The Catskill Chronicle

By Jude Waterston

Dennis wasn’t easy. There were times I asked myself why we were friends. He was a conundrum, a mind-boggling, mixed bag of traits. Immature, uncouth, inappropriate, a boor, warm, affectionate, enthusiastic, emotional, funny and caring. He edited no thought; each and every one was verbalized. He was embarrassed by nothing. Nearly every time we got together there was some point at which I felt intense moments of frustration and irritation. I miss him in my life.

We met when I was behind the stick at a local Village bar. He strode in, boomed in a husky voice, “Yo, gimme a  Heineken and a shot of Wild Turkey,” all before hitting a bar stool. I looked skeptically at him. His head, topped with a baseball cap, was the  largest I’d ever encountered, and he had a massive paunch that was as tight as a drum. He weighed three times as much as I did, and was huge in every way, down to the thick sterling silver hoop in one ear that would’ve made a bull envious.

He took a long slug of beer, downing a third of the bottle and announced, in lieu of nothing, that he’d just gotten off from work and was a cook at Sloane Kettering Hospital where he had free rein to concoct whatever he pleased, as the patients he cooked for, who were dying, had no restrictions. Weird as this announcement was, and against my will, I found myself intrigued. He talked, and I listened. He’d had plenty of other gigs in the food industry. Over the years, besides running his own food concession in a bar in Brooklyn, he’d cooked enormous banquet meals in Vegas, and one of his favorite jobs had been for the five-star French chef, the late Jean Louis Pallidin. Dennis described in detail the ingredients he’d been introduced to there. He paused  long enough to lift up his shot of bourbon between two thick, sausage-like fingers, pinky in the air, and downed it in one gulp. “Yo, mama, lemme have another one of these bad boys.” As I poured the Wild Turkey, he let out a slow, contented belch. “Charming,” I said. He threw back his head and his laugh was glorious, full of gusto and a love of life. What can I say? I was hooked. Food would be our common denominator.

Each time we met and on every excursion we took together, food was front and center. He bought us tickets and introduced me to the Fancy Food Show at the Jacob Javits Center.  There, his natural inquisitiveness and enthusiasm was at its peak, and he would grab my small hand in his huge mitt and lead me through dozens of aisles of the latest in gourmet trends. He boldly devoured samples of anything offered, passed one to me, helped himself to a second helping and schmoozed with everyone in the industry. We stopped at every beer vendor’s booth. He would grab two samples; quickly down one and shove the other one into my hand, which he immediately re-gifted to himself the moment we were out of eye-shot. He was infuriating, but his interest and passion were sincere and captivating. “Baby, what do you think of this?” he’d ask, popping a coconut-dusted chocolate truffle into my mouth, “It’s fucking awesome, right?” Then he’d kiss me shyly, gently, lips closed. He never pushed for more.

Dennis lived in Brooklyn and didn’t like the subway. He’d drive to the Village to pick me up and ferry me to whatever restaurant we’d decided we had to try. I dreaded the drive to our destination in Dennis’ vintage boat of a car. His window was always rolled all the way down, his thick, hairy arm resting there like a log. Within inches of careening into another car, he would thrust his head and the top third of his torso out the window to scream a series of epithets. “Where’d you get your mother-fucking license, dude?” was a favorite. “Yo, yo, I’m driving here!” was another unnecessary proclamation. “Could you just once, please, drive without ranting at everyone?” I’d plead. “Chill, mama!” he’d boom. Then he’d suddenly swerve and abruptly pull up to the curb and lean over me to get to the glove compartment. He would extract a neatly rolled joint from a throat lozenge tin packed to the gills with pre-rolled joints. After a few long tokes, he’d chill. Sometimes, on a whim and in hopes of calming myself, I’d take a few deep draws from the proffered joint Dennis thrust at me. I’ll admit that worked up my appetite.

As a teenage hippie, I had decided to live the healthy life (with an exception for  alcohol and recreational drugs) and cut out white flour, sugar, coffee, preservatives, beef, pork, veal, and lamb from my diet. My mother persuaded me to continue eating fish and poultry by presenting me with articles on their healthy properties. Naturally, it was with Dennis that I reverted back to eating meat after over 30 years of abstinence. We were at Tia Pol, a tapas restaurant in West Chelsea, and he asked the waitress to name the one dish we should not leave without trying. “The roast suckling pig,” she answered without hesitation. “Bring it on!” Dennis commanded. I rolled my eyes at him, which he ignored, smacking his full lips in anticipation. The waitress returned holding a plate adorned with nothing but a huge slab of crispy-skinned, mahogany-colored roast pork. It looked so striking and mouthwatering that I reminded myself that I’d never had a moral issue regarding killing animals; my reasons were purely health-related. Dennis cut into the center of it with a sharp knife, extracted a glistening chunk, and bit into it. “I wanna die!” he exclaimed. “Oh, what the hell,” I muttered. “Now you’re talking!” Dennis said as I served myself a small portion. The skin crackled and gave way to tender, moist, richly flavored meat falling off the bone. The tiny bones were crunchy enough that Dennis and I both chewed and swallowed them. Though I was slightly freaked out at what I’d just done and feared becoming physically ill, I didn’t, and it was heavenly. I never looked back.

One aspect, in particular, of our restaurant dining experiences drove me insane. We always ordered a mess of appetizers, sides and salads rather than having a single entree. We wanted to sample as much of the menu as we could. As soon as we were finished plowing through a variety of dishes, Dennis couldn’t bear to have the myriad empty plates sit on the table. He’d stack them willy nilly on top of each other and impatiently try to pass them to any wait-person, hostess or bus boy walking by. Often their arms were laden with plates or they carried trays topped with cocktails. “Could you stop doing that? They’ll get to it!” I’d hiss. It made him crazy. He made me crazy.

We had many shellfish fetes together. One was at the bar of Aquagrill, a seafood place in Soho known for its selection of top-quality oysters. We sampled eleven different kinds, and as we ate, I wrote down their names and our reactions to them. “Briny, with hints of cucumber,” or “plump and creamy.” Dennis just had to end the meal with one more  oyster he’d spotted. Its gnarled shell was at least five inches long. The oyster meat inside was huge and pale, shiny grey. It didn’t look appetizing in the least. Dennis opened his mouth wide, slurped it up and then gasped. He picked something off of his tongue and brought it close to my face, then held it high above his head. The staff gathered around excitedly. It was the first pearl found by a patron since the opening of the restaurant. I still have the pearl, all these years later, tucked away in drawer.

At the now defunct seafood mecca, Lundy’s of Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, Dennis and I sat side by side at its bar and shared raw oysters and clams, shrimp and chowder. While we waited for each course to arrive, we managed to eat an entire bowl of freshly grated horseradish, tearing through a half a dozen plastic bags of Lundy’s famous oyster crackers.

And on a Sunday afternoon spent desperately seeking oysters at one after another closed or packed-to-the-gills establishment from midtown to downtown, we ended up at a tiny, quiet French restaurant, Le Gigot, on Cornelia Street in the Village. When asked by a curt   waitress if we had reservations, Dennis blurted, “No, no, we’re starving. We gotta eat, woman.” With a disdainful expression, she indicated two small tables, each the size of an open dinner napkin, abutting each other. Undaunted, Dennis pushed the miniscule tables forward enough to allow for his generous girth and asked for menus. There we shared a half dozen oysters served with crusty bread and good French butter; a charcuterie plate of sausages, country pate, duck rillettes, and chicken liver pate, garnished with tiny cornichons and pickled okra slices; tender, garlicky escargot; and stewed calamari in a rich, spicy tomato-based sauce. By this time, Dennis’s obvious passion and curiosity about what part of France each ingredient came from had melted the waitress’ cold heart, and she beamed when Dennis ordered another half-dozen oysters as we sipped the last of our wine.

There were times when Dennis’ uncensored remarks and unmodulated voice caused me some embarrassment. One evening I suggested he and I meet at the serene, rustic home of Kyoto-style country cooking, Omen, in Soho. When I made the reservation, I requested a quiet corner table I knew would place us far from the hub of the restaurant. I was nervous that Dennis would frighten or shock the sweet, solicitous and gentile Japanese staff, as well as any diners within earshot.

“Hey baby!” Dennis yelled when I entered. He encircled me in a bear hug, squeezing the breath out of me. When he finally released me, the hostess smiled politely and brought us to our table. Upon receiving our first appetizer of raw tuna and sea urchin topped with finely grated Japanese yam, wasabi, and a raw quail egg, Dennis proclaimed, “Yo, I need a spoon! How the hell do you eat this goddam thing with chopsticks?” After giving him a withering look, I hailed a waiter and got Dennis a fork and spoon.

We were presented with a procession of dishes, each more beautifully composed than the next, and the flavors popped in our mouths. The duo of entrees, miso-glazed black cod and scallops on soba noodles and pan-roasted chicken seasoned with tangy sansho pepper, were miraculous. Our last dish was udon noodles in the traditional style of the restaurant. Our waiter, who throughout the meal had served with poise, grace, and a gentle humor, explained the array of accompanying ceramic bowls and plates he’d brought and laid before us. Dennis picked up his fork and held it in mid-air a moment and turned to the waiter. “Hey, you speak English real good!” The man smiled and bowed his head slightly before turning away. I gave Dennis a good kick under the table. “Leave a really good tip,” I said. “Sure,” he responded, “but I could use a burger and fries right about now, after these itty-bitty dishes.”

An unforgettable experience with Dennis is when he was working with an up-and-coming chef, Frederic Kieffer, of Gaia restaurant in Connecticut, and Kieffer was invited to cook at the venerable James Beard Foundation for fifty people. Aside from Kieffer’s own staff, they needed a few volunteers to help plate and garnish the offerings before they were scooted out by wait staff. Dennis thrust me into the controlled mayhem of a working kitchen, and I had an exhilarating  evening working in tandem with others to create astoundingly beautiful and delicious food. Some of the courses I recall are: handmade ravioli filled with a mixture of crunchy vegetables and anointed with truffle sauce; tiny pastry tartlets filled with silky egg salad and garnished with a generous dollop of caviar; disks of crispy fingerling potatoes topped with house-smoked salmon, upon which a ribbon of pale green scallion-cream was piped; airy pillows of ricotta gnocchi tossed in butter and plated with orange butter-sauced lobster chunks and slivers of baby artichoke; pan-seared diver scallops with warm leek coulis served in pink-tinged scallop shells; grilled pork belly served with a tamarind glaze on a bed of baby arugula leaves and garnished with spicy cashew nuts. Finally, for dessert, there were little mason jars with rubber gasket seals filled with caramel cheesecakes sprinkled lightly with French sea salt.

There were trips to specialty stores, like Sahadi’s Middle Eastern emporium on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, where Dennis seemed to know or be related to everyone we passed on the street. Of Lebanese descent, like the owners of  Sahadi’s, Dennis hugged and kissed each male cousin we bumped into. Once in the shop, he recognized dozens more relatives and acquaintances as we wended our way through the bins of dried grains, legumes, dried fruit, and nuts. The scent of fresh spices and Mediterranean cooking wafted through the air as Dennis dipped his hands into barrels of pickled eggplant, peppers, cucumbers, and dozens of types of olives he would drop into my mouth with joy. We embraced then, and often, as a sort of cementing of our special relationship.

When he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, it came as a devastating blow. His decline was swift, and the loss of appetite he experienced bewildered and disappointed him, food having been his strongest tie and passion to life. I tried  to stay in touch despite his growing withdrawal. I wanted to see him, and he allowed me one visit in the hospital a week or so before he was moved to hospice. When I asked what I could bring him, he recited a long list of candies I could pick up at any newsstand. I also packed a few handfuls of sweet cherry tomatoes I had grown in my garden upstate.

When I entered his hospital room, I was astonished at how much weight he had lost. He was emaciated, with that huge head sitting atop a body that was steadily being depleted. I was happy to see the silver hoop still in his ear. We hugged and cried and talked, and he ate some of the candy, but was more excited by the fresh tomatoes that burst in his mouth with their deep flavor.

I called to say goodbye a few days later. His nephew answered the phone and told me Dennis was on morphine and didn’t know if he would know me or be able to respond. Then I heard Dennis’ labored breathing and soft moaning and knew he held the phone in his hand. And I spoke of all we’d done together; all the foods adventures we’d shared. I told him I loved him and I’d miss him. I heard a sound on the other side of the line. It was not quite words, but I believe he knew it was me on the phone and that he too was saying goodbye and I love you.

Miso-Glazed Black Cod and Scallops on Soba Noodles

Serves 2

 

I adapted this recipe from one by chef David Tanis, published in the New York Times. Black cod is hard to find and extremely expensive, so I substituted some scallops for half of the fish called for. Hake or salmon would be work well here too. The recipe for the glaze is enough for 1½ pounds of fish if you’d like to make this for four people. If you cannot find mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine), you can add ½ teaspoon sugar to ¼ cup of dry sherry or marsala as a substitute.

 

An optional addition to this dish is to saute 4 ounces of kale in a tablespoon of olive oil, season with salt and pepper, and place it atop the noodles before plating the fish. The kale adds a nice vegetal element.

 

For the soba noodles:

6 ounces soba noodles

1 tablespoon tamari, shoyu, or regular soy sauce

1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar

1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lime (or lemon) juice

2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil

1 ½ teaspoons mirin

1 teaspoon sugar

½ teaspoon freshly grated ginger root

Combine the dressing ingredients in a bowl, whisking to blend well. Bring a pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add the soba noodles and cook for 4 – 5 minutes, or according to the package instructions. Drain well and rinse with cold water. Blot with paper towels to remove any moisture and place noodles in a large, shallow bowl. Pour dressing over noodles. Toss to distribute dressing. The noodles can be made 30 minutes before using. Toss again before using. When ready to serve, place half the noodles in each of two large, shallow bowls. Top with sautéed kale, if using. Top with fish and scallops and garnish with toasted sesame seeds.

For miso-glazed black cod and scallops:

6 ounces black cod, sliced length-wise into two portions

6 ounces (six large) sea scallops

2 tablespoons white or red miso

1 tablespoon sake or sherry

1 tablespoon mirin

2 teaspoons soy sauce

2 teaspoons freshly grated ginger root

1 tablespoon honey

2 egg yolks

Garnish: 1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Combine the miso, sake, mirin, soy sauce, ginger root, and honey in a small bowl and mix well. Dip each piece of fish and the scallops in the marinade one at a time, removing excess on the side of the bowl, and lay the fish and scallops in a shallow glass or earthenware baking dish. Leave to marinate 10 to 15 minutes. Beat egg yolks into the remaining miso mixture. With a spoon, ladle tops of fish and scallops with the mixture. Bake on the top shelf of the oven for 6 to 8 minutes until topping begins to brown. Remove from the oven and turn on the broiler. Broil the fish for about 2 minutes, until just cooked through. Serve immediately.