The little neighbourhood farmers' market at the Borough Hall Plaza, seen from a bench as we nibble on a breakfast of cider doughnuts.No, I haven't devegetarianised. But today Pseudonyme and I took part in an ancient and storied tradition for the first time - that of New York Pre-Thanksgiving Ham Day.
First of all though, we had a lovely food-centric day in my neighbourhood. On one of my pre-work dowsing-for-farmers'-markets mornings, I had stumbled across one such in the Borough Hall plaza not far from home. I later discovered it ran Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, but had never gone on a weekend. Anyway the weekend affair is somewhat larger and was full of lovely root vegetables and greens, apples and apple products and a number of bread and baking stalls. We perused, nibbled on some cider doughnuts, and finally made our choices, including some lovely leeks, some tiny flavourful grapes, and lashings of hardy roots. And some toothsome rugelach...
After this we headed over to Sahadi, as any right-thinking person would, as early and often as possible. It had been at least a month since I had been in, and it was more crowded than I had ever seen it. A Middle-Eastern food store that seems to carry everything,...we love Sahadi. As does everyone else, because when I went in and took the number 49 in order to order bulk goods, they were only serving number 9. Luckily there is plenty to divert one in the long wait.
When it was at last my turn, I was greeted by the extremely warm and friendly attentions of a man who hailed me as a regular who has been gone for too long. Extremely warm and friendly. But hey, I'm not going to object to being called "my love" and having extra handfuls of chocolate covered whatevers tipped in to my hand to sustain me for the long arduous wait...(note to self, must go back and buy some of those chocolate covered toffee encrusted pistachios, they were fantastic). After promising to come back soon, we made our purchases and departed.
The rest of the day passed in pleasant Brooklyn pursuits. We joined some people from work in brunch at the cuban cafe on Smith St., then wandered around participating in a little tour for the visitors. Then later, on the way home, we dropped into one of the many small wine stores of the area and managed to slip into a tasting of some very fine Italian wines. We loved the Barbera d'Alba and the Barolo, but the Brunello de Montalcino was the best, although alas at $54.99 we will probably never have it again. On the recommendation of the man running the tasting, who appeared to know all the winemakers personally, we got a Dolcetto that was only slightly out of our price range. We'll have to plan a meal around it.
Belatedly, we got home and I started cooking. At last, the preparation for Ham Day! Ham Day is the tradition of one of my coworkers, the Acrobat. He and his friends typically hold a dinner the weekend before American Thanksgiving, at which they cook a ham, since most people have turkey with their families on the Day Itself. I was instructed to make some sort of vegetarian dish, so I made a kind of pilaf, with basmati rice and a bunch of vegetables: leeks, oyster mushrooms, swiss chard and roasted butternut squash, tossed in a balsamic glaze. Unsurprisingly we left later than planned and had a few on-the-weekends-it's-near-impossible-to-cross-from-outerboroughs-to-Manhattan related mishaps (I should have known better) but in the end we made it up to Harlem and found his place with little difficulty.
Ham Day was quite nice, in fact. We were welcomed with enthusiasm, and while we knew no one there besides the host, managed to have a good time and eat way too much food and drink way too much wine. Pseudonyme confirmed the ham was very nice indeed, and there were lots of traditional sides to keep a vegetarian happy. Dessert might have been the highlight though - not only were there apple and pumpkin pies, chocolate chip cookies so hot from the oven we had to toss them up and down to cool them before eating, and little pastries from one of New York's innumerable Sicilian bakeries, but at one point, someone came round with a tray on which were balanced apple slices and little bowls of hot melted chocolate and cool liquid caramel. Fondue brought to one's chair!! This should happen more often.
Besides the red wine there was Prosecco and by the end we were a little overcome, but we made it safely home on the A train and curled up for a well earned rest. Ham Day is voted a success.
