If you love food and think about it a lot (as I do), you’ve probably thought back to your early food memories. Those times you tried something different, something that imprinted you because you loved or hated it.

I grew up eating a lot of great food, but for some reason one of my strongest first food memories is a deep fried calzone. I was probably about eight years old, and my parents and I were sitting in New York City at a tiny outdoor table in front of Sal’s Pizza, off the Bowery. I remember how crispy the crust was and how the cheese oozed out as soon as I cut in. I remember how hot it was, and yet how I couldn’t stop eating.

Lucky for me, my husband discovered a delicious source of fried (and non-fried) calzones in Rhode Island – Napolitano’s Brooklyn Pizza. It’s a small but welcoming BYOB pizza place with calzones that definitely rival the ones I had in New York. The calzones are made to order and are totally delicious.

Garlic knots – fried knots of dough with plenty of fresh garlic, parsley, and coarse salt. I could imagine coming just for these, they are so good.

 
A classic deep-fried calzone filled with mozzarella cheese, ricotta cheese, and prosciutto. These are HUGE! You can also get the other calzones fried – I also recommend the spinach calzone, the one we had was stuffed with tons of whole-leaf baby spinach.

Napolitano’s Brooklyn Pizza
100 East Street, Cranston, RI (map)

Last weekend we attended the “Taste of Germany” food tasting / art show at the German American Cultural Society of Rhode Island.  The GACS, which is in a residential neighborhood in Pawtucket, has a picturesque mirrored ballroom perfect for special events.  (I’ll let you in on a secret – their cozy basement bar, the Ratskeller, is open on Friday nights from 7pm and is a great place for shockingly affordable German food and draft beers. The selection varies, but some of the beers I’ve had on draft include Kulmbacher Pils, Franziskaner Hefe-weisse, Spaten Lager, Aventinus Dunkel, to name a few.)

This was the first time they’ve held a tasting, and it was a huge hit, so hopefully it’ll happen again next year. I really appreciated the choice of uncommon and interesting foods.  The dishes represented 16 different regions of Germany.

I brought my camera and snapped photos of my favorites:

Eier in grüne soße (eggs in green sauce) from Hesse. The green sauce is bursting with fresh herbs.

Harzer Kase mit Musik – this marinated cheese is an acquired taste (one that I’ve acquired and my husband hasn’t). It’s really strong and pungent. Some people say the “music” that accompany the cheese comes a bit later, if you know what I mean (I hope you didn’t think my blog was too classy for fart jokes!)

Bread soup – doesn’t sound like anything special, but it was absolutely delicious!

Some of the other dishes included three other soups (potato/shrimp, white bean, green bean), potato salad, pretzels with obatzda (a cheese spread- also a favorite of mine), Spreewald style sweet pickles, herring dip, quark spread with pumpernickel, plum cake (my contribution), and stollen.  A large beer and wine selection accompanied all of this food – we had a couple of German beers on draft and toasted with a glass of Heinz Eifel Eiswein.

You can view the rest of my photos from the tasting on Flickr.

Fall is my favorite season, but the end of summer still fills me with regret for all my unrealized summer plans.   Like taking the Newport ferry, which will no longer set sail next year.  Or renting bikes on Block Island – I’ve still never been.  But sometimes you can take a bit of summer with you into the fall, like we did one night at Iggy’s in Warwick.  The line was shorter but the food, and the walk along the beach, were just as good.

We compensated for the summer’s lack of fried seafood by ordering in overabundance – chowder, clamcakes, calimari, fried clams, seafood platters…

This year’s Food For Thought is coming up on September 25th, and it’s going to be RI’s largest food & wine pairing, showcasing some great local restaurants and vineyards.

Want to go?  The first person to comment here (who is able to attend on the 25th) will get on the guest list for the event.  If you’re not quick enough, you can buy tickets online at http://foodforthoughtri.org.

If you want to see my post on last year’s event, it’s here.

As a 10-year-old tomboy, I always rose to the dare of eating something spicy. I’d chomp a hot pepper and try to convince everyone that it was nothing, even if the steam circling out of my ears belied my suffering.

I guess that part of me hasn’t died, because last night I went to Providence’s new BBQ joint Rick’s Roadhouse and insisted on finishing their Wings from Hell so I could get my picture on the Wall of Flame.

The waiver we had to sign hinted at how hot the wings would be. And they were HOT. My dining companions were only able to get through one or two, but once I hit four I became one with the pain and made my way through the rest. These weren’t tasty wings for spice lovers – they were a potent weapon slathered with as much capsicum as a wing could hold. Strangely enough, they were so hot that the Beamish Stout we were drinking tasted like pure sugar. I managed to survive, though we canceled our movie plans for the evening so we could all go home, clutch our stomachs and feel sorry for ourselves.

My Place on the Wall of Flame

This was my second meal at Rick’s. The first as a bit more modest – a shared deluxe barbecue platter. We thought Rick’s was the best barbecue we’ve had in Providence, but I know barbecue is a very subjective and touchy subject, so you should find out for yourselves. A lot of the menu items are a very good value, like the pulled pork sandwich which is just $5.49. They have a bunch of whiskey flights and you can get pitchers of beer (which is a necessary accessory to wash down really hot wings).

If any of you decide to rise to the hot wings challenge, let me know what happens!

Rick’s Roadhouse
370 Richmond St., Providence (in the Jewelry District)