05.18.07
Posted in Astoria, Middle Eastern, On The Open Road, Queens, Seafood at 8:01 am by Administrator
I’m no innovator. Famous Fat Dave’s Five Borough Eating Tour On The Wheels Of Steel may be one of a kind in this town, but the concept of cabbie-as-tour-guide is not unique. In almost every country I’ve visited, I’ve found cabbies who double as tour guides. It’s only natural. Who knows a city better than the people who drive all over every inch of it, talk with every person in it, eat at a different place for lunch every day?
When I blew into Cairo in February of 2005, I’d already been doing my eating tours for friends and family (and friends of family and family of friends) in New York for years. But I met a cabbie there who took me on a tour that made me realize I should be Famous Fat Dave for real.
As far south as Abu Siembel (40 clicks north of the Sudan border) I’d heard rumors of this cabbie in Cairo who gives pyramid tours. On the way to Luxor I ran into a friend I’d met back in the Sinai, and she gave me his name and number. So the minute my train stopped in Cairo, I called this Ibrahim and within an hour he met me at the station cafe just as the sun was coming up.
He was a huge man with a huge smile. After he made sure I was well fed at the cafe, we were off. His cab, a classic black and white taxi (the yellow cab of Cairo), was comically small. I couldn’t bring myself to dream how this big guy squeezed into his tiny 1975 Peugot with 3,000,000 km on it all day long. But he did.
We spent the day cruising around the 22 pyramids of the lower Nile region. He stopped at all the amazing views. He gave a running commentary on everything from Egyptian history to Cairo traffic.
And his jokes were priceless. Before we stopped for lunch, he said that his cab was “hungry too.” At the gas station he pointed to the oil palms lining the Nile, turned to me and said, “But David, we don’t have much oil here. Only a little” and then made a gesture as if to ward me off. “Mr. Bush can smell oil,” he said (he never knew that I was crying inside). When a man pulled his donkey into the gas station, Ibrahim let out a belly laugh and told me the donkey was there to get gas too, “IN HIS ASS!” I’m not sure if the pun was intended.
I wanted to go native for lunch. I’d never tried Egyptian seafood, and I saw some people eating it at a stand. But Ibrahim warned me not to eat anything out of the Nile. Instead Ibrahim took me to a super touristy spot because he got to eat there for free (this was not an eating tour after all, we had 22 pyramids to squeeze in). Still, the meal was delicious. The babaganoush, tahina, hummus, and pita were nothing less than fantabulous. And the mixed grill and pickles were okay. But I could have eaten for three days in Egypt for what it cost me.
By the time we reached the Great Pyramids at Giza, he’d taken a real shining to me (I’d like to think). I told him about the Famous Fat Dave tour I conducted back in NYC and that I drive a yellow cab, so, naturally, he saw a little of himself in me. He pointed to my burgeoning pot belly and said that in 30 years, I’d have a belly like his. I told him I hoped to have a tour like his as well.
So when I returned to New York, I began promoting my tour in earnest. I’d already discovered a great Egyptian spot to take people on Steinway Street called Kabab Cafe. The food there is better than most I had in Egypt, and Ali, the owner, with his larger-than-life personality and bold opinions reminded me of Ibrahim.
My cousin Aaron, the swingin’ violinist who played on my theme song, moved to NYC last week (his first gig will be as the lone violinist at a Stephane Grapelli tribute at Lincoln Center on June 1), and I took the drive out to LaGuardia to pick him up. Afterwords, I stopped off to see Ali on Stienway Street for some falafel and a chat. But his store was shuttered for renovations. I considered going to his brother’s restaurant Mombar up the street which is just about as good, but I noticed an inviting place called Sabry’s across the street.
Sabry’s bills itself as an Egyptian seafood restaurant. Because Ibrahim warned me not to eat any fish out of the Nile, and it’s illegal to fish out of the Red Sea, I never ate any seafood during my month in Egypt. So I was intrigued.
This place had some beautiful looking fish on display in the middle of the dining room:
And all sorts of interesting fish were being pushed across the counter to the frenetic waiters like whole Red Snapper:
And fish heads:
We got it started with some of best, hot pita I’ve ever tasted:
A strawberry smoothie that would have hit the spot if I were in the Sinai:
And some fried shrimp to gauge how good the place might be compared to any old seafood shack:
We could tell we were in for a treat, because we’ve both had our fair share of fried shrimp, and these were especially good. They were plump and fresh, fried just to the point at which the freshness was still evident.
Our main courses were amazing. The talapia special that the waiter pushed blew my freaking mind. The meat fell off the bone like bbq pork even though it was grilled fish. And it was loaded with all sorts of amazing herbs and spices that gave it the flavor of Egypt with the quality control of America.
The other dish they called “fish cake” because it came piled high like a wedding cake. I’d never had anything like it. I didn’t get the name of the fish from the waiter whose English, though better than my Arabic, was a little weak. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the delicate fish mixed with steamed vegetables immensely and I’m glad the waiter convinced me to order it.
Egyptians must just be a gregarious bunch, because this waiter, like Ibrahim in Cairo and Ali across the street, was nothing but smiles and jokes the whole meal:
Ibrahim, from the driver seat of his black and white cab, took it upon himself to explain to me that the Jews refuse to live in peace and must always make war, so the Arab-Israeli conflict will never end. There were billboards all over Cairo proclaiming “Egypt is the Leader of Peace.” Our waiter, however, told us that he thinks terrorists are crazy. I didn’t bring up the subject, and I felt sorry for him that he felt the need to clarify that to me, as though if he’d left it unsaid I’d assume he agrees with terrorism. But mostly, he just joked around with us and smiled a lot.
Even the guys preparing the fish and making that delicious pita behind the counter were friendly:
So I’ve got a cab like Ibrahim’s and a tour like Ibrahim’s. My belly still isn’t quite like Ibrahim’s. But now, unlike Ibrahim, I’ve even got a place for Egyptian seafood.
Sabry’s, 24-25 Steinway Street at Astoria Blvd, Astoria, Queens
Visit www.FamousFatDave.com for five borough eating tours
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03.09.07
Posted in Bronx, Dave's Faves, La Pizza, Queens, Rockaway Beach, South Bronx at 8:46 am by Administrator
I believe in luck. I believe in karma. I believe in the yin and the yang. And I believe in curses. But a string of bizarre and inexplicable events that dominated my life during a week in mid October of 2003 made me believe in God.
“Baseball is the only real sport, I think, in the world.” Babe Ruth said that. As a Yankee fan who hasn’t missed a box score since I was eight years old, laid on collapsed cardboard in the South Bronx for twenty two hours to get a ticket to the 1998 World Series, and chants “Boston SUCKS” at Yankee Stadium even when the visiting team is the Orioles, I believed in the Curse of the Bambino. In the American League Championship Series that October of 2003, the Yankees were playing the Red Sox, who had been languishing under the curse since Babe Ruth was sold by Boston to the Yankees for the low, low price of $100,000 in 1920. The Red Sox, who had won the 1915, 1916, and 1918 World Series behind the brilliant pitching of a young Babe Ruth, had seemed to be on a roll when the teens ended. But the Great Bambino led the Yankees to their first World Series title ever in 1923, the Yankees went on to win 25 more championships, and the Red Sox were damned.
My second team was the Chicago Cubs, who I’d always loved with a warm place in my heart as a result of a large, deep-dish eating extended family hailing from the North Side. The Cubs have suffered through an equally powerful curse. The story goes that when a man arrived at Wrigley Field with a billygoat in tow, he was denied entrance. So he hexed the Cubs, saying they would never win another World Series. It was a ludicrous concept at the time. The Cubs, in fact, had been the century’s first great dynasty, going to four of the first seven World Series ever played, and winning twice. But the curse of the billygoat stuck, and the last time the Cubs brought home the ring was in 1908. The last time they even made it to the World Series there were only forty eight states. The Cubs too were poised to win a pennant that October of 2003, playing in the National League Championship Series.
I was living on the sandy peninsula of Rockaway Beach, an old Irish enclave barely existing on three blocks of Queens between Jamaica Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. The locals, mostly cops and firefighters, were surprised to find a chubby, moderately-tanned Jewish kid living on the Irish Riviera. I was there, however, not to befriend the natives, but for the fishing, sun, and fresh air. Mostly, I have to say, I was there for the abundant parking. I’d already been a yellow cabbie for a couple of years. But I was having trouble finding time to work because I was watching one or two baseball games an evening, and rarely did both the Cubs and the Yankees have a simultaneous travel day.
Early in the Championship Series, the Cubs had the day off so I elected to work and listen to the Yankees on the radio. Unknowingly, as I pulled my cab out from the garage in Greenpoint Brooklyn, I was beginning my religious education. Before the sun would come up over the Atlantic, I would be on my way to edification.
It was a night of ups and downs, strikes and gutters. My first fare of the evening, at 5:15 when traffic is at its worst, was my first trip in two years on the job to Newark Airport. This is the worst possible fare because, not only does it take forever to get to the airport and back, it is illegal to pick up another fare in New Jersey so I had to return empty. To make matters worse, I was out of my element and ended up getting off Highway 9 by accident and getting lost in downtown Newark. But when I finally returned to the city, I picked up a Chinese woman in the garment district who wanted a ride to Chinatown. We hit it off and by the time we stopped at the base of the Manhattan Bridge, she offered me a job selling jewelry at her shop on Canal Street. I can’t say I’ve always wanted to sell cheap jewelry to tourists at a massive mark up, but, since my full time career had blossomed into watching baseball in the afternoon and night, I was in the market for a day job. Here was one handed to me on a silver platter. A case of the yin and the yang? It crossed my mind at the time.
A couple hours later on Avenue B and 7th Street, a man hailed me frantically. Usually I’d pass by people like that for fear of dealing with an insane person, but I stopped because I saw he was propping up what looked to be his elderly father with his other arm. The old man got in first, wheezing, coughing, and clearly frightened. His son got in second and told me to go to the nearest emergency room in a hurried voice. I asked if he wanted to get there very quickly, and the younger man said, “Be reasonable.” Little did he know that I had always wanted to be an ambulance driver. I put my flashing emergency lights on and blew through a fresh red light on Avenue A leaning on my horn. I turned right onto First Avenue and before four minutes were up, I stopped in front of NYU Medical Center ER on Thirty Third and First. I got this man twenty five blocked and I think I set a land speed record for New York City. I was on such a natural high that I pumped my fist, hooted, and hollered after I let them out. I can’t say for sure that I saved his life, but I felt I had done a serious mitzvah. Now, wasn’t I due for some good karma?
The rest of the night passed without incident until, at about 3:15 am, I stopped for pizza at Rosario’s on Orchard Street. As I was waiting for my slice, three neighborhood guys started a friendly conversation with me about the Yankees. I was feeling a bit too comfortable. I was in my element, the neighborhood in which I had lived, worked, hung out, and volunteered with youths just like these. At that moment, waiting for Sal to heat me up a slice and talking of life and baseball with the locals, all was right with New York City. As I hopped back in my cab and waved goodbye to my new friends, I thought to myself, “Those neighborhood kids are great; you just gotta give ‘em a chance.” I realized twenty minutes later that the chance I had given them was the chance to rob me. While my three friends distracted me, a fourth had stolen my cigar box of money out of the cab. I was not pleased. How was I to believe in karma?
I arrived home in Rockaway despondent and disillusioned. Leaning against my door was a FedEx package. I plopped down in a chair and looked at it. It had my address but the name Susan Garbarino. I knew she was not the former resident, so, without giving it much thought, I opened the envelope. Inside I found the single most beautiful thing I have ever laid my eyes upon. It was one ticket – JUST ONE – to game six of the American League Championship Series at Yankee Stadium.
This is where Dave goes crazy. Of all the people in all New York to be on the winning end of this kind of mix up, the kind of mix up I have never known FedEx to make, it probably gave me the purest, most unadulterated bliss. After I finished freaking out, screaming, running in circles around my tiny house, pumping my fist like Derek Jeter, doing the Bernie dance, and laughing hysterically, I took a look at the flip side of the ticket where the receipt was attached. On it, Ticket Master had printed Susan Garbarino’s real address. Not even close. She did live in Rockaway, but it was eighty one blocks east of me on Beach 19th Street. Tough luck Susan.
But as I tried to go to sleep it dawned on me that I had a moral dilemma on my hands. I could use the ticket for myself, go to the game, and enjoy it immensely. When I first saw the ticket, this option was the only one that even entered my mind. But I had this woman’s address. I could easily go to her door and present her with her rightful ticket. Beach 19th Street, however, is at the edge of one of the worst neighborhoods in all the five boroughs. On the list of bad ideas, showing up in the middle of the ghetto and buzzing a stranger’s door ranks just ahead of leaving a box full of money in an unlocked yellow cab on the Lower East Side. From the day’s events, it was clear to me that I was not having the best luck with the city’s rougher neighborhoods.
I awoke the next afternoon honestly thinking the ticket was a dream. I cannot stress enough how amazing it was to me to have a ticket to game six of the ALCS against the Red Sox magically show up at my door. Over the next couple of days, I ran my moral dilemma by as many friends, family members, and strangers as possible. I’d say I talked to about thirty people and only four of them told me what I wanted to hear. And all four were morally bankrupt people and/or equally huge Yankee fans who were astonished at my dumb luck. The good people kept telling me that it was bad karma to keep the ticket. My defense, I maintained, was airtight. It wasn’t bad karma to hold onto the ticket because the ticket falling into my hands was the second half of a karmic equation that had been set into motion for me when I rushed a dying man to the hospital just hours before finding the FedEx package. Or maybe it was my yang to the yin of being robbed only one hour earlier.
The day before the game I took yet another night off of work and went to my brother’s apartment to watch game six of the National League Championship Series. I was now sick of everyone telling me to return the ticket and defiantly announced, “Screw it, I’m going to the game tomorrow.” I then watched in horror as the Cubs, just five outs away from winning the pennant for the first time in three generations, fell victim to their curse. A Cub fan in a seat in foul territory reached up and grabbed a fly ball away from a leaping Cub outfielder. An eerie darkness washed over the fans at Wrigley Field. The rowdy mob gathering on Waveland Avenue fell silent. Even the television cameras, which seconds before were shaking in the pandemonium and excitement of the moment, were still. Millions of people all over Chicagoland were thinking about a billygoat. The Cubs had been ahead three to nothing. A passed ball, an error, a few weak pitches, and the Cubs gave up EIGHT runs that inning. My brother told me to leave his house and not come back for a while, citing bad karma.
I did not take this lightly. It was pouring rain that night, and I wandered the streets of Brooklyn in a daze. Was I to blame for the Cubs’ tragic loss? Or was this just a warning to make things right by Susan Garbarino? Could I bring this bad karma into the House That Ruth Built and be responsible for giving the Yankees a curse of their own? Was this mystery ticket not just a stroke of luck, but a test from God Himself? What would Sandy Koufax do? All of this was coming hard on the heels of Yom Kippur, a Yom Kippur during which I had broken the fast a good hour early with an unkosher Nathan’s hot dog at a break-the-fast-bbq I had thrown for a bunch of goys. It was impossible to deny the religious implications.
And this could all go beyond baseball. Even if I were to snub Susan Garbarino, use the ticket, and the Yankees were to go on to win twenty five more World Series, this karmicly charged ticket would be hovering over my head for the rest of my life. I would spend my days with a numb fear in the back of my head and the pit of my stomach, just waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I had to find Susan. That night I looked up Susan Garbarino in the Rockaway yellow pages but she wasn’t listed. I called FedEx with the tracking number – 1220ZI0155104 – and they told me they don’t even use letters. I was now thoroughly freaked out. I was feeling an emotion akin to what the dying man in the back of my cab must have felt. I was preparing to stare God in the face.
I awoke early the next morning to go to Susan’s house. Since she lived straight down the beach from me, and I had the feeling that I was experiencing something larger than the things of man, I left my car and walked along the boardwalk. The storm the night before had brought in dangerously windy weather. It was difficult to walk. Blowing sands stung my ears, sea spray impeded my bespectacled vision, and the wind nearly knocked me off my feet on a number of occasions. As I drew closer to Beach 19th Street I saw that I was approaching a cluster of high rises. This woman lived in a complex of buildings which I had always noticed as the most distant visible edifices on the eastern horizon. It was as if the Eyes of TJ Eckleburg were upon me.
When I arrived, I realized with a sinking feeling, that these building comprised a retirement community/ nursing home. I very well could have been denying this woman her dying wish. I made up my mind right then and there that not only would I return Susan Garbarino her ticket, I would drive her to The Stadium myself.
I found her building, went to an elevator, and tried to go to the 14th floor to find Susan Garbarino’s apartment: 14C according to the Ticket Master receipt. To my dismay, this elevator only went to the 12th floor. I found a different elevator bank, but again the highest floor was the 12th. Now perplexed, I sought help from a janitor. He was an old, white-haired black man with a mop and a glass eye. He would, naturally, play the part of the blind oracle in my story which is about to sound made up, but I swear upon the lives of my ancestors it is true.
I asked him, innocently, “How do I get to the 14th floor?” He gave me a kindly smile, and in country accent quite foreign to the borough, he said softly, “You goin’ ta tha 14th floor, you goin’ ta heaven.” I swear that is what he said. Now I felt like I was dreaming with my eyes open. Refusing to believe what I just heard, I breathlessly explained the entire situation to him and showed him the ticket and the receipt with the address. He told me he had been working in the building for nearly twenty years and that he was positive that there was no 14th floor. After we checked at the front office to be sure no Susan Garbarino resided there, my blind oracle told me, “You blessed! You blessed! Go ta tha game.”
That was the moment I began believing in God. Not only did I begin believing in God, I began believing I knew God’s name, and it was Susan Garbarino. With the wind still blowing violently, I walked back to my house. But this time the gales were at my back, hurrying me along. The game now just hours away, I drove to the Bronx in a hurry, and, in perhaps the greatest miracle of all, I found a free and legal parking spot less than five blocks from The Stadium.
But the Lord works in mysterious ways, and as a newly converted religious zealot, I believe that with all of my heart. The Yankees lost game six. I stood there frozen as the drunken and angry denizens of Yankee Stadium filed out onto 161st Street. I was shocked. I had been as positive that the Yankees would win that game as I was that Red Sox would never win another World Series. In the end, both occurred. But no, the Red Sox would not win in 2003.
The important thing is that the Yankees went on to win game seven, and they did so in dramatic fashion. Aaron Boone’s home run in the bottom of the 13th inning broke untold millions of hearts across New England. But I witnessed something earlier in game seven, something largely forgotten by history, something for which I take total responsibility. In the eight inning, the Yankees came from behind off a weakened Pedro Martinez to tie the score. But they could have taken the lead. A fan reached out of the stands to put a hand on the batted ball, forcing the umpires to call a grounds rule double and call back the go-ahead run. When a fan touched a ball in Wrigley Field, the God of baseball, who I think is same God of everything else, descended upon the Cubs. The Yankees, on the other hand, didn’t miss a beat. The fans continued screaming, the cameras continued shaking in the excitement, and the Yankees went on to win.
I contend that, had I not exorcised the demons locked within that FedExed ticket, the Yankees could very well have fallen under the spell of a wicked curse. I cannot speak for whatever damned, faceless fan cursed the Yankees in 2004. But when it was up to me during that October of 2003, I wouldn’t let the dynasty be replaced by anguish, as occurred in Boston and Chicago so many years before. I wouldn’t let luck turn against the Yankees. I wouldn’t let karma at The Stadium go bad. I took it upon myself to go see the blind oracle of Beach 19th Street, I looked into Susan Garbarino’s eyes in those high winds, and I refused to bring a curse upon the Yankees.
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