Grill Room Visited 4/27/2011 2.75 Forks

Grill Room World Financial Ctr, 225 Liberty St., New York, NY 10281

If you happen to work in the World Financial Center, you know that there is a serious dearth of good food.  Hopefully that will all change soon as the weather gets nicer, there are more food carts moving in outside and there are rumors of a Shake Shack and Blue Smoke opening across the street.  But in the meantime, if you want to have a "nice" sit down meal your choices are limited to the Grill Room or PJ Clarke's.  Strangely enough, I've never eaten at the Grill Room before.

I will give high scores of the setting and ambiance.  It has almost floor to ceiling windows that over look the river and on a nice day it's really a gorgeous view.  I went there for a client lunch, so I was excited to not feel restricted budget wise.  The menu is your usual American style food but that's slightly higher end.  They have soups, burgers, and sandwiches but then they also have pork chops, steak, fish fillets and fancy pastas. A friend of mine had told me that the fish was good (and in the end I probably should have listened to her) but I'm always a sucker for a good sandwich during lunch so I opted for the salmon sandwich ($16).  They didn't ask me how I liked my fish but I had assumed that any good restaurant would serve it medium rare.  I usually love fish sandwiches and the best ones I've had involve thick cuts of fish (almost steak-like).  So when this sandwich came out I was disappointed.  The actual piece of salmon was extremely thin and overcooked.  It came on a focaccia bread that was nice and soft but it was way too big for the piece of fish.  I felt like I barely had any fish and in the end was eating something that was closer to a tomato and lettuce sandwich.  There was a nice basil spread inside the bread and I would have liked more of it.  Given that the fillet of fish was pretty thin, there was no need to put 2 giant leaves of lettuce the size of my head on top of the fish.  The fries were just ok, they were cooked with the skin on it and had that overcooked style to it that I'm not a huge fan of.  The girl next to me had gotten the tuna steak and it was definitely thick cut and looked pretty decent.  All in all, I wasn't thrilled with my food but when you consider what the other dining options are in the WFC it's not that terrible of a place.  But if it wasn't for the business they get from the employees in the building I'm not sure that they would last very long.

Brooklyn Star (Re-visited) Visited 4/22/2011 4 Forks

Brooklyn Star 593 Lorimer St., (between Metropolitan Ave & Conselyea St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

 I went to the original Brooklyn Star a few years ago at the location on Havemeyer Street and thought it was fine, nothing earth shattering.  But that might have been because it was 10pm on New Years Eve and Dan had worked all day and we were both in a shitty mood and just wanted to have dinner and go to bed.  Unfortunately, that place burned down and it took a while for them to get back on their feet.  It has since re-opened a 5 minute walk from my place and while it has a pretty different vibe, the menu is fairly similar (although not exactly the same). The front bar section is packed and claustrophobic feeling but after you walk through the bar, you get to the actual restaurant.  It's pretty different from the original restaurant in that it's very open and airy and the structure lends itself to being super noisy. All you can hear is the tin of background noise all through dinner.


Luckily, Dan and I were able to get a table right away at 8:30pm on a Friday night but shortly there after, the place became totally packed.  The menu hasn't really changed too much from the original menu. It's mostly Southern fare food: corn bread, country fried steak, mac and cheese, rib eye steak and shrimp and grits type dishes.  Dan and I thought it would be a good idea to split the mac and cheese ($9), the hot meat loaf sandwich, and the country fried steak ($15).  The mac and cheese came out first and it was delicious! It was the size of a small skillet and you could tell it was made with a nice combo of cheese (and not the veleeta kind, although there is definitely a time and place for that).  It wasn't super gooey but you could definitely taste the fresh, non-processed cheese in it.  It came with big shell pasta instead of elbow macaroni which was kind of a nice change.  But the BEST part of the meal was the bacon. So freakin good and salty.  They should make it as a big entree option.  Shortly after wards, the hot meat loaf sandwich came out.  It was on a white bread and came with chips and pickle.  I am generally not a huge fan of meat loaf, but I thought it was pretty decent, although I wasn't a huge fan of the white bread because it was kind of thin and you could feel the meat loaf soaking through.  But how I feel about crab cakes is how Dan feels about meat loaf (meaning very seriously).  He thought that there was a bit too much filler (either chickpeas or mashed potato) and not enough meat, but none the less, we both thought it was pretty good.  We should have just stopped our meal there and let our veins deal with all the oil and fat flowing through. 


But no, we had to go one step further and order the country fried steak.  When it came out, the couple next to me was like "uh, omg, is that the country fried steak? That looks amazing!"  And they were totally right.  The country fried steak was the size of Dan's foot (so huge) and covered in a white gravy.  The breading was nicely crisp and not overly fried.  Although after a while, we had started to pick off the breading because it was just too much fried-ness.  When you do that, you get to the base of the steak,which in all honestly wasn't amazing.  You have to eat it with the fried breading and gravy or else it just doesn't taste the same.  I actually love the mashed potato (probably because it had about 5 sticks of butter) and the hot slaw was strangely addicting.  I would have totally just had a dish of mashed potato and cabbage.  I actually had the country fried steak last time at the original place and don't remember it being this good.  It was totally a bad idea to have ordered 3 dishes.  Even if you're hungry, if you're just 2 people, 1 small dish and 1 big dish is more than enough.  I feel like I need to have be fat drained out of my body now.  Total bill with tip: $63 total.

Kellari's Parea Greek Bistro Visited 4/15/2011 4 Forks

Kellari's Parea 36 E 20th St., (between Broadway & S Park Ave), New York, NY 10003

 Sometimes when you live in New York you get sucked into the latest, hottest, and most blogged about restaurants that you forget that there are thousands of great unwritten about places.  Kellari's is one of them.  Lav had stumbled across this place online and since it was only 3 blocks from her apt we thought we'd give it a go. 


It's on 20th street which is totally not a street when you think of places to eat, but as we were walking down I realized there were several good places there: Rhom Thai, Mizu Sushi and there was another sushi place next door that looked good. We walked into Kellari at 8:30 on a Friday night and while it wasn't packed, it was definitely full of what looked like locals.  At first glance, the menu is a bit more upscale Greek food as they don't have any pita pockets, gyros, or souvlaki type dishes.  They did have a lot of whole fish and lamb chop type dishes.  

They start off by giving you soft sliced multi-grain bread and a pretty good hummus spread.  One of my downfalls was that I ate a lot of it, so by the time our food came, I was kind of full.  We started with Saganaki ($10) and the feta cheese spread ($8).  The saganaki was lit table side, which was pretty dramatic.  But unfortunately the taste was not dramatic at all.  It kind of tasted like over-cooked, dried out cheese.  I haven't had saganaki in a long time, but I think any kind of hot cheese based dish should be soft and gooey? Luckily, the feta spread more than made up for it. Ok, I know that it's just a cheese spread, but for some reason it was just really really tasty.  The soft pita that came with it was super addictive as well.  It was a good thing we had that to nosh on because the wait time between the appetizers and main entrees was a loooooong time.  This definitely knocked them down 1/2 a fork...the service in general was just not great, so they were lucky that Lav and I really liked our food.  I don't even think our dishes were that complicated but for some reason it took a really long time for them to come out.  I had gotten the Maryland crab burger with fries ($18) and Lav got the zucchini fritters ($11) and a spinach and orzo side dish ($8).  As you all know, as someone from Maryland I am super picky about my crab cakes and a crab cake isn't really a Greek dish but for some reason it just called out to me.  I must say, it was a pretty good crab burger.  It was huge and you could see and taste real chunks of blue crab meat.  There was very little filler in it, so I was really pleased with how it turned out.  It was served on a brioche bun but after having had almost an entire bag of pita I ended up just eating the crab burger without the bun.  The fries were nicely done and tossed with oregano to give it a Mediterranean flare.  Lav's zucchini fritters were also excellent.  They were little balls of fried zucchini and cheese and served on a mint yogurt dipping sauce.  Delish.  Another service mistake they made was that they brought out grilled asparagus instead of the spinach orzo (I will say the asparagus looked really tasty), so they had to send it back and then we had a wait a bit for the right dish to come out.  I only had a small bite of it, but it was a nice blend of flavors and I could see it going well with a lamb dish.  All in all, I was pleasantly surprised at Kellari's given it's obscurity.  I do wish the service was a bit better, otherwise I might have even bumped this up to a 4.5 forks.  Total bill was $50/pp.       

Grand Central Oyster Bar Visited 4/15/2011 3 Forks

Grand Central Oyster Bar Grand Central Station, New York, NY 10017

My friend Jenn had forwarded me this article from NY Mag that said that the Oyster Pan Roast from the Grand Central Oyster bar was New York's Greatest Dish.  So of course we had to try it.  I had been to the Oyster Bar many years go when I first moved to New York City.  It's your classic, quintessential New York restaurant.  It's a big spacious restaurant inside Grand Central Terminal with classic subway tiles on the walls with lots of noise and commotion going on.  The restaurant is split up into two sections: to the left is the main dining room and to the right is the bar/counter area.

We each ordered the oyster pan roast ($12) and then we split the fried oysters with fries ($22).  Unfortunately I have to say that this is most definitely NOT New York's greatest dish.  It actually wasn't at all what I (or Jenn) had imagined.  Although I had seen a picture of it before, I envisioned it to be much heartier and thicker like a chowder.  The soup that came out was water-y and thin.  It tasted very similar to a light tomato soup sprinkled with paprika.  Although I knew it had cream and butter in it, it didn't really taste very creamy and there was a hit of some sour taste to it.  The bread that was soaking it in was completely mushy and the presentation was a mess.  They brought it out with a giant silver platter over it and "unveiled' it but the soup had sloshed all over the edges, so it just looked messy.  But the good part of it was the oysters.  They were extremely plump (I have no idea what kind they used but they were giant) and juicy.  I wish I just had a huge bowl of oysters instead.  I was able to finish most of it but Jenn couldn't get over the sour taste and barely finished.  We also split the fried oysters and fries, which were fine.  The breading was a bit thick for me and I wish they could have been a bit more creative than to dump a huge bowl of tartar sauce on the side, but all in all they were fine....just nothing amazing.  Strangely, the fries were pretty good.  They were thin but crispy and salted well.

 While I'm definitely glad I tried these dishes and thought it was unique, I was a bit disappointed at the overall quality.  Plus I was a bit annoyed that they only offered seafood sandwiches in the bar/counter area because I think that could have been a decent soup and sandwich combo.  The couple next to us got raw oysters and they looked pretty good, so I guess if I were ever to come back, I may stick to just the raw bar.

Barbados Visited 4/2-4/6/2011

Right around the Feb/March timeframe I was starting to go crazy in NYC.  The weather was horrid and all I wanted was to sit on a white sand beach and look at gorgeous beautiful blue water.  Enter Barbados.  Aarti, Deanna and I planned a pseudo-impromptu girls trip to Barbados to just relax and unwind.  But any part of a good trip for me always involves eating.  Most of the Caribbean island vacations that I have been on have had sub-par food because they are so isolated that they have to ship in food.  So that makes the food not only expensive but just not that fresh and great.

But the food in Barbados totally changed my perspective.  I would say that in general the food that I had in Barbados was pretty damn good and very healthy and fresh.  I will try to give the low down on most of the places I ate at:

Spartan

Who would have ever thought you could get great Greek food in Barbados? Not me! This place is literally right across the street from our hotel and it was a great, cheap option to the fine dining options on the island.  The food there was really tasty and tasted just as good as any Greek place I've been to in recent memory.  Granted, I just had the Greek Salad, which was just a bunch of lettuce, tomatoes, red onion and olives tossed with olive oil but the kicker is that it came with a GIANT piece of feta cheese on top.  Isn't feta the whole reason why you get a greek salad to begin with anywyas?  It was just what I wanted after getting off a stuffy plane ($6 with a bottle of water).  Aarti and Deanna got the tofu pita and they raved about the softness of the pita (which came as white or wheat) and the tzatziki sauce.  The fries were also really crispy and delicious.   We later found out that it's owned by an actual Greek man who moved here from Greece...amazing and I can't blame him for the move.

Sand Dollar Cafe
Also in the picture is the Sand Dollar Cafe.  It was nice to have two options so close to our hotel.  This place is a local cafe and is a very basic, bare-bones operation.  There is only 1 woman who works there and the menu is generally soups, sandwiches and coffee.  I'm not a huge coffee drinker but Aarti and Deanna both swore by the coffee and said it was amazing.  It came in these mugs that were the size of my head and they were brewed fresh individually, which I guess would lend to their tastiness.  Twice I had the ham, egg, and cheese breakfast sandwich on "brown" bread ($3.63).  It really was just a sandwich I could have easily made at home. It was grocery-store like bread but toasted just right and the ham was ham that was cut off the bone, so it was thick and had a lot of meat to it (not like your sliced deli meat).  The egg was fried and the cheese was freshly grated white cheddar.  It also came with a cucumber inside which was actually a nice touch considering how freaking hot it is out there.  It's nothing special, but it hit the spot in the morning and at that price I have nothing to complain about.

Cafe Sol

Yet again, we had a cuisine that was totally unexpected for the island. MEXICAN.  Who the hell gets Mexican food in the Caribbean? Well, we did.  The place is right at the entrance to The Gap (not the store) but this kind of touristy street that has a bunch of bars and restaurants.  It was one of the most popular places as we had to wait 45 minutes for a table.  When we were finally seated, the waitress told us immediately that it would be a wait for food. Grrrreat. But at least we had drinks (2 for 1 sangria) to keep us going.  I got the shrimp burrito and I have to say it was pretty good.  You could actually see and taste the shrimp and it was grilled with the right amount of seasoning and it was extremely filling.  I was pleasantly surprised by my meal and so were Aarti and Deanna.  Total bill was $93.

Tapas

This was probably one of the most beautiful restaurants I've been to, if not on the island, but anywhere.  It's set at the end of the boardwalk on Accra Beach (my favorite beach there) and it's this gorgeous modern open air restaurant set with amazing views.  That water in the picture is not photoshopped, it was really that blue.  The food was definitely more upscale and not exactly Spanish or small plate style (as you would expect).  It was more high-end pastas, soups, fish, and seafood in appetizer or entrees format.  We all split the paprika potato wedges and I got the grilled fish of the day (Dolphin but not of the Flipper kind, more of the white fish kind) which came on a bed of mashed plantains and topped with pineapple salsa ($21).  Aarti got the penne pasta and Deanna got the parmigiana (baked eggplant, tomato and cheese).  Everything was beautifully presented and my fish was fresh and delicious.  The plantain was a nice change from potatoes and it really fills you up very quickly.  We all loved the potato wedges, they were good size wedges and so perfectly crisp and delicious with aoli mayo (it's every where!).  Total bill was $65.

Brown Sugar

 
 Ahh, Brown Sugar. How can you not love that name? We had to go because first, it got good reviews, second, we wanted to try local Bajan cuisine and third, IT'S CALLED BROWN SUGAR!  The decor is a cute open air plantation style house.  It's in a pretty quiet part of town (totally opposite from The Gap), so it was a nice change of pace.  The national dish there is the Flying Fish, so of course I had to try it.  Aarti got the lentil chili (very spicy!) and Denana got the pesto pasta.  Flying Fish is really just fried fish (so think fish and chips but not with cod fish).  It was kind of a skinny fillet that was lightly seasoned and fried.  It was ok, the fish was a bit too thin for me.  It came with these sad looking boil vegetables and more potato wedges.  We also got paw-paw (papaya cake), which was fine.  It tasted just like warm apple pie to me (complete with vanilla ice cream on the side) and it had a lot more crust-y than I like my desserts.  Total bill was $95

Roti Den

The Roti Den was this tiny shack that was tucked away on this dirt road and attached to this pool hall.  We had originally wanted to go to this other Roti place that was "home to the 1 pound Roti" but it was closed.  So we tried this place instead and it was just fine. I got the chicken and potato ($6.35).  If you've never had roti before it's this bread-like product similar to naan and it's usually filled with potato.  The one issue I had with my meal was that it was served on thin paper.  At one point I discovered I was missing a bunch of paper at the bottom and that's when I realized that I probably had cut it up and eaten it with my food. Oh well. I'm still alive.

Oistin Fish Fry

Apparently this is THE place to be on a Friday night...so of course we end up there on a Monday night.  The locals actually told us it was better to go on Monday because it's less touristy and crowded.  When we got there, I could see what they mean.  It's a huge open air market with lots of different stalls.  They all pretty much sell the same stuff and they can be pretty aggressive trying to get you to try their stall.  I can just see how packed it could be and how annoying that would be.  We picked the one that had the most people and outdoor seating (Pat's).  I got the grilled swordfish and all the sides (because I am a pig!) which included macaroni pie (mac and cheese basically), yuca, plantains, a green salad and cole slaw all on one plate for $12!  There were 3 huge pieces of swordfish and they were so freakin good.  You can see them grilling them right next to you, so you know it's made to order and even all the sides just tasted homemade and really hit the spot.  It was probably one of my favorite meals of the trip.

Tamarind

While Tamarind was a great meal, we kind of ended up there out of sheer hunger and desperation.  We took a 45 min bus ride to Sandy Lane Beach which turned out to be not that great of a beach at all. But we had spent so much time getting there that we kind of forgot to eat lunch. So by the time 4pm rolled around I was a horrible grouchy monster. Luckily Tamarind saved the day.  It's this beautiful fancy hotel by the beach with a great outdoor bar/restaurant.  I got the club sandwich which came with thick cut fries.  While it was a bit smaller than how I usually like my sandwiches, I loved that fact that they had the crust cut off for me and all the ingredients tasted healthy and fresh.  Aarti got a cheese pizza that was kind of heavy on the cheese and a bit too doughy, but at that point we were all so hungry that we devoured everything.  The ambiance was so relaxing with these giant cushy lounge chairs right by the beach.  It's totally what I want my outdoor seating area to look like if I ever own a house (probably in 2050).  While I liked our hotel and it totally suited our needs, this made me think about what it would be like if we had splurged and stayed somewhere really nice.  Total $26/pp.

Harlequin

For our last meal in Barbados we headed back to The Gap area since it was within walking distance from our hotel.  Harlequin's outdoor deck is decorated with a bunch of x-mas lights and I am such a sucker for those things.  We split the Mediterranean salad (who knew Greek/Mediterranean food was so popular there?) and it was light and refreshing.  Their homemade vinaigrette totally made me want to go home and try to make my own (which I have still yet to do).  I wanted to get the red snapper but they were out of it so I got the barracuda instead with mashed potatoes (I've never had so many starch-y products in one trip) and more sad looking boiled veggies.  I don't think they know how to cook veggies very well on the island as most of the time if it wasn't in a salad, they were boiled and tasteless.  While I asked for my fish to be grilled and to have the garlic butter on the side, it still tasted a bit oily to me.  The fish wasn't as flavorful or tender as the swordfish from the other night.  So I guess I know now not to order barracuda anymore.  Sadly the mashed potatoes were lacking in some flavor. It definitely could have used more salt as well as butter and it could have been whipped more.  But all in all, the meal wasn't terrible, just not the best I've had on the island.  Total bill was $35/pp

Chefette

I just had to throw this in here.  It's their local fast food chain and they were everywhere.  They sell fried chicken, pizza, ice cream, roti, bbq chicken...it's just a mis-mosh of everything.  I just couldn't get over their logo and the fact that their cashiers wear bright purple pants and yellow tops a la the Joker in Batman.  Love Chefette!
 
Over all, I was really impressed with the food in Barbados and it wasn't nearly as expensive as I thought. Ok, the nice places are still expensive and you can't really go out to dinner without dropping at least $30-$50 but you can definitely find good deals and local cheap eats if you're willing to look for them. The waitstaff at all the places were so wonderful.  I really have to give a shout out to all of them because despite having to deal with annoying tourists (and mostly European at that), they are still super friendly and warm. I can't wait to go back!

Korilla BBQ Truck Visited 4/13/2011 4 Forks

Korilla BBQ Various locations, check website for exact location

Ever since I had read about the Kogi Korean Taco truck in LA, I have been dying to try a Korean taco or burrito.  I mean, I love Korean food and I love Mexican food, so why wouldn't a combination be great?

The Korilla BBQ truck is NYC's answer to Kogi.  It stops in various places around the city during lunch and on Weds it stops on Water Street and Old Slip, which is a 20 minute walk from work but the closest location to me that they have.  By the time I got to the truck at 12:30pm, there must have been a line 20 people deep.  Aarti and I waited about 20-25 minutes to order our food which I hear is pretty standard for the truck.  At first I thought that they weren't being operationally efficient, but when you get to the window, you see that they are really doing the best they can.  There are only so many people you can fit into a truck that is the size of my bathroom.  There is one guy who takes your order and puts the rice on the tortilla, another guy who puts the topping on and another guy who put the sauce on and takes your money.  Somehow there is a 4th guy who is prepping and cooking more stuff.

While the menu is super colorful  and has a lot going on, there are just a few main options: chicken, rib-eye (bulgogi), pork, kimchi, or wild child (veggie) in a burrito, taco or bowl form.  As a meat lover, I got the bulgogi burrito ($7) with fried rice (bacon + kimchi fried rice - a $1 extra) with korilla sauce (aoli mayo basically).  I got the works, which means it came with monterey jack cheese, tomato salsa, more kimchi,  and lettuce.  Aarti got a similar one but with house made tofu and with regular sticky white rice ($7).

The tortilla shell was nice and soft and thin, which is how I like my burritos.  As with any good Korean food, there was a nice punch of spiciness and sourness from the kimchi.  You would think that all these ingredients together might taste weird but it was super tasty.  It was about the size of a Chipotle burrito but I had somehow managed to wolf down the entire thing with nothing left over.  My one complaint was that the bulgogi was all the way at the bottom of the burrito.  So for the first few bites, it was really just hunks of kiimchi.  The best burrito I've ever had was in the Mission district in SF and one of the reasons why it was so delicious was because in every bite you could taste everything.  They had somehow mix all the ingredients and place them in the tortilla so that with every bite you could taste sour cream, cheese, rice, beans, chicken, tomato and lettuce. I have no freakin clue how they do it but it's amazing. So with the Korilla burrito I was kind of eating in layers which was kind of annoying. While the fried rice was good, I didn't taste any bacon at all.  But then again I also had rib-eye in my burrito so it might be hard to decipher all the different meat tastes, but I didn't even really see it in there either.  I didn't try Aarti's but it looked great too and she raved about it.  The tofu was the soft silky kind and it looked really fresh and tasty.  It would have been great if they gave you wet naps because in the end I was covered in sauce and cabbage. Oh well.  Maybe next time I will get the chosun bowl instead.  It was totally worth the walk and wait but not sure how my boss would feel about me taking a 1 1/2 hour lunch and then taking a nap in the afternoon from being overly full.

Danji Visited 4/11/2011 3.75 Forks

Danji 346 W 52nd St., (between 8th Ave & 9th Ave), New York, NY 10019

Korean and tapas? In Hell's Kitchen? Who would have thought? Well that is the concept of Danji.  They have a "modern" twist to the menu and a "traditional" twist to the menu.  Everything on the menu is served small plate style which is usually the complete opposite of my usual Korean experiences.  Usually when I have Korean food in K-town it's in a glutinous BBQ style of eating.  The one downfall of this meal was that I was only with one other person and it's pretty hard to enjoy tapas style eating with only two people.

The waitress suggested that we get 5 dishes, which seemed to be a bit excessive and considering that each dish is ~$15, a bit steep as well.  We decided to get 4 dishes instead: 2 from the modern and 2 from the traditional side.  From the modern, we got the fried calamari and wasabi mayo and the bulgogi sliders.  From the traditional, we got the grilled pork belly with kimchi and tofu and the korean fried chicken.  The fried chicken and calamari came out pretty quickly after ordering.  When I first had Korean style fried chicken about 5 years ago, it was like having crack cocaine for the first time.  I was instantly smitten and couldn't stop eating them.  They were so addictive and Dan and I couldn't stop talking about it for days.  Danji's fried chicken did not have that effect.  While they were good, they just weren't as delicious as other chicken I've had before. Nancy made a comment that she thought that they were rather bony.  It did have the sweet and crispy element to Korean fried chicken that I loved but they just could have been a bit meatier.  I'm sure why the fried calamari was on the menu as it's not really a take on Korean food at all but I'm always a sucker for good calamari.  They were actually really really delicious.  They were perfectly and lightly battered with the right amount of crispness (almost a tempura-like texture). They were the least oily fried calamari I've ever had.  The wasabi mayo was a nice addition but it tasted exactly like the jar of wasabi mayo I have in my fridge from Trader Joe's. 

It then took a long time for the other two dishes to come out.  The bulgogi sliders came out next and while I knew there were only 2, it was still a bit shocking when you know you're paying $14 to see two very tiny sandwiches on a plate.  But they were some pretty good mini sandwiches.  The buns were brioche bread (although it was a bit too greasy on the top of the bread for some reason) and the meat was nicely marinated with a definite kick to it.  It's topped with scallion and cucumber for a nice cooling effect to the spice.  We then waited another 15 mins (at least) for our pork belly dish.  This was the one I was really looking forward to because I will sell my first born for good pork belly.  Unfortunately, this was the most disappointing dish of the night.  There was barely any pork belly and the best part of pork belly (which is the fat) was non-existent.  Instead it tasted like sauteed pork slices.  The dish was primarily kimchi which was a bummer because even though it was good kimchi, it's not worth the price of the dish. I did also really like the extra soft silkly tofu that came with the dish but it seemed a bit out of place with the rest of the meal.

The decor of the restaurant was very modern and sleek.  It was also pretty tiny, so I would definitely suggest you get there early.  I would come back with a larger group of people and try more dishes since I'm not sure if I tasted the full range of the menu with only 1 other person.  Total bill $29/pp including tax and tip.  

Dumont Burger Visited 4/9/2011 3.75 Forks

Dumont Burger 314 Bedford Ave., (between 2nd St & 1st St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

 For those of you who have been following my blog you'll know that I gave the regular Dumont a pretty low rating.  I had such a crappy experience there that I vowed never to go back.  But that didn't include Dumont Burger which is on the other side of Williamsburg.  Dan and I were hankering for a good burger and despite having been around Williamsburg for years, we have never gone to this neighborhood staple. 


We went at 9pm on a Saturday and it was packed (with hipsters but what can you expect?)! The place is tiny so it's not hard to be packed but they make sure to use up every single square foot of space so there is almost no place to even stand and wait.  We finally got a seat at the communal table but it was right next to the door, so that was bit annoying.  As you can imagine the main feature here is the dumont burger ($12.50).  I got it with cheddar cheese ($1 extra) and sauteed mushrooms ($1.50 extra) and the green salad (it took a lot of restraint to not get fries or the potato leek soup).  Dan got it with cheese ($1 extra) and caramelized onions ($1.50 extra) and a side of chipotle mayo (another $1 extra) and onion rings.  The one thing that really irked me is the feeling that I was being nickeled and dimed for my burger toppings.  Cheese should always be free and mushrooms don't cost $1.50, nor does a small container of mayo cost $1.  I just wished more places would just offer more robust burgers without charging you extra for everything.  The burger itself was cooked nicely and there was a good bun to burger ratio.  It was the right amount of juiciness (I had to use my napkin several times, but that's a good sign when eating burgers) and flavor.  Size-wise, it was just the right size.  It wasn't flat and thin but it wasn't some monsterous piece of meat that would make me feel sick at the end.  It was just the perfect size.  The bun was a nice and soft brioche bread and I had a good heaping of mushrooms.  The one down side was that my cheese wasn't as sharp as I would have liked it, in fact I could barely taste it.  Surprisingly, the green salad was really good.  It was just mixed greens but it had a great light dressing on it.  Dan's onion rings were battered lightly and had a good crisp to it.  They went really well with the chipotle mayo (I mean what doesn't go well with chipotle mayo?).  

Dumont Burger actually had a very surprisingly good sounding cocktail menu (all were $10) but after a weekend of drinking I wasn't really in the mood for more alcohol, but I would definitely give them a try next time.  While I liked the food there, the atmosphere was just so claustrophobic on the weekends, that I would only consider going on a weekday or off hours. Total bill was $50 with tax and tip for two.     

Locanda Verde Visited 4/9/2011 4.25 Forks

Locanda Verde 377 Greenwich St., (between Franklin St & Moore St), New York, NY 10013

There has been no other restaurant that I have wanted to try for brunch for the past couple of months than Locanda Verde.  But every time I call for a brunch reservation they don't have any openings.  However, this time Deanna was in town and they had told me that if we went really early (i.e. before 11AM), they usually can accommodate walk-ins.  So against every fiber of my body, I went to brunch in the city at 10:45AM.

I am always aghast at how many people are up and eating brunch at this hour, but Locanda Verde was definitely pretty full by then, but not too full that we had to wait for a table.  The decor of the place is gorgeous, similar to a huge, old, rustic Italian restaurant.  I had read that they were famous for their sheep's milk ricotta ($14), so we split that for the table.  I got the Uovo Modernese ($17), Deanna got the zucchini frittata ($16) and Aarti got the Al Forno ($16) and then as if we didn't have enough carbs on the table, we also split the garlic potatos ($7).  I was really torn over getting the Modernese and the Scampi and Grit because that came with polenta and I'm on such a huge polenta kick right now.  If I was with someone else who ate meat, it would have been great to get both and split them.  But since I wasn't with another meat eater, I decided to go with the dish that had hollandaise sauce.  Next time I'll bring another meat eater.

The ricotta came out first and it was an enormous amount of fresh ricotta with truffle honey and brunt orange toast. It was incredibly fresh and creamy.  I don't think we did a good job of mixing the honey with the ricotta because without the honey the ricotta was actually a bit too light.  I almost would have liked to have added a pinch of salt.  The orange toast was on its own was pretty amazing. It was toasted perfectly and you could taste the hint of orange but it wasn't overpowering.  Then out of the blue the bus boys bring out a basket of freakin delicious focaccia bread with caramelized onions in it.  It was so soft and tasty that I could have eaten the whole basket.
 
My Uovo Modernese was 2 poached eggs covered in a tomato and spinach hollandaise sauce, sitting on a bed of cotechino hash AND FREAKIN MORE BREAD.  The hash was god damn amazing and the eggs were perfectly runny.  Everything about it was simply delicious.  I used the focaccia bread to sop up all of the hash and runny egg.  I didn't try Deanna or Aarti's dish but I did notice that the frittata had fried zucchini blossoms on it which I love.  Aarti's dish looked like a baked casserole with brunt baked cheese in a round dish.  The one thing that was a slight disappointment was the garlic potatoes.  Dare I say that they were over garlic-y? They were nice and crispy but all you could taste was this over powering sense of garlic that you couldn't taste the potato.  All in all, I think I may have eaten an entire loaf of bread during the course of my meal.  I was so sad to see almost half of the ricotta left over, but it just didn't make sense to bring it home with us.  Next time I would definitely not order another side and I would try to maybe try to mix the ricotta in with my main dish.  I think it would have went pretty well with the hash and eggs.  The total bill was $35/pp which is a bit steep for brunch but in this case I actually think it was totally worth the bill.  I may finally be coming around to embracing Italian food in the city after this meal and Osteria Morini.  

Dirt Candy Visited 4/8/2011 4 Forks

Dirt Candy 430 E 9th St., (between 1st Ave & Avenue A), New York, NY 10009

When I made the reservation for Dirt Candy almost 2 weeks ago I was shocked that even at two weeks out the only slot available was at  5:45pm.  But after walking in, I realized why.  The place is TINY.  At it's max capacity, it only holds 18 people.  So if you want to get a seat there, plan on making reservations way in advance.

But making that reservation will be totally worth it.  Everything on the menu is vegetarian. I know, I know, it might sound slightly off-putting at first.  Believe me, especially as someone who loves meat and seafood, I was wondering how good just vegetables could be.  But this place was great.  They make you forget that there isn't any meat on the menu.  The menu is seasonal and there are about 4 choices of appetizers and 5 choices of entrees.  Aarti, Deanna and I split the mushroom and squash appetizer.  The mushroom came in a mousse form and a sauteed shitaake version with small slices of toast.  The mousse looked a bit weird because it just came in a grey solid cube but it tasted a lot like foie gras and even had a similar texture.  The sauteed shitaake had a really strong punch to it and was cooked just perfectly that it still had a little bit of crunch to bit.  The squash actually turned out to be a soup, so it was a bit hard to share.  It might have been a mistake to have eaten that one 2nd because by the time we ate it, it was pretty cold. To be honest, it was good but nothing to write home about.  For entrees, I got the zucchini, Aarti got the corn and Deanna got the cauliflower.  Obviously each of these dishes come in a more robust form, it's not like they just dump you a plate of zucchini.  My dish was zucchini cut up into the shape of pasta and it was covered in a yogurt mint sauce. It was absolutely delicious.  I had to take some of Deanna's waffle and sop up all the yogurt.  Deanna's dish was a play on fried chicken and waffles but instead it was fried cauliflower and waffles.  The cauliflower was fried perfectly but the waffle was kind of flat and could have been a bit more buttery.  Aarti's dish was a plate of creamed corn mixed with cilantro and watercress topped with a tempura egg.  The egg was nice and runny and the corn had a nice consistency and the flavors of the cilantro and watercress really popped in the dish.

We also got dessert, which was the pea mint ice cream bar.  It was a pea mint ice cream chunk on top of a thick cream base and chocolate cookie.  The best part was the cookie and cream, it tasted like you were eating icing on top of a cookie.  The ice cream was good and definitely tasted like pea mint but I would have rather just had a giant cookie with icing instead.  The waitress was super friendly and really really knowledgeable about the whole menu.  All the dishes were really delicious and didn't make me miss meat much.  I'm glad it wasn't vegan because I think some of the key components of the dishes had diary and eggs in them.  We also split a really unique bottle of dark red sparkling wine, something I've never seen before but it just tasted like champagne instead of wine.  Overall it's a unique place that will definitely make you think twice about how creative one can get with just vegetables.  The total bill was $56/pp with tip.

Sugar Beets Thai Visited 4/1/2011 3.25 Forks

Sugar Beets Thai 227 Roebling St., (between 2nd St & 3rd St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

 I was craving cheap Thai food but didn't want to go to Cheers Thai, which is the only barely respectable Thai place within walking distance to my apt.  There were a few other slightly further options that I was willing to try and Sugar Beets Thai was one of them (the other being Siam Orchard). 


It's really South Williamsburg and there is not near much it. When you walk in, you get this feeling that used to be some storefront and the current owners didn't really make good use of the space.  It's actually a pretty large space but there's only 10 tables at most and a completely unused upstairs.  The entire right hand side of the front part of the restaurant is totally empty, which was weird.  Ever since I've been back from Thailand I've been on this fried rice kick, although I have yet to find a good fried rice place here at home.  I usually feel like a loser for ordering fried rice, but this one had crab ($10), so I figured I would give it a go. Dan got the glass noodles with tofu ($8) and we split the steamed Thai dumplings ($5).  The dumplings came out and they looked like shumai on steroids  They were huge and while there were only 4 on the plate, it was the same amount of food as 6 dumplings.  Taste-wise it was actually pretty similar to a shumai and it had some good flavors to it.  The noodles and rice dishes were equally enormous in portion size (which did not stop me and Dan from completely over-eating and finishing our dishes).  My fried rice was good and there was definitely visible pieces of real crab meat, so that was refreshing.  But I was disappointed that it didn't have a fried egg on top of it and they added these huge slices of cold tomatoes and cucumbers which didn't really add anything to the dish. My other gripe was that the slices of onion were too big too, but I finished my entire meal, so clearly I must have liked it on some level.  It was pretty light tasting and not oily like some fried rice dishes you get in Chinese places.  I didn't try Dan's dish but it looked like your standard glass noodle fare and the tofu was fried, not steamed.

The service there was a bit touch and go.  I know that waitresses at many Asian places have a very quiet and soft spoken waitstaff, but this was beyond ridiculous.  I could barely hear her and I have super sonic hearing!  This is one of those typical, decent, cheap, neighborhood Thai joints and if it were closer I would definitely consider going here more often, but since it requires me to drive here I'm not sure how often I will be back.  Total bill was $15/pp.