Foiled; search for the old time German style bakeries in Queens

After much ado reading about the Stork's Bakery in Whitestone, Queens, not far from the beloved and much missed Cake Box in Bayside, Queens, I drove over to Stork's; I had memorized the directions on Google maps; I chugged my way down 150th Street in the 90 degree temperature, and sighted the bakery!

I parked, paid the Muni Meter, and skipped across the street to Stork's on the corner - what a huge bakery from the outside!
But as I neared the door, I saw this:

Darn - July 7- August 15th closed!  The German bakery has the German vacation (I wish the U.S. had more Urlaubzeit).  We shall have to return mid August.

Bicerin-finally finally tasted one!

Ever since reading about the famous Bicerin drink from Turin, I have longed to taste it; having travelled in Italy in the cold winter months in the year we did our study abroad and so been introduced to the thick chocolatey pudding heaven that is an Italian hot chocolate, I had no doubt that combining this superb hot chocolate with espresso and cream would be an experience akin to reaching the peak of a chocolatey Mount Everest.
I thought I might have to travel to Turin, but as fate would have it, Turin came to me, or rather, to Manhattan; the food emporium/ restaurant/ cafe/ almost all things Italian enterprise of Lidia Bastianich and Mario Bataly, called " Eataly" , on 23rd street, selling the coveted Bicerin. Here was my chance!
I confess, it took me a little longer to get there than I had planned-simply because, as a New Yorker who has worked in and commuted back aNd forth to Manhattan for over a decade, I was reluctant to travel into Manhattan on an off day.
But last Monday, I finally did it; I stepped into Eataly at lunchtime ( if you go, I do not recommend lunchtime because of the swelling crowds), and at the caffe bar, ordered my Bicerin.
At close to $5, and just the size of an overfilled espresso, it is a little painful on the wallet, but again, how much would airfare be to Italy? I stepped out to Madison square park and found a bench amongst the lunch breakers to sit and savor my drink.
I found it thick and rich as expected; a drink to be sipped slowly, but not too slowly as the extreme heat of the espresso wears off quickly. The coffee and chocolate meld nicely in the palate; I don't know if this is blasphemy, but the taste, after a few sips, reminded me vaguely of a Starbucks' caffe mocha. The cream slowly sifted down and dispersed, like marshmallows on hot cocoa.
I was sorry the drink was over, I shook the cup for the last drops. Was it what I had expected; yes, I would say delightfully so!
Here is my cellphone pic of my Bicerin:

 

Yes - that is chocolate on the rim of the cup...ooh lala!

Good eats in Alabama!

Hello - it's been a while since we posted here!  Sorry - been busy and time flies by - but food is never far from our thoughts!
Here are a few more delish dishes I had on our trip down south - a couple of restaurants - one that is beloved by my mother -in-law and her husband, and another we discovered on our journey to Alabama.
Here is superb Italian food - Frank's Italian Restaurant, in Sheffield, Alabama.  We started with the bread dip - I believe this one is tomato pesto - we just couldn't get enough of it:

Darn - I see this photo is a little blurry - I thought it was clearer, sorry.  But you can see the herbs mixed in the sauce,and the sauce was a pink color, kind of like vodka sauce.

I also ordered the eggplant parmigiana - just lovely - fried cutlets of eggplant - I  love deep fried cuts of eggplant without the skin, and that's just what this was!  Smothered in sizzling cheese.

My husband and his Mom ordered the lasagna - it looked cheesy and perfect.

When we go back down to Florence, we are definitely returning to Frank's - if you are in the Muscle Shoals area, and there are many reasons to be there, besides being beautiful it also has a rich musical history-stop in at Frank's!

And I want to give a shout out to Sapphire, in Knoxville - it was right next door to a popular sports bar; the sports bar had an hour wait, and so we tried Sapphire next door, and were delighted.  So delighted, in fact, that on our trip back home to New York, passing through Knoxville again, we beelined it right back to Sapphire.  They had a lot of non-traditional takes on traditional food.  They had outstanding sweet potato potato chips, but also, brussel sprouts that were flash fried on the outside, so that the outer layers were shriveled but hugging the curve of the brussel - and perfectly soft on the inside.  We ordered them both times.

Ok, that's my tale for now. 

Southern New Year's

Since my husband and I spent New Year's with his mother and step-dad in northern Alabama, we were treated to an authentic Southern New Year's dinner!  I was thrilled!
My mother-in-law prepared us a delicious meal in her lovely home - and it was so good, I think I'm going to make this a Northern tradition too.
We had the black eyed peas, turnip greens, and ham, sweet potatoes, green onions, rice, and cornbread.  I didn't know where to start - the ham was beckoning - there's a reason they say bacon is boss! 
We ate the green onions as you would a carrot stick - I had never done that before, but I sure enjoyed it! 
I read later on that the peas are supposed to signify coins, and the greens - either the turnip greens or the green onions, signify green paper money.  I like the symbolism and the hope and good wishes it bestows on a new year.

Cinnamon Roll Redux; Startin' the New Year Out Right!

So I took it upon myself to make the cinnamon rolls again, from the recipe in last year's "Taste of the South" (note: they do have another receipe in this year's iron skillet issue for orange cinnamon rolls, but I wanted to stick to these).  Also, I had to address the taunts, snide remarks, sarcasm, etc. about how poorly those last rolls turned out.
I made these mostly according to the recipe; 4 cups of flour, 1 packet of yeast, 4 tablespoons of sugar, 1 egg, canola oil, salt and vanilla extract, all mixed together in my trusty mixer, "Ice"(thank you again Aunt Marge!).  The dough endures three risings; after being mixed, it rises in a buttered bowl for an hour; it gets punched down, then rises for another 15 minutes; then rolled out and buttered and sugared and sliced up and then it lays in the pan for another hour before being placed in the oven.
Tonight though, the last rising turned out to be about 3 hours, because I had to step out, and I figured, it should be ok to let them rise a bit more.

 

Well, when I got  home, I scurried to the kitchen to check on them - they had risen a bit more than expected, but it wasn't like they had strong-armed their way out of the pan! 
So I popped them into the oven at 350 degrees, and 25 minutes later, they were browned and ready!
I had the glaze ready; the recipe calls for 1/2 cup of whipping cream, 2 cups of confectioners sugar, and 3 tablespoons of light corn syrup; my version was 1/2 cup of half and half (because it has 1 gram less of fat per serving), and the 2 cups of confectioners sugar, and then 2 tablespoons of agave syrup.  I think it tastes great - and my husband agrees!  It smelled like Cinnabon in here while they were baking, and he was dancing around as I pulled them out of the oven and lifted them from the pan. 



May I just back up a moment here - I just want to point out something that I skimmed over - right before the last rising of the dough, when I said I had "rolled out and buttered and sugared and sliced  up...", the buttered in this case is a brown butter that the recipe recommends - it is simply melting the butter until way past simply melting it - it is letting the butter burn, so that it is a nice caramel color and scent.  I think that really adds to the caramelly sweetness of the whole cinnamon roll endeavor!

Apple pies and hurricane Sandy

I haven't posted in a while, there's been a lot going on around here weatherwise - Hurricane Sandy hit a few weeks ago, and then we had a little snowstorm.  There was some electricity out in our neighborhood and we just stayed holed in for a few days.  We had some felled trees and had to be careful about power lines, but that was the extent of it in our little neighborhood.
As we were cocooned in the apartment, I was texting with my Mom, and we both had the ingredients and working stoves to make apple pies - so we did!  And I always think of apple pie as a go-to, cozy dessert - I think a lot of people do. 
I had a 1/2 peck of apples I got before Sandy, as a stock fruit to have that didn't need refrigeration.  I had a recipe for a whole wheat crust using canola oil as the fat, so it was a little more heart-healthy than the store bought crusts I usually use (have to give a shout-out to Pillsbury, that doughboy is still my main man!).
This crust, while easy to make, is extremely crumbly and you have to handle it gingerly - I had a time of it flipping it onto the pan and repairing all the breaks, but it is moldable.  I used apple pie spice and on the advice of my sister, sprinkled agave nectar on it instead of sugar; it worked out nicely - didn't alter the taste from my usual apple pie with sugar and cinnamon.

Just wanted to put in a photo from our neighborhood - my husband and I took walks on the nights after the storm - we came across this and several others.

Penne pasta with red peppers and capers

This is one of me and my sister's favorite dishes, which also happens to be vegetarian and I think would qualify as vegan as well.  But, anyway, we first saw this recipe on tv on the Bravo channel, as part of the "Aria and Pasta" series; and this episode featured our favorite countertenor of all time, Derek Lee Ragin.  Derek made this dish along with the show's host, Beverley Bergen.  Might I add that my sister and I have met Derek twice in person; what a lovely man; we are hoping he will have more engagements in the NY area soon.
After seeing this episode, my sister and I would get together and cook up this dish; it usually happened over two days, as one of us would usually bake the peppers a day before to begin the process of removing the skins.
But the recipe is fairly straightforward:
Ingredients:
5 large red peppers
2 cloves garlic
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons capers (preferably those preserved in salt & washed well)
500 grams (about 1 pound) penne pasta
Chopped parsley
Take 5 red peppers and remove the skins; you can do this by baking them for about an hour on a pan in the oven, letting them cool a bit, then removing the skins - you can of course leave the skins on if you wish.  Then you chop the peppers into strips.  Place 4 tablespoons of olive oil into a heavy saute pan , heat it up a bit, and then add 2 cloves of garlic.  Cook gently, but do not let the garlic take on too much color. (I am copying directly from the recipe from here on). Add the pepppers and cook, stirring until they soften and taken on a very glossy color.  Let this simmer gently until the peppers are very soft and lightly brown at the edges.  Add the capers and when you are ready to serve, add chopped parsley.
Cook the pasta in boiling water until "al dente". Drain and serve with the pepper sauce over the pasta.  Accompany with parmesan cheese (or romano, which we prefer!).

I made this a couple of nights ago and I have a new fan; my adventurous husband!  He turned down a nice meal in a restaurant to stay home and try this dish, I had raved about it so; and he was not disappointed.