Is The Dixie Lee Bakery Gone

 The Dixie Lee Bakery was on e of those must stops along the Raritan Bay area of New Jersey People went to Keansburg Amusement Park and Water Park and then the bakery for cookies.Locals bought their famed onion rye bread that was even good hard and stale.It lasted with the original family then sold them closed just recently.

I found out about its' closing  yesterday aduring a day at the shore.I wanted to see if their quarter pound of their yummy chocolate dipped butter cookies had gone up in price. Imagine my surprise when I read that the bakery closed in June. There was shock and surprise. The Dixie Lee has been a staple of the area since 1937 meh the original owners opened it in 1937.The Slovenc family started it , naming it after Bing Crosby's wife at the time Dixie Lee. For decades and generations family went there after mass at nearby St Ann,.s Kids love the Cookie Monster cupcakes while adults loved the checkerboard cakes and croissants.Dixie Lee was responsible for cakes from birthdays to probably weddings. They were there. Always. They caught the eye ,including myself , of visitors to the Bayside city.I fell for the butter cookies dipped in lush dark chocolate and  covered in sprinkles. The big cookies were excellent too, every bite buttery and sugary - and satisfying.I bought my Mom's graduation seven layer cake along with that incredibly delicious onion rye bread. That last made for excellent sandwiches and was great slathered with butter.

Then The Slovenc's retired with he kids and grandkids not wanting to take over. In 2022 the famed New Jersey chef David Burke took over. He created restaurants throughout the state , New York and Floritda, I had hoped that he would continue on with the Slovenc';s recipes and charm. I had met him during a visit there.He was in the middle of a tantrum , going on about his pastry chefs. His assistant ,Jake, was much more helpful even agreeing to an interview for this blog.. The brownies and breads remained the same, along with the butter cookies. He did add the fancier macarons which would probably would have been better off in a little shop at Long Branch or in a fancy French bakery in Red Bank.There were also tee shirts and baking lessons offered.Is this part of a typical bakery ?No.  That probably was his first mistake. The second was changing recipes people grew up on. That;s when many, according to their  Facebook posts went to bakeries in nearby towns. Customer traffic dwindled. There was slowly no more trade. Chef Burke's possession lasted  only four years. There is hope with Anthony Rotondo , from Plainview who wants to buy the bakery and return the Dixie Lee to its' former glory.

Is the Dixie Lee poised for a resurrection. SO many hope so. Bring back this grand bakery and all the great recipes with it.

Kids On The Menu

 Should fancy restaurants bam kids? Do we want to discourage families from enjoying a night out? That's the controversy here in New Jersey. An upscale eatery has placed a ban on children under te age of ten. Is this a good idea? There are some pluses and more minuses.

The restaurant in question is Nettie's Spaghetti,in Tinton Falls, a fairly upscale town in oceanfront Monmouth County. The name sounds playful and welcoming for young ones yet it's more of a fancy place for date nights and small gatherings.It is expensive with no kid's menu in sight. A salad starts at fifteen dollars while a main meal of tuna cutlet goes for a whopping forty bucks and spinach fettucine is a pricey twenty-seven. Even the sides are expensive with eggplant and zucchini Parmesan going for eighteen dollars.Their signature spaghetti dish is almost thirty dollars, too dear for my tastes. Another distasteful aspect is that you're charged twenty dollars for cancelling a reservation within a day of reserving a table. Not even Manhattan's four star restaurants pull that trick. Not even David Burke , the famed chef who's conquoring the Jersey shore has done this.Now to add to this is the kid ban. This has infuriated parents all over the area. 

The question is is this a good thing? Go to Nettie's Facebook page and you see a myriad of fors and againsts.One person astutely pointed out that no restaurants makes money off a kid's menu.This makes sense because children don't have the appetite of adults nor do they order alcohol. There is an indeed a financial loss here however many other upscale places also have kids  menus. They don't seem to be bothered by the lost. Many others feel that the blame goes to the parents (let's face it  - it does).Moms and dads who let the little ones climb on the seats or run between tables need to be disciplined themselves.It just doesn;t fly whether it's in a McDonalad's or Wendy's or in an upscale place. A disciplined child is a delight to behold and a quiet well behaved one can eat at any restaurant. A respectful four year old is a better dinner companion than a drunk thirty something or a constantly complaining fifty year old. There's also the philosophy -which my parents believed in - is that children need to eat out.One to experience  dining out of the home and two, to exercise those learned manners. It does pay off. Eating out helps kids experience diffrent foods and to see the world outside their own.

Is Nettie's Spaghetti doing the right thing by banning kids under ten. That depends on who you ask. There are many opinions.Is there a right one? That's hard to say.

A Master 's Legacy

 Thnaks to Eileen  Yin Fei Lo, American home chefs have learned the subtleties of Chinese cooking. She introduced an entire generation to both varied and healthy Chinese cooking. Thanks to her,people  discovered they could  make the dishes they craved isntead of relying on take out.

Sadly Chef Lo passed away at the age of eighty five back in November.She was born in Guangzhou China, the daughter of a government worker and a homemaker. She married American journalist Fred Ferretti in Hong Kong where her family fled after the Cultural Revolution. She lived in Monclair ,New Jersey . According to her son Stephen Ferretti , she was constantly critical of restaurant food. It was easier to cook at home. She and her husband shared a deep connection to food. They even wrote joint reviews for the New York Times where Mr. Feretti worked. Her love of cooking led to her writing cookbooks. Thanks to her home chefs learned how to create won tons, siu mai - a Cantonese version for wonton and char si bao, buns stuffed with barbecued pork.She became friendly with such famed chefs as David Burke and Charlie Palmer and taught them how to cook Chinese food in their establishments. Chef Burke even hired her in the mid-1990s to create a dim sum brunch at his Park Avenue Cafe restaurant.

Yet it is Chef Lo's cookbooks that will be her best legacy. They're still sold on Amazon and there is a wide variety to choose from. She even wrote The Chinese Way :Healthy Low Fat Cooking From CHinese Regions (Wiley Publishers 1987) which features Chinese vegetarian cooking along with healthy ways of cooking through steaming and stir frying. Her first cookbook The Dim Sum Cookbook published in 1981 allowed  home chefs to have the fun of creating all sorts of won tons for the first time. They didin;t have to travel to their city's Chinatowns or Chinese restaurants. Authentic dishes can be made at home. Her second book Eileen Yin-fei Lo's New Cantonese Cooking (Viking 1988)  followed by ten more and ending with  Mastering The Art of Chinese  Cooking(CHronicle Books LLC 2012).  New York Times food critic Florence Fabricant praised her New Cantonese Cooking in 1989 for its' departure from the Chinese food Americans knew. There was a growing interest in Cantonese food  and she introduced Americans  to its freshly delicate and highly seasoned cooking along with how to s on navigating through Chinese markets.

Eileen Yin-Fei Lo made a huge impact on modern American cuisine/ She brought authentic Chinese recipes to the American table. Gone were the days fo chop suey and in its' place authentic wontons and char si bao.

David Burke's Dixie Lee Pure Deliciousness

 There was a lot of worry when the famed chef David Burke took over Keansburg, New Jersey's famed Dixie Lee Bakery. Would he keep the classic cake and bread recipes that the bakery was known for? What about their famed onion rye bread?Or their much loved chocolate dipped butter cookies? Would these be kept? Good news. Chef Burke and his pastry chef have not only maintained favorite recipes but added a spin on many treats.

I visited yesterday and was pleasantly suprtised. The bakery itself has been spruced up. There are added shelves that hold everything from penny candy to a new addition Dixie Lee Coffee. You can even buy chocolate truffles here, another new addition.

These are the cookies and Chef Burke has kept most of the original kinds. It was a relief to see that the chocolate filled green and pink leaf cookies were still there. I liked that they used more white chocolate now for variety. My favorites the big cookies were also still around - thanks heavens.

There are still Lindzer tortes along with apple strudels and fruit tarts. I bought their brownies and jelly doughnuts. 

This is the best jelly  doughnut I've ever had. For one it has a grape jelly center instead of the usual raspberry. It was heavenly. I hope the Dixie Lee decides to offer jellies like this to be spread on their croissants, It was flavortful but not too sweet. The grape flavor came through strong, a perfect foil to the light yeasty dough around it. The doughnut was encrusted in granualted sugar - which just topped it off.

The brownies were also perfect and they and the doughnuts are my new favorites. This was a seriously old fashioned brownie, moist and fudgy  - loaded with walnuts. I love the chocolate frosting on top.It's like an extra bite of fudge along with the granulated sugar dusted bottom. Every bite was perfect. 

I will be trying out the cookies on my next trip and maybe croissants if there are any left. The parking lot was filled  - unusual for the bakery on a summer Sunday afternoon.My only fear is that it becomes too popular with regulars like myself being crowded out.It is good business for this Raritan Bay beach town where the only lucrative businesses are the beach itself, the water park and famed amusement park. 

Chef David Burke has knoicked it out of the park this time. The Dixie Lee offers an amazing array of baked goods from bread to cookies,brownies to jelly doughnuts. It's the destination bakery to visit.

 

Who Is David Burke?

  You  probably have heard the name David Burke if you live in New Jersey and eat out a lot. He's becoming more and  more prevalent as he opens up tons of restaurants across the Garden State. Will he be the next Bobby Flay or Lidia Bastianich with a culinary empire?

Chef Burke is amassing a mighty empire of interesting and varied restaurants.He has one in Riyadh , Saudi Arabia along with two in North Carolina and three in New York State. However it's his home state ,New Jersey that has the most and the most varied menus. You can go to  Son Cubano in West New York, get a great view of Manhattan and have such Spanish and Hispanic  influenced mainstays  as  paella and empanadas.Then there is Morristown's 1776,  the name a nod to the town's major involvement in the Revolutionary War.This is modern American fusion food, that features hamburgers made with aged beef to a wide assortment of sushi rolls. He has appealed to brides and grooms by opening up Orchard Park at the elegant Gilded Age looking  Chateau Grande in East Brunswick. The menu is trendy with date night specials and breakfast pizzas offered at brunch.His Fort Lee establishment Ventana's has a fusion menu of Cuban Asian and American dishes as well as entertainment, namely in comedy

The Jersey shore seems to be his mainstay since he is familiar with the area. he grew up in Hazlet where his early years were spent delivering papers. His restaurants span from Rumson to Sea Bright to the latest The Goat, The Greatest of All Times,  which features a wild mix of Nuovo Italian and traditional hamburgers, along with a twist on shrimp cocktail(it involves cucumbers. His latest acquisition is dear to my heart - the famed Dixie Lee Bakery in Keansburg. From the pictures, it's gone upscale with a cheery outside repainting that makes it look like an Amish barn. The inside seems redone too, with what seems to be mirrors added to give the main part a bigger look.However he's intent on making too SoHo or West Village for this predominantly red leaning area of New Jersey. He wants to bring sandwiches and gourmet coffee to the Dixie Lee, named for Bing Crosby's first wife Dixie Lee, a popular  actress.when the Slovenz family opened it up in 1933. There are also going to be salads too and even baking classes. Is this too much for a bakery who sold such deliciously homey goods like their onion rye bread and chocolate dipped butter cookies?

Who is David Burke then? He's the man behind some of this state's great restaurants. Let's hope he keeps up this winning streak of successful eateries  while keeping in mind his roots.