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The Garden of Eden Gourmet Markets and Eden Gourmet featured in The Star Ledger:
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Temptation triumphs
How to describe Eden Gourmet? How about irresistible!
Actually, Eden Gourmet, a brand new market in South Orange, is incomparable in our neck of the woods, but trying to describe it on its own isn't easy.
It's supposed to look like an outdoor European marketplace, but with more than 10,000 specialty food items in a 35,000-square-foot space, it's hardly a stroll through a town bazaar. In fact, on a recent shopping spree, it was truly difficult to not put at least one product from every aisle, section and/or food group in my carriage, and I tried to resist.
Their motto is "temptation in every aisle" and for food lovers, this is sin city. There are several individual specialty food counters that serve as little markets within the big market. You'll find seafood, two butchers (one kosher), a charcuterie, a cheese shop, a bakery, a prepared foods department and a juice bar, along with aisle after aisle of organics, exotic labels and just plain old goodies from chocolates to chips and soups to spices.
For grab and go, you can choose from a Greek fruit and yogurt bar, Israeli/Mediterranean salad counter, hot entrees buffet, sushi and hand-carved meats. The butchers, fishmongers and cheese purveyors aim to please and really know their products. They'll share chapter and verse on how to select, prepare and store. One cheese specialist recited the history of a cheese I liked, and a meat cutter gave me his dad's recipe for a dry rub.
Third Jersey location
South Orange is the company's third location in New Jersey and its largest. In Hoboken, you can walk around and put together a meal, then take it to the second floor café and look over the marketplace while you eat (Garden of Eden Gourmet, 226 Washington St., 201-659-0355) and in Atlantic City at the small Eden Gourmet Café (The Pier Shops at Caesar's, One Atlantic Ocean, 609-344-7580), you can do the same, then take your food to the beach, the boardwalk or a table inside The Pier. But in South Orange, the second floor café won't be ready'til the fall, so for now, you can sample your way through the store.
There are delicious, nutty rice cakes popping hot and fresh out of a machine ($2 bags of 12 for $5) in front of you and apple cider donuts dipped in cinnamon cooling as you pass by -- and few people pass by without buying at least one for 59 cents. Every week, there's a sale flyer at the customer service counter, and you'll find some bargains. In general, Eden Gourmet's prices are competitive for foods of this caliber, and the opportunity of shopping at 10 specialty shops in one place is a treat.
Let's start in the frozen section. I could find enough fun things here to serve guests and look good. Large escargots in pesto wrapped in phyllo dough comes with its own serving dish ($17.99 for 24) and assorted canapés including shrimp with garlic and herb mini blinis and smoked salmon and basil cheese ($13.29 for 20) seem like a good start. In the refrigerator, cold soup might be fun at $3.99 per pint, in honeydew, cantaloupe, strawberry, pineapple or watermelon.
Then there are a dozen flavors of hummus and other spreads, fun things like prosciutto and provolone wrapped in banana peppers ($9.99 per pound), 20 patés and terrines from truffle mousse paté for $11 per pound to duck foie gras at $120 per pound.
If you're cooking, there's every condiment you can imagine -- I even found cracked pepper, lemon and thyme mustard. There are frozen dinners, but here they include chicken Jambalaya, paella and goat cheese quiche ($7, average). You'll find frozen pizza, also, but these are flatbreads, baked in a "primitive wood-fired earthen oven" with a variety of exotic toppings.
Save room for lunch
In the prepared section, everything looked so good, the cooking idea lost its appeal. Looking at the shrimp orzo ($15.99 per pound), poached, grilled or honey-glazed salmon, tangerine salad ($11.99 per pound), octopus salad, grilled, sliced pineapple ($3.99 per pound), stuffed zucchini, wild rice with dried cranberries, wheat berry cous cous with raisins and peaches and roasted mushrooms made me so hungry, I just had to stop at the seafood market and sample -- then buy -- some ahi tuna salad ($14.99 per pound). This is a winner. Chunks of tender tuna, green onions, celery, mayo -- my sister-in-law Sheila and I had lunch on the spot. We even made a date to come back again to purchase more; it was that good.
There are also gorgeous crab cakes at a bargain $4.99 each, cold shrimp of every size, salmon cakes ($2.49 each) and tuna and salmon burgers ($2.99 each).
Now it's on to the cheese department. Stephanie, Daniel and Alin deserve kudos for knowing their 300-plus varieties, including a Pecorino Testun made with leftover pulp from Barolo wine and my new favorite: abbaye du bellocq. This delicate Basque wonder is a 1,200-year-old sheep's milk cheese made by monks, and if I could buy the entire round, I would. Try it and let me know what you think.
There's just not enough room to get to the bakers, the butchers, the meat carvers, the buffets and the juicers -- and they're all worth seeing -- but you've got to spend some significant time in the produce market. Fifteen varieties of mushrooms, so many sprouts there's even alfalfa onion and clover garlic and things I love and can't find like apple-bananas, quince, kiwano melons, sunchokes and golden berries -- I could not stop filling my cart. Cherries, Georgia peaches, Indian eggplant, beech mushrooms, yellow tomatoes on the vine, heirlooms of every hue -- honestly, I could not find a bruise or spot on any piece of fruit or veggie. It's all a beautiful bounty.
It's obvious I'm smitten by Eden Gourmet. The company -- based in Brooklyn, began as a farmers' market under a tent in 1994 by Mustafa and John Coskun. The South Orange store is the first site with partners Mario Andreani and Stephen Katzman. The philosophy is to hire culinary school grads as chefs and bakers and make as much as possible in-house. It's literally floor-to-ceiling food.
Look up and the top shelf is snacks around one aisle. Another has cereal. It's also fun. The walls are a tangle of greens, with jungle animals surprising you here and there.
As for the name Eden Gourmet, I don't know if the original apple really caused all that trouble, but in the store, they looked pretty good to me. I gave in, bought a few and even ate one on the way home. I've had a pretty good couple of weeks since then, so I'm going back for some more. Eden Gourmet is way too good a find to worry about the small stuff.
IF YOU GO:
EDEN GOURMET CAFÉ & MARKETPLACE
1 South Orange Ave., South Orange
(973) 762-5200
Hours: 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., daily