Out of the Woods

Apparently, the cop at the entrance to the Greenwich Village Equinox was there because Tiger Woods's mistress was there, and the paparazzi was out of control.  


Ok, before everyone jumps all over me for writing about this, let me indicate 4 reasons why this is news, even though the Tiger Woods story, in general, is NOT:


1.  Tagging onto something this stupid but over-reported is bound to improve this blog's results in search.
2.  It  permits me to illustrate the proper grammatical usage of a singular possessive when the possessor's name ends in "s".  The usage of "s'" is commonly substituted but is often (though not alway) incorrect.
3.  Any time a cop is in an Equinox for any reason other than to arrest someone for jacking off in the steam room is news.


Maybe the reason we're getting so much of Tiger-gate (Wood-er-gate?) is because the sex scandal of an admired, accomplished professional athlete is a refreshing change from all those sex scandals about politicians, many of whom are neither admired nor accomplished.

Although maybe that's not fair.  A fair portion of an entire political party has accomplished the Herculean task of convincing a segment of the American people that scientific facts are a mere matter of opinion.  After all, just because Darwin believed in God and evolution doesn't mean you're allowed to; much more fun to see if we can get broad swaths of the citizenry to live like ignorant fools.  Oh, and that whole global warming thing - apparently it's still clearly up for debate - and I'm afraid it might remain so until we're harvesting cotton and tobacco in New Hampshire.  (This year's Christmas tree: Douglas Fir or Coconut Palm?  Discuss.)


In our regular reality TV update, I am pleased to report that the cute brothers from The Amazing Race did NOT win, but came in second to Megan and Cheyne (stupidest name ever.)  Those two really did deserve to win, they managed to work together - and be NICE to each other - through the whole season, and came in first on most of the legs of the race.  The brothers, however, pretty much whined and bitched at each other across eastern Europe.  And the cuter one was fat.


However, the hot brothers on Top Chef totally won.  The duller one coming in second, with the younger (and cuter - looks matter) one winning.  In all seriousness, though, this was the best season of Top Chef ever if you were a foodie.  From the beginning, there were at least six seriously talented chefs, and they were all interesting to watch.  Plus, all six of them made it to the Top 7, so there were very few shockingly early eliminations.  Also, there was so much talent at the very top, that any of the four finalists could conceivably have won, without argument.  So much more interesting than the season I spent sitting around waiting for that cute little Butterball Stephanie to beat the pants off that creepy Richard Blais.  

I have to admit, it actually was a really touching episode, and I'm always so moved by the Top Chef finale.  It's great to see people who've worked so hard get recognized for it, and the contestants always seem to find so much joy in cooking.  As it should be.


In cooking news, most of what we've made this week is something I've already given you the recipe for, so I'm stealing today's recipe from my sister, who got it from Martha Stewart Everyday Food.  She loves this magazine - she says it's really well organized.  Every month they give you a vegetable, tell you when it is in season, discusses how to prep it (if necessary) and gives you a few recipes for it.  They do the same with other food categories, kitchen tools, etc - giving you an introduction to a particular item, provide information and background, then options for how to use it practically.  


Last night she made her family (they of the "I cook for these clowns every night" comment) a Roasted Vegetable Lasagna.  While it was cooking, my niece Cassidy (3 and a half) came up and said, "Mommy that smells delicious."

• You'll need:
• Coarse salt
• 2 pounds eggplant, peeled and cut lengthwise into 1/4-inch-thick slices
• 2 pounds zucchini, cut lengthwise into 1/4-inch-thick slices
• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil, for brushing
• Freshly ground pepper
• 3 medium red onions, cut into 1/2-inch rings
• 5 ounces goat cheese
• Marinara
• Fresh Lasagna Noodles (you will need about 1/2 of the batch), cut into 4-by-13-inch strips and cooked, or store-bought dried noodles, cooked
• 1/4 cup loosely packed fresh marjoram leaves, roughly chopped
• 2 ounces finely grated Pecorino Romano cheese (3/4 cup)

Here's what you'll do:

1. Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons salt over eggplant slices, and let drain for 45 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, place zucchini in a single layer on oiled baking sheets. (Work in batches if necessary.) Brush with oil, and season with salt and pepper. Bake, rotating pans halfway through, until tender and just starting to brown, 10 to 12 minutes. Let cool slightly, then transfer to a dish.
3. Place onion rings in a single layer on oiled baking sheets. (Work in batches if necessary.) Brush with oil, and season with salt and pepper. Bake until tender and browned, 10 to 15 minutes. Let cool slightly, then chop into 1/2-inch pieces. Mix with goat cheese in a small bowl.
4. Gently press eggplant slices between double layers of paper towels to remove excess liquid. Place eggplant in a single layer on oiled baking sheets (work in batches if necessary.) Brush with oil, and season with pepper. Bake until tender and golden, 6 to 9 minutes.
5. Reduce oven temperature to 375 degrees. Spread 1/2 cup of marinara in a 9-by-13-inch baking dish. Place a layer of noodles over marinara. Layer eggplant on top of noodles. Spread 1/2 of the goat cheese mixture over eggplant. Spread 1 cup marinara over cheese layer, and sprinkle with 2 tablespoons marjoram. Repeat layering once, replacing eggplant with zucchini (noodles, zucchini, goat cheese, marinara, marjoram). Place a layer of noodles on top. Spread remaining marinara on top of noodles, and sprinkle with Pecorino Romano cheese.
6. Place baking dish on a rimmed baking sheet. Bake until cheese is golden and sauce is bubbling, about 45 minutes. Let stand for 15 minutes before slicing and serving.

Want the recipe in printable format?  Just go here.

Those of you who have been following may be wondering where the Christmas Cookie recipe is - but I'm suspending today's cookie recipe in honor of the onset of Hanukkah.  Yes, I know, I've said some pretty nasty things about Hanukkah recently, but I've been forced to re-visit my opinion of the holiday.

No, not by my mother.

By Mormon Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT).   Hatch - like many Republicans - is a huge fan of Jews and of Israel.  (So disorienting --- it's like finding out the Focus on the Family Guy, James Dobson, watches Will and Grace reruns and goes to Drag Bingo.)  Anyway, Senator Hatch is such a fan of the tribe that he's applied his talent for songwriting (the dissonance just grows, doesn't it?) to penning a song about Hanukkah.

Yes, of course it will suck.  All Hanukkah songs suck.  No trees, no Santa, and it's hard to get something to rhyme with Dreidel (or coupon or Florida, or anything else that would be in a song about a Jewish winter holiday.)  Plus, there isn't a great tradition of snappy ditties written by Mormon Republicans from Utah.  

Still, as signs of the apocalypse go, I'll take that over Tiger's mistress on the Stairmaster.

Sweeped Away

Maybe I would be cuter if I had a brother?

Have you been watching reality television this year?  Cute brothers are this year's competition reality raison d'etre.  Which, quite frankly, is a welcome change from the standard issue "token gay team," "inspiring handicapped contestant," and "sweet old people who make it further than you think they would but still lose."  Thankfully, they haven't totally pre-empted the "couple on the verge of marriage who clearly aren't getting there because he's an abusive dick or she's a totally manipulative whiny bitch."

Because that's the reason I participate in pop culture to begin with.  Well, that and special moments like Sarah Palin's book.  Really, am I the only one who expected it to be a Pop-Up book?  Wouldn't that have been fun?  Like, you turn the page to the Chapter on Foreign Policy and there's Alaska and you can tug on the Aleutian Archipelago (string of islands that make Alaska look like it has a tail" and a Russian castle appears with Vladimir Putin waving at Sarah.

But more about television later.

This week has been all about agents.  First, I spent a lot of time negotiating with real estate agents over a house we saw last weekend that we're trying to buy.  I think half the reason I want to buy it is the crash in the real estate market.  Usually I get involved in something five minutes before its market tanks (I starting working at international software company SAP one month before the tech bubble burst. )  For once, I feel like I have a chance to get in after the damage has been done and prices are at or close to rock bottom.

So, of course, after we negotiate our way to a deal, my agent calls me to tell me the seller wants to raise the price.  You'd laugh and think this is uncommon, but this is the second time we've tried to buy a house only to have the seller try to raise the price.  Call me crazy, but isn't this basically the equivalent of going to a restaurant, ordering dinner, and then having the waiter saw, "Yeah, I know the menu says $14.95, but we decided we want to charge you $19.95."

Oh - and the best part: the seller owns multiple properties and lives in a penthouse on the Upper East Side.  So there was no way we were agreeing to a price increase.  At the end of the day, she stuck by the deal, but not without spending needless cycles getting right back to where we started.

I also dealt with theatrical agents.  First, trying to get one for myself, as I find myself getting more and more opportunities in hosting and developing television shows, and knowing less and less about how to protect myself and represent my own interests.  Thankfully, some good friends have helped me get in touch with the agents they work with and trust, but one experience stands out.  An agent who had passed on my portfolio a few months ago was contacted, since his agency does a lot of hosting work.  Despite the fact that I wasn't even asking him to fully represent me, just freelance for one project because I'm fairly far along and don't understand the process.  He wouldn't even take a meeting.

I know I'm supposed to be stolid and confident through all of this, because there are always more "no"s than "yes"es in this business, but stuff like that really torpedoes my confidence.  I mean, if I can make it fairly far along a casting process for a pretty major network and still not generate interest, what the heck do I have to do?

And finally, I dealt with gate agents.  I had to fly to DC on Wednesday morning.  You'd think that US Air Shuttle, with 15 flights from New York to Washington every day - on the hour! - would be a little more efficient in moving people through the airport.  I don't know why they even both to have four security lanes when there's never more than one open at any given time.  I mean, if they aren't opening additional lanes during the morning and evening rushes, when people are flying in for a day's worth of meetings and the line is nearly a hundred people deep, when the hell do they open it?  2pm when soap operas are on and they want to move people through so they can find out if Nicole is really Fred, the former Navy Seal who had a sex change after finding out his psychotic twin brother fathered a half-Cambodian girl that Lisa served gruel to at a soup kitchen before conscripting her into a prostitution ring run by Freemasons?

By the way, in the shuttle departure lounge at LaGuardia, you can always tell who is going to Boston and who is going to DC.  The Boston passengers are generally younger, maybe students, a little edgier and interesting.  The DC passengers are the ugly people in suits.

I spent my day in meetings, then came back to New York (miraculously leaving downtown DC at 5:15 and making it to National Airport in time to clear security and board a 6pm shuttle.  Which somehow left on time.  Evening flights NEVER leave on time for LaGuardia.

When I landed, I called Neil and we agreed to meet at one of our favorite restaurants on the west side, 44andX, at Tenth Avenue and 44th St.  44 and X is a New American restaurant that's been in Hell's Kitchen since long before it was the trendy place that young homos moved to because they could no longer afford Chelsea.

Neil and I shared the chopped salad to start - a Mediterranean inspired salad that includes hearts of palm, avocado, chickpeas and feta.  We were both also really intrigued by the pork, so we got the same dish: an ancho chile rubbed pork tenderloin served atop an almond polenta.  The pork was perfectly cooked, and the nuttiness of the polenta - which was creamy and slightly sweet - cut the salt an spice of the pork perfectly.

We go to 44 and X quite a bit.  The owner and manager, Scott Hart, has been in the neighborhood for years, contributes to local charities particularly those involving the Broadway community, and is always working the restaurant making sure his customers are happy.  He's an excellent host - check out his restaurant.  And for brunch, try the sister location, just up the block, called 44 and 1/2.

Which brings us back to television.  Isn't November sweeps month?  Why did nothing happen on any of my shows this week?  Project Runway had the dull Tim-goes-to-visit-the-finalists-at-their-homes-and-has-dinner-with-their-supportive/skeptical/charming/crazy/old-world-families.  There's always a wacky best friend or a distant father, as well as Tim looking concerned over some piece in their collection that isn't fit for a pet boutique, but other wise the episode is always a total dud; nothing but filler.  BO-ring.

How I Met Your Mother was a snore where Neil Patrick Harris and Cobie Smulders spent the episode in fat suits and old-age make-up, stumbling through the paces of "old married couple" jokes.

Even Melrose Place was low on the suds this week, with some sappy storyline about David taking his little brother to the amusement park.  After the kid gets hurt, his dad, the ever-nasty Michael Mancini is pissed, but becomes tender and touched when David says he just wants to spend time with his little brother.  This is the same guy who once left his psychotic wife to develop a brain aneurysm so he could take advantage of a vulnerable cancer patient. Thankfully, that cancer patient was Amanda Woodward, and she's back next week.

Which leaves us with the only things worth watching this week: on Top Chef, the Chefrechaun and the Hot Brothers were once again on top, while crazy Robin, who lasted a few weeks past her level of competence, was finally the victim of a mercy killing.

And on the Amazing Race, we have the first-ever team of gay brothers: Sam and Dan McMillen.  Sam and Dan brothers from Missouri who recently came out to each other (and 15 million viewers) and decided to run the race.  Once is more introverted, one is a model, and both are born-again Christians.

Evangelicious.


THE LAST WORD:


Do This, New York:

Check out 44 & X.

Stick with Top Chef and Amazing Race


Don't Do This, New York:

You can pretty much dump everything else from this past week's TiVo.  Feh.

Pull Your Own Pork

For a change, I've decided to write a post while watching food-related television.  I'm just wrapping up an episode of The Next Iron Chef (America), which - on first viewing - comes off as the unholy love child of Top Chef and The Next Food Network Star.  I can't tell you if I'm hooked yet, but I can tell you that Alton Brown is looking really gaunt.  Isn't this the Food Network? Isn't he in moderate proximity to, umm, FOOD?  Eat some of it.

His face has more leftover skin than the deep fryer at a KFC.

(FYI: Alton hosts.  The judges include some chick I've never seen or heard of (the website says it's Anya Fernald - but I don't know who that is), Jeffrey Steingarten - that queeny, fussy guy who judges Iron Chef America (not a judgment.  I, too, can be queeny and fussy,) and Donatella Arpaia, who has created some of my favorite New York restaurants - Mia Dona, davidburke and Donatella, Bellini.  She's totally cool, though she's at risk of becoming known as the black widow of the New York restaurant scene for partnering with extremely talented male chefs, creating multi-star restaurants, then ending the relationship.  She's done it twice in five years (David Burke and Michael Psilakis) and she's showing no sign of slowing down.)

I'm rooting for Amanda Freitag, whose restaurant, The Harrison, is one of my favorites.

Friday night we at a local restaurant called Citrus, which bills itself as offering Latin fare with an Asian flair.  As far as I can tell, that means that they serve sushi and tortilla chips in the same restaurant.  Other than the sushi there isn't much Asian flair, and I'm not sure where butternut squash soup or spaghetti and meatballs fit into either cuisine.  Still, the food is pretty good, so whatever ethnicity they want to claim is fine with me. (Here is where I should explain that my mother is adopted and has, at times, speculated about possibly being Italian, Spanish, and a range of Latin American options - to the point where she once encouraged me to select "Hispanic" on a law school application.  I did not.  But I am OK with claiming any heritage you want as long as it's not dancing the ethical line of a resume or college application.)

My non-Latin, non-Asian butternut squash soup was non-delicious.  (At least it wasn't non-hot, my pet peeve.)  It was bland, with little discernible flavor other than an underlying sweetness.  However, my roasted half Chicken in natural jus (also neither Latin nor Asian), was delicious.  Crispy skin, juicy and tender meat, well-seasoned and served with garlic mashed potatoes and vegetables.  Neil had their chopped salad and a quesadilla (finally, some Latin fare) which he characterized as "just OK."

I kicked off Saturday at Equinox 19th Street, taking a cycling class with Shaina.  I've known her since she started at Equinox and her classes are terrific.  She's got a background in exercise physiology and her classes use a technique called periodization - periods of intensity followed by active recovery, resulting in greater strength and endurance.  Her classes are terrific, balancing intervals, hills and speed work, and Shaina has fantastic energy ("You can do ANYTHING for FIFTEEN SECONDS!"  I am fairly certain she'd feel differently if she'd experienced waterboarding.  Or a Brazilian Wax.  Not that I know.)

Plus, her music is great, which is saying a lot at Equinox.  During my last workout I noticed that the nearly three month marathon of Taylor Swift's "Love Story" had been supplanted by "Walk This Way." Having sweat most of my bodily fluids on the cycling room floor, I needed to refresh and replenish.  With a cheeseburger.

I called Neil and agreed to meet him in the West Village.  I walked over and was about to sit down with my newspaper, when I heard a cheerful voice call out my name.

Those of you who've been reading this blog for a while now know that I am not describing my husband.

You know how there are some people who you simply can't stand, no matter how nice they are?  Neil made a friend at the gym several months ago - a very friendly, nice-looking European guy whom I find irrevocably irritating.  He's unfailingly charming and polite, always saying hello and making small talk - but he has an overly gallant and theatrical manner that I find off-putting; his voice a cross between Julia Child and Hercule Poirot.  I realize this is unkind and says more about me than it does him, and I'm ok with that.  I can live with not wanting to be greeted like I'm the Queen of England.

The truth is I was also having a pretty bad weekend.  I knew that this career change was going to have its ups and downs, and include periods of rejection along with a feeling of being unmoored due to the lack of structure.  However, the past few days have been particularly difficult - William Morris Endeavor passed on representing me, which was not unexpected nor surprising - an audition and callback didn't lead to further interest, and I was beginning to feel frustrated by the effort of getting more on-camera experience, making contacts, developing and pitching my shows, all while trying to run my consulting practice.  I was starting to become nostalgic for my airless, exhausting, lucrative former career and just wanted to sit with the advance sections of the Sunday paper - Real Estate, Travel - and dream about the things we used to spend money on; the spoils of a corporate life that balm the barren soul.

Instead, I was now forced into ritual politeness as I make small talk about my husband (on his way), the weather (awful rain, but better than last weekend's unseasonable cold) and recent headlines (yes, it is frightening in a post-9/11 world that 2 pilots could lose radio contact for 500 miles, overshoot the airport by 150, and there be no obvious military deployment or other activity.)  Finally freed from social convention, we say good bye and a few minutes later Neil shows up (I'm not entirely convinced he wasn't hiding just around the corner, eager to avoid the loquacity.)

We head to Bill's Bar & Burger in the space that was formerly The Hog Pit in the Meatpacking District, and it's here where I need to pause for a little detour.

I know I've written a great deal about the repurposing of comfort food as trendy cuisine.  I'm sorry, but as much as I like meatloaf now, I don't need to pay $20 for the same meal that my mother - and her whole generation - made because it only cost $5 to feed an entire family of four, and that included the valium you needed to slip your kids to prevent them from having a tantrum when they sat down to meatloaf.  Mac'n'cheese, burgers, cupcakes, that Peanut Butter & Co. on Sullivan Street, now fried chicken - we've reinvented an entire category of higher-end dining with casual dining entrees suited to the palette of a seven year old.  What's next?  Fish sticks?  Tuna Casserole?  If some restaurant tried to charge me $8 for a dessert of Jell-O, we're through.

Bill's, however, gets my thumbs up - despite venturing into the burger genre and doing so this late in the game.  Why?  Three reasons:

1.  The prices.  The burgers are in the $6 range, a great improvement over the $11-20+ category that has become pervasive.   A basket of fries is $3.50 and is large enough for 2 regular people or 6 gay men.  Neil and I shared them, with plenty left over.

2.  The quality.  The menu is simple - burgers, chicken sandwich, fish sandwich, hot dog.  A handful of sides, soda, beer and milkshakes.  (That sentence can, and should, be read two ways.  They have beer and they have milkshakes, but they also have beer-and-milk shakes; a stout with a vanilla ice cream float among them.  Ew.)  My burger was well-cooked and well-seasoned (a miracle in a city where so many burgers taste like nothing other than what you put on them; at Bill's the meat has flavor.)  The fries were delicious - warm and salty with a crispy outside but a soft inside; neither limp nor crunchy.

3.  They have American cheese.  Why is this so hard?  So many burger places will offer you cheddar, swiss, bleu - even Gruyere and jack - but very few offer American.  Isn't that the definition of a cheeseburger?

Stuffed and tired, and in no mood to wander through the rain, we decide to hide out in a move theater.  We head over to Union Square to check out the Chris Rock documentary, Good Hair.  Inspired by his daughter's complaint of having "bad" hair, the documentary explores the social and cultural forces impacting African-American women's hair - the products and stylists, the wigs and weaves - folding in the personal experiences of several prominent black women and a 60 year old hair show in Atlanta which includes a styling competition.  It was interesting to learn how much the industry serving African-American women is dominated by east Asian manufacturers and south Asian wig and weave suppliers (the hair being harvested from Indian women.)  Further, the hair show comes down to two men - one African-American, one White, and both so gay the screen nearly burst in flames - but men nonetheless; the two female competitors were practically nonentities.  Thus, the movie offered an interesting, and subversive, subtext about gender, in addition to race.  See it.

After the movie, I needed some couch time with TiVo, and I began by firing up last week's episode of Melrose Place (Hi Jo Reynolds! Bye Jo Reynolds!  You've now done as much for MP2.0 as you did for the alpha version.  Poor Daphne Zuniga; they created a character with so much promise, and gave her so little to do beyond being put-upon.)  After an hour of Ashlee Simpson rolling her Cavalier King Charles Spaniel eyes (cute on a dog, weird on a pop star) at Thomas Calabro (how does he look exactly the same after 12 years?) I progress to Project Runway.

You know, Project Runway really needs to give up the farce that each elimination is solely about that week's competition.  Not that I wasn't happy to see the departure of obnoxious Nicolas with his black humor and his white, sparkly-trashy ice skating costumes.  But cute Christopher Straub has been on the bottom (a familiar position, I'm sure) for three consecutive weeks.  I could understand him surviving the first time, but the past two weeks his work has clearly been the worst, and it's apparent the judges saved him because his haute couture work in the early part of the season was so good and showed real talent and imagination.

I find a similar sin of commission over on Top Chef.  This week's episode was Restaurant Wars, the challenge done each season, generally when there are 8 chefs left (they used to do it with 6, but setting up an entire restaurant in 24 hours is nearly impossible with only three people.)  Thankfully, they've gotten rid of the requirement that the chef's decorate the restaurant.  That segment was always so awkward with the hyper-masculine chefs, accompanied by the occasional butch lesbian or clueless homo, plodding through Pier One and picking out the most tragic decorations like oversize urns (?), scented candles (Ew) and synthetic pussywillow (!).

This season saw the Dirty-Hot Michael Voltaggio, his Uptight-Hot Brother, the clumsy Mike Isabella, and possibly insane redheaded cancer survivor Robin Leventhal not just winning, but blowing the other team away.  It was a pretty bad defeat for the mousy Laurine Wickett, sweaty Eli Kirschensteinengoldenbergenbaum, bearded Leprechaun (Chefrechaun?) Kevin from Atlanta, and their captain: Bitchy Jen from Philly.  Their loss was clearly a failure of leadership and direction, but Laurine got the boot.  Not that anyone's going to miss her, and Jen has clearly been in the top four all season with the Voltaggios and the Chefrechaun.  However, make no mistake that this was a pity save.  Jen knew it, the judges knew it, the viewers knew it.

(Hee.  Chefrechaun.  That's funny.)

Having had my fill of scripted and unscripted soap opera, I head to the kitchen to prepare dinner.  I made a barbecue pork tenderloin that was so good, I have to share the recipe with you.

2 pork tenderloins
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 medium red onion, chopped
1-2 garlic cloves, minced
14 cup ketchup
1/4 cup +1 Tbsp ketchup-style chili sauce
asian chili garlic sauce
sriracha sauce
1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp Apple Cider vinegar
ground mustard
hot paprika
kosher salt
pepper

You can make this two ways: make the sauce, then chill it.  You can then marinate the meat in it, or glaze it, before grilling it.  Alternatively, you can make the sauce then cook the pork in it, which is what I did this time.

Slice the pork crosswise into 1/4 inch thick slices; then cut each piece into three strips.  Set aside.

Heat a heavy stockpot (I use Le Creuset - it distributes the heat evenly) over medium high heat, then add olive oil - about 2 Tbsp.  When hot and sizzling, but not sputtering or spoking, add the onion and cook until translucent - about 5 minutes.  Add the garlic and cook another minute or two.  Add the ketchup, chili sauce, Worcestershire, and vinegar and stir.  Add a pinch of Kosher salt.  Stir.  After a few minutes, add about 1-2 tsp of Sriracha and 1-2 Tbsp of the asian chili garlic sauce (more if you like hot and spicy food, less if you don't).  Stir in a little ground mustard and hot paprika, along with 1/4 cup to 1/2 cup water and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to medium, add pork, and cook for 8 minutes, then reduce heat to low.  Continue to cook for at least an hour, stirring periodically, until meat is fall-apart tender.

You can serve this on sandwich rolls, on top of potatoes, or as-is - which is how we ate it; accompanies with some wok-fired asparagus in chili garlic sauce and baked sweet potatoes (2 sweet potatoes, hand cut, sprinkled with a mixture of salt, pepper, cumin, onion powder, garlic powder and cayenne pepper, and cooked in a 425 degree over for 30 minutes, turning once.)  Slurp.

Dinner was delicious - as was dessert.  I made a crostata, adapted from the Barefoot Contessa.  I replaced her summer fruit with a mixture of Granny Smith apple, pear, cinnamon, flour, and sugar.  I also changed the topping, using quick oats ground in a food processor and using brown sugar instead of white sugar.  Otherwise, the rest of the recipe is here.

Sunday morning came bright and relatively warm, perfect for an autumn run in Central Park (no sighting of pink leopard print this time, thank the Lord.)  After a light lunch at Nanoosh - apparently this is the elusive "something fresh" Neil's been referring to - we head downtown to the Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams store for free cocktails.  Only in New York would a furniture store have a cocktail party.  Of course, only in New York would people (us and our friends) take two subways and go to the opposite corner of the city for a free drink.  They were serving champagne and Bundt cake (who did the menu? Donna Reed?)  so after an hour we went in search of a real drink. (On Sundays we sometimes go to a place called Niso's - a Greek restaurant in Chelsea where there's nary a patron eating but the bar is so packed you can barely move.)

Between the five-mile run, the champagne, and the rest of the cocktails, a home-cooked dinner was a dream long dead by 7pm, so we ordered a pizza and camped out in front of the TV. The Next Iron Chef is over and Challenge, that show where four chefs have a cake-off, turning pastry into crazy cartoon characters is on.  It's a Halloween episode, and someone is making a coffin and skeleton.  Yeah, that's what kids love: coffins.

You want to really scare those kids - make a meatloaf.

THE LAST WORD:


DO THIS, New York:


Eat a Bill's Bar & Burger

Make that BBQ Pork

See Good Hair


Watch Top Chef and Project Runway

Go for a run in Central Park

DON'T DO THIS, New York:

I'm fairly certain it's not a good idea to give kids Valium, though I won't physically stop you.

You can skip Citrus.

I'd advise you not to throw a cocktail party in a furniture store.