christmas in connecticut: the sweetness, part 1

cookies (plenty more where these came from. PLENTY)

flan (peerless)

nutella cups with white chocolate mousse

tiramisu

red velvet cupcakes

carrot cake

coconut cream pie (best ever)

AMO the ARG: food (dulce de leche day, in san telmo, day 2)

i was stalking the area around plaza dorrego, for an hour or so, maybe longer, waiting for my friend. i was hungry and wanting a little something to tide me over until the unknown time she and i met again. i stopped at havanna, for my first taste of real alfajores (i served a version of this dulce de leche cookie sandwich at a little party i had here last summer. they are not even in the same league as the treats at havanna).


i love everything about this: that it's a delicate, but not chewy cookie; that they don't skimp on the dulce del leche but yet that rich cream doesn't overwhelm; that it melts into your mouth. and that this one is covered in meringue...

i did feel like kind of an ass, standing on a narrow strip of sidewalk in buenos aires, pointing my g10 at a half-eaten argentinian cookie. kind of.
it was just too good not to try to share..

part 2 of dulce de leche day involved a mid-afternoon gelato break at freddo, a popular chain. i read somewhere that freddo is good, but maybe not the best. i can't even imagine how anything could be better than this. it has a real nice salty bite. it's so creamy and condensed that it was slow to eat. it seemed forever before it even started to melt.

even the the color is rich.


***

oh i ate "real" food that day, too. lunch at a mexican place. i ordered a daily special: arroz con hongos y mil hojas de papas, which apart from the rice and potatoes bit, was kind of a mystery. i thought hongos were going to be beans. well, this is what it is and it was pretty good...

all photos © anita aguilar

pure junk

the compost cookie™.

thanks to the inventive mind and high-fructose palate of christina tosi,

the pastry chef at momofuku bakery and milk bar.

nyc. march 21, 2009.

my new favorite cookie is a perfectly crazy union of sweet/salty, chewy/crunchy, "blondie"and "brownie". it's rich and altogether cloying. it's not for the timid.

i brought some home and asked my dad what he thought.

i barely started wowing him with the list of ingredients (potato chips! pretzels!) before he declared, good!

since he's a man of few words, i didn't think i'd get much more than that (and maybe an approving nod) out of him. he's decidedly no nonsense about food (as he is with everything, really). and while he's definitely of the "you can eat everything in moderation" school, he's not at all a fan of "junk food." i had been curious to know what he'd make of this debaucherous little experiment.

after a few more quick bites, he asked me to recite the ingredients again:
coffee grounds.
potato chips.

pretzels.
chocolate chips.
butterscotch chips...

i watched his brows start to wrinkle and i thought, uh-oh, he gonna balk...

then he laughed, "puro junk, eh (it's all junk)! that's why it's so good!"

he tossed back the last bite, and clapped the crumbs from his hands.

yes.

a game changer, and the over/under(rated)

the game changer: the 8oz kobe beef foot long hot dog,

with schaller & weber sauerkraut (braised in beer). and fries.

at five napkin burger. nyc. march 18, 2009.

five or so years ago, when everyone was whispering hot about kobe beef and kitchens were converting the stuff into burgers, i succumbed to the hype--i ordered it a few times at different fancy-pants midtown restaurants, in part because the burger "format" was likely the only way "kobe" was going to fit into my freelancer's budget. i didn't much care if it was real kobe beef (not likely) or kobe grade or kobe style, i just wanted a little taste.

those ventures were enough to kill my interest altogether. prepared on the rare side, "so as not to lose the kobe tenderness," it was consistently an unremarkable mess. (but at least i learned a couple of solid tips: even the best quality meat deserves a touch of seasoning to enliven it; and, if meat can't bind itself together, best not to sandwich it. serve it as tartare.)

anyway, i've been passing it over on menus ever since. until last night.

i was at five napkin burger, and since i've already tried their nice, oozy signature burger, i opted for the "kobe beef" foot long hot dog. (my friend allison and i had seen someone order it "5 N" style: with mustard, cheddar, relish, onions, tomatoes, and jalapenos, and we stared shamelessly at the thing once it hit the table.) i decided to keep it simple, and have it with "just" sauerkraut.

i don't know what exactly was "kobe" about it, but the hot dog was perfectly prepared: grilled, not boiled, it had a nice, crisp snap to it. there was "tenderness." it was --what's another fun word for juicy? and the deeply tasty sauerkraut was so generously portioned, i thought they'd read my mind ("the more sauerkraut the better"). i sat there, working my way though it with my steak knife and fork, thinking this was the stuff of my dreams...

now, less than a half day later, i've decided that meal changed everything, and not in a good way. oh, i still think the hot dog itself is the tops. but i haven't experienced this sort of gastronomic remorse in years. was that dog only 8 oz? it eats like 16. and i shared it! (btw, i am no lightweight--i've eaten two foot long hot dogs at a knicks game--as my friend's husband kindly pointed out, that's about half my height in hot dog. so...) it may have actually ruined me for baseball season and the us open! it was just too much. a kobe beef hot dog itself may not be overrated, but the wisdom and allure of eating one, foot-long and buried under an avalanche of beer-braised kraut that is too unwieldy to be picked up with two hands, surely is.

***

on the other hand, i'm starting to wonder if roasted, salted peanuts aren't the most underrated dessert topping.

a couple of months ago, i dined at joe's stone crab in miami--their key lime pie is stunningly good. i raved and spoke about having one shipped to my mom for mother's day, prompting liam, my server that night, to ask what my favorite dessert in nyc was. i couldn't think of one. he left me to attend to other tables, returned, and i still didn't have an answer for him. kind of embarrassing! maybe i was just slow that night? or maybe i don't love dessert the way i should, or the way others do. i've had some great desserts here, but i told him my preference is for simple things: ice cream or cookies, more than any sort of mousse-y affair.

but i may have found a favorite dessert in ny. true to what i told him, i love its simplicity: it's five napkin burger's brownie sundae (vanilla ice cream, an espresso brownie, caramel, and salted peanuts). but i think what really makes it stand out are the peanuts.

i like walnuts, but unless they are candied, they can be soft and waxy and fade into their surroundings. i love hazelnuts--but everyone is doing hazelnuts. and almonds--also a nice touch, but sometimes too sweet.

what does a roasted salted peanut give you? solid crunch, an assertive nutty-ness, and salt--the perfect counterpoint to cold, sweet ice cream, deep chocolate, and feather-light whipped topping.

peanuts are an old standby, maybe we even take them for granted (do we enjoy them beyond the baseball stadium anymore? do we even enjoy them on planes anymore?), but they can be a real goodie...

see if you agree.

if you're ever at 5 napkin burger, try to make room for the sundae.

if you're in la, at pizzeria mozza, treat yourself to the caramel copetta.

and if you have suggestions--or contradictions--by all means, please send them my way.

it's 'wichcraft

cream'wiches. 1 rockefeller plaza. nyc.

happy birthday, bub!

mmmm roasted marshmallow milkshake at stand

taken on sept 10, 2007

xoxoxo