Eating In Translation

Strohmeyer & Arpe Co.

The copper letters above the entrance memorialize an importer of food products, founded in 1882, that was successful enough by 1909 to commission these bespoke premises. Among the company's imported brands, according to a 1939 photo, were Umberto Olive Oil and Marie Elisabeth Sardines.

That period photo also includes a name still visible today: "SAPCO BUILDING." (It was the sight of that name, faintly visible even from a distance, that led me here in the first place.) The meaning of S and A are clear enough: The first is for Frederick Gottfried Strohmeyer, the company's founder, the second, for Herman Arpe, who seems to have been employed by Strohmeyer from the start and who made partner around 1895. P surely honors Col. Gustav Porges, who joined the firm as partner after World War I, "fresh from his assignment as General "Black Jack" Pershing's chief food procurement officer." Although almost universally slighted in online accounts, the colonel does receive his due on the Strohmeyer website — a century later, the company, now based in New Jersey, is still a going concern.

Strohmeyer & Arpe Co.
Surviving signage, 139-141 Franklin St. (at Varick St.), Manhattan

Rabbits' Run Farm

The pawpaw been called "the best-tasting, biggest American fruit you probably haven’t tasted." Until a few days ago, I hadn't, either. A few fruiting trees do grow within the five boroughs of New York City, their locations kept secret by those in the know. These ($5 per pound), the bounty of a chance Greenmarket encounter, hailed from Pennsylvania, where the season will run another three, maybe four weeks, according to the farmer.

When the skin yields easily to light pressure, the golden flesh — typical for a member of the custard apple family — has a spoonable, fetchingly creamy texture. Don't dig into the skin or suck the flesh too avidly from the 10 to 12 almond-sized seeds; both are inedible. Chilled, the ripe fruit is easier to slice open and less messy to eat, but at room temperature, the mango-banana aroma and flavor are more pronounced, more becoming.

Rabbits' Run Farm
Quakertown, Pennsylvania
215-536-1161
At the St. George Greenmarket, St. Mark's Pl. at Hyatt St., Staten Island
Saturday only
www.GrowNYC.org/greenmarket/staten-island/saint-george

Helsinki Street Eats

In recent years, the chef at this afternoon event told me, Mexican cuisine has begun to win fans in Helsinki, Finland. Traditional ingredients, he also noted, are understandably hard to come by. His measured response: Fish tacos that forsake Baja for the Baltic, not only in their resemblance to Nordic open sandwiches but also for their marriage of smoked bluefish (shown in the first photo) with smoked trout. The tortillas, fashioned from parsnips and dill as well as corn, were generously brushed with butter before being warmed on the grill. Dressings included beet salsa, dill guacamole, and Skagen crema — named for a coastal town in Denmark where midsummer temperatures regularly climb into the mid-60s. For the Finns, that's practically beach weather.

Helsinki Street Eats
139 Charles St. (Washington-Greenwich Sts.), Manhattan
www.NordicFoodFestival.org/sessions/helsinki-street-eats-helyeah
(Helsinki Street Eats was held on September 25, 2015, as part of the annual, multiday North Food Festival)

Sadelle's

Sweet, petite: sticky buns ($3 each).

Sadelle's
463 West Broadway (Houston-Prince Sts.), Manhattan
212-254-3000
www.Sadelles.com
Closed Monday

Packsun Halal Chicken

You're unlikely to encounter mustard oil, which hums through many Bangladeshi dishes like low-wattage horseradish, at this brand-new business from the owner of Neerob. The menu is geared toward a general audience, and the South Asian touches are subtle. Note the raw onion, for example, in the salad that accompanied a lip-smackingly grilled chicken sandwich (comped for me).

Only a handful of items — "lollipop" chicken, a whole fried fish, and a box of "Desi spicy" chicken wings (with biscuits!) — hinted at the exotic when Packsun first opened. Since then the restaurant has expanded its South Asian repertoire, but, if you desire truly to be transported by the cuisine of Bangladesh, Neerob awaits you again, only a short walk away.

Packsun Halal Chicken
2160 Westchester Ave. (Castle Hill-Olmstead Aves.), Unionport, Bronx
718-822-8777

Regina Cafe & Pizzeria

A rebus is a compact means of delivering a message in pictorial form. Some rebuses must be puzzled out, but to attract passers-by, a telegraphic image such as "two slices" would seem to be more effective. Like the other examples cited below, this signboard doesn't dispense with text altogether. The green lettering helps to visually separate the oversized "2" and "5"; the recessive type in the lower right corner ensures that the tax man gets his due.

Previous rebuses:
Hakata TonTon
Kam Fung Wong Chicken Market
Bo Bo Poultry
Phatty Beef Burgers

Regina Cafe & Pizzeria
176-49 Union Tpk. (at Utopia Pkwy.), Utopia, Queens
718-591-5727
www.ReginaCafePizza.com

Sunset Park Fifth Avenue Street Festival

Street fairs and green foods generally keep a respectful distance. This pepino loco ($10) is a rare exception, though the namesake "crazy cucumber" is so well-doused by bright red chamoy, a Mexican salty-sour-spicy-sweet sauce, that little green can be seen.

More maddening than the messy sauce, which also stains slivers of mango and jicama and a small fistful of peanuts, is that the cucumber is still in one piece. The upright wedges, and the peels that drape over the rim of the cup, are still firmly connected deep down under the surface of the accumulated chamoy. Your only tools to free them are an oversized toothpick, a flimsy plastic fork — and your teeth. Go that route, and things really get crazy.

For a pepino loco on a non-festival day, visit Nieves Tia Mimi. For more photos, see the EIT page on Facebook.

Sunset Park Fifth Avenue Street Festival
Fifth Ave. between 44th and 59th Sts., Sunset Park, Brooklyn
www.Facebook.com/SunsetParkBID/photos/pcb.883171218403482/883170211736916
(The 2015 festival was held on September 20)

2nd City Beef

For some true believers, an Italian beef sandwich can never be too wet. The beef is slowly roasted, sliced thin, deposited in a spicy, garlic-enhanced broth made from the roast drippings, and simmered. When finally the beef is heaped on the bread, a ladle's worth of liquid invariably comes along.

Before relish is added — sometimes sweet peppers, for me a spicier giardiniera — a native Chicagoan would probably have the whole thing dunked in the broth. "Wet," in such case, is a term of art that reportedly signals restraint; "soaked" puts the bread to the test. (Compare this torta ahogada, "drowned" in a spicy sauce.) My sandwich ($10) simply received the pour-over treatment, which was plenty messy enough — especially when I swabbed the caddy to clean up the last of the liquid pooled at the bottom. Next time, one more ladle.

2nd City Beef
212-847-0304
www.2ndCityBeef.com
At Viva La Comida, 82nd St. south of Roosevelt Ave., Elmhurst, Queens
www.VivaLaComida.com
(The 2015 festival was held on September 19)

Lulu's Bakery

For the novelty I tried Nutella ($2.10) rather than a more traditional hamentash. (It won't supplant my favorites.) After I'd placed my order, the counterwoman asked a follow-up, several times, that I couldn't make out (her accent, my ears) until a younger colleague stepped in. She pointed out a distinction within the batch that's easier to see, from this photo, if you compare the two flavors. The first counterwoman had been asking if I wanted a "well done" hamentash — I took mine "light," thank you.

Lulu's Bakery
185-26 Union Tpk. (Chevy Chase-188th Sts.), Fresh Meadows, Queens
718-454-4300
www.LulusBakeryShop.com

Armenian Church of the Holy Martyrs Street Festival

This was not the last of the kataif: A few moments later, the ladies at the pastry station brought out another cinnamon-scented tray that had been held in reserve. While not a time for panic, this was a time for action — a chance to get not only an extra-crunchy corner but also all the loose scrapings that otherwise would go to waste.

Armenian Church of the Holy Martyrs Street Festival
Outside the Church of the Holy Martyrs, 209-15 Horace Harding Expy. (at Oceania St.), Bayside, Queens
www.Facebook.com/events/1472985522997055
(The 2015 festival was held on September 12)