Cleaning up from that Florida trip last month…
One of my favorite restaurant types is the barbecue shack. Not the barbecue restaurant, mind you – those are fine as long as they’re not chains – but the actual shack, something I’ve only encountered in Florida to date. The usual model is two small buildings by the side of the road, a small smokehouse where the actual Q happens and a shack nearby where orders are taken and food is served. There is never indoor seating, and the menu is extremely limited, as it should be. My all-time favorite barbecue shack is Big Ed’s in Dunedin, right near the Blue Jays’ spring training ballpark; the late Bobby Mattick tried it once and raved about it, so I tried it and was hooked. Big Ed’s still serves the best pulled pork I’ve ever had, anywhere.
Less than a mile from our hotel on this trip stood another barbecue shack, this one called McCray’s II. I went with my usual meal, a pulled pork sandwich and a side of barbecue beans. The pork was good, with a light smoke flavor and plenty of moisture left in it, so that the sauce was just for added flavor rather than to cover up the fact that the meat is dry. The beans were a disappointment – one trend I noticed in Florida was the tendency to cook many foods to within an inch of their lives so that their texture blows by al dente and ends up mush. Perhaps it’s a nod to Florida’s older population. Perhaps people down there just overcook everything by habit. Either way, it’s not good eats. But the pork was worth the trip.
Found a surprisingly good New York-style pizzeria in Palm Beach Gardens, called Giovanni’s, just off I-95. I’m a big fan of pizza in general – anything except Chicago/deep-dish, which is just a typical (dare I say it) American more-is-more approach to pizza – but having grown up in New York, I have a particular fondness for that style of thin-but-not-too-thin crust. Giovanni’s was solid, good crust with a crisp bottom below a soft dough that still had some softness to it; a sauce that didn’t taste like sugar; and the right amount of cheese. They also do a very nice garden salad, with artichokes, roasted red peppers, and sun-dried tomatoes on top of field greens. A medium cheese pizza and the salad (which serves two to three) came to about $17.
While down in Miami Springs to see a high school player I stumbled on a Thai place that was actually about to close for the afternoon, but turned out to be a gem. Rama Thai and Sushi appears to be mostly Thai, with a tiny sushi bar with only 3-4 stools, so Thai was what I went for. I had a lunch special, which was a huge bargain: $7 got me a miso soup, one fried spring roll (vegetarian, I think), and a just-right serving of pad thai. The pad thai was different, less sweet than I’m used to (that’s fine) with an earthy undertone, which I think came from cumin. I wanted to be polite and let them close up for the afternoon, but I have to mention that the cop sitting at the next table went for a very intriguing dessert of fried dumplings. He knocked off two plates, amazing since he looked like he weighed about 120 pounds.
Couple of not-so-great places to report on: Greek Taverna in Vero Beach looked promising, but the food was lousy. I went with a chicken kabob – I know, the gyro might have been a better choice – and the chicken had a bizarre texture, as if it wasn’t fully thawed when it was placed on the grill. Back in West Palm Beach, Jasmine Thai over on Haverhill Road promises “authentic Thai cuisine,” but while the tom yum goong was outstanding, the sauce on the pad thai clearly had peanut butter in it, making it sticky and way too sweet. The best part of that restaurant was the clientele, which that day included a man from southern China who was haranguing the waiter with descriptions of China and monologues on why people in Fujian never get sick (part of it is that they eat soup twice a day, or so he said), and an apparent heroin addict who had a loud conversation on his cell phone about some TV station that wanted to interview him that night. Good stuff.
I can sympathize with your delight at finding good New York style pizza while on the road, especially in a place like Florida. I am a transplanted New Yorker now living in Helsinki, Finland and got so discouraged by the quality of pizza that I started to make my own. I try to make the crust the same exact way as you describe it (thin but not too thin, and the semi-crisp shell) and it comes out consistently good; its suprising since I have a small European-style electric oven, and not a wood-burning brick or even gas oven. As it happens Finland has been very good for my cooking repertoire because while there are many wonderful things about the country, culinary expertise is not one of these.
I have to admit the novelty of hearing that I have readers around the world never gets old. Haven’t been to Finland myself, but I’ve found good Italian food in almost every other European country I’ve visited. What’s the local food like? A lot of fish, I’d presume.
I’ve had mixed results making my own dough – I think I need a stronger stand mixer to get a really strong dough that can withstand the stretching required for a thin crust. Alton Brown recommends using a little sugar in the dough to feed the yeast, but I find that gives the finished product a weirdly sweet undertone. (Trader Joes sells a great pizza dough for 99 cents, so I usually go with that instead.)
Wow, the novelty of posting comments and actually getting reactions from one of my favorite writers, and personalities, on the net is absolutely cool too. The italian food here in Finland is worse than the pizza. Its really ridiculous sometimes what they try to pass of as Italian cuisine. It is tasteless and often doesn’t have anything close to proper spicing. An example of their ignorance here with regard to spices, addmittedly mainly due to climate and lack of availability until 10-15 years ago: the word for garlic- valkosipuli is just “white onion”. Onion is sipuli. So you see they are still learning with all these things. Fortunately there are a few gourmet markets that have good and fresh herbs and vegetables, but on the whole, it is as you can imagine.
The local Finnish cuisine can be very good, but is somewhat uniform fare: potatoes always make an appearance, either roasted and salted or mashed, and often unfortunately from a box (shakes head). There is a decent amount of fish, though the levels of chemicals in the Baltic and in the Ostrobothnian gulf force the government to set limits on how much they recommend people consume. Of course I ignore these, but I am describing Finnish cuisine on the whole. The fish is often done very simply but tastily too. Herring, salmon and rainbow trout, are the most common fish dishes and often smoked, or sautéed with a light breading flavored with dill – a Finnish favorite. When they aren’t eating fish its Pork that rules the day and made in a variety of ways, but often truly dry and salty. There is very little beef, and chicken is only consumed in limited quantities, though turkey is gaining ground in a lot of menus. They also take great pride in their sausages here, but honestly if you have ever had some good Italian sweet or spicy sausage or french dried cured sausages or German würstchen the finnish ones are hardly better than hot dogs- and they are very much filled with non-meats.
This is probably a lot more than you wanted to know, but I just wanted to be thorough. Thanks for all your writing on this site and elsewhere. I have great interest in food, great literature (I went to a great books school for undergrad), and that sport with bats and balls, so you are a natural fit for my favorite internet author.
Thanks, Fran. Part of the idea of this site was to give me a way to interact with readers on non-baseball subjects, so that my chats stay mostly baseball (although I’ll always answer a few non-baseball questions).
You’re not exactly making the Finnish Board of Culinary Tourism’s job any easier, you know. Oddly enough, when my wife and I went to Reykjavik back in 2001, we found a very good Italian restaurant right in the center of town. That put me under the impression that you could find good Italian food anywhere in Europe. Guess not!
I am a transplanted New Yorker living on Cape Cod and I also have loved finding some good pizza places both on the Cape and in Boston. There is Steve’s in Hyannis which makes nice thin crust pies that are too small for my druthers but cheap enough to make it acceptable. In Boston, I actually really like the chain Pizzeria Regina. The best, though, is Pino’s at Cleveland Circle. Just great.
Also, since you talk about books and food so often I thought I would pass along a recommendation. I know you like to concentrate on fiction but I just read “Heat” by Bill Buford and it was great. If you want to get a flavor of what his food writing is like (if you don’t read the New Yorker) here is a link to a recent article about Gordon Ramsey (http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/04/02/070402fa_fact_buford). Anyway, the book is exceedingly well written, full of great writing not just about the craft of cooking but also about the life of a cook, the history of Italian food, and above all the food itself.
I’ve never been to Big Ed’s, and my family has lived in Palm Harbor since I was 12. I’m going to try it for lunch tomorrow, thanks for the tip.
I’m sure you made it to the various Greek restaurants in Tarpon Springs during Spring Training–my favorite there is Mykonos. I was there a few years ago and the woman at the table next to me ordered grilled octopus. When it showed up, she made a stink about how it wasn’t prepared like the octopus she’d had when she visited Greece on a recent cruise vacation. My father was with me, and he was stationed on a ship in the Mediterranean during Vietnam. He took a look at the plate and said, “that’s exactly how it looked when I was there.” The woman then complained to her server, and the owner/chef (who looked as Greek as a human being possibly could) came out of the kitchen and was completely amazed. She said, “this octopus isn’t authentic Greek.” He politely asked “where are you from?” She said, “Michigan,” and his response was “well, I’m from Athens, who do you think know more about authentic Greek octopus?” It was a very fun exchange for us to overhear.
Keith–I’m currently writing a law school paper discussing potential methods of punishment for MLB’s past steroid users, specifically relating to Hall of Fame induction and the treatment of their accumulated statistics. Is there any way I can send you a few short questions on the subject for inclusion in my paper?
Thanks, Jesse, I’ll check that book out – saw it in Costco when it was in hardcover and made a mental note to grab the paperback.
I agree that Regina makes a pretty good pizza. I’ll check out Steve’s when I’m on the Cape this summer (and I’ll file a report, of course).
Keith,
I’ve enjoyed your book recommendations. Thanks very much. It’s been nice to mix my reading up a little bit.
There is a barbecue shack in Elkton, Maryland called Durham’s Barbecue. If you get off I-95 at the first/last exit in Maryland as you cross the Delaware line (Exit 109/MD 279) and head north, it’s a couple of miles on the left. Probably smell it before you see it. Really good food.
Love your work…You mentioned A Confederacy of Dunces a few months back in one of your chats, and I really liked it…do you have any other recommendations on well-written books in that sort of humor genre?
I don’t know that I’ve ever found a book that really measured up to a Confederacy of Dunces, but here are some other smart-funny books I’ve really liked: Jasper Fforde’s The Eyre Affair
, Evelyn Waugh’s Scoop
(reviewed in an earlier post here), anything by P.G. Wodehouse (Life with Jeeves
is a good place to start), Mikhail Bulgakov’s masterpiece The Master and Margarita
, and Italo Calvino’s If on a winter’s night a traveler
.
Okay, I know that this is not exactly in the same realm but the book that I have read that most conforms to the smart/funny mix is Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972.” This book, while overshadowed by “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” is, in my opinion, HST’s masterpiece. It combines his brilliant and bizarre sense of humor with the uncannily keen sense of American culture and politics.
Really, there has never been nor will there ever be another HST. He had the amazing ability to cut through the bullshit and talk about serious subjects while keeping them interesting and funny. If you want a taste of his political insight try out this link to his obituary of the late President Nixon.
As a personal note, I first read it during the Democratic Primary season in the Winter of 2003 and it was eerily similar to the political situation at the time.
Thanks for the recommendations, Scoop is really good.