Eating In Translation

Kubel's

This rustic bar-restaurant up near Barnegat Lighthouse always seems to have a wait at dinnertime; service is all-business. Clams on the half-shell (half-dozen; $6.25) were good 'n' briny, if on the smallish side. Kubel's crab pie ($17.95) — "an old-fashioned pot pie" with cole slaw and an indifferent baked potato — was adequately filled with shreds of crab but was nothing special otherwise. Mom and my brother, Jer, each did better the sweet, locally caught Barnegat Light sea scallops ($18.25) topped with seasoned bread crumbs and a "lemon buerre blanc sauce"; my cousin Jim enjoyed his "jumbo shrimp stuffed with our crab imperial" ($16.95). For dessert, I took our server's suggestion and ordered my peach cobbler ($5.25) a la mode; turned out very heavy on the vanilla ice cream, light on the cobbler.

Kubel's
7th St. and Bayview Ave., Barnegat Light, New Jersey
609-494-8592

Martinez Grocery

Goya mandarin orange soda (12 fl. oz.; $1) was unexceptional but pleasant, like the grocery itself.

Martinez Grocery
928 Columbus Ave. (105th-106th Sts.)

La Embajada

(This venue is closed.) There's never a full house at The Embassy these days; in the window, only one of the two rotisseries was doing its work with the pollo al carbon. It's still lively enough for a lunchtime snack: a number of people seemed to be enjoying their big meal of the day, entertained by tunes on the jukebox and the Yankees game on the TV.

My snack was a lighter meal than I intended; my "avocado salad" turned out to be no more than chunks of avocado, which I dressed with oil and salt. Just $1, though, not the listed $2.50, so perhaps there was some miscommunication. A batido de trigo (wheat shake) wasn't available today; avena, china, and leche (oats, orange juice, and milk; $3.50) was well-blended, yet it still had a slightly grainy taste. Nice, for a half-inning.

La Embajada
953 Amsterdam Ave. (106th-107th Sts.)
212-663-3441

Fuji

(This venue is closed.) This grocery also prepares sushi and a limited menu of cooked items — though not often, lately, judging by the sullenness of the fellow behind the register. From the limited packaged-food selection I bought a Golden Sound brand basil seed drink with honey (350 ml.; $1.50); it's a little sweeter, and less odd-tasting, than the DeDe version of this drink I found in Jersey City.

Fuji
227 Sullivan St. (Bleecker-West 3rd Sts.), Manhattan
212-674-5242

Peanut Butter & Co.

(This venue is closed.) An "Elvis" sandwich ($6.50) consisted of peanut butter, bananas, and honey on white bread, grilled (well, toasted, anyway), with potato chips and three carrot sticks on the side. I chose smooth peanut butter over chunky at my server's suggestion, and I left the crusts on, but I felt that I took more care in ordering my sandwich than the kitchen did in preparing it. In fact, at about 8:00., mine was the last sandwich of the day; though ostensibly Peanut Butter& Co. serves till at least 9:00, customers who followed me discovered that they were "out of bread."

Peanut Butter & Co.
240 Sullivan St. (Bleecker-West 3rd Sts.), Manhattan
212-677-3995

Picnic

(This venue is closed.) After a rainstorm brought down the heat and humidity from insufferable to tolerable, I was willing to consider Picnic's Wednesday-only special of choucroute garnie ("dressed sauerkraut"; $22): potatoes, fatty ham, one thin beef Frankfurt sausage, and a couple of slices of some much thicker and paler sausage. All of this was nestled among sauerkraut cooked with caraway seeds and something on the rich and oily side, perhaps pork fat. Juniper berries are traditional, too, according to Jeffrey Steingarten; I may have overlooked them. You won't need an appetizer.

Choucroute garnie is similar to a Slovak dish I still enjoy every so often at family get-togethers; usually kielbasa serves as the single meat, and mushrooms and prunes as the "dressing." (Family lore has it that this dish is better, and more "potent," on the second day, after it's sat out on the porch the night before.)

Tonight I took my meal to go — Picnic seems to do a lot of takeaway business — but the cafe and the few seats outside are perfectly serviceable.

Picnic
2665 Broadway (101st-102nd Sts.)
212-222-8222

Health Nuts

Expansive health-food store with a little café seating. A "rainforest mix" ($3.78 per pound) of dried tropical fruits like banana, pineapple, papaya, and some of their more-temperate cousins like apricots and raisins, was about what you'd expect.

Health Nuts
2611 Broadway (98th-99th Sts.)

Haagen-Dazs

On a 90-degree-plus day, how can Haagen-Dazs be cleaning out the blenders at 10 p.m.? Shortchanged of the root beer float I really wanted, I made do with a scoop of vanilla chocolate chip in a cone ($2.95). Interesting technical challenge: Set up a taste test against a nice stracchiatella gelato under field conditions (that is, outdoors) before the samples go all runny.

Haagen-Dazs
2905 Broadway (113th-114th Sts.)
(one of many locations)

Westerly Health Foods

Voluminous store, much larger and easier to navigate than Gary Null's Uptown Whole Foods, yet with a supermarket feel. No staffed deli counter, either; why would someone who insists on a fat-free, dairy-free, meat-free sandwich buy one pre-wrapped in Saran?

Palapa Azul paleta ("Blue Palm Hut" brand frozen fruit bar), Mexican papaya (4 fl. oz.; $1.29). Seemed a more exotic variety than mango, strawberry, or watermelon, but it had little flavor other than that "fuzziness" I find in papaya, and even more with persimmon. I'll see from the box, though, that Palapa Azul also makes a paleta in cucumber-chile...

Westerly Health Foods
911 Eighth Ave. (at 54th St.)
212-586-5262

Julian's

(This venue is closed.) Sleek-looking restaurant that may well be packed for pre-theater meals; today the kind of place that "looks good enough" for an informal lunch.

Complementary foccacia with an eggplant dip was OK. Many of the gummy orrecchiete in my lunch special ($8.95) were nested together, but the spicy sausage had a good charred taste; broccoli rabe and garlic added a nice tang.

My glass of iced tea (included) tasted like some commercial flavored variety (I'd guess peach). Polite, professional service.

Julian's
802 Ninth Ave. (53rd-54th Sts.)
212-262-4800