New Old Favorites

This month has been all about discovering favorite places. When Mr. Food Musings and I decided to move in December, friends told us we were crazy. "Who moves at Christmas?" they said, bewildered. "There's never a good time to move," was my stock reply. But the truth is, it was time.

We'd been smushed into a tiny one bedroom apartment for five years. (Mr. FM lived there more than a decade altogether.) Every nook and cranny was full of something -- guitars lying shoulder to shoulder like flat soldiers beneath the bed, workout clothes relegated to a too-high closet shelf when the armoires were full, a kitchen's worth of storage cobbled together from a stainless steel-topped island, a slim IKEA bookshelf, and a wooden cart. Shoes exploded out of the kitchen like an over-heated bowl of oatmeal in the microwave, and furniture lined the walls so closely you could barely tell what color the walls were in spots. Our overflow stuff sat cold and still two floors below us in not one, but two storage units. Like I said -- it was time.

In the end, it was the perfect time. Competition for apartments was at an all-time low around the holidays, and landlords were eager to bargain. Plus, Little Sister and my mom were due over the holidays, and both emailed that they would be more than happy to help us unpack. Offer accepted, I wrote back, and meant it: Little Sister organized the kitchen her first day in town.

The holidays were a flurry of unpacking and gift wrapping, dinners and trips to the airport. Tours given to friends and family were punctuated with phrases like "Imagine that room painted cherry red" or "Eventually I'll get a desk to put there."

Now, just one week shy of a month in the new place, most of the rooms are settled. The carpet is new, the paint is fresh, and almost everything has its place. Except us.

We keep getting lost in the new place, feeling our way through unfamiliar spaces, creating new pathways from room to room. We're learning that you can't hear someone if they're in the kitchen and you're in the office, and that keeping your cell phone in the same place is a matter of survival more than convenience. Our muscles are just starting to remember on their own which way to twist to toss clothes into the laundry basket, or how far to pivot to reach the knife drawer. We no longer scrape the car when we go in and out of the garage (well, most of the time...) and we know the fastest ways to get to Union Square and 101 from here.

When we leave the apartment on foot, we still feel like aliens. It's not like we've never gotten an ice cream at Ghirardelli Square or had dinner on Polk Street, but learning how far the walk is from our house to the nearest pharmacy, or which nearby market stocks the kind of yogurt I like, took some figuring. And even though we've found them, they still feel funny. I don't know where to get the carts, or which aisle the toothpaste is on. I miss our old grocery store, even though it wasn't that great; I knew all the checkers, and the guys at the meat counter. I knew when I needed to take a number at the deli and when I didn't. I loved that they had parking, and I knew right where the bathroom was (upstairs, past the crates of oranges and lemons).

When we first signed the lease, we walked up and down the stretch of Polk Street closest to us, pointing out all the restaurants we loved that we'd get to eat at regularly without a cab ride: Yabbie's and Tablespoon, and a few blocks north Luella and 1550 Hyde. We pointed across the street, realizing our go-to delivery Thai spot could now be our go-to sit-down Thai spot, and that crispy weekend tacos slathered in guacamole were now just a walk away. We found a wine shop, a magazine store and a dry cleaner, too.

The thing that you have to know about us is that we loved our old neighborhood. I mean LOVED. We couldn't understand people who bought places and moved to soulless parts of town with nowhere to stroll with a coffee in hand. We declared we'd never leave the bucolic, bustling streets of our hood with their movie theaters and restaurants, nail shops by the dozen and overpriced boutiques. But somehow, when the time came to find a new apartment, we found we were ready for a change. We'd grown tired of most of the restaurants within walking distance, and having to shell out big bucks (or haul ass downtown) was too much trouble for a last minute Saturday night outfit. 

Still, we were sad about a few things we'd be leaving behind, and especially our favorite Italian restaurant. This was the place we'd go to celebrate and the place we'd go to grieve, the place we'd go when we were tired or when we were too full of energy to sit home. We liked not needing a reservation and knowing our waiter knew the wines we'd enjoy, and more than all that, we loved the food. Warm cannellini beans studded with smoky pancetta and fresh rosemary, or grilled endive in a creamy puddle of gorgonzola dressing. Housemade pasta filled with ham and rosemary, or strung together in a tangle of fettucine with sausage, or tomatoes, or cream. Chicken cooked flat under a brick and drizzled with a sticky balsamic reduction, or steak grilled pink and plated with spinach. Sweet and tangy lemon tarts big enough for two, and small snowball cookies showered with powdered sugar.

As luck would have it, there's another fabulous rustic trattoria in our new neighborhood. We've been in twice in recent days, once for work and another time just for fun. We love the one room square painted in terra cotta tones, and the high windows decorated with old Etruscan-looking vases. On our last two visits, we piled in, determined to love it, to make it our own; the food made it easy to do. By the second visit, our waitress was already smiling at us in recognition, and we were starting to remember which wines we liked by the glass. We know to ask if the rabbit is on special, and that the wild boar pappardelle will be for a little longer yet. We've learned that the salad of apples, gorgonzola and candied walnuts sounds like a dime a dozen but tastes like gold, and that the panna cotta with huckleberries is our go-to dessert. We know that the lentils with sausage are just what we'll crave when the weather is cold, and that the steak carpaccio is judiciously dressed. We know that we have found another home away from home, and we couldn't be happier.

Comments

[Tea]

This is lovely, Catherine. I am glad you are settling in (though no rule you can't go back to the old neighborhood for dinner, when you feel like it). But with wild boar pappardelle close at hand, I might be hanging around your new digs as well. That sounds good!

[teri]

Have you ever been to Frascati (on Hyde, across from Luella)? Definitely the sort of place where the owners remember you after your first visit and always make an effort to find a table for you even when the place is packed. And the bread pudding is to die for...

[millicent]

This was the time, & this was the place! That's all there is to it!

[Catherine]

Tea - Thank you! You are always there with a pat of encouragement for the writing, which is so appreciated. I have already been back a zillion times...several of those to the grocery store. Old habits die hard!

Teri - Yes, I have been to Frascati several times (never had the bread pudding, oops!). I have a feeling we should put that on our must-retry list. Thanks for the reminder!

Mom - that's my feeling, too.

[Mina]

You and Mr. FM have inspired my man and I to look for a bigger place here in Brooklyn. We are so reluctant to leave our beautiful little nabe for exactly the same reasons you wrote about. But, now I'm convinced we can settle in somewhere else and make it home.

[sam]

Ah Frascati - the first place I ever met Catherine. The friendship is far more memorable than the food.

What about zarzuela? we need someone to check how is it is doing?
And there was a sushi bar on Union before Swansons that was good.
And sushi groove too.

I like Antica, havent been in a while but i always liked it when I did.

[Catherine]

Mina - I was really apprehensive, until we found what was clearly meant to be our new space. Once that happened, we realized we needed a big change and that was that. No looking back.

Sam - That's right! I had forgotten about our dinner at Frascati. I like Sushi Groove but it's so loud (am I getting old?). We can put Zarzuela on our must try list. this weekend we're heading over to Hime, the new Japanese place on Lombard that's getting all the hype.