Restaurant Review: Moosewood, Ithaca, NY

Last Friday, Kimberly and I, after our lunch at Tim's Philly Steaks, picked Ian up after school and drove up to Ithaca, NY.  After five hours on the road, we arrived, just a tad late, for dinner with a large group of friends at the intergalactically famous Moosewood Restaurant.  

One of several Moosewood
cookbooks at Chez Brysmi.

While I've got absolutely nothing against vegetarian food, I haven't generally had good experiences at vegetarian restaurants.  I adore Indian vegetarian food, but for some reason American-style vegetarian restaurants have a sad habit of correlating meatlessness and flavorlessness.  There's simply no excuse for that.  For the most part, though, Moosewood doesn't take a "Vegetarian=Boring" approach to food, a fact that is equally apparent when eating there as it is when cooking from one of their many cookbooks, as we often do in the Bryant-Smith household.

By the time we arrived at Moosewood on Friday, the crowd we were dining with had already picked over several appetizers, which I'm sure were good, though I have no first-hand experience of that.  What we did get to experience were the bread baskets, with three different, hearty, fresh-baked breads, as well as salads and entrees that were all quite good.

Ian and I were seated together at one end of the long table, with Kimberly lost somewhere at the other end and, essentially, not dining with us, though she later told me that she had enjoyed a pasta dish with cauliflower and cheese, as well as the salad with the house dressing.  Ian and I were of the same mind, ordering the ginger-miso dressing on our salads and selecting an Indian potato wrap, essentially a samosa, with brown rice, dal, and chutney.

Ian isn't a big fan of green salads, but he enjoyed this one, with its Asian flavors.  When the potato wraps arrived, we puzzled over whether to treat them as sandwiches or as a meals to eat with knife and fork and ended up deciding that the rice, dal, and chutney made what would have normally been simple finger food into a full-fledged targets for cutlery.  While the wraps were not very highly spiced, they weren't bad, and the dal and chutney were nice additions to the plate.

Ian and I both enjoyed beverages from the Ithaca Brewing Company.  I had the Cascazilla, a wonderfully hoppy red ale, while Ian enjoyed the "under 21 option" of rootbeer.

While Moosewood isn't my favorite restaurant in the world, it does vegetarian food better than any other that I've visited, with a good mix of flavors and an emphasis on local, organic produce when it is available.  I expect that, should we be in Ithaca again in the future, we'll probably stop back in for another meal there, especially if we had cheesesteaks for lunch that same day.

Restaurant Review: Tim's Philly Steaks, Norwalk, CT

Tim's Philly Steaks at 336 Westport Ave. in Norwalk

I'm a cheesesteak junkie.  I've blogged about it before, writing about my quest for the holy grail of cheesesteaks and how hope springs eternal, despite the number of times I've suffered through substandard fare.

12" Philly Steak with grilled onions and cheese whiz.
Note the free pickled peppers in the background.

A week ago, my local newspaper, The Hour, ran a complimentary article featuring Tim's Philly Steaks, which recently opened not quite a mile from my home.  On Friday, I dragged Kimberly to Tim's to see how they measured up to my  hopes.

Tim's is located at 336 Westport Avenue in Norwalk, in front of  the very dicey-looking Norwalk-Westport Motel and next to Masas Arapera and  Electrical Wholesalers.  When we arrived at the restaurant, there were only two other customers there, so Kimberly and I got our orders in quickly, with Kimberly ordering a 6" Philly Steak with provolone, onions and peppers and me opting for a more traditional 12" with onions and cheese whiz.   Then, we took a seat at the fast-food-style table next to the window to wait as our sandwiches were prepared.  As we waited for our cheesesteaks to be ready, the place began to fill up and Kimberly -- much to her amusement -- noticed that everyone else in the restaurant was male.  I guess Philly steaks do qualify as "guy food."

When the guy behind the counter called our order number, I got up to retrieve our sandwiches and then went back to the counter to get a couple pickled peppers (free!!)  from the jar.  By the time I got back to the table (Maybe 45 seconds.  A minute, tops.) Kimberly had already eaten 80% of her sandwich.  I unwrapped mine, peeling back the aluminum foil that had been glued down with cheese, and bit into the sandwich which, true to advertising, tasted like it may have come from the corner of Passyunk Ave. and 9th Street in Philadelphia.  Of course, that's not much of a surprise as Tim imports his bread and meat (shaved ribeye, rather than the pressed mystery meat that many places use to make cheesesteaks) from a supplier in Philly.

While I enjoyed my Philly steak, Kimberly reported that her sandwich was somewhat disappointing, with the cheese having been placed on the cold roll and the meat being placed on top of it, rather than having the cheese integrated into the meat on the griddle.  Also, the peppers were not the bell peppers she had expected, but were pickled sweet peppers which were added, cold, to the sandwich.  Since I had ordered the traditional version of the sandwich, I didn't have any such problems; the onions were appropriately grilled and the cheese whiz was integrated well with the beef.

After lunch, as we were getting into the car to drive home, a red Jeep, jacked up and sporting oversized tires, pulled in next to us.  The driver was a solid-looking woman with a red bandanna on her head and wearing work clothes and boots.  Like Rosie the Riveter, she looked like the kind of woman who was comfortable doing work traditionally done by men.  She also wasn't afraid to stop by Tim's Philly Steaks and have "guy food" for lunch.  Good for her!

Thinking about Working for God Retreat

TAWFG Retreat Participants Preparing for Candlelight Prayer Walk

I spent this past weekend at the Silver Lake Conference Center with eleven young people who are part of the Connecticut Conference's "Thinking About Working For God" program.  Some time ago, Rev. Da Vita "Day" McCallister, the Associate Conference Minister for Youth and Young Adult Ministries, had asked me to be one of the mentors for the young people who are members of the TAWFG program and this was the first opportunity to have a retreat together.  Day led the program, along with John Selders, pastor of Amistad United Church of Christ in Hartford, and my good friend Eric Anderson , who is variously known as the "Alpha Geek" or the "Minister of Magic" for the Connecticut Conference, though he has a much more mundane title on his business card.

Over the course of the weekend, the young people discussed the reasons that they had "said yes" to thinking about working for God and heard the pastors tell stories of how they had discerned their calls to ministry.  We played together.  We ate together.  We had dance breaks.  Really.  We engaged in several spiritual disciplines, including prayer walking, with confession, petition and listening for God's response, and a reflection called "examen," during which we examined the day, taking stock of the high points, the low points, and giving thanks for both.  Working with these eleven teenagers (and there are many more TAWFG members who weren't able to attend the retreat, too) gives me a lot of hope for the future of the church, as I see their passion, intelligence, energy and faith.  I look forward to working with them as they continue to grow into their callings.

For Eric Anderson's coverage of this event, see his article at ctucc.org here.

 

Chantey Singing at the Rowayton Arts Center

For the last two months, I've been taking part in a chantey sing held at the Rowayton Arts Center from 4:00-6:00pm on the third Sunday of the month, and have been enjoying it immensely.  The program is hosted by Deirdre Murtha, of The Johnson Girls, and her husband Sean, who also sings and plays banjo, fiddle and bones.

Each afternoon, different people take turns leading chanteys and other maritime-related songs.  The guy on the left, whose name I should remember, but don't, sings a lot of Scottish and Irish songs.  [Editor's Note 4/14/12: His name is Cliff Abrans and he's a heck of a great guy.  Also, for the record, I figured that out right after I made the original post, but only just got around to making this note.  Oops.]  Other folks are more general-purpose chantey singers, while others just come and sing along -- or even just listen.

When I went last month, it was a spur-of-the-moment decision and I didn't have anything prepared, but ended up leading Adieu, Sweet Lovely Nancy, The Mary Ellen Carter, and Fair Maid Walking.  This last time, since I had a chance to plan, I took along my guitar and banjo and led The Loss of the Bay Rupert, Battleship of Maine [Here's a video of me playing it in Havana.], Christmas in the Trenches, and The Storms are on the Ocean.

The Chantey Blast at Mystic Seaport is January 7 and I'm looking forward to going up for that.  I feel like I need to have a policy of not repeating songs at the Rowayton Chantey Sing, so I'll be on the lookout for catchy tunes with interesting lyrics.

Ship Sighting: Hudson River Sloop CLEARWATER

Earlier this week, the Norwalk Hour ran a brief piece letting the world know that the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater would be at the Norwalk Cove Marina for a few days for maintenance.  Having crewed on Clearwater for part of a single day, back in the fall of 2006 when Amistad and Clearwater were tied up at the same dock on the Hudson, I was interested in seeing what Clearwater looked like out of the water.  On Thursday afternoon, Kimberly and I took Ian to Cove after we picked him up from school.

Unlike Amistad, which draws 10.5 feet of water, Clearwater is a shallow-draft vessel, with a centerboard that can be raised and lowered to accommodate the waters of the Hudson.  Similarly, the areas below decks are rather scant on headroom and the crew's quarters have the feel of a child's play area, with stringed instruments hanging on bulkheads for easy access by the crew.  Steering is with a large tiller, carved in the shape of an arm with a fist on the end of it, rather than with a wheel.

Clearwater's crew, who are usually busy teaching lessons about the Hudson River's ecosystem, were hard at work replacing planking and caulking seams, so I didn't want to bother them, but here are a couple photos from the afternoon.

Bless!: A Retrospective

Rev. Quinn Caldwell speaks
about blessings.  Note the
spiffy tweed vest, similar to
the one I was wearing.  We
were extremely stylish together.

The last couple days in Boston have been fantastic, with several great worship experiences, informative workshops, and shop-talk with fellow pastors and worship leaders, including several that I had gotten to know well in my days back in the Central Atlantic Conference.  Not to give too much away, but I'm coming back with a couple interesting ideas for different celebrations in the life of the church.

The pastoral staff at Old South Church, Revs. Nancy Taylor (Sr. Minister) and Quinn Caldwell (Associate Minister), along with Ron Buford (Minister for Discipleship), and Harry Huff (Minister of Music) encouraged attendees to make the practice of blessing things, people, and pets a regular part of their congregation's worship lives.  At Old South, they bless "anything that moves and many things that don't," including stewardship pledges, animals (from hamsters to police horses), backpacks, hammers, and marathon runners.  They are also extremely intentional in their worship planning, having weekly meetings with the worship leaders to critique the previous week's service and to fully plan out the logistics of the coming week's service.  Often, they try out new ways of doing things at the early service ("First Worship") before incorporating them in the main service ("Festival Worship").

At the conclusion of the conference, there was a live webcast of a blessing service for the fruits of the Mission:1 offerings.  (Video archived here.)  With preaching from Ben Guess and music featuring Old South's magnificent pipe organ, 'cello, and a quartet, we praised God for the ability to share in blessing others.  We dedicated all of the items that had been received and those still outstanding.  At the time of my writing this, the UCC has collected:

• 1,190,533 items of food collected (Goal of 1,000,000 exceeded 11/10.)
• 33,792 letters to congress (Goal of 11,111 exceeded 11/6.)
• $91,802 donated to Neighbors in Need for US hunger relief (Goal of $11,111 met in pledges.)
• $93,930 donated for famine relief in East Africa (Goal of $11,111 met in pledges.)

A sign along the green line of the MTBA
somewhere between Boston and Riverside.
Click on the picture and read about Charlie.

In other news, it turns out that the distance from Old South Church and the Walker Center, where I stayed, is longer than I had anticipated, with each trip taking 45 minutes or so, which gave me lots of time to read and people-watch.  At one point, as we were sitting at a station, I heard some start humming the MTA song, "Let me tell you a story 'bout a man named Charlie..."  I was amused, as it had been running through my brain ever since getting on my first T train, but I was surprised to see that my fellow traveler had been inspired to sing not by the mere fact that we had used our "Charlie Cards" to pay our fares, but that the song -- and my friend Jackie Steiner -- had been immortalized by a sign along the tracks.  Go ahead.  Click on the picture and read all about Walter O'Brien and the true story of "the man who never returned."

I managed to eat two meals in Boston's Chinatown, one at Xinh Xinh, a Vietnamese restaurant where I got a fantastic bowl of pho, and Winsor Dim Sum Cafe, where Eric Anderson and I gorged ourselves on many varieties of dumplings after the conference ended.

Today, I wandered around the Boston area, with a dead cell phone battery, so I couldn't take pictures of anything or even check in on Facebook, Twitter or Foursquare until I managed to plug in late in the day.  I stuck my head in at Andover Newton Theological School, since you never know when there might be a D.Min. in the cards, though Saturday may not have been the best possible time for a visit.  I also stopped by the Occupy Boston encampment in Dewey Square, where I chatted with some of the folks who were in residence and prayed with some of them  in the Sacred Space Tent.

So here I am, making use of Amtrak's WiFi and 120 Volt outlets, posting even before getting home from my trip.  Isn't technology grand?!

"Bless!" Conference in Boston

I haven't taken a train trip in a while, not since the Great Chesapeake Bay Schooner Race back in 2008.  Today, I'm riding Amtrak on my way to Boston for "bless!", a national conference for worship leaders, sponsored by the UCC's Local Church Ministries and hosted at the historic Old South Church.  Tomorrow afternoon, the bless! conference will include a blessing for all of the food and financial gifts that have been raised by all of the congregations of the United Church of Christ as part of the Mission: 1 project, with the blessing service being webcast at 4:00pm here.  If you look carefully, you might even see me in the congregation.

While at the conference, I'll be staying at the Walker Center, which was originally started by a Congregationalist missionary who had returned from Turkey when her husband died.  Her new mission was to start a home for the children of missionaries who needed to stay in the US for either safety concerns or so they could pursue their education.  Over time, the Walker Center shifted from hosting Missionaries' Kids, becoming first a center where students from abroad can stay while pursuing studying at Boston area schools, and then a retreat center.

Over the next couple days, I'll be posting reflections from the conference, mostly via Facebook (friend me) and Twitter (follow me).  I'll post a big-picture reflection here, as well.