Eating In Translation

Al Raouche

Winding down our long walk before meeting friends for a group lunch, we reckoned we had room for just one of the two weekend-only hot mezze. Make that one-plus: The side plate of pickles and olives was essential to cutting the richness of lamb brain dressed with olive oil, garlic, and lemon. Also shown: condiments. Untouched by us, but I liked the way they caught the light.

Al Raouche
169 Crooks Ave. (at Getty Ave.), Paterson, New Jersey
973-279-5131
www.Facebook.com/AlRaoucheRestaurant
Closed Tuesday

Ameer Bakery

In late morning, still warm from the oven: a Palestinian pie with the salty allure of organic Nabulsi cheese (comped by the owner). This was, in fact, a two-cheese pie; the second was mozzarella.

Ameer Bakery
243 Buffalo Ave. (Columbia-Lehigh Aves.), Paterson, New Jersey
973-998-6444
www.Facebook.com/Ameer-Bakery-Patterson-NJ-105548687556664
Closed Tuesday

Taqueria Brenda Lee

On my first visit to this Mexico City-style taqueria, late on a Saturday afternoon, customers were elbow-to-elbow at the windowside seats; I nosed my way just far enough past the door to witness the rhythmic hand-pressing of tortillas behind the counter. My two tacos al pastor were the bounty of a brief return visit, off-hours. Below: a footed bowl of chiles curtidos (pickled peppers). Show respect.

Taqueria Brenda Lee
359 Monroe St. (at Martha Pl.), Passaic, New Jersey
973-859-0972
(one of several locations)
www.TaqueriaBrendaLee.com

Al-Mazaq Bakery

Bagila (Bah-gee-lah) — in common with North African, Middle Eastern, and Arabian dishes such as rifissa and fatteh — allows for the use of day-old bread to line the serving dish and soak up good flavors. At this Iraqi-American bakery and restaurant, the bread is abundant, and so some of that morning's batch lined a bowl mounded with fava beans (the namesake bagila) and, for good measure, scrambled eggs. Another hefty round of bread, folded in two, arrived at its side. Translation: leftovers after all.

Also shown: gaymar, a sort of clotted cream drizzled with what our waitress identified as black honey, and kahi, gaymar's companion bread, tenuously clinging to crispness despite a shallow pool of syrup. These we finished.

H/T Peter Cuce, Bao and Butter Blog

Al-Mazaq Bakery
46 East Railway Ave. (Kentucky-Iowa Aves.), Paterson, New Jersey
862-239-9444
www.Facebook.com/مخبز-و-مطعم-المذاق-العراقي-Al-Mazaq-Bakery-Restaurant-1772278093034471
(Note: This post is based on a visit before Ramadan; call ahead to confirm the current menu and hours.)

Libby's Lunch

(This venue is closed.) Partial eclipse of vanilla shake by chocolate malted.

Libby's Lunch
98 McBride Ave. (near Wayne Ave.), Paterson, New Jersey
973-278-8718
www.Facebook.com/pg/OfficialLibbysLunch

Somos Tu Perú

Homey, rib-sticking fare: cau-cau, patasca, carapulcra ($8-$10 each). Cau-cau is an Afro-Peruvian potato stew that traditionally features tripe; turmeric provides the color. Patasca, a hominy soup of pre-Columbian origins, is even heavier with off-cuts; our bowl boasted oxtail, cow foot, and tripe from at least two stomach chambers.

By some accounts carapulcra, which also dates to the Incan empire, was first prepared with llama; most recipes now use pork. But the potatoes — small Andean specimens freeze-dried in the open air, thereafter called papa seca or chuño, and incorporated in a peanut sauce — are unchanged.

Somos Tu Perú
94 Market St. (Main-Cianci Sts.), Paterson, New Jersey
862-264-6555
Also at 270 Union Ave. (Preakness-Edmund Aves.)
973-942-5400
www.Facebook.com/pg/SomossTuPeru

Carnaval Ayacuchano

Yes, it was the most prosaic, but at this celebration of the culture of southern Peru, the first of these meats was also my favorite. Shown: a lamb-and-goat combo, beef heart (stewed with potato, not skewered as anticuchos), and cuy (fried rather than spit-roasted). The beans were very good, too.

Carnaval Ayacuchano
Outdoors at 47 Godwin St., Paterson, New Jersey
www.Facebook.com/Carnaval-Ayacuchano-USA-192898367417549
(The 2017 festival was held on August 6)

Dulcemente Peruano

Pudding on pudding: rice atop cinnamon-scented, pineapple-chunked mazamorra morada ($4). The latter pudding is made from Peruvian purple corn, also the foundation for chicha morada.

Dulcemente Peruano
73 Market St. (Cianci-Mill Sts.), Paterson, New Jersey
973-553-2780

Pampa Bakery

Ice pops, housemade from fruit or fruit pulp, sugar, water, and (often) milk, are a common sideline at Peruvian bakeries and snack shops. This one ($1.50) was flavored by lucuma, a fruit native to the Pacific Coast of South America that tastes like maple, or maybe butterscotch.

Mine was more dense and chewy than icy and drippy; even on a hot afternoon I was able to snip the tied-off plastic bag and peel it back without making a mess. (At least at first. A gradual approach that exposes only the business end, bit by bit, is more prudent.) Still a mystery to me: Why Peruvian ice pops are best-known as marcianos — Martians.

Pampa Bakery
52 Market St. (Mill-Cianci St.), Paterson, New Jersey
973-345-4223

Panaderia La Sultana

Only a few Colombian shops do business along the lower end of Paterson, New Jersey's Main St., near the border with Clifton, a district better known for doner kebab and baba ghanoush than for pan de bono. Just this one, to my knowledge, pays homage by name to its Turkish and Middle Eastern neighbors. ("Sultana" also suggests that the owner is a woman.)

Pork-friendly Colombian items, of course, are no enticement to passers-by who keep halal, but housemade cremas might be. In Jackson Heights, these ice pops are generally known as helados; in the Tremont section of the Bronx, a Puerto Rican rarity called limber fills the same market niche. To free the crema from its plastic cup, roll it back and forth between your hands as if you're hatching a plot. Once the surface has been slightly warmed, the crema can be loosed and resheathed as necessary. Shown: a guanabana go-cup on a stick ($1).

Panaderia La Sultana
907 Main St. (Elk-Robert Sts.), Paterson, New Jersey
973-742-7078