BKTX

Fourth feast

Brooklyn TexasComment

Every year, Olivia hosts a Fourth of July party all weekend at her family's house in the Catskills. She had most of the weekend's meals planned out, but was stuck on figuring out Saturday's breakfast — knowing that Sunday would be filled with homemade biscuits and a fish boil, she wasn't sure what to bake. Blueberry scones? Muffins? We love biscuits so much, she didn't want something too similar, and something lighter than a pastry would be nice. Finally, she hit on it: DIY granola bowls! We'd make our own granola, which is easy to whip up and takes less than an hour, and friends could choose whatever yogurt, fruit, and toppings (extra sesame seeds or coconut flakes! honey or jam!) they wanted. The recipe we used is delicious. Pro tip: it might not seem perfectly crispy when you take it out of the oven, but it'll get crunchier as it cools.

Recipe adapted from Martha Stewart

  • 3 cups rolled oats
  • 1 cup dried unsweetened coconut chips
  • 1 cup crushed pecans or walnuts
  • 1/2 cup pure maple syrup
  • 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
  • 1/2 cup packed light-brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup sesame seeds
  • 1 teaspoon coarse salt
  • 3/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
  • 1/2 cup dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Mix together oats, coconut, nuts, syrup, oil, sugar, sesame seeds, salt, and nutmeg. Spread granola in an even layer on a rimmed baking sheet. Bake, stirring every 10 minutes, for 40 minutes. Add cranberries, and bake until granola is toasted, about 10 minutes more. Let cool completely. Serve with yogurt and cherries, peaches, blueberries, strawberries coconut, honey, jam, or anything else you like!

Extra special thanks to Julie Harris and Maija Ekey for photo contributions! 

Sugar High

Brooklyn TexasComment

Popsicles are the ultimate summer treat — sometimes you just need a sugar high. Alas, our unopened box of popsicle molds has been collecting dust for an embarrassingly long time. After two long, popsicle-less summers, we finally found some inspopration. We were gifted some beautiful copper cups for Moscow Mules, and in searching for an updated recipe we came across the idea for Moscow Mule popsicles. The ginger is unexpected and fresh, and the pops are just slightly effervescent, making them extra fun to eat. If you slice limes into the popsicles, the flavor comes through strongly and they end up tasting a bit more like margaritas. Bottoms up!

MOSCOW MULE POPSICLES

Adapted from Shutterbean
makes 6 popsicles

• juice of 2 limes
• 2 1/4  cups ginger beer
• 2 oz. vodka

Mix lime juice, ginger beer and vodka in a large measuring cup. Stir mixture and pour into popsicle molds, making sure to leave a little space at the top. Stick the molds in the freezer overnight (or at least 12 hours) and enjoy

Dates Part Deux

Brooklyn TexasComment

After we ran our Dream Dates blog post a few weeks ago, we were immediately asked about some grievous oversights we’d made in our selection. No Paul Rudd? No hot tubs? Mea culpa. We are compelled to make some additions to our list of dream dates with some even dreamier fantasy romantic matches. *Thanks to Rockyanne Bullwinkel for her visionary contributions.

• Kayaking with Kyle McLachlan

• Soup with Hugh Grant

• Chips and queso at Javelina with Mr. Darcy

• Lattes with Benicio Del Toro 

•Rock climbing with Adrien Brody

• Horseback riding with Kate Bush

• Tanning with Jon Snow

• Mario Kart with Paul Rudd

• Binging Youtube videos with Mark Ruffalo

• Rodeo with Jon Hamm

• Pedicures with James Franco

• Loft Opera with Kim Kardashian and Cindy Sherman

• Horror film drive-in with Matt Damon

• French fries with Dorian Grey

• Hot tub with Danny Devito*

• Dairy Queen with Shelley Duvall*

• Dog park with Jimmy Stewart*

Swim Fans

Brooklyn TexasComment

Summer’s here y’all! We’re ready for a serious dip. We thought about running a cold bath and donning our swimsuits at home; instead, we did the research and narrowed down our top methods of splashing around in and around New York City. Check out our favorites as well as a few swimming spots we haven’t tried but are excited to explore this summer.

Swimming holes

Last summer, we ventured to Peekamoose Blue Hole on County Rt. 42 just northeast of Grahamsville, NY and it’s very fun but there a few things to note. It was hard to find at first — we had to pull over and ask some friendly people if we were going in the right direction, and we kept driving and driving and thought we had certainly missed it. But, on a nice day, there are lots of cars parked and people out. It’s actually pretty hard to miss. Swimming holes are beautiful but even on the hottest day are extremely cold. You hike down to the river and the air temperature drops about 10 degrees — you have to be a real trooper to jump in. It’s really fun though, so just bring lots of towels, and don’t forget water shoes, if you have them. Just don’t expect to sunbathe. This summer, we can’t wait to try Enfield Falls at Robert Treman State Park (looks like Austin to us?!) and Stony Brook State Park.

Beaches

We explored Sandy Hook Beach in New Jersey last year, and boy was that an adventure. This summer, we’ll try to head to the beaches in Queens. We hope to head to the Rockaways for fish tacos, swimming, and hipster-spotting. We also need to try biking to Jacob Riis beach, which is supposed to be relatively clean and quieter than the trendy Fort Tilden beach next door.

Free pools (!)

OK so it’s hard to research free public pools in New York, nay in any place, without also reading about diarrhea. I’m going to choose not to link you to any of the Gothamist articles that describe the McCarren Pool of days past as a “diarrhea filled cesspool of violence and despair,” and instead remind you of its fun past as a rock concert venue. We’ve heard that the last few years, it’s gotten to be a pretty nice place to swim. We’re also excited to try out the Red Hook Recreation Center, which is Olympic sized and allows you to reserve times to swim laps. We might even make the trek out to the Bronx this summer because Barretto Point Floating Pool looks completely amazing. It’s on a floating barge on the East River. Just don’t forget to bring a lock to any of these public pools, because you can’t get in without one.

Not free pools

Not to be confused with McCarren Park Pool, the McCarren Hotel across the street will charge you a cool $325 for a “Pool Bed for two” from 11:30 am to 4:30 pm. Dang! Tickets for a “Day Swim” will set you back $45 on a weekday, $60 on the weekend, but it’s cheaper than a trip out of town. Mr. Purple, the bar on top of the Indigo hotel, has a gorgeous pool with sweeping views of the city, but expect wait times — and you might have to buy a table. It’s $55 for a day pass to the Dream Hotel Downtown’s pool in the Meatpacking district, but it’s seriously classy: quiet, a real sandy beach by the bar, striped chaise lounges. It also has a glass bottom, so even if you don’t feel like dishing out $55 to swim, you can swig a cocktail in the hotel bar and look up to see people swimming above you.

Dream Dates

Brooklyn TexasComment

Last week, I (Emily) realized that my dream date had happened and I wasn’t invited. I learned this sad truth from a single Tweet:

I saw this image, and I realized, eating cheap noodles and drinking beer on tiny stools over some trash in an anonymous restaurant in Vietnam with Barack Obama and Anthony Bourdain (both of them) was my ideal celebrity romantic situation. The brilliance, the daring, the bun cha! In an effort to recover from my great loss, this week we came up with some new dream dates

• Hamburgers somewhere dark and moody, like Corner Bistro, with Jon Hamm

• Wandering around the Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature with Wes Anderson

• Walking through the Luxembourg Gardens in the rain with Owen Wilson, a la "Midnight in Paris"

• Hitchhiking highway 89 with Shia LaBeouf  (actually, that sounds horrible)

• Running around an art museum and getting into trouble with Ferris Bueller-era Matthew Broderick

• Shopping for Rachel Comey dresses with Dan Stevens

• Going to the Russian Tea Room with Jason Schwartzman

•  Kung Pao Pastrami at Mission Chinese Food with Jamie Oliver

• Martinis at Bemelman’s Bar with “To Catch a Thief”-era Carey Grant

• Eating strawberry cupcakes in a park with Joseph Gordon-Levitt

• Popping into the frame with Andy Samberg

• Spending a few hours flirt-tweeting with Rob Delaney

• Steins of beer in a saloon with  “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”-era Robert Redford

• Tea at Sketch London with Prince Harry

• Hanging out reading the newspaper with Benedict Cumberbatch

Stars and Strawbs Forever

Brooklyn TexasComment

For most people, Memorial Day is associated with white: generally, it signals that it's time to ditch your winter blacks and that it's finally safe to lighten up with all white outfits for summer. BKTX associates it with red, because summer time means an overload of some of our favorite all red substances: watermelon, barbecue, ketchup, and strawberries. This Memorial Day, we're looking forward to breaking out our white dresses and immediately dripping strawberry sauce all over them, because the only thing better than sticky fingers stained red from fresh berries is a bubbly strawberry rhubarb pie. We experimented with Strawberry Rhubarb Galettes, and these babies are really the best way to ring in the new season — don't skimp on the whipped cream, these tarts are TART!

Strawberry Rhubarb Galettes

All-purpose flour
1 package (14 ounces) frozen puff pastry, preferably all-butter, thawed
8 ounces rhubarb, trimmed and sliced 1/4 inch thick (1 1/2 cups)
8 ounces fresh strawberries, hulled and sliced 1/4 inch thick (1 1/2 cups)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/8 teaspoon coarse salt
1 large egg white, lightly beaten

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. On a lightly floured surface, roll out pastry 1/8 inch thick. Cut into 5 squares; arrange on 2 parchment-lined baking sheets.

Stir together rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, cornstarch, and salt. Arrange 1/3 cup mixture in center of each pastry square. Fold edges in; crimp to form rounds. Brush edges with beaten egg white. Freeze until firm, 20 minutes.

Bake, rotating sheet halfway through, until golden brown and fruit is bubbling, 30 to 35 minutes. Transfer to a wirerack to cool. Serve with whipped cream.

Recipe Adapted from Martha Stewart

Beer! Round 4: Great Cans

Brooklyn TexasComment

In our last beer/design challenge, we asked a bunch of our friends to bring over beers they’ve never tasted that had great design, and we noticed something interesting: people brought cans. Good design isn’t restricted to labels, and as cans are darlings of hipster indie breweries, they tend to have some pretty interesting design — and the beer is getting pretty good too. Resident graphic designer Olivia picked some of her favorites and we put them to the test: blindly tasting all of the beer first, then ranking all of their designs, then revealing which beer was which. After it all, one of us admitted to preferring the pop and fizz of drinking straight from the can. One had no preference. As for the other two, as Jay put it, “There’s nothing better than drinking Lonestar out of the bottle outside a dive bar in Texas.” Amen.

From the Blind TASTE Test:

Jay: Grassy? Kinda hoppy, but really light, could drink like 8 of these in a night (and would enjoy it and myself). Farmhouse.

Olivia: Hoppy, skunky, tasty! It’s an IPA for sure.

Eliza: Light and hoppy, this is a beer I’d like to get drunk on. But it’s a little too hoppy for me to drink casually.

Emily: Yum! This tastes like a yummy summer beer. A little bitter at the end but not overwhelming. It’s an amiable IPA! Amiable IPA is a great name, I should make a brewery and call it that. Or a band! I don’t normally drink IPAs but I adore this.

Thoughts on DESIGN:

Jay: Big Lebowsky? Hard to decipher and the triangles feel gimmicky. Feels generic and “weird.”

Olivia: The dude on this can is kind of scary! He reminds me of someone from the Big Lebowski, This is my least favorite. I’m not into the geometric style. He is just trying to be too cool.

Eliza: I can’t read this! I like the geometric shapes and the color scheme but the print isn’t legible. Also the background yellow is boring AF. Like a bad ’70’s rug.

Emily: I love the lightning bolt graphic but I’m not a fan of the faded yellow, brown, and beige. It looks like ’70s stylized Urban Outfitters home accessories or someone trying to rip off Quentin Tarantino, poorly.

From the blind taste test:

Jay: Cocoa in both a “yummy milkshake” way when you first drink it, and also in a “dark chocolate bitter but yummy” way in the aftertaste. It actually only tastes better with a second sup. Burnt Popcorn, tobacco.

Olivia: Smoky and dark! Love this. It has hints of coffee, like a stout, and it’s earthy. It’s bitter but still drinkable.

Eliza: Smooth, velvety porter, a cozy beer. Frothy and wintery, makes me feel happy horny. This beer is like that naked photo of Burt Reynolds.

Emily: Dang that looks dark. It doesn’t taste that dark though. A little chocolatey and coffee tasting, but it’s not creamy at all so very drinkable. I also don’t normally like dark beer but I’d drink this happily.

thoughts on Design:

Jay: Looks crafty but still new — a nice marriage of traditional and weird. I like that it’s restrained enough to just have the graphic dominate. Looks like a beer you’d drink to feel unique but not one you’d drink to look unique to other people

Olivia: I love this one. The Baba logo is great and the can gives off the feeling of being dark while staying light in color. I fucking love the sheep and the compass on the top. Adventure is calling and we are heading west!

Eliza: I love the compass look at the top, the off white kind of creamy color, the font variation. It’s newsprint-like. Hi sheep! <3 baaa. The block letters on Baba are nice.

Emily: Love the compass detail around the top and the mix of typefaces on the back. It looks like an old newspaper to me. Beige is bold in this case! Don’t see many cans like this. Very cool.

From the blind Taste test:

Jay: Kind of skunky or smelly. What I really don’t like is that it isn’t pungently skunky, it tastes watered down. Sour Yeast (wish it were more, though).

Olivia: Sweet and fruity! So fresh and light for summer. This is the lightest one.

Eliza: Somehow sour and bland at the same time. Tastes like cologne or Bud Light with vinegar. Ew.

Emily: Yummy! Also summery and fruity. Smells kind of pumpkiny and sour, but tastes crisp and peachy.

thoughts on Design:

Jay: Name sounds like a Bob’s Burger’s pun. The whole illustration style is like a cartoon I would want to watch. This makes me smile, though it seems a little cloying. The font seems “done” and overly crafty.

Olivia: this illustration is great and slightly whimsical. I love the barge filled with watermelon. The format of this can is unusual and I appreciate that. I think beer bottles should incorporate illustration more frequently.

Eliza: Obviously an interesting graphic, I like the teal color but I think it’s too monochromatic with the Statue of Liberty. I do love the wave and cloud detail and the crown hung on the bridge. Also that one flying black bird!

Emily: I love the teal and vintage comic looking iconography. It reminds me of Japanese art (the Great Wave off Kanagawa). Lady Liberty is a babe, and the Golden Gate Bridge is a great place for her to park her fanny.

From the blind Taste test:

Jay: Smells smoky in a nice way. Earthy. Mustache-clinging foam feels thick and velvety.

Olivia: Very mild. Tastes pilsnery. Probably my least favorite, it’s kind of boring and uninspiring.

Eliza: This beer would be great with a burger. It’s a lightly hoppy amber, inoffensive and dry. A good happy hour beer.

Emily: Light, but my least favorite. Smells a little like Bud light but also coffee or something? It’s tangy but not in a positive way.

Olivia: The flavors change depending on what order you drink the beer in. The third beer was my second favorite when I tried it before the second beer, but when I tasted it again after drinking the second beer, I liked it less.

thoughts on Design:

Jay: Love the X. Simple, salty, and beachy. Really love how simple and unassuming it is it is.

Olivia: So fun! It feels like a beer for camping or boy scout adventures. I love the mix of typefaces. This is the perfect beer to channel my Wes Anderson obsession.

Eliza: Boring. But obviously I love that it’s called “Driftwood Ale” because I love maritime shit. I do like how the design can be seen as either yellow X’s or white diamonds! It’s harlequiny.

Emily: This wins for looking most like its name. It could be out of “Moonrise Kingdom” with the arrowhead logo, mustard hue, and bold details. The big X across the can could be a scout’s honor, and the tagline, “Come as you are,” is SO Wes Anderson. Very Montauk old school, or how it is in my imagination.

The Very Best

Brooklyn TexasComment

It's our birthday! We're off celebrating like kweens and developing some exciting new content for the next few weeks, but in the meantime we wanted to share some of our favorite posts from the last year. From our Winter Staycation, which is weirdly still applicable, to our Gettin' Handsy post (so random), these were the most fun to create. Enjoy the very best for a very BKTX b-day!

Fleurs du Ma

Brooklyn Texas1 Comment

When it comes to flowers, we’re deeply committed to the bodega variety. In fact, last weekend, fueled by pizza and rosé (and maybe also some sangria, gin spiked lemonade, and beer), we were waylaid by a bodega overflowing with tiny yellow roses and big red ranunculus and bought some even though both of us already had overflowing vases at home. That said, sometimes the corner store doesn’t cut it: those roses hardly made it from Chelsea to Brooklyn, and with Mother’s Day coming up we needed to seriously up our floral game. When you (sadly) live1,600 miles away from the best mom in the world, you want to give her the freshest blooms around, not thirsty, fading buds. Mother's Days past, we resorted to blindly calling local florists to see if they'll deliver whatever they had on hand or shamefully asking our dads to pick up our orders. An overwhelming number of online flower delivery services have sprouted up recently to solve the mailing-fresh-flowers problem, so we checked out all the important features: bouquet originality, price, variety of flowers available, and where they deliver. Whether you’re a slacker and still need to send your mom a gift (DO IT NOW) or you just want an extra punch of freshness delivered to your door, here’s how to choose the right digital florist. 

Farmgirl Flowers

We love Farmgirl! These bouquets are a wild mix of whatever is fresh that day and are very nicely designed. You can get them wrapped in burlap or in a vase. Options are limited to “small,” “medium,” “large,” or “fancy pants” (plus an option for a bouquet of peonies). They don’t tell you exactly what will be included because the arrangement changes each day, but you can rest assured that the flowers will be fresh, Pinterest-ready, and exploding with the best seasonal stems out there. Emily has sent bouquets that included peonies and even tiny cabbages! Farmgirl is definitely a favorite.

The Bouqs

Flat rate, free delivery: the Bouqs makes buying flowers super simple. You pick the kind of flower you want or the bouquet that you like, they tell you the estimated delivery time, and your blooms show up! Waiving the delivery charge makes the Bouqs one of the most reasonable players in the game. They also have cool options where you can customize the size of the bouquet you want, giving you more control over what you end up sending.

BloomThat

Same idea as Farmgirl: with BloomThat, there are about 3 bouquets available each day, as well as a few potted succulents, varying by location. They show you great photos of what the bouquet design will be: tasteful, but no surprises here. These blooms are a bit more traditional, and if you don't like the bouquets available then you're out of luck.

Urban Stems

The most conservative of the bunch, Urban Stems bouquets are tastefully designed but you won’t find any stems you’ve never seen before here. Bouquets are tailored for personalities, with each one specified as “for the bookworm,” or “for the brave one," though it's not really clear why.

Petal by Pedal

Points for a great name! Petal by Pedal offers bicycle delivery flowers in NYC. They pick the flower arrangement for you, and don’t give you a lot of images on their website to see what they normally look like. If you're flexible and prioritize personal delivery, this service is for you!

The Sill

Ecommerce for potted plants! About $40 will get you a tiny indoor plant in a very sweet pastel pot from The Sill. Great for mixing it up if you’re over the whole petal thing. You can also just buy the ceramics, which are very cool.

 

 

Milk Milk Lemonade

Brooklyn TexasComment

After Beyoncé dropped “Lemonade” last weekend, an explosion of think-pieces, criticisms, and Bey-hive witch hunts detonated. We were given so many metaphors to pore over and read into, but in all the hubbub we were given something else, something important, that was easy to overlook: literal lemonade. There is nothing remotely basic about Beyonce, but the lemonade recipe she shared on the visual album was gloriously simple: her grandmother Agnez Dereon’s recipe for the golden beverage is a classic staple. We may never know who Becky with the Good Hair is, but we now hold the key to one of the Knowles family treasures — ok maybe that’s an exaggeration, but it’s certainly the quickest and cheapest way to have a shared experience with Queen Bey. We decided to test it out … and while we were at it, we couldn’t stop ourselves from BKTXing it up a bit. There are a lot of food references throughout all of “Lemonade,” particularly in “Formation,” so we decided to take the hot sauce out of our bags and sip our Cuervo, not with a chaser, but mixed into our Spicy Pink Watermelon Lemonade.

 
 

Agnez Deréon’s Lemonade Recipe

8 lemons
1 pint water
1/2 pound sugar

Take one pint of water, add a half-pound of sugar, the juice of 8 lemons, and the zest of half of a lemon. Pour the water from one jug into the other several times, strain through a clean napkin.

BKTX Spicy Pink Watermelon Lemonade Recipe

8 lemons (extra for garnish)
1 bottle of Topo Chico Agua Mineral (if you live in NYC this may be hard to come by... we used Boylan Seltzer) 
1/2 pound sugar
3 cups of watermelon juice (about 1/4 watermelon)
1/4 teaspoon of Habanero Tabasco Sauce
1 Habanero, halved and seeded.

Juice lemons and watermelon separately and set aside. Whisk lemon juice, sugar, and seltzer water until the sugar is dissolved. Stir in the watermelon juice and Tabasco Sauce. Taste and add more seltzer if necessary. Add the habanero and refrigerate overnight (or until you have reached your desired level of hotness)! Spike with Cuervo and serve over ice with slices of lemon.