The Best Tri-Color Cookies in NY

Walking around in the village yesterday, we (my parent's and I) wandered into our favorite pastry shop in all of Manhattan, Rocco's. Here you can find a vast varieties of Italian cookies, cakes, and pastries; all of which are done artfully well. Rocco's signature dessert that he has in his shop is his cannoli that he makes completely from scratch. All of the shells he makes on his own as well as the cream and he only stuffs them when they're ordered so everything stays fresh. This quality control goes on with all of the pastries and they are jam-packed with flavor and aren't too sugary or sweet. JUST RIGHT!

I rarely get a chance to get to the village, so it's always a treat to get down to Rocco's and order my favorite: the tri-color cookies. These aren't like the rainbow cookies that you find in the supermarket in the plastic container, they are all hand baked and each layer has a generous helping of raspberry jelly. The cake itself is done wonderfully as he does with everything in his shop making for something perfect and you're always sad when you're done with them.

Below is a picture from them from a few years ago:

Keep in mind, they've evolved over the past years getting bigger and better, however, these were still far above par many years ago. I was still eating them back then.

Anyway, I went into the shop the other day and it was the afternoon so we only had an hour on the meter and we just ate lunch and left a good 10 minutes to go to Rocco's. We usually go there and sit down, however we just had to order and take out. It had been so long since I've had these (a month or two...) and I felt like I couldn't live with only a few. I ordered ten in a box to take home. I have to say that these cookies get bigger and bigger each time I have them and need to use a fork to eat one.

Believe me, ten was too much for one day though I enjoyed 8 and saved 2 for breakfast today, which gave me a good reason to get up early. The real reason to get up was not because I was happy about getting them, though I wanted to get at them before anyone else in the house could. I was happy that I could save them and have a cup of Aldo's coffee at the same time! The perfect breakfast for me!

Jean-Georges, NY

I never got to talk about the amazing food that is made in this man's kitchen. It was most certainly worth the money and well deserving of the 3 Michelin Stars (making his dining room one of the 4 restaurants that were granted 3 stars). Jean Georges Vongerichten has 15 restaurants, however, his restaurant in New York, Jean Georges (which is aptly named), is his signature and houses some very creative and innovative French food. I had one of the best and unique meals in my life at his restaurant. I'll go over what I ordered which everyone at the table was jealous of because they didn't order what I ordered.

It was a prix fixe dinner of three courses and then a dessert "themed tasting."

Course 1- Fois Gras Brulee with Strawberry-Balsamic Reduction

I've had some good fois gras, though this was just wonderful, not quite the fois gras you get in the top restaurants in France, though it was pretty close. He takes fois gras that's the style of pate and places it on a circle of brioche bread and then places strawberries and sugar on top of the fois gras and sets a blow torch to it. Next to it lies the strawberry and aged balsamic reduction. One last thing I have to say is that the balsamic was some of the best I've ever had.

Course 2- Butter Poached Turbot with a Châteaux-Challon Sauce (white wine and butter)

I apologize for the size of the picture, though everyone at the table said it was possibly the best course of the dinner. It was a perfect cut of fish that was cooked using the poaching method in butter. There were pieces of chopped tomato and zucchini on top of it (which were very fresh and flavorful). Then the sauce. Nothing can be better that when you mix it with butter, and you can see that it is not clear at all. There was a lot of butter and some very high quality white wine. I would have been happy if they just gave me a bowl with this sauce and a spoon.

Course 3- Crunchy Rabbit with a Soy Bean Puree and Citrus-Chili Paste

I couldn't find an image of this one, though I'm going to have you use your imagination. The rabbit was almost in the form of a sausage that was breaded with panko bread crumbs and lightly fried. In the rabbit and on the side was this hot paste made primarily of some chili and essence of citrus as in the description. The soybean puree seemed to be mixed with butter because the soybean only takes on the flavor of what is mixed with it. Lastly, a spiced rabbit broth was poured under the rabbit. Definitely a new type of French cuisine, though, never the less, very, very good.

Dessert- Chocolate Tasting

The great thing about Jean Georges is that the menu changes with the season so there is always variation, this is the summer variation of the chocolate dessert which I had. [Top Left]- This was a chocolate sorbet with a little bit of sea salt on the top of it that shocked me a bit when I expected sweet. [Top Right]- Ganache that was rolled in amaranth seeds for texture which was easy to pick up by hand and eat. [Bottom Left]- This one was great, it was a chocolate paste which was very tasty with a bunch of chocolate candy with it. On top of it were aerated sesame seeds which melted in your mouth though were served at negative temperatures which were fun. [Bottom Right]- Last but not least, the molten chocolate cake which is one of my favorite desserts and was one of the best I've had. I was so sad to have such a small sampling of it, but you can't have it all.

After dinner, like in all nice restaurants, the gave us petifores. One of selections was a house made marshmallow which was nice. Overall, a magnificent dinner and I completely recommend trying it if you're willing to pay the high prices; you know, "the things I do for food!"

Pepe's Pizzeria Napoletana, New Haven, CT

I haven't been around for a long time but I have to tell you what I would do for this pizza, travel all the way from Long Island, NY to New Haven CT just to get it. This is by far one of the best pizzas outside of Napoli! It is as well a real Neapolitan pizza, more than any other in New York that I had and what a spot for it, right in New Haven. You don't hear about many Italians immigrating to Connecticut but the ones who did were really good cooks. I would know, I drove an hour and forty minutes just to get a large pie.

I felt truly at home in New Haven's Little Italy more than New York's for one reason, it felt more like Brooklyn than Manhattan. You walk down the street and your smelling from all of these food stores the scent of fresh tomatoes and garlic. In addition to the smells of a good Italian neighborhood, going into Pepe's for the first time, I looked at the pictures on the wall of Frank Pepe and he looked like a combination of my two maternal great-grandfathers. Those are a few reasons to go back.

Let's talk about the result of my day trip. I could tell from walking in to the restaurant that I was in the right place. I could smell the ingredients from the kitchen and I saw all of the people in the kitchen and they looked like we could be related. But enough of my habitual Italian family networking. One important characteristic of this pizza is the fact that it's not a perfect circle like any other pizza. The second thing about this pizza is that I knew that they were getting their ingredients from the pork store that I went into across the street.

It was so artfully cooked that it was incredibly great tasting as well as extremely authentic. In terms of other elements, the crust was so flavorful and the ends were burnt like they were supposed to be. People assume that burnt food isn't good, though, it has a unique and powerful taste and that's how you can tell that the oven has been on a very high heat which a good pizza has to be in.

Case and point, it was one of the best pizza's I've had and it reminded me of something my grandmother or great-grandmother would make. Definitely worth the drive to New Haven to get it.

I Break for Good Coffee.

Don't pay attention to the coming soon sign, I couldn't find any pictures of this shop.

When ever I'm out at the bay house I make an effort to get to Aldo's Coffee every morning that I'm there. Going to Aldo's, people find that aside from getting great coffee, Aldo Maiorana has a peculiar way of serving up his coffee: with a side of verbal abuse. He opened up his shop many, many years ago when he ended up leaving his career as a NYC chef and coming out to Greenport, L.I. to start his coffee business.

Now this is not just any old coffee, I wouldn't be talking about it if it was. Another good inclination that his shop is really great is that there is a Starbucks directly across the street and locals as well as tourists (sometimes) gravitate over to his side. When it comes to the preparation, never question it or you're just asking to be verbally attacked and you'll just have to go and buy a pound of his beans and prepare your glass yourself at home. However, don't be afraid, you can always have a calm, casual conversation with him.

What makes his coffee so special is that he has reserves where he orders and receives his beans daily; once those beans come he has his own machine in the front of the store where he roasts them for the day. Once the roasting process is finished, he takes half of what he roasted and bags them in pounds for sale ($13 a pound) and he takes the other half and uses it to make the coffee up at the counter. Once he is done with one of the types of beans, he roasts others. He imports his raw coffee beans from both Guatemala and Sumatra, selling both caffeinated and decaf.

I don't know how he roasts the coffee and I don't think that many people do if not any. He must be the only one to do so and he keeps his secret safe very well. Even though he has a limited selection in his store he makes an effort to keep everything artfully prepared. Which brings me to my next point about the shop which makes it great, though slow at times when there is a lot of business.

Aldo has very few people working for him and that includes himself. He rarely trusts people to do anything in his store and if they don't do something right, he'll get frustrated with them. It takes a lot for people to prove themselves to him. He has one woman preparing his scones which sell out instantly as well as his signature biscotti which are unlike any other in the US if not all of Europe. He makes sure that all of the baking is done right and routinely. In terms of making the coffee at the counter, he usually makes it himself with the exception for his niece and nephew from France that are assisting him for the summer and just recently he trusted them to make the coffee on their own.

Ultimately, I make all of the effort that I can to get down to Greenport to have one, if not two cups of his famous "Caffe Latte" and a pound of Guatemalan beans. It if for sure worth making the trip to have it, just don't piss him off.

He Who Saved Portland For Me.

The title kind of explains why I wasn't able to post for the past few days. I was up in Portland for my cousins wedding. While waiting for the wedding day, my parents and I were a bit lost in this foreign town. However, we managed to find a savior in Downtown Portland who managed to give us a huge load of information on the best places to dine in the city. This man's name is Jacques and he is the foodie and wine connoisseur behind the counter in "Portland Wine and Cigar."

My parents and I wandered into the store late at night on our first night in Portland because we ate a lot on the road an my mom wanted to have a glass of wine in the room. It didn't happen that we wandered into the store and Jacques began to tell us about places to eat; we were actually wondering if there was a place for dessert in walking distance from that store. When we asked him he began to give us a lot of great information about the city including a place called "Standard Bakery" to go for breakfast. However, he told us that there is no place to have dessert at all which is sad.

Jacques did direct us to a restaurant called Ribolita who makes the best flan he's ever tasted. He also bet that if it wasn't the best flan we've ever tasted, he'd pay for it; he even called the restaurant for us. Unfortunately, they didn't have any tables in the restaurant, however, when we went to the restaurant, the hostess kindly packed up two servings of the flan in it's presentation as it would be on the plate. It turned out after we ate it that it was the best flan that we'd ever eaten.

The next morning, we went over to Standard Bakery to have some of the best almond croissants of all time which Jacques had recommended and we headed back to the wine shop to thank him for the great flan. He was happy that we liked it and we started talking about how much he liked the city since he wasn't originally from there. Eventually, he told us about his meal the night before at Hugo's. It was his first time there and he said it was one of the top 5 restaurants he had ever eaten in. Judging from the fact that he has eaten in some of the best restaurants in the world while touring and selling wine.

After he told us about Hugo's he told us all of the best places to eat in Portland, including Miyake, Street and Co., as well as Ribolita, for the best Italian (I'm usually very skeptical of Italian restaurants, though when we went there for the flan, it smelt pretty good). So I have to thank Jacques for his help and hospitality and he really saved us from eating poorly over the period of our time in Maine (THANK GOD!).

Leonidas: The Best Chocolate from Belgium

I might just be saying that they're the best because I'm completely infatuated with these chocolates, but notice that I'm going back to the fancier food and I will as well talk about my dinner tomorrow when I dine at Jean-Georges for my birthday. After I talk a bit about these chocolates, I'm going to tell you a "Things I Do For Food" story; though it won't be directly about me, but my uncle and his excellent food finding skills. So let's talk a little about these small wonders.

Leonidas is a Belgian based chocolate company, and there is no chocolate being made in this country by this company. However, there is a store on Madison Avenue that is selling chocolate that is being delivered weekly if not bi-weekly. All of the chocolate is safely shipped and kept fresh from Brussels to New York. There are many different kinds of chocolate being sold which includes chocolate bars and many different assortments of truffles. Now that you know a bit about these chocolates, I'll tell you my story.

I mentioned before that it's around the time of my birthday. It already passed but because of my trip to Texas, we didn't get much of a chance to celebrate the actual day with family. So, this passed weekend we celebrated at our bay house and tomorrow I'll be going to Jean-Georges with my grandparents for mine and my grandmother's birthday. My uncle (who will remain unnamed) was shopping for a gift for me and he thought of chocolate. In addition, he knows that raspberry is my favorite fruit, especially with chocolate. He took that into account while shopping.

He thought of going to the Leonidas store since he works in Manhattan. Once he got there he looked all over for the assortment with the feature on raspberry truffles. He couldn't find them, however. He went over to the counter and asked if they had them in stock and they replied no. That's where his bluffing skills came into play. My uncle then replied with "well, if you don't have it, I'm just going to have to go somewhere else." That pressured them to go and look in the back.

After going into the back to review their stock and check for the raspberry assortment, they found it and as well found out that they came in a new shipment that hour. So, I have to thank him for his persistence and luckily he didn't have to work too hard to find my gift. He gave me a great gift of some of the best chocolate I've ever tasted in a small box!