It’s Sunday morning, and I’m standing on a corner in Bay Ridge, a not-trendy section of Brooklyn, eating panelle from a brown paper bag with the chef Jordan Frosolone. We greedily tear off pieces of the fried chickpea fritters, a street food specialty from Sicily—4,000 miles away yet somehow so close. We squeeze lemon over them. We savor them. And then they’re gone.

Chef Jordan and I have just concluded a tour of his favorite food markets, delis and snack stops in the neighborhood he’s called home for the past few years. It’s a long commute to the kitchen at Leopard at des Artistes, a revamped Italian restaurant founded by restaurateur Gianfranco Sorrentino (the man behind Il Gattopardo) in the Midtown space that was once home to the famed Cafe des Artistes.