Jennifer Blowdryer

Lower Manhattan Dumpster Tour

Time’s Up!
212 802 8222

Black Hound
170 Second Ave
212 – 979 9505

I met my pedicel driver, Bobby from the Manhattan Rickshaw Company, in Washington Square Park for the Dumpster Tour of food spots. I was excited, having heard about a mysterious map of all the good spots to find food outside of businesses, and the best time to hit it. I found a bunch of cyclists edged by cops, some of them looking sharp on their nice new scooters.

“It’s a little frightening because it’s not really subversive to bicycle” pointed out a curious older woman.

Meanwhile Bill, from Time’s Up, was looking around for their Legal Observer, which they need on each ride. Of course, the police attention is not out of the blue, as his organization is also part of huge bicycle ridden protests like Critical Mass and an upcoming bike bloc.

Bobby had picked out a hot pink pedicel for me, though we’d never met. People now use them in weddings or just to bring groceries home from the farmer’s market, and during the tour lots of recycled food got piled on my seat, headed for Food not Bombs.

The first spot we hit was the Gristedes on Mercer Street, where the dumpster tour group quickly found bananas, Orange Juice, Nellie cage free eggs, and yogurt. They don’t really have room for dumpsters in Manhattan, so they rummaged through a stack of bags before neatly tying them back up.

Cleaning up is important, explained Bobby: “The whole purpose is not to piss anybody off, it’s to reduce waste.”

I had a half a banana, it wasn’t bad, but a woman said that the Cherry Dannon yogurt contains ground up Peruvian bugs, which get their red coloring from eating certain blossoms. I don’t know what to believe now that I’m meeting these health radicals, but I liked saying it: Ground Up Peruvian Bugs. I took some Parmalat Half and Half for myself, because most plain deli milk goes bad almost immediately.

Biking to the next spot, Gracefully on Ave A and 3rd, Bobby spotted the guy cycling next to him. “I saw you in court! I was there for an open container!” The other guy mumbled something about urination. I had almost forgotten about Quality of Life laws, even though I had two cops bang on my door because of a flyering run I’d gone on the night before. POLICE! They yelled dramatically, helping me make even more of a good impression on my neighbors.

I was peeking in the trash, I mean the food, outside of Gracefully when Justin Bond of Kiki and Herb spotted me. Has she come to this, he must have quietly wondered. I can never afford Gracefully, it’s one of those NY Gourmet Delis where $20 buys you very little, so I was pleased to see a net of sandwiches, upscale lettuce, cereal, raspberries, and old flowers. The raspberries tasted bitter, and I tucked a nasty old flower into my skirt.

One smallish guy was especially quick untying bags and pawing through them, like a handsome little rat. Thaddeus, our tour leader, said he lives on 100% found food, but doesn’t eat anything cooked, unless it comes from Life Thyme, on 6th Ave. He gave it a pretty good review – the cakes are dairy free, and he especially enjoys the chocolate mousse cake, and the coconut and lemon pies.

We hit a slightly less vegan desert place, Black Hound on 2nd Ave, and the health food buffs looked suspiciously excited as they opened a plastic bag full of creamy deserts mashed together. I sampled a lemon tart, which was solid and tart, and a little of the poppy seed cake. A woman said she found it a little dry, and just a bit too heavy.

“Damn you, Thaddeus!” a kid boomed theatrically, finding us already kid (to me) already digging in – we just sort of stuck our fingers in and scooped out goods, including a slab of unusually tasty coffee cake. In the window was the beautifully displayed specialty of Black Hound, a bumble bee cake valued at $22.

We swung back to Old Fashioned Donuts on First Ave at about 10:30, it had been closed earlier, and the very first bag was filled with donuts, slightly stale, but refreshingly not as sweet as the near by Dunkin Donuts. A woman nibbled on one compulsively, angry at herself, and complained that she would have to fast the next day. Apparently these vegans are not as tough as they think.

Outside of Commodities Natural Market, on First Ave, I had a yellow cherry tomato. I associate yellow tomatoes with luxury, and this one was flavorful, unlike the new Star Trek replicate tomatoes in the grocery stores that look great and taste like crap, like in that planet they went to where they could replicate the look of human food but didn’t understand about taste. I had a pretty good night, onlookers smiled indulgently at us studying the garbage, and I finally scored the secret list, Dumpster Diving Spots of NYC.