Food of the People

As a lover of food, and a lover of travel, I am of the opinion that generally the best food is 'the food of the people'. And by that, I mean the food that is ubiquitous, fresh, and inexpensive. This ideal has rarely failed me in my quest for international gastronomic sustenance (with Vietnamese Pho being the most glaring exception - don't get it on the street). We all know 'wanna be like the local' creed: Find the Italian's pizza joint in Rome, the Nepalese streetcart samosa, the Chinese restaurant with all the smiling Chinese inside. And usually that place isn't inside hotels or swank restaurants; its the street side stalls, the no frills restaurants, the 'dives' that you always see, smell and, depending on who you are, think either "gosh that smells great" or "everyone who eats there gets sick, its a fact". You can bet I'm in the former category - I love the food of the people.

As I mentioned, the food of the people is cheap and no frills, which is why I'm so fascinated by New York's culinary scene. If 'the food of the people' is usually served from streetcarts, then New York, as you may know, is one amazingly diverse place. Having gradually evolved culinarily from the dirty hot dog and salty pretzel capital of the world (not to be confused with Bavaria, the sausage and awesome capital of the world), New York now finds itself blessed with streetcarts as diverse as the summer is hot. Next to my office is a Jamaican cart, selling jerk, stewed, and curried chicken with beans, rice and fried plantains. Not your style? What about southern BBQ at a cart 2 blocks over? Or Mexican? Not feeling well, try some spicy chicken ramen, from one of 3 ramen carts nearby. Or go to the organic fresh cart for a vegetable and mozzarella crepe. I could go on endlessly, Indian curry, Korean bbq, Chinese dumplings, German schnitzel and don't even try to count the number of gyro carts there are. And the selections aren't just limited to entrees - there is even a Belgian waffle cart. Of course this is in addition to the myriad of sushi and pizza places the city already boasts of.

All the carts have their own personality. Some return to the same place every day, staking a claim to their turf. Others rotate, in a different location around the city each day, requiring you to cross reference the day of the week, the time and a tidal chart for the Mediterranean, just to be sure your food will be there when you are. There is even a yearly event, The Vendies, where the top street carts come together to be judged, with a champion being crowned "best in the city".

With all this diversity in street food, I can't help but marvel at what it means for the diversity of the city. The immigrant story rings true, "with the people come their food". And most of their food has been embedded and put on the street, making it "our food". What luck to live in a city with a diversity of people and culinary traditions to service whatever craving I could have. It's a far cry from the old hot dog and pretzel days for this city. Well, unless you go to the Bavarian cart because there, yup, you can get an awesome sausage.

Another Tick on the Great Restaurant List

So far I haven't written much about food in New York. Well, really, I haven't written much about anything in New York, but it's time to start. It there is one thing I love, its food. Now, working in New York allows me to eat plenty of food every day for lunch, but if I'm going to start with New York Food, I feel I should start at the top. This past week I went out with my work group to Peter Luger's Steak House - one of the finest steak houses in the city.

Located in Brooklyn under the shadow of the Willamsburgh, Peter Luger is a New York institution. Famous for great steak and bad service, they've been rated Zagat's best steakhouse in New York for who knows how many years. This place is a notorious haunt for the Wall St. types, in part because it isn't easy to get to. The interior has that startlingly plane decor you find in places not trying to obscure its food - white walls, wood floors, plain white linen and dozens of plane, yet beautiful, chandeliers. This place is all about the food.

And the food is terrific. Going out with my high-earning co-workers, or at least co-workers who earn more than I, afforded us the opportunity to order practically half the menu. Admittedly, steak is the word, the star, the alpha and omega, but Luger's other offerings aren't slouches either. The shrimp in the shrimp cocktail are massive, the cream spinach is... well it was the only vegetable on the table and was probably 50% butter, so needless to say it was delicious. And I can see some people shaking their heads thinking that's disgraceful, one measly pseudo-vegetable in a rich red-meat meal, but I didn't go to New York's premiere steakhouse to eat salad, so hesh-up.

I could tell you the steak was sublime -a massive plate of meat cooked perfectly medium rare and served family style with its own juices drizzled over the top - but I'd rather mention the shockingly good bacon. Thickly cut and bursting with flavor, it was so good I forgot it cost $3 a strip while I ate it.

Make no mistake, this meal wasn't cheap. In fact, it was the most expensive meal I've ever eaten, tipping the scales at just under $100. Yet, when I compare the taste of the food, the quality of the wine and the experience of it all, I can't help but feel it was worth it. Another tick mark in the great restaurant list.

Would I go again? Maybe - but probably just as an excuse to cross over the Williamsburgh bridge again. Man, what a view!

Where the action is

I've been searching for things to do in New York City. The usual tourist haunts abound, but one can really only 'see the sights' so many times before they will want to take a more active role. I've scoured webpages; I've taken surveys; I've searched books. In the city that never sleeps, there must be things for a guy like me: a history, culture loving traveler who is trying to save a buck.

Initially I was perpetually disappointed, thwarted by the same old haunts appearing again and again - Time Square, Radio City, Broadway (which are great, but which I'm also fortunate enough to pass every day on my way to the office).

The museums are world class, but the costs prohibit dropping in casually. Then again, many have 'pay what you want' hours or days. These specials allow the viewing public to choose their fare, be it $1 to $1000. Of course any visitor who pays less than full fare must deal with the blank stares of confusment from the ticket sellers, who play dumb until you confess that you 'only want to pay $5, even though the museum suggests $20."

What I was looking for was things like I know about in Boston. Things like the Scooperbowl, a charity event where there are dozens of ice cream brands competing to give you the most ice cream they can! Or the Walk for Hunger. Or even visiting Wilson Farm in the fall for a fresh Apple Cider Doughnut. Nobody I spoke with in New York could tell me about events like this. A few said Christmas time was special, but that seems to go without saying. Of course Christmas is special. I've been searching for special events throughout the year.

Today after work I walked down 6th Ave, which led me to Bryant Park and a free jazz concert, when it hit me - New York must have so many special things going on it's hard to keep track. There isn't any one or two big events each weekend everyone goes to, there are hundreds of smaller ones I just need to find. Signs in Bryant Park alone advertised Movies in the Park, jazz concerts, morning Tai Chi lessons and fencing. And just last week I stumbled across a street food festival in Times Square. Advertised events might be harder to find here, but all I'll need to do is walk around and I'm bound to find something. Besides, I should be out walking around, not poking about the internet looking up where to go... in fact, why are we both still here? I'm going out, you should too!

A Nice Spot

History book after history book extols the many splendid virtues, benefits, and wonderment of New York's geography. These books tell us that when Henry Hudson came upon his most famous discovery, the fields were green, the forests lush, and fawns played lutes softly beside bubbling brooks. Most agree that the deep harbor enable the location to be a shipping magnet, before the sturdy, accessible bedrock beneath Manhattan allowed the rise of great towers to support the cities primary interest: business. I have yet to see a book which didn't credit New York's fame and good fortune to it's unique geography.

Or for a more personal view, you could talk to any of the millions people who commute into the city each day. Like candles to a flame, tourists to a gift store or Dan to a brownie sundae, cities and towns have sprung up around New York, each pulling the tentacles of New York Metropolitan transportation further and further out. Aside from commutes terminating in New York, another shared aspect of many of these cities is proximity to the sea. Perhaps you're a fan of casino's or want to still claim to be a New Englander (despite rooting for the Yankees). Well, we've got oceanfront property in Port Chester to Stamford to Norwalk. Or if the TV shows have you wearing your hair big and rockin' out to Bon Jovi, New Jersey has ample shoreline for you too. Then again, you might be a New York purist, and prefer to live and work in the same state, so Long Island, with miles of soft sand beaches could be your choice. With so much oceanfront property in the region, New York benefits again.

But I'm really here to bring up the geographic benefit I've been seeing lately; it's smack-dab in the middle of the Eastern Seaboard. Being poor, as young travelers should be, I find myself gravitating to travel by bus. It's cheap and easy, plus they have wireless Internet now so I can write dibble like this for you while moving at 65... ugh, traffic, make that 20 miles per hour. Whatever the speed, it's relatively simple to get wherever I want to go, quickly and cheaply. Last weekend I returned to Boston. This weekend I swung through Washington, DC. Pretty much any major city on the Eastern Seaboard is accessible within a few hours on the bus. How had I never realized how much better it would be to live in the middle, instead of at the end? Aside from being the destination for other travelers, it seems to be a great departure point for it's own people!

I tell you I'd be positively giddy with excitement about this discovery, except that all this time on the bus has zapped most of my energy. Plus we have a long way to go before we reach Manhattan, all those cities up and down the East coast have brought traffic to a crawl. I think I'll relax and read my book about how great the New York Harbor is. Or maybe I'll gaze out the window at the passing sea. Just kidding... the Jersey turnpike goes nowhere near it's beautiful ocean.

Bouncing Back

I'm not predisposed to like New York. Let's face it; down in my heart, cultivated since birth, there is a deeply embedded bias against the city because it is home to a certain baseball team. As a result, fair or not, accurate or not, I've used that starting excuse to draft a mental tableau of ills that plague the city. Sure, maturity, personal experience and Big Papi have helped dissuade these irrational perceptions, but I'll confess that just a mere year ago I was saying, "there's no way I'd live in New York. It's too... big/dirty/dingy/self-centered/full of Yankee fans. Yet, here I am.

Off the bat, I'm pleased to report that most of my remaining prejudices have proven false as George Washington's teeth. In fact, my first weeks there have left me deeply impressed with numerous things, including it's resilience.

New York has seen terrorism, and I haven't. To be honest, I've always felt pretty secure because: (a) nobody is going to attack suburban Lexington because it's not an economic center, (b) nobody would dare attack Shanghai, let alone know how, and (c) nobody would attack Boston when New York is a more appealing target.

Then, one week into my New York Experiment, someone puts a car bomb in Times Square. Thankfully, we were spared disaster, but that doesn't alter the fact that 7 blocks from my office sat a terrifying weapon of destruction.

48 hours later, I walked through the area on my way home from work. I expected thin crowds, an aura of hesitancy, the unease of vigilance, people looking over their shoulders. There was none of that. The place was packed with tourists and suits. Nobody looked concerned, nobody looked upset. It was business as usual for all the bag sellers, professional sign holders and street cart hawkers. Taxis, buses and subways ran on time. The city seemed to have moved on from the attempt. What struck me even more was that week at work, it wasn't the hot button topic of conversation. People had other things to talk about - the Dow and Cinco de Mayo festivities.

Compare that to Boston, where a few years back the evening commute was disrupted when light-bright signs, in a guerrilla marketing campaign for the TV show Aqua Teen Hunger Force, were mistaken for possible explosives. Not only did the city come to a near screeching halt, but everyone was talking about it for days to come. I know the news is making a much bigger deal of the Times Square attempted bomb, and rightfully so, but I personally saw more public interest in Boston about a night-light attack, than in New York after a bomb scare.

I can't help but marvel at the contrast, and at New York's ability to bounce back. It's like the city, known for it's cynicism, is wrapped in a blanket of optimism about these things, focusing on the positives (the heroes of the day, nobody getting hurt) and glossing-over the obvious negatives (there was a bomb in Times Square). The city has seen much worse. I don't know what the city felt, what it went through, how it recovered, how it bonded in the fall of 2001, and I don't see how I could. I never properly realized exactly how important, how galvanizing those months were for the city. The result is a city far stronger, far more prepared, far more resilient than I expected. The type of city that can come back from after loosing the first 3 games of the playoffs to win the last 4... or something like that,

A New Begining

I'm starting up my blog again. Writing helps me process my world, allows me to see it, gives me cause to examine it. When I'm writing my blog the mundane becomes exciting; sights my mind would gloss over become fascinating vignettes. Life is more interesting when you contemplate it.

I no longer live in Shanghai, and I'm no longer traveling. I have started a job in New York City, while living a bit further outside the city in New Jersey. This can never be as foreign as Shanghai, and because of that perhaps my revival will be a bit of a boar, and certainly a blog about New York life is far, far from a new idea, but I hope this blog will be amusing, if nothing else.

When I speak of my impressions of Shanghai, I always talk about "Dan's Shanghai", which was different from everyone else's Shanghai. I went to my restaurants, my parts of the city. I did things I thought were interesting, and had a fascinating job to boot! But make no mistake, "Dan's Shanghai" and the Shanghai of my students would have likely seemed very, very different.

In that light, I hope to write about "Dan's New York". I'll confess I expect it to be riddled with information about commuting from central Jersey, eating from street carts around my office and the changing of the seasons. It may be mundane, it may be boring, but it'll be my life, and as I slow down to study it, it might become my New York.