Travel Q&A with author & cook Tamara Reynolds

by Alex Robertson Textor on

Tamara Reynolds is a the co-founder (with Zora O’Neill) of The Sunday Night Dinner, an Astoria, Queens-based supper club. The Sunday Night Dinner, which continues to thrive, was well ahead of what has become a supper club trend. Out of the Sunday Night Dinner came a fabulous cookbook, Forking Fantastic, which Reynolds co-authored with O’Neill. Travel is key to Reynolds’ imagination as a cook. She shops for food in the international food markets of Astoria and travels to countries with great food traditions.

Q: Sum up your professions in a few snappy words.

A: Cookbook author, cook for hire, cooking teacher, television show shopper, and Hostess with the Mostess of The Sunday Night Dinner.

Q: How did the Sunday night dinners come to happen? And how did Forking Fantastic emerge from the supper club?

A: SND began when Zora O’Neill and I met in 2002. We worked at Prune together and discovered we were neighbors and both loved to cook. We began cooking on Sundays for friends, and the next thing we knew, we were consistently feeding 15-20 people every Sunday. We began asking for donations so we could afford to keep doing it, and the next thing we knew, we were running an underground supper club.

We became convinced that the next step should be to write a cookbook, with encouraging words on entertaining, for real life. Zora and I felt that everyone was so hung up on the Martha Stewart perfection ideal that no one was actually cooking dinner for friends for the fun of it. Plus, we thought that if we wrote a kick ass guide to entertaining, detailing how we taught ourselves to cook and our many many mistakes along the way, maybe we would get invited to dinner more often.
Q: You told me that the fact that you’re based in Astoria has had a lot to do with the fact that the supper club took off.

A: It is funny, when we started our supper club, it was us and Ghetto Gourmet, a traveling club. Now I get a notice about every third day that another one is starting up, usually in Brooklyn. We remain one of the very few in Queens.

Queens is incredibly culturally diverse, but Brooklyn still seems to keep a headlock on “culinary coolness”. That said, I would never be the cook that I am or be able to feed people the way I do if I didn’t live in Astoria. I find the butchers and “old world” feel of Astoria’s food shops completely inspiring and refreshing. There are stores that only import Greek products, Italian products, Eastern European, North African, Middle Eastern, Brazilian, etcetera. Within a seven-minute walk from my house there are three butchers, all with whole lambs, goats and pigs hanging in the windows. These hanging animal carcasses aren’t decorative. People in my neighborhood cook these things on a daily basis. The produce markets burst with really excellent fresh produce, too. The first Long Island tomatoes and flat beans of the season just appeared last Friday and it looked like there was going to be a riot lead by the grandmothers of Astoria!

Q: Your Forking Fantastic co-author Zora O’Neill is also a travel writer. Did her perspectives on travel and food influence your own?

A: Absolutely. I went to grad school to be an opera singer; Zora went to grad school to study Classical Arabic poetry. Along the way we both learned to cook, but when I met her she had lived in Egypt and knew far more about Middle Eastern/North African cuisine than I did. I eagerly lapped up all of the information I could get out of her. She still travels far more than I do. My travel is mainly for pleasure while hers is for work. It is always nice to get a story of a great meal from her. It spurs my imagination.

Q: Where do you like to travel?

A: I feel like I am kind of done with Europe for now. I really want to concentrate on the US states I have not visited, North Africa, and Vietnam. February I am trying to put together a Vietnam/Cambodia/Laos trip. I think it is safe to say that I like to go anywhere where they are doing things differently than I do them at home.

Q: Have you ever traveled somewhere expressly to try a particular food?

A: You know, not exclusively, but I never go anywhere without considering where and what I will be eating, and cannot imagine traveling to a country with bad food. That said, I cannot wait to go back to Turkey to eat some more, and to Morocco, Tunisia, Syria, Sicily, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos just to eat. I view sightseeing as a great way to burn off the last meal and get your body ready to eat the next one. I am also considering driving around the backwaters of Georgia in August to sample some Gullah specialties. I am fascinated the resilience of Gullah traditions.

Q: How do your travels influence your cooking?

A: People cannot cook without markets and grocery stores. Going into either can tell you so much about where you are, who lives there, and what happens in their kitchens. I love to visit grocery stores and markets in every town I am in, one-horse or otherwise. The fact that in other countries you can wander around and see meat sitting out in the open for hours and here we insist on shrink-wrapping everything is fascinating. Sometimes small observations can inform you that your accepted way of doing things at home is definitely not the only way.

Of course, places have particular smells. Every time I exit the airport in Phoenix, my hometown, it smells like home. The smells of cities often tell me what people are eating, and I love to try to recreate particular smells in my home kitchen.

Q: Do you have a favorite destination, secret or otherwise?

A: Secret? Are there any secrets left? Ha. I must say, I loved Ayvalik, a small town in Turkey. People were transporting goods through the cobblestone streets in the town in horse drawn wagons. And there was pickled watermelon rind everywhere. And the eggplant, tomatoes, melons and lamb were amazing. We took a boat from Mytilini, Greece to Ayvalik and stayed a few days on our way to Istanbul. I would love to return.

I also loved the plains of Portugal. I ended up there six years ago purely by accident; my drive down to the Algarve was scuttled by torrential rain, and we didn’t want rainy beach. So we ended up driving up and over from east to west: Evora, Elvas, Beja. So beautiful and so unexpected. We happened into an ancient Roman Meat Market that had at a later point been a Catholic Church and was now a local craft shop/art gallery. So many Roman Ruins and such beauty! For a few years I loved to say, “If you want to see Rome, go to Portugal!”

SkyMall Monday: The Drib

by Mike Barish on

An awful lot of attention is being paid these days to the dangers of texting and driving. Heck, even Oprah has a No Phone Zone pledge on her website. If Oprah’s covering it, it must be big. However, there’s a much more pressing issue facing drivers that is often overlooked. It destroys lives. It tears apart families. It creates awkward situations. I’m referring, of course, to food spills caused by driving while eating (DWE). SkyMall Monday is the only media outlet drawing attention to this critical issue. In our hectic work-a-day lives, the car is the last bastion of solitude, privacy and ambiance needed to enjoy a quality meal. Whether it’s a fast food hamburger, a shepherd’s pie or a steaming hot bowl of ramen, there’s simply no food that isn’t perfect for eating in the car. But what happens when that a-hole in front of you stops short and forces you to slam on the breaks? Your skirt steak quickly becomes steak on your skirt. You can’t go to work like that. That’s why you need to protect yourself and your loved ones who do your laundry. SkyMall understands how serious DWE is and answered America’s cry for help. From now on, when you’re considering DWE, be sure you also have The Drib.It’s not surprising that SkyMall chose to address this issue. Virtually every food that SkyMall sells is perfect for eating in the car. From cheesesteaks to wings to sausages of every variety, food just makes more sense (and tastes better) when you’re weaving through traffic on the interstate. The mix of adrenaline, drive-time radio and some cheese fondue sitting in your cup holder really lets you know that you’re alive! But, to keep your tie clean and your blouse pristine, you need to drape yourself in a lengthy bib reminiscent of the lead aprons that your dentist uses while taking x-rays.

Think you can eat a sloppy joe drip-free down Lombard Street? Believe that eating while driving is just as dangerous – if not more – than texting while driving? Well, I bet you’ve never eaten goulash in a Yugo. For you non-epicurean motorists, check out The Drib’s product description:

If you’re one of those busy people who frequently grab a quick meal or snack in the parking lot or at your desk, you know how annoying drips and spills can be. Protect your appearance (and your car’s) with The Drib. This foldable, washable, shoulder-to-knee bib was designed to be worn in the car. An absorbent fabric front and moisture-resistant back keep spills in check and large pockets on the bottom catch food spills. Shoulder weights allow for easy use without the need for awkward ties and clips. Folds into its own pocket for compact storage.

You know those times when you put on a jacket, stick your hand in the pocket and find a five dollar bill? Well, imagine putting on The Drib and finding an old turkey leg in there? Talk about a lucky day!

Sure, you could eat at home or when you get to the office, but you spend enough time with your family and your co-workers. Your car is your fortress of solitude. Your dress shirt and pleated khakis are your tights. That means you need a cape. The Drib is that cape…worn on the front…with pockets…and lots of BBQ sauce stains.

So, stop texting in the car and start masticating. That turducken isn’t going to eat itself (but it will allow you to drive in the carpool lane).

Check out all of the previous SkyMall Monday posts HERE.

A tale of two brunches: Two of Chicago’s finest brunches

by Grant Martin on

Here in Chicago we take our brunches seriously — perhaps because our winter nights are long and we need something to shake the cobwebs of sleep from our weekends, or perhaps because we just need a good hangover cure. From Lincoln Park to Bucktown to Pilsen each neighborhood has its favorite haunt, Midwest sized stacks of French toast heaped on top of hashbrowns and bacon in a mountain of carbohydrate bliss.

The downtown hotel scene has done well at tapping into and emulating the thriving city brunch scene. Two of our favorites are only a stone’s throw away from the Magnificent Mile, making them well-accessible to locals, visitors and tourists alike.

Mercat a la Planxa (638 S. Michigan Ave), part of Marriott’s Blackstone Hotel, hosts an excellent Spanish-inspired brunch on Saturday and Sunday mornings featuring a dazzling array of paella, tapas and sangria. Rolled across a sprawling, high ceilinged ballroom (pictured above,) the mood at Mercat is hip, laid back and inexpensive; one can get in and out of the restaurant for between $20 and $30 per person.

Just up the street in the Park Hyatt (800 N. Michigan Ave), NoMi‘s brunch is more of a high minded affair. With a main dining room that gazes over the Watertower square, the selection, service and dress code are nothing short of opulent. Custom ordered sushi or garden rolls from the in-house Japanese chefs? No problem. Hand cut roast from the carving station? They’ve got that too.

Sunday brunch at Nomi will run up to $55 per person with Saturday brunch an a la carte affair. For a real treat try NoMi on Mother’s Day, when a multi-course, no-holds-barred brunch will set you back over $100 each.

SkyMall Monday: Edge Baking Pan ACTUAL REVIEW (ft. the Garden Yeti)

by Mike Barish on

Last month we had a little poll to see which SkyMall dessert pan was the king of confections. The Edge Baking Pan won in a landslide. I’ll be the first to admit that I was skeptical about whether brownies sporting heaps of edges could be good. I like my brownies like I like my women: moist and packed with M&Ms. However, you voted and I listened. I got my hands on an Edge Baking Pan immediately and put it to the test.

Well, to be honest, my Garden Yeti, Calvin, was the real tester*. He whipped up a batch of brownies with more edges than a knife collector. And you know what? Those brownies were moist. Chewy but not tough. Moist but not loose. The best of both worlds, really. So, consider me a convert. All of my brownies will be edgy now. I’m sorry that I ever doubted the Edge Baking Pan. I guess even SkyMall experts don’t know everything.

Check out the video above to see just how a Garden Yeti gets busy with the Edge Baking Pan.

* Actually, it was my girlfriend, Jordana, who did all the baking. She’s good at that. I just manage the Garden Yeti.

Check out all of the previous SkyMall Monday posts HERE.

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An open love letter to Ä°skender kebab

by Mike Barish on

Dear İskender kebab,

I know we only recently met, but, well, I love you. Whoa, whoa, don’t freak out. I’m sure you get this a lot. I mean, you’re pretty lovable. Turkish Delight might be more famous (and have better PR people), but you’re my own personal Turkish treasure. Don’t get freaked out. I just really enjoyed our time together and wanted to let you know why I think you’re the best-tasting, least-known Turkish food out there.Sure, almost everyone knows your cousin, the simple döner kebab. But, you were the first kebab made of vertical meat. That makes you special. An innovator. But, much like Melle Mel and Kurtis Blow in hip hop, you don’t get the credit you deserve amongst the mainstream.

Made of shaved lamb basted and covered in a tomato broth, you’re served over pide bread with a heaping helping of yogurt. That alone would merit this declaration of my love. However, you add one more sensual ingredient that lubes things up perfectly: a luxurious amount of hot, melted butter is poured over your meat and bread immediately after you have been placed on the table. At that moment, as you glisten and sizzle, you look more desirable than anyone else in the room. That was when I fell in love with you…at first sight.

You originated in Bursa, the fourth-largest city in Turkey. That makes Bursa the Houston of Turkey. Houston is a town known for meat and you certainly do not lack for meat, İskender kebab. Bursa has some interesting sister cities (Houston is not one of them). Tiffin, Ohio, USA. Oulu, Finland. Two towns in Bulgaria! I haven’t been to any of your “twin towns,” but I don’t see my own sister that often, either, so don’t worry.

Bursa was a key center in the ancient silk trade because of its location on the Silk Road. To this day, it is Turkey’s silk capital and perhaps the best place in the country to buy both raw and handmade silk items. It’s fitting, then, that you, İskender kebab, with your silky smooth buttery coating, were created in the city the known for silk.

Bursa’s futbol team, Bursaspor, won the Süper Lig in 2010. How exciting! They were the first team not based in Istanbul to win the Süper Lig championship since 1984. Istanbul, of course, is Turkey’s tourist hub, but is not the only place worth visiting in Turkey. Heck, it’s not even the capital! Bursa’s champions are called the Green Crocodiles, but İskender kebab most certainly should be made with lamb.

Your name comes from İskender Efendi, who created you. How I wish I could have asked for his approval before I professed my love to you. Alas, he lived in Bursa in the late 19th Century and must be presumed dead.

Baklava is sweeter. Köfte is healthier. Döner kebab is more widely available. But, dear, succulent İskender kebab, you are unique. You are an innovator. You are my own personal Turkish delight.

Love always,
Mike Barish

Mike Barish’s trip to Turkey was sponsored by Intrepid Travel. While everyone should agree that İskender kebab is amazing, the thoughts and opinions expressed in this post are strictly his own. You can read more about his trip to Turkey here.