Bruncher, Can You Spare The Time?

How I look forward to Saturday and Sunday! A couple of my friends have to work during the week, and Saturday and Sunday (they call it the "weekend") are the only days when everyone can get together for brunch. So, Saturday morning I drag myself out of the condo early, and by 3PM I'm ready to find a good brunch line to stand in.
Brunch is an old custom dating back to 1896, appearing roughly around the same time as the appearance of the brunch line. It's unclear which phenomenon came first.

A modern-day brunch line.


Old-time brunch line from 1930.

Either there weren't as many restaurants serving brunch back then, or this was a line for a REALLY good brunch restaurant!

Obviously, if there's no line, the brunch can't be any good. So, our team splits up and checks out the various brunch lines in Williamsburg, and wherever the longest line is reported is where we finally meet up. A good two-hour wait is considered respectable. This gives you plenty of time to catch up on your tweeting and blogging. I put many of my blog posts online, right here IN line! Also, a good strong brunch line is a formidable show of force on the streets to let everyone know who runs this town!
This Saturday, we had brunch at Awkward (343 Porter Ave. in Greenpoint, right next to the gasworks), where they run a Recession Brunch Special for $20. The coffee of the day was fair-trade organic Rwandan Harrar from Triangle Shirtwaist Roasters. A brief cupping for aroma revealed blueberry, raspberry, brown sugar, marmalade and melted butter notes. The muffin of the day was blueberry, raspberry and brown sugar, with marmalade and Idyllrich Farms butter, and the taste was reminiscent of Rwandan Harrar coffee.

At Awkward, brunch comes with all-you-can-eat bacon. I LOVE bacon! Does anyone else in Brooklyn love bacon? I almost hate to let my little secret out about this humble breakfast meat, but ultimately it's my foodie duty to spread the word.


I ordered the fried eggs with fleur de sel and shredded ten dollar bill. It's those little value-added ingredients that really make or break an egg dish.



As we ambled out into the early evening air, our appetites were whetted for dinner, but it was only 7PM. Someone ought to invent dunch, or linner, or suppunch!

Potably in Motion

Now, I didn't move to New York to eat a hot dog in an automat. I came here in order to enjoy the best food the world has to offer, right here and right now! New York is the swirling simmering stew pot of every known cuisine, and I'm lying under it with a funnel in my mouth. I've had Eritrean/Samoan pupusas in Tottenville and Antarctic/Uzbekistani sushi blini in Chelsea, and I must admit that I've been feeling a little jaded lately. Fortunately, there is a growing trend, primarily in the beer world, where the production process occurs while on an expedition, which gives the finished beer value-added travel miles before being shipped to the consumer. The most intrepid of these "gastronauts" are the brewers at BrewDog in Scotland. Here is how they describe the process behind their Atlantic IPA:

"BrewDog has once again blown other beer brands out of the water with the unveiling of the most ambitious brews by any drinks brand in over 200 years - Atlantic IPA.

James was given an 1856 "Brewer's Handbook" as a gift last Christmas which contained an even older original IPA hoppy recipe - which provided inspiration for him to embark on BrewDog's latest voyage of creating waves in an otherwise flat beer market. The following month (January 2009), he set off on a journey on his fishing trawler in the North Atlantic with eight barrels on-board, each containing beer brewed from the original recipe.

After two tempestuous months aging aboard BrewDog founder James Watt's mackerel trawler on the North Atlantic, Atlantic IPA will be the first commercially available, genuine sea-aged IPA in two centuries - a project which is typical of the scale, audacity and boldness characteristic of BrewDog in its quest to take the UK beer industry by storm."

I was so enticed by this travelogue that, as soon as I deposited the check from my dad, I rushed to my local bottle shop and sought out a bottle of Atlantic IPA. Unfortunately, there had been a two-year waiting list for the beer and there was none to be had. There were, however, a few bottles left of Barnum Brewing's Queequog Ale, brewed on Nantucket and aged on a Japanese whaling ship that traced the course of the Pequod, as laid out in Herman Melville's classic Moby Dick, in 2008. The 9 ounce bottle was $140, but if you think that's expensive, how much would a trans-Pacific voyage and a trip in a time machine cost you? As soon as I uncapped the bottle, I was knocked back nearly off my chair by a briny gust of foam. My face was flecked with bits of seaweed and ambergris, and as the swarthy brew descended the gangplank of my tongue with its rolling gait, its gumboots tracked the exotic tang of rancid blubber and stale beer that only the struggle of Man versus Nature could concoct. I must not have my "sea legs" yet, for I got pretty seasick after drinking it. Still, the experience is one more accomplishment for my diary.

For the less adventurous, there is a new mobile brewery cart that travels the streets of Brooklyn-Mobile Foam- which provides the freshest beer in the borough, at random locations. Follow them on Twitter to find out where they are now. The plain white Dodge van is hard to spot, but I noticed it one night parked by a Key Foods dumpster, where the brewer was throwing out his used barley ("helps to reduce our carbon footprint", he explained), and some torn clothing. He offered me samples of Amber Alert, a sparkling amber ale fresh out of the tank, and Barely Lager, a pilsener so young that it was still fermenting. "The younger the better",the brewer, who preferred to remain anonymous, murmured as he screeched off into the night.

One more way to add stamps to your beer's visa is the collaboration ale, whereby all of your favorite brewers meet up as far away as possible and combine their talents to brew a beer that could only be exponentially better than their solo efforts. Last week at Gouty McGillicuddy's on 23rd St. at Third Ave. I tried Bukaki Ale ($15), made in Japan by the brewers from Turtle Head, Rabid Squirrel, Chemical Valley, Gander Hill Prison Brewery, UniBev and Flying Cockroach. Each brewer contributed an ingredient, and the resulting cream ale is a delicious testimony to the creative power of synergy and travel expenses. AMAZING!