Lonestar Empire

Last week I went to my first ever SummerStage concert.  SummerStage is a concert series in Central Park that provides both free and not free music throughout the summer.  Concerts are always a good time but my mind was blown when I saw they had food and beer stalls.  Lo and behold!  Food and beer makes the music sound even better!  If anything, I thought it would be simple burgers and hot dogs, but they actually had about three fancy food vendors from the Brooklyn Flea set up.  We got all of our food from Lonestar Empire, who put their Texas-style smoked meats (brisket and pork) in both sandwich and taco form.  The tacos had great slaw; the sandwiches had perfect pickles - good toppings all around.  They don't have a brick and mortar store so make sure you head to Smorgasburg to taste their meat (that's what she said).  And if you haven't been to a SummerStage show, definitely put that on your bucket list.

 

Monday Reads

1. European Court has upheld France's ban of the niqab, the type of veil worn by many Muslim women that only leaves a slit for the eyes.  I'm not sure I like the veil itself...but I'm also not sure how I feel about a government telling someone they can't wear something that is a part of their religious practice.  Not sure how to keep all the different head-coverings straight?  This article also includes a handy guide.
2. Creative genius and mental illness often go hand in hand.
3. Knowing my neighbors makes me feel more at home which then makes me happier.  Not so for Euros, apparently.
4. It doesn't yet affect US domestic flights, but some travelers will soon not be able to board planes with an uncharged cell phone for security reasons so make sure your iPhone's got some juice before you fly.

4th of July

After about five years on the less convenient river [for me, the only one that matters] the fireworks came back to the east side (thanks, Mayor de Blasio!) so I decided to throw a party on my rooftop.  It was a great idea until I woke up to rainy skies.  The weather cleared up just in time for the sun to start setting so I cancelled the laying out portion of the party (like people really needed to be subjected to me in a bathing suit anyway) and people started coming over at 4:30 instead of noon.  Thankfully, that gave everyone plenty of time to get boozed up before the fireworks started at around 9:00 so no one really cared that they couldn't see them as planned since they moved all the barges alllll the way downtown.  I hardly cared, myself.  In fact, I didn't have a care in the world because this was the easiest party in party history.  I made the decision to pick up a couple buckets from KFC (or rather, I sent Albert on this chore) and then I made a few sides to round out the spread.

I wanted the menu to have an all-American feel, which to me means classic picnic food.  Fried chicken is a good centerpiece because it's just as good at room temp/cold as it is hot.  That means you can leave it out all afternoon and not have to worry about it.  It's a low maintenance food (if only I could describe more of my friends that way).  For sides we had:

• Corn and black bean salsa.  It's one of my go-to items because it's just canned corn, canned black beans, chopped tomato, chopped onion, cilantro, and jalapeno.  Serve with the Scoops type of Tostitos because they're the best.  This is actually rather healthy when you think about it, something I like to point out since we were eating extra crispy fried chicken.
• Spinach dip...from a jar.  Because why not have one more food item on the table?  I poured it into a real bowl and told everyone I slaved over it, naturally.
• Pimento cheese sandwiches.  I make my own pimento cheese since it's expensive and hard to find in NYC.  And because I think my version is bangin.  I always like to serve mine on mushy white bread because that's how I had it growing up.  That fancy whole wheat oat bread didn't exist in the Konter household til after I left for college.
• Potato salad.  The dressing for mine is 2 parts Greek yogurt with 1 part mayo.  I use the little red potatoes and mix in dill and scallions.  Since I use 0% Greek yogurt this joins the salsa on the healthy side of the table.  If the salsa canceled out the fried chicken, this should help counterbalance the pimento cheese.  
• Cake pops.  Albert gave me a cake pop maker as part of my Xmas/Chanukah present and this party was its innauguration.  I used blue cake mix (when you bite into the cake pop the inside is more of an electric blue than you would think from the pic) and covered with white chocolate and red sprinkles.  I had to get something patriotic in there.

I cooked off the cake the night before, but I managed to decorate them, prepare all the sides, do all the dishes, clean the whole apartment, and shower in about 2 hours.  Since pretty much the whole party took place on the roof, my apartment was nice and clean when I went back inside at the end of the evening.  It is such a good feeling knowing there is absolutely zero mess to clean up.  Cleaning up just doesn't feel American enough.

   

OddFellows Ice Cream

Happy 4th of July!  This holiday is all about being outside in the heat of summer.  Rather than sit in the air conditioning, I like to cool down with some frozen treats.  If you're the same, you should check out my new favorite scoop shop, OddFellows.  Their first shop opened a year ago in Williamsburg and was written up in the city's best dining blogs even during New York's coldest months for their amazing flavors that often incorporate unexpected ingredients like miso or pink peppercorn.

I never made it to Williamsburg last summer and deeply regretted it.  Thankfully, in the year I wasted they opened a second location in my home borough of Manhattan - and on the east side, no less!  My Mom and I had spent all morning walking and were working up a sweat so we stopped in before heading to a movie on Saturday.  It's a small place that brackets the new school flavors with an old time soda pop shop feel.

My Mom was going to order the s'mores but one taste test of the buttermilk blueberry honey and her mind was set.  I had a taste and even though the blueberries were mixed into the ice cream, they still tasted fresh picked - even popped in your mouth like blueberries are should.  I went with the Thai ice cream, which infuses Thai tea into the base.  Though it had a deep burnt orange color, it was very light, probably why I gravitated towards even though I am [typically] a sorbet lover.  I added a drizzle of salted caramel sauce to mine because whenever salted caramel is on a menu I MUST have it.

Now that I've had my first ice cream cone of the season, it finally feels like summer.

3 on Thursday

Everyone around here is anxious to kick off their 4th of July weekends a bit early, and I am no exception.  I can't wait to leave work and finish up a few last minute errands before a little date night.  Then tomorrow it's party time!  Now that the fireworks are back on the East River, I've planned a little shindig on my rooftop where relaxation is the name of the game.

Background: entrance to the newly opened Union Square Pavilion

1. I dug into my treats from Myers of Keswick on Tuesday night and now realize they won't last long.  Both cookies - I'm sorry, "biscuits" - were very different from what we have here.  The Hobnobs (great name for the "nobbly oaty biscuit") weren't too crunchy (phew: I like my cookies like I like my boyfriend's heart, soft) and I like that they have a dark chocolate variety since everything in the US seems to be milk choc focused.  The caramel wafer cookies may have looked like a Kit Kat but the texture was softer, like a Belgian waffle.  Plus, I'm a sucker for such great packaging.
2. One of the best ways to beat a case of the Mondays is to do something extra fun on what is typically the lamest night of the week.  I headed to Central Park to see Counting Crows at Summer Stage and it was a total throwback to middle/high school.  They're still great.
3. The Empire State Building was lit up in all the colors of the rainbow for Pride this past weekend.  While I didn't get to take my Mom to the West Village for the parade on Sunday because of her flight time, she could tell that there was some craziness brewing in the city and loved being surrounded by that energy. 

Whitehall

I guess Friday was just all about the UK because after Meyers of Keswick we went to dinner at Whitehall.  It doesn't feel overly British, but you will see a good deal of gin on the cocktail menu.  They also feature not one but four of my favorite gastropub touches: subway tile on one wall, exposed brick on the others, wood planks for the ceiling, and filiment lightbulbs galore.  It's my favorite vibe.  Dark with enough pizazz that it doesn't feel run of the mill, but not so fancy that you have to dress up if you don't feel like it.

We all went the app route since we had been snacking all day.  My Mom had the crab pasta and loved how light it was.  Though she would have loved anything on Friday night (because that was the day I introduced her to rosé and she just looooved it - new meaning to rose colored glasses), I think this dish was, indeed, quite good.  Albert got some oysters (very good - it may not be a cooked dish, but at least they know how to pick em) and the chicken and pork terrine, a major departure for him but one he enjoyed.  I actually thought it was a very well balanced terrine that was just rich enough.  I ordered two apps thinking we would all share one of them.  The sharing didn't happen so I was very full but it's hard to complain.  I had the asparagus salad with fried egg and caerphilly (a favorite cheese I once picked up at Murray's).  I also got the pea fritters with mint yogurt.  I wish they put on just a bit more yogurt because it really made the dish.  The fritters were bigger than I expected and the inside was nice and creamy, not dry as I worried it would be upon seeing the size.

Whitehall is British, but not in a Ginger Spice, Union-Jack-flag-as-a-dress sort of way.  It's the kind of British I can really appreciate, like a marriage proposal from Prince Harry.

Myers of Keswick

I keep a little list on my phone of things I want to do.  I'm not sure exactly when Myers of Keswick made it onto the list but it's been sitting there for a while.  When my Mom and I were planning our next move on Friday evening, I consulted the list, hoping I could find a unique experience for us to share.

It was like I used some of Harry Potter's flue powder and was transported to a quaint English corner grocery store.  There is NOTHING American in this store.  Not one thing.  Even the Heinz baked beans are imported with their fancier British labels.  Americans are not big on meat pies (huge mistake, Americans) so they are in short supply in the U-S-of A.  Thankfully, Myers of Keswick has tons of fresh meat pies to choose from alongside British chips ("crisps," I think they call them), candy, cookies, even oatmeal.  I highly recommend heading to the West Village for your Brit fix.