Zanzibari Pesto

Potato Fritters with Chili Sauce

We followed the Masai guard into a warmly lit dining room where two doors opened out to the star studded sky.  Just past the sandy porch, waves crashed with the strength of full tide.  We had survived a puddle jumper flight from the Tanzanian bush and landed, it seemed, in paradise.

Fabio, the charismatic owner of Mamamapambo Hotel, ushered John and me up a spiral staircase to a lofted room.  We almost didn’t need a to turn on the lights, the full moon shone bright enough to illuminate the comfortable Zanzibar lounge chairs and plush cushions strewn about the veranda. 

Women Collecting Seaweed

He gave his profuse apologies.  With our plane arriving late that evening there would be no time for his cooks to make a complicated dinner.  But perhaps something simple?  Maybe a mango salad?  Or a plate of pasta?  A pesto or arrabiata could be arranged.

Really?  Pesto and arrabiata in Zanzibar?  That would be easy for his cooks to do, just like that?  We could hardly pass up the offer.

Fifteen minutes later we descended back into the cozy dining room.  One plate of pesto spaghetti made with fresh basil (and did I detect peanuts?) and one spicy penne arrabiata materialized, perfectly al dente. It was as good as if we were in Italy.  Except we were far from Italy, hungrily bent over plates, adrift on a tropical island off the coast of Africa. 

Fisherman on his boat

The next morning I spent a couple of hours watching village life happen below our veranda.  Women waded out into the turquoise waters early in the morning not returning until late in the afternoon, trailing wooden dhows leaden with bulging potato sacks.  These sacks carried the women’s livelihood: seaweed to be dried and shipped to Japan where it would find its way into cosmetics and creams.  Their daughters and sons attempted to help with the load, but even young boys working together could not equal the strength of a mother’s arms as she hoisted a bag on her scarf wrapped head and carried it the long walk in. 

Meanwhile, the few men who appeared to be working, gathered food.  Fishing dhows shipped out for the reef early in the morning returning with their catch and the rising tide.  Boys with sharp sticks drove octopus from their holes and collected them in canvas sacks.  Sea urchins and cockles filled buckets, destined for the market or the feast that would happen after the sun went down for these Muslim villagers celebrating the holy month of Ramadan. 

Mediterranean Tuna

We easily fell into a routine.  Lunch was always pasta giving us a chance to try as many variations as we could. Puttanesca, tuna with mint and lime, fresh crab, then back again to that pesto and arrabiata.  Each (with the exception of slightly gummy crab) was executed with perfection.  Fabio informed us that the produce was grown locally but for certain items like the Spanish olive oil and the Italian dried pasta, they relied on an importer.  His wife, Stephania, had lured the men in the kitchen from up the coast at one of the bigger and splashier resorts catering to mostly Italian tourists.  They already had the basics of Italian cuisine that she built upon, teaching the cooks her own recipes.  These Zanzibari men made pesto better than most Italians I know.

Coconut Crusted Kingfish

In the morning while we nibbled on fresh baked pastries and papaya, Stephania would post the night’s specials on a small black board.  If the fishermen brought in tuna that morning there might be “Mediterranean Fish” listed- grilled and topped with compote of tomato, olives, and garlic.  Kingfish, a local catch, made a couple of appearances, once expertly breaded in a crust of fresh coconut.  Appetizers ranged from a lime drenched mango salad to creamy pumpkin soup to fluffy balls of fried potato puree that would not have been out of place on any New York menu. Samosas stuffed with fish, fresh chapatis, hot sesame studded rolls with every meal, there was little these chefs couldn't cook. 

Before we knew it the three nights were up.  We were tan, relaxed, well-fed and ready to trade in our adult lives for this beach idyll.  We told Fabio and Stephania if they ever needed help, we’d gladly come work for them. 

Work for them?  Nooo… Fabio said.   But if you are really interested, I might have a hotel to sell you, he said with his characteristic wink.

It seemed that the women gathering seaweed weren’t the only ones breaking their backs.  Making pesto in Africa was hard work.  Albeit, Fabio and Stephania’s kind of hard work came with an amazing view and some delicious perks.  

Amy Powell is a food and travel writer based in New York City. She is a graduate of Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration and the French Culinary Institute. Follow her on Twitter @amymariepowell

A New Standard in Hotel Food

Spanish Octopus at The Standard Grill, New York City

“Hotel Food” is a phrase synonymous with the generic offerings of national chains buying frozen tortellini and curly fries in bulk from mainline distributors.  Over years of business travel too often resulting in late night arrivals and room service menus, I developed a strategy for eating that would at least satisfy hunger without completely repulsing my taste buds.  I call it the Club Sandwich Rule. 

The rule is simple.  It is fairly impossible to screw up a club sandwich.  A typical club sandwich involves layers of toasted bread separated by sliced turkey, bacon, lettuce, tomato, and a (hopefully) thin layer of mayonnaise. It is hard to screw up a club for a few reasons: turkey is almost always moist, even plain sandwich bread is better when toasted, and bacon makes everything better.  If a skeleton crew manning the kitchen on the late shift can’t handle that, then the hotel’s kitchen can be deemed pretty much hopeless.  (If the hotel doesn’t do club sandwiches, the Chicken Quesadilla Rule, and French Fries for Dinner Rule are good alternatives). 

It is a nice surprise then from time to time when a hotel (that is not the Las Vegas sized 10,000 room variety) manages to attract people because of the food.  Such is the case at the newish Standard Hotel in New York City.  Vaguely French bistro in style, The Standard is blessed with an expansive patio perfect for slurping roses on hot summer days, or sipping Manhattans under the heaters when the weather turns chilly.

A recent dinner brought a Moorish influenced appetizer of tender Spanish octopus with sweet potatoes and chilies.  A juicy steak came nicely charred and perfectly pink in the middle.  And accompanying fries were thin and crisp enough to rival the famed fries at neighbor Pastis. 

The service, which easily could have veered toward snobby, was instead overly accommodating.  The restaurant does not have beers on tap but its adjoining Biergarten does.  The restaurant and bustling beer hall operate separately so the waitress could not transfer a beer bought there to our check in the restaurant.  But she kindly offered to escort my boyfriend to the Biergarten bar where he was served right away and then ushered back to our cozy patio seat, frosty brew in hand. 

I might live just down the street from The Standard but if I didn’t, I would go out of my way to stay there for work.  (At least one person I know stays there when in New York for business just for that reason.)  Even in a city like New York where food options abound, there will always be that day- delayed flight, urgent project, after work nap- that causes one to miss a normal dinner hour and rely on phoned-in food.    It is nice knowing that a few floors below lies a kitchen turning out some of the most consistently good food in the neighborhood and with a touch of a button, it will come direct to the door.  One can only hope that this level of service and quality signals a new “standard” for hotel food. 

Do you know a hotel (not of the 10,000 room Las Vegas variety) that has exceptionally good food available for room service?  Leave a comment!

Amy Powell is a food and travel writer based in New York City. She is a graduate of Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration and the French Culinary Institute. Follow her on Twitter @amymariepowell