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Dlh Nw Yok ood. edible manhattan Telling the Story ofHow Gotham Eats
No.10 March/April 2010
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RUSS & DAUGHTERS’KEYSTO LOX MARCUSSAMUELSSON’S MELTINGPOT MUSE OCTOGENARIANORACLE JOAN GUSSOW
C e l l e eb b r r a a t ti i n n g t h g t he B e B o or r o o u u g h h’ ’ s F s F o oo o d d C u ul l t tu u r r e e, S e e a a s so o n n b y S e e a as s o on n N o. 1 6 o 6
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edible east end Cele Ce lebr brat atin ingg the the Har arve vest st of th thee Ham Hampt pton onss an and d Nor orth th For orkk
No. 33 Wi Wint nter er 20 2012 12
FOOD PANTRY FARMS MICROGREENS WINTER CLAMMING MARY’S MARVELOUS MALI B SWEETS PINOT BLANC BEER PROJECT
Member of Edible Communities
THE BIG CHEESE
The
THURSDAYS THURSDA YS 9:30 PM ES EST T ON COOKING CHANNEL
CHEESE For more information on Jason please visit:
jasonthebigcheese.com
CONTENTS 6
NOTABLE EDIBLES
36
Red-Stained Hands Club Green Thumb for Hire Food Politics 18
Love Lane Market Culling the Herd Farm-to-Foodd Pantry Farm-to-Foo
PLANT A ROW FOR THE HUNGRY At EECO Farm, a plot is dedicated to supplying South Fork food pantries. 40
FARMGIRL ANGST
BEHIND THE BOTTLE
LIEB 2010 PINOT BLANC An homage to Alsace for winter stews, oyster pan roasts and East End chowders. 23
24
28
35
57
HAPPENINGS
A COUPLE WEDS IN WATER MILL International fare for a pioneering state ceremony. 70
HEIRLOOMS
CHEESE LADDERS, FIRKINS, BABY CAGES AND OTHER COOKING C URIOSITIE URIOSITIES S Why should historical societies look in their pantries? 75
VISUAL VICTUALS
COLDSEASON CLAMMING There are hearty harvesters behind your winter chowder.
PAIRINGS
COCOAVINO A chocolate sommelier goes head-to-head with Long Island wine.
CULT OF TASTE
FATHER AND MOTHER NATUR E FATHER Joe and Alexandra Macari and their bottles brimming with biodiversity.
BOOKS
FREEDOM TO COOK A diabetic chef relies on flavor and texture, not carbs and calories. 31
52
EDIBLE ENTR EPRENEUR
LITTLE GREENS, BIG FLAVOR Elfin carrot tops, micro mustard and radish sprouts emerge from an Amagansett Amagan sett greenhouse.
IN THE KITCHEN WITH
APRIL GORNIK AND ERIC FISCHL Two painters thrive on eggs, homemade bread and ambitious dinner parties.
ARTISANS
NOT YOUR ORDINARY SWEETS A North Fork cake baker, a South Fork weaver, and their confectionary creations. 26
46
A WINEMAK ER’S WOND WONDERINGS ERINGS
THE 2011 VINTAGE Three vineyard tenders describe one of the strangest seasons in memory.
BACK OF THE HOUSE
MA RY’S M ARVEL ARVELOU OUS S This cozy Main Street spot is crammed full of all-day, from-scratch nourishment.
THE BLIGHT CHRONICLES, PART I 21
ON GOOD LAND
88
AFTERTASTE
THE APPLE PUSHERS
SOCIAL SUDS
STRONG RY ELAND STRONG The region’s first collaborative beer delivers a taste from both forks. 2
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WINTE R 2012
COVER AND THIS PAGE
Mali B Sweets, Greenport. By Randee Daddona
For the past four years, brewmaster Garrett Oliver has been working on a massive project. It’s the ultimate beer collaboration, but it’s not a beer. Published this September by Oxford University Press, it’s The Oxford Companion to Beer , the most comprehensive book on beer
ever published, featuring 160 experts covering more than 1,100 subjects. It’s a momentous thing, so Garrett (Editor-in-Chief), Horst Dornbusch Dornb usch (Associate Editor, writer, writer, scholar, man-about-town) and Thomas Kraus-Weyermann Kraus-Weyermann (writer and master maltster) hatched a plan. Together,, they brewed our next Brewmaster’s Together Reserve beer, called The Companion. Thomas created special new floor malts for The Companion, which is brewed in an old style called “wheat wine”, a wheat-based equivalent to barley wine. The floor malts give this beer a juicy malt character of considerable depth, 55% malted wheat gives it a surprising lightness on the palate, while our house ale yeast lends a gentle fruitiness. The Oxford Companion to Beer will impart knowledge, while The Companion imparts conviviality. Maybe you really can have it all?
GRIST FOR THE MILL A few months ago, Eileen Roaman, a Springs resident who raises bees and chickens and keeps a home garden, had a seasonal epiphany. Te number of families visiting local food pantries swells in winter, just as many nearby farmers have lost their main roadside customers. So, working with the Amagansett Food Institute, Roaman quickly raised $15,000 in small and large donations, bought crops from a group of local farmers and delivered it to local pantries. “It’s “It’s tightening the circle, circle,”” Roaman said of the harmonious transaction. Pantry visitors got a wider selection of fresh produce; farmers got new customers. In fact, there were similar motivations behind the Food Pantry Farm, a three-acre section and two hoop houses at EECO Farm in East Hampton, whose entire harvest is committed to local food pantries. Started three years ago, the farm makes weekly deliveries to five local pantries—upward of 16 tons a year that includes farm-stand standards like tomatoes and corn, as well as the hot peppers, collard greens and other ingredients pantry patrons are cooking with. apping into unused resources—and unsuspecting generosity—was also the goal of Southold town officials who added a refrigerated cooler to make it ea sier for hunters to drop off excess meat, a nd for people in need to pick it up. up. If the New Year is a good time for remembering to give back to our community, it’s it’s also the right season sea son to dote on our loved ones. Consider the new crop of cupcake bakers, cake sculptors and sweets makers in our midst. Former Nassau County mayor, mayor, and new cocoa convert, Roxanne Browning has been sta ging sold-out chocolate and wine tastings on the North Fork. Meanwhile, Miche Bacher’s Greenport Greenport sweets shop has been reinvented as Mali B Sweets, with the addition of fellow baker Nanao A nton. Te two won “Best Cake in the Nation” honors from Brides magazine, are rolling out a chocolate bar with local potato chips, and offer patrons their latest experimental cake filling in the form of ever-changing little bonbons called “winks.” Mary’s Marvelous at the end of Main Street in Amagansett is a standby for locals seeking such ingenious forms of nourishment as eggs Colombian, bone-warming soups, and a boutique of edible gifts, from granola to Mary Os. (Tis time of year, Mary’s is also the last, reliable food option for eastbound lig hthouse roadtrippers.) In the spirit of this Holiday issue, we’ve decorated the page borders with our local gift picks—from cheesemonger baskets to a Montauk-bo Montauk-born rn dog food, to starter sta rter kits for the t he aspiring oyster grower in your life. So whether you donate to a food pantry, invest in a CSA or just buy a cake from down the street, there are plenty of sweet opportunities to enjoy and support all that’s around.
Tere is plenty of produce available just a few miles from the pantries that serve our hungry and a nd poor neighbors. neighbors.
Brian Halweil Editor
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EDIOR Brian Halweil PUBLISHER Stephen Munshin DEPUY EDIOR Eileen M. Duffy DESIGNER Bambi Edlund PHOO EDIOR Lindsay Morris COPY EDIOR Carrington Morris CONRIBUORS Randee Daddona Marilee Foster Chris Gangemi Gwendolen Gwendol en Groocock Courtney MacGinley Geraldine Pluenneke Kelly Smith James Christopher racy Amy Zavatto CONAC US PO Box 779 Sag Harbor, NY 11963 631.537.4637, [email protected] ADVERISING North Fork: Mary Morgan, [email protected], 63 631.323 1.323.2320 .2320 Jack Oxee, [email protected], 631.298.7025 South Fork: [email protected], 631.537.4637 LEERS o write to the editor, use the address above or, for the quickest response, e-mail us: [email protected]. Edible East End is published five times a year.
Subscription rate is $35 annually. annually. Call the number above to inquire about advertising rates, deadlines or subscription information, information, or e-mail us at [email protected]. No part of this publication may be used without written permission by the publisher publisher.. © 2011–2012. Every effort is made to avoid errors, misspellings and omissions. If, however, an error comes to your attention, please accept our sincere apologies and notify us. Tank you.
NOTABLE EDIBLES BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
REDSTAINED HA NDS CLUB CLUB
It’s chilly, but no one seems to mind. Tere’s lentil soup in the Crock-Pot Crock-P ot (for the vegetarians), vegetar ians), as well as a s some delicious pulled pork and a shared fascination about how one turns grapes into wine. On a Saturday morning in November, members of the Bella Vita Vine to Wine program were happy to be standing wrapped in scarves and down vests in a cement-floored barn watching Anthony Sannino (shown at right and below) punch down the cap on a fermenting container of cabernet sauvignon. Te small room lined with tanks built to hold the juice that would make one barrel—or 23 cases—of wine smells like, well, a winery, because it is one, but that’s a simplification. It smells like conversion, which is, in a sense, rotting and renewal, sweetness and energy and funk (and fruit-fly bait). Winemaking is elemental and attractive. Te Sanninos, Lisa and Anthony, bought their vineyard from Harold Watts of ernhaven Cellars—one of the North Fork’s first wave of vineyard owners—in 2006, 5.25 acres of cabernet and merlot planted in 1989. Te idea was to sell the grapes and build a bed-andbreakfast in the middle of the vines. Both goals were accomplished. But the desire to make wine, instilled in Anthony from his family roots in Ischia, an island off the coast of Naples, kept kept tugging at them. How to start up their own winemaking business while acknowledging the significant investment in equipment? Vine to Wine was born. In 2007 the t he couple promoted promoted the idea that anyone could make wine, proposing that members contribute $4,500 up front for a year of the winemaking experience and the guarantee of going home with the equivalent of one barrel of wine. Enough people signed on, shown nothing but an empty room,
and paid in advance, adva nce, allowing the t he couple to buy all the equipment they needed. Kind of like a wine CSA. oday, the Sanninos average about 20 members per vintage, with membership including couples and up to eight individuals. Te members start with harvest, on Columbus Day weekend, when there is usually something ripe—whether it be white or red grapes—depending on the growing season. Te weekend is like a party. Te children come, and pumpkins are all around. Once t he grapes are picked, the members come back periodically to watch, and help, as the grapes make their progress to the bottle. Tere’s crushing and racking and stabilizing and blending and bottling. Te members are involved in the decision making, and all go home with the same wine: a little bit of white, a little bit of rosé and a little bit of red, which comes out to about $16 per bottle. Te experience and the wine are enough to keep people coming back. John A rini of Setauket has joined his wife, erry, erry, for her second year. She was a home winemaker, and now he’s an accomplice, asking questions about fermentation time and winemaker intent. After tasting the mid-fermentation cabernet, erry says it was like when you’re baking a cake and eat the dough before you bake it. What’s more elemental than that? sanninovineyard.com
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WINE, DINE & VINEYARD VIEWS
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|NOTABLE EDIBLES GREEN THUMB FOR HIRE
a n o d d a D e e d n a R : s h p a r g o t o h P
Not many fathers refer to their chi ldren as free-range chickens, ch ickens, but for Renato Stanford of Southold, the description is apt. Tat’s because his yard is where the bulk of his family’s food comes from. Tis former effi ciency expert exper t with a career c areer at Dupont beh ind him expeexpe rienced a life-changing event 10 years ago when he was in a car accident that took his wife’s life. Since then he has been dedicated to growing his own food, going to the supermarket as little as possible and taking advantage of what he says comes naturally to him: making things grow. o do so, he built a hoop house in his yard to be able to provide his family with fresh produce year round. He relies on local honey for sweetener and spends days canning and preserving when his outdoor garden gives up its bounty at the end of the summer growing season. Tis fall, he says, he put away 200 jars of tomatoes and 75 jars of dill pickles. Tis was after he and his family ate all the cucumbers they could handle. “I was borderline sick of them,” he says, “but now I miss them. t hem.”” His hoop house is essentially a dugout; one enters by going three steps down so the beds are waist high. Tis helps to preserve the heat, which is all captured solar energy. He uses no chemical fertilizer and no pesticides. He’s thinking about adding chickens and he says his son’s favorite food is arugula. When this th is kind of thing works out for someone, someone, it’s it’s hard not to be an evangelist. Tis summer Stanford Stan ford set up a booth at the Westhampton Beach Farmers Market offering to build personalized hoop houses, so everyone could have fresh greens year round. Te display caught the eye of Bill and Susan Groner of Bedford, New York. “Tere was a brilliant idea right in our face,” says Bill. “We “ We just couldn’t couldn’t resist.” Te couple had never even had a garden before, but was taken by the t he idea and, of course, Stanford’s contagious enthusiasm. (Once Stanford starts talking, it’s hard not to imagine your own little year-round garden just outside the back door.) “He’s amazing,” says Bill. “You have to cherish people with positive energy like Renato.” Stanford credits his Italian upbringing with instilling in him the desire to grow, to grow anything, anything , anywhere. He remembers his Great Uncle Uncle Sebastian putting him hi m in his garden as a child and letting him dig and plant. Tis led to finding a space, any space, to plant tomatoes. Te hunt for space continues. So far, Stanford had helped Southold Schools plant their community garden and is working on a project with the Concourse House in the Bronx, a shelter for homeless families. He sees limitless possibilities to help anyone take advantage of the land, sun and water readily at our disposa l. “I know how to do this,” he says. “I don’t don’t even know how I know.”
HOLIDAY PARTY FIXINS. Coffee & Cake.
Late a fternoon pick-me-ups—or pick-me-ups—or morning get-me-goings— Butta’ Cakes in Greenport and Hamptons Coffee Company make for good gift certificate ideas. Butta’, buttacakes.com, will put together holiday platters, and HCC, ha mpton mptoncoffee.com, coffee.com, will supply an urn for a crowd.
edibleeastend.com
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|NOTABLE EDIB EDIBLES LES
FOOD POLITICS
Despite widespread budget tightening across t he nation, decisionmakers in New York are banking that there’s money in matters related to food. Both the Suffolk Suff olk County Legislature Le gislature and a nd officials up in Albany are joining Long Island farmers and local nonprofits to make major infrastructure investments to extend the local growing season and expand the sales of all things grown on Long Island. State Senator Ken LaValle supported a $3.5 million grant, and the town of Riverhead donated 50 acres, to build the 8,300-squarefoot Agriculture Consumer Science Center at the Enterprise Park in Calverton (known as EPCAL). Te space, which could be finished as early as next summer, will have the equipment to help farmers— as well as aspiring food artisans—develop and process products made from local ingredients with the help of researchers and scientists from f rom Stony Brook University, University, Brookhaven National Laboratory and the NYS Small Business Development Center. (Finally, a place to deal with the surfeit of tomatoes in September and October.) On the heels of this groundbreaking, a coalition that includes both Nassau and Suffolk counties, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County, Long Island Farm Bureau, Peconic Land rust, Susta inable Long Island, Long Isla nd Wine Council, North Shore Land Alliance and Stony Brook Incubator for Agriculture
and Consumer Science has developed a proposal they’ve sent to Empire State Development asking for an initial $5 million for their Comprehensive Program for Sustainable Agriculture on Long Island. Te brainchild brainch ild of farmer Paulette Satur, the proposal includes 1,000 1,000 acres of land at EPCA L to rent for small-sca small-sca le agriculture, a mobile slaughterhouse for the region’s growing number of farmers keeping poultry and livestock, a mobile farmers market to reach underserved communities, a 100,000-square-foot refrigerated food-distribution hub, and training programs for aspiring farmers—partt of a program they’re calling “Farms for the Future.” farmers—par Future.” All told, the goal is to turn “Grown on Long Island” into a brand people will reach for like cheese from Roquefort or tomatoes from San Marzano. In a related effort, Suffolk County Legislator Vivian Viloria-Fisher has started sta rted a Food Policy Council for the county, for which public hearings started this fall. Te goals of the council include ensuring school and county institutions give preference to buying local, increasing access to healthy food, reducing pesticide use, and boosting use of locally grown ingredients at existing food-processing facilities in the county. Like similar food policy councils that have sprouted in cities and states around the country, the body will bring together farmers, fa rmers, food companies and the t he public to guide long-term food-related planning.
LUBRICATE YOUR FURNITURE SHOPP SHOPPING ING.. Vine and A ntiques Sherwood House Vineyards’ tasting house at 1291 Main Road in Jamesport shares space with Material Objects, an antique shop run by a collector/builder collector/builder.. aste some wine, move into the store a nd find a country countr y antique. 10
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|NOTABLE EDIBLES
LOVE LO VE LANE MA RKET
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At Michael and Patti Avella’s Avella’s new European-style European-st yle market in Mattituck, the yellow-pine floor is recycled from a farm in Connecticut, the tin ceiling is stamped from original dyes and the window frames are reclaimed from a 1920’s industrial building. Mike and Patti dreamed of a food emporium for years, and so when Michael Bourguigon, owner of the Mattituck Village Market, decided to sell his business last year, it didn’t take them long to make a decision. Tey closed on the circa-1 circ a-1928 928 property in November 2010, renovated with the help of architect Chris Smith (who designed Nobu and Dylan Prime in New York), and officially opened this t his past pas t October. CIA-trained chef and butcher John Nordin, who has worked for both om Colicchio and odd English, further bolsters the team. Mike’s goal is to create a welcoming place for “adventurous “adventurous home cooks.” o o that end, local and seasonal items sit alongside high-quality imported artisanal products—olive oil, vinegar, soy sauce, ghee, dried porcini mushrooms, salt-packed capers and anchovies, and salami, lardo and pancetta from Salumeria Biellese in Manhattan. Tere are pizzas cooking in a wood-burning oven; sushi prepared every morning by a Japanese chef, homemade sausages, soups and sandwiches. Next spring, they are planning to add a
donut machine and a Japanese noodle station. Te demand has been greater than the supply of grassfed beef from nearby McCall’s Ranch and Vineyard’s herd of Charolais cattle. Mike (shown above) says he is “unable to keep up with it,” and will be adding beef from a grassfed Hereford herd in Rhode Island to supplement. Another strong seller is the Crescent Farms duck. In the style of a European open-air market—Mike lived in Italy for many years—the ducks are steamed for half an hour before being turned on a rotisserie over baskets of herb-and-garlictossed potatoes that soak up the luscious drippings. D’Artagnan free-range chickens are on the grill, too. On a lovely fall Saturday afternoon, my husband and I stopped in for duck, potatoes and roasted garlic. We added some fresh greens from a local farm stand for a quick salad, opened a bottle of ros from Croteaux vineyards and had one of the best dinners of early autumn. (Note: Call ahead for beef to avoid disappointment. Not only is supply limited, reservations determine the way beef is cut.) —Susan Yager lovelanemarket.com
BOOK AND A BEER. Suds Stocking Stuffer. Garrett Oliver, brewmaster of the Brooklyn Brewery, edited the formidable, informative and entertaining Oxford Companion to Beer , available in a boxed set with a limited-edition, old-style wheat beer that’s perfect for sipping while reading. brooklynbrewery.com edibleeastend.com
13
|NOTABLE EDIBLES
CULLING THE HERD
Whether you think of them as Bambi or as car-wrecking, shrub-eating nuisances, the fact is there are too many deer on the East End of Long Island. And from October 1 through January 31, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation declares hunting season. (Te rules for Suffolk County allow bowhunting for the entire season; shotguns are allowed in January but only with a special permit and on weekdays.) Ethic al hunters, hunters , as DEC offi o fficer, hunter and Greenpor t resident om Gadomski puts it, however, do not kill deer for sport. In fact they do not use the term “kill”; they prefer “harvest” because whatever deer they take they make sure does not go to waste. Te town of Southold recognized this dilemma, says Jeff Standish, the deputy director of the department of public works, and last year rented a refrigerated truck and put it behind the community center on Peconic Lane. Te idea was to have a place where hunters could drop off harvested deer they could not use themselves. Te deer, under the auspices of the New York– based Venison Donation Donation Coalition, are t hen transported to a butcher who breaks down t he animals and donates the meat to soup kitchens. Te coalition has been active since 1999 1999 and has processed nearly 340 tons of venison since that time. In the case of Southold, last las t year the town collected 162 deer. deer. Over the winter, Standish says the town bought a used refrigerated box, overhauled it, and now have a permanent drop-off site. Most of the harvested deer go to Fish and Wildlife Unlimited axidermy in Oakdale for butchering, but residents, who can fill out a form, take some of it. Standish says one woman, who has a dog with food allergies that can only eat venison, paid to have one butchered to use for dog food. Te drop-off also accepts roadkill, and Gadomski has donated deer illegally taken by hunters without the DEC-approved tags that indicate a valid hunting license. Normally, says Gadomski, he would harvest maybe t hree deer per year, one for for himself and a nd others for friends, which he butchers himself. But now that he knows the meat will go to good use, he will harvest up to seven per year. Some of the take are a re big does or bucks, but Gadomski says he is seeing an increasing number of smaller deer. “Tey’re not eating a s well.” 14
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Recipe from the New York Conservati Conse rvation on Officer’s Cookbook Cookb ook LORI’S PAPRIKA VENISON 1 c. sliced onion 1 clove minced garlic ¾ c. ketchup 1 . Worcestershire 1 . brown sugar Salt 2 t. paprika ½ t. dry mustard ¾ c. water ¾ c. white wine 2 lbs. venison (scraps work well) Sauté venison, onions and garlic until venison is brown. In bowl, stir until smooth: ketchup, Worcestershire, sugar, salt, paprika, mustard, water and wine. Add to venison. Cover and simmer until meat is cooked. Add flour to thicken if desired. Serve over egg noodles. From Colonel D. W. Brewer, Central Office, Albany. (Officer Gadomski marked this as “very good ” in his copy.) copy.)
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|NOTABLE EDIB EDIBLES LES FAR M MTOFOOD TOFOOD PANTRY
Tree food pantries on the South Fork, East Hampton, Springs and Amagansett regularly feed hundreds of families, and during the winter that number can soar close to 1,000. Tere are also farmers whose venues to sell their wares diminish in the winter as the crowds that frequent farm stands have left for the season. o Springs resident Eileen Roaman a li nk was obvious: organize a way to have farmers sell their produce to the pantries through donations expressly for that purpose. “Tat way, the money would stay in the community,”” she says, “the families would have fresh nutrimunity, tious food and the farmers would have customers. It’s tightening the circle.” Roaman made an initial pledge and then sent out an e-mail asking for donations; soon the total was $15,000. $15,000. Enter Amanda Merrow and Katie Baldwin of Amber Waves Farm in Amagansett, a nonprofit that has as part of its mission to help feed the community. Under their 501(c)3 status, that money was now 100 percent tax-deductible and 100 percent going directly toward the purchase of food. All of the food is grown by farms in East Hampton and Southampton, including Amber Waves, Balsam Farms, Quail Hil l Farm, the Milk Pail and Sunset Beach Farm. In the first t wo weeks, the Farm to Food Pantry Program was able to deliver 1,550 pounds of produce. Families pick up boxes of food once per week and now, in addition to staples, they will find apples, butternut squash, eggplant, peppers, potatoes and winter greens. In the past, says Gabrielle Scarpaci, executive executive director of the East Hampton Ha mpton food pantry, which relies on donations, farms have donated produce to feed the 44,000 mouths that came through her door last year. Now the farmers are being compensated for their work and the plan is to keep growing. According to Roaman, a $25 donation will provide a family with fruits and vegetables for two weeks; $100 will cover two months and $300 will underwrite a family’s share for the six-month fall and winter season. Baldwin and Merrow have set a fundraising goal of $75,000.
n i h s n u M n e h p e t S : h p a r g o t Donations can be made to the Farm to Food Pantry Program, o h c/o Amber Waves Farm, PO Box 2623, Amagansett, Amaganse tt, NY N Y 11930. 11930. P
INHALE, EXHALE. Start Relaxing. Class cards at Yoga Shanti in Sag Harbor help you balance, while balancing your budget. For $180 per month, yogis and yoginis can take an unlimited number of classes with a six-month commitment. yogashanti.com
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FARMG FAR MGIRL IRL ANG A NGST ST
THE BLIGHT CHRONICLES, PART I BY MAR ILEE FOSTER FOSTER
Grumble, grumble, gr umble, shuffl e, spit. Unlike most perusing per using this th is magazine, I am sick of food. I am sick of worrying about it, sick of thinking about it, reading about it, going to lengthy dinners made lengthier by everyone talking about it. Tis is post-mortem time for me, when the season is put to bed, mostly. Tere is not so much picking and fieldwork; instead it is wrap-up and put away and think. In 2009, the Northeast sustained an outbreak of late blight. Tis was the t he first time in my career that I had to farm through such challenging conditions. conditions. In June, the disease dise ase was confirmed to have wiped out a commercial planting on the North Fork and large gardens were gone in Bridgehampton. It was raining again and there was nothing else for us to do but try to allay or confirm our fears. Dean and I decided to drive around Sagg and look at other farmer’s fields. As we neared a field that was rumored to be suspicious, I began to shake. My heart pounded in my ears so hard that I was partially deafened to outside noise. I began to sputter, my voice getting shrill with panic, as I fretted aloud. My brother looked at me, “Now you’ve got to chill out!” he barked. And then sternly, “Christ, it’s only tomatoes.” Ten, less sternly, “Or potatoes.” In 2011 the Northeast was hit by blight again. Tere are some garden pests, viral, bacterial and even animal that a farmer can endure. I believe a little illness can be good for the overall immune system. Phytophthora means plant destroyer. In a place like Sagaponack, with our heavy fogs and morning dews, with our persistent, often damp breeze, a little blight is all you need to start a devastating war of man versus fungi. I like to believe I do all I can do—homegrown plants, monitored for for vigor all spring, are a re staked and trellised. trell ised. I spray. But in the end my success in surviving an outbreak will depend on my neighbors’ success. My neighbors are not only farmers. Empty houses with automatic sprinklers in i n their kitchen gardens and a nd no one monitoring real need, such vectors line almost every field. s i r r Tis year, toward the middle of June, on the eighth day with “no o M y spray” conditions, a neighboring farmer stopped by to tell me he had a s d n blight in his tomatoes. It was a pretty big spot. I told him how sorry i L : h I was to hear this, wished him luck and then, after he’d left, I suc p a r g cumbed to a set of anxiety-sparked dry heaves. It was late in the day, o t o h so I considered not running to the shop and sharing the bad news P
with my brother. Why not let him hi m have one more, decent night’s sleep? But misery needed company. I raise two acres of tomatoes— Dean’s got one one hundred and fifty fift y of potatoes. He’d want wa nt to know. All the employees have gone home, I find him in the machine room— the barn where custom parts are made to save the day—he’s calmly working on something. For the next half hour we talked about management strategy. We We talked about effective fungicides f ungicides and we talked about windows of opportunity; would there ever be one? What if it just keeps raining? We have no machines for fixing weather. What am I going to do? Outside, the drenching sky is turning to night. Dean reaches down under the cluttered desk that doubles as a workbench. He lifts and opens an elegant blue box that holds a gift from last Christmas. Snuggled down on a sapphire pillow is a special edition of some very fine scotch. “We could get in the bottle?” Tis scene between us, drink ing high-end stuff out of Styrofoam cups, might seem sordid or sinful for more than one reason. I know we should have had glasses. But worse, I know of many farms that were lost to alcohol. After a few hard seasons, I more fully understand understa nd the smooth liquor’s persuasive draw. We check to see our cups aren’t melting, and then toast our fortunate lot. 2011 went on to be the wettest year on record. I am often asked what I do in the winter—a fter I’ve finished with cauliflower, cabbage, Brussels sprouts and other fall crops that have their own set of diseases caused by too much rain. Winter is short, really just December. I spend the month writing personal agricultural parodies of Broadway and popular tunes. My sister and I then turn the material into a one-performance, no-rehearsal puppet show. Te song I’ve been singing, in my head from May to November, is usually sung by an optimistic orphan. In my production it will be an emotional farmer consulting Cornell Cooperative C ooperative Extension. Editor’s note: Tis is the first part in an emotional series about blight. une in for the next installment in stallment when we will learn l earn where the local blight bligh t came from, how the Fosters’ tomatoes and potatoes fared and what they are doing to prevent blight next tomato and potato season. Marilee Foster farms and writes in Sagaponack.
DELICIOUS COLLABORATION. Buy Vegetables Now. Community Supported Agriculture programs can s ell out. Contact the following farms, so you can pay upfront and receive fresh produce— or eggs or flowers—all summer long. Garden of Eve, Golden Earthworm, Sang L ee, Green Tumb, Biophilia, Quail Hil l, Sylvestor Sylvestor Manor, and Sunset Beach Farm all have var ying stages of commitment. You’ll Y ou’ll learn to love ka le even more than you thought you already did. List at edibleeastend.com edibleeastend.com.. edibleeastend.com
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BEHIND BE HIND THE BOTTLE BOT TLE
LIEB 2010 PINOT BLANC An homage to Alsace for winter stews, oyster pan roasts and East End chowders. BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
y ff u D . M n e e l i E : h p a r g o t o h P
Tere’s a cert ain plasticity to grape va rieties: Tey become different Tere’s different things in different parts of t he world. Cabernet in California is an ocean and a continent away from cabernet on the left bank of the Garonne River in Bordeaux. Te sauvignon blanc from Marlborough in New Zealand might as well come halfway around the world from the sauvignon blanc grown and produced just south of that cabernet in Bordeaux. (Wait, it is a half a world away.) away.) In a newish region like Long Island, the trick is to honor what the grapes can do here while paying homage to what has been successful in other parts of the world, to get around that anxiety of influence, except in this case one can drink the poetry. Gary Madden of Lieb Family Cellars feels little anxiety about the winery’s new release: the 2010 Pinot Blanc in the style of Alsace, where the grape is one of the region’s four noble varieties. Lieb is the only producer on the East End that bott les a single varieta l pinot blanc; it’s it’s become their signature, and so far they’ve done it in an all-dry style—during fermentation all the sugar in the grape must is turned into CO2 and alcohol—and as a sparkling wine. In the Alsace region of France, low rainfall and south-facing slopes result in reliably ripe grapes. Reliable and ripe are not two words we can u se together on Long Island, but in 2010 everyone could. It was a beautiful growing season and Madden saw the opportunity to make a pinot blanc like one finds in Alsace, higher in alcohol and a bit sweet: not all the sugar is converted into alcohol, a little is left to give the wine a bigger mouthfeel. Tus t he wine goes better with cool weather dishes (not much red is grown in the t he region). region). Lieb makes their wine at Premium Wine Group in Mattituck, where Mark Lieb is a partner with Russell Hearn, who serves as the consulting winemaker for all their wines. Madden is the general manager. Lieb and his wife, Kathy, bought their vineyards in 1992, and up until 1999 sold their grapes to other wineries. In 2000 the first wines were released under their own label. Te 2010 10th Anniversary Pinot Blanc commemorates that. Te wine is sold in a fluted bottle, like the ones found in Alsace, with the added modernity of a screw cap. A pale straw color color,, the wine is bright and clear; it smells like super-ripe pear with ca ndied pineapple pineapple and white pepper. pepper. Te wine is spicy and lively in the mouth with tropical fruits a nd the pleasant heaviness one gets from residual sugar. Te wine, however, has enough acid that it doesn’t directly come across as sweet. It’s balanced. Madden fell in love with the style on a trip through Alsace years ago. A longtime fan and owner of erverun erverun shepherds, named after a fter a town in Belgium, Belg ium, he couldn’t couldn’t complete his trip, which star ted in Paris, without visiting Alsace. “I was a red wine drinker before that,” he says. “It made me reevaluate. It changed my palate.” Unfortunately, due to the short, wet growing season of 2011, Madden doesn’t see a pinot blanc in this st yle coming out next year. But there are 2010s 2010s still at the tasting room in Mattituck. Get them for the winter stews, oyster pan roasts and chowders that are best eaten in front of a fire.
TUROPHILES REJOICE. Local Cheeseboard. Specialty cheeses, local and artisana l, are great for party
favors. Cavaniola’s Gourmet in Sag Harbor, cavaniola.com; Lucy’s Whey in East Hampton, lucyswhey. com; and Village Cheese Shop in Mat tituck, 631.298.85 631.298.8556, 56, all put together platters and gift boxes. edibleeastend.com
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A WINEMAKER’S WONDERINGS
THE 201 2 011 1 VINTAG V INTAGE E Tree vineyard tenders describe one of the strangest seasons in memory. BY JAMES CHRISTOPHER TRACY
Tis was a strange st range and hard vintage; everything about it from beginning to end required an extraordinary amount of effort. More time, more labor, more money was expended growing the grapes and making the wines this year than anyone can remember. In the end more people than not are very very happy happy with what they have in the cellar, and I for one look forward to sharing many delicious, expressive wines that offer immense gratification to the consumer for their inherent quality and to the professionals who know firsthand firstha nd how much work itit took to get there. But that is what we always say, right? Every vintage has something outstanding to offer, and the winemakers are always pronouncing how great the wines will be when they are still in barrel maturing or even earlier when the are still fermenting in tank! So instead of talking with the folks in the cellar, who always seem to have a cheery outlook and who have a way to go before their work is done, I solicited some thoughts from some growers whose work has culminated with harvest. harvest . I want to share t wo points of view. Te first is more measured and academic. Tis is to be expected coming from the astute and invaluable Alice Wise, who runs the viticulture research program at Cornell’s Long Island Horticultural Research and Extension Center (LIHREC). Alice had this to say: Te 2011 2011 season was wa rmer and wetter tha n the long-term averages. Tis afforded growers the luxury of a slightly earlier than normal harvest. Te frequent rains and tropical storm after véraison [the onset of ripening] forced vineyard managers to be vigilant with canopy- and fruit-management practices. Many growers elected to hand harvest, which facilitated more careful sorting of fruit prior to crush. Across the board with all varieties, brix and acids were moderate and balanced, allowing clear expression of varietal flavors. It was gratifying to taste delicious fruit after such a labor-intensive season.
Te other, blunter, dirty-boots-on-the-ground version comes from the uber-talented and awesome grape grower Sam McCullough. Sam is the vineyard manager for Lenz Winery and also grows some of the best and most sought-after grapes at his home farm in Aquebogue. Tis is what Sam shared:
l i e w l a H h a r a S : h p a r g o t o h P
Te 2011 vintage has been the most difficult I can remember short of 1985 when Gloria pretty much wiped out the crop. 2011 was a year marked by lack of sunshine and continual intense fungal pressure from start to finish. I’ve never experienced such difficulty with downy mildew. It just wouldn’t go away. Excessive moisture in August, September and October got a lot of botrytis and sour rot going. All grapes required careful (aka really tedious, slow and expensive) hand harvest. By the time we finished chardonnay I was beginning to think that I knew what the dinosaurs felt like when they got stuck in tar pits. When we started with pinot noir for sparkling and it was messy
at 19 brix, I knew right there that this was going to be a fight to the end. When we finished with cabernet on 11/11, my suspicion was confirmed. Fortunately the wines are good. After this year I need a drink!
Both of these, taken together, paint a realistic picture of the vintage. Sometimes the most telling observations come from outside eyes, and in the midst of harvest Mark L. Chien the viticulture educator at Penn State Cooperative Extension visited the region and wrote a wonderful 17-page 17-page summar y of his visit for his blog. It is a befitting summary to end with his thoughts… We visited in the midst of a difficult vintage, yet the level of optimism and the quality of juice and wine samples we tasted bespoke of a mature industry that understands how to deal with adversity…. Some of the winemakers have almost 30 vintages under their belt and say this is the strangest vintage in memory, not the worst, just odd. I concur. Despite the weirdness, there was little sense of urgency or aggravation on the crush pad or in the vineyard, only a singular determination to do the best they possible can with the fruit that is available. Not that it matters one bit, but a California winemaker would be thoroughly confused by a vintage like this. A low brix, low pH, low acid wine? What’s up with that? I say this only because I believe that these t hese are among the most agile, a gile, creative, talented, patient, persevering and unflappable winemakers in the world.
James Christopher racy is the winemaker and partner at Channin g Daughters Winery in Bridgehampton , as well as a student candidate for the Institute of Masters of Wine. edibleeastend.com
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ARTISANS
NOT YOUR OR DINARY SWEETS S WEETS A North Fork cake baker, a South Fork weaver, and their confectionary creations. BY GER GER ALDINE PLUENNEKE PHOTOGRAPHS PHO TOGRAPHS BY R ANDEE DADDONA
GREENPOR—Tey pass as quite benignly ordinary chocolate cupcakes—until the first bite. Ten impressions of merlot and blackberries dance with rich chocolate across the palate. Last May 1, 60 food lovers on a Greenport Slow Food Crawl crowded into the edible art shop of Miche Bacher and Nanao Anton to sample these cakes and other desserts and to view the shop’s display of stunningly decorated wedding cakes. “If they open a store in the South Fork, that’s it. I’m lost,” says Linda, a Slow Food member, who shook her head and grinned. As an avid Internet shopper, Linda assuredly is now lost. Bacher and Anton have just launched a new Web site carrying many of the sweets in their Greenport Shop. Tey have changed their name from Sacred Sweets to Mali B Sweets, and it’s worth spending five minutes checking out the cake gallery as an art form on Malibsweets.com. If you dare venture into the online shop, you’ll encounter several dozen temptations ranging from herb-flavored cookies, spiced nuts and homemade marshmallows to chocolate bars and cakes made with fair-trade Kallari chocolate, produced by a coalition of 850 indigenous Kichwa families in the Napo region of the Ecuadorian Amazon. Soon to be offered: a bar with Amagansett’s Art of Eating potato chips made from Balsam Farms organic potatoes. It’ss been quite a journey, first from a spare-change exercise It’ e xercise and the start of the business in 2002 to the one that supports local growers and wineries and products like Kallari, with a wedding cake featured in the September issue of Brides Brides magazine magazine as one of the 24 most beautiful in the nation. Bacher, trained as an acupuncturist and doula, is a self-taught baker. “I was the stay-at-home mom who always brought desserts to the party. A friend asked me to make her something. Te next thing I knew, people were calling.” In 2006, with the business pushing up against what she wanted to handle herself, Bacher joined forces with Anton, a fellow mother at the Hayground School in Bridgehampton. “I dragged Nanao into it because I wanted someone who was my equal,” says Bacher. “Nanao, a weaver, has an art background and an incredibly open palate as well as an open eye.” oday, the collaboration involves dreaming up and sketching designs for cakes, then working side-by-side painstakingly executing the idea, molding designs in sugar dough and creating the unique flavors 24
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Beautiful things: At Mali B Sweets, Nanao Anton (above) and Miche Bacher, Bacher, turn out marshmallows, a chocolate bar with local potato chips, and a form of winkies that feature their latest, experimental cake fillings.
which are a re the underlying point. “It’s incredibly long hours, for incredibly low pay. pay. I work seven days a week, and the average day is 14 hours,” says Bacher of the peak wedding season. (Recently they’ve created many new designs for same-sex weddings.) Watch Bacher and Anton in the kitchen, and they’re motivated as much by the challenge as the art. Every cake and cupcake is made only to-order after confirmation by telephone or in person, because they feel freshness is imperative to maintain their standards. Cakes run $7.50 to $60 per head. “Isn’tt it traumatic to think “Isn’ th ink of someone cutting into your beautiful wedding cakes?” a visitor asks. “I don’t see it that way,” way,” replies Bacher, “I consider ours a transient art. Tere are artists who do sand sculptures on the beach that are meant to be washed out.” Bacher continues, “We put days” (“Days ,” ,” echoes Anton) “into something that’s t hat’s going to be decimated in momen moments.” ts.” Teir record creating a cake: 50 to 60 hours over three days. “Te best things we make come out of our synergistic relationship. Te flavors that we produce work,” work,” Bacher says. “We do
a merlot, a chardonnay, a sparkling wine, a black duck porter in cakes, in cupcakes, cupcakes , in cake pops”—their fudgy confection that the Food Network Magazine featured a while back. Even those who aren’t buying a whole cake can still preview their cake-making skills and the fillings of the moment by buying a few winks, their take on commercial winkies, in the shop or online, which feature whatever flavors they are currently playing with. “We’ve “We’ve had carrot cake c ake with cream cheese, c heese, passion-fruit filling, Mexican chocolate,” says Anton. In the realm of cookies, there are variations with lavender, bourbon, fennel and sesame seeds, and buckwheat with cocoa nibs, as well as green-tea brownies. Tey’re Tey’ re perfecting a line of savory biscuits that particularly appeal to both women—one with cranberries, herbs and a little cayenne, another with almond and rosemary, apricot and sage—“savory crackers and things for your cheese plate that are elegant and upscale,” says Bacher. Ten there are the chocolate bars available in seven standard flavors, from the most popular dark chocolate with toffee and sea salt to milk chocolate and bacon, plus three extra flavors monthly. Te Web site offers a tasting sampler for sweet-tooths sweet-tooths among us who like to plan ahead: a year of three special monthly flavors for $300. “Our sweets are never terribly sweet…,” begins Anton. “…because we use only organic sugar,” finishes Bacher. Although the bakers aren’t sure why, the unrefined, certified-organic sugar they use seems less sweet than conventional sugar and allows their myriad other flavors to shine. “Neither Anton or I love sweet things,” reflects Bacher. “Tat may be where we differ from other bakers,” she says. You sense that their enthusiasm for the business extends to their families, with both husbands and teenagers contributing their time. Mali Mal i B Sweets is named na med for Bacher’s Bacher’s mixed-breed yearold black dog, Mali, pronounced Molly, and Anton’ A nton’s mixed-breed six-year-old, Brownie, because, says Bacher, “Our dogs sustain us with unconditional love and support.” “I am extremely ext remely grateful,” muses Anton. “Art “Art is a lonely way of working, and it’s rare to find a partner. We get along beautifully, feed off each other, are able to make beautiful things that taste spectacular every day. And we laugh.”
Geraldine Pluenneke writes from Montauk where she is completing a book about flavor. Mali B Sweets is located lo cated at 130 Front Street, Street , Greenport, 631.477.6762. 631.477.6762. Tis past summer season its confections were carried at Sag Harbor’s Java Nation and Sylvester & Co., in Southampton at S chmidt’s, in East Hampton at Hampton Country Market, and currently at the Village Cheese Shop in Mattituck.
WOMAN’S BEST FRIEND. Don’t Forget the Pets. dogOdog, a Montauk-based company with recipes created by local shar-pei owner Betsy Petroski Smith, has gift sets of their all-organic treats and play-tugchew toy made from 100 percent cotton. Visit dogodogorganics.com. edibleeastend.com
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EDIB ED IBLE LE ENTR ENTREP EPR R ENEUR
LITTLE GREENS, BIG FLAVOR Elfin carrot tops, micro mustard and radish sprouts emerge from an Amagansett greenhouse. BY LAUREL BERGER
PHOTOGR PHOT OGR APHS BY LINDSAY MORRIS
AMAGANSEDelicate and lovely and doomed from birth to an early death, microgreens—bright-flavored shoots of herbs and leaves—are the neurasthenics of the salad world. Until recently no one grew them in any quantity on the South Fork (although Satur Farms in Cutchogue offers them, as does Koppert Cress, which counts the New York Yankees among its high-profile clientele). From time to time you might spot them at a certain fancy food shop, but those microgreens always look travel-spent, all but fainting away. And then last June, small packets of fresh of fresh microgreens started cropping up at Provisions in Sag Harbor. Trough the summer and into the fall they continued to materialize, but from where? On the label, a minute telephone number offered the magnifying glass–equipped glas s–equipped investigator a lead to a 7-b 7-byy-14-foo 14-foott Amagansett Ama gansett greenhouse named, in grand fashion, Good Water Farms. Flourishing in that close space were at least 20 varieties of miniature plants sown from organic seed, including elfin carrot car rot tops (which taste like the Platonic essence of, well, a tiny carrot), sorrel, amaranth, garnet mustard and China rose radish. “ry the cumin,” said Brendan Davison, the grower, who lives on the property. “You’ll freak, I promise.” And he should know, because Davison (shown opposite page) happens to be a practitioner of shamanic energy medicine. During his apprenticeship,, he spent time in Cuzco, Peru, where, it appears, shamanprenticeship sha manfarmers are not unusual. Reflecting on the close connection between the two callings, he realized his was to devote himself to microgreens. Te idea turned out to be a good one. When he went round to restaurants like Nobu, South Edison, Sen, and Nick and oni’s with his 26
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first harvest, the chefs all wanted to know when he could bring more (12 to 18 days from seed to plate, depending on the variety). Tis past summer, customers included Ruschmeyer’s, Navy Beach and Crow’s Nest in Montauk, as well as the 1770 House in East Hampton and Estia’s Little Kitchen Kitchen in Sag Harbor. Having outgrown his backyard quarters due to demand, Davison plans to move the year-round business to an 1,800-square-foo 1,800-square-foott warehouse in East Eas t Hampton and extend his reach to restaurants in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Manhatt an. “What ma kes Good Water Farms special,” said chef Joe Isidori of South Fork Kitchen, “is that Brendan delivers the plants by the flat so we can snip them right before we serve them. Te stuff I could get from other sources isn’ isn’tt local a nd it’s it’s already bagged.” ba gged.” What’s more, most of the big growers rely on soil-free growing mediums, while Davison uses an organic potting mix enriched with worm castings, bat guano and fish meal. And then there’s that metaphysical ingredient he’s slightly embarrassed to talk about. “Te shamans call it ‘opening sacred space,’” he explained, “and it involves invoking the four directions. It sounds funny, I know, but I do it every time I plant seeds. It brings a ll the elements into right relationship. relationship.”” Laurel Berger is an arts write r in Sag Harbor. Good Water Farms sprouts and microgreens are sold at Provisions Natural Foods in Sag Harbor, Naturally Good Foods in Montauk, and the Sag Harbor Winter Farmers Market. goodwaterfarms .com
McCall McCa ll Wines Wines
HAYGROUND SCHOOL
“ In the charmingly rustic tasting room, I got to sample some of the wines and I was so impressed that I bought a mixed case, which I enjoyed immensely.” – MARTHA S TEWART “If his regular and reserve pinots made from the splendid 2007 vintage are indicators, he’s sitting pretty. ” – HOWARD G. GOLDBERG T HE HE N EW EW Y ORK ORK T IMES IMES
Fine Estat Wins 22600 Main Road, Cutchogue, New York 11935 631.734.5764 / mccallwines.com
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BOOKS
FREEDOM TO COOK A diabetic chef relies on flavor and texture, not carbs and calories. BY GER GER ALDINE PLUENNEKE
At the age of 12, Sam albot was diagnosed as a type 1 d iabetic. His mother burst into tears t he day she heard the doctor’s diagnosis, then drove her son straight to Friendly’s where she ordered him a half-dozen different ice cream sundaes, with the words, “Tis is the last time you can do this.” albot would learn all the prohibitions and at one time or another “broke every rule” even into his college days. Perhaps it was preordained that, loving to eat, albot became a chef a nd expanded his palate t raveling worldwide.
In his new cookbook, Te Sweet Life: Diabetes Without Boundaries, the executive chef of the Surf Lodge in Montauk and Mondrian Hotel’s Imperial No. Nine in SoHo has compiled pleasuredelivering recipes not only for diabetics, but for all eaters. His flavors are deep and complex, his dishes colorful and comforty. Te 75 recipes in this late-October Rodale release rely on flavor and textures rather than carbs, ca lories and fat. Most veggies are cooked al dente (“cook ½-inch pieces for 1 to 2 minutes than transfer t ransfer to a bowl of ice water”) a s a base for albot’s albot’s unique
and eclectic flavors. Some work as either side dishes or entrées. Others, shorn of their seafood, chicken or meat, can stand alone as vegetarian or vegan fare. For diabetics, Sweet Life is both a primer on how to indulge in rich, satisfying and low carb flavor, and tips from a pro on how to manage the unexpected challenges of plummeting or soaring blood sugars. Te book car ries a new message about t he freedom and enjoyment of food choices possible for a diabetic. “Tere’s no ‘NO’ in diabetes for me. Tere’s no, ‘you can’t.’ [A diabetic] can eat anything as long as it’s in moderation, and you’re monitoring your blood sugar, and it’s a balance,” says albot. No chef knows better than he. On a recent rainy af ternoon at Imperial No. Nine, Nine, the restaurant he helped open in SoHo’s Mondrian Hotel, the 33-year-old chef reflected, “I’ve got this forum, th is God-given forum, to be able to speak up, to be written about in magazines about something I believe in, not something meaningless and silly.” Indeed, on September 21, albot, a partner with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, raised $50,700 for JDRF with his inaugural fund-raiser, “the Sweet Life Kitchen,” on the rooftop of the Mondrian. Oddly, at first glance albot’s recipes appear quite improbable for everyday cooking, okay, totally improbable. Dauntingly, most call for layering in a myriad of spices, herbs and ingredients, a few for expensive, hard-to-find additions like mustard oil and yuzu juice, the imported Japanese citrus juice appearing on trendy menus. (Mustard oil and other unusual ingredients are all available on the Internet, in some health food stores or Asian markets.) But ingredients assembled, most are simple and fast. I fi rst fell for albot’s flavor instincts making his fairly mainstream squid with sesame seeds and jalapeño peppers. I then tried his spicy cucumber salad with charred red onion, cabbage and a cast of 10 supporting ingredients for a vegetarian potluck. “Oh, my God. Tis is incredible,” said the muscular, blond surfer sitting across from f rom me. “Te heat of the spices against the cool of the cucumber. I’ve got to have the recipe. I’m a gourmet cook.” “Mmmmm, Mmmm, Mmmm,” murmured the woman next to him as she forked into the cucumbers. “You’re clearly joking,” a guest and former California chef said last weekend as I set the first course down, “crab with blueberries and popcorn!” Tis fresh and crunchy crab ceviche with yuzu juice is the top-selling dish at Surf Lodge, and the four of us at my table rated it and all the other dishes “delicious winners.” edibleeastend.com
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I first fell for albot’s flavor instincts making his fairly mainstream squid with sesame seeds and jalapeño jala peño peppers. peppers. I then tried his spicy cucumber salad with charred red onion,, cabbage and a cast of 10 supporting onion supporting ingredients for a vegetarian potluck. Te mustard oil in the tuna ceviche delivered a hot wasabi-like bite. Te broccoli with citrus and roasted garlic oil was vibrant and sweet. Te shirataki noodles (a soy-yam combo with minimal carbs), cashews and chiles was textured, mellow and fulfilling. For dessert we munched albot’s 17-ingredient coconut granola. Te granola erased my qualms about expense, and I’ve ordered a supply of açai powder, cacao nibs, goji berries a nd pistachios. “His style will have h ave an effect on other chefs,” chefs ,” one guest predicted later. later. So what influences inform albot’s recipes? “Tese recipes aren’t based on anybody but myself, from my everyday life. Tings I like to sustain on and nourish.” Some he first developed cooking by the roadside on a cross-country cross-country car trip with his L abrador. Te Sweet Life details the advance preparations and snacks
albot has found vital traveling as a diabetic, and how he has coped with the “alarming, tricky situations” that can confront any diabetic round-the-clock. Other recipes are variations on favorites from his restaurant menus. When he isn’t cooking or surfing, albot (shown above at his Montauk home) home) paints—in mixed mi xed media. “Te canvas is t he same thing as a s a plate. My head’s in the same place whether I’m cooking or painting.... painting.... I’m all about texture, texture in foods, texture in painting. I love layers (of both paint and flavor).” New research on health benefits of food—of eating more herbs, of eating more greens and spices intrigue him. “Cinnamon’ “Cinnamon’ss great for a diabetic. I eat it all day long by t he spoonful.” urns out nothing is improbable about Sam albot’s cookbook.
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cold-season grilling, grilling , comes in regula r and hot in 16-ounce bottles for $7.50. $7.50. Buy itit at the restaura nt on own own Line Road in Sagaponack. Sag aponack. 30
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PAIRINGS
COCOAVINO A chocolate sommelier goes head-to-head with Long Island wine. BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
PHOTOGRAPHS PH OTOGRAPHS BY R ANDEE DADDONA
Roxanne Browning had a captive audience at Laurel Lake Vineyards. Tey were seated in the tank room in front of wineglasses with the promise of a pairing not usually on the menu: wine and chocolate. Browning, formerly a Madison Avenue ad executive and the mayor of Northport, has been passionate about chocolate ever since a trip to the Ecuadorian Amazon in the early 2000s where she visited visited villages that made their livings making “bean to bar” chocolate, the kind of chocolate that now is encroaching upon the shelves that used to be populated with c andy made by global companies like Nestlé, Hershey and Cadbury. But watch that word “candy.” rue chocolate, says this “choco-
late sommelier,” is not candy. If you look at the label of a commercially available chocolate bar, the first ingredient is some kind of sugar, whether it be high-fructose corn syrup or your run-of-themill cane sugar. A true chocolate bar, she says, will always have as its first ingredient cocoa. And the benefit of seeking out such chocolates, she says, in addition to the fact that they taste better, provide health benefits (more about that later) and are a qua lity product, which most consumers demand these days, is that chocolate from such small villages helps sustain the native peoples who have, for the most part, formed cooperatives, cooperatives, know how to select the best beans and are farming a nd producing with the environment in mind. edibleeastend.com
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For the first round, Laurel Lake’s winemaker Juan Sepulveda poured his 2010 Sauvignon Blanc, which Browning paired with a chocolate bar with dried banana and cayenne pepper by Antidote, a company in Ecuador. Te spice of the pepper and the sweetness of the banana complemented the herbaceousness of the wine. Next was Laurel Lake’s 2001 Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon with a 75 percent cocoa bar by Askinose, from the Soconusco region of Mexico. Te darkness of the wine with its chalky ta nnins and the darkness of the chocolate with its chalky tannins worked well together. My favorite was the combination of the slightly sweet 2010 Laurel Lake Gewürztraminer with chocolate from Kallari in Ecuador made with 75 percent cocoa and more cocoa butter than in the other bars. Te chocolate was rich, pure and creamy, and the acidic but sweet wine made it melt in your mouth. It’ss not too hard to convince people that chocolate is good for It’ you, but Browning (shown at left in red sweater) made her case: the monounsaturated fats in cocoa butter are similar to the good fats in avocados and olive oil. Chocolate is also high in antioxidants, which are said s aid to control insulin levels and provide minerals important to everyone’s diet. And in its purest form, chocolate has very low levels of caffeine. Te crowd was a lready won over. For more information or to set up tastings tastings,, visit exoticchocolatetasting.com. exoticchocolatet asting.com.
All six bottles in the Artist Series Collection (aste Red and White, Gewürztraminer, Gewürztra miner, Gallery, Gallery, Musée and Sparkling) come c ome packed in a custom wooden box for $280. Tey are ready to drink or just stare at. bedellcellars.com
ART YOU DRINK. Bedell “Artist Series” Gift Box.
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SOCIAL SUDS
STRON STRO NG RYE RY EL A ND Te region’s region’s first collaborative beer delivers a taste from f rom both forks. BY NIKO KROMMYDAS
i k s o r o D g e r G f o y s e t r u o C : h p a r g o t o h P
Strong Ryeland, a copper-hued collaboration created by Greenport Harbor Brewing Company and Southampton Publick House, is more than a well-balanced amalgam amalga m of five malt types and a nd two hop varieties, suitable for session-easy situations; the Long Island–interpreted English Special Bitter (ESB) embodies the convergence of two local breweries, situated on opposite forks, for the appreciation of craft beer. “I really wanted wa nted Greenport Greenport and Southampton to do something they felt represented them as brewers and would be proud to put their names on,” says Jen orriero, orriero, bar manager of Spring Lounge in Manhattan’s Manhatt an’s NoLita. NoLita. orriero, the impetus behind the two-day union in early September, chose a bold, rye-based ESB (comprising 20 percent of Strong Ryeland’s malt profile, rye is also used in Greenport Harbor Brewing Company’s recent Spring urning Saison) after a discussion with Spencer Niebuhr, brand manager of Southampton Publick House, about a one-off project that could serve as the apex of “I Love NY Beer,” Spring Lounge’s monthlong switch to New York–only craft drafts and bottles in October. (One of New York’s oldest bars, Spring Lounge features American beer and impressively opens at 8:00 a.m.) “I suggested we combine forces with our brethren on the East End of Long Island and create a new beer,” says Niebuhr. “wo text messages later to Greenport and we were off-and-running.” off-and-running.” Tough Strong Ryeland’s Ryeland’s moniker is a playful jab at an unfavorable local portrayal (“I think it goes without saying that our breweries embody the gold chains and muscle shirts that people
Community beer: Te people behind Strong Ryeland include, above from left, Spencer Niebuhr, Phil Markowski, DJ Swanson, Jen orriero orriero and Greg Doroski.
often associate with L ong Island,” jokes Greg Doroski, Doroski, assista nt brewer of Greenport Harbor Brewing Company), its handle also represents the awareness, and s olidarity, of community—not only within craft beer, but on Long Island, as well. Tis was most evident during Strong Ryeland’s recipe formation by Phil Markowski and DJ Swanson, brewmasters of Southampton Publick House and Greenport Harbor Ha rbor Brewing Company C ompany,, respectively. “Te planning was around the time of Hurricane Irene, so it wasn’t always an easy process,” recalls Swanson. “But it seemed like the perfect time to hang out and make a beer with friends.” Over two sessions in Greenport, the five a foremen forementioned tioned beerists shared brewing duties, industry stories, and pints, until a moderately spiced, maltforward ale with subtle notes of citrus and herbal tea was compl completed. eted. “Te specialty malts impart a unique character to the foundation, and the use of both UK arget and Cascade hops gives this beer more of a multi-continental take on the style,” says Markowski. “With Strong Ryeland, we hope to give the beer-drinking community a taste of the two forks.” Niko Krommydas lives in Selden, and runs “Super Neat Beer Adventure, Yes!!,” a Long Island craft beer blog, nikokrommyd as.com. edibleeastend.com
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ON GOOD LAND
PL A NT A RO ROW W FOR THE HUNGRY HUNGRY At EECO Farm, a plot is dedicated to supplying South Fork food pantries. STORY AND PHOTOGR APHS BY ELLEN WATSON WATSON
EAS HAMPON—I met John Malafronte at the Food Pantry Farm on a blustery, gray day at the end of April. It was overcast and chilly with a dampness that crept into my bones. Malafronte greeted me with such excitement and enthusiasm that I instantly warmed up and was comfortable walking the fields with him. A slight man with an eagerness and willingness to talk, Malafronte (who had a career as a bond salesman in Man hattan), told me that upon retiring on the East End he decided to take a small garden at EECO Farm. With no prior experience as a gardener, he grew food for himself and his wife. Eventually he met Peter Garnham, who was farming commercially at EECO Farm. Garnham had been gardening all of his life; his tanned face and rugged manner speaks of the time he has spent outdoors. He is a master gardener and makes a living as a garden writer for national magazines. In 2009 as the economy slumped, Garnham became aware of the need for food donations at the local East End food pantries and decided to do something about it. He enlisted Malafronte’s 38
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help, and the two friends started growing food to donate. Bringing their contacts, experience and enthusiasm enthusiasm to the c ause, calls for help were made to national seed companies and local nurseries, and the donations began to come in. Malafronte and Garnham provided the rented land and “seed” money needed for the farm’s other necessities, and the Food Pantry Farm was born. Te Food Pantry Farm is exactly what it sounds like: a farm that grows fresh organic produce for food pantries. I admit I al ways thought that food pantries only distributed government-issued and donated meat, cheese and a nd dried and/or canned goods. o me, this sounded uninspired and unappetizing. If indeed that was the case of food pantries in the past, then the face of today’s food pantry is different. Here on the East End, people using the resources of the local food pantries can also expect fresh food, fresh herbs and flowers. Te idea being this: people who need to use a food pantry deserve the same fresh, nutritious food that is available to people shopping at the supermarket and farmers market s.
Te Food Pantry Farm sensibility is a balance of idealism and practicality. As we discuss what is being grown at the farm (carrots, salad and cooking greens, summer and winter squash, melons, sweet potatoes, okra, beets, turnips, collards, kale, parsnips, radishes and Swiss chard, to name a few), the farmers share some thoughts with me. Tey grow and donate fresh herbs, such as cilantro, parsley, sage, mint and thyme to the pantries. But they want to know from their clientele: What other herbs and vegetables would you like? Tey also feel that if you are driven by need to use a food pantry, you are in a rough spot—so they grow fresh flowers to include in the donations. After all, who wouldn’t wouldn’t like a bouquet of flowers to cheer them up? Tese are very civil, endearing thoughts to be having when providing food for the needy. Tese farmers discovered that there was a need for good, fresh food, and so they are providing it, and more. Tey are telling the food pantry clientele that they they matter, matter, that someone cares for them. In 2009, the first year of the farm, Garnham and Malafronte did all the physical labor, along with friends and family volunteers. Tey planted and weeded and harvested, adding to their land area whenever more became available. Also part of the founding team is Ira Bezoza, a retired attorney and businessperson (and a keen gardener) who came on board to help out. He has a cheery, quick smile and is a great sidekick to Malafronte in their mutual storytelling. Involved in numerous citizen and community groups, Ira works as the bookkeeper and chief fund-raiser for the Food Pantry Farm. wo major donors, and a late-summer benefit barbecue held in September, have raised the funds for a planned state-of-the-art 3,400-square-foot hoop house, a plastic-covered greenhouse. When this th is
hoop house is in place (upon approval from the own Board), the Food Pantry Farm will be capable of growing and delivering food year-round. In the summer of 2010, Bruce Warr joined the board. Warr has had a passion for farming since childhood. His grandfather grandfat her was a professor of agriculture and commissioner of agriculture for New Jersey. He visited many farms when he was young, and a nd a lifelong love of the natural world was instilled inst illed in him. With a great work ethic, he helps in the day-to-day operations of the farm several days d ays a week. Tese men put in anywhere from 20 to 70 hours a week working at the farm. Te Food Pantry Farm currently works almost three acres of land and has two hoop houses. Tey recently reclaimed an abandoned orchard in a corner of EECO Farm. When I first visited in April, this patch of land was dead looking: brown grass, wiry sick-looking trees. Te farmers weren’t even sure what the health of the trees was or whether they would bear fruit. On a second visit at the end of June, the grass was green and mowed. Much of the area had been covered in black plastic ground-cover cloth to keep down the weeds; large nursery pots had been set on top and planted with cucumbers, melons and zucchini. Vines flowed over the top and onto the ground-cover fabric, ripe with flowers and baby squash. Te fruit trees looked healthy and happy, some with fruit on them—a few apples, pears and peaches. Te trees will be pruned and fed this winter and spring. Some new Te Food Pantry Farm makes a weekly delivery to five local pantries. Darcy Hutzenlaub, below and opposite page, started volunteering at Food Pantry Farm, and is now the farm’s field manager and community serv ice supervisor.
Dedicated deliveries:
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Farm vision: Peter Garnham, at left with farm manager Hutzenlaub, founded Food Pantry Farm with other EECO Farm colleagues. Each year, the farm delivers more than 16 tons of produce to nearby food pantries.
trees will be planted to replace the dead ones that will be removed. So how do these four retirement-age men manage all the physical labor needed to run the farm? Besides them and the volunteers, they have one paid employee, Darcy Hutzenlaub. She is the farm’s field manager and a nd community service supervisor. Hutzenlaub met Garnham when she began volunteering at the Food Pantry Farm. She wanted to learn more about growing food to assist her in a job she had at the time. Eventually, she quit her other job and came to work for the Food Pantry Farm. She recently rec ently completed the Cornell Cooperative Extension’s Master Gardener program and this winter will attend the New York Beginning Female Farmer’s Program. Hutzenlaub is a striking, strong, knowledgeable young woman and
At present, food donations are made by the Food Pantry Farm from April through early December. One delivery a week is made to the Amagansett, East Hampton, Sag Harbor, Southampton and Springs food pantries. In 2009, the Food Pantry Farm donated a total of 9½ tons of food from April through early December. In 2010, the number went up to 16½ tons. At the time of this writing, over 15 tons of food has been delivered from April through September 2011. Te farmers estimate that for every $1 that is donated, they deliver about $3 worth of vegetables at wholesale prices. Donations pay for seeds, supplies, tools and the salar s alaryy of one paid employee; volunteers volunteers and community service people do the rest of the work. For more information or to volunteer, e-mail them at [email protected].
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rounds out this crowd of retired men just perfectly. In fact the group feels like a family. Tere is smart conversation, lots of humor and great compassion for each other and the cause. Te group bounces around ideas, discusses current farm issues and laughs a lot. Tey all share the view that the Food Pantry Farm is a model that could be replicated in communities around the country. c ountry. Unemployed Unemployed people could be given work, and those in need could be given their fair share of fresh food. Tey are all tireless workers with big ideas that I am convinced will come to pass. Ellen Watson, self-proclaimed naturalist, can often be found photo graphing gardens, farms and field s on the sublime East End.
Amagansett Food Pantry Saint Michael’s Lutheran Church 486 Montauk Highway Amagansett, NY 11930 631.267.6351 uesday 4– 6 p.m.
Springs Food Pantry Springs Presbyterian Church 5 Old Stone Highway East Hampton, NY 11937 631.324.4791 Wednesday 4–6 p.m.
East Hampton Food Pantry Windmill Village II 219-50 Accabonac Road East Hampton, NY 11937 631.324.2300 uesday 2– 6 p.m.
Southampton Food Pantry Human Resources of the Hamptons 168 Hill Street Southampton, NY 11968 631.283.6415 Monday, Wednesday & Friday 10 a.m.–2 p.m.
Sag Harbor Food Pantry Old Whalers Church 44 Union Street Sag Harbor, NY 11963 631.725.2880 uesday 10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.
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BACK OF THE HOUSE
MARY’S MARVELOUS Tis cozy Main Street spot is crammed full of all-day, from-scratch nourishment. BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
PHOTOGRAPHS BY LINDSAY MORR MORR IS
AMAGANSE—Standing behind the counter of a grab-andgo breakfast-lunch spot has taug ht Mary Schoenlein a lot about people in the past nine years. It kind of boils down to th is: People People don’tt like change, don’ chang e, except when they ask for it. Schoenlein, the owner of Mary’s Marvelous on Main Street in Amagansett, Amag ansett, during t he summer feeds the frantic recreationer, recreationer, but over the winter a stream of locals keeps her in business. Tere are some she sees every day and others who will cal l her at home if she takes an item off the menu. “People “Peop le got upset when I stopped making t he curried chicken salad sa ndwich, ndwich,”” she says. “We had another kind of ch icken salad, and everybody makes a curried cu rried chicken salad, but that’s what they wanted.” She is not complaining. In fact, the evolution of her business— from a stripped down selection of pastries and sandwiches, to an ever-changing chalkboard of breakfast sandwiches, soups, grains, vegetables, and meat dishes—was prompted by her standby customers, who came to depend on Mary’s for breakfast, lunch and (reheated-at-home) dinner. From the very beginning, “people were just wanting to grab food and get to their next thing. New Yorkers, especially on vacation, want that lifestyle,” says Schoenlein. Ten as customers started coming back and asking for more, the prepared foods started creeping in. “Tey’d say ‘this is great, but how about a salad?’ or ‘Do you have anything I could bring home for dinner?’” For Schoenlein what her customers want is as important, and maybe more so, than her desire for creativity. It shows in how many of those who enter her store greet her by name, ask after her family and talk about their lives, as a s Schoenlein listens like she has all a ll day. Despite Despite the exclamation mark in her logo, Mary’s Marvelous conveys a steady dedication to quality where the answer to the question “What’s good here?” is answered by other customers customers and staff alike, a like, “Everything!” “Everything!” And everything is prepared in the diminutive 1,100-squarefoot space. Egg dishes for breakfast, 12 different types of pastry, muffins, prepared sandwiches, salads, hot food like curried tofu, sautéed kale from Balsam’s Farm and Waldorf salad. Chicken potpies sit in the case next to macaroni and cheese. Cupcakes are surrounded by spiced nuts and the dozen or so different cookies baked in the small smal l kitchen. Tere are sablés , regular and chocolate, peanut butter filled peanut butter cookies, fresh lime shortbread, Mary O’s, just like Oreos but better, and what Schoenlein cal ls her 42
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American line, good old chocolate chips and oatmeal raisin. Te menu also reflects the diversity in t he kitchen. Te housemade salsa is prepared using a recipe provided by one of the Ecuadorian cooks, which uses tomate de arbol, a tree tomato native to South America that results in a creamy pale orange sauce. Te eggs Colombian are rolled in a tortilla and have crumbled potato chips in a decidedly Andean flourish. Outside of home kitchens, Mary’s Marvelous offers some of the South Fork’s only madefrom-scratch arepas, thick corn cakes filled with milk, butter and white cheese, or shredded beef, guacamole and ha rd-boiled egg. In the winter, with the Amagansett Farmers Market, Vicki’s Veggies and much of Montauk shuttered, Mary’s is perhaps the last food option for eastbound roadtrippers. So, it’s not unusual that, on any given day in winter, a line of customers snakes away from the cash register, toward the back of the shop and then back toward the front, forming a horseshoe around a center table arranged with the shop’s own packaged products and selected artisan foods from f rom around the country countr y. During a recent “quiet” “quiet” week, the shop went through 120 dozen eggs, a number that quadruples in summer. Te shop goes through 1,000 pounds of flour each week. For Tanksgiving, they sold nearly 80 pies, mostly pumpkin, double-crusted apple, and pecan. Mary’s sells “gallons and gallons” of chicken soup, made fresh three or four times a week. Mary’s opened in 2002, but Schoenlein’s cooking career began nearly two decades before when she moved to New York City and talked her way into trendsetting Gotham restaurants, like Jonathan Waxman’ Waxma n’ss Jams on the Upper East Side. She honed her pastry skills during a stint at a two-star Michelin restaurant in Versailles, France, and deepened her reverence for impeccable ingredients alongside Alfred Portale when Gotham Bar and Grill received its first New York imes stars. imes stars. Schoenlein and her husband ultimately wanted out of the city. Tey found a home in Amagansett, and Schoenlein became the executive chef of the late Red Horse Market on Montauk High way, east of East Hampton. Tere she started her own line of granola, called Mary’s Marvelous at the suggestion of a friend, a suggestion that Schoenlein first doubted but it stuck. (More than a few customers have made the granola—a heavenly mix of oats, maple syrup sent direct from a farm in Vermont, jumbo raisins, and “just a few other ingredients”—their morning staple for the
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last decade. “It’ “It’ss baked in small batches,” says Schoenlein. “We’re “We’re very conscious about keeping it f resh.”) When the Red Horse Market closed, S choenlein started looking for a space for her own business. Te space, at the eastern end of the row of shops in Amagansett, had once been the Coach outlet but before that, in the ’70s, it had been the Store, run by Bert Greene, who went on to become a food writer and cookbook author. Te Store was one of the first to sell prepared gourmet food, preceding even the Barefoot Contessa in East Hampton. Te landlord heard she was looking for a place and gave her a call. It was a perfect match, a store with plenty of parking ideally located for beachgoers seeking breakfast and lunch. Schoenlein’s husband, Pat McKibbin, who works for South Fork builder Bulgin & Associates, redesigned the space and was side-by-side with Schoenlein as they sledgehammered s ledgehammered the concrete slab to lay a new kitchen floor. Later, when the business quickly grew, McKibbin helped build out storage and a nd refrigerator space. (“He’s really been my rock in starting t his whole venture,” venture,” Schoenlein says. “Starting my own business was a dream. Pat helped me realize it.”) And for 10 years this coming summer, Mary’s Marvelous has served customers seven days per week, opening at 7:00 a.m. and closing at 4:00 p.m. (3:00 p.m. on Sundays). She now has a full-time staff of 13, and her sister, Sandra, has been there since the beginning. Another sister, Laura, worked there but died of cancer, something customers still talk about and remember. Change still hovers. Tis year, in response to customer requests, Schoenlein added gluten-free offerings and more vegan specialties. Items like raw kale salad, a butternut squash and spinach gratin, and quinoa cakes are just a rotating roster of in-season additions that consistently sell out. In the home-meal category categor y, her turkey meat loaf a nd chicken potpie remain big sellers. Schoenlein continues to consider expansion as the volume of her business bumps up ag ainst t he tiny kitchen. She’s She’s investing in her Web site, taking notes for a cookbook, and, with her longhaired miniature dachshund, Bijoux, at her feet, spending more time in her office, which had to be moved to another building bu ilding so she could expand the kitchen. Tis year, she says, af ter a decade of “working ma butt off,” was the first she’s had weekends off. And while she has tried to get some distance from the day to day, the demands of 4:00 a.m. pastry-baking, after-closing stock and soup-making, and her own ongoing urge to get her hands Savvy shopkeeper: When her customers started to depend on Mary’s Marvelous for breakfast, lunch, and (reheated-at-home) dinner, Mary Schoenlein (opposite page) added an ever-changing chalkboard of breakfast sandwiches, soups, grains, vegetables, and meat dishes.
coated in flour, all pull her back in. She depends on “an incredible staff,” including cooks who head up pastry, savory and other elements. But Schoenlein still designs all the menus. “It amazes me. It still amazes me,” she says. “All the time and all the work that goes into making good food.” Eileen M. Duffy, Edible East End’s deputy editor, holds a diploma in wine and spirits from the International Wine Center and writes from her home in Southold. RUBS AND FUDGE. Condiments for Xmas.
Local producers are selling stuff that makes the stuff they already sell taste better. For preparing pastured poultry, Browder’s Birds sells two dry rubs in 5-ounce jars for $10: Grill, for a barbecue flavor, and Roast, a mix of dry herbs; call 631.599.3394 or visit browdersbirds.com to order. Vine Street Café is now selling their barbecue sauce, cookies and hot fudge. Buy their Blue Canoe products at the restaurant on Shelter Island, or through their Web site, bluecanoesi.com.
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IN THE KITCHEN WITH
APRIL GORNIK AND ERIC FISCHL Two painters thrive on eggs, homemade bread and ambitious dinner parties. BY BRIAN HALWEIL
PHOTOGRAPHS BY LINDSAY MORR IS
NORH HAVEN—Te home of artists April Gornik and Eric Fischl is perched above freshwater wetlands and surrounded by gnarled wild cherry trees t hat stretch to the sky. Te path from the driveway, where where a Chevy Chev y Volt Volt is fed through a bright-orange cord near a bank of solar panels, leads past matching his-and-hers glass studios with wraparound porches; up concrete stairways bisected by collecting pools that ferry rainwater away from the house; and finally, through a native-plants garden dotted with Japanese maples ablaze in autumn glory. Te robust Lacinato kale patch outside the front door is a sign of the couple’s deep-rooted interest in matters related to eating. In 1975, when the two painters met at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, Fischl wooed Gornik with mulligatawny soup, a salade composée and composée and what Gornik recalls as “this insanely delicious creamy clam chowder.” (Born in New York City and raised in suburban Long Island, Fischl knew the chowder as part of his kitchen vernacular. He thinks the mulligatawny soup came from the Alice’s Restaurant Cookbook ; the salad was “a half-assed attempt at dieting.”) Gornik admits she was no gourmand—“my main food was Kraft Macaroni & Cheese and Ragú spaghetti sauce”—but a few years later, inspired by a fancy French dinner-party circuit that some art school friends started, sta rted, she got a copy of Mastering Mastering the Art of French Cooking , and, on an electric skillet and hot plate in the illegal office building where she and Fischl were squatting, turned out sole de bonne femme and femme and a gâteau a gâteau de crêpes with crêpes with a frangipane filling. Did those early edible install ations from April help seal the deal with Eric? “It certainly went a long way,” way,” he says, wrapping an arm around his h is wife’s shoulders. Dinner parties remain a big part of the routine. Tey regularly host holiday feasts, dishing up communal delicacies like Brazilian fish soup to a couple dozen guests. Other edible endeavors include Gornik pushing farmers market schedules and food pantry donations in the Save Sag Harbor e-newsletter, and Fischl re-creating historic Midwestern meals as part of America: America: Now and Here , his ambitious 18-wheeler mounted, moveable exhibit that raises questions about democracy, patriotism and trust in a post-911 America. Both artists have produced labels for Bedell Cellars’ Artist Series—a Fischl nude kicked off the series on a 2001 magnum of merlot, while a Gornik oceanscape graced the 2007 blanc de blancs. Most days, they do breakfast and lunch separately. She eats
lightly before noon to leave room for yoga and swi mming. He sips cappuccino and munches granola. She tends the garden, stocks the pantry and books their CSA memberships. He makes bread—“a genius talent,” Gornik says. Teir home, designed by Fischl and built with the collaboration of architect Lee Skolnick, is adorned with a collection of sculpture, paintings and a nd books that you’d expect from f rom a New York art world power duo who both count works at the Met, Whitney and MoMA. From the main living room—a soaring barnlike space with a library that floats overhead—the home flows down into a cozy dining room and kitchen, joined by a floor-to-ceiling concrete and stucco partition, with heart pine cupboards and trim, that holds plates, cups and cookbooks. And although Gornik and Fischl are two very different eaters, they share the conviction that what we put in our mouths can be both model and muse. “It seems like every couple of months, I’m wildly interested in cooking and I’ll need to make up a new recipe,” says Gornik. “I don’t really associate it with either a creative or fallow time in my studio. But I do think that cooking and a nd making art and gardening are all parallel activities for me.”
She tends tends the garden ga rden,, stocks the pantry pa ntry and books their CSA memberships. He makes bread—“a genius talent,” she says. Te opening of America: America: Now and Here in Here in Kansas City, Missouri, included two food events. Te first was a lunch t hat featured jerky, hardtack and jars of lard. “One of the courses was preceded by a history lesson in which it was told that the Missouri River was once full of salmon, but that settlers sa id they would rather eat their dogs than eat salmon,” says Fischl. “Te chef then served salmon hot dogs!” At the second event, organized with a local artists collective named Bread, aspiring activists came to sup on homemade bread and soup. Attendees threw their na mes into a hat, three were chosen to speak about their projects, a vote was ta ken and the winner was awarded the evening’s proceeds. “So, yes,” Fischl says. “Art and food a re intimately tied together.” edibleeastend.com
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six months or a year. Sometimes it’s only one egg. Sometimes it’s two. But I do find that if I eat two eggs and a piece of toast or a half a piece of toast, then I’m just fine for hours and hours and hours and hours. Andreja Premium espresso machine EF: I have a fancy espresso machine and burr grinder but I am not an expert. My coffee is organic beans called Hurricane Espresso I get from IGA in Sag. Every now and then I nail a great foam, but it is so inconsistent it plagues me. I do the same thing every day with differing results (which proves I am not mad, just
Who does the cooking? AG: It’s me. He does bake bread, but that’s kinda it. It’s partly my fault because I’m kind of strict about health things, like butter. I’m a little bit of a kitchen dictator. (I’m tired of people saying “Nazi.”) What’s your breakfast routine? AG: I always eat two local, organic eggs, either from Bette and Dale or David Falkowski, and some bread from Eric, and chives from my garden. EF: Coffee, two cups, cappuccino, first thing. I read the paper (digital imes Reader), do crossword and/or Words with Friends. Bola Granola with fruit (April ma kes it with maple syrup) and 2 percent milk. I’m a friend of [the designer] Nicole Miller’s, and Bola is her sister’s product. Tat would be enough reason to support it, but it is delicious on top of that. We get it at Cavaniola’s Cheese Shop. Eggs AG: My mom would make me eggs when I was sick. Softboiled. Eric will tell you his theory that women like to eat eggs more than men do. He thinks that’s weird and cannibalistic. I think he thinks that because he doesn’t like caviar. EF: I do find it unsettling to watch women coo and glee over a bowl of caviar. More so than men who also coo and glee over it. Ironic how upset they can get at birds that rob eggs from other birds’ nests but don’t make this connection to our nest or uterine robbery. AG: I’m currently eating them scrambled. I’m a little OCD with my eggs. I’ll get into a soft-boiled thing and I’ll do that for 50
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inconsistent). My theory is t hat it is the milk’s inconsistent). mi lk’s fault. It seems when I open a new carton car ton [it] [it] foams the best but then t hen over several days it becomes less and less certain. I will never research this theory, but if any of your readers have thoughts let me know. Berries AG: I like to eat red fruits in the morning. What the French call “red fruits”—strawberries, raspberries, blackberries. I get that at Provisions. Tey are high in antioxidants, and I like them. Meat AG: I’m not a meat person. It’s to a certain extent philosophical.
I curated a show called Other Is Animal at Danese Gallery. It was not supposed to be a “don’t eat animals show,” it was just supposed to show animals as having real presence and as being worthy of attention. Because of their consciousness. Not because they are cute or they look like us or even on ecological grounds. For Tanksgiving I ordered a Heritage Foods USA cruelty-free turkey. It’s not so much people eating animals per se, but the cruelty involved involv ed in factory farming. It makes me insane with rage and disgust disg ust and sorrow. o me it’s the moral elephant in the room of America. Dreamfields pasta AG: I should do an ad for this spaghetti. Actually, I was talking with the guy who sells the fish at King Kullen, about trying to find local fish. But then what I wanted for dinner was pasta. He said, “Have you tried Dreamfields spaghetti?” And I said no, because I like Barilla the best and I’m a total pasta snob. And so I bought it, and it’s fantastic. It has a lower glycemic content than most spaghettis, and it’s the best pasta I’ve ever bought. I recommend it, but the only place I can find it is K ing Kullen. I do spaghetti and arugula pesto from my garden. And kale pesto is really good, or just kale sautéed. My personal favorite is probably spaghetti and artichokes with tomato and mint. Indian spices AG: Here’s a funny story. I’m in a taxi in New York and the driver has a dish di sh on his seat t hat he’s going to eat for dinner, and it
smelled delicious. And I went, “Tat smells so good. Tere’s amchur in it, isn’t there?” And he said, “Yes, how did you know?” And I said, “I just love that spice, I could smell it from a mile away.” And he goes, “all women love amchur, what is it?” And I said, “if you don’t understand it, I don’t understand it.” Ceramic egg tray Tat’s Mae Mougin. She makes them. She’s great. It’s obviously decorative, but I use it all the time. Tomato sauce I have my own way of doing it. It’s not chunky, chunky. I like it with a huge amount of garlic, ga rlic, olive oil, bay leaf and sa lt. Broccoli rabe Tis is broccoli rabe from Quail Hill that needs to be eaten. Right Rig ht now, now, I’m in the winter share of Quail Quai l Hill. But in the summer I tried Sunset Beach Farm, which is, like, just around the corner. Garden I just started sta rted doing the garden two summers ago. It’s It’s always been, like, flowers and perennials. I said to Eric, “What “W hat do you like?” And he said, “Cucumbers.” I don’t like them really, but there’s this Tai fish soup that involves those long European cucumbers. And there was a seed package at Marder’s, so I grabbed it. And I planted them just like it said, five little seeds in a mounded hole. And then, like three weeks later, our entire yard was a sea of cucumbers. Cupcake trays and baking pans AG: I got into trying to make health muffins a few years ago. Te baking trays are what I use to bake sweet potatoes and vegetables. I love roasted vegetables. I do that a lot in the winter. Eric used to make pies and cinnamon buns. And I begged him repeatedly to make them. ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to have cinnamon buns?’ But then he’d probably put butter in them and I would be telling him to put less butter. EF: I was a dishwasher at a pharmacy in Scottsdale, Arizona, [I] got promoted overnight to cook becaus e the cook quit. It was a real soda fountain kind of place, and I was responsible for breakfast and lunch. Te usual stuff like eggs any which way, BLs, burgers and dogs, chicken and tuna salads. I also had to make a edibleeastend.com
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Cookbooks AG: I tend more now to go to Epicurious online if I’m trying to make something up and I just want ideas. I’ll scan a bunch of recipes and make my own version. But I like t he cookbooks. Astier de Villatte china AG: Tis company in France makes it. We’ve been collecting it for years and years. It’s a black or dark-gray clay with a white slick. It’s really a simple idea. I don’ don’tt think thin k there’s anything like l ike it. Places you like to go? AG: Nick and oni’s. I like North Fork able and I love the Vine Wine & Café up there [in Greenport]. Greenport]. And I like Vine Street Café. I think Cittanuova does a really great job. Te nice thing is that most of the restaurants rest aurants around here seem to be aware of using local produce and supporting local farmers. Tat matters to me. EF: Almond (excellent). utto il Giorno (though I am not treated well there). Dockside (lunch in summer on the patio, can’t be beat). Dining table AG: Our dining room table was made by Eric’s former assistant, a great woodworker named om Brokish who now lives in Portland, Maine, but still does custom work down here for us and others. He and Eric worked on the design together. We have some pretty ambitious dinners here. I get nervous cooking and planning, but once I pull it off, when everyone is enthusiastic and happy,, I’m happy. happy happy. I do Christmas Chris tmas or Christmas C hristmas Eve dinner. Every year with friends, which is really nice. I’ve done Tanksgiving for years and years and years. Te occasional birthday party. And big dinner parties in the summer. EF: For me all our dinners blend together into one continu ous love affair with friends.
couple of pies and cinnamon-raisin buns each morning. Tey were edible but not pretty. I could never get the fruit to gel, so when I sliced into the pie, the crust collapsed and fruit pooled. No one complained but no one offered to help me figure it out either. Two Bengal cats AG: We got one from a friend and another from the Southampton Animal Shelter [Gornik is an active supporter of the Southampton Animal Shelter Foundation]. We take our cats for walks on leashes. When they t hey see something outside it’s really cute. Tey go boing, boing. Tey bounce, like igger in Winnie the Pooh. Breadmaking supplies (including assorted flours, measuring containers, scale and and artine Bread cookbook) AG: Tis is his olive bread from a few days ag o. It’s It’s really delicious. He also makes an amazing walnut loaf. Tat’s my favorite. EF: I’m not not a baker. I just ma ke some bread.
Brian Halweil is the editor of Edible East End. End .
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CULT OF TASTE
FATHER AND MOTHE MO THER R NATUR NAT URE E Joe and Alexandra Macari and their bottles brimming with biodiversity. BY AMY ZAVATTO PHOTOGRAPHS PHO TOGRAPHS BY MATTHEW FUR MA N
Bring up a word like “organic” around Joe and Alexandra Mac ari, and you won’t won’t get the reaction that you think th ink you might get from this 16-year-old producer known by many for their organic-leaning approach to farming; in fac t, it kind of feels like the “O” word around their 450 or so acres. Not because they don’t believe in these principles of farming, or because they aren’ aren’tt very, very good stewards of the t he land—they do and they are. Very much so. It’s just that as far as the Macaris are concerned, the only thing you can reliably stick a label on is a bottle; outside of that, words are just words. Te real stuff is in the soil. “I think it [can be] a marketing tool to get people to buy things,” says Alexandra, when we talk about the countrywide embrace of organics in everything from meat to cleaning products to wine. “We know what’s in the bottle is right; I see the biodiversity in our vineyards.” Since they started the winery with Joe’s parents—Joe Sr. and Katherine—in 1995, the Macaris have embraced the principles of biodynamics—the farming ideals develop developed ed by Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner in the 19 1920s. 20s. A nd while Steiner’s theories may be better known for their unconventional, seemingly loopy methods (head-scratchers like the iconic manure-filled buried cow horns and a strologically based planting schedules), their greater good is firmly rooted in a practical, holistic, all-encompassing view of the land and all that surrounds it. It’s about keeping and maintaining a healthy environment; something the Macaris are more than just a little passionate about. “It’s a year-round business,” says Joe one autumn afternoon just around harvest time on a tour we take across the vast acreage Macari holds. Tis year, the wet, unpredictable unpredictable season th at was 2011 201 1 was hard ha rd on every farmer, fa rmer, and Joe is quick to point out some of the problems in the vineyard— browning leaves here, rot there, which is the big reason he says that going for organic certification in the Northeast is challenging. “A year like this? It’s tough,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s blood and sweat and tears.” (And, as it so happens, Red Hook Winery, the three-year-old urban winemaking project owned by the cross-country force of Napa’s Abe Schoener and Robert Foley, New York’s Mark Snyder and Max 54
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Loubiere, and Michael Cinque rounding things out in Amagansett, Long Island, who purchase their fruit from Macari, nodded to Joe’s toil by christening ch ristening their chardonnay “Joe’s ears.”) ears.”) “Joe really takes it hard,” says Alexandra about plants that aren’t happy. “We “We try to cheer c heer him up, and tell him, h im, ‘It’s going to be great!’ but he’s pretty hard on himself if the vineyard v ineyard isn’t happy.” happy.” If you wound back a couple of decades, creating planting schedules based on the stars and planets in the sky isn’t exactly where the couple thought they’d be. Not by a longshot. Alexandra was an IV F nurse at Lenox Hill Hospital—a job she t horoughly loved and still speaks passionately about; Joe was a property manager and
real estate developer based in Jackson Heights, Queens. But 40 or so years ago, Joe Sr. had purchased over 500 acres of potato farmland, renting the plots to local loca l farmers and introducing Joe Jr. to the wide-open spaces and salty charms of the North Fork. After he and Alexandra met and married, they began to spend summers here, renting a house and stopping in at the now-defunct Mattituck Hills Winery for some casual swirling and sipping fun, buying a few bottles here and there to take back home. Little did they know they’d end up owning that very piece of property—where the North Road tasting room sits today—and its now well-established merlot vines. By the early ’90s, it got harder and harder to leave the weekends
Searching steward: Joe Macari, and his wife, Alexandra, who have planted 100 acres of vines since t he early 1990s, say they have learned that the choices you make in the vineyard affect more than the ultimate life of the plants. behind, and Joe and Alexandra decided to move out to Mattituck full-time. At first, Joe commuted back and forth forth while Alexandra Alexa ndra was busy raising their then three children, with a fourth that would soon be on the way. Joe Sr. had been keeping an eye on the burgeoning wine industry, and approached his son and daughter-in-law about giving a winery a go. Tey started with an ambitio ambitious us 60 planted acres in edibleeastend.com
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Macari’s Urbanik Urbanik is a patient, patient, observing and a nd thoughtful kind of winemaker; laid-back and trusting of the good fruit Joe cultivates out out in the vineyard. vineya rd. Her imprint imprint tends toward wines that are a re the best possib possible le expression of themselves; incredibly aromatic and much less manipulated. 1995 on the land his dad bought all those years ago. “We thought we were too big!” laughs Alexandra. A couple of years later, they planted 40 more. And while they learned from their mistakes and successes (“Now we’ve we’ve learned that t hat lower yields make ma ke for better-tasting fruit,” f ruit,” says Alexandra), they also learned that farming is a very imperfect, beautiful, frustrating occupation, but one in which the choices you make affect more than the ultimate life of the plants. A conversation with a potato-farming friend clued Joe into the notion that many of the chemicals used in farming sprays were related to those used to create the Vietnam warfare herbicide Agent Orange—from that early point, he knew that this wasn’t what he wanted to work with, and he began to study st udy the tenets of ecological and biodynamic farming. “I’ve known the Macaris’ wines pretty much since they started,” says Chris Miller, wine director at the Living Room at the Maidstone Arms in East Hampton, whose list focuses on sustainably minded producers. “I look for family-owned wineries,” says Miller. “Places where [the owner’s] children play there. You especially find this in Europe where domaine owners plan on passing the property to their offspring, so they take care of land in a better manner; take it to a higher level. And the Macaris have done that.” In fact, in the Macaris’ measured approach to chemical use, Miller finds some old-world precedent. “It’s what Europeans call lutte raisonnée ,” ,” says Miller. “What it means is if you’re in a region where it’s difficult or dangerous to the health of the vineyard to be 100 percent biodynamic and organic”—like in Long Island’s prevailing damp conditions, for instance—“you do the best you can and kill-off [pests and fungus] in the most gentle manner that you can so you don’t lose your vineyard. Macari is doing a wonderful job of this.” oday, the Macaris have 200 acres under vine—which include merlot, cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon, pinot noir, syrah, petit verdot, malbec, chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, and viognier—and from the get-go they eschewed chemical nitrogen in favor of a soilenrichment program fed from nutrient-balancing “teas” (a sort of liquid soil booster that Alexandra coaxes from a mix of nettles and compost) and offerings from the mountain-high compost pile made up of leaves, vegetables, horse manure, and fish heads, tails and bones. Tey encourage the natural insect population and native area plants for cover crops. Joe has planted around 200 of those manurefilled horns around the property to jibe with Steiner’s soil and plant vitality program. And while Joe readily admits to the need to spray 56
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for things like powdery mildew, especially in years as particularly uncooperative on the East End as 2011, he never uses chemical fertilizers or insecticides. “Tere are a lot of things that are wrong between the cosmos and the earth; we need to fix it. And I know I’m both part of the problem and the solution, but that’s my struggle.” Te rest of the 450 acres, which include a second tasting room and its surrounding property in Cutchogue on the North Road that they acquired in 2008, are filled with a treasure of biodiversity. biodiversity. As lovely at the North Fork is, the beauty of their propert y is still something to behold, and riding around it feels a bit like you’ve entered another romantic world. Maybe the Loire Valley or perhaps even some gently hilly countryside in Virginia. But no, it’s just lovely Long Island, allowed to flourish and grow under good stewardship: Tere are wetlands, woods of birch and locust, thickets of cattails, goldenrod and wildflowers, and, if you go far enough, a cliff that overlooks the rolling waters of the Sound. Sequestered in large, open pens around the property are grazing longhorn cattle, rabbits, pigs, goats, turkeys and chickens. Tere are 70 beehives tucked into funny square houses that look like an oddball sort of outdoor filing cabinet system in three different spots scattered around the property. Tere are 30 acres of corn for feed; there’s an enormous greenhouse where they grow a mind-boggling amount of peppers, multiple kinds of tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, herbs, nettles and a fig tree, too, nodding to Joe’s Frosinone, Italy, born grandparents. With all the changing, thriving, growing life cycles on in the vineyard, there have been changes indoors at the winery, too. In July 2010, Paola Valverde of Chile, Macari’s main winemaker for seven years, left. In I n her place easily slipped Kelly Urbanik, a name you might know from her years spent at the former Bedell offshoot, Corey Creek. A native of Healdsburg in the heart of Napa, California, Urbanik fell hard for the East Coast, and the way she came to Macari was about as natural as it gets. She met Joe and Alexa ndra’s daughter, Gabriella, on a beach volleyball team, striking up a friendship in 2006 that would lead her eventually to the Macaris’ door. Urbanik is a patient, observing and thoughtful kind of winemaker; laid-back and trusting of the good fruit Joe cultivates out in the vineyard, with a desire for wines that really show a sense of the blocks in which they are planted, and the expression of the vintage from which they came. Her imprint tends toward wines that are the best possible expression of themselves; incredibly aromatic and
much less manipulated, and some early tastings prove extremely promising. We barrel-tasted through a few fe w of her reds from the 2010 vintage—a floral, elegant, plushy cabernet franc from a plot near Bergen Road; another from older vines full of pretty, ripe plum and blackberry notes with none of the abrasive greenness that cab fran can sometimes have; an expressive, intense, vibrant merlot from the vines that stretch out behind the Mattituck tasting room, all rich, juicy black cherries, blackberries and tobacco that already was such a journey on the palate at this young point in its life. here are other recent changes, too, to keep up with their 17,000-ca 17 ,000-case-a-year se-a-year production. production. Around the t he same time Kelly arrived, the Macaris added a new barrel cellar, a new private dining room for special parties with a great little tricked-out kitchen down the hall, as well as a bright new windowed tasting area with doors leading to a patio that looks out upon the vines of Block C, the original merlot acreage. Tere’s the second tasting room, too, on Route 25, with a pretty copper-topped bar that the Macaris acquired from a nearby restaurant. And around the main tasting room in Mattituck are flags from other nations, representing the homelands of some of their 40 or so employees (and nodding to Alexandra’s Argentine family background). “Wine has no borders,” offers Joe. “We don’t sit around drinking our own wine every night. If you don’t get out and try the wines and food of other places, how can you judge your own?” But like any vineyard owner, he does of course judge his own, starting at the ground level. Because, really, it all amounts to a hill of badly grown bea ns to them if the la nd isn’t isn’t any good. “Te soil is alive,” he says. “It’s hard farming, but doing things this way revitalizes it; it connects to everything.” Amy Zavatto grew up on Shelte r Island and writes about food, wine and spirits from her home on Staten Island.
FARM ON LAND AND AT SEA. Give Support.
Why not sign your loved one, or yourself, up for an associate membership in the Long Island Farm Bureau, which is available for nonfarmers interested in the future of our agricultural community. Enjoy member benefits and be a part of the lobby for $80 per year. lifb.com Or, learn to grow shellfish with SPA; $150 gets you a year’s worth of classes, your own shellfish garden and 1,000 oyster seed. ccesuffolk.org
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HAPPENINGS
A COUPLE WEDS IN WATER MILL International fare for a pioneering state ceremony. BY LAUREL BERGER
PHOTOGRAPHS PHO TOGRAPHS BY JENNY GORMA N
Editor’s Note: We Note: We shared in the pride people felt this past summer s ummer when Governor Cuomo made New York York the sixth sixt h state, and largest state, to legalize gay marriage. And, naturally, we were curious about what food would be served at the first weddings sanctioned by this law. At Gracie Mansion, our friends at Great Performances had the privilege of catering the Sunday-morning Sunday-m orning ceremony officiated by Mayor Bloomberg, complete with Montauk seafood and Long Island wines, Hudson Valley vegetables and local cheeses, poultry and beef, Brooklyn-brewed beers, and even bouquets and floral arrangements picked the day before the wedding from the fields of the caterer’s own Katchkie Farm. We had the pleasure of attending one of the first gay marriages in Suffolk County, the town hall ceremony of Alan Ceppos and Frédéric Rambaud, followed by an all-day celebration at their home in Water Mill. What follows is a play-by-play of the locavore-tinged international specialties they assembled, as chronicled by Laurel Berger and photographed by Jenny Gorman.
WAER MILL—Te East End of Long Island is no outpost of North Africa n culture. If you were to marry here, and if you wanted, say, a unisian unisian delicac y like droigts de la mariée , or bride’s fingers, at the reception, you might make them yourself (a bad idea) or you could ring Martine Abitbol, a Shelter Island chef reared in unisia and France whom I love to cook c ook with. Alan Al an Ceppos and Frédéric Rambaud, the owners of the Hamptons Hamptons Honey Company, wisely chose the latter course of action. On July 26, at 10:30 in the morning, the two became the first firs t gay couple to wed in Southampton. Ceppos, a New Yorker with deep-set eyes in a moon face, and Rambaud, a slender, handsome Frenchman from Senegal,
After the Ceppos-Rambaud wedding dinner, the staff and newlyweds posed, including, back row from left, Frédéric Rambaud, Cody Simons and Alan Ceppos, and, front row from left, the author, Martine Abitbol, Gabrielle Apparu, Jill Doherty and Anne Apparu. Sealed with a meal:
lived together in Paris for 10 years, where they developed a taste for the unisian cuisine that Abitbol grew up with. Having long enjoyed her food, which draws on the t he traditions of unisia’s unisia’s Sephardi, Arab, A rab, Berber and Italian communities, Ceppos and Rambaud engaged Abitbol to cater a feast for 45 guests, to be held that evening. edibleeastend.com
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Te ingredients of a marriage: marriage: Clockwise, from above, Rambaud samples the fare as the cooks prepare; thin-skinned peppers purchased that afternoon from an old farmer on Shelter Island; Abitbol frying homemade rolls, a Tunisian specialty called “fricassée” (Each was split down the middle and stuffed with méchouia just before serving.); as the guests arrive, the t he first batch of droigts de la mariée were deep-fried until golden; the finished fricassée; a Judeo-Tunisian feast begins with an array of kemia or cold mixed appetizers. 60
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Recruited to help with the preparations, I met Abitbol and her capable daughter, the chef Anne Apparu, at the wedding couple’s 15acre farm and compound on the afternoon of the dinner. At sunset massive loaves of semolina dough were still rising, platters heaped with lamb awaited the grill, and buckets of summer vegetables had not yet been dealt with for the couscous. And, of course, there were those doigts de la mariée —sheets —sheets of brick, a fragile tissue-thin pastr y, filled, in this variation, with minced shrimp flavored with cilantro, lemon and garlic, and rolled into neat scrolls before being tossed into the deep fryer. Tough bride’s fingers are labor-intensive and fiddly— the pastry leaves must be kept moist or they will break apart in your hands—this wouldn’t be a unisian wedding without them. Soon the guests were at the door, arriving from Europe, India, Africa Afr ica and the borough of Queens. A few locals filtered in. Checking my sheet pan of digits, some emaciated, others pudgy, I glanced at the clock, which read half past seven. Ceppos and Rambaud wandered into the kitchen. kitchen. Dressed in caftans c aftans of shimmering silk, they looked like caliphs or extremely prosperous North African merchants. “More hot pepper!” Rambaud mock-commanded after tasting the méchouia méchouia,, a mash of grilled sweet peppers, tomatoes, onions, tuna, capers and preserved lemons. “But not too much, we don’t want the taste buds overexcited.” Abitbol, who is small and agile, was a picture of serenity, as if it had not crossed her mind that unless all the elements of this meal came together snappety-snap, we’d be responsible for the first gay divorce in the Hamptons. For a moment, I’d forgotten that she comes from a long line of brilliant cooks who are always in control. (I once witnessed her octogenarian mother bang out, chez Abitbol, an elaborate dinner for 10 featuring pkaila featuring pkaila,, a Jewish-unisian wedding stew of beef and greens. Later Madame remarked that she had completed the most onerous bit the day before, at her Paris apartment. Tat an elderly woman managed to smuggle a suspicious jar of a dark, viscous substance—spinach paste—past a irport security officials is a feat as a s impressive as it is worrisome.) “ Allez Allez les enfants ,” ,” Abitbol murmured, “Un “Un dernier effort et c’est fini .” .” And then she told Apparu to take the minina from the fridge and prepare it for serving. Part frittata, part terrine, enriched with hard-cooked eggs and chicken, minina, eaten cold, is a Jewishunisian dish served at weddings and celebrations. (In the past, calves’ brains were a common addition, but Abitbol says that almost no one includes them anymore.) You You bake the mixture m ixture in a cake pan until firm, fi rm, slosh on a ladle of chicken broth and cool it in the fridge. Some describe minina as a casserole but they’re wrong; with its custardy texture, it’s closer to a flan. According to Te Encyclopedia of Jewish Food , minina used to be prepared in a skillet. Once the top was set, the minina was inverted onto a plate and eased back into the skillet ski llet to cook the other side—just side—jus t like a Spanish potato omelet. Tis makes ma kes me wonder if Jewish exiles from Spain might not have brought the dish to unisia. How else to 62
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account for that mellifluous name with its ancient Castilian ring? Anyway, when the wedding party arrives, a rrives, you whip out the pan, cut the minina into cubes and have the servant offer it to the guests with small wedges of lemon, complemented by excellent sundry hors d’oeuvres, d’oe uvres, while the cooks proceed calmly with the rest of the feast. Te bride’s fingers dipped in harissa were a triumph. Te chicken with preserved lemons and okra was pronounced sublime. All savored the arissa arissa,, a semolina and honey cake meant to evoke the sweetness of life. Perhaps it affected the new couple: at the end of the evening, as Apparu made room in the freezer for a tray t ray of leftover lamb couscous next to a stash of good old cherry blintzes, Rambaud happily assured us that neither groom has any plans for a second marriage. Laurel Berger is an arts writ er in Sag Harbor. MARINE ABIBOL’S MININA (For eight) 10 free-range organic eggs, lightly beaten 4 hard-boiled eggs, roughly diced 1.5 lbs. chicken breast and thighs, on the bone (about half a chicken) A large handful ha ndful of bread, crumbs only, only, pulled from a good country loaf 3 c. homemade chicken stock or water 5 . olive oil (or more) ½ lemon or lime, cut into small wedges Salt and pepper to taste Preheat the oven to 375°. In a stockpot, poach the chicken in homemade chicken stock or salted water for 25–30 minutes, skimming off any impurities that rise to the surface. When the chicken is no longer pink, remove and discard the skin, but leave some fat, which will give the minina flavor. Pull the meat from the bones and roughly chop it. Combine the chicken with the hard-cooked eggs in a medium-size bowl. At this point, if you poached the chicken in water, return the bones to the pot and continue cooking them for another hour until you have a good-tasting broth; otherwise, proceed with the recipe. In a small bowl, b owl, moisten the bread with ¼–½ cup of stock. Grease a 9-inch cake pan with a generous quantity of olive oil. Warm the pan in the oven. (Tis operation should only take a minute or two. If the oil begins to smoke, clean the pan pa n and start star t over.) over.) Wring out the bread and add it to the bowl with the chicken and hard-boiled eggs. ip in the beaten eggs and season the mixture aggressively with sea salt and fresh-cracked black pepper, then, wearing oven mitts, pour it into the prepared pan and cover the pan. Bake the minina for 15–20 minutes until firm. When it is done, turn off the oven, and ladle on a half-cup of chicken stock, freezing the rest for another use. Return the pan to the unlit oven for another 10 minutes or so, until most of the stock has been absorbed. Chill the minina in the refrigerator. Serve in cubed pieces garnished with small wedges of lemon.
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HEIRLOOMS
CHEESE CHEE SE LADD L ADDERS, ERS, FI FIR R K IN INS, S, BABY BA BY CAG C AGES ES AND OTHER COOKING CURIOSITIES Why should historical societies look in their pantries? BY BRIAN HALWEIL
EAS HAMPON—Of H AMPON—Of all the beautiful, puzzling puzzling and seemingly anachronistic objects from What’s Cooking: East Hampton Kitchens 1648–1948 , an exhibit that ran at the East Hampton Historical Society this past fall, the one that resonated most with me was the “baby cage,” an ominous—and unfortunately named—wooden container where a 17th-century mother cooking at an open fire or massive wood stove could quickly stow any toddler that might wander too close to the hearth. (Tink of it as a Pack-’N-Play, only not foldable and painted a very dark shade of black.) Te baby cage had a sort of feeding tray where a baby might find food or toys, and as historical society director Richard Barons discreetly pointed out to our tour group, little holes drilled through the bottom of the boxshape container. “For drainage,” he added quietly. We’re re always looking for useful usef ul tips on cooking and eating wisew isely with young children. Te baby cage, although long extinct, shows that sometimes the right way to involve kids in kitchen tasks is to not involve them, so the parent can get on with preparing the meal, tidying and everything else we need to do to keep a home. But this petite and meticulously displayed exhibit of 300 items, curated by Barons and Frank Newbold, the chair of the society’s collection committee, provides inspiration and guidance for our locavore-leaning modern food ways. Consider the extensive evidence it presents that barter and small-scale backyard homesteading were essential parts of East Hampton culture until just a half century ago. Te diversity of butter churns and butter molds found in the society’s collection, and gathered from local households, shows that most people made their own butter and many probably kept a cow in the yard (or had access to fresh milk from nearby). Te society’s collection includes at least 10 cheese ladders—used to make square wheels of cheese—indicating to Barons that, at a certain time, “probably every home on Main Street owned one. “Cheese curds were one of the most popular homemade treats in the 1700s.” People People who regularly drank d rank coffee probably roasted it at home, and definitely ground it—by hand— at home. A long wall-mounted display of hearth tools demon-
strates that open fire cooking need not be purely utilitarian or blunt. Tere were tools for keeping exact temperature, precise cutting and careful browning of the tops of pastries. Instead of immersion blenders blenders and food processors, t here were berry mashers (as opposed to potato mashers), meat juice presses and sugar sheers. Even if cheese ladders have been replaced by more modern tools and techniques, today’s DIY cu lture might feel at home with some of these objects, or might be creative enough to replicate their uses, sort of like Sarah Lohman, the Queens-based historical gastronomist who took on the task of making ice cream from 1890. Consider an egg boiler intended to be placed on a t able in a sort of performance art: boiling water was poured in the bottom, six eggs fit above, and the device was shut for as long as it took for the top-mounted hourglass to run out, when the top would be opened and the eggs divvied up. We may not encounter the same sort of craftspersonship in cookware today. “Like so many things in the 19th century, it’s over-engineered,” Barons said of a tabletop butter churn that had assorted drainage gutters to catch any spillage, or baking tins that were keystoned ever so slightly to allow easy extraction of whatever was baking. Rolling pins and butter molds were made from lignum vitae, a super-hard Caribbean wood brought North by 18th-century whalers. Tere are stackable sieves and corner cupboards with precisely routed slots for particular tools that would make Ikea designers drool. Tis exhibit, on display at the Clinton Academy Museum at 151 Main Street in East Hampton, was actually the culmination of nearly three years of research. Historical societies all over Long Island had conferred on a topic that they might jointly present, and settled on food. So far, the East Hampton Historical Society show is the only one that has actually been mounted. Hopefully, it will serve to prompt some of the other historical societies to dust off their butter churns and baby cages this winter. For hours and more information, visit easthamptonhistory.org. easthamp tonhistory.org.
Support wine shops that stock local wine and spirits: Michael’s in Riverhead has a whole room, as does Showcase in Southold. Domaine Franey in East Eas t Hampton is bulking up their selection of New York spirits. spirits. MOM AND POP SHOPS. Drink Local.
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y t e i c o S l a c i r o t s i H n o t p m a H t s a E e h t f o y s e t r u o C : s h p a r g o t o h P
Blue-green Greek revival corner cupboard (circa 1830) bursting with yellow-ware (circa 1850-1920).
Mortar and pestle, circa 1740.
Apple peeler, circa 1888.
Hearth tools (circa 1750–1850). Te collection includes peels, toasters, grills, flesh forks, heart-shaped trivets and choppers.
Ingeniously improvised apple paring device.
Butter print, circa 1870.
Te Ideal Stewart Stove (circa 1905) is surrounded by an amazing array ar ray of special and everyday kitchen items used by our East End ancestors.
Nutmeg grater, circa 1880.
Baby Cage, used by East End mothers in the 1800s to keep baby safe while cooking over an open fire, either indoors or outdoors.
Clam shucker (circa 1880) and clam basket (circa 1800).
y t e i c o S l a c i r o t s i H n o t p m a H t s a E e h t f o y s e t r u o C : s h p a r g o t o h P
Te Davis Swing butter churn, circa 1879.
Salt-glazed & Redware bottles, crocks and jugs, gathered from New York State, circa 1790–1860. 66
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Cheese baskets and cheese ladders (circa 1850s) and Fruit Press (circa 1920) 1920) used predominantly by our East Eas t End ancestors for making ma king apple cider.
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VISUAL VICTUALS
COLDSEASON CLAMMING Tere are hearty harvesters behind your winter chowder. STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHS BY CHRISTOPHER FANJUL
SOUHOLD—In early winter, when some East Enders are squirreling away thick-skinned squash in preparation for the long months seemingly barren of local produce, produce, a hearty handful of men are just gearing up for their harvest. Clamming season on Arshamomaque (or Hashamomuck) Pond, a body of salt water quietly sprawling between the Bay and the Sound, requires some special equipment equipment and a certa in thickness of blood. Te water is sha llow llow,, making it warm in the summer and thus perfect for the fast growth of mollusks, but also prone to freezing after a few chilly January nights. Te clammers come clad in neoprene waders and armed with long-handled rakes, and upon entering the water, attach to themselves a floating s creen and a collecting basket. Below their feet are hard-shell clams, “happy” and scattered across the sandy bottom among stones and debris. In order to bring his prey to the surface, a clammer must sink the tines of a large basket-rake into the bottom and slowly work the rake across a patch, using a tugging motion that looks like someone trying to uproot a stubborn sapling. Once brought to t he surface and washed of mud, the catch is separated from the stones and tossed in the screen to sort out anything anyt hing under one inch before eventually being moved to the basket in batches.
An early, still morning on Arshamomaque Pond, just east of the Port of Egypt Marina in Southold.
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All this is accomplished under the watchful gaze of diving mergansers, which seem equally impervious to the water’s chill. Te clams will wi ll be loaded into the back of a pickup and deposited at seafood markets on the East End and in Nassau County, where they will be sorted by size into littlenecks, cherrystones and chowder clams. While clams might not drum up the same excitement as the first tomatoes of summer, they are a long-standing and flavorful element of local cuisine, and hopefully will be for years to come. Christopher Fanjul lives in Southol d and plans to forage mushrooms, oysters and goat cheese all winter long.
A good rake and warm war m gloves help pull in a bucket of clams. Northern Quahogs ( Mercenar Mercenaria ia mercenaria mercenaria), ), also called “hard-shell clams” to distinguish them from “soft-shell” steamers, conveniently packed in ice from the pond. Te long-handled rake is rested on a clammer’s shoulder to get better leverage. Te clams will wil l be sorted from the stones and then kept alive in the floating basket. edibleeastend.com
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ADVERTISERS DIRECTORY FARMS Balsam Farms Specializing in growing high-quality produce and cut flowers. flowers. Find these and other gourmet items at our farm stand in Amagansett at the corner of Town Lane and Windmill Ln., open June–Nov. balsamfarms.com Fairview Farm at Mecox This family-run fa rm bordering Mecox Bay specializes in beautiful herbs, fruit and vegetables, one-of-a-kind bunches of cut flowers, Mecox Bay Dairy cheeses, Berkshire pigs and fresh pastured chicken and duck eggs. The famous 8-acre corn maze is open Labor Day through Nov. 8. Farm stand at 19 Horsemill Ln., Bridgehampton, 631.537.1445, cornfieldmaze.com Garden of Eve Organic Farm Market & Garden Center This Riverhead farm offers a large selection of organic vegetable & herb plants, annuals and perennials, as well as their own organic heirloom vegetables, cut flowers, and freerange pastured eggs, on site from April 1 until Thanksgiving. And at farmers markets in Westhampton Beach, Mt. Sinai, and Williamsburg, Brooklyn, as well as through CSAs on the farm, across Long Island, in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. 4558 Sound Ave. (at Northville Tpk.), Riverhead Riverhead,, 631.722.8777, 631 .722.8777, gardenofevefarm.com gardenofevefa rm.com Golden Earthworm Organic Farm Celebrating over 13 years of beautiful certified organic produce and communitysupported agriculture (CSA) Program, they look forward to welcoming you all into their growing farm community. Join now for the 2010 CSA which runs June through November with 28 pick-up locations in Suffolk, Nassau, and Queens Counties. 652 Peconic Bay Blvd., Jamesport, 631.722.3302, goldenearthworm.com Green Thumb Organic Farm Farmed by the Halsey family since the 1640s, this 100-acre property is the oldest organic farm in NYS, and is biodynamic, too. The roadside farm stand offers over 300 varieties of vegetables, fruit, herbs, flowers and seedlings, a nd other products made by local artisans. Weekend pony rides and fall farm tours. Montauk Hwy., Water Mill, 631.726.1900 The Milk Pail Farm, Orchard & Greenhouses A farm-family tradition in Water Mill offering U-pick apples and pears, pumpkins, cider, cider donuts, donuts, peaches, cherries, f lowers and more.. Montauk Highway between Water more Mill and Bridgehampto Bridgehampton, n, milk-pail.com) Pike Farms This one-stop farm stand features strawberries, raspberries, early greenhouse tomatoes, field tomatoes and famous sweet corn—as well as fruits, granola, f lowers, pies pies and artisanal breads. breads . Wholesale available. Sagg Main M ain St., Sagaponack, 631. 631.537 537.5854 .5854 Sang Lee Farms This Peconic farms offers organic vegetables and herbs, local artisanal products, and their own line of dressings, dips, cooking sauces, prepared and preserved foods. foods . Visit website to learn about events, classes, CSA and farmers markets. 25180 County Rd. 48, Peconic, 631.734.7001, sangleefarms.com Quail Hill Farm One of the original CSAs in the country with over 200 members enjoying organic produce and field-grown flowers, Quail
Hill also provides produce to a local school, food pantries, a farmers market and local restaurants. Only proven sustainable farming techniques are used. Synthetic insecticides, herbicides, fungicides and fertilizers are avoided. Deep Ln. and Side Hill Ln., Amagansett, 283.3195, peconiclandtrust.org Springfield Creamery This family business offers history, a commitment to values and a short list of healthf ul ingredients as their recipe for success—50 years and counting. Producers of high-quality cultured dairy and soy products that are uncompromising in their commitment to simple, healthy and all-natural ingredients, Springfield Creamery has been a pioneer of cultured yogurt production within the natural foods industry. A commitment to providing the most healthful products to the largest number of people has earned Springfield Creamery recognition, like Oregon Tilth’s “2009 Organic Producer of the Year” award, and Oregon Organic Coalition’s Coa lition’s 2010 2010 “Processor of the Year” award. nancysyogurt.com FARMERS MARKETS The Community Farmers Market at the Hayground School A collaborative school-community farmers market on Fridays, Memorial Day weekend-Labor Day weekend from 3-6:30 p.m., on the beautiful grounds of the Hayground School. Locally grown produce (including student-grown seedlings, vegetables and flowers), seafood, farmstead cheeses, European-style baked goods, wine, organic infused infus ed olive oils, spreads and fresh pasta, pizza and more. 15 151 1 Mitchell Ln., Bridgeha mpton, 631.987 631.987.3553 .3553 East Hampton Farmers Market Nestled in the parking lot of Hamptons landmark restaurant Nick & Toni’s, this Friday market features locally grown vegetables and fruit, honey, farmstead cheeses, mushrooms, colorful plants and flowers, goat’s milk fudge, the best baguette on Long Island, wine, fabulous French bakery items, local seafood and homespun llama wool. wool. 136 North Main St., East Hampton, 631.324.3550 Sag Harbor Farmers Market This bayfront market offers local and organic produce, artisanal baked goods, raw-milk cheeses, pickles, seafood, mushrooms, honey, wine and flowers and herbs.. Bay and Burke St., Sag Harbor. herbs Westhampton Beach Farmers Market 40+ farmers, growers and producers all from Long Island! The largest farmers market in the Hamptons offering local bounty . Rain or Shine, Saturdays 9 a.m.–1 p.m., May 7–Nov 19, 2011. 85 Mill Rd (Village Municipal Municip al Parking Lot next to the WHB Historical Society). 631.288.3337, info@ westhamptonbeachfarmersmarket.com, WesthamptonBeachFarmersMarket.com COFFEE ROASTERS Hampton Coffee Company The award-winning coffee roastery, espresso bar, & bakery with locations in Water Mill and Westhampton Beach, features smallbatch hand-roasted Arabica beans. It offers an authentic Mexican grill gril l menu at the Water Mill full-service café, and breakfast, lunch and outdoor seating at both locations, as well as their new Mobile Espresso Unit. Water Mill & Westhampton Beach, 631.726. COFE, hamptoncoffeeco hamptoncoffeecompany.co mpany.com m
Whether you are buying or selling a home, I provide personal service to meet your individual needs. Representing waterfront and inland properties throughout the North Fork; I can help you achieve your real-estate dreams. Contact me directly for a free property evaluation or a tour of North Fork properties.
Nicole LaBella VP, Associate Broker
516.652.8888 | corcor corcoran.com/labella an.com/labella northforkwaterfrontproperties.com The Corcoran Group is a licensed real estate broker. Owned and operated by NRT LLC.
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BREWERIES Fire Island Beer Company Fire Island Beer Company crafts worldclass beers inspired by the color, character and delicious experience of Fire Island, NY. Look for Fire Island Lighthouse Ale and Red Wagon IPA at your favorite restaurant, beer bar or beverage store. fireislandbeer.com Greenport Harbor Brewery Located at the very end of Long Island, Greenport Harbor Brewery specializes in making fresh small batch craft ale, with the mission to constantly challenge people’s notion of what a beer can be. Visit them at the brewery, online or at the bars, restaurants, and beverage centers (growlers) who carry them. 234 Carpenter St., Greenport, 631.477.6681, harborbrewing.com
Beacon Restaurant Waterfront dining with groovy sunsets, Waterfront Beacon serves solid American fare in the comfort of a great bar and leather banquettes.. Available for private functions. quettes 8 W. Water St., Sag Ha rbor, 725.7088 725.7088 Blackwell’s Restaurant Perfectly located at the gateway to L ong Island Wine Country, Blackwell’s offers exceptional pairings with prime dry-aged steaks and chops and fresh local seafood.. 141 Fairway Dr., Wading River. food 631.929.1200, greatrockgolfclub.com
Ciao Bella Senhora Veteran restaurateur and family offer exceptional Northern Italian cuisine and delicious Portuguese specialties, with delicacies from Brazil and France. International wines paired with the finest flavored churrasco Southampton Publick House The East End’s first microbrewery restau- wood-fired rotisserie meats, poultr y, and seawelcome! 322 West Montauk rant offers Long Island’s finest casual din- food. Foodies welcome!322 ing alongside handcrafted ales and lagers, Hwy, Hampton Bays, 631.728.2218, which are also available at specialty beer ciaobellasenhora.com. bars and restaurants throughout New Fresno Restaurant England.. 40 Bowden Sq., Southampton, Serving regional American cuisine nightEngland 283.2800, publick.com ly, year-round, Fresno boasts a zinc-top bar, warm lighting and patio seating RESTAURANTS in season. season. Prix fixe menu available. 8 A Lure Chowderhouse & Oysteria Fresno Pl., East Hampton, 324.8700 The North Fork’s latest waterfront restaurant featuring local seafood and spirits with The Frisky Oyster a nouveau flair. flair. Enjoy the views of Southold Chef/owner Robert Beaver offers imaginaBay whether inside our cozy dining room tive cuisine in the sophisticated, metroor relaxing on our luxurious wrap around politan atmosphere craved by locals and deck. 62300 Main Rd., R d., Rte. 25, Southold; visitors for years. His menu changes daily to showcase the most exceptional, local 631.876.53 631 .876.5300; 00; alurenorthfork.com ingredients from Pipes Cove, KK’s, Sep’s A Mano Osteria & Wine Bar Tuscan dining with highlight on delec- and Satur Farms to name a few. The local table local fare, produce and cheese from and international wine list is personally the North Fork’s bounty, paired with selected to complement the current menu. an extensive Italian and local wine list. list . Dinner is available in their stylish dining 631.298.4800; amanorestaurant.com room or at the buzzing bar. DJ Frisky turns up the beat as the energy level rises Almond after 9 p.m. 27 Front St., Greenport, This contemporary French bistro serves 631. 631.477 477.4265, .4265, thefrisk yoyster.com seasonally driven fare, using local and artisanal ingredients, with a year-round Foody’s $24.95 prix fixe and the “Best Dessert Better food for the entire family. Cooking in the Hamptons,” according to Wine from scratch and hand-selecting farm-fresh Spectator. 1 Ocean Road, Bridgehampton, produce, enjoy wood-grilled meats and veggies, house-made mozzarella, hand-stretched 631.537.8885, almondrestaurant.com thin crust pizza and abundant local seafood Amarelle This North Shore culinary gem, which and veggies. Catering available. 760 Montauk overlooks a scenic duck pond in Wading Hwy., Water Mill, 726.FOOD River on the threshold of North Fork wine country, serves up contemporary country cuisine at the skillful hand of co-owner and executive chef Lia Fallon. It features many Long Island wines by the glass to go with the French-inspired dishes that utilize local fruits , cheese, produce and duck. 2028 North Country Road, Wading River. 631.886.2242, amarelle.net Babette’s Babette’s mostly organic menu features world flavors and local produce, vegetarian/vegan cuisine and organic grassfed meats, in a casual-chic atmosphere with cool jazz. Serving breakfast until 4 p.m., lunch and dinner, and offering an organic juice bar, organic wines and full liquor bar. 66 Newtown Ln., East Hampton, 631.329. 631 .329.5377 5377,, babettesrestaura babettesrestaurant.com. nt.com. Bay Burger This Sag Harbor burger joint serves their own freshly ground beef on a homemade brioche-style bun, as well as homemade ice cream (available in Hamptons specialty shops as Joe & Liza’s Ice Cream) and their amazing local fish burger. burger. 1742 Sag Harbor Tpk., Sag Harbor, 631.899.3915, 631.899.3915, bayburger.com baybu rger.com 74
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Jamesport Manor Inn Experience North Fork history and unprecedented local cuisine in the magnificently reconstructed 185 1850’s 0’s Gothic Revival mansion, featuring an extensive list of carefully selected wines, as well as a local artist art gallery . Private dining rooms and catering available. 370 Manor Ln., Jamesport, 631.722.0500, jamesportmanor.com La Fondita La Fondita, “little kitchen,” serves tacos, posole rojo, homemade salsas, sopes, tostadas and other dishes reminiscent of the street food found all over Mexico. A fun and casual atmosphere, offering takeout and seating on picnic tables overlooking the pond. 74 Montauk Hwy., Amagansett, 267 267.8800, .8800, lafondita.net The Little Kitchen Located just outside Sag Harbor, this country restaurant features East End seafood, wines, produce, fruit, vegetables and herbs from the restaurant’s own ga rden rden.. 1615 161 5 Sag Harbor-Bridgehampton Tpk., Sag Harbor, 725.1045, eatshampton.com
Lobster Roll Northside Rowdy Hall The critically acclaimed country version of English pub and French bistro-style the famed Hampton Hampton’s ’s seafooder (LUNCH) cuisine. An Arts-and-Crafts-inspir Arts-and-Crafts-inspired ed operated by the originator! A “must do” restaurant, with beautiful copper-topped dining experience while on the North Fork! bar and soothing fireplace. According 631.369.3039; 631 .369.3039; Lobster Roll.com to local lore, churchgoing locals found the establishment still full of revelers on Luce & Hawkins at Jedediah Sunday mornings and declared it a “rowdy Hawkins Inn This historic Jamesport inn and restaurant hall.” A gathering place for locals and visioffers warm service and a unique “earth to tors alike. 10 Main St., East Hampton, 631.324.8555 24.8555,, rowdyhall.com table” dining experience from acclaimed 631.3 chef Keith Luce. The casual Luce’s Rugosa Restaurant Landing menu is a perfect entry point A year-round destination for modern to discovering the flavors of the North American fine dining in East Hampton. Fork. 400 S. Jamesport Ave., Jamesport, Chef Bill Mammes applies his training in 631.722.2900,jedediahhawkinsinn.com contemporary French cuisine to local, seaNick & Toni’s sonal ingredients delivering a fresh approach A forerunner to the East End’s current to Hamptons Dining. 290 Montauk restaurant community, Nick & Toni’s is Highway, East Hampton, 631.604.1550 631.604.1550 reminiscent of a Tuscan farmhouse. The Scrimshaw Mediterranean- and rustic Italian-influenced This restaura nt’s historic waterfront seasonal menus feature local seafood, probuildings, with panoram ic views, openduce and the harvest from the restaurant’s air dining and drinks on the dock, reflect own organic garden. 136 N. Main St., East Hampton, 631 631.324.35 .324.3550, 50, nickandtonis.com Greenport’s whaling history while its cuisine reflects modern tastes —a blendNoah’s Restaurant ing of classic techniques with Asian and This Greenport restaurant offers a range of global influences. influences . Preston’s Wharf, 102 small plates with inspired takes on tradi- Main St., Greenport, 631.477.8882, tional seafood dishes, with locally-sourced scrimshawrestaurant.com ingredients. Featuring the only raw bar on the North Fork, with local and internation- The Sea Grille at Gurney’s Inn al oysters, as well as wines available in 3- or Overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, the renowned ed Sea Grille ref lects Montauk’s 6-ounce pours. 136 Front St., Greenport, renown fishing legacy offering morning-caught 631.477.6720, chefnoahs.com fish, locally harvested shellfish, farmers North Fork Oyster Company organic produce and regional specialties. North Fork Oyster Company serves creSpa guests choose from world-class menus ative cuisine featuring the freshest local produce and seafood from waters surround- featuring preparations of the freshest ingreing it on the East End of Long Island. Island. Be dients. 290 Old Montauk Hwy., Montauk, 631.668.2660, .668.2660, gurneysinn.com sure to contact us when looking for a place 631 Squiretown Restaurant + Bar This modern American bistro in Hampton Bays offers offers beautiful sa lads, a raw bar, exciting appetizers, delicious The North Fork Table & Inn Gerry Hayden and Claudia Fleming pro- sandwiches, steaks, local seafood and vide progressive American menus com- great wine, paired with i mpeccable sermitted to the highest standard of culinary vice and a great atmosphere . Take out excellence. Understated elegance replaces & Catering available. 26 W. Montauk utility in each room in the tradition of Hwy., Hampton Bays 631.723.2626. the finest European and American coun- Town Line BBQ try inns. 57225 Main Rd., Southold, Texas-style on Montauk Highway. 765.0177 765 .0177,, northforktablea ndinn.com East Enders looking for beef a nd pork ribs, burnt end sandwiches, pickles The Old Mill Inn Built in 1820 and tucked into an unspoiled and cornbread will enjoy the strippedcorner of Long Island, this waterfront res- down decor and menu straight out of Townline Rd. taurant serves local, fresh fare overlooking the Barbecue Belt. 3593 Townline Mattituck Inlet. Inlet. 5775 W. W. Mill Rd., Mattituck, Matt ituck, (and Montauk Hwy.), Sagaponack, 631.298.8080, theoldmillinn.net 537.2271, 537 .2271, townl inebbq.com Red Bar Brasserie GOURMET FOODS French-inspired American cuisine and Cavaniola’s Kitchen an award-winning wine list presented Churning out everything from smoked by a professional and friendly staff. fish pate to potato chips to soups and Sophisticated and welcoming. Offsalads, this shop next to Cavaniola’s season prix fixe menu. 210 Hampton Gourmet (cheese) and Cavaniola’s Cellar Rd., Southampton, 631.283.0704 (wine) offers a range of f resh-made, readyThe Riverhead Project to-eat delectables, as well as an extensive Located in the District neighborhood of catering menu. 89 Division St., Sag Riverhead, the newest addition of restaura- Harbor, 631.725.8100, 631.725.8100, cavaniola .com teur Dennis McDermott offers a contempo A Taste of the North Fork rary American menu with ethnic and healthy Homegrown flavors, freshness, sophisinfluences.. With honest food, excellent cockinfluences tails and an inspired wine list, TRP contrib- ticated taste. Enjoy the preserves, musutes energy, style and sense of community to tards, vinegars, sauces, spreads—all the East End’s restaurant scene. Downstairs, made from naturally grown, organic and Available the vault and adjacent vault bar are available local fruits, f lowers and herbs. Available for private dining and conferences. Outdoor at the Sag Harbor Farmers Market and at dining and lounging has a Palm Springs their store in Peconic. Custom-made gift feel in the warmer seasons. Open in May baskets, corporate gifts and event favors for lunch and dinner. 300 East Main St., available. 2885 Peconic Ln., Peconic, 631.734.61 631 .734.6100, 00, atasteofthenorthfork com Riverhead; 631.284.9300 to host your private event. 300 Main St. (Sterling Sq.) Greenport; 631 631.477 .477.6840; .6840; northforkoystercompany.com
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GROCERY STORES Amagansett Farmers Market This local landmark, now run by Eli Zabar is part fa rmer’ rmer’ss market, part gourmet food store and all about Eli’s committment to local, sustainable and delicious. Don’t miss the Amagansett loaf f resh out of the oven. oven. 367 Main St., Amagansett, 631.267.3894 Whole Foods Market The world’s leading organic and natural foods supermarket. With new stores in Manhasset and Jericho, Whole Foods Market carries a growing selection of LI-grown produce, seafood, and other edibles from small food makers. A one-stop shop for natural meats, healthy baked goods, organic produce, and nontoxic beauty and cleaning products. 2101 Northern Blvd., Manhasset, 516.869.8900; 429 North Bwy., Jericho, 516.932.1733, wholefoodsmarket.com BAKERIES Blue Duck Bakery Café Everything Everythi ng Blue Duck sells is hand-formed and baked fresh on premises, daily. Find their signature line of artisanal breads and finest quality pastries and cakes at East End grocers, fine restaurants and all local farmers markets. 30 Hampton Rd., Southampton, 631.204.1701; also 56275 Main Rd., Southold, 631 631.629.41 .629.4123 23 Breadzilla Serving scones, muffins, hand-rolled bagels, granola and other breakfast fare baked each morning. Everything made from scratch, including soups, salads, sandwiches, pizzas and pies featuring local produce and seafood. Specialty meats, pastries, birthday and wedding cakes made to order. 84 Wainscott NW Rd., off Montauk Hwy., Wainscott, 537.0955, 537 .0955, breadzilla.com bread zilla.com ARTISANAL FOODS Bees’ Needs These East End honeys, produced with small-scale, noninvasive practices that promote promo te bees’ health, are raw and unfiltered, multifloral blends that provide customers with an expressive range of artisanal honeys. CSA shares available. Products sold at Sag Harbor farmers market, The Greenthumb farmstand, Quail Hill Farm, Juicy Naam a nd Marder’s. 631.702.5657, [email protected] Catapano Dairy Farm Long Island’s only goat dairy is a family-operated farm specializing in handcrafted goat’s milk cheeses and pure goat’s milk skin care products . 33705 North Rd., Peconic, 631.765.8042, 631.765.8042, catapanodairyfarm.com Chocolate Sommelier Roxanne Browning hosts chocolate and wine pairings to bring awareness of exceptional direct-trade, single-origin artisanal chocolates.. Guests enjoy their two favorite chocolates pleasures at these entertaining and educational events held at wine bars, vineyards and restaurants for public, business and private functions. ExoticChocolateTasting. com, 631.252.0658 The Hamptons Honey Company: Your source for unprocessed, local and raw honey—just as the bees intended. By working directly with other small-scale beekeepers and familyowned apiaries around the world, the Southampton-based Hamptons Honey Company’s goal is to offer local, artisanal honey wherever our label is found. 888.365.2325, hamptonshoney.com 76
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Mecox Dairy In a converted 19th-century potato barn, Arthur and Stacy Ludlow turn out award-winning cheeses from their small herd of Jersey cows that graze near Mecox Bay. Available at Cavaniola’s Gourmet and Schiavoni’s in Sag Harbor, the Village Cheese Shop in Southampton and Mattituck, and Fairview Farm Stand on Horsemill Lane in Bridgehampton. 855 Mecox Rd., Bridgehampton, 631.537.0335, mecoxbaydairy.com Organic Valley This farmer-owned co-op produces milk, cheese, butter, eggs, juice, soy beverages, producee and meats—all organic. Available produc at major grocers and health food stores. 1 Organic Way, La Farge, WI 54639, 888.444.MILK, organicvalley.coop INNS AND B&B’S Harbor Knoll A waterfront B&B with its own private beach and dock. It is an 1870’s Dutch Colonial manor house decorated in the English country-house style, with wonderful gardens and spectacular views, very quiet, yet within easy walking distance of Greenport Village and transport directly to NYC. 424 4th St., Greenport; 631.477.2352; harborknoll.com Jedediah Jed ediah Hawkins Inn Winner of the prestigious New York Historic Preservation Award and listed in the National Register of Historic Houses, this meticulously restored Captain’s mansion offers luxury accommodations accommodatio ns , warm service and a unique “earth to table” dining experience from chef-proprietor Keith Luce . 400 S. Jamesport Ave., Jamesport, 631.722.2900,jedediahhawkinsinn.com The Mill House Inn A gracious inn in the heart of historic East Hampton Village with beautifully appointed appoin ted rooms, spectacular child and dog-friendly suites, and “the best breakfast in t he Hamptons. Hamptons.” Their Graybarn Cottage is ideal for small weddings, conferences and retreats. Named in the “Top 50 Small Hotels” by the Zagat US Hotel Guide. 31 N. Main St., East Hampton, 631.324.9766, millhouseinn.com NFBBA Rest Assured—Select an inspected member inn approved by the North Fork B&B Assn. (NFBBA); for 20 years the only organiz ation for B&B’s on Long Island recognized by NYS. 877.883.93 877 .883.9333; 33; [email protected] The North Fork Table & Inn Gerry Hayden and Claudia Fleming provide progressive American menus committed to the highest standard of culinary excellence. Understated elegance replaces utility in each room in the tradition of the finest European and American country inns. 57225 Main Rd., Southold, 765.0177, northforktableandinn.com The Old Mill Inn Built in 1820 and tucked into an unspoiled corner of Long Island, this waterfront restaurant serves local, fresh fare overlooking Mattituck Inlet. Inlet . 5775 W.. Mill Rd., Mattituck, 631 W 631.298.8080, .298.8080, theoldmillinn.net Orient Inn Built in 1906, this arts-and-crafts st yle farmhouse is located on Main Road, Orient, just 2 ½ miles from the Cross Sound ferry dock. Orient Inn is seconds away from the historic Hamlet of Orient, which is surrounded by
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water and beaches where guests enjoy all that Channing Daughters Winery nature provides for outdoor activities. Orient A small, artisanal, quality-driven winery Inn includes comfortable living rooms, fire- specializing in t he production of focused, places and five guest rooms each with pri- individual lots of wine made from an array vate baths. Chef Joan Turturro, a graduate of grape varieties. Employing traditional of the French Culinary Institute, provides winemaking methods and experimentation a memorable breakfast. breakfast. Dinner is available and creativity to achieve varietal and mul with advanced notice. The Inn is available tivarietal wines of class and distinction. distinction. for theme events and workshops. Orient Inn, 1927 Scuttlehole Rd., Bridgehampton, 25500 Main Rd., Orient; 631.323.2300, 631.323.2300, ori537.7224, channingdaughters.com [email protected], orientinn-ny orientinn-ny.com .com Gramercy Vineyards Ruby’s Cove Walk to restaurants, brewery, oyster bar and Founded in 2003 by Carol Sullivan and the harbor and a short drive to wineries, farm Erich Moenius, Gramercy Vineyards in stands and beaches. beaches. 151 Bay Ave, Greenport, Mattituck is the producer of a trio of boutique wines that includes a rosé, an Estate 631.477.1837 631.477 .1837,, rubysc ovebnb.com Merlot and an exclusive Reserve Estate Shorecrest Shorecr est Bed and Breakfast Merlot.. 10020 Sound Avenue, Mattituck, Merlot Voted Vo ted “Best B&B on Long Island” by GramercyVineyards.com Channel 12 news viewers, and the only amesport Vineyards B&B with our own beach on Long Island J amesport Sound.. Great food, elegant comfort, A father-son collaboration that began Sound spectacular gardens, good times! 54300 in 1981, Jamesport Vineyards’ 60 acres Cty Rte. 48, Southold; 631.765.1570; constitute one of the North Fork’s oldshorecrestbedandbreakfast.com est vineyards. All of their wines are produced using only their high-quality fruit. CHEESE SHOPS A large grassy backyard is available for Cavaniola’s Gourmet Cheese Shop musical events, private parties and wedFamily-owned and -run cheese s hop dings. Main Rd., Rt. 25, Jamesport, offering over 150 types of local, domes- 631. 631.722.525 722.5256, 6, jamespor twines .com tic and imported cheeses. Paninis, soups and fondue to go, as well as a beautiful Lenz selection of olive oils, balsamics, olives, Founded in 1978, Lenz is one of the oldest O wned and operatpâtés, fresh breads, pastries and more. wineries on the East End. Owned 89B Division St., Sag Harbor, 725.0095 ed by Peter and Deborah Carroll, Lenz creates critically acclaimed chardonnays, gewürzLucy’s Whey An exciting new shop offering a large, traminers, merlots, cabernets and sparkling carefully chosen selection of unique (méthode champenoise) wines. Main Rd./ American artisanal cheeses, as well as Rt. 25, Peconic, 734.6010, lenzwine.com other handcrafted American products, including salamis, chutneys, oils, vinegars, rubs and crostini. crostini. 80 N. Main St., East Hampton, 324.4428, lucyswhey.com SEAFOOD SHOPS
Macari Vineyards Macari vineyards has been known to sow wildflowers and release thousands of ladybugs in their largely organic approach to managing their 180 acres of vines. Sip wines at their tasting room or on their covered deck. Available for private parties, weddings and corporate events. 150 Bergen Ave., Mattituck; 24385 Route 25, Cutchogue, 298.0100, 298.0100, macariwines.com
Stuart’s Seafood Market The oldest fish market on the East End, baymen bring the catch of the day directly f rom their boats to Stuart’s door. Specializing in dayboat-fresh local seafood as well as hardshell Nova Scotia lobsters lobsters of all sizes, McCall Ranch available live or cooked to order along with This family ranch specializes in fine estate a wide selection of gourmet provisions. wines and grassfed organic cattle, and has Full-service clambakes and catering. Voted been growing and selling pinot noir and Best Clambake Clambak e Caterer in the Da n’s Paper’s Paper’s merlot on Long Island’s North Fork for 14 Readers’ Poll. 41 Oak Ln., Amagansett, years. A commitment to the preser vation of 267.6700, 267 .6700, stuartsseafood.com stuartsse afood.com local wild and agricultural land and to our environmentt in a broader view is integral environmen CHOCOLATE to our mission. The tasting room is open Chocolate Sommelier 12.30–5.30 p.m. Thurs–Sun. 22600 Rte Roxanne Browning hosts chocolate and wine 25 in Cutchogue. 631.734.5764 pairings to bring awareness of exceptional direct-trade, single-origin artisanal choco- Osprey’s Dominion lates.. Guests enjoy their two favorite pleasures The 75-acre winery is the first on Long lates at these entertaining and educational events Island to contract for a wind turbine, with held at wine bars, vineyards and restaurants a ground breaking this past fa ll attended by for public, business and private functions. executives from LIPA, Eastern Energy, the ExoticChocolateTasting.com, 631.252.0658 press, and local politicians, and an unveiling this coming spring. Visit their tasting room WINERIES and see the future of energy in Long Island Bedell Cellars and Corey and Corey Creek Vineyards wine country. 44075 Main Rd., Peconic, Founded in 1980, Bedell North Fork 631.765 631 .765.6188, .6188, ospreysdominion.com is recognized as a leader in Long Island wine growing. With 78 planted acres, the Palmer Vineyards winery produces award-winning mer- Founded in 1923 on a rolling parcel of gravlots, Bordeaux-style blends and a special elly farmland on the North Fork of Long Artist Series under the Bedell Cellars Island, Palmer Vineyards has become a siglabel, and a range of small-batch varietal nificant part of the Long Island wine industry wines under the Corey Creek Vineyards where “excellence is never an accident.” The label. Bedell Cellars, 36225 Main Rd. tasting room is open year-round, regularly (Rt. 25), Cutchogue, 734.7537; Corey hosts music, and is available availa ble for special events. Creek Vineyards, Main Rd., Southold, 5120 Sound Ave., Riverhead, 631.722. 765.4168, 765 .4168, bedellcellars .com WINE (9463 (9463), ), palmervineyards.com.
Paumanok Vineyards Founded in 1983, Paumanok is an estate winery dedicated to the production of premium vinifera wines. The Massouds grow chardonnay,, chenin blanc, sauvignon blanc, chardonnay riesling, cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon, merlot and petit verdot. 107 1074 4 Main R d., Aquebogue, 722.8800, paumanok.com Raphael Established in 1996, Raphael is dedicated to the production of Long Isla nd merlot, and continues a centuries-old tradition of winemaking for the Petrocelli Family that incorporates both New World advances and Old World traditions to produce wine reflecting both the terroir and spirit of a great Bordeaux chateau.. 39390 Main Rd., Peconic, chateau 631.765. 631. 765.1100, 1100, raphaelwine. com
Clovis Point 631.722.4222, 631 .722.4222, clovispointwines.com clovispointwines.com Comtesse Thérèse 631.871.9194, 631 .871.9194, comtessetherese.com comtessetherese.com Corey Creek Vineyards 631.765.4 631 .765.4168, 168, coreycree k .com .com Croteaux Vineyards 631 63 1.765.6099, croteaux .com .com Diliberto Winery 631 63 1.722.34 .722.3416, 16, dilibertowinery .com Duck Walk Vineyards 631 63 1.726.7555, duckwalk .com .com Duck Walk Vineyards North 631 63 1.765.3500, duckwalk .com .com Harbes Family Farm & Vineyard 631 63 1.298.WINE(9463), harbesfamilyfarm.com harbesfamilyfarm .com
Jamesport Vineyards Sherwood House Vineyards 631.722.5256, jamesportwines.com jamesportwines.com Since l996, committed to the production 631 of world-class wines using only estate- Jason’s Vineyard grown vinifera grapes. “There’s very little 631 631.238.5801, .238.5801, jasonsvineyard.com jasonsvineyard.com nature and man can do in true harmony,” says owner Dr. Charles Smithen. “A Laurel Lake Vineyards 631.298.1420, 631 .298.1420, llwines llwines.com .com vineyard is one of those things.” 2600 Oregon Rd., Mattituck, 212.828.3426, Lieb Family Cellars 631.298.1942, 631 .298.1942, liebcellars.com liebcellars.com sherwoodhousevineyards.com Long Island Meadery Shinn Estate Vineyards 631.285.7469, .285.7469, limeadery .com .com This Mattituck vineyard and winery 631 believes that a sustainable approach to Loughlin Vineyards growing wine and natural techniques 631 631.589.0027, .589.0027, loughlinvineyard.com loughlinvineyard.com in the cellar result in wines that reflect Macari Vineyards & Winery both the land and the individual grow631 63 1.298.0100, macariwines.com macariwines.com ing seasons. Their biologically intensive intensive viticulture allows the vines to produce Martha Clara Vineyards 631 1.298.0075, marthaclaravineyards.com marthaclaravineyards.com balanced and complex wines vintage after 63 vintage. 2000 Oregon Road Mattituck, Mattebella Vineyards 631.804.0367, shinnestatevineyards.com 888 888.628.8323 .628.8323,, mattebellavineyards mattebellavineyards.com .com Sparkling Pointe McCall Vineyards Sparkling Pointe’s award-winning spar- 404 404.274.2809, .274.2809, mccallwines.com mccallwines.com kling wines are executed with artistry Onabay Vineyard and finesse in the traditional French 917 91 7.715.0605, onabayvineyards.com onabayvineyards.com Méthode Champenoise. We like to call One Woman Vineyards it “romance in a bott le.” 631.765.0200, 631.765.1200, 631 .765.1200, onewomanwines.com onewomanwines.com sparklingpointe.com Wölffer Estate Vineyard Founded in 1987, 1987, Wölffer Estate Estat e has become a leader in the wine industry. The East Coast climate, similar to Bordeaux, combined with the terroir and the maritime influence, make the Hamptons an outstanding region for growing wines. Surrounded by 55 acres of rolling hills planted with vines, the neatly trellised vineyard provides a magnificent setting for wine tastings and social events. 139 Sagg Rd., Sagaponack, 631.537.5106, wolffer.com
Osprey’s Dominion Vineyards 631.765.6188, 631 .765.6188, ospreysdominion.com ospreysdominion.com
Please visit these members of the Long Island Wine Council.
Pugliese Vineyards 631 63 1.734.4057, pugliesevineyards.com pugliesevineyards.com
Ackerly Pond Vineyards 631.765 631 .765.6861, .6861, ackerlypondvineyards.com ackerlypondvineyard s.com
Raphael 631 63 1.765. .765.1100, 1100, raphaelwi ne ne.com .com
Baiting Hollow Farm Vineyard 631 63 1.369.0100, baitinghollowfarmvineyard.com baitinghollowfarmvineyard.com
Roanoke Vineyards 631 63 1.727 .727.416 .4161, 1, roanokev ineya rds rds.com .com
Bedell Cellars 631.734.7537, 631 .734.7537, bedellcellars.com bedellcellars.com
Scarola Vineyards 631 63 1.335.4199, scarolavineyards.com scarolavineyards.com
Bella Vita Vineyard 631.734.828 631 .734.8282, 2, bellavitavineyard bellavitavineyard.com .com
Sherwood House Vineyards 631 63 1.779.2817, sherwoodhousevineyards.com sherwoodhousevineyards.com
Bouké Wines 877.877.0527 877 .877.0527,, bouke wines wines.com .com
Shinn Estate Vineyards 631.804.0367 631 .804.0367,, shinnestatevineyards shinnestatevineyards.com .com
Castello di Borghese Vineyard & Winery 631.734.5 631 .734.511 111, 1, castellodiborghese castellodiborghese.com .com
Sparkling Pointe 631.765.0200, 631 .765.0200, sparklingpointe.com sparklingpointe.com
Channing Daughters Winery 631.537.7224, 631 .537.7224, channingdaughters.com channingdaughters.com
Suhru Wines 631 63 1.603.8127, suhruwines.com suhruwines.com
Christiano Family Vineyards christianowines.com
The Grapes of Roth 631 63 1.725.7999, thegrapesofroth.com thegrapesofroth.com
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Palmer Vineyards 631.722. 631 .722.WINE, WINE, palmervineyards palmervineyards.com .com Peconic Bay Winery 631.734.7361, 631 .734.7361, peconicbaywinery .com Pellegrini Vineyards 631.734.4 631 .734.411 111, 1, pellegrinivineyards pellegrinivineyards.com .com Pindar Vineyards 631 63 1.734.6200, pindar.net pindar.net
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The Old Field Vineyards 631.765.0004, 631 .765.0004, theoldfield.com theoldfield.com Vineyard 48 631.734. 631 .734.5200, 5200, vineyard48winery .com Waters Crest Winery 631-734-5065, 631 -734-5065, waterscrestwinery.com Wölffer Estate 631.537.5106, wolffer 631.537.5106, wolffer.com .com WINE SHOPS Cavaniola’s Cellar This wine shop in the historic Umbrella building offers a wide select ion of limited-run Old World wines designed to go with the cheese and other offerings from Cavaniola’s Gourmet and Cavaniola’s Kitchen next door. 89 Division St., Sag Harbor, 631.725.2930, 631.725.2930, cavaniola .com Domaine Franey This East Hampton wine shop, run by the son of famed author and chef Pierre Franey, specializes in wines from Burgundy and caters to wine enthusiasts, including those looking for well-priced bottles or the perfect meal pairing.. 459 Pantigo Rd., East Hampton, pairing 631.324.0906, domainefraney.com Michael’s Wines & Spirits Lowest prices around! The knowledgeable staff will help you select from the most extensive inventory of wines and champagnes on the East End, including the best selection of Long Island wines at competitive prices . Delivery available. 802 Main St., Riverhead, 631.727.7410 WINE BARS A Mano This osteria and wine bar in Mattituck features local farmers, cheesemakers, fishers and wineries, as well as Italian varietals from f rom American and Italian wineries. wineries. 13550 Main Rd, Mattituck, 631.298.4800, amanorestaurant.com SPIRITS Hendrick’s Gin With delightful infusions of cucumber and rose, one would be a fool to forgo the unusually delicious Hendrick’s Gin! Simply put, no other gin tastes like Hendrick’s because no other gin is made like Hendrick’s. Hendrick’s . hendricksgin.com ORGANIC FOOD STORES The Juicy Naam An oasis of organic juices, smoothies and freshly prepared live food. Stop by for organic local produce, a full menu of the best juices, snacks, salads, raw soups and nori rolls, for takeout or catering, as well as daily Naam Yoga and a full range of healing bodywork . We also offer fully customized private cleanses and juice fasts that will detox det ox and rejuvenate you from the inside out, and a wonderful array of vis iting healers and health experts throughout the summer. 27 Race Ln., East Hampton and 51 Division Street/Route 114, Sag Harbor. New York City: 1295 Madison Ave. The Wales Hotel; 876-6000, thejuicynaam.us The Market An organic food market with gourmet items, delivery, catering and customized meal preparation, the Market offers ca fé, indoor/ outdoor dining right on Front Street. Street. Fresh organic produce, vitamins, bulk grains, pasta, nuts, personal care, wheat-free. Café offers delicious organic and vegetarian soups, salads, sandwiches and juices. 130 Front St., Greenport, 631.477.8803 78
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Provisions Natural Foods Market & Cafe Committed to serving healthy food, Provisions offers a snug retreat for a memorable organic lunch. lunch . Café is open for breakfast and lunch, serving chicken and veggie wraps, omelets, marinated brown rice, soups and homemade muffins and corn bread, a ju ice and smoothie bar, and a full line of “Eart h Friendly” groceries, cosmetics, books, gifts and organic produce. Bay and Division St., Sag Harbor, 725.3636
LANDSCAPE DESIGN AND ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES Barry Block Landscape Design & Contracting Inc. Award-winning, formally trained design/ build firm providing landscape services from design concept to complete installation. All projects receive personal attention and unique designs to fit your lifestyle, while offering a variety of specialized solutions using ecologically sound and organic techniques. 631.874.3430, barryblock.com, [email protected]
massage and health through natural therapies. Red Horse Plaza, 74 Montauk Hwy., East Hampton, 329.2525, naturopathica. com/ourspa.html
Southampton Osteopathy Dr. Stephen Braun DO, specializing in Osteopathy, and associates are welcoming new patients. They offer compassionate, integrative, personal, empowering medicine, specializing in i n restoration of your body’s healthy structure and optimal function after trauma, injury, or pain. 349 Meeting House Ln., Southampton, shosteo.com NATURAL PRODUCTS Fort Pond Native Plants Yoga Shanti A local garden center with a mission to pro- A full-time, Shaklee ful l-time, year-round, year-round, East End yoga stuFor over 50 years, generations of families mote the use and appreciation of native plants dio, Yoga Shanti offers classes class es to all levels in a have counted on us to do what no other for home landscapes. Employing organic range of styles. A recent review called Shanti company can do quite like Shaklee— maintenance products as well as sound envi- “the Hamptons yoga studio. You will never approaches.. 26 S. Embassy St., make products that are naturally safe ronmental approaches waste your time...The teachers are always AND proven effective. Every product Montauk, 631.668.6452, nativeplants.net amazing.” 23 Washington St., Sag Harbor, that goes into every Shaklee bottle Muse Design Inc. Inc . 725.6424, yogashanti.com is designed to improve health, work Offering residential and corporate cliCONSTRUCTION, without compromise and be gentle ents inspired environmental planning. RESTORAT ION, DESIGN DESIGN on the planet. 631.236.2670. green- “Weaving highly functional land use into [email protected]. mama@optonlin e.net. BeT BeTheChange. heChange. natural spaces fu ll of emotion and wonwon- Berg Design Architects der.” Whether a rain garden or a natural- A multi-faceted firm dedicated to susMyShaklee.com ly filtered pool design, native plantings or tainable modern residences, commercial PUBLIC RELATIONS natural resource management planning, architecture, interior design, and furniture. WordHampton Public Relations Muse Design blends the natural and the Client collaboration, green technology and Established in 1992, award-winning manmade into a beautiful celebratio celebration n of environmentally low impact designs lead to WordHampton represents signature hos- nature. 631. 631.725.872 725.8725, 5, t homasmuse.com unique architectural solutions with warm, pitality, real estate and lifestyle businesses comfortable surroundings. 917.328.3905, Playful Gardens from the East End to New York City, We design and build natural play-spaces 88 Old Stone Hwy., East Hampton, bergbuilding client reputations and revenues for children and provide instruction in designarchitects.com. through strategic and creative think- the garden. garden. Playful Gardens specializes in Environmentt Ea st ing, deep media relationships, social vegetables, flowers and herbs and custom- Environmen Consistent attention attention to detail has earned the media savvy and client partnering . 512 raised planters. myplayfulgarden.com trust of our customers and for over thirty Three Mile Harbor Rd., East Hampton, TRANSPORTATION years they have recommended us to their 631.329.0050, wordhampton.com AND TOURS friends and neighbors as one of the finest CATERERS AND CHEFS construction companies on the east end. end . Hampton Jitney Art of Eating Operating 365 days a year between Their friendly and professional staff will This community-focused and charity- the South and North Forks and Metro be glad to take a look at your house and driven caterer and events planner has NY, including new service to Brooklyn, advise you on maintenance, expansion or extensive connections with local farm- Hampton Jitney Jitney is your fa stest way to complete restoration. They offer a full specers, fishers and food makers, and will and from the City and NY airports. trum of services from design to permits, help you invite guests with the confi- Offering limousines, charters and tours roofs to decks and everything in between. dence that they will thorough ly enjoy the throughout the Northeast and Canada. 631.734.7474/7400, environmenteast.com food, setting a nd entire event experience experience.. 283.4600, hamptonjitney.com East End Awning 631.267.2411, hamptonsartofeating.com HEALTH, BEAUTY Owners Carol and Bill Duffy have been Need a Chef AND WELLNESS serving the Hamptons and the entire East Your private chef for a day. Local affordEnd of Long Island for over 12 years. The Body Shop able, established private chef. Peter Available seven day s a week for an in-home The first yoga and massage studio on the Cooke a 1991 CIA grad a lifelong resiestimate. They’ll bring the showroom to dent of the East End, f arm-to-table chef. East End is loc ated above Eileen Fisher in you. 631. 631.287 287.6080; .6080; eastendawning.com. the heart of East Hampton Village. The Free menu planning. planning. Shop, cook, clean. EDUCATION AND Body Shop, “the most beautiful yoga space 631.578.0798, 631. 578.0798, need achef.com COMMUNITY in the Hamptons,” offers classes in yoga, REAL ESTATE Pilates, cardio and dance, as well as private Hayground School Corcoran yoga and massage therapy. 26 Newtown An open community school where For over 30 years, exemplifying a steadLn., East Hampton; 631.324.6440; the- unproductive conventions are replaced fast commitment to service, creativity and by new ways of teaching and learning. learning . hard work. NYC’s largest residential real bodyshopeasthampton.com With the apprenticeship program for estate firm, Corcoran has offices through- Gil Ferrer Salon out the East End to help you find your Gil Ferrer hair care ser vices include cut- older youth, rich and varied programs home. Live who you are. 290 Main St., ting, color, Japanese hair straightening, in “Jeff’s Kitchen,” visiting artists and thermal-curl, hair treatments, reflexol- inspiring math, reading, music, art and Sag Harbor, 725.4926, corcoran.com ogy and nail and skin care. Salon is science, Hayground remains tr ue to its Town And Country Real Estate mission.. 537 537.7068, .7068, hay ground.org renowned Brazilian st ylist mission Offering personalized service and bou- directed by renowned Vincent Da Silva. In the City, visit their Ross School tique flexibility, Nicholas J. Planamento & Town And Country Real Estate flower-filled oa sis on Madison Avenue. Develop new skills or follow a passion at focuses on establishing relationships Bridgehampton Commons, Montauk Ross School, offering a wide selection of 537.5805, vin- year-ro year-round und classes, workshop workshopss a nd camps through honesty and quality service Hwy., Bridgeha mpton, 537.5805, to buyers and sellers. As a member of centferrer.com, and 21 E. 74 St., NYC, for kids, teens and adults, including classes 212.535.3543, 5.3543, gilferrersa lon.com in art, athletics, farm care, gymnastics, “Who’s Who in Luxury Real Estate,” 212.53 Nicholas J. Planamento & Town And Naturopathica Holistic Health Spa music, performance, tennis, humanities, Country Real Estate enjoys a referral Pure Beauty Lounge media, wellness, nutrition, and languages, network with the finest brokers glob- Much more than a product line, a destina- as well as courses in college preparation and ally. 631.298.0600 or 631. 631.948.0143, 948.0143, tion point for embracing the pure essentials ESL ESL.. 18 Goodfriend Drive, East Hampton, [email protected] of well-being. Skin care, b ody treatments, 631.907.5555 or ross.org/community
WINTER 2012
Slow Food East End Chapter The mission of the East End Chapter of Slow Food is to spread the word about the advantages (health, economi economic, c, environ environ-mental, taste!) of eating locally and seasonally, and connect those interested with the national and international Slow Food Movement. Slow Food is about good, clean and fair food. Currently our local chapter has over 1,000 on our email newsletter list. Local Leaders: Miche Bacher, Noah Bacher, Leslie Rose Close, Judiann C Fayyaz, Bryan Futerman, Tullia Limarzi, Ursula Massoud, Mary Morgan, Kate Plumb, Alexandra Sofis. Follow us on facebook: Slow Food East End. Suffolk County Community College Culinary School & Bakers Workshop With campuses in Brentwood, Selden, Sayville and Riverhead, Suffolk County Community College is NY’s largest community college. SCCC is renowned for its nationally recognized faculty, small classes and affordable tuition. Students may choose from more than 60 programs of study, including the new world-class culinary program a nd Bakers Workshop in Riverhead. 20 E. Main St., Riverhead, 548.3750,, sunysuffolk.edu 548.3750 Twin Peeks Geeks Fast, friendly, experienced, dependable, affordable, on-site Macintosh service at your home or business in the Hamptons and Manhattan. Specializing in hookups, troubleshooting; software installation, upgrades and instruction; Internet installation, Photoshop instruction and scanning instruction. 631.723.3660, twinpeeksgeeks.com
FOOD BLOGS gift items, specializing in custom monogramming. 31 Main St., Southampton, Let There Be Bite Life is too short for bad food, and LTBB 631.283.4747, theelegantsetting.com Long Island Farm Bureau cold-pressed California Lifestyle Providing local, grassroots regional lead- finds the best of it: cold-pressed olive oil, slo slow-dried w-dried Italian pasta, artisa nal Contemporary Fashion Apparel and ership for the L.I. agricultural commuMen. The chocolate toffee. Some chili pepper in our Accessories for Women + Men. nity to preserve our remaining open land, best edit on what’s new in fashion, beautiful vistas and the 300-year legacy blog, too! [email protected]; luxury basics, denim and accessoof rural Long Island. 104 Edwards Ave., LetThereBeBite.com ries. Let our amazing staff navigate and ART SUPPLIES Calverton, 727.3777, lifb.com style your wardrobe. Open 7 days yearGolden Eagle Long Island Wine Council round! 127 Main Street, Sag Harbor; Founded in 1989, this industry association This East Hampton shop for those who “live 631. 631.725.1 725.1667; 667; shopat lifest yle.com is dedicated to achieving recognition for local and paint local” offers a wine range of COMPUTER & TECH SUPPORT Long Island as a premium wine-producing art materials, as well as year-round art classes including oil painting, mixed media, sculpture, GEEKHAMPTON region. Visit its Web site to plan your v isit encaustic and kids’ classes. classes. 14 Gingerbread Fast, friendly, experienced, dependable, to Long Island wine country. PO Box 74, Ln., East Hampton, 631.324.0603 affordable on-site Macintosh service at Peconic, 631.477.8493, 631.477.8493, liwi nes.com your home or business on the East End, or CLOTHING, JEWELRY our store. Specializing in hookups, troublePeconic Land Trust AND GIFTS shooting; software installation, upgrades The Hamptons, the East E nd, Peconic, A. J. Dak Etc. and instruction for your computer, iPhone North Fork, South Fork, Eastern Suffolk... An array of objects old and new, art work, or iPod. 154 W. Montauk Hwy., Hampton however you identify the special place accessories, flowers (dried and fau x, pot- Bays, 631.723.3660, geekhampton.com that is Eastern L ong Island, you’ll want ted and tropical), jewelry, soaps and canLEGAL SERVICES to know more about Peconic Land Trust’s dles. Gifts and things in general to whet work with landowners to protect our sce- your fancy. Fri.–Mon. 11–5 and by appt. Jason Foscolo LLC The only law firm on Long Island dedinic vistas, water qual ity and productive 1240 Village Ln., Orient ; 631.323.0048 631.323.0048 cated to agricultural a nd food law, which farmland. PO Box 1776, Southampton, Eileen Fisher regulates how food is grown, processed, 283.3195, 283.31 95, peconiclandtrust .org Clothing that invites every woman to marketed and sold, we can help you to Slow Food East End Convivium express her own style. style . 800.445.1603, maximize profits and navigate food law Founded in 2003, this local chapter of eileenfisher.com complexities, form cooperatives, find the the international movement to defend The Elegant Setting right crop insurance, understand and utiregional food traditions boasts 600 The Elegant Setting is inspired by lize USDA cost-share programs, make the enthusiasts who have launched two nostalgia for a time when entertaining most of value-added processing equipment, school programs. programs . Sponsors of the Sag was an art. The Main Street shop in apply for federal conservation benefits and Harbor and East Hampton Farmers Southampton offers an exquisite col- much more. more. New and beginning farmers Markets. slowfoodlongisland.org lection of tabletop as well as home and welcome. 479. 479.799.70 799.7035; 35;jasonfoscolo.com ja sonfoscolo.com ENVIRONMENTAL AND FARM ORGANIZATIONS
edible east end:
NOW IN 3-D. Well, sort of.
Each week, our editors explore the behind-thescene food and drink From Manhattan to mix drinks at Lower East Side speakeasies, rake clams in Southampton, sip suds at Brooklyn beer
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79
AFTERTASTE
THE APPLE PUSHERS BY COURTNEY MACGINLEY
Te East End is in fact edible, with its countless producers of freshgrown fruits and vegetables and an abundance of agriculture at its residents’ fingertips. Te main roads of our towns are not lined with fast-food joints, but rather farm stands and pick-your-own purveyors. We are very fortunate. But, not more than a hundred or so miles from Long Island’s East End lie areas that have literally been deemed “food deserts”: low-income parts of New York City and its surrounding boroughs, where residents have little if any source of such nourishing ingredients to feed themselves and their families. It was partly the alarming rate of obesity within these neighborhoods that prompted New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to work with the City Council to launch the NYC Green Cart Initiative in 2008, supported by a $1.5 million grant from the Laurie M. isch Illumination Fund. While Manhattanites will be familiar with the umbrella-topped displays of apples, bananas, potatoes and other produce on street corners much of the year, the initiative set out to double and triple the number of these mobile carts and push them into specific low-income locations in outer boroughs of the city where fresh produce options are scarce. Tis program is also the subject matter of Te Apple Pushers , a documentary film by Mary Muzzio, narrated by Edward Norton, that made its world premiere at this year’s Hamptons International Film Festival.
And while the t he actual apple pushers pushers themselves—about 800 vendors across the five boroughs who are primarily first-generation immigrants, much like the Jewish, Italian and other ethnic produce peddlers of previous New York eras—worked on a Sunday afternoon in October, 100 miles or so away a crowd of about 150 gathered in East Hampton’s United Artists Teater to watch their story unfold. “Te goal of this film is twofold” explains Muzzio, “First, to inspire municipalities to think thin k creatively about different ways to address the problems of obesity and food deserts. Te other goal, which became apparent to me while making the film, fil m, is to inspire other philanthropists philanthropists to consider public-private partnerships within their own cities, like Laurie [isch] did through her support of the Green Cart Initiative.” Muzzio is proud to report, “In New York the Green Cart Initiative is one of several strategies underway in the fight against obesity and food deserts. deser ts. However, the concept of mobile vending is catching on, and several cities are working on developing their own ‘Green Cart’ initiatives.” For more information on Te Apple Pushers visit theapplepushers theapplepushers.com. .com. Courtney MacGinl ey has a passion for good food and great films. She writes from her home in Coram.
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edible east end Cele Ce lebr brat atin ingg the the Har arve vest st of th thee Ham Hampt pton onss an and d Nor orth th For orkk
No. 33 Wi Wint nter er 20 2012 12
FOOD PANTRY FARMS MICROGREENS WINTER CLAMMING MARY’S MARVELOUS MALI B SWEETS PINOT BLANC BEER PROJECT
Member of Edible Communities
THE BIG CHEESE
The
THURSDAYS THURSDA YS 9:30 PM ES EST T ON COOKING CHANNEL
CHEESE For more information on Jason please visit:
jasonthebigcheese.com
CONTENTS 6
NOTABLE EDIBLES
36
Red-Stained Hands Club Green Thumb for Hire Food Politics 18
Love Lane Market Culling the Herd Farm-to-Foodd Pantry Farm-to-Foo
PLANT A ROW FOR THE HUNGRY At EECO Farm, a plot is dedicated to supplying South Fork food pantries. 40
FARMGIRL ANGST
BEHIND THE BOTTLE
LIEB 2010 PINOT BLANC An homage to Alsace for winter stews, oyster pan roasts and East End chowders. 23
24
28
35
57
HAPPENINGS
A COUPLE WEDS IN WATER MILL International fare for a pioneering state ceremony. 70
HEIRLOOMS
CHEESE LADDERS, FIRKINS, BABY CAGES AND OTHER COOKING C URIOSITIE URIOSITIES S Why should historical societies look in their pantries? 75
VISUAL VICTUALS
COLDSEASON CLAMMING There are hearty harvesters behind your winter chowder.
PAIRINGS
COCOAVINO A chocolate sommelier goes head-to-head with Long Island wine.
CULT OF TASTE
FATHER AND MOTHER NATUR E FATHER Joe and Alexandra Macari and their bottles brimming with biodiversity.
BOOKS
FREEDOM TO COOK A diabetic chef relies on flavor and texture, not carbs and calories. 31
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EDIBLE ENTR EPRENEUR
LITTLE GREENS, BIG FLAVOR Elfin carrot tops, micro mustard and radish sprouts emerge from an Amagansett Amagan sett greenhouse.
IN THE KITCHEN WITH
APRIL GORNIK AND ERIC FISCHL Two painters thrive on eggs, homemade bread and ambitious dinner parties.
ARTISANS
NOT YOUR ORDINARY SWEETS A North Fork cake baker, a South Fork weaver, and their confectionary creations. 26
46
A WINEMAK ER’S WOND WONDERINGS ERINGS
THE 2011 VINTAGE Three vineyard tenders describe one of the strangest seasons in memory.
BACK OF THE HOUSE
MA RY’S M ARVEL ARVELOU OUS S This cozy Main Street spot is crammed full of all-day, from-scratch nourishment.
THE BLIGHT CHRONICLES, PART I 21
ON GOOD LAND
88
AFTERTASTE
THE APPLE PUSHERS
SOCIAL SUDS
STRONG RY ELAND STRONG The region’s first collaborative beer delivers a taste from both forks. 2
edible EAST END
WINTE R 2012
COVER AND THIS PAGE
Mali B Sweets, Greenport. By Randee Daddona
For the past four years, brewmaster Garrett Oliver has been working on a massive project. It’s the ultimate beer collaboration, but it’s not a beer. Published this September by Oxford University Press, it’s The Oxford Companion to Beer , the most comprehensive book on beer
ever published, featuring 160 experts covering more than 1,100 subjects. It’s a momentous thing, so Garrett (Editor-in-Chief), Horst Dornbusch Dornb usch (Associate Editor, writer, writer, scholar, man-about-town) and Thomas Kraus-Weyermann Kraus-Weyermann (writer and master maltster) hatched a plan. Together,, they brewed our next Brewmaster’s Together Reserve beer, called The Companion. Thomas created special new floor malts for The Companion, which is brewed in an old style called “wheat wine”, a wheat-based equivalent to barley wine. The floor malts give this beer a juicy malt character of considerable depth, 55% malted wheat gives it a surprising lightness on the palate, while our house ale yeast lends a gentle fruitiness. The Oxford Companion to Beer will impart knowledge, while The Companion imparts conviviality. Maybe you really can have it all?
GRIST FOR THE MILL A few months ago, Eileen Roaman, a Springs resident who raises bees and chickens and keeps a home garden, had a seasonal epiphany. Te number of families visiting local food pantries swells in winter, just as many nearby farmers have lost their main roadside customers. So, working with the Amagansett Food Institute, Roaman quickly raised $15,000 in small and large donations, bought crops from a group of local farmers and delivered it to local pantries. “It’s “It’s tightening the circle, circle,”” Roaman said of the harmonious transaction. Pantry visitors got a wider selection of fresh produce; farmers got new customers. In fact, there were similar motivations behind the Food Pantry Farm, a three-acre section and two hoop houses at EECO Farm in East Hampton, whose entire harvest is committed to local food pantries. Started three years ago, the farm makes weekly deliveries to five local pantries—upward of 16 tons a year that includes farm-stand standards like tomatoes and corn, as well as the hot peppers, collard greens and other ingredients pantry patrons are cooking with. apping into unused resources—and unsuspecting generosity—was also the goal of Southold town officials who added a refrigerated cooler to make it ea sier for hunters to drop off excess meat, a nd for people in need to pick it up. up. If the New Year is a good time for remembering to give back to our community, it’s it’s also the right season sea son to dote on our loved ones. Consider the new crop of cupcake bakers, cake sculptors and sweets makers in our midst. Former Nassau County mayor, mayor, and new cocoa convert, Roxanne Browning has been sta ging sold-out chocolate and wine tastings on the North Fork. Meanwhile, Miche Bacher’s Greenport Greenport sweets shop has been reinvented as Mali B Sweets, with the addition of fellow baker Nanao A nton. Te two won “Best Cake in the Nation” honors from Brides magazine, are rolling out a chocolate bar with local potato chips, and offer patrons their latest experimental cake filling in the form of ever-changing little bonbons called “winks.” Mary’s Marvelous at the end of Main Street in Amagansett is a standby for locals seeking such ingenious forms of nourishment as eggs Colombian, bone-warming soups, and a boutique of edible gifts, from granola to Mary Os. (Tis time of year, Mary’s is also the last, reliable food option for eastbound lig hthouse roadtrippers.) In the spirit of this Holiday issue, we’ve decorated the page borders with our local gift picks—from cheesemonger baskets to a Montauk-bo Montauk-born rn dog food, to starter sta rter kits for the t he aspiring oyster grower in your life. So whether you donate to a food pantry, invest in a CSA or just buy a cake from down the street, there are plenty of sweet opportunities to enjoy and support all that’s around.
Tere is plenty of produce available just a few miles from the pantries that serve our hungry and a nd poor neighbors. neighbors.
Brian Halweil Editor
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WINE R 2012
EDIOR Brian Halweil PUBLISHER Stephen Munshin DEPUY EDIOR Eileen M. Duffy DESIGNER Bambi Edlund PHOO EDIOR Lindsay Morris COPY EDIOR Carrington Morris CONRIBUORS Randee Daddona Marilee Foster Chris Gangemi Gwendolen Gwendol en Groocock Courtney MacGinley Geraldine Pluenneke Kelly Smith James Christopher racy Amy Zavatto CONAC US PO Box 779 Sag Harbor, NY 11963 631.537.4637, [email protected] ADVERISING North Fork: Mary Morgan, [email protected], 63 631.323 1.323.2320 .2320 Jack Oxee, [email protected], 631.298.7025 South Fork: [email protected], 631.537.4637 LEERS o write to the editor, use the address above or, for the quickest response, e-mail us: [email protected]. Edible East End is published five times a year.
Subscription rate is $35 annually. annually. Call the number above to inquire about advertising rates, deadlines or subscription information, information, or e-mail us at [email protected]. No part of this publication may be used without written permission by the publisher publisher.. © 2011–2012. Every effort is made to avoid errors, misspellings and omissions. If, however, an error comes to your attention, please accept our sincere apologies and notify us. Tank you.
NOTABLE EDIBLES BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
REDSTAINED HA NDS CLUB CLUB
It’s chilly, but no one seems to mind. Tere’s lentil soup in the Crock-Pot Crock-P ot (for the vegetarians), vegetar ians), as well as a s some delicious pulled pork and a shared fascination about how one turns grapes into wine. On a Saturday morning in November, members of the Bella Vita Vine to Wine program were happy to be standing wrapped in scarves and down vests in a cement-floored barn watching Anthony Sannino (shown at right and below) punch down the cap on a fermenting container of cabernet sauvignon. Te small room lined with tanks built to hold the juice that would make one barrel—or 23 cases—of wine smells like, well, a winery, because it is one, but that’s a simplification. It smells like conversion, which is, in a sense, rotting and renewal, sweetness and energy and funk (and fruit-fly bait). Winemaking is elemental and attractive. Te Sanninos, Lisa and Anthony, bought their vineyard from Harold Watts of ernhaven Cellars—one of the North Fork’s first wave of vineyard owners—in 2006, 5.25 acres of cabernet and merlot planted in 1989. Te idea was to sell the grapes and build a bed-andbreakfast in the middle of the vines. Both goals were accomplished. But the desire to make wine, instilled in Anthony from his family roots in Ischia, an island off the coast of Naples, kept kept tugging at them. How to start up their own winemaking business while acknowledging the significant investment in equipment? Vine to Wine was born. In 2007 the t he couple promoted promoted the idea that anyone could make wine, proposing that members contribute $4,500 up front for a year of the winemaking experience and the guarantee of going home with the equivalent of one barrel of wine. Enough people signed on, shown nothing but an empty room,
and paid in advance, adva nce, allowing the t he couple to buy all the equipment they needed. Kind of like a wine CSA. oday, the Sanninos average about 20 members per vintage, with membership including couples and up to eight individuals. Te members start with harvest, on Columbus Day weekend, when there is usually something ripe—whether it be white or red grapes—depending on the growing season. Te weekend is like a party. Te children come, and pumpkins are all around. Once t he grapes are picked, the members come back periodically to watch, and help, as the grapes make their progress to the bottle. Tere’s crushing and racking and stabilizing and blending and bottling. Te members are involved in the decision making, and all go home with the same wine: a little bit of white, a little bit of rosé and a little bit of red, which comes out to about $16 per bottle. Te experience and the wine are enough to keep people coming back. John A rini of Setauket has joined his wife, erry, erry, for her second year. She was a home winemaker, and now he’s an accomplice, asking questions about fermentation time and winemaker intent. After tasting the mid-fermentation cabernet, erry says it was like when you’re baking a cake and eat the dough before you bake it. What’s more elemental than that? sanninovineyard.com
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|NOTABLE EDIBLES GREEN THUMB FOR HIRE
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Not many fathers refer to their chi ldren as free-range chickens, ch ickens, but for Renato Stanford of Southold, the description is apt. Tat’s because his yard is where the bulk of his family’s food comes from. Tis former effi ciency expert exper t with a career c areer at Dupont beh ind him expeexpe rienced a life-changing event 10 years ago when he was in a car accident that took his wife’s life. Since then he has been dedicated to growing his own food, going to the supermarket as little as possible and taking advantage of what he says comes naturally to him: making things grow. o do so, he built a hoop house in his yard to be able to provide his family with fresh produce year round. He relies on local honey for sweetener and spends days canning and preserving when his outdoor garden gives up its bounty at the end of the summer growing season. Tis fall, he says, he put away 200 jars of tomatoes and 75 jars of dill pickles. Tis was after he and his family ate all the cucumbers they could handle. “I was borderline sick of them,” he says, “but now I miss them. t hem.”” His hoop house is essentially a dugout; one enters by going three steps down so the beds are waist high. Tis helps to preserve the heat, which is all captured solar energy. He uses no chemical fertilizer and no pesticides. He’s thinking about adding chickens and he says his son’s favorite food is arugula. When this th is kind of thing works out for someone, someone, it’s it’s hard not to be an evangelist. Tis summer Stanford Stan ford set up a booth at the Westhampton Beach Farmers Market offering to build personalized hoop houses, so everyone could have fresh greens year round. Te display caught the eye of Bill and Susan Groner of Bedford, New York. “Tere was a brilliant idea right in our face,” says Bill. “We “ We just couldn’t couldn’t resist.” Te couple had never even had a garden before, but was taken by the t he idea and, of course, Stanford’s contagious enthusiasm. (Once Stanford starts talking, it’s hard not to imagine your own little year-round garden just outside the back door.) “He’s amazing,” says Bill. “You have to cherish people with positive energy like Renato.” Stanford credits his Italian upbringing with instilling in him the desire to grow, to grow anything, anything , anywhere. He remembers his Great Uncle Uncle Sebastian putting him hi m in his garden as a child and letting him dig and plant. Tis led to finding a space, any space, to plant tomatoes. Te hunt for space continues. So far, Stanford had helped Southold Schools plant their community garden and is working on a project with the Concourse House in the Bronx, a shelter for homeless families. He sees limitless possibilities to help anyone take advantage of the land, sun and water readily at our disposa l. “I know how to do this,” he says. “I don’t don’t even know how I know.”
HOLIDAY PARTY FIXINS. Coffee & Cake.
Late a fternoon pick-me-ups—or pick-me-ups—or morning get-me-goings— Butta’ Cakes in Greenport and Hamptons Coffee Company make for good gift certificate ideas. Butta’, buttacakes.com, will put together holiday platters, and HCC, ha mpton mptoncoffee.com, coffee.com, will supply an urn for a crowd.
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|NOTABLE EDIB EDIBLES LES
FOOD POLITICS
Despite widespread budget tightening across t he nation, decisionmakers in New York are banking that there’s money in matters related to food. Both the Suffolk Suff olk County Legislature Le gislature and a nd officials up in Albany are joining Long Island farmers and local nonprofits to make major infrastructure investments to extend the local growing season and expand the sales of all things grown on Long Island. State Senator Ken LaValle supported a $3.5 million grant, and the town of Riverhead donated 50 acres, to build the 8,300-squarefoot Agriculture Consumer Science Center at the Enterprise Park in Calverton (known as EPCAL). Te space, which could be finished as early as next summer, will have the equipment to help farmers— as well as aspiring food artisans—develop and process products made from local ingredients with the help of researchers and scientists from f rom Stony Brook University, University, Brookhaven National Laboratory and the NYS Small Business Development Center. (Finally, a place to deal with the surfeit of tomatoes in September and October.) On the heels of this groundbreaking, a coalition that includes both Nassau and Suffolk counties, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County, Long Island Farm Bureau, Peconic Land rust, Susta inable Long Island, Long Isla nd Wine Council, North Shore Land Alliance and Stony Brook Incubator for Agriculture
and Consumer Science has developed a proposal they’ve sent to Empire State Development asking for an initial $5 million for their Comprehensive Program for Sustainable Agriculture on Long Island. Te brainchild brainch ild of farmer Paulette Satur, the proposal includes 1,000 1,000 acres of land at EPCA L to rent for small-sca small-sca le agriculture, a mobile slaughterhouse for the region’s growing number of farmers keeping poultry and livestock, a mobile farmers market to reach underserved communities, a 100,000-square-foot refrigerated food-distribution hub, and training programs for aspiring farmers—partt of a program they’re calling “Farms for the Future.” farmers—par Future.” All told, the goal is to turn “Grown on Long Island” into a brand people will reach for like cheese from Roquefort or tomatoes from San Marzano. In a related effort, Suffolk County Legislator Vivian Viloria-Fisher has started sta rted a Food Policy Council for the county, for which public hearings started this fall. Te goals of the council include ensuring school and county institutions give preference to buying local, increasing access to healthy food, reducing pesticide use, and boosting use of locally grown ingredients at existing food-processing facilities in the county. Like similar food policy councils that have sprouted in cities and states around the country, the body will bring together farmers, fa rmers, food companies and the t he public to guide long-term food-related planning.
LUBRICATE YOUR FURNITURE SHOPP SHOPPING ING.. Vine and A ntiques Sherwood House Vineyards’ tasting house at 1291 Main Road in Jamesport shares space with Material Objects, an antique shop run by a collector/builder collector/builder.. aste some wine, move into the store a nd find a country countr y antique. 10
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|NOTABLE EDIBLES
LOVE LO VE LANE MA RKET
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At Michael and Patti Avella’s Avella’s new European-style European-st yle market in Mattituck, the yellow-pine floor is recycled from a farm in Connecticut, the tin ceiling is stamped from original dyes and the window frames are reclaimed from a 1920’s industrial building. Mike and Patti dreamed of a food emporium for years, and so when Michael Bourguigon, owner of the Mattituck Village Market, decided to sell his business last year, it didn’t take them long to make a decision. Tey closed on the circa-1 circ a-1928 928 property in November 2010, renovated with the help of architect Chris Smith (who designed Nobu and Dylan Prime in New York), and officially opened this t his past pas t October. CIA-trained chef and butcher John Nordin, who has worked for both om Colicchio and odd English, further bolsters the team. Mike’s goal is to create a welcoming place for “adventurous “adventurous home cooks.” o o that end, local and seasonal items sit alongside high-quality imported artisanal products—olive oil, vinegar, soy sauce, ghee, dried porcini mushrooms, salt-packed capers and anchovies, and salami, lardo and pancetta from Salumeria Biellese in Manhattan. Tere are pizzas cooking in a wood-burning oven; sushi prepared every morning by a Japanese chef, homemade sausages, soups and sandwiches. Next spring, they are planning to add a
donut machine and a Japanese noodle station. Te demand has been greater than the supply of grassfed beef from nearby McCall’s Ranch and Vineyard’s herd of Charolais cattle. Mike (shown above) says he is “unable to keep up with it,” and will be adding beef from a grassfed Hereford herd in Rhode Island to supplement. Another strong seller is the Crescent Farms duck. In the style of a European open-air market—Mike lived in Italy for many years—the ducks are steamed for half an hour before being turned on a rotisserie over baskets of herb-and-garlictossed potatoes that soak up the luscious drippings. D’Artagnan free-range chickens are on the grill, too. On a lovely fall Saturday afternoon, my husband and I stopped in for duck, potatoes and roasted garlic. We added some fresh greens from a local farm stand for a quick salad, opened a bottle of ros from Croteaux vineyards and had one of the best dinners of early autumn. (Note: Call ahead for beef to avoid disappointment. Not only is supply limited, reservations determine the way beef is cut.) —Susan Yager lovelanemarket.com
BOOK AND A BEER. Suds Stocking Stuffer. Garrett Oliver, brewmaster of the Brooklyn Brewery, edited the formidable, informative and entertaining Oxford Companion to Beer , available in a boxed set with a limited-edition, old-style wheat beer that’s perfect for sipping while reading. brooklynbrewery.com edibleeastend.com
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|NOTABLE EDIBLES
CULLING THE HERD
Whether you think of them as Bambi or as car-wrecking, shrub-eating nuisances, the fact is there are too many deer on the East End of Long Island. And from October 1 through January 31, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation declares hunting season. (Te rules for Suffolk County allow bowhunting for the entire season; shotguns are allowed in January but only with a special permit and on weekdays.) Ethic al hunters, hunters , as DEC offi o fficer, hunter and Greenpor t resident om Gadomski puts it, however, do not kill deer for sport. In fact they do not use the term “kill”; they prefer “harvest” because whatever deer they take they make sure does not go to waste. Te town of Southold recognized this dilemma, says Jeff Standish, the deputy director of the department of public works, and last year rented a refrigerated truck and put it behind the community center on Peconic Lane. Te idea was to have a place where hunters could drop off harvested deer they could not use themselves. Te deer, under the auspices of the New York– based Venison Donation Donation Coalition, are t hen transported to a butcher who breaks down t he animals and donates the meat to soup kitchens. Te coalition has been active since 1999 1999 and has processed nearly 340 tons of venison since that time. In the case of Southold, last las t year the town collected 162 deer. deer. Over the winter, Standish says the town bought a used refrigerated box, overhauled it, and now have a permanent drop-off site. Most of the harvested deer go to Fish and Wildlife Unlimited axidermy in Oakdale for butchering, but residents, who can fill out a form, take some of it. Standish says one woman, who has a dog with food allergies that can only eat venison, paid to have one butchered to use for dog food. Te drop-off also accepts roadkill, and Gadomski has donated deer illegally taken by hunters without the DEC-approved tags that indicate a valid hunting license. Normally, says Gadomski, he would harvest maybe t hree deer per year, one for for himself and a nd others for friends, which he butchers himself. But now that he knows the meat will go to good use, he will harvest up to seven per year. Some of the take are a re big does or bucks, but Gadomski says he is seeing an increasing number of smaller deer. “Tey’re not eating a s well.” 14
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Recipe from the New York Conservati Conse rvation on Officer’s Cookbook Cookb ook LORI’S PAPRIKA VENISON 1 c. sliced onion 1 clove minced garlic ¾ c. ketchup 1 . Worcestershire 1 . brown sugar Salt 2 t. paprika ½ t. dry mustard ¾ c. water ¾ c. white wine 2 lbs. venison (scraps work well) Sauté venison, onions and garlic until venison is brown. In bowl, stir until smooth: ketchup, Worcestershire, sugar, salt, paprika, mustard, water and wine. Add to venison. Cover and simmer until meat is cooked. Add flour to thicken if desired. Serve over egg noodles. From Colonel D. W. Brewer, Central Office, Albany. (Officer Gadomski marked this as “very good ” in his copy.) copy.)
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|NOTABLE EDIB EDIBLES LES FAR M MTOFOOD TOFOOD PANTRY
Tree food pantries on the South Fork, East Hampton, Springs and Amagansett regularly feed hundreds of families, and during the winter that number can soar close to 1,000. Tere are also farmers whose venues to sell their wares diminish in the winter as the crowds that frequent farm stands have left for the season. o Springs resident Eileen Roaman a li nk was obvious: organize a way to have farmers sell their produce to the pantries through donations expressly for that purpose. “Tat way, the money would stay in the community,”” she says, “the families would have fresh nutrimunity, tious food and the farmers would have customers. It’s tightening the circle.” Roaman made an initial pledge and then sent out an e-mail asking for donations; soon the total was $15,000. $15,000. Enter Amanda Merrow and Katie Baldwin of Amber Waves Farm in Amagansett, a nonprofit that has as part of its mission to help feed the community. Under their 501(c)3 status, that money was now 100 percent tax-deductible and 100 percent going directly toward the purchase of food. All of the food is grown by farms in East Hampton and Southampton, including Amber Waves, Balsam Farms, Quail Hil l Farm, the Milk Pail and Sunset Beach Farm. In the first t wo weeks, the Farm to Food Pantry Program was able to deliver 1,550 pounds of produce. Families pick up boxes of food once per week and now, in addition to staples, they will find apples, butternut squash, eggplant, peppers, potatoes and winter greens. In the past, says Gabrielle Scarpaci, executive executive director of the East Hampton Ha mpton food pantry, which relies on donations, farms have donated produce to feed the 44,000 mouths that came through her door last year. Now the farmers are being compensated for their work and the plan is to keep growing. According to Roaman, a $25 donation will provide a family with fruits and vegetables for two weeks; $100 will cover two months and $300 will underwrite a family’s share for the six-month fall and winter season. Baldwin and Merrow have set a fundraising goal of $75,000.
n i h s n u M n e h p e t S : h p a r g o t Donations can be made to the Farm to Food Pantry Program, o h c/o Amber Waves Farm, PO Box 2623, Amagansett, Amaganse tt, NY N Y 11930. 11930. P
INHALE, EXHALE. Start Relaxing. Class cards at Yoga Shanti in Sag Harbor help you balance, while balancing your budget. For $180 per month, yogis and yoginis can take an unlimited number of classes with a six-month commitment. yogashanti.com
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FARMG FAR MGIRL IRL ANG A NGST ST
THE BLIGHT CHRONICLES, PART I BY MAR ILEE FOSTER FOSTER
Grumble, grumble, gr umble, shuffl e, spit. Unlike most perusing per using this th is magazine, I am sick of food. I am sick of worrying about it, sick of thinking about it, reading about it, going to lengthy dinners made lengthier by everyone talking about it. Tis is post-mortem time for me, when the season is put to bed, mostly. Tere is not so much picking and fieldwork; instead it is wrap-up and put away and think. In 2009, the Northeast sustained an outbreak of late blight. Tis was the t he first time in my career that I had to farm through such challenging conditions. conditions. In June, the disease dise ase was confirmed to have wiped out a commercial planting on the North Fork and large gardens were gone in Bridgehampton. It was raining again and there was nothing else for us to do but try to allay or confirm our fears. Dean and I decided to drive around Sagg and look at other farmer’s fields. As we neared a field that was rumored to be suspicious, I began to shake. My heart pounded in my ears so hard that I was partially deafened to outside noise. I began to sputter, my voice getting shrill with panic, as I fretted aloud. My brother looked at me, “Now you’ve got to chill out!” he barked. And then sternly, “Christ, it’s only tomatoes.” Ten, less sternly, “Or potatoes.” In 2011 the Northeast was hit by blight again. Tere are some garden pests, viral, bacterial and even animal that a farmer can endure. I believe a little illness can be good for the overall immune system. Phytophthora means plant destroyer. In a place like Sagaponack, with our heavy fogs and morning dews, with our persistent, often damp breeze, a little blight is all you need to start a devastating war of man versus fungi. I like to believe I do all I can do—homegrown plants, monitored for for vigor all spring, are a re staked and trellised. trell ised. I spray. But in the end my success in surviving an outbreak will depend on my neighbors’ success. My neighbors are not only farmers. Empty houses with automatic sprinklers in i n their kitchen gardens and a nd no one monitoring real need, such vectors line almost every field. s i r r Tis year, toward the middle of June, on the eighth day with “no o M y spray” conditions, a neighboring farmer stopped by to tell me he had a s d n blight in his tomatoes. It was a pretty big spot. I told him how sorry i L : h I was to hear this, wished him luck and then, after he’d left, I suc p a r g cumbed to a set of anxiety-sparked dry heaves. It was late in the day, o t o h so I considered not running to the shop and sharing the bad news P
with my brother. Why not let him hi m have one more, decent night’s sleep? But misery needed company. I raise two acres of tomatoes— Dean’s got one one hundred and fifty fift y of potatoes. He’d want wa nt to know. All the employees have gone home, I find him in the machine room— the barn where custom parts are made to save the day—he’s calmly working on something. For the next half hour we talked about management strategy. We We talked about effective fungicides f ungicides and we talked about windows of opportunity; would there ever be one? What if it just keeps raining? We have no machines for fixing weather. What am I going to do? Outside, the drenching sky is turning to night. Dean reaches down under the cluttered desk that doubles as a workbench. He lifts and opens an elegant blue box that holds a gift from last Christmas. Snuggled down on a sapphire pillow is a special edition of some very fine scotch. “We could get in the bottle?” Tis scene between us, drink ing high-end stuff out of Styrofoam cups, might seem sordid or sinful for more than one reason. I know we should have had glasses. But worse, I know of many farms that were lost to alcohol. After a few hard seasons, I more fully understand understa nd the smooth liquor’s persuasive draw. We check to see our cups aren’t melting, and then toast our fortunate lot. 2011 went on to be the wettest year on record. I am often asked what I do in the winter—a fter I’ve finished with cauliflower, cabbage, Brussels sprouts and other fall crops that have their own set of diseases caused by too much rain. Winter is short, really just December. I spend the month writing personal agricultural parodies of Broadway and popular tunes. My sister and I then turn the material into a one-performance, no-rehearsal puppet show. Te song I’ve been singing, in my head from May to November, is usually sung by an optimistic orphan. In my production it will be an emotional farmer consulting Cornell Cooperative C ooperative Extension. Editor’s note: Tis is the first part in an emotional series about blight. une in for the next installment in stallment when we will learn l earn where the local blight bligh t came from, how the Fosters’ tomatoes and potatoes fared and what they are doing to prevent blight next tomato and potato season. Marilee Foster farms and writes in Sagaponack.
DELICIOUS COLLABORATION. Buy Vegetables Now. Community Supported Agriculture programs can s ell out. Contact the following farms, so you can pay upfront and receive fresh produce— or eggs or flowers—all summer long. Garden of Eve, Golden Earthworm, Sang L ee, Green Tumb, Biophilia, Quail Hil l, Sylvestor Sylvestor Manor, and Sunset Beach Farm all have var ying stages of commitment. You’ll Y ou’ll learn to love ka le even more than you thought you already did. List at edibleeastend.com edibleeastend.com.. edibleeastend.com
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BEHIND BE HIND THE BOTTLE BOT TLE
LIEB 2010 PINOT BLANC An homage to Alsace for winter stews, oyster pan roasts and East End chowders. BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
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Tere’s a cert ain plasticity to grape va rieties: Tey become different Tere’s different things in different parts of t he world. Cabernet in California is an ocean and a continent away from cabernet on the left bank of the Garonne River in Bordeaux. Te sauvignon blanc from Marlborough in New Zealand might as well come halfway around the world from the sauvignon blanc grown and produced just south of that cabernet in Bordeaux. (Wait, it is a half a world away.) away.) In a newish region like Long Island, the trick is to honor what the grapes can do here while paying homage to what has been successful in other parts of the world, to get around that anxiety of influence, except in this case one can drink the poetry. Gary Madden of Lieb Family Cellars feels little anxiety about the winery’s new release: the 2010 Pinot Blanc in the style of Alsace, where the grape is one of the region’s four noble varieties. Lieb is the only producer on the East End that bott les a single varieta l pinot blanc; it’s it’s become their signature, and so far they’ve done it in an all-dry style—during fermentation all the sugar in the grape must is turned into CO2 and alcohol—and as a sparkling wine. In the Alsace region of France, low rainfall and south-facing slopes result in reliably ripe grapes. Reliable and ripe are not two words we can u se together on Long Island, but in 2010 everyone could. It was a beautiful growing season and Madden saw the opportunity to make a pinot blanc like one finds in Alsace, higher in alcohol and a bit sweet: not all the sugar is converted into alcohol, a little is left to give the wine a bigger mouthfeel. Tus t he wine goes better with cool weather dishes (not much red is grown in the t he region). region). Lieb makes their wine at Premium Wine Group in Mattituck, where Mark Lieb is a partner with Russell Hearn, who serves as the consulting winemaker for all their wines. Madden is the general manager. Lieb and his wife, Kathy, bought their vineyards in 1992, and up until 1999 sold their grapes to other wineries. In 2000 the first wines were released under their own label. Te 2010 10th Anniversary Pinot Blanc commemorates that. Te wine is sold in a fluted bottle, like the ones found in Alsace, with the added modernity of a screw cap. A pale straw color color,, the wine is bright and clear; it smells like super-ripe pear with ca ndied pineapple pineapple and white pepper. pepper. Te wine is spicy and lively in the mouth with tropical fruits a nd the pleasant heaviness one gets from residual sugar. Te wine, however, has enough acid that it doesn’t directly come across as sweet. It’s balanced. Madden fell in love with the style on a trip through Alsace years ago. A longtime fan and owner of erverun erverun shepherds, named after a fter a town in Belgium, Belg ium, he couldn’t couldn’t complete his trip, which star ted in Paris, without visiting Alsace. “I was a red wine drinker before that,” he says. “It made me reevaluate. It changed my palate.” Unfortunately, due to the short, wet growing season of 2011, Madden doesn’t see a pinot blanc in this st yle coming out next year. But there are 2010s 2010s still at the tasting room in Mattituck. Get them for the winter stews, oyster pan roasts and chowders that are best eaten in front of a fire.
TUROPHILES REJOICE. Local Cheeseboard. Specialty cheeses, local and artisana l, are great for party
favors. Cavaniola’s Gourmet in Sag Harbor, cavaniola.com; Lucy’s Whey in East Hampton, lucyswhey. com; and Village Cheese Shop in Mat tituck, 631.298.85 631.298.8556, 56, all put together platters and gift boxes. edibleeastend.com
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A WINEMAKER’S WONDERINGS
THE 201 2 011 1 VINTAG V INTAGE E Tree vineyard tenders describe one of the strangest seasons in memory. BY JAMES CHRISTOPHER TRACY
Tis was a strange st range and hard vintage; everything about it from beginning to end required an extraordinary amount of effort. More time, more labor, more money was expended growing the grapes and making the wines this year than anyone can remember. In the end more people than not are very very happy happy with what they have in the cellar, and I for one look forward to sharing many delicious, expressive wines that offer immense gratification to the consumer for their inherent quality and to the professionals who know firsthand firstha nd how much work itit took to get there. But that is what we always say, right? Every vintage has something outstanding to offer, and the winemakers are always pronouncing how great the wines will be when they are still in barrel maturing or even earlier when the are still fermenting in tank! So instead of talking with the folks in the cellar, who always seem to have a cheery outlook and who have a way to go before their work is done, I solicited some thoughts from some growers whose work has culminated with harvest. harvest . I want to share t wo points of view. Te first is more measured and academic. Tis is to be expected coming from the astute and invaluable Alice Wise, who runs the viticulture research program at Cornell’s Long Island Horticultural Research and Extension Center (LIHREC). Alice had this to say: Te 2011 2011 season was wa rmer and wetter tha n the long-term averages. Tis afforded growers the luxury of a slightly earlier than normal harvest. Te frequent rains and tropical storm after véraison [the onset of ripening] forced vineyard managers to be vigilant with canopy- and fruit-management practices. Many growers elected to hand harvest, which facilitated more careful sorting of fruit prior to crush. Across the board with all varieties, brix and acids were moderate and balanced, allowing clear expression of varietal flavors. It was gratifying to taste delicious fruit after such a labor-intensive season.
Te other, blunter, dirty-boots-on-the-ground version comes from the uber-talented and awesome grape grower Sam McCullough. Sam is the vineyard manager for Lenz Winery and also grows some of the best and most sought-after grapes at his home farm in Aquebogue. Tis is what Sam shared:
l i e w l a H h a r a S : h p a r g o t o h P
Te 2011 vintage has been the most difficult I can remember short of 1985 when Gloria pretty much wiped out the crop. 2011 was a year marked by lack of sunshine and continual intense fungal pressure from start to finish. I’ve never experienced such difficulty with downy mildew. It just wouldn’t go away. Excessive moisture in August, September and October got a lot of botrytis and sour rot going. All grapes required careful (aka really tedious, slow and expensive) hand harvest. By the time we finished chardonnay I was beginning to think that I knew what the dinosaurs felt like when they got stuck in tar pits. When we started with pinot noir for sparkling and it was messy
at 19 brix, I knew right there that this was going to be a fight to the end. When we finished with cabernet on 11/11, my suspicion was confirmed. Fortunately the wines are good. After this year I need a drink!
Both of these, taken together, paint a realistic picture of the vintage. Sometimes the most telling observations come from outside eyes, and in the midst of harvest Mark L. Chien the viticulture educator at Penn State Cooperative Extension visited the region and wrote a wonderful 17-page 17-page summar y of his visit for his blog. It is a befitting summary to end with his thoughts… We visited in the midst of a difficult vintage, yet the level of optimism and the quality of juice and wine samples we tasted bespoke of a mature industry that understands how to deal with adversity…. Some of the winemakers have almost 30 vintages under their belt and say this is the strangest vintage in memory, not the worst, just odd. I concur. Despite the weirdness, there was little sense of urgency or aggravation on the crush pad or in the vineyard, only a singular determination to do the best they possible can with the fruit that is available. Not that it matters one bit, but a California winemaker would be thoroughly confused by a vintage like this. A low brix, low pH, low acid wine? What’s up with that? I say this only because I believe that these t hese are among the most agile, a gile, creative, talented, patient, persevering and unflappable winemakers in the world.
James Christopher racy is the winemaker and partner at Channin g Daughters Winery in Bridgehampton , as well as a student candidate for the Institute of Masters of Wine. edibleeastend.com
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ARTISANS
NOT YOUR OR DINARY SWEETS S WEETS A North Fork cake baker, a South Fork weaver, and their confectionary creations. BY GER GER ALDINE PLUENNEKE PHOTOGRAPHS PHO TOGRAPHS BY R ANDEE DADDONA
GREENPOR—Tey pass as quite benignly ordinary chocolate cupcakes—until the first bite. Ten impressions of merlot and blackberries dance with rich chocolate across the palate. Last May 1, 60 food lovers on a Greenport Slow Food Crawl crowded into the edible art shop of Miche Bacher and Nanao Anton to sample these cakes and other desserts and to view the shop’s display of stunningly decorated wedding cakes. “If they open a store in the South Fork, that’s it. I’m lost,” says Linda, a Slow Food member, who shook her head and grinned. As an avid Internet shopper, Linda assuredly is now lost. Bacher and Anton have just launched a new Web site carrying many of the sweets in their Greenport Shop. Tey have changed their name from Sacred Sweets to Mali B Sweets, and it’s worth spending five minutes checking out the cake gallery as an art form on Malibsweets.com. If you dare venture into the online shop, you’ll encounter several dozen temptations ranging from herb-flavored cookies, spiced nuts and homemade marshmallows to chocolate bars and cakes made with fair-trade Kallari chocolate, produced by a coalition of 850 indigenous Kichwa families in the Napo region of the Ecuadorian Amazon. Soon to be offered: a bar with Amagansett’s Art of Eating potato chips made from Balsam Farms organic potatoes. It’ss been quite a journey, first from a spare-change exercise It’ e xercise and the start of the business in 2002 to the one that supports local growers and wineries and products like Kallari, with a wedding cake featured in the September issue of Brides Brides magazine magazine as one of the 24 most beautiful in the nation. Bacher, trained as an acupuncturist and doula, is a self-taught baker. “I was the stay-at-home mom who always brought desserts to the party. A friend asked me to make her something. Te next thing I knew, people were calling.” In 2006, with the business pushing up against what she wanted to handle herself, Bacher joined forces with Anton, a fellow mother at the Hayground School in Bridgehampton. “I dragged Nanao into it because I wanted someone who was my equal,” says Bacher. “Nanao, a weaver, has an art background and an incredibly open palate as well as an open eye.” oday, the collaboration involves dreaming up and sketching designs for cakes, then working side-by-side painstakingly executing the idea, molding designs in sugar dough and creating the unique flavors 24
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Beautiful things: At Mali B Sweets, Nanao Anton (above) and Miche Bacher, Bacher, turn out marshmallows, a chocolate bar with local potato chips, and a form of winkies that feature their latest, experimental cake fillings.
which are a re the underlying point. “It’s incredibly long hours, for incredibly low pay. pay. I work seven days a week, and the average day is 14 hours,” says Bacher of the peak wedding season. (Recently they’ve created many new designs for same-sex weddings.) Watch Bacher and Anton in the kitchen, and they’re motivated as much by the challenge as the art. Every cake and cupcake is made only to-order after confirmation by telephone or in person, because they feel freshness is imperative to maintain their standards. Cakes run $7.50 to $60 per head. “Isn’tt it traumatic to think “Isn’ th ink of someone cutting into your beautiful wedding cakes?” a visitor asks. “I don’t see it that way,” way,” replies Bacher, “I consider ours a transient art. Tere are artists who do sand sculptures on the beach that are meant to be washed out.” Bacher continues, “We put days” (“Days ,” ,” echoes Anton) “into something that’s t hat’s going to be decimated in momen moments.” ts.” Teir record creating a cake: 50 to 60 hours over three days. “Te best things we make come out of our synergistic relationship. Te flavors that we produce work,” work,” Bacher says. “We do
a merlot, a chardonnay, a sparkling wine, a black duck porter in cakes, in cupcakes, cupcakes , in cake pops”—their fudgy confection that the Food Network Magazine featured a while back. Even those who aren’t buying a whole cake can still preview their cake-making skills and the fillings of the moment by buying a few winks, their take on commercial winkies, in the shop or online, which feature whatever flavors they are currently playing with. “We’ve “We’ve had carrot cake c ake with cream cheese, c heese, passion-fruit filling, Mexican chocolate,” says Anton. In the realm of cookies, there are variations with lavender, bourbon, fennel and sesame seeds, and buckwheat with cocoa nibs, as well as green-tea brownies. Tey’re Tey’ re perfecting a line of savory biscuits that particularly appeal to both women—one with cranberries, herbs and a little cayenne, another with almond and rosemary, apricot and sage—“savory crackers and things for your cheese plate that are elegant and upscale,” says Bacher. Ten there are the chocolate bars available in seven standard flavors, from the most popular dark chocolate with toffee and sea salt to milk chocolate and bacon, plus three extra flavors monthly. Te Web site offers a tasting sampler for sweet-tooths sweet-tooths among us who like to plan ahead: a year of three special monthly flavors for $300. “Our sweets are never terribly sweet…,” begins Anton. “…because we use only organic sugar,” finishes Bacher. Although the bakers aren’t sure why, the unrefined, certified-organic sugar they use seems less sweet than conventional sugar and allows their myriad other flavors to shine. “Neither Anton or I love sweet things,” reflects Bacher. “Tat may be where we differ from other bakers,” she says. You sense that their enthusiasm for the business extends to their families, with both husbands and teenagers contributing their time. Mali Mal i B Sweets is named na med for Bacher’s Bacher’s mixed-breed yearold black dog, Mali, pronounced Molly, and Anton’ A nton’s mixed-breed six-year-old, Brownie, because, says Bacher, “Our dogs sustain us with unconditional love and support.” “I am extremely ext remely grateful,” muses Anton. “Art “Art is a lonely way of working, and it’s rare to find a partner. We get along beautifully, feed off each other, are able to make beautiful things that taste spectacular every day. And we laugh.”
Geraldine Pluenneke writes from Montauk where she is completing a book about flavor. Mali B Sweets is located lo cated at 130 Front Street, Street , Greenport, 631.477.6762. 631.477.6762. Tis past summer season its confections were carried at Sag Harbor’s Java Nation and Sylvester & Co., in Southampton at S chmidt’s, in East Hampton at Hampton Country Market, and currently at the Village Cheese Shop in Mattituck.
WOMAN’S BEST FRIEND. Don’t Forget the Pets. dogOdog, a Montauk-based company with recipes created by local shar-pei owner Betsy Petroski Smith, has gift sets of their all-organic treats and play-tugchew toy made from 100 percent cotton. Visit dogodogorganics.com. edibleeastend.com
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EDIB ED IBLE LE ENTR ENTREP EPR R ENEUR
LITTLE GREENS, BIG FLAVOR Elfin carrot tops, micro mustard and radish sprouts emerge from an Amagansett greenhouse. BY LAUREL BERGER
PHOTOGR PHOT OGR APHS BY LINDSAY MORRIS
AMAGANSEDelicate and lovely and doomed from birth to an early death, microgreens—bright-flavored shoots of herbs and leaves—are the neurasthenics of the salad world. Until recently no one grew them in any quantity on the South Fork (although Satur Farms in Cutchogue offers them, as does Koppert Cress, which counts the New York Yankees among its high-profile clientele). From time to time you might spot them at a certain fancy food shop, but those microgreens always look travel-spent, all but fainting away. And then last June, small packets of fresh of fresh microgreens started cropping up at Provisions in Sag Harbor. Trough the summer and into the fall they continued to materialize, but from where? On the label, a minute telephone number offered the magnifying glass–equipped glas s–equipped investigator a lead to a 7-b 7-byy-14-foo 14-foott Amagansett Ama gansett greenhouse named, in grand fashion, Good Water Farms. Flourishing in that close space were at least 20 varieties of miniature plants sown from organic seed, including elfin carrot car rot tops (which taste like the Platonic essence of, well, a tiny carrot), sorrel, amaranth, garnet mustard and China rose radish. “ry the cumin,” said Brendan Davison, the grower, who lives on the property. “You’ll freak, I promise.” And he should know, because Davison (shown opposite page) happens to be a practitioner of shamanic energy medicine. During his apprenticeship,, he spent time in Cuzco, Peru, where, it appears, shamanprenticeship sha manfarmers are not unusual. Reflecting on the close connection between the two callings, he realized his was to devote himself to microgreens. Te idea turned out to be a good one. When he went round to restaurants like Nobu, South Edison, Sen, and Nick and oni’s with his 26
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first harvest, the chefs all wanted to know when he could bring more (12 to 18 days from seed to plate, depending on the variety). Tis past summer, customers included Ruschmeyer’s, Navy Beach and Crow’s Nest in Montauk, as well as the 1770 House in East Hampton and Estia’s Little Kitchen Kitchen in Sag Harbor. Having outgrown his backyard quarters due to demand, Davison plans to move the year-round business to an 1,800-square-foo 1,800-square-foott warehouse in East Eas t Hampton and extend his reach to restaurants in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Manhatt an. “What ma kes Good Water Farms special,” said chef Joe Isidori of South Fork Kitchen, “is that Brendan delivers the plants by the flat so we can snip them right before we serve them. Te stuff I could get from other sources isn’ isn’tt local a nd it’s it’s already bagged.” ba gged.” What’s more, most of the big growers rely on soil-free growing mediums, while Davison uses an organic potting mix enriched with worm castings, bat guano and fish meal. And then there’s that metaphysical ingredient he’s slightly embarrassed to talk about. “Te shamans call it ‘opening sacred space,’” he explained, “and it involves invoking the four directions. It sounds funny, I know, but I do it every time I plant seeds. It brings a ll the elements into right relationship. relationship.”” Laurel Berger is an arts write r in Sag Harbor. Good Water Farms sprouts and microgreens are sold at Provisions Natural Foods in Sag Harbor, Naturally Good Foods in Montauk, and the Sag Harbor Winter Farmers Market. goodwaterfarms .com
McCall McCa ll Wines Wines
HAYGROUND SCHOOL
“ In the charmingly rustic tasting room, I got to sample some of the wines and I was so impressed that I bought a mixed case, which I enjoyed immensely.” – MARTHA S TEWART “If his regular and reserve pinots made from the splendid 2007 vintage are indicators, he’s sitting pretty. ” – HOWARD G. GOLDBERG T HE HE N EW EW Y ORK ORK T IMES IMES
Fine Estat Wins 22600 Main Road, Cutchogue, New York 11935 631.734.5764 / mccallwines.com
STUDENT S AGE 3-13 | 151 MITCHELL LANE, BRIDGEHAMPTON, NY WWW.HAYGROUNDSCHOOL.ORG
BOOKS
FREEDOM TO COOK A diabetic chef relies on flavor and texture, not carbs and calories. BY GER GER ALDINE PLUENNEKE
At the age of 12, Sam albot was diagnosed as a type 1 d iabetic. His mother burst into tears t he day she heard the doctor’s diagnosis, then drove her son straight to Friendly’s where she ordered him a half-dozen different ice cream sundaes, with the words, “Tis is the last time you can do this.” albot would learn all the prohibitions and at one time or another “broke every rule” even into his college days. Perhaps it was preordained that, loving to eat, albot became a chef a nd expanded his palate t raveling worldwide.
In his new cookbook, Te Sweet Life: Diabetes Without Boundaries, the executive chef of the Surf Lodge in Montauk and Mondrian Hotel’s Imperial No. Nine in SoHo has compiled pleasuredelivering recipes not only for diabetics, but for all eaters. His flavors are deep and complex, his dishes colorful and comforty. Te 75 recipes in this late-October Rodale release rely on flavor and textures rather than carbs, ca lories and fat. Most veggies are cooked al dente (“cook ½-inch pieces for 1 to 2 minutes than transfer t ransfer to a bowl of ice water”) a s a base for albot’s albot’s unique
and eclectic flavors. Some work as either side dishes or entrées. Others, shorn of their seafood, chicken or meat, can stand alone as vegetarian or vegan fare. For diabetics, Sweet Life is both a primer on how to indulge in rich, satisfying and low carb flavor, and tips from a pro on how to manage the unexpected challenges of plummeting or soaring blood sugars. Te book car ries a new message about t he freedom and enjoyment of food choices possible for a diabetic. “Tere’s no ‘NO’ in diabetes for me. Tere’s no, ‘you can’t.’ [A diabetic] can eat anything as long as it’s in moderation, and you’re monitoring your blood sugar, and it’s a balance,” says albot. No chef knows better than he. On a recent rainy af ternoon at Imperial No. Nine, Nine, the restaurant he helped open in SoHo’s Mondrian Hotel, the 33-year-old chef reflected, “I’ve got this forum, th is God-given forum, to be able to speak up, to be written about in magazines about something I believe in, not something meaningless and silly.” Indeed, on September 21, albot, a partner with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, raised $50,700 for JDRF with his inaugural fund-raiser, “the Sweet Life Kitchen,” on the rooftop of the Mondrian. Oddly, at first glance albot’s recipes appear quite improbable for everyday cooking, okay, totally improbable. Dauntingly, most call for layering in a myriad of spices, herbs and ingredients, a few for expensive, hard-to-find additions like mustard oil and yuzu juice, the imported Japanese citrus juice appearing on trendy menus. (Mustard oil and other unusual ingredients are all available on the Internet, in some health food stores or Asian markets.) But ingredients assembled, most are simple and fast. I fi rst fell for albot’s flavor instincts making his fairly mainstream squid with sesame seeds and jalapeño peppers. I then tried his spicy cucumber salad with charred red onion, cabbage and a cast of 10 supporting ingredients for a vegetarian potluck. “Oh, my God. Tis is incredible,” said the muscular, blond surfer sitting across from f rom me. “Te heat of the spices against the cool of the cucumber. I’ve got to have the recipe. I’m a gourmet cook.” “Mmmmm, Mmmm, Mmmm,” murmured the woman next to him as she forked into the cucumbers. “You’re clearly joking,” a guest and former California chef said last weekend as I set the first course down, “crab with blueberries and popcorn!” Tis fresh and crunchy crab ceviche with yuzu juice is the top-selling dish at Surf Lodge, and the four of us at my table rated it and all the other dishes “delicious winners.” edibleeastend.com
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I first fell for albot’s flavor instincts making his fairly mainstream squid with sesame seeds and jalapeño jala peño peppers. peppers. I then tried his spicy cucumber salad with charred red onion,, cabbage and a cast of 10 supporting onion supporting ingredients for a vegetarian potluck. Te mustard oil in the tuna ceviche delivered a hot wasabi-like bite. Te broccoli with citrus and roasted garlic oil was vibrant and sweet. Te shirataki noodles (a soy-yam combo with minimal carbs), cashews and chiles was textured, mellow and fulfilling. For dessert we munched albot’s 17-ingredient coconut granola. Te granola erased my qualms about expense, and I’ve ordered a supply of açai powder, cacao nibs, goji berries a nd pistachios. “His style will have h ave an effect on other chefs,” chefs ,” one guest predicted later. later. So what influences inform albot’s recipes? “Tese recipes aren’t based on anybody but myself, from my everyday life. Tings I like to sustain on and nourish.” Some he first developed cooking by the roadside on a cross-country cross-country car trip with his L abrador. Te Sweet Life details the advance preparations and snacks
albot has found vital traveling as a diabetic, and how he has coped with the “alarming, tricky situations” that can confront any diabetic round-the-clock. Other recipes are variations on favorites from his restaurant menus. When he isn’t cooking or surfing, albot (shown above at his Montauk home) home) paints—in mixed mi xed media. “Te canvas is t he same thing as a s a plate. My head’s in the same place whether I’m cooking or painting.... painting.... I’m all about texture, texture in foods, texture in painting. I love layers (of both paint and flavor).” New research on health benefits of food—of eating more herbs, of eating more greens and spices intrigue him. “Cinnamon’ “Cinnamon’ss great for a diabetic. I eat it all day long by t he spoonful.” urns out nothing is improbable about Sam albot’s cookbook.
WINTER WARMER. Townline BBQ Sauce. Te housemade sauce, ideal for
cold-season grilling, grilling , comes in regula r and hot in 16-ounce bottles for $7.50. $7.50. Buy itit at the restaura nt on own own Line Road in Sagaponack. Sag aponack. 30
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PAIRINGS
COCOAVINO A chocolate sommelier goes head-to-head with Long Island wine. BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
PHOTOGRAPHS PH OTOGRAPHS BY R ANDEE DADDONA
Roxanne Browning had a captive audience at Laurel Lake Vineyards. Tey were seated in the tank room in front of wineglasses with the promise of a pairing not usually on the menu: wine and chocolate. Browning, formerly a Madison Avenue ad executive and the mayor of Northport, has been passionate about chocolate ever since a trip to the Ecuadorian Amazon in the early 2000s where she visited visited villages that made their livings making “bean to bar” chocolate, the kind of chocolate that now is encroaching upon the shelves that used to be populated with c andy made by global companies like Nestlé, Hershey and Cadbury. But watch that word “candy.” rue chocolate, says this “choco-
late sommelier,” is not candy. If you look at the label of a commercially available chocolate bar, the first ingredient is some kind of sugar, whether it be high-fructose corn syrup or your run-of-themill cane sugar. A true chocolate bar, she says, will always have as its first ingredient cocoa. And the benefit of seeking out such chocolates, she says, in addition to the fact that they taste better, provide health benefits (more about that later) and are a qua lity product, which most consumers demand these days, is that chocolate from such small villages helps sustain the native peoples who have, for the most part, formed cooperatives, cooperatives, know how to select the best beans and are farming a nd producing with the environment in mind. edibleeastend.com
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For the first round, Laurel Lake’s winemaker Juan Sepulveda poured his 2010 Sauvignon Blanc, which Browning paired with a chocolate bar with dried banana and cayenne pepper by Antidote, a company in Ecuador. Te spice of the pepper and the sweetness of the banana complemented the herbaceousness of the wine. Next was Laurel Lake’s 2001 Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon with a 75 percent cocoa bar by Askinose, from the Soconusco region of Mexico. Te darkness of the wine with its chalky ta nnins and the darkness of the chocolate with its chalky tannins worked well together. My favorite was the combination of the slightly sweet 2010 Laurel Lake Gewürztraminer with chocolate from Kallari in Ecuador made with 75 percent cocoa and more cocoa butter than in the other bars. Te chocolate was rich, pure and creamy, and the acidic but sweet wine made it melt in your mouth. It’ss not too hard to convince people that chocolate is good for It’ you, but Browning (shown at left in red sweater) made her case: the monounsaturated fats in cocoa butter are similar to the good fats in avocados and olive oil. Chocolate is also high in antioxidants, which are said s aid to control insulin levels and provide minerals important to everyone’s diet. And in its purest form, chocolate has very low levels of caffeine. Te crowd was a lready won over. For more information or to set up tastings tastings,, visit exoticchocolatetasting.com. exoticchocolatet asting.com.
All six bottles in the Artist Series Collection (aste Red and White, Gewürztraminer, Gewürztra miner, Gallery, Gallery, Musée and Sparkling) come c ome packed in a custom wooden box for $280. Tey are ready to drink or just stare at. bedellcellars.com
ART YOU DRINK. Bedell “Artist Series” Gift Box.
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SOCIAL SUDS
STRON STRO NG RYE RY EL A ND Te region’s region’s first collaborative beer delivers a taste from f rom both forks. BY NIKO KROMMYDAS
i k s o r o D g e r G f o y s e t r u o C : h p a r g o t o h P
Strong Ryeland, a copper-hued collaboration created by Greenport Harbor Brewing Company and Southampton Publick House, is more than a well-balanced amalgam amalga m of five malt types and a nd two hop varieties, suitable for session-easy situations; the Long Island–interpreted English Special Bitter (ESB) embodies the convergence of two local breweries, situated on opposite forks, for the appreciation of craft beer. “I really wanted wa nted Greenport Greenport and Southampton to do something they felt represented them as brewers and would be proud to put their names on,” says Jen orriero, orriero, bar manager of Spring Lounge in Manhattan’s Manhatt an’s NoLita. NoLita. orriero, the impetus behind the two-day union in early September, chose a bold, rye-based ESB (comprising 20 percent of Strong Ryeland’s malt profile, rye is also used in Greenport Harbor Brewing Company’s recent Spring urning Saison) after a discussion with Spencer Niebuhr, brand manager of Southampton Publick House, about a one-off project that could serve as the apex of “I Love NY Beer,” Spring Lounge’s monthlong switch to New York–only craft drafts and bottles in October. (One of New York’s oldest bars, Spring Lounge features American beer and impressively opens at 8:00 a.m.) “I suggested we combine forces with our brethren on the East End of Long Island and create a new beer,” says Niebuhr. “wo text messages later to Greenport and we were off-and-running.” off-and-running.” Tough Strong Ryeland’s Ryeland’s moniker is a playful jab at an unfavorable local portrayal (“I think it goes without saying that our breweries embody the gold chains and muscle shirts that people
Community beer: Te people behind Strong Ryeland include, above from left, Spencer Niebuhr, Phil Markowski, DJ Swanson, Jen orriero orriero and Greg Doroski.
often associate with L ong Island,” jokes Greg Doroski, Doroski, assista nt brewer of Greenport Harbor Brewing Company), its handle also represents the awareness, and s olidarity, of community—not only within craft beer, but on Long Island, as well. Tis was most evident during Strong Ryeland’s recipe formation by Phil Markowski and DJ Swanson, brewmasters of Southampton Publick House and Greenport Harbor Ha rbor Brewing Company C ompany,, respectively. “Te planning was around the time of Hurricane Irene, so it wasn’t always an easy process,” recalls Swanson. “But it seemed like the perfect time to hang out and make a beer with friends.” Over two sessions in Greenport, the five a foremen forementioned tioned beerists shared brewing duties, industry stories, and pints, until a moderately spiced, maltforward ale with subtle notes of citrus and herbal tea was compl completed. eted. “Te specialty malts impart a unique character to the foundation, and the use of both UK arget and Cascade hops gives this beer more of a multi-continental take on the style,” says Markowski. “With Strong Ryeland, we hope to give the beer-drinking community a taste of the two forks.” Niko Krommydas lives in Selden, and runs “Super Neat Beer Adventure, Yes!!,” a Long Island craft beer blog, nikokrommyd as.com. edibleeastend.com
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ON GOOD LAND
PL A NT A RO ROW W FOR THE HUNGRY HUNGRY At EECO Farm, a plot is dedicated to supplying South Fork food pantries. STORY AND PHOTOGR APHS BY ELLEN WATSON WATSON
EAS HAMPON—I met John Malafronte at the Food Pantry Farm on a blustery, gray day at the end of April. It was overcast and chilly with a dampness that crept into my bones. Malafronte greeted me with such excitement and enthusiasm that I instantly warmed up and was comfortable walking the fields with him. A slight man with an eagerness and willingness to talk, Malafronte (who had a career as a bond salesman in Man hattan), told me that upon retiring on the East End he decided to take a small garden at EECO Farm. With no prior experience as a gardener, he grew food for himself and his wife. Eventually he met Peter Garnham, who was farming commercially at EECO Farm. Garnham had been gardening all of his life; his tanned face and rugged manner speaks of the time he has spent outdoors. He is a master gardener and makes a living as a garden writer for national magazines. In 2009 as the economy slumped, Garnham became aware of the need for food donations at the local East End food pantries and decided to do something about it. He enlisted Malafronte’s 38
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help, and the two friends started growing food to donate. Bringing their contacts, experience and enthusiasm enthusiasm to the c ause, calls for help were made to national seed companies and local nurseries, and the donations began to come in. Malafronte and Garnham provided the rented land and “seed” money needed for the farm’s other necessities, and the Food Pantry Farm was born. Te Food Pantry Farm is exactly what it sounds like: a farm that grows fresh organic produce for food pantries. I admit I al ways thought that food pantries only distributed government-issued and donated meat, cheese and a nd dried and/or canned goods. o me, this sounded uninspired and unappetizing. If indeed that was the case of food pantries in the past, then the face of today’s food pantry is different. Here on the East End, people using the resources of the local food pantries can also expect fresh food, fresh herbs and flowers. Te idea being this: people who need to use a food pantry deserve the same fresh, nutritious food that is available to people shopping at the supermarket and farmers market s.
Te Food Pantry Farm sensibility is a balance of idealism and practicality. As we discuss what is being grown at the farm (carrots, salad and cooking greens, summer and winter squash, melons, sweet potatoes, okra, beets, turnips, collards, kale, parsnips, radishes and Swiss chard, to name a few), the farmers share some thoughts with me. Tey grow and donate fresh herbs, such as cilantro, parsley, sage, mint and thyme to the pantries. But they want to know from their clientele: What other herbs and vegetables would you like? Tey also feel that if you are driven by need to use a food pantry, you are in a rough spot—so they grow fresh flowers to include in the donations. After all, who wouldn’t wouldn’t like a bouquet of flowers to cheer them up? Tese are very civil, endearing thoughts to be having when providing food for the needy. Tese farmers discovered that there was a need for good, fresh food, and so they are providing it, and more. Tey are telling the food pantry clientele that they they matter, matter, that someone cares for them. In 2009, the first year of the farm, Garnham and Malafronte did all the physical labor, along with friends and family volunteers. Tey planted and weeded and harvested, adding to their land area whenever more became available. Also part of the founding team is Ira Bezoza, a retired attorney and businessperson (and a keen gardener) who came on board to help out. He has a cheery, quick smile and is a great sidekick to Malafronte in their mutual storytelling. Involved in numerous citizen and community groups, Ira works as the bookkeeper and chief fund-raiser for the Food Pantry Farm. wo major donors, and a late-summer benefit barbecue held in September, have raised the funds for a planned state-of-the-art 3,400-square-foot hoop house, a plastic-covered greenhouse. When this th is
hoop house is in place (upon approval from the own Board), the Food Pantry Farm will be capable of growing and delivering food year-round. In the summer of 2010, Bruce Warr joined the board. Warr has had a passion for farming since childhood. His grandfather grandfat her was a professor of agriculture and commissioner of agriculture for New Jersey. He visited many farms when he was young, and a nd a lifelong love of the natural world was instilled inst illed in him. With a great work ethic, he helps in the day-to-day operations of the farm several days d ays a week. Tese men put in anywhere from 20 to 70 hours a week working at the farm. Te Food Pantry Farm currently works almost three acres of land and has two hoop houses. Tey recently reclaimed an abandoned orchard in a corner of EECO Farm. When I first visited in April, this patch of land was dead looking: brown grass, wiry sick-looking trees. Te farmers weren’t even sure what the health of the trees was or whether they would bear fruit. On a second visit at the end of June, the grass was green and mowed. Much of the area had been covered in black plastic ground-cover cloth to keep down the weeds; large nursery pots had been set on top and planted with cucumbers, melons and zucchini. Vines flowed over the top and onto the ground-cover fabric, ripe with flowers and baby squash. Te fruit trees looked healthy and happy, some with fruit on them—a few apples, pears and peaches. Te trees will be pruned and fed this winter and spring. Some new Te Food Pantry Farm makes a weekly delivery to five local pantries. Darcy Hutzenlaub, below and opposite page, started volunteering at Food Pantry Farm, and is now the farm’s field manager and community serv ice supervisor.
Dedicated deliveries:
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Farm vision: Peter Garnham, at left with farm manager Hutzenlaub, founded Food Pantry Farm with other EECO Farm colleagues. Each year, the farm delivers more than 16 tons of produce to nearby food pantries.
trees will be planted to replace the dead ones that will be removed. So how do these four retirement-age men manage all the physical labor needed to run the farm? Besides them and the volunteers, they have one paid employee, Darcy Hutzenlaub. She is the farm’s field manager and a nd community service supervisor. Hutzenlaub met Garnham when she began volunteering at the Food Pantry Farm. She wanted to learn more about growing food to assist her in a job she had at the time. Eventually, she quit her other job and came to work for the Food Pantry Farm. She recently rec ently completed the Cornell Cooperative Extension’s Master Gardener program and this winter will attend the New York Beginning Female Farmer’s Program. Hutzenlaub is a striking, strong, knowledgeable young woman and
At present, food donations are made by the Food Pantry Farm from April through early December. One delivery a week is made to the Amagansett, East Hampton, Sag Harbor, Southampton and Springs food pantries. In 2009, the Food Pantry Farm donated a total of 9½ tons of food from April through early December. In 2010, the number went up to 16½ tons. At the time of this writing, over 15 tons of food has been delivered from April through September 2011. Te farmers estimate that for every $1 that is donated, they deliver about $3 worth of vegetables at wholesale prices. Donations pay for seeds, supplies, tools and the salar s alaryy of one paid employee; volunteers volunteers and community service people do the rest of the work. For more information or to volunteer, e-mail them at [email protected].
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rounds out this crowd of retired men just perfectly. In fact the group feels like a family. Tere is smart conversation, lots of humor and great compassion for each other and the cause. Te group bounces around ideas, discusses current farm issues and laughs a lot. Tey all share the view that the Food Pantry Farm is a model that could be replicated in communities around the country. c ountry. Unemployed Unemployed people could be given work, and those in need could be given their fair share of fresh food. Tey are all tireless workers with big ideas that I am convinced will come to pass. Ellen Watson, self-proclaimed naturalist, can often be found photo graphing gardens, farms and field s on the sublime East End.
Amagansett Food Pantry Saint Michael’s Lutheran Church 486 Montauk Highway Amagansett, NY 11930 631.267.6351 uesday 4– 6 p.m.
Springs Food Pantry Springs Presbyterian Church 5 Old Stone Highway East Hampton, NY 11937 631.324.4791 Wednesday 4–6 p.m.
East Hampton Food Pantry Windmill Village II 219-50 Accabonac Road East Hampton, NY 11937 631.324.2300 uesday 2– 6 p.m.
Southampton Food Pantry Human Resources of the Hamptons 168 Hill Street Southampton, NY 11968 631.283.6415 Monday, Wednesday & Friday 10 a.m.–2 p.m.
Sag Harbor Food Pantry Old Whalers Church 44 Union Street Sag Harbor, NY 11963 631.725.2880 uesday 10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.
Seasons change. Seasons Qualityy doesn’t. Qualit Lenz wines consistently show well in blind tastings against notable French wines like Château Pétrus & Château Latour.* But don’t believe this ad, come to the winery & taste for yourself.
Open daily, all year round 10am - 6pm * Most recent results may be found on the Lenz website.
Main Rd (Rte 25) in Peconic 631.734.6010 www.lenzwine.com
BACK OF THE HOUSE
MARY’S MARVELOUS Tis cozy Main Street spot is crammed full of all-day, from-scratch nourishment. BY EILEEN M. DUFFY
PHOTOGRAPHS BY LINDSAY MORR MORR IS
AMAGANSE—Standing behind the counter of a grab-andgo breakfast-lunch spot has taug ht Mary Schoenlein a lot about people in the past nine years. It kind of boils down to th is: People People don’tt like change, don’ chang e, except when they ask for it. Schoenlein, the owner of Mary’s Marvelous on Main Street in Amagansett, Amag ansett, during t he summer feeds the frantic recreationer, recreationer, but over the winter a stream of locals keeps her in business. Tere are some she sees every day and others who will cal l her at home if she takes an item off the menu. “People “Peop le got upset when I stopped making t he curried chicken salad sa ndwich, ndwich,”” she says. “We had another kind of ch icken salad, and everybody makes a curried cu rried chicken salad, but that’s what they wanted.” She is not complaining. In fact, the evolution of her business— from a stripped down selection of pastries and sandwiches, to an ever-changing chalkboard of breakfast sandwiches, soups, grains, vegetables, and meat dishes—was prompted by her standby customers, who came to depend on Mary’s for breakfast, lunch and (reheated-at-home) dinner. From the very beginning, “people were just wanting to grab food and get to their next thing. New Yorkers, especially on vacation, want that lifestyle,” says Schoenlein. Ten as customers started coming back and asking for more, the prepared foods started creeping in. “Tey’d say ‘this is great, but how about a salad?’ or ‘Do you have anything I could bring home for dinner?’” For Schoenlein what her customers want is as important, and maybe more so, than her desire for creativity. It shows in how many of those who enter her store greet her by name, ask after her family and talk about their lives, as a s Schoenlein listens like she has all a ll day. Despite Despite the exclamation mark in her logo, Mary’s Marvelous conveys a steady dedication to quality where the answer to the question “What’s good here?” is answered by other customers customers and staff alike, a like, “Everything!” “Everything!” And everything is prepared in the diminutive 1,100-squarefoot space. Egg dishes for breakfast, 12 different types of pastry, muffins, prepared sandwiches, salads, hot food like curried tofu, sautéed kale from Balsam’s Farm and Waldorf salad. Chicken potpies sit in the case next to macaroni and cheese. Cupcakes are surrounded by spiced nuts and the dozen or so different cookies baked in the small smal l kitchen. Tere are sablés , regular and chocolate, peanut butter filled peanut butter cookies, fresh lime shortbread, Mary O’s, just like Oreos but better, and what Schoenlein cal ls her 42
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American line, good old chocolate chips and oatmeal raisin. Te menu also reflects the diversity in t he kitchen. Te housemade salsa is prepared using a recipe provided by one of the Ecuadorian cooks, which uses tomate de arbol, a tree tomato native to South America that results in a creamy pale orange sauce. Te eggs Colombian are rolled in a tortilla and have crumbled potato chips in a decidedly Andean flourish. Outside of home kitchens, Mary’s Marvelous offers some of the South Fork’s only madefrom-scratch arepas, thick corn cakes filled with milk, butter and white cheese, or shredded beef, guacamole and ha rd-boiled egg. In the winter, with the Amagansett Farmers Market, Vicki’s Veggies and much of Montauk shuttered, Mary’s is perhaps the last food option for eastbound roadtrippers. So, it’s not unusual that, on any given day in winter, a line of customers snakes away from the cash register, toward the back of the shop and then back toward the front, forming a horseshoe around a center table arranged with the shop’s own packaged products and selected artisan foods from f rom around the country countr y. During a recent “quiet” “quiet” week, the shop went through 120 dozen eggs, a number that quadruples in summer. Te shop goes through 1,000 pounds of flour each week. For Tanksgiving, they sold nearly 80 pies, mostly pumpkin, double-crusted apple, and pecan. Mary’s sells “gallons and gallons” of chicken soup, made fresh three or four times a week. Mary’s opened in 2002, but Schoenlein’s cooking career began nearly two decades before when she moved to New York City and talked her way into trendsetting Gotham restaurants, like Jonathan Waxman’ Waxma n’ss Jams on the Upper East Side. She honed her pastry skills during a stint at a two-star Michelin restaurant in Versailles, France, and deepened her reverence for impeccable ingredients alongside Alfred Portale when Gotham Bar and Grill received its first New York imes stars. imes stars. Schoenlein and her husband ultimately wanted out of the city. Tey found a home in Amagansett, and Schoenlein became the executive chef of the late Red Horse Market on Montauk High way, east of East Hampton. Tere she started her own line of granola, called Mary’s Marvelous at the suggestion of a friend, a suggestion that Schoenlein first doubted but it stuck. (More than a few customers have made the granola—a heavenly mix of oats, maple syrup sent direct from a farm in Vermont, jumbo raisins, and “just a few other ingredients”—their morning staple for the
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last decade. “It’ “It’ss baked in small batches,” says Schoenlein. “We’re “We’re very conscious about keeping it f resh.”) When the Red Horse Market closed, S choenlein started looking for a space for her own business. Te space, at the eastern end of the row of shops in Amagansett, had once been the Coach outlet but before that, in the ’70s, it had been the Store, run by Bert Greene, who went on to become a food writer and cookbook author. Te Store was one of the first to sell prepared gourmet food, preceding even the Barefoot Contessa in East Hampton. Te landlord heard she was looking for a place and gave her a call. It was a perfect match, a store with plenty of parking ideally located for beachgoers seeking breakfast and lunch. Schoenlein’s husband, Pat McKibbin, who works for South Fork builder Bulgin & Associates, redesigned the space and was side-by-side with Schoenlein as they sledgehammered s ledgehammered the concrete slab to lay a new kitchen floor. Later, when the business quickly grew, McKibbin helped build out storage and a nd refrigerator space. (“He’s really been my rock in starting t his whole venture,” venture,” Schoenlein says. “Starting my own business was a dream. Pat helped me realize it.”) And for 10 years this coming summer, Mary’s Marvelous has served customers seven days per week, opening at 7:00 a.m. and closing at 4:00 p.m. (3:00 p.m. on Sundays). She now has a full-time staff of 13, and her sister, Sandra, has been there since the beginning. Another sister, Laura, worked there but died of cancer, something customers still talk about and remember. Change still hovers. Tis year, in response to customer requests, Schoenlein added gluten-free offerings and more vegan specialties. Items like raw kale salad, a butternut squash and spinach gratin, and quinoa cakes are just a rotating roster of in-season additions that consistently sell out. In the home-meal category categor y, her turkey meat loaf a nd chicken potpie remain big sellers. Schoenlein continues to consider expansion as the volume of her business bumps up ag ainst t he tiny kitchen. She’s She’s investing in her Web site, taking notes for a cookbook, and, with her longhaired miniature dachshund, Bijoux, at her feet, spending more time in her office, which had to be moved to another building bu ilding so she could expand the kitchen. Tis year, she says, af ter a decade of “working ma butt off,” was the first she’s had weekends off. And while she has tried to get some distance from the day to day, the demands of 4:00 a.m. pastry-baking, after-closing stock and soup-making, and her own ongoing urge to get her hands Savvy shopkeeper: When her customers started to depend on Mary’s Marvelous for breakfast, lunch, and (reheated-at-home) dinner, Mary Schoenlein (opposite page) added an ever-changing chalkboard of breakfast sandwiches, soups, grains, vegetables, and meat dishes.
coated in flour, all pull her back in. She depends on “an incredible staff,” including cooks who head up pastry, savory and other elements. But Schoenlein still designs all the menus. “It amazes me. It still amazes me,” she says. “All the time and all the work that goes into making good food.” Eileen M. Duffy, Edible East End’s deputy editor, holds a diploma in wine and spirits from the International Wine Center and writes from her home in Southold. RUBS AND FUDGE. Condiments for Xmas.
Local producers are selling stuff that makes the stuff they already sell taste better. For preparing pastured poultry, Browder’s Birds sells two dry rubs in 5-ounce jars for $10: Grill, for a barbecue flavor, and Roast, a mix of dry herbs; call 631.599.3394 or visit browdersbirds.com to order. Vine Street Café is now selling their barbecue sauce, cookies and hot fudge. Buy their Blue Canoe products at the restaurant on Shelter Island, or through their Web site, bluecanoesi.com.
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IN THE KITCHEN WITH
APRIL GORNIK AND ERIC FISCHL Two painters thrive on eggs, homemade bread and ambitious dinner parties. BY BRIAN HALWEIL
PHOTOGRAPHS BY LINDSAY MORR IS
NORH HAVEN—Te home of artists April Gornik and Eric Fischl is perched above freshwater wetlands and surrounded by gnarled wild cherry trees t hat stretch to the sky. Te path from the driveway, where where a Chevy Chev y Volt Volt is fed through a bright-orange cord near a bank of solar panels, leads past matching his-and-hers glass studios with wraparound porches; up concrete stairways bisected by collecting pools that ferry rainwater away from the house; and finally, through a native-plants garden dotted with Japanese maples ablaze in autumn glory. Te robust Lacinato kale patch outside the front door is a sign of the couple’s deep-rooted interest in matters related to eating. In 1975, when the two painters met at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, Fischl wooed Gornik with mulligatawny soup, a salade composée and composée and what Gornik recalls as “this insanely delicious creamy clam chowder.” (Born in New York City and raised in suburban Long Island, Fischl knew the chowder as part of his kitchen vernacular. He thinks the mulligatawny soup came from the Alice’s Restaurant Cookbook ; the salad was “a half-assed attempt at dieting.”) Gornik admits she was no gourmand—“my main food was Kraft Macaroni & Cheese and Ragú spaghetti sauce”—but a few years later, inspired by a fancy French dinner-party circuit that some art school friends started, sta rted, she got a copy of Mastering Mastering the Art of French Cooking , and, on an electric skillet and hot plate in the illegal office building where she and Fischl were squatting, turned out sole de bonne femme and femme and a gâteau a gâteau de crêpes with crêpes with a frangipane filling. Did those early edible install ations from April help seal the deal with Eric? “It certainly went a long way,” way,” he says, wrapping an arm around his h is wife’s shoulders. Dinner parties remain a big part of the routine. Tey regularly host holiday feasts, dishing up communal delicacies like Brazilian fish soup to a couple dozen guests. Other edible endeavors include Gornik pushing farmers market schedules and food pantry donations in the Save Sag Harbor e-newsletter, and Fischl re-creating historic Midwestern meals as part of America: America: Now and Here , his ambitious 18-wheeler mounted, moveable exhibit that raises questions about democracy, patriotism and trust in a post-911 America. Both artists have produced labels for Bedell Cellars’ Artist Series—a Fischl nude kicked off the series on a 2001 magnum of merlot, while a Gornik oceanscape graced the 2007 blanc de blancs. Most days, they do breakfast and lunch separately. She eats
lightly before noon to leave room for yoga and swi mming. He sips cappuccino and munches granola. She tends the garden, stocks the pantry and books their CSA memberships. He makes bread—“a genius talent,” Gornik says. Teir home, designed by Fischl and built with the collaboration of architect Lee Skolnick, is adorned with a collection of sculpture, paintings and a nd books that you’d expect from f rom a New York art world power duo who both count works at the Met, Whitney and MoMA. From the main living room—a soaring barnlike space with a library that floats overhead—the home flows down into a cozy dining room and kitchen, joined by a floor-to-ceiling concrete and stucco partition, with heart pine cupboards and trim, that holds plates, cups and cookbooks. And although Gornik and Fischl are two very different eaters, they share the conviction that what we put in our mouths can be both model and muse. “It seems like every couple of months, I’m wildly interested in cooking and I’ll need to make up a new recipe,” says Gornik. “I don’t really associate it with either a creative or fallow time in my studio. But I do think that cooking and a nd making art and gardening are all parallel activities for me.”
She tends tends the garden ga rden,, stocks the pantry pa ntry and books their CSA memberships. He makes bread—“a genius talent,” she says. Te opening of America: America: Now and Here in Here in Kansas City, Missouri, included two food events. Te first was a lunch t hat featured jerky, hardtack and jars of lard. “One of the courses was preceded by a history lesson in which it was told that the Missouri River was once full of salmon, but that settlers sa id they would rather eat their dogs than eat salmon,” says Fischl. “Te chef then served salmon hot dogs!” At the second event, organized with a local artists collective named Bread, aspiring activists came to sup on homemade bread and soup. Attendees threw their na mes into a hat, three were chosen to speak about their projects, a vote was ta ken and the winner was awarded the evening’s proceeds. “So, yes,” Fischl says. “Art and food a re intimately tied together.” edibleeastend.com
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six months or a year. Sometimes it’s only one egg. Sometimes it’s two. But I do find that if I eat two eggs and a piece of toast or a half a piece of toast, then I’m just fine for hours and hours and hours and hours. Andreja Premium espresso machine EF: I have a fancy espresso machine and burr grinder but I am not an expert. My coffee is organic beans called Hurricane Espresso I get from IGA in Sag. Every now and then I nail a great foam, but it is so inconsistent it plagues me. I do the same thing every day with differing results (which proves I am not mad, just
Who does the cooking? AG: It’s me. He does bake bread, but that’s kinda it. It’s partly my fault because I’m kind of strict about health things, like butter. I’m a little bit of a kitchen dictator. (I’m tired of people saying “Nazi.”) What’s your breakfast routine? AG: I always eat two local, organic eggs, either from Bette and Dale or David Falkowski, and some bread from Eric, and chives from my garden. EF: Coffee, two cups, cappuccino, first thing. I read the paper (digital imes Reader), do crossword and/or Words with Friends. Bola Granola with fruit (April ma kes it with maple syrup) and 2 percent milk. I’m a friend of [the designer] Nicole Miller’s, and Bola is her sister’s product. Tat would be enough reason to support it, but it is delicious on top of that. We get it at Cavaniola’s Cheese Shop. Eggs AG: My mom would make me eggs when I was sick. Softboiled. Eric will tell you his theory that women like to eat eggs more than men do. He thinks that’s weird and cannibalistic. I think he thinks that because he doesn’t like caviar. EF: I do find it unsettling to watch women coo and glee over a bowl of caviar. More so than men who also coo and glee over it. Ironic how upset they can get at birds that rob eggs from other birds’ nests but don’t make this connection to our nest or uterine robbery. AG: I’m currently eating them scrambled. I’m a little OCD with my eggs. I’ll get into a soft-boiled thing and I’ll do that for 50
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inconsistent). My theory is t hat it is the milk’s inconsistent). mi lk’s fault. It seems when I open a new carton car ton [it] [it] foams the best but then t hen over several days it becomes less and less certain. I will never research this theory, but if any of your readers have thoughts let me know. Berries AG: I like to eat red fruits in the morning. What the French call “red fruits”—strawberries, raspberries, blackberries. I get that at Provisions. Tey are high in antioxidants, and I like them. Meat AG: I’m not a meat person. It’s to a certain extent philosophical.
I curated a show called Other Is Animal at Danese Gallery. It was not supposed to be a “don’t eat animals show,” it was just supposed to show animals as having real presence and as being worthy of attention. Because of their consciousness. Not because they are cute or they look like us or even on ecological grounds. For Tanksgiving I ordered a Heritage Foods USA cruelty-free turkey. It’s not so much people eating animals per se, but the cruelty involved involv ed in factory farming. It makes me insane with rage and disgust disg ust and sorrow. o me it’s the moral elephant in the room of America. Dreamfields pasta AG: I should do an ad for this spaghetti. Actually, I was talking with the guy who sells the fish at King Kullen, about trying to find local fish. But then what I wanted for dinner was pasta. He said, “Have you tried Dreamfields spaghetti?” And I said no, because I like Barilla the best and I’m a total pasta snob. And so I bought it, and it’s fantastic. It has a lower glycemic content than most spaghettis, and it’s the best pasta I’ve ever bought. I recommend it, but the only place I can find it is K ing Kullen. I do spaghetti and arugula pesto from my garden. And kale pesto is really good, or just kale sautéed. My personal favorite is probably spaghetti and artichokes with tomato and mint. Indian spices AG: Here’s a funny story. I’m in a taxi in New York and the driver has a dish di sh on his seat t hat he’s going to eat for dinner, and it
smelled delicious. And I went, “Tat smells so good. Tere’s amchur in it, isn’t there?” And he said, “Yes, how did you know?” And I said, “I just love that spice, I could smell it from a mile away.” And he goes, “all women love amchur, what is it?” And I said, “if you don’t understand it, I don’t understand it.” Ceramic egg tray Tat’s Mae Mougin. She makes them. She’s great. It’s obviously decorative, but I use it all the time. Tomato sauce I have my own way of doing it. It’s not chunky, chunky. I like it with a huge amount of garlic, ga rlic, olive oil, bay leaf and sa lt. Broccoli rabe Tis is broccoli rabe from Quail Hill that needs to be eaten. Right Rig ht now, now, I’m in the winter share of Quail Quai l Hill. But in the summer I tried Sunset Beach Farm, which is, like, just around the corner. Garden I just started sta rted doing the garden two summers ago. It’s It’s always been, like, flowers and perennials. I said to Eric, “What “W hat do you like?” And he said, “Cucumbers.” I don’t like them really, but there’s this Tai fish soup that involves those long European cucumbers. And there was a seed package at Marder’s, so I grabbed it. And I planted them just like it said, five little seeds in a mounded hole. And then, like three weeks later, our entire yard was a sea of cucumbers. Cupcake trays and baking pans AG: I got into trying to make health muffins a few years ago. Te baking trays are what I use to bake sweet potatoes and vegetables. I love roasted vegetables. I do that a lot in the winter. Eric used to make pies and cinnamon buns. And I begged him repeatedly to make them. ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to have cinnamon buns?’ But then he’d probably put butter in them and I would be telling him to put less butter. EF: I was a dishwasher at a pharmacy in Scottsdale, Arizona, [I] got promoted overnight to cook becaus e the cook quit. It was a real soda fountain kind of place, and I was responsible for breakfast and lunch. Te usual stuff like eggs any which way, BLs, burgers and dogs, chicken and tuna salads. I also had to make a edibleeastend.com
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Cookbooks AG: I tend more now to go to Epicurious online if I’m trying to make something up and I just want ideas. I’ll scan a bunch of recipes and make my own version. But I like t he cookbooks. Astier de Villatte china AG: Tis company in France makes it. We’ve been collecting it for years and years. It’s a black or dark-gray clay with a white slick. It’s really a simple idea. I don’ don’tt think thin k there’s anything like l ike it. Places you like to go? AG: Nick and oni’s. I like North Fork able and I love the Vine Wine & Café up there [in Greenport]. Greenport]. And I like Vine Street Café. I think Cittanuova does a really great job. Te nice thing is that most of the restaurants rest aurants around here seem to be aware of using local produce and supporting local farmers. Tat matters to me. EF: Almond (excellent). utto il Giorno (though I am not treated well there). Dockside (lunch in summer on the patio, can’t be beat). Dining table AG: Our dining room table was made by Eric’s former assistant, a great woodworker named om Brokish who now lives in Portland, Maine, but still does custom work down here for us and others. He and Eric worked on the design together. We have some pretty ambitious dinners here. I get nervous cooking and planning, but once I pull it off, when everyone is enthusiastic and happy,, I’m happy. happy happy. I do Christmas Chris tmas or Christmas C hristmas Eve dinner. Every year with friends, which is really nice. I’ve done Tanksgiving for years and years and years. Te occasional birthday party. And big dinner parties in the summer. EF: For me all our dinners blend together into one continu ous love affair with friends.
couple of pies and cinnamon-raisin buns each morning. Tey were edible but not pretty. I could never get the fruit to gel, so when I sliced into the pie, the crust collapsed and fruit pooled. No one complained but no one offered to help me figure it out either. Two Bengal cats AG: We got one from a friend and another from the Southampton Animal Shelter [Gornik is an active supporter of the Southampton Animal Shelter Foundation]. We take our cats for walks on leashes. When they t hey see something outside it’s really cute. Tey go boing, boing. Tey bounce, like igger in Winnie the Pooh. Breadmaking supplies (including assorted flours, measuring containers, scale and and artine Bread cookbook) AG: Tis is his olive bread from a few days ag o. It’s It’s really delicious. He also makes an amazing walnut loaf. Tat’s my favorite. EF: I’m not not a baker. I just ma ke some bread.
Brian Halweil is the editor of Edible East End. End .
PAINT THE WORLD BEAUTIFUL. Holiday Art. Te Golden Eagle in East Hampton sells art supplies and offers classes. Give someone the opportunity to learn to draw, or take 10 kids off someone’s hands for a paint party during the holiday week. goldeneagleart.com week. goldeneagleart.com 52
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CULT OF TASTE
FATHER AND MOTHE MO THER R NATUR NAT URE E Joe and Alexandra Macari and their bottles brimming with biodiversity. BY AMY ZAVATTO PHOTOGRAPHS PHO TOGRAPHS BY MATTHEW FUR MA N
Bring up a word like “organic” around Joe and Alexandra Mac ari, and you won’t won’t get the reaction that you think th ink you might get from this 16-year-old producer known by many for their organic-leaning approach to farming; in fac t, it kind of feels like the “O” word around their 450 or so acres. Not because they don’t believe in these principles of farming, or because they aren’ aren’tt very, very good stewards of the t he land—they do and they are. Very much so. It’s just that as far as the Macaris are concerned, the only thing you can reliably stick a label on is a bottle; outside of that, words are just words. Te real stuff is in the soil. “I think it [can be] a marketing tool to get people to buy things,” says Alexandra, when we talk about the countrywide embrace of organics in everything from meat to cleaning products to wine. “We know what’s in the bottle is right; I see the biodiversity in our vineyards.” Since they started the winery with Joe’s parents—Joe Sr. and Katherine—in 1995, the Macaris have embraced the principles of biodynamics—the farming ideals develop developed ed by Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner in the 19 1920s. 20s. A nd while Steiner’s theories may be better known for their unconventional, seemingly loopy methods (head-scratchers like the iconic manure-filled buried cow horns and a strologically based planting schedules), their greater good is firmly rooted in a practical, holistic, all-encompassing view of the land and all that surrounds it. It’s about keeping and maintaining a healthy environment; something the Macaris are more than just a little passionate about. “It’s a year-round business,” says Joe one autumn afternoon just around harvest time on a tour we take across the vast acreage Macari holds. Tis year, the wet, unpredictable unpredictable season th at was 2011 201 1 was hard ha rd on every farmer, fa rmer, and Joe is quick to point out some of the problems in the vineyard— browning leaves here, rot there, which is the big reason he says that going for organic certification in the Northeast is challenging. “A year like this? It’s tough,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s blood and sweat and tears.” (And, as it so happens, Red Hook Winery, the three-year-old urban winemaking project owned by the cross-country force of Napa’s Abe Schoener and Robert Foley, New York’s Mark Snyder and Max 54
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Loubiere, and Michael Cinque rounding things out in Amagansett, Long Island, who purchase their fruit from Macari, nodded to Joe’s toil by christening ch ristening their chardonnay “Joe’s ears.”) ears.”) “Joe really takes it hard,” says Alexandra about plants that aren’t happy. “We “We try to cheer c heer him up, and tell him, h im, ‘It’s going to be great!’ but he’s pretty hard on himself if the vineyard v ineyard isn’t happy.” happy.” If you wound back a couple of decades, creating planting schedules based on the stars and planets in the sky isn’t exactly where the couple thought they’d be. Not by a longshot. Alexandra was an IV F nurse at Lenox Hill Hospital—a job she t horoughly loved and still speaks passionately about; Joe was a property manager and
real estate developer based in Jackson Heights, Queens. But 40 or so years ago, Joe Sr. had purchased over 500 acres of potato farmland, renting the plots to local loca l farmers and introducing Joe Jr. to the wide-open spaces and salty charms of the North Fork. After he and Alexandra met and married, they began to spend summers here, renting a house and stopping in at the now-defunct Mattituck Hills Winery for some casual swirling and sipping fun, buying a few bottles here and there to take back home. Little did they know they’d end up owning that very piece of property—where the North Road tasting room sits today—and its now well-established merlot vines. By the early ’90s, it got harder and harder to leave the weekends
Searching steward: Joe Macari, and his wife, Alexandra, who have planted 100 acres of vines since t he early 1990s, say they have learned that the choices you make in the vineyard affect more than the ultimate life of the plants. behind, and Joe and Alexandra decided to move out to Mattituck full-time. At first, Joe commuted back and forth forth while Alexandra Alexa ndra was busy raising their then three children, with a fourth that would soon be on the way. Joe Sr. had been keeping an eye on the burgeoning wine industry, and approached his son and daughter-in-law about giving a winery a go. Tey started with an ambitio ambitious us 60 planted acres in edibleeastend.com
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Macari’s Urbanik Urbanik is a patient, patient, observing and a nd thoughtful kind of winemaker; laid-back and trusting of the good fruit Joe cultivates out out in the vineyard. vineya rd. Her imprint imprint tends toward wines that are a re the best possib possible le expression of themselves; incredibly aromatic and much less manipulated. 1995 on the land his dad bought all those years ago. “We thought we were too big!” laughs Alexandra. A couple of years later, they planted 40 more. And while they learned from their mistakes and successes (“Now we’ve we’ve learned that t hat lower yields make ma ke for better-tasting fruit,” f ruit,” says Alexandra), they also learned that farming is a very imperfect, beautiful, frustrating occupation, but one in which the choices you make affect more than the ultimate life of the plants. A conversation with a potato-farming friend clued Joe into the notion that many of the chemicals used in farming sprays were related to those used to create the Vietnam warfare herbicide Agent Orange—from that early point, he knew that this wasn’t what he wanted to work with, and he began to study st udy the tenets of ecological and biodynamic farming. “I’ve known the Macaris’ wines pretty much since they started,” says Chris Miller, wine director at the Living Room at the Maidstone Arms in East Hampton, whose list focuses on sustainably minded producers. “I look for family-owned wineries,” says Miller. “Places where [the owner’s] children play there. You especially find this in Europe where domaine owners plan on passing the property to their offspring, so they take care of land in a better manner; take it to a higher level. And the Macaris have done that.” In fact, in the Macaris’ measured approach to chemical use, Miller finds some old-world precedent. “It’s what Europeans call lutte raisonnée ,” ,” says Miller. “What it means is if you’re in a region where it’s difficult or dangerous to the health of the vineyard to be 100 percent biodynamic and organic”—like in Long Island’s prevailing damp conditions, for instance—“you do the best you can and kill-off [pests and fungus] in the most gentle manner that you can so you don’t lose your vineyard. Macari is doing a wonderful job of this.” oday, the Macaris have 200 acres under vine—which include merlot, cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon, pinot noir, syrah, petit verdot, malbec, chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, and viognier—and from the get-go they eschewed chemical nitrogen in favor of a soilenrichment program fed from nutrient-balancing “teas” (a sort of liquid soil booster that Alexandra coaxes from a mix of nettles and compost) and offerings from the mountain-high compost pile made up of leaves, vegetables, horse manure, and fish heads, tails and bones. Tey encourage the natural insect population and native area plants for cover crops. Joe has planted around 200 of those manurefilled horns around the property to jibe with Steiner’s soil and plant vitality program. And while Joe readily admits to the need to spray 56
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for things like powdery mildew, especially in years as particularly uncooperative on the East End as 2011, he never uses chemical fertilizers or insecticides. “Tere are a lot of things that are wrong between the cosmos and the earth; we need to fix it. And I know I’m both part of the problem and the solution, but that’s my struggle.” Te rest of the 450 acres, which include a second tasting room and its surrounding property in Cutchogue on the North Road that they acquired in 2008, are filled with a treasure of biodiversity. biodiversity. As lovely at the North Fork is, the beauty of their propert y is still something to behold, and riding around it feels a bit like you’ve entered another romantic world. Maybe the Loire Valley or perhaps even some gently hilly countryside in Virginia. But no, it’s just lovely Long Island, allowed to flourish and grow under good stewardship: Tere are wetlands, woods of birch and locust, thickets of cattails, goldenrod and wildflowers, and, if you go far enough, a cliff that overlooks the rolling waters of the Sound. Sequestered in large, open pens around the property are grazing longhorn cattle, rabbits, pigs, goats, turkeys and chickens. Tere are 70 beehives tucked into funny square houses that look like an oddball sort of outdoor filing cabinet system in three different spots scattered around the property. Tere are 30 acres of corn for feed; there’s an enormous greenhouse where they grow a mind-boggling amount of peppers, multiple kinds of tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, herbs, nettles and a fig tree, too, nodding to Joe’s Frosinone, Italy, born grandparents. With all the changing, thriving, growing life cycles on in the vineyard, there have been changes indoors at the winery, too. In July 2010, Paola Valverde of Chile, Macari’s main winemaker for seven years, left. In I n her place easily slipped Kelly Urbanik, a name you might know from her years spent at the former Bedell offshoot, Corey Creek. A native of Healdsburg in the heart of Napa, California, Urbanik fell hard for the East Coast, and the way she came to Macari was about as natural as it gets. She met Joe and Alexa ndra’s daughter, Gabriella, on a beach volleyball team, striking up a friendship in 2006 that would lead her eventually to the Macaris’ door. Urbanik is a patient, observing and thoughtful kind of winemaker; laid-back and trusting of the good fruit Joe cultivates out in the vineyard, with a desire for wines that really show a sense of the blocks in which they are planted, and the expression of the vintage from which they came. Her imprint tends toward wines that are the best possible expression of themselves; incredibly aromatic and
much less manipulated, and some early tastings prove extremely promising. We barrel-tasted through a few fe w of her reds from the 2010 vintage—a floral, elegant, plushy cabernet franc from a plot near Bergen Road; another from older vines full of pretty, ripe plum and blackberry notes with none of the abrasive greenness that cab fran can sometimes have; an expressive, intense, vibrant merlot from the vines that stretch out behind the Mattituck tasting room, all rich, juicy black cherries, blackberries and tobacco that already was such a journey on the palate at this young point in its life. here are other recent changes, too, to keep up with their 17,000-ca 17 ,000-case-a-year se-a-year production. production. Around the t he same time Kelly arrived, the Macaris added a new barrel cellar, a new private dining room for special parties with a great little tricked-out kitchen down the hall, as well as a bright new windowed tasting area with doors leading to a patio that looks out upon the vines of Block C, the original merlot acreage. Tere’s the second tasting room, too, on Route 25, with a pretty copper-topped bar that the Macaris acquired from a nearby restaurant. And around the main tasting room in Mattituck are flags from other nations, representing the homelands of some of their 40 or so employees (and nodding to Alexandra’s Argentine family background). “Wine has no borders,” offers Joe. “We don’t sit around drinking our own wine every night. If you don’t get out and try the wines and food of other places, how can you judge your own?” But like any vineyard owner, he does of course judge his own, starting at the ground level. Because, really, it all amounts to a hill of badly grown bea ns to them if the la nd isn’t isn’t any good. “Te soil is alive,” he says. “It’s hard farming, but doing things this way revitalizes it; it connects to everything.” Amy Zavatto grew up on Shelte r Island and writes about food, wine and spirits from her home on Staten Island.
FARM ON LAND AND AT SEA. Give Support.
Why not sign your loved one, or yourself, up for an associate membership in the Long Island Farm Bureau, which is available for nonfarmers interested in the future of our agricultural community. Enjoy member benefits and be a part of the lobby for $80 per year. lifb.com Or, learn to grow shellfish with SPA; $150 gets you a year’s worth of classes, your own shellfish garden and 1,000 oyster seed. ccesuffolk.org
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HAPPENINGS
A COUPLE WEDS IN WATER MILL International fare for a pioneering state ceremony. BY LAUREL BERGER
PHOTOGRAPHS PHO TOGRAPHS BY JENNY GORMA N
Editor’s Note: We Note: We shared in the pride people felt this past summer s ummer when Governor Cuomo made New York York the sixth sixt h state, and largest state, to legalize gay marriage. And, naturally, we were curious about what food would be served at the first weddings sanctioned by this law. At Gracie Mansion, our friends at Great Performances had the privilege of catering the Sunday-morning Sunday-m orning ceremony officiated by Mayor Bloomberg, complete with Montauk seafood and Long Island wines, Hudson Valley vegetables and local cheeses, poultry and beef, Brooklyn-brewed beers, and even bouquets and floral arrangements picked the day before the wedding from the fields of the caterer’s own Katchkie Farm. We had the pleasure of attending one of the first gay marriages in Suffolk County, the town hall ceremony of Alan Ceppos and Frédéric Rambaud, followed by an all-day celebration at their home in Water Mill. What follows is a play-by-play of the locavore-tinged international specialties they assembled, as chronicled by Laurel Berger and photographed by Jenny Gorman.
WAER MILL—Te East End of Long Island is no outpost of North Africa n culture. If you were to marry here, and if you wanted, say, a unisian unisian delicac y like droigts de la mariée , or bride’s fingers, at the reception, you might make them yourself (a bad idea) or you could ring Martine Abitbol, a Shelter Island chef reared in unisia and France whom I love to cook c ook with. Alan Al an Ceppos and Frédéric Rambaud, the owners of the Hamptons Hamptons Honey Company, wisely chose the latter course of action. On July 26, at 10:30 in the morning, the two became the first firs t gay couple to wed in Southampton. Ceppos, a New Yorker with deep-set eyes in a moon face, and Rambaud, a slender, handsome Frenchman from Senegal,
After the Ceppos-Rambaud wedding dinner, the staff and newlyweds posed, including, back row from left, Frédéric Rambaud, Cody Simons and Alan Ceppos, and, front row from left, the author, Martine Abitbol, Gabrielle Apparu, Jill Doherty and Anne Apparu. Sealed with a meal:
lived together in Paris for 10 years, where they developed a taste for the unisian cuisine that Abitbol grew up with. Having long enjoyed her food, which draws on the t he traditions of unisia’s unisia’s Sephardi, Arab, A rab, Berber and Italian communities, Ceppos and Rambaud engaged Abitbol to cater a feast for 45 guests, to be held that evening. edibleeastend.com
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Te ingredients of a marriage: marriage: Clockwise, from above, Rambaud samples the fare as the cooks prepare; thin-skinned peppers purchased that afternoon from an old farmer on Shelter Island; Abitbol frying homemade rolls, a Tunisian specialty called “fricassée” (Each was split down the middle and stuffed with méchouia just before serving.); as the guests arrive, the t he first batch of droigts de la mariée were deep-fried until golden; the finished fricassée; a Judeo-Tunisian feast begins with an array of kemia or cold mixed appetizers. 60
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Recruited to help with the preparations, I met Abitbol and her capable daughter, the chef Anne Apparu, at the wedding couple’s 15acre farm and compound on the afternoon of the dinner. At sunset massive loaves of semolina dough were still rising, platters heaped with lamb awaited the grill, and buckets of summer vegetables had not yet been dealt with for the couscous. And, of course, there were those doigts de la mariée —sheets —sheets of brick, a fragile tissue-thin pastr y, filled, in this variation, with minced shrimp flavored with cilantro, lemon and garlic, and rolled into neat scrolls before being tossed into the deep fryer. Tough bride’s fingers are labor-intensive and fiddly— the pastry leaves must be kept moist or they will break apart in your hands—this wouldn’t be a unisian wedding without them. Soon the guests were at the door, arriving from Europe, India, Africa Afr ica and the borough of Queens. A few locals filtered in. Checking my sheet pan of digits, some emaciated, others pudgy, I glanced at the clock, which read half past seven. Ceppos and Rambaud wandered into the kitchen. kitchen. Dressed in caftans c aftans of shimmering silk, they looked like caliphs or extremely prosperous North African merchants. “More hot pepper!” Rambaud mock-commanded after tasting the méchouia méchouia,, a mash of grilled sweet peppers, tomatoes, onions, tuna, capers and preserved lemons. “But not too much, we don’t want the taste buds overexcited.” Abitbol, who is small and agile, was a picture of serenity, as if it had not crossed her mind that unless all the elements of this meal came together snappety-snap, we’d be responsible for the first gay divorce in the Hamptons. For a moment, I’d forgotten that she comes from a long line of brilliant cooks who are always in control. (I once witnessed her octogenarian mother bang out, chez Abitbol, an elaborate dinner for 10 featuring pkaila featuring pkaila,, a Jewish-unisian wedding stew of beef and greens. Later Madame remarked that she had completed the most onerous bit the day before, at her Paris apartment. Tat an elderly woman managed to smuggle a suspicious jar of a dark, viscous substance—spinach paste—past a irport security officials is a feat as a s impressive as it is worrisome.) “ Allez Allez les enfants ,” ,” Abitbol murmured, “Un “Un dernier effort et c’est fini .” .” And then she told Apparu to take the minina from the fridge and prepare it for serving. Part frittata, part terrine, enriched with hard-cooked eggs and chicken, minina, eaten cold, is a Jewishunisian dish served at weddings and celebrations. (In the past, calves’ brains were a common addition, but Abitbol says that almost no one includes them anymore.) You You bake the mixture m ixture in a cake pan until firm, fi rm, slosh on a ladle of chicken broth and cool it in the fridge. Some describe minina as a casserole but they’re wrong; with its custardy texture, it’s closer to a flan. According to Te Encyclopedia of Jewish Food , minina used to be prepared in a skillet. Once the top was set, the minina was inverted onto a plate and eased back into the skillet ski llet to cook the other side—just side—jus t like a Spanish potato omelet. Tis makes ma kes me wonder if Jewish exiles from Spain might not have brought the dish to unisia. How else to 62
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account for that mellifluous name with its ancient Castilian ring? Anyway, when the wedding party arrives, a rrives, you whip out the pan, cut the minina into cubes and have the servant offer it to the guests with small wedges of lemon, complemented by excellent sundry hors d’oeuvres, d’oe uvres, while the cooks proceed calmly with the rest of the feast. Te bride’s fingers dipped in harissa were a triumph. Te chicken with preserved lemons and okra was pronounced sublime. All savored the arissa arissa,, a semolina and honey cake meant to evoke the sweetness of life. Perhaps it affected the new couple: at the end of the evening, as Apparu made room in the freezer for a tray t ray of leftover lamb couscous next to a stash of good old cherry blintzes, Rambaud happily assured us that neither groom has any plans for a second marriage. Laurel Berger is an arts writ er in Sag Harbor. MARINE ABIBOL’S MININA (For eight) 10 free-range organic eggs, lightly beaten 4 hard-boiled eggs, roughly diced 1.5 lbs. chicken breast and thighs, on the bone (about half a chicken) A large handful ha ndful of bread, crumbs only, only, pulled from a good country loaf 3 c. homemade chicken stock or water 5 . olive oil (or more) ½ lemon or lime, cut into small wedges Salt and pepper to taste Preheat the oven to 375°. In a stockpot, poach the chicken in homemade chicken stock or salted water for 25–30 minutes, skimming off any impurities that rise to the surface. When the chicken is no longer pink, remove and discard the skin, but leave some fat, which will give the minina flavor. Pull the meat from the bones and roughly chop it. Combine the chicken with the hard-cooked eggs in a medium-size bowl. At this point, if you poached the chicken in water, return the bones to the pot and continue cooking them for another hour until you have a good-tasting broth; otherwise, proceed with the recipe. In a small bowl, b owl, moisten the bread with ¼–½ cup of stock. Grease a 9-inch cake pan with a generous quantity of olive oil. Warm the pan in the oven. (Tis operation should only take a minute or two. If the oil begins to smoke, clean the pan pa n and start star t over.) over.) Wring out the bread and add it to the bowl with the chicken and hard-boiled eggs. ip in the beaten eggs and season the mixture aggressively with sea salt and fresh-cracked black pepper, then, wearing oven mitts, pour it into the prepared pan and cover the pan. Bake the minina for 15–20 minutes until firm. When it is done, turn off the oven, and ladle on a half-cup of chicken stock, freezing the rest for another use. Return the pan to the unlit oven for another 10 minutes or so, until most of the stock has been absorbed. Chill the minina in the refrigerator. Serve in cubed pieces garnished with small wedges of lemon.
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HEIRLOOMS
CHEESE CHEE SE LADD L ADDERS, ERS, FI FIR R K IN INS, S, BABY BA BY CAG C AGES ES AND OTHER COOKING CURIOSITIES Why should historical societies look in their pantries? BY BRIAN HALWEIL
EAS HAMPON—Of H AMPON—Of all the beautiful, puzzling puzzling and seemingly anachronistic objects from What’s Cooking: East Hampton Kitchens 1648–1948 , an exhibit that ran at the East Hampton Historical Society this past fall, the one that resonated most with me was the “baby cage,” an ominous—and unfortunately named—wooden container where a 17th-century mother cooking at an open fire or massive wood stove could quickly stow any toddler that might wander too close to the hearth. (Tink of it as a Pack-’N-Play, only not foldable and painted a very dark shade of black.) Te baby cage had a sort of feeding tray where a baby might find food or toys, and as historical society director Richard Barons discreetly pointed out to our tour group, little holes drilled through the bottom of the boxshape container. “For drainage,” he added quietly. We’re re always looking for useful usef ul tips on cooking and eating wisew isely with young children. Te baby cage, although long extinct, shows that sometimes the right way to involve kids in kitchen tasks is to not involve them, so the parent can get on with preparing the meal, tidying and everything else we need to do to keep a home. But this petite and meticulously displayed exhibit of 300 items, curated by Barons and Frank Newbold, the chair of the society’s collection committee, provides inspiration and guidance for our locavore-leaning modern food ways. Consider the extensive evidence it presents that barter and small-scale backyard homesteading were essential parts of East Hampton culture until just a half century ago. Te diversity of butter churns and butter molds found in the society’s collection, and gathered from local households, shows that most people made their own butter and many probably kept a cow in the yard (or had access to fresh milk from nearby). Te society’s collection includes at least 10 cheese ladders—used to make square wheels of cheese—indicating to Barons that, at a certain time, “probably every home on Main Street owned one. “Cheese curds were one of the most popular homemade treats in the 1700s.” People People who regularly drank d rank coffee probably roasted it at home, and definitely ground it—by hand— at home. A long wall-mounted display of hearth tools demon-
strates that open fire cooking need not be purely utilitarian or blunt. Tere were tools for keeping exact temperature, precise cutting and careful browning of the tops of pastries. Instead of immersion blenders blenders and food processors, t here were berry mashers (as opposed to potato mashers), meat juice presses and sugar sheers. Even if cheese ladders have been replaced by more modern tools and techniques, today’s DIY cu lture might feel at home with some of these objects, or might be creative enough to replicate their uses, sort of like Sarah Lohman, the Queens-based historical gastronomist who took on the task of making ice cream from 1890. Consider an egg boiler intended to be placed on a t able in a sort of performance art: boiling water was poured in the bottom, six eggs fit above, and the device was shut for as long as it took for the top-mounted hourglass to run out, when the top would be opened and the eggs divvied up. We may not encounter the same sort of craftspersonship in cookware today. “Like so many things in the 19th century, it’s over-engineered,” Barons said of a tabletop butter churn that had assorted drainage gutters to catch any spillage, or baking tins that were keystoned ever so slightly to allow easy extraction of whatever was baking. Rolling pins and butter molds were made from lignum vitae, a super-hard Caribbean wood brought North by 18th-century whalers. Tere are stackable sieves and corner cupboards with precisely routed slots for particular tools that would make Ikea designers drool. Tis exhibit, on display at the Clinton Academy Museum at 151 Main Street in East Hampton, was actually the culmination of nearly three years of research. Historical societies all over Long Island had conferred on a topic that they might jointly present, and settled on food. So far, the East Hampton Historical Society show is the only one that has actually been mounted. Hopefully, it will serve to prompt some of the other historical societies to dust off their butter churns and baby cages this winter. For hours and more information, visit easthamptonhistory.org. easthamp tonhistory.org.
Support wine shops that stock local wine and spirits: Michael’s in Riverhead has a whole room, as does Showcase in Southold. Domaine Franey in East Eas t Hampton is bulking up their selection of New York spirits. spirits. MOM AND POP SHOPS. Drink Local.
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Blue-green Greek revival corner cupboard (circa 1830) bursting with yellow-ware (circa 1850-1920).
Mortar and pestle, circa 1740.
Apple peeler, circa 1888.
Hearth tools (circa 1750–1850). Te collection includes peels, toasters, grills, flesh forks, heart-shaped trivets and choppers.
Ingeniously improvised apple paring device.
Butter print, circa 1870.
Te Ideal Stewart Stove (circa 1905) is surrounded by an amazing array ar ray of special and everyday kitchen items used by our East End ancestors.
Nutmeg grater, circa 1880.
Baby Cage, used by East End mothers in the 1800s to keep baby safe while cooking over an open fire, either indoors or outdoors.
Clam shucker (circa 1880) and clam basket (circa 1800).
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Te Davis Swing butter churn, circa 1879.
Salt-glazed & Redware bottles, crocks and jugs, gathered from New York State, circa 1790–1860. 66
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Cheese baskets and cheese ladders (circa 1850s) and Fruit Press (circa 1920) 1920) used predominantly by our East Eas t End ancestors for making ma king apple cider.
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VISUAL VICTUALS
COLDSEASON CLAMMING Tere are hearty harvesters behind your winter chowder. STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHS BY CHRISTOPHER FANJUL
SOUHOLD—In early winter, when some East Enders are squirreling away thick-skinned squash in preparation for the long months seemingly barren of local produce, produce, a hearty handful of men are just gearing up for their harvest. Clamming season on Arshamomaque (or Hashamomuck) Pond, a body of salt water quietly sprawling between the Bay and the Sound, requires some special equipment equipment and a certa in thickness of blood. Te water is sha llow llow,, making it warm in the summer and thus perfect for the fast growth of mollusks, but also prone to freezing after a few chilly January nights. Te clammers come clad in neoprene waders and armed with long-handled rakes, and upon entering the water, attach to themselves a floating s creen and a collecting basket. Below their feet are hard-shell clams, “happy” and scattered across the sandy bottom among stones and debris. In order to bring his prey to the surface, a clammer must sink the tines of a large basket-rake into the bottom and slowly work the rake across a patch, using a tugging motion that looks like someone trying to uproot a stubborn sapling. Once brought to t he surface and washed of mud, the catch is separated from the stones and tossed in the screen to sort out anything anyt hing under one inch before eventually being moved to the basket in batches.
An early, still morning on Arshamomaque Pond, just east of the Port of Egypt Marina in Southold.
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All this is accomplished under the watchful gaze of diving mergansers, which seem equally impervious to the water’s chill. Te clams will wi ll be loaded into the back of a pickup and deposited at seafood markets on the East End and in Nassau County, where they will be sorted by size into littlenecks, cherrystones and chowder clams. While clams might not drum up the same excitement as the first tomatoes of summer, they are a long-standing and flavorful element of local cuisine, and hopefully will be for years to come. Christopher Fanjul lives in Southol d and plans to forage mushrooms, oysters and goat cheese all winter long.
A good rake and warm war m gloves help pull in a bucket of clams. Northern Quahogs ( Mercenar Mercenaria ia mercenaria mercenaria), ), also called “hard-shell clams” to distinguish them from “soft-shell” steamers, conveniently packed in ice from the pond. Te long-handled rake is rested on a clammer’s shoulder to get better leverage. Te clams will wil l be sorted from the stones and then kept alive in the floating basket. edibleeastend.com
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ADVERTISERS DIRECTORY FARMS Balsam Farms Specializing in growing high-quality produce and cut flowers. flowers. Find these and other gourmet items at our farm stand in Amagansett at the corner of Town Lane and Windmill Ln., open June–Nov. balsamfarms.com Fairview Farm at Mecox This family-run fa rm bordering Mecox Bay specializes in beautiful herbs, fruit and vegetables, one-of-a-kind bunches of cut flowers, Mecox Bay Dairy cheeses, Berkshire pigs and fresh pastured chicken and duck eggs. The famous 8-acre corn maze is open Labor Day through Nov. 8. Farm stand at 19 Horsemill Ln., Bridgehampton, 631.537.1445, cornfieldmaze.com Garden of Eve Organic Farm Market & Garden Center This Riverhead farm offers a large selection of organic vegetable & herb plants, annuals and perennials, as well as their own organic heirloom vegetables, cut flowers, and freerange pastured eggs, on site from April 1 until Thanksgiving. And at farmers markets in Westhampton Beach, Mt. Sinai, and Williamsburg, Brooklyn, as well as through CSAs on the farm, across Long Island, in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. 4558 Sound Ave. (at Northville Tpk.), Riverhead Riverhead,, 631.722.8777, 631 .722.8777, gardenofevefarm.com gardenofevefa rm.com Golden Earthworm Organic Farm Celebrating over 13 years of beautiful certified organic produce and communitysupported agriculture (CSA) Program, they look forward to welcoming you all into their growing farm community. Join now for the 2010 CSA which runs June through November with 28 pick-up locations in Suffolk, Nassau, and Queens Counties. 652 Peconic Bay Blvd., Jamesport, 631.722.3302, goldenearthworm.com Green Thumb Organic Farm Farmed by the Halsey family since the 1640s, this 100-acre property is the oldest organic farm in NYS, and is biodynamic, too. The roadside farm stand offers over 300 varieties of vegetables, fruit, herbs, flowers and seedlings, a nd other products made by local artisans. Weekend pony rides and fall farm tours. Montauk Hwy., Water Mill, 631.726.1900 The Milk Pail Farm, Orchard & Greenhouses A farm-family tradition in Water Mill offering U-pick apples and pears, pumpkins, cider, cider donuts, donuts, peaches, cherries, f lowers and more.. Montauk Highway between Water more Mill and Bridgehampto Bridgehampton, n, milk-pail.com) Pike Farms This one-stop farm stand features strawberries, raspberries, early greenhouse tomatoes, field tomatoes and famous sweet corn—as well as fruits, granola, f lowers, pies pies and artisanal breads. breads . Wholesale available. Sagg Main M ain St., Sagaponack, 631. 631.537 537.5854 .5854 Sang Lee Farms This Peconic farms offers organic vegetables and herbs, local artisanal products, and their own line of dressings, dips, cooking sauces, prepared and preserved foods. foods . Visit website to learn about events, classes, CSA and farmers markets. 25180 County Rd. 48, Peconic, 631.734.7001, sangleefarms.com Quail Hill Farm One of the original CSAs in the country with over 200 members enjoying organic produce and field-grown flowers, Quail
Hill also provides produce to a local school, food pantries, a farmers market and local restaurants. Only proven sustainable farming techniques are used. Synthetic insecticides, herbicides, fungicides and fertilizers are avoided. Deep Ln. and Side Hill Ln., Amagansett, 283.3195, peconiclandtrust.org Springfield Creamery This family business offers history, a commitment to values and a short list of healthf ul ingredients as their recipe for success—50 years and counting. Producers of high-quality cultured dairy and soy products that are uncompromising in their commitment to simple, healthy and all-natural ingredients, Springfield Creamery has been a pioneer of cultured yogurt production within the natural foods industry. A commitment to providing the most healthful products to the largest number of people has earned Springfield Creamery recognition, like Oregon Tilth’s “2009 Organic Producer of the Year” award, and Oregon Organic Coalition’s Coa lition’s 2010 2010 “Processor of the Year” award. nancysyogurt.com FARMERS MARKETS The Community Farmers Market at the Hayground School A collaborative school-community farmers market on Fridays, Memorial Day weekend-Labor Day weekend from 3-6:30 p.m., on the beautiful grounds of the Hayground School. Locally grown produce (including student-grown seedlings, vegetables and flowers), seafood, farmstead cheeses, European-style baked goods, wine, organic infused infus ed olive oils, spreads and fresh pasta, pizza and more. 15 151 1 Mitchell Ln., Bridgeha mpton, 631.987 631.987.3553 .3553 East Hampton Farmers Market Nestled in the parking lot of Hamptons landmark restaurant Nick & Toni’s, this Friday market features locally grown vegetables and fruit, honey, farmstead cheeses, mushrooms, colorful plants and flowers, goat’s milk fudge, the best baguette on Long Island, wine, fabulous French bakery items, local seafood and homespun llama wool. wool. 136 North Main St., East Hampton, 631.324.3550 Sag Harbor Farmers Market This bayfront market offers local and organic produce, artisanal baked goods, raw-milk cheeses, pickles, seafood, mushrooms, honey, wine and flowers and herbs.. Bay and Burke St., Sag Harbor. herbs Westhampton Beach Farmers Market 40+ farmers, growers and producers all from Long Island! The largest farmers market in the Hamptons offering local bounty . Rain or Shine, Saturdays 9 a.m.–1 p.m., May 7–Nov 19, 2011. 85 Mill Rd (Village Municipal Municip al Parking Lot next to the WHB Historical Society). 631.288.3337, info@ westhamptonbeachfarmersmarket.com, WesthamptonBeachFarmersMarket.com COFFEE ROASTERS Hampton Coffee Company The award-winning coffee roastery, espresso bar, & bakery with locations in Water Mill and Westhampton Beach, features smallbatch hand-roasted Arabica beans. It offers an authentic Mexican grill gril l menu at the Water Mill full-service café, and breakfast, lunch and outdoor seating at both locations, as well as their new Mobile Espresso Unit. Water Mill & Westhampton Beach, 631.726. COFE, hamptoncoffeeco hamptoncoffeecompany.co mpany.com m
Whether you are buying or selling a home, I provide personal service to meet your individual needs. Representing waterfront and inland properties throughout the North Fork; I can help you achieve your real-estate dreams. Contact me directly for a free property evaluation or a tour of North Fork properties.
Nicole LaBella VP, Associate Broker
516.652.8888 | corcor corcoran.com/labella an.com/labella northforkwaterfrontproperties.com The Corcoran Group is a licensed real estate broker. Owned and operated by NRT LLC.
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BREWERIES Fire Island Beer Company Fire Island Beer Company crafts worldclass beers inspired by the color, character and delicious experience of Fire Island, NY. Look for Fire Island Lighthouse Ale and Red Wagon IPA at your favorite restaurant, beer bar or beverage store. fireislandbeer.com Greenport Harbor Brewery Located at the very end of Long Island, Greenport Harbor Brewery specializes in making fresh small batch craft ale, with the mission to constantly challenge people’s notion of what a beer can be. Visit them at the brewery, online or at the bars, restaurants, and beverage centers (growlers) who carry them. 234 Carpenter St., Greenport, 631.477.6681, harborbrewing.com
Beacon Restaurant Waterfront dining with groovy sunsets, Waterfront Beacon serves solid American fare in the comfort of a great bar and leather banquettes.. Available for private functions. quettes 8 W. Water St., Sag Ha rbor, 725.7088 725.7088 Blackwell’s Restaurant Perfectly located at the gateway to L ong Island Wine Country, Blackwell’s offers exceptional pairings with prime dry-aged steaks and chops and fresh local seafood.. 141 Fairway Dr., Wading River. food 631.929.1200, greatrockgolfclub.com
Ciao Bella Senhora Veteran restaurateur and family offer exceptional Northern Italian cuisine and delicious Portuguese specialties, with delicacies from Brazil and France. International wines paired with the finest flavored churrasco Southampton Publick House The East End’s first microbrewery restau- wood-fired rotisserie meats, poultr y, and seawelcome! 322 West Montauk rant offers Long Island’s finest casual din- food. Foodies welcome!322 ing alongside handcrafted ales and lagers, Hwy, Hampton Bays, 631.728.2218, which are also available at specialty beer ciaobellasenhora.com. bars and restaurants throughout New Fresno Restaurant England.. 40 Bowden Sq., Southampton, Serving regional American cuisine nightEngland 283.2800, publick.com ly, year-round, Fresno boasts a zinc-top bar, warm lighting and patio seating RESTAURANTS in season. season. Prix fixe menu available. 8 A Lure Chowderhouse & Oysteria Fresno Pl., East Hampton, 324.8700 The North Fork’s latest waterfront restaurant featuring local seafood and spirits with The Frisky Oyster a nouveau flair. flair. Enjoy the views of Southold Chef/owner Robert Beaver offers imaginaBay whether inside our cozy dining room tive cuisine in the sophisticated, metroor relaxing on our luxurious wrap around politan atmosphere craved by locals and deck. 62300 Main Rd., R d., Rte. 25, Southold; visitors for years. His menu changes daily to showcase the most exceptional, local 631.876.53 631 .876.5300; 00; alurenorthfork.com ingredients from Pipes Cove, KK’s, Sep’s A Mano Osteria & Wine Bar Tuscan dining with highlight on delec- and Satur Farms to name a few. The local table local fare, produce and cheese from and international wine list is personally the North Fork’s bounty, paired with selected to complement the current menu. an extensive Italian and local wine list. list . Dinner is available in their stylish dining 631.298.4800; amanorestaurant.com room or at the buzzing bar. DJ Frisky turns up the beat as the energy level rises Almond after 9 p.m. 27 Front St., Greenport, This contemporary French bistro serves 631. 631.477 477.4265, .4265, thefrisk yoyster.com seasonally driven fare, using local and artisanal ingredients, with a year-round Foody’s $24.95 prix fixe and the “Best Dessert Better food for the entire family. Cooking in the Hamptons,” according to Wine from scratch and hand-selecting farm-fresh Spectator. 1 Ocean Road, Bridgehampton, produce, enjoy wood-grilled meats and veggies, house-made mozzarella, hand-stretched 631.537.8885, almondrestaurant.com thin crust pizza and abundant local seafood Amarelle This North Shore culinary gem, which and veggies. Catering available. 760 Montauk overlooks a scenic duck pond in Wading Hwy., Water Mill, 726.FOOD River on the threshold of North Fork wine country, serves up contemporary country cuisine at the skillful hand of co-owner and executive chef Lia Fallon. It features many Long Island wines by the glass to go with the French-inspired dishes that utilize local fruits , cheese, produce and duck. 2028 North Country Road, Wading River. 631.886.2242, amarelle.net Babette’s Babette’s mostly organic menu features world flavors and local produce, vegetarian/vegan cuisine and organic grassfed meats, in a casual-chic atmosphere with cool jazz. Serving breakfast until 4 p.m., lunch and dinner, and offering an organic juice bar, organic wines and full liquor bar. 66 Newtown Ln., East Hampton, 631.329. 631 .329.5377 5377,, babettesrestaura babettesrestaurant.com. nt.com. Bay Burger This Sag Harbor burger joint serves their own freshly ground beef on a homemade brioche-style bun, as well as homemade ice cream (available in Hamptons specialty shops as Joe & Liza’s Ice Cream) and their amazing local fish burger. burger. 1742 Sag Harbor Tpk., Sag Harbor, 631.899.3915, 631.899.3915, bayburger.com baybu rger.com 74
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Jamesport Manor Inn Experience North Fork history and unprecedented local cuisine in the magnificently reconstructed 185 1850’s 0’s Gothic Revival mansion, featuring an extensive list of carefully selected wines, as well as a local artist art gallery . Private dining rooms and catering available. 370 Manor Ln., Jamesport, 631.722.0500, jamesportmanor.com La Fondita La Fondita, “little kitchen,” serves tacos, posole rojo, homemade salsas, sopes, tostadas and other dishes reminiscent of the street food found all over Mexico. A fun and casual atmosphere, offering takeout and seating on picnic tables overlooking the pond. 74 Montauk Hwy., Amagansett, 267 267.8800, .8800, lafondita.net The Little Kitchen Located just outside Sag Harbor, this country restaurant features East End seafood, wines, produce, fruit, vegetables and herbs from the restaurant’s own ga rden rden.. 1615 161 5 Sag Harbor-Bridgehampton Tpk., Sag Harbor, 725.1045, eatshampton.com
Lobster Roll Northside Rowdy Hall The critically acclaimed country version of English pub and French bistro-style the famed Hampton Hampton’s ’s seafooder (LUNCH) cuisine. An Arts-and-Crafts-inspir Arts-and-Crafts-inspired ed operated by the originator! A “must do” restaurant, with beautiful copper-topped dining experience while on the North Fork! bar and soothing fireplace. According 631.369.3039; 631 .369.3039; Lobster Roll.com to local lore, churchgoing locals found the establishment still full of revelers on Luce & Hawkins at Jedediah Sunday mornings and declared it a “rowdy Hawkins Inn This historic Jamesport inn and restaurant hall.” A gathering place for locals and visioffers warm service and a unique “earth to tors alike. 10 Main St., East Hampton, 631.324.8555 24.8555,, rowdyhall.com table” dining experience from acclaimed 631.3 chef Keith Luce. The casual Luce’s Rugosa Restaurant Landing menu is a perfect entry point A year-round destination for modern to discovering the flavors of the North American fine dining in East Hampton. Fork. 400 S. Jamesport Ave., Jamesport, Chef Bill Mammes applies his training in 631.722.2900,jedediahhawkinsinn.com contemporary French cuisine to local, seaNick & Toni’s sonal ingredients delivering a fresh approach A forerunner to the East End’s current to Hamptons Dining. 290 Montauk restaurant community, Nick & Toni’s is Highway, East Hampton, 631.604.1550 631.604.1550 reminiscent of a Tuscan farmhouse. The Scrimshaw Mediterranean- and rustic Italian-influenced This restaura nt’s historic waterfront seasonal menus feature local seafood, probuildings, with panoram ic views, openduce and the harvest from the restaurant’s air dining and drinks on the dock, reflect own organic garden. 136 N. Main St., East Hampton, 631 631.324.35 .324.3550, 50, nickandtonis.com Greenport’s whaling history while its cuisine reflects modern tastes —a blendNoah’s Restaurant ing of classic techniques with Asian and This Greenport restaurant offers a range of global influences. influences . Preston’s Wharf, 102 small plates with inspired takes on tradi- Main St., Greenport, 631.477.8882, tional seafood dishes, with locally-sourced scrimshawrestaurant.com ingredients. Featuring the only raw bar on the North Fork, with local and internation- The Sea Grille at Gurney’s Inn al oysters, as well as wines available in 3- or Overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, the renowned ed Sea Grille ref lects Montauk’s 6-ounce pours. 136 Front St., Greenport, renown fishing legacy offering morning-caught 631.477.6720, chefnoahs.com fish, locally harvested shellfish, farmers North Fork Oyster Company organic produce and regional specialties. North Fork Oyster Company serves creSpa guests choose from world-class menus ative cuisine featuring the freshest local produce and seafood from waters surround- featuring preparations of the freshest ingreing it on the East End of Long Island. Island. Be dients. 290 Old Montauk Hwy., Montauk, 631.668.2660, .668.2660, gurneysinn.com sure to contact us when looking for a place 631 Squiretown Restaurant + Bar This modern American bistro in Hampton Bays offers offers beautiful sa lads, a raw bar, exciting appetizers, delicious The North Fork Table & Inn Gerry Hayden and Claudia Fleming pro- sandwiches, steaks, local seafood and vide progressive American menus com- great wine, paired with i mpeccable sermitted to the highest standard of culinary vice and a great atmosphere . Take out excellence. Understated elegance replaces & Catering available. 26 W. Montauk utility in each room in the tradition of Hwy., Hampton Bays 631.723.2626. the finest European and American coun- Town Line BBQ try inns. 57225 Main Rd., Southold, Texas-style on Montauk Highway. 765.0177 765 .0177,, northforktablea ndinn.com East Enders looking for beef a nd pork ribs, burnt end sandwiches, pickles The Old Mill Inn Built in 1820 and tucked into an unspoiled and cornbread will enjoy the strippedcorner of Long Island, this waterfront res- down decor and menu straight out of Townline Rd. taurant serves local, fresh fare overlooking the Barbecue Belt. 3593 Townline Mattituck Inlet. Inlet. 5775 W. W. Mill Rd., Mattituck, Matt ituck, (and Montauk Hwy.), Sagaponack, 631.298.8080, theoldmillinn.net 537.2271, 537 .2271, townl inebbq.com Red Bar Brasserie GOURMET FOODS French-inspired American cuisine and Cavaniola’s Kitchen an award-winning wine list presented Churning out everything from smoked by a professional and friendly staff. fish pate to potato chips to soups and Sophisticated and welcoming. Offsalads, this shop next to Cavaniola’s season prix fixe menu. 210 Hampton Gourmet (cheese) and Cavaniola’s Cellar Rd., Southampton, 631.283.0704 (wine) offers a range of f resh-made, readyThe Riverhead Project to-eat delectables, as well as an extensive Located in the District neighborhood of catering menu. 89 Division St., Sag Riverhead, the newest addition of restaura- Harbor, 631.725.8100, 631.725.8100, cavaniola .com teur Dennis McDermott offers a contempo A Taste of the North Fork rary American menu with ethnic and healthy Homegrown flavors, freshness, sophisinfluences.. With honest food, excellent cockinfluences tails and an inspired wine list, TRP contrib- ticated taste. Enjoy the preserves, musutes energy, style and sense of community to tards, vinegars, sauces, spreads—all the East End’s restaurant scene. Downstairs, made from naturally grown, organic and Available the vault and adjacent vault bar are available local fruits, f lowers and herbs. Available for private dining and conferences. Outdoor at the Sag Harbor Farmers Market and at dining and lounging has a Palm Springs their store in Peconic. Custom-made gift feel in the warmer seasons. Open in May baskets, corporate gifts and event favors for lunch and dinner. 300 East Main St., available. 2885 Peconic Ln., Peconic, 631.734.61 631 .734.6100, 00, atasteofthenorthfork com Riverhead; 631.284.9300 to host your private event. 300 Main St. (Sterling Sq.) Greenport; 631 631.477 .477.6840; .6840; northforkoystercompany.com
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More than ever. WordHampton. Strategic and Creative Thinking Deep Media Relationships Social Media Savvy Client Partnering
www.wordhampton.com 631.329.0050
“The Hamptons are a magical place, they capture the imagination... from the ocean beaches, to the bountiful farm fields, to the charming villages. Please let me know if I can be of assistance!”
Priscilla Garston | pgarston@elliman. [email protected] com
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GROCERY STORES Amagansett Farmers Market This local landmark, now run by Eli Zabar is part fa rmer’ rmer’ss market, part gourmet food store and all about Eli’s committment to local, sustainable and delicious. Don’t miss the Amagansett loaf f resh out of the oven. oven. 367 Main St., Amagansett, 631.267.3894 Whole Foods Market The world’s leading organic and natural foods supermarket. With new stores in Manhasset and Jericho, Whole Foods Market carries a growing selection of LI-grown produce, seafood, and other edibles from small food makers. A one-stop shop for natural meats, healthy baked goods, organic produce, and nontoxic beauty and cleaning products. 2101 Northern Blvd., Manhasset, 516.869.8900; 429 North Bwy., Jericho, 516.932.1733, wholefoodsmarket.com BAKERIES Blue Duck Bakery Café Everything Everythi ng Blue Duck sells is hand-formed and baked fresh on premises, daily. Find their signature line of artisanal breads and finest quality pastries and cakes at East End grocers, fine restaurants and all local farmers markets. 30 Hampton Rd., Southampton, 631.204.1701; also 56275 Main Rd., Southold, 631 631.629.41 .629.4123 23 Breadzilla Serving scones, muffins, hand-rolled bagels, granola and other breakfast fare baked each morning. Everything made from scratch, including soups, salads, sandwiches, pizzas and pies featuring local produce and seafood. Specialty meats, pastries, birthday and wedding cakes made to order. 84 Wainscott NW Rd., off Montauk Hwy., Wainscott, 537.0955, 537 .0955, breadzilla.com bread zilla.com ARTISANAL FOODS Bees’ Needs These East End honeys, produced with small-scale, noninvasive practices that promote promo te bees’ health, are raw and unfiltered, multifloral blends that provide customers with an expressive range of artisanal honeys. CSA shares available. Products sold at Sag Harbor farmers market, The Greenthumb farmstand, Quail Hill Farm, Juicy Naam a nd Marder’s. 631.702.5657, [email protected] Catapano Dairy Farm Long Island’s only goat dairy is a family-operated farm specializing in handcrafted goat’s milk cheeses and pure goat’s milk skin care products . 33705 North Rd., Peconic, 631.765.8042, 631.765.8042, catapanodairyfarm.com Chocolate Sommelier Roxanne Browning hosts chocolate and wine pairings to bring awareness of exceptional direct-trade, single-origin artisanal chocolates.. Guests enjoy their two favorite chocolates pleasures at these entertaining and educational events held at wine bars, vineyards and restaurants for public, business and private functions. ExoticChocolateTasting. com, 631.252.0658 The Hamptons Honey Company: Your source for unprocessed, local and raw honey—just as the bees intended. By working directly with other small-scale beekeepers and familyowned apiaries around the world, the Southampton-based Hamptons Honey Company’s goal is to offer local, artisanal honey wherever our label is found. 888.365.2325, hamptonshoney.com 76
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Mecox Dairy In a converted 19th-century potato barn, Arthur and Stacy Ludlow turn out award-winning cheeses from their small herd of Jersey cows that graze near Mecox Bay. Available at Cavaniola’s Gourmet and Schiavoni’s in Sag Harbor, the Village Cheese Shop in Southampton and Mattituck, and Fairview Farm Stand on Horsemill Lane in Bridgehampton. 855 Mecox Rd., Bridgehampton, 631.537.0335, mecoxbaydairy.com Organic Valley This farmer-owned co-op produces milk, cheese, butter, eggs, juice, soy beverages, producee and meats—all organic. Available produc at major grocers and health food stores. 1 Organic Way, La Farge, WI 54639, 888.444.MILK, organicvalley.coop INNS AND B&B’S Harbor Knoll A waterfront B&B with its own private beach and dock. It is an 1870’s Dutch Colonial manor house decorated in the English country-house style, with wonderful gardens and spectacular views, very quiet, yet within easy walking distance of Greenport Village and transport directly to NYC. 424 4th St., Greenport; 631.477.2352; harborknoll.com Jedediah Jed ediah Hawkins Inn Winner of the prestigious New York Historic Preservation Award and listed in the National Register of Historic Houses, this meticulously restored Captain’s mansion offers luxury accommodations accommodatio ns , warm service and a unique “earth to table” dining experience from chef-proprietor Keith Luce . 400 S. Jamesport Ave., Jamesport, 631.722.2900,jedediahhawkinsinn.com The Mill House Inn A gracious inn in the heart of historic East Hampton Village with beautifully appointed appoin ted rooms, spectacular child and dog-friendly suites, and “the best breakfast in t he Hamptons. Hamptons.” Their Graybarn Cottage is ideal for small weddings, conferences and retreats. Named in the “Top 50 Small Hotels” by the Zagat US Hotel Guide. 31 N. Main St., East Hampton, 631.324.9766, millhouseinn.com NFBBA Rest Assured—Select an inspected member inn approved by the North Fork B&B Assn. (NFBBA); for 20 years the only organiz ation for B&B’s on Long Island recognized by NYS. 877.883.93 877 .883.9333; 33; [email protected] The North Fork Table & Inn Gerry Hayden and Claudia Fleming provide progressive American menus committed to the highest standard of culinary excellence. Understated elegance replaces utility in each room in the tradition of the finest European and American country inns. 57225 Main Rd., Southold, 765.0177, northforktableandinn.com The Old Mill Inn Built in 1820 and tucked into an unspoiled corner of Long Island, this waterfront restaurant serves local, fresh fare overlooking Mattituck Inlet. Inlet . 5775 W.. Mill Rd., Mattituck, 631 W 631.298.8080, .298.8080, theoldmillinn.net Orient Inn Built in 1906, this arts-and-crafts st yle farmhouse is located on Main Road, Orient, just 2 ½ miles from the Cross Sound ferry dock. Orient Inn is seconds away from the historic Hamlet of Orient, which is surrounded by
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water and beaches where guests enjoy all that Channing Daughters Winery nature provides for outdoor activities. Orient A small, artisanal, quality-driven winery Inn includes comfortable living rooms, fire- specializing in t he production of focused, places and five guest rooms each with pri- individual lots of wine made from an array vate baths. Chef Joan Turturro, a graduate of grape varieties. Employing traditional of the French Culinary Institute, provides winemaking methods and experimentation a memorable breakfast. breakfast. Dinner is available and creativity to achieve varietal and mul with advanced notice. The Inn is available tivarietal wines of class and distinction. distinction. for theme events and workshops. Orient Inn, 1927 Scuttlehole Rd., Bridgehampton, 25500 Main Rd., Orient; 631.323.2300, 631.323.2300, ori537.7224, channingdaughters.com [email protected], orientinn-ny orientinn-ny.com .com Gramercy Vineyards Ruby’s Cove Walk to restaurants, brewery, oyster bar and Founded in 2003 by Carol Sullivan and the harbor and a short drive to wineries, farm Erich Moenius, Gramercy Vineyards in stands and beaches. beaches. 151 Bay Ave, Greenport, Mattituck is the producer of a trio of boutique wines that includes a rosé, an Estate 631.477.1837 631.477 .1837,, rubysc ovebnb.com Merlot and an exclusive Reserve Estate Shorecrest Shorecr est Bed and Breakfast Merlot.. 10020 Sound Avenue, Mattituck, Merlot Voted Vo ted “Best B&B on Long Island” by GramercyVineyards.com Channel 12 news viewers, and the only amesport Vineyards B&B with our own beach on Long Island J amesport Sound.. Great food, elegant comfort, A father-son collaboration that began Sound spectacular gardens, good times! 54300 in 1981, Jamesport Vineyards’ 60 acres Cty Rte. 48, Southold; 631.765.1570; constitute one of the North Fork’s oldshorecrestbedandbreakfast.com est vineyards. All of their wines are produced using only their high-quality fruit. CHEESE SHOPS A large grassy backyard is available for Cavaniola’s Gourmet Cheese Shop musical events, private parties and wedFamily-owned and -run cheese s hop dings. Main Rd., Rt. 25, Jamesport, offering over 150 types of local, domes- 631. 631.722.525 722.5256, 6, jamespor twines .com tic and imported cheeses. Paninis, soups and fondue to go, as well as a beautiful Lenz selection of olive oils, balsamics, olives, Founded in 1978, Lenz is one of the oldest O wned and operatpâtés, fresh breads, pastries and more. wineries on the East End. Owned 89B Division St., Sag Harbor, 725.0095 ed by Peter and Deborah Carroll, Lenz creates critically acclaimed chardonnays, gewürzLucy’s Whey An exciting new shop offering a large, traminers, merlots, cabernets and sparkling carefully chosen selection of unique (méthode champenoise) wines. Main Rd./ American artisanal cheeses, as well as Rt. 25, Peconic, 734.6010, lenzwine.com other handcrafted American products, including salamis, chutneys, oils, vinegars, rubs and crostini. crostini. 80 N. Main St., East Hampton, 324.4428, lucyswhey.com SEAFOOD SHOPS
Macari Vineyards Macari vineyards has been known to sow wildflowers and release thousands of ladybugs in their largely organic approach to managing their 180 acres of vines. Sip wines at their tasting room or on their covered deck. Available for private parties, weddings and corporate events. 150 Bergen Ave., Mattituck; 24385 Route 25, Cutchogue, 298.0100, 298.0100, macariwines.com
Stuart’s Seafood Market The oldest fish market on the East End, baymen bring the catch of the day directly f rom their boats to Stuart’s door. Specializing in dayboat-fresh local seafood as well as hardshell Nova Scotia lobsters lobsters of all sizes, McCall Ranch available live or cooked to order along with This family ranch specializes in fine estate a wide selection of gourmet provisions. wines and grassfed organic cattle, and has Full-service clambakes and catering. Voted been growing and selling pinot noir and Best Clambake Clambak e Caterer in the Da n’s Paper’s Paper’s merlot on Long Island’s North Fork for 14 Readers’ Poll. 41 Oak Ln., Amagansett, years. A commitment to the preser vation of 267.6700, 267 .6700, stuartsseafood.com stuartsse afood.com local wild and agricultural land and to our environmentt in a broader view is integral environmen CHOCOLATE to our mission. The tasting room is open Chocolate Sommelier 12.30–5.30 p.m. Thurs–Sun. 22600 Rte Roxanne Browning hosts chocolate and wine 25 in Cutchogue. 631.734.5764 pairings to bring awareness of exceptional direct-trade, single-origin artisanal choco- Osprey’s Dominion lates.. Guests enjoy their two favorite pleasures The 75-acre winery is the first on Long lates at these entertaining and educational events Island to contract for a wind turbine, with held at wine bars, vineyards and restaurants a ground breaking this past fa ll attended by for public, business and private functions. executives from LIPA, Eastern Energy, the ExoticChocolateTasting.com, 631.252.0658 press, and local politicians, and an unveiling this coming spring. Visit their tasting room WINERIES and see the future of energy in Long Island Bedell Cellars and Corey and Corey Creek Vineyards wine country. 44075 Main Rd., Peconic, Founded in 1980, Bedell North Fork 631.765 631 .765.6188, .6188, ospreysdominion.com is recognized as a leader in Long Island wine growing. With 78 planted acres, the Palmer Vineyards winery produces award-winning mer- Founded in 1923 on a rolling parcel of gravlots, Bordeaux-style blends and a special elly farmland on the North Fork of Long Artist Series under the Bedell Cellars Island, Palmer Vineyards has become a siglabel, and a range of small-batch varietal nificant part of the Long Island wine industry wines under the Corey Creek Vineyards where “excellence is never an accident.” The label. Bedell Cellars, 36225 Main Rd. tasting room is open year-round, regularly (Rt. 25), Cutchogue, 734.7537; Corey hosts music, and is available availa ble for special events. Creek Vineyards, Main Rd., Southold, 5120 Sound Ave., Riverhead, 631.722. 765.4168, 765 .4168, bedellcellars .com WINE (9463 (9463), ), palmervineyards.com.
Paumanok Vineyards Founded in 1983, Paumanok is an estate winery dedicated to the production of premium vinifera wines. The Massouds grow chardonnay,, chenin blanc, sauvignon blanc, chardonnay riesling, cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon, merlot and petit verdot. 107 1074 4 Main R d., Aquebogue, 722.8800, paumanok.com Raphael Established in 1996, Raphael is dedicated to the production of Long Isla nd merlot, and continues a centuries-old tradition of winemaking for the Petrocelli Family that incorporates both New World advances and Old World traditions to produce wine reflecting both the terroir and spirit of a great Bordeaux chateau.. 39390 Main Rd., Peconic, chateau 631.765. 631. 765.1100, 1100, raphaelwine. com
Clovis Point 631.722.4222, 631 .722.4222, clovispointwines.com clovispointwines.com Comtesse Thérèse 631.871.9194, 631 .871.9194, comtessetherese.com comtessetherese.com Corey Creek Vineyards 631.765.4 631 .765.4168, 168, coreycree k .com .com Croteaux Vineyards 631 63 1.765.6099, croteaux .com .com Diliberto Winery 631 63 1.722.34 .722.3416, 16, dilibertowinery .com Duck Walk Vineyards 631 63 1.726.7555, duckwalk .com .com Duck Walk Vineyards North 631 63 1.765.3500, duckwalk .com .com Harbes Family Farm & Vineyard 631 63 1.298.WINE(9463), harbesfamilyfarm.com harbesfamilyfarm .com
Jamesport Vineyards Sherwood House Vineyards 631.722.5256, jamesportwines.com jamesportwines.com Since l996, committed to the production 631 of world-class wines using only estate- Jason’s Vineyard grown vinifera grapes. “There’s very little 631 631.238.5801, .238.5801, jasonsvineyard.com jasonsvineyard.com nature and man can do in true harmony,” says owner Dr. Charles Smithen. “A Laurel Lake Vineyards 631.298.1420, 631 .298.1420, llwines llwines.com .com vineyard is one of those things.” 2600 Oregon Rd., Mattituck, 212.828.3426, Lieb Family Cellars 631.298.1942, 631 .298.1942, liebcellars.com liebcellars.com sherwoodhousevineyards.com Long Island Meadery Shinn Estate Vineyards 631.285.7469, .285.7469, limeadery .com .com This Mattituck vineyard and winery 631 believes that a sustainable approach to Loughlin Vineyards growing wine and natural techniques 631 631.589.0027, .589.0027, loughlinvineyard.com loughlinvineyard.com in the cellar result in wines that reflect Macari Vineyards & Winery both the land and the individual grow631 63 1.298.0100, macariwines.com macariwines.com ing seasons. Their biologically intensive intensive viticulture allows the vines to produce Martha Clara Vineyards 631 1.298.0075, marthaclaravineyards.com marthaclaravineyards.com balanced and complex wines vintage after 63 vintage. 2000 Oregon Road Mattituck, Mattebella Vineyards 631.804.0367, shinnestatevineyards.com 888 888.628.8323 .628.8323,, mattebellavineyards mattebellavineyards.com .com Sparkling Pointe McCall Vineyards Sparkling Pointe’s award-winning spar- 404 404.274.2809, .274.2809, mccallwines.com mccallwines.com kling wines are executed with artistry Onabay Vineyard and finesse in the traditional French 917 91 7.715.0605, onabayvineyards.com onabayvineyards.com Méthode Champenoise. We like to call One Woman Vineyards it “romance in a bott le.” 631.765.0200, 631.765.1200, 631 .765.1200, onewomanwines.com onewomanwines.com sparklingpointe.com Wölffer Estate Vineyard Founded in 1987, 1987, Wölffer Estate Estat e has become a leader in the wine industry. The East Coast climate, similar to Bordeaux, combined with the terroir and the maritime influence, make the Hamptons an outstanding region for growing wines. Surrounded by 55 acres of rolling hills planted with vines, the neatly trellised vineyard provides a magnificent setting for wine tastings and social events. 139 Sagg Rd., Sagaponack, 631.537.5106, wolffer.com
Osprey’s Dominion Vineyards 631.765.6188, 631 .765.6188, ospreysdominion.com ospreysdominion.com
Please visit these members of the Long Island Wine Council.
Pugliese Vineyards 631 63 1.734.4057, pugliesevineyards.com pugliesevineyards.com
Ackerly Pond Vineyards 631.765 631 .765.6861, .6861, ackerlypondvineyards.com ackerlypondvineyard s.com
Raphael 631 63 1.765. .765.1100, 1100, raphaelwi ne ne.com .com
Baiting Hollow Farm Vineyard 631 63 1.369.0100, baitinghollowfarmvineyard.com baitinghollowfarmvineyard.com
Roanoke Vineyards 631 63 1.727 .727.416 .4161, 1, roanokev ineya rds rds.com .com
Bedell Cellars 631.734.7537, 631 .734.7537, bedellcellars.com bedellcellars.com
Scarola Vineyards 631 63 1.335.4199, scarolavineyards.com scarolavineyards.com
Bella Vita Vineyard 631.734.828 631 .734.8282, 2, bellavitavineyard bellavitavineyard.com .com
Sherwood House Vineyards 631 63 1.779.2817, sherwoodhousevineyards.com sherwoodhousevineyards.com
Bouké Wines 877.877.0527 877 .877.0527,, bouke wines wines.com .com
Shinn Estate Vineyards 631.804.0367 631 .804.0367,, shinnestatevineyards shinnestatevineyards.com .com
Castello di Borghese Vineyard & Winery 631.734.5 631 .734.511 111, 1, castellodiborghese castellodiborghese.com .com
Sparkling Pointe 631.765.0200, 631 .765.0200, sparklingpointe.com sparklingpointe.com
Channing Daughters Winery 631.537.7224, 631 .537.7224, channingdaughters.com channingdaughters.com
Suhru Wines 631 63 1.603.8127, suhruwines.com suhruwines.com
Christiano Family Vineyards christianowines.com
The Grapes of Roth 631 63 1.725.7999, thegrapesofroth.com thegrapesofroth.com
GeekHampton™ all Mac all the Time
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MAC SERVICE AC SUPPORT AC SALES
631.723.3660
A TWIN PEAKS GEEKS PRODUCTION
Palmer Vineyards 631.722. 631 .722.WINE, WINE, palmervineyards palmervineyards.com .com Peconic Bay Winery 631.734.7361, 631 .734.7361, peconicbaywinery .com Pellegrini Vineyards 631.734.4 631 .734.411 111, 1, pellegrinivineyards pellegrinivineyards.com .com Pindar Vineyards 631 63 1.734.6200, pindar.net pindar.net
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The Old Field Vineyards 631.765.0004, 631 .765.0004, theoldfield.com theoldfield.com Vineyard 48 631.734. 631 .734.5200, 5200, vineyard48winery .com Waters Crest Winery 631-734-5065, 631 -734-5065, waterscrestwinery.com Wölffer Estate 631.537.5106, wolffer 631.537.5106, wolffer.com .com WINE SHOPS Cavaniola’s Cellar This wine shop in the historic Umbrella building offers a wide select ion of limited-run Old World wines designed to go with the cheese and other offerings from Cavaniola’s Gourmet and Cavaniola’s Kitchen next door. 89 Division St., Sag Harbor, 631.725.2930, 631.725.2930, cavaniola .com Domaine Franey This East Hampton wine shop, run by the son of famed author and chef Pierre Franey, specializes in wines from Burgundy and caters to wine enthusiasts, including those looking for well-priced bottles or the perfect meal pairing.. 459 Pantigo Rd., East Hampton, pairing 631.324.0906, domainefraney.com Michael’s Wines & Spirits Lowest prices around! The knowledgeable staff will help you select from the most extensive inventory of wines and champagnes on the East End, including the best selection of Long Island wines at competitive prices . Delivery available. 802 Main St., Riverhead, 631.727.7410 WINE BARS A Mano This osteria and wine bar in Mattituck features local farmers, cheesemakers, fishers and wineries, as well as Italian varietals from f rom American and Italian wineries. wineries. 13550 Main Rd, Mattituck, 631.298.4800, amanorestaurant.com SPIRITS Hendrick’s Gin With delightful infusions of cucumber and rose, one would be a fool to forgo the unusually delicious Hendrick’s Gin! Simply put, no other gin tastes like Hendrick’s because no other gin is made like Hendrick’s. Hendrick’s . hendricksgin.com ORGANIC FOOD STORES The Juicy Naam An oasis of organic juices, smoothies and freshly prepared live food. Stop by for organic local produce, a full menu of the best juices, snacks, salads, raw soups and nori rolls, for takeout or catering, as well as daily Naam Yoga and a full range of healing bodywork . We also offer fully customized private cleanses and juice fasts that will detox det ox and rejuvenate you from the inside out, and a wonderful array of vis iting healers and health experts throughout the summer. 27 Race Ln., East Hampton and 51 Division Street/Route 114, Sag Harbor. New York City: 1295 Madison Ave. The Wales Hotel; 876-6000, thejuicynaam.us The Market An organic food market with gourmet items, delivery, catering and customized meal preparation, the Market offers ca fé, indoor/ outdoor dining right on Front Street. Street. Fresh organic produce, vitamins, bulk grains, pasta, nuts, personal care, wheat-free. Café offers delicious organic and vegetarian soups, salads, sandwiches and juices. 130 Front St., Greenport, 631.477.8803 78
edible EAST END
Provisions Natural Foods Market & Cafe Committed to serving healthy food, Provisions offers a snug retreat for a memorable organic lunch. lunch . Café is open for breakfast and lunch, serving chicken and veggie wraps, omelets, marinated brown rice, soups and homemade muffins and corn bread, a ju ice and smoothie bar, and a full line of “Eart h Friendly” groceries, cosmetics, books, gifts and organic produce. Bay and Division St., Sag Harbor, 725.3636
LANDSCAPE DESIGN AND ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES Barry Block Landscape Design & Contracting Inc. Award-winning, formally trained design/ build firm providing landscape services from design concept to complete installation. All projects receive personal attention and unique designs to fit your lifestyle, while offering a variety of specialized solutions using ecologically sound and organic techniques. 631.874.3430, barryblock.com, [email protected]
massage and health through natural therapies. Red Horse Plaza, 74 Montauk Hwy., East Hampton, 329.2525, naturopathica. com/ourspa.html
Southampton Osteopathy Dr. Stephen Braun DO, specializing in Osteopathy, and associates are welcoming new patients. They offer compassionate, integrative, personal, empowering medicine, specializing in i n restoration of your body’s healthy structure and optimal function after trauma, injury, or pain. 349 Meeting House Ln., Southampton, shosteo.com NATURAL PRODUCTS Fort Pond Native Plants Yoga Shanti A local garden center with a mission to pro- A full-time, Shaklee ful l-time, year-round, year-round, East End yoga stuFor over 50 years, generations of families mote the use and appreciation of native plants dio, Yoga Shanti offers classes class es to all levels in a have counted on us to do what no other for home landscapes. Employing organic range of styles. A recent review called Shanti company can do quite like Shaklee— maintenance products as well as sound envi- “the Hamptons yoga studio. You will never approaches.. 26 S. Embassy St., make products that are naturally safe ronmental approaches waste your time...The teachers are always AND proven effective. Every product Montauk, 631.668.6452, nativeplants.net amazing.” 23 Washington St., Sag Harbor, that goes into every Shaklee bottle Muse Design Inc. Inc . 725.6424, yogashanti.com is designed to improve health, work Offering residential and corporate cliCONSTRUCTION, without compromise and be gentle ents inspired environmental planning. RESTORAT ION, DESIGN DESIGN on the planet. 631.236.2670. green- “Weaving highly functional land use into [email protected]. mama@optonlin e.net. BeT BeTheChange. heChange. natural spaces fu ll of emotion and wonwon- Berg Design Architects der.” Whether a rain garden or a natural- A multi-faceted firm dedicated to susMyShaklee.com ly filtered pool design, native plantings or tainable modern residences, commercial PUBLIC RELATIONS natural resource management planning, architecture, interior design, and furniture. WordHampton Public Relations Muse Design blends the natural and the Client collaboration, green technology and Established in 1992, award-winning manmade into a beautiful celebratio celebration n of environmentally low impact designs lead to WordHampton represents signature hos- nature. 631. 631.725.872 725.8725, 5, t homasmuse.com unique architectural solutions with warm, pitality, real estate and lifestyle businesses comfortable surroundings. 917.328.3905, Playful Gardens from the East End to New York City, We design and build natural play-spaces 88 Old Stone Hwy., East Hampton, bergbuilding client reputations and revenues for children and provide instruction in designarchitects.com. through strategic and creative think- the garden. garden. Playful Gardens specializes in Environmentt Ea st ing, deep media relationships, social vegetables, flowers and herbs and custom- Environmen Consistent attention attention to detail has earned the media savvy and client partnering . 512 raised planters. myplayfulgarden.com trust of our customers and for over thirty Three Mile Harbor Rd., East Hampton, TRANSPORTATION years they have recommended us to their 631.329.0050, wordhampton.com AND TOURS friends and neighbors as one of the finest CATERERS AND CHEFS construction companies on the east end. end . Hampton Jitney Art of Eating Operating 365 days a year between Their friendly and professional staff will This community-focused and charity- the South and North Forks and Metro be glad to take a look at your house and driven caterer and events planner has NY, including new service to Brooklyn, advise you on maintenance, expansion or extensive connections with local farm- Hampton Jitney Jitney is your fa stest way to complete restoration. They offer a full specers, fishers and food makers, and will and from the City and NY airports. trum of services from design to permits, help you invite guests with the confi- Offering limousines, charters and tours roofs to decks and everything in between. dence that they will thorough ly enjoy the throughout the Northeast and Canada. 631.734.7474/7400, environmenteast.com food, setting a nd entire event experience experience.. 283.4600, hamptonjitney.com East End Awning 631.267.2411, hamptonsartofeating.com HEALTH, BEAUTY Owners Carol and Bill Duffy have been Need a Chef AND WELLNESS serving the Hamptons and the entire East Your private chef for a day. Local affordEnd of Long Island for over 12 years. The Body Shop able, established private chef. Peter Available seven day s a week for an in-home The first yoga and massage studio on the Cooke a 1991 CIA grad a lifelong resiestimate. They’ll bring the showroom to dent of the East End, f arm-to-table chef. East End is loc ated above Eileen Fisher in you. 631. 631.287 287.6080; .6080; eastendawning.com. the heart of East Hampton Village. The Free menu planning. planning. Shop, cook, clean. EDUCATION AND Body Shop, “the most beautiful yoga space 631.578.0798, 631. 578.0798, need achef.com COMMUNITY in the Hamptons,” offers classes in yoga, REAL ESTATE Pilates, cardio and dance, as well as private Hayground School Corcoran yoga and massage therapy. 26 Newtown An open community school where For over 30 years, exemplifying a steadLn., East Hampton; 631.324.6440; the- unproductive conventions are replaced fast commitment to service, creativity and by new ways of teaching and learning. learning . hard work. NYC’s largest residential real bodyshopeasthampton.com With the apprenticeship program for estate firm, Corcoran has offices through- Gil Ferrer Salon out the East End to help you find your Gil Ferrer hair care ser vices include cut- older youth, rich and varied programs home. Live who you are. 290 Main St., ting, color, Japanese hair straightening, in “Jeff’s Kitchen,” visiting artists and thermal-curl, hair treatments, reflexol- inspiring math, reading, music, art and Sag Harbor, 725.4926, corcoran.com ogy and nail and skin care. Salon is science, Hayground remains tr ue to its Town And Country Real Estate mission.. 537 537.7068, .7068, hay ground.org renowned Brazilian st ylist mission Offering personalized service and bou- directed by renowned Vincent Da Silva. In the City, visit their Ross School tique flexibility, Nicholas J. Planamento & Town And Country Real Estate flower-filled oa sis on Madison Avenue. Develop new skills or follow a passion at focuses on establishing relationships Bridgehampton Commons, Montauk Ross School, offering a wide selection of 537.5805, vin- year-ro year-round und classes, workshop workshopss a nd camps through honesty and quality service Hwy., Bridgeha mpton, 537.5805, to buyers and sellers. As a member of centferrer.com, and 21 E. 74 St., NYC, for kids, teens and adults, including classes 212.535.3543, 5.3543, gilferrersa lon.com in art, athletics, farm care, gymnastics, “Who’s Who in Luxury Real Estate,” 212.53 Nicholas J. Planamento & Town And Naturopathica Holistic Health Spa music, performance, tennis, humanities, Country Real Estate enjoys a referral Pure Beauty Lounge media, wellness, nutrition, and languages, network with the finest brokers glob- Much more than a product line, a destina- as well as courses in college preparation and ally. 631.298.0600 or 631. 631.948.0143, 948.0143, tion point for embracing the pure essentials ESL ESL.. 18 Goodfriend Drive, East Hampton, [email protected] of well-being. Skin care, b ody treatments, 631.907.5555 or ross.org/community
WINTER 2012
Slow Food East End Chapter The mission of the East End Chapter of Slow Food is to spread the word about the advantages (health, economi economic, c, environ environ-mental, taste!) of eating locally and seasonally, and connect those interested with the national and international Slow Food Movement. Slow Food is about good, clean and fair food. Currently our local chapter has over 1,000 on our email newsletter list. Local Leaders: Miche Bacher, Noah Bacher, Leslie Rose Close, Judiann C Fayyaz, Bryan Futerman, Tullia Limarzi, Ursula Massoud, Mary Morgan, Kate Plumb, Alexandra Sofis. Follow us on facebook: Slow Food East End. Suffolk County Community College Culinary School & Bakers Workshop With campuses in Brentwood, Selden, Sayville and Riverhead, Suffolk County Community College is NY’s largest community college. SCCC is renowned for its nationally recognized faculty, small classes and affordable tuition. Students may choose from more than 60 programs of study, including the new world-class culinary program a nd Bakers Workshop in Riverhead. 20 E. Main St., Riverhead, 548.3750,, sunysuffolk.edu 548.3750 Twin Peeks Geeks Fast, friendly, experienced, dependable, affordable, on-site Macintosh service at your home or business in the Hamptons and Manhattan. Specializing in hookups, troubleshooting; software installation, upgrades and instruction; Internet installation, Photoshop instruction and scanning instruction. 631.723.3660, twinpeeksgeeks.com
FOOD BLOGS gift items, specializing in custom monogramming. 31 Main St., Southampton, Let There Be Bite Life is too short for bad food, and LTBB 631.283.4747, theelegantsetting.com Long Island Farm Bureau cold-pressed California Lifestyle Providing local, grassroots regional lead- finds the best of it: cold-pressed olive oil, slo slow-dried w-dried Italian pasta, artisa nal Contemporary Fashion Apparel and ership for the L.I. agricultural commuMen. The chocolate toffee. Some chili pepper in our Accessories for Women + Men. nity to preserve our remaining open land, best edit on what’s new in fashion, beautiful vistas and the 300-year legacy blog, too! [email protected]; luxury basics, denim and accessoof rural Long Island. 104 Edwards Ave., LetThereBeBite.com ries. Let our amazing staff navigate and ART SUPPLIES Calverton, 727.3777, lifb.com style your wardrobe. Open 7 days yearGolden Eagle Long Island Wine Council round! 127 Main Street, Sag Harbor; Founded in 1989, this industry association This East Hampton shop for those who “live 631. 631.725.1 725.1667; 667; shopat lifest yle.com is dedicated to achieving recognition for local and paint local” offers a wine range of COMPUTER & TECH SUPPORT Long Island as a premium wine-producing art materials, as well as year-round art classes including oil painting, mixed media, sculpture, GEEKHAMPTON region. Visit its Web site to plan your v isit encaustic and kids’ classes. classes. 14 Gingerbread Fast, friendly, experienced, dependable, to Long Island wine country. PO Box 74, Ln., East Hampton, 631.324.0603 affordable on-site Macintosh service at Peconic, 631.477.8493, 631.477.8493, liwi nes.com your home or business on the East End, or CLOTHING, JEWELRY our store. Specializing in hookups, troublePeconic Land Trust AND GIFTS shooting; software installation, upgrades The Hamptons, the East E nd, Peconic, A. J. Dak Etc. and instruction for your computer, iPhone North Fork, South Fork, Eastern Suffolk... An array of objects old and new, art work, or iPod. 154 W. Montauk Hwy., Hampton however you identify the special place accessories, flowers (dried and fau x, pot- Bays, 631.723.3660, geekhampton.com that is Eastern L ong Island, you’ll want ted and tropical), jewelry, soaps and canLEGAL SERVICES to know more about Peconic Land Trust’s dles. Gifts and things in general to whet work with landowners to protect our sce- your fancy. Fri.–Mon. 11–5 and by appt. Jason Foscolo LLC The only law firm on Long Island dedinic vistas, water qual ity and productive 1240 Village Ln., Orient ; 631.323.0048 631.323.0048 cated to agricultural a nd food law, which farmland. PO Box 1776, Southampton, Eileen Fisher regulates how food is grown, processed, 283.3195, 283.31 95, peconiclandtrust .org Clothing that invites every woman to marketed and sold, we can help you to Slow Food East End Convivium express her own style. style . 800.445.1603, maximize profits and navigate food law Founded in 2003, this local chapter of eileenfisher.com complexities, form cooperatives, find the the international movement to defend The Elegant Setting right crop insurance, understand and utiregional food traditions boasts 600 The Elegant Setting is inspired by lize USDA cost-share programs, make the enthusiasts who have launched two nostalgia for a time when entertaining most of value-added processing equipment, school programs. programs . Sponsors of the Sag was an art. The Main Street shop in apply for federal conservation benefits and Harbor and East Hampton Farmers Southampton offers an exquisite col- much more. more. New and beginning farmers Markets. slowfoodlongisland.org lection of tabletop as well as home and welcome. 479. 479.799.70 799.7035; 35;jasonfoscolo.com ja sonfoscolo.com ENVIRONMENTAL AND FARM ORGANIZATIONS
edible east end:
NOW IN 3-D. Well, sort of.
Each week, our editors explore the behind-thescene food and drink From Manhattan to mix drinks at Lower East Side speakeasies, rake clams in Southampton, sip suds at Brooklyn beer
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AFTERTASTE
THE APPLE PUSHERS BY COURTNEY MACGINLEY
Te East End is in fact edible, with its countless producers of freshgrown fruits and vegetables and an abundance of agriculture at its residents’ fingertips. Te main roads of our towns are not lined with fast-food joints, but rather farm stands and pick-your-own purveyors. We are very fortunate. But, not more than a hundred or so miles from Long Island’s East End lie areas that have literally been deemed “food deserts”: low-income parts of New York City and its surrounding boroughs, where residents have little if any source of such nourishing ingredients to feed themselves and their families. It was partly the alarming rate of obesity within these neighborhoods that prompted New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to work with the City Council to launch the NYC Green Cart Initiative in 2008, supported by a $1.5 million grant from the Laurie M. isch Illumination Fund. While Manhattanites will be familiar with the umbrella-topped displays of apples, bananas, potatoes and other produce on street corners much of the year, the initiative set out to double and triple the number of these mobile carts and push them into specific low-income locations in outer boroughs of the city where fresh produce options are scarce. Tis program is also the subject matter of Te Apple Pushers , a documentary film by Mary Muzzio, narrated by Edward Norton, that made its world premiere at this year’s Hamptons International Film Festival.
And while the t he actual apple pushers pushers themselves—about 800 vendors across the five boroughs who are primarily first-generation immigrants, much like the Jewish, Italian and other ethnic produce peddlers of previous New York eras—worked on a Sunday afternoon in October, 100 miles or so away a crowd of about 150 gathered in East Hampton’s United Artists Teater to watch their story unfold. “Te goal of this film is twofold” explains Muzzio, “First, to inspire municipalities to think thin k creatively about different ways to address the problems of obesity and food deserts. Te other goal, which became apparent to me while making the film, fil m, is to inspire other philanthropists philanthropists to consider public-private partnerships within their own cities, like Laurie [isch] did through her support of the Green Cart Initiative.” Muzzio is proud to report, “In New York the Green Cart Initiative is one of several strategies underway in the fight against obesity and food deserts. deser ts. However, the concept of mobile vending is catching on, and several cities are working on developing their own ‘Green Cart’ initiatives.” For more information on Te Apple Pushers visit theapplepushers theapplepushers.com. .com. Courtney MacGinl ey has a passion for good food and great films. She writes from her home in Coram.
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SHARE THE FLAVOR, SAVE THE TIME. Order holiday meals online at wholefoodsmarket.com/shop.
For recipes and cooking advice, visit us at nyc.wholefoodsmarketcooking.com. nyc.wholefoodsmarketcooking.com. BOWERY
CHELSEA
TRIBECA
COLUMBUS CIRCLE
UNION SQUARE
JERICHO
UPPER WEST SIDE
LAKE GROVE
MANHASSET
WHITE PLAINS
YONKERS
