The Eating Adventures of a Checker Cabbie
Corona is a neighborhood in Queens. In today’s Gothamist, I review the Mexican sweet bread at The Corona Bakery . . . in Astoria.
www.gothamist.com/archives/2006/07/20/the_hungry_cabb_11.php
Famous Fat Dave’s Five Borough Eating Tour On The Wheels Of Steel
How many articles can one food writer do that revolve around pickles? There may be no limit:
www.gothamist.com/archives/2006/07/16/the_hungry_cabb_13.php
Click www.famousfatdave.com for limitless eating tour possibilities
I’ve spent a lot of time in Chelsea over the years. As a cab driver, I go through that neighborhood at least 15 times per shift. As an admirer of New York’s gay community, I’ll meet up with friends in Chelsea for drinks or the occasional transvesite stripper Broadway review extravaganza. And as an eater, I used to go to Chelsea at least once a month for a restaurant on 18th Street and 8th Avenue called La Chinita Linda.
La Chinita Linda, which translates to ”The Pretty Little Chinese Girl,” was a stubborn hold-out from that bygone era sometime in the 80s and 90s when “Chino-Latino” cuisine was all the rage. Menus all over town were devoted half to Chinese food and half to Cuban food.
One of the most popular restaurants of that ilk was called Bayamo. Located on Broadway and Washington Place, the cavernous space was decorated with a giant, embarassingly phallic red chili pepper suspended from the ceiling. Although Bayamo and most of the others closed a few years back, La Chinita Linda remained.
(I loved it enough to put my camera on top of a parked car, set the timer, and leap into the frame to express the joy it brought me)
I thought La Chinita Linda was different, impervious to change. Their Chinese food was above par. Their egg rolls, heavy on the shrimp, light on the cabbage, and fried until they were a dark, crispy brown, were some of the best I’ve ever had. And the beers were under $2 per bottle.
The Cuban food was nothing less than phenomenal. La Chinita Linda was run by Chinese people with Chinese waitresses and Chinese cooks, but the Cuban food was better than any I’ve ever tasted (those who know me me know that I’ve gone to great lengths to eat authentic Cuban food). I’ve heard the Chinese owner speak in Spanish with a Cuban accent to some of the many gay Cuban patrons who, in my wild imagination, all came over on the Mariel boat lift in 1980, and I swear the owner was more fluent than the Cubans.
My favorite dish was called ropa vieja or “old clothes.” According to some Cubans I’ve spoken with, the dish is named ropa vieja because the shredded beef bares a striking resemblance to tattered old rags. For the money, nothing in Chelsea could beat that plate overflowing with tender, juicy shredded beef beside a steaming mound of fluffy yellow rice topped with five or six plump, gooey maduros (sweet plantains). I used to save some of the yellow rice to eat on its own, mix the rest in with the meat, douse one corner in hot sauce, save another corner to enjoy with just the natural flavoring, consume the rest with a conservative smothering of hot sauce, down some maduros straight, mingle the other maduros with the rice and meat. Every bite was a unique taste sensation. Even Famous Fat Dave couldn’t ever finish a whole plate. And then there was something so satisfying, so uniquely New York, about capping off an amazing traditional Cuban feast with a fortune cookie.
This February I went to look at an apartment in Chelsea. I was checking out the dismal parking situation and considering the subway options when I noticed I was on the corner of 18th and 8th. I raised my finger in the direction of my favorite Chelsea haunt and said, “Well, at least we’d be near . . .” when I saw the For Lease signs all over the gated windows. I actually dropped to my knees and screamed in agony. Tears welled up in my eyes, and my heart was bursting with actual physical pain. I was in a terrible mood for weeks. I don’t deal well with change.
Yesterday I drove by late at night and noticed a new establishment had finally opened in La Chinita Linda’s place. I knew it wasn’t going to be a tasty, inexpensive eatery that might find its way into my heart against all the odds, but I wish it didn’t turn out the way it did. It is exactly what Chelsea doesn’t need: another tragically hip, overpriced bar/ unauthentic Thai restaurant that is clearly too concerned with its appearance. I don’t know who gets to sit in this chair, but I don’t think they had me in mind when they hung it in the window:
As I gazed upon what had become of my pretty little Chinese girl, I heard a crash at the corner of 18th Street. One yellow cabbie had spotted a potential fare on the slow night and stopped short while turning onto 8th Ave. Another cabbie rear ended him firmly. The first cabbie got out of his car and began hurling all sorts of outlandish insults in broken English, so the second cabbie gave the first cab yet another love nudge to prove his point.
As the argument reached a fever pitch, an unnecessarily muscular man in snakeskin cowboy boots and a mesh tank top walked by. In a stern, but jovial tone, he bellowed, “GIRLS, GIRLS, YOU’RE BOTH BEAUTIFUL.” It was nice to see that some things in Chelsea haven’t changed.
Visit www.famousfatdave.com for an eating tour on which maduros can be featured prominently
I’m totally down with Mexicans. I always have been, even before it was a hot button issue. My best friend in third grade was Gustavo Gonzales. And my best friend in fourth grade was Felipe Gonzales (no relation).
When I worked at Murray’s Cheese Shop, I didn’t get along with every other cheesemonger, but I made fast friends with all of the Mexicans. I’d try to speak with them as much as possible to pick up the slang. And I talked so much baseball with them in my broken Spanish that they stopped calling me “Mr. David” and bestowed the honorary nickname of “Mr. David Ortiz” upon me.
I think because I was openly friendly with the Mexicans, I was treated like one of them by the management, and I eventually left because I felt I wasn’t respected there. But before I went, I tried to organize a union as we stood around the lockers nightly.
I thought my efforts were going unappreciated (probably because they couldn’t understand my Spanish) until one day while I was stocking a cracker shelf. Cristo, one of my closest friends at Murray’s, saddled up next to me and pretended to front some items so as not to draw the ire of the watchful and vengeful manager. Cristo, who is from Puebla, shot me a sideways glance and whispered, “Hijos del maize (children of the corn). . . Viva la revolucion.” I smiled at him and nodded vigorously. As he walked off with his arms full of Pecorino Romano he barked, “VIVA EL CHE!!!”
(Mi amigo Carlos who taught me to say “Que Pasa Con La Rasa” posing proudly with some cheese)
My heart was swollen with proletarian pride. After that, even the quiet Mexican from Chiapas would smile at me every time he passed, sometimes raising a fist, and occasionally murmuring, “Viva Commandante Marcos.” Even with all the revolutionary sentiment I’d stirred up, I didn’t manage to organize a union, though one surely was needed.
Oddly, I’ve never met a Mexican yellow cab driver (another group of immigrants who would do well to form a union). I’ve met immigrants from pretty much every other country on earth who drive yellow cabs. And I’m sure there are Mexican cabbies. There must be. I’ve just never met one.
The result is that I have no reliable source for Mexican food recommendations in New York City (Murray’s Mexicans all ate at home). I’ve asked my Mexican fares, but I’ve never found a Mexican restaurant with tacos or burritos that compares to what I’ve eaten in California . . . until yesterday.
My friend Mark (not a Mexican, but he is fluent in Spanish after living in Argentina for a few months) urged me to visit a place near his Clinton Hill apartment called Castro’s. Mark, a very talented musician who just finished a great album all about apples, knows his burritos. He swears by Castro’s, and now I do too.
The burritos at Castro’s are gigantic. They are probably larger than the ones I found in the Mission District (unless my memory has faded), and certainly larger than the ones I found in East L.A. and San Diego. The innards are full of fresh veggies, fluffy rice, wet black beans, and succulent meat. They serve a generous portion of guacamole, salsa, and spicy green sauce on the side so that each bite can be custom flavored.
The highlight of the Castro’s burrito is the tortilla. They do a sort of toasting of the entire burrito once it is contructed. The burritos are placed onto a tray, lifted upwards, and pressed against the roof of the oven. A small brown spot appears on the top of each burrito where it touched the metal, and the texture of the tortilla comes out varied from crispy to chewy depending on how close it was the roof or the tray. Every bite is a unique taste sensation.
(One of the burrito’s broke apart before it was half eaten, but Mark claims that this was a first)
I’m not saying Castro’s burrito is the same as an authentic California burrito. I’m saying a comparable wave of ecstasy washed over me as I ate it. It made my shoulders relax, my mind expand, and my belly widen. And, as always, I was totally down with the Mexicans.
Castro’s, Myrtle Ave btwn Ryerson and Gran, Clinton Hill, Brooklyn
Visit www.famousfatdave.com for a good time or to book an eating tour
I’m not a waiter. I don’t live on tips. But I sure do appreciate them. Usually, if I get a really nice tip, I’ll blow it on a really nice meal before the shift is over. Even if its a slow night in general, one good tip can convince me to go for a $12 pastrami sandwich instead of a $2 falafel. The other night, I got an unexpected $7 tip from a moody Frenchman, so I bought $22 worth of shrimp cocktails and raw oysters at Blue Ribbon instead of $2 worth of pizza at Joe’s. I know the math doesn’t add up, but I tend to seize any opportunity to splurge on food.
As a rule, your cabbie will expect at least a couple extra bucks if he does anything out of the ordinary for you such as waiting for more than a minute while your special lady friend runs upstairs to get her toothbrush on the way to your place. And a handsome gratuity generally follows if you say “step on it,” and your cabbie gets you where you’re going extremely quickly.
So I was anticipating a windfall last night when I picked up a couple on the west side who opted for me rather than an ambulance. The tall blond was propping up her slumping husband when she hailed me, and when she rolled him into the back seat I could hear his belabored, gasping breaths. “We need New York Presbyterian Hosptial, THIS IS AN EMERGENCY!!!” she basically shouted.
I’ve taken people to the hospital in a hurry before, and it is a pure adrenaline rush akin to sky diving. The last time I did it, I was a sweaty mess by the time we pulled up to the ER doors, and once they rushed out of the cab, I pumped my fist and shouted like I’d just won Fear Factor. Actually, I’ve always harbored a desire to be an ambulance driver, and I considered working for the International Committee of the Red Cross or the FDNY (but I get sick when I even THINK about broken bones, so I ruled it out). I actually live for those rare emergency fares.
As I racked up the traffic violations on my way to the West Side Highway, I suggested that I take them to one of a number of closer hospitals. “His surgeon is waiting for him at New York Presbyterian,” the woman sputtered. She seemed like she was out of breath as well. I put in my comforting “Songs to Help Me Sleep” mix as we waited for the light to change at the highway, and I offered him a sip of my Arizona Green Tea with Ginsing (she respectfully declined for him).
I think I got his heart pumping again as I weaved sharply through the highway traffic with the pedal to the floor. It was a liberating feeling to push my 2001 Crown Victoria with 219,187 miles on it to speeds near 100. It wasn’t just because driving fast is exciting, it was because I knew that if a cop stopped me, we’d just end up with a police escort, and that would be the sweetest thing of all time.
But we didn’t pass a cop. And I might have pushed it a little too hard, because as we exited the highway, we skidded past our turn on the slick asphalt. I had to throw it into reverse once we came to a stop, reassure my frightened passengers that everything was okay, and make the right onto 138th Street. I could hear that the man was breathing easier. I don’t know if it was the chill Lou Reed song or his kick start of adrenaline.
We pulled up in front of the hospital in record time, and, sure enough, there was a stretcher and a surgeon waiting at the door. Call me a lousy cold-hearted bastard, but I was expecting a huge tip.
Instead, I got $2.40. And not only did I get $2.40, but the woman WAITED while I got her $10 in change for the 2 twenties she gave me on the $27.60 meter. She WAITED, while her husband sat beside her (admittedly he was no longer gasping for air). Why not just give me the $12 and get a move on? She thanked me multiple times for rushing, even after we skidded 15 feet.
The overwhelmingly emotion was dejection. It was like a kick to the gut. I wouldn’t expect a tip if I were an ambulance driver, but I’m not one. And she even said, “We were gonna wait for an ambulance, but I figured it’d be faster to grab a taxi, and I was right.” I guess I did my civic duty, but isn’t it her duty as a fellow human to show her gratitude with something other than “thanks”? The $2.40 was just insulting.
My escargot at Florent disappeared with them as they passed through the swinging double doors. But I was in Washington Heights with almost $3 burning a hole in my pocket, so I made my way up another 10 blocks to Mambi’s for my favorite Cuban sandwich.
I found Mambi’s early on in my career as a cabbie, and I return any time I’m above 155th Street and don’t want to spend more than $3 on dinner. Last night, my heart still pounding from both the excitement and the disappointment, I walked up to the bar and ordered a cubano.
My one issue with Mambi’s is that they almost never put pickles on their cubanos. If you sell a cubano without any pickles, it’s just a ham and cheese sandwich in my book. And last night they did it again. Even though I asked them, in Spanish no less, for pickles, once I unwrapped it while I was on the road back downtown, I found it to be pickleless.
Still, a Mambi’s ham and cheese sandwich is utterly delicious. Two kinds of ham and fully melted cheese on a pressed sandwich is amazing even without the pickles. The Mambi cubano is spread with a strong garlic mayo that gives it a flavor like no other in Washington Heights. My belly was completely satisfied. But next time I take a fare to the emergency room at break neck speeds, I want to eat a 1492 Sampler at Victor’s Cafe.
Mambi’s, Broadway and 177th Street, Washington Heights, Manhattan
(El Duque is a real Cuban, an he likes Mambis! He pitched a gem last night. The Yankees should never have gotten rid of him. Neither should have the White Sox)
Visit www.famousfatdave.com for a smile or to book an eating tour
When I started driving a yellow cab nearly 5 years ago, I said I’d never get jaded and cynical like so many other cabbies seem to be. I promised myself I’d approach every shift with the open minded enthusiasm that I had on my first day. I never wanted to hear myself say something ridiculous like, “I’ve heard it all before.”
But I’ve driven in about a hundred thousand circles around this city so far, and I have to tell you: I’ve heard it all before. On my very first night shift, I stopped for a man on Mulberry Street with one arm around his girlfriend and the other hailing me madly. He had apparently just popped the question, and as soon as I hit the meter the blushing bride-to-be moaned, “This dick for the rest of my life. . . THIS DICK.” Then her head disappeared into his lap for rest of the two minute fare.
And I was a hack for less than a year before I witnessed a man scream “Sieg Heil,” make the nazi salute, and take a bite off a woman’s collar bone. Her response, once she’d put a safe distance between her and him, was to point to her bloody wound and yell, “You goin’ down cuz I got the forensic evidence right here.”
Soon thereafter I listened as a worried frat boy confided in me that he’d slept with his paraplegic roommate without a condom. Just his luck, she told him later that she had HIV. The real kick in the ass was that she’d contracted HIV from his own brother who’d secretly slept with her during the frat boy’s birthday party. Could anything top meeting a guy who just found out that, first of all, his brother had HIV, and, second of all, he might have contracted it too, indirectly, from his own flesh and blood?
What I’m trying to say is, no matter what I try to force my attitude to be, my jaw rarely drops these days. But last week I took a British woman to her brownstone on President Street in Park Slope. It was the day I’d gone to the JFK central taxi hold and played my first ever game of cricket, so I was excited to tell a real Brit about my recent cultural exchange.
The conversation turned to real estate when I asked her why she’d left London. She told me she couldn’t afford to buy a house there, but a year and a half ago, she bought her brownstone in Park Slope with money to spare. I asked how much she had paid, and she responded only with a cryptic remark that her Brooklyn house would be worth 6 million dollars if it were in London.
Then she managed to make my jaw drop. She told me that the value on her brownstone had increased by a full 100 percent in the last year and a half alone. I’ve been hearing that the bubble is about to burst since Clinton was in office , but, evidently, it hasn’t even started in Brooklyn. I was truly shocked. I’d been saving up to buy my own place in Brooklyn, but now I guess my money isn’t good enough. So I suppose I’ll be investing it all in that 1934 Goudy Gum “Lou Gehrig says” series Lou Gehrig card I’ve wanted my whole life:
(Actually I haven’t saved enough money for this yet either)
With real estate prices ballooning out of control like that, I’m sure it will have dire consequences on cheap eats in that neighborhood. So this weekend, I decided to meet my friend Bryant, who lives in Park Slope, at the inexpensive Mexican joint he’d been telling me about for months.
It is called Cafe Mexicano, and Bryant, along with every fare I take to that part of Park Slope, raves about the $2 tamales. I figured I’d better try them before a rent hike puts the place out of business.
Cafe Mexicano is exactly the type of eatery I would love. Comically tiny (that might help with rent), reasonably priced, and run by friendly people who mix Spanish words into their English sentences. I did not, however, love driving through a biblical downpour and hellish traffic to find that they were completely out of tamales.
I should have ordered the tacos, since they looked delicious and Bryant said they are the second best thing on the menu. My friend Andrew, who I brought with me across the bridge, did order them, and he seemed quite happy:
But I, stupidly, took the advice of the white girl at the other table (there are only 2 tables inside) and ordered chilaquiles. It sounded wonderful: a bowl full of “crunchy” tortilla chips, shredded chicken, salsa verde, sour cream, cotija cheese, red onion, and avocados. And had the menu not claimed the tortilla chips would be “crunchy,” I might not have been disappointed. But they were anything but “crunchy” (how could they possibly survive all that), and so I was disappointed.
And I was also disappointed with the grilled corn rolled in cotija, chili powder, and mayo. Andrew and I could have walked just one block from his house to Cafe Habana on Elizabeth Street for the same treat with ten times the flavor (and ten times the wait).
(This Mexican corn looks exactly like the Cuban incarnation at Cafe Habana)
Really, I’m mostly mad at myself for ordering poorly. So I plan to return to Cafe Mexicano in the very near future. Hopefully I’ll have better luck. But if they keep running out of tamales, they won’t be around long enough to see their rent double.
Cafe Mexicano, Union Street btwn 4th Ave and 5th Ave, Park Slope, Brooklyn
Visit www.famousfatdave.com for a laugh or to book a five borough eating tour
Maybe my dispatcher Cha Cha is right: I’m too nice to drive the night shift. You’ve got to be a little hard-hearted to drive a cab at night. There is a lot of misery on the streets, but I’m not out there to do community service. Ideally, I’m making money. And to make money, I can’t be giving away free rides.
Twice before last night, I did give away free rides. One was to a kid, a few years younger than me, who hailed me at the foot of the Williamsburg Bridge. He told me right off the bat that he didn’t have a dime, but it was freezing and he just had to cross the bridge. I’ve walked across bridges in the the bitter cold before, and I was empty anyway, so I figured it would be a mitzvah. The second free ride, speaking of mitzvahs, I gave to a couple of Haitian nuns who hailed me in Washington Heights on another particularly cold day. They too informed me that they had no money, and only needed short ride. They actually had just walked across the George Washington Bridge (I didn’t know there was a pedestrian lane on that bridge, but who am I to question Haitian nuns). I was glad to drive them down through Washington Heights and Harlem, because I rarely get hailed in those neighborhoods anyway, and when I have been hailed, I generally end up wishing I hadn’t stopped.
Last night I saw something that broke my heart, though I guess I’m a softy anyway. I should tell you, there is something going on at North 4th Street and Driggs in Brooklyn. Every time I pass, for years now, I see a lone, gnarly-looking female eyeing the passing cars. She is usually in her 30s or 40s, dressed not exactly like a hooker, but never bundled up no matter what the weather. There is always one, and she is always really sketchy, but she never hails cabs.
Last night, she hailed me. Actually she hailed each of the three cabs in front of me, each of which slowed down to take a look and then peeled out. When I slowed down, I saw she was nothing to be afraid of. She just looked scared.
When she got in, the first thing she said was, “I only have 13 cents on me. That’s it.” This is the point at which a real New York cabbie would tell her to get out very loudly, maybe showering her with curses in his native tongue, probably gesticulating wildly. But I don’t have the heart. Plus I noticed in my rearview that her nose and lip were bleeding, and she was shaking.
“I gotta to get to Jackson Heights,” she said. At that point I did consider kicking her out, because it would take an hour to get to Jackson Heights and back to the city. But I’ve always said that I believe in karma, so we took off.
During the ride, I tried to see if she would tell me what it is that is going on at that corner every night, but she didn’t understand what I was asking her. She was a native English-speaker, but she was very slow, possibly retarded. She told me her brother had dropped her off there, but she wouldn’t tell me why. He was supposed to come back and get her, but he hadn’t, and she didn’t know why. She’d been waiting for five hours. Then “some guys” came by and beat her up for no reason.
I didn’t care if her story checked out. All she wanted to do was get back to her dad who she lived with in VAN DOWN BY THE RIVER underneath the 59th Street Bridge. But today, as was sometimes the case, he was parked up near Roosevelt Avenue in Jackson Heights.
When we got there, sure enough, I saw an old van parked just off the avenue. She thanked me profusely, and started to get out. I can’t say I’m proud, but I told her, “That’ll be 13 cents please.” Her face froze, and she started reaching for her pocket. I think the joke went over her head.
Before she got the change (which she really did have; I heard it jingling) I apologized for messing with her, and asked, “What is there to eat around here?” figuring if anyone knows where the inexpensive food is, it would be her. She told me, “I eat hot dogs and spaghettiOs.” I did’t know if she was offering me some, and we had an awkward moment before I asked, “No, I mean, is there anything cheap to eat in this neighborhood?”
(Ever wonder where homeless people eat out?)
She directed me to Tacolandia on the next block. She told me they have $2 tacos and a fixin’ bar you do yourself. She said she loads up on radishes.
I figured, as long I was out there, I might as well give it a whirl. I bought two, one pollo and one chorizo, and I put a ton of radishes on one of them. I can’t say they were as good as anything you could find in a taco truck in East L.A. (I certainly can’t say the ton of radishes was good), but they were tasty. They tasted pretty much how I imagined a $2 taco in Jackson Heights would taste. But I’m still waiting for the karmic payoff from this latest mitzvah. I’m hoping that will be very sweet.
Tacolandia, 77-04 Roosevelt Avenue, Jackson Heights, Queens
Check out www.famousfatdave.com for a chuckle or to book an eating tour on which we don’t have to load up on radishes at Tacolandia
Be my guest on a virtual Famous Fat Dave’s Uptown and The Bronx Boogie Down. Come along on a double date from heaven with Rex and Steve and Sarah and Sha for deviled eggs, fried whiting, Littleneck clams posillipo, fresh mozzarella, maduros, broccoli rabe, hand-piped cannoli and MUCH more . You’ll get virtually hungry, then virtually full, then briefly virtually ashamed of yourself, and then virtually proud you virtually ate the whole thing. And visit the Famous Fat Dave’s Five Borough Eating Tour website to learn more about tour options or take other virtual tours.
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