1. Tacos - I had this big revelation when I spent a semester of my college years in Los Angeles: I could eat tacos every day, forever. But ever since I lived in Los Angeles, I have been hungry. In New York, tacos that compare don't park nightly in my local grocery store's parking lot. Sure, there are tacos around me, but usually not the ones I crave. The ones filled with crispy stomach, ear, cheek, brain, chicharron, tongue... Carnitas don't cut it anymore. And if there's no radishes on the side? I can't take it! I've got a full blown taco problem. The only thing that can cure it in this city is when summer rolls around and all the taco trucks set up shop on the weekend at the Red Hook Soccer Field. (That link there says that the taco trucks signed a six year lease and last year was when it ended???? This is a serious loss and I hope, not true. If it is, there's always Sunset Park...)
2. Pizza - Growing up my parents made homemade pizza with my brother and I on occasion, for a birthday party or a play date. We'd order delivery pizza like the doughey, premade, gluey thing from Papa John's, more than we made homemade pizza. I think growing up, that's the reason why I wasn't super excited about pizza like every other white kid on my block. The first time I remember actually craving pizza was in college (of course every craving I've ever had goes back to college). I lived above an Italian brick oven pizza place that would put stuff like potatoes, pancetta, salami, rosemary, gorgonzola, and arugula on their pizza. I was poor and the pizza was expensive for my student salary. but that was usually how I rewarded myself. Finished a paper? Order a large cheese pizza topped with crispy salami. Eat half of it one night, the rest for breakfast. Long weekend? Pick up some blueberry yum yum, roll it, invite over my best girl, and order a white pizza with pancetta, potatoes, gorgonzola and rosemary. Shittttt.
Last year, I got really into making skillet pizzas with my boyfriend, Brad. It's a super decadent cheap and speedy meal. My favorite is a re-creation of this pizza from Piccolo's in Newtown, PA where Brad is from. Get a can of whole San Marzano whole peeled tomatoes. Squish 'em up in a bowl. Start with a little garlic in a pan until it's fragrant, not brown. Then add your squished tomatoes and a couple tablespoons of sugar, a pinch of salt. You want the sauce to be sweet. Simmer for 10-15 minutes until the oil in the pan turns orange. Add some whole fresh basil leaves, let them wilt and stir them in. Crisp up your dough for a few minutes on your pizza stone. Take it out, turn the crispy side up, pour that shit all over your pizza. Add some slices of mozzarella and pop it in the oven. It's done when it looks done.
For the record, my dad makes bomb pizza now. He's really awesome at making the dough ever since he started hanging out with the guys at the pizza shop next to his work on his breaks.
3. Sushi - It's rare that I get to eat something that I think actually qualify as sushi. I know that is like the worst, most snobby thing a person could ever say but I really mean it. I don't count rolls as true sushi. In Brooklyn, I order sushi rolls a lot, and a lot of the time (also horrible) I don't trust the fish I'm eating. I make sushi rolls at home too. I take care in where I buy my fish from. But it's still not real sushi. I do it to satisfy a craving that I can't actually afford. To me, real sushi you can't take out. The temperature has to be controlled, you have to eat it right there. A chef who knows his fish and knows exactly how to slice the fish, how to cook and prepare the rice, has to make the sushi. I think that's the main reason I look forward to eating sushi. Eating it is like a special ceremony. Oh, and I've never had seafood that tasted as amazing as it does at a sushi bar.
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This list is hilarious to me because at a glance this list looks like some little 10 year old was like, "Okay, my favorite foods are... those hard shell tacos with cheese and ground beef -- NO LETTUCE!!!!! Pepperoni pizza from Pizza Hut, and california rolls."
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