NYC Ethnic Food - Not to be taken for Granted

Around this time every year I prepare for five months of living full time upstate in the Catskills. As June rolls around and it gets hot and humid and in NYC, I pack up everything and head to the cool, crisp mountains to run Catskill Maison for the summer/fall season. When there are no guests at our Bed and Breakfast I retreat to our summer home in Schoharie County. I absolutely love our family summer place, we have a wrap around porch with mountain views and a really wonderful grill! In Riverdale I really can't practice my grilling techniques on my small terrace with my tiny electric grill, but in the summer I really take advantage of all of the farm fresh meat and produce and I grill at least 4 times a week. (Stay tuned for grilling recipes). It's such a treat to be a stones throw from the farms which produce incredibly fresh ingredients. It's a chefs/cooks dream to have that level of quality on a daily basis.

The only downside to living upstate for a long period of time is the lack of accessibility to ethnic food. Upstate NY isn't the melting pot by a long shot. Good food that isn't American/Italian is few and far between, and unless you go to Albany there is little to no variety and what there is tends to miss some of those authentic ingredients. When I'm in the City I take for granted that I can have excellent food from every corner of the world all within a 20-30 minute drive at the furthest (and that's with traffic)...so for the past month I've been crazed trying to make sure I go to all of the ethnic restaurants for the food that I really can't get upstate.

Last month I tried Yak for the first time in my life. It tastes a lot like wild boar or maybe beef, and not nearly as foreign as the name would imply. A group of us went to Himalayan Yak in Queens for a taste of food that is part Nepali, part Indian and part Tibetan, an experience not to be missed. Above is a picture of Yak tongue, which tastes very much like beef strips. Some of the bread we ordered reminded me of Italian focaccia, other bread reminded me of Chinese Bao. Vegetables reminded me of Thai veggies, and the curries and some of the plate presentations were classic Indian. It was interesting to acknowledge that those "exotic" tastes, when given the chance to really analyze were actually pretty familiar, so therefore really not that foreign after all...however, all of these flavors are foreign to the Catskills, and that's what I'm now coming to terms with. Today I'm excited about leaving NYC next week for the peace and serenity of the mountains, but I'm also a little sad, because I know that experiences like the one that I had at "Yak" will not be repeated for quite awhile. It's so important for those of us who live in Metropolitan areas to open our palates and experience cuisine from different places because there are so many places in this country where that experience isn't possible.

Juniper - A berry? Or a restaurant with a cult following in Hastings?

Juniper - a berry known for its spice or better known for Gin, or now for a tiny restaurant holding no more than 30 people at a time in Hastings on the Hudson in Westchester County NY.

Tonight after reading much hype about it, I called Juniper in Hastings and was able to secure an 8pm reservation for dinner! Juniper is known for simple, creative food that is locally sourced and seasonal, clearly right up my alley, since we all know I'm a locavore I was very excited to try it. Yes, the food did live up to the hype and if you are lucky enough to score a reservation you won't be disappointed.

I won't go into detail about the courses but I have to highlight the appetizer that I had which was PERFECTLY executed. I ordered a pasta with a fried poached egg, spring peas with braised rabbit. Sounds simple right? But no, the flavors and textures were so complex I was swooning from first bite to last. First of all, the rabbit was perfectly braised; tender but still had substance, and oh so flavorful, and there was quite a bit of it, not just a hint of rabbit. The spring peas were fresh, and sweet and clearly a pick of the current local harvest (it is pea season after all)...and it was paired with sweet fennel and the licorice flavor wasn't overpowering because the fennel was sauteed perfectly...but most of all I must talk about this egg. I make eggs constantly at Catskill Maison because at a Bed and Breakfast people expect egg dishes. But rarely do I make poached eggs, because to me, a poached egg must be very soft and runny in the center as a runny egg makes the dish, it emphasizes the richness of the yolk, especially if the egg is a farm egg...however there are people that are turned off by a runny egg. So I shy away from preparing poached eggs. But not these innovative chefs. Not only do they perfectly poach the egg so it's firm on the outside but runny on the inside, but they delicately flour the egg and then flash fry it for about 30 seconds to have this crisp, crunchy texture on the outside but when you break into the egg it pours into the pasta like a carbonara...simply brilliant and really one of the best appetizers I've had in a really long time.

Put Juniper on your to do list, I promise it's all that and a bag of Doritos!