12.05.10
Posted in Lower East Side, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, small plates, Spanish at 23:49 by Dominique
29 Clinton & Stanton Sts., 212-979-0002
Great for: sangria
I was technically not drinking for a while, in an ongoing attempt to slim down, but after two hours of very athletic tennis with the Pool Champion it was hard to resist the siren call of beautiful white sangria. Also we were sort of on a date and somehow I feel bad letting guys drink alone when they’re trying to impress me. It of course has nothing to do with how much I enjoy a nice drink.
We got some nibbles to replenish our energy too. The tapa of the day, scallops in pomegranate orange glaze on salad with mushrooms, was quite good. It was surprisingly not too sweet and the scallops had a lovely crunchy glaze. The croquetas de bacalao with aïoli were thick, not as fluffy as I expected and tasty. It was at least a very large amount of cod for the price. The dates stuffed with cheese wrapped in Serrano ham were only pretty good. Overall they were very sweet while the ham was basically a salt lick, so the flavors didn’t meld terribly well.
The white sangria is lovely. It’s refreshing, just the right strength and the embodiment of summer. I could use some of that right now in Manhattan winter.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Our cost: $$60 (3 tapas, 3 sangrias)
Noise level: not too bad
Chance of walking in: decent.
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09.30.10
Posted in Lower East Side, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, small plates, Spanish at 19:48 by Dominique
173 Orchard & Stanton Sts., 212.253-1900
Great for: empanadas, spicy picante sauce, non-foodie dates
I’d heard amazing things about the empanadas here. Thanks to a Blackboard Eats coupon, I see why I didn’t hear about anything else. The restaurant is decent, not a standout.
The discount gave us a mini-carafe of sangria and six mini-empanadas (roughly a $20 value) with the order of two entrées. We were completely delighted with the tiny empanadas. Other than the portabello, which I didn’t try because I hate mushrooms, the queso blanco, chicken, beef, pork and chorizo were all juicy and terrific. On the other hand, the similarly miniscule red pepper crab cakes with chipotle mayo were not amazing; just crisp outside and all crab inside. Not what a crab cake should be.
The clay pot dinners with Spanish fried rice and black beans are much bigger. My carne chorizada, ground sirloin in onion, garlic, tomato and vegetable stew, was somewhat flavorful. I found the copious addition of house picante sauce helped. It’s a little sour and has a Beckham-level kick to it. The best part of the camarones a la brazas – shrimp in mustard, sherry and dill, wrapped in bacon and grilled – was the bacon. The shrimp could have been cooked less.
The sangria is lovely. It’s a bit sweet and not too strong, and gives the feeling of an outdoor café in Spain. The service is efficient, though they weren’t packed. The décor kind of looks like a roomy grandma’s house with nooks and books and interesting mirrors inside lamps. It’s cute and actually quite large, as well as very dark. The music is quiet Spanish. As long as your date isn’t much of a foodie, the sangria, empanadas and romantic darkness should get you pretty far.
Rating: 6.5 / 10 (6 if not for empanadas)
Our cost: $90 without deal (tapas are $8, small plates $14, clay pots $14-24 – it’s not cheap)
Noise level: quiet enough for a date
Chance of walking in: not bad.
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Posted in American, brunch, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, SoHo at 01:27 by Dominique
54 Prince St. & Lafayette, 212-226-0211
Great for: tuna tartare, Tilly cocktails, brunching and people-watching
SoHo, despite its reputation as a hub of nightlife, is oddly short of places to eat late. Or at least the eastern bit is. Towards Broadway there’s more stuff open. Delicatessen helps somewhat by being open until 12 on weekdays and 1 on weekends. I’ve been here before for drinks in their subterranean party space, so I was glad to finally try the food.
The tuna tartare with wasabi tobiko, crème fraiche and taro chips is wonderful. One of the best I’ve ever had, it’s a huge disc with lovely taste and texture. I even liked the taro chips, the wasabi really flavored the tobiko, and the tuna was great quality. On the other hand, the La Frieda short rib blend sliders with bacon, Swiss and minced pickles were just fine. They weren’t as rich as you’d expect. Some of the meat was a bit burned, though overall the combination was pretty good.
They can’t do chicken properly here. We tried the chicken caesar salad and the enormous paillard over arugula, fennel, parmesan and balsamic, and the chicken was all weirdly done. The salads were delicious minus the meat. The paillard was just grilled, no breading or flour, and the edges were overcooked while the center was juicy and tasty. There is no excuse for a restaurant that has trouble with chicken.
The place redeemed itself somewhat with the Tilly cocktail, which was so good I asked the bartender for the recipe. 1.5 ounces Ketel One, 3/4 ounce triple sec, the juice of half a lime, 4 small strawberries and a splash of pomegranate juice all blended are heaven. There you go, a foolproof way to to make people’s eyes light up at your next party. When I made it at home, my friend and I couldn’t stop saying “Mmmm” for quite a while.
Our waitress was as pretty as she was nice. The cooking was also impressively fast, though it was very late and they weren’t packed. It’s a large restaurant with abundant sidewalk space, and somehow usually filled despite the mostly so-so food. I am proud of myself for not stopping here for the tuna tartare when I leave the Equinox up the block every day or so. It is good enough that I might consider working out an extra hour to have it! And maybe a Tilly. Just one.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Our cost: $90
Noise level: noisy all the time
Chance of walking in: not great. With such a big restaurant, though, it raises your chances.
Their MacBar next door is not very good. I tried the small “lobsta’” mac and cheese and it was a disappointing waste of $9. It was my treat for the day, so I finished it, but there’s not a lot of flavoring, just expensive ingredients they overcharge for. I personally have not tried Delicatessen brunch. However, the place is always slammed during that time, and the patrons are pretty, so it’s probably worth stopping by.
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09.29.10
Posted in American, New York City, New York City Reviews, NoLIta, rated 6 to 6.5, SoHo at 21:59 by Dominique
282 Bowery & E. Houston, 212-226-1966
Great for: eating late in a weird area, pizza, noisy scene
I’m generally a Keith McNally fan. The man definitely has a way with French bistros. I wasn’t as impressed by Morandi, but then I was coming off a massive Halloween bender and that’s not their fault. In this case, I was on my way to an audition and sober, so I’m pretty confident about this review.
In deference to the cheapskate (and hence ex-) Boyfriend, we shared a salsiccia pizza, though everyone else seemed to have their own. I liked the superthin crispy crust, which was a bit too blackened. The ingredients were scattered in very even average density; someone clearly took a lot of care with that. Broccoli rabe plus sausage is a new combination to me and I grew to like it. If you don’t, they have more than ten other choices and fairly good ones. None of that lame no-topping crap like some other Italian joints. Yes, I know, it’s “classic” to have just sauce and cheese – whatever, I want meat on my pies.
The service and cooking are mercifully quick. I shudder to imagine how much longer the lines would be if they were any slower. It’s also admirable considering they serve late and open back up for breakfast a couple hours later. There are classic McNally touches of numbered wine carafes, tile and exposed brick everywhere. It looks basically like Schiller’s writ large, down to the double door entryway. It’s always lively, packed and a bit noisy from the tin ceilings. I like the enormous frosted windows. The retro slatted chairs are, surprisingly, fairly comfy. Be careful, there are children and the tables are close together so if you’re swearing at your meal partner because he won’t stop arguing, you might get some horrified parental stares. Overall, it’s not mind-blowing but it is really good pizza. If I want food late and haven’t had bread in a while I might come back.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Our cost: $20
Noise level: loud party with children
Chance of walking in: haha you will wait a while. Have some drinks.
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08.07.10
Posted in American, Italian, Lower East Side, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5 at 02:31 by Dominique
84 Stanton & Allen/Orchard Sts., 212-982-8895
Great for: pork meatballs, spicy meat sauce, cream sauce, bread, ice cream, destroying your hearing
I had an exhausting and strange audition – the weekend ones are always the worst – and my reward was to go try this place. Fortunately I had a wonderful book to read, so the noise didn’t bother me much. I highly recommend Leo Babauta’s Power of Less. Sadly, I can’t recommend the Meatball Shop anywhere near as wholeheartedly, but they do some things well.
There’s no mix-and-match option, so I ended up ordering 5 different meatballs as sliders. That was the only way I could try all of them (I didn’t bother with the veggie ball, that’s just dumb). They’re quite small for $3 – they’d fit comfortably in my tiny curled-up palm. You get a cool laminated menu to write your order on, since there are many permutations of sauces, meats and sandwich formats. I didn’t have stomach space to try any of the sides. You can get up to four of the same meatball on a sandwich as well.
My favorite was the pork in spicy meat (pork) sauce. The pork itself was flavorful, moist and spicy, and the sauce helped it along. I also quite liked the juicy special of tandoori lamb in tomato sauce. It had a good combination of spices.
The chicken in parmesan cream was tasty, not amazing, and soft. It scares me when chicken is very soft. I loved the cream, which definitely had some cool spices in there. I was a bit sorry I got the salmon in parmesan cream. Not as tasty or moist as I’d hoped, I definitely did not need more than one. I tired of it halfway through. Good thing I ordered it with the cream sauce.
The worst was the beef in tomato sauce. It was bland and had lots of gristle, unlike all the others. Shocking, that such a standard meatball was so underwhelming.
Whatever each bun was, brioche or something, it was terrific; fluffy and tasty without competing with the meat. And you guys know I don’t eat bread. Sometimes there isn’t enough sauce but that’s ok, the bread is good all by itself.
I’d heard a lot about the ginger snap ice cream sandwich. Since I was being a dutiful blogging piglet anyway I figured I’d go the distance. The ginger snaps were pretty good but ultimately they are still messy, bready sweets. I preferred the caramel ice cream. The sandwich is fairly difficult to eat – I found it best to nibble one side at a time so as not to squeeze out all the ice cream. For $4 it was a pretty good deal.
Service is nice, but scatterbrained and slow. It’s very likely that was because they just opened and were swamped from day one, so I didn’t mind being patient. I finished my book, though. The décor is colonial/crazy American Gothic. I have never seen so many black and white pictures of loony old people. I probably won’t again, as this place is very overpriced for being only decent, and insanely packed all the time. Only two meatballs of six offered are good – not a very good success rate. I’ll give them this, though; it’s a cool gimmick and they seem to be raking it in at the moment.
Rating: 6 / 10
My cost: $25 (5 sliders and an ice cream sandwich)
Noise level: noisy as hell; the music is loud rock and the people are just as bad
Chance of walking in: bad. But at least they’re open late (noon until 2am Sunday to Wednesday, 4am other days) and have many seats so you have a lot of chances to try.
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07.12.10
Posted in Italian, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, SoHo at 02:19 by Dominique
231 Mott & Prince Sts., 212-966-1234
Great for: olives all’ascolano, possibly pizza (pending another visit)
The first couple times I tried to come here, they were closed, or doing a private party. Don’t you hate when that happens, and then you finally try the place and it’s not amazing?
I started with the four juicy olives all’ascolano, which are breaded olives with veal and sausage inside. They were a little oversalted, but satisfying and a nice size and number. P got grilled octopus with potatoes. It was chewy and quite tasty.
We both got the Yukon gold gnocchi with oxtail ragù. The gnocchi had kind of a weird taste and the meat was super fatty and gristly. I never had oxtail before, and when I researched it online later I learned that it’s supposed to be a bit fatty, but this really freaked me out. I didn’t even finish my dish. Now that I’ve had oxtail at Má Pêche I don’t think the meat was very good quality. P quite liked his, on the other hand, so I’m willing to give them another try.
To calm down my palate, I got an affogato gelato in an espresso shot that was pretty good. I felt there was a bit too much cocoa powder which made it very bitter. It sort of did the trick.
We had a nice waitress. I found the meat slicer prominently displayed behind the bar the most interesting thing in the restaurant. I literally couldn’t stop watching people slice things on it. Fortunately P thinks my nerdy tendencies are funny. It was less amusing that they misspelled “proscuitto” [sic] on the entire menu.
I suspect pizza is their best thing, since that’s what everyone else ordered. Each pie is really big, though, and I didn’t want to eat that much. Next time I will suck it up and get a pizza, and sit in the lovely back room with its skylight.
Rating: 6 / 10
Our cost: $90 (1 glass wine)
Noise level: not too bad
Chance of walking in: fine.
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03.30.10
Posted in Latin, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, Union Square at 01:08 by Dominique
137 4th Ave. & 13th St., 212-677-7300
Great for: Mexican in Union Square, eating standing up, well-executed meat
I thought the Boyfriend would be delighted I was willing to eat Mexican – he was fairly happy with the food here, just not the price. He feels Chipotle is a slightly better value. Considering they get Niman Ranch pork and other high-quality ingredients over there, I sort of agree. Dos Toros only specifies the source of its chicken. They do pack the tacos super full of meat but the tacos are quite tiny. And, of course, the waiting would drive me crazy. We got lucky and snagged seats and service immediately.
I tried all three tacos – carnitas (pork), pollo asado and carne asada. The shells are very crispy, though not after they’re overstuffed with the super juicy meat. Seriously, I could barely open my mouth wide enough. I really enjoyed them. The accompanying veggies are fresh and crispy. I’d say three tacos is ample; I probably would have been ok with just two. I was a little annoyed the guy didn’t tell me they charge extra for guacamole, and just slyly asked, “Would you like some guac?” B liked his steak quesadilla, which tasted a bit different from my steak taco, in a toasty nutty way. It was a good size, maybe a bit on the small side.
They make a big deal about doing a whole sustainable thing, which is a gimmick as far as I’m concerned, since it is merely smart business practice, but you can feel good about eating here. The place is tiny. You’ll almost certainly need to have your food to go. It might be nice before movies at the Regal, especially in the summer.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Our cost: $25 (3 tacos, 1 quesadilla, a mango Jarritos)
Noise level: loud
Chance of walking in: there is a curb outside that you can sit on, though I’d walk the extra few blocks to the park.
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03.10.10
Posted in Asian, Chinatown/Little Italy, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, Southeast Asian at 17:04 by Dominique
141 Grand & Crosby/Lafayette Sts., 212-966-8916
Great for: um, not much
After very relaxing facials with my friend G, we wandered around looking for a non-brunch, non-Chinese lunch. We found it, but it wasn’t very satisfying. At least we had fun hanging out, though that’s because G is a dear and that’s par for the course with her.
We began with num tok grilled beef barbecue with onion, chili powder and lime juice. It was super lime-flavored, not medium rare as requested, and not bad. I think I prefer when citrus is provided on the side – it’s tough to get that exactly right for different people, and too much sourness is pretty much irreparable. The tom yum noodle soup with shrimp was better, but not spicy as promised. It was white people hot, I guess. There were nice noodles and the shrimps were very cooked.
Our chef special main of crispy scallops with sweet chili sauce was quite good. It was not as sweet as I feared it’d be, and the scallops were pretty well executed. The best were the sauceless ones, actually, though they could have been juicier.
The $2 Thai iced tea is a bizarre orange color, and not very sweet. I’m not sure if that’s what it’s supposed to be like – the few times I’ve had it before, it’s been pretty sweet. On the other hand, I am certain about our service, which left much to be desired. Considering they only had two other tables in a fairly large space to look after, the girls were very pissed off about serving us. They were glacially slow doing everything and really quite puzzlingly hostile. I was more pleased with the standard pan-Asian décor and the lovely track lights.
Rating: 6 / 10
Our cost: $40 (2 apps, 1 iced tea)
Noise level: fairly quiet
Chance of walking in: decent.
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02.22.10
Posted in Asian, Greenwich Village, Japanese, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, small plates at 23:56 by Dominique
11 Barrow St. & W.4th St., 212-675-7775
Great for: interesting little plates
I was supposed to audition for this show in the far West Village. They said I should watch it first to be sure I wasn’t offended by the religious mocking. I knew I wouldn’t be, but it’s always nice to see a free show. Except this one. The singing sucked ass, the story made no sense, and if the people had got up on stage and masturbated it would have been far less solipsistic and annoying. In any case, we ran away as soon as the show ended, to a place with redeeming qualities.
We both got the chashu ramen. A simple broth with just noodles, scallions, very thin pork slices and and radish bits, it’s pretty good. I give them props for doing something simply and well. $14 is a little expensive for what it is, though. We got more mileage out of the bottle of organic Sho Chiku Bai Nama.
Our service was nice and the place seems quite popular. There are lots of interesting little plates I’d try in a more adventurous mood.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Our cost: $55 (2 ramens, 1 bottle sake)
Noise level: depends how drunk the other patrons are
Chance of walking in: not good.
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02.16.10
Posted in Asian, New York City, New York City Reviews, rated 6 to 6.5, SoHo, Southeast Asian at 23:50 by Dominique
196 Elizabeth & Spring/Prince Sts., 212-925-3310
Great for: ginger fried chicken, hobo noodles, dates on a budget
Lovely Day is sort of a SoHo institution, so people were pretty upset when they closed for several months last year after fire damage. Fortunately, they managed to get back on their feet and their beloved ginger fried chicken was not lost.
That chicken is good and juicy, but they should make the pieces smaller so the flavoring gets to more of the meat. I love the accompanying aïoli, basically a spicy mayo. The kimono fried shrimp with sweet chili sauce was fine, not a standout. I wish it were spicier.
The Boyfriend’s pad thai with shrimp was pretty good. There was too much sweet fish sauce – it was better when doused in hot sauce. A Thai place really should have better pad thai. I was tempted by the special of Chilean sea bass but couldn’t pass up the chicken hobo noodles. It was satisfying, though the chicken could be moister. The best part was the addictive and lovely, soft but not sticky noodles.
The green tea ice cream was fine and so were the nice waiters. We liked the cute log cabin décor. The quaint and homey thing keeps the vibe low-key. The place was packed on a cold Wednesday at 10pm including every seat at the bar. I guess people are very happy it’s open again.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Our cost: $55 (one green tea ice cream, 2 non-alcoholic drinks)
Noise level: noisy but not too bad
Chance of walking in: they’re always packed. You can only make a reservation at lunch. They’re open until 11pm every day though.
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