A Stroke of Genius

             A couple of months ago I was frequenting the Bronx Alehouse in Riverdale and had a few tall glasses of fine ale. It was late on a Sunday night and before taking the car to drive back home, I had decided it was wise to eat something and have a cup of coffee before hitting the road. A few blocks away a solution flashed in my face in the form of the Riverdale Diner with it's large red sign. When I entered the establishment I was immediately faced with the dessert cake, and there before my eyes stood one of the greatest concepts ever put into action; a red velvet cheesecake. At the time I wasn't fully prepared to take on such a mighty force (think when Moses first discovers the Burning Bush), but I knew the time would come when there would be a final confrontation.

             The weeks and months dropped off the calender and as good as the good times were or as bad as the bad times were, in the back of my mind the red velvet cheesecake had been looming in the back of my head. On some days I might say red velvet is my favorite cake, but on other days I would side with cheesecake. I was curious what the combination of both cakes were going to do with me. Positive and negative protons were able to set the atomic bomb in place, would the powers of red velvet and cheesecake be just as powerful? Without wanting to think about it further, I reached a point where I needed to plunge ahead and experience one of the wonders of the world. In preparation of this event, I ate very light during the day. I had half of a nasty chicken empanada from 7-11, a small chicken noodle soup, and a granola bar. I wanted to leave plenty of room for a reasonable-sized dinner and then the grand finale of a slice of red velvet cheesecake. That afternoon I even stopped by the gym to burn off the calories I knew I would be accepting later on.

             I returned to the Riverdale Diner and the first thing I checked was the dessert case to make sure they were still offering it. There it was, in all it's glory. In fact, only a slice had been taken away which indicated it was a freshly made cake. Then from there things got a little awkward as I stood waiting for someone to seat me. The place wasn't crowded at all and there were workers all over, but none of them took notice that I wanted a seat. The owner or manager was counting money, a few workers were chatting with a customer at the counter, and someone was replacing a few of the pastries in the dessert case. It was possible they thought I was standing and waiting for a take-out order, but I was there for a good six minutes in limbo. I didn't want to sit at the counter as the people there were waiting for take-out orders and I didn't want to be stuck at a transient position while trying the cake. Then all of a sudden, an older lady walked in, looking quiet shabby, a few inches away from homeless, with a band aid on her elbow, and she approached the counter for a take-out order as well. I figured then maybe that's the only protocol to get any attention in the place. I shuffled my feet a few places towards the left to get closer to the counter in hopes someone would recognize my predicament, but it did no good. Eventually, I had to throw in the towel and ask a random waiter if I could have a seat (in hopes he would actually say yes).

            Once seated I scanned the menu for a good medium sized meal, in knowing I already had the answer in my head in regards of what I was going to do for dessert. As a favorite diner haunt of mine, I found a nicely priced liver option: calves liver with peppers and onions over yellow rice. The dish itself had a fancy-sounding Spanish name, but it was basically liver over rice. The eleven-dollar meal came with a soup option and out of the four options I went with matzah ball soup. I only had to wait a minute for the soup to come out, and it was perfect for the situation. It was very light and went down easy, including the slices of bread and crackers they served on the side. Shortly after the soup came out it was time for the liver dish. Really, dinner was just as a formality as I was only there for the red velvet cheesecake, so it was difficult to fully evaluate the liver, but it was a tad bit overdone. I could've cleaned the plate if I really wanted to, but I needed to leave room for the main event. As I digested my meal, I entertained myself by taking in the patrons of the other tables around me. For example, one lady across from me couldn't eat dairy products and kept asking the waiter about almost ever item on the menu if it had dairy in it. Or behind me, instead of ordering a regular gyro deluxe dish, this other lady needed a special customized dish of a gyro served in a wrap instead of the standard pita bread.

            Knowing I would only be moments away from take-off of the red velvet cheesecake, I made a short trip to the bathroom to splash some water on my face and get ready. It was quite a large and clean facility and served as the perfect venue for a few moments of quiet reflection. I returned to my table and as the busboy took my dishes away, the waiter asked if I wanted anything else. That's a moment I'll never forget, that's when I ordered the red velvet cheesecake. Naturally, I also had to add a cup of coffee to go with it, otherwise it wouldn't officially be a dessert. The coffee came out rather quickly, but the waiter said he needed a few minutes to prepare the slice of cake, I understood. You can't just serve something like that and walk away, it needs to be prepared the right way. About three minutes later the waiter returned with the red velvet cheesecake placed on a triangular plate with a few sprays of whipped cream and a dash of some type of syrup. I didn't want to dwell on it much, so I picked up my folk and dug in. To my surprise, the red velvet doe was dominate and I wasn't tasting much of the more densely-packed cheesecake, but then I realized what happened.

          The way the cake was constructed, it was cheesecake heavy on top, and red velvet dominate towards the bottom, by eating the cake on the side, this threw me off a little. After a few bites, then a few more bites, I looked down and saw I had almost finished the whole thing so quickly, I needed to slow the pace. While I took a short break, I paid closer attention to the radio station that was pouring out of the diner's speakers. It seemed as if it was tuned into an 80's satellite radio station, and a song came on that I had been seeking quite some time back. I remember hearing it in the early 90's the first time, and again about four years ago, but had forgotten I wanted to find out the name of it. I remembered the lyrics of "two steps forward and two steps back", as well as, "opposites attract". Turns out the name of the song was "Opposites Attract" by Paula Abdul. This was turning out to be quite a night with the confrontation of the red velvet cheesecake and unlocking a mystery song that had been puzzling my brain for half my life. I picked up my fork for a few more bites and just about the time my stomach told me I won, I checked the battlefield and saw the cake splattered all over. I didn't want to completely embarrass the red velvet cheesecake, so I left a few pieces laying around so it could have it's dignity. The busboy whisked the defeated dish away and months of wonder had suddenly been fulfilled.

            When it comes to red velvet and cheesecake, opposites certainly attract......

CLICK HERE to be brought to YouTube to hear "Opposites Attract"

The Sandwich Shop Saga

                                     _______Updated 2/24/12 from previous post_______

           Two weeks ago, a friend brought it to my attention that a new sandwich shop opened up in the Financial District of Manhattan and the pictures from their website made it appetizing enough to give it a try. The place is called My Belly's Playlist and there was a press release annoucing it's opening with the address of 3 Hanover Square. It was one of those gourmet sandwich places that I usually don't frequent, but the promise mentioned in the press release is if a customer creates a sandwich and other people like the concept, the sandwich is named after you. My friend came up with the clever name, the 'Zeisswich', if I would be able to create a winning combo other people would also like.

            I took the subway down to the city and got off at the Bowling Green station to meet up with my friend. I actually found out for the first time what the heck Bowling Green was and it turns out to be this tiny little park, hardly worth naming a subway station over. As we walked down the narrow streets of the Financial District, one of them cleverly named Stone Street for obvious reasons, there was the usual amount of police and security making their presence known. We eventually reached the Hanover Square area, but were having difficulty locating any place named My Belly's Playlist. In fact we couldn't even find a store or building with the address number of 3. It wasn't until we walked around the entire block that we finally found 3 Hanover Square, but it wasn't a store, it was an entrance to a regular building. Perhaps it was an office building and the sandwich place was inside for workers to get something for lunch. We entered the building and there's nothing there but a security guard at a desk and a pair of elevators beyond his desk. With nothing to lose at that point we asked the security guard if My Belly's Playlist is inside the building. Not only did he tell us he has no idea what we're talking about, but he informed us it was a residential building, and we had been the third group of people this week that came to his desk and asked for the same sandwich shop. It was semi-comforting to know that we weren't the only ones who couldn't find this place, but then where was it?

            I called the phone number listed on the press release, after the third ring someone picked up and I asked where were they located. First he told me they were about to close as it was 4pm and then he said they were at the corner of Hanover and Beaver. We passed that way and didn't see anything that said My Belly's Playlist, all that was there was a typical deli called Cafe Bravo. It was one of those have-everything places with the hot food sold by the pound, sandwiches, smoothies, pizza, etc. This wasn't exactly the gourmet sandwich shop that had its own website with customer comments of how great it was. We walked by Cafe Bravo again to doublecheck, and yes it was just your typical corner store deli. It was a major letdown so we decided to find somewhere else to eat. One possibility was a Cuban chain with several locations in the city called Sophie's, but this place was closing at 4pm and were only doing take-out orders. The food looked good, but where were we going to eat it? So we actually ended up at the 3 Hanover Square residential building again, as to the left of it was a Northern Italian resturant called Joseph's. After entering, there's a flight of stairs that go down and lead into a bar area, but we ate in the dining room and were the only ones in there.

            The waiter had a rather thick Italian accent and the opera music playing from the speakers gave it the full Italian resturant touch. For appetizer they brought out a plate of thiny-sliced prosciutto di parma over slices of canteloupe. For my main course I had the ravioli di aragosta, which is basically lobster-stuffed ravioli. One of the good and bad parts of the place is they give you alot of time in between the phases of the dining experience, as in they're not on top of you every five minutes. This was actually a set-back when they forgot to bring out my friend's soup and there was no one around to tell it to. We waited until it was time for the check before breaking that little bit of news. For dessert they brought out a large plate with four types of cake slices, and as the waiter described them my eyes immediately went to the red velvet slice and I tuned out what the waiter was saying. Naturally, I had made my selection, but I have to say it wasn't one of the better red velvet slice I've had lately. It was very plain in taste, perhaps it had been sitting around for an extra week than normal. Plus to make matters worse, the coffee was a little weak too. The prosciutto and ravioli were rather good, but unfortunately the dessert was a drop-off on the way out.

             My original blog about that afternoon and not being able to find the sandwich shop was posted on 2/10/12, titled "New Sandwich Shop That Doesn't Exist". Two days ago, a representative from My Belly's Playlist, Chef Jim, contacted me with the news that they're a delivery-based business right now and are using a basement kitchen of another establishment to prepare the food, which is why I couldn't find an actual store location two weeks ago(actual conversion with Chef Jim featured below in Comments section). He invited me down today and told me to give him a call when I was in front of the Yorganic store, as their operation is in the basement of that place. The night before I checked their menu online again and decided I wanted to go with the Outcast which was a trio of short-rib sliders of praire breeze cheddar cheese, bright apple and carrot slaw, and horseradish cream, served on mini brioche buns. Once I was inside Yorganic, Chef Jim came upstairs to meet me and took my Outcast order, and while he was making that I had a chance to speak with their other founder, Chef Shawn. He's been in the resturant business for a while and he told me that they opened up last month to focus on deliveries for now, but would like to get their own place in the future. Although they're only using a basement right now, one can still go there to get a sandwich and simply eat it in Yorganic, which has a seating section.

             In about ten-minutes my sandwich was ready and it cost a reasonable ten-dollars. This sandwich experience was two weeks in the making, so I couldn't wait to get started. I stayed inside Yorganic and took my box, they package the sandwich in, over to the seating area. Inside the neatly packed box was the trio-sandwich, two dipping sides, and the showstoper in the form of a soft chocolate chip cookie. The sliders looked just as good as the pictures on their website and the taste was amazing. Although the meat was short-rib, it wasn't greasy at all, unlike alot of other 'pulled' sandwiches. I was certainly happy Chef Jim got in touch with me so I was able to discover this wonderful sandwich experience. Unfortunately, Chef Jim went back downstairs so I wasn't able to say goodbye, but I did have another quick word with Chef Shawn on the way out. With a good meal in my stomach, I needed something extra to top it off. Back at the well traveled 3 Hanover Square I went into Lanidas, which specializes in Belgian chocolate, to get a fancy hot chocolate and small piece of white chocolate that came with it. At six dollars for a medium size it has to be the most expensive cup of hot coco I ever bought, but the taste of the true rich chocolate was worth every penny.

            If I ever go onto Jeopardy and one of the categories is 3 Hanover Square, I'm winning that round hands-down...