Whenever my dad (a gregarious MexTexican) comes to visit, his favorite thing to do is ask every random person he meets what they think is the best slice of pizza in New York City. He asks everyone. Cabbies. Bartenders. Bodega owners. He’s often eating a slice while he asks the guy, who just sold it [...]
Archive for the ‘Travel’ category
February 24th, 2010
Pizza Field Notes, by Celest
February 2nd, 2010
Marmalade, sans Smoosh
I’m a cat person. Taleggio and I bonded over shellfish and sleeping in on Sundays as soon as I brought him home from the shelter. As the consummate bedfellow in my life, we share secrets. He’s the only other set of eyes to witness the dirty dishes I leave in the sink or my midnight [...]
January 8th, 2010
Naughty or Nice?
Uncle Tony is not my real uncle. He’s my cousins’ great uncle, but we celebrate Christmas Eve together as one big not quite Italian-American family every year in his brother’s (my cousins’ grandfather’s) basement. Phew, got that? It’s quite a mouthful.
Tony’s pushing 90, but by all appearances he is a classic bull, or better [...]
December 22nd, 2009
Jesus sans Skis
I don’t ski. And for the record, I don’t date bankers or wear Christmas sweaters either. I grew up in a working class town covered in snow six months out of the year, with very few peaks or ski snobs to speak of. I like winter for her log fires and [...]
November 18th, 2009
Food Fight
Her revolution started with taste.
Back in 1971 when Alice Waters opened Chez Panisse, she wasn’t so much interested in becoming a restaurateur, as she was provoked to open a restaurant that would cater to her values. She wanted to feed the Berkeley revolutionaries and build a revolutionary meeting place that would, as she says, [...]
November 13th, 2009
Market Report: Scallops, Santa & Scrooge
Like any through-and-through New Yorker, I have a secret, almost an illicit fantasy – moving. In this recurring dream, my destination is Northern California, where I’d live in an actual house, somewhere near the sea or grape vines, and do California things: like become a morning person and walk a big beautiful dog on the [...]
October 30th, 2009
Market Report: Don’t Play With Your Food
My first crush was Jason. Jason was way too cool for school, and way too impressed with boy toys to notice my bouncing blonde curls. An example: in second grade I brought in one of those glitter wands filled with purple sparkles and twirled it like a baton during show-and-tell. Jason fell asleep at his [...]
October 23rd, 2009
Market Report: Sniffles & Truffles
It happens every year. After six blissful months during which I almost forget that I have sinuses, a little bit of blustery weather comes along and boom, it’s back – that persistently annoying if not terribly severe, stuffy-runny-nose common cold. It’s nothing to miss work over, certainly not swine flu, but [...]
October 15th, 2009
Death of a Salesman
Mac is in sales. And he’s very good at what he does. A few weeks ago he closed a deal on what may have been the biggest sell of his life. After nearly one year of buttering ‘em up, then greasing the wheel, promising commitment, and pledging to stake his personal [...]
September 11th, 2009
Market Report: My Kind of Town
At a certain moment, it happens to every New Yorker (especially perhaps, to those of us lucky enough to live below 14th street). Manhattan starts to seem like the beginning and ending of the known world. It’s not hard to understand; the whole universe is on your block: a Michelin-starred French restaurant, totally authentic falafel [...]
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