Old Classics and New Favorites in The Strip

UPDATE 12/27/09: We went to the strip to stock up on some goodies before Christmas, and we were happy to find some new street fare. A stand was set up outside of Reyna's Mexican Groceria (corner of Penn and 21st), and the vendor was offering tacos and burritos. Either could be filled with shredded chicken, steak, shrimp, pork, or veal tongue. We had tacos - chicken for me, veal tongue for my husband - and they were great. The filling and soft corn tortilla were heated on a griddle, and they were piled on top of each other, along with an arsenal of toppings: queso fresco, lime juice, lettuce, salsa, and onion. Additional sauces were available - chipotle and salsa verde. I used the chipotle sauce, and it added some nice heat to the taco. The man behind us got a shrimp taco, and it looked very good. The shrimp was chopped as it was being heated, and rice was an additional topping to the taco. Lucy was no where in sight, so I fear that she really is gone. But, the taco stand offers some hope that my hungry heart will heal.

ORIGINAL POST: For those of you who aren't familiar with Pittsburgh, "The Strip District" is a mile-long stretch of the city full of old industrial warehouses turned into food wholesalers and an eclectic mix of food markets and odd shops. My husband and I go there often, and we are continually drawn to same stores to shop in and foods to snack on. However, on a recent trip, we discovered some new (to us) gems.

The first of many pleasant surprises came as we went to enjoy and old classic. Lucy Nguyen is a Vietnamese street vendor who has been grilling her bahn mi, or Vietnamese hoagies, outside of the My Ngoc restaurant for over a decade. Literally everytime we go to the strip, we make sure to enjoy one of the hoagies. The bahn mi is made on a Breadworks baguette, cut in front of you so that you can watch the knife break through the crusty outside before gliding through the fluffy inside. Lucy then takes marinated and grilled chicken or pork straight from the skewer, cuts it into strips, and places it on the bread. The chicken, which we usually get, is moist and flavorful, and the sandwich would be outstanding even at that point. However, this is when the real fun begins. Lucy tops the chicken or pork with pickled carrots, sliced onions, fresh peppers (chilies and or jalapenos), cucumbers, and chopped cilantro. The cherry on top, so to speak, is a brown sweet and spicy glaze/sauce. The sandwich is bursting with flavor, and the heat from the peppers is perfectly balanced with the sweet of the sauce, the cool of the cilantro and cucumber, and the starch from the bread. As you can probably tell from the description, I get pretty excited about this sandwich. If I were a man, I would say that this sandwich gives me a culinary boner. (Can women have culinary boners? I guess we'll save that for a different blog...)

I was so excited to dig into the sandwich that I almost walked right by the bowl of pyramid-shaped-and-banana-leaf-wrapped goodies. Once it registered that there might by something else besides the sandwich to eat, we gave an inquisitive look to each other and to the other vendor standing near Lucy. The other woman, whose name I regretfully did not get (it was hard to effectively communicate with the food in my mouth and the saliva on my chin), told us that the bowl was full of snacks she made, which have pork, beans, and sticky rice inside. As if on cue from a promoter, a woman walked up to the bowl and asked for ten of the pyramids, mentioning that she eats two of them for lunch everyday. She was stocking up for the week. We couldn't resist, so we got two of the surprise pyramids as well. The banana leaves on the outside were tied together with a twine-like leaf, so we snipped the outside leaf and opened the package like the beautiful present that it was. All that was visible once opened was the rice, glossy and tinted green from the leaves. We dug in, and the next thing I remember was looking up at my husband, who had also just finished his pyramid, and seeing that goofy grin that emerges when he eats something that makes him happy. We were sold. Inside the layer rice, which is perfectly sticky but not at all mushy, was a layer of pureed beans we both thought to be garbanzos, then a layer of ground pork. There is a spicy kick from somewhere, and it too is balanced well with the earthiness of the rice. We can't decide if the pyramids are boiled or steamed, but we likened them to a Hue Com Sen. Whatever the case, we were so pleasantly surprised to find this new gem nestled amongst an old staple. If you can make it to the Strip on a Saturday (the only day the pyramids are available, though Lucy is a Monday - Saturday vendor), stop in for one (or more) of each.

Also new to us on our recent visit was the Slow Food (http://www.slowfoodpgh.com)/tasting tent/demonstration at the Farmers' Market. The Farmers' Market (Farmers@Firehouse) always holds some true treats, but this week we were lucky enough to stumble upon Bill Fuller, executive chef of the Big Burrito Group, using ingredients available at the market that day to cook up (and more importantly to hand out samples of) some delicious dishes. Chef Fuller , with the help of a local queen of the foodies, Virginia Phillips, made some amazing frittatas, using some raw milk goat cheese and heirloom peppers from the market. He also sauteed some homemade bacon, cured from a pork belly he got from a local butcher. To be more specific, the bacon was from the belly of a whole pig he got from a local butcher. (Note: the goodness that was the homemade bacon is too much an undertaking at this juncture, and will have to be addressed in a later, pork-inspired posting. For know, just know that it was so amazing that I cannot even begin to describe it.)We also stuck around for some sauteed chanterelles and Swiss chard, again, from the market, and were happy we did. Not only was the demonstration fun and informative, but the food was delicious and inspirational. The Farmers' Market is a definite stop on the list sans samples, but if you are lucky enough to catch one in progress, be sure to stop by, give generously to the donation bucket, and taste some dishes made from the best of the in-season local ingredients.

The third and final exciting find of the day for us was the Greek fare outside of Penn Mac. The food we know and love from Little Athens in Sewickley was suddenly available from a sidewalk vendor in the Strip. Was this some kind of bizarro world? A food-high induced mirage? We knew the answer as soon as the smell hit our noses. We also recognized the street vendors as the owners of the restaurant. This was the real deal, and we were going to have to suck it up and eat some more. As mentioned, we were familiar with the food, and were already big fans. But, seeing them in the middle of the Strip was a little like seeing your kindergarten teacher anywhere outside the classroom. Getting over the shock, we got a custard pastry. I am sure there is a Greek name for it, but I'm not aware of it. If I knew the Greek word for heaven I would just as soon use that to refer to it. Both the dough and the custard were made that morning, and the love and time that I am sure went into it became blatantly obvious once we bit into it. Also available from this vendor were gyros, spanakopita, moussaka, and baklava, all of which were being thoroughly enjoyed by other Strip-goers.

We went home, happy and fat, still reeling from the new goodies our old friend The Strip District had introduced us to that morning.