the weekend buzz

“Brooklyn Flea's New Smorgasburg Turns Saturdays into Feast and Fun Day, Fairway's Free Barbecue ”

Brooklyn Smorgaburg

When I visited Brooklyn Flea in Williamsburg last week, it was abundantly clear that the vintage clothes, handmade jewelry, and reclaimed furniture took a backseat to the real draw: the food. The menu of vendors at Brooklyn Flea is fantastic, with eats from Saltie (try a chocolate nudge), Porchetta (the classic sandwich is served warm on a neat roll that's overloaded with swine), Milk Truck (grilled cheese oozing with cheddar between caramelized slices of buttered bread), Milk Bar, Ovenly, Red Hook Ball Fields, and more transforming the flea into a veritable outdoor food court of the most outrageously delicious (and affordable) edibles.

This week, I received great news from founder Eric Denby that the Brooklyn Flea will usher in a new phase in New York City's food-making movement when its new "Smorgasburg" food market brings together New York State Greenmarket farmers and top New York City purveyors and chefs on the spectacular Williamsburg waterfront every Saturday starting May 21.

Smorgasburg adds to the Flea's weekly market lineup-Saturdays in Fort Greene, Sundays in Williamsburg-with 100+ food vendors serving everything from Mexican cemita sandwiches to Shanghai-style banana-ricotta spring rolls to heirloom bean seeds to small-batch ketchup, mustard, and mayonnaise. The market will also feature chef guest vendors-including Zak Pelaccio of Fatty Cue/Crab on opening day-preparing dishes using ingredients from Smorgasburg farmers and purveyors, and a weekly "Food Groups" booth highlighting organizations such as Slow Food, Just Food, and the Brooklyn Food Coalition. 

With the intention of integrating upstate small farmers, New York City food-makers, chefs, social entrepreneurs, shoppers, and families in a large outdoor retail market, Smorgasburg hopes to spread the sea change in food consciousness by making fresh, affordable food and ideas about eating and sourcing more accessible to a broad and diverse audience. 

The crop of new food vendors at Smorgasburg includes several well-known chefs embarking on new projects: 

• Queen's Dahn Tu: Liza Queen, formerly of Greenpoint's Queen's Hideaway, returns from 2 years in Vietnam studying street food to debut her banh xeo (a Vietnamese crepe-style omelette), banh trang tron (a shredded rice paper, green mango, and hard-boiled quail egg salad), and bun (rice vermicelli with grilled meat or vegetables). 
• Shorty Tang & Sons: Casey and Gilley Tang revive the cold sesame noodles their father Shorty made famous at his East Broadway restaurant Hwa Yuan.
• La Buena: Alex Raij of El Quinto Pino and Txikito takes her famous gazpacho to market, to eat and to go. 
• King's Crumb: John Husby, a Momofuku Noodle Bar chef, Shane Feirstein, a Prime Meats bartender, and Mark Goldman debut their homemade biscuits, served with clotted cream and seasonal jams in the morning and fried chicken in the afternoon.
• Nana's: Cecile Dyer, pastry chef at Pie 'n' Thighs, covers frozen bananas in chocolate, with coconut, sprinkles, or sea salt.
• Tin Mustard: Tin Dizdarevic, a veteran of Craft and La Esquina, launches his new whole-grain mustard.
• Speedy Romeo: Justin Bazdarich, a veteran of the Jean-Georges empire, debuts his hand-pulled mozzarella, with toppings such as salsa verde, fig-honey-almond, and oven-dried tomato-basil.
• The market will be a place to both eat onsite and shop for products and ingredients for cooking at home.
• Landhaus will serve BLTs to order, and their Arcadian Pastures packaged bacon will be available for purchase.
• Sun Noodle, a top Asian noodle manufacturer based in Hawaii and California, will serve hot ramen soups and also sell fresh-made noodles-soba, udon, ramen, wonton skins-to take home (starting June 11).
• The Meat Hook will grill house-made sausages and hamburgers, and have fresh-frozen-packs of the same for sale.
• Among other packaged products for sale: Rio Grande organic Texas pecans, Sir Kensington's ketchup, Bean-In's heirloom bean seeds, Barry Tempeh's tempeh, Granola Lab's granola, and the new Market Share shared-kitchen's Outpost, featuring locally produced vanilla extract, Brooklyn Cured's sausages, raw foods, and more. 

"The Social Circle," located near the market's seating area, will be a place to learn about food-related issues in a relaxed setting, and to have fun. Tribeca playspace Moomah will conduct kids-craft activities every week; Kickstarter.com will feature special funding projects related to food and Brooklyn at its informational booth; sellers from Etsy.com will share a weekly curated booth for housewares; the Brooklyn Kitchen will feature a selection of cookware and specialty food items connected to weekly events; a weekly "Food Groups" booth will feature a food-justice or -awareness organization; and vendors like Common Good (Williamsburg organic cleaning products, refillable growler stations) and Sprout Wellness (small-batch skincare products using many food-based ingredients) will round out Smorgasburg as a full-service food-shopping destination.  

For more information and a full vendor lineup, click here.

Fairway's Customer Appreciation Barbecue

On Saturday, head to Fairway's Red Hook or Harlem locations for an all-day barbecue with free food, music and giveaways. The annual Customer Appreciation Day takes place from 11am-3pm and includes dozens of vendors who will be offering drinks, desserts, salads and sides to go along with the grilled hot dogs and sausages to be enjoyed throughout the day. There will be fresh pulled mozzarella and breads to dip in olive oils at the Fairway table.  Raffles, T-shirts, hats and music will be part of the festivities.

Fairway is located in Red Hook at 480-500 Van Brunt Street and in Harlem at 2284 12th Ave at 126th Street.

Free for all !

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