A Quirky Food Tour in the East Village

There's nothing like a forecast of 87 degrees to ring in a Manhattan restaurant crawl. "Restaurant crawl?" you ask, "Not bar crawl?" Well, at a recent East Village tasting event, there was ample emphasis on the eating part. From gourmet mac'n'cheese to savory caramel macaroons and fiery Vietnamese sandwiches, the event showcased some of the best examples of typical village quirk. And that's certainly saying something, because anyone who's ever tucked into that hush-hush bar , hidden inside a hot dog restaurant behind the doors of a telephone booth can tell you this: the East Village itself is defined by quirk. So getting a chance to sample miniature versions of, well, just about everything, was the perfect treat on a sweltering weekend afternoon.

Kicking off the tour: S'Mac (345 E. 12th)

If you are American, or ever heard of America, you or someone you know has eaten macaroni and cheese. What's amazing about this product is that even the boxed, mass-produced Kraft version is actually pretty good, only so far as comfort food goes anyway. Which is to say that S'Mac has set itself a world apart with its Four-Cheese Mac'n'Cheese: al dente pasta baked in a lusciously rich and creamy cheese sauce, with a roof of firm, and slightly chewy cheddar, the varying kinds of texture that play war games in your mouth, and explode with flavor.

Next up: The Village Pourhouse (64 3rd Ave)

I assure you, this stop on the tour was more about the scene at the bar than what the bartender was pouring. After suffering through a pint of Bud Lite in a delightfully breezy open-air pub, I took a look around. Across the bar, a trio donning sombreros and faux mustaches, celebrating Saturday in anticipation of Cinco de Mayo. Next to my table, a group of eight or so identically-dressed Where's Waldo fans drinking and posing. Of course they were. Only in the Village.

And now, a tasting: Baoguette (37 St Mark's)

"Can I be in your picture?" the homeless man asked me. "No," I said, somewhat abruptly, because I'd just imbibed the liquid attitude that is Bud Lite. "But what about me?" asked another man, standing to my right, not looking very much like the chef he claimed to be. Cheerful in that humble sort of way, he hinted that he was the boss at Baoguette, and invited me inside.

And sure enough...

Sure enough, he was the boss, and while I waited for my "Sloppy Bao", which was graded "Very Spicy" out of four categories of pain, Chef Huang offered me sweet, creamy Pandan soft-serve. True to his claim, the bao was hot as hell. But its heat was cut with the tart sweetness of slivers of raw, young mango. On a freshly baked "baoguette", the sandwich of marinated minced beef couldn't have gone better - with a dark wheat beer, poured by an Aussie with an excellently coiffed weave - at Jimmy's 43, my next stop.

Pit stop: Jimmy's 43 (43 E. 7th St.)

The perfectly-coiffed Aussie bartender recommended a wheat beer with such authority that I gave in to my hesitation. Normally, wheat beer is just so yeasty and so hoppy; in my mind, it's lightweight material. But not this wheat. This wheat was brown and nutty, marrying the edginess of pecan with the softness of a shandy. It served the bao well, and I quaffed alongside the coiffed.

Next up: Luke's Lobster (93 E. 7th St.)

I don't know about you, but there's just something about white toast. Which is odd, because there's just nothing about untoasted white bread. Nothing - at all. But back to white toast, which usually sits in the background of a good sandwich, smirking smugly that it can't help but be noticed.

And so it was...

And so it was noticed, even in the company of lobster so tender that an entire restaurant of tasting revelers were completely silent, save the orgasmic exclamations of those of us eating: "Oh. My. God. That was so worth the wait!" Toasted white bread, mayo, tender lobster, an option for cocktail sauce. A simple sandwich, done just right.

Winding down: La Lucha (147 Ave. A)

It's a little bit difficult to focus on the food in front of you when there are scary S&M masks on the wall. What to do?

Face your fears, of course and wear a scary S&M mask while eating an open-faced taco. So that's what I did while sampling a vegetarian taco stuffed with cactus (looks and tastes like a sticky, gummy version of a snow pea) and a pork taco laced with pickled red onion.

Finally, dessert: Chikalicious (204 E. 10th)

Chikalicious has something of a cult following. I know this because I have walked past its two restaurants (which happen to be in such proximity to each other that they share a block) as early as 4PM, or as late as 11PM, and there is almost always a line of desperate sugar addicts waiting to get their gourmet fix. I mean, it's like seeing a line snaking outside of two Starbuck's on the same block. Oh wait, that happens all the time. Anyway, on offer that day for The Dealist's ticketholders were cupcakes and macaroons. If I may, I'll skip over the cupcakes (they were as good as cupcakes always are, especially red velvet ones), and move right onto the thing that will change your life: the salted-caramel macaroon. Never have I ever tasted such a waltz of sweet and savory, nor have I experienced the struggle to keep my cool between layers of crispy exterior giving way to silken caramel interior. It is possible that my life heretofore will be referred to as "B.C.", "Before Chikalicious", and "A.D.", "After Dessert". If you haven't sampled one of their salted-caramel macaroons, you haven't lived.

The End...

And that was where my tour ended. Although I hadn't even made it to every restaurant and bar on the tour's list, I'd done my best. Full and happy, I rang in the coming summer season in the quirkiest neighborhood of the best city on the planet.

Actual footage from Mongolian news broadcast; Patricia Sexton as anchor

What if you...just did it?

From Wall Street to Mongolian TV

If you're like me, you've spent years thinking about it. Worrying about it. Considering its endless implications. Creating Excel spreadsheet scenarios to forecast every imaginable outcome in the event you ever actually worked up the courage to Just-Do-It. And if you're a lot like I was, many years later, you still haven't done it.

But what if you did do it? What if you finally decided to throw in the towel on what's expected of you, instead of what you truly expect from yourself? What if you traded in security for passion? What if, finally, you pursued your dream?

For ten years, I worked on Wall Street in currency sales. It was a job I liked, but didn't love. And like exactly 100% of people working in jobs that they like but don't love, I daydreamed. What if, I always thought, stopping myself at the persistent call of obligations like mortgage, bills, lifestyle.

But then one day I did do it. Suddenly, or so it seemed to everyone but me, I quit my job and landed an internship at a TV station in Mongolia. Moved to Ulaanbaatar for a summer and lived with a family of Mongolian Mormons. And I can hardly believe that I'm telling you this next part because, years on, I can still hardly believe it myself - I was named anchor of the Mongolian national news. And that is what can actually happen if you follow your wildest dream in life.

Of course, I was pretty terrible at what I was trying to do. Just before we went to air that first time, I had a panic attack that can be blamed on a banana. Maybe you don't know this, but bananas are your enemy if you're planning on speaking into a microphone. They turn to paste and stick like glue to your tongue. In fact, try reciting a series of Mongolian names in front of a camera with a mouthful of paste and you'll suddenly understand what I mean. But that aside (oh, and the embarrassing head-bobbing like a buoy on a choppy sea), I can tell you this: there hasn't been a single moment in my life that, for even one second, I have regretted simply trying. I walked away from a lot, and discovered a world I didn't even know was there.

This video is the first of five. I'm posting these now because I've just finished a book about my wild adventure from Wall Street trading floor to Mongolian TV, and I thought the pictures would go well with the story. So each week, I'll be posting some tidbits about my experience anchoring, and my time living in Mongolia. I'd love it if you supported me, and forwarded this blog to anyone who's thought of throwing in the towel and pursuing a life of passion. Even if the bananas seem to be getting in their way.

An Interruption to the Love Story

I just found a quarter of a moldy, rotting cheeseburger. And I did not find it in the refrigerator, where it should have been. But where I found it is far less interesting than why I found it. So let me interrupt myself interrupting myself and ask you something: have you heard of Fanny Mendelssohn? No? I hadn't either.

Last Thursday, I spent an evening at Cornelia St Cafe listening to her 19th-century piano compositions. This might interest few of you, until you understand who Fanny was, and why Fanny wasn't. The sister of the uber-famous Felix Mendelssohn, Fanny was arguably as gifted as her brother, but nobody knew this until it was too late. That is, until she was dead.

As a young woman, Fanny displayed a lot of talent for writing music. However, where Dad supported brother Felix, he told sister Fanny that, for her, publishing music was a man's game, and that for her, music was to be nothing but an "ornament" in her social calendar. Without her father's support, and without even her husband's, Fanny had to rely on playing music for houseguests. How dull. Anyway, one particular night, while she was performing for her guests, Fanny got a hand cramp, and died suddenly. She was 41, and her musical publishing career was over before it had begun.

But what does this have to do with finding a rotting cheeseburger?

While at author Robin Hirsch's Cornelia St Cafe, listening to Victoria Sirota explain the life of Fanny, and Joanne Polk perform Fanny's dizzying finger-fluttering compositions, my fire re-ignited itself. The same fire to which I referred last week, the temporarily extinguished one that has all but eluded me for the past month.

Suddenly, everything seemed worth writing about - dinner, the wine I paired with it, and any number of otherwise-pointless thoughts I had between bites. Of course, my apartment's hygiene suffered terribly, as did my cuticles. Both were a mess: I wrote until my cuticles bled, and ate only to sustain myself, leaving pizza boxes, soda containers, coffee cups, and even a quarter of a moldy cheeseburger...anywhere I dropped any of them. With dragon-claw toenails (come on, don't act like it hasn't happened to you), I wrote until I finished, and then I drank one glass of the finest Spanish red I could get my bleeding-cuticle paws on.

As they say, 'There's something about Fanny,' and whatever it was in her musical recipes, she struck a chord. Whether she's struck for me the direction of destiny, or the destiny of direction, I don't know. But I'm happy to be on fire.

Sidebar: If anyone wants to know where I found this glass of wine, and what it was, let me know. It's a showstopper of its own.

(Updates coming soon to the rest of the Boy Meets Girl; Girl Meets Boy story)