Free olives and lots of wine at Stuzzicheria

One of the greatest aspects of my current job is that I have coworkers! Delightful, wonderful coworkers. And AS, one such coworker, just left the bakery to return to his former consulting position... similar to my own situation a few years ago. Anyway, we met up for celebratory/goodbye/thank-you drinks after work on Friday, ducking out of the frigid cold into Stuzzicheria near the bakery in Tribeca.

Stuzzicheria is the downtown outpost of Bar Stuzzichini in the Flatiron district. Apparently, it was happy hour, so though it meant we couldn't sit at an actual table-- relegated instead to backless stools at the bar-- we did get some benefits out of the deal. First, drinks: AS got an enormous mug of Bitburger, and I had a quartino of Fiano D'Avellino. All the wine here comes in quartinos, which means it's a bit more expensive than a regular glass, but you get more. The classic trade-off.

So I forgot to take a picture of my wine. Oops?

So back to the happy hour part. Each diner at the bar gets one free stuzzichini-- a type of Italian bar snack or appetizer-- with the order of a drink. Both of us went for the Castelvetrano olives. This was a surprisingly generous dish of plump, green olives, and they turned out to be some of the best olives I've ever encountered. Not greasy, but plump, almost buttery, and supremely delicious, they were incredibly tasty and incredibly, well, free.

They almost look like grapes, no?

Though the service was nonexistent-- the bartender, for the most part, talked on his phone and ignored patrons, making it impossible to get his attention--Stuzzicheria was enough of a good deal that I'd go back for another round of happy hour food and drinks.

Stuzzicheria
305 Church Street at Walker
212-219-4037

The classic chocolate cupcake from Billy's

I'm slowly making my way through the menu at Billy's, once again, and I'm reminded every day how freakin' delicious this stuff is. And I'm not just saying that because I'm employed there. I mean, take the classic chocolate cupcake with vanilla frosting. Light, fluffy, cocoa-inflected cake, with an appealing darker, almost coffee-like undertone at the exposed lip of the cake. Sugary, pure frosting, dotted liberally with sprinkles for visual and textural contrast. It's baked-good perfection: simple, uncomplicated, and thoroughly, seriously delicious. It may be humble (and bordering on homely, once I squished it beyond recognition in my purse on the way home), but it's a straight-shot throwback to childhood. In the best way possible.

Kinda dented. Oops.

So light and tender!

Billy's Bakery
184 Ninth Avenue and 75 Franklin Street
212-647-9958

Blossom Du Jour truly brings the "shrewd"

Last week, I was in Chelsea on my way to watch the (AWFUL, TRAGIC) Pats game and found myself in need of a take-out salad. I happened across Blossom Du Jour, the takeout branch of Blossom, one of the best-known vegetarian/vegan outposts in New York City. I'd been to Blossom a year or two ago and not really enjoyed it, but for some reason I had higher hopes for Blossom Du Jour. Why does my brain do things like that? I don't know.

The space itself is kind of odd-- mostly empty, not much seating, but not much else, either. There's one very small, sleek fridge built into the wall, which holds the take-out salads and sandwiches. There wasn't a huge variety-- four salads on offer-- and since they were all pre-made, what you got was what you got. I grabbed a "Two-Tone Beet" salad, described as "marinated red and yellow beets, peppers, field greens, citrus dressing." It felt very, very light in my hand, even with the included enclosed container of dressing, which should have tipped me off to something, but it didn't. I paid my $8 and change and left.

When I got a chance to eat the salad a bit later in the evening, it was... well... okay. There were about a dozen pieces of field greens and three little dishes of shredded vegetables. the "marinated" red and yellow beets didn't have much discernible flavor beyond "wet," and it's notable that there weren't any peppers-- they seemed to have been replaced by equally "marinated" (wet) carrots, which honestly was all the better for me because I'm not a huge pepper fan. I realized only mid-consumption that this was a raw salad, so nothing was cooked, meaning the only real flavor came from the mildly tangy dressing. And given that most of the room in the container was taken up by the empty space around the plastic dishes, after finishing off the salad in approximately six bites, I was hungry about three minutes later.

There is really not much in this small, small salad

So, while there wasn't really anything WRONG with the salad per se, overall it was pretty flavorless and unnecessarily small for an outrageous $8+ dollars. I felt, honestly, ripped off. And while I appreciate that it's great for vegans to have another eating outlet in the city, Blossom Du Jour is really not a place I'd recommend or visit again myself. I should have paid more attention to the tagline: "Shrewd Fast Food." When the restaurant advertises itself as tricky and/or cunning, you're bound to leave with a (proverbial) bad taste in your mouth.

Blossom Du Jour
174 Ninth Avenue, between 20th and 21st Streets
212-229-2595

Klee saves the day

Last week, the lovely DA and I made plans to convene at the Little Cheese Pub in Chelsea. I was really excited-- it was a new place, and the menu looked delicious. I got there first and took a seat at one of their ingenious swing-out seats at a communal table. I procured a menu and began to peruse... when I was unpleasantly accosted by a notice screaming "We do not currently serve alcohol." Ummm... really? According to the website, there was an extensive beer and wine list, and perhaps not surprisingly, that's why I'd chosen the LCP for our drinks date. Apparently, they'd gotten their liquor license but didn't have the necessary piece of paper yet-- so BYOB it was. Now, this is all perfectly fine, but don't you think they should have posted that fact... somewhere? Anywhere aside from buried in the middle of the menu? Like, maybe, online? Or at the door? Anyway, when DA arrived, I informed him of the sad situation, and we headed back out into the frigid night in search of, well, booze.

Given the ~20-degree temperature, we needed someplace nearby. Quickly. So on a gametime decision, we decided to check out Klee, which is located around the corner from the LCP and is owned by the same chef, Daniel Angerer. We burst into the quiet, serene dining room and gratefully took seats at the small but entirely adequate bar.

A good 15 minutes of wrangling with the menu for the purposes of the Wine Century Club later, we had a couple drinks and had placed a food order. I had ordered a glass of "Rosso, Gerbino, Di Giovanno" (check Nero D'Avola off my WCC list, thank you very much), which I'd say was just ah-kay. The alcohol burn in this wine was hot and almost overwhelming, although after a bit of time in the glass it opened up and mellowed a bit. DA noted that his glass of Primitivo, the special red of the night, was also decent but not memorable.

My wine (check out the cool coaster!)

DA's wine. Looks eerily similar.

But the food! We had ordered a cheese plate, and after once again struggling to decide among the five cheese options, we went with a Pecorino Tartufo, a Green Hill, and a classic Appenzeller. And while it was a bit pricey at $13, this was a damn good cheese plate. First of all, Klee gives you a truly generous portion of each cheese, particularly the Pecorino and Appenzelelr. There was enough cheese that both of us (or maybe just me?) were reaching cheese overload by the end of the plate. And the cheeses themselves were top quality-- we both loved the Pecorino for its soft texture and assertive truffley bite. The Green Hill was super creamy and mild, and the Appenzeller tasted just like diving into a fondue pot. The dark honey accompaniment was interesting, but the stewed figs were pretty average-- in fact, our only gripe was that the accompaniments could have been a bit better or more creative (and there could have been more-- I mean, three half-figs for two people?).

Left to right, Appenzeller, Pecorino, Green Hill

Raisin bread and toasted rye for the smearin'

We spent almost two hours sipping wine, eating cheese, and just talking. It was, in a word, delightful. And Klee was so peaceful and warm, with laid-back but welcoming service-- I'd definitely come back to try a "real" meal down the line.

Klee Brasserie
200 Ninth Avenue, between 22nd and 23rd Streets
212-633-8033

Another ode to the Hello Dolly

Recently, I had the first Hello Dolly of my second stint with Billy's Bakery. Last time, I loved them so, but in my first few weeks at the bakery this time around there was a lot of cupcake and brownie tasting, so I hadn't gotten around to bringing one of these fabulous babes home yet... but then I did. And I remembered.

Why hello, Dolly.

Sure, she may be homely. But darn it, this Dolly is delicious. Graham cracker, pecans, chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, and coconut are all enrobed in a crackly, sticky-sweet layer of condensed milk. It's incredibly sweet and incredibly satisfying-- texturally interesting with a range of flavors, filling but not cloying. I could eat one of these every day, and the only thing standing between me and doing just that is willpower. And the prospect of buying a whole new wardrobe, several sizes bigger.

Billy's Bakery
184 Ninth Avenue and 75 Franklin Street
212-647-9956

Black Hound FAIL

So again, last week I found myself with a cake I ordered online. Again, don't ask. This time, it was from Black Hound, another bakery in NYC that's known for shipping its cakes. I had high hopes for this checkerboard cake, which was appealingly decorated in buttercream and ganache.

Purty

As I cut into it, I found a really visually enticing checkerboard pattern. The cake is really well-crafted, I'll give them that, despite the fact that the chocolate cake crumbs on the sides of the cake spill everywhere when you try to move the confection.

Busy

But I knew almost instantly I wouldn't really like the taste. The cake itself wasn't bad, but it was rimmed on all sides with buttercream, both chocolatey (which had a bit of a mocha tang) and vanilla. And I could tell just by looking that this, sadly, was exactly the type of frosting I don't like-- absurdly buttery and greasy, kind of like shoving a stick of butter right in your face. Blech. It's not even really sweet, and with that unpleasant mouthfeel-- just... no. I took one bite and dumped the slice in the trash.

So, I'll say this: If you're a fan of the Cupcake Cafe's cupcakes, you'll like this cake. If you're not (that is, if you have my frosting preferences), you won't. The end.

Black Hound
Order online

Cana: A wine bar in an Escher painting

Cana Wine Bar recently opened in the Limelight Marketplace, everyone's favorite church-turned-nightclub-turned-upscale-trinket-marketplace. I've written about the bizarro world inside the Limelight before, but what better way to enhance the experience of being inside an Escher painting than to drink some wine? No better way, that's what. (Huh?) Anyway, after work last week, I suggested my old friend AS and I meet up at the newly-debuted Cana for a tipple and a nibble. And so we did.

Cana is situated on one of the Limelight's many landings, and rather than having its own enclosed space, it's kind of just out there on the platform. There are tables lined up against the internal railings overlooking the marketplace's ground floor, and there's a small bar tucked under the overhang of the next floor above us.

The menu is both pretty substantial and relatively reasonably priced (N.B.: Don't go by what's up on the website; the actual menu, particularly the wines by the glass, differs considerably). AS chose a glass of Pinot Noir; I went with a glass of Montepulciano, which was rich and ruby-toned and delicious. And for all those counting, I am now up to EIGHTY-ONE varietals on my Wine Century Club quest! Nineteen wines to go...

Montepulciano

And pinot

I also ordered a dish of their cocktail olives, which goes for a very reasonable $5. A large plate of chile-spiked olives is surprisingly accompanied by a plate of "crostini," thick slices of warm white toast with shards of parmesan bruleed on top sporting humorously long skewers, for some reason. (Do people often have trouble picking up pieces of toast with their hands?) The olives were salty and succulent, and the toast was a nice extra gesture-- and warm and tasty, to boot.

Olives! And toast!

Our overall experience with Cana was quite positive. It's not exactly your cozy, intimate, candlelit neighborhood wine bar, but it's actually a really nice place to grab a drink, albeit in a frenetic, blindingly white, and techno-pumping atmosphere. If you happen to find yourself in the somewhat in-between neighborhood of 6th Avenue and the low 20s, stop on in and have a drink. At the very least, it'll give you some liquid courage to tackle the rest of the marketplace.

Cana Wine Bar
Inside the Limelight Marketplace
656 Avenue of the Americas, between 20th and 21st Street