Fiat Café

I don't usually think of SoHo as a place for cheap eating.  Sure, you can find plenty of cafés in the area that aren't overly expensive...but a straight up deal?  Not so much.  I am singing a different tune now that I've found Fiat Café.  Pretty much nothing on the menu costs more than $8.50.  Considering it costs a minimum of $7.99 for me to buy burrata at the grocery store, an appetizer of burrata with cherry tomatoes, basil, and olive oil for $8.50 is a steal.  Since I can't make it any cheaper myself, paying cash only does not seem like an inconvenience anymore.

In addition to the burrata, we also ordered an antipasto platter (prosciutto, sopresatta, braseola, parmesan, and olives) and two carpaccio salads (one beef, one salmon).  The portions were sizable enough that we couldn't finish all the food, especially after snacking on the bread and very flavorful olive oil.  And everything was good.  For that price I wasn't expecting too much.  Frankly, I just needed to get burrata in my stomach as soon as possible because I'd been craving it for weeks and didn't care about much else.  But all the food was fresh, simple, and seemed like what my [imaginary] old Italian grandmother would throw together for a light lunch when we come inside after a long day of playing outside.

  

Pesto and Sausage Bake

When you think of baked ziti, it's always marinara and mozz.  You'd be amazed at what a difference switching to pesto can make.  It's still the same process of opening up a jar of store-bought sauce...the only difference is the sauce being green instead of red.

Cook up 1/2 a box of ziti (this recipe should probably fill a 2 qt. dish and serve 4-6).  It will take about 9 minutes to cook, which is exactly how much time you'll need to get everything else prepped.  Slice up three links of pre-cooked chicken sausage.  Just about any flavor will work except the jalapeno type ones.  If you want yours to be on the meatier side, slice up all four sausages in the pack, I won't judge.  To the bowl, add grated mozzarella.  I grated a ball of fresh mozz and I like to think it made a difference, but who really knows these things.  When the pasta is ready, toss it with the sausage, mozz, and pesto sauce to taste.  Pour it all into the casserole dish and then top with a mixture of melted butter, panko breadcrumbs, and grated parmesan or asiago.  Stick it in a 325 oven for about 30 minutes, til you see the breadcrumbs start to brown.

I didn't put a ton of mozzerella in there so mine wasn't as glued together as it could have been, but that's because I just wasn't feeling an extra cheesy dish that night.  More mozz = more glue.  The reason baked ziti is one of the most popular Italian side dishes is because it is so simple to throw together.  This version is just as simple but a little less predictable.  Also, adding sausage makes it appropriate for a full meal instead of just a side.

Italian Turkey Burgers

I had some leftover pesto in the fridge and only about two days before it went bad.  It had to get used up but with an entire 9x13 casserole of mac and cheese in the fridge, I had no need for anything pasta based.  I also had some hamburger buns so an Italian themed burger began to take shape.

There are a couple ways to do this, you can mix the pesto right into the turkey meat or if your turkey burger was already pre-shaped at the butcher counter like mine was, you can do what I did and just use the pesto as a spread right on the bun.  You can do this plain or, again, follow my lead and mix it with mayo to give the spread a little extra creaminess.  I like the pesto/mayo ratio to tip in the pesto's favor, but that's just me.  For the final touch, top with smoked mozzarella.  For best results, put the mozz on top of the burger as it finishes cooking in the pan or on the grill.  Then cover it with the lid of a pan so the steam gets the cheese nice and melty.  That's how you get the gorgeous stringy cheese you see in the pic.

Summer is burger time, but that doesn't mean it always has to be as simple as beef and cheddar cheese with ketchup.

Zoodles with Pesto and Meatballs

Have you heard about zoodles?  They're alllll the rage on Pinterest; right up there with paleo this and DIY that.  Zoodles = zucchini noodles.  There is no actual noodles in zoodles, making this innately carb-free and healthy.  They are super easy to make: just use the julienne setting on your mandolin.  If you haven't bought a mandolin by now, get on it!  I've told you time and again how great it is for making potato chips and slicing radishes.  Mine cost me a whopping $13 at Bed Bath and Beyond so there's no excuse not to own one.

When the zucchini is sliced like that it doesn't take long to cook, especially if you like your zoodles al dente.  That means this whole dish will only take as long to prepare as it takes the meatballs to cook.  I made my meatballs by getting one pre-formed burger from the meat counter and rolling it into 8 small balls.  If you like big balls (and who doesn't wink wink), you can split the burger into quarters, but the small ones will cook quicker.  Because the burger was already prepped, you have built-in portion control.  Once the meatballs are almost done cooking, throw your zoodles in the pan and cook with some pesto sauce.  Takes no time to cook, tastes delicious, and healthily satisfies your pasta craving...are you convinced you need to try zoodles yet?

Cotta

When it comes to the UWS, I'm usually out of my depth.  I'm not in the area often enough to know which spots are good and which, more importantly, offer a great brunch deal.  That's why when we met Shawn in his neighborhood for brunch last weekend, we had to follow his lead.  He introduced us to Cotta, which serves rustic Italian food that on weekends is paired with bottomless drinks for only $24.  I ordered the Brussels sprout pizza with pancetta, and parmesan.  It was amazing and I ate the whole thing.  That's right; unlike Albert who generously shared his meatball pizza or Shawn who offered a bite of his smoked salmon eggs benny to everyone at the table, I ate my entire pizza by myself.  And you know what?  I don't feel bad about it because it was delicious.

Terrible pic due to flash use and the fact that I had already devoured almost the entire pizza.  Sorry.

Estela

My friend Wendy is a fabulous foodie who also knows her way around a kitchen.  If she says a restaurant is good, you can probably take her word for it.  I reached out to her for suggestions for Jen's visit because Jen wanted to be sure to check out the hottest spot on the NYC restaurant scene and Wendy would likely know exactly what that would be.  Estela received her highest recommendation so we booked it right away.

Inspiration comes from all over the place, but I would say the small plates skew Italian/Mediterranean.  Everything we had was fabulous, including the "throwaway" items you order just so you have something to snack on while you wait for the real food to arrive.  Case in point: the olives.  If you at all like olives, order these.  Even if you're not an olive fan, try to find someone at the table who is because the olive oil they are sitting in is truly amazing.  They infuse it with orange, fennel seeds, clove, and who knows what else.  Just make sure you order it and request some bread for dipping.  We also ordered the salami which arrived in olive oil and a little salt instead of just being piled on a plate.  I plan to serve my charcuterie like this in the future.  The oil and salt helped bring out the flavor of the meat.

I have to first stop and compliment Estela on the sharability of their menu items.  If you bill yourself as a small plates restaurant, don't make it difficult to have a communal dining experience.  I can't stand when small plates come out with three pieces when most people dine in groups of four.  The portions were large enough for everyone to feel like they got a real taste of each dish.

I'm a sucker for grilled octopus and loved how creamy the accompanying potatoes were, but it was the pimentón that really set it off.  The meat on the lamb ribs fell off the bone as I picked it up and it had a great crust.  There are a couple of plates that are just a bit larger and are priced as full entrées, like the pork with wheat berries, pear, and onion.  This is where the portion felt a little small, but the pork was cooked so perfectly that I forgot about it.  My absolute favorite dish of the evening was the mussels escabeche on toast.  The mussels were basically pickled and the toast was sitting in a pool of green oil that the chef likes to incorporate into many of his dishes.  The toast soaked up the herbacious oil but still maintained its structure.  I've never had anything like it.  I need to have it again.  For dessert we got a coffee and chocolate panna cotta that was a bit unforgettable and a parsnip ice cream that was sort of like a reverse baked alaska.  The ice cream surrounded a chocolate caramel and when you took a bite you got a mix of temperatures and textures that got me - in a good way.

 

Piccolo Cafe

Italian food is not usually quick service.  If you go to an Italian restaurant, you know you'll likely be sitting there for a while, eating family style, sipping wine, and having good conversation.  That's why, when it comes to take-out, it's usually forgotten.  Piccolo Cafe is more of a coffee house that serves Italian food.  That means it's small and intimate - prime for grab and go.

Coffee house fare is usually in the pastry castegory and there is plenty of that here, but because Italians just want to feed you and then feed you again, they is a full list of salads, paninis, and pastas.  I ordered the mozzarella and tomato salad as a starter.  The mozz was perfect in texture but the salad needed a bit more salt (maybe in the oil and/or balsamic?).  The fettuccine was cooked nicely but stuck together a bit.  The bolognese sauce only had tiny pieces of meat, not the larger chunks I was hoping for.  Was it amazing?  No, but it was good in a pinch, pretty inexpensive, and came with good bread.  Those are three things I look for when it comes to take out so I was satisfied.

Garlic

Everybody in NYC has their neighborhood slice place.  If you don't, it means your realtor lied to you and you're not actually living in New York.  I hope Minnesota is nice this time of year.

One of the pizza joints in my neighborhood is just a teensy bit nicer than normal.  It's not significantly different than what you would find elsewhere, but the floors are nicely tiled and it's too clean for massive eyesores of parmesan jugs.  I love the grimy pizza joint, but it's nice to have something a little cleaner every once in a while.  Along with the cleanliness at Garlic comes some great pizza toppings.  Don't get a slice from the one round pizza in the case - that's what they make for those silly doubters who are too afraid to try something new.  The rectangular pizzas are where it's at.

Have you heard of chicken bacon ranch pizza?  If you have, you're far more worldly than I am.  I'm a fan of that one but really love the buffalo chicken and the upside down (sauce on top of cheese) pizzas.  Those are the two I went with last night, though I was tempted by the artichoke and ricotta white pizza.

They stay open late and they have an iPhone app.  What more do you need?

Tagliatelle with Prosciutto and Orange

Now that I'm further from the N/R line, I go to Eataly less frequently then I used to.  After some thinking (it shouldn't have taken me this long to figure out), I realized it's not that far of a walk from the 6 or my apartment in general if I want to get in a good jaunt.  This is good news because after a while without their fresh made pasta I crave it like crazy.  Want it need it gotta have it.  Since last week was feeling particularly long after two 4 day work weeks, I decided it would be the perfect hump day treat.

One benefit of fresh made pasta (besides the fact that it tastes amazing) is the cook time.  That stuff is done in just two to three minutes.  That means if your overall recipe is simple, you can be eating in less than ten minutes like I was.  Good, because when I want my fresh pasta, I want it NOW.  Me Hulk.  Me want pasta.  Once I decided on mandated fresh pasta for supper, I searched out a recipe that I could activate quickly.  I found this recipe from Epicurious to be ridiculously simple and easy to scale up/down.

One of the great things about Eataly is that everything is seasonal.  When I went looking for an orange, I didn't find the regular guys from Florida (now I'm picturing little oranges wearing jorts); I found a gorgeous blood orange.  Since i was making this meal for one and only using half the orange and zest, I was able to snack on the other half while I cooked - perk for the chef!  I thought the blood orange gave it a unique flavor that was not overly sweet or citrus-y, but the recipe would work just as well with a normal orange as it was originally intended.  I usually like prosciutto in it's true form, especially when it's nice and buttery; however, since there are few ingredients in this dish, it's nice that it crisps up in the pan a bit.  It really feels like a main protein this way instead of a supporting ingredient.  Yes, the sauce is cream based, but you're not putting in much.  This sauce is supposed to just lightly glaze the pasta, not kerplunk on there like an alfredo.

I absolutely loved this pasta and not just because it went from shopping bag to dinner plate in about 8 minutes.  It is the perfect transition dish from summer to fall with a sauce that alludes to cozy fireplace meals to come but a bit of orange peeking through to remind you that we're not quite there yet.    

Noturo

When I wanted a full meal but didn't feel like cooking last week I decided to give Noturo a shot. It's a little Italian place around the corner from my apartment where I always saw families or older couples when I spied through the windows on my walk back from the grocery store. Since Italian is the kind of food best eaten when surrounded by family, I took this as a good sign.

Pasta is something I love to cook so I don't usually order it out and if I do it needs to be a combination if ingredients I don't usually make. The item that best fit that description was the capellini rucola salmone: angel hair pasta with arugula and salmon in a light pink sauce. I have to commend Noturo on two things: 1) for $16 you really get a full serving if salmon and 2) the pink sauce really was light. Usually when a restaurant offers a light cream sauce there's nothing light about it. In this case there was a lot of sauce but it wasn't this thick mess that took over the angel hair. The one thing it could have used was a bit more of the arugula. The peppery green gave the dish the depth of flavor it needed to set this restaurant apart from other common red sauce Italian places. I know there's a fine line with arugula and too much is overkill, but just a little more would have been nice. It also needed just a bit of salt but adding the Parmesan the restaurant included with my order on the side did the trick. Since I had a 20% off coupon through Seamless, I decided to go crazy and order a caprese salad to start. Maybe you and I have different definitions of crazy. As long as you have good tomatoes for this dish, you're good do I was happy, especially when I saw that they three a couple good olives in there on the side. The Italian dinner experience was complete with one final thing. On the side, they sent some sliced bread. Other than the fact that I like to make my own pasta dishes the main reason I don't order from Italian restaurants is because then you miss out on the bread that's always on the table. I love covering it bread or dipping it in olive oil and maybe using it to sweep up some extra sauce on my plate. I'm glade Noturo recognized it as an integral part of the meal, even for those not dining in the restaurant.  

This is a standard Italian restaurant, one like every neighborhood needs. It's not necessarily a standout and it's about $5 too expensive to become a true regular in my takeout rotation, but it's perfect for a Friday night that I want to stay in but still feel like a real person by eating a meal that doesn't feel at all like delivery. Since I'm not spending money on alcohol in this scenario I can totally justify the extra couple dollars. 

Sausage Lasagna with Smoked Mozzarella

I wouldn't have known Monday was National Lasagna Day if Albert had not pointed it out to me.  Thankfully, lasagna is an easy dish to throw together so I didn't need much advanced notice to celebrate.  But boring, standard lasagna doesn't really say "celebration" so I wanted to update the recipe - something that's easy to do if you take a shortcut with jarred sauce and make a few fresh tweaks with the other ingredients:

First, instead of ground beef, I removed fresh sausage links from the casing, crumbled them, and browned them in a pan.  I used a one to one ratio of hot and sweet Italian sausage but that came out pretty spicy so you may want to use more sweet than hot if your palate prefers the mild.  Once it was cooked, I added some of that jarred sauce to the pan to heat through and then used some of the meat mixture as the first layer in my lasagna pan.  Next comes a layer of noodles, followed by fresh ricotta that I mixed with shredded mozzarella (whatever cheap bag you find in the refrigerator aisle) and torn basil (fresh herbs add so much great flavor).  I repeated each layer a few times until the ingredients were used up and then topped with the whole thing with slices of smoked mozzarella.  It went into the oven at 350 til it was nice and bubbly (about 30 minutes).

Italian sausage makes for an entirely different tasting lasagna.  I could taste all the fennel seeds and hot pepper that went into their preparation.  The smoked mozzarella makes a huge difference.  The flavor seeps through the whole dish and really makes it stand out from other lasagnas out there.  One bite and everyone will know it's homemade - in the good way, not in the nobody-wants-to-eat-the-weird-cupcakes-at-the-bake-sale way.

 

Il Bastardo

Steph loves to go to Il Bastardo because it's easy for her to get to from Hoboken and they apparently do a rowdy, dance party brunch. It's hard to imagine that when you're eating lunch there on a random weekday (which I was fortunate enough to do thanks to a pre-memorial day off work), but the lunch deal gives you an idea of how crazy it can get.  Who wouldn't go nuts over a $10, 2-course meal?  I went with the caesar salad to start and the chicken paillard for my entree.  Both were well prepared, simple, Italian staples.  But here's where it goes from mild to wild: just $16 for unlimited wine.  Yes, please.

Oliva

In a smaller town like Savannah, locals flock to a new restaurant the moment it opens in hopes of infusing some variety into their diets.  My brother and sister-in-law are trendsetters and usually the first to try any new eatery, but I managed to beat them to this one (and as a visitor, no less!), which I suppose makes me the trendsetter supreme.

Oliva is an Italian restaurant run by the same folks behind Rancho Alegre.  I wasn't sure how they would transition from Cuban to Italian, but I now know that the wife of this husband/wife team was raised in Venezuela, immersed in the Italian culture and all the recipes are her invention.  Such a situation was surprising to me but even more surprising was that all the fresh made pasta dishes are only $15.  I'm not sure I've ever seen a hand cut pasta dish for less than $20 and I've certainly never seen it when the pasta is filled with chicken liver paté and topped with sage butter.  Also fantastic was my Mom's pappardelle with lamb ragu and my Daddy said his grilled Octopus was like eating lobster - considering lobster's status in the world of crustaceans, that's a high compliment.  Our beef carpaccio appetizer was an ample portion and set off with a nice zesting of lemon.  

Sausage and Peppers Cous Cous

I usually keep a package of chicken sausage in my fridge for those nights when I get home late but still want a home cooked meal.  They stay fresh for a while and come in all sorts of fun flavors like jalapeno, the variety residing in my fridge this week.  If you've ever seen an episode of The Jersey Shore where they cook family meal, you know sausage and peppers is a classic dish.  Using that as my inspiration, I whipped up a batch to serve over Israeli cous cous.

I chopped up an onion and a bell pepper and threw them in a pan.  No oil or anything.  Once it starts crackling - which it will do soon without oil/butter - toss in a little white wine and some garlic and keep going til it cooks out and the veggies are tender.  When the wine is almost gone, add the sliced sausage.  It's already cooked so it just needs to warm up.  Your cous cous should be cooked by now so put in a drop of oil so it doesn't clump up and toss in some grated parm or pecorino.  Use whichever cheese you have on hand.  I'm assuming you have some sort of grate-able Italian cheese in your fridge at all times because you're not a heathen.  The cheese adds some flavor and the wine that you cooked the veggies in does the rest and the whole thing comes together in about 20 minutes.   I can't believe that anything inspired by the Jersey Shore was a success.  What is this world coming to?

What a Difference a Little Smoke Makes

The caprese salad is a tried and true favorite.  It's just as easy to make for one as it is to make for 100 and so simple that if you can find someone who messes up the recipe I will give you some sort of reward.

The most common way of spicing up this simple salad is by using heirloom tomatoes (which I also used), but I would like to suggest something else: smoked mozzarella.  The second I took off the wrapper, my kitchen smelled like fresh wood chips.  You can't throw mozzarella on the grill, but this comes close.  This cheese has a deeper flavor than the regular mozz and is less of a blank canvas than it's non-smoked brother so it can't be paired with just anything.  I say brother because I find mozzarella to be a manly cheese.  This is as opposed to, say, chevre, who is a total chick.

Anyway, this tiny change isn't anything crazy, but it did wake up my Monday a bit by saying "hey taste buds, I know you were expecting the other guy but surprise!  It's-a me, Mario!"

See those pieces that look like portobellos?  That brown coloring is alllll smoke, baby.

Pala

By the time I made it to the restaurant on Thursday, Steph had already put in an order for pizza at Pala, a place she stumbled into before instructing me to abandon our original restaurant plan and meet her there.  She had ordered the spinach pizza, which was topped with a sweet cherry tomato sauce, perfectly browned mozzarella, and ricotta that turned into a creamy sauce when warmed by the pizza.  The crust was not to thick, not too thin - the Goldilocks of crusts.

 

Via Quadronno

I've known about Via Quadronno ever since I lived a couple avenues away on 73rd street when I first moved to New York.  I first noticed it as a cute and narrow café on my way to the park on a sunny weekend.  It looked like the perfect place to grab a quick brunch or lunch bite along with a good cup of coffee.  I am a great judge of character, it seems, because that is exactly what it is.

This place is the flame to which Upper East Side moths are drawn.  It's classy, the food is consistently good, and the prices are just high enough to keep the riff raff out.  This is something they take very seriously as they are notably always closed the day of the Puerto Rican Day Parade.  No comment.

Since the restaurant is a mere half block from Central Park I decided to grab an iced coffee and Il Cosacco panini (bresaola, camembert, and thinly sliced lemon) to go.  Because this is one of their specialty paninis it rang up at almost $15 which is a little pricey considering it's on a demi baguette.  But it was such a beautiful day outside that I didn't care.  Also, lemon inside a sandwich is a new experience for me.  There was just the slightest pucker before the sandwich gives way to the salty bresaola.  I'll definitely try to replicate it at home, then perhaps I can save myself a few bucks on my next trip to the park.  

It may be a little more than I typically like to spend but I loved how the people at the takeout counter knew most patrons by name.  "How are you doing, Dr. So-and-so?" was a question I heard 4 times in the short time I was waiting for my order.  Maybe I'll reserve this one for special park occasions...or for when I'm one of those chic Upper East Side moths.

Broccoli, Basil, and Burrata

Here's a tip you'll want to write down: Trader Joe's has a pretty good deal on burrata.  When I found two rounds of it for less than $8, I snatched it up for a caprese salad.  I only used one for my salad, leaving me with a whole second ball of mozzarella goodness to play with the next night.

When it came time to use the rest of my burrata, there were no tomatoes left, but I did have some pasta and figured I'd try something new.  I chopped the burrata up, letting all the cream pool in the bottom of the bowl I would eventually use as my serving dish.  Meanwhile, I cooked up the pasta and steamed some broccoli.  Once everything was cooked, I tossed the pasta, broccoli, and some basil with the cheese.  The only seasoning it needs, is salt, pepper, and some red pepper flakes.

The cheese is filled with cream so it naturally creates the sauce type quality you want in pasta - neither dry nor soupy.  Burrata is mild so I like the red pepper flakes to spice it up a bit and you can always add some rotisserie chicken for some protein without adding any time to this ultra quick supper.  Yes, you should remember that this is such a good, cheap, and easy meal to make, but another important takeaway is that burrata is more versatile than originally thought.  It doesn't just have to be served with tomatoes or crusty bread.

Acqua

After a combo 1/2 marathon and St. Patty's Day celebration on Sunday, we decided we needed to soak up all our green beer with some Italian food and headed to the closest place we could find, Acqua.  Acqua stands out as a nicer restaurant in the middle of the more sparsely populated South Street Seaport area.  We started by ordering a margheria and a bufalina pizza to share but I would have skipped those had I realized the enormity of the pasta dishes that were on their way.

We decided to do family style versions of the orecchiette (with sausage, tomato, and broccoli rabe) and spinach gnocchi (with safron, fontina, and speck). Since family style isn't exactly on the menu, the waitress said she would prepare each dish as 3 orders to feed our table of six.  What came out was much bigger than that and try as we might, we were unable to finish.  They nailed the sauce on the gnocchi - one of the few times somebody says a touch of cream and actually means it.  Sausage and broccoli rabe are a pretty typical pair, especially with orecchiette and with just enough of each in this version, traditional is welcomed.

Before this weekend, if you had asked me to name a single restaurant near the South Street Seaport, I would have come up blank.  Now, I can happily tell you to walk yourself over the cobblestone streets to Acqua for some quality Italian.

Baked Ricotta

Since my apartment is relatively close to Gramercy Theater, I decided to have the girls over for food and drinks before we headed to Yacht Rock later that night.  Most of the food came from Trader Joe's because no one can complain about going with store-bought food when it means you're munching on mac and cheese balls.  I did, however make one dish: baked ricotta.  I used this recipe for the ultra simple dip and it couldn't have come out better.  It's basically lasagna without the noodles and great when scooped up with toasted baguette slices.  I didn't take a picture of my version, but it actually came out looking a lot like the one from the recipe so click your way through the link above...you might even discover you like the blog it came from, Sarcastic Cooking, as much as I do.