News for Foodies: 07.17.13
Dennis MacNeil and Dede McCann, the former executive chef and manager of the Laundry in East Hampton, have finally found a new home - in the former Duke's restaurant space in East Hampton. They left the Laundry, for which they helped build a solid reputation, about a year ago after an unsuccessful attempt to buy the business.
The duo's new venture will be called Peconic Coast. Though a definite menu has not been set, Mr. MacNeil, who will be the restau rant's executive chef, said it will focus on the kind of food he loves to prepare - American/Mediterranean. It will include a good selection of appetizers, as much local seafood as the chef can get his hands on, and good steaks and burgers like the Laundry offers.
The wine list will have 35 to 40 "value-oriented" selections, Mr. MacNeil added.
Dinners Year-Round
The paperwork for a lease with an option to buy the Montauk Highway property was just signed last week, and the partners are busy getting the place ready for business. That includes sprucing up the outside with new fencing and a new sign and redoing the driveway.
The inside decor will probably stay as is, except for a possible paint job, Mr. MacNeil said. A kitchen staff is in place and a staff for the front of the house, which Ms. McCann will direct, is being gathered. Once the details are ironed out, Mr. MacNeil said, he and his partner will set an opening date.
The plan is for Peconic Coast to serve dinner seven nights a week year-round, a remarkable schedule on the East End that the Laundry also is known for. Lunch might be added at Peconic Coast next spring, Mr. MacNeil added.
Ahoy, Malloy!
A new restaurant where Yellowfin was on Sag Harbor's Long Wharf has been open for a few weeks. Malloy's Dock is being managed by Shari Alexander, a New York Restaurant School graduate, former chef and owner of the Ship's Galley, and a food columnist who has a house in Sag Harbor, and Albert Geldmacher, an East Hampton resident who once ran the Cove Deli, the Madison Market, and the Dockhouse in Sag Harbor.
The restaurant's name comes from the owner of the property, Patrick E. Malloy 3d. Michael Vignapiano, the executive chef, has a house in Noyac and is on leave as program director at the New York Restaurant School. He has had an extensive career in hotel and restaurant kitchens, though this is the first time he has worked on the South Fork.
The menu, served all day for lunch and dinner every day but Tuesday, emphasizes seafood, or, in the words of Ms. Alexander, whose food and wine column "Dish" appears monthly in The Sarasota Herald-Tribune,"seaside comfort food."
Seafood And Daiquiris
Among the appetizers on the menu are baked clams, steamed mussels, and shrimp cocktail, and there is a kind of salad nicoise with blue claw crab instead of tuna. Entrees include a lobster roll, a Spanish version of shrimp scampi, lobster, grilled vegetables, and, for landlubbers, shell steak and a burger.
Catch of the day and grilled chicken of the day specials are offered, as well as a $20 "lobster Monday" special that includes a one and a quarter-pound steamed lobster, corn on the cob, fries or baked potato, and focaccia.
Desserts such as key lime pie and fresh fruit tarts come from a New York baker, though Mr. Vignapiano makes one of his own each week. The restaurant's large bar has a new frozen drink machine for such concoctions as a mango daiquiri (did you know that those drinks come from Cuba?) and there's a martini bar as well. Ms. Alexander said the restaurant's wine list is priced below others in the area.
There are 200 al fresco seats overlooking the docked boats and Sag Harbor at Malloy's Dock.
Paolo's Turns Salamander
The Salamander Bar and Grill is now open where Paolo's restaurant was in Montauk earlier this season. Eileen Oliver and Martin Olive have changed the Mediterranean menu their late partner and the chef, Paolo Penati, had offered. The new focus is on local seafood and Southwestern fare.
Ms. Oliver and Mr. Olive designed the menu along with their consulting chef, Steve Blechner, who has worked at La Reserve, La Cygne, and the Sign of the Dove in Manhattan and at the Maidstone Arms and the Ram's Head Inn locally. The Salamander's chef de cuisine will be Alberto Rivera, who has taken a sabbatical from his duties at the China Grill in Miami Beach's South Beach to head the kitchen staff for the season.
The menu includes a raw bar, soups and salads, sandwiches like seared fresh tuna on a roll with rouille, and fajitas with such fillings as spicy chicken with slow-roasted tomatoes and Monterey Jack cheese. Among the pasta choices is penne with sweet sausage, broccoli rabe, tomatoes, and corn, and entrees include potato-crusted flounder, roasted cod with shiitake and portobello ragout, and a grilled ribeye.
Mr. Rivera will draw upon his experience at China Grill to create daily specials.
Lunch and dinner will be served seven days a week at the Salamander Bar and Grill, and plans are afoot to add breakfast.
Cooking Classes
Silvia Lehrer's Cookhampton classes will continue this week at her house on Oliver's Cove Lane in Water Mill. John DeLucie, the executive chef of the Bridgehampton Cafe, will lead a demonstration class Tuesday from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. for $60.
Mr. DeLucie will show students how to prepare cured gravlax with grappa, creme fraiche, and caper berries, grilled local striped bass with melon salsa, and shortbread with seasonal berries. Roman Roth, the winemaker at SagPond Vineyards in Sagaponack, will match wines with the menu, which students will be able to consume at the end of the evening.
Knowledge Devoured
A class scheduled for this past Tuesday with Kevin Penner of Della Femina restaurant in East Hampton was rescheduled for Aug. 5. Ms. Lehrer is teaching her own class tonight on do-ahead Asian grill recipes, and next Thursday will teach a sold-out class focusing on fish specialties.
Victor Vieira, the executive chef at Savanna's restaurant in South ampton, will continue his weekly Thursday afternoon cooking classes. Today beginning at noon, Mr. Vieira's students can learn to make salad di caprese with roasted peppers, escargot in puff pastry, seafood risotto, and key lime pie with baked meringue. The class, which costs $50, is followed by the meal itself.
The foods prepared in Kristi Hood's next cooking class also will be enjoyed by the students who helped prepare it. The $70 class, on Monday and Tuesday from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m., will feature marinated olives, a salad of poached egg and fresh spinach with a mushroom vinaigrette, poached chicken breast with chive sauce, and open apple tart. The class will meet at the Mill House Inn in East Hampton, but Ms. Hood can be reached at her house in East Hampton to register.
The Station Bistro in Water Mill will offer a three-course meal inspired by Provence tonight for $24. The restaurant offers a prix-fixe of foods from various French provinces each Wednesday and Thursday night.
Also:
The 1770 House in East Hampton will host a dinner to benefit East End Hospice and the East End AIDS Wellness Project on Friday, July 25. More details can be found elsewhere in this section of The Star.
Also in East Hampton, the Maidstone Arms will begin serving dinner a half-hour early, at 5:30 p.m., on Saturdays. The restaurant serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner seven days a week.
Rowdy Hall in East Hampton Village is serving lunch on Saturdays and Sundays only now, from noon to 3:30 p.m., although dinner continues seven nights a week. A "Rowdy Hour" is now offered at the restaurant's bar Monday through Friday from 4:30 to 6 p.m., with $3 drafts, $3 for well drinks, and homemade snacks.
Italian Inspiration
Homemade pastry items are now available at Jerry and David's Red Horse Market in East Hampton. The market's new pastry chef, Laura Donnelly, is baking a variety of fruit pies, cobblers, and tarts.
Ms. Donnelly, a contributor to The Star, once taught Italian cooking at the Peter Kump Cooking School, worked as the pastry chef at the Firehook Bakery in Washington, D.C., and was sous chef under Colin Ambrose at Estia in Amagansett before coming to the Red Horse Market.
A two-for-one special on selected entrees is available Wednesdays at Chili Peppers in Sag Harbor. Also, some dishes with a little Italian inspiration are being added to the menu, like chicken marsala, steamed mussels in marinara sauce, and broccoli and shrimp over pasta.
La Bonne Soupe
Jean-Paul Picot, the owner and chef of Manhattan's La Bonne Soupe and the co-author of a cookbook by that same name, will be on hand at Palmer Vineyards in Aquebogue Sunday. Mr. Picot will demonstrate some of his cooking techniques and also sign copies of his book.
Doris Tobias, a food and wine authority and Mr. Picot's co-author, will be on hand as well to sign copies of the book, answer questions, and match food with Palmer wines. Admission is free and the doors will be open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.