There are just some offers you can't refuse. Take for instance, a proposal to serve lunch in a defunct airplane hangar--it warrants an enthusiastic, head-shaking 'yes.'
So under these pretenses, a rainy Thursday in May began.
Sara Grady and Jason Wood were the conspirators enlisting my help--a pair I met fortuitously last November while on a writing assignment at a supper club they hosted in Brooklyn. Both tall and slender, Grady and Jason could be mistaken for siblings with their sandy strawberry hair and pale elvish faces. Certainly two of a kind, the couple shares a passion for creating off-the-radar communal meals against equally quirky, but always warm backdrops.
Foggy and a little damp, the excursion began at 9 am on Reade Street where Sara took the helm and Jason munched a bagel in the front seat. Onto the West Side Highway, down the tip of Manhattan and over the Brooklyn Bridge we watched the storefronts drizzle past as we made our way down Flatbush Avenue's milieu of discount clothing outlets and single moniker shops--Mike Meat Deli and Aden Liquor Corner--pondering the afternoon ahead.
Several weeks prior, Sara had received a letter from an individual inquiring about GradyWood's culinary services. He explained his loyalties to a group quaintly called 'The Outer Boroughs Dining Society,' a cartel of retired gentlemen journalists and ad guys who voyage off the island for far-flung dining experiences in the exotic quarters of Queens or, in this case Floyd Bennett Field. The Society was in need of a Spring Frolic venue and had a mind to give it wings.
Through fog and ocean mist, the expanse of Floyd Bennett's runways began to reveal itself along a deserted stretch of road. We pulled up to our destination, Hangar B, perched on a weedy concrete lot overlooking the water. Industrially paned windows and corrugated metal shed droplets onto our heads as we ducked in through the yawning gap of building. As our eyes adjusted to the dusty light shafts, broad sheets of welded metal emerged in the shapes of wings and propellers--regal though somewhat eerie where some were half dissected and looking rather shabby.
We met a salty sixty-something mechanic at the door who snorted a bit at our endeavor, but left us to our own devices scooting heavy loads in and out of the building. Soon enough we were unpacked and prepping the meal. Nothing more than four picnic tables on an oil-spotted slab of concrete, our little oasis glowed against the rusty mullions and the borough trotters began to trickle in.
With a cooler of rosé in tow, the couples wandered gawking at a restored silver jet and chattering over what Jason was constructing upon china tea plates. Sweaters encircled shoulders and pastel polo shirts floated about as Sara and I brought out the first plates-- a veritable garden. Everyone sat to eat and wondered at the paper thin radishes atop quinoa and pea shoots--all except one man who would have been slight had he not been wearing a trench coat, a Donegal cap and large tinted sunglasses. His diet didn't "allow most foods." He stood and supervised his table mates, sniffed at a wine glass and wandered around the prep table poking at the boxes which would soon produce dessert.
Scallops atop the season's first sugar snap peas, final asparagus tips and French lentils came next. 'Incognito' (as we started calling the cloaked man) glanced at the tarragon Pernod dressing with a sour look, reached into his coat and pulled out a glazed donut. We surmised his dietary allowances were an affectation as he followed it up with several chocolate tarts we'd toted along for the final course.
Incognito was only one of many characters who graced us that afternoon. The Dining Society was certainly chock full of them. They left us with four and a half bottles of rosé, which we polished off while cleaning and left feeling hungry though we'd been feeding people all afternoon. We filled up at Marlow and Sons with cocktails and panini and went our separate ways, but received glowing reviews from the society that very evening. This little expert from the head diner sums up a bit of the Society's cog and quirk, but mostly the general sentiment GradyWood tends to leave behind.
You are so good you could become the Glorious Food of the farm-to-table sustainable-grower movement, an upswelling that's in only its earliest gurgles, and thank goodness for that.
...
You both have a rare touch, with people and food. Very few ever get the chance, but you might be among the anointed to never trade tedium for money. Go for it, all windows open, the stove lit, the handheld charged and empty of images, the garden full to bursting.
Gosh, I do go on. It must have been the green sauce on the scallops
A bit late on posting this one, but last week I wrote about Red Hook Lobster Pound's lobster roll debut at the Brooklyn Bridge Flea (which Urban Daddy totally ripped off).
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