Eating In Translation

Nussbaum & Wu

(This venue is closed.) A black-and-white cookie with a soft texture and creamy frosting is part of New York's culinary core curriculum, but you might want to take an elective like this, too. On most days, Nussbaum & Wu prepares two-tone cookies, draped in fondant atop a thin lemony cakelike base, in black-and-white, black-and-mocha, and mocha-and-white. Themed color combos appear at holidays and on other special occasions — say, to welcome back the local student body after a summer out of town. The nontraditional half of this Columbia blue-and-white ($2.95) is faintly, refreshingly minty.

Nussbaum & Wu
2897 Broadway (at 113th St.), Manhattan
212-280-5344

Delicias de Minas

My dining buddy and I should have known better. The all-you-can-eat buffet ($22.99), so beguiling when we arrived shortly after noon, was cause for regret when the rest of our day's culinary exploration was shortchanged. A single plate, at the by-the-pound price, would have been wiser: My dutiful heap of shredded collard greens would still have left ample room for shrimp, bacon-wrapped chicken, and feijão tropeiro, "cattleman's beans" (first photo, lower left corner) that are a specialty of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. In typical fashion, this Mineiran restaurant garnishes them generously with fried pork rind.

Also shown: from my second plateful (or was it the third?), a picked-apart chunk of "sun beef," one of many cuts of meat from the buffet's busy rodizio station; abobora com coco. The all-you-can-eat option also includes a choice of more than 20 desserts (otherwise a la carte, $4-$5 each). In brisk autumn weather, this pumpkin preserve with coconut might taste even better.

Delicias de Minas
168 McWhorter St. (at Garden St.), Newark, New Jersey
973-589-1920
www.DeliciasDeMinasRestaurant.com

Experience Thailand

(Updated with additional photos.) Khanom foy thong is prepared much like street-fair funnel cakes and South Asian jalebi, but with more-delicate results.

Portuguese American Deli

Things that say "Portugal": sun-faded stripes, in national green and red, to the left of the entrance. A short stack of Portuguese-language newspapers, on the ledge inside the window, side-by-side with the New York tabloids. Jars of honey and bottle of olive oil imported from the old country, and lupini beans packaged in New Bedford, Massachusetts, a magnet for Portuguese immigrants since the whaling days of the 19th century. And presunto, a dry-cured ham, which like all the sandwich meats can be served on a hero — but why would you pass up a Portuguese roll ($4.50)?

Portuguese American Deli
220-17 Jamaica Ave. (220th-221st Sts.), Queens Village, Queens
718-464-8321
www.AllMenus.com/ny/queens-village/364199-portuguese-american-deli/menu

Nasto's Ice Cream

Everyone from Newark knows Nasto's, fictional mobsters included. In the Sopranos episode "Down Neck" — the reference is to a neighborhood, hugged tight by a curve of the Passaic River, better-known today as the Ironbound — Tony flashes back to a childhood memory. His father, "Johnny Boy" Soprano, is arrested one afternoon, under circumstances the young son is only beginning to understand, then returns home that evening, unruffled. "I stopped at Nasto's," Tony's father tells him, "got you some cherry vanilla."

Cherry vanilla is still a regular in the rotation, one in a lengthy list of ice creams, sorbetti, gelati, Italian ices, and sherbets. Over the intervening decades, as the old neighborhood has changed, new ice cream flavors have found their way into the mix: mamey and guava, green tea and red bean, dulce de leche and sweet corn (shown). True, these newer flavors part ways with tradition — but if young Tony liked corn on the cob, he would have enjoyed this corn in a cup, too.

Nasto's Ice Cream
236 Jefferson St. (at East Kinney St.), Newark, New Jersey
973-589-3333
www.NastosIceCream.com

La Sorrentina Pizza & Restaurant

At one time, no doubt, this was an Italian-American pizzeria. When I first passed this way some years ago, it was doing business as Roma Pizza Restaurant (a name still lettered on the windows), but a hand-drawn list of specials signaled a change in ownership. Many of these newer items have been codified on the menu, though in a section of their own, separated from the more traditional fare just as the middle flag out front is set apart from its neighbors. Nowadays, you can order chaulafan, and you can order pizza, but you can't get an Ecuadorian-fried-rice pizza. Perhaps that's just as well — but the possibility of a churrasco, fritada, or carne asada pie might be worth asking about.

La Sorrentina Pizza & Restaurant
245 Adams St. (Nichols-East Kinney Sts.), Newark, New Jersey
973-465-9555
Closed Tuesday

Groceries, liquor & segars

The spelling is odd, and at least two centuries old: It figured in the title of an 1802 satirical print published in London. In New York, an 1846 directory identified 273 proprietors whose business included the word "segar," a mere 21 that mentioned "cigar." For reasons unclear, the phonetic spelling gradually fell out of favor over the course of the 19th century.

The premises shown here date to 1810. The initials "G.H." (date and full name unknown) appear above the left-hand door, whose slot for "lettres" is painted shut; following that pointed finger won't get you far. For the current bar-restaurant, take the door to the right — but no smoking, please.

Groceries, liquor & segars
Surviving signage, Tiny's, 135 West Broadway (Thomas-Duane Sts.), Manhattan
212-374-1135
www.TinysNYC.com

Eve of the West Indian Day Parade

A dazzling bill of fare, prepared and served primarily by vendors who rarely do business except on special occasions, is a highlight of the annual West Indian Day Parade. Each Labor Day, the parade and its accompanying street-food bonanza blanket some two miles of Eastern Pkwy., in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

The night before, from Sunday until the wee hours of Monday, an unofficial pre-parade event occupies several blocks of Utica Ave. just south of Eastern Pkwy., at the eastern end of the parade route. It's an early opportunity to procure a flag, or hat, or bandana, or what-have-you in the national colors of a dozen Caribbean nations. It's also an early opportunity to chow down on jerk chicken (above), grilled corn, bags of guineps and sliced mangos, a vinegary serving of cow-foot souse (below), and various gaily colored snow cones and fruit drinks, some of them not entirely street legal. The more exotic items are available only on the day of the parade, but this evening event is less sweltering and much less crowded, too.

Eve of the West Indian Day Parade
Vicinity of Utica Ave. and Eastern Pkwy., Crown Heights, Brooklyn
(The 2015 festivities took place on September 6-7)

Rise-and-shine signboards

Even if you don't read Chinese, you can spot a familiar face on the first signboard. This depiction of the sun, a circle surrounded by radiating lines, is so widely understood that even a half-circle, as on the second signboard, can suffice.

In context, the second sign clearly shows a sunrise and not a sunset. I can't pin down why that's equally apparent for the first sign, which advertises a modestly appointed Dongbei (Northeast Chinese) restaurant. Perhaps it's the smile. I needed a moment to identify the stylized characters that follow: 早点, "zǎodiǎn," "breakfast."

Note also that this photo illustrates one peril of insufficient morning coffee: an inadvertent waist-down self-portrait.

Rise-and-shine signboards
First photo: Tieling Restaurant
46-24 Kissena Blvd. (Juniper-Kalmia Aves.), Flushing, Queens
347-732-4199
www.TielingFlushing.com
Second photo: Tiny's
135 West Broadway (Thomas-Duane Sts.), Manhattan
212-374-1135
www.TinysNYC.com

Rubel Coal & Ice Corporation

From 1928, see this exuberant announcement of the headquarter building's construction and a handful of rather more modest photos of the interior.

Rubel Coal & Ice Corporation
Surviving signage, 937 Fulton St. (at Waverly Ave.), Clinton Hill, Brooklyn