ending food carts in NYC….PLEASE NO!!!

Last week, I read an interesting article in the free newspaper amNewYork about midtown businesses complaining about the street vendor carts.  Their complaint is that they don’t follow the rules and are making the streets dirty.  While I love the food and character that the street food carts bring to NYC, I wanted to see if their complaints had any validity.  Last Wednesday, I was walking down 34th street, one of the busiest streets in NYC. I walked from 6th avenue to 9th avenue and payed special attention to the several street carts lining 34th Street.  There was no garbage around their carts, as indicated by the complaining group.

Street Food has been in institution in NYC since the first immigrants arrived from Eastern Europe.  Pretzel vendors were the first and from that, the hot dog cart was born.  The hot dog cart evolved to sell pretzels, hot dogs, hot sausages, knishes and beverages.  Some of these also sell chicken and beef kebabs now.  While hot dog carts still dot the streets, the more popular Halal carts has overtaken their popularity in recent years.  The use of many spices in Middle Eastern cuisine, plus the vegetarian options is what has led to their popularity.  In recent years, the Halal carts have also started to include American favorites.  For $5-$7, you can get a plate of lamb, rice and salad or falafel or burgers and fries…plus other options.

In the past 3-4 years, the variety of Street Food carts is endless…Mexican, Korean, Indian, Caribbean, Crepe carts, Waffle carts…You can get anything from Kathi Rolls to BBQ Pulled Pork Waffles!  We even now have an annual award event…Vendy Awards…celebrating the best that NYC street food has to offer.  However, elitist corporations want to get rid of the character of NYC, which celebrates our immigrant population through the appreciation of their diverse cuisines.  What makes NYC different from the rest of the nation is its diversity and the many ways we celebrate it – their cuisines, Independence day parades of many different countries, cultural street fairs..we celebrate our diversity.

Whenever my family visits from Europe, they don’t crave 4-star restaurants, the first thing they ask for is the food from one of our street carts…they especially LOVE the dirty water hot dogs….sausages are common in Holland, where they are from…yet still they always say that in New York, they get the best hot dogs ever!

Street Food vendors are part of the character of New York.  Without them, the landscape would be boring and we would lose a part of our essence, a part of our diversity and our uniqueness…that makes people all over the world want to come here!

Follow amNew York on Twitter or FB….if this idea gets any traction, please contact Mayor Bloomberg so we don’t lose the unique character of our city.

 

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Cesar’s Food Truck

I took a long walk today through the streets of Carroll Gardens and Boerum Hil in Brooklyn today, looking for something to eat.  It was quite depressing walking along Atlantic Avenue, looking for a quick bite to eat.  For many, Monday was the one day they were closed.  For just as many, there were for rent or lease signs – the effects of the bad economy!  To see so many places now out of business was sad.

Finally, I ended up at Atlantic Terminal ready to take the train home, without finding anything I wanted to eat.  I wasn’t in the mood for Pizza – about the only things that was available.

But then, I came across Cesar’s – a food truck offering fried fish, tacos, burritos and their specialty – empanadas.  I love empanadas, especially ones with unique fillings.  My favorite place to date has been Empanada Mama, with fillings like Seafood Stew and Sausage and Sauerkraut.  Empanada Mama is a sit down restaurant.  Cesar’s comes in as a very close second, especially when you consider what they are able to produce from a food cart.  About 20 different varieties of empanadas, including guava and cheese, lasagna and yellow plantain.  Depending on the filling, the price range is from $2-$3.50.

I tried the Chicken and Spinach, as well as the plantain.  Sometimes, you get empanadas filled with a lot of dough and air and it takes several bites to get to the filling.  This was not the case.  Every bite was filled well seasoned chicken and spinach.  The spinach was definitely fresh (no frozen products at Cesar’s).

 

The yellow plantain was just as perfect.  I hate when I order yellow plantain and it is not quite ripe or vice-versa, when I order green plantain and it has already started to ripen.  The yellow plantain empanadas were so sweet it was dessert and no other sweeteners were added.

Conveniently located at the entrance of Atlantic Terminal, it’s a great option for a quick bite before you head on the Long Island Railroad or whichever MTA train you’re getting on!

NYC street food is represented by many different countries, as Cesar’s shows.

(pardon the quality of the photos, but taken with a dying cellphone while on the go)

 

Mireille

Sri Lankan Kootu

I had no exposure to Sri Lankan cuisine, prior to seeing an episode of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations.  After that, I was intrigued and obsessed with it, especially the street food he experienced, call Kootu.  I went on a search for Sri Lankan restaurants in New York.  There is only in Manhattan, called Sigiri.  There I tried the String Hopper Kootu.  It was good.

String Hopper Kootu at Sigiri

But then I discovered there was a Sri Lankan enclave neighborhood on Staten Island.  I always say NY has every type of food – you just have to know where to find it!  I discovered New Asha Sri Lankan Restaurant.  A hole in the wall restaurant with virtually no decor.   It is a mostly take out restaurant, with seating for no more than 12 people.  Less fancier than Sigiri, with food served on paper plates, however the taste far outweighs the lack of decor.  This is authentic Sri Lankan cuisine, with the flavors of their homeland.  I went with a Sri Lankan, who vouched for Asha.  I went with a group of 10 people (we filled up the whole place) and we ate family style,  so I got to sample a lot of dishes, including both Chicken and Vegetarian Kootu.  Believe it or not, I preferred the Vegetarian one, which was loaded with coconut.

Here is a video of the street vendors making Kootu (with a No Reservations accident):

Anthony Bourdain experiences Sri Lankan street food

I don’t own two cleavers, nor do I have the speed and expertise of the street vendors, that come from years of practice.  I looked everywhere, but no recipe for Kootu was found.  Based on what I saw on the show and what I tasted at New Asha, this is my recipe for Vegetarian Kootu.

2 teaspoons oil

3 scallions, chopped

3 chiles, chopped

2 tablespoons ginger, chopped

3 carrots, grated

1 bell peppers, sliced

can be purchased at http://www.kalustyans.com

3/4 cup grated coconut

3 rotis, chopped (although you can make these yourself, I took a shortcut and used some store bought ones)

purchased plain chapatti

10 tablespoons Sri Lankan curry powder (I have found Sri Lankan curry to be a little spicier than Indian curry and it also has pandan leaf – also known as screwpine – which is used more often in Southeast Asian cuisine)

3 cups coconut milk

1 cup water

2 tablespoons coarsely chopped cilantro

To make curry sauce, combine curry powder, coconut milk and water.  Bring to a boil.  Reduce to a simmer and cook on low for 30 minutes for flavors to develop.

In a skillet, heat oil and fry ginger for 1 minute.

Add scallions and chiles.  Cook for 2-3 minutes, until vegetables are softened.

Add bell pepper and roti bread and cook for 5 minutes.

Add carrots and coconut and cook for 3 minutes more.

Add 1 1/3 cups of the coconut sauce and fry for another 2 minutes.  Add cilantro and stir another minute.

To serve, place in a bowl and add more curry sauce.  Garnish with a sprig of cilantro.

For more video from his visit to Sri Lanka:

No Reservations episode in Sri Lanka

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Mireille

Street Foods of India

Thanks to http://foodiliciousnan.wordpress.com/ for providing this wonderful link on the Street Foods of India (from her Roasted Gram Chaat posting).

This is a dynamic, visual look at the street foods of India by Sephi Bergerson.

He stresses the importance of food photography being all about making the viewer hungry and not over-styling food.

http://www.sephi.com/archives/

Enjoy and please send me your recipes to join the street food community!

http://everywherestreetfoods.wordpress.com/join-the-street-food-community/

Roasted Gram Chaat (India)

courtesy of http://foodiliciousnan.wordpress.com/

Welcome to the first post to the Scrumptious Street Foods Community.

This post comes courtesy of http://foodiliciousnan.wordpress.com

My tongue was itching for a chatpata (sour and spicy) snack after I came across the photoblog of Sephi Bergerson. Sephi is a photographer who’s currently based in India and was awarded ‘best cookbook photography’ title for his book Street Food of India by the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards 2010.

Indian Street Food – An Introduction

India is a vast country and food varies widely from region to region. If asafoetida-flavoured tamarind-based sour foods dominate the south-Indian palate, it is spicy food that rules in the northern regions of the country. Mustard and fish dominate the subtle Bengali cuisine from the east as does easy, on-the-go food in western state ofMaharashtra. These are very broad generalisations and there is not much more I could talk about foods from each of these regions in less than 2 sentences!

Street food inIndiais altogether a different story! While it satisfies the snacking needs of some, there are certain varieties that even work as lunch/dinner for the busy working-class. Most street food items, though, are easy to prepare and a good mix of the healthy and the tasty. The ‘chat’ I have written about in today’s post is a take on the ubiquitous bhel-puri (a combination of puffed rice with some raw veggies and sour and spicy chutneys), which could be as easily found on the beaches of Mumbai as on the narrow bylanes of crowded Kolkata orDelhi. Read on…

His street food pics definitely made me go crazy and I was foraging my pantry looking for stuff I could put together to make some sort of a chat, a healthy one at that, which I could also post for the ongoing BM#12 event being hosted by Srivalli of Spice Your Life.  This meant some sort of a lentil had to be the star ingredient (since I’ve chosen to blog on the theme Delicious Dals for seven days in a row).

I found a half-used packet of roasted gram (bhuna chana/pottu kadalai) and I wondered if I could make something really appetising with this. Roasted gram is full of protein and fibre and has very little fat content. But it is normally consumed as an evening/on-the-go snack only by the elderly. The other common use it is put to is, of course, in coconut chutney.

So I made a sort of bhel puri, using roasted gram instead of puffed rice (murmura/pori). I
also added whatever vegetables I had in the refrigerator along with the typical chat sauces
and spice powders to come up with this.

 

Roasted Gram Chat

(Serves 2)

Ingredients:

Roasted gram – 50 gm (1 3/4 ounces)

Grated carrots and radish – ¼ cup

Capsicum (finely chopped) – ¼ cup

Sweet corn – 2 tbsp

Green chutney – 2 tbsp

Khatti-meethi (Sweet & sour) chutney – 2 tbsp

Beaten rice – 1/8 cup

Green chilli (finely chopped) – 1

Chopped coriander leaves – 2 tbsp

Sev (vermicelli) – ¼ cup

Red chilli powder – ½ tsp

Amchur (Dry mango) powder – ½ tsp or Lemon juice – 2 tsp

Salt – ½ tsp

Method:

Spread a layer of roasted gram on your serving plates

Mix all chopped vegetables and green chilli in a bowl

Take a small cup and fill it up with the vegetables

Upturn it bang in the centre of the roasted gram layer

Sprinkle beaten rice all over

Spread some more roasted gram

Top it with a tbsp of green and khatti-meethi chutney

Sprinkle red chilli powder, amchur powder (or lemon juice), salt and sev

Garnish with chopped coriander leaves and serve

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