Arthur Schwartz, the Food Maven, now featured at the 3Ts; the best Neapolitan pizza in NYC; Horn and Hardart's famous Mac and Cheese
recipe
The Three
Tomatoes love that you read our weekly missives, and some of you occasionally even visit our web site, which truth be told,
originally was just a place to house our archived newsletters and take the occasional poll. But that’s been changing over
the past few months, and here are three great reasons to stop by our “home” more often. Reason #1,
we’ve continued to add experts in wine, style and fashion, feng shui design, health and wellness, and we have a book club. Reason #2, which we
announced last week, is the addition of Valerie Smaldone’s weekly blog on NYC nightlife (especially for women who aren’t kids) at our
new section called, Valerie’s
Gallery. And….drum roll…reason #3 is that we now feature Arthur Schwartz, aka, The Food Maven, one of the
country’s foremost experts on food, cooking, culinary history, restaurants, and restaurant history. You are so going to
love Arthur’s weekly blog which is a treasure trove of all things food related, plus you’ll get the scoop on NYC restaurants, and
fabulous recipes from his award-winning cookbooks too.
How we met Arthur
Early last December, we received a press invitation to the Azzurro SicilyFest sponsored by the Region of Sicily and
the Fishery Department and produced by SicilyWine
Travels. It was a “feast indeed” and turned out to be a gazillion course fabulous Sicilian meal that featured
the fish from the area, and took place in the private upstairs room at Felidia's. (The Sicilian wines were superb too by the
way.) The invitation said 7PM, and since we arrived with the always punctual Mr. Tomato, we were right on time, and the very first
to arrive while our hosts were still setting up. About 10 minutes later, we heard the arrival of another guest (which we were
most grateful for) and we knew who it was immediately from the voice, one we had heard many, many times on WOR radio
-- Arthur Schwartz. And to our good fortune, and now yours too, Arthur was seated next to
us.
Well by about 8 PM, most of the other guests had arrived who unlike us, understood Sicilian “time”, and by
about 8:30 our first appetizers started to appear. Arthur enthralled everyone at our table as he explained every fabulous dish, and gave us a
history of the region as well, and told us about his cooking school in Italy too. The evening was great, even though we never
quite made it to dessert (it was 10:30 and past our bedtimes when we left). But in addition to full tummies and a great wine
buzz, we had Arthur’s contact info, which ultimately led to featuring “The Food Maven”, which you can now find at The Three Tomatoes.
“The Schwartz who ate New York”
The New York Times Magazine called Arthur Schwartz “a walking Google of food and restaurant knowledge.”
As the restaurant critic and executive food editor of the New York Daily News, which he was for 18 years, he was called “The Schwartz
Who Ate New York”. Nowadays, he is best known as The Food Maven, the name of his website and his new section at The Three
Tomatoes.
Over the 37 years of his career, he has written five award-winning cookbooks, and just published his latest book, Arthur Schwartz’s New York Jewish
Food, paying homage to his heritage. He is currently
working on his next cookbook, The Big Book of Southern Italian Food & Wine.
For 13 years, he broadcast daily on WOR radio. He was the food critic on Fox
network's (WNYW-TV) local morning show, Good Day New York, and has appeared on Good Morning America, Today, and Live
With Kathie and Regis, as well as many local morning shows. He continues to make frequent TV appearances on PBS and the Food
Network. These days in addition to media appearances, and writing cookbooks, he is a restaurant consultant and
lecturer. Oh, and did we mention he also has a cooking school in Paestum, Italy, just south of the Amalfi Coast. Talk about multitasking!
How Arthur became The Food Maven
Arthur visited us at our apartment recently, after having spent an entire day testing recipes for his next
cookbook. He told about his frustration with one recipe he kept trying to get consistent all afternoon, which is something
we had never really thought about. We thought you threw those recipes together, and viola, they turn
into something yummy. But then again, when Arthur asked to see our renovated, and well appointed kitchen with gas stove
and oven, we almost killed Mr. Tomato who ratted us out by telling Arthur how we get letters from Con Edison asking to check our gas meter, because
our consumption is so low. Okay, so we may not cook a lot, but we do love reading recipes. And, we wanted to
know how Arthur became a food critic, and of course, we had to know how a nice Jewish boy from Brooklyn became an Italian food maven too.
(And by the way, did you know maven is actually a Yiddish word? One of the many factoids that you’ll learn from
Arthur.)
Here’s what else we learned. He did not grow up with visions of being a food critic, but
rather a journalist, which was his major in college. However, he did grow up, as he says with a “wooden spoon”
in his mouth, in a food-obsessed Brooklyn family that went, and still goes, to any length for a good meal. His paternal grandfather was first a
professional chef, and his maternal grandmother's home cooking was the “envy and despair” of the neighbors. And the fact
that he grew up in an Italian/Jewish neighborhood, in a two-family house, where the downstairs was occupied by a Neapolitan family who treated him to
his first tastes of Italian home cooking, led to his lifelong love of Italian food.
He graduated from college, and worked briefly as a teacher, and then became a cub reporter on a local paper, making next
nothing. Then he saw an ad for “assistant food critic” at Newsday. He sent off a flip letter on why he should
be considered, and was immediately hired at the grand salary of $125 a week. He eventually joined the Daily News,
ultimately becoming the Executive Food Editor and restaurant critic, and the rest as they say, is history.
Where’s the best Neapolitan
pizza in NYC and Horn and Hardart's Mac & Cheese Recipe
You’ll find those answers this week at The Food Maven, featured at The Three Tomatoes.
So here’s to chance meetings, and fabulous food.
‘til next week,
The Three
Tomatoes
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reserved.
