Mi Rancho Visited 12/30/2011 2 Forks

Mi Rancho 1488 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852

Now before people think of me as a food snob, I will preface by saying that I love food in all forms, from high end restaurants to fast food to street food.  But there's just something about food in the suburbs, especially from a strip mall that just never sits well with me.  Maybe it is because I have so many great options in New York that has spoiled me, but with the exception of a few favorite stand bys, any "new" place I try when I go home to MD is just never good. 


Mi Rancho is no exception.  It's really just a very bland, basic Tex-Mex place that's slightly overpriced for what they offer.  The menu has your basic tacos, burritos, enchiladas, and fajitas.  Then they had this random "Specials" menu that had lobster, rack of lamb, whole snapper and rib eye.  What?! And they were super expensive, the red snapper was $25.  I settled for a basic chicken and beef fajita dish ($14), my mom got the salmon (lord knows why she would get that at a Tex-Mex place) and Mike got the Cancun platter (seriously, that's what it was called - it came with an enchilada and 2 soft tacos). 


When my sizzling dish came out, it was pretty underwhelming to look at.  The rice and beans look like they came out of a can from the supermarket and there was no sour cream or cheese and only a very small serving of guacamole.  The tortillas were way to thick and tasted overcooked and again seemed like they came out of a box instead of being homemade.  The saving grace was that the beef and chicken were fine. Not great but totally edible.  I would have liked more sauteed vegetables with the platter.  Instead it came with some onions and then a giant piece of raw green pepper - it should have been sauteed with the onions.  I didn't try anyone else's food but my mom seemed happy with her salmon and Mike didn't have any complaints about his food.  While the food wasn't good, I'm not giving it a goose egg because it wasn't inedible and it was filling.  Plus this type of food does have a place in this world.  Not every place can be 5 stars, super fancy and uses farm to table ingredients.  But I've definitely had better Mexican food from a street cart in Williamsburg. 


Total price $44 for 3 people (not including tip).


Photo Credit: Yelp

Tara Thai Visited 12/26/2011 2.5 Forks

Tara Thai 4828 Bethesda Ave., Bethesda, MD 20814

I grew up in Bethesda but it's actually been years since I've eaten there since my mom moved to another surrounding suburb many years ago.  The only time I really get an opportunity to eat in downtown Bethesda is when I'm in town for Christmas break.  This year, I'm home for a week and it's great that I was able to meet up with so many of my close high school friends for a meal.  Unfortunately, the meal was at Tara Thai...but really I was more looking forward to the company than the food.

To be honest, the food wasn't bad.  It was just extremely uneventful and mundane.  I hadn't been to Tara Thai in years and somehow I didn't remember it being so run of the mill, but then again that was almost 15 years ago.  A bunch of my friends and I met up the day after Christmas and say able to get a table for 8 people pretty easily.  The menu is actually pretty extensive and went on for several pages.  We ordered a few orders of spring rolls ($5) to start and I got the Siamese Bay Noodles ($17) which consisted of broad noodles with mussels, squid, shrimp, string beans and topped with lump crabmeat.  I don't know what everyone else ordered but I saw a few orders of pad thai and pad see ew.  The spring rolls were fine, they look like they could have come from Costco and served with a sweet dipping sauce.  Again totally fine...nothing wrong with it.  I was excited for the noodles because I love a good wide noodle and I love seafood, so a combination of the two sounded great.  The concept of the dish was great, but the problem was that it was totally over-sauced.  All I could taste of the sauce, it just overpowered the entire dish and the sauce was too sweet.  There was actually a good amount of seafood, about 4-5 pieces of each type of seafood which I appreciated.  My one complaint about them would be that they were all a bit overcooked which made them a bit tough in texture.  I didn't taste anyone else's dish, but the pad thai looked the opposite of my noodles in that it looked under-sauced and plain.

All in all, the meal didn't wow me in any way and the service was incredibly slow (although they were really nice).  Luckily, it was just really nice to catch up with old friends, so that food didn't need to be the star of the night.  The total bill was $24/pp with tax and tip.

Photo Credit: Yelp

Saxon + Parole Visited 12/21/2011 3.5 Forks

Saxon + Parole 316 Bowery, (between Bleecker St & 1st St), New York, NY 10012

In the 11 years that I've lived in NYC, the space that Saxon + Parole occupies has gone through many different iterations.  It was Manhattana years ago and most recently it was Double Crown.  Now it's a gastropub-esque restaurant called Saxon + Parole. 

The inside is pretty spacious and is based around a horse theme (even the bathrooms are decorated like stables).  The menu has a variety of foods from giant seafood towers, steaks, fish entrees and an abundance of side and appetizer options.  Nancy and I decided to split a bunch of things instead of each getting an entree.  We started with the Brussels sprout leaves, poached egg, toasted hazelnuts, maple bacon lardons, truffle-yuzu hollandaise ($13), the burger with Pennsylvania Havarti, maple bacon, a fried egg + fries ($18) and Cauliflower & gruyère gratin ($7).  We were also about to order the mustard mashed potatoes but our waitress so kindly pointed out that we were ordering a lot of carbs and that the burger came with a large order of fries.  So thanks to her we probably saved ourselves 1,000 calories on dinner.

The meal started off with these amazing puffs of bread that was kind of hard on the outside but very puffy and soft in the inside.  It came with a side of froie gras butter and camembert cheese. It was fabulous and every meal should start like this.   I used to never like brussel sprouts but there's been this big explosion and trendiness about it that I've actually started to really like it recently.  I loved this dish because it was just the leaves steamed but then you got this amazing buttery goodness of the poached egg  and hollandaise sauce.  Conveniently we were able to use the bread to sop up the remaining mixture.  Next the burger came out and I'm so glad we decided to split it.  Not because it was big (it was regular sized) but with the bacon and fried egg on top, it was just a bit too much for 1 person.  Trying to cut it in half might have ruined the burger for us because as soon as I cut it in half, the egg yolk broke and the whole thing was just kind of soggy.  The bottom was a bit too greasy, but that didn't stop me from eating my half in about 3 minutes.  The fries that came with the meal were crispy and addictive and came with a spicy ketchup and mayo.  I love that this place serves the basics condiments with slight twists.  The disappointment of the meal was the cauliflower gratin.  The gruyere taste was just too strong for the dish that it overpowered each bite.  Plus the pieces of cauliflower were too big for a gratin.  We also got the Christmas pudding ($9) for dessert which I thought was pudding but was instead a chocolate cake like dish with raisins and vanilla ice cream.  The cake tasted like a donut and was actually fine but when you were expecting pudding a cake comes out, it's a little bit disappointing.

All in all the meal was totally fine just not mind blowing. The environment is definitely social and festive and probably more fun for larger groups.  Total bill with drinks $45/pp without tip.

Photo credit: Yelp

The Dutch Visited 12/18/2011 2.5 Forks

The Dutch 131 Sullivan St., (between Prince St & Houston St), New York, NY 10012

The Dutch has been on several list as one of the hottest restaurant openings this year.  Visually, it is quite lovely.  It's spacious, airy, and has this general old fashion but still modern look to it.  The menu is your typical New American food, which generally isn't my favorite cuisine but I do like it for brunch which is when I went on Sunday.

There was no problem getting a seat for 2 at 11:30 on Sunday but it definitely started to get crowded while we were eating.  My first gripe with this place was that it took the waiter forever to come and take our order.  To his credit, he did stop by when we first sat down and VA and I were so busy talking that we didn't have a chance to look at the menu.  Fine, our bad.  But then our waiter basically disappeared for the next 15-20 minutes.  Finally we did get to order: I had the mushroom frittata with goat cheese and watercress ($16) and a side of sausage ($7), VA got the two fried eggs, grits and chorizo ($16) and a side of honey butter biscuits ($9) and applewood smoked bacon ($7) - clearly we were both starving at brunch.

All the food pretty much came out at the same time.  The reason I got the frittata was because I love mushroom and goat cheese.  So I was a bit disappointed that there was not enough of either.  I definitely had several bites where I had neither mushroom or goat cheese.  Plus the frittata was thin and dry.  It was almost like they overcooked an omelette in a frying pan instead of cooking it in a skillet to make it thick and fluffy.  I didn't try VA's dish but she did mention that the chorizo was too overpowering (I've always loved chorizo but do find that many places are a bit too heavy handed with it).  What was surprising, the star of the meal were the sides.  They were all delicious, especially the honey butter biscuits.  They were fluffy, buttery and sticky with honey.  They were served with sweet butter and strawberry jam.  I could have eaten the entire plate.  The sausage was also top notch.  The one piece was huge and cut in half and almost had this lightly toasted texture on the outside.  It was the least oily sausage I've ever had (and I'm usually a big sucker for greasy pieces of breakfast meat) but it was still yummy.  I had a bite of the bacon and it was smoky and covered in honey too and there were plenty of strips on the plate.  We should have just stuck to the sides!  We did see a lot of people order the fried chicken dish and it was huge! It came with 4 big pieces of chicken and biscuits and it looked amazing.  So maybe we just ordered the wrong thing here.

So the food overall wasn't terrible but what's knocked the review down a bit was the slow service and the high prices.  Not only did it take a long time to order, but it took foooorever to get our bill and pay it.  On one had it wasn't a big deal because it gave VA and I more time to chat without feeling pressure of being kicked out. But at some point, it would be nice to pay the bill!  I also knocked off 1/2 fork for the high prices.  Granted we did order a lot of food but $9 for biscuits and $7 for sausage?!  Our total bill with tip was $40/pp.

Photo Credit: Yelp

Nitehawk Cinema Visited 12/17/2011 3.5 Forks

Nitehawk Cinema 136 Metropolitan Ave., (between Wythe Ave & Berry St), Brooklyn, NY 11211

For those of you who live in Williamsburg you can understand the frustration of not having a movie theater in the neighborhood.  It's so ridiculous to think that you have to go into the city (granted Union Square is only 10-15 minutes away) to see a movie.  But luckily, Nitehawk Cinema opened up in the past year and it's a great and different alternative to seeing a movie in a regular theater.

Nitehawk takes dinner and a movie to a literal level.  Not only do they show movies but they also serve food and drinks while you watch the movie.  Genius!  Why hasn't anyone else thought of this before? You sit down at a seat that has a table and you write your order down on a piece of paper.  Then a "waiter" will come by and pick up your order and then you wait for your food and drinks to come while the movie starts.  They generally try to have "theme" foods for each movie (for example, I saw The Descendents and they had a Hawaiian Pulled Pork Sandwich on the menu) but they also have a regular menu that has snacks (prerequisite popcorn and nachos) and real food (sandwiches, burgers, salads, dessert and beer/cocktails).  I got the grilled chicken on  pretzel bread with fries ($13) and Aarti got the queso ($8) and greek salad ($10).  I wasn't sure how this was going to play out:  would people be loudly eating their food during the movie? Could I even see my food in the dark? Would the waitstaff be getting in the way of things?  Surprisingly the answer was no, yes, and no.  The waitstaff has pretty much gotten it down to a science of not getting in people's way.  But the big downfall for this was that we waited FOREVER for our food.  I mean the movie must have gone on for at least 45 minutes before we got our food and it was just sandwiches and salad!  They were apologetic about it but still frustrating because it's not like I could just get up and leave my seat.

When the food finally came, it was ok.  Actually, I did enjoy my sandwich but Aarti was pretty disappointed with the queso and salad.  The queso was bascially hot nacho cheese dip poured into a bowl served with chips.  It almost tasted like the velveeta cheese you get in the supermarket.  I didn't taste her salad but she said it was fine.  So I was a bit nervous about my sandwich but it actually tasted pretty good and it was super filling.  The pretzel bread tasted exactly like a warm soft pretzel and the chicken was grilled nicely and there were nice additions of tarragon mayo, melted cheese and lots of onions.  The fries were nice and crispy but were a bit over salted but I was so hungry at that point I didn't really care too much.  I also had a Six Point Sweet Action ($6) and a King Family Fortune Cocktail ($8) which was a delicious combination of vanilla vodka and pineapple juice.  

In the last 20 minutes the waters come around and drop off and pick up your checks so that when the movie is over you can just get up and leave.  All in all, I really enjoyed the experience and you don't have to order food if all you want is to enjoy the movie.  I would give the food 3 forks but the overall experience and innovation 4 forks, for a net score of 3.5 forks. :)

Photo Credit: Yelp 

Morandi Visited 12/9/2011 3.5 Forks

Morandi 211 Waverly Pl., (between 10th St & Charles St), New York, NY 10014

So what do I do after my 1st official Reformer/Tower Pilates class? I gorge myself of pasta and cheese. So I pretty much negated everything I did for the past hour.  But I'm actually totally fine with that.  After a work out like what I had, I was having a huge craving for good pasta and I had heard that Morandi could hit the spot.

The location is great, slightly off the beaten path in the West Village and once you walk inside, even though the space is pretty big, it had a nice, warm and cozy feel.  It kind of made me feel like I wasn't in New York anymore with it's nice brick work inside and festive holiday decorations.  The hostess was very pleasant and nice despite the place being mobbed at 9pm on Friday.  We were told it would be a 35 minute wait and it was actually a 35 minute wait.  That usually doesn't happen in the city. They tell you 30 minutes and it ends up being like 70 minutes.  So I appreciated the fact that we sat down when we were supposed to.

The menu had a lot of fabulous authentic sounding Italian dishes.  It's not a cheesy Little Italy Italian type of menu and the portions were more individual sized than family style.  We started with the burata cheese and roasted cherry tomatoes on the vine ($16), blistering peppers ($13) and I had the cavatelli with spicy lamb ragu and chickpeas ($19) and Aarti had the hand-rolled spaghetti with lemon and parmesan ($18).  The burata was amazing (how can it not be?) and the roasted cherry tomatoes were a nice touch.  I've never had roasted cherry tomatoes and by roasting them, they really brought out the sweetness in them and it was covered in a light balsamic vinaigrette.   I would have liked some basil and bigger tomatoes because there just wasn't enough tomato to cheese ratio, but it was still delicious none the less.  Next, the green peppers came out and even though I am usually not a "eat a whole pepper" type of person, I had had this dish at a Spanish Taps place before and LOVED them.  Our waiter had told us that 1 in 10 peppers would be super hot.  So you know who got that 1 super hot pepper? Not Aart, but me.  I thought my whole mouth was going to explode.  But besides that, the dish could have used more sea salt on it and they could have roasted them for a bit longer.

By the time our main dishes came out, I was actually kind of stuffed but I was still excited for my pasta.  I haven't had cavatelli before (or at least I don't think so) and it was ok not mind blowing.  I was torn between the cavatelli and the pappardelle and I now kind of wish I got the pappardelle instead.  There was nothing wrong with my cavatelli at all, I just think I would have preferred a broad thick noodle.  Cavatelli is a small pasta shell that's kind of shaped like a tiny hot dog buns. The spicy lamb wasn't very spicy and some of the pieces of lamb were too big and needed to be more bite sized and there wasn't too many chickpeas.  But overall, it was a perfectly fine dish and did it's job in filling me up.  I was just in the mood for more mind- blowing, super saucy, hit you in the face with flavor, stomach busting pasta.  Sadly, we were both too full to get dessert but after looking at the menu, there wasn't anything that I was dying to try.

As we were paying the bill, we saw a couple order some super cheesy fondue type dish with mushrooms (almost like a queso fresco) that I totally want to try if I'm back.  There was also a pumpkin polenta that sounded good, so there are plenty of other dishes on the menu that I think merit another visit.  I also wanted to give a shout out about the cocktails.  I had a berry vodka cocktail and it was one of the most delicious cocktails I've had in a while.  Our total bill was $55/pp with tax and tip.

Photo Credit: Yelp 

Buvette Visited 12/3/2011 4 Forks

Buvette 42 Grove St., (between Bedford St & Bleecker St), New York, NY 10014

 The first word that comes to mind when I think of Buvette is tiny.  The second word is French.  Yes, this place is teeny tiny and very French.  But that's what makes it so freakin cute. Everything there is tiny, the tables, glasses and even utensils and menu.  So accordingly, their food is tapas (or small plate) style.

Lav and I had the roasted beets, cauliflower gratin, lentils and kale and I got an order of the croque monsieur.  The waitress was also kind enough to tell us that ordering 2 quartinos of wine wasn't economical and that we were better off ordering the entire bottle.  I love it when the waitstaff has your best interests in mind!

The croque monsieur and beets came out first (mainly because there's no freakin room to put more than 2 dishes on the table at a time).  Despite the size, there were plenty of beets piled on top of each other and even though the croque monsieur came on small crostinis, they were really filling and packed a punch.  The sandwich came on perfect crispy crositini bread but was nice and soft in the middle.  It was covered in cheese and had 1 sliver of ham in inside.  I was actually glad that it was more bit sized than a full sandwich otherwise, I wouldn't have had any room for the other dishes.  The beets were perfectly roasted and served with a red wine vinaigrette and walnuts.  Perfect.  Then the lentils and kale came in this small but adorable dutch oven looking like pot.  I couldn't taste or see any kale but none the less, the dish was seasoned well and the lentils were cooked to well (meaning not over or under cooked which is very easy to do with beans).  The cauliflower gratin was exactly like what it sounds like....the same as a potato gratin but only healthier (I hope!).    We left room for dessert and got the chocolate mousse with creme fresh. Now THIS is creme fresh.  Light and fluffy and I wanted to just have an entire plate of it.  Oh and the chocolate mousse was great too.  It was a nice thicker version of chocolate pudding.  I'm not a huge chocolate fan but this was extremely tasty and I loved every bite of it. 


Everything about this place is so adorable.  From the street it's on (Grove Street) to the waitstaff to the food.  But that's the exact downside.  My seat and table were so god damn small I felt like I was on the set of Alice in Wonderland.  Although I loved my food, it would be nice if there were more dishes and perhaps bigger plates.  Even though we got there at 6:30 (we thought we would be the only ones there!), the place was totally packed.  I would totally love to come back here but hopefully at a bigger table. Total bill: $50/pp with tip and tax. 


Photo Credit: Yelp

Betto Visited 12/2/2011 3 Forks

Betto 138 N 8th St., (between Berry St & Bedford Ave), Brooklyn, NY 11211

I was excited to try Betto because they are from the same owners as 'intoeca in the LES and I love that place.  So even better that they opened a post in my neighborhood (ok, it's not exactly right in my neighborhood but close enough).

I went there on a Friday night and it was surprisingly not very packed but pleasantly full.  The menu is tapas style but with more of an Italian slant than a Spanish one.  Aarti and I decide to get the flatbread with ricotta and parmesan, market salad, sunchokes and pear, and meatballs.  The food came out insanely quickly which usually freaks me out a bit because it makes me think that all the food is just sitting there and when someone orders it, they just shove it in the microwave for 5 minutes in bring it out.  Now I don't think that's what happened here at all, but my meatballs were a bit cold.  However, they were also delicious.  There were 3 huge meatballs and they had great flavor and were super filling.  Plus the red sauce it was in was also really enjoyable.  To be honest, we weren't really sure what sunchokes were and I'm still not sure.  There was a bunch of thinly shaved pear and that's all I could taste but the dish itself was very healthy tasting.  The market salad seemed like a very basic bowl of mixed greens with vinaigrette dressing.  I didn't have any but Aarti ate most of the leaves, so I guess it was good?  The flatbread that came out was HUGE.  I mean it almost took the entire length of our table.  I normally love ricotta (especially at Locanda Verde) but here, the flatbread was just a tad too tough and the ricotta needed some more sweetness like honey on top of it.  For a place that serves tapas, all the plates were pretty huge in size and we were pleasantly full at the end of it.

While I think we thought our food was fine, a lot of people around us were getting the pastas and those looked amazing! Nice and shiny with sauce.  I am totally getting a pasta dish next time!  What was disappointing was the dessert.  We got the apple crumble with creme fresh.  Now I know that creme fresh is not whip cream, but this tasted exactly sour cream.  So much so that I actually think it might have been sour cream.  I had creme fresh the next day at another restaurant and that was exactly what creme fresh should be: light and fluffy.  This was thick and heavy.  The apple crumble itself was also not very good.  It was just apple with dough of top of it.  No brown sugar or anything on top of it to make it taste sweet.

But overall, the place is nice and spacious, the menu has a lot of variety of food that it was easy to go to with a vegetarian and both be happy.  I heard that the brunch there is supposed to be fabulous, so if I do come back next time, it would be for brunch but I would give dinner one more try.  Total price: $28/pp without tip.

Photo Credit: Yelp