flea at laff #10: the good batch.

snack: birthday cake cookie
drink: hot tea

hey, so the saturday brooklyn flea has finally returned to fort greene. yep. it's true. in fact, they kicked off the 2011 season way back on april 3rd. the weather sucked on that first day, so i wasn't there to experience the opening in all its glory, but on the following saturday i did make it out to the flea for the first time this year. since my last visit to the flea back in late september, the sunday edition has moved to williamsburg & just yesterday the folks behind the flea announced that on may 21st they're launching a saturday food market called "smorgasburg" at the willyburg location. it'll feature over 100 vendors, making it the largest outdoor food market in the city. it'll also be the one with the f'n cleverest name. ch-ch-changes.

while there are a few new food vendors this year & there doesn't appear to be a flying V guitar for sale like there was all last summer & there's a proud pink elephant statue near the back, the saturday edition of the flea has remained essentially the same. a healthy crowd of hip brooklynites? check. myriad booths of stuff i'd never buy? check. a ridiculously awesome selection of food vendors? double check.

for my first snack & drink of the 2011 flea season, i decided to go dutch & try one of the vendors i never got around to sampling last summer--the good batch. their claim to fame is the stroopwafel, a dutch waffle cookie with a caramel syrup filling. i assume they're made in a dutch oven or something. as the story goes, after months of perfecting her stroopwafel recipe, anna gordon, the founder of good batch, started the company & since then they've expanded beyond stroopwafels with other cookies & brownies & such. according to their website, they're "one of the few handmade stroopwafel companies in the united states" & their treats are available in a bunch of stores in brooklyn & manhattan. on this particular saturday, they were celebrating their one year anniversary.

to mark the occasion they created a special birthday cake cookie--a vanilla "funfetti" cake waffle cookie with milk chocolate mousse frosting. i was feeling festive so i went with one of those. the cookie had a subtle sweetness to it & was mostly firm with a slight chewiness to it. as for the chocolate mousse filling, it was a bit rich but since i have a high tolerance for sweets, i was fine with it. overall, it was a damn tasty treat & within a few minutes i'd inhaled the entire thing. unfortunately, a half hour after i finished the cookie, i started to have a bit of a stomachache. don't blame the cookie though. it's not the cookie's fault. blame me. i woke up & the first thing i consumed that day was a cookie filled with a shitload of chocolate mousse. i deserved that stomachache.

the only thing they have available for beverages is hot tea. meh. it's not like there's anything wrong with the soothing warmth of a nice cup of hot tea, but it's not all that exciting. i guess that sipping tea tends to have a calming effect, but when you're sitting on concrete steps surrounded by hundreds of people whilst doing so, it's hard to feel all that calm. anyway, the cup of tea only ran me $1 & although i can't pinpoint what type of tea it was, it tasted good even without sugar, so i can't really complain all that much. i've since learned that it's customary to rest your stroopwafel on top of your cup of tea so that it softens up a bit first. while that would've given the tea a bit more purpose, i didn't know at the time, so oh well.

other than the stomachache, it was good to be back at the flea after so long away. i'm definitely looking forward to a few weeks from now, when the sun (& the accompanying sexy brooklyn female summer dress code) will be out in full force. while a birthday cake cookie's pretty damn sweet, that'll be even sweeter.