Thanksgiving Tips

A cooking class on preparing healthy but satisfying side dishes for Thanksgiving dinner will be held at Sang Lee Farms in Peconic on Nov. 8 from 5:30 to 8 p.m. Karen Lee, an owner of the farm, and Stefanie Sacks, a culinary nutritionist, will teach students how to make five plant-based dishes. A family-style meal will be served following the class. The cost is $150, and registration is via the farm’s website. 

Nick and Toni’s Specials

Pizzas made in a wood-burning oven are back on the dinner menu four nights a week at Nick and Toni’s in East Hampton. They are available Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. The restaurant is also offering three-course prix fixe dinner specials. A pizza or pasta entree with a romaine or mixed green salad, and a dessert of either gelato or sorbetto is $32. A roasted chicken entree with either a romaine salad or penne appetizer, plus a quarter tartufo for dessert is $37. The chef’s choice dinner, featuring an appetizer, entree, and dessert of the day is $45. Bar menu specials, offered weekdays from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. and on Sundays from 2:30 to 6:30 p.m., include an artisanal cheese plate and crostini for $10, and bruschetta for $6. 

Demo and Dinner

Arie Pavlou, the chef at Bistro Ete in Water Mill, will hold a cooking demonstration and wine dinner on Saturday at 4 p.m. The cost is $125, plus tax and tip. Reservations are by calling the restaurant. 

Planning Ahead

Long Island Restaurant Week, a promotion featuring $29.95 three-course prix fixes, will run from Nov. 4 through 11. Reservations are being taken now at the participating restaurants, which include 10 on the South Fork and two in Greenport.

Almond in Bridgehampton is taking reservations for holiday parties, and offering a gift certificate for up to $200 to those who book an event. The restaurant can accommodate up to 200 people for cocktails, and 80 for sit-down dinners. Reservations are by emailing [email protected]

If you are a writer, chances are your friends bestow upon you fascinating books, blank journals, and fancy pens as gifts. If you are an artist, you may receive canvases, paintbrushes, inks, and oils. If you are a gardener, perhaps you have received heirloom seeds, exotic orchids, and colorful books of English rose gardens. As a semi-retired pastry chef and food writer, my friends and family have given me endless pleasure and puzzlement with the most staggering array of cooking equipment, ancient cookbooks, and truly peculiar ingredients.

Have you ever heard of ebelskivers? Miraculin? Pandan extract? A Toas-tite? Go! Go! Curry sauce? The Smoking Gun? These are some of the fascinating items I have been given over the years, along with X-rated potholders (anatomically correct male and female), a first edition 1902 White House Cookbook, and a kitschy pie server shaped like a dressy shoe with a crystal heel. This last one always gets some giggles when I ceremoniously pull it out to slice into a homemade blueberry pie or quiche. 

My dear childhood friend Dicky is also an avid cook. He is responsible for the ebelskiver and the Smoking Gun. We’ve spent a good amount of time fiddling with these contraptions when he visits. The ebelskiver is a Danish invention, a cast iron pan with deep round indentations to cook little pancake/popovers with fillings. They are mostly meant to be sweet, but we thought a savory version with a little cube of Gruyere cheese in the middle would make a pretty soigné canapé! 

The Smoking Gun looks like a piece of medical equipment with a rubber tube and motorized hot fan. You add some wood chips (cherry, mesquite, apple), turn it on, and trap the smoke over some bourbon or beets or potatoes or whatever. I think my true chef and bartender friends play with theirs more than I play with mine.

Along the lines of “what the heck do I do with that?!” is the pandan extract. This comes from the Pandanus amaryllfolius plant, common in Southeast Asian cooking. The extract is used in sweet and savory cooking and has an aroma similar to basmati rice — nutty and botanical. The extract is a brilliant green and one of these days I plan to attempt a pandan chiffon cake. This was given to me by a chef friend Daniel. 

When he gets a break in the summer, he goes to a remote island off of Brittany and harvests sea salt and wild fennel pollen. He brought me a jar of this pollen salt recently and I must say, it has become my favorite finishing salt of all time. Just sitting on the table, its fragrance wafts around in a heavenly way. I have used it before searing a filet mignon, in mashed potatoes, on green beans, and sprinkled on good butter to serve at the table.

Many years ago, before computers and Amazon, those gateways to getting any damn thing you want from around the world, my friend Cheryl brought me little packets of squid ink from Italy. I squealed with delight as onlookers wrinkled their noses in disgust. I had had squid ink pasta and risotto on my honeymoon and loved it and never thought I’d see it again. It is salty, briny, umami, and black as night. It was a risky gift, but so much appreciated.

My son gave me the miraculin, or “miracle fruit,” which is a glycoprotein that binds to your taste buds and makes sour fruit taste sweet. This was, for sure, a weird science novelty.

When it comes to cookbooks, my friend Fraser wins the award for most peculiar and obscure. (He is also responsible for the aforementioned X-rated potholders.) Who knew that Vincent Price was a gourmand and published an enormous volume called “A Treasury of Great Recipes”? This book is full of fantastic color photos and menus from around the world. Fraser also gave me a first edition of “The White House Cookbook” from 1902. It is full of menus, recipes, and harsh opinions over what causes colds. A beer before bed, apparently. Duly noted.

Another treasured book I received is from the mother of a friend in Texas: “Feeding the Flock” from the West Freeway Church of Christ in Fort Worth. It has a lot of congealed salads and tortilla soups and cow patty cakes, but the jewel in the crown is Frito candy. When you have been cooking for most of your life, you reach a point where you can read a recipe and pretty much know what it will taste like. Frito candy is truly a ghastly sounding recipe: a bag of Fritos with boiled sugar, corn syrup, and peanut butter poured over it. I made it out of boredom one day when I was pastry chef at the old Laundry restaurant in East Hampton. This literally became the most requested treat to be served at staff parties for years after. If you like PayDay candy bars (crunchy, salty, chewy, peanuty, caramely) then you will love Frito candy. 

The batch I made Sunday was enjoyed by the staff at Guild Hall the next day, thanks to my neighbor and good friend Kathleen, she of the high-heeled bejeweled pie slicer gift.

Some food gifts expire or get consumed; some remain treasures to be cherished for the rest of my life. Some just give me the giggles. Regardless, they always make me think fondly of the giver, and sometimes wonder what could possibly have been going through their minds when they picked up a copy of Ted Nugent’s “Kill It and Grill It” or “Last Dinner on the Titanic” or “Cooking With Coolio.” 

“Who would appreciate this?” they may wonder. “Laura, that’s who.” So true.

Click for recipes

A clam chowder contest featuring recipes from local restaurants and home chefs will be held at the East Hampton Historical Farm Museum on Saturday from noon to 3 p.m. Competing restaurants include Nick and Toni’s, Harbor Bistro, Bostwick’s Chowder House, the Quiet Clam 2.0, and Smokin’ Wolf. 

After purchasing a museum mug for $15, attendees can sample the chowders and vote for their favorites. 

Kyle Ballou and Hy Mariampolski, the judges, will present awards to the winners in the people’s choice, professional chef, and home chef categories.

Fall Specials

Every Thursday each menu item is priced at $17.70 in the downstairs tavern at the 1770 House in East Hampton. The dishes include St. Louis ribs, veal Parmigiana, lamb and chickpea curry, meatloaf, and a hamburger.

Almond in Bridgehampton is offering five nights of dinner specials. On Sunday, a burger and beer at the bar is $19. On Monday, a three-course prix fixe menu of meatless dishes is $32. On Tuesday, a dinner of filet mignon and lobster tail with a side dish is $25. On Wednesday, a three-course prix fixe dinner for $32 is available all evening, and on Thursday, an all-you-can-eat serving of mussels at the bar is $10. A three-course prix fixe menu for $32 is also available Sunday through Thursday 

until 7 p.m. 

Take Me to the Greek!

A tasting of Greek wines will be held at Wainscott Main Wine and Spirits on Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. The cost is $10, and reservations are by calling the store.

Over the years I have done random taste tests to try to find the best pizza by the slice, best fried chicken, best hamburgers, and tastiest lobster rolls in our area. It is impossible to try every single one, so I just throw a certain number of establishments in a hat and pull out a bunch, gas up the car, and get eating.

I spent last weekend exploring salad bars and trying a few “grab-and-go” options. I did not include restaurants, nor did I include places that will be closed soon for the winter. There were also some places that we already know serve splendid fresh salads — Breadzilla and Mary’s Marvelous come to mind — but they did not get pulled out of my snappy Panama hat. Certain places like the Golden Pear, with numerous locations, deserve mention because its salads are very good and priced between $13 and $20. Organic Krush in Amagansett offers make-your-own salad bowls that are $12 to $15 and they are generally pretty good.

On a recent visit to New York City, I noticed that there are many versions of the salad bar or build-your-own salad. Places like Sweetgreen, Just Salad, and Chopt offer quick, healthy, convenient salads from $8.85 to $12.35 (Sweetgreen), $7.99 to $11.99 (Just Salad), and $8.79 to $11.49 (Chopt). They are as prevalent in the city as Starbucks.

So now, lettuce entertain you with the results. 

In Montauk I visited Naturally Good and M and R Deli. Naturally Good has a nice variety of organic salads that come with homemade sesame vinaigrette or other homemade dressing options. They cost from $7.95 to $10.50 and range from a simple garden salad to the more exotic “kimchee” salad, a mixture of greens, homemade kimchi, avocado, edamame, and cashews. I didn’t know the tiny M and R Deli had a salad bar until I asked some Montauk friends. Its salads start at $4.95 (the most reasonable of all that I tried) and the price goes up from there. Everything in the case was fresh and neaty-pie. The next stop was King Kullen in Bridgehampton where the salad bar price is $6.99 per pound. Frankly, I found this one somewhat disappointing considering the size of the store and its vast organic grocery and produce sections. Many bottles of Wishbone dressing stand sentry at one end and there is a plethora of olives taking up one whole side of the salad bar. 

In East Hampton, I checked out Red Horse Market’s salad bar, $7.99 per pound, with some homemade dressings and some commercially made. They had an impressive selection of greens, and some creative add-ins like Brussels sprouts, gigante beans, and roasted sweet potatoes. Next stop was L and W Market in Bridgehampton, opened this summer by the groovy dudes of Almond restaurant. Their pre-made salad choices are $11 to $14 and they are excellent, ranging from Nicoise to Greek to the amusing “China Grill 1987,” a Napa cabbage, chicken, cilantro, radish, and pickled carrots salad with a good sesame ginger dressing.

It was back to genuine, make your own salad from a salad bar with a visit to the Southampton branch of Citarella. Good God, this place is so huge it should have its own ZIP code, like the shoe department at Saks Fifth Avenue! The salad bar is $7.99 per pound and offers a huge array of condiments, along with quinoa, proteins, grilled vegetables, asparagus, faro, couscous, haricots verts, and more. I tried three of Citarella’s dressings and found their balsamic to be the best — tangy, a little sweet, and nicely blended. I made a huge salad with romaine, mesclun, feta, edamame, green onions, beets, and a pinch of bacon, and the total was $8.50. Not bad!

The Village Gourmet Cheese Shoppe, one of the most charming shops around, is known for its staggering array of gourmet items from around the world, great sandwiches, and cheeses. But it also has a build-your-own salad starting at $3.75, which employees will toss or chop for you. The Cheese Shoppe, too, makes its own dressings.

Sometimes salad bars can be a great time and money saver, sometimes not. So be wary of the weight of that big blob of cottage cheese you just put on your salad. They can also be a great short cut when you are making frittatas, soups, fajitas, and more, at home. Why buy a whole package of celery when you only need two stalks for vegetable soup? 

It is believed that salad bars took off in popularity in the 1960s. In 1951, Russell Swanson, of Swanson Equipment in Stevens Point, Wisc., built the first bar for chilled salads and fixings for the nearby Sky Club supper club. Norman Brinker is credited with bringing them into the mainstream (Chili’s, Bennigan’s, Steak and Ale) as a way to keep diners busy while waiting for their entrees. These early “salad” bars were heavy on the canned three-bean salad, macaroni, and gelatins. Over time, the offerings became more healthful and more varied. A short time later, thankfully, hygienic sneeze guards created a barrier between the salads and the humans. A Gallup poll in 1986 revealed that the most popular salad bar items were iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, bacon, and shredded cheese. Oh, dear. By the late ’80s one restaurant critic described salad bars as “herbage, lubricant, and crunchies.”

I cook my meals from scratch almost every day, and make a batch of vinaigrette to last a week. But I am delighted with the convenience of salad bars when I just need some carrots, celery, zucchini, onions, and green beans to make soupe au pistou, topped with doctored-up commercial pesto. You can pick up cauliflower and broccoli florets and chopped onions along with a can of coconut milk and Thai curry paste to make a vegetarian curry in a hurry. Grab any chopped vegetables to make a quick stir-fry.

So there you have it, from Montauk to Southampton, a random review/taste test of some of the salad bars and grab-and-go options available to us. They are all good, fresh, and convenient, some even organic and creative with homemade dressings. Let your budget and imagination guide you to your favorites.

Restaurant Week Coming

Looking ahead, foodies may want to mark their calendars for Nov. 4 through 11, when the fall iteration of Long Island Restaurant Week brings prix fixe deals to a range of restaurants across the Island, including half a dozen on the South Fork. A full list is at longislandrestaurantweek.com.

On Food Culture

Stony Brook Southampton has added an eight-week seminar on contemporary food culture to its fall curriculum. Taught by Brian Halweil, the founding editor of Edible East End magazine, it will cover topical issues such as food safety, animal welfare, the use of genetically modified organisms (G.M.O.s), and school lunch reform. 

Each class will also feature a 30-minute workshop on cooking, gardening, and food preservation. Two supplemental gardening intensives will be included.

The course is for “anyone interested in making food a bigger part of their career and life,” said Mr. Halweil in a statement. The class will begin on Oct. 25 from 5:20 to 8:10 p.m. in Chancellors Hall, room 237, and meet weekly through Dec. 20. The gardening intensives will take place on Nov. 10 and 17, from 9 a.m. to noon. The cost is $985, and registration is on the college’s website.

Nick and Toni’s opened on Aug. 3, 1988, long before foodies started using smartphones to take photos of exquisitely-plated entrees to share on social media. Yet, even on day one, the restaurant had a following. “We didn’t tell anyone we were opening, but apparently people were driving by really curious, and waiting for the lights to go on,” said Toni Ross, who founded the restaurant with her late husband, Jeff Salaway, whose nickname was Nick.  

The North Main Street, East Hampton, location Mr. Salaway had chosen for the couple’s first foray into restaurant ownership wasn’t exactly hallowed culinary ground. Its most memorable inhabitant was Ma Bergman’s pizza and meatball place, and the space itself was disheveled. “I have no idea what Jeff loved about it,” said Ms. Ross. “It was small, the floors were awful, the walls were really bad. I guess he just saw it as a cool blank slate. When I saw it, I was like, ‘You’re kidding me.’ ”

“Jeff did all the demolition himself, and then we hired people and got friends to help us,” said Ms. Ross. The couple, both artists who had met in Italy and worked in restaurants in New York City, wanted to create a spot that would serve the kind of food they had discovered during their travels north of Tuscany. The cuisine, which had yet to become popular stateside, would feature dishes such as beet ravioli with poppy seeds, spaghetti with lemon, and calf’s liver and onions. 

“The simplicity of the food was a hard thing to grasp as a young chef,” said Joe Realmuto, who joined the restaurant in the early 1990s, and, now as executive chef and a co-owner, oversees the kitchens at Nick and Toni’s and its sister restaurants, Rowdy Hall in East Hampton, Townline BBQ in Sagaponack, and La Fondita in Amagansett. “It can be just three ingredients on a plate, but you use really good ingredients. That’s one main thing that has stayed the same since the restaurant’s beginning.”

An early proponent of the slow-food movement, the restaurant formed relationships with local farmers and fishermen, who supplied fresh seasonal produce and the catches of the day. Mr. Salaway also planted an herb garden on-site, where it remains. “Jeff rototilled that himself with his skinny little legs and his boots and his shorts,” recalled Ms. Ross. “I have very distinct memories of that.”

After a few years of running the restaurant at a loss, Mark Smith, who previously worked in the hosiery industry, was brought on to help Nick and Toni’s turn a profit. “Mark had pretty much everything that we did not, such as business acumen, ideas about systems, consistency, staffing,” said Ms. Ross. “It was really a lot about reining in Jeff’s creativity so that it worked in a business model. Mark righted the ship.” 

 Then, in 2001, the restaurant faced an existential crisis when Mr. Salaway died in a car accident. “That’s when everybody’s world changed personally and professionally,” said Mr. Smith. “It was a very uncertain time because he was the face of the restaurant to a large degree.”  

While coping with her loss, Ms. Ross left Nick and Toni’s in the hands of Mr. Smith, Mr. Realmuto, Christie Cober, director of operations, and Bonnie Munshin, who managed the floor. “I couldn’t be present at all because I had young kids,” she said. “But Mark, Joe, Christie, and Bonnie understood the mission completely, so I never worried about it. They kept it the mom and pop place that Jeff and I had started.”

Mr. Smith said the death of Mr. Salaway made him determined to build the Honest Management group, which owns and operates Nick and Toni’s and the other restaurants, into an organization sturdy enough to withstand such an unexpected setback. The company went on to open Townline BBQ, start a catering company, and shut down the Nick and Toni’s Cafe in the city. 

By the end of this year, a new restaurant, Coche Comedor, an offshoot of La Fondita, will open in the space next door to it, which was once the Honest Diner. 

Even as the business grows, the Nick and Toni’s ethos of creating a family atmosphere, both for its customers and its employees, remains. The restaurant is committed to staying open year-round to serve its clientele and to provide work for its staff. “It’s an investment that we make in people,” said Ms. Ross.  

“You can’t create a family atmosphere from Memorial Day to Labor Day,” said Ms. Cober. “Our staff knows who the people are coming in, they have real relationships with our guests. That happens on a continuum over 30 years.”

Instead of spending money on an anniversary celebration this summer, the restaurant group donated money to local charities such as OLA (Organizacion Latino-Americana) of Eastern Long Island, which supports the East End’s Latino and Hispanic community, the Springs School’s chapter of Blessings in a Backpack, which provides food assistance, and the Community Council of East Hampton, a social services agency. 

Diners who happened to be at Nick and Toni’s on the anniversary weekend did get treated to glasses of champagne in honor of the milestone. “A lot of customers were reminiscing about this place as part of their own history,” said Ms. Ross, who shared one of her most vivid memories from the restaurant’s opening night. 

“The first person to walk through the door was Craig Claiborne, the New York Times food critic,” she said. “He was retired then, but he could still make or break a restaurant. I was working the door, and I thought, ‘Well, okay, this is over, we’ll finish off tonight and then pack up and go home.’ ” 

As it turned out Mr. Claiborne became one of Nick and Toni’s earliest devotees, returning often and bringing companions. He even offered pointers on how the restaurant could improve. “It was amazing,” said Ms. Ross. “We were really lucky.”

Artists and Writers

Almond in Bridgehampton will hold its first Artists and Writers night of the season on Tuesday at 7. The three-course dinner will be hosted by members of the Stony Brook Southampton M.F.A. faculty including Susan Scarf Merrell, the author of the novel “Shirley”; Amy Hempel, a short-story writer; Cornelius Eady, a poet, and Emily Gilbert, a writer and the editor of The Southampton Review literary journal. The cost is $45 and includes a glass of local wine or craft beer and tax but not gratuity. Reservations can be made by calling the restaurant. 

Quiet Clam Specials 

The Quiet Clam 2.0 in East Hampton is offering football specials, including a burger and a beer for $20, and chicken wings and a beer for $10, during any televised N.F.L. game. A taco special, available on Tuesdays from 4 p.m. to closing, features two tacos for $18 or three for $21, and includes chips, salsa, guacamole, and a Corona Light. There is also a two-for-one margarita special that night. Happy hour deals, including $5 pints of beer, $7 glasses of wine, and $11 specialty cocktails, plus bar bites are available from 4 to 7 p.m. every night except Saturday. 

Taste of Korea 

Members of the Korean Spirit and Culture Project will hold a free cooking demonstration and tasting of four traditional Korean dishes plus dessert at the John Jermain Memorial Library in Sag Harbor next Thursday from 6 to 8 p.m. Registration is via the library’s website.

Oysters!

Tickets are on sale for the Shelter Island Historical Society’s oyster tasting event on Oct. 20 from 4 to 6 p.m. at Havens Barn. The cost is $60 for adults, $40 for children who will be eating oysters, and free for kids 12 and under who will not be partaking. Tickets are available on the historical society’s website.

People sure do have strong opinions about chowders. Should it be New England, Manhattan, Long Island, Rhode Island, or, as our esteemed editor suggested, “alt-chowder,” in other words, allowing for substitutions, additions, creativity?

In Louis De Gouy’s 1949 cookbook, “The Soup Book,” he said, “Clam chowder is one of those subjects, like politics and religion, that can never be discussed lightly. Bring it up even incidentally, and all the innumerable factions of the clambake regions raise their heads and begin to yammer.”

A Maine politician once claimed (I don’t know when, but it sounds very McCarthy era) that the addition of tomatoes to chowder was “the work of the reds” who seek to undermine “our most hallowed tradition” and suggested that any housewives or chefs caught adding tomatoes be forced to “dig a barrel of clams at high tide as penalty.” Ha ha.

Manhattan clam chowder, which has a clear broth with tomatoes, carrots, celery, and onions, has been found in cookbooks going back to the 1890s. The title “Manhattan” was supposedly given by New Englanders as it was an insult to call someone a New Yorker.

Rhode Island clam chowder, also known as South County style, has a clear broth, along with bacon, onions, potatoes, and quahogs. Some are a hybrid with a tomato broth base.

Long Island clam chowder can also be a hybrid, tomato and cream based.

New England clam chowder is loosely defined as a thick chowder made from clams, potatoes, onions, sometimes salt pork or bacon, and milk or cream. It can be further thickened with oyster crackers.

Although the author of 47 books about Cape Cod, Joseph C. Lincoln, referred to New England clam chowder as “Yankee Doodle in a kettle,” it probably originated with Breton fishermen who migrated south to New England from Newfoundland. The word “chowder” is believed to be derived from the French word “chaudiere,” roughly translated to pot or boiler.

For the past six or so years I have had the honor of being a judge at the Montauk Chamber of Commerce’s chowder contest — Oct. 6, mark your calendars! The chowders are provided by local restaurants; judges make their choices, and the people choose their favorites, too. At first the two varieties, Manhattan and New England, were lumped together. Now they are in separate categories, and approximately 30 to 40 restaurants participate, with New England being the predominant variety offered. I’ve often thought (well, actually, loudly suggested) that there should be a third category for most original or most unique, because some of them don’t quite fall into a classic definition of either, but they are exquisite soups — the alt-chowders.

For instance, David E. Rattray told me about a chowder he made recently for his friend Jameson Ellis’s birthday. Based on a Sam Sifton recipe. He eliminated the dairy (folks could add it later), used leeks in lieu of onions, added rosé, and substituted smoked bluefish for the bacon. Mind blown. This genius substitution made his chowder close to the Scot’s broth “cullen skink.”

For other creative additions and variations on chowder I turned to my Department of Slothful Research, Facebook. Most people are adamant about preferring New England over Manhattan, myself among them.

Ellen White suggested a touch of Old Bay seasoning in either variety. Sydney Jones recommended Jarlsberg cheese and sherry in New England. Jeremy Blutstein, who never lacks for strong opinions, declared Manhattan “whack.” 

Chef Peter Ambrose had some outstanding suggestions. He has made a New Mexican version with andouille sausage, hard clams, belly clams, sweet potatoes, and Mexican spices. He also has made a New-England-style chowder with coconut milk and Thai red curry spice. He uses chipotle peppers as a substitute for pork and said that a drop of booze like Lillet is a great addition. These are exactly the kinds of variations that deserve their own category.

Naturally, you can find great chowders at many restaurants out here. Some recommended by those in the know are at Bostwick’s, the Quiet Clam, and Silver’s.

To put you in the mood in this first month of “Rs”, here are two recipes for your Yankee Doodle in a kettle. One is Mr. Rattray’s, the other from Lisa Kristel, an owner of South Edison in Montauk. This chowder won the people’s choice award at the Montauk contest in 2010.

Click for recipes

Jameson Ellis’s Birthday Chowder 

“I whipped this up based on a traditional recipe for my friend Jameson Ellis’s birthday,” David Rattray wrote. He served it in coffee mugs to about 20 guests as an appetizer. 

Serves eight as a meal.

24 medium or 12 large chowder clams

2 Tbsp. olive oil

1/4 pound smoked bluefish

1 cup Spanish onion, diced

1 cup leeks, white parts, mostly, diced

2 ribs celery, diced

2 cups Yukon Gold, red, or white potatoes, cubed

1 small clove garlic, minced

1 cup dry rosé

2 sprigs thyme

1 large bay leaf

Fresh black pepper, ground, to taste

Open clams with a sharp clam knife (Persan’s Hardware in Sag Harbor has a terrific French version). Be sure to save all the clam juice, strain it, and measure it. Add water to make three cups of liquid, if necessary, and set aside. Remove clams from shells and chop roughly.

(Alternative: Scrub clams and place in a heavy pot over two to three cups water. Cover and cook until clams are open. Pour off and reserve three cups of clam broth so that the sand stays in the pot. When cool enough to handle, remove clams from shells and chop roughly.)

Put the olive oil in a heavy pot and cook onions until softened. Add the leeks and celery and cook until soft. Add garlic and crumbled smoked bluefish. Add potatoes and rosé and cook until the alcohol has bubbled out and the potatoes are beginning to soften. Add the reserved clam liquid, thyme, bay leaf, and pepper to taste.

Simmer until potatoes are soft, then add chopped clams and heat until just simmering. Remove from heat and discard the thyme and bay leaf.

Taste for seasoning and serve.

South Edison Chowder

20 chowder clams

1/2 cup white wine

2 sprigs fresh thyme

2 whole heads of garlic, sliced horizontally 

so the flesh of each clove is exposed

2 fresh bay leaves

1 tsp. whole black peppercorns

1/4 cup homemade or store-bought bacon lardoons

1/4 cup finely minced shallots

3 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed

1/4 cup finely minced celery

1/4 cup finely minced leeks

1/4 cup hickory smoked and charred corn, 

kernels removed from the cob (home cooks can char it on a grill) 

2 cups whole milk

2 cups heavy cream

1/2 cup baby marble potatoes (or diced, unpeeled potatoes)

Bouquet Garni: 

Green tops of leeks

Garlic

Fresh thyme

Fresh bay leaf

Black peppercorns

1/4 cup tomatoes, skinned, cored, seeded, and finely chopped

2 Tbsp. finely minced thyme leaves

2 Tbsp. finely minced chives

2 Tbsp. finely minced parsley

In a large stockpot, steam open the chowder clams with white wine, sprigs of thyme, cut heads of garlic, bay leaves, and peppercorns. 

Once the clams open, remove them from the pot and strain the clam stock from the vegetables, reserving stock in a separate container. 

When the clams are cool, julienne into bite-sized pieces. 

In a separate pot, render the bacon until crisp. Transfer to a cooling plate. Strain and reserve the bacon fat.

Saute the shallots, crushed garlic, celery, leeks, and smoked corn in the bacon fat in the stockpot. Cook until softened.

Pour reserved clam stock, whole milk, and heavy cream over the softened vegetables.

Add the potatoes and a bouquet garni and cook until the potatoes are soft.

Add the chopped clams, the crisped bacon, and chopped tomatoes. Bring to a boil.

Remove the bouquet garni.

Just before serving, stir in the fresh thyme, chives, and parsley. Season to taste with kosher salt.

At the Clubhouse

The Clubhouse restaurant in East Hampton has a series of weekday dinner specials that will continue into winter. On Monday, a lobster bake dinner, which includes a one-and-a-quarter-pound lobster, corn on the cob, new potatoes, coleslaw, and a side of mussels, costs $36. Tuesday’s special is three tacos made with either steak, chicken, or fish, plus a margarita for $24. On Wednesday, a burger with fries, a side of chicken wings, and a draft beer is $25. Thursday’s surf and turf dinner features filet mignon and lobster tail with mashed potatoes and asparagus for $38. On Friday, prime rib with mashed potatoes and the vegetable of the day is $36. 

Fall Specials 

The fall specials at Almond in Bridgehampton include a three-course Meatless Monday menu for $32.50. On Tuesdays and Thursdays from 5 to 7 p.m. and all night on Wednesday, the restaurant offers a three-course prix fixe dinner featuring a menu that will change daily, also for $32.50. 

On Thursday nights, Springs Tavern in East Hampton is offering first responders, including police officers, firefighters, and emergency medical personnel a 25 percent discount off the dinner bill. Teachers receive the same discount on Fridays. On Tuesdays at the Tavern, chicken, beef, vegetable, or fish tacos are $4 apiece, with rice and beans included with each order of three or more.