'Cips of Bliss

Cipriani Downtown
376 W Broadway, New York, NY 10012
Located between Spring & Broome St.
(212) 343-0999

One of my favorite Billy Joel songs is "I've Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway." But at one particular posh lounge-eatery on West Broadway, mega-mega-watt bulbs beam like perpetual spotlights. Clearly, this place has nothing to hide, except maybe the secret to making the best peach cocktails on earth. But I, Nancy Drew of the Food & Wine World, managed to find out a few things...

Cipriani Downtown, home of the Bellini concocted by Giuseppe Cipriani in 1943 Italy, is one of Manhattan's foremost celebrity, supermodel and socialite hotspots.  I just had to stop by Tuesday night to scope out the scene and 'do my thing.

Although I didn't see Victoria Beckham or Nicole Richie, who apparently frequent the place, I did sit near a 6-foot woman, about 90 pounds, who blabbed on her Blackberry in French and toyed with the gold fixtures on her brand new Louis Vuitton.  Oh yes, and some blonde, wan-faced woman I know I'd seen on TV before sat at a table outside in her tawny fur coat sliding cucumber slices between her collagen-plumped lips. 

I stood at the over-crowded bar in my glory munching on crispy, lightly-battered fried calamari and nibbling on tomatoes with fresh basil and mozzarella...with about four Bellinis lined up in front of me, stirred up and poured by bar master Charles Nemeth.

After chatting with Charles for a bit, I found out that he wanted to open up his own bar and thought his job at Cips would be temporary. Fourteen years later, he's still there on Mondays and Tuesdays, treating every customer like a celeb--even if they're not J-Lo or Marc Anthony. He is not your bottle-flipping mixologist who dreams up exotic drinks on the drop of a dime. Instead, he plays it old-school--simple and classy--by wearing the signature white jacket and tie, and by using only fresh, natural juices in his cocktails. He whips up each Bellini, for example, with prosecco (Italian sparkling wine) and frozen pureed peaches from France. That's it. And he pours his vodka from a frosty, scalloped glass pitcher--straight from the freezer. Chic and elegant. 

Everyone else on the staff was great to be around, too, from the bald waiter who joked that the flaming crêpes à la crème had previously snuffed out his hair, to the blonde barmaid who kept pouring me Italian spring water and squeezing lemon on my calamari.

This place is all about hospitality. At $18 a Bellini (don't shriek), you get what you pay for. 

But please, you've got to stop by at least once. Even if it's only for one drink. You never know, you just might catch a glimpse of George Clooney...

Above all, there's just something so special about the "original" Bellini. It's a bubbly, sweet, pink celebration in a glass. On a Tuesday night after a long, hard day at work, it's even sweeter.

Cheers to you!

;) Holly

Directions from Grand Central Station:

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Not Another Ramen Noodle No No: Pre-Prep Dinner the Daisy Way

(Photo courtesy of www.daisymartinez.com)

I've never met Daisy Martinez, but after watching her PBS show Daisy Cooks! I feel like we were BFF in some other lifetime. 

She's so down to earth and her recipes are simple yet sincere. I just want to be her friend so badly! Am I pathetic? (You don't have to answer.)

If you're thinking about what to make this week and don't have a lot of time to cook (whether you live alone or with a large family), watch this video. It's a special segment from "Food University."

Today's Lesson: 

Prepping your weeknight dinners a few days ahead will erase any after-work urge to crack open a package of Ramen or some processed product laced with monosodium glutamate, high fructose corn syrup, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, and all other nauseating, unpronounceable polypeptides (or whatever the heck they're called...chemistry was never my forte).

Her food's personality comes close to hers: colorful, comforting, bubbly and warm.

Enjoy.

Grandma's Sunday Gravy...Up Close & Personal

Look for Grandma's "Don't You Dare Call It Sauce" gravy recipe in the sidebar archive titled "On the Back Burner, But Still Worth a Taste."

I've been having technical difficulties and couldn't include my whole virtual tutorial. Sorry--Blogger.com needs to work on some major uploading issues!

But here's a clip. Enjoy it.

For a healthy variation, substitute ground beef with lean ground turkey, serve it up with some whole wheat pasta, and you've got the perfect feel-good, lazy weekend dinner.  Don't forget the table wine!  For this meal, I recommend Carlo Rossi paisano, an inexpensive, fruity table wine (about $12 for a 4 liter jug at PremierWines.com !).

You can put the gravy into a plastic container and freeze for up to 2 months. 

Yum is the Word.

Adventures at Puglia...Once Again

Let me count tonight's consumption of calories at my favorite restaurant in Little Italy...

...or not.

Looks like I'll be doing two rounds of Billy Blanks butt kickin' Boot Camp tomorrow.

I'm not complaining. It was totally worth it.

With me is Vinny, the most popular waiter in the joint.  

Come have a few laughs with me (and my former college roommate Jessica, who can be heard laughing in the background)! 

Warning: these videos are extremely silly, totally unscripted and totally unprofessional.  

Enjoy!

Unfortunately, I didn't get to go into the kitchen this time...

The "pillowy soft" bread and liquid gold (a.k.a. herb-infused olive oil).

The escarole and bean soup was the best $6.95 I spent in a long time.  It was a meal in itself.

The soft cannelloni beans melted in my mouth with the strong, sharp Pecorino Romano and bursts of fresh basil with every spoonful of escarole.  Delightful. 

I did NOT order this. Vinny surprised us. I believe it's called a banana "Xanga"--FRIED banana cheesecake (I know...I should go to confession).

It actually looked like phyllo dough and was filled with warm, gooey bananas foster on the inside...in the martini glass was a scoop of vanilla ice cream doused with banana liquor and drizzled with chocolate syrup).  

Ethereal as it was, I had to call it quits after a few bites (I had to save room for my almond cappuccino from Ferrara's).

Singing in the background is the famous Jorge Buccio who had a cameo in Big Daddy (see my previous post on Puglia for more info!). I tried to zoom in on him for you.

Want to have a good time? Stop by this place! 

And come back here for more silly dining adventures with me and my equally flighty friends.  

;) Holly

Behind the Burner: Your Backstage Pass

Newsflash!

I've got your secret sneak-preview pass right here for Behind the Burner, a new website that's set to launch at the end of this month.

Here's a video clip of Behind the Burner CEO / host Divya Gugnani and Top Chef Season One Winner chef Harold Dieterle of NYC's Perilla restaurant. He's making spicy duck meatballs. As dicey as that may sound to you, just wait 'till you see how yummy the finished product looks. You'll be pleasantly surprised.

Divya Says: "He starts with the best Fossil Farms meat and couples it with an unsuspecting hot sauce to give dinner a real kick. We think his charm and his dish are tied for first place."

Watch and learn, baby. Watch and learn.

Make sure you sign up to receive updates at the home site: http://www.behindtheburner.com/. It's an invitation-only arena that offers tricks, tips, and techniques on everything you want to know about the foodie world. You'll learn how to create NYC chef-inspired dishes and find out where and how to buy the exact ingredients these supreme culinarians use in their recipes!

Yum's the Word. Now go and spread it!

Holly

The Perfect Pea Soup

It's storming outside and there are mosquitoes suctioned against the window, wishing they could get a bite out of me (hah! they wish.). I'm sitting here safe, dry and satisfied from a bowl of the most soothing homemade pea soup. It sure beat the hell out of the Campbell's stuff I spit out at age five.

Beth, a dear friend of mine, made it last week and put it in the freezer. I just took it out, defrosted it, and enjoyed some by myself at the dining room table. It was her mom's recipe. No funny or nostalgic story about it. Just the soup. Plain and simple.

I swirled my spoon; it was the exact color of the Green-Yellow Crayola crayon, thick and silky from the pureed peas with little salty, chewy, delicate bites of Carnation Pink ham and soft Vivid Orange carrots cut into tiny rounds.

A simple work of art. Humble and comforting.

I don't know why, but each bite made me think of my childhood--of mom feeding me warm soup, of me drawing pictures on construction paper and scribbling with crayon on the bias until the entire side wore down to the wrapper and my middle finger was squished and waxy from all my hard work.

I'll spare you the sappy sentimentality by venturing over to the kitchen so I can get a first-class view of the lightning show outside.

In the meantime, here's the pea soup recipe, just in case you're all alone on a rainy night and want, like me, to re-imagine the days of your innocence--when you had two teeth and felt the warm soup (or baby food) slide over your gums (NOT to ponder what it'll be like when you once again have no teeth and can only eat pureed food...we have good dentists nowadays, so that probably won't be an issue).

Bethy's Mom's Pea Soup

What You Need:

• 2 bags green split peas
  
• 1 white onion, diced
  
• 2 russet potatoes (baking potatoes), diced
  
• 1/2 lb. baby carrots, cut into small rounds
  
• 1 ham bone, and any remaining pieces of non-fatty ham
  
• Extra cubes of ham, if you want (leftover works best)
  
• 8-10 cups of water
  
• salt and pepper
  

What to do:

• Soak split peas for 2 hours, then rinse
  
• In a large soup pot, add the diced ingredients, the peas, the ham bone and the water
  
• Boil everything together
  
• Simmer for 4 hours
  

You can freeze this for up to 2 months, but trust me...it'll be gone before you can say, "Buon Appetite."

:) Holly