Gotham Gold: The Springtime Barbecue

Ah Spring, most gracious of seasons, betwixt frosty Winter's bite and warm Summer's glow! Ah Spring, when a young man's thoughts of fancy turn to barbecue. Nothing says, "I'm outside!" like firing up the grill and charring some hunks of cow flesh. Even in New York City, a city not normally known for encouraging a great diversity of outdoor pastimes besides window shopping and job hunting, can one find massive fiestas where a gracious host holds court over a small patch of grass, garbed with a "Kiss the Cook" apron and drunk as a sailor.

In my time at Columbia, I have attended numerous New York barbecues (henceforth to be known as BBQs). Some, such as those I can only foggily recollect from Homecoming at Baker Field, are more Collegiate than Gothamite. Others, such as the annual event my uncle hosts in his backyard--yes, someone actually does have a backyard in Manhattan--are as hip and urban as a Yeah Yeah Yeahs concert.

Replacing steak, burgers, franks, and sausages with king salmon, tuna filets, and crab legs, the savvy NYC BBQ architect keeps in mind those whom he includes on the guest list. While a grease-heavy double cheeseburger may be fine for Billy Bob the Plumber, for Jean-Paul the Gucci Model something slightly less caloric is required. Gone from the side dish table are macaroni and cheese, potato salad, baked beans, and corn-on-the-cob. To accompany the lime and cilantro Mahi-Mahi, today's New York BBQer demands blended caviar, penne à la vodka, stuffed grape leaves, and spanakopita. When a New Yorker grills out, there is no keg of Milwaukee's Best, perched on ice and freshly tapped--no, for alcoholic refreshment a true Manhattan man must settle for Jello shots, whiskey sours, Cosmopolitans, and Capecodders.
Please don't mistake me. New York BBQs are truly enjoyable. While stuffing myself on food I could never ever afford and drinking booze I would never ever buy, I am entertained for hours by drunken Yuppies. You can talk to beautiful women wearing clothing entirely inappropriate for anything other than a fashion show, watch B-list celebrities like Jon Lovitz and John Leguizamo hit on college girls, and swipe enough grub to last you a week. However, for me, the acronym BBQ invokes images of potbellied factory workers drinking warm beer, wearing wifebeaters, and dropping pieces of potato on their shirts.

My first memory of a BBQ was when I was seven years old. My family had just moved to Indiana from New York by way of Boston, and our neighbors--whose families had lived in Indiana since the late 19th century--graciously invited us to their Fourth of July party. I remember being forced to carry a jelly-mold as we walked down the street, my mother wearing a dress, my father wearing a sports coat. When we turned the corner and saw the 30-odd pick-up trucks lining the street--each with a different assortment of lights, tires, and other automotive paraphernalia--my mother turned to my father and asked, "Do they know we're Jewish?"

Three hours and a dozen polite remarks about my mother's dress later, my dad was plastered off cheap beer and playing touch football with the neighbors--college kids--and I was busy puking in the bathroom while three other seven-year-olds watched, jaws to the floor. Unfortunately, my northeastern Jewish stomach was not quite ready to handle the cornucopia of midwestern cooking. Somewhere between the third polish sausage and the second helping of franks and beans, my intestinal system gave up the ghost. Too bold to inform my parents of my violent illness, I quarantined myself in the upstairs bathroom along with three children I had never met before that day.

While I salute that noble and proud New York BBQer, there are certain things that cannot be transplanted from the heartland to Wall Street. As a close, dear friend of mine from Indiana once said while he packed another wad of Skoal into his lip, "shit, Ben, none of them New Yorkers ever even seen a pig slaughtered!" Too true.