More Cheese, Please

Happy 2008 and welcome friends, snack addicts, finger-lickers, sleep-eaters, and crumb catchers!

I am now into my second month in Brooklyn, and barely remember Soho…

Have you been to East Williamsburg? It is a concrete cornucopia. My favorite vegetable stand has the sour oranges I coveted so much in Puerto Rico. The local bakery has barley rusks like the ones I smuggled home from Athens.

Stepping into the butcher shop down Graham Avenue is like stepping back 50 years. There is no rushing in and out of this place. You come, you chat, you joke, you get teased. Then you gather your meat and go, giddy from the insane deal you’ve just scored ($3.50 for a whole chicken?!).

The local flora is what inspired my New Year’s pizza party. See my Google map to find out where I got everything to make them, including fresh Neapolitan-style pizza dough (1$ per pound= 1$ per pizza), cheap baby bella mushrooms, hand made smoked mozarella ($5), and fresh shrimp (1/2 pound $3.50, enough for 1 pizza) – all within 5 blocks!

I served the pizza on a table covered with brown package paper to avoid dishes or disposables. At the end of the night, just fold up the mess inside the paper and toss it. (Or rip out the greasy bits and recycle, which, er, I, um…) Then you can wake up new year’s morning to a nice, fresh table. Just don’t look at the floors.