Posts Tagged ‘Hell’s Kitchen’
Spotlight: Lali Restaurant05.24.12
In this week’s Spotlight, we’re featuring Lali Restaurant, a family-run business Dominican restaurant located in Hell’s Kitchen. This is part of a longer story that Executive Editor Karina Taveras wrote as her thesis for graduate school (which she just completed last week, WOO-HOOOO!).
On an unusually clear and breezy June afternoon, Lestiel Lopez, her curvy silhouette crowding the doorway of Lali Restaurant in midtown Manhattan, declares her latest plan.
“We start selling frio-frio today,” she announces to her staff.
Dressed in a cotton t-shirt and skirt, Lestiel, 30, known as Les, swiftly enters the restaurant, hugging a green jug filled with fresh mint that hides half her face with its wild stems. She walks past the vinyl stools at the counter and plops the greenery down on a table. A gold headband keeps her dark curls in place. Her skin is the color of brown sugar. more »
Get Spiced NYC is LIVE!05.01.12
I’m proud to announce the birth of a new food project. It’s a web food series called Get Spiced NYC and after many months of work, the fist episode is finally LIVE!
In each episode, we’ll sample 1 dish in 3 different spots and give you the verdict, so you can discover the city’s diversity along with us, one neighborhood at a time. Come along for the ride.
Bottled Jewels10.31.10
Latin American soft drinks
Did you know that there are soft drinks produced all over Latin America, and that you can get a taste of a country’s local flavor just by flipping open one of these bottles? In the Dominican Republic, for example, two of the most popular drinks are Merengue and Refresco Rojo, and are available at Dominican restaurants and bodegas around NYC. In Peru, the local palate lusts for Inca Cola, Cola Real and Chicha Morada. I know, I know, when the temperature starts to drop, it’s more fitting to talk about chocolate caliente and atole? But even though the city seems to have changed from green to fall yellow overnight, my memories of summer are still alive.
I was walking to work one day when I stepped into my corner deli to pick up a bottle of water and some flowers for the week. As I paced through the store browsing the cold drinks stocking the fridge something surprised me. An entire shelf was stocked with a line of the quintessential Mexican soft drink Jarritos. Captivated by the bejeweled bottles, I stared at the luminous rainbow of flavors: tamarind, pineapple, jamaica, mandarin, grapefruit, lime.
Not long ago, lime soda became my summer drink of choice. Along with boogie boarding Saturdays. G and I would wake up, pack PBJ’s and rush out of the house to squeeze every moment of our long warm days, returning time and time again to our favorite spot on the Jersey Shore. After an invigorating day of playing with the waves, we would drive home when the last hint of light covered the sky, picking up burritos at our favorite tex-mex joint in Hell’s Kitchen. With salt on my skin and leftover sand between my toes, I would order a bottle of the lime green, psychedelic-looking soda, straight out of the pages of Dr. Seuss.
Capizzi Pizzeria brings la Nonna’s Sicily to Hell’s Kitchen10.22.10
Pizza at Capizzi with San Marzano tomatoes
When I was a little girl, my parents would take us out to eat pizza, usually after school functions, to celebrate birthdays or early Sunday nights. We would go to Pizzarelli, the quintessential Dominican pizzeria, or Pala Pizza, another chain run by Italian family friends. All the pies were wonderful, sweet and tangy, perked up with enough extra local oregano and albahaca needed to satisfy the Dominican palate. The taste and smell of these Dominican pizzas has been forever embedded in my senses, yet it was the way they were created that gave me the most pleasure. I would watch the pizza maker pull and stretch the dough until it was pliable enough to toss in the air, and wouldn’t take my eyes off the flying disk. For a 7-year-old, the process was hypnotic and as cool as the most dazzling magic trick.
I give you this background because walking home today, my memories of pizza pie were stirred up like the particles inside a snow globe. I discovered a new pizza joint in my neighborhood. Even though there is tough competition–a few blocks away pizza is sold by the slice for 99 cents–this place is unique. Capizzi Pizzeria is warm and inviting, with wooden tables, a vintage fridge, and assorted knickknacks on the walls. The restaurant specializes in Sicilian-style pies and features four kinds on the menu plus a list of toppings that includes caramelized onions, sausage, roasted peppers and garlic. Joe, the owner, is a friendly guy, and according to one of the servers, opened the restaurant in honor of his Grandmother. I wanted to stay, but in my haste to finally make it home after a long, strange week, I waited for my pie at one of the tables while I sipped some water. I looked at the chef preparing my pie, happily flinging the dough high into the air and dressing it with the San Marzano tomatoes and parmeggiano before sticking it into the brick oven. Even though I couldn’t hear him, I could swear that he was whistling.
I raced home, hugging the pizza box, in order to keep the pie warm on this nippy night. I bolted through the door and laid the box on the kitchen table. After settling in, I picked up a slice and carried it with me to the couch. With the first bite vibrant red tomatoes popped on my tongue. The cheese was sparse, yet full of flavor. The dough was light and fluffy. As I polished 1, 2, 3, 4 slices, the flavors reminded me of a bowl of spaguetti. It tasted like something Grandma would have made–it was sweet, bright and made with love.
Food For Thought