Zabar's Blog

New to Zabar’s: Mushroom Flavor Elixirs from the Distillerie Du Perigord $21.98

    As seen in the New York Time’s food section, these new flavor offerings at Zabar’s are a convenient and flavorful way to add the essence of different mushrooms to any sort of dish. Available in 3 different flavors; Porcini, Morel and Truffle, these flavors were made by infusing alcohol with their respective mushrooms, then distilling the infusion. This results in a powerful 36-proof flavor elixir that can be used in many ways by even the home chef. These elixirs are perfect to flambé, marinade or deglaze meats and poultry, yet can also be utilized to flavor sauces, pastas and soups by adding 1 Tablespoon per serving at the end of the cooking time. Available in-store and online at $21.98 for a limited time.

Stopping by Zabar's in December? Here are our upcoming demos in the Cheese Department

Stop by the store, have a taste, and take one of these delicious products home from Zabar’s.

Thursday Dec 3 12-3:30 pm - EAT WELL EMBRACE LIFE HUMMUS
Sampling assorted Flavored hummus

Friday Dec 4 3-6pm - IL FORTETO

Sampling their 3-month Pecorino Toscano Stagionato and Cacio de Bosco al Tartufo

Saturday Dec 5

10am-4pm DIVINA OLIVES

3-5pm - FRENCH LE CHATELAIN BRIE

            

Monday Dec 7 - MISHA NEW AMERICAN QUARK

Sampling their Plain, Vanilla Bean Coconut and Peach Mango flavors

Thursday Dec 10 

FOUR FAT FOWL CHEESE St. Stephen

1-5pm R&G CHEESE MAKERS Trufflebert 


Friday Dec 11 12-6pm DIVINA OLIVES

3-5pm L'INDULGENT BRIE

Saturday Dec 12 9am-2pm DIVINA OLIVES

Sunday Dec 13 10am-3pm GOURMET SOFRITO VERDE
A traditional Latin American fresh seasoning of vegetables, herbs and spices

Saturday Dec 19 10am-4pm DIVINA OLIVES

Monday Dec 21

1-7pm DIVINA OLIVES

4-7:30pm FRESH GOAT CHEESE DEMO

 

         

New at Zabar’s: Beef pies and Empanadas

Our newest prepared food items available in-store and online are Zabar's collection of empanadas and meat pies. With four new flavors, and 3 pies per package, these subtle pockets are stuffed with delicious surprises and come at a great deal at $11.98. Each crispy crust is packed with hearty fillings made from the freshest ingredients right here at Zabar’s. Order yours today at Zabar's.com

Shepherd Beef Pocket Pie
Hearty, beef filled pastry pocket that makes for a great snack, appetizer or meal. Made from the freshest ingredients, this mini Shepherd’s pie is a filling nosh in a convenient package.

Italian Mini Beef Pie
With a delicious Italian delicacy-filled center, this Puffed-Pastry pie is a handy meal on the go. Stuffed with hearty Beef, Parmesan, Mushrooms and Marinara, these mini Italian pies can be quickly reheated for a tasty treat

Ancho Chicken Empanada
The Ancho Chicken Empanada is a delicious and handy meal on the go. A crispy, flaky crust stuffed with Chicken and Corn, with a hint of Ancho spice, these empanadas are a meal in themselves.

Pulled Pork Empanada
Stuffed with home-made pulled pork filling, these crispy empanadas are a delicious and handy meal in a conveniently transportable empanada package.

Making Empanadas from fresh ingredients here in Zabar's kitchens is as easy as 1, 2, 3

Are you a local Upper West Sider, or in New York for the holiday this November?

                                                                  5 Spoke's "Porter"

Here are some demos happening in our cheese department. Stop by the store, have a taste, and take one of these delicious products home from Zabar’s to share with friends and family…or keep it all to yourself.

Thursday 11/19

Cochran Farm presents two of their most popular cheeses: St. Johnsville and Mohawk Mist. Both are Loire-Valley style goat milk cheeses made from milk supplied by local Amish farmers

 

Sat 11/21

 

 

 

 

 

 

Formed as a co-operative farm in the 1970’s, Il Forteto has become a very popular Italian brand. They will be sampling their Boschetto as well as their Tuscan 30 day sheep Pecorino.

Sun 11/22 10a-2p

Divina Olives, a regular sample staple at Zabar’s, will be sampling a wide range of their stuffed olives and olive mixes.

 

Sun 11/22 1p-5p

5 Spoke Creamery, a NY company with a farm in Goshen NY, will be sampling their ‘Porter,’ one of their new products. A lightly pressed semi-hard wheel with pleasant buttery notes, this Porter is 5 Spoke’s take on a traditional French Tomme de Savoie.

 

Mon 11/23 4-7:30p

The French Cheese Board will be at Zabar’s sampling a selection of French Goat Cheeses on Monday, November 23^rd. Stop by, grab a sample, and explore the goat cheeses of France.

 

Sat 11/28

Divina Olives is back to sample their wide range of stuffed olives and olive mixes.

 

Fri & Sat 11/28-11/29    

The weekend of the 28^th will have Istara at Zabar’s sampling their smooth and sweet French Sheep Milk cheeses. Aged for at least 70 days, these cheeses are delicious exports from the Basque region and pair nicely with jams as well as other savory appetizers.

Thanksgiving is here! Well, almost here - it's still there, but it's almost here!

Get ready to:

1. Order

2. Open the box

3. Heat & Enjoy

That's it. That's all you need to do for an outstanding, gourmet, complete dinner from Zabar's.

This year you can order our Dinners for 6 or for 10: Thanksgiving Turkey Dinner or try something different with our NEW Complete Country Ham Celebration Dinner or Complete Brisket Celebration Dinner.

Read about it in About Travel's article, 5 Places to Get a Thanksgiving Dinner to Go in Manhattan (read the full article).

Zabar's is an iconic store in the Upper West Side with an 81-year history, and it offers a great option for people who want their Thanksgiving catered. Zabar's offers a complete Thanksgiving dinner for 6, which includes an 11-13 lbs. free-range roast turkey, chestnut stuffing, giblet gravy, cranberry salad, garlic mashed potatoes, string beans with almonds, dinner rolls, and cheesecake. The deadline for Thanksgiving orders is Monday, November 23. Obviously it's best that you make your order as soon as possible. 2245 Broadway, at 80th St., btwn W. 80th St. and W. 81st St.; zabars.com

Preventing Potato Mashing Mishaps

    With Thanksgiving and the rest of the holiday season approaching, Americans everywhere will be making the ubiquitous and delicious side dish of mashed potatoes. What is the secret to making mashed potatoes and what tools can help create a creamy, light batch for you and your guests this holiday?

    I can remember my grandmother standing over a bowl of recently boiled potatoes, wailing away with her simple wood-handled, steel wire masher while she made mashed potatoes the old fashioned way: one smoosh at a time. Then, when I started cooking on my own, there were times where my attempts to create a light, airy batch of mashed potatoes results in a white, gluey paste with a consistency more useful for putting up wallpaper in a parlor. Preparing the right potatoes, and utilizing the right tools can be instrumental in creating the perfect mashed potatoes and here are some tips to help steer you down the right path to creamy potato goodness.

A brief history of Potatoes and their mashing.

    Mashed potato recipes started appearing in the early 17^th century, yet the ‘father’ of the mashed potato is generally accepted as Antoine-Augustin Parmentier. As a major supporter of bringing the potato into the accepted diet of everyday Frenchmen, Parmentier proposed a competition to ‘discover’ new nourishing foods and won his own competition with a mashed potato recipe, which he published in his Examen chimique des pommes de terres (1774). Over the next two centuries, the potato has become an everyday part of the North American and European diet, and new ways to mash, roast and fry potatoes has made it an integral part of gourmet and holiday fare.

Why Are Mashing Tools/Technique important?

    The first thing to say is that under-mashing your potatoes isn’t ‘wrong’. Differing recipes can call for a completely smooth, homogenous bowl of mashed potatoes, as well as mashed potatoes with chunks and skin still included in the mix. The danger in making mashed potatoes is in OVER mashing. This can produce ‘gluey’ potatoes with the consistency of wallpaper paste and will distract from the flavors of your delicious tubers.

    This result is caused by the high level of starch naturally occurring in potatoes. The initial step of boiling potatoes swells starch cells and when initially mashed, this starch is released. The more smashing, the gummier the potatoes and this starch can start working into strands.

    One way to sidestep this issue is to make sure ALL of the water is drained from the potatoes before beginning to mash, and making sure not to overcook the potatoes in the first place. You should be able to just put a knife through the center of a potato chunk but before the edges of the potato start to wilt.

    Sometimes this starchy, gluey result is from using wrong ‘type’ of potatoes. This isn’t to say that any type of potato is wrong for mashed potatoes, and experimenting is encouraged, but using low starch/waxy red potatoes takes more effort to mash to a uniform consistency, and may result in over-mashing, whereas Russet-type, high starch potatoes break down easier. This simply means that the type of potato being used needs to match the level of smooth/chunky that you’re attempting to reach.

The Tools of the Trade

    Potato mashers come in all shapes, sizes and materials. The original mashers looked like mortar and pestles, but in the late 1800’s, the metal wire devices recognizable as the forbearers of the modern potato masher arrived. Since that time, new options have arrived and offer different pros and cons to any level of chef attempting to prepare their holiday side dish. Here are three different tools to mash your potatoes that are offered by the Zabar’s housewares department and some tips on how to utilize them.

Manual hand masher

    This is what we all picture when we think of when we hear ‘home-made’ mashed potatoes. Like my grandmother’s recipe, this method calls for both a large amount of physical force, as well as enough restraint to stop mashing before you reach the ‘gluey’ texture. I personally believe that manual hand mashing is better for using recipes in which you want chunkier pieces of potato in the mashed potatoes, such as with certain flavored (such as garlic) or home-style mashed potatoes which also are supplemented with pieces of potato skin still in the final result. As a native New York with a kitchen that seems smaller every time I add a new kitchen tool, the PREPARA FLIP MASHER ($19.98) is a great space-saver that does its job to the fullest. Utilizing a ‘grid’ type mashing face that really gets all the big chunks with minimal repetitions, the most endearing attribute is the foldaway design. As someone who doesn’t just make a big bowl of mashed potatoes on a whim, the ability to slide this masher away in my tool drawer until the next time it’s needed is a huge bonus for this product.

Food mill/ricer

    Potato Ricers and Food Mills may seem like an extraneous product that only people with infants who need to make baby food should buy, but after making a batch of mashed potatoes with the Oxo Potato Ricer (29.98), I can tell you that the deliciousness of the end result makes the purchase of this tool totally worth it. Essentially an oversized garlic press, Potato Ricers allow the user to quickly work through an entire bowl of cooked potatoes without a great deal of physical effort. As the potato is extruded through the die (and the Oxo Potato Ricer comes with three screen settings for different textures/uses) air is incorporated into the potatoes which results in a finer, smoother texture of mashed potatoes. Because each potato is only being processed once, as opposed to repeated strikes from a hand masher, there is less chance of pulling too much starch out of the potatoes. One tip is to remove the skin from the potatoes before putting them through the ricer. Although not necessary, you won’t have to stop and remove the skin from the inside cup of the ricer between potatoes, which can result in an extremely quick and easy process.

Electric Counter-top/Hand Mixer

    The quickest and easiest way to get from solid potatoes to mashed is with a standard electric countertop/hand mixer like this KitchenAid stand mixer ($349.99). Mechanical power allows the chef to make larger amounts of potatoes with a more homogenous texture, but it is extremely easy to over-mash! I typically only use it for a few quick revolutions as each ingredient is added. I initially mash the whole, cooked potatoes with the mixer whisk, then I fold in the cream and butter with a spatula, and give one last mix with the machine to incorporate all of the ingredients evenly.

 

    Whichever method and tools you utilize for your potato mashing endeavors, there is no ‘wrong’ way to do it, but be cautioned that over-doing the mashing can result in a poorly textured final product. If you feel like skipping the whole process, you can find delicious Zabar’s mashed potatoes here. We’ll take care of the mashing and schlepping.

Zabar's NYC gift food baskets

AM New York's Melissa Kravitz gathered together her favorites from across the city to represent New York Gifts - guess who tops the list? Zabar's! Thank you, Melissa. We think our Totally Bamboo Manhattan Board & NYC Gift Boxes make great gifts too!

Gifts for New Yorkers who love New York (read the article!)
By Melissa Kravitz 

"Think you heart New York more than the next New Yorker? Prove it with your gift giving. Here are some gift ideas that showcase the Empire State in all its glory, so you can share your love of the city.



Zabar's is one of the few markets that embodies the NYC spirit with its line of food products that include babka, black and white cookies and New York bagels. They've gathered some of their NYC favorites in baskets that range in price, but we love the New York Goodies Box, which includes an "I LOVE NY" cookie. Prices vary. Zabars.com



This combination cutting and serving board shaped like the island of Manhattan is the perfect gift for New York newbies who may not know SoHo from NoHo. Serve cheese up in Harlem and crackers in TriBeca to freshen up on NYC geography with this classy kitchen piece. $30, Zabar's

 

Product of the Week: Zabar’s Spanish Olive Oil $19.98

    Zabar’s tradition of bringing the best gourmet offerings from around the world at a reasonable price is embodied by our store-brand Olive Oils that have been deemed deliciously worthy of carrying the Zabar brand name. High quality extra virgin olive (EVOO) improves the flavor of just about everything it touches, from roasting and grilling meats and fish, to creating a custom dressing for a healthy salad. In moderation, the non-saturated fats in Olive Oil are a healthy alternative to a world filled with trans- and saturated fat and can help lower bad cholesterol. It’s easy to overlook how important the oil you cook or garnish with is to the final product, but choosing a good quality oil (without breaking the bank) can make or break a dish.

    The newest Zabar’s brand oil product is the Arbequina & Picual Extra Virgin Olive Oil from Catalonia, Spain. This bold and fragrant extra virgin olive oil blends the smooth nuttiness of Arbequina olives with the fresh bite of Picual olives for a dynamic finish. Yet even with these delicious tasting notes, this Iberian oil won’t overpower the other flavor profiles of a prepared dish. Strong enough to be used as a dipper or to top off an appetizer, yet subtle enough for a fried or sautéed dish, utilize this newest addition to our olive oil selection every day to add flavor and freshness to sauces, salads, vegetables and grilled meats. Made and bottled in Spain exclusively for Zabar's, it is the only private label oil produced by this maker, who is also a multi-generation family business.

$19.98 Available in-store, and online.

Olive Oil Tips

    Remember to store your oil in a cool dark place. Although keeping a bottle next to the stove or on top of the fridge is convenient and accessible, excess heat and sunlight can break down the oil and reduce its typical shelf life of 1 year.

    According to Ellie Krieger of Finecooking.com, Olive Oil can make a great substitute for vegetable oil (at a 1:1 ratio) or butter (3Tbsp Oil for each ¼ cup of butter) in certain baked goods. This trick works especially well with muffins and loaves with savory spices such as cinnamon or pumpkin, yet may overpower and distract in sweet/lightly flavored recipes.

Suggested Housewares Product:

Misto Aluminum Olive Oil Sprayer $9.98

    Our featured Housewares oil product is the Misto by Liquid Motion Inc. This gourmet olive oil sprayer is powered by a manual pump, which eliminates the need for aerosols and other ecologically harmful propellants. Easy to refill and spray, the Misto is great for portion control and adding just a light hint of delicious oils like Zabar’s Spanish Olive Oil to any kind of dish. Great for grilling, on the stove, or to garnish a salad or sandwich, the Misto is the perfect countertop accessory for every kitchen.

At only $9.98, the Misto is a great value.

Available in-store, and online. Available in Red.

Hot drink options leaving you bored? Get Gourd!

Pumpkin Spice Coffee and Tea arrives at Zabar’s for a limited time.

After a hot summer, the chill in the air has announced the arrival of fall here in New York City. One of the best ways to warm yourself up this season is with Zabar’s seasonal Pumpkin Spice coffee and tea. Traditionally a blend of cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves and allspice, Pumpkin spice has made the transition over to hot beverages and is now one of the most popular treats to sip on as autumn cools the air.

Pumpkin Spice Coffee With beans custom roasted to perfection, the addition of pumpkin spice flavor gives this coffee an extra kick to get you through a blustery fall day. Impress your friends by serving Pumpkin Spice Café Lattes at home. Ground to order, full 16 oz lbs. available online and in-store.

Brew it up in the Bialetti Moka Express 9-Cup Coffee Maker.

Also just in, Zabar’s Pumpkin Spice loose tea. This blend combines black teas with pumpkin spice flavor to create a deep amber cup that is velvety smooth and aromatic. Its light, delicious taste is reminiscent of pumpkin custard. Whether to warm yourself up as a treat, or trying to fight off this season’s colds and sore throats, Zabar’s Pumpkin Spice Coffee and Tea are a deliciously seasonal option that is only available for a limited time.

We use Melitta Tea Filters to easily brew loose tea.

Introducting our NEW gourmet kit!

Sending NY food to NYers all over the country! Have a look at our new kit: Zabar's Latke & Blintzes Kit. Loaded with nostalgic deliciousness! 

Nothing hits the spot like the nostalgic deliciousness of our home-made Latkes and Blintzes. Everything you need for a sweet-and-savory feast, just like you remember:
• 1 lb. Zabar’s potato latke
• Homemade apple sauce
• 1 lb. Zabar’s cheese blintz
• Zabar’s cinnamon rugelach
• Zabar’s chocolate truffle-filled apple.

$109, Price Includes 1-Day Shipping