BAMN!
In the early 80s there was a Japanese noodle house and restaurant around the corner from my house, long since defunct, called Dosanko. My mother, in her endless quest to broaden my culinary horizons (and thank the Lord she did this OUTSIDE the home. I love my mother dearly, but when I’m asked if she was a good cook when I was growing up, I respond, “She’s an academic.”), made it a semi-monthly practice to have dinner there. I could pretty much take or leave the cuisine (seven-year-olds back then generally didn’t get jazzed about noodles unless covered in tomato sauce; who knows what exotic Thai-Burmese-Malaysian concoctions today’s urban youths enjoy), but one day I asked for the green tea ice cream for dessert, and an obsession was born that remains to this day.
Ice cream, when paired with green tea, becomes something fruity, floral and elevated. It’s exotic but not off-putting, incredibly refreshing and really sings on the tongue when it’s made correctly. Unfortunately it’s not the easiest flavor to find outside of Japanese restaurants.
Enter BAMN!, the city’s first modern automat. This cute little storefront on St. Mark’s Place is noteworthy in and of itself for re-introducing the automat to New York City, in a jazzy pink and fuschia update. You make change at the machine in the corner, and for eight or twelve quarters apiece you can enjoy a number of hot, tasty little mini-meals, from macaroni and cheese bites to veggie empanadas. But it was the green tea soft-serve that really grabbed me, mostly because the flavor choices are usually vanilla (which they also have) or chocolate, both of which I find boring as hell. One bite and I was seven again – the taste was somehow different from all the other times I’ve had it, and surprised my palate in that same hey-now-what’s-THIS??? way. I was regretfully nibbling the bottom of the cone by the time I got to the end of the block, and remembering when it was okay to have ice cream every day.
The plan is to visit BAMN! many times in these droopy, dopey dog-days of summer for a quick trip down memory lane. Since I’m not building a time machine anytime soon, I’m happy to spend $3 instead.
BAMN!; 37 St. Mark’s Place; take the 6 to Astor Place or the R, W to 8th Street and walk east. www.bamnfood.com
