Summer in Pittsburgh...there's eats afoot (long with photos)

Until this past July, I had never been to Pittsburgh. Some would say that's a fine thing, as Pittsburgh's natives are often dismissed as gruff and unwelcoming; and the city, aside from the multitude of remarkable bridges, is shrugged off little more than a place to study technology and eat perogis and think about Heinz ketchup and the Steelers. And that would be a pity, as Pittsburgh, it turns out, is a rather interesting food city.

On a Saturday morning in August, I wandered around, escorted by a native Pittsburgian (or whatever they call themselves these days) who himself was rediscovering the finer points of Pittsburgh food. I told him I wanted to see local food hotspots. Of course the Strip District topped the list, with its multitude of vendors and hawkers and terrible towel souvenirs. But as we discovered, there were a few other interesting spots to check out.

This is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

Our morning began at the East End Food Coop. Some amusing if downright ironic graffiti was spray stenciled on an outside wall.



Along with the usual complement of local goods at the coop was a most curious 70% chocolate bar made by a local company, Love Street Living Foods. A mostly 'raw' chocolate bar and 100% vegan, it came in three varieties. Out of curiosity (I am most definitely not a raw foodist), and perhaps the need to torture myself, I bought all three: Chocolate with Goji Berries, Organic Vegan, and Organic Raw Vegan Chocolate Super Fudge. Hello Judy Blume!

Here's one of the bars, in my hand for perspective:



I liked the texture quite a bit - not smooth but a little sandy crunchy. It wasn't bad, but at $2.99 for a one ounce bar, it most certainly will not replace Valrhona, Pralus or Cluizel in my home.

We then went to the Farmers' Market Cooperative of East Liberty, a year-round indoor market behind a Home Depot.



It wasn't the organic love fest I was looking for, but I was impressed by the refrigerator full of raw milk. Oh how I love the unpasteurized dairy. But of course I forgot to take that picture. Instead, a picture of the interior (you can see the refrigerated case to the right):



We then made our way to the Strip District, where we found the Saturday Morning mostly organic Farmers' Market @ the Firehouse. You can't miss it. Even the awnings tell you where you are:



You can renew your Slow Food membership here, or buy a Locavore mug.



I'm guessing it wasn't manufactured within 100 miles of Pittsburgh. What do you think?

I was rather enamored of the CSA that was selling fresh lemongrass. The farmer told me that week he sent out 600 stalks to his members.



My favorite vendor at the market was Najat, a Lebanese woman who sold some of her wares at the East End Food Coop (mostly hummus and baba) but kept her best dips and mezze and spreads for the Saturday Farmers' Market:



I purchased a couple tubs for my drive back to Chicago: her version of Sleek, a rich dip made with chickpeas, white beans, spinach, bulghur, lemon juice and spices, and Beans Plaki, made with white beans, tomatoes, carrots, olive oil, lemon juice and spices. I sopped them up with freshly made whole wheat lavosh.

She also had some lovely pies, which we didn't bring home that day:



We then popped into Reyna's, a local Mexican specialty retailers that makes tortilla on-site. You can watch them feed the masa into the machine...



and see the fresh-made tortillas coming out the other side:



Continuing on our walk through the Strip District, we came upon a sno-cone stand. But not just your generic turn the handle, out comes ice sno-cone. Old school sno-cone. Made with a square of ice and an ice-shave, a tool dating back to at least 1898. The ice had the best texture of any sno-cone I've ever tasted. Flavors - well, they were the usual. But for $1.00, you can't beat it.

The ice shave, made in Philadelphia:



and the shave in action:



and of course, my root beer shaved ice:



We then stopped in at Enrico's, a bakery known for its beloved biscotti. Since I'm mostly off cookies these days, I didn't indulge. I was assured by my host that his ginger almond biscotti was delicious.



There was quite a bit more worth seeing and eating in the Strip District, but our time was limited so we hurried back to the car. In a parking lot next to the car we stumbled upon a curious sight - an old RV and three young women busily preparing a meal in front of it:



This was the first day of their new business - RV Eatin'.

Recent graduates of Carnegie-Mellon, the three had 'borrowed' a professor's old RV, rehabbed it, and were offering organic, fresh meals to anyone who was willing to pay $10 per person for an engagement. Their idea is to bring fresh, organic, sustainable, easy-to-make food to everyone at a reasonable price. They told us they didn't care about profits, they just wanted to make back their food cost and gas money. Since one of the three works at an urban organic farm, produce isn't expensive for them. Another worked as a server for many years. And the third is an enthusiastic cook with, apparently, mad skillz.

Here's the inside of the RV:



They were in the parking lot near the organic market in the hope of generating interesting and getting some reservations.
Apparently they had been kicked out of another parking lot already that day. The way they see it, when you engage them for a dinner, you cook with them and once the food is done, everyone sits in the RV and eats together and talks about food. Interesting idea. Though I'm not quite sure how they are going to sustain their budding business without increasing prices.



I'm planning on driving back through Pittsburgh later this month. There's a rumor that I may be spending some time on a farm. I will most definitely update my report at that time.

East End Food Coop and Cafe
7516 Meade Street
Pittsburgh, PA 15208
412-242-3598

Farmers' Cooperative Market of East Liberty
344 N. Sheridan Ave
Pittsburgh, PA
5 am-Noon only

Strip District Market and Shops
Penn Ave
Pittsburgh, PA
Saturday Mornings (though shops are open most days)
http://www.neighborsinthestrip.com/

Farmers @ The Firehouse
Penn Ave
Pittsburgh, PA
http://www.slowfoodpgh.com/farmers.html

Najat's Cuisine
Farmers @ The Firehouse
najats_cuisine@hotmail.com
412-823-2214

Reyna's
2023 Penn Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15222
(412) 261-2606

Enrico's Biscotti Company Cafe
2022 Penn Ave
Pittsburgh, PA 15222
(412) 281-2602
http://www.enricobiscotti.com/cafe.html

RV Eatin'
http://rveatin.blogspot.com/
RV.Eatin@gmail.com

That's a great report. I especially like the part with RV Eatin'. It's so...60's. I guess the old joke, "First prize is a one week trip to Pittsburgh. Second prize is two weeks in Pittsburgh" might not really apply.

We call ourselves yinzers.

Nice post.

I guess the old joke, "First prize is a one week trip to Pittsburgh. Second prize is two weeks in Pittsburgh" might not really apply.

Maybe not in the summer...but in the winter it very well may still apply.

The RV Eatin' gals are something else. When we met them, we tried to make a reservation for that night, but we couldn't get the rest of my friend's family excited about it. Pffft!

Ah yes, yinzers. Thanks for the correction, Mike.

Queijo wrote:When we met them, we tried to make a reservation for that night, but we couldn't get the rest of my friend's family excited about it. Pffft!

Too bad. I'll bet there would have been hand holding and singing in a circle on the floor of the RV before the night was done.

Great report, Queijo! Thank you for illuminating a city about which I know very little.

=R=

m'th'su wrote:We call ourselves yinzers.

Nice post.

We don't all call ourselves that. Growing up, I always perceived the term Yinzers to be pejorative. I'd go with Pittsburghers, to be safe.

Lovely post, Q!

Thanks!

I have one more experience I want to share with you from my Pittsburgh trip. The first night I arrived in Pittsburgh, we had reservations at Richard Chen, a newly opened offshoot of the Michelin starred Wing Lei, so called "French-influenced Shanghai cuisine" at the Wynn Las Vegas. The prices were OUTRAGEOUS - not dissimilar to what I would expect to pay in Las Vegas as a captive of Steve Wynn. The food, however, was as good as the prices were high, not that that created a good dollar/value ratio.

Here's a shot of the menu. You can't really see it, but if it were in focus, you'd notice the 'Wok-tossed Lobster, XO sauce" is $42. It was great, but not $42 of great for a single lobster.



A bowl of hot & sour soup was $8. Three 'dim sum' dumplings were also $8. Entrees ranged from about $22 to $42. A vegetable or rice side was about $12, except for a small bowl of white jasmine, brown, or red rice, which was significantly less.

The food itself was extremely tasty and everything we ate was an articulate story with a beginning, middle and end. As an example, the Five Spice Duck was the most interesting, well-imagined fine dining version of Peking duck I've tasted. Requisite crispy skin, tender beyond tender meat, fresh just made wrappers, elegant plating. The menu, however, was a bit confusing to many diners. Do you order family style? Were you supposed to order an entree just for yourself? The answer is 'yes' to both options -either was considered a fine choice - although that wasn't explained to us at the outset of the meal. We opted for the family style route, which made for riot of flavors but ended up being exceptionally expensive (with wine, tax and tip, we spent about $100 per person - though if each of us had opted for the lobster, it would have been more. There's always something more extreme, right?). Service was doting if a bit obtrusive. The space itself was modern, minimal, bright in places, dark in others and loud.

To clarify, Richard Chen himself is not in the kitchen. His trained staff, many from his Las Vegas restaurant, are doing the cooking in his style to his specifications. If that matters. Here's a link to the article that explains how Richard Chen came to open his second restaurant in a most unlikely place.

My pictures were mostly disasters, so I won't share them here but for one, dessert. It reminds me of a dessert I had at the Gramercy Tavern in 1998 - coconut, mango, tapioca. The execution here was rather different (more like a parfait) and it was pretty tasty, if not particularly novel.



Would I go back? Sure, on the company expense account. Would I want to spend my own money? Probably not. Were I resident in Pittsburgh, would I feel differently? Oh yes. According to my friend, a fussy expert in all things Chinese (he first lived in Nanjing in the 80s and worked on a Ph.D there), there isn't much Chinese of note in Pittsburgh and he was definitely going to go back.

Richard Chen
5996 Penn Circle South
Pittsburgh, PA
412-924-0080