Where to get your King of Brunch on

After 3 of my least classy posts in recent memory I decided it was time to sit down and write something serious. Today I'm going to talk to you about brunch, the underrated love child of lunch and breakfast. I'm surprised that more teenagers haven't embraced brunch, considering it starts at around 10 when most of us wake up on weekends anyway. I'm a big fan of the hearty breakfast, and considering the increased girth of brunch, which often includes things like skirt steak and biscuits, it suits my tastes perfectly. For good steak and eggs I recommend The Breslin on west 29th st. It's not cheap, at 17$ a brunch, but the steak is cooked perfectly, with a nice outer char, and the eggs, while not fantastic, are good enough to justify the price. If you prefer to gather your own brunch instead of going out for it, buttermilk biscuits are a must. Forget the pilsburry and go to Clinton street Baking co or Cafe Pedler, which are both located on the same block of Clinton st. I honestly can't decide which spot sells better biscuits, both are very good, while maybe the Clinton St. Baking Co. has a slight edge in terms of consistency. Both bisctus carry considerable heft, and at 2$ a pop they can be paired with butter, jam, eggs, or bacon, for a complete breakfast or brunch.

Wall of Shame

Rules of Bumming Vol 9: Hood Ass Cocktails (mom don't read this)

This could potentially be the dumbest thing I've ever posted... Throughout high school I've found myself in the unique position of being a drinks snob and a bum at the same time. I can't stand piss water, and I'm always (to the disgust of party goers) putting things in my drinks to make them bearable to me. Here are some favorites for you to try or laugh at

1.The Soho Loft (props to Cole): Bear with me on this, chocolate milk, plus whiskey. If you want to be really classy use a powdered mix like ovaltine. Most people can't stand the strong stuff, and a little dairy is the perfect way to cut the after burn. Fill a mug about half way with chocolate milk and add the equivalent of a shot of Whiskey, stir well and drink quickly since you don't want the milk to curdle. (Sam F is grinding his teeth in anger at this drink)


2.Brass Monkey: I find that dousing your malt liquor with a healthy amount of OJ makes it go down much easier in what the West Coast has dubbed the brass monkey. Malt Liquor is characterized by a flat bland taste, and the citrus in Oj really helps it go down. In fact OJ is really good to put in anything. If your lacking in OJ squeeze a whole lemon or lime into the bottle. Good ratio: 15 oz OJ to every 40oz malt liquor.

3.Gimel faced: Ouzo and ice.

4.Sue's House: Coors light (or equally flavorless watery beer) and pellegrino lemonciata. This is the grossest sounding one because it involves mixing beer. I made this once at a party and some dick had the nerve to tell me I was ruining the integrity of the beer. With apology to the defenders of Coors Light, the beer has no integrity to begin with and even less taste, so it's perfect for mixing. It's also really flat, which is why I recommend mixing it with something like pellegrino lemonciata for both taste and fizz. An alternative would be a little seltzer and some lemon or even seltzer and OJ.

Lastly make sure everything is cold. A bad beer will taste ten times worse at room temperature.

once again this is totally ridiculous

Forget I Heart NY

all you need to represent

The State of Molecular Cooking

Here is a very interesting article on scientific cooking. Ol Dirty is of the opinion that if it tastes good then do whatever you want to it.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126532946414240915.html

Lets be serious for a second

I normally stay away from the complex politics of the food industry, since I prefer to focus on the enjoyment brought on by dining, not where or how my food is made. When I was eleven I was at a a now extinct Boston restaurant called Maison Robert. My grandfather leaned over to me and asked me if I knew how Fois Gras was made, which of course I didn't. He went on to describe the process, including the binding of the goose, the force feeding, the hanging of the goose to limit it's movement, and finally the slaughter and liver extraction. He then scooped up a nice big chunk of the stuff into a toasted bread slice and jammed it in my mouth. As I sat there thinking of a room full of hanging gooses with tubes down their throats, another thought entered my head, this was fucking delicious. I'm pretty callous to food issues. I read Fast Food Nation, saw supersize me, and continue to eat Micky D's. I like organic ingredients not because they're better for the environment but because they taste better. But there is one issue which i just can't, despite my incredible powers of ignoring the often brutal and inhumane process of food preparation, overlook, and that is the state of fish in the world. Whenever I eat sushi or cooked tuna I can't help but feel like I'm contributing to the extinction of a species. The EU is entertaining a ban on Bluefin fishing, which I wholeheartedly support. Currently in the Mediterranean Bluefin are at about 15% their historic level, which means that there is less then a fifth of the normal tuna average left. About 80% of Bluefin Tuna ends up in Japan (watch the south park episode), and a huge Japanese fish market remains the chief obstacle to any sort of limitations on Tuna fishing. So I'm going to say something I've never though I would say. Please stop eating Tuna. I'm not asking this because of some sort of hippie appreciation for God's beautiful creations, but simply because I want to eat the slimy bastards for the rest of my life, and I can't do that if those greedy Japanese roll them all up into sushi.

Skull and Rolls

I'm a sucker for this kind of thing. Apparently there's a guy in Greenpoint named Ben Sargent, who hails from the lobster loving city of Boston. Give Ben a call and he will whip you up a lobster roll... yeh it's that simple. Sarge runs a unlicensed (illegal) lobster business from his apartment, and if you call him during the evening you can stop buy and pick up your rolls. If it's late at night he even runs a mail slot service, which will drop your rolls through a mail slot. So why would you make a trip out to Greenpoint for lobster rolls? Well you really need to appreciate your lobster. Ben won't say where his lobster comes from, but since hes a Boston guy I'm going to assume it comes from Cape Cod (Which means its delicious), and he also guarantees that your lobster is less then 24 hours out of the world, which makes all the difference for a good lobster. Besides the taste there's something nice about an unlicensed New England native (complete with patriots hat, flannel, and baggy jeans) running a lobster speakeasy in a city which tends to get too fancy with its seafood. I'm making it my food goal of the month to eat one of Ben's rolls and I'll let you know what I think.