eggs

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The egg sandwich that saved the day

All the color I needed on an otherwise grey ass day.

“This just isn’t gonna happen for me today,” I thought, as I laid on my back on the floor, still in my pajamas, on the rug in my bedroom. I was talking about working out, which I normally do before work every morning, but really, it turned out to be applicable to so much more.

It was snowing when I woke up, and while I don’t usually mind the snow, today it only added to my general feeling of malaise. When my needy desire for affection got the best of me and I tried to scoop up my cat from the window where she was peacefully minding her business, watching the snow, she taught me another lesson in boundaries and freaked out, flailed, and knocked over one of my plants, breaking the brontosaurus planter it was in and sending dirt and broken succulent bits all over the floor.

“Ok, fine then, Universe. I’ll just shower.”

Under the scalding hot water I hoped would wash away my listlessness, I planned for the workday ahead. I would turn the lights up, diffuse energizing essential oils, play upbeat music, and not wait till late afternoon to make some tea. I was going to be alert, focused and productive, goddammit.

Then the power went out.

But not completely, because that would’ve been too easy, and would’ve meant calling out of work and reading in bed all day, like I wanted to do. Cruelly, one outlet worked in my room, the one near my dresser, where I put my laptop when I need it to be a makeshift standing desk. Nothing in the kitchen turned on. Randomly, the lights in the bathroom also worked.

Motivation was at an all-time low, even by pandemic standards, and by the time it was finally lunchtime, what felt like 12 hours after I’d started work, I was hangry enough to scream if I got just one more email. I put all my layers on, slipped on the snow boots that’ve gotten more use this winter than in the past three years, and trudged through the still-falling snow to pick up lunch at reliable, consistently delicious Golda, a couple of blocks away from my apartment.

There, in addition to a hot, creamy matcha latte with oat milk, I ordered the classic egg sandwich with added avocado and brought it back home, where I ate in my room, sitting by the window where my cat had so unceremoniously reminded me that she will at best tolerate me, not love me. That egg sandwich though, which I’d had before, made everything better. The giant onion poppy seed challah bread felt like a carby cloud in my hands and the whole thing oozed with scrambled eggs, melted cheese, avocado, and a tangy red pepper sauce.

Anyone that doesn’t believe in the transcendent power of food is an asshole, because let me tell you, that big, beautiful scrambled egg sandwich saved my whole day. It was hopeful. It was encouraging. It was so very freakin’ good. and absolutely delicious. It basically told me, “Don’t worry, you’re halfway there. The lights will come back soon, you’ll be able to make dinner tonight, and even if your cat never shows you she loves you, she probably does. Maybe.” That egg sandwich was the hug that I’ve been needing all day, all week, all miserable quarantine.

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Table for one, please

“Just me,” I said, lifting one finger to the guy behind the counter when he asked how many people I needed a table for. I’m never sure who can hear the muffled voice behind my mask.

About a month ago, I was supposed to be on vacation in Australia for the first time, tagging along on my boyfriend’s trip back home to renew his work visa. As I plopped down alone at a small sidewalk table in SoHo last week, surreptitiously eyeing the tables of twos, threes and even fours around me while I rummaged through my tote for hand sanitizer, I thought about that cancelled trip and my boyfriend almost 10,000 miles away.

So many new normals to get used to.

Thai Diner, from the team behind the recently closed Uncle Boons, a beloved restaurant and a pandemic casualty that actually made me sad, opened just before New York— and really the world— shut down. I’d been excited about eating at the Thai influenced American comfort food diner when I first saw their menu online, already planning how many different things I could try between my boyfriend and me.

All those months after first telling him about it, I finally went, alone one day for lunch in the middle of last week, which I had taken off both to use up some of my vacation days and to reward myself for surviving a move to a new apartment, a hellish August, a global pandemic for six months so far.

With no one to give me a weird face for eating breakfast at 2pm on a Tuesday, I ordered George’s Egg Sandwich, a messy  affair of eggs, cheese, avocado, bok choy, and Thai basil wrapped in crispy roti. I’m not sure who George is, but he has a damn delicious sandwich. Messy sure, with its oozing cheese and bits of scrambled egg falling out between piping hot roti slippery with oil, but very much worth it. All the delicious green in this sandwich, the creamy avocado and dark, leafy bok choy, the kicky, spicy Thai basil, filled it with flavors and textures that set it apart from any breakfast sandwich I’d ever had at a diner before.

While it wasn’t quite the experience I had imagined all those months ago (especially since I didn’t get to split the Thai Tea Babka French Toast with anyone), Thai Diner was just what I needed: different, delicious, and as it so often is with food for me, distracting, transportive, and comforting.

I never thought that with a week off from work the most exotic and adventurous thing I would do was ride the subway into Manhattan to eat a Thai inspired breakfast sandwich, but there I was. I also didn’t think I’d be living in a new apartment with a new roommate instead of my boyfriend, who I wasn’t sure when I’d see again thanks to a global pandemic, but there I also was.

So many new normals to get used to.

When I was done eating, I sat at my table for one, fingers glistening with oil, back of my hands shiny from every time I’d wiped my mouth between bites. I did the quick math in my head, as I so often do throughout the day now, to figure out what 14 hours ahead made it in Australia. Boyfriend would still be sleeping for several more hours so I reached for the hand sanitizer instead, cleaned my greasy hands until I smelled vaguely of cheap grain alcohol, and went on with my day.

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Pork rolling right into the weekend

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Ah, good morning indeed. 

If you looked at this first picture here and were thoroughly unimpressed, let me explain. That’s not the badly composed food pic you think it is, taken at a not-so-great angle with maybe not enough detail of the edible subject at hand and possibly too much uninteresting negative space behind it. Nope, that’s not it.

It’s a picture of a freshly made, just unwrapped, warm and toasty pork roll, egg and cheese about to get wolfed down from the comfort of a damn near magically comfortable hotel bed where I was burrowed underneath a fluffy white down comforter that because of the delicious powerful air conditioner in the room made every inch of it feel like the cool side of the pillow. THAT’S what that is.

And maybe because I’ve extended Meatless Mondays to be Meatless Monday through Fridays for about the past six months, or possibly because I never EVER eat in my room much less in my bed, or because this room was luxuriously cool unlike my room at home which even with the AC going only ever feels a degree below comfortable room temperature… but let me tell you, that pork roll in bed? It was DELICIOUS.

So what’s a pork roll and why was I eating one in a hotel bed? Well, it’s what they call a particular “processed pork product” (that’s per the interwebs) also known as Taylor ham in the fine and often maligned state of New Jersey, where the BF and I were for his birthday last weekend. It’s served on a big round Kaiser roll, which you can usually get seeded or not, and includes eggs and cheese. It’s the kind of thing you order at a bodega or a diner, a low budget, quick and easy eat, perfect for weekends and hangovers and enjoying in bed.

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When in Asbury Park, eat as the New Jerseyans.

The one in bed was from The Counter at The Asbury Hotel where we stayed for the weekend (and you should too sometime cause it’s a great little hotel and if you’re in NY, Asbury Park is a super fun, cute and easy-to-pull-off weekend getaway) but we also had one a different morning at Frank’s Deli & Restaurant, a great, no frills, old school diner near the beach. (A little fun fact for you: if you’re like me and still mourning the death of the great and so very sorely missed Anthony Bourdain, he ate here while filming a New Jersey episode of “Parts Unknown” a few years ago. And no, I didn’t know that before going. I like to think he’s just my spirit guide when I travel and eat out of town.)

I won’t eat them very often I don’t think, and even if the corner bodega started selling them in Brooklyn I certainly wouldn’t have them in bed, but the memory of enjoying them on a weekend away with the beau will always be delicious to me.

 

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Bone marrow freaking bread pudding!

Listen, before you recoil in disgust, ask me how I do it, or give me so much as a hint of shade over my eating habits (which I’ll remind you are only partially documented on this blog), let me say this: I began my Saturday in Charleston with an 8-mile run all up, down and around the peninsula.

Eight miles is not nothing. It’s a pretty exhausting bit of exercise actually. Let me tell you, you work up a good amount of sweat. So much so, that when other runners were wearing fleece headbands, windbreakers and gloves, I had peeled off my long sleeve shirt (mid-run, like the graceful swan that I am) and was running in a tank top, so sweat-drenched I looked like I’d crawled out of the river.

Why did I do it? Well, part of it’s that I’m training for a half marathon next month, but the real answer, the more pressing answer is bone marrow bread pudding.

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You just can’t capture this level of deliciousness in a photo

The MacIntosh had been recommended by a good friend and when I looked up the menu and saw those four magic words— words I’d never seen all together—I knew there was no getting out of that long run.

Now, I ate a lot of great food in Charleston, pretty much only great food, but hands down, the best thing I ate was the Mac Attack, a  hunk of bone marrow bread pudding topped with pork belly, a poached egg, and hollandaise sauce. Basically their version of eggs benedict, the Mac Attack was unbelievably good, all gooey and rich and packed with flavor. The bread pudding was almost custard-like, just fatty enough to remind you where you were but not so fatty that it felt gross.

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When bone marrow pudding is an option, you should always go with it.

I thought it was so exceptionally delicious that after, when the waitress came around to ask about dessert, I easily let her sell me on the Mac Attack’s sweet cousin, a take of sorts on french toast, this time featuring the same custardy bone barrow bread pudding smeared thick with apple butter now and topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. I’m a fan of mixing sweet and savory so this spoke right to the fat kid heart of me.

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You know what goes well with bone marrow bread pudding? Bacon.

My sister’s entree, a fancy variation of biscuits and gravy, was also delicious, the giant biscuit with butter and jam we split as an appetizer was scrumptious, and my bacon bloody Mary with its candied bacon salt rim was one of the best bloodies I’ve ever enjoyed, but that bone marrow bread pudding… ooooh, I’d run a full ass marathon just for a piece of that at the end.

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New attempts in the new year

When it comes to new year’s resolutions, I don’t like making big, sweeping declarations of intent. I’m going to lose weight! (Lame.) I’m going to be happy! (Shut up.) I’m going to cut out sugar. (BYE.)

Instead, I like to start small and set realistic expectations and achievable goals. Doing yoga once a week was my resolution for 2015, for example. Not every single day. Not post about it on Instagram every day either. Just go once a week. That kinda thing. And you know what? That kinda thing works for me. I’ve done yoga at least once every week for the past two years.

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Would you believe I made this?

So this year, ladies and gents, my new year’s resolution is to make a home cooked meal at least once a week. I know, I know. “What?! You don’t already cook at home? Who are you?”

It’s terrible, I know. Trust me, I do. But between working weird hours, not being a great cook, and having the awesomeness that is Seamless at my disposal, I rarely make a proper meal at home. I might steam some Brussels sprouts or heat up a can of beans but rarely do I make dinner from scratch.

So in this here 2017, I’m gonna try and change that. Once a week I’ll give it the ol’ college try and make something that involves using multiple pots and pans, different ingredients and every last cooking skill I can dig up from my limited arsenal.

Back in November for Thanksgiving, and then again in December for our annual holiday party, I made a pretty phenomenal, albeit very simple, baked brie by wrapping a wheel of brie in Pillsbury crescent rolls dough smeared thick with raspberry preserves. I brushed egg yolks on the outside and served the golden, molten cheesey beauty with crisp, green apple slices. It was delicious, gorgeous and a big hit with my friends, so I’m hopeful I can make that kind of magic happen more often. Once a week to be exact.

We’ll see how this goes. Let’s hope for lots of deliciousness in 2017!

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Lunch amongst the lucky ones

The four years I spent in Gainesville, Florida during college were filled with a lot of the same when it came to food: pizza (of the cheap, greasy, late night variety), burgers, pitas (Pita Pit what what!) and all manner of microwaved garbage when I ate at home.  So earlier this week, when I passed a large group of kids in Greenwich Village who I assumed were in town for NYU orientation (the purple “Class of 2018” stickers gave them away…and also horrified me), I thought about how nice it must be for them to have so many amazing food options, many—contrary to popular belief—not even that expensive.

Think of it as the burrito's Indian cousin.

Think of it as the burrito’s Indian cousin.

Case in point: the cheap and so very delicious lunch I had at The Kati Roll Company on MacDougal Street, in the thick of all things NYU.

Quick, easy and tasty, what's not to love?

Quick, easy and tasty, what’s not to love?

Kati rolls are an Indian street food of sorts, basically different meats, veggies and other fillings rolled into crepe like flatbreads called paratha. I ordered the unda shami roll, a delicious rolled up mix of minced lamb, lentil croquettes and a thin layer of beaten eggs. The paratha was thick enough to hold everything but light and soft in taste and texture, and didn’t take away from the heartier, spicy filling inside. The spices in the lamb and in the lentil croquettes made for bright, rich flavors and the egg was just enough to give it a softer, almost buttery flavor without making it taste like a full on breakfast wrap. (Though I might point out that I would gladly eat this for breakfast, lunch or dinner.)

If I could do college all over again, I wouldn’t change a thing (because crappy pizza aside, my days in Gainesville were some of my favorite) but man, would it have been nice to have delicious things like Cambodian sandwiches, Ukranian pierogis, italian bomboloni and now Indian kati rolls. I hope all these new kids in the city know just how good they have it.

 

The Kati Roll Company on Urbanspoon

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Tasty and healthy and I made it myself!

Anyone who knows me also knows good and well that while I definitely love food (duh, this blog), I’m way more about eating it than I am about cooking it. (Growing up I always just assumed that by the time I was as old as I am now, I would be so filthy loaded that I would have a personal chef to cook all my meals and therefore, would never have to actually learn how to cook. Needless to say, things did not pan out the way I’d hoped as a child.)

However, every once in a while, the spirit moves me, and I decide to put what few kitchen skills I have to use. Tonight, for example, was one of those times.  Following a recipe from one of my favorite blogs, The Londoner (about a London girl who has my dream life), I made a guilt free egg fried “rice.”

And whaddaya know, it came out pretty damn good! Tasty and healthy? A double win! So here’s how things went down:

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Everybody’s here for the party.

First, I gathered my ingredient and styled them for your viewing pleasure: coconut oil, sesame oil, cauliflower, garlic, scallions, peppers, eggs, cilantro, peanuts and soy sauce (not pictured above.)

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Note to self: invest in a food processor. Grating sucks.

The magic trick to making this dish healthy is that instead of rice, you use cauliflower. Now, on The Londoner she just popped all of her cauliflower into a food processor to break down into crumbly bits, but I don’t have one of those so I took a cheese grater to my cauliflower and grated it all down to teeny tiny bits manually. This, first of all, takes way longer, and second, is a hell of an arm workout. You laugh, but I’m sore.

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Fizzing, foaming and smelling my kitchen with tasty smells.

In a pan (which should’ve been a wok, but again, didn’t have one of those), I poured the coconut and sesame oils along with some garlic. Everything kinda fizzed up into a beigey foam and the smell filled my kitchen (whole apartment really) with awesomeness. At this point, The Londoner added shrimp, but I wasn’t feeling them so I proceeded without.

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Adding a little color and flavor with some soy sauce.

Once that got going, I dumped all of the grated cauliflower inside, stirred it around, then added the chopped scallions and fresh peppers. A little pour of soy sauce (low sodium of course, cause why not cut calories when it tastes the same?)  turned everything a nice golden brown.

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Fact: adding an egg to anything will always increase the deliciousness factor.

Then, I made a little hole in the middle of the cauliflower mix and cracked an egg right into it, letting it simmer and cook up for a bit, before scrambling it all in with everything else. I did that again with a second egg, let everything cook and get nice and toasty, and then finally turned off the stove.

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Behold! Egg fried rice with not a single grain of rice in sight!

I sprinkled some crushed peanuts on top, garnished with fresh cilantro and added a couple squirts of Sriracha sauce, and BAM! A delicious meal I hoovered down with not the tiniest bit of guilt. Now, that’s the kinda cooking I can get into!

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Fat kid reverie

If I could travel anywhere right now it would be to Thailand. It’s my dream destination these days, and part of it’s because I imagine gorging off delicious, cheap eats from street vendors and small, gritty food stalls. It would be hot, my hair frizzy and unruly, my skin shiny and sticky, but man, would that food be good.

Recently I was at Pok Pok Phat Thai,  Andy Ricker’s pad thai centric spin off of his more popular Pok Pok in Brooklyn, when I saw something on the menu that confirmed exactly what I imagine about my dream Thai vacation: Hoi thawt, a Thai specialty sold by street vendors at night markets. SOLD.

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In my wanderlust fueled reveries, I visit Thailand and eat stuff like this. And it’s damn near magical.

Served on a green banana leaf, hoi thawt’s an eggy creation made of crispy, thin egg crepe filled with plump little fresh mussels,  chives, garlic and bean sprouts, served with a side of fiery, tangy Shark sriracha sauce.  It filled my whole mouth with bright, colorful flavors and my head with even more delicious, exotic wanderlust fat kid daydreams.

My Thai vacation dreams are alive and well and until I make them happen, thankfully at least some street eats are just a couple trains away.

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Breakfast for dinner

I miss my little West Village apartment, I do, but man oh maaaaan, do I love my big new Brooklyn kitchen! I mean, I like the whole apartment obviously, but the kitchen, that was the selling point for me. I have three times the counter space, a sink big enough to sit in (well, maybe if I was a four-year-old but STILL) and my favorite and most treasured feature, a full sized fridge WITH a freezer.

Only three ingredients? Sign. Me. UP.

Only three ingredients? Sign. Me. UP.

You guys, it’s been great.

Last night, for example, I was inspired by my new kitchen to make something I’d been talking to a coworker about last week: breakfast burritos. We love ordering greasy chorizo and egg breakfast burritos from a mexican place near work but while they’re delicious, they’re not even a little healthy. They’re pretty much just terrible for you, which is why I set out to make a healthy version.

A quick trip to Trader Joe’s got me some egg whites, brown rice tortillas and one of my new obsessions, soy chorizo. Egg whites are fat-free and cholesterol free, the tortillas are wheat free and gluten free and the soy chorizo, which I promise is actually insanely delicious, is way less fattening and bad-for-you than real pork chorizo. All around awesomeness.

Breakfast burrito for dinner: WIN

Breakfast burrito for dinner: WIN

It took just a couple of minutes to heat up the tortilla, scramble up some egg whites and toss in some soy chorizo, with just another minute or so to pile everything up, roll it into a burrito and dig into it. It seemed to take just mere seconds for me to hoover the whole thing. And the best part, no guilt afterward or that dreaded anxiety of a ticking burrito time bomb going off in your stomach later!

If this is any indication of what will come out of my new kitchen, then I am very excited to see what else gets cooked up. I doubt it’ll always be healthy but that’s ok. I always have this breakfast burrito to fall back on.

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A cheeky start to the year

For me, 2013 didn’t officially start until sometime in the early afternoon of January 4th. That’s precisely when, on my first day off of the new calendar year, I walked over to Perla, the Greenwich Village restaurant I had been food-lusting over since opening last year, and ate one of the most outrageously delicious sandwiches I’ve had… possibly ever.

BAM! just like that, 2013 was suddenly off to a phenomenal start and I could feel it in my bones that everything was going to be ok this year. It would all be more than ok. It would be delicious and amazing.

This will probably remain one of the top meals of 2013, you wait and see

My edible omen came in the form of Perla’s open-faced beef cheek sandwich, a mountain of tender, braised meat on thick toasted bread with porcini mustard, all topped with two eggs, of the glorious, sunny side up variety, and a heap of crispy shoestring fries to go with it.

Beef cheek, which apparently tends to be tough, is braised or slow-cooked to really tenderize it. This particular beef cheek went through that and then some. It was some of the juiciest, softest meat I can remember eating, almost just falling apart in the best way as I shoveled it in my mouth. Add rich, thick egg yolk and a slight, but spicy, kick from the mustard and you’re looking at a serious foodgasm waiting to happen. (No really, think the “I’ll-have-what-she’s-having” scene from When Harry Met Sally. No faking.)

It was one of those meals where I walked out of the restaurant with a little pep in my step and a smile on my face. If I could whistle, I would have. This year’s gonna be good, I thought to myself. My full, happy stomach was telling me so.

Perla on Urbanspoon