A soda tax is being mooted and salt-laden snacks are the mayor’s current bugbear, but processed food still has fans in high places, including some of the city’s most frequented restaurants. There, innovative chefs are using not-so-nutritious (but delicious) store-bought products to gussy up their fabulous meals — and trigger feel-good moments for diners.
“It’s about taking something, making it familiar and also new,” says Dan Reineke, general manager of BLT Burger, where Hostess Twinkies are celebrated in its Twinkie Boy milkshake. “Some of my favorite dishes are the things I grew up eating. That’s the nostalgia of eating.”
Here are five fantastic dishes featuring the junk food we all know and love:
Pork belly with Pop Rocks
Served at: Klee Brasserie, 200 Ninth Ave.; 212-633-8033
Daniel Angerer uses Pop Rocks to add a touch of theater to his luscious pork belly special ($35). “We have terrific Austrian-style Mangalitsa pork,” the chef explains. “It’s fairly rich and has good texture, but I thought it needed some crunch to it.” So, he confits the meat for 10 hours, crisps it in a pan, then sprinkles the fruit-flavored exploding candy on top. Once plated in front of the lucky diner, a cippolini onion broth is poured over the dish — and the rocks start to pop!
“People are taken back because their dish just exploded,” says Angerer. “We adults don’t eat Pop Rocks on a daily basis, so it reminds us of when we were 4, hanging out with our friends.”
Tingas de pollo braised in Coca-Cola
Served at: Cabrito, 50 Carmine St.; 212-929-5050
Mexican Coca-Cola is known for tasting better than its US counterpart because it’s sweetened with sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup, which is why David Schuttenberg insists on using it in his tingas de pollo (spicy stewed chicken) tacos (two for $15; three for $18). To make the dish, the chef braises 10 chickens in onions, garlic, adobo paste — and a quart of Coke. “My sous chef had an old family recipe that used Coke, so we adapted it,” says Schuttenberg, who buys the soda in bulk from local purveyors that specialize in Mexican products. “I can’t explain the taste other than that I love it,” he adds. “And it’s really popular. We sell a lot of those tacos.”
Twinkie Boy milkshake
Served at: BLT Burger, 470 Sixth Ave.; 212-243-8226
Chef Laurent Tourondel’s Twinkie Boy milkshake has been on the menu at BLT Burger since the Greenwich Village restaurant opened in 2006. “It’s one of our most popular milkshakes. On a busy day, we sell between 15 and 30,” says general manager Dan Reineke. “One guy comes in all the time and has spiced rum added to it.”
The hearty drink ($7) that’s whipped up with a whole Twinkie is made from vanilla ice cream, caramel and whipped cream. “It has that confectionery taste to it. And we have really big straws, so you can get a bit of Twinkie through them,” says Reineke. “It’s just kind of a cool idea.”
Wonder Bread meatballs
Served at: Kefi, 505 Columbus Ave; 212-873-0200
The secret ingredient in Michael Psilakis’ marvelous meatballs isn’t hand-reared beef or rare herbs, but plain old processed Wonder Bread. “When I started to develop this recipe, I was trying to make them as light as possible,” says Psilakis. “You achieve that by adding bread soaked in milk. I tried fresh bread from a bakery and day-old bread, but it wouldn’t deteriorate enough.” So the famed chef experimented with Wonder Bread. “It was a soupy mess and it worked the best!” he says. Now the meatballs ($6.95 as an appetizer on the dinner menu; $6.25 at lunch) are one of the restaurant’s most popular dishes. “We go through more loaves each week than you could imagine,” Psilakis says.
Cheesecake lollipops served with bubble-gum whipped cream
Served at: Fishtail, 135 E. 62nd St.; 212-754-1300
The extravaganza that is David Burke’s cheesecake lollipop tree ($16) is one good-looking trip down memory lane. First, there are the lollipops, an adult take on a childhood favorite; then the bubble-gum whipped cream, a bowl of pink fluff that accompanies the dessert. To get the bubble-gum taste, Burke uses an extract from a flavor house in New Jersey. “There’s probably 100 gum flavors to choose from,” says Burke, “but ours is the all-American, Bazooka Joe flavor.”
Burke recommends dipping the pops, which are on the dessert menu at all of Burke’s restaurants, into the cream before digging in. “Why not? It’s fun and surprising,” he says.