Sometimes, Shang Feifei goes to a restaurant just for the manicures. On a recent Wednesday night, Ms. Shang, 40, sat patiently at a downtown Beijing branch of Haidilao, a restaurant chain that defies China’s well-earned reputation for lousy customer service. A Haidilao employee buffed and painted her nails, free. The aroma from bubbling broth-filled pots…
In 2010, Joseph Ogrodnek turned a sleepy Greenpoint restaurant, Anella, into one of Brooklyn’s most talked-about spots — a destination for tightly focused, vegetable-driven cooking. A year later, he and his business partner, Walker Stern, opened Battersby in Carroll Gardens, followed by Dover in 2013; both restaurants helped foster the kale-laden, Provençal-esque cuisine that still…
When dozens of people across the country got sick from eating contaminated romaine lettuce this spring, Walmart did what many grocers would do: It cleared every shred off its shelves, just to be safe. Walmart says it now has a better system for pinpointing which batches of leafy green vegetables might be contaminated. After a…
Zach & Zoe Sweet Bee Farm is a newcomer to the lower level Chelsea Local area in Chelsea Market selling a collection of unusual flavored raw honeys. It’s a small stand run by Summer Johnson, who makes the honeys with her husband, Kam Johnson, in New Jersey at their farm and in a commercial kitchen,…
There are also pockets of grape varietals that were originally brought from the Canary Islands by the Spanish, like torrontés and pedro giménez in whites and negra criolla in reds. Vicchoqueña is a mutant of negra criolla that yields a wine akin to pinot noir. The Valle de los Cintis, north of Tarija, is the…
For some time now, La Quercia, the cured meat company in Norwalk, Iowa, has been selling its version of ’nduja, a spicy spreadable proscuitto popular in Calabria in Southern Italy. Now it has added two more similar concoctions: ground pancetta and pesto bianco made with seasoned lardo (pork fat). They’re great to keep on hand…
This roomy new pot has rows of holes in the lid, which locks in place, so the cook can drain liquid while keeping the food, like vegetables or pasta, in the vessel. At five and a half quarts, it’s big enough to accommodate long pasta like linguine. The interior of the hard anodized aluminum pot…
Daniel Lee introduced soju, the popular Korean spirit, to his friend at George Washington University, Maxwell Fine, some time ago in New York. The two decided to make their own without artificial sweeteners and other additives, as a sideline to their day jobs in finance and law. Named for the Manhattan block known as Koreatown,…
This is the 11th year for the New York City Wine & Food Festival, held from Oct. 11 to 14 and benefiting No Kid Hungry and the Food Bank for New York City. The events — around 80 dinners, brunches, demos, book signings, cooking classes and entertainment — will take place throughout the city, in…
This new guide to 100 chiles is organized according to heat, starting with bell peppers, the mildest, with no more than a hundred Scoville Heat Units, the scientific measure of spiciness. At the high end, with often more than 1 million units, are Dorset Naga, Naga Viper, Bhut Jolokia, Chocolate 7-Pot, Trinidad Moruga Scorpion and,…