Eating our way through NYC: Part one

After Christmas we took the train down to New York for a few days, spurred on by the deeply discounted room rate at the Roosevelt that I won in a Twitter contest (and they say Twitter is pointless! Ha!).

Previous experience of Amtrak food had made us wise, so we combined the pernil that The Boy roasted for Christmas Eve and the baked ham I'd done for Christmas Day, and lunched on Cuban sandwiches while watching snowbound New England zip by.



We settled in at the hotel, rested for a short while, and then headed out to our first stop: a bar at a railroad station.

Okay, it was nicer than that. The Campbell Apartment used to be the office of a 1920s railroad tycoon, and was furnished in the style typical of rich men of the time ("Make it look as though I plundered it all from Europe!").

As we were there early on a Sunday evening, we'd expected it to be quiet. But the place was almost full, so we squeezed into a space at the bar. The solo, overwhelmed bartender was Andy Dick-level clumsy; while we sat there, he broke, spilled and knocked over more barware than we own.

Still, he muddled a lovely combination of Bourbon, fresh ginger, lime and rosemary:



And then to dinner at Benoit, an Alain Ducasse joint. Our previous encounter with the Ducasse brand had been at the then-newly opened Adour, which was incredible.

Benoit, by comparison, was not so outstanding (and a comparison of menus shows just an average $10 difference in entrée price between the two).

Not to say it was bad; just that the food seemed made with a heavier hand. The escargots (which, though ordered as an appetizer, came out slightly after the mains) were largely tasteless, and the boudin noir wasn't as bold as it could have been.

On the other hand, The Boy got a lovely selection of magical animal in his choucroute:



And dessert was baba au rhum, served in an adorable domed silver dish:



Time to roll back to the hotel and rest up before the next day's lunch.

First, a morning at MoMA, to check out the Tim Burton exhibit.

Then a brisk walk of a couple of blocks (coatless, because the line for MoMA's cloakroom was too damn long) to Le Bernardin.

As it's one of only four three-star restos in New York, and not a place for a cheap nosh, we expected the place to be hushed, refined; populated by the kind of people who respect the chef's art and the sanctity of a great meal. And, for the most part, that's who we found.

Apart from the old broad at the table behind us.

"Why is it all fish? You know I'm allergic to fish ... I can't eat anything on this menu. Oh, lobster, that I can have. Can you ask them to do me plain lobster, with butter, and just some steamed vegetables? I don't know why they have to have so much fish ... don't put your fork in my food, what are you doing? I can't believe this ... oh, I can't eat anything on the dessert menu, I'm allergic to everything ... just some vanilla ice cream, maybe two scoops."

I have no problem with people who have food allergies. I just don't understand:

a) Why someone would go to a seafood restaurant if they can't eat the central ingredient;
b) Why someone would go to a place known for exquisite, creative, thoughtful dishes if they have no interest/ability to try them;
c) Why someone can't KEEP THEIR DAMN VOICE DOWN.

I just had to get that out. Sorry. I feel better now.

Apart from that, the meal was fantastic, and I wish the photographic evidence had come out better.

I started with the freshest sea urchin I've had, served in a citrus broth:



The Boy had raw tuna, pounded thin and layered over foie gras:



then lightly breaded monkfish with a ginger-turnip purée:



and I had skate wrapped in nori, served with oysters and winter greens:



And then. Oh, and then.

Dessert.

See this?



Grapefruit, vanilla, tarragon. Soft, crisp, creamy, tart, cold.

And this?



Okay, yes, the first word is "blurry." But then: cinnamon, caramel, pear, salt, fromage blanc. The green spheres are liquid pear. Liquid. It involves some molecular gastronomy magic, and results in a sphere of poached, puréed pear encased in a delicate skin, which bursts in the mouth, releasing sweet, spicy juice. Completely amazing.

Even made me forget the loud, allergic lady.

Otherworldly sushi in Boston? O ya!

The Boy turned F-Word this past birthday; he sailed into it much more gracefully than I did. To celebrate, we checked out o ya, the sushi sensation that allegedly has people commuting up from New York for dinner.

Those who claim Boston is superior to NYC must be delighted to have evidence to back up their belief.

I made the reservation through OpenTable, which meant we were at the chef's bar (reserving one of their six tables is only possible by calling).

This turned out to be the best option, as we got to watch o ya's three chefs at work in their tiny space, creating incredible dishes using only veryveryvery sharp knives, a blowtorch and an electric whisk. Oh, and insanely fresh and fabulous ingredients.

I've had sea urchin before, but I'd assumed it was an acquired taste. How could anyone truly enjoy something that tasted as though it had sat in a tidepool on Revere Beach for three days?

The sea urchin at o ya, however, made me realize I just hadn't had fresh uni. This wasn't Revere Beach; it was a deserted Polynesian island. It was amazing.

The other surprise was the onsen egg. Apparently this is a relatively common preparation in Japan—onsen means hot springs, and eggs can be slow-cooked in the water—but it was a revelation to us.

When I think poached egg, I think runny yolk. But here, the yolk was just-just-just cooked; enough to hold together, but still soft, almost custardy. And warm. And topped with wafer-thin slices of pickled garlic.

How good was it? It actually made me cry. Thanks a lot, o ya.

In all, we had:

Kumamoto oyster
watermelon pearls, cucumber mignonette



Diver scallop
sage tempura, olive oil bubbles, meyer lemon



Scottish salmon belly
cilantro, ginger, hot sesame oil drizzle

Peruvian-style tuna toro tataki
aji panca sauce, cilantro pesto

Shima aji & sea urchin
ceviche vinaigrette, cilantro



Warm eel
thai basil, kabayaki, fresh Kyoto sansho

Onsen egg
dashi sauce, truffle salt, homemade pickled garlic

Porcelet tonkatsu
seared foie gras, cabbage shiso slaw, dashi apple sauce, hojiso

House-smoked moullard duck tataki
foie gras kabayaki, arima sansho

Foie Gras
balsamic chocolate kabayaki, raisin cocoa pulp, sip of aged sake

Everything was excellent, although (what?) ... the meat dishes weren't as fantastic as the fish. The smoked duck took a lot of chewing; maybe that was more noticable because we'd had several plates of melt-in-the-mouth tender ingredients beforehand. The pork was delicious, but no more amazing (it seemed) than pork anywhere else.

But the last item—the foie gras with chocolate—more than made up for it, especially with the taste of 8-year-old sake (with the color and depth of port).

I made a video. Wanna see? Goes like this:



The only thing I felt bad about was the prep-to-consumption-time ratio; we'd watch as the chef sliced fish with meticulous precision, bathed it in marinade, chose the right kind of plate on which to delicately place the fish, sliced another ingredient, layered them and topped them with tiny, measured amounts of garnishes, and finished them with a spoonful of something from a sizzling pan.

And then our waiter would bring the finished dish to us. And we'd go nom. Nom. And the chef's intense, focused artwork would have disappeared.

I think we'll be going back. O ya.

Lansdowne Pub: Magically delicious chips!

Remember how disappointed I was with the uneven, dry chips at the Battery?

It doesn't really matter any more. Because I found a place that does the closest thing to real, proper chips.

Last week, the Lansdowne Pub opened, so I went with lovely co-worker Sarah and new co-worker Eric to check it out.

In its corporate attempt to create the atmosphere of ye olde taverne from scratch, it's everything I dislike: 4,000 cozy square feet of faux-traditional, newly distressed, dark-wood bar room. A Pogues/Van Morrison/Cranberries soundtrack. Walls decorated with carefully distressed tchotchkes and cloth-bound books, Guinness posters and HDTVs showing sports.



I was all ready for a menu of authentic Irish dishes such as nachos and quesdillas and buffalo wings and chili.

But the Lansdowne's options were actually interesting. Yes, there were the usual bangers & mash and shepherd's pie and beef stew, but there were also pork chops, oysters, mussels, salmon—items that could easily appear on a trad/modern Irish menu but, at least in Boston, rarely do.

The Lansdowne also does the ubiquitious full-on fry-up breakfast on weekends, and what may be a proper Sunday roast. I shall investigate further.

But what gave me most hope was that they had chips with a variety of toppings: gravy, curry sauce, mushy peas, baked beans.

So Sarah ordered the grilled cheese sandwich, and was going to order a side of chips until the waitress explained they came with her dish anyway. And then this arrived:



"I thought you said it came with chips," Sarah said to our waitress, who rolled her eyes.

"You know, I keep telling them they should change the wording on the menu," she said. "People are always getting this confused."

Okay, so why didn't you clarify this before we ordered??

Eric went for the fish sandwich, which did really come with chips:



The fish itself was lovely:



And I ordered the ploughman's lunch. This was something of a test: in England, you can tell a lot about a pub from its ploughman's, which is, at its core, bread and a wedge of cheese, but can range from those ingredients alone to a feast of cured meats, pork pie, boiled eggs, salad and fruit.

And it turned out to be better than expected:



The bread was fabulous, light and nutty; the cheddar could have been stronger; the salad was okay (no one expects tomatoes to taste of anything in April anyway); and it came with an interesting tomato chutney, as well as Branston pickle, to which I am addicted.

And then there was the meat:



The camera doesn't lie: that's about how appetizing it was. Basically thin-sliced deli turkey and beef, it was cold, clammy, and completely without flavor. I'd seriously suggest that the Lansdowne ditch it and serve a couple of cold sausages instead.

Oh, and the chips?



As good as it gets without going to a proper chippy. Soft and pliant, not too dry or too greasy, held salt and vinegar well. Better than most late-night post-club takeaways back home, at least. I'm usually able to restrain myself from eating a whole plate of chips, but it took willpower not to finish the lot.

The Lansdowne Pub isn't the cheapest lunch option—my bread and cheese set me back $13—but I'm glad it's there for when I get the insatiable urge for real proper chips.

The final word on fish and chips

I know, I need to move on from the fish and chips obsession. But since my review of The Battery in Brighton, I've been looking for ways to explain just what makes good fish and chips so good.

And it's hard, for two reasons:

I have an emotional attachment to fish and chips
It's not just a meal in isolation: it means driving to the seaside (Seaton mostly) with my parents and sitting in the car, eating chips, and watching the rough, gray waves of the North Sea. It means walking to the chip shop on a Friday night to get fish-and-chips-three-times-and-a-pineapple-ring (my favorite), and then running home with a warm bundle wrapped in newspaper. It means schoolyard discussions on the subject of scraps, and whether they were necessary. It's Proustian, but with more malt vinegar.

The basic description sounds gross
It's true. Deep-fried fish in batter, served with fat chips that are best if there's no crunch, no hard bits, just a pale, soft wedge of potato, all sitting on a piece of wax paper turned translucent from the grease. Yum? No.

Luckily, the Guardian came through for me this week, with an article about the Best Fish and Chip Shop of the Year 2008 award and a description that perfectly encapsulated the essence of fish and chips:

And to my way of thinking, the papery rustle of chips, the golden brown of autumn leaves, the exquisite crunch of crisp batter, the little puff of steam bearing the sweet promise of cod or haddock (sustainably sauced, of course) that escapes as you break through the batter carapace for the first time, the slippery collops of hot, lucent, white fish slipping between your fingers into your mouth, the tang of vinegar, the rasp of salt, the gloss of fat on the lips – don't tell me that these aren't the equal to any gastronomic experience in any part of the world.

I really have nothing to add.

Oh, except this: As we were heading to Penn Station at the end of our NYC trip the other week, we made a pit-stop at A Salt and Battery. It might not be real absolute proper fish and chips, but it will do for now.



Their flaky, fabulous steak and kidney pie: beef gravy and pastry is one of the best combinations ever.



Sadly, we were too full for dessert:

The Battery: an assault on fish and chips

When I learned about the recent opening of The Battery, an "authentic Irish chipper" in Brighton, I was delighted. Finally, I thought, there was a place I could find something approaching real fish and chips without having to go all the way to New York.

The Boy, it turned out, was equally enthusiastic (but then again, he's a sucker for anything that involves a Fryolator). So last Wednesday he picked me up after work and we headed out for fried deliciousness.

I was a little anxious, as my friend Lisa had investigated the place when it first opened (literally; they'd been in business for about an hour when she arrived) and she'd said they didn't seem to have their act together. But we decided that was probably opening night jitters.

The Battery's exterior promised good things.



The interior looked authentic enough.



And it smelled authentic, in that it was impossible to breathe without inhaling lungfuls of grease molecules.

The Battery's menu is basic but varied, offering chips with gravy, curry, cheese, peas (mushy, one assumes) or garlic mayo; pollock or haddock; battered sausage or burger (yeah, not too sure about that one); and chip butties.

Figuring we shouldn't pig out too much, we decided to get a fish each and share a side of fries. So I ordered fish and chips, plus a fish.

And that's when everything went horribly wrong.

First of all, the woman behind the counter couldn't understand what I was asking for. And she was so soft-spoken, and the combined chorus of hot oil, venting system, and CNN on the TV was so loud, that I couldn't hear what she was saying.

We probably should have realize that the total cost of $30 for one-and-a-half meals was a little high, but we were tired and hungry and we just wanted some damn chips.

And then I asked if we could get a couple of slices of bread to go with it.

"No," she said, "we don't have bread."

But you have chip butties, right?

"Yes, you could order a chip butty. But I can't give you bread."

Okay, no bread. We sat down to wait.

Eventually, the woman came toward us, bearing a tray piled with food. It can't be all for us, can it?

It was.

She unloaded a fish and chips for The Boy. And then a fish and chips for me. And then a super-sized extra mountain of chips.

Now I understood why our food cost so much. Now I got why she sounded incredulous when we said our order was "for here" instead of "to go."

But didn't it strike her as slightly odd that we'd want an entire sack of potatoes?

She was apologetic (though grudgingly so), took the extra fries away, and said we should stop at the cash register on the way out for a refund. Back behind the counter, she explained the situation to the manager, who explained that she should figure out the difference and bring the cash to us.

So, after all this, what about the food?

Okay, I admit I have a gold standard for fish 'n' chips: The Station Chippy on Station Road in Billingham. The chips are pale, soft and pliant. The fish is delicate, and the batter clings to it the way one holds on to a dream in the moments before wakefulness. I'm serious. There's a sweetness to the frying oil that infuses everything. And also, they do pineapple rings. And you can get scraps.

At The Battery ... well, the haddock was lovely. Generous, flaky, flavorful and generally good quality.

However.

The batter was thick and chewy, dry on the outside, gluey inside, unnecessarily crunchy in places.



And the chips were just. Sad.



Little-known piece of kitchen science trivia: thinly cut potatoes cook more quickly than thickly cut potatoes. Oh, you knew that? Apparently the spud-basher at The Battery is unaware of this arcane fact, which is why half the fries were okay and the other half were cooked to an inedible crisp.

Look, I don't claim to be a frying expert. I know it takes practice to be able to turn out perfect fish and chips every time. But there are hundreds, if not thousands, of practitioners in the UK who have figured it out. And until The Battery gets it right, it's upholding the myth that British cooking is bad.

In the meantime, I'll content myself with dreams of fish suppers to come.



The champagne is optional. The buttered bread is not.

Chip butties in Brighton!

I'm sure this does nothing to support my argument in favor of British food, but I was delighted to discover this tasty treat in Thrillist today:

From a family of Cork emigrees, The Battery's Boston's first "authentic Irish chipper," serving up homemade battered & fried deliciousness [...] The arterial onslaught starts with hand-cut "chips" in eleven styles (from homemade garlic mayo, to curry/mayo, to cheese/coleslaw) that're also available as a "Chip Butty" [...] old-school fish 'n chips [...] fried potato pies (cheese/onion, or thyme/parsley), battered sausage [...] Lucozade [...] Ribena ...

I am so there.

You shall have a fishy ...

Not all of Asda is dedicated to junk; they have a small but well-stocked fish counter with everything from fresh sea bass to Manx kippers:



We bought some Atlantic cod, because I wanted to make my new favorite dish of roast cod with baby potatoes, olives and cherry tomatoes (courtesy, I admit to my shame, of Martha Stewart).

And instead of wrapping the fish in paper, as they do in WholeFoods, the fishcounterman enveloped it in a sheet of foil-coated paper and heat-sealed it into a package.



It's leak-proof, odor-proof, and keeps the fish cooler longer. You can also throw it straight into the freezer.

Do these exist in the US? Or is it just a European thing?

Anyway, just wanted to make it clear that England has some healthy food.



(Ignore that.)



(Ignore that, too.)