Food Adventuring Around NYC
SADLY, DENNY’S DELIGHT IS NOW CLOSED. I find myself on Coney Island so rarely (in fact, I’ve only been three times in the nine years I’ve lived in New York) that I feel I need to take full advantage of the journey and explore and taste as much as I can. No, I didn’t ride the …
SADLY, BLUE MARBLE IS NOW CLOSED. I really really wanted to like Blue Marble. Really I did. It’s co-owned by Alexis Miesen and Jennifer Dundas, two friends who had a dream of making ice cream. Dundas is a working New York stage actress and we have mutual friends, so I had a particular interest in …
One thing I don’t think about when it comes to Mexican food is lamb. I think of tacos in many different flavors: chicken, pork, beef, beans, fish, vegetables. Even the occasional cactus. But I’ve never even seen lamb on the menu at Mexican restaurants (or maybe I haven’t paid close enough attention). And I do …
For all intents and purposes, my pizza journey is over. Of course I couldn’t make it to every single pizzeria in the city and spots continue to open up every week. But I made my peace (piece?) with the pizza search and even wrote up a conclusion. Well, thanks to Jason Feirman and his Pizza …
I’m getting a little bored with all the new restaurants in Brooklyn. They’re all either homey, romantic settings serving modern takes on Southern-influenced comfort food. Or they feature a menu of pub fare in an old fashioned wood-heavy locale designed to be a throwback to an era of New York’s colorful past. Of course I’m …
If you’re ordering a corned beef and pastrami sandwich, you better be prepared for some fat. No matter how hard you try to only eat half a sandwich or order the meat extra lean (and I try both), you’re bound to clog an artery or two. It’s just part of the game. But now, I’d …
Fortunately, my parents never kept kosher. So growing up, I was allowed to indulge in things like cheeseburgers and baby back ribs. But when I’d travel somewhere with my Jewish youth group or spend the summer at sleepaway camp, I had no choice but to keep kosher for the duration of the trip. As much …
Pastrami, as we know it, is made from beef. But it wasn’t always that way. In Romania, the first pastramis were probably made from some sort of fowl, like duck or chicken. And at Barney Greengrass on the Upper West Side, they make a special salmon pastrami. Pastrami really refers to a meat that’s been …
There are words, such as fish, furniture, and moose, that are both the singular and plural form of the root noun. You observe a school of fish, move all the furniture, and run from a stampede of moose. Why has this turned into a grammar blog all of a sudden? Because my next list item …
SADLY, FORT DEFIANCE IS NOW CLOSED. My second trip to Red Hook brought me back to Fort Defiance. I was here just a few days earlier for another Time Out list item, the Iced Coffee. But this time, it was time for dinner, so the deviled eggs were now available. There’s a very funny moment on …
Some folks like to get away, take a holiday from the neighborhood. When Billy Joel sings those lyrics, he’s implying that no vacation is as satisfying or comfortable as being in his home state. But New York State of Mind was written long before the gentrification of Red Hook. In the last few years, this …
SADLY, FORT DEFIANCE IS NOW CLOSED. I might be the only person out there who doesn’t drink coffee. Seriously. If there are any other caffeine-free folks out there, let me know and we should start a support group. People look at me funny when I tell them I don’t drink the stuff. I just never got …
When I decided to do corned beef and pastrami, I set some ground rules for myself. First and foremost, I couldn’t get one without the other. Well, rules are meant to be broken. Especially when they’re broken with such unique style and deliciousness as at Mile End. If you read any New York publications or food …
Saraghina is one of those well-respected new pizza restaurants that I just didn’t get to during my intense pizza search. So I’m very thankful that it happened to find its way onto TONY’s list. Partly because it helped make my pizza search more comprehensive, but also because it was quite delicious. Michele Iuliano, the chef …
SADLY, ADELMAN’S KOSHER DELI IS NOW CLOSED. Corned beef, pastrami, knishes, chopped liver, and Jewish guilt, among other things were brought to New York by Eastern European Jews. And they were the first chefs, owners, waiters, and customers at the delicatessens. But times have changed and New York has become the melting pot of the world …
For a long time, whenever I thought of Vietnamese food I thought of very clean, healthy and light flavors – summer rolls and pho. In the last few years, I (and most of NY) discovered the banh mi. A Vietnamese sandwich traditionally made with cucumbers, cilantro, pickled carrots, and all sorts of pork: paté, roasted, …
What to do on a Sunday afternoon? I’m tired of going to the movies, I’m never up early enough for brunch, and there’s only so long I can sit at home and write blog entries. So last weekend, I ventured into Williamsburg for a different sort of Sunday afternoon. Instead of doing any of the …
SADLY, BATI IS NOW CLOSED. I pretty much eat everything, but there are certain cuisines I like better than others. And one cuisine I’ve tried and tried, but just never get too excited about is Ethiopian. It’s a unique experience: going to a traditional Ethiopian restaurant. First off, they don’t really offer you silverware. In …
SADLY, RYE IS NOW CLOSED. Is it just me or do all the new restaurants in Williamsburg look alike? And to frustrate me even more, most of them don’t even have a sign out front. You just have to know it’s there, or get close enough to look at the menu on the door (if there …
I love that you don’t need a car in New York. As much as we bitch and moan about the public transit system, it can really take you just about anywhere within the five boroughs. There are certain places (like Red Hook, Brooklyn) that are difficult to reach by train and will force you to …