Marie Fromage

Bites: National Cheese Appreciation Day, Deux Amis, BLT Market

National Cheese Appreciation Day!

Hey, did you know that that Jan. 20 was National Cheese Appreciation Day? Neither did I, until I got an email from The Cheese Mistress, who was honoring the date by organizing one of her meet-ups at Artisanal Bistro. It was a bitterly cold day, but we found warmth and sustenance in the form of yummy red wine, bubbling fondue and platters of cheese chosen from Artisanal’s in-bistro cheese boutique. When picking out the cheeses, I was attracted to one in particular: the Bierdeckel Beermat from Switzerland, described as having “an explosive barnyard aroma”.
Never one to shrink from a challenge, I stepped-up to the cheese plate and nearly passed out from the smell. Whoa! I believe this is the stinkiest cheese I have tasted to-date. I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but it was TOO stinky. Offensively stinky. At least to me, because there were a few among us (mostly the fellas) who really liked it. Go figure!

I was, however, introduced to a new favorite, the Brescianella Stagionata, a raw cow’s milk cheese from Italy. It was creamy, tangy and had a slight pungency that wasn’t overpowering. I loved it and the happy day of cheese talk.
The Cheese Mistress: www.cheesemistress.com

Deux Amis

This kind of freezing weather brings on cravings for hot and steamy things to warm you from head to toe. In particular, I get a hankering for cassoulet, that classic French country stew made of white beans, pork sausage and duck confit baked in an earthenware pot. When served with crusty bread and a hearty red wine, nothing could be cozier; and the cassoulet they’re cooking up at Deux Amis fits the bill perfectly.

Deux Amis is a quirky little place and it took me a while to succumb to its charms. The crowd is a little wacky: one part ancient, plastic Sutton Place denizens, one part United Nations delegates and one part Midtown professionals. It’s not a place I naturally gravitate to, and I only started coming here because friends in the neighborhood liked it; however, the food is so much better than expected: classic French bistro fare with a Moroccan twist. Here you will find excellent versions of French onion soup, escargot and steak au poivre, as well as delicious couscous stews served with chicken, lamb or vegetables. And that near-perfect cassoulet that finally won me over. Worth going back? Oh yes. You will find me here quite a bit.
Deux Amis: 356 E 51st St. between First and Second Avenues.

BLT Market

We interrupt this generally upbeat blog with a bit of ranting. I make an effort to keep my comments on the positive side. I think there’s more than enough snark to go around in the world of bloggers, and I do my part to accentuate the positive; however, I need to vent my frustration with BLT Market.

BLT stands for “Bistro Laurent Tourondel”, not the sandwich. Chef Tourondel is furiously building a brand, with his BLT restaurants multiplying all over the place like popcorn: BLT Steak, BLT Fish, BLT Prime, BLT Burger. The new one is BLT Market, attached to The Ritz Carlton on Central Park South. His restaurants are so overtly branded that I have resisted trying out any of them, but BLT Market has been receiving particularly good buzz lately, so the time had come to check it out and Gastro Chic made us a reservation.

Her reaction to the experience was much more generous than mine; read her review here. BLT Market is jumping on the current (and all-good) local-seasonal-artisanal dining trend. But it rings hollow to me here and seems so completely calculated. There is a blackboard with hand-written specials. The napkins are dish towels. The menu has a wooden clothespin attached. Water for the table is served in a chunky old-time milk bottle. Over by the maitre d’ stand you can pick-up a colander, a jar of honey and a cookbook on your way out.

On the positive side, it’s a bright, festive and fresh-looking room. The service is warm, friendly and professional. The crowd is attractive and sophisticated. The food is very good, if way overpriced, with some dishes truly and deeply delicious, such as the amuse bouche of “pigs-in-a-blanket”, crusty bread slathered with a garlic-parsley pesto, the venison bolognese with shaved pecorino and a poached lobster gnocchi with a lemon beurre blanc sauce.

But oh, the plastic-ness of it all. I can see a branch of this restaurant opening soon at an upscale glitzy mall near you. Gastro Chic captured my sentiments perfectly, saying it “feels a little slick, like Marie Antoinette playing country house.” In a way I can’t blame a chef for making the most of his success. After all, the food business is brutal and any hint of revenue-generating excitement should be encouraged. The reality is that all successful chefs and their monied backers are doing it, so I shouldn’t be so naïve.

I just wish it weren’t so in your face.

Worth going back? Certainly not on my dime.
BLT Market: 1430 Sixth Ave. at Central Park South

Bites: Marie Fromage Gets Some Ink, Belcourt, Cookshop

Happy New Year Everyone!

Cheese(s) of the Week: Queso de la Serena & Rolf Beeler’s Hoch Ybrig

My friends & I rang in the New Year with some bubbly and these two marvelous
cheeses:

Queso de la Serena: a buttery, creamy, slightly grassy Spanish raw sheep’s milk cheese. It reminds me of the famously runny French cheese Vacherin Mont D’Or, only less stinky.

Rolf Beeler’s Hoch Ybrig: a firm, nutty, tangy & lively cow’s milk cheese from Switzerland, aged to perfection by rock star cheese maker Rolf Beeler.

Marie Fromage Gets Some Press!

I am very excited to tell you I am currently featured in the January/February 2008 issue of Angels on Earth magazine, a publication of Guideposts with over half a million subscribers. You can check me out and see my recipe for the classic French country dessert called Clafouti.

They are also featuring an abbreviated version of the article on their website, www.angelsonearth.com. You can find me under "Recipe Box" AND in the left hand column under "What's New on Angelsonearth.com, Someone's in the Kitchen With..." which is a link to this blog!

The magazine can be found in the spirituality magazine section at Barnes & Noble and large suburban retailers like Walmart, Kmart and Target.

Belcourt

My pal Veronica Taylor & I hit this new French Mediterranean brasserie after seeing Sweeney Todd *. I know, I was surprised that I actually had an appetite after this movie, but it's amazing how easily the senses can switch gears when you step out onto Second Avenue on a Saturday night in the East Village.

It was my second visit to Belcourt and I can officially say that it’s a winner. The room is cozy and casual, a bit rustic with a touch of Belle Époque. The room has tiled floors and flattering light, with small marble-topped tables.

To keep things from being too precious, there are dish towel napkins and a rock & soul soundtrack. They serve elevated comfort food here and, for the most part, it truly satisfies. They proudly state on the menu, “Everything that can be made in house, is” and you can taste the freshness.

Standout dishes include a big bowl of brothy monkfish with brandade dumplings, baby fennel and manila clams; succulent roasted pork belly, sausage and cheeks with beets, house-made sauerkraut, and lavender spaetzle; a butternut squash and apple raviolo, with wild mushrooms, brown butter and sage; and a silky and decadent chocolate pot de crème.

My only complaint? The service. Both times I was here the servers didn’t know what they were doing, and I found myself spending time playing “flag down the waitress” on more than one occasion. However, I’m certain that this is still a work in progress and will improve with time.

Worth going back? Absolutely. If it were near my apartment I’d be there for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Belcourt: 84 East Fourth at Second Avenue

* Sweeney Todd: basically a wonderful, funny, cartoonish slasher movie with music. It is the perfect marriage of material, director and cast and I thought it was amazing. Johnny Depp is a brilliant actor, a national treasure. There is so much blood in this movie it becomes its own character. Certainly not for the kids, and you might have to cover your eyes a couple of times, but extremely well done and great fun.

Cookshop

I have recently begun a new tradition of spending Christmas Eve with good friends. My dear friend Mark Newman, Editor-in-Chief of Southern Breeze magazine (he requested that I use his real name, with title), was visiting NYC for the holidays and as luck would have it, he was free to join me for dinner on this special night.

Cookshop has been on my “to eat” list for quite some time, so I was long overdue for a visit. It opened with tons of breathless buzz about two years ago, and at the time it was at the forefront of the local-seasonal-artisanal-sustainable-foods trend that is now something that most chefs - and regular folk - seem to strive for.

Mark was already at the cozy bar when I arrived, enjoying a delicious Bourbon Cider cocktail. We were surprised to see that the place was packed on Christmas Eve. Really packed. I had been warned about this. A busy bar is one thing, but the tables at Cookshop are VERY close together, uncomfortably so. However, after the bourbon cider kicked in, we didn¹t seem to mind as much. Was that by design? In any event, the room was warm and festive and we were glad to be there.

We ordered a plate of deviled eggs to go with the cocktails; they were tasty with a little bite, the yolks whipped with mustard, scallion, smoked paprika, and maybe a dash of wasabi? We moved on to the tasty country pate studded with dried cherries and pistachios, and a salad of chicken fried duck livers with pear over frisee with a dressing that was way too vinegary. For our entrees: roasted pheasant and a mushroom pot pie. We finished off the meal by splitting a dessert of warm sticky toffee pudding with eggnog ice cream. All of it, everything was just fine. Solid food, competent cooking, professional service, reasonable prices. BUT, I felt like something was missing.

Ethical eating is an admirable effort. But does it taste good? At the end of the day, what I really want when dining out is a meal that blows my mind and gives me a break from everyday existence. This is possible not only at pricey culinary temples, but also at the local hamburger joint. Cookshop, to me, is a warm and friendly neighborhood spot that serves tasty, satisfying, but not particularly exciting food. Worth going back? Probably, if I happened to be in the neighborhood.
Cookshop: 156 Tenth Ave. at 20th St