Eating In Translation

What's Eating In Translation?

This website began as a collection of field notes on interesting food I'd tried, or planned to try, in and around New York. Since its launch, in January 2005, I've visited thousands of venues, from white-linen restaurants to elbows-on-the-table eateries, as well as street vendors, fairs, festivals, grocers, and greenmarkets — and my "to eat" list is longer than ever.

Haitian sweets table

The lady who prepared this tablet noix, Haitian cashew brittle, says she is on hand "every day" (by afternoon and only in clement weather, I imagine). Her tiny sidewalk table also affords room, just barely, for similar confections featuring peanut and coconut.

Haitian sweets table
South side of Church Ave. near East 19th St., Prospect Park South, Brooklyn

Hunan Suofen

The server mentioned twice, with a question in her eyes, that these hot and sour green beans with minced pork were "spicy," and twice I reassured her that this was fine. The sourness, in fact, was much more pronounced; a one-to-one ratio of main dish to white rice was about right. Note that the wall menu (shown below) offers the translation "hot & sour chicken giblets rice"; the characters 酸豆角肉末盖饭 more readily identify this classic dish.

Hunan Suofen (branded, on the premises, only as 湖南嗦粉)
13621 Roosevelt Ave. (Main-Union Sts., inside the Landmark Quest Mall, "the same place as Joe's Steam Rice Roll"), Flushing, Queens
929-391-4633
www.Instagram.com/HunanSuofen

Jacqueline's Bakery

Faced with a display of "Colombiano," Dominicano," and "Ecuatoriano" items, I chanced a small investment in "rugalos," but two-for-a-dollar guayavitas were more in the baker's sweet spot. Also shown: a Manhattan-bound 6 train pulling in, two stations to the west.

Jacqueline's Bakery
1579 Westchester Ave. (at Manor Ave.), Soundview, Bronx
718-542-6177
http://Jacquelines-Bakery.edan.io

Johnson's BBQ

Like the lines of a coloring book, the partitions of a takeout container are sometimes just a suggestion. For my chicken dinner, collard greens and mac 'n' cheese blanketed the base, then were crowned by a fried half-bird dressed in mustard sauce. Dinner, and then some. Also shown: chicken 'n' mac in miniature; a coconut-flecked slice of Stayceecake blackout cake.

Johnson's BBQ
790 East 163rd St. (Union-Tinton Aves.) Woodstock, Bronx
914-439-6187
www.JohnsonsBBQBX.com
Closed Monday

F.W. Woolworth & Co.

Site of a lunch counter, too? For pointing me this way, thanks to the Facebook group Ghost Signs.

F.W. Woolworth & Co.
Surviving signage, 2226 Third Ave. (at East 121st St.), Manhattan