Seven Questions For . . .

Seven Questions For . . .
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04/02/13 9:55am

The Marrow’s Harold Dieterle Digs Pop Rocks, Elmhurst Thai

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The man behind The Marrow.

The man behind The Marrow.

PLEASE NOTE THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED

With a menu that includes Italian-inspired fare from Famiglia Chiarelli and German-inspired dishes from Familie Dieterle Harold Dieterle’s The Marrow is a deeply personal restaurant. It is also deeply delicious at least based on the dish I tried, The Bone Marrow ($16) Chef Dieterle’s  genius combination of uni and bone marrow with baby celery leaves,  Meyer lemon aioli, and crunchy little potato cubes. The man in charge of what is surely New York City’s first Teutonic-Italian eatery took some time to answer Seven Questions as he prepped for dinner service last Friday afternoon.

The Marrow’s menu is a nod to your lineage, you’re half German and half Sicilian right?
My paternal grandmother is actually Irish but her husband was 100% German. I grew up eating two very different styles of cuisine. Half the time I’d eat very German, schnitzels, spaetzels, a lot of braises, very peasant style food. The other half of the time I would eat very southern Italian style food.

What do your folks think of the half German half Italian menu?
They love it. It’s a very personal restaurant to me. They’re very excited about it. They’re proud that this is what I decided to go with for the next place.

Why did you name the restaurant The Marrow?
A lot of our restaurants have double meanings, so The Marrow really means the center of or the best part of. It’s very much a meat-focused restaurant, so we thought it would be a fun name. (more…)

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Seven Questions For . . .
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03/19/13 9:41am

ZenKimchi’s Joe McPherson Digs Down-home Korean, BBQ Sauce

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Joe McPherson knows a thing or two about kimchi.

Joe McPherson knows a thing or two about kimchi.

Joe McPherson, founder of Korean food site ZenKimchi has forgotten more about Korean food and culture than I will probably ever know. I’m still trying to wrap my brain around the immense K-town that is Northern Boulevard. Korean Joe, as I have taken to calling him, was kind enough to answer this week’s edition of Seven Questions.

Are there any foods from the States that you miss in Korea?
These days it’s getting progressively better. I do miss good Mexican, American Chinese food, Cajun, good beer, and affordable whiskey. But if I was back in America, I’d miss makgeolli [Korean rice wine] and Korean country-style foods.

Name three things that are always in your refrigerator.
Kimchi, gochujang, peeled garlic

What’s your favorite way to eat bone marrow?
When I’m able to get it, on toast. (more…)

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Seven Questions For . . .
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03/12/13 12:13pm

Barbecue Whiz Kid Daniel Delaney of Brooklyn’s BrisketTown

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Williamsburg
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Barbecued IPads are not on the menu at Daniel Delaney’s BrisketTown.

PLEASE NOTE THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED

I’ve made something of a career of hating on, or at least avoiding, dining in Brooklyn. Home town pride aside, there are many places worth eating at in the Borough of Kings. In no particular order some of them are: Do or Dine, Difaras, Joe’s of Avenue U, and BrisketTown. The last is Daniel Delaney’s Williamsburg barbecue emporium specializing in the smoky arts of Texas, notably some amazingly good brisket. Daniel and I go back a long way, I was a guest on his VendrTV and have helped out at his rooftop barbecues. He took a break from smoking some of the city’s best brisket to answer Seven Questions.

How did a good old boy from New Milford, N.J., get into barbecue?
I had been making videos about food for some number of years, which caused me to travel the country quite a bit. My crew and I made it a point to eat the local cuisine in whatever city we’d land in. When in the South, we ate barbecue. It was only when eating brisket at Louie Mueller’s in Taylor, Texas, that I really fell in love with it. That was the first great barbecue I had. All the rest had clearly been just OK. And it was that taste that set me off on trying to make my own.

What was the capacity of the first smoker you ever had?
The first smoker I bought could barely cook a pork shoulder. You could smoke it for an hour and then get so frustrated that you’d have to go finish it in the oven. It was a total piece of shit. (more…)

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Flushing
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02/28/13 3:15pm

Danny Bowien of Mission Chinese Digs Golden Mall, Salad

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Danny Bowien and crew at Chen du Tian Fu in Flushing’s Golden Shopping Mall.

Danny Bowien and crew at Flushing’s Golden Shopping Mall.

A few weeks ago I was giving a tour of downtown Flushing’s Chinatown. I had forgotten that the Lunar New Year Parade was being held that day. It was an unexpected treat for both me and my guests when we exited New World Mall to the pulsing beat of Gangnam Style from a passing float. As if the parade and its lion dancers weren’t enough good fortune for one day we encountered one of my favorite chefs. Just as we got to the bottom of the stairs of the Golden Shopping Mall Food Court, Danny Bowien of Mission Chinese Food came into view. He and his posse were digging into a meal at Chen Du Tian Fu. Danny was kind enough to let me ask him Seven Questions . . .

What’s your favorite way to eat bone marrow?
Seolleongtang.

Where’d you get the dragon that graces the dining room at the Mission Chinese Food in New York City?
We ordered it on-line from Beijing. We crowd-sourced it as part of a low-budget remodeling effort.

How many pounds of Sichuan peppercorn does MCFNYC go through in a week?
Probably five. (more…)

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Seven Questions For . . .
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02/11/13 10:36am

Andrew Zimmern Loves Queens’ Bukharian Bread, Hates Korea’s Giant Sea Squirts

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Andrew Zimmern is crazy about the bread at Rokhat Bakery in Rego Park.

Andrew Zimmern’s TV show “Bizarre Foods” has its season premiere tonight on The Travel Channel at 9 p.m. with a visit to Washington, D.C.  While I’m excited to see Zimmern eat a blackened snakehead sandwich in a boat on the Potomac, I’m more excited about the past several days  he’s spent eating his way around Queens. Especially yesterday, when I had the opportunity to take him on a global food crawl that started in the Himalayas and ended in Liberia.  Before I gave the bizarre one a private food tour I  caught up with him at M. Wells Dinette and asked him Seven Questions.

What’s the best thing you’ve eaten thus far on this trip to New York City?
I’m just gonna go right out with the bread at Rokhat Bakery [in Rego Park]. I’m just going with the thing that I’ve been talking to the most people about. The Golden Mall? Fantastic. Fu Run? Ethereal. To stand in the kitchen [at M. Wells Dinette] and have Hugue make little tasty tidbits for me? Glorious. And on and on and on. I had dinner last night at The Dutch. Carmellini was just killing it and sending out all kinds of great things. The moment he came out to say hello the first thing I did was take out the picture of  Rokhat Bakery and say, “You have to go try this bread place.” I’m still captivated by it. What a special unique thing they have out there. Those samsa, those meat pies, the breads, the cabbage pierogi.  I’ve never tasted its equal.

What’s your favorite way to eat bone marrow?
With my fingers. I put it up to my mouth and I suck. It’s the way I was taught when I was a little kid. The very first bone marrow that I had was osso bucco at Trattoria Sostanza in Florence in 1969 with my father. I remember my first visit there.

Where did you learn how to use chopsticks?
I learned how to use chopsticks from my mother. My mother went to Mills College in the ’40s in San Francisco, her roommate was Trader Vic’s daughter. Vic Bergeron taught my mother how to cook in the original Trader Vic’s in San Francisco. Ethnic dining in America, especially in New York, was not what is now back then. In the early ’60s, yes, there was a chow mein restaurant on every corner. There were a couple of good Cantonese restaurants around and there were your various Chinatowns in the five boroughs. We actually had a home where my mother would make certain Polynesian specialties. And, we had chopsticks. So, I learned from my Mom.

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East Village
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02/06/13 9:48am

Will Horowitz of Ducks Talks BBQ, Buddhism, Bone Marrow

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Will Horowitz cooks up what he calls "Vietnamese Cajun food" in Manhattan's East Village.

Will Horowitz cooks “Vietnamese Cajun food” at Ducks.   Photo: ELK

This week I pose Seven Questions to Will Horowitz, the chef-owner of  Ducks Eatery in Manhattan’s East Village. Ducks is the kind of place where trail mix,  crispy pig’s ears, and yakamein with barbecued brisket and clams all appear on the same menu. Strange, beautiful and delicious.

How would you characterize the food at Ducks?
We like to tell people that it’s “Vietnamese Cajun food, strongly influenced by local terroir” so people have some sense of category, maybe next week we’ll just start calling it “New Orleans 2047.” Really though, I have no fucking idea. I’m building recipes like stories, my inspiration is found in old trade routes, travels, nature, wars, traditions and heritage techniques. With that being said, there’s also a very “stream of consciousness” style undertone to our creativity, which we tend to paint on what’s often a very comedic canvas.

Do most customers get it?
A lot of people get it, a lot of people don’t. Not that I expect everyone too, that wasn’t the goal. Religion gives faith to the uncertainty of the universe’s question marks… we are a question mark with no religion. We’re utilizing a mentality driving some of the world’s most exciting restaurants in the form of corn dogs & moonshine. With that being said we have a huge following from the neighborhood, food writers and most of all industry folk. We’ve become sort of a cult hangout for a lot of really cool chefs, which makes me happy. I love cooking for other cooks.

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