33 Eating Adventures

1.

Head to a strip mall in Jamaica for perfect fried chicken.

“How good can chicken be?” my friend asked when I told them I was headed to the outskirts of JFK for New York Fried Chicken (147-1 Liberty Ave., at Sutphin Blvd.; 718-523-1900), a squat brick building next to a laundromat and a gas station. In a city with a Kennedy, KFC, or Popeyes never more than a few minutes away, I understand the skepticism: There’s no flavored coating or special sauce. Instead, there is only chicken, the best I’ve ever had. The spicy, salty crust and the skin become one — yet never distract from the juicy meat underneath. —Tammie Teclemariam

2.

Play hooky and eat a hero.

Wednesdays are when Mama’s Too (2750 Broadway, nr. W. 106th St.; mamastoo.com) — the much-loved Upper West Side pizza place — reliably serves sandwiches. Come late July, when the boss is on vacation, why not dip out for lunch? The shop offers a rotating special each week, usually around $20 (not cheap, but worth it). Sometimes it’s an original creation — like lemony grilled chicken with thick gobs of stracciatella cheese — while other weeks bring chicken cutlets alla vodka, craggy eggplant parms, or roast beef with provolone and garlicky au jus. —Chris Crowley

3.

Take a ferry to eat a Blizzard.

Unfortunately — or fortunately, because scarcity is a kind of gift — there is only one Dairy Queen in the five boroughs, and it’s in the Staten Island Ferry terminal. Technically, it is not a Dairy Queen. It’s a DQ Grill & Chill (St. George Ferry Terminal; dairyqueen.com), but upon docking, it is right there, like a beacon. Not a nice beacon: It would not be out of place in a rest stop on the New Jersey Turnpike. You don’t go for ambience. You go because you are committed to the quest. On a recent Tuesday afternoon, eating my Oreo Blizzard, looking out over the Hudson with my back to Wetzel’s Pretzels, I marveled at the thoroughness of the blending process and the way the cookie fragments maintain their crunch against all possible odds. —Rachel Sugar

4.

Slurp some clams on Arthur Avenue.

An amble along Arthur Avenue remains a worthwhile experience, though — truth be told — the restaurants have seen better days. The stores and delis have the most juice now. Along with pastry shops and olive-oil factories, there are two fish markets on the strip: Cosenza’s Fish Market (2354 Arthur Ave., nr. E. 186th St.; 718-933-6099) and Randazzo’s Seafood (2327 Arthur Ave., nr. E. 184th St.; randazzoseafood.com). On warm days, both spots set up outdoor clam bars. At Randazzo’s — which has no relation to the other clam-forward Randazzo’s in Brooklyn — it means a small display of seafood that can include oysters, cherrystones, sea urchin, and mussels with everything splayed out on ice. Two shuckers make quick work of any order, and nobody is pushing nouveau raw-bar innovations like rhubarb mignonette. —C.C.

5.

Choose your own fluke in Astoria.

There is no more satisfying way to feast on the spoils of the sea than to visit Astoria’s collection of fresh-fish counters, where customers can pluck out their preferred salmon or sardines from the daily specials displayed on ice, then have their choice broiled, fried, grilled, or steamed. But the first decision to make is where to go: At Astoria Seafood (37-10 33rd St.; astoriaseafoodnyc.com), tables are crammed to capacity. Bring one friend to scout for seats, another to handle BYOB responsibilities, and a third for picking out the sea bass and fluke along with a plate of oysters to start. The selection is less expansive at Hamido Seafood (33-08 Ditmars Blvd.; hamidoseafood.com), but the atmosphere is less chaotic and options still include wild red mullet, sardines, and three sizes of shrimp. It’s halal, so there’s no BYOB; get the mint lemonade instead and an order of fresh baba ghannouj while you wait for your fish. AbuQir Seafood (24-19 Steinway St., nr. Astoria Blvd. S.; 718-274-3474), which seats about 20 people, is better for solo diners or parties of two. Branzino may seem basic, but it’s also the perfect canvas for the house seasoning. —T.T.

6.

Organize a taco outing to Coney Island …

Skip the scrum at Nathan’s and wander over to Stillwell Avenue, where you’ll find Taqueria Emilio 3 (3029 Stillwell Ave., at Bowery St.; taqueriaemilio.com), a new-to-the-neighborhood offshoot of a local chainlet that consists of a couple of trailers with a fenced-in seating area in view of Luna Park. Bring friends because the best order is la ruleta de tacos, a platter of 15 tacos arranged in a wheel surrounding a mound of grilled nopales and green onions. There’s a choice of different proteins; the one to get is glistening al pastor, carved fresh from the restaurant’s spit. —T.T.

7.

… Or tuck into the Boardwalk’s new hookah bar.

The best beach views at Zula (3052 W. 21st St., at the Boardwalk; 718-973-4336), a Mediterranean restaurant that just opened in a former theater, are on the roof. It’s nice enough for lunch (fattoush is fresh and cool and just $14), but the allure for most tables is the alfresco hookah service. Even if mint-melon shisha isn’t your thing, the Turkish pides — boat-shaped breads filled with cheese or meats, like a sujuk-and-mozzarella combo — are worth the trip. —T.T.

8.

Order a spice bag in the Bronx.

Innovations in Irish cuisine rarely capture the wider world’s attention. Several years ago, however, a delicacy called a spice bag broke out from the Emerald Isle. Reportedly invented at a Chinese takeout in Dublin, it’s a bag of chile-seasoned fries with chicken, onion, bell pepper, and spices. Now the question becomes, Where to find one in New York? Up in Woodlawn. The sequestered Bronx neighborhood has been an Irish-American stronghold for as long as anyone remembers. The IRA bar might be gone, but the spice bags have arrived. They’re better when you’re buzzed, so start with some drinks at Keane’s (4342 Katonah Ave., nr. E. 239th St.; keanesbar.com), where the bartenders know to take their time with the Guinness pour. After a few of those, walk over to The Kitchen (4330 Katonah Ave., at E. 238th St.; thekitchenbronx.com), a cubbyhole-size takeout spot that calls itself the “home of the Irish Chinese in USA.” Its spice bags are flecked with chile, fragrant with cumin, and loaded with crisp chicken strips and fried peppers. —C.C

9.

Do a Dankwrap in Rockaway Beach.

You’ll be here at some point before the fall. Here is a very good three-point plan: First, get off the A at Beach 67th Street, because it is home to the original Super Burrito (190 Beach 69th St., at Rockaway Beach Blvd.; superburritonyc.com), where you can grab a Dankwrap, a cheesy, beefy, crunchy griddled upmarket Taco Bell dupe. Next: ice cream. Pop into Coastal Market (108-19 Rockaway Beach Dr., at Beach 109th St.; coastalmarketrbny.com), where Rockaway Beach Bakery owner Tracy Obolsky offers her new ice cream by the scoop. Get the peanut butter and jelly or a mint fudge that’s as potent as a shot of crème de menthe. Finally: drinks. What Rockaway Tiki Bar (6720 Rockaway Beach Blvd., at Beach 68th St.; rockawaytikibar.com) lacks in mixological innovation, it makes up for with strong mai tais and — on the first Saturday of each month — performances by the Grateful Dead cover band Rainbow Spirals. —C.C. and T.T.

10.

Make a dosa run to Central Jersey.

The Sri Venkateswara Temple sits about 40 miles west of the Holland Tunnel, and it’s massive: A compound with a community center, auditoriums, and banquet halls, it’s also home to the Balaji Temple Cafe (1 Balaji Temple Dr., at U.S. 202, Bridgewater, New Jersey; venkateswaratemple.org), where you will find the preferred dosas of Dhamaka chef Chintan Pandya. The café is easy to find because there’s usually a line. Everything on the menu is vegetarian, drawing mostly from states in South India. There are plain dosas and masala dosas that are crisp but soft and ripe for dipping in sambar. There are also mysore dosas and weekends-only pesarattu, spongier and greenish in shade thanks to the addition of moong lentils. Supplement the dosas with lightly breaded spinach pakora; tangy bisi bele bath, a lentil, rice, and vegetable dish from Karnataka; and dahi vada in its thin yogurt sauce. —C.C.

11.

Brave the New Jersey Turnpike for a mustard pie …

Persuading friends who live in New York to drive an hour or so into Jersey for pizza is tough. They will ask why. The answer is Papa’s Tomato Pies (19 Main St., nr. Railroad Ave., Robbinsville Township, New Jersey; papastomatopies.com), near Trenton, which has been open since 1912 and has a valid claim to the title of longest-running pizzeria in America, since Lombardi’s was closed for a decade starting in 1977. But it’s the pizza itself that makes Papa’s worth the journey along I-95, specifically the pizza most commonly referred to as “mustard pie.” It’s “thin crust,” but the genre has more in common with Manhattan’s slice joints. It leaves a nice little puddle of hot grease in its wake, and the outer edge always sports a few shades of brown, proof that somebody in the kitchen is turning the pie every few seconds to make sure it’s cooked evenly. Fellow Trenton-area pizza legend De Lorenzo’s also makes tomato pies, but a mustard version isn’t on the menu. That’s a Papa’s thing, where spicy brown mustard is spread on before anything else, then the other toppings are added. (The story goes that another pizza spot nearby, Schuster’s, was owned by a German family that introduced the idea to the area. When it closed, Papa’s decided to try it and the flavor stuck.) I make the trip anytime I can convince someone to come with me and even times when I can’t. Recently, I was the only person in the dining room at 11:30 a.m. The restaurant has been in the current location for a decade but somehow looks like it hasn’t been touched since 1992. The booths are a little banged up, Tiffany lamps hang over the tables, and there’s carpet. It took six minutes for my large pie to come out. I ate half in about 15 minutes, then decided to take the rest home. —Jason Diamond

12.

… Or take a detour off the Long Island Expressway for a cold slice.

Any summer plans on Long Island tend to involve crawling along the LIE. Take a break around exit 45 and make the 20-ish-minute drive north to Little Vincent’s Pizza (329 New York Ave., nr. Main St., Huntington; 631-423-9620), a nothing-special-looking counter shop that is home to a curiously undersung regional delicacy: the cold-cheese slice, whereupon a giant fistful of uncooked mozzarella is added to a plain slice just as it emerges hot from the oven. Local legend has it that Little Vincent’s developed this innovation as a way to help overeager patrons, unwilling or unable to wait for their pizza’s heat to dissipate, avoid burning their mouths; whatever its true origins, it is perplexing that nobody else has thought to copy the idea. Folding the slice around salty cheese creates a taco effect, as the extra-crispy crust cradles the cooling curls of mozz. A cold-cheese slice offers the thermal and textural contrasts that define the best kind of street eating — compositional perfection that costs a mere $5 and can make any driver forget, however briefly, about the chaos of I-495 during a busy weekend. —Alan Sytsma

13.

Venture out of the city for fine dining that isn’t Blue Hill.

Since 2017, the kitchens of Manhattan have been bereft of Jesse Schenker, first spotted at the diminutive West Village tasting spot Recette. It’s less than 35 miles from West 12th Street to the Long Island cottage where Schenker’s newest restaurant, Four (4 Spring St., nr. Audrey Ave., Oyster Bay; 4springstreet.com), is housed — but it feels much farther. To start, with only ten seats, it’s almost laughably small. It’s closed three nights a week. And one senses that it is exactly what Schenker, or any fine-dining chef, wishes a restaurant could be. The counter is Danby marble; the stools are custom Italian upholstery; the soundtrack is Eddie Vedder. There are 17 courses on the tasting menu, each as concise as a haiku. One, a duck-fat croissant filled with foie gras, arrives on a pillow. “We never could have done this in New York,” says Schenker. The economics would’ve forbade it. Nevertheless, by civilian standards, Four is not cheap. The tasting menu costs $275 per person. But compared to similar meals in the city — Per Se starts at $390; Chef’s Table at Brooklyn Fare is $430 — it’s a bargain. Much of Schenker’s menu comes from extremely local farmers like “Sam and Benedetta,” who drop off duck eggs that become a luxurious scramble (equal parts butter and egg) topped with a quenelle of Kaluga caviar. Fluke, freshly removed from the Sound, gets a little gremolata and a refreshing agua chile. Even more refreshing: the North Shore amity that flows between the chef and his guests. —Joshua David Stein

14.

Feast on crabs at Clemente’s.

Shell Bank Creek isn’t the Chesapeake Bay, but the South Brooklyn waterway is an ideal backdrop for a spread of Maryland seafood clawed apart outside while wearing a plastic bib. Although a long-standing all-you-can-eat policy at Clemente’s Crab House (Venice Marina, 3939 Emmons Ave., Sheepshead Bay; clementescrabhouse.com) is gone, the upside is that the equally famous two-plus-hour wait times for a table have disappeared as well. A stack of blue crabs covered in Old Bay is the traditional order, of course, but a Brooklyn-meets-Maryland specialty known as crabs oreganata is not only doused in garlic and lemon: The top of each crab is pre-cracked, making the labor-to-meat ratio a bit more favorable. —A.S.

15.

Take a 32-minute Metro-North ride for a saucy sandwich.

Pambazos, the guajillo-sauce-dipped Mexican sandwiches, aren’t too difficult to find in the five boroughs. Good pambazos, though? The area’s best ones are about six miles above Manhattan’s northernmost tip. (They’re also a ten-minute walk from the Yonkers train station.) El Poblano Cafe (2 Main St., at N. Broadway; 914-963-0062) is announced by a black awning that reads only luncheonette. Inside, the sandwiches arrive practically spilling onto their plates. That bread, sprinkled with cheese and streaked with grill marks, is soft, not crusty, and made even more so from the guajillo sauce, which is a little fruity, a little smoky, and ever so slightly spicy. It’s filled with cubes of potatoes that are cooked until pliant, bits of roughly chopped sausage, lettuce, some more queso fresco, and a bit of crema. —C.C.

16.

Sip a “Jet Fuel” in a pool.

The city’s hotel pools that offer day passes tend to be a total rip-off ($160 for a first-come, first-serve lounge chair at the William Vale), or limited in hours (the Rockaway Hotel doesn’t offer passes on weekends). But the not-so-secret TWA Hotel (1 Idlewild Dr., at John F. Kennedy Airport Terminal 5; twahotel.com) has a rooftop pool with one of the most spectacular views in the city and charges only $50 for access ($25 for hotel guests). Anyone can sit in the infinity pool perched above a runway and watch a double-decker Emirates A380 take off while a bartender mixes their cocktail. The Jet Fuel (cucumber-mint vodka, Aperol, and muddled watermelon) is sufficiently summery, while the Clear Skies Ahead (prosecco, fresh raspberries, and passion-fruit syrup) is light enough to count as breakfast. The bar opens at 11 a.m. You’re at the airport; you might as well start drinking early. —Megan Paetzhold

17.

Spend a Sunday devouring carnitas in someone’s backyard.

There is a driveway in Woodside, just down the block from Donovan’s Pub, that’s sandwiched between two houses. It looks like any other, but walk in and the sound of music playing from a portable speaker will become louder. Soon it’s joined by kids laughing and — crucially — the sizzle of a griddle. This is Carnitas los Jarochos (41-06 58th St.; 646-255-4525), a Sundays-only restaurant that’s open when the weather is nice. The namesake carnitas come from three cuts of pork (ear, skin, shoulder), all crispy meat and gelatinous fat. Order the tampiquena, too, a medium-rare skirt steak that comes with blistered nopales, a mass of melted cheese, and rice and beans. —C.C.

18.

Stop for salami before catching the 1:20 p.m. Amtrak to Hudson.

It’s hard enough to find somewhere to sit, let alone a decent lunch, within the vicinity of Penn Station. Skip the food hall and instead build in the 20 extra minutes or so that it takes to swing by Salumeria Biellese (378 Eighth Ave., at W. 29th St.; salumeriadeli.com). Sandwiches piled with mortadella, prosciutto cotto, or capicola are easy enough to grab — and make a fine meal as you ride up to Columbia County on the train — but options like boar cacciatorini, finocchiona, and spreadable ’nduja are solid snacking choices that are easy to share with any travel companions. —T.T.

19.

Do a Korean Japanese twofer in Fort Lee.

Fort Lee offers a cornucopia of banchan; the variety of its restaurants makes a trip across the George Washington Bridge worthwhile — and if you’re going all that way, you might as well make two stops. Head first to Katsune Donkatsu Cafe (1400 Anderson Ave., at Elsmere Pl., Fort Lee, New Jersey; katsunedonkatsu.com), a corner spot that specializes in fried pork cutlets. The menu explores other territory, too, such as fried shrimp shaped like corn dogs, fried chicken cutlets, and fried beef-pork patties.​​ (Okay, everything’s fried.) Stick with one donkatsu, unless leftovers are the goal, and make it the wang donkatsu, which is sliced thinner than the others, meaning there is more of the featherlight crust, shards of which flutter off like flakes of a croissant. Next, locate the Hudson Lights apartment complex. Fort Lee’s reputation as a Korean American enclave has attracted outside restaurateurs, and in this generically upscale development you’ll find a gem: the first East Coast location of Tokyo’s famous Tsujita (2034 Lemoine Ave., nr. Central Ave., Fort Lee; tsujita.com). Tsukemen — dipped ramen — is the specialty, and the deluxe is the best option. The pork-based soup is thick with a heavy helping of fish to round it out. Punch it up with the spicy mustard greens, and get to work on the firm, chewy noodles. —C.C.

20.

Start a summer Friday in Spanish Harlem.

Paradise exists on an unassuming uptown corner. The interior walls at Bar Goyana (177 E. 100th St., nr. Lexington Ave.; bargoyana.com) are painted with a rain-forest mural. Outside, the unique slope of the street miraculously shields the dining shack from extraneous noise. There are few better places to pass several hours with a procession of tart caipirinhas, served in short rocks glasses with wooden parrot stir sticks. Happy hour lasts from noon until 7 p.m., during which time those drinks are just $10 each. —T.T.

21.

Assemble an Uzbek picnic feast.

While it’s easy to default to obvious picnic fare — salami and cheese, maybe some olives or crusty bread — instead head to Tashkent Supermarket (multiple locations; tashkentsupermarket.com), a cornucopia of kebabs, stuffed breads, and other Uzbek specialties. The supermarket’s outposts are ideally positioned near several prime picnicking locations: Brighton Beach, Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, and, soon, Washington Square Park. Regardless of your final destination, get to the hot bar. Start with a container of the meaty rice pilaf known as plov (there are varieties made with chicken, beef, and lamb), and stock up on the juicy lula kebabs made with beef. Also try the vegetarian kutabi — a fried pocket of flat bread stuffed with greens seasoned with more mint than a mojito. Round out your spread with Korean carrot salad and rice-noodle salad with sesame oil. Get a few bottles of Borjomi, the salty mineral water from the country of Georgia, and you’re set. —C.C.

22-26.

Got a car? Get a hot dog.

Many of the tristate area’s most exceptional frankfurters are not found in the city at all; they demand a road trip (several, really). Here’s where you’ll want to go, organized by driving distance from midtown Manhattan.

10.3 miles | Hiram’s Roadstand
1345 Palisade Ave., nr. Harmon Ave., Fort Lee, New Jersey; 201-592-9602
Get the deep-fried Thumann’s dog topped with warm sauerkraut. Beer is served, but it’s cash only with no ATM, so be prepared.

15.9 miles | The Hot Grill
669 Lexington Ave., at Christie Ave., Clifton, New Jersey; thehotgrill.com
In the shadow of the legendary Rutt’s Hut, this spot serves the best version of Jersey’s Texas wieners, topped with onion, mustard, and chili sauce.

19.2 miles | Tommy’s Italian Sausage and Hot Dogs
900 Second Ave., at South St., Elizabeth, New Jersey; 908-351-9831
Tommy’s specializes in what is variously known as the Italian- or Newark-style hot dog. It involves one, two, or three dogs stuffed inside half a loaf of round “pizza bread” and topped with sautéed peppers and onions and fried potatoes. There are no seats, so head to the small wedge-shaped park across the street.

26.4 miles | Walter’s
937 Palmer Ave., nr. Fulton Rd., Mamaroneck; waltershotdogs.com
The line at this copper-roofed pagoda is always long, and the dogs — split-grilled franks served simply with Walter’s own mustard on a toasted bun — are not pretty, but they are awfully tasty.

93.9 miles | Blackie’s Hot Dog Stand
2200 Waterbury Rd., at Byam Rd., Cheshire, Connecticut; blackieshotdogs.com
The house relish is made in bulk each year, only when local peppers are ripe, but it’s the space — and its neon — that helps justify this particular hot-dog day trip. —Robert Simonson

27.

Find the best vanilla ice cream in the city — in Brooklyn Heights, of all places.

While Van Leeuwen expands across the country and Ample Hills dips in and out of bankruptcy, Amai Bā (70 Henry St., at Orange St., Brooklyn Heights; amai-ba.com) — a bright and spare year-old corner store — is quietly scooping the city’s most exquisite homemade ice cream: Ube is the showstopper flavor, but the vanilla, an appealing shade of pale yellow, dotted with vanilla bean, with an accent of caramelized sugar, is where the skill comes through most clearly. The shop is hiding in plain sight; get over there before everyone else hears about it, too. —A.S.

28.

Follow a mariscos master to Staten Island.

Marisquería Veracruz is a roving operation, setting up shop from Soundview in the Bronx down to Staten Island, where it sits outside El Centro Del Inmigrante (260 Port Richmond Ave., at Charles Ave.; 929-499-4949). It’s worth looking it up on Facebook and tracking it down, wherever it happens to be. There’s an electric aguachile verde with shrimp and octopus, served in a large plastic cup, that’s got a nice, gentle burn and flecks of cilantro floating about. The coctel is tangy and sweet with chunks of avocado and crunchy diced onion. For dessert, there are churros, strawberries with cream, tres leches, and fresh doughnuts stuffed with soft, creamy arroz con leche. —C.C.

29.

Sweat your way through a plate of calamari Calabrese.

It takes a lot for an order of fried calamari to impress. The overflowing platter of calamari Calabrese at Lenny’s Clam Bar (161-03 Cross Bay Blvd., at 161st Ave., Howard Beach; lennysclambar.com) — the Italian American seafood tavern that never quite gets mentioned with the city’s most storied spots — is squid that demands a special journey. Battered chunks of cherry peppers are mixed among chewy rings and crunchy tentacles, and they lend the lingering, slow-build heat that helps a dish cross over from merely delicious to worthy of an hour-long subway ride (plus a transfer to the Q41 bus). —A.S.

30.

Throw a birthday party for nobody at Liman.

Picture it: Middle of the summer and your calendar is clear on a Saturday night. Gather five friends and tell them to meet you in Sheepshead Bay. What’s the occasion? Who cares? Your landing place is Liman (2710 Emmons Ave., nr. E. 27th St.; limanrestaurantny.com), the Turkish restaurant where it’s impossible to have a bad time. Get a table in the waterfront dining room so you can watch jet-skiers zip past. Start with a round of raki and order a bunch of appetizers: lightly fried anchovies with a mound of onions, braised red beans swimming in oil and adorned with a single potato chip, fish cakes served over leeks cooked until they’ve melted. The server won’t let you get away without ordering the octopus, cut into big chunks, lightly smoky from the grill. Another round of raki, and it’s on to the entrées: grilled dorado or pan-fried mullet. Get a surf and turf of shrimp kebabs and lamb chops over rice. The room is full of couples toasting birthdays, families out for dinner, and old friends celebrating over bottles of wine. Nobody’s rushing anyone through the last sips of a limoncello spritz so they can turn the table. The party lasts as long as you want or at least until Liman closes for the night. —C.C.

31.

Wind down a day with Peruvian slushies.

The frozen pisco sours at Jora (47-46 11th St., at 48th Ave., Long Island City; jorany.com) may first call to mind mediocre frosé, but they are afforded the utmost care, lightened with egg, garnished with edible flowers, and optionally layered with passion-fruit purée. They are among the city’s most gorgeous ways to get buzzed. (The classic shaken version is also excellent.) Along with the drinks, there is ceviche carretilla — cubes of soft fish and crispy calamari in a bright, creamy leche de tigre — and a side of French fries to dip in the yellow aji sauce. —T.T.

32.

Seek out the city’s most elusive Italian pastry.

Last winter, in Sicily, I fell in love. He was six and a half inches tall with a torso of fried dough, a core of sweet ricotta, and no legs to speak of. He was a cartoccio, and I haven’t found anything quite like him since. Unlike the cannolo, the cartoccio is not so common in the U.S. If you can locate one at all, it’s usually found around Christmas. “Car-what? What does that look like?” asked a man at the legendary Pasticceria Rocco on Bleecker Street when I phoned trying to find one. I eventually tried Villabate Alba (7001 18th Ave., at 70th St., Bensonhurst; villabate.com), a wildly joyful Sicilian bakery in Brooklyn where tubs of gemstone-colored gelato ripple beneath pyramids of brioche buns. It has made cartocci every day since the shop opened in 1978: The pastry dough is first twisted like string cheese around a metal core. After it proofs, each cartoccio gets deep-fried, then rolled in sugar and piped with ricotta cream. One regular customer drives up from Virginia twice a month to fill his truck. After my own visit, I took home a box of cartocci and ate them one by one, untwisting the tender dough and peeling it from the core of tangy filling. —Ella Quittner