Appetitte for Deconstruction in New York

Note: Since my last post nearly 5 months ago I have been lucky enough to touch 3 continents, the rooftop of Africa, the Pacific cost in Los Angeles, the Atlantic coast in Rhode Island, and, last but certainly not least, the corner of Broadway and 114th St. in New York. I'm sorry to say that I did not finish writing my tale of Peruvian Proportions, nor about speeding across the Serengeti Planes or reaching Uhru Peak, 6,895 meters away from terra firma. This blog, though it still holds the same web address, is no longer just about Julie in Peru, but about about my culinary exploits in New York and where ever else I can get my hands on food. Hopefully it will end up being about other things too, but first and foremost I'm hoping to find out just what kind of gastronomic exploits this city holds for me. That said, I've whetted my appetite and it is, as always, up for deconstruction.

Thanks for reading!

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It has been nearly 4 ½ years since the City Council approved the plan that paved the blue and yellow brick road for Ikea’s entrance. About 5 years before that a Fairway Market sprung up, gracing the shores of the rogue part of Brooklyn with a historically checkered past. And only about 10 years before "The Market Like No Other" appeared, Life Magazine named Red Hook one of the 10 worst neighborhoods in the U.S., calling it “the crack capital” of the country. Basically in the past 20 years we have seen Red Hook grow up from a violent teenager with explosive anger issues to a 30-something businessman with 2 kids and a Subaru.

As a diverse neighborhood—which has housed one of the city’s initial Puerto Rican communities, vibrant Italian and Irish populations and many of the city’s first longshoremen—Red Hook has long been home to lots of diverse eateries. And the tradition still stands, as Mexican, Ecuadorian and one ceviche, food trucks flock to the Red Hood Ball Fields on Saturdays and Sundays, waiting for the throngs of people who have heard about it.

And, living up to their hype, each weekend these alternating quilted-silver and white trucks line up like soldiers, armed with piles of tortillas and mountains of fresh mango and pineapple. They adorn their trucks with war paint: strings of blue and white and yellow flags denoting the Ecuadorian pupusa vendors, red and green and white paper cutouts flapping haphazardly in the breeze to signify tacos and pico de gallo. These trucks are by no means a new attraction; on the contrary, at least one of the Ecuadorian trucks touts that to have been in business since 1991. The ballpark seems well prepared for the onslaught of people, too. There are tables set up and even a small kiosk selling blow up carnival toys like big hammers and neon green dogs on a wooden dowel that you can pretend to walk.

Since the trucks are so popular the lines are very long: it’s best to go to the taco truck with the shortest line—on Saturday that was Mama Mexico’s Taco Truck—and get a pork al pastor taco for your wait in line for either a pupsa or ceviche. I ordered a chicken taco, and thankfully my generous friends, who had more foresight than I, gave me bites of their carne and al pastor tacos. I think I’ve finally learned my lesson about chicken tacos, which is that they’re usually not that good. Often made of dark meat, which is fattier and therefore richer, the flavor of the marinade doesn’t seem to come across as much in a chicken taco than in other kinds. In this particular one, there was too much filling inside (I couldn’t close the tortilla, and there were actually 2 of them, one to act as a sort of retaining wall for the other), and the chicken tasted greasy and bland. Of course, as with many tacos, the flavor has as much to do with the salsas that adorn it than with the meat itself. The pickled jalapeños and carrots tasted tart with a sharp acid kick at the end, the pico de gallo was spicy but textured, and the salsa roja had a complex enough flavor that added a whole lot of heat without dulling your mouth. Still, the quality and taste of the meat didn’t do justice to its accompaniments.

The pork al pastor, was a completely different story. Served in a thick brown sauce that was sweet as it was savory, these tacos were a much better indication of why the carts are so popular. First of all there was not as much meat in the shell which allowed for easier eating. Second, the cooking technique—it looked and tasted like it was braised, although I’m not sure—allowed for the sauce to bring out and compliment the natural flavor and texture of the meat. Topped with lettuce, onions, cilantro and a bit of salsa roja, the flavors of this taco worked much better together.

While the 20 minute wait for pupsas would have been worth it even without the tacos, it certainly made the time pass more quickly. A pupsa is something like an Ecuadorian stuffed pancake: it is made of two corn tortillas, joined around their edges and filled in the middle with things ranging from cheese and jalapeños to pork to chicken, and grilled. The dough outside is a bit thicker than a regular corn tortilla and has a touch of sweetness. The first one I tried, queso and jalapeños, converted me. The cheese tasted like jack cheese, mild and creamy, while the jalapeños cut through it sharply. And the shell, with a consistency that lies somewhere between a corn tortilla and corn bread, got a crispy outside and theoretically should have melt the cheese inside, like a gooey grilled cheese pocket. In actuality the cheese wasn’t melted as much as it could have been, but I credit that more to the amount of cheese that was stuffed inside, that was for all intents and purposes way too much, than to the actual preparation. The second pupusa I had was filled with stewed chicken. I liked the second better because I thought that there was a bit too much cheese in the first, and because the chicken had a nice tanginess and gave marked contrast to the bland chicken I’d had in the taco.

Everyone and their foodie-mother has written about the Red Hook Ball Field Street Vendors, so if you haven’t gone I would highly recommend it, even if only to watch the soldierly procession of trucks competing with one another. And, at the very least, this eclectic mix of vibrant food vendors is surely a better alternative to Swedish Meatballs.
To get to the Red Hook Ball Field Street Vendors, take the 2 or 3 train to Wall Street and walk east to Pier 11, where the Ikea Water Taxi leaves from. (It is free on weekends, and costs $5 during the week). Once you get off the taxi in Brooklyn, walk across the parking lot to Halleck St. Make a left on Halleck St. and walk 2 blocks until Bay St. Go left on Bay st., and continue 4 blocks to the intersection of Clinton and Bay Streets. The vendors are there on the weekends, beginning around 10 o'clock.

Make pickled jalapeños, not war.

And now, to bed.