Buttermilk Channel Tuesday

December 17

It was snowing last night here in Gotham. It wasn't snowing much, but ice flakes were falling from the sky and at times like that New Yorkers tend to stay close to home, or to order in. But Buttermilk Channel was packed.
I sat at the bar and ordered a Six Points IPA after owner Doug Crowell updated me on what had been going since I wrote a little item on his restaurant for this blog. They had readjusted their daily specials, so bluefish was no longer on the menu, although they were considering offering it as a whole fish.
Chef Ryan Angulo later came out from the kitchen, placed some roasted cauliflower and apple soup in front of me and said the challenge for him was getting the right size of bluefish — one to two pounds — to serve whole. So if you know of anyone selling a regular supply of cocktail blues, or big snapper blues I guess, let them know.
What had previously been offered as the Wednesday special, bluefish with cranberry bean-linguiça stew, is now on the regular menu, but with hake instead of bluefish. Now the Wednesday special is heritage pork cheek schnitzel with creamy celery root and prune jam.
I told Doug that for some reason my blog entry about his restaurant continues to be one of my most regularly visited entries.
“I think it’s the neighborhood,” he said.
But today someone from Bangkok visited that specific entry. I can’t explain it.
At any rate, business has been good at Buttermilk Channel since it opened in November, and business is also booming at nearby Frankies. I know, because I ended up nearly closing down Buttermilk Channel chatting with Mary, Frankies' comptroller and a native of Buffalo. So we had a good laugh about how downstate New Yorkers react to snow. Of course, Mary’d laugh at how Denverites like me react to snow, too, because we don’t get anything like the snow storms of western New York; Mary told the story of one Christmas Eve when they got 96 inches. That’s eight feet. But that was actually in a Buffalo suburb, where her parents live. Her parents say “the city” (Buffalo) doesn’t really get snow. Not real snow.
Just remember this: Don’t stop driving during a white out. Shift to low gear, put your high beams on and try to stay above 30 miles per hour. Once you stop you might never, ever get started again, and you could also trigger a multiple-car pile-up of disastrous proportions. Don’t stop.
What I ate:
Chicken liver mousse topped with grilled grapes
Roasted cauliflower and apple soup with crispy bacon and croutons
Buttermilk fried chicken with cheddar waffles and winter vegetable slaw
Pecan pie sundae