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Welcome to The Greenmarket Challenge. Each month, Time Out takes to the iconic Union Square Greenmarket in search of unique ingredients. We then deliver the goods to one of our talented chefs at Time Out Market New York, Union Square, who will be given one hour to create a one-of-a-kind dish. If it passes our Food and Drink Editor's taste test, the mystery dish will be served at the Market for a limited time.
The Greenmarket Challenge is on, baby! Four ingredients, one chef and one dish to rule them all!
For our second episode of the series, we teamed up with GrowNYC to hunt for four of the most unique seasonal ingredients found at Union Square Greenmarket. Our spring shopping spree yielded ssamjang from Lani’s Farm and fresh veggies, including watermelon radish from Halal Pasture Farms and pea shoots from Hawthorne Valley Farms. But as for the wild card, we added maple cotton candy to our cart, courtesy of Roxbury Mountain Maple.
This month’s challenger? Chef Ivy Stark, former executive chef of Dos Caminos and the mind behind our latest, plant-forward eatery, BKLYN Wild. Chef Stark began with the Korean condiment, creating a ssamjang marinade and brushing it on extra-firm tofu before roasting it in the oven. Letting the simplicity of the greens shine, she created a fresh spring salad using pea shoots as a base, complemented with ribbons of watermelon radish and a little EVOO, all served over a dairy-free sweet potato purée. As for the curveball of cotton candy, Stark kept it as a garnish, bringing a simple, sweet finish to the dish.
Passing the test with flying colors, chef Stark’s ssamjang marinated tofu is now on BKLYN Wild's secret menu. So come by and give it a try this April.
Watch the first episode on YouTube now
