Neat trip report. Thanks.

Terrific report…………….would have loved to be on on your great food day.

Ken and Cora, thanks so much for this report.  Definitely an area I don’t get to very often.  I LOVE anything from Red Jacket!  Many of these places I haven’t heard of so you’ve given me some inspiration.  I’ve been meaning to go to Peter Pan for years now, but it never seems to happen!  My girlfriend’s uncle swears by the lard bread at Napoli.  I am a huge fan of the hot roast beef/mutz sandwiches.  I could probably make a sandwich smackdown report on those alone!  Thanks again!!

Wait a minute. Ken and Cora? What happened to Ken and Laura?? Laura’s my wife, Cora’s my sister, a life long resident of Brooklyn. And last Saturday it was time for a daylong food trip with her to the old old ethnic Brooklyn neighborhoods of Greenpoint and Williamsburg.
 
Greenpoint is still mostly Polish, Williamsburg is still a mix of Old Italians, Hassidic Jews, and Hispanics, but in the past 10 years both Greenpoint and Williamsburg have seen many 20-something hipsters and artists move in, enticed by the relatively cheap rents, funky storefronts, and low crime rates.
 
I parked my car in Greenpoint, near McCarren Park, which is sort of the Central Park of Greenpoint. It’s huge, but truth be told, not very attractive. Just a large flat expanse without many trees, and in this very dry summer, brown grass. But it does have a very busy farmer’s market and that was my first stop. I bought a selection of Apple Juices from the highly regarded Red Jacket Orchard of the Finger Lakes area of Upstate NY. The ice cold juice samples they gave out really hit the spot on this hot dry day. Delicious.
 
http://www.redjacketorchards.com http://www.redjacketorchards.com/
 
Now it was time to start the 5 mile loop walk around Greenpoint that I had mapped out. And time to do some food shopping along Greenpoint’s Main thoroughfare, Manhattan Avenue (so named because you can see across the river to Manhattan in the distance). Along this very busy street, nearly everyone speaks Polish.
 
First stop was the Sikorsky Meat Market, at 603 Manhattan Avenue. Inside, hanging from the racks were at leat 10 different kinds of Kielbasy. I never know what to order when this happens, but after tasting a few samples I settled on one (dam if I remember the name) and some rye bread supplied from the New Warsaw Bakery. Rather than carry Kielbasy around all day in my backpack in 90 degree weather, I doubled back to the car and put this in the cooler, but not before having a Kielbasy and Rye sandwich washed down with Red Jacket Apple/Cherry juice. Outstanding all around!  The rye bread was among the best I have ever had. I would have bought more  than one loaf, but I wasn’t sure how it would hold up in the hot weather until I got it home.
 
Next stop was supposed to be the Peter Pan doughnut shop, at 727 Manhattan Avenue, but I couldn’t bring myself to eat donuts on top of Kielbasy (must be getting old..). But people say these are the best donuts in all of NY City. They sure looked great, and judging by the line waiting to get inside, I guess a lot of people agree.
 
So, on up Manhattan Avenue to the West Nassau Meat Market, at 915 Manhattan Avenue, and here the language barrier couldn’t be overcome. In a very odd, and chaotic set up, this shop has no meat on display, just some pictures of various meats above the counter. You tell them what you want and they bring it out from the back. And I wanted thier hot dogs. I thought “Hot Dog” was a universal word, but apparently not in Polish. I actually finally gave up after being offered just about every cured meat in the world except hot dogs.
 
At this point my sister called and said she’d meet me a few blocks away for lunch (she was coming from her neighborhood by bus) at the Polish Slavic Center Cafeteria at 177 Kent Street. Here we hit another snafu, it was closed for a private function. Exactly what that private function was I’m not sure, since all the signs were in Polish and once again nobody spoke English.
 
So we decided to walk back to the car and have some more of that Kielbasy and Rye as a picnic in McCarren Park  , and then drive up to where we left off on the walking tour (Finding parking was much easier than I thought it would be so I felt free to drive around instead of being locked t,29,600402,0,17177,70.111.25.112
600401,591145,600399,2010-07-17 21:44:25.993000000,Re:Homemade Pizza”

Thanks so much for your report. The mozz lady, especially, sounds like someone I’d like to visit.

My dad grew up in Brooklyn and we’ve talked about heading there and doing something similar – thanks for the great story.

I have some of Brooklyn Brewery’s products and as good as the packaged versions were I can only imagine what the beer at the brewery is like.  A couple of years ago I had a limited-release Imperial stout that was just fantastic.

The food sounds great, too!

Brad

Oh, those sandwiches sound crazy good, and I would have to spend time with the Mozzarella Lady too.  Sounds like a lovely day out!