Please stand with the little people

park
Originally uploaded by i_eat_ny.

I had to go to Alkit camera store yesterday, and I passed this funny sign in the grassy area of Union Square. No dogs, no bikes, no skating. And what exactly is that last no no? No martinis? I love how there's a little olive in the glass or is it a pickled onion?
In other funny news, my famous aquaintence, Lee Anne Wong and I had to email about some work stuff today. She will be giving a walking food tour of the LES on May 19th. I can only imagine that a camera crew will be following her. That gal is going straight for the top!
She also warned me not to watch tonight's episode because it was " a hosefest. really. imagine me engulfed in flames and then Tom Colicchio pisses on me to put out the fire." Tee hee! She did get beat down, but it was a pretty good episode nonetheless. Lee Anne is ambitious; therefore she had a complicated menu. It's not like she knew they had to make the food the next day. She worked her ass off though and showed humility when things slipped. But man, that Harold is getting hunkier and hunkier. I love how he stands up to and for people. In this episode he puts that annoying sommelier in his place. I think that Lee Anne and Harold should reenact the tea ceremony scene in Karate Kid 2 where Ralph Macchio is sitting on the floor and then Tamlyn Tomito pulls the chopstick from her bun and shakes her hair out to the strains of Peter Cetera's Glory of Love. I would do it, but I just got my hair cut, I'd need extensions.

Looks like Chicken

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Originally uploaded by i_eat_ny.

Aren't these neat? A picture from the set. It's fake meat! More about fake meat later.

This Crew is Bananas

family
Originally uploaded by i_eat_ny.

I don't have too much time to write because my office is having our French Formal Friday Tie Day celebration. This entry is food related because we have bananas. Have a great weekend!

Pie to Try

I noticed that Nomad offers a $15 prix fixe and Robert from the Village Voice gave it a pretty good review. He waxed nostalgic about a North African appetizer called a brik which is a fried phyllo stuffed with tuna, potatoes, capers and some other stuff. Sounds like a tuna pie that I need to try.
It made me think of the Tuck Shop (68 1st St.). Located on 1st Ave. and 1st St. (near Prune), they sell Australian meat pies called tucks. When I came back from Florida, all I had eaten was pretzels, so I went to Tuck Shop to get a pie. I've eaten the chook pie before which is a yummy chicken pot pie. They also offer lamb shank, seasonal veggie pie, chicken curry, and a vegan pie with a mashed potato top. Another day I had a pie of the day that was sort of a pepper steak pie. This was a while ago, so now their daily pie specials are different. That Monday night, steak and mushy (peas?) was the pie of the day, but I was distracted by the sausage rolls. They were 2 bucks cheaper ($3) and I was intrigued by the vegetarian roll. How could a sausage be made from chickpea, mushrooms, onions, parsley and capers? The answer is that it can't really, it was more of a mush roll, but a tasty one. The mush had a pleasant tangy flavor and the roll was a flaky pastry dough sprinkled with toasted sesame seeds. Chick mush roll would sound funny, but the Aussie's have funny names for lots of things. One of their signature items is a pie floater ($7). It's one of their pies drowned in pea soup! They also serve sandwiches called sangers filled with cheddar and veggies, chicken or vegemite. I guess the sangers are cold because Tuck Shop also serves ham and cheese jaffles which are toasted sangers. I've also had the sticky date pudding. It's good, but I had to warm it up in the toaster oven to get the sauce to be the proper temperature. They have added a lot more to the menu, but I can't wait to try their breakfast pies. The first one has ham, egg, baked beans and cheddar. The second is the same without the ham. They're both $3.50 and sound like they'll be a great substitute for the usual bacon, egg and cheese on a roll. I'll let you know how they are.

Should Pan-Asian Cubanos Exist?

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Originally uploaded by i_eat_ny.

I've been eyeing Noodle Bar on 26 Carmine St. (at Bleecker) for the past couple of months as they prepared to open. It's weird to get a sandwich from a place called Noodle Bar, but noodles don't travel well, and I had to walk from West 4th to the office. So I'll try them another time.
The Asia de Cuban sandwich ($8) reminded me of last week's episode of Top Chef. The assignment on the Bravo reality show was to design a fusion street food. One of the teams came up with a Cuban Morroccan Sandwich. When I saw Leanne Wong last week she was still pissed that she and her partner lost to that Cubano. She said that there was nothing Cuban about the sandwich except for the pork. She also said that hot Harold likes Asian girls. Wonder if he'd like this sandwich.
It had all the Cuban elements: roasted pork, cheese, a form of ham, and a pickle of sorts. Their twists were to use kimchee instead of cucumber pickles and China spam instead of ham lunch meat. It wasn't bad, but I think it could have been better. I wanted the bread to be a flat sesame bread like Dumpling House (118 Eldridge St.) uses. I couldn't really taste the roasted pork because the "China spam" overpowered it with flabby saltiness. I dunno what China had to do with it. Spam is spam is spam. This element wasn't terrible. In fact, it reminded me of Vietnamese ban mi sandwich pate, but it could have benefited from being sliced more thinly. The heat from the press would have melted the fat in the spam and moistened the sandwich. Instead, the moisture came from the mayo that was spooged on. There was also added oilyness from the Swiss Cheese which goes great with ham, but again the flavor faught with the spam. A milder cheese should have been used to balance out the strong flavor of the spam and the kimchee. I'm not sure if everyone will like the fiery acidity of the pickled cabbage, but I think it works. Granted, I'm biased, but it added a welcome freshness that could have been heightened with the addition of grated carrot, cilantro, or radish. Again, these are ideas borrowed from the ban mi. Ultimately, I don't think I'd order the sandwich again, but I'm glad I did because it got me thinking about sandwiches that I have loved and new ideas to spice them up.

Hot Lunch On Set

In my last couple of jobs, I've been more of a house, not a field slave. However, it's always fun to visit the set to see how the other half lives. One thing I've been fascinated with is their lunch set up. In the production and art departments we generally have a ten dollar (or so) limit and we order something in the neighborhood for delivery. Meanwhile, the shooting crew will sometimes get a walk away lunch where they can get a slice of pizza somewhere close if they are shooting in the city. More often, to keep costs and schedules in check, a catering company prepares the crew a hot lunch. One time "The Departed" payroll accountant Linda Toon brought us steaks from set. Another time on that show I went to the set at Maritime College in the Bronx and everyone was eating crab legs! They were sort of dry, but the melted butter fixed that problem. On this movie, the catering spread is quite impressive. Take a look.

Discovering Deli Manjoo

Carissa, Miryam and I were walking uptown after veggie dim sum in Chinatown when we happened upon this little snack shack that sells deliciously hot and steaming cream cakes. A quick internet search shows me that the Deli Manjoo company is Korean. The cake wasn't very sweet which was a good foil for the hot sweet cream filling. 12 corn shaped cakes for $3. You can find the treats a block or two north of Canal St. on Lafayette across from those $4 Chinese buffets.

Softball Sub

Now that the shooting crew is on set, I can talk about the locations department and how they wronged me and the APOC.
When we were still shooting in the city, every Thursday the locations folks would get meatball subs from M&O deli on Prince and Thompson. They said M&O had the best meatball subs in Soho. They also said they have terrific BLTs, but it's not tomato season yet, so I won't be trying that. One day when walking to work, I saw a dead rat stuck to a glue trap on the sidewalk in front of the store. That did not deter me from fetching two meatball subs with mozzarella for me and Matt. To be honest, the store wasn't dirty at all. Everything was orderly and clean, it's just that the sandwich was mediocre. Matt said it best as he felt the sub up like a dancer at a stripclub, "I can't feel the balls." These meatballs were mushy. There were too many breadcrumbs and not enough beef. Enough said. In conclusion, while the meatball subs were big and filling ($7), I'd only go to M&O if I wanted a cold cut sandwich, an egg and bacon sandwich or during in summer when the tomatoes are in season for BLT's. Thick cut and crispy fried, their bacon looked delicious.

Honorary Korean

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Originally uploaded by i_eat_ny.

I could have sworn I took a picture at that Chinese restaurant in Korea - and here it is!!
What you see here is the remnants of some yummy fried pork thing covered in sauce at the top, and at bottom those black bean sauce noodles with onions, peas and beef. VERY TASTY! Oooh, kimchi

That's part of an email from my new friend Diana in costume. It's pretty slow on the office today, so I've been emailing her even though she's just down the hall. Her brother used to be stationed in Korea, so she visited last year and fell in love with the food. She showed me her food pics and I had to post something from her.

Tangsuyook is the Korean sweet and sour and the noodles are my favorite, Cha Chjun Myun! Check out this old post to learn more.
My Favorite Pasta Isn't Italian

Blind Items over Lunch

What's fun about getting free lunch and cool people together on a film crew is the enlightening gossip that ensues. Who needs Us Magazine when you've got a department that has about 100 years of collective experience and lots of funny celebrity stories? Lately, we've been discussing a certain actor turned politician and his body double's hat, an aging action hero's thespian attempts, and actresses with farmer man hands. It's always fun to find out who's a bitch and who's great to work with. I was surprised and bummed to hear about the antics of a limosine liberal actor/director. Dreamy to the actors, but a real terror to the crew, my admiration for this New Yorker is gone.
However, I'm really digging the veggie shepards pie ($11.50) from Tea and Sympathy. Instead of the usual beef and tomato sauce mixture, this version uses a tasty lentil and carrot stew under rich buttery mashed potatoes. This dish is a rib sticker. It also comes with a nice side of peas that aren't mushy at all. For dessert I've had their sticky toffee pudding and it's nice because they serve it with a hot custard on the side. Pictured above is the teacle cake ($6). I understand that treacle is a type of molasses, but it sure looks light, doesn't it? It tastes light as well. I think the Brits call corn syrup, golden syrup. Don't quote me on all of this, the point is these syrups are related. Anyway, I find their prices a bit much, but since I'm not paying for it, I don't care. And their delivery guys are often quite attractive!
Tea & Sympathy
108-110 Greenwich Ave.

Meat & Greet

The best parts of working in film production aren’t just the free lunch and breakfast. It's also the people on the crew. I've met some absolutely fascinating, funny, and fabulous folks working on movies. Two more below the line movie job titles you should know are APOC and production secretary. According to Matt, the APOC (Assistant Production Coordinator) is responsible for holding the entire office together by force of sheer will. Also, he is head of lookin' good and dressin' sexy. Meanwhile Kirsten says the secretary is in charge of distributing the mountains of paperwork we churn out, clearing parking tickets, making crew and contact lists, and some other stuff.
This Sunday, we shot some video in Kirsten’s neighborhood. We ate some great stuff —tamales, huaraches, dos leches, pizza, donuts, tacos, corn. After the shoot, we found all this meat in her Kirsten’s freezer, so we decided to start a rhythmic gymnastics group called the Meat Three. We can practice our routines at the gymnastics studio located on the first floor of our office. I’ll probably finish editing our mini food tour of Spanish Harlem and gymnastic work later this month.
Just for kicks, I wanted to post a photo of my new favorite food star. Lee Anne Wong is one of our consultants for the movie. She’s also one of the stars of the Bravo reality show, Top Chef. She won’t tell us who wins the $100,000 prize, but I think it’s either her or the other New Yorker, Harold. Watch the show, it’s not as much stupid fun as America’s Top Model, but the more support Lee Anne gets, the better her chances of getting her own show on Bravo!