Dja miss me? I missed you. Did you like how I said, oh yeah, I'm going to take my iBook and realtime blog while I'm in Adelaide because I'm going to have SO MUCH FREE TIME.
As it turns out, they were paying me to work, and work me they did. Some pics and stories to come, but to sum up, I had an amazing time and being a musician RULES. That cubicle doesn't seem too romantic anymore.
Seeing as I'll be up all night trying to fight jetlag, the bulk of the story may gurgle up tonight. Stay tuned!
Name: Bill Pearis
Occupation: Editor / part-time video store clerk
Borough: Brooklyn
What did you eat today?
Breakfast: Goat's milk yogurt with honey and granola. Lunch:
Combination Platter from the Dil-E Punjab -- three choices over rice for $4.50.
Half the time I have no idea what I'm ordering; it's all vaguely
yellowish-brown and almost always good. Today it was some kind of yellow curry,
eggplant and a curried vegetable medley. If you ask for it, you also get
"salad" (wedge of iceberg lettuce and chunks of red onion). Dinner:
tacos (two bistek, one carne enchilada) from Matamoros Puebla on Bedford. In-between:
a lime cornmeal cookie from Amy's Bread in Chelsea Market and some Cheddar Beer
Kettle Chips.
What do you
never eat?
I've basically given up
all fast food though I have a weakness for KFC and White Castle. [I've got one of each two blocks from my house. I'd trade both as well as the Subway, Taco Bell, and McDonald's down the streets to get Pollo Campero back. Or an In-N-Out. --Ed.] Intestines
aren't high on my list. Neither is Taiwanese stinky tofu -- the only thing I've spit into my napkin
in the last ten years.
Complete this sentence: In my refrigerator, you can always find:
Eggs, frozen chicken
stock, beer, a box of baking soda, mayonnaise, mustard, and a bottle of
unopened Heinz Green Ketchup I bought for a cookout in 1999 and never used. I
will never throw it out.
What is your favorite kitchen item?
My digital probe thermometer, which I rely on
way too much. [Probe...heh heh... --Ed.]
Where do you eat out most frequently?
In Williamsburg, where I live, it's Matamoros
Puebla (soon to close), Dumont (and Dumont Burger), and Snacky on Grand Street.
In Manhattan, the various branches of Grand Sichuan International. My go-to
splurge used to be Jewel Bako but I'm afraid I've been priced out.
World ends tomorrow. What would you like for your last meal?
Probably sushi from somewhere awesome, like Yasuda or Jewel Bako. For dessert,,, some of my mom's chicken and dumplings.
Visit Bill at Soundbites for his take on music, food, film, culture, and ephemera.
So...I'm still in NYC. Our flight got cancelled last night (which, of course, we didn't find out till we'd been lolling around the terminal for seven hours, eating fried junk and turkey burgers I would normally give the stink eye to). We received vouchers for cab fare home in lieu of staying overnight at the glamorous Holiday Inn @ JFK.
I do feel good about their decision NOT to fly 20 hours with a plane missing parts. But I am a little bummed we won't have a day of rest before we get to work in Adelaide.
Last night I got home from the airport at midnight to find Doug plunking away on his computer, Blaise on the laptop designing web pages, and occasional houseguest Justin bouncing off the walls while waiting to play Halo. Some snippets of last night's non-sequiturs:
JUSTIN: Ganda, you're back! How was it?
GANDA: AWESOME. I am a STAH in Australia!
******
DOUG: You know what I heard about Australians?
GANDA: Big penises?
DOUG: Yes.
GANDA: Cut or uncut?
DOUG: Uncut.
GANDA: Are they cut anywhere else in the world or is it just here?
DOUG: I think it's just here.
[contemplative silence]
******
JUSTIN: I had a tissue in my pocket and then they washed my jeans and the tissue got all weird.
DOUG: That was such a good story.
BLAISE: Tell it again!
*****
JUSTIN: Who's Bill Withers?
GANDA: You know, [singing] "Oh you just keep on using me--"
BLAISE: [singing] "Lean on me--"
GANDA: [singing] "Ain't no sunshine when she's gone--"
DOUG: [singing] "Lovely day, lovely day, lovely day, LOVEly day--"
JUSTIN: Oh THAT guy. I LOVE Bill Withers.
*****
BLAISE: This house is crazy. I thought my house was crazy, but this house is once, twice, three times the crazy!
DOUG & JUSTIN: [singing in unison] "Once, twice, three tiiiiiiiiiiimes the crazay..."
******
Bonus text message exchange earlier in the evening:
To Justin:
Don't break the xbox while I'm gone.
To Ganda:
I plan on humping it nightly.
It's 9:20 p.m. Do you know where your Ganda is? While all y'all are watching the Oscars (go Brokeback!) I am stuck in Terminal 7 at JFK waiting for our plane to be fixed. Our plane was supposed to leave at 6:55 p.m. Apparently, the plane needs some part that they had to track down at another airport. This does not inspire feelings of confidence and security in me. And I ate all my Newman Hint of Mint O's already.
Meanwhile, we have been rewarded with a $15 food court voucher for our patience and understanding. O heat lamps of JFK, what plastic spork joy awaits?
Adelaide, you are still so very far away...
Name: Dan Barasch
Occupation: Fluffer. For the Man. [Hey muffin, this isn't friendster, you know. I'll let it slide today because I'm too busy/lazy to pester you. --Ed.]
Borough: Brooklyn
What did you eat today?
Large coffee, buttered
bialy, baked chicken cutlet with artichoke-mustard remoulade and arugula on
foccacia, Italian vegetable soup, couscous with pine nuts, a big-ass homemade
juicy burger filled with bleu cheese and onions, and a spinach-radish-carrot
salad tossed in olive oil and balsamic.
What do you never eat?
Canned tuna. Any of that skanky mayonnaised crap sold
under sweaty deli counters (macaroni salad, potato salad, chicken salad,
barforama salad).
Complete this sentence: In my refrigerator, you can always find:
Crumbly cheese, spinach,
and Chinese chili-garlic sauce (the one with the rooster on the front).
What is your favorite kitchen item? 
Vegetable peeler. Or,
anything involving quickly moving and dangerously sharp metal pieces—which most
likely I don’t know how to use without hurting myself and others.
Where do you eat out most frequently?
Dumont and Fada in Williamsburg.
World ends tomorrow. What would you like for your last meal?
A five courser at Gramercy Tavern, involving a bit too much pork belly, and way too much sparkling wine. Cheers, dahling.
Happy Birthday, dahling!
International jetsetter and EDOW reader Rose told me there was an article about Here Lies Love in The Australian, which is apparently the New York Times of Australia. Except that, judging by the FOX Sports tab at the top of the page, it appears to be owned by the Murdoch dynasty. The Rupester LOVES me. Anyway, hey Mae, I'm in the newspaper.
Rehearsals are over now. It was a lot of intense work in a short period of time. It's fun to be a musician, but it's also hard work. I used in-ear monitors for the first time; felt very Justin Timberlake.
Meanwhile, work has been insanely busy, and I am in full dizzy cockroach/headless chicken mode. I haven't gone out with my friends in about three weeks. I am drinking Bija Cold Stop tea, taking Airborne fizzy tabs and Ayurcedics WinterWell herb capsules, and eating lots of Champlain Valley raw honey (which is incredibly delicious and creamy and you must try it). At the end of last week, I had a hint of a cold, and now I don't, so something worked. Since I have no idea which one it was, I'm just going to keep taking everything.
The humidifier is going to go on the tropical setting with camphor solution for the next few nights. I have a history of very bad jet lag because when I'm home, I'm a very heavy sleeper. In fact, this past weekend I had two nights in a row of 12 hours of sleep. So, I have No Jet-Lag homeopathic pills to take every two hours on the plane, Ola Loa packets to drink along the way, and melatonin and antihistamines to try and sleep when I get to Australia. I'm going to take three liters of Volvic with me on the plane, as well as some of those delicious Patterson California dried apricots from Murray's and a slew of other non-dairy foods for that long ass flight. I am washing my hands like an OCD maniac.
Speaking of germophobia, I keep making the mistake of walking down my regular route by Downing and Bedford and passing the HazMat tent village. I assume they're trying to clear out Vado "Anthrax" Diomande's apartment. When the story first broke, there was a swarm of reporters and camera crews on the corner. My friend Jenny and I tried to Veronica Mars the situation.
ME: [to bystander 1] What happened?
BYSTANDER 1: I don't know.
ME: [to bystander 2] What happened?
BYSTANDER 2: I don't know.
ME: [crossing the street, to bystander 3] What happened?
BYSTANDER 3: I don't know.
BYSTANDER 4: Do you know Vado?
ME: Vato? [Odalay!]
BYSTANDER 4: Vado, lives on this block?
ME: No.
BYSTANDER 4: He got anthrax.
ME: Alrighty then, shall we go now, Jenny?
BYSTANDER 4: But it's alright, he got it the natural way. He works with animal skins.
JENNY: Natural way? But I thought getting it in the mail WAS the natural way.
First printed in metro.pop magazine, I think in the March/April issue.
Considering the popularity it’s enjoyed from the day it opened its doors, Employees Only is far more welcoming than it has ever needed to be. On any given night, you can walk past the tarot card reader in the window, through the velvet curtains and find yourself in a thick and unusually tall crowd of thirty-something revelers, heavy with Carrie Bradshaw types. There’s always enough flaxen hair and lip gloss to make most of us normals feel short and matte.
But the restaurant/bar’s five co-owners have created a friendly, speakeasy atmosphere, from the Art Deco detailing to the spirit of Prohibition camaraderie. Even through the crowds, it’s easy to immediately see the glamour and appeal of the place – caramel lighting, mahogany wood, a curvy brass topped bar, handsome bartenders in chef whites, flames dancing in the fireplace, pretty waitresses in jaunty uniforms, and an astonishingly well stocked wall of liquor bottles.
A key to its success is its namesake – I’ve seen at least one, but usually two or three, of the five owners acting as employees every night I’ve been there, seating diners in the outdoor garden or tending the bar in the front of the house. And those gentlemen really know what they’re doing behind the bar. Their cocktails – and I’ve sampled more of them than I care to admit – are so delectable and potent, the menu should come with a warning.
The dangerous Mata Hari tastes as incredible as it looks – chai infused vermouth, Courvoisier VS and pomegranate juice are shaken up and poured into Employees Only’s signature old-school globular glasses, topped with three dried pink rosebuds.
For those who like their cocktails less sweet, there’s the refreshing Provencale – lavender infused gin stirred with herbs de provence vermouth, Cointreau, and an orange twist. It's a gin martini for an English rose. The expert bartenders can also turn out the classics with flair, like the well-balanced Manhattan, finished barside with a flame throwing burst from orange peel oil.
Once you’ve been properly prepped by the signature cocktails, you’ll want to stick around for dinner. Employees Only serves its seasonal trans-Atlantic fare til it closes nightly (or morning-ly) at 4 a.m. Before 11 p.m., the kitchen turns out robust plates of Italian-influenced dishes like caramelized, braised veal on a rich bed of polenta with spears of sweet roasted carrots and fennel. Moist roasted chicken comes with glazed whole baby carrots, crisp haricots verts, and rich mashed potatoes punctuated by silky bits of porcini mushroom. I rarely order pasta in a non-Italian restaurant, but their orecchiette is wonderful – thumbprint pasta “ears”generously topped with a meaty, ropy pork ragu.
The menu offers a wide variety of nibble plates if you’re just looking for a little nosh to keep you on your feet. The steak tartare is not for the squeamish, but it may be one of the finest examples of tartare in the city. It is definitely one of my favorite things to eat while imbibing -- hand-chopped filet mignon and roasted tomato,are mixed tableside with lemon, raw egg yolk, sea salt, chopped shallots, truffled capers, Dijon mustard, Worcestershire and a few (or more) dashes of house made hot sauce, served with a little pile of baguette chips.
Washington state oysters are also make for excellent slurping snacks,; they’re served with a subtle, tangy lime-chili granite. But the allure of the Serbian charcuterie platter escaped me – thick, tacky slices of pink pork pastrami, stiff lamb prosciutto and little cups of runny chicken liver pate and red pepper compote were unappealing, though the pillowy, sweet homemade flatbread accompaniment was lovely.
With consistently excellent eats and knockout cocktails, the only improvement I’d like to make at this classy joint is to add a few more bathrooms – the unisex single occupancy water closet will never be enough to accommodate the crowds of regulars. I’m sure that this is the kind of place that will defy trends and capricious buzz. Like Balthazar or Nobu, Employees Only is so New York that it feels like it was, is, and will always be part of the city landscape.
Employees Only
510 Hudson St.
212-242-3021
