New York Tales 2 - A bite of Billyburg - Dec 2012

Manhattan's officially over for me. A weekend in Williamsburg gave me chance to really explore another side of the city I love. I've crossed the East River to graze on a few occasions, most memorably for visits to Peter Luger, the steak lover's equivalent of a trip to the Vatican. This time however I was staying there. 

Slowly but surely, the hipsters have been forced out of the lower reaches of the borough and pushed up into Williamsburg and Greenpoint by the buggies and prices of outrageous gentrification and for the last few years the buzz outside the enclave has been growing about the strip dividing Brooklyn from Queens. With pop ups littering every unused shop front and bars in people's front rooms, It seemed like a good place to start. 

Metropolitan Avenue runs broadly above the L train, the true hipster express, and the line that takes you from Manhattan out to the sprawling Brooklyn suburbs. While it's only a handful of stops until you step out at Bedford or Grahame Ave, it's a world away in terms of style and surroundings. Low rise apartment buildings run all ways in strict grids, occasionally drunkenly bisected by thundering expressways. There's a clapperboard style used along the slight, narrow streets that covers those that don't expose their redbrick to the pale December sun. 

The photos on cult flat-sharing site Airbnb showed part of the story, shot from great angles, perfectly lit. Turning up and realising we were bunking down in the corner of a photographers studio explained why we'd see the best angles before we arrived. 

Still, we weren't here for the five star living arrangements, this is Brooklyn baby, and we were here for a slice of the atmosphere, a pint or two of Brooklyn Lager and most importantly to check out a tip off about the best BBQ in New York City. 

As I've said before, the joy of barhopping in strange cities is that you'll end up with recommendations that you won't find in any of the guide books. And more often than not, you'll be on track for a proper locals night out. Here amongst the hipsters, that means necking artisan craft brews in a speakeasy that resembles a Girl Guide hut before queueing outside (in December) for beef ribs, drinking whiskey out of jam jars like some sort of hillbilly. After that? Well it's got to be pickle backs in Mabels hasn't it? Pretentious, scenester-ish. Fantastic.

Thankfully the steam train of gentrification hasn't yet brought conformity (unless it's in the identikit denizens with their plaid shirts, rigger boots and artful woodsman beanie hats) and you'll struggle to find a Starbux, or a Maccy D's on these streets. Coffee came from San Fran export Bluebottle (also sold at Variety Coffee on Graham), beer was almost always Brooklyn or craft and post 'refreshment' tacos came from one of the multitude of street vans.

And the BBQ? Now that was something special...
 
Queuing down an anonymous chain link lined alley in December wouldn't usually be my thing, at all, but James the barman had been insistent. "Best. Damn. BBQ. In New York". Early doors on a Saturday, we waited over an hour, warmed by a retro hipster body warmer my travelling companion had half-inched from the rental flat, fortified by hard liquor served in jam jars. And it was worth it. 

A huge wall montage covered the cuts and joints of every animal (just for those who didn't know what they were getting into), a chalkboard next to the server gave you the lowdown on their goods, sold by weight. Creamy soft brisket crowded the metal serving tray, stacked next to charred beef ribs, blackened fat crackling under tooth, breaking like ice on a pond to reveal soft and toothsome deep red meat. The sweet and tender pork ribs, burnt end infused beans and soft white rolls to mop and sop were almost an afterthought, the broccoli (you can take my travelling companion out of California...) was a steamed irrelevance. A few more of those jam jars and we rolled, hiccuping gently, into the Brooklyn night. "Best. Damn. BBQ. In New York".


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Dukes Brew and Cue and MEATmission - The Hipster Diaries - Dec 2012

This month, I'm mostly loving the Hipster Express. The whizzy new London Overground train line delivering Camberwell casuals into the dark beating heart of hip Hoxton since, well, Sunday last..

In less than 25 minutes I can be surrounded by all the skinny jeaned architects, students and wanna be design agency head honchos I could ever possibly need. Like exotic aeroplane trips that take you from the safe and known before dropping you unprepared into new and exciting worlds, the new Gingerline has thrown me into the mean streets of Dalston, with no chance to acclimatise from Peckham's green and verdant lands.

And the reason for this unprecedented exploration? Food of course…

Now we may have been travelling to (culturally) the other side of the world, but they still have to eat in Hoxton we scoffed nervously on the tube. Don't they? We'd soon find out.

MEATmission
Day one delivered us to the new home of a former Peckham resident, possibly the equivalent of eating pizza in Shanghai, but I wanted to ease myself in to the local cuisine gently. Much has been written about the might MEAT burger-based empire (some of it by me) and as I've just promised not to write about burgers again, I won't say anything about them, other than they are as you'd expect and hope.

Once you get over the most ambitious of their spaces, a wonderfully deconsecrated Welsh Mission chapel with a Gilbert & George inspired backlit ceiling, you'll be straight into a broadly as expected MEATmenu. The burgers are there, the sides are there and the cocktails are lurking with faint menace.

Not seen before and worthy of note were the Monkey Fingers, thickly battered strips of chicken doused in a hot and vinegary sauce, like boneless buffalo wings, served with a (too) mild blue cheese sauce. We continued onto sodden white submarine rolls filled with succulent slow roast beef and gravy. This was cheap and cheerful wonder-food, tasting like the white bread you'd use to soak up the last of the gravy at a resolutely home style Sunday lunch. Hellishly unhealthy, mopping up the accompanying dish of gravy with salty skinny chips, but after a couple of cocktails truly the food of gods.


Duke's Brew & Cue
Further north, the illuminating light of the Overground has touched parts other gentrifiers couldn't reach and brought hipsters and prosperity (or possibly only hipsters) to Haggerston. I've been assured that there's more to the area than a fixie bike shop and an espresso bar but that was by a man with a handlebar 'tache leaving me dubious to say the least.

The rough wood panelling of Duke's Brew & Cue (in recent history almost certainly a much less salubrious drinking hole) surrounds a new to the location micro-brewery cum bar cum restaurant. It's like a million and one Williamsburg hangouts (Fette Sau in Brooklyn is definitely one of their inspirations) and is currently still a massive hit with the locals. Even on a rain drenched Wednesday early, early evening we only just managed to squeeze into one of the unreserved bar tables.

I've been a couple of times, once for a so-so brunch and a pretty reasonable (and gargantuan) burger, the second for ribs.. As you'd expect with a name like Brew & Cue, you're only really here for the ribs.

We split two orders of the home smoked ribs, one beef and one pork. This was seemingly what most of the place was doing so I'm unsure why they don't offer that as a menu option. Beef ribs sadly were sadly cooked too hot, too quick for me. The well flavoured meat was cut through with just too many strands of hard, unyielding fat to make it as easy as it should have been to stripmine the bone of every juicy morsel. The pork ribs were much better, coming with a lovely deep flavoured meat and nutty hard bones to gnaw.

Sides were a mixed bag too. A cheap and cheerful mac'n'cheese didn't try to compete with the richness of the ribs, complementing them perfectly with a comforting blandness, house fried pickles and okra were just bad. Reminicent of the sort of deep fried generic vegetable sides you'd get in a Harvester or a Toby Steakhouse.

The food promised so, so much. In reality, it delivered some. As a place to hang out with locals, it comes as a strong recommendation. The bar staff were also excellent, though the servers a little harried. The cocktails are great and the brews on tap are also well recommended, strong, punchy and self assured. It's a shame that the kitchen doesn't quite live up to it.

 The roof of MEATmission... try looking at that after too many Peckham Negronis...

    A very bad shot of some ribs... blow it, you know what ribs look like...

Pitt Cue Co and Mishkin's - Jan 2012

Hype (n.)"excessive or misleading publicity or advertising," 1967, American English (the verb is attested from 1937), probably in part a back-formation of hyperbole, but also from underworld slang sense "swindle by overcharging or short-changing"(1926)


Don't believe the hype.


You'd be forgiven for thinking that London restaurant-land is a currently a barren desert with all roads out leading to a slew of pop up joints or casual short order cafes. Each one as breathily lauded as the other within the foodie community, welcomed into the world and birthed online with a salivatory crescendo of blurry photography and a level of preemptive sweaty palmed anticipation not seen since Take That reformed. Mishkin's, Pitt Cue Co, and Burger and Lobster are going to be packed to the rafters with the great and the gluttonous for some time to come. If you listen to the foodie community on Twitter, read reviews in newspapers or follow other food blogs, it's not hard to be swept up in the gustatory anticipation. If I'd spent a couple of million launching a new fine dining spot recently (hello Dabbous), right now I'd be kicking my PR team up and down the stairs.


Have I been to them? Of course. And as much as I protest circumstance, you're right to accuse me of being dragged along in part by the the desperately positive tide.

Mishkin's
New York meets the East End by way of Finchley style all day Jew'ish' diner. Those who have been to other restaurants by creator Russell Norman will know the drill; small space squeezes maximum capacity with handsome bar seating, trendy and friendly staff sucked from design school by way of Diamond Jacks and a cocktail cum small sharing menu focused on comfortable classics. The only anomaly is that Mishkin's has a booking policy (finally, Norman, finally!).


The space is beautiful. Russell Norman truly is the Conran of the cozy cafe, though you need to be VERY good friends if you're getting more than two people round the postage stamp tables. 


My guests went for salt beef mac 'n' cheese, a pleasant enough concept, unfortunately overdosed with English mustard and on the runny side, missing the nutty unctuousness of the thick fontina-based sauce in sister restaurant Spuntino. 


I followed the crowds, who have been raving about the Reuben, toasted rye with layers of good pastrami, melted swiss cheese and sauerkraut. You know what though? It's just a sandwich. A messily enjoyable one with a little too much gunk for me and fundamentally - Just. A. Sandwich. After numerous reviews, outpourings on Twitter and a double page spread in the Metro, just on the sodding sandwich, it's hard to see how anywhere could live up to that level of hype. 


I went again, for post-meeting cocktails (all gin-based and very acceptable) and bar snacks of battered Brussels sprout and battered cod cheeks. Both quirky and totally fine, though neither demanded return visits in the way of Spuntino's deep fried olives. You're not going to feel hard done by when you get the bill, the staff are superb (with the possible exception of that mustard handler in the kitchen) and if you had it on your doorstep you'd be crazy not to be there regularly. It's not the second coming though...

Pitt Cue Co
Purveyors of allegedly the finest BBQ in London (not a great boast given the competition), Pitt Cue Co has built up similar levels of rabid support. Following a period slumming it Meatwagon style in a silver trailer on the Southbank, they've moved into a (slightly) more permanent space in the middle of Soho. Even at 6.30 on a Monday evening the queue is out of the door and round the corner for one of the 30 spaces in the tiny two-floor space. Luckily I'd sent Miss Jones on ahead to bag a spot on the waitlist. 


The menu is perfunctory. Two meats, two ribs and a daily special with a few sides on one page, wines, cocktails and beers on the other page. Hipster credentials are established with the imported Pabst Blue Ribbon; PBR is gassily ubiquitous in Lower East Side and Williamsburg skinny-jeaned hangouts, and so very appropriate here given the early adopter clientele. The cocktail getting the airtime is the Pickleback, a shot of bourbon and pickle juice - better than it sounds and enough to give any junior advertising executive a few hairs on their chest...


Onto the meat. They really do know what they're doing here. Short rib of rich, aged, buttery Dexter and a half portion of exemplary moist pulled pork came with pickles and garlicky greens. Miss Jones took in the heavily sauced St Louis  pork ribs and a large portion of beef brisket, slow cooked and sliced in thin slivers. Certainly the best BBQ I've had in London; though with the competition consisting of Sir Jamie's pricey and off the mark Barbecoa, the execrable Sticky Fingers and mid market hangover cure Bodeans, they didn't have to do much. 


Certainly a deeply satisfying meal, we waddled out 90 minutes later, unrushed by the splendid staff. Stifling a meaty belch as we walked past the crowds waiting for their turn I couldn't help but think that, with the experience they were going to have, over an hour stood in the cold might be bearable again.


Swindled, overcharged or shortchanged? Not at all. Misleading, possibly. Excessive publicity, certainly. Either way, don't (always) believe the hype.

 

A short review of Bodeans - July 2010

Where: Bodean's, Soho originally (and now also Clapham, Fulham and another couple)

I'm not quite sure why I'm putting a date against this one, and I'm certainly not putting people, the list would be way too long. Pretty much ever since I started working in Soho, the weak mid-morning cry of 'Bodean's?' on a Friday has been the dead giveaway of many a hangover. It's been there since 2002 pumping the area's media workers full of authentic(ish) BBQ treats and grumble as I may, I've got to say it does a pretty good job.

I'm not sure why BBQ, for that's what they serve, and serve well, is the ideal cure for the self inflicted wounds of school night drinking, but it's generally held that the hot and greasy will somehow make you feel better (see other exhibits here, the fry up, fish and chips, the Sausage and Egg Muffin and the bacon sandwich) at least in my version of the world. Similar to hair of the dog, there's the idea of a restorative shot of flavour, salt and some form of pork product will bring you back to normality.

The decor falls somewhere between sports bar and diner, long high communal tables in the middle, a full size fibreglass cow and TV screens everywhere. The downstairs resembles the kind of country club you'd expect to find in Happy Days. They have laminated menus and a selection of chipotles on every table, a witches brew of different condiments to anoint your meat. In short, it's not an ideal spot for a first date... unless he/she really likes meat.
Pay at the counter,grab your ticket and wait for them to holler your number (downstairs is waiter service, see, I told you it was like a posh country club). Your food is served on a plastic tray with a liner to soak up the juices. The few sides offered (fries, gherkins, slaw as you'd expect, beans come studded with more pig) are nothing special, just necessary to break up the monopoly of the main ingredient. Skip the burgers and 'salads' too. The first because you can get much better locally and the buns really don't measure up, the second because it's a BBQ restaurant. Man (or woman) up, the clue is in the title...

So how's the meat? That is after all the reason we're here right? Several species roost / roast here, chicken, beef (brisket) and pork, both ribs and 'pulled' pork shoulder. All cooked long and low in their oak smoked BBQ pit (disclaimer, never seen the pit, though would like to...) I've always been a fan of pulled meat, it's a simple concept that brings a real tenderness to some of the most surly and taciturn cuts. By marinading and roasting low for 8 or 9 hours you get the recalcitrant strands of muscle to fall apart into a juicy stringy mass. The South Americans use it as carnitas, served spicy with salsa and guacamole. Those north of the border prefer theirs slavered in vinegary BBQ sauce. 


This all comes in various combinations, all with sides, mostly under or around a tenner. The one sandwich I would think worth including is their inspired Soho Special, a heady mix of beef brisket, salty spicy 'que sauce and pulled pork which embraces the poor quality soft white bun like garments from its trailer trash roots and gets to work on your hangover / hunger in the manner of a character from a Johnny Cash song. 
Nothing Bodean's does will win fine dining awards. And they don't necessarily care. It's a simple, down to earth and relatively cheap spot. But they serve you more meat that you can cope with, and you cover it with a zingy chipotle sauce and after a long time chewing, you smile a simple meaty greasy smile and immediately lower your eyes to the rest of the plate, resolving that this time, definitely this time, you won't be beat.