Spasso Restaurant- West Village

This new spot in the West Village has been tempting me ever since I got that first UrbanDaddy email about it opening.  I love Choptank and it's the same owners so.....

Stracciatella

Polenta

Well, it was fine.  Not good.  Not bad.  Fine.  The wait was 35 minutes for a 9:30 reservation on a Tuesday, pretty ridic.  Our waitress was quite nice and pretty knowledgeable about the GF situation for the menu.  She okayed my choices so I ordered the grilled octopus, mushrooms, polenta, and the home-made stracciatella (to be fair, at first glance, it doesn't look like there are a lot of GF options but these were what I wanted to order anyway so it worked out).

Octopus was good, nice charred taste, polenta was a creamy dream, mushrooms fine (perhaps a giant pile of mushrooms was a bit ambitious both on my part and theirs), and the stracciatella, well, a bowl of cheese is always delicious even if you can't spread it on bread.

According to my dining companions, I can report that the ribolita was delicious.  That's one of those things I think wouldn't be worth even trying make gluten-free.  It's an Italian bread soup that conjures up some lovely, culinary memories from my time studying in Florence, but I guess those memories will just have to suffice.

Spasso
551 Hudson St
New York, NY 10014
212-858-3838

Chicness at the Gramercy Park Hotel

I always knew the Gramercy Park Hotel was chic, with the Rose Bar, the Rooftop Bar, and then the Italian restaurant Maialino, but I didn't realize how much I'd love the rooms.  Our suite had the cutest details.  A little bohemian, a little rococo, and a little modern.

The drop down mirrored bar, bright and shiny! (and check out the bit of bright blue wall, very fun)

The glass selection for your cocktail needs.  Why yes, I would like my $14 grey goose in a mini goblet!

The lighting in the bathroom.  Sorry the pic is a little bright- the detail shots are better but I wanted to give a feel for the whole thing.

Now the bathtub was a little shabby, peeling and grody, but otherwise, a charming hotel room.

http://www.gramercyparkhotel.com/

Gluten Free Entertaining! Pizza Party

The biggest issue for me eating GF is the inconvenience to those around me.  I find it almost embarrassing to reveal this little issue and am always looking for ways to live in a way that doesn't make a big deal of it.

Obviously, dinner parties are a problem. I don't want to serve my friends gluten-free food that might not be up to snuff with it's gluten laden counterparts, but I'd like to eat, too!

SOLUTION- Pizza party!

I made my own GF pizza crust and then we had pre-made regular pizza dough.  I wanted to make Gluten Free Girl's recipe, but was in a rush and just couldn't source the flours.  I went with King Arthur's mix which was fine.  A little too "fluffy" but flavor wise not too bad, just a little dull which is a bad combination when it's that fluffy.  But at least I didn't feel left out.

All of my guests brought toppings: red sauce, pesto, mozzarella, sausage, salami, arugula, mushrooms, olives, peppers, onions, you get the idea.  We assembled each pie on tinfoil, then cooked them on my new purchase, the AMAZING Mario Batali pizza maker from Crate and Barrel.  Pump the oven to 500 degrees, put the pizza still on the greased tinfoil onto the cast iron pan and cook for ~9 mins.

My pizza pan! Love! crateandbarrel.com

My first finished gluten-free pizza!  The Batali pizza maker ensure you don't have to pre-cook the dough, just top the raw pizza with your delicious choices and throw it in the oven and out pops a crisp pizza.  I will be researching a better/thinner dough for future attempts but in general I am pleased as punch.

Dovetail Restaurant, aka Heaven

Food allergists rejoice!  Foodies rejoice!  Everybody rejoice!  Dovetail on the Upper West Side is a winner for all.  Our server politely asked at the beginning of the meal if there were any allergies, and I said gluten.  Not a problem.  She made certain that the scallops I wanted were gluten-free, they were, and everything else that came to my setting was as well.  

No need to push aside the bread, the busboy didn't serve me any.  No need to worry that the delightful plate of amuse-bouches might be toxic, I was quietly informed they were A-OK.  And after dessert, when the bill arrived, so did a plate of magnificent petits-fours, all, I was assured, GF.

And, not too mention, it was perhaps one of the better meals I've had in recent memory.  Especially the beginning amuse-bouches, a bit of celery-type soup and a disc of mushroom gelee.  My entree of scallops were perfect in flavor, if a touch over-cooked.  The meals of my dining companions were also noteworthy, especially the halibut with chanterelles - true perfection.

It's always great to have a meal where not eating gluten isn't a huge issue and can be dealt with quietly.   It's even better when the food is delicious and I don't feel like I'm forcing my normal eating companions to eat at a poor restaurant for my sake. Dovetail was perfect in this sense and I'm eager to return.

Dovetail, 103 West 77th Street

New York, NY 10024
(212) 362-3800

Longevity Noodles! Happy Chinese New Year!

It's Thursday so... Jo and I are cooking some sort of Asian cuisine.  Tonight?  Longevity noodles! Gung Hey Fat Choi! 

The recipe is here on the Times website.  Again, we had GREAT success.  We had to use mixed dark stir fry greens since the store didn't have napa cabbage and we added a little sriracha at the end, but basically followed the recipe to at T.  (rice noodles of course)  And it was simply amazing.  I'll never order Chinese take-out again after tasting the goodness of homemade.

Leaving Well Enough Alone

Today I stopped by Francois Payard on Houston on the way back from a meeting.  Ostensibly, I needed something for lunch but I also wanted a macaron, having snagged a mini one yesterday in the office, my appetite for my fave cookies was whetted.  They had five flavors of the larger ones, oreo, coffee, cranberry, something else unappetizing, and PB&J. I went with PB&J because, well, why the hell not?  The name on the door being French lulled me into a false sense of gastronomic security.

It sucked.  No PB, some J, terrible consistency for the filling, rather hard and fudgy and altogether too thick.  The cookie sandwich parts were allright, though the flavor aside from sweet was barely discernible. 

The delicious ones at work were from Ceci-Cela, and I can tell you, I know where my next macaron is coming from.

Macy's Windows- Not What I Was Expecting

Despite their much heralded foray into designer collaborations, Macy's doesn't really have that high fashion cachet.  Lord knows I love it there, they are always having a great sale on housewares and I love an impulse Cuisinart purchase, but fashion-forward they are not.

So I was surprised to see these cute windows with cool vintage dresses in them.  There were also montages involving modern clothes, not depicted here because Jessica Simpson's line is a horror I need not impose on my readers.  But I thought these dresses were so gorgeous and a unique take on window dressing for the mass market.  Sure Simon Doonan can do whatever crazy he wants over at Barney's, but they are selling a luxury and irreverence.  Macy's is selling, well, J. Simp and Cuisinart.

So hat's off to Macy's for doing something kind of cool.  (No points awarded, though, for Kinder Aggugini collaboration, I simply did not like it nor do I think it will up their street cred one iota)