Food photos: Spicy seafood soup, tuna salad, home cooking and more

At Ewha Won, a Korean-Chinese restaurant in Closter, a seafood soup with green noodles and oysters, called jampong, costs $1 more when you ask for the extra-spicy version containing cut up whole chili peppers ($13.99). The large bowl of soup, which will leave your lips tingling, is a filling meal for one or can be split, if you order an appetizer or another dish.

Ewha Won, at 570 Piermont Road in the Closter Commons shopping center, served us three complimentary side dishes, including crunchy radish kimchi, above, and black bean paste for the soup.

If your soup isn't spicy enough, you can always use a shaker of ground red pepper on the table. On Saturday afternoon, after a large group of parents and children were seated for a birthday party, it was difficult for me and my wife to get a refill of our water glasses or extra napkins.

The Mediterranean Salad at the Suburban Diner, 172 Route 17 north in Paramus, includes white tuna, mixed greens, Kalamata Olives, Feta Cheese, Capers and Artichoke Hearts, dressed in a vinaigrette of extra-virgin olive oil and lemon ($13.50). I took home leftovers. Organic tea is $2.50.

Jerry's Gourmet & More, 410 S. Dean St. in Englewood, was out of takeout seafood dinners when I stopped there after 4 on Friday afternoon, but I picked up two steak dinners -- complete with pasta, vegetable and salad -- for the meat eaters in the family at a reduced price of $5.99.

I'm happy with a dinner of pasta, salad and wine at home, especially when I prepare it with Luigi Vitelli-brand Organic Whole Wheat Fusilli, Kirkland Signature Basil Pesto and Organic Pignoli Nuts, the last two from Costco Wholesale in Teterboro.

After lunch on Thursday at the Suburban Diner, I stopped at Trader Joe's, 404 Route 17 north in Paramus, for two 3-pound bags of Organic Sweet Potatoes ($4.49 each). The next day, I boiled the potatoes from one bag with whole peeled garlic cloves, mashed them with extra-virgin olive oil and seasonings, and had some for breakfast with an egg-white omelet and sauteed spinach, above and below. I baked the others.

I stuffed the omelet with smoked wild salmon and fresh organic salsa, both from Costco, and dusted it with Ras el Hanout, a Moroccan spice mixture.

A kitchen-sink Frittata I made at home on Saturday morning contained slices of smoked wild salmon, chopped black olives, whole eggs, egg whites, grated cheese and fresh tomatoes. I served it with leftover organic brown rice and fresh organic salsa.

For Sunday night dinner, we shelled and deveined 2 pounds of raw frozen wild shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico that were on sale at the Paramus ShopRite ($19.98), preparing them with fresh spinach, extra-virgin olive oil, pitted green olives, fresh tomatoes, shredded cheese and lemon juice. They were ready after 10 minutes in a preheated 400-degree oven. 

At the Costco Wholesale Business Center in Hackensack, a 2-pound bag of Mayorga Organic Cafe Cubano dark roast coffee beans was $13.99, perfect for my built-in coffee machine, which grinds them for espresso, lattes and other drinks.

The Hackensack Business Center also sells 2.2-pound bags of Lavazza espresso coffee beans for about $10 less than I have seen them elsewhere.

KIND Fruit & Nut Bars are 18 for $18.99 at the Costco Business Center. The warehouse also sells 1 pound of Earthbound Farm Organic Spring Mix -- with lettuce, arugula, radicchio, spinach and chard -- for $4.29.

 -- VICTOR E. SASSON

On two sides of the food tracks in Englewood

Englewood's Palisade Avenue has been in flux. One of the changes was Blue Moon Restaurant moving next door to a bigger space in the shuttered Ann Taylor store.

The Kitchen restaurant also moved, to the old Blue Moon space next to Starbucks.

Recent additions include Simply Seafood and Teita, a Dominican restaurant, below.

El Paso is an inexpensive Mexican place.

Las Maravillas de Tulcingo is the third restaurant from Jesus Pita; the others are in Passaic. The food is more authentic and cheaper than at Blue Moon, but on Memorial Day, the staff left a mess on an outdoor table, a sure way to turn off potential customers.

Palm BBQ Grill, above and below, is the second place to open in the space occupied for many years by the popular Vietnamese restaurant, Saigon, which moved to Tenafly.

The Palm BBQ menu offers pita and po' boy sandwiches, plus falafel and hummus.

A popular Panera Bread was replaced by a bank, above. On the same block, Victoria's Secret closed after more than a decade at the entrance to the ShopRite shopping center.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Englewood is a classic two-sides-of-the-tracks community, even when it comes to dining out.

Wealthy, mostly white residents live on one side of the tracks all the way up the East Hill, and send their children to large private schools.

On the other side, a long-established Jamaican community and Hispanic residents occupy modest homes, sending their kids to elementary and middle schools that have few white students.

Food lovers will find the better restaurants on the east side of the tracks, while most of the cheaper ethnic restaurants and bakeries are on the other side.

Food city

Baumgart's, It's Greek To Me, Starbucks, El Prado and others have had staying power. 

In other parts of the city, Jerry's Gourmet & More and Balthazar Bakery draw customers from far and wide.

The city also boasts two good Thai restaurants, popular Colombian restaurants and bakeries; excellent Jamaican takeout; H Mart, a large Korean supermarket; and Korean dumpling and kimchi factories.

But the food scene is always in flux, and I would be hard pressed to name all of the restaurants that have opened, operated for several years or more, and disappeared.

Sushi to tacos to pizza

Wild Ginger, an expensive sushi restaurant, closed in 2011 after a 16-year run, and was replaced first by a Mexican restaurant and then by an upscale pizzeria.

The businesses on the first floor of the Town Centre at Englewood luxury rental building on Palisade Avenue change constantly, and at least two food markets have failed there.

What factor ever-escalating rents play in the closing of popular businesses is unclear. 

Bittan Group

Little is known about Michel Bittan, owner of the Bittan Group of Englewood, whose signs are on several vacant commercial spaces.

Bittan is the owner of Solaia, a fine-dining restaurant on North Van Brunt Street, between the performing arts center and City Hall. 

He also owns a casual restaurant next door called Caprizza, and the 201 Club, a party space.

Food shopping in Italy and North Jersey

I had a chance to shop at an Italian supermarket and browse in a local butcher shop-deli, and compare them to my favorite food stores in North Jersey.

I was told the Billa supermarket on Lido di Venezia that I visited was part of a chain owned by Austrians, who once ruled Venice. (Lido is a beach resort on the Adriatic Sea, and one of the islands that make up Venice.)

This Billa market wasn't as big as a ShopRite, but all the promotions and sales going on gave the impression it is the low-price leader in Italy, just as ShopRite makes that claim here. But Billa is behind some ShopRites when it comes to providing antibiotic-free poultry and meat, and preservative-free cold cuts. I didn't see any fish.

I also couldn't find any organic milk, and in fact, no item I saw was labeled organic. That surprised me, because the Slow Food movement began in Italy and agriturismo is well-developed, with organic farms offering overnight stays and meals of naturally raised food.

At the checkout counter, one man was buying a dozen liters of Italian extra-virgin olive oil, which were on sale for about $4 each. The price of the large, plastic bottle of mineral water I had was cut in half, to 22 euro cents ($1 was worth 70 euro cents).

As I do in a ShopRite or other supermarkets here, I  had to make sure the item near a price or sale sign was, in fact, the item described on the sign. And the checkout counters moved as slowly there as they do here. If you want a plastic bag, Billa charges 6 euro cents for one.

A few days later, I visited Varese and walked through a crowded butcher shop. Chickens were being sold whole with some of the feathers still in place, and that seemed intentional rather than the result of a poor cleaning job.

In Gallarate, outside a cheese shop, I saw a vending machine selling plastic and glass bottles and unpasturized milk (latte crudo). The price was 1 euro per liter (3.8 liters make a gallon).

Back home, I went to Whole Foods Market in Paramus on Tuesday, and found large, whole whiting for $4.99 a pound. The store was having a one-day sale on wild-caught coho salmon for a low price of $7.99 a pound.

At H Mart in Little Ferry the next day, I bought fresh spinach and baby bok choy, and watched the fishmongers set up the counter, which usually has about 20 selections of whole and filleted fish on ice, labeled with country of origin and whether it is farmed or wild-caught. I also picked up prepared Korean food: stewed tofu, stewed Alaskan pollack and japchae or noodles.

At Jerry's in Englewood on Thursday, I limited myself  to Italian wine at $4.99 and $5.99 a bottle.

Although my exposure to shopping in Italy was limited, North Jersey food stores appear to be both bigger and better.

(Photo: The window of a butcher shop in the city of Monza, Italy.)