July 2005 Archives

Name: Tracy E. Hopkins

Occupation: Journalist specializing in music, entertainment, and lifestyle.

Borough: Brooklyn

What did you eat today?

For breakfast, I had a carton of Special K with soymilk.  For lunch, I had various salad and cold pasta combinations from the Union Square Whole Foods salad bar.  And for dinner, I ate at Cubana Cafe on Smith Street in Cobble Hill, where I had two delicious-but-deadly mojitos that were only $6 each and for my entree I had a tasty grilled shrimp dish with rice and beans.  My boyfriend had the red snapper with mango salsa and pureed plantains.  The whipped plantains tasted a bit like baby food, but the snapper was good.

What do you never eat?

Liver and onions or any type of red meat. Although I love seafood, I'm also not too crazy about shark -- I don't want to eat a fish that could eat me.

Complete this sentence:  In my refrigerator, you can always find:

A bottle of ketchup, mustard, or mayo.  I have the condiments, but usually not anything of substance to put them on.   

What is your favorite kitchen item?

Dish detergent.  I'm not home that often, so I like to make sure I wash my dishes before I leave.

Where do you eat out most frequently?

In the Cobble Hill or Fort Greene sections of Brooklyn, and in Chelsea near where I work.  But I recently found two great Italian restaurants in areas I don't usually frequent -- Basso Est on Orchard Street and Pesce Pasta on Bleecker.

World ends tomorrow.  What would you like for your last meal?

Although I love Italian, Thai, and Latin food, I would probably want to keep it simple and have a veggie burger with cheese and all the fixins' and sweet potato fries. But since this is my last meal, I'd probably pig out and have that for an appetizer.  Then for the main course I'd have a big plate of Pad Thai with vegetables or Frutti di Mare.  And top everything off with a pint of Ben and Jerry's Heath Bar Crunch ice cream.   

Name: Tracy E. Hopkins

Occupation: Journalist specializing in music, entertainment, and lifestyle.

Borough: Brooklyn

What did you eat today?

For breakfast, I had a carton of Special K with soymilk.  For lunch, I had various salad and cold pasta combinations from the Union Square Whole Foods salad bar.  And for dinner, I ate at Cubana Cafe on Smith Street in Cobble Hill, where I had two delicious-but-deadly mojitos that were only $6 each and for my entree I had a tasty grilled shrimp dish with rice and beans.  My boyfriend had the red snapper with mango salsa and pureed plantains.  The whipped plantains tasted a bit like baby food, but the snapper was good.

What do you never eat?

Liver and onions or any type of red meat. Although I love seafood, I'm also not too crazy about shark -- I don't want to eat a fish that could eat me.

Complete this sentence:  In my refrigerator, you can always find:

A bottle of ketchup, mustard, or mayo.  I have the condiments, but usually not anything of substance to put them on.   

What is your favorite kitchen item?

Dish detergent.  I'm not home that often, so I like to make sure I wash my dishes before I leave.

Where do you eat out most frequently?

In the Cobble Hill or Fort Greene sections of Brooklyn, and in Chelsea near where I work.  But I recently found two great Italian restaurants in areas I don't usually frequent -- Basso Est on Orchard Street and Pesce Pasta on Bleecker.

World ends tomorrow.  What would you like for your last meal?

Although I love Italian, Thai, and Latin food, I would probably want to keep it simple and have a veggie burger with cheese and all the fixins' and sweet potato fries. But since this is my last meal, I'd probably pig out and have that for an appetizer.  Then for the main course I'd have a big plate of Pad Thai with vegetables or Frutti di Mare.  And top everything off with a pint of Ben and Jerry's Heath Bar Crunch ice cream.   

Kashi -- I make myself eat it for breakfast because it's good for me. But let's be honest: it's a little bit like eating a bowl of styrofoam peanuts, right?

Kashi -- I make myself eat it for breakfast because it's good for me. But let's be honest: it's a little bit like eating a bowl of styrofoam peanuts, right?

Hey, I heard an unsubstantiated rumor and I had to tell the internet!  Taku got a Frank Bruni massage in this week's NYTimes.  I know someone who was there when the Times shutterbug came by the other night, and HE said the photog was none other than DWEEZIL ZAPPA.  Ho ho, nice pseudonym, "Rahav Segev" my tuchus!  Anyone else hear that about the Dweez using a pseudonym, or has my source been smoking the anise hyssop?  Before y'all start clucking, don't forget about Dweezil & Lisa Loeb's Food Network show.  And how could anyone mistake those son-of-rock legend baby blues?  The only better son-of-rock legend baby blues are those of Jakob Dylan:

HA-CHA-CHA is your computer going to BLOW UP from all this hotttness?

UPDATE!!  Dude, Rahav Segev is SO NOT DWEEZIL ZAPPA.  My source has obviously been hitting the soju.  Witness Rahav with NYTimes pop culture critic and "Love him for his body" Gawker hottie nominee Kelefa Sanneh:

photo by Ray Tamarra

Don't you have to doubt the veracity of anyone who claims to be "real"?    Like Splenda, made with "real" sugar -- except that Splenda tastes like sugar, oh, NOT AT ALL?  Unless you compare it to ass-flavored Nutrasweet?  Or ReaLemon®, that reconstituted lemon powder in a lemon shaped plastic squeeze bottle, a completely pointless product for people who are too lazy to cut open a lemon and squeeze it?  Jenny from the block lip-synching "I'm Real" while rocking a fox bolero and Jimmy Choo nutbusters?  "The Real World", where pretty nubiles hump each other like they're the last seven rabbits on earth in their RENT-FREE LOFT?

I'm going to cut Pam Real Thai Food a little slack -- their fried beef jerky was pretty good, and the sticky rice was nice and soft.  Pad kee mao chicken was greasy, but tasted pretty good, if a little light on the hangover-remedy chili and basil.  Chicken with garlic used plenty of golden fried garlic, always a plus in my book.  Chicken larb was made with chopped white meat chicken, just as I like it, but the bland-ish, pale, onion flecked dish really could have used a dose of color in the form of dried chili powder and maybe a little fresh mint. 

But I measure the "realness" of a Thai restaurant by their som tam, and Pam Real Thai Food's som tam was a Real Tragedy.  It tasted like it had been doused enthusiastically with that sugar shock sweet, syrupy chili sauce that usually gets poured over fried fish.  And a peanut-allergy person could have gone into anaphylactic shock from being in the same room as that dish. 

For the Manhattanites who insist Pam Real Thai Food is authentic as an excuse to avoid hopping the train to Queens, I pat you on the head and nod patronizingly.  And then I'll catch the E to Roosevelt Ave. to get my fermented crab som tam on at Sripraphai.

Pam Real Thai Food
404 W 49th St between 9th Ave. and 10th Ave.
C or E to 50th St.

P.S.  Just because a cook in a Thai kitchen is willing to put enough chilies in your food to make your brain run out of your nose doesn't automatically mean you're getting real Thai food.  Or good food, for that matter.

12:55 p.m., Sunday morningish

I don't have anything to say on that liquor before beer/beer before liquor business, but vanilla vodka before a half bottle of cheap Gruet "champagne" from New Mexico = my liver HATES me right now.  I got some serious Sunday morning spins.  Now if I can only figure out where I put the Advil...

1 a.m., Sunday morning

I love drinking in Brooklyn. 

And I love being drunk and coming home.  I'm going to sip my glass of seltzer and read Harry Potter til I fall asleep.

Where's the party next weekend?

Name: Patrick Farley

Occupation: Software

Borough: Manhattan

What did you eat today?

9:30 AM Iced Coffee with milk from a truck

11:30 AM Iced Coffee with milk from a truck

1:00 PM Crawfish Etoufee from Jacques-imo's.  The Grand Central Food Court
is creepy.

3:30 PM Café Frio from Juan Valdez on 57th, which is not the same thing as Iced Coffee from Juan Valdez on 57th.  Go figure.

5:00 PM 3 Gumballs

Looking forward to:

9:00 PM  Medium-Rare Cheeseburger, fries with mayonnaise, salad with house vinaigrette at Le Gamin.

What do you never eat?

Okra.

If I had a dollar for every time I've had this conversation.

"You don't like Okra?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Too slimy."

"Have you tried Fried Okra? It's not slimy."

"Yeah...umm...that's not true."

Also Gin, but I'm working on that one.

Complete this sentence. In my refrigerator, you can always find:

The sad remains of over ambitious greenmarket shopping.
A ridiculous supply of seltzer
Flour and Sugar because I have this weird thing about it being safe from bugs in there.  After a while the flour starts to smell like refrigerator and I have to throw it out which I feel pretty bad about.

What is your favorite kitchen item?

I have a love/hate relationship with my food mill.

Where do you eat out most frequently?

Ramen at Minca (lat least twice a week)
Cheeseburgers, Risotto, Mussels, and desserts at Le Gamin
Arepas at Caracas
Sliders at AKA
Zum Schneider for Weisswurst and Weissbeer on Sunday afternoons and Schnitzel anytime.
Pork Buns at Momofuku
Mandoo at Mandoo Bar
Mussaman at SEA (Can everyone agree on a spelling for this?)
Anything at Beyoglu

World ends tomorrow. What would you like for your last meal?

I'd like to die in Mario Batali's arms.

Okay, he's not at all new to the blog scene, but Lockhart Steele of Curbed fame and She Loves NY have started a new food & restaurant news/gossip blog called Eater.  Go check out the news and come back here when the weather's cooled down and I'm actually able to eat again.