An Update from New York

Orange wine, bottomless coffee, beautiful apartments, scrubbing counters, earning trust

{The relief of sunsets getting later!}

Hello and happy April! I missed last week’s letter and, although it was for good reason and I can’t imagine that anyone noticed, I felt sad about it! April marks my eighth month of writing these letters, and it’s a ritual that has become ingrained in my life. Throughout my days, I make mental and physical notes of things I might like to write about, and I hunger for the moment that I get to sit with my laptop and turn them into paragraphs to send to you. Writing is an exercise in attention; how will you have anything original to say if you’re not observing closely? When I’m in the practice of writing, I pay much closer attention to my life and consequently find my existence much more interesting than I normally would. Mary Oliver was telling me all along and I didn’t listen! Anyway, here I am, back with my laptop.

My excuse for last week’s lack of letter (not that you demanded one) is that Teo was visiting New York. His cousins just moved from Montana to Connecticut, and he offered to drive their car across the country for them. Teo’s friend Jan, who lives in Boston, flew out to join him for the road trip, and their first shift, from Bozeman, Montana to Hudson, Ohio, took them 26.5 hours. Sounds like a nightmare to me, but they were in shockingly good spirits every time I called to check in. In Hudson, they stayed the night with Larkin, a chef and dear family friend of mine. Upon their arrival, Larkin sent me a picture of the boys eating charcuterie with a bottle of red wine between the three of them, and I melted. It’s the sweetest thing to connect the people you love.

Teo and Jan were ahead of schedule and arrived in New York a day earlier than expected, so they joined me and Bel for our dinner reservation at Hart’s, the sister restaurant of Cervo’s. I wasn’t expecting to have any nights off of work while Teo was here, so it was a nice surprise that he and Jan could come to dinner with us. Our waitress poured us little glasses of sparkling orange wine from Emilia-Romagna as a little welcome gift and treated us to an extra dish when we ordered. Hart’s is a teeny tiny restaurant—only 30 seats—with an ever-evolving menu of Mediterranean-leaning food. I loved the pork milanese with shaved fennel salad and tahini, sprinkled with urfa chili and squeezed with lemon, but I loved it all, truly.

{Before-dinner cocktails at Hart’s}

{The aforementioned milanese, courtesy of the Hart’s Instagram}

I was working for the rest of Teo’s time in New York, so we spent the mornings together, continuing our quest of finding the best diner in our neighborhoods. We discovered early on that we’re both diner freaks, and we have highly specific criteria for the diners where we plan to become regulars:

1. Bottomless coffee. Doesn’t have to be good coffee. You must leave the establishment over-caffeinated and jittery.

2. Booths and bar stools. Is it a diner if you’re not either sitting in a booth or on a bar stool? 

3. Tacky wall adornments.

4. Brusque service.

5. Cash only.

6. Crispity crunchy almost-burnt bacon. 

New Yorkers: with these requirements in mind, we welcome your diner recommendations.

{Waverly Diner, a West Village contender}

I stayed with Teo at his parents’ apartment in the West Village while he was here, although  I didn’t see much of anyone because I got back so late every night. Regardless, it was a treat to have such an easy commute uptown after work, and I always love spending time in their apartment. Teo’s mom Mary is a brilliant architect and painter, and it shows in their space, which is full of art and books and light, grays and blues and orangey-reds. My design sensibility is closely aligned with hers, and was built on a foundation laid by my late grandmother Nancy, whom my brothers and I called Mana. I think about Mana a lot when I'm in spaces designed and decorated by Mary. She was a great love of my life—one of my favorite people to converse with and a talented painter herself, with an elegant design sensibility. We wrote each other letters often, and I so wish she could read these. What a gift for an apartment to invite me to reflect on a person I miss!

{A view from the living room into the dining area of Teo’s parents’ apartment}

{Another view from the living room. The light!}

{The living room my grandma designed for the apartment she and my grandpa moved into later in life}

{A piece by my grandma using the trompe l'œil technique}

As for my work life, all is well except for the state of my hands, which are sore and numb and barely getting me through services. My right hand is particularly bad, which makes sense given that it’s my dominant side and I’m working my hands harder than ever before. I told my chef about it, so he’s going to watch my technique to make sure I’m not aggravating my hands with the way I’m holding my knives or shucking oysters or whatever. I’m going to my doctor today to see what she thinks, and my mom just sent me a brace to wear on my right hand at night to keep it in a good position. I’ll figure it out! It’s not painful, but it’s uncomfortable and makes my job tricky, so I’m hoping to resolve the situation sooner rather than later.

On the bright side, I’ve been feeling really happy and much more confident at work these days. It takes time to earn people’s trust in a restaurant, I’ve realized, and I think I’m starting to get there at Cervo’s. Cooks rely on each other a lot in order to run a successful service, and you can’t be selfish with your energy or your time. Oh, and you absolutely cannot be precious. You’d better believe that I am on my hands and knees at midnight, scrubbing the shit out of every surface in sight. It’s not that anyone was cold to me when I started out, but I feel more and more warmth from my coworkers every day, and I’d like to think that it’s because they’re starting to trust me.

One of the days before Teo got here, a fellow line cook drove me and another cook home to Brooklyn when we got out of work at 12:30 am or so. We blasted The Cure and had the windows wide open so one of them could smoke a cigarette out the window. It was freezing outside and I was only wearing a tank top, but it was just the right temperature after many hours in a hot kitchen. Crossing the Manhattan Bridge with these two people who have already taught me so much about cooking and human-ing, I felt very, very glad to be doing what I’m doing where I’m doing it. For all the money this city swallows, for all the dark under-eye circles and sirens and stenches and subway delays: could there be a better place to learn?

I purposefully made very few plans for this weekend and am blissed out, cooking simple food and writing. I made Adeena Sussman’s Melted Green Cabbage from her cookbook Sababa yesterday, and today it will breathe new life in pasta with parmesan and parsley and olive oil.

All my best to you and yours,

Phoebe

P.S. Send my letters along by copying and pasting this link! All are welcome.