The Brooklyn Flea

All New York City foodies owe themselves a trip to the Brooklyn Flea, a weekend market that celebrates the creative culture of Brooklyn. I made my first visit this past Saturday, and was highly impressed with the goods on offer by the vendors. As with any flea market, there is a high amount of junk for sale at the Brooklyn Flea, but with some patience, one can find some great-looking vintage clothing, handmade jewelery, and antique furniture. Of course, I was there for the food, of which I found very little junk. For twenty dollars total, my significant eater and I were able to eat our way through the Brooklyn Flea. It was a great way to spend one of the few beautiful weekend days that New York has had this spring.

We weren't the only ones who decided to go to the Brooklyn Flea last Saturday:


The kind owners of People's Pops pose for a picture. Their ginger-lemon shaved ice (with hand-shaved ice) and strawberry rhubarb popsicles are excellent:


The line for the Red Hook ballfield vendors:


The delicious-looking grilled corn from the Red Hook vendors:


Chicken huaraches from the Red Hook vendors. Like a taco salad, but so much better:


Grilled cheese from Saxelby Cheesemongers, made with Constant Bliss cheese and Brooklyn's McClure's Pickles (another vendor at the Brooklyn Flea):



The creative takes on the hot dog at AsiaDog. I recommend "The Vinh":


Manning the grill at AsiaDog:

A rocking chair circa 1890:


The Brooklyn Flea takes place every Saturday at the following locations:

Saturday: Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School (Lafayette Ave. between Clermont and Vanderbilt Ave)
Fort Greene, Brooklyn
10am to 5pm

Sunday: Under the Brooklyn Bridge
DUMBO, Brooklyn
11am to 6pm

More on Pine Nuts and Pine Mouth

Apparently it wasn't just the pine nuts in Roni-Sue's Bacon Buttercrunch that ruined my taste buds for a few days. According to the Daily Mail, more and more people are being left with a bitter, metallic taste after eating pine nuts. There's even a name for the strange affliction: "pine mouth." From now on, I'll only make pesto with walnuts, thank you very much.

Kung Pao Chicken

To me, Kung Pao chicken is Chinese comfort food. It's one of those guilty pleasures that I find myself frequently making a batch of on Thursday nights when I have little desire desire to cook after a long week of work.

For my latest dose of Kung Pao chicken, I improvised quite a bit based on the ingredients I had on hand. I adapted a recipe from Fuchsia Dunlop, substituting shallots for the a few garlic cloves and adding a healthy dose of spinach. Although it was not quite the real deal, it was completely delicious. For authentic Kung Pao chicken, just omit the spinach addition and shallot-for-garlic substitution.

Eddie's Kung Pao Chicken
Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 1/2 tsp cornstarch
• 1 tbsp Shaoxing wine
• 2 lbs. chicken breasts (or thighs), cut into bite-size pieces
• 3 tbsp. peanut oil
• 6 dried chiles
• 1 shallot, minced
• 1 inch piece of ginger, minced
• 1 tsp. sugar
• 3 tbsp. soy sauce
• 1 tsp. sesame oil
• 1 large handful of spinach
• 1 handful of unsalted roasted peanuts, chopped
• 1 scallion, thinly sliced

Directions:

1. Mix cornstarch with wine in a large bowl and whisk until cornstarch dissolves. Add chicken to bowl and mix well to coat pieces with cornstarch mixture.
2. Add oil to wok or large skillet and heat over high heat. Add dried chiles to pan and cook until they are blackened and fragrant, about 5 minutes.
3. Add shallots and ginger to pan and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.
4. Add chicken to wok and cook, stirring constantly, until chicken is cooked through, about 5 minutes.
5. Reduce heat to low. Add sugar and soy sauce and mix well. Simmer until sauce has thickened slightly, about five minutes.
6. Add spinach and stir until wilted, about two minutes.
7. Remove pan from heat. Mix in peanuts, scallion, and sesame oil and serve.

Granola Bars

I have to give a shout out to this recipe for cranberry-walnut power bars from Food and Wine. They have been powering me through workouts, mid-afternoon slumps, and after-dinner sugar cravings all week. They are tastier, healthier, cheaper, and much more hearty than packaged granola bars. And they are a cinch to make; I made a batch of 16 in less time than it would have taken to walk down the street to the store to purchase a package of six granola bars. I simply can't give these treats enough praise.

Chocolate and Bacon: At Least It Didn't Kill Me

In one of my weaker moments while wandering in through Essex Market in the Lower East Side, I stopped by Roni-Sue's Chocolates to purchase a bag of bacon buttercrunch. For those that haven't been keeping track of the bacon-obsessed New York food media, the bacon buttercrunch candy from Roni-Sue is toffee that has been mixed with pieces of fried bacon and covered with chocolate, pine nuts, and chile. At least too me, the candy sounded like a great idea at the time.

The candy, while not nearly deserving of the hype that some of the major food blogs have given it, was pretty good. The toffee was bursting with butter flavor. The bacon, thank goodness, was added with a light hand, and the chiles gave a nice bite. The pine nuts, while a good idea, could have been toasted more so that they were a bit crunchier. After finishing off the bag with my significant eater, I was glad I tried Roni-Sue's bacon buttercrunch, but doubted that I would try it again. This bacon and chocolate candy just didn't do it for me. Little did I know.

A day after eating the candy, I noticed that everything I ate tasted very bitter. Bitter oatmeal, bitter salad for lunch, and bitter chicken for dinner. I assumed my taste buds were just having a case of the Mondays. I mentioned this oddity to my significant eater who complained that everything tasted bitter to her as well. We had eaten three completely different meals during the day. That's so cute that we have the same afflictions at the same time, I thought.

Two days after eating the bacon buttercrunch, my significant eater and I continued to be afflicted by an awful bitter, metallic taste after every meal. Being the occasional hypochondriac that she occasionally is, my girlfriend decided to do some research to find out what could possibly have ruined both of our taste buds. After ruling out that both of us had come down with oral cancer at the exact same time, she came across this blurb from Wikipedia that mentions: The eating of pine nuts can cause serious taste disturbances, developing 1-3 days after consumption and lasting for days or weeks. A bitter, metallic taste is described. In general, a minority of pine nuts on the market present this problem. Though very unpleasant, there does not seem to be a real health concern." Damn you, bacon buttercrunch and its bad batch of pine nuts! Thankfully, the metallic taste was not a symptom of any grave danger we were in, but we have both now all but sworn off pine nuts (except in pesto, ahem). And we have definitely sworn off all combinations of bacon and chocolate for good. Taste buds and sanity back in tact, I can easily say that I will never again succumb to the gluttonous allure of bacon and chocolate again.

Steamed Salmon with Garlic and Ginger

Despite my grand plans to cook a dinner celebrating the completion of my Greenmarket Challenge, after a particularly wild weekend of birthday parties, I was ready to detox come Sunday night. This salmon recipe, while on the healthy side, adapted from Andrea Nguyen's Into the Vietnamese Kitchen, is a winner. By steaming the salmon until it is barely cooked through, the fish stays moist. The sauce is just bold enough to not overpower the fish.


Steamed Salmon with Garlic and Ginger
Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 4 6 oz. salmon fillets
• 1 1/4 tsp sugar
• Ground black pepper, to taste
• 2 tbsp. oyster sauce
• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
• 2 tbsp. grapeseed oil
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2-inch piece of ginger, peeled and minced
• 3 scallions, thinly chopped

Directions:

1. Mix the sugar, pepper, oyster sauce, and soy sauce in a small bowl. Stir until sugar has dissolved.
2. Heat oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and ginger and cook until fragrant, about a minute. Add sauce mixture and bring to boil. Remove from heat and add scallions. Take sauce off heat and let come to room temperature.
3. Fill a saute pan with deep sides half way with water. Bring to a boil.
4. Place salmon fillets in a cake pan (or other pan with sides that is smaller in diameter than the saute pan), Top salmon with sauce mixture.
5. Carefully place pan containing the salmon in the boiling water and cover. Let salmon steam until it flakes with a fork, approximately 7 to 9 minutes.
6. Carefully remove salmon pan from water and serve salmon with the sauce.

Review: Momofuku Ssäm Bar

Fresh off the 12-days of cooking that was my Greenmarket Challenge, I decided to take a night off from cooking and have dinner with my significant eater at Momofuku Ssäm Bar, the only one of the four Momofuku establishments I had yet to try. The great meal that followed extended my enthusiasm for all things Momofuku.

As a starter we ordered the steamed pork buns, a standby at all David Chang restaurants. Like the pork buns at Noodle Bar and Milk Bar, the buns at Ssäm Bar are a celebration in pork fat: melt-in-your-mouth pork belly with thinly sliced cucumbers and hoisin sauce in a soft steamed bun. It may have just been a night in which I was craving pork buns, but the rendition as Ssäm Bar tasted better than any Momofuku pork buns I have had before, with the pork being particularly buttery.

From the "local/seasonal" section of the menu, we ordered snap peas which, along with eggs and mint, were tossed in XO sauce, a traditional Chinese sauce consisting of dried shrimp and scallops in spicy oil. The snap peas showed why David Chang deserves much of the overwhelming praise he receives; the sweet peas alongside the salty XO sauce created an excellent and unique combination of flavors, with the mint brightening the dish just enough.

Due to the Southerner in me, I have a difficult time passing up a fried chicken dish on a menu and my visit to Ssäm Bar was no exception. I ordered the fried chicken dish, assured that Chang would take fried chicken to a new level; the menu was certainly convincing, even in the teasing way of dishes are described at all Momofuku restaurants: "bell & evan's fried chicken-- ramps porcinis, egg." At least to me, neither of those ingredients can do any wrong. Unfortunately, the fried chicken was the one letdown of the night. While delicious, I was hoping my $24 would get more than two large cubes of crispy dark meat, a few morels, and a very rich egg yolk. Of course, despite my slight disappointment, my significant eater and I all but licked the plate dry. If anything, this dish served as reminder that David Chang is not quite the culinary god that some make him out to be; you expect a fried chicken dish from him to be transcendent, but this one was merely very good.

While perusing the dessert menu, the hostess told us we had to try the ice cream pie, which had recently been added to the menu. We took her advice and ordered the pie, which consisted of the Momofuku-trademark cereal milk ice cream in a salty and sweet cornmeal crust. The pie was served with a compote of tri-star strawberries. The hostess was right on with the ice cream pie; it was excellent, with each element being equally delicious on its own as it was with the other two elements. Some may balk at the texture of the re-frozen soft serve ice cream, which made the ice cream slightly icy and not as creamy as one may expect an ice cream pie to be; my significant eater and I had no complaints.

Like the other Momofuku establishments, Ssäm Bar turns a blind eye to the established rules of fine dining. The room is extremely loud. The service is rushed, although friendly enough. For the most part, the only utensils offered are in a canister of chop sticks in the center of each table. Despite these deficiencies, there is a reason why the restaurant is packed with diners night after night; the food is excellent. If anything, Ssäm Bar's lack of fine dining pretense-- although it does carry a high degree of the annoying hipster pretense -- is refreshing. Most of all, the food at Ssäm Bar makes the deficiencies worth putting up with.

As we left Ssäm Bar, my significant eater and I made a pit stop next door at Momofuku Milk Bar and purchased a slice of "crack pie" to eat at home. We didn't need another pie out of hunger-- the portions at Ssäm Bar are more than adequate-- we just weren't quite ready to end our Momofuku night. Fortunately for us, the buttery slice of crack extended our Momofuku high a little bit longer.


Momofuku Ssäm Bar
207 2nd Ave. (at 13th St.)
New York, NY 10003

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 12

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 12

Breakfast: Poached Knoll Crest eggs over whole wheat toast

Lunch: Rotini salad with green garlic pesto and sugar snap peas

Dinner: Polenta with green garlic pesto, chorizo, and roasted asparagus

And with that, my Greenmarket Challenge is over! I was hoping to end the challenge with an interesting, celebratory meal of Greenmarket ingredients, but alas, I had very little of my Greenmarket purchases from two weeks ago remaining.

All in all, the past twelve days have been incredibly rewarding, both as an amateur cook and as a proponent of locally-sourced ingredients. Not only have I challenged my culinary creativity, but I have also learned how to make the most of my food budget. While I doubt that I will continue to try to source my meals entirely from the Greenmarket, my Greenmarket Challenge has taught me some valuable lessons in both budgeting and cooking.

With the completion of my Greenmarket Challenge, I have a couple celebratory meals planned for the weekend. The first will certainly be a restaurant meal, as I have cooked non-stop for the last twelve days and am in need of a meal out. For my second celebratory meal, I will return to the theme of the past two weeks and cook a meal consisting entirely of local ingredients. Check back to read about my meals!

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 11

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 11

Breakfast: Leftover chorizo tortilla

Lunch: Turkey sandwich

Dinner: Polenta mixed with green garlic pesto, topped with sauteed kale and a fried Knoll Crest egg

As I reach the penultimate day of my Greenmarket Challenge, I am off icially running out of food. I had to cheat on lunch, bringing in non-Greenmarket turkey sandwich. Dinner was a compost pile of leftover polenta topped with other leftovers from my refrigerator. Here is some proof that locavore cuisine ain't always pretty:

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 10

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 10

Breakfast: Leftover chorizo tortilla

Lunch: Rotini salad with green garlic pesto and sugar snap peas

Dinner: Leftover Flying Pigs Farms spare ribs, polenta, roasted asparagus

I'm up to Day 10 and maximizing my use of leftovers. Only two days left of my Greenmarket Challenge!

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 9

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 9

Breakfast: Poached Knoll Crest eggs over whole wheat toast

Lunch: I cheated and went out for burger with my co-workers

Dinner: Leftover chorizo tortilla, spinach salad

My meals are beginning to become monotonous as I scrounge around for the last of my Greenmarket Challenge ingredients to make it through the final 4 days of the challenge. My boss treated my team to burgers for lunch today, so I was relieved of having to cook one meal. The last 3 days of the challenge will force me to be creative with leftovers. What is keeping me going through the monotony of leftovers is the anticipation of my post-challenge celebratory meal. Stay tuned...

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 8

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 8

Breakfast: Strawberries, yogurt, and honey

Lunch: Spinach salad with hard boiled Knoll Crest egg, sugar snap peas, and roasted asparagus

Dinner: Roast spare ribs from Flying Pigs Farm, sauteed kale with onions, polenta

As if I didn't already get my pork fix at the Big Apple Barbecue Block Party this weekend, I decided to cook my spare ribs from Flying Pigs Farm for the eighth day of my Greenmarket Challenge. I chose this meal more out of necessity-- the ribs were the only meat from the Greenmarket remaining in my refrigerator-- than out of a desire for more pork fat. Nonetheless, they made for an excellent dinner, with the Italian-ish spice mixture I rubbed on them making these ribs very different from the sweet and spicy pork I had stuffed my face with all weekend.

I rubbed the spare ribs with a mixture of salt, pepper, and sage, and roasted them at 325F for 75 minutes. Unfortunately, my camera battery died at the dinner table, so I have no pictures to commemorate the 8th day of the Greenmarket Challenge.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 7

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 7

Breakfast: Poached Knoll Crest eggs on whole wheat toast

Lunch: Rotini salad with sugar snap peas and spring garlic pesto

Dinner: Knoll crest egg tortilla with Flying Pigs Farm chorizo (recipe below)

As I go into the final week of my challenge, I'm having to get creative with my proteins as supplies are beginning to run out. While my produce supplies should last me well over 12 days, I am anticipating some vegetarian meals coming up. Or, as was the case today, I will have be on egg overload. Fortunately, the tortilla I made with Knoll Crest eggs and Flying Pigs chorizo was unique enough where I could forget about the poached eggs I had already had for breakfast.


Chorizo Tortilla

Ingredients:

• 6 eggs
• Salt, to taste
• 1 cup olive oil
• 5 small to medium yukon gold potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
• 1 yellow onion, thinly sliced
• 1 link fresh chorizo sausage, casing removed

Directions:

1. Beat eggs in a bowl. Add salt to taste and set aside.
2. Heat olive oil in a large skillet (or frittata pan) over medium heat.
3. Layer potatoes and onion slices in skillet. Sprinkle each layer with salt. Cook, flipping layers every five minutes, until potatoes are soft, 15-20 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, saute chorizo in a small skillet over medium heat. Break up sausage with the back of a spoon and cook until browned. Drain sausage and add to eggs.
5. When potatoes and onions are cooked, drain them from the oil (save olive oil for another use). Add potatoes and onions to bowl containing eggs and set aside for 15 minutes. Wipe off the skillet.
6. Add two tbsp of reserved olive oil to skillet (or bottom of frittata pan) and heat over high. Add egg, sausage, and potato mixture and reduce heat to med-high. Jiggle pan to prevent sticking.
7. Cook egg mixture until potatoes begin to brown, about five minutes. Flip eggs (either by using a plate or with a frittata pan) and cook other side until potatoes brown, another 3-5 minutes. Flip tortilla a few more times to give it a nice shape. Serve warm or at room temperature.

The Big Apple Barbecue Block Party

I took a brief break from my Greenmarket Challenge yesterday to attend the Big Apple Barbecue Block Party, a two-day festival that brings some of the country's top barbecue joints to Manhattan's Madison Square Park each year. As has always been the case with the festival, the lines at all of the best establishments were long, but the long waits were worth it to sample some topnotch barbecue.

I was lucky enough to have a friend who lives right next to Madison Square Park. We brought up loads of food from the festival to his apartment and enjoyed our barbecue on the balcony while watching the crowds of people below:


Despite the comforts of my friend's apartment, I did escape for a bit to enjoy the festival below:


Despite eating twice my weight in barbecue yesterday, I am still contemplating a return to the festival today as it was just that much fun.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 6

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.


Day 6

Breakfast: Whole wheat toast with Tonjes Farm Dairy ricotta, Cherry Lane Farm strawberries, and local honey

Lunch: Rotini salad with sugar snap peas and spring garlic pesto (recipe below)

Dinner: Leftover Grazin' Angus Acres roast chicken with baked Rancho Gordo yellow eye beans

I'm now halfway through my Greenmarket challenge. I've been subsisting on leftovers the last few days, but with today's meals, I have finished my leftovers and will start cooking from scratch again with the rest of my Greenmarket goods.

I find it interesting that the New York Times is running this story from Pete Wells in this Sunday's magazine section. Mr. Wells' $35 5lb. chicken is almost certainly from Grazin' Angus Farms (the only farm at the Greenmarket charging $7 per lb. of chicken). While I found the price of the chicken to be just as jaw dropping as Mr. Wells did, I was quite pleased with the flavor of the chicken. As Mr. Wells mentions, the Grazin' Angus chicken is somewhat tough, but not to the point of being inedible. I have found that freshly-killed pasture-raised chickens tend to be tougher than most chickens due both to the muscles they have developed from running around the farm. Also, meat tenderizes days after it is slaughtered; unlike supermarket chickens, the chickens sold at the Greenmarket are generally sold shortly after they have been slaughtered, so they are not as tender.

While Mr. Wells is correct in writing that purchasing a $7/lb. chicken is not the best strategy for surviving the depression, one need not give up shopping at the Greenmarket to save money. Just as you cannot mindlessly throw items into a shopping cart at the supermarket, you cannot shop for local ingredients at the farmers market without a budget and a shopping plan in mind. Twenty-one dollar chicken aside, I hope that my Greenmarket challenge is proving that anyone can go local to some degree.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 5

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 5

Breakfast: Poached Knoll Crest eggs over whole wheat toast

Lunch: Rotini salad with sugar snap peas and spring garlic pesto (recipe below)

Dinner: Leftover Grazin' Angus Acres roast chicken with roasted asparagus


Spring Garlic Pesto
Adapted from United Taste with Richard Ruben

Ingredients:

• 4 scallions
• 3 spring garlic
• 2 tbsp walnuts, toasted
• 1 tsp salt
• Ground black pepper, to taste
• 3/4 cup oil

Directions:

1. Coarsely chop scallions and garlic and place into bowl of food processor.
2. Add walnuts, salt, and pepper and begin to process. Drizzle in oil and process until smooth. If necessary, add more oil to reach desired consistency. Taste for salt and pepper and serve.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 4

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.


Day 4
Breakfast: Whole wheat toast with Tonjes Farm Dairy ricotta, Cherry Lane Farm strawberries, and local honey

Lunch: Cherry Lane spinach salad with Grazin' Angus Acres roast chicken, hard-boiled Knoll Crest egg, and sherry vinaigrette

Dinner: Leftover Grazin' Angus Acres beef sliders with leftover Rancho Gordo baked beans

My Greenmarket challenge continues as I eat my way through some leftovers over the next few days.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 3

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 3

Breakfast: Whole wheat toast with Tonjes Farm Dairy ricotta, Cherry Lane Farm strawberries, and local honey

Lunch: Pasta salad with Eckerton Farm sugar snap peas and spring garlic pesto

Dinner: Roasted Grazin' Angus Acres chicken with Cherry Lane asparagus and leftover Rancho Gordo baked beans


The $21 chicken was by far the biggest splurge on my Greenmarket Challenge, but I could not resist purchasing it since all of my other purchases from Grazin' Angus (eggs, flap steak, ground beef) have been superb. How was the chicken? Well, it didn't taste like foie gras, which one might expect from a $21 chicken, but it was pretty darn good. I roasted it using the minimalistic (and Greenmarket Challenge rule-abiding) Thomas Keller method. It turned out perfectly, with succulent meat and a crispy skin. Not to say the chicken was worth $21 dollars (no chicken is worth $21), but I did feel great for supporting a great local farm in Grazin' Angus Acres.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 2

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 2:

Breakfast: Whole wheat toast with Tonjes Farm Dairy ricotta, Cherry Lane Farm strawberries, and local honey

Lunch: Salad with Cherry Lane spinach Flying Pigs Farm chorizo and Knoll Crest hard boiled egg

Dinner: Grazin' Angus Acres beef sliders with Rick's Picks Slices of Life and Rancho Gordo baked beans

On Day 2 of my Greenmarket Challeneg, I turned the locavore movement low brow by making sliders with local, grass fed beef from Grazin' Angus Acres. I seasoned the tiny beef patties with salt and pepper and seared them in a very hot skillet for two minutes per side. They were very rare in the middle, but that's the way to eat such fresh grass fed beef. I served them on Parker House roles from a local bakery. I topped the sliders with Rick's Picks Slice of Life pickles which were amazing; high praise coming from a non-pickle lover.

On the side, I baked Rancho Gordo yellow eye beans using the recipe from his book Heirloom Beans. Grown in California, the beans aren't quite local, but I did already have them on hand, so they are allowed by my Greenmarket Challenge rules. Plus, if any food should be allowed break the rules of the challenge, it would be beans from Rancho Gordo, who's farming practices are locavore in philosophy if not by geography. His baked beans recipe, I should add, was unbelievable, making the my slight breakage of the rules well worth it.

The Greenmarket Challenge: Day 1

Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I bough all of my purchases from the Greenmarket this week. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods. Follow along with me as I document local my meals over the next twelve days of my Greenmarket Challenge.

Day 1

Breakfast: Poached Knoll Crest Eggs over whole wheat bread

Lunch: Cherry Lanes spinach, Eckerton Farm sugar snap peas, and Flying Pigs Farm chorizo

Dinner: P.E. & D.D. monkfish with chorizo, sherry, saffron vinaigrette (recipe below) and Cherry Lanes asparagus, and sauteed Paffenroth potatoes



Monkfish with Chorizo, Sherry, and Saffron Vinaigrette
Serves 2

Ingredients:

• 1 lb. piece of monkfish, cut into two equal pieces
• salt and pepper
• 1/4 cup tbsp olive oil
• 2 thyme sprigs
• 1 chorizo sausage, casing removed
• 2 tbsp sherry vinegar
• Sugar, to taste
• pinch of saffron
  

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450F.
2. Dry monkfish pieces and season with salt and pepper. Place in an ovenproof skillet. Drizzle fish with 1 tbsp olive oil and top each piece with a sprig of thyme. Roast in oven for 10-12 min., until cooked through.
3. Meanwhile, heat skillet over medium heat. Add sausage, and cook slowly, allowing the oil to sweat out of the chorizo. As it cooks, break the sausage up with the back of a wooden spoon. Once the sausage is brown and has released much of its fat, add half of the remaining olive oil. Reduce heat to low. Add sherry vinegar, a pinch of sugar, and saffron to pan and whisk until well blended. Taste the vinaigrette and add sugar, oil, and/or vinegar according to taste; the dressing should have a mild acidity from the vinegar and should not be too sweet.
4. Remove fish from oven. Spoon vinaigrette over fish and serve.

The Greenmarket Challenge

The locavore movement is often dismissed as idealistic philosophy that cannot be practiced by anyone but the very well-heeled. There is a certain degree of truth to this: go to any farmer's market and you will be shocked at what people will pay for local foods. However, one does not need to break the bank in order to eat locally.

This weekend, I set out to the Union Square Greenmarket to conduct that experiment for myself. Rather than supplementing my Greenmarket purchases with purchases from the supermarket as I usually do, I would buy everything from the Greenmarket. I set myself a budget of $110, which is only slightly more than what I normally spend for two weeks of groceries. Keep in mind that this budget will cover my breakfasts, lunches, and dinner for the next 12 days; that's $11 a day, a fair budget considering my average lunch in midtown Manhattan is $8. Some of these items should last me even longer than 10 days, as well. I have allowed myself some leg room to use ingredients such as grains, sauces, and garlic that I already had on hand, but other than that necessary allowance, my entire diet for the week will consist of local foods.

Shopping for this week's meals was certainly challenging. Due to my price constraint, I will have to decrease my meat consumption during the week and may have to eat more vegetables (gasp!) in order to fill myself up. Also, as few recipes include only ingredients that can be sourced from New York in early June, this week will challenge my culinary creativity in order to use only the ingredients I purchased at the Greenmarket. These challenges will help me to eat more healthily and force me to be think outside the box when I cook.

I did have a weekly menu in mind while shopping as doing without it would be nearly impossible to stay within budget, but I won't be posting it (what would be the fun in that?). Instead, stay tuned throughout the week to see what I cook for my Greenmarket Challenge.

Here's what I bought (prices are from my recollection). Note that the pictures contain a few items that my significant eater bought, and are not included in the below list:

- Milk Thistle Farm Milk ($4)
- Cherry Lane strawberries ($8/qt)
- Cherry Lane asparagus ($8 for a large bunch)
- Cherry Lane spinach ($3)
- Knoll Crest eggs ($4)
- Grazin' Angus Acres ground beef ($8)
- Grazin' Angus Acres chicken ($21, by far my biggest splurge)
- Paffenroth yellow onions ($1.50)
- Paffenroth thyme ($1)
- Paffenroth potatoes ($4)
- Eckerton Farm sugar snap peas ($2.50)
- Eckerton Farm kale ($4)
- Eckerton Farm scallions ($2.50)
- Mountain Sweet Berry spring garlic ($2.50)
- Tonjes Farm Dairy ricotta ($2.50)
- Flying Pigs Farm pork spare ribs ($10)
- Flying Pigs Farm chorizo ($10)
- Rick's Picks Slices of Life ($6)
- P.E. & D.D. Fish monkfish ($10)

Pork Chops with Soy and Sriracha Pan Sauce

One of the first cooking techniques I learned was how to make a basic pan sauce: deglaze pan with alcohol, add liquid and seasonings, and reduce. Due to both the simplicity and versatility of pan sauces, they have become one of my standard go to's when cooking simple meals during the week. I have also found that a pan sauce lends itself well to improvisation; just about any tasteful combination of liquids and seasonings can make a great pan sauce as long as you follow the basic technique.

Tonight was one such pan sauce experiment that turned out nicely. The combination of soy sauce, sriracha, and hoisin rarely fails, so I decided to turn it into a pan sauce to accompany pork chops. I added garlic and ginger to season the sauce, and some sugar to slightly sweeten the sauce and to help it thicken. To keep with the Asian theme, I used shaoxing rice wine to deglaze the pan, but dry sherry would work just as well. The measurements are by no means exact, so add or subtract according to your taste; remember, a pan sauce lends itself to improvisation.

Pork Chops with Soy and Sriracha Pan Sauce
Serves 2

Ingredients:

• 2 thick bone-in pork chops
• Salt and pepper
• 2 tbsp peanut oil
• 1 large clove of garlic, minced
• 1/2 inch piece of ginger, minced
• 1/4 cup shaoxing (Chinese rice wine) or sherry
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1 tbsp sriracha sauce
• 1 tbsp hoisin sauce
• 2 tsp sugar

Directions:

1. Pat pork chops dry with paper towels. Season with salt and pepper.
2. Heat oil in a deep skillet over medium-high heat.
3. Add pork chops to pan. Cook for about two minutes per side. Reduce heat to low, cover skillet, and continue to cook pork chops until cooked through, about 3 more minutes per side. Remove chops from pan and let rest.
4. Increase heat to medium. Add garlic and ginger to pan and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.
5. Add wine to pan and bring to a boil. Reduce by half, about 2 minutes. Reduce heat to low.
6. Add soy sauce, hoisin, sriracha, and sugar to pan. Simmer until thickened, about two minutes.
7. Serve pork chops over rice with pan sauce.
   

The Joys of Cooking

Normally, I would not write about a recipe I have previously posted on this blog, but sometimes the tried and true is what makes me most appreciative of a home cooked meal. After slaving over complicated recipes, hand washing a countless number of dishes, and spending an inordinate amount of time purchasing food, it can be easy to forget that cooking does not have to be complicated. On the contrary, making a home cooked can be the easiest way to get food to the table, as demonstrated by my recent dinner of rotini with ramps, breadcrumbs, and pecorino cheese. I made this meal after returning home from a recent trip to Florida.

Coming home to a nearly empty refrigerator and being tired from my early morning flight and a long day of work, cooking was the last thing on my mind at the time. However, not wanting to order an unsatisfying delivery meal, I decided that making the always dependable pasta with ramps and breadcrumbs would be the quickest way to get food in my stomach and begin relaxing after my grueling day. So I set a pot of water on the stove, and I began unpacking my suitcase while I let the water come to a boil. By the time I had finished unpacking, the water was boiling, so I added the pasta. With the pasta cooking, I sauteed the breadcrumbs and ramps. Ten minutes later, I was eating my pasta and thinking about how damn wonderful cooking can be.

Lamb Chops with Mint Pesto

Mint is a perfect accompaniment to lamb. The lemon juice in this mint pesto adds a sour note that brightens up the the sauce, making it a great dish for spring.

Lamb Chops with Mint Pesto
Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 2 cups mint leaves, loosely packed
• 2 tbsp. lemon juice
• 1/4 cup toasted walnuts
• 1/4 cup
• 1 small garlic clove
• Salt and pepper
• 2 tbsp. grape seed oil
• 8 lamb rib chops

Directions:

1. Combine mint, lemon juice, walnuts, 1/4 cup oil, and garlic in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until well blended. Add salt and pepper to taste and set aside.
2. Dry lamb chops with paper towels and season on both sides with salt and pepper.
3. Heat 2 tbsp. grape seed oil over medium-high heat in a large skillet.
4. Add lamb chops to skillet and cook, 2 minutes per side for medium-rare.
5. Let lamb chops rest for a few minutes. Serve with mint pesto.