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| Week
of March 4, 2002 |
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new
menu
 You'll
Eat Brunch in This Town Again
Prune's phenomenal
new weekend brunch is capable of undoing any residual
damage that Kitchen Confidential's notorious chapter on
that disparaged meal may have inflicted upon you. It's
worth the trip just to read chef-owner Gabrielle Hamilton's
truly inspired menu. After you've chosen from nine variations
on the Bloody Mary theme (the "Chicago Matchbox" contains
homemade lemon vodka, a skewerful of pickled vegetables
and caperberries, and comes with a beer chaser) or "Prune
juice," a fresh-squeezed blend of Meyer lemon, orange,
lime, and grapefruit, you've got an embarrassment of beyond-eggs-Benedict
dishes to contend with: a marvelously peppery spaghetti
carbonara. A killer Monte Cristo with a side of fried
eggs and red-currant jelly. Grilled lamb sausages with
Malpeque oysters. And a braised-beef-tongue-and-gremolata
omelette. Plus plates that pay tribute to neighborhood
institutions, like Joe's Dairy and Russ & Daughters. It's
a sunny side of Prune we've never seen before, with light
streaming through the French doors, no reservations, and
no smoking.
Prune
54 East 1st Street
212-677-6221
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best of the week
The Grand
Central Oyster Bar & Restaurant
The shad are in — those sweet-fleshed
fish with rich roe, once a Hudson Valley staple every
spring, now a rare treat. The Oyster Bar is featuring
four shad and shad-roe specials in the coming weeks,
including sautéed Carolina shad fillet with roasted-garlic
crust.
Grand
Central Oyster Bar
42nd St. and Vanderbilt Ave.
212 490-6650
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in print
 The
Cheese Plate
In the old dairy
days, Kraft and Laughing Cow ruled the supermarket cheese
shelf, and "Parmesan" came in a canister. Now, with the
burgeoning appetite for handcrafted farmhouse cheeses,
we need an expert to guide us through the stinky spectrum
of spoiled milk. Who better than Max McCalman, maître
fromager at Picholine
and Artisanal and
outspoken raw-milk advocate? In The Cheese Plate
(Clarkson Potter; $32.50), McCalman reveals how to buy
("If a taste isn't offered, ask for one. If it's refused,
leave"), store (when too cold, cheeses are "not dead,
they're not ruined, but they're not 100 percent happy"),
and taste ("We are a culture that is out of touch with
its nose!"). Most helpfully, he assembles plates for every
season, wine, and meal, including breakfast. And to dispel
the notion that his is a life of glamour and gluttony,
he guides us through a typical day, from "reading about
cheeses as I ride the subway" to his nightly "six hours
of unbroken cheese service."
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Ask Gael
How far is too far?
By train
and by Volvo, my intrepid pals and I converge on Rego
Park to sample the cooking of the Bukharan-Central Asian
Jews clustered in Queens. Alas, Da Mikelle II, recommended
over the phone by a Bukharan bakery, turns out to be — excuse
me? — an Italian restaurant. "Don't go," the hostess pleads.
"The owner will come to cook kebabs for you." But in broken
English on the cell, a voice concedes that it's not too
late for kebabs at King David. We arrive to find
a noisy congregation celebrating with speeches, song,
and crooning guitar at one huge vibrant table. We order
from the lone and abused English menu, pointing for the
bewildered waitress while one of our wanderlustful pals
fills us in on the culture, from youthful treks to Uzbekistan
and Afghanistan. "All the salads will be the same," he
warns. And so they are. Tomatoes, more or less. And iceberg.
The eggplant never comes. But there is wine. Red or white.
Don't ask. The cook clearly favors the rambunctious locals.
But finally, platters arrive — lamb and beef and wonderful
lulu (ground-beef) kebabs. We've been warned it will be
a 45-minute wait for manti (pictured), the meat dumplings
we're craving. We wait, but none come. And no apologies:
Manti is for the weekends, explains a young man sensing
our frustration. "I'll come with you next time," he promises,
taking our card. So far, not a word.
King David
101-10 Queens Boulevard, Forest
Hills
718-896-7686
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Bites & Buzz Archive
Week of February
25
Breakfast cooking classes for kids; Montparnasse's dazzling duo; Gael
gets an eyeful at Mexico Magico
Week of February
18
The lowly radish gets a makeover; Two Little Red Hens take Manhattan;
a breadmaker's best friend; Gael racks 'em up at Slate
Week of February
11
Hadom scores; Rockefeller Center gets a Pulse; Mardi Gras at Café Boulud;
NoLIta's sweetest couple; Chef Tom Valenti's cookbook; Gael discovers
a new talent in Yorkville
and
more ...
Photos: From top to bottom- Carina Salvi (2); Dasha
Wright Ewing
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