Lo’s lucky day

Lo’s love of food – nay, her obsession with it – is common knowledge amongst all who know her. So when she won a curated tour of 10 of the best food vendors at the Brooklyn Flea, she was almost overcome with every positive emotion a human being is capable of feeling. Led by the staff of Tasting Table, the fabulously informative and food-centric newsletter and website, the tour covered all sorts of sweet and savory treats from some of the city’s trendiest food crafters and creative types, and even ended with…BOOZE. Free booze! What a day! Even as she documents the excursion days after the fact, Lo is still in a somewhat euphoric state.

The tour began with a stop at People’s Pops, which Lo had sampled before (they have, after all, become absolutely HUGE and have now spread to multiple locations, like the Chelsea Market). The roasted plum-flavored pop she tried was delicious (it literally tasted like my granny’s plum cobbler filling, y’all) and was gone in about 35 seconds. Next, it was on to fried fish tacos at Choncho’s Tacos, Montreal-style bagels from Mile End, rolls absolutely overflowing with fresh lobster from the Red Hook Lobster Pound, wonderfully fatty pork sandwiches from the geniuses at Porchetta, creatively flavored breads, scones and sticky buns from SCRATCHbread, hot and spicy pickled veggies at Rick’s Picks, and…whew, time for a deep breath…

You get the idea. The tour went on and on, but was totally, wonderfully, unbelievably amazing, despite the mild discomfort from being just so damn full. When Tasting Table said the lucky crew of winners would receive samples from the vendors, Lo thought, well, sample-sized portions were in store. Most of the vendors, however, were generous enough to give out normal portions of their goodies, meaning Lo and her new friends actually ate about 3.5 full meals in the hour that the tour lasted. Luckily, Lo had fasted all day in preparation for her food-filled afternoon, so she managed to consume (almost) every delicious bite put in front of her face.

Yummy lox and fixins’ on a Montreal-style bagel from Mile End. The company is named after a Montreal neighborhood.

The Redhook Lobster Pound’s stand at the flea, where you can see them preparing the most heavenly lobster rolls in existence.

PIG. heck yes!

Fancy, funky-flavored sodas from Brooklyn Soda Works.

Nothing says summer like green tomato jam. Perfect on some chewy sourdough from SCRATCHbread.

Chai sticky buns, also from SCRATCHbread.

After-tour Absolut Brooklyn cocktails at the Vanderbilt.

Even Absolut’s mascot for the day had hipster style at the after party, hosted by a local Brooklyn bar. How fitting.

Full of food and joyful feelings toward the entire world, Lo and the Tasting Table crew were then herded off to the Vanderbilt for drinks, compliments of Absolut. The company – and it’s new, limited-edition Absolut Brooklyn vodka – sponsored the swank event, so the beverages were all made with the red apple and ginger flavored liquor. They were, of course, also unbelievably delicious, and seemed quite simple to make, so perhaps check back soon for Lo’s own experimentations with the sweet, sinfully good stuff? She feels another fun weekend coming on…

Do you think we can convince them to do this every Saturday? Petition time, anyone?