at the sign of The Pink Pig

Here, There, Everywhere (Deli Heights, C&L Dumpling House, Noodle Bar, Coatzingo)

[Pigging by Wilfrid: September 26, 2016]

Yes, end of summer, start of fall, and you're still in the streets as much as possible, walking across Central Park, watching soccer games, going to food festivals, finding yourself in shirt-sleeves at midnight on a cool night.

Well that's me anyway, so here's a dump from the in-tray to the out-tray featuring a random range of refuellings.

The Cello Woman: Charlotte Moorman

[New York Peasant by Wilfrid: September 26, 2016]

Shows at the Grey Art Gallery in Washington Square drawing on documentation of the modern avant-garde, both from NYU's Fales Library and other sources, have been unfailingly informative.  The current (through December 10) two floor exhibit devoted to Charlotte Moorman and work she inspired is just outstanding.

 

Known always as the topless cellist, for some of her controversial early perfomances, and as the subject of a remarkable video sculpture by Nam June Paik (detail above), Moorman spent years instigating happenings, including founding the Avant-Garde Festival of Art.

Back To New York: Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid:  September 26, 2016]

The route home from Paris meant a final night in London, again at Hazlitt's Hotel, and I had time for lunch at Jimmy's before heading to the airport.  

Sadly now closed, Jimmy's was legendary.  Opened in 1948, it was a basement Greek restaurant next door to the even more legendary Bar Italia espresso bar on Frith Street.  Down the stairs, you found a dark dining room staffed by Greek waiters who seemed to have been there since the first night.

Paris (Yes, Contined): Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid:  September 22, 2016]

Diverting my attention briefly from my stomach, I did some exhibition-going the next day, and stumbled serendipitously across a survey of the Dreyfus affair at the Musee d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaisme in the Marais, replete with contemporary photographs. Then Cubism and Surrealism at the Pomidou.

Lunch was in an old dining room known as Machon d'Henri, packed with regulars; dinner at the rather more ambitious Chez Michel, just a short walk from Le Gard du Nord.  It had an acclaimed young chef, who turned out--very audibly--to be a screamer in the kitchen.  Here's what I wrote:

Paris (Continued Again): Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid:  September 21, 2016]

This was a good market day.  I set out early and took in the food stands at Place Maubert and Aligre, stopping in the lovely Baron Rouge wine bar for some andouille de pays (that's the sliced, cold andouille, not the hot andouillette).  Later on I made it to Raspail.

I managed to squeeze in two meals. Dinner was at the sedate, conservative Chez Maître Paul, a  left bank outpost of the Franche-Comté. That followed lunch at Au Moulin-au-Vent, better known as Chez Henri. Here's that I said back then:

Paris (Continued): Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine:  September 20, 2016]

Dinner that first night?  One of the veteran regional restaurants which allow Parisians to take a virtual journey to one of the country's many bread baskets: L'Ambassade d'Auvergne. Forty years old then, fifty this year, and still going strong.

There is no serious alternative to ordering the classic dishes on the menu. Here's my take on it from 2006:

London-Paris-London: Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid:  September 19, 2016]

Mid-September 2006 I embarked on a food trip, pure and simple. I rarely travel just for food, not matter how important eating turns out to be on the journey. But this was explicitly a pilgrimage to the classic bistros of Paris.  No trendy restaurants bistronomiques, no Michelin four star indulgences.  The solid mainstream: because you don't know what you've got till its gone.

It will take all week to tell you about it, but we'll start off by touching down in London, booking into Hazlitt's Hotel on Frith Street, and taking a pint at the Coach & Horses before a late supper.

Tocqueville And Dona: Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine: September 15, 2016]

Does everyone remember Gotham Book Mart.  I used to hang out in its penultimate location (amidst the Diamond stores) all the time.  Anyway, I was there ten years ago, my diary says. I also discovered John Allan's salon inside Saks Fifth Avenue, which became my regular grooming spot while working around Rock Plaza. 

But you don't care about any of that; you care what I ate.

Quick Bites: Untitled (The Restaurant, I Mean)

[Pigging by Wilfrid:  September 12, 2016]

I went through the MePa to a joint with no name.  Or something like that. You know, I thought Untitled was a dumb name for a restaurant, even given the arts reference, when it first opened at the old Whitney up on Madison.

But after five years, and in its new home in the sparkling new Whitney, it's well enough established that the name doesn't matter any more. I kept looking through the big windows while waiting to get into the Stuart Davis show this summer, and decided I should check it out.

Pig Heaven In The DR: Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid: 9/12/2016]

A good ten days of R&R in the DR in August 2006, not least hanging out on the balcony of a recently acquired apartment, reading Deleuze & Guattari's Mille Plateaux and wishing we didn't have to rent the place out.

There was also a close encounter with pigs/pork.