12/09/15 4:46pm
kristenppork

A girl and her porchetta.

When people ask me about traveling, my stock response is something along the lines of “I’m still working my way through Queens.” Lucky for me I have friends who travel that I can live and eat vicariously through, friends like Kristen Baughman, who was kind enough to write a guest post about a certain porchetta sandwich in Florence that goes by the name L’Inferno.

I spent the past two months traveling around the Middle East indulging in giant plates of hummus and late-night chicken shawarma sandwiches. So, when I discovered that a flight back to New York City was cheaper if I did a stopover in Italy, I had to extend my trip for two more weeks. Plus, my stomach was ready to be filled with as many pork products as physically possible. I was ecstatic to enter the land of unlimited amounts of porchetta, culatello and prosciutto! (more…)

08/19/15 10:02am

With summer coming to a fiery close, I thought it would be a good idea for Sandwich Wednesday to get its last licks in with a list of four of our favorite ice cream sandwiches in New York City. 

Mikeys

1. Redd Foxx at Mikey Likes It
It’s probably a good thing that Mikey Likes It Ice Cream, the hiphop themed scoop shop in the East Village is a good 45-minute subway ride from me, otherwise I’d be in here every day scarfing down a Redd Foxx. Named for the salacious comedian it’s a freshly made red velvet waffle encasing a scoop of ice cream. Mikey Likes It Ice Cream, 199 Avenue A, 646-896-1836

INASALSANDWICH
2. Pandi Ice Cream at House of Inasal
The pandi-ice cream ($5.50) at House of Inasal is surely the most elaborate pair of ice cream sandwiches to ever be served under the 7 train. It’s a duo of ube ice cream sandwiches topped with halaya, coconut, and pinipig. Young coconut and pinipig, a crunchy beaten rice, top each scoop of purple yam ice cream. The warm slightly sweet eggy buns are smeared with halaya, a rich spread made from ube, or purple yam. Pandi-ice cream is the best most purple ice cream sandwich in Queens. House of Inasal, 65-14 Roosevelt Ave., Woodside, 718-429-0709 (more…)

07/01/15 2:04pm
amarino

The bun can barely contain its contents of gelato and Chantilly cream.

“Oh my god you have to have the focaccine at Amorino,” my new friend Sara Massarotto told me last night in her broad Florentine accent over mounds and mounds of San Daniele prosciutto, speck, and ham at a swine and dine at Osteria del Principe hosted by my good friends at Tabelog and Joios! I ate a lot of pork product—thumbs up for both truffle ham and porchetta—but I didn’t let that deter me from trying the new gelato sandwich that Sara had enthused about. “Ask for Federico,” she reminded me as I left. (more…)

03/18/15 11:39am
SPAGWICH

Carbohydrate love, Italian style.

“It’s kind of like a banh mi,” the waitress said of the roast lamb sandwich at M. Wells Dinette. As I scanned the menu my eyes darted between the lamb sandwich ($12) and the spaghetti sandwich ($12). Lamb and Vietnamese sandwiches sit pretty high in my culinary pantheon, but ultimately I went with the spaghetti sandwich.  It bears pointing out this kooky sandwich predates, that other noodle-based mashup, the ramen burger. (more…)

02/26/15 11:23pm
SOTTOPIZZA

Sotto 13’s pork pie pizza topped with head cheese.

Last November I had the privilege of being taught how to make turducken by Ed Cotton, the executive chef of Sotto 13. “Come back some time; I’d love to feed you,” he told me after our lesson and frankenbird photo shoot. A couple of weeks ago I finally took him up on that offer.

The meal began with that week’s special pizza, pork pie. Provolone cheese, caramelized onions, and cabbage are topped with pork shank meat. Once the pie comes out of the oven it’s blnaketed with housemade coppa di testa and lashed with mustard vinaigrette. It’s like a subtler, more sophisticated version of an Italian combo sandwich. Cotton changes out the pizzas regularly and recent iterations have included beef carpaccio with creamy kale, wild mushrooms and fontina and this week’s special: spicy lamb sausage pizza with n’duja, ricotta, and mint. (more…)

02/23/15 11:32am
BLOODPUDDING

Ornella’s sanguinaccio is bloody marvelous.

When it comes to offal I’m one of the least squeamish people around, gladly gobbling everything from Southern fried chitterlings to Chinese lamb face salad. Friends often call me the Andrew Zimmern of Queens. That’s high praise, but there are some things even I can’t abide, like the coppery tasting blocks of blood often found in Chinese soups. A can get behind a savory morcilla enriched with rice and spice and I like a good British black pudding. And then there’s sanguinaccio. (more…)

02/03/15 11:59am
DIPDIP1

Dip Dip, perhaps Flushing’s coolest looking hot pot spot.

PLEASE NOTE DIP DIP IS CLOSED

This brutal winter has me craving Chinese hotpot. Do you have a favorite place? — Jane S., College Point
I’m not the biggest fan of huo gou, or fire pot as it’s known in Chinese, but I had a great experience at Dip Dip (135-21A 37th Ave, Flushing, 718-888-0711)  recently. Apart from excellent hotpot—with such add-ins as baby ginseng and well-marbled ribbons of beef and lamb—the place looks like a movie set. I half expected Lucy Liu and her henchman to come leaping out of the upper room. This weather makes me want to go back and try the medicinal black chicken pot. (more…)

01/14/15 11:30am
CENTRALMUFF

Central Grocery’s muffuletta.

There are many, many sandwiches to be had in New Orleans as I learned when my fellow Chowzters set themselves the mission of eating every po’ bo they could get their hands on. I skipped that mission and focused my sandwich eating energies on the muffuletta. Leave it to this Italian-American boy to go all the way to New Orleans for a Sicilian sandwich.

Central Grocery, located in the Big Easy’s French Quarter is credited with inventing this Sicilian sandwich combo. It takes its name from the round sesame seed-studded Sicilian loaf. Central’s version consists of Genoa salami, mortadella, ham, mozzarella, and provolone, dressed with an olive salad. My eating buddy Joe “Hungry Dude” Hakim split a half sandwich as we were saving room for yet another Italian-American meal, fried chicken at Fiorella’s. (more…)

10/30/14 12:11am
luciataiwan

Two great tastes in one via Taipei and New York City.

Until very recently I was a pizza purist. Then I ate the falafel slice at Benjy’s Kosher Pizza Dairy Restaurant and Sushi Bar in Flushing. This surprisingly delicious mashup of Israeli and New York City street foods can be found on Main Street in Flushing , not the Chinese portion but the Jewish neighborhood sometimes called Kew Garden Hills. Yesterday I created a decidedly non-kosher mashup in the heart of Flushing’s Chinatown. Ladies and gentlemen, I present the Taiwanese chicken parm slice. (more…)

10/01/14 10:11am
PHAYUL1

Sausage and peppers, Tibetan style.

The idea for the Tibetan Triple Decker came to me while eating gyuma ($8) at Phayul. A few bites of gyuma ($8) had brought back happy memories of my father grilling up huge batches of sausage and peppers and serving sandwiches to my extended family at my annual birthday barbecue. With the addition of a bit of chili paste the beef blood sausage fried up with onions and red and green peppers tasted just like my 40-year-old memories of hot Italian sausage. This would make a great sandwich on a steamed tingmo, I thought to myself. (more…)