Sokhna

Today's installment is filled on with many dos and one don't. It has has transportation instructions.

Getting there

This is the summer of 'The Bike'. I have been venturing out weekly on big expeditions, grazing along the way. Yesterday the itinerary took us up north along Riverside Drive (did you know there is a very old, very creepy graveyard at 155th and Riverside?) to Ft. Tyron Park (where a Mister Softee awaited). On the return, we crossed the George Washington bridge over to the Ft. Lee Historic Park on the Jersey side where there is a reenactment camp of colonial soldiers. Back in Manhattan, we decided to stop and check out some of the Chimichurri trucks (at least 6) parked along Amsterdam Ave. between 175th and 165th.

The Don't

La Vecina #1 is one of the many chimichurri trucks parked on the avenue. Like the others, it is tagged in graffiti and the menu is scratched out in places, but we could still read the offerings: Cerdo oreja, pata, corazon and every other yucky part of the pig. Also chimichurri torta, made with a wafer thin beef products (looked like a Steak'um to me). We went for one torta ($4), two limon jugos naturales ($2) and two fried beef empanadas ($1 each). Chimichurri - a type of South American sauce used for beef - in this case was Russian dressing with a few squirts of hot sauce. The limon was about four scoops of CountryTime on ice and the beef empanada? Who knows what was really inside. Anjum couldn't finish his, but I soldiered on. In the name of Belly Up.

I should mention, however, that the proprietor, who didn't speak English, was really nice and walked us through the pig parts by pointing to his ears, lips, etc..as I called them out from the menu. We had high expectations; taco trucks in the city are usually pretty decent. But this was a sore disappointment. The Vegas-like lights made these chimichurri trucks seem more enticing than the food really was. We walked a few block out of sight before dumping our too-sweet limon jugos and pedaled onwards. I patted my belly, silently apologizing that I am an 'adventure' eater and will try anything for the sake of a good blog post.

The Do

Redemption was on the horizon. We whipped down St. Nicholas Avenue, where there is a highway of a bike lane. Slowing at 135th, we noticed a large group gathered on the streets and parked on lawn chairs. What was happening? The Teddy Pendergrass Tribute concert! Luck was on our side! We parked it for a few minutes, wandered among the crowd and then slowly headed south again. Riding back through Harlem on a Saturday summer evening is tops, people were street-partying, street ball was being played, music blasting.

A strip of Senegalese restaurants on 116th street awaited. We chose Sokhna, for no other reason than it looked welcoming. The food gods were helping us redeem the chimichurri experience. Sokhna is a family restaurant, bustling with take out business, and has a television pumping out African hip hop at the back. We ordered the chicken brouchette platter ($9), a fresh, house-made bissap juice and ginger juice ($2 each). The platter can easily feed two people and the chicken was excellently tender and well-marinated. The accompanying mountain of cous cous, flecked with raisins and pinenuts, was topped with stewed onions and olives. A pile of spicy, pickled onions accompanied the brouchettes. We mopped up the salty jous with fresh white rolls. The juice was amazingly good - I was so sorry I didn't buy several to bring home. We also ordered a baobab juice. This is a specialty African fruit, when made into a juice is a thick, sweet milkshakey thing. I preferred the strong ginger juice. The grand total was $18 for the feast, without a doubt one of the best food deals I have encountered in the city.

Where: Sokhna, 225 West 116th Street, 212-864-0081

King Sauna

King Sauna Lounge.

What brings to mind a well-deserved pig out like hanging out naked with dozens of strangers? King Sauna, the reigning monarch of bimbibop and jimjibang, sure does.

I decided to make the most of a recent summer afternoon and treat myself to some TLC. Cheap TLC. I contemplated a Chinatown $1/minute massage followed by dim sum. But I hankered for something more adventerous.

It was then that King Sauna entered my radar. It is a massive Korean sauna/wet spa emporium in Palisades Park, NJ, where you can get scrubbed raw and slapped around by a couple of tough Korean ladies for a feeling like no other. TLC, the hard-core version.

The Koreans love saunas. And King Sauna aims to out-Korean all of them. To get there I took a 20-minute bus from Port Authority ($8.10 round trip). It is $35 for a day pass and they assigned me a locker, a towel, pink shorts and matching tee-shirt. After I stripped down and stopped feeling self-conscious (sort of), a spa attendant instructed to bathe on a little stool and then jump into one of the many tubs (hot, warm, cold). After I was soaked, I went for the body scrub or wet massage ($70 for both plus tip). A row of tables at the back of the 'wet' spa is where the real experience happens. The spa workers, wearing black lingerie as a uniform (not the sexy kind) use scrub mits to exfoliate you everywhere (yes, *everywhere* and big yucky rolls of old skin will literally fall off your body - gross huh) and then, through an almost-hostile massage, reinvigorate your circulation and muscles. It's bit like being reborn.

After an hour of abuse, they released me back to soak in the steam room or move on into the many sauna rooms. There is one room, the Mugwort room, which is quite possibly the most masochistic experience on earth. My lips started sweating and I felt I might die after about 60 seconds. I donned my pink outfit and moved into the more tolerable co-ed sauna rooms (a men's wet spa is seperate).

By this time, I had worked up some major hunger for a bowl of bimbibop. The lounge/restaurant offer some pink 'royal' seating arrangements where you can dine with other pink-tee-shirt clad spa goers. A bimbibop will cost you $8, and it's advisable to wash it down with a jug of water, and finish with a fresh papaya smoothie. After a relaxing meal while watching a Korean soap opera, I took one more spin through a sauna room, showered, and dressed. Three hours after arriving at King Sauna, I was sufficiently TLC'd and glowing like a newborn, all for the princely sum of less than $150.

Truck stop boom

There is a truck for every gourmande in Lower Manhattan these days (15 at last count), from the iconic joe vendors at the Mud Truck on Astor Place to the newly opened Van Leeuwen ice cream truck, which started dishing fancy scoops at Prince and Greene streets this week. Then there is The Dessert Truck, which exploded on to the eater scene last spring with a barrage of media attention.

But the ice-cream truck model has been around for decades, so why the boom now? These are not fresh-off-the-boat operations, people. These are legit businesses with a slew of MBA number crunching. (Pepto truck anyone? I put money on 48th and Park for that one.)

As I licked my tasty, if pricey, Slow Food scoop the other day, I pondered the boom. The Internet has revitalized the old park-and-sell model. Some web sites and blogs - such as Yum Tacos, Los Tacos Trucks and Taco Hunt - are dedicated to tracking and mapping the mobile kitchens (and their turf wars), freeing them from geographic confines.

Another reason, overhead is low. The young and hungry can start a business with elbow grease and truck rental.

And lastly, a food truck offers entreprenurial freedom and lifestyle that brings business back to basic. It is literally where the rubber hits the road. Except instead of schilling lemonade, it's lunch. For the record, the ice cream from Van Leeuwen is very good - much better than Grom - because it remains light, fresh and creamy without going overboard on sweetness and milkfat. I didn't have the scoop 'coma' that so often follows a heart-clogging lick. I recommend splurging the $3.75 on a scoop.

Dallas Jones Bar-B-Q

For those that understand bacon makes everything taste better: this is your mothership. And for you others, it's still a worthy satellite. This button-sized BBQ joint, which can seat 10 people max, is a taste of southern heaven on the south side of the West Village. It is the opposite of Dinosaur's bigger-than-life operation uptown (my other fave BBQ joint), but the taste is eyes-rolling-in-back-of-head delicious. I got an order of the St.Louis-style pork ribs (recommended by the super-nice waiter) with a side of collard greens and beans. It was accompanied by a corn muffin, which sadly I had no room for. There was pork grease running down my chin and the bacon bits in the chopped collard greens were so salty and tender that I ordered a second side of the vegetable dish. The beans were soaked in tomato sauce (maybe some ketchup?) but they brought the sweet to the bacon's salt. My pork-free BF went for the beef ribs and a quarter chicken, also drenched in their spicy sauce. Tasty! I was amazed/impressed that this little hole-in-the-wall kitchen produced such a mighty and authentic BBQ meal. When you've already well passed the 1,000-calorie meal mark, it's best to just pile it on. So we did. A pecan tart a la mode sealed the deal. Washed down with some lemonade, the whole mess came to $63 for both of us. Bottom line: good place to stuff your belly, but be prepared to spend the next few hours in a sticky food coma.

Where: 178 West Houston Street, 212-741-7390

Eighty One

Eighty One is not just the name and address of this new restaurant. It is also perhaps the age of many clientle. Their spiritual age at least. The new restaurant was opened several months ago by Ed Brown, formerly of the Sea Grill (see Go Belly Up review).

Frank Bruni issued two stars last Wednesday, and I was tucking into the acclaimed vitals on Thursday. You don't always have a chance to follow so closely on Bruni's coattails. My interest also veered into personal territory because it is located stumbling distance from my apartment.

So how was it? Well, it was very "Upper West Side-ish." Go figure. The food was an entirely separate issue from the restaurant. The food was very, very good, though not quite mind-blowingly good enough to merit its very expensive price tags (most entrees over $35).

Or rather, with the food at this price, there just seemed to be a little something missing. It's hard to say what that "something" was: the service was attentive and friendly, the food excellent, the desserts beautiful. The "something", I suspect, was atmosphere. The other diners were older, tight-faced doyennes and then, strangely, a huge stroller (the massive kind with a built-in mobile) was parked in the dining room (along with attendant baby). Buzz kill.

I don't know about you, but when I come to the Upper West Side, I want to be reminded of its cool parts: the park views, the planetarium, the intellectual aspects, the characters. It should be a respite from downtown, as the leafy north, rather than an uncomfortable stay with relatives you neither knew you had nor do you really want to be around. It's one-long dinner with the in-laws.

Granted, the front of the restaurant, with its sliver of window overlooking the Natural History museum, is more clubby and welcoming to young couples. Understandably, other reviews, including Bruni's, bypass the creepy dining room in favor of the bar area. This has atmosphere; one almost wishes the whole restaurant had its dark-paneled elegance throughout.

The food: I started with the Baby Montauk Calamari ($17), grilled tendrils dressed in a very spicy pimento, which were tender and succulent. The BF went for the Sea Scallop and Foie Gras Ravioli ($17), generous and buttery, but not the best foie ravioli I've ever had. It didn't have that pop in your mouth whereupon your limbs melt, eyes widen and you have a moment. But good. He also ordered the White Asparagus and Marinated Leeks ($19) which was also wonderful and I could very much taste the Spring season. I couldn't resist the special crispy soft shell crabs, which are being served everywhere for the next week or two (in season). And he ordered the Casco Bay Codfish, one of Chef Brown's signature dishes. It tasted refined, perfectly measured and above all a real-crowd pleaser. A totally inoffensive dish at the height of its perfection. For desserts, the Greek Yogurt Cheesecake, with berries, was fantastic.

My final verdict: do as Bruni, and sit at the bar to eat. The food is excellent, but the dining room might suffocate you.

Were: 45 West 81st Street, New York, NY, 212-873-8181

Maccu or Fava Bean Puree

What says recession more than dried beans? Exactly. In the spirit of economizing, I decided to venture more deeply into the dried legume department. Fava had come across my radar recently and so I bought a 10 oz. bag for about $4 at Whole Foods. I used this recipe from Cucina de Calabria by Mary Anabile Palmer as my guideline, but I made several major mistakes: I shelled the beans after cooking, not before, which was messy; I also sautéed the onion in olive oil and added to the cooked, shelled beans. I used sea salt with rosemary, and added a little water while pureeing. However, the result is delicious.

Crostini (or crackers)
10 ounces dried fava beans
1/2 small onion
2 tablespoons pecorino or Parmesean cheese
1 tablespoon olive oil (I used more like 3-4 tbsp.)
1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds
freshly ground pepper and sea salt

Soak the beans overnight. Drain and slip off the outer skins.

Put the beans and onion in a medium saucepan. Cover with cold water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and cook for 3 1/2 hours to 4 hours or until beans are soft. Put in a food processor and pulse until beans are completely pureed. Add cheese, olive oil, fennel seeds and pepper. Mix well and serve on crostini.

Blue Hill v. Allen & Delancey

A&D has all the pretensions of the LES neighborhood it resides in. It tries to fly under the radar with a windowless, dimly lit interior of rustic details (read: rickety uncomfortable chairs) while still sweeping its Brit-styled snobbery all around. To wit, the beautiful yet dumb wait staff is not yet sure who to fawn over and how to do it. The food is a culinary fashion victim in the current taste for super-foodie things: fois gras with abandon (and not just a little, the whole goose it seems); tasteless sea scallops the size of albino hockey pucks and massive slice of fatty, chunky rabbit terrine served with a wee slice of toast. These appetizers were very large, which justified their exorbitant prices at least (but then were too big to leave sufficient room for the expensive entrée coming next). The main plates were quite small in contrast, which was baffling. They came and went without much anything remarkable (a bad thing, when you're paying $35 plus.) In short the meal was completely and utterly blah, veering towards bad.

In stark contrast is Blue Hill. On Monday night the West Village organic-seasonal resto was hopping. Tables were filled with a wide variety of people: older academics, a mother-and-son discussing a recently departed husband, a pair of pretty young German professionals and some rock-and-roll types squirreled into the back corner. We started with the fennel soup served with sweet Maine crab chunks and candied lemon ($10) and followed with fresh poached farm egg served over wild mushrooms and herb broth ($14). Freshness and delicacy reigns here; even hands in the kitchen render the dishes simple and succulent. My entrée of grilled hamachi with crispy green cabbage and mustard ($34) was fantastic; the fish was unbelievably fresh; it was delicately creamy and matched thrillingly with the surrounding mustard and mussel juice. Steamed cheesecake for dessert and wild mint tea completed the experience. Service was attentive and smiling, and it was all-in-all a class act at a top restaurant.

Here's the bottom line: Blue Hill is the real deal and A&D is a gauche knockoff.

Where: Allen & Delancey, 115 Allen Street, 212.253.5400
Blue Hill, 75 Washington Place, 212-539-1776