Side Of Spaghetti: #11
What a week, have a peek!
Monday 6/2- I pumped iron at the gym and chugged some coffee on the way home. I got to work on some proposals and sorted some last minuet deets for my upcoming trip to Tuscany to cater my friends Janet & Daniel’s wedding next week. I had a big catering gig fall through which stressed me out, but that’s the nature of the biz folks. I had some leftover squash/tomato thing that I made the night before for lunch and worked on this here newsletter! My mom had made falafel last week and it inspired me to make some too! I started with soaked chickpeas that I ground up with dill, parsley, scallions and cilantro. Then I mixed in a bit of flour and baking soda, sesame oil, cinnamon, cardamon, cumin and plenty of s&p. Took a long walk while the mixture set and then rolled them into balls and froze most of them. I fried up a few for dinner and ate them with a salad of cukes, cherry tomatoes, pickled beets, scallions, carrots, feta and herbs, and soaked in red wine vin and lemon, lemony Greek yogurt sauce, hot sauce and tahini. WOWOWOWOW!! I watched Misery for some unknown reason and went to bed early.
Tuesday 6/3- Hit le gym early to pump more iron and watched The Better Sister on the treddy. I tackled some cooking projects for work and wrote a few catering proposals. For lunch I had leftover salad with hummus. I listened to an episode of The Rewatchables where they discussed New Jack City. Before I knew it day was turning to night and I was very hungry so I made myself a quick and delicious pasta. I made an amazing sauce from blanched kale, spinach, dill, parsley, evoo, scallions, goat cream cheese, parm and lemon. I mixed it into some spaghetti and blanched string beans and was literally saying out loud to myself, “oh my god, this si so good”, and it really was. Healthy and delicious! I binge watched my friend Liz’s show, The Better Sister.
Wednesday 6/4- I woke up and went for a long walk with Liz ( are you watching her show The Better Sister??) and her new dog Penelope! She is a little white toy poodle that they adopted from Waldo’s Rescue, and boy is she cute! I came home and ate some cold kale sauce with a spoon, worked on my newsletter and went to a grueling but amazing hot yoga class. Came home and made a quickie Greek salad and kept on writing. It feels weird to not be doing a lot of cooking work right now, but I am trying to look at it as a transitional time where I get to try and be a real writer, I hope it works lol. I went for another long walk then came home to work on a my curried chicken salad recipe (folks, it’s so good), and then out for a drink and some food with Thomas. We tried the new version of Frank’s, which was very tasty, but the vibe was sterile and it made me miss Prime Meats. I had a Negroni and we snacked on beef carpaccio, a springy salad with zucchini and favas, a big green salad and their fluffy focaccia which i slathered in mutter and EVOO. We had an amaro and then hung out my stoop and talked and I sent him home with a pint of chicken salad which he said he loved!
Thursday 6/5- I had tried and failed at making cold brew at home, so I headed to Octavia for a pistachio latte and then talked with a client and wrote a bit before heading to Long Island to visit my mom. I listened to an episode of The Rewatchables Inside Man, which is a great Spike Lee heist flick. I got to Bobbie’s and she had a gorgeous salad ready that had grilled chicken, tomatoes, avocado, cucumbers, fennel, radishes and one of her famous sweet and sour dressings. It was perfection, just like her! She got off early and we took a long drive to Northport, the town I grew up in. We had wanted steak, which neither of us eat very often, and picked a cool looking old scholl spot. But when we drove up it just felt off, so we read some reviews, the majority of which said in no uncertain terms, “avoid this place at all costs!'“, so we pivoted and went to Joanina, one of our favorite Italian spots in Huntington. We had a gorgonzola salad, eggplant marinara and wood oven roasted shrimp with beans and garlicky spinach. It was delightful! We grabbed some Italian ices from Ralph’s on the way home (mint chip, so, so, so good!) and ate it with Rob while we watched Goodfella’s, which Bobbie had somehow never seen and kept calling it “Nicefella’s” lol. All in all a truly glorious day!
Friday 6/6- Bobbie and I took a ride out east to Greenport. We grabbed coffee from Southdown Coffee on the way out, and stopped at a farm stand near Southold for some incredible strawberries. We made a pitstop at Aldo’s for another coffee and biscotti, and had a lovely little stroll around the harbor. Bobbie had gotten me a gift certificate to The Times Vintage last Christmas, and I used it to buy a cute 90’s top and some black cigarette pants. We headed to our favorite lunch spot, Southold Fish Market, which is a top tier fish store that also makes simple and delicious fresh seafood to eat there. We had INCREDIBLE raw clams, black bass tacos and fried local sea scallops with onion rings. Guys, this was so good, and a total dream to get to spend the day with my cute mom. She is the best! I had to head back to BK to get some work done, so I braved the rush hour traffic and made it back to do some writing and organizing for the week ahead. I ate some cukes dipped in kale puree and watched the first episode of the new season of And Just Like That, which I cringe watch religiously.
Saturday 6/7- Did some mother fucking Pilates, deep cleaned my home and made a curried chicken salad wrap to photograph. I wasn’t super hungry so I brought it down to BK Wine Exchange for the crew to try. I wrote some recipes, took a walk in between rain bursts and talked on the phone with my friend Michael about Jaws for like an hour. I did actually get caught in a downpour during this walk, but I kind of liked it. There’s something special about surrendering to a summer rain that just feels tethering to being human in a time where everything feels so bizarre and awful. I came home and you guessed it, watched Jaws. I wasn’t very hungry because watching ICE kidnap innocent people and attack protestors made me absolutely sick to my stomach, but I knew I needed to eat something so I had a slice of leftover pizza I had shoved in the freezer for a time like this.
Sunday 6/8- I sweated my little heart out at hot yoga and then headed to the Carroll Gardens farmers market. I grabbed a kale smoothie thing from Lani’s, as well as some cukes, shisho and beets. I grabbed a gigantic bunch of purple scallions and some kale from the stall all the way at the end close to court. Came home and processed some of last weeks odds and ends and cleaned the fridge. I love/need/only feel relaxed when I have a clean and organized fridge. I’m not sure how many other chefs are like this, but I really like keeping it all very tidy and organized in there. Anyway, I’m crazed and have mild OCD and also realize how unimportant it is to be talking about a neat fridge as the world burns. Ok, so I sautéed some old, saggy bok choy with kale and garlic, and made a string bean and zucchini salad with feta, scallions and golden raisins. I ate a big scoop of that on a half a charred Vista Hermosa tortilla with some avocado. It was great, i absolutely loved it. I finished my Jaws newsletter, and then met my best friend Becky and her wonderful partner Adam for a quick walk and snack. We got treats from Caputo’s Bakery and ate them in the middle of the sidewalk like we were tourists or something. Adam had an apple filled pastry, I had their killer chocolate chip walnut cookie, and Becky got their focaccia, which IMO is the best in NYC. I cleaned and ran errands, and for dinner I picked at some more string bean salad with a little hummus and some of the kale and bok choy. I binged the last few ep’s of The Better Sister (WOW twisssst!) and ate some Bjorn Corn and a little chocolate.
Until next week folks, and make sure to take care of yourselves and each other
XOXO,
Z
