ghostrider

Actually I work across the street from Whole Foods (live in Rutherford). The WF is one of the attractions to working in Montclair, for me. Fresh seafood! That's what it's all about. I even have one of those gel icepack thingies from Campmor to keep the fish chilled while driving it home on warm days. It's all such a treat. The Starbucks is handy when I need a quick cup of good tea, so I'll miss them when they're gone, if I'm still working in the area then. Not sure what the timetable is on their lease, nor what my future holds. There seems to be a certain aesthetic coupling between WF & Starbucks, & they certainly generate a lot of cross-trade for each other.

Not sure where Lawrenceville is, but I have patronized their truck at the Union Sq Greenmarket in NYC for years. I suspect that's still more convenient to me than their farm.

The word on my street (Bloomfield Ave, right across from Whole Foods) is that WF owns the building, is kicking out Starbucks when their lease expires (pity, seemed a marriage made in, err, purgatory), knocking down the wall & expanding their space. Doesn't quite jibe w rumors of their closing. Of course anything can happen, regardless of what a corporation says at any point in time.

The price is right! Whole Foods (while they're still open! ) has the same stuff for $3.99 for 1 lb. I guess that's where the WHole Paycheck rep comes from. It looks good, but I'm still after the local stuff if I can find it. Gonna call some farms tomorrow & see where I get.

The Jersey Fresh site that I linked above gives the info. Montclair Farmers' Mkt starts 6/12, by which time asparagus season is fading fast. That's the pity of the whole thing. May is really your prime asparagus month.

Well that just plain sucks. The Montclair Whole Foods is one of the reasons why I took my current job. Who the hell goes to West Orange? The parking lot doesn't suck, it's the idiot drivers. Sure it's small, but use a little common sense, y'know, it's easy to navigate if you have half a brain. BTW, I will point out for the umpteenth time, Whole Foods has considerably better prices on Texmati rice, Gerolsteiner mineral water, & Clif bars than any other store I've ever found. Not to mention their bulk cereals wall, which offers the best selection of low-sodium / low-sugar cereals in the state. Tends to balance things out.

Forgot to mention that the first-of-season NYC Greenmarket asparagus was $3.49 a lb. But it was so FRESH and so delicious. And I was already there; I'd probably use up any price differential in gas to get to any of the Jersey places. And the bag of mixed lettuce I got from the same farmer - good Lord, what flavor. Still, I plan to check some of these Jersey farm stands real soon, since I'm not in NYC every week.

Would that be the big one in Lyndhurst? Is it actual Jersey asparagus? (No comment on Anthony's post because I am way jealous.) EDIT: A friend has recommended DePiero's in Montvale. Some googling has led me to other possible sources listed right here. There is yet hope!

Maybe help is hard to find? Lalezar, up the street on Bloomfield Ave., has had a "Help Wanted" sign up for well over a month. A restaurant in my town has had one up for easily 3 times that long. I'm not sure what to conclude from this admittedly small evidence, let alone whether Little Saigon even understands that they need more staff.

Last week marked the beginning of the local asparagus season, as I discovered on a chance visit to the Union Sq Greenmarket in NYC on Monday 4/25. And once again I find it inconceivably insane that New York City is my closest source of fresh local produce at this time of year. The Jersey greenmarkets don't seem to get up & running until high summer, by which time the asparagus is long gone. Can anyone recommend a good source for the local stuff in North Jersey (Bergen / Passaic / Essex County area)?

Bergen County is a big place. If you're ever down Rutherford way, Trattoria Corrado would fit your criteria pretty well. There's a thread about it right here. Don't know if you'd find it worth a 20-mile drive, but if you're in the area, they're solid, consistent & reasonably priced.

Ha I knew this thread was around here somewhere. I have taken a part-time job as the lunchtime delivery guy for Belgiovine's. (HINT to folks in the Montclair/Bloomfield/Cedar Grove/Verona area: Belgiovine's delivers!) The deli got a nice Quick Bites writeup in the NY Times a year ago; you can read it right here. I love these lines in particular: We tried their manicotti for dinner last week & it was heavenly. The writer doesn't touch on the similar excellence of their made-to-order sandwiches & salads & daily hot specials, but to my taste the quality is consistent. Just by being there, I'm learning a lot about what it takes to keep a business like this going in the 21st century. It's a fascinating place. P.S. I hope that this post doesn't violate some unwritten eGullet policy, if that's even possible. I feel a bit awkward working there & praising their food, but I'm being up front about my relationship with the place. I found this paragraph in the User Agreement: "This User Agreement sets forth the basic tenets of your relationship with eGullet.com. We have a number of additional policies, however, governing use of the site under specific circumstances. For example, it is your responsibility to familiarize yourself with our policies on Private Messenger Use, Off-Site Events, Special Categories of Posts (Commercial and Media)...." However, I find no stated policy on Commercial Posts. In any event, eGullet is partially responsible for my taking this job, so I hope that the administrators will allow some leeway here.

I agree, that's the concept. And for my money nobody does it better than the folks on the pier at Five Islands, Maine. (First right off Rt. 1 after you cross the Kennebec via the Bath Bridge. Just follow the road all the way out the Georgetown peninsula until it ends. You'll find a working dock just before you drive into the ocean.) We had a thread last year that incorporated a debate on whether Red's can be considered a true lobster roll, or merely a heap of lobster meat atop a toasted roll. I'm too tired to try & find it. I've also never been to Red's so must reserve judgement. But I remain skeptical of the claim that they have the best lobster roll, as opposed to one of the best values, in Maine.

THat story reminds me of a couple decades back in an oceanfront cabin in Maine. It was a rustic place & the owners didn't mind that we brought our cats with us. Got a bag of lobsters that afternoon, didn't want to bring them inside cuz we knew the cats would have at them. Figgered no harm in leaving bag on front stoop for a couple hours - it being Maine, it was plenty cool that day even though it was still technically summer. Wrong. In spite of the late afternoon light, a bag of lobsters was still too much for the local raccoons to resist. We found a ripped up bag & many lobster shell shards scattered around. Don't recall what we had for dinner that night but it wasn't lobster.

Thanx! I get it now. Back to lobstering.....

OT, but I am intrigued by this phrase. Are we now in the serious internet days?

Well, I've never done it at a restaurant outside of Maine, so I'm not sure if this qualifies, but..... We went out one night last year after an exhausting day getting to Portland. It was high summer, so hard to find a table anywhere. At the place we finally found that had an opening, lobster fra diavolo simply seemed to be the most appealing thing on the menu that night. And it was pretty darned good. I should clarify that this was a whole lobster in the diavolo sauce on top of a pile of spaghetti, this was not a dish of dainty sauced lobster meat. You think that eating a regular steamed lobster w drawn butter is messy, you ain't seen nothin'! Apart from situations like that, we save our lobster cravings for the dockside lobster cookery we frequent, because most anything else is less satisfying. P.S. Good call on the Humpty Dumpty chips. Still the best!

I'm still digging on this imagery! I think there's something here.

If they're returning to their roots, then why are they using Sweet Home Alabama as their theme song? OK the story does say "Southern roots," not "Kentucky roots," so I guess it's close enough.

Thanks. Though that puts rodizio off the menu for me, it's good to know something about the process.

Been exploring the various rodizio threads here on the NJ Forum. I haven't found any significant comments on rodizio since last July, so I thought I'd use this one to ask two questions: 1) Any updated recommendations of rodizio places, specifically in Newark? 2) I've noted a lot of comments about saltiness in the food at various places. This is of concern to me. What's the deal with salt & rodizio? Is heavy salt an essential element of the prep? Thanks.

I do spaghetti (or other pasta) con aglio e olio all the time, with a healthy dose of fresh Italian parsley to add color, a bit of flavor, and a systemic counter-agent for the heavy garlic aroma.

You haven't heard from me cuz I just started a new job & don't have time to look at every eG forum daily anymore. Coincidentally, last week I was reading a back issue of New Scientist, the British mag which for my money is the single most informative publication on the planet. There was an article from last summer on the possibility of BSE in North America. The consensus was that we're probably seeing only the tip of the iceberg & it's likely that there's a BSE epidemic growing as we speak. The major culprit is widespread violation of current feed content restrictions & lack of enforcement of same; folks have mentioned this in discussions above. Reduction of testing doesn't help, of course. It's a pattern that's been followed by cattle farmers & nearly every government in every country in the world that now has BSE: too little action until it's too late, because it's more expensive to do the right thing. The US is far from alone in this shameful pattern of behavior. (Those who don't learn from history, even recent history.....) In fairness, they also mentioned that the incidence of vCJD in humans so far has been less than most disease models predict. But (from a separate article): Source I would post a link to the larger article I mentioned above, but it's available only to subscribers to the magazine.

Naw, the reduced-salt diet is only 2 years old. Pickle aversion has been a lifelong affliction. I'm very fond of vinegar, particularly red wine varieties (I think balsamic is overused, but that's another topic). Also Chinese rice wine vinegar - one of my fave dishes is a cold bean sprout salad with a sweet-sour dressing that's mostly sour. Virtually all of the elements of a pickle! It's a peculiar life, that's all I can say.

Lemons? Love 'em! Not happy unless I can squeeze a fresh one all over my halibut. Love all citrus, actually. I understand the point about contrast & counterpoint. I haven't exactly avoided pickles either, if folks who think otherwise will re-read my initial post. I just don't go out of my way to ingest them any more. I've paid my pickle dues. It's been one of life's puzzlements to me that I don't like them better, I've always felt that I should be able to rave about them, considering how much I like so many other foods, & being respectful as I am of the tastes of many folks I know who DO rave about the sour little buggers.