Sea Visited 7/25/10 3.5 Forks

Sea  114 N 6th St, (between Wythe Ave & Berry St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

Ah, SEA.  What can I say? The location in the East Village (now closed) was one of the first restaurants I had ever been to when I first moved to NYC, so I will always have a soft spot for it. It really kicked off the concept of good cheap thai food in my book.

I have been to this location of SEA only a few times b/c it is just such a scene.  It huge, loud and way too "hip".  It only got worse after Sex and the City filmed there.  But I will admit that it does have that "wow" factor when you walk in with the buddha and lotus and water.  I have avoided this place for the past few years only b/c I can't deal with the crowds, and there are just as good thai places nearby.  But when Dan mentioned it last night, I thought, what the hell? Let's give it another try.

We get there around 6:45pm on a Sunday and it was packed! I was so shocked that after all these years it's still so crowded, but luckily we were able to snag a table right away.  We ordered the Emerald Vegetable dumplings to start and then Dan and I decided that we were going to order out of our comfort zone of pad thai and pad woon sen.  I get the Seafood Rice Pot ($14), which had squid, shrimp, white fish fillet, and vegetables in a brown gravy sauce on a bed of rice.  Dan got almost the same thing but with a spicy sauce.  The thing about places like this is that the food comes out super quickly.  The dumplings came out 5-7 mins after we ordered.  To be honest, the dumplings were not good at all.  They were very doughy and had no taste to it.  Luckily, the main dish was a bit better.  First of all, the portions there are huge...almost unfit for 1 meal.  There was a lot of seafood on my dish which was great...but a bit too much squid, which is what Dan said about his meal too.  I had envisioned my meal coming in a hot clay pot but instead it was served in this weird mini wok on top of a plate, but there was food spilling out of the mini wok in to the plate, so it was a bit hard to get everything in one place.  I thought it was pretty decent and I was happy that it wasn't just a lot of rice with a little bit of seafood, it was quite the opposite.

Unlike Le Barricou, the waiter, while super nice, wasn't too attentive and they never re-filled my water, which is kind of key when you are eating food with MSG in it.  While I will continue to stay away from this place during peak hours, I would come back every now and then just to make myself feel hip again.  Total bill with tax, tip and drinks $53.

Le Barricou Visited 7/25/10 3.25 Forks

Le Barricou  533 Grand St, (between Union Ave & Lorimer St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

In my continued quest for more brunch options, I decided to try Le Barricou after hearing about it from Paige.  The walk was a bit further than what I would like to walk in the morning. 
 
It's a super cute restaurant in the middle of an "up-and-coming" road, Grand Street.  The decor is designed to be like a Parisian bistro and it is indeed super cute inside.  The best thing was that they had the A/C and fans on full blast during the heat wave, so I give them high marks for keeping their customers happy.  Our waitress was full-on French, even lapsing into French during our ordering.
 
They offer you a basked of croissants before our meal and in all honesty, I kind of wished it was warm and right out of the oven, but instead they were cold and tasted like they had been sitting out for a bit.  The menu has classic brunch items (lots of omelets, benedicts, etc).  I was on the verge of ordering the eggs benedict when the waitress mentioned the specials, which all sounded great.  I got the "free range omelet" with mozzeralla, asparagus, and heirloom tomoatoes ($12) and a side of bacon ($4).  Dan got the Norweigen benedict, which just had smoked salmon instead of ham ($11) and some weird fancy drink that ended up being pink ($10).  The waitress actually gave me the drink first b/c she thought it was for me, ha! 
 
The omlete came out and it was HUGE, it must have been a 5 egg omelet.  It came with a side of potatoes and a side salad.  I loved that the waitress gave us ketchup and mustard without asking b/c I hate asking for ketchup for my omelet makes me feel a bit low class sometimes.  The omelet had so much potential with the ingredients they used.  The eggs definitely tasted good and they were quite fluffy, but I would have liked a bit more seasoning.  The tomoatoes were good but I didn't feel like they were heirloom quality.  The asparagus used was just the stems, which was disappointing b/c the stems are the best part of the vegetable and I didn't think the mozz worked too well...it wasn't gooey enough. 
 
The best part of the meal was the bacon.  Oh my.  It was perfectly cook..they were huge fatty pieces.  I can't explain how amazing they were, they definitely weren't the dry shrivled pieces you get from other places.  Dan mentioned that the eggs for his benedict were poached well and they looked runny and good.  Unfortunately, I had too much food going on that I barely ate the potatoes and salad...from what I did have, they were also quite good.  The other good part of the meal was the service.  It was almost borderline too attentive.  They must have re-filled our water and coffee 15 times. 
 
After I came home and thought about my meal, I wasn't as satisfied as I would have liked with a meal like that, but I would definitely go back and try other things on the menu.  By the time we left the place, it was totally crowded and backed with hipsters.  Our total bill was $50 with tax and tip.

Jimmy's Diner Visited 7/24/10 3.25 Forks

Jimmy's Diner  577 Union Ave, (between Frost St & Richardson St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

For my first weekend living with Dan, I wanted to try something that wasn't one of the usual places we always go to in the 'hood.  It would be nice to expand our breakfast/brunch options.  I found Jimmy's on Yelp and I thought that it was a pretty good choice. 


It's a pretty small diner (there's probably no more than 10-12 seats and then there is a counter you can eat at).  The menu is just good creative American food.  For breakfast they had these things called Breakfast Bowls, which is a lot of breakfast like food crammed into a bowl, lots of different breakfast sandwiches, egg scrambles and pancake options.  They also had a few tasty specials.  I got the grits and eggs ($6) which was a medium bowl full of grits, scrambled eggs, cheddar cheese, and sausage.  I would not recommend eating it on a hot day, which is what I did.  I literally sweated through my whole meal.  But grits were good (not as good as the ones I had in New Orleans) but I thought the sausage was a bit too seasoned and it had a lot of caraway seeds in them, which I am not really a huge fan of.  I ate probably 1/2 of the bowl and couldn't eat anymore. Dan got a scramble with sour cream, beans, cheese, and tomato with a side of grits and corn bread.  He mentioned that the corn bread was pretty tasty and the eggs were fine but not out of this world. 


The rest of the dinner/lunch menu sounded pretty good...lots of different types of burgers (10+), big salads, and other good ole american diner type of food.  Our waiter was super peppy and friendly and he seemed to know a lot of the locals there.  The only draw back is that it's cash only but our total bill was $22, so that's not too bad. 

Goods Food Truck Visted 7/23/10 3 Forks

Goods Food Truck  Corner of Metropolitan and Lorimer, Brooklyn, NY

What used to be in this space was an abandoned space with over grown weeds.  It's a great location and I'm really glad that someone was able to take it over and do something great with it.

Apparently this food truck used to be a hit at the 3rd Ward in Bushwick and I can see why.  I actually really love the look of this airstream trailer where you can order at the counter to go.  Also, they took the back and put in simple wood benches and covering and have an actual waitstaff.

The overall menu is pretty simple with a few burgers, a fried green tomato sandwich, fish and chips and some breakfast sandwiches and a fried chicken box during brunch.  They also have daily specials on a chalk board.  Dan and I went on a very rainy Friday night and surprisingly stayed mostly dry in the back garden area.  Our waiter was a really nice, happy go lucky guy considering the shitty weather outside.  We ordered the special yellow beefsteak tomatoes with mozzarella ($5.75), I got a cheeseburger ($7.75), a side order of curly fries ($3.25), and Dan got a Goods burger ($8.75), which I think had onions in addition to cheese.  The food gets served in a pretty basic and low budget serving tray with plastic forks and knives, but I think it's actually ok given the overall low key feel of the place.  The tomato special had a good helping of both tomato and mozz and it came with some sort of chutney topping.  It was pretty good but I think it could have used some more salt or seasoning and maybe some basil on top of it.

The burgers come out wrapped in paper and they were actually really quite excellent.  The bun was super soft  (I think it was a potato bun) and the meat was juicy and tasted like it was fresh and not frozen.  It was seasoned very well and definitely just as good as any of the more expensive burgers in town.  The one disappointing aspect of the meal were the fries.  I generally love curly fries but these were pretty dry and overcooked, which made me really sad.  The breakfast/brunch menu seemed very limiting but I would definitely consider getting a biscuit sandwich to go one day.  The total bill with food, drink, tax and tip was $32.

STK Visited 7/21/10 3.5 Forks

STK  26 Little West 12th St, New York, NY 10014

So the only reason I went to STK was for a client dinner.  The place is uber trendy (how can you not be in the meat packing district?!).  I think the place used to be Tejune nightclub? The inside looks exactly like it used to be a club, complete with the hot model waitresses.  I started the meal with a chopped garden salad ($14), which was surprisingly fresh and light tasting.  I gobbled up the entire salad.  The other people in my group got the hearts of romaine, which looked like one giant piece of romaine lettuce with some freshly grated cheese on the side...frankly, it looks not that great to me.  Why would you ever just get 1 piece of lettuce?!


The entrée section is mostly different cuts of meat (sirloin, fillet, chop, bone in, etc).  I had the fillet (10 oz) medium rare ($39).  I also got the STK bold ($2) sauce on the side.  Presentation-wise, the plate was kind of sad looking.  It was just the meat with the side sauce in a cup on a white plate.  It just didn't look very beautiful, but when I bit into the fillet, it was delicious.  It was super close to being totally rare, which I personally didn't mind. The meat cut really well and the sauce was a great addition to the meal.  I couldn't finish the meal but was dying to just put the leftovers in my purse to eat later.  We had several sides ($9 each), mashed potatoes (which I initially mistook for mac and cheese, but it was very smooth and probably had 10 sticks of butter in it), sautéed spinach (decent, you could smell the garlic 2 tables away) and mac and cheese (this was what I was most excited about but was most disappointed by...it was kind of too wet and not gooey enough).  The other people in the party got the tuna (which looked very rare and healthy), skirt steak (which I was told was good, but look-wise seemed like something I could have made) and the fish of the day (which seemed like too thin of a cut).


The general atmosphere was very loud and just trying too hard to be hip.  Everyone seemed to either on a corporate card (lots of douchey looking Wall St. guys in ties and white shirts) or the painfully cool.  It was hard to have a conversation without screaming.  But the service was attentive but not too intrusive. 


Dessert wise we split the ice cream sampler, which was a vanilla, chocolate and cookies and cream on 3 separate cones.  It was cute and tasted good but for $9, it seemed overpriced.  I will say that we had a delicious bottle of red wine, but I have no idea what brand it was. 


The total bill came out to be ~$500 for 4 people, so obviously I wouldn't recommend unless you were a baller or had a corporate card. 

Rye Visited 7/17/10 3.5 Forks

Rye 247 S 1st St (between Roebling St & Havemeyer St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

I had been wanting to try Rye for a while but just never seems to make it over (except the one time I tried to go for brunch and they were closed).  After a REALLY long day of moving and having a 30% Blackboard Eats coupon, I decided it was finally time to treat ourselves to dinner at Rye.


We went at 8pm on a Saturday so I was afraid that we would have to wait for a while, but even though it was pretty crowded, we were seated immediately in a nice cute corner table.  The decor is old school with lots of dark wood and dim lights.  The one thing I really did not like was the fact that it was SO loud in there. I could barely hear our waitress tell us the specials.  The menu itself is pretty simple with only a handful of dishes on the menu.  We started with the crab croquette ($9), which essentially like a giant crabcake with some watercress on it.  It was pretty good but not enough crab tasting for me.  For drinks, Dan got the Kings beer ($6), which was like a michelada but it had rum and they used Bud.  I had the Carol Cooler ($10), which was watermelon juice, basil, vodka and  another herb. It's normally made with gin but I'm not a huge gin fan and they were nice enough to substitute without giving me attitude. 


For entrees, I got the hanger steak ($18), which was cooked perfectly (medium rare, but closer to rare) and it came on a bed of sautéed spinach, which was cooked pretty well.  The meal itself was pretty simple but good tasting, but I couldn't help but feel like it could have used another side.  Dan got the special ravioli ($18), which had about 6 large pieces in a butter-y herb sauce.  The sauce was great and I eventually started dipping my steak in it.  For dessert, we got a steamed lemon cake, which came with some fruit on the side ($9).  It was indeed very lemon-y, although it didn't blow my mind, I thought it was a good way to end the meal.  The service was pretty attentive, my water was constantly re-filled and they took my card as soon as I put it down.  The total bill was $79 (which for a regular night out is a bit more than what I would like to spend)  but with my BBE coupon, it was $60.  I would definitely try brunch here and would come back whenever I was in the mood for simple American fare.  

ABC Kitchen Visited 7/5/10 4 Forks

ABC Kitchen  35 E 18th St, (between Broadway & S Park Ave), New York, NY 10003

ABC Kitchen is Jean-George's new restaurant venture in NYC and has gotten a LOT of very positive buzz lately, so of course I had to go check it out.

Just getting a reservation took a while. I used OpenTable and I couldn't get a good time for a few weeks. I finally decided that I would go for my 5 yr anniversary with Dan over the 4th of July weekend.  One of my first reactions when I saw this place was Wow, it's beautiful.  You walk in and you immediately notice all the white - white tables, white chairs, white painted brick wall.  It also has an exposed loft feel with exposed wooden beams and concrete pillars.  The table setting was very rustic with hand painted porcelain plates and "antique" flatware.  The staff is extremely attentive and nice throughout the whole meal.  The menu consists of the ever-so trendy farm to table, organic, local, sustainable, whatever you want to call it, food.  The back of the menu lists all the ways they are local and sustainable...which I appreciated but it almost became like the J.Peterman catalog when they started describing how the bowls (or something) were hand made by natives from the hills of Patagonia..seriously, that's what they said. 

The food menu had a section of Market table and appetizers. I'm not quite sure what the difference is, but in any case, Dan and I each order an item as a starter.  I ordered the fresh mozzarella, heirloom tomato, basil, and chili ($13).  The mozz was these 5 small balls of cheese and they were extremely fresh and it was mixed in with a lot of gorgeous looking tomatoes (greens, dark reds, bright reds, etc), topped with basil and then thinly shaved chili.  Good thing they were thinly shaved b/c you could really taste their heat from just the small pieces in there.  Dan got the snap pea salad, which was a bunch of greens topped on a weird hunk of lettuce.  I really liked the fresh taste of the peas and it was dressed really well (not too heavy) with light cheese.  However, I didn't like that it was on a thick hunk of lettuce that was essentially not too edible. 

For entree, I got the organic crispy chicken with mashed potato ($23) and Dan got the black sea bass ($27).  I know that normally chicken sounds like a boring dish, but to me if you can do a chicken right, that's a sign of a good restaurant. And oh boy, was this chicken good. It has to be one of the best chicken dishes I've had in a while.  It was perfectly juicy and it had the right amount of crispy (not deep fried) skin on it.  The mashed potato tasted like it probably had 5 sticks of butter in it, which is why it was so good. I wished they had more of it, it was just a very thin layer on the bottom.  I was practically using the chicken as a sopping bread to get all the potato on my plate.  Dan's sea bass was also very fresh tasting and came in a light salty broth. 

For dessert, we opted for the rhubarb crumble ($9).  When it came out, it was in this cute mini dutch oven like pot and it came with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.  The crust of this crumble also tasted like it had 5 sticks of butter in it and it was delicious.  To be honest, it tasted exactly like an apple crumble, only if you looked hard could you see some pink/redness to it. Dan thought it had a tartness that comes with rhubarb...I guess I just don't know rhubarb very well.

Overall, this was a very pleasing meal and I can see why people like it.  The place is gorgeous, the service is attentive, and the food is very fresh.  Several of the pastas and pizzas were more affordable (in the $15 range).  Total bill for two before tip was $109.

Char No. 4 Visited 7/3/10 3.75 Forks

Char No. 4  196 Smith St, (between Warren St & Baltic St), Brooklyn, NY 11201

I've been to Char No. 4 before for drinks and snacks before but never for dinner. I always kind of thought that it was a bit expensive food-wise, so when Blackboard Eats had a $38 3-course prix fix meal plus whiskey tastings I thought that I would finally give the food a go (although I will say that I've had their pork nuggets and fried cheese curds before and they were delicious).  The set menu came with a cold pea soup with shrimp to start, a choice of jambalaya, hot sausage link or gnocchi for an entree and a key lime pie with marshmallow topping.  Each course came with a 1 oz whiskey pairing.

Priced separately the total meal would have been around $50ish, so the $38 gives you around the standard 30% discount.  The soup, as described, as chilled with bits of shrimp and chunks of avocado.  It was good to be honest, I'm not a huge fan of cold soup in general.  There was an element of spiciness to the soup...I'm not sure if that came from the shrimp or that added something to the soup.  While I love avocado in general and would eat it in any form, I'm not quite sure they it was in the soup.  It didn't really add much to it.  The whiskey pairing for this was the Rittenhouse Rye, which was pretty good.

For an entree, I got the jambalaya and Dan got the hot sausage link.  Both entrees were pretty big in size.  The jambalaya was served with manilla clams and 3-4 big,de-shelled shrimp (I thought it was a nice touch to have it completely de-shelled).  I thought it was flavored well and all the seafood was prepared to the right consistency.  The hot sausage link came with crispy shallots and potato salad.  The potato salad was pretty good...it was the yellow mustard-kind and not the white mayo base.  The sausage could have been cooked a bit warmer...strangely the plate was extremely hot but the meal could have used a few more minutes on the oven.  The whiskey pairing was the Eagle Rare 10 yr, which was a substitute from the listed Elijah Craig.  The Eagle Rare was very good. Extremely smooth and easy to drink.

If this wasn't a prix fixe meal, I would have stopped eating and drinking here.  I was pretty full by the time dessert rolled around, but I couldn't say no.  When the pie came out, it was way bigger a slice that it needed to be.  And damn it, it was really good too. The graham cracker crust was really yummy and the pie was the right amount of tartness and sweetness.  The marshmallow top didn't really need to be there, but who's going to say no to marshmallow?  Unfortunately, I couldn't finish my piece even though I really really wanted to.  The whiskey pairing here was the George Dickel No. 12.  At this point, all my senses were in overload and I think I liked this whiskey? Even though I didn't drink a lot of alcohol and I ate a heavy meal, by the time I got home I seriously felt like someone had drugged me. I couldn't stay awake past 11pm.

The total bill plus tax and tip was $98 for two.  Not too bad when you factor in each person got a 3 course meal and 3 1 oz. pours.  I would always go back for the whiskey as they really have an awesome selection.  While I enjoyed my meal too, I definitely don't think I would order a 3 course meal there. I might just stick to the snacks.