I left my apartment and headed for the Green Market at Union Square. Every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday local farmers and producers come into the city from the tri-state area to sell their seasonal goodies. I LOVE beets and know that one of the stalls on the north side of the market sold them at a great price, so that was my first stop. While I was there, I was also going to poke my head into Casa Mono, another Mario Batali/Joe Bastianich restaurant located at 52 Irving Place - just one block east of Union Square.
I looked at my watch and realized I was hungry, so when I got there, I decided I would have a quick bite to eat. Casa Mono opened about 7 years ago and is the smallest restaurant I have ever been inside. There are 11 tables (some were pushed together while I was there, but its was 11 groups) and they are constantly filled. Just for fun, I went on OpenTable and checked their reservation availability and there is nothing open for 2 people in the next two weeks between 5:00-10:15pm - yeah, that busy. Luckily for me, there is sitting room at the bar (about 6 seats) and another 6 or 7 seats at a "bar" which actually overlooks the completely open kitchen. I decided to sit there so I could see what the executive chef, Anthony, and his line cooks could do.
This is Chef Anthony (kind of cute, huh?)
I got the wine list and found an Albarino by the glass (I'm assuming it's a wine most Spanish restuarants carry). I ordered a 2009 Zarate Albarino produced by Rias Baixas which was $19. Casa Mono is tapas, and I wasn't absolutely ravishing, so I asked the waiter to pair one dish with the wine. He suggested the Fideos with Chorizo and Clams ($18). He said the balance of some spice from the chorizo would pair nicely with the crisp, light wine.
While I was waiting for my dish to arrive, the gentleman sitting next to me asked if I had ever tried razor clams. I had, I said, its one of my chef's specialties. He got excited when I mentioned where I worked and Conrad and I shared the rest of our meal talking about food. The razor clam he offered me was cooked "a la plancha" (on the flat top) and was topped with a pesto of sorts made of almost every herb imaginable. Delicious. While we were introducing ourselves and eating the razor clams, my food arrived.
Thank god I only ordered one "tapas." As you can see below, it was a big "small plate." The dish was made up of three key components - the fideua (the Spanish version of a capellini pasta that is about an inch long), the garlic aioli, and the clams. First, the chef cooked the clams in their natural juice in the oven. I missed the initial prep because I was paying closer attention to my wine, but I saw the line cook remove the steaming clams from the oven, place them on the stove and then cover them to finish the steaming process. While this was happening, I believe they were cooking my fiduea in some of the remaining clam juice (I did not witness the juice moving from the clam pan to the pasta, but the clam flavor infused in the noodles was the prominent taste in the finished product). Once cooked, shaved garlic, a green I could not identify and chopped chorizo were added. The steamed clams were then moved from their pan to a small, authentic, red clay ramekin and topped with the fideua mixture. This was then placed in the broiler - a great step that I was not expecting to see. Because of the thin, short nature of the pasta, the top part gets this nice crispiness to it while the rest underneath warms up and soaks up the flavor of the chorizo, garlic and the green. Once removed from the broiler, the dish is topped with the garlic aioli and served. The crispy pasta, with the spicy chorizo, creamy aioli and the clams worked magically together. The wine pairing was perfect to cut through the cream and spice as well as to complement and add to the delicate flavor of the clams and their juice that was, as I said, a dominating flavor.
Conrad and I kept talking and I found out he is from Barcelona, I'm guessing he is around 60 years old, and he is a Spanish food and wine supplier. He lives in New Jersey and supplies ingredients to a lot of New York City restaurants, including Casa Mono - I guess that explains why he was able to sit down, talk over the bar to the chef and order his lunch instead of going through the waiter. He gave me his card and told me about a paella feast he is holding on Saturday, October 9th. His father was famous in Barcelona for his paella and they used to cook for up to 400 people. Next Saturday, however, is for a measly 250 people. While he is telling me about the paella and his family's history in food, Chef Anthony hands him another dish (one he did not order).
This time it was Padron Peppers. These are traditional Spanish green peppers that are thrown into hot oil and cooked until the blister. They are covered in sea salt and served whole as a finger food. Simply pick the pepper up by the stem and eat it all in one bite. There is just a little spice but the sea salt help cuts through that. By this time, my Albarino was gone but that wine (and, of course, Casey suggestion which started everything) had created a great lunch experience that wasn't over!
I decided to order a glass of Granacha - my go-to Spanish red wine. I picked an 2007 Agricolas Aguaza Sarada Seleccion produced by Almansa. It had the typical pepperiness and earthiness expected in a Granacha but it was also extremely light on the palate. It was easy drinking and worked well with the peppers.
Conrad had another dish come out that he wanted me to try. This time it was the lamb chop, also cooked a la plancha. He insisted on me taking half the dish and, in between telling me about his friend who is a food writer in Chicago, he also decided to sneak away and tell my waiter he was going to buy the glass of Granacha I had just ordered. So sweet! I felt bad taking half of his lamb chop but he got up, paid his bill, shook my hand and told me he looked forward to seeing me at my restaurant the next time he came in for dinner. He left me with the lamb, so of course I had to try it.
Needless to say, it was also amazing. The meat was grilled to perfection and placed on top of a marinated chick pea salad then topped with thinly sliced bell peppers, carrots and onions with an opal basil, mint and spicy lemon pesto. To make this amazing meal even better, it was a great complement to the red wine! By this point, I was stuffed but the Manchego cheese plate sounded too good. The dessert was served with a 3 month, 6 month and 12 month aged Manchego. All were delicious and very different. The 3 month was creamy and soft and went well on the bread served on the side. The 6 month was slightly less creamy with a sharper, more pronounced flavor and my favorite of the three. The 12 month was an extremely dry cheese and very complex. It went best with the quince jelly - the sweet and soft texture of the jelly balanced the sharp texture and flavor.
Casa Mono was a great experience. Not only was the food amazing but meeting Conrad, someone so connected in the food world, was an added bonus. We have already sent each other an email and I am planning on attending the paella feast with a friend from work. Hopefully, he can be some sort of a mentor and, if not, be a great person to run into and sit next to at another NYC restuarant (who doesn't love sampling specialities and getting free wine?)
As you can see, this is part one. Remember, I woke up wanting to buy a bottle of Albarino and to cook cripsy skate. Stay tuned for part two of Albarino Adventures...
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Currently Cooking/Eating: Nothing but I was just boiling water for some tea. I'm embarrassed to say this, but I was sitting here writing and the fire alarm went off. For a second I wondered how that was possible - I don't have the stove or oven on. Shit! Yes, I do! I run into the kitchen and see that, in forgetting about the boiling water, I had let it all boil off and my pot was so hot it was smoking... I guess sometimes its easy to forget about the simplest things.
Currently Craving: Nothing. I ate so much at family meal at the end of my shift today, I doubt I'll eat the rest of the night.
Currently Reading: Heat by Bill Buford
Currently Obsessing Over: Chelsea Market. I went again yesterday to do some of the dinner shopping and I love this place. It has everything imaginable and everything is of the highest quality. I definitely recommend going to the Lobster Place - anything seafood a girl could ever ask for.
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