Eating In Translation

Orchid Tea Cafe

"Photos for illustration purposes only." I'd bet that you've read words to this effect, on more than one menu, disclaiming responsibility for the appearance of dishes that might not live up to their depictions. You could argue that the picture menu at this Cantonese cafe — drawn by hand, torn from a sketchbook, and taped up beside the counter — is an effort to underpromise, so the kitchen will be sure to overdeliver. I'd frame matters a little differently: The hand-sketched eel rice charmed me, and the real eel rice delighted me.

Orchid Tea Cafe (where a single table and several chairs have replaced the bench)
4602 Seventh Ave. (entrance on 46th St.), Sunset Park, Brooklyn
917-470-8088

Al Afia Sen Teranga

(This venue is closed.) As you might deduce from the half-shuttered storefront, in the current climate this Senegalese kitchen isn't operating at full steam. Only two dishes were on offer, and the customers ahead of me had each walked away with thiebou guinar, joloff rice with chicken, so I gathered that the chef-proprietor was pleased to fill an order of soupe kandja. Her okra stew was well-furnished with chunks of lamb; a few thin bones were the only visible tokens of the fish that deepened the flavor.

Al Afia Sen Teranga
1230 Jerome Ave. (167th-169th Sts.), Concourse, Bronx
718-293-0444

Elysian Fields Cafe

The postal code "Brooklyn 21," on the maker's mark of (L&M) Ellanam Adjustable Forms, dates this "stand-in hostess" to sometime between the early 1940s and the early 1960s. Still serving.

Elysian Fields Cafe
1207 Amsterdam Ave. (119th-120th Sts.), Manhattan
917-388-2191
www.ElysianFields Cafe.com

WW Cafe

Breakfast egg — preserved egg, with cilantro and scallion, tucked inside a small order of rice rolls.

WW Cafe
968 58th St. (Fort Hamilton Pkwy.-Ninth Ave.), Borough Park, Brooklyn
718-790-3143
www.Instagram.com/WW.Cafe
Morning till midafternoon

Helado de Coco at LuvUms Tropical Ices

LuvUms carries on the tradition made famous by Fabio's Helado de Coco & Tropical Ices, which changed addresses several times over the course of some 30 years before shuttering in 2011. From a recent visit: almond ice.

From a previous visit (and shown below): Spanish vanilla, 西班牙冰淇 (lit. "Spanish ice cream"), mantecado. This much-loved flavor of Dominican shaved ice, embodied here in a richer, more velvety frozen form, speaks a universal language.

Helado de Coco at LuvUms Tropical Ices (shown in 2015)
4716 Seventh Ave. (47th-48th Sts.), Sunset Park, Brooklyn
347-987-3958
www.Facebook.com/HeladoDeCocoLuvUms
Open during the warmer months; the final day of the 2020 season is August 30

Peaches

No pickings, just lookings, since the tree stood in one corner of a private yard. I noticed it only because a pair of fallen peaches had rolled onto the sidewalk, then realized — after taking a photo of the nearest street sign, to document the location — that I'd missed a turn on the walk from Ridgewood to Allendale.

Peaches
By the roadside, Ho-Ho-Kus, New Jersey

Sook Pastry

Unfurled, my brioche revealed more raspberry than I would have believed. My thumb gives a hint; my fingers did, too.

Sook Pastry
24 South Broad St. (at Dayton St.), Ridgewood, New Jersey
201-493-2500
www.SookPastry.com

Mi Espiguita

At the moment, this Mexican taqueria can't offer seats — as illustrated by a customer's impromptu sketch, which still hangs on the back wall — but the counter is still a fine place to stage photos. Eventually my tostadas con pata de cerdo accompanied me outside. Although picking around lots of little bones was a distinct possibility, the chunks of pig's feet on these crispy tortillas were, with one minor exception, bone-free.

Mi Espiguita
3244 31st St. (34th Ave.-Broadway), Astoria, Queens
718-777-5648

Elliniki Agora Fruit & Vegetables

I don't recall ever seeing Long Island fresh sweet "mush melons" for sale. The much more common name for the species, which includes many cultivars, is "muskmelon," owing to the aroma of the mature fruit; "mush," by many accounts, is an old corruption. This particular cultivar, considered in cross-section, you'd probably call a cantaloupe.

Elliniki Agora Fruit & Vegetables
3212 30th Ave. (31st-32nd Sts.), Astoria, Queens
718-728-0751

Taiwan Pork Chop House

The name "taro ball Taiwan ice" only begins to tell the tale. I won't try to identify all the ingredients in this dish (also shown in the first two photos below), or even to enumerate them; I stopped counting at a dozen. Perhaps you'll do better by splitting it with a friend, between two bowls; the portion is huge.

Previously, from visits to the restaurant in its earlier incarnation, as Excellent Pork Chop House: Glad I got the small size of smelt with chili; it's simply too spicy as anything other than a palate awakener between courses. The eponymous pork chop, over rice and a pleasingly sour pairing of ground pork and pickled vegetables, is much more mouth-watering. A friend from Taipei has noted that this restaurant has an older, famous namesake in his hometown, and that the featured item is far better at the original. That has to be some dynamite pork chop, because the version down on Doyers is very good by me. A bespoke bowl of Taiwanese ice featured the muted but tasty trio of taro, dry-roasted peanuts, and condensed milk.

Taiwan Pork Chop House (shown below in 2014)
3 Doyers St. (Pell St.-Bowery), Manhattan
212-791-7007
www.TaiwanPorkChop.com