Chef Eric Simeon’s menu has creative flourishes, such as Peekytoe Crab Fritters With Thai Basil-Chili Sauce; Smoked Baby Beets With Goat Cheese, Fennel and Pistachio; and Tuscan Kale Salad with shaved watermelon radishes, pecorino cheese and bread crumbs in a honey-and-whole-grain-mustard vinaigrette. For vegetarians, there’s Smoked & Grilled Tofu with grilled broccolini and yuzu-ginger sauce. Here’s a photo gallery of the food).

Your choice of beef cut can be garnished with one of eight sauces, including Benedict, Blue Cheese Brulee, Caramelized Shallots, Cultured Bone Marrow Butter, Bearnaise, Roasted Garlic-Mustard, Salt-Cured Foie Gras and Telicherry Peppercorn. The service is great.

AND THEN THERE’S THE CAKE

As much as we enjoyed our beef dishes, we left dreaming of a dessert called Birthday Cake: velvet chocolate cake (deep chocolate, not red velvet) with cream cheese frosting and a side of confetti ice cream—a ball of vanilla rolled in rainbow sprinkles.

It was so good, we couldn’t wait for our next trip to the neighborhood—just for the Birthday Cake.

Not your birthday? That’s OK: It’s your un-birthday. Or, as the Mad Hatter, March Hare and White Rabbit from Alice In Wonderland so memorably sing:

“Now statistics prove that you’ve one birthday
Imagine, just one birthday every year
Ah, but there are 364 unbirthdays
Precisely why we’re gathered here to cheer.”

Want a weekend cooking project? Bake this cake! It may be just the thing to bake for Father’s Day, too.

Thanks to E&E pastry chef Christopher Peneiro for sharing his delectable Birthday Cake recipe with us.

E&E BIRTHDAY CAKE RECIPE

Ingredients

Preparation: Cake

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.

2. Mix together cake flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

3. In a separate bowl, mix together melted butter, sugar, eggs, coffee, buttermilk, vanilla paste and olive oil. Slowly stir buttermilk mixture into flour mixture, blending until smooth.

4. Pour batter into two 8-inch round cake pans. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

CREAM CHEESE FROSTING & CONFETTI ICE CREAM RECIPES

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. Beat cold cream cheese with softened butter and vanilla until combined.

2. Gradually add 2 cups powdered sugar that has been sifted after measuring. Continue to add more sifted powdered sugar until you reach a consistency and sweetness that fits your taste. (Editor’s Note: We don’t add much additional sugar. The cake and ice cream are sweet enough for us without over-sweetening the frosting.)

3. Layer the cake with frosting and serve with a ball of confetti ice cream.

CONFETTI ICE CREAM

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. Scoop round balls of ice cream and roll in sprinkles.

2. Return to freezer on a plate or tray until ready to serve, covered with plastic wrap or foil. You can do this the day before.
 
We hope you love this cake as much as we do.

You can do the same with mocktails, mixed drinks without alcohol. One of the most historic is shandy, a 50:50 combination of beer mixed with a carbonated beverage: cider, citrus soda (like 7-UP), ginger beer, ginger ale or lemonade.

The shandy is also called a half-and-half. And then there’s the Arnold Palmer, a non-alcoholic shandy made of half lemonade and half iced tea.

So today’s tip is: Create your own signature mocktail.

Start with a half-and-half recipe of your favorite ingredients. Make a small test recipe—a half cup or so.

You can turn it into a family or friends activity by inviting others to join you as co-mixologists. If you enjoy the exercise, you can make it a party activity, with a prize for the best recipe.

What should you mix?

Start with fruit sodas (cherry, cranberry, lemon-lime, raspberry, etc.), club soda and fruit juices (apple juice, lemonade, pomegranate juice, etc.). Add bitters if you enjoy them (we love them!), and top off your creation with a squeeze of lemon or lime.

 
For more lime flavor, juice a lime and add a teaspoon per eight-ounce serving.

The Rickey (originally the “Joe Rickey”) was created in 1883 at Shoomaker’s bar in Washington, D.C. It was named for Colonel Joe Rickey, a Missouri statesman. Each morning, he went to Shoomaker’s for a Bourbon with sparkling water over ice.

One day, the bartender added a squeeze of lime, and the Rickey was born. It’s evolved to include simple syrup and bitters. Omit the Bourbon and you’ve got a mocktail that you can layer with other ingredients (soda, juice, etc.).

Ingredients Per Drink

 
Preparation

1. Combine first three ingredients in a collins glass.

2. Top with soda, add garnish and serve.

A sparkling blend of raspberry syrup, lime syrup and club soda, it was the Boston alternative to the New York egg cream. And, depending on your proclivities, it’s much more refreshing than the original.

[1] Gnocchi in tomato sauce, garnished with parmesan and microgreens (photo © Scarpetta Restaurant | NYC).

[2] Getting fancy with smoked ricotta gnudi and chives, at L’Amico restaurant in New York City (photo © L’Amico).

[3] Gnocchi, like the simple preparation in photo #1, were once inexpensive peasant food. Now, let’s get even fancier: gnudi topped with truffles, in truffle sauce, from L’Amico restaurant in New York City (photo © L’Amico).

[4] Here’s the recipe from Philo’s Kitchen.

[5] Sauteed tops spinach and ricotta gnudi (photos 4 and 5 © Philo’s Kitchen).

[6] Spinach and ricotta gnudi in Alfredo sauce (photo © Comugnero Silvana | Fotolia).

[7] Oval gnocchi are heavier dumplings than gnocchi (photo © Coulour Box).

Do you like gnocchi, ravioli and tortellini, but not the carbs? Get to know gnudi: It’s the filling without the pasta or the potatoes.

So essentially, gnudi is a dumpling: It has no pasta wrapping.

Essentially, gnudi are a low-carb way to enjoy pasta, with the delicious filling of ravioli, but so much more of it.
 
 
GNOCCHI VERSUS GNUDI

Gnocchi (pronounced NYOH-kee), the Italian word for dumplings, are chewy pillows that are shaped into little balls. They are most often made with white or sweet potatoes, then boiled, baked or fried.

They can be flavored: basil, spinach, tomato and saffron are classic; and beet, butternut squash, carrot and pumpkin—perhaps with goat cheese instead of ricotta—can be found on menus.

Gnocchi are served with butter and grated Parmesan cheese or a sauce.

See a photo of plain gnocchi, photo #7 below.

Gnudi (pronounced NYOO-dee, also with a silent “g”) derives from nudi, which means nude in Italian. They are much lighter than gnocchi and much easier to make.

Gnudi is actually the English word for the Italian “nudi” (naked). Why the extra “g?”

Our best guess: The English didn’t want to call something “nudie” so they added the silent “g” of “gnocchi.”

A traditional Tuscan ricotta dumpling, gnudi consist of pasta filling—what you find inside tortellini or ravioli—shaped into small, flattened balls without any dough.

In fact, they are also referred to as nude ravioli or naked ravioli: the filling without the shell.

The dumplings are sautéed with brown butter and sage sauce, sprinkled with Parmigiano Romano or Pecorino Toscano cheese.

Outside of Tuscany, the ricotta is often mixed with spinach and parmesan, to create gnocchi di ricotta e spinaci. The gnudi are sautéed or baked.

You can serve them as plain—simply sautéed in olive oil or butter, with grated cheese or tomato sauce [photo #1]. Or go as sophisticated as you like, like the truffle-topped gnocchi in truffle sauce in photo #2. Caviar, anyone?
 
 
THE HISTORY OF GNUDI

Without heading to Italy to hunt through historical archives, it’s tough to find out much on the origin of gnudi.

According to Oretta Zanini de Vita in the Encyclopedia of Pasta, they date from at least the late 1200s, and predate stuffed pasta [source].

Pasta-followers may recall from our history of pasta that the pasta Marco Polo brought back from China—he set out in 1271 and returned in 1295—is believed to have been “pillow pasta” like ravioli, the Italian spin on Chinese wontons.

Thus, if gnudi did pre-date stuffed pasta, they predated Marco Polo’s introduction of it. But, it’s apples and oranges:

Even though they end up on pasta menus, gnudi are dumplings, not pasta.
 
 
GNUDI RECIPE WITH RICOTTA AND SPINACH

Thanks to Chef Johnny Gnall for sharing his easy gnudi recipe.

Ingredients

 
For The Sauce

 
Optional Garnishes

 
Preparation

1. Make the sauce. Melt butter in a sauté pan and cook until it begins to turn golden brown (do not overcook or the butter may burn). Add sage; stir and and remove from heat. Add lemon juice and set aside.

2. Remove water from spinach. It’s important that you remove most of the water from your spinach, or the dough will never come together. Press the pureed spinach against a mesh strainer and then hang it to drain for 30 minutes.

3. Combine ricotta and spinach. Thoroughly incorporate, then add the beaten egg, a couple of pinches of salt, and Parmesan. Mix well. Taste a bit of your mixture and adjust with salt and pepper as necessary.

4. Add the flour. The actual amount of flour may vary slightly depending on anything from the moisture content of the ricotta to the moisture in the atmosphere. Too much flour could make the gnudi dense and heavy; not enough flour, and the gnudi might fall apart.

Therefore, bring everything together and test the consistency by dropping a spoonful into some boiling water. If it holds its general shape and doesn’t come apart in the water, you’ve nailed it!

5. Shape the gnudi. Using two spoons, form your gnudi into quenelles (oval shapes) and lay them on a cookie sheet, tray or clean surface. One they are ready to go, drop them into seasoned boiling water in batches. Make sure you don’t overcrowd your pot, or the gnudi will jostle one another and likely fall apart. Once the dumplings float to the surface, they should take about a minute to cook. Exact cooking time may vary, so it do a tester or two and see which time suits your taste.

6. Sauce and serve. Right before serving, return the brown butter to the heat and add the Parmesan cheese. Stir to blend, then add the gnudi and toss to coat. Serve immediately.
 
 
FRIED SAGE LEAVES RECIPE

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. Wash and dry sage and remove stems. Be sure that the leaves are thoroughly dry before frying (when we don’t have time to air dry, we use a hair dryer!).

2. Heat oil in a small pan over medium-high heat.

3. Fry sage leaves until crisp, 2–3 seconds. Do not crowd in the pan; fry in batches if necessary.

4. Transfer to paper towels to drain and sprinkle with salt. Reserve until ready to serve.

 
HOW MANY TYPES OF PASTA HAVE YOU TRIED?

Check out the delicious options in our Pasta Glossary.