Michael Phillips - Chelsea Market Makers: Recipes, Tips, and Techniques from the Artisans of New Yorks Premier Food Hall

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Chelsea Market is home to many of New Yorks premier craftsmen, cooks, bakers, and food purveyors. As parts of a dynamic whole, the people who have contributed to this book bring to it a range of talent, knowledge, and wisdom that comes from specializing in their particular craft in the company of like-minded specialists. The fast-paced lifestyle characteristic of New York City makes it all the more important that we take time to appreciate and value true craftsmanship.

While Chelsea Market fills with its own particular energy from the time the doors open until after dark, the space is also home to a mix of skilled, passionate makers whose daily work demonstrates the value of deliberate creation. No matter how busy the retail stores or restaurants might be, the symbiosis between the front and back ends, the retailers and wholesalers, is fundamental to what Chelsea Market is to our community. Most vendors at the Market are wholesalers first and retailers second. Thats a good thing for you if you shop at the Market because it means youve taken out the middleman. Many of the markets vendors are the sole importers of the goods they sell, but far more are curators of the best ingredientsthe very raw materials of the soups, breads, gelato, candies, cakes, cookies, pastas, stews, cocktails, tacos, ramen, crpes, and sandwiches they make every day.

Whether you come to the Market to buy your ingredients, to eat, or to do a little of each, its difficult to get very far down the corridor without eating somethingmaybe one of the incredible salt caramelchocolate fudge brownies Pat Helding makes at Fat Witch or the best organic hot dog youve ever tasted from Jake Dickson at Dicksons Farmstand Meats or an astonishing lobster roll from Ian MacGregor at the Lobster Place. Whatever you find yourself popping into your mouth as you shop and look, youre bound to witness crowds of businessmen, mothers, nannies, sightseers, and serious chefs doing just what youre doing. Some rush through to return with their bounty to their own kitchens, while others engage with the space slowly, as if experiencing a county fair for the first time.

One of the qualities we love best about the Market is the way its vast array of choices prompts our desireto consume, of course, but also to make, create, and participate. Take Esther Choi, who opened Mkbar a little more than a year ago at age twenty-eight. She has been making kimchi since she was old enough to trail behind her grandmothers skirt into the kitchen. Esther was born in Philadelphia, but shes a first-generation American with deep roots in Korean food culture. Weve gathered Esthers unusual knowledge of traditional ingredients and techniques while at the same time capturing the freshness and dedication (her stock takes more than ten days to make from start to finish) that make her kimchi ramen unlike any other in our ramen-obsessed city. This is but one example of the people, personalities, and voices that fill Chelsea Market and make it a destination for makers and consumers from across New York City and beyond.

Situated in the heart of the historic Meatpacking District, Chelsea Market is perfectly at home. At the turn of the previous century, Meatpacking was a central market location in the city, with more than 250 slaughterhouses and packing plants, because of its proximity to the rail line and the Hudson River. It quickly came to include a variety of other craftsmen, from cigar makers to import-export businesses. Through the ups and downs of the past one hundred years, the neighborhood has remained a market hub. The building in which Chelsea Market is housed was once the Nabisco factoryand the birthplace of the venerable Oreo cookie in 1898 when the companies merged. In 1990, New York City developer Irwin Cohen spearheaded the redevelopment of the existing buildings, connecting the entire block via a passage on the ground level. He then invited a handful of wholesalers to try retail.

This one-million-plus-square-foot space is now home to Chelsea Market, owned, managed, and curated by Jamestown, with more than fifty artisan food purveyors filling the lively concourse. In addition to the varied mix of tenants who occupy the public space on the ground level, what tourists and locals alike dont see is that the market is also home to a multitude of office tenants who fill the upper floors, including MLB.com, YouTube, Food Network, NY 1 News, and Google.

One of the things we like best about the Market is the sense of history and the collective spirit of production that makes the vendors and other occupants of the building something like one dynamic, purposeful whole. The diversity of Chelsea Market today mirrors the development of the Meatpacking District, a neighborhood known throughout New York City for its food, fashion, art, and technology. With the addition of the Whitney Museum of American Art just down the street, the era of the new Meatpacking District has arrived, and Chelsea Market remains solidly at its core.

APPLES AND OTHER FRUIT

We rely on the Manhattan Fruit Exchange and the Latilla brothers who own and operate it for sharing the knowledge theyve accumulated during their almost thirty years in the business. The brothers began by selling produce to just one restaurant in 1974. Today, three decades later, with two generations working at the Exchange, theyre still in business, now with hundreds of restaurants, plus a retail store and suppliers from around the world to match. When you shop there youre buying directly from the wholesalerjust one step away from buying from a grower at a farmers market. You cant get any closer to the source unless you pick the fruit yourself.

Step into the chilly walk-in retail store in Chelsea Market and youre likely to discover something new, or, if youre a professional, youll encounter prime specimens and varieties of fruit you cant find anywhere else. We open this chapter with New Yorks most famous contribution to the fruit worldthe apple. Its a humble, honored fruit.

APPLES

Vito Latilla begins pestering his New York growers for the new crop of apples in mid-August, when the first upstate fruit is ripe enough for picking. After the first hard frost, sometime in November, he leaves them alone, turning to the South for citrus. As you know if you like appleswho doesnt?the quality and variety of the fruit available year-round has exploded in recent years. Given the crazy abundance of types on the market, from heirloom varieties to new hybrids, if your favorite is Red or Golden Deliciousthe vanilla ice creams of the apple worldits time to look further afield. Theres no longer any excuse for a bad apple.

One of Vitos favorite apples happens to be dominating the market at the moment. Its an Australian hybrid with a balance of tart and sweet called Cripps Pink, trademarked in 2012 under the name Pink Lady. The Pink Lady vies for space and attention with its closest competitor, the Honeycrisp. Developed at the Minnesota Agricultural Research Station and trademarked in 1988, the Honeycrisp is a tad too sweet for Vitos taste. (Were big fans of it.) Both varieties are outstanding eating applescrisp and firm with tender skin protecting the fleshs large cells. These apples practically pop when you bite into them, and they hit the palate with tart juice infused with notes of citrus. They are at once fragrant, sweet, and refreshingly bright. Bred for extended shelf life, these beauties hold their staying power in the produce aisle right into March, even if the unmistakable bold, honest flavor of a local apple only a week or two off the tree wont keep beyond Thanksgiving.