Suzume Visited 6/22/2014 4 Forks

Suzume  545 Lorimer St., Brooklyn, NY 1121

Even though Paige and I had already had dinner at Zona Rosa, we thought it would be a good idea to have a 2nd dinner at Suzume for more drinks and more snacks.  I'll be honest that I a bit drunk at this point, so the review might be slightly skewed.  Paige had told me about this place multiple times but every time I looked at the menu, I just never felt compelled to go.  It's not quite a sushi place and not quite a ramen place.  It was kind of a mish-mosh of stuff.  But I figured since it was on my way home, it was worth checking out. 

As I mentioned the menu is a bit weird.  They have 3 different types of sushi and 5 different kinds of funky rolls but they don't have a full blown sushi menu.  There's also 4 different kinds of tacos and then 2 kinds of ramen and then a few other Hawaiian style snacks like spam masubi.  Since we didn't want a full blown dinner, we got the peashoot bok choy salad ($6) and then the salmon poke, tuna poke and spicy scallop sushi ($3.50 per piece).  I was a bit unsure about the salad but it was actually quite refreshing and a great healthy snack after our tequilla and tacos.  It was lightly dressed with the right amount of flavor and balance to the vegetables.  The sushi was chunks of fish on a bed of rice and then wrapped with seaweed - so similar to the type of sushi you get when you order the salmon roe pieces.  I didn't know what to expect, but it was surprisingly good and delicious.  It was a bit unusual in that the salmon poke is served with a ramp vinaigrette and the tuna was served with sweet onion and chili oil but they all worked really well together and the bits of fish were clean and fresh.   I didn't have any of the ramen there and while it got mixed reviews on Yelp, I would go back and at least try it out.

As a fair warning, this place is most definitely crawling with hipsters and it's most definitely not as authentic as Okonomi down the street, but none the less it was definitely a surprising treat for me.  The one part that does kind of suck is that it's cash only.  Total bill:  $25/pp with tax, tip and drinks

Photo Credit:  Yelp

Zona Rosa Visited 6/22/2014 2.5 Forks

Zona Rosa  571 Lorimer St, Brooklyn, NY 11211

I had gone to Zona Rosa when it used to be this real air stream trailer restaurant that served burgers and just had outdoor seating.  It closed a few years ago and it took a while for it to re-open and this time it opened as a Mexican shoot off of Mesa Coyoacan.  I have walked past here a million times but I heard a bunch of negative reviews, so I was never inclined to go.  But on the day the US played Portugal in the World Cup, every place in Williamsburg was packed to the gills, so Paige and I ended up at Zona Rosa because they had available seating right in front of the TV.

The downstairs space isn't nearly as cute as the used to be but they did have upstairs seating that I believe has a retractable roof, so that may be a much nicer space.   I honestly wasn't thinking of getting food rather just a bunch of cocktails for the game, but of course it's hard to say no to food when you've been sitting in the same place for 2+ hours.  Paige and I got the guacamole ($9) to start and it was your basic standard guacamole.  I wasn't a huge fan of the chips - they were a bit too thick and heavy and salty.   We then waited a bit and then ordered some tacos to feed our hunger.  Paige had warned me that the regular grilled fish tacos were really bad here but the waiter mentioned that they had a special beer battered version that night, so we thought we'd give that one a try and also got the carnitas version as well ($11).  The tacos come three to an order and are the typical smaller fancy type of tacos you see everywhere these days.  The beer battered tacos were made with mahi mahi and while they weren't bad, they were a bit too heavy on the batter for me and the pieces of fish were a bit too big for the small tortilla so it was a bit difficult to manage.  But flavor-wise, it was fine, it just felt a bit like an unrefined taco trying to be one of those fancy tacos at ABC Cocina.  The carintas one was a bit more manageable to eat and the pork was the right amount for the tortilla - it was served traditional style with onions and cilantro and 3 different kinds of salsa.   Again - it was a fine taco but nothing that would really compel me to come back again soon.   In the end, I'm glad that they were open and willing to let us just sit there and watch the game and I'm sure the upstairs open air section is quite lovely.  I'm not necessarily dying to make this my local joint just yet.  Total bill:  $66/pp with tip, tax and lots of drinks

Photo Credit:  Yelp

WD-50 Visited 6/20/2014 3 Forks

wd-50 50 Clinton St., New York, NY 10002

It seems rather appropriate that my 600th review is for the legendary restaurant wd-50.  While I didn't plan for it to be that way, I did finally make it here because of the news that they were the latest victims of ridiculously high rent and closing at the end of November.  There was no way I could let this place close without me getting in a review.  While I can't say it lived up to my high expectations, I'm still glad I made it here before it closed its doors. 

Before we actually made it to the restaurant, Holly, Janet and I had kind of decided that we would do the smaller tasting menu (6 courses at $95), since the full one was 12 courses and $155 without wine pairing and that seemed a bit extreme.  But of course, once you get there, you feel like there's no point in coming here without getting the full experience.   I'm incredibly upset that I forgot to take the print out they gave us with the menu description, so I apologize if this review is a bit lacking, since, let's be honest, it's a bit difficult to remember all 12 dishes over 2 weeks after I ate there.  But I'll give it my best try.  

I had been expecting the meal to be full of Wylie's famous molecular gastronomy tricks with lots of foam, steam and weirdness.  The first dish seemed to fit that bill, it was an oyster with its "shell", preserved lemon, snow pea and hazelnut.  I put the word shell in quotations because it was an edible shell, so not the actual one.  The actual oyster was quite briny and fishy, but that didn't really bother me too much.  It was a bit of a mental block to get into eating the shell but it good first introduction to the world of Wylie.  The next dish was my favorite of the night:  egg yolk, potato stuffed ravioli with caviar.  Oh my, this was absolutely delicious and it was then that I realized what I don't like about tasting menus.  While it's awesome to get to try a bunch of different things, everything is only 1-2 bites, so when you find a dish that you actually like, you're so bummed out that there isn't more.  And that's exactly how I felt about this dish.  I felt teased by only have 1 small bite...I wanted 20 more of them.  Next course was a cold soup of avocado, English pea, and peakytoe crab meat.  It was smooth and creamy and the crab was excellent but in general, I'm not a huge fan of gazpacho or cold soups.   The 4th course was charred chicken liver with injera and melon.  While I usually don't mind chicken liver, it's not really my favorite thing in the world and it was no different here.  It was exactly what you would think good chicken liver should taste like. 

The next dish was a shrimp and grits with pickled jalapeno and it tasted exactly how it sounds.  It was a solid dish but there wasn't anything super molecular gastronomy about it.    Dish six was probably my least favorite of the night, it was bloodless sausage.  It was designed to look like a blood sausage but instead it was made with flour, beets (to give it color) and forbidden rice.  It was just really dry and flavorless and I probably would have preferred a real blood sausage at that point.  Next was the black bass with parsnip, pickled ginger, nori and mustard.  Again a good solid dish but nothing crazy about in presentation or taste to it.  The next two dishes were the protein dishes of the night - a milk braised pork collar with fried sunchokes and a cured duck breast with curds-n-whey and sweet potato. I really enjoyed both dishes, especially the crispy sunchokes.  Again - solid dishes and both were incredibly moist and tender but also pretty small bites.  We finished the meal with four different desserts:  a sheet of rhubarb flavored ice, an apple tart with pomegranate, and pistachio (our favorite dish), an ovaltine cake with cardamom and sheep's milk   and lastly bites of cookie dough and root beer chews (the cookie dough was great but the chew was just weird but I guess that was what I was looking for!).  

Despite the fact that they were all pretty small bites, I was full by the end of the meal - which was great considering how expensive the meal was.  The service was impeccable, although almost a bit too attentive.  They changed our silverware after every dish, even if we hadn't even used them.  In the end, I'm definitely glad I went to this legendary restaurant and I do hope that it re-opens somewhere else, but for all the hype and price tag for it, I'm not necessarily dying to go back.  Total bill:  $284/pp with tax, tip and a few drinks

Photo Credit:  Yelp

Bar Bolonat Visited 6/20/2014 3.5 Forks

Bar Bolonat  611 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014

I was excited to try Bar Bolonat since it is from the same people of Taim (one of my all time favorite places) and Balaboosta (another solid Middle Eastern restaurant).  The menu here also has an Israeli and Middle Eastern focus and luckily for Lav, they also had many veggie friendly options. 

Everything sounded great but with the help of our very friendly waitress, we narrowed down our selections to start with the fried olives ($8), grilled baby artichokes ($12), and everyday cauliflower ($12) while I opted for the shrimp curry ($16) for my main entree and Lav got the hand cut pasta ($23).  I'm not a huge fan of olives and even though these were fried, I still didn't really love them but Lav thought they were quite good.  Next came the grilled baby artichokes, which came highly recommended by our waitress.  It was served with pistachio yogurt and then lightly sprinkled with a variety of herbs and spices.  I have a somewhat love/hate relationship with artichokes but I quite enjoyed this dish.  I basically like anything covered in yogurt and this was a nice way to marry the two ingredients together.  Next, I tried the cauliflower which was lightly fried and served with peanut tahini sauce.  I appreciated that the cauliflower was very lightly fried - just enough to give it some crunch on the outside and the tahini sauce gave it a different twist to how cauliflower is normally served.  Lav didn't think either of these dishes had enough salt to it, which she may be right, but after having had several recent meals that were way too heavy on salt, I kind of appreciated some dishes that were lighter in taste.

When I ordered the curry, I was a bit worried that it was going to be a heavy curry that you get in Indian or Thai, but luckily the one here is a much lighter version.  This one was made with coconut milk, a Middle Eastern hot sauce, 5 very thick and plumb pieces of shrimp and then topped with a few circular pieces of fried bread.  I thought I was going to miss not having rice or something else to go with the dish, but I really liked just soaking the shrimp in the curry sauce and taking bites like that.  I could have (and should have) stopped eating there but I also took bites from Lav's pasta dish.  The pasta was served with garlic, chilies, and yogurt ricotta.  The pasta itself was long flat ribbons and cooked perfectly al dente.  I liked that the pasta wasn't swimming in a thick heavy sauce but I did think it was a bit oily and I think I had just eaten too much food at this point to fully enjoy it.

All in all, I thought the service was lovely and the food had great aspects to it.  I can see how it's a natural higher end extension of Taim, but to me, nothing will really beat Taim in terms of straight up amazing Middle Eastern food but this is worth a trek if you're looking for something fancier than a falafel sandwich.   Total bill:  ~$120 with a bottle of wine

Photo Credit:  Yelp

Okonomi Visited 6/15/2014 4.5 Forks

Okonomi 150 Ainslie Street , Brooklyn, NY 11211

I'm not in love with Okonomi because it's one of the few non-hipster restaurants within walking distance from my apartment or because Anuja and I had gone to see the owner do a fantastic fish demonstration at Whole Foods - I love it because it's simple, clean food in its purest form and it makes realize that you don't need a bunch of flash to make a really good dish.  As I mentioned, this place is owned by Yuji Haraguchi, who owns the Yuji Ramen stalls in Whole Foods in the East Village and Brooklyn.  Anuja and I had seen him give a fish cutting demonstration earlier in the year and he was just the cutest thing ever and just very passionate about his craft.  So I was beyond thrilled when he had mentioned in the class that he was opening a restaurant literally 5 minutes from my apartment. 

It's on a very unassuming, quiet block in Williamsburg and it just has a lovely peaceful decor.  It's pretty small and only fits about 10 people total but I think that's the charm that goes with the overall vibe of the restaurant and menu.  The menu is really very basic:  it's a set lunch of miso soup, rice with bonito flakes and then a plate of pickled market vegetables, a green vegetable that's blanched and servedwith a tofu cream and sesame seeds and an Japanese egg custard/omelet and then the fresh fish of the day - all for $15 (although I heard it used to be $9).  That day it was tile fish and king mackerel.  What I love about this place is that the menu changes daily based on what's fresh and available, so it's always a pleasant surprise.  They also have a small selection of appetizers and that day they had monkfish liver ($5),  bluefish tartar ($7) and scallop sashimi ($8).   I am obsessed with scallop sashimi so we had to order it and it was amazing.  There was 4-5 pieces and each were incredibly smooth and tasted like they just came out of the water.  Delicious.  As for the lunch set, it was fantastic.  Such a basic and simple concept but everything was just right and to top it off, it was so healthy for you.  I personally liked the tile fish more than the mackerel because it seemed more flakey and moist but in the end, they were both great.  The pickled vegetables and blanched vegetables were a nice complement to the rest of the dish and the whole experience was just incredibly calming and pleasant.  I felt like it was an oasis away from the hustle and bustle of Brooklyn and definitely a departure from the hipsters.  And to top it off, everything here was incredibly reasonably priced.  I just hope he can keep up these prices and still stay in business.  Despite how simple the food look, I left fairly full from the whole experience.  

But what's really great about the experience was that Yuji himself was at the restaurant and could not have been nicer to us.  Anuja had posted something on Okonomi's Facebook wall a day or two before our brunch date and he actually recognized her face and made a comment about how he recognized her when we sat down.  How often does that happen in NYC?  He kindly explained the menu to us and was just incredibly sweet.  He was telling us how this place was a year in the making and you could just tell how proud and passionate he was about it.  That's what I love about dining out - when you meet someone who just really loves what they do and then on top of it, does it really well with no pretentious attitude.  The only negatives I can think about is that I can see how the limiting menu is not for everybody and the restaurant is only open for lunch as of now.  But in general I am super excited how close this place is to my apartment and I will definitely be back multiple times.  Total bill:  ~$50 for 2 with tax and tip

Photo Credit:  Yelp

Comodo Visited 6/14/2014 3 Forks

Comodo 58 MacDougal St., New York, NY 10012

Aarti and I celebrated my birthday at this Brazilian place late on a Saturday night - in true South American style we had dinner starting at 9:45pm.   I was excited to try this place right off the heels of my trip to Colombia.  The menu sounded great and had a great mix of seafood, meat and vegetables.   I'll be the first to admit that I had been drinking earlier that day, so this review might be a bit skewed but I had sobered up by the time I got there. 

I opted to go with the lamb sliders ($11) to start and got the black sea bass as my main entree ($28) while Aarti got a mix of different vegetable appetizers for her entrees.  She got the Brussels sprout salad ($10), the kale and quinoa salad ($14) and the cauliflower gratin ($12) - all sounded great but I thought the price points were a bit high considering they were vegetable appetizers and not full entrees.   The lamb sliders were served on Brazilian cheese bread and a chipotle cream sauce.  The cheese bread is a popular bread in South America and to be honest, it's just not my favorite.  I think it's a bit too dry and doesn't really have much taste to it.  While the lamb patty was great and I enjoyed the chipotle cream sauce that went with it, but I just didn't think that the cheese bread, while being an authentic South American ingredient, really made the slider stand out.  I guess call me unpatriotic but it would have been better on a basic potato bun.  As for the black bass, it was served with polenta and sauteed broccolini.  The fish and broccolini were way over seasoned and very heavy on the garlic - which usually isn't a huge problem, but I just felt incredibly dehydrated and my mouth reeked of garlic after only a few bites.  The fish itself was cooked well and in theory the pairing of it with polenta and broccolini would be a winner.  It was just cooked with such a heavy hand on the salt that it was kind of hard to finish the whole dish.  I didn't get a chance to try any of Aarti's vegetable dishes but on paper they all sounded great.  Who doesn't like Brussel Sprouts with a mustard avocado Parmesean dressing or kale with quinoa mixed with shitake mushrooms and feta cheese?   

The place is pretty small and narrow and I thought it would be a bit more lively given all the World Cup hoopla, but it was relatively calm on a random Saturday night.  It's possible that my earlier drinking impaired my judgement, so I'm willing to give this place another try but maybe more for  brunch than dinner.  Total bill:  $120 for 2 people with tax and tip

 Photo Credit:  Yelp

Mercadito Visited 6/11/2014 2.5 Forks

Mercadito 179 Ave B, New York, NY 10009

I had been to Mercadito years ago and remembered it being super tiny, hot and just ok.  Fast forward to 2014 and honestly not much has changed.  It's still tiny, it's still hot and muggy inside and the food is still ok.  I will say that it's a lively place with some pretty strong margaritas, which is a good offset to the mediocre tacos.  But another good thing is that on Tuesday it's Taco Tuesdays so instead of 4 tacos for $14.50 it's 2 tacos for $5.  

I was torn between the sauteed fish or the beer battered fish tacos, but I opted for the sauteed version to be "healthy" and then also got the carne one as well.  The table split an order of the guacamole ($13.50) and the pico de tres elote ($5.50).  The guacamole was ok - it was too chunky and not creamy enough for me.  It felt like they forgot to mash up the avocados before putting it in the bowl.  The tacos themselves were also ok...they were definitely a bit lack luster presentation wise.  They just looked a bit sloppy but taste wise they were fine nothing to really write home about.  They were your basic tacos that got the job done if you were hungry but they lacked the quality of a place like ABC Cocina or the originality of a Tacqueria Lower East Side.  The elotes was a corn dish of hominy and mixed with yellow and white corn with pico de gallo.  Again, a standard corn dish but I wasn't getting that biting fresh feeling from it, plus I find hominy a bit dry and boring to eat. 

All in all, it was a standard meal but the Tuesday Taco special does make it at least worth a try while downing margaritas on a lazy Tuesday.  As for the service, it was definitely a bit lacking.  Jill had to order a margarita about 1,000 times and when I had asked for my 2nd one, it took forever to come out that by the time it arrived everyone had already finished their food and drink so I had to chug it which I wasn't really happy about.  Total bill:  $44/pp with tax, tip and drink

Photo Credit:  Yelp