Chinatown: The Event

Off Canal Street, NY - Somewhere in Manhattan a young woman is cooking furiously a Vietnamese dish or other in her Manhattan-sized kitchen. She loves to cook and she is good at re-creating dishes from her youthful days at home. She loves to eat and share with friends her favorite things. On Sunday, a small group got a taste of T’s largesse.

A party of nine convened at T’s place for dinner after 6:00 PM. We brought wine, watermelon, water---in that order---and lugged those items up to her apartment and then marched those things up to the roof. T brought pillows, blanket, and a beach umbrella to set on the naked roof. The sun was beating down on us at the time as we baked with sangria in hand. The incongruity of our beach set-up on a rooftop of a building against such a dense, urban landscape as Chinatown was matchless. The wind would have taken our beach umbrella into the skies had we not weighed it down.

Alas, wetted with sangria and with our stomachs in knots in anticipation, T brought up stewed pork and eggs, greens sautéed in garlic, and winter melon soup at 7:00. The pork had been stewing for an afternoon in its own juices with choice fatty bits left intact. (The fat was as flavorful as the meat.) The greens came fresh from the neighborhood grocer’s. The winter melon was infused by a broth based on ground pork. I was unaware that watermelon follows well with a bite of stewed pork---sweet chasing salty. The scene was not a vegetarian’s dream. It, in fact, recalled dinner times at home for those who were fortunate to grow up in such traditions.

The sunset came without our noticing. The conversation turned to dating, relationships, and the end of relationships. The night crept up on us at 10:00. The dinner was flawless. The scene was made by the food, the open air, the company.

Call it an urban picnic. Better yet, call a friend who will cook for you.

Photo courtesy of Twannwinn