I always liked drip coffee. But it wasn’t until last summer that I began to enjoy espresso. I had a revelation sometime last June, at Joe the Art of Coffee, where for the first time my espresso didn’t taste sour or burnt; rather it was subtle and chocolatey with nutty hints of maple syrup. It was outstanding. And since that moment, I’ve become obsessed.
Frankly it wasn’t until more recently that I began to appreciate the tremendous skill involved with extracting espresso. I began pulling espresso daily using my Rancilio Sylvia modified with an Auber Instruments PID kit to help maintain proper brewing temperature. I started pulling some incredible shots, intermixed with some not-so-great ones. The hardest part, I quickly learned, was consistency. There are so many variables (like temperature, pressure, temping pressure, grind size, ambient humidity, and bean age) that turned this into a real science. What makes Ninth Street so impressive is its consistency: rarely have I had a poorly extracted espresso. Their baristi too, are obsessed.
Ninth Street Espresso deserves the credit of introducing New York City to a new wave of coffee brewers. Ones that took an eye to quality and taste, rather than quantity and dollars. Having opened nearly ten years ago in 2001 by Ken Nye, Ninth Street has brewed the coffee of every major American roaster: Stumptown, Counter Culture, and currently Intelligentsia, which roasts their own Alphabet City blend. And as such the attitude of the baristi is one of understated confidence: not pretentious; but they sure know what they are doing.
My favorite way to drink espresso is a triple macchiato. It’s what I make at home every morning. A 21-gram puck tamped with around thirty pounds of pressure, extracted for just over 25-seconds and “stained” with a dollop of whole milk. The ability to create art (a “rosetta”) while pouring the milk indicates the perfect texture and temperature of the silky smooth micro-foam: too thin and and the milk will just blend, too thick and it will sit on top of the espresso with large bubbles. While I do enjoy this drink by itself, a pinch of Sugar in the Raw brings out the caramel and chocolate flavors even more.
When I’m in the mood to linger for a longer conversation, I order a triple cappuccino. It uses the same twenty-one gram shot of espresso, only significantly more milk. The wider cup and added milk gives the barista more flexibility to make artwork on the top, usually in the form of a heart or olive leaf. The sweet whole milk needs no additional sugar.
All of Ninth Street’s espresso drinks use triple shots. But don’t get scared, this is not the same as a triple espresso. It’s actually a triple ristretto (Italian for “restricted”), meaning three times the beans but for the same extraction time yielding the same quantity of a single shot. (A traditional double espresso has double the quantity, and a triple espresso, triple the quantity.) So here, the result is a more luxurious shot (extra wasted beans) with more natural oils. The caffeine content is something in-between a single and double espresso. By contrast, Joe the Art of Coffee does something similar but with double-ristrettos (14g) instead of triples (21g).
So make a morning out of it. Being located in Alphabet City means the original Ninth Street is not so easy to get to. But this can be a good thing: there is always ample seating and a laid back atmosphere filtering out all but the most dedicated coffee cognoscenti. Don’t be afraid to strike up a conversation with the baristi. Even if they appear a bit quiet or even austere at first, they enjoy educating customers about their coffee and technique. It’s a learning experience that won’t be forgotten. And what better way to learn something new, than with a rich chocolatey macchiato?
Warning: what you are about to read and see is not safe for work. If you are in a public place, you may want to wait until in the comfort (and safety) of your own home before proceeding. The following photos are pure culinary pornography.
On the other side of the East River lies a small village known as Williamsburg, rife with flannel shirts, thick-rimmed glasses, beards, attitudes, and now, pretty good pizza.
Being located in Williamsburg affords Motorino a fair amount of space for a restaurant — even outdoor courtyard space. The wood-burning pizza oven in the back is cleverly incased by thick glass to lock in the heat, keeping the dining room cool even in the summertime. The simple yet cosy interior keeps the focus on the pies. I was impressed with how my sun-drenched window table turned into a romantic corner alcove as night fell.
The menu reads pretty simply, with two types of Pizza Margherita one with D.O.C. Buffalo Mozzarella and the other of a lesser quality of mozzarella for a few dollars less. Most of the appetizers are decent and feature seasonal ingredients. I particularly liked my beet salad with acidic red onions and creamy ricotta. But let’s face it, I wasn’t here for the salads.
Pizza Margherita D.O.C. – An 18-inch flat pie decorated with creamy mozzarella, tomato sauce, and basil leaves. This pie was very crispy all around, a fork and knife were not necessary. The cheese and sauce magically bound to the crispy crust: even when I held a slice vertically, nothing slid off. It did seem a bit like the pizza was forcefully catered to my expectations: a little extra cornmeal underneath to make the pie more rustic with, at times, excessive charring to make the crust more real. However, I did buy into Motorino’s authenticity game and enjoyed the pizza. Maybe the crust was a bit too crunchy and lacked elasticity at times; but that’s a personal preference, I suppose.
Pizza Marinara – One look at this pie says it all. It’s a violent display of charred explosions and molten tomato sauce, tempered with a drizzle of olive oil and slices of fresh garlic. It’s outstanding. Just gently painted with fresh tomatoes, the Pizza Marinara is both light and savory with a hint of sweetness coming through from the tomatoes. A fork and knife is not necessary here.
I’ve brought home slices of this pizza several times, and I will say that it keeps exceptionally well for several days. After the first day it’s really more like bread than pizza. It tastes good hot or cold, for breakfast or for dinner, and still maintains its crispy texture despite being refrigerated. The light saucing means this crust will never get soggy.
Special Pizza – Mozzarella, Olive, Anchovy, and Capers – I ordered this pizza to try something completely different and outside my comfort zone. I’m not an anchovy guy. I was surprised at how well the olive’s acidity complimented the salty anchovies all supported by a base of creamy mozzarella. In this situation, the crispy crust was fantastic as it gave significant structure to all the toppings. A fork and knife was still not necessary.
During my visits I’ve rarely laid eyes on Chef Mathieu Palombino behind the counter; but that doesn’t seem to matter. The pizzas are consistent, a testament to his ability to train the staff effectively (I only wish that such pizzaioli actually existed in Mexico — the pizza down there is awful). However while consistent, they lack much of the love and soul found at Kesté.
Is it an authentic Pizza Napoleatana? Sometimes; depends who’s making it. On some visits I’ve had hints of elasticity in the crust; other times, it was more crispy with extra garlic and charring. So while the pizzas are consistently good overall; there is a range of variability in textures and flavors: sometimes it’s more New York-style, other times more Naples-style, and occasionally somewhere in-between. But they sure are consistently gorgeous.
As with any pizza, no two are completely alike. You’ll just have to go see for yourself. And what better way to test this edible chaos theory than with a pizza?
Slowly but surely, New York’s quest for authenticity is improving the quality of pizza in the city. The legends of New York-style pizza: DiFara, Patsy’s, Lombardi’s, Grimaldi’s, are facing a wave of new comers bringing traditional Neopolitan-style pies to the Big Apple. Instead of extra large crispy pies overloaded with mozzarella and globs of olive oil, which make no mistake are still delicious, Neapolitan pies are more restrained: smaller, lighter, elastic, and sparse with cheese and saucing. Fork and knife are required. Unfortunately, there aren’t too many places in the city that serve an authentic Naples pie. Kesté is one of them, and it serves the best.
Roberto Caporuscio, chef and co-owner of Kesté Pizza & Vino, is a pizza master. Chef Caporuscio comes from Pontinia, Italy just over an hour north of Naples, the putative birthplace of pizza. After several years of training in Napoli he ventured to the United States to share this traditional style of pizza without compromise. New York-style pizza wasn’t for him. Despite being the president of the Associazione Pizzaiuoli Napoletani, he is rarely found outside of the kitchen. And if he is, his hands are always covered in white dust. Roberto’s enthusiasm for making the perfect pie can be seen almost immediately by watching his slow precise hands working the dough, his eyes almost never straying from the pie.
The dining room is modest, a long narrow corridor with simple wooden tables and chairs lining both sides. On a Saturday night (actually any night, for that matter) the brick walls echo the groans and sighs of a jam-packed room full of ecstatic diners. Kesté does not take reservations, and since the word got out that “this is it” (the rough translation of “Kesté” from Neapolitan dialect) be sure to arrive early.
The menu features authentic items such as the pizza margherita and pizza marinara, as well as more original creations involving squash, mushrooms, truffle oil, and other unique assortments of seasonal ingredients. I’ve heard purists cite the variety of Kesté’s menu as a weakness, saying Naples doesn’t have “salad pizzas.” While that’s probably true, this isn’t Naples and the clientele isn’t from Naples; unless you’re David Chang, having a restaurant in New York without light and vegetarian options is operational suicide. Good luck. Fortunately, Chef Caporuscio uses this to his advantage: the creative pies are still baked in the Neapolitan way, just with toppings to please the diner. However if you’re a member of the cultural police, stick to the first few items on the menu.
Pizza Margherita – A soft and pliable dough, just over a foot in diameter, with crispy charred black spots decorating the rim. The pie was adorned with molten globs of fresh mozzarella, tomato sauce, and crispy basil leaves. In a wood-burning oven this hot, pizzas cook in under a minute. While I tried to use my hands at first, the soft eye of the pizza quickly told me a fork and knife would be easier. Each crack with the knife sent a puff of black dust onto the table. This pizza was just as much fun to cut, as it was to eat. The flavor was extremely fresh and subtle, reminiscent of the first time I made marinara sauce with canned tomatoes. The high quality mozzarella cheese nearly made me reach for the salt shaker, until the subtle sweetness of the tomatoes shone through. This pie was in perfect balance.
It’s always a battle with pizza: eating too quickly will result in a burnt tongue; but wait too long, and the cheese hardens. As tempting as it is to take an immediate bite, I usually try as hard as possible to wait a minute for the molten tomato sauce to cool to a safe temperature. However Kesté’s pies are no bread bowl: sauce is applied sparingly so the cooling time is much quicker. I find thirty seconds to be ideal. At least, that’s the extent of my restraint.
Pizza Marinara – The lightweight cousin to the Pizza Margherita, this pie has no cheese. The same elastic crust is garnished with bright red tomato sauce, slices of roasted garlic, thin crispy basil, and a drizzle of olive oil. There are few things in the world as satisfying as this.
There was a bit of a line on my first trip to the sole bathroom, which afforded me the opportunity to watch Chef Caporuscio in action. He could tell that I was curious, and without taking his eyes off the pizza, managed to keep a conversation. He was genuinely interested in talking about pizza, the places that do it right while omitting the places that did not do it so right. He explained his passion for finding the right ingredients and for methodically assembling and baking them in just a few minutes. I watched as he pulled a pie right from the oven into the trash, “a little too charred on the edges,” he replied. He was a perfectionist.
Mast’nicola – A pie from such an ancient recipe that it doesn’t include tomato sauce. Thin and translucent slices of lardo and basil are spread over the dough and crisped in the oven with a dusting of Pecorino romano. I feared this pie would be dry. It wasn’t. It was this pie that awakened me to Kesté’s true secret: the crust. Part elastic, part crispy, part chewy, part dusty, this crust expanded the entire gamut of texture. It formed a perfect foundation for a variety of topings; but frankly, could easily be enjoyed by itself.
Ripieno (Calzone) - Tomatoes, ricotta, fresh mozzarella, salame, extra virgin olive oil. A pizza folded in half, overflowing and oozing with warm mozzarella and ricotta. Hidden strips of spicy salame were buried under the crust, adding a meaty salt to the overall flavor. I’ve tried on various occasions to get Chef Caporuscio to make a calzone of just ricotta and mozzarella with no tomato sauce and no salame; but every time I got the same dish with a note from the waiter, “Roberto says it doesn’t taste so good like that.” I just wanted to compare this calzone eye-to-eye with my favorite from DiFara; because frankly, this might be my new favorite.
Salsiccia e Friarielli – Chunks of sausage and a vegetable similar to broccoli rabe. The crust was outstanding; but I don’t care much for smoked mozzarella. This was the special pizza of the day, often spontaneous and impromptu creations by the chef. While I did enjoy this; I’m not too sure I would order it again.
Tiramisù and Tiramisù alla fragola – Regular and strawberry tiramisu, moist and wet with a clearly defined shape. The taste of coffee was very light, which I appreciated.
Panna Cotta – Firm and rich, with a delicate hint of vanilla.
Torta Caprese – A dark chocolate and walnut cake spiked with limoncello. This was very heavy and I would only recommend it for those with a rather large appetite. Delicious, nonetheless.
Regina Margherita – like a Pizza margherita only with grape tomatoes and buffalo mozzarella. The added acidity of the tomato skins cuts through much of the cheesy mouth-feel from the traditional margherita. A similar pie, only with burrata instead of mozzarella, is available sometimes as a special. I highly recommend trying the later if it’s available; but only with a large appetite. The squeaky mozzarella spills off the pie onto the plate. It’s almost like drinking cream.
Prosciutto e Rucola – Large layers of prosciutto layered over raw arugula. An obvious choice for salumi lovers looking for something light.
Pizza alla Nutella -Kesté’s signature crust sliced horizontally and layered with nutella. The whole pie is then dusted with sugar. Really now, try to think of a more appealing dessert to share. It’s exceptional (and apparently authentic, says the Chef, too).
Kesté is the best thing to happen to New York’s pizza in a long time, and I find myself constantly returning for another exceptional pie. It’s just always the right decision, for lunch, for dinner, with family, or with friends. And the staff is kind and accommodating, the service prompt and responsive. I highly recommend that everyone visit, and am counting the days until I return to New York.
When most New Yorkers think of Italian food, they think of pizza, lasagna, and spaghetti and meatballs: dishes with strong dominantly red sauces. And with good reason. These southern Italian dishes originate where the majority of New York’s Italian immigrants came from. At the turn of the 20th century, New York was the single largest nerve center for Southern Italian immigrants coming over from Naples and Sicily. As a result, Southern Italian cuisine is vastly over-represented in the big apple (which I’m definitely not complaining about). But with this disproportional representation comes the omission of the wonderfully light fish dishes from the coastal cities of Northern Italy.
This is where Marea comes in. As sister restaurant of New York’s other Northern Italian gem, Alto, Marea’s menu is rife with raw seafood. Over half of the menu, in fact. At times some of the plates look Japanese in simplicity and presentation, that is until the golden dab of olive oil shines through.
Marea occupies the former space of San Domenico, which other than perhaps Del Posto, was the most expensive Italian restaurant in the city. In this respect, Chef Michael White’s cuisine is similar: it’s expensive. But the restaurant space has been completely renovated and no longer feels like a scene from CSI Miami. Its reflective hard lacquer surfaces and focused halogen lighting put the food on a well-lit pedestal.
The first glance of the menu brought a huge smile to my face: raw scallops, prawns, sea urchin. This menu read like happiness on a page. Dishes appeared fresh, clean, crisp, and simple: almost as if an Italian and Japanese chef had shared their mutual cultural secrets. I was literally ready to book a second reservation, as getting a table can be difficult, before any of the dishes came to the table. But that sentiment quickly changed.
AMUSE BOUCHE – A white fish soup, olive oil, with a fried crisp of bread. The texture was salty and grainy, much like watered down mashed potatoes. Still, the textures were nicely balanced, and I was starving.
RICCI – sea urchin, lard, sea salt. This was a room temperature slice of sea urchin served atop a slice of toasted baguette and encased in a thin film of lard. The warm urchin was shrink-wrapped by the clear layer of lard, preventing it from dripping off the toast. This was an interesting combination, particularly the salty cured flavor of the lard mixing with the sweetness of the urchin. I like sea urchin for its clean sweet flavor; I did not like how the lard’s saltiness made it taste a few days old. The lard masked the freshness of the fish. This was an interesting combination of two ingredients I like separately; but together, they felt forced. Quite simply, this just didn’t taste good.
SEPPIA – cuttlefish tagliatelle, soffrito crudo, bottarga di muggine. Another dish that sounded great on the menu. Extremely fresh cuttlefish develops an addicting chewy crunch with a hint of elasticity. The texture of this fish definitely had that. But there was so much bottarga on the plate that everything tasted like sour salt. I could not figure out why someone would pair a very fishy tasting bottarga to a sweet and fresh tasting fish. The bottarga seemed out of place and overwhelming; by flavor alone, it was impossible to connect with the freshness of the fish. The fish could have been 2 hours or 2 days old, and would have still tasted a week old. Bottarga has its place by itself and in small quantities; but in this case, completely dominated the subtle flavor of the cuttlefish.
SPARNOCCHI – sweet maine prawns, lemon, black lava salt. This dish sounded fantastic on the menu. Large sweet prawns lifted by a little lemon and salt. In reality the prawns were bitter in taste and the sweetness never came through. I wasn’t sure why the dish was layered with slices of flavorless cucumber. Since the ingredient was not listed in the menu, it was likely more a thoughtless garnish. But why slice them thinly in edible slices if not to be eaten? This seemed too academic without any thought that the watery cucumber offered nothing to the dish, except for the color green. The cucumber skin made the shrimp taste terrible and the overall dish appear lazy.
FUSILLI – red wine braised octopus, bone marrow. This was another dish that just sounded incredible. I’m pretty much always in the mood for L’Os a Moelle, the smell of which immediately brings me back to my two years living in Paris. Its combination with fresh octopus also sounded intriguing. But the red wine sauce was just too sweet and too sour. Each bite of the fusilli left an aspartame-like chemical tingle on my tongue. And the strong sour smell, similar to orange juice, really put me off. The sauce was so thick and abundant that at times this seemed more like a stew as the pasta became pasty. This dish has so much potential; but the night I went, it was the most disappointing of the evening.
TARALLI – nantucket bay scallops, mussels, tomato sauce
This was the highlight dish of the night. While I did find this sauce too sweet as well, the texture of the pasta combined with the briny scallops and mussels kept me distracted. But frankly this dish stood out merely because it was the least offensive of the other dishes. This dish has no offensive ingredient combinations.
UOVO – slow poached egg, black truffle, marsala ragu, polenta cream. A rich and creamy poached egg buried in a bed of polenta cream touched with black truffle. A weightless polenta cream that held together the black truffle and egg, contributing an earthy touch of silky-smooth cornmeal, which tied everything together. This part of the dish was exceptional. However, layered in there was also a marsala “ragu”. The ragu was both sour and sweet, like a red wine sauce that had been sitting on the stove too long. Like the bone marrow fusilli, it smelled like orange juice. The texture of this sauce was thick, clear, and starchy. It was too similar to gooey Americanized Cantonese sauces, and completely offensive to the rest of the dish.
Our waiter brought us a small dish of chocolate petit fours, which were delicious — paper thin layers of chocolate encasing a full spectrum of fruits. We chose to skip dessert.
Aside from the occasionally distracting across the room chant of “ándale güey” (Mexican slang for “Go ahead, man”), the service was excellent. The restaurant was packed and at no point did we feel rushed, particularly with the extended amount of food we ordered. That’s no easy task.
But at the end of the day, the dishes felt forced and unnatural, and did not taste good. Creativity should never be at the expense of flavor, and every chef must at some point step back, look at his dishes, and do a taste test to make sure that they actually work. Nearly every dish we ordered had an offensive ingredient or flavor that tasted like it didn’t belong. But the menu still reads really well, so perhaps the restaurant just needs some more time to settle. I’ll probably re-visit; but not anytime too soon.
Coffee fuels the city that never sleeps. Unfortunately, most of it is terrible. But there are exceptions.
It would be unfair to not give Starbucks tremendous credit for raising awareness of coffee and its many forms; however, most of its products remain heavily sugared and over-diluted with milk, cream, and syrups. It’s become fast-food drinkable dessert. And even assuming that its beans are of decent quality, its computerized machines over-extract them while many of its unskilled “baristas” continue to flip on the milk steamer and walk away to help other customers, leaving the milk burnt and undrinkable. What was once a trendy logo to carry in your hand is now a red flag for poor taste.
However, a better educated coffee-craving public now has higher demands that Starbucks cannot fulfill in its current form. For this new demand, boutiquecoffeeshops have been opening up and thriving. So much so, in fact, that Starbucks has been opening unbranded, clandestine shops with a community feel to trick consumers into thinking they’re local shops. But no matter how hard they try, it will be hard to emulate what’s available at Joe the Art of Coffee on Waverly.
In looking back at my summer in New York, this small corner shop at 141 Waverly is the one place I kept re-visiting over and over again. Not only is this the best espresso in New York; but frankly, it’s better than anything I’ve had in Italy. I can’t get enough of it.
Espresso here is really a misnomer, since all shots are double ristrettos; instead of 7 grams of ground beans extracted for 25 seconds, 14 grams are extracted in the same amount of time. The net effect is half the stress on each bean resulting in a richer, rounder, thicker pull with more of the natural oils. The resulting taste is of rich dark chocolate and caramel with an intoxicating scent of butter popcorn.
I have noticed that each barista here leaves his own unique signature on the coffee. But whether you get more or less milk in a cappuccino or a heart versus an olive branch in a macchiato really comes down to preference: all the barristas here are highly trained and skillful. Granted the La Marzocco equipment used here, accurate to 0.1 degrees farenheit, narrows the possibility of error a bit. But great coffee is no easy task, and consistently great coffee, as found here, requires the unique blend of deft barristas, great beans, and careful machinery, everything which can be found only here at Joe’s.
