud. I’m pretty sure I started to drool almost instantly. The room is filled will sacks of cocoa beans, a roasting oven, ‘conching’ drums (these heat and grind the beans for 3 days until the chocolate is beautifully smooth), and this awesome mad scientist-esque glass vacuum pump device that separates the cracked beans from the husk. It’s very cool, and feels really nicely old fashioned.
Apologies for the radio silence. It’s almost been a week since I finished the course at the SFBI, and I’ve been enjoying a few well earned days off. I’ve got a bunch more posts in the bank to write, so if I can pull my finger out, I’ll get to these very soon. AND I’ve also got exciting news about some work experience that I’ve hopefully lined up here for the next couple of weeks.
But back to this week. It was something lurking in my in my in-box on Wednesday that has tempted me back to Wordpress, and that was the launch of the new Big Apple Hot Dogs site. I mentioned it briefly in this post, but I worked with the very talented chaps over at Nation on the site before I left for California.
This is a ‘Big Dog’ from Big Apple Hot Dogs on Old Street. It’s big and it’s tasty. If you’re in the area, go and get one. You won’t regret it.
My buddy Tom over at Nation has been working with Abiye, the man behind the dogs, on a new website, branding and all that jazz for his enterprise, and I’ve been helping him out with some well chosen words and some (hopefully welcome) thoughts on food branding.
There’s nothing to show you yet, but I’ve got to say, it’s a real joy when work and hobbies collide. I’ll be doing a proper post once the new look and feel is live, so until then, keep it locked.
Hand To Mouth is a blog about food. Eating it. Cooking it. Reviewing it. Reading about it. And everything in between.
I’ll be regularly posting recipes, reviews of some of my favourite places and opinion about anything food related that grabs my eye. Hopefully there’ll be a few laughs along the way, and I promise not to cut the cheese.
If you like what you see please let me know, and equally don’t be afraid of throwing a few rotten tomatoes my way if you don’t.
BIG thanks to Tom Hardcore at Nation for the blog design.
Morning / afternoon all.
