Alfred Portale Simple Pleasures: Home Cooking from the Gotham Bar and Grill's Acclaimed Chef
Author: Alfred Portal
When you imagine the quintessential New York City restaurant, one name comes to mind: Alfred Portale's Gotham Bar and Grill. The same is true when you think of the top American restaurants:Gotham has been one of our most cherished culinary institutions for two decades.
Led by executive chef and co-owner Alfred Portale, Gotham has been honored with four consecutive New York Times three-star reviews and has resided among the Zagat Survey's top five New York City restaurants for more than ten years. Known for Portale's defining modern American cooking, impeccable service, and soaring space, Gotham was recently named "Most Outstanding Restaurant" in the nation by the James Beard Foundation.
But what does Portale cook when he's not working? In Alfred Portale Simple Pleasures, one of our most accomplished chefs invites you to taste the sublime and surprisingly easy-to-prepare, restaurant-quality dishes he serves to friends and family at home.
The 125 recipes include home versions of Gotham classics as well as new recipes straight from Portale's home kitchen. They're all simple enough for any home cook, and spectacular enough to impress anyone who tastes them.
At the center of Alfred Portale Simple Pleasures are elemental main courses such as Roast Cod with a New England Chowder Sauce, Filet Mignon with Madeira Sauce, and Sautéed Chicken Breasts with Button Mushrooms and Sage. Pick one, then build a meal by pairing it with recipes from the chapters of salads, starters, and small plates; soups, sandwiches, and pizzas; pasta and risotto; side dishes; and desserts.
Along with the recipes, Portale offers pairing suggestionsfor building a menu, variations for adapting recipes according to season and personal taste, and flavor-building instructions on how to accent a dish with extravagant extras such as caviar or everyday additions such as flavored oils. In other words, home cooks will learn how to add a Gotham-inspired twist to their own favorite recipes.
The supermarket-friendly dishes include modern classics such as Spicy Shrimp Salad with Mango, Avocado, and Lime Vinaigrette; Pumpkin and Caramelized Onion Soup with Gruyère and Sage; and Sautéed Spinach with Garlic, Ginger, and Sesame Oil. Alfred helps you transform everything from ordinary weekday lunches to Saturday night dinner parties into anything but ordinary.
Of course, no meal is complete without dessert, and Portale delivers sweet and sophisticated send-offs, including Lime Meringue Tarts, a simple Summer Plum Pudding, and an elegant Chocolate-Grand Marnier Cake.
Alfred Portale Simple Pleasures -- nothing could be simpler or more pleasurable.
Publishers Weekly
As in his two previous cookbooks, Alfred Portale's Gotham Bar and Grill Cookbook and Alfred Portale's 12 Seasons Cookbook, Portale uses the same flavor-enhancing principles he's used at his top New York City restaurant, Gotham Bar and Grill, for 20 years, but works his magic on home-style foods rather than dishes that require a team of sous chefs to be executed properly. Portale makes particularly good use of vegetables, in such intriguing concoctions as Israeli Couscous Salad with Grilled Summer Vegetables, and Crisp Vegetable Salad with Sunflower Seeds and Mustard Vinaigrette. His headers are informative, like the one for Roasted Chestnut Soup that offers a rundown of how to choose and store the nuts. Repeatedly, recipes that sound somewhat familiar reveal a twist or demonstrate a technique: Roast Turkey, Avocado, Bacon and Blue Cheese Sandwich sounds almost ordinary, but includes a clearly explained method for brining a turkey breast that is helpful beyond the confines of one recipe. Roasted Wild Striped Bass with Leeks, Fingerling Potatoes and Lemon calls for steaming the fish briefly, baking it to draw out its flavor, then reducing the juices into a sauce, but Portale manages to maximize flavor while still minimizing the number of pans dirtied. Photos. (Nov.) Forecast: Portale is the rare chef/author who can transition smoothly between a restaurant kitchen and a home kitchen. His restaurant's longevity means that the pool of past customers is large. Expect brisk sales. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
See also: Fresh from the Garden Cookbook or History of Wine in America Volume 1
Out of This Kitchen: A History of the Ethnic Groups and Their Foods in the Steel Valley
Author: Dan Karaczun
From the Author
This commemorative cookbook is the culmination of my life's experiences. My ethnic heritage and participation in the folk arts, education in the social sciences and history, work experience in the Homestead Steel Works, computer graphics and art.
In 1991 I was introduced to some people involved in the Centennial Celebration of the 1892 Homestead Steel Strike. I joined the committee to help plan the event and in so doing began the germ of the idea for the book.
Historians were writing histories of the strike, producers were making videos of the history but there seemed to be something missing. What was missing was a celebration of the people that were involved in the strike and their descendants. They came from various ethnic backgrounds and settled at various times through the history of Homestead and the steel mill.
Having been involved in the folk arts since childhood I also knew that as heritage was passed from generation to generation the folk elements became diluted. The dress or costumes were the first to go, next the language, then the songs and dances. What remained was the food. Passed from generation to generation as grandmothers worked with their daughters and granddaughters cooking holiday traditional recipes and Sunday dinners. A cookbook, I decided, was the perfect media for the celebration of the people of Homestead and surrounding communities that composed the Steel Valley on the Monongahela River.
The format of the book was important if it was to have meaning. I decided that history would be the uniting thread throughout the book but not the purpose of it. World, U.S. and local history would tie the elements together. We researched the local newspapers through local libraries and area newspapers. We found recipes that dated back to 1700's as well as household tips and home remedies for ailments. We interviewed people from the major ethnic groups that populated the Homestead vicinity and talked a lot of people into sharing their precious family recipes with us. In short they shared their life's experiences with us. It was also important not to take a position revolving around the politics of the strike but instead to celebrate the people involved in this titanic labor struggle that would find 12 men killed in the violence of the Homestead Massacre that changed the relationship between management and labor for the next fifty years.
And so the book took the shape of an ethno-historic cookbook of all things. Whether by design or accident this formula has proven to be quite popular. We are now in the third printing of the book and have shipped books all over the United States and Canada.
We begin the book with a brief history of the strike to provide a setting. Each ethnic section begins with a history of the immigration of that particular group and include some interviews with senior members of the group to provide context of what life was like during the heyday of the mills and follow these with some of their most notable recipes. Mixed into this are some historic recipes from local newspapers and many household tips and home remedies.
As a labor of love, I am pleased by the success the book has enjoyed. I hope to do others in the future. Learning about the people of this great nation and where they came from is the best part of all.
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