Black Coffee, French Toast, Straight Chillin

Initially I was going to write about magazines today, but I just don't feel like being analytical right now. I had a great weekend, 62 degrees in the city. Nothing going on, but a light jacket, mango ice cream, pizza, and champagne. Everyone was so frickin happy and friendly. Harlem was a buzz with hotties and loud music blasting from small, fast cars. My number even came out-- 471, but since I've stopped playing the numbers and started playing these damn scratch-offs, I didn't win squat. Bumped into a neighbor and went to her place where we laughed and talked and she fixed me the best salad ever. Some kind of secret dressing she made... Newman's Family Style and something in a red bottle. Anyway it was slamming!

Sunday was unexpectedly wonderful too. While making egg salad I got a call inviting me to brunch. Needless to say my hard-boiled breakfast became sublime French toast stuffed with caramelized pears and pecans. My friend and I both love Kitchenette because it's one of the few spots uptown that understands that breakfast is more than chicken and waffles or fried whiting and cheese grits. Our conversation was just as refreshing-- Seydou Keita, Obeah, Dinah Washington vs. Billie Holiday and why coffee is better black. I personally like mine with milk and two sugars, but always feel young, immature even, when in the company of coffee purists. I thought jazz purists where bad, but these java heads are the worse sometimes.

It was crowded as usual but for some reason I never seem to mind the crowd or as some of my friends have pointed out, "the whiteness," of Kitchenette. As if whiteness in Harlem could be avoided or should be for that matter in 2006. Yeah, the theories of why coffee is better black is one conversation, but why Harlem is better Black is something entirely different. But today I'm supposed to be straight chillin and non-political, right? I really don't know how I even got here. Now I feel like erasing this entry and writing about urban mags. Okay, I'll say this. Kitchenette is white-owned and they fill a void on 123rd. They serve really good food that isn't necessarily fried or dripping in gravy (don’t get it twisted there are days that I like my honey fried smothered chicken, but I also love French Toast, seasoned turkey sausage and frittatas) and the service is great. On the other hand, Black folks are opening restaurants in Harlem where in a new Chinese food establishment my man tells me they were actually out of chicken wings one night. Huh, out of wings at a Chinese food joint in Harlem? Or there’s the all American fusion spot that has good food but the service is horrible. I ALWAYS have to ask for black pepper and by the time the dude comes to grind it on my linguini, my plate is lukewarm at best! Then there are the martini bars that are popping up all over uptown where a cosmo is $13 and there is the requisite red velvet rope outside the front door of the venue that is right across the street from the projects. C’mon people! I’m down with Wu-Tang when they rhymed, “Can it be that it was all so simple then?” Why can’t it be so simple now? And this has got to my favorite new opening-- a Caviar Café on Lenox Ave. Yep, yep these brothers have pooled their loot together to open a lounge that serves smoked salmon and caviar, never mind that the UN just put a worldwide ban on the import and export of caviar, and that Lenox Ave. or for that matter the entire Morningside Heights area doesn’t even have a sushi spot yet, but now we have fish eggs. Gimme a break! We have gone from fried porgies straight to beluga. I may be wrong but, damn it’s all got me wondering and I’ll leave it at that.