Eating In Translation

Fort Defiance

2009-11-20T17:15:00-05:00

They serve slices.

Which is fine for a nosh but dear for a meal; compare the Fort Defiance muffuletta (above and below; $9) with a half-order from Central Grocery, in New Orleans, which reportedly served as its exemplar. That said, the bread in the Brooklyn sandwich is admirably dense yet springy, so it absorbs the marinade from the olive salad without falling to pieces. But thinking back to the Big Easy, I'd like more sesame seeds, more of a giardiniera sting in the salad, and, if not housemade charcuterie, perhaps a taller heap of cold cuts, too.

Fort Defiance
365 Van Brunt St. (at Dikeman St.), Red Hook, Brooklyn
347-453-6672
www.FortDefianceBrooklyn.com

Food-Friendly Events, November 20-26

2009-11-19T23:55:00-05:00

Norwegian Seaman's Church Christmas Fair
Continues Friday, November 20, 12:00-8:00; Saturday, 12:00-6:00
317 East 52nd St. (First-Second Aves.)
www.SjomannsKirken.no
See previous coverage. Free admission

Danish Seamens Church Christmas Fair
Friday, November 20, 5:00-8:00; Saturday, 11:00-5:00
102 Willow St. (at Clark St.), Brooklyn Heights
www.DankirkeNY.org
On Saturday only, the fair is held both at Willow St. and at the nearby, larger Zion Lutheran German Church, 125 Henry St., where the photo above was taken; see previous coverage. Free admission

Church of Sweden Christmas Bazaar
Friday, November 21, 11:00-8:00; Saturday, 11:00-6:00; Sunday, 1:00-6:00
5 East 48 St. (Fifth-Madison Aves.)
www.SwedishChurch.net
See previous coverage. Free admission

Greenpoint Food Market
Saturday, November 21, noon-5:00
Church of the Messiah, 129 Russell St. (Nassau-Driggs Aves.), Greenpoint, Brooklyn
www.GreenpointFoodMarket.wordpress.com
Free admission

New Amsterdam Market
Sunday, November 22, 11:00-4:00
South St. between Beekman St. and Peck Slip
www.NewAmsterdamPublic.org
See previous coverage. Free admission

Fish Market Day
Sunday, November 22, 1:00-???
@Seaport, 210 Front St. (at Beekman St.)
www.RememberingFultonFishMarket.com
Free admission

Coffee Past and Future
Sunday, November 22, 3:00-4:00
South Street Seaport Museum, 12 Fulton St.
www.BrownPaperTickets.com/event/89868
Tickets: $25 online, $35 at the door, if available

Brooklyn Pie Bake-Off Benefit
Sunday, November 22, 1:30-4:30
Spacecraft, 355 Bedford Ave. (South 4th-South 5th Sts.), Williamsburg, Brooklyn
www.BrooklynPieBake.tumblr.com
Tickets: $10-$15

A Revolutionary Thanksgiving
Sunday, November 22, noon-3:00
The Old Stone House, 336 3rd St. (Fourth-Fifth Aves.), Gowanus, Brooklyn
www.FourPoundsFlour.blogspot.com
Free admission
Via Brooklyn Based

Chili Takedown
Sunday, November 22, 4:00-???
The Bell House, 149 7th St. (Second-Third Aves.), Gowanus, Brooklyn
www.Chili-Takedown.com
Tickets: $15

Luncheon Meet
Sunday, November 22, 4:00-6:00
Verlaine Bar, 110 Rivington St. (Ludlow-Essex Sts.)
www.Luncheon-Meet.tumblr.com
Tickets: $10-$15

Santa Cecilia Encuentro de Mariachis
Wednesday, November 25, 4:00-6:00
Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, 526 59th St. (Fifth-Sixth Aves.), Sunset Park, Brooklyn
www.SantaCeciliaNYC.com
According to the website, the music will be performed by New York's "most active mariachi crews"; a follow-up email from the festival staff stated that the chow will include "tacos, tacos, y mas tacos, tostadas, flautas, tortas, tamales, arroz con frijoles, pozole, enchiladas, chalupas, plenty of salsas, atoles y champurrados." Free admission

Ongoing: You'll find food vendors at Brooklyn Flea, on Saturday in Fort Greene and Sunday in Dumbo, through November 22 (indoor dates to follow). This fall the vibrant New Amsterdam Market returns once more, on December 20. You can find New York Greenmarkets, and a smaller array of Community Markets, at various locations around the city. The NYC.gov events calendar offers a searchable list of block parties and street fairs, though don't expect many in winter.

Classes: See the schedules of the Astor Center, The Brooklyn Kitchen, the Indian Culinary Center, the Institute of Culinary Education, the International Culinary Center, Murray's Cheese, and the Whole Foods Bowery Culinary Center.

Walking tours: Tag along with Big Onion, the Institute of Culinary Education, NoshWalks, NYC Discovery Walking Tours, and "Wildman" Steve Brill. Most tour operators cut back or suspend their schedule from mid-December through spring.

Coming soon: Finnish Christmas Bazaar, November 27-28; ChowdaFest, Westport, Connecticut, November 27-28; Hungarian Holiday Fair, December 6; Coquito competition, December 19

Minamoto Kitchoan

2009-11-18T12:45:00-05:00

This purveyor of the exquisite, traditional Japanese pastries called wagashi is wonderful, even when you're just looking.

An assortment of wagashi might make a striking present for a friend or relative. Before you ask for the gift-wrap, though, try one or two yourself; pastries made from beans, grains, potatoes, and sesame seeds aren't to everyone's taste.

The feathery rice cake called oribenishiki (above and first photo below; $2.50) is imprinted with the image of a five-lobed compound leaf on its ruddy brown top; it's a sign that inside, you'll find pastes of pale chestnut as well as darker red bean. Oribenishiki may be a seasonal offering, for autumn. In spring, look for sakura daifuku (next photo below, in "biteaway" view; $2.50), whose filling of white-bean paste is sweetened with the very light, clean flavor of cherry blossoms; it's wrapped in glutinous rice. The white-bean jelly called jyukushi (at bottom; $1.60) takes its color and flavor from minced persimmon.

On numerous other occasions (but not shown here): Yakiimo (literally, "sweet potato"; $2.50) was an autumn-colored confection blending white bean and sweet potato paste wrapped in a cinnamon crepe, sliced on a bias to reveal its tuberlike core, and dotted there with tiny black seeds. Kurimanju ($1.90), which Minomoto described a sweet pastry with a flour, honey, and butter extract, had a white bean and (slightly chunky) chestnut filling. Kuridaifuku ($2.80) was a pale-green sugar-dusted rice cake filled with red bean paste, surrounding a chestnut that was hard to divvy up into two separate bites. Its cousin mamedaifuku ($2.50) coupled whole red beans — some poking through the wrapper — with the bean paste.

Minamoto Kitchoan
608 Fifth Ave. (entrance on W. 49th St.)
212-489-3747
www.Kitchoan.com

Quesos La Ricura

2009-11-18T09:55:00-05:00

Possible sign of a Salvadoran spread from Washington Heights southward to West Harlem: this cheese truck, which paralleled my walk down Frederick Douglass Boulevard and made at least two deliveries. Quesos La Ricura also distributes products from Mexico and elsewhere in Central America, too.

Quesos La Ricura
Truck seen on Frederick Douglass Boulevard near 132nd St.
www.QuesosLaRicura.com

"Poisson Paysage V"

2009-11-18T09:05:00-05:00

"Fish Landscape 5," here, with yellow cabs; my effort with a passing, towed coffee cart was not as well-framed. This bronze is one of several sculptures by the late artist François-Xavier Lalanne and his wife, Claude, temporarily installed on the Park Ave. median in the 50s. If you're a fish lover who prefers portraiture, step right up and strike a pose — but only till Friday.

"Poisson Paysage V" ("Fish Landscape 5")
François-Xavier Lalanne, 2007
Park Ave. at 56th St.
Through November 20, 2009

Mariam Restaurant

2009-11-17T23:40:00-05:00

Guinea fowl, Guinean style.

Guinean not so much for the style of the succulent roast pintade itself ($11) as for the acheke (often, attieke), the pale, granular side dish, made from fermented cassava. As previously noted on Word of Mouth, acheke can be dry and bland, but Mariam's version was relatively moist, as if cooked in some flavorful broth; that wrapped Maggi cube stayed wrapped.

Guinean cuisine is also well-known for its leaf-based sauces; one I especially enjoyed but couldn't photograph clearly was the sauce feuille patate ($10), potato greens stewed with beef, over white rice. The oxtails, on the other hand, were redolent of some sweet-savory intense flavor; maybe it was that Maggi. Also shown below: poisson frit (probably tilapia; $12) with acheke; callaloo, heavily infiltrated by okra; a side of couscous; and thiakry, a vanilla-flavored couscous dessert mixed with sour cream.

Mariam Restaurant
975 Fulton St. (Washington-St. James Sts.), Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn
718-398-3930

New Harlem Halal Meat

2009-11-17T23:15:00-05:00

"Ingredients: millet."

After a brief look at the work of the whining bandsaw behind the butcher counter, I left this shop with the makings of my evening's dessert. Thiakry (Chok-ree), a.k.a. degue (Deh-gway), is millet couscous that's also the basis for a namesake West African pudding. This package (400 g.; $4) was imported from Senegal; after soaking the grains in boiling water, steaming them, and adding milk, sugar, and sour cream, I has something passingly similar to the thiakry at the Guinean restaurant Mariam.

New Harlem Halal Meat
2132 Frederick Douglas Blvd. (115th-116th Sts.)
646-698-5345

Chandni Restaurant

2009-11-16T21:00:00-05:00

Well met by moonlight.

To be perfectly honest, on the occasion I snapped this particular photo the moon was down, but these things go in phases. That's also true of the readily available South Asian entrees behind the counter glass at Chandni ("moonlight"), where an intriguing black-lentil dish, spotted during a look-see, was absent from the rotation when I stopped in to eat. In its place: peas and potatoes, and pepper-zinged goat shoulder, over rice (with a side salad; $7).

Chandni Restaurant
11 West 29th St. (Fifth Ave.-Broadway)
Next to Masjid Ar Rahman, and across the street from The Breslin
212-686-4456
www.ChandniNYC.com

Hungarian Food and Pastry Fair

2009-11-15T22:15:00-05:00

Leave room for a little lunch with your pastry.

This leisurely occasion for fellowship and food offers waiter service for the savory courses, which are trundled to your seat on a two-level cart. The pastries are laid out on a string of long tables at the head of the room; you fetch them yourself, but the greater effort is in biding your time, at least till after the soup.

Shown below: chicken paprikás and dumplings (with cucumber salad; $10); székely gulyás ($9), a goulash from the country's south that seems to rely on sauerkraut; gulyás soup ($6); cabbage noodles ($7); chicken broth with liver dumplings ($6); and an extensive (but not exhaustive) photo menu of the pastries.

Hungarian Food and Pastry Fair
At the Hungarian Reformed Church, 220 4th St., Passaic, New Jersey
973-778-1019
www.PassaicHunRef.org
April and November

Old Bridge

2009-11-14T19:20:00-05:00

This one they actually call a burger.

Dressed with lettuce, tomato, cucumber, and feta, the Sarajevo burger ($8.50) is distinct from the pljeskavica (Place-kah-Veet-suh), also served here and nicknamed the Bosnian burger at many other Balkan joints. A side-by-side taste-off would have required a second plate: Compared with a burger, the pljeskavica is famously "longer, lower, wider," like the new season's models from Detroit, many seasons ago. The mildly seasoned pljeskavica patty is typically a blend of beef and lamb, which I believe was the case with my burger, too.

As for the bread, what the waitress originally described as a pita proved thicker, denser, and chewier than most pitas of my acquaintance. Afterward I mentioned the name "somun"; she said that this was simply the Bosnian word for "pita." They're the same, she maintained, though she did add the familiar plaint that the bread here, in New York, is not the same as back home.

Old Bridge (a.k.a. Stari Most, its Bosnian name)
28-51 42nd St. (28th-30th Aves.), Astoria, Queens
718-932-7683
www.OldBridgeNY.com

Ukus

2009-11-14T19:00:00-05:00

The awning of this small restaurant proclaims it a cevabdzinica and buregdzinica, a shop that prepares the skinless sausages called cevapi and the savory pies called bureks. Ukus also serves a Bosnian soup ($5.50), whose glistening surface posed a photographic challenge even when not reflecting a televised soccer match. Beneath the surface I found dark-meat chicken, firm chunks of okra, bits of carrot and celery, and submerged dollops of sour cream that slowly emulsified in the broth. The sour cream, too, was less easily captured in pictures than in words, or with a spoon.

Ukus
42-08 30th Ave. (42nd-43rd Sts.), Astoria, Queens
718-267-8587

Phillips Farms

2009-11-13T21:00:00-05:00

Stand and deliver.

This tangy-sweet ketchup (18 oz.; $4) combines vine-ripened Jersey tomatoes with green bell peppers, onions, and celery, all grown on the Phillips family farm. It stands up even better on the burger of your choice.

Phillips Farms
Milford, New Jersey
908-995-0022
At the Union Square Greenmarket (and others), March through December
www.PhillipsFarms.com

Musa Durgun produce truck

2009-11-13T12:20:00-05:00

Each morning one of Manhattan's more colorful produce trucks makes its way to the Upper West Side from North Bergen, New Jersey (previously Paterson, as still shown on the side panel). Hardly an easy commute, but just a hop and a step when measured against the journey from Chechnya, the Turkish proprietor's previous home.

The selection of produce offers nothing so exotic. But budget-minded street-food fans, please note: As dessert or snack, the banana provides its own biodegradable "packaging" and doesn't need to be washed; just peel and eat. Though on the street I've seen bananas priced as dear as 35 cents apiece, here they're four for a dollar.

Musa Durgun produce truck
Parked on West 71st St., near the southeast corner with Broadway
Morning till evening, except in inclement weather

Food-Friendly Events, November 13-19

2009-11-13T00:30:00-05:00

Slideluck Potshow
Friday, November 13, 7:00-11:00
The Aperture Foundation, 547 W. 27th St. (Tenth-Eleventh Aves.), 4th floor
www.SlideluckPotshow.com
This nonprofit "aims to bring people together around food and art, and to give people an interesting, engaging, and fun platform for sharing art with their community." Adds the organizer: "Don't bring booze (we have you covered.) Do bring food to share — either for the potluck or as donations for the soup kitchen. Dress sharp for the Irving Penn photo booth!" $10 admission; online purchase recommended

Yankee Fair
Saturday, November 14, 10:00-4:00, rain or shine
Outside Plymouth Church, 75 Hicks St. (at Orange St.), Brooklyn Heights
www.PlymouthChurch.org
Many family-friendly activities. Lunch (indoors, 11:30-1:30) offers "three kinds of premium chili, plus sandwiches and kids' meals; there's also a "country kitchen [selling] baked goods and sweet treats, bread, cakes, and pies, ready-made meals, jams and chutneys, all made in Brooklyn kitchens." Free admission

Fresh Giant Bluefin Tuna Cutting Performance
Saturday, November 14, 11:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m.; Sunday, noon
Mitsuwa Marketplace, 595 River Rd., Edgewater, New Jersey (accessible by bus from Port Authority or the George Washington Bridge)
www.MitsuwaNJ.com
"See the master chefs cut and slice a whole bluefin tuna right before your eyes!" Fresh oh-toro, chu-toro, and akami for sale, too. Free admission

17th-Century Dutch Worship Service and Colonial-Era Dinner
Sunday, November 15, service at 11:00 a.m., dinner at 12:30 p.m.
Old First Reformed Church, 729 Carroll St. (at Seventh Ave.), Park Slope, Brooklyn
www.OldFirstBrooklyn.org
"Worship as it was held in New Netherlands (Breukelen) in 1654, offered by members of Brooklyn's first congregation founded in that year, followed by a historically authentic dinner from the same era. ... The dishes are based on recipes from an authentic cookbook of the period, The Sensible Cook, and will be served and eaten in the style of the period (i.e., entirely with a wooden spoon.)" Adults, $20 in advance/$25 at the door; children $5. Reservations: 718-6388300 or info@oldfirstbrooklyn.org

The Brooklyn Chocolate Experiment
Sunday, November 15, 1:00-5:00, plus an afterparty
The Bell House, 149 7th St., Gowanus, Brooklyn
www.TheFoodExperiments.com
"Amateur chefs will compete by creating their most delicious chocolate-based dishes in two categories (sweet and savory). The audience, along with a celebrity judging panel pick their favorites." Afterparty includes free samples from Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream. Admission: $20 advance/$25 door; a portion of ticket sales will support ovarian cancer research

Cookies at Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks
Sunday, November 15, through Saturday, November 21, 1:00-7:00
Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks, 163 West 10th St. (near Seventh Ave.)
www.BonnieSlotnickCookbooks.com
During the city's first Independent Bookstore Week, Katherine Yang of Prune will bake a fresh batch of cookies each day for bookstore browsers and customers. Free admission, but call ahead (212-989-8962) to confirm shop hours and cookies du jour

A Toast with Hot Bread Kitchen
Monday, November 16, 6:00-9:00
Chelsea Market, 75 Ninth Ave. (15th-16th Sts.)
www.HotBreadKitchen.org/toast
A fundraiser for this nonprofit that "bakes artisanal breads from around the world...honors the culinary experience of immigrant women, and provides entrepreneurial and job skills." Eat, drink, and take a spin on "New York's only corn-grinding bicycle." Tickets: $50 advance/$75 door

Reading and Q&A with Jonathan Safran Foer
Monday, November 16, 7:00-???
Barnes and Noble Union Square, 33 East 17th St.
http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/event/60519
The novelist reads from his first work of nonfiction, Eating Animals

Ongoing: You'll find food vendors at Brooklyn Flea, on Saturday in Fort Greene and Sunday in Dumbo, through November 22. This fall the vibrant New Amsterdam Market returns twice more this fall, next on November 22. You can find New York Greenmarkets, and a smaller array of Community Markets, at various locations around the city. The NYC.gov events calendar offers a searchable list of block parties and street fairs.

Coming soon: Norwegian Christmas Fair, November 19-21; Danish Christmas Fair, November 20-21; Swedish Christmas Bazaar, November 20-22; Luncheon Meet, November 22; Finnish Christmas Bazaar, November 27-28; ChowdaFest, Westport, Connecticut, November 27-28; Hungarian Holiday Fair, December 6

Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream

2009-11-11T16:50:00-05:00

Tea, Earl Grey, cold.

And in a cone, not a cup (small; $3.95). Van Leeuwen ice creams are rightly renowned for their scrupulous reliance on superior ingredients. (At an UnFancy Food Show one summer, it was explained to me that the nuts for their pistachio ice cream are sourced just every other year, "on the trees' schedule.") The custard base, made only from milk, egg yolks, and cane sugar (18 percent butterfat, 30 percent overrun, if you're into stats), is super-rich and creamy. So much so, in fact, that at first the ice cream may seem all texture, until that "Aha!" moment when the flavor makes itself known.

Shown: Earl Grey, flavored with Yunnan black tea and Italian bergamot; mint chip, excellent primarily because it was clearly made with peppermint, as advertised, and not merely some random "mint"; a subtle vanilla; and one of the Van Leeuwen trucks, parked at the Columbia University main gate.

Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream
For truck locations, see www.Twitter.com/VLAIC
718-701-1830
www.VanLeeuwenIceCream.com

Riverside Café

2009-11-11T16:45:00-05:00

The dining room, on the ground floor, has a much more modest design.

Six days a week it offers a buffet breakfast and lunch ($4 and $6, respectively, for one serving, not all-you-can-eat). The portion was modest, too, but Madras curried short ribs were fork-tender, and roasted Japanese eggplants I took by their stems until only the stems remained.

Riverside Café
490 Riverside Dr. (near 120th St., inside Riverside Church)
212-870-6820
Sunday through Friday, 8:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m.

The Leopard

2009-11-11T13:40:00-05:00

I know little about this "Midtown French-Continental 'time warp'," except what I read in an old Zagat. The New York Times, which reported the restaurant's passage in June 2004 (yes, it's been lying in wait that long for a favorable real estate market), added that The Leopard had "been at 253 East 50th Street since the mid-60's."

In August 1963, it so happens, the Times reviewed a movie then playing at the Plaza (not far away, at 42 East 58th), praising it as "a stunning visualization of a mood of melancholy and nostalgia at the passing of an age," noting particularly the movie's "autumnal mood of change and decay." Those words, which describe Luchino Visconti's adaptation of Giuseppe di Lampedusa's novel The Leopard, are not out of keeping with the somber brown townhouse that was the restaurant's home. Pure coincidence?

The Leopard (closed)
253 East 50th St. (Second-Third Aves.)

Gian & Piero Bakery

2009-11-11T01:25:00-05:00

There's also a plain-looking, double-crusted version filled with vanilla custard.

But that was another evening, another dessert. This is Gian & Piero's almond pasticiotto (pahst-uh-Shawt approximates the bakers' pronunciation; $1.90), a palm-sized tart that layers almond paste on ricotta cheese on a thin seam of raspberry jam. The crown of slivered nuts are both a come-on and a promise.

Gian & Piero Bakery
44-17 30th Ave. (44th-45th Sts.), Astoria, Queens
718-274-8959

City and Soul

2009-11-10T14:40:00-05:00

The artist is a city boy.

New York and, to a lesser degree, San Francisco are the inspirations for Kim Cogan's solo exhibition City and Soul. If you've wandered, as I have, in latitudes south of 14th St., through the haze of brushstrokes you may recognize the subjects of several of Cogan's paintings. (Some are shown here only in detail, or on an angle, in accommodation of gallery lighting.) Above, "Nick's Luncheonette" sits empty on Williamsburg's Broadway, while "Open Late" portrays the Zaragoza Mexican Deli Grocery on Avenue A.

Below, "Grocery at Dusk" is the Chinese Hispanic Grocery of the Lower East Side, shown here in idiosyncratic detail. (See also Spy Pizza Café.) "Catch of the Day" portrays a Chinese fish market, maybe on Mott, maybe on Grand; according to the artist, the woman in the flowered dress, shown in multiple "exposures," was snapping pictures of the seafood with her camera. (Sounds like a food blogger to me.) I can't place the café of "When It Rains"; if you recognize it, drop a word in the comments.

City and Soul
Paintings by Kim Cogan
www.KimCogan.com
At Gallery Henoch, 555 West 25th St. (Tenth-Eleventh Aves.)
917-305-0003
www.GalleryHenoch.com
Through November 29, 2009

Berried Treasure Farm

2009-11-10T10:40:00-05:00

"Cooks like potatoes"; can be eaten raw, too.

The sunchoke ($4.00 per pound) is the edible tuber of a species of sunflower; "girasole," Italian for "sunflower," is the likely source of the tuber's other common name, Jerusalem artichoke. The flavor does suggest artichoke, but the crunchiness brings to mind water chestnut, too; if you cook them at all, steaming rather than roasting or boiling is better for safeguarding the texture.

And like the artichoke, the sunchoke stores a carbohydrate called inulin rather than starch, which not everyone digests comfortably. Better to experiment with a small portion before you dig in wholeheartedly.

Berried Treasure Farm
Cooks Falls, New York
607-498-4666
At the Union Square Greenmarket, roughly from March to Thanksgiving

Anselmo's

2009-11-09T21:30:00-05:00

Horn of plenty.

Anselmo's calzone ($10) would be cumbersome if the pizzeria didn't score it across the middle. But pull it apart and you'll have two flattened cones — perhaps one for you, one for a friend — of stark white ricotta and mozzarella in a thin, chewy, coal-oven-charred crust. The little tub of red sauce is merely a distraction, and the sausage I added ($2) made no impression at all. Choosing from the customary roster of pizza toppings, perhaps you can do better.

Anselmo's
354 Van Brunt St. (at Sullivan St.), Red Hook, Brooklyn
718-488-7400
www.AnselmosPizza.com
Closed Monday

Name This Restaurant

2009-11-09T19:30:00-05:00

The best-known Native American princess of the 1950s had little opportunity to visit this restaurant, which opened in 1959. Granted, this royal personage began her career as a puppet, which would have made the seating problematic, but it's possible that one of the two actresses who later embodied her did, indeed, dine here. Can you name this restaurant, and (perhaps more challenging) can you name this princess? (Please post your answer in the comments.)

Piccola Cucina Focacceria

2009-11-09T12:35:00-05:00

Supremely creamy arancini — just wait till you see inside.

Compared with a sturdy rice ball (so called) at Esposito & Sons in Caroll Gardens, after two bites this arancini ($3.50) collapsed into a delectable mass of arborio rice and pea-dotted ragu. See how it runs; the texture is closer to that of the prosciutto balls at Espo's neighbor Joe's Superette.

Another customer — a native of Catania, Sicily, who works at this focacceria's affiliated restaurant — told me that these are the only arancini he's found in New York that remind him of the Old World version. He also observed that although "arancini" (ah-rahn-Chee-nee), the commonly used Sicilian name for these "little oranges," is plural in form, even back home some folks use the word to order just one; others prefer to say "arancino" for the singular. No big deal, says he; sidestep the issue and order two arancini, say I.

Piccola Cucina Focacceria
120 MacDougal St. (Bleecker-West 3rd Sts.)
212-228-6175
Affiliated with a full-service restaurant called Piccola Cucina (184 Prince St.), which also lists arancini on its menu

Locust Grove Farms

2009-11-09T00:40:00-05:00

Despite the white pubescent fuzz, one tough character.

The fuzz rubs off easily under running water, though when you core your quince ($2.50 per pound) you might prefer to pull off the peel, which is edible but slightly astringent. You'll still need to soften it up. As a simpler alternative to roasting or baking, I sliced mine in eighths and steamed it on the stovetop, after which it took equally well to balsamic vinegar and to honey.

On many other occasions: I haven't ventured the squash blossoms, but the cherries ($3 per pint) were sweet if smallish. Clapp favorite pears ($1.40) were very juicy after a few days of brown-bagging it; awkward name, though. As for apples, a blushing golden (not shown; $2 per pound) turned out to be nearly as golden within, soft-textured, and sweet; from "the oldest tree on the farm," a Rhode Island greening (not shown; $1.40 per pound) was very firm.

Locust Grove Farms
Milton, New York
At the Union Square Greenmarket

Nada-Sushi

2009-11-09T00:35:00-05:00

Not angling for the Hispanic market, I take it. (See also the apocryphal misadventures of the marketing for the Chevy Nova.) Nada, I learn, is a ward of the Japanese city of Kobe. But I haven't visited the restaurant; wisecracks aside, about it I know nada.

Nada-Sushi
135 East 50th St. (Third-Lexington Aves.)
212-838-2537