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The Meatball Shop + Ice Cream Sandwiches

I have been meaning to go to The Meatball Shop for a long time and was fortunate enough that this place is close to Pianos – we wrapped up our set, watched Anni Rossi and then headed over to check out the magic. Chances of getting a seat looked pretty grim when we got there; the place was packed. Somehow timing was perfect, a group of four leaving just as we got in and we were seated in literally 2 minutes.

The Meatball Shop offers a fun menu with lots of options. You can get orders of meatballs a la carte where you choose one type of meat and one sauce, unfortunately no mixing and matching. The rest of the menu is much more open-ended. You can get Meatball sliders, a hero, or a meatball smash (2 meatballs on a brioche bun with sauce and cheese). The meat offerings are classic beef, spicy pork, chicken, vegetable, and the special of the day along with choice of tomato sauce, spicy meat sauce, mushroom, or parmesan cream.

I decided to go with two sliders, a Classic Beef with Spicy Meat Sauce and the special of the day, Buffalo Chicken with a Bleu Cheese Sauce. To start off, the classic beef slider was incredible. One of the tastiest meatballs I’ve had in a while, and the spicy meat sauce is perfection. This little guy had me wishing all I got was classic beef/spicy meat sauce sliders. That being said, the Buffalo Chicken meatball was surprisingly delicious. I didn’t expect to eat something that was so… buffalo-chicken in the form of a meatball. The bleu cheese sauce was great and this was super yummy.

For the big meal I decided to go for a Spicy Pork meatball hero with Tomato Sauce and Mozzarella. This is where I made a bit of a mistake, I got whole wheat bread – kind of a bad idea. I opted for the larger hero assuming that the spicy pork was going to be tastier than a beef meatball, but I was so enamored by the beef meatball it was hard to move on to this one. I had a few bites of the beef meatball first, then basically chugged this hero and then finished the meatball explosion by going back to the beef. Don’t get me wrong, the pork is awesome, but that beef is hard to contend with. Also, whole wheat was just stupid – shoulda gone for white.

The Meatball Shop offers an awesome build-your-own ice cream sandwich. I went for house-made mint ice cream in between a chocolate chip cookie and a ginger snap. The ice cream was incredibly soft and the flavor was completely not what I was expecting. This mint ice cream was so minty it was borderline herbal and ridiculously refreshing. A part of me was confused, but the other part loved it. The mint scoop was super soft and tasty, and the mix-and-match cookie combination was definitely the right choice. Chocolate chip and ginger? Golden move.

Look at Alexa and Gao Di so happy with their ice cream sandwiches! Fools for going with chocolate chip cookies on both sides – ha!

Anyway, the Meatball Shop rocked and I will definitely be back for more. You can definitely make a meal out of eating a bunch of sliders – I think next time I will go for a Meatball Smash as those seem a little more interesting than your average meatball sub and will allow you the stomach to consume more sliders. Bravo, Meatball Shop. I will be back!

The Meatball Shop is located at 84 Stanton St between Allen and Orchard

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Candle Cafe – Delicious Vegan (Really!)

Generally, I am a hater of vegan foods and the vegan tax that comes with the price of what I think is tasteless food. Candle Cafe changes everything. This upper east side vegan restaurant is hands down, the best vegan food I’ve ever had, and also a damn good restaurant. Skeptical as I was, my first bites of into the Cajun Seitan sandwich and Gao Di’s Sesame Crusted Tofu were a revelation into the possibilities of vegan food that actually tastes good.

The Sesame Crusted Tofu (pictured above) features black rice, steamed greens and sauteed gingered vegetables over a green coconut curry sauce and is served with arame coulis and kimchi. There is a lot going on in this meal, but it’s nice to know that the taste of the tofu wasn’t lost in the mix of accompanying flavors. The tofu is juicy and delicious – mmmmmmm!

The Cajun Seitan Sandwich features pan-seared seitan, steamed greens, caramelized onions and avocado served on tasted focaccia and is accompanied by ancho chili aioli and coleslaw. All I have to say is: Wow. This sandwich is unbelievably flavorful and the vegan aioli is the perfect condiment. Lather lots of this on for the perfect taste. The slaw is not particularly exciting, just seems like your average slaw, but it rounds out the meal well. The real glory here is in the sandwich, and I wholeheartedly recommend you feast on it.

Like I said, it’s hard to excite me with vegan food but Candle Cafe did a damn good job blowing me away. Amazing food, friendly service, nice environment – this is a restaurant you need to try out – not just because it’s good Vegan, but because it’s GOOD FOOD. Oh, and while you’re at it, get yourself a smoothie!

Mmmmm!

Candle Cafe is located at 1307 3rd Avenue btwn 75th and 74th sts in the Upper East Side.

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Northeast Kingdom – A Piece of Vermont in Bushwick

Back when I lived briefly in Bushwick, the one hipster getaway restaurant in our area was Northeast Kingdom. I’ve been meaning to come back here for a while but the train ride is a serious deterrent. Anyway, half a year later we were invited to a party in Bushwick and decided this would be the perfect time to hit up our old favorite spot. The restaurant, whose name references the northeast corner of Vermont, goes for a log cabin Vermont vibe. It’s super cozy!

Northeast Kingdom changes up their menu seasonally and changes are usually pretty drastic, leading to some sad faces but awesome new discoveries. The burger special has changed a few times but I know it’s a burger you can always count on. The rabbit bangers and mash are great in the winter and they also had a great crispy duck sandwich.

Tonight the menu had some new items and my eyes immediately focused on the Bushwick Bánh Mì.  This take on the classic Vietnamese sandwich featured crispy pig’s head, duck pate, pickled radish and carrot, dijon dressing and herbs.  While I’ve had a lot of pork products I don’t think I’d actually had pig’s head.  The sandwich came with two large pieces of pig’s head. The meat was really tender after you got through the initial crispiness and went great with the duck pate. I love bánh mì’s and Northeast Kingdom’s Bushwick take on the sandwich is awesome.

We lucked out in a wrong order getting put in and rather than wasting perfectly good clams, they were gifted to our spot at the bar. The clams were a special and came with bacon bits, crumbs, scallions and can’t-remember-what-else

We also got their Banana Cream Pie which was delicious. It was super light but really flavorful. Mmmmmm.

Northeast Kingdom is a great place to grab drinks and have some good food. If you’re in Bushwick, this is the place to hit up. Their burger special is always money!

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La Sirene is French Genius

My visit to La Sirene had been a long time coming. Last year, Gao Di intended to take me there for my birthday but we neglected to look up the address and decided to stop walking west any further. Big mistake! This year we did my birthday right by finally going to this amazing French restaurant. This is hands down one of the best meals I’ve had in NYC. Now to the food run-down.

We started our meal off with the Tartelette de Chevre Frais – a Goat Cheese Tart with Shallots ,Truffles, Grape and a Veil of 90 days Aged Swiss Cheese, a signature La Sirene dish. This was arguably my favorite part of the experience. This goat cheese tart is hard to comprehend. Topped with swiss cheese, this combination of cheese flavor and textures is one of the most delicious things I have ever had. So delicious that it deserved two photos. Yum!

La Sirene is also known for their mussels, they have four types to choose from! We went with the Moules Rochelaises Originated from La Rochelle - Steamed mussels with curry, diced apples, and light cream. This light creamy curry sauce gave the mussels a really rich flavor.

For an entree I got the Kassulet Toulousain de la Maison, a Cassoulet with Cannellini Beans, tomato, Garlic Duck Confit, Slab Bacon & Pork sausage all Braised with Noble Duck Fat. The menu’s note  reads, “Yummy but GREASY!! It was created for Warriors to defend the City! Don’t take it if you can’t bear it ”

Like the note says, this meal is insanely greasy but it is pretty awesome. The duck confit is super tender and the pork products all taste amazing from being submerged in duck fat. The cassoulet has a LOT of beans. I’m not sure if I would get this again, it was delicious and worth it – I like to think of myself as a warrior, but I just don’t know if I can handle that grease and all those beans again! Delicious, but there are other things on the menu I want to try.

Gao Di ordered the Tournedos Rossini, Seared Filet Mignon Over Bread Toasted With Foie Gras, Shallots, Port & Red Wine Truffles Sauce, and this was definitely my next favorite thing from the goat cheese tart. This filet mignon’s texture was pretty insane. The sauce and meat together was a beautiful combination of flavors. This meal came with a side of four pureed vegetables – mmm, perfect accompaniment to the filet mignon.

Although we were sufficiently stuffed, we decided dessert was necessary to make the birthday experience complete. We rounded out the meal with La Sirene’s Big Profiteroles au “Bittersweet” Chocolat. Profiteroles are usually small and filled with some kind of cream. La Sirene does their profiteroles to a grand scale – filled with ICE CREAM and covered in a Hot Callebaut Bittersweet Chocolate Sauce – this is an amazing dessert. They really don’t skimp you here, these large profiteroles are easily shareable.

Like I said, La Sirene really has to be one of my best restaurant experiences. I love its small unpretentious environment – the waitresses are super friendly and give great suggestions! While on the pricy side, La Sirene is also BYOB and they don’t charge you a cork fee and are happy to pop open your beers. This way you know you’re spending your money on amazing FOOD and not blowing it on a $10 Kronenberg. This restaurant is amazing and I will be back when I’m ready to splurge again. Do yourself a favor and treat yourself one weekend to an amazing meal at La Sirene.

La Sirene is located at 558 Broome St and Varick St

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On the Other Side of the Michelada

I never had a Michelada until I was intrigued by somebody drinking one while I was at Caracas’ Williamsburg location. For those of you that don’t know, a michelada is a beer cocktail composed of (obviously) beer, lime juice and assorted spices, salts, peppers, sauces served in a salt-rimmed glass. A seemingly bizarre concoction but it sounded interesting so we decided to try it out. Caracas‘ variety of the michelada is made with pacifo beer, lemon, home-made spicy panela and salt. I don’t know who came up with this random ass idea, but micheladas are damn good!

The above photos were taken at Barrio Chino while playing around with the camera. In each photo you see the other’s drink! Barrio Chino’s Michelada is made with a beer of your choice, Worcestershire, lime juice, and a salt crusted rim. I went for a Negra Modelo and Gao Di shot for Sol. The Negra Modelo version was awesome- I wasn’t sure what to expect from a michelada with a dark beer but it was super tasty. Gao Di was a little less pleased with the Sol. Barrio Chino also has really good food that I’ll be posting about later on….

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Menkui Tei – My Love for Ramen

Like I said a long time ago in my post on alphabet city’s ramen joint, Minca, Menkui Tei on 3rd avenue between St. Marks and E. 7th street has a special place in my heart (it’s actually technically Cooper Square). I have been coming here with Thomas since freshman year of college. Located just a little ways from NYU’s jazz building, Menkui Tei offers some great ramen at a much better price than our good friend, the overpriced Ippudo.

So what’s to love here? Pretty much everything. The wait staff is ridiculously nice (they always remember me!) and I love the wooden environment + mix of 90’s hip-hop and pop music. My two favorite ramens that Menkui offers are the Kyushu Ramen and the Sutamina Ramen. The Kyushu Ramen, pictured above, is a “Special Menu” item that happens to always be on the menu – this is a good thing. The Kyushu features sprouts, bamboo, fried garlic, scallions, a half a soft-boiled ehh, and of course – two thick and tasty slices of pork, along with thin noodles in a delicious pork bone broth.

The Sutamina Ramen has a spicy miso-based broth with sliced pork, egg, garlic and scallions. Yum! I need to get a photo of this one because it’s quite wonderful.

Anyway, I love Menkui Tei and you should too! Among pricier places like Ramen Setagaya, Ippudo, and Minca, Menkui Tei is a delicious and affordable contender in the ramen market. They also have a really good mabo tofu and pitcher deals that come with hot wings!

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The Spotted Pig’s Chargrilled Burger & Shoestring Fries

The Spotted Pig is a West Village gastropub whose prices on the menu have me shying away instantly, the cheap bastard that I am. Regardless, Gao Di told me the place has a damn good burger and we decided it was a time for me to own up to the $17 dollar price tag and try it out.

I like the Spotted Pig’s setup, didn’t even realize the place was so big until the host brought us to a cozy little table on the second floor. Our waiter seemed a bit curt at the start, he came to our table and asked, “Did you see our specials?” and immediately walked away. He later turned out to be quite friendly. Anyway. Menu: I can’t imagine paying for roasted almonds or marinated olives. Those are the kinds of things you’re supposed to get for free! Am I being cheap right now, or can we all agree on this right now? One of the specials was a giant pork chop for $30 bucks, the couple next to us got that beauty and my eyes widened.

In the interest of “saving money,” Gao Di and I both went for the Chargrilled Burger & Shoestrings (sticking to the plan!), Gao Di assured me that that would be enough food, and as skeptical as I always am I still wanted an appetizer, but cheapness conquered. This burger is beautiful and delicious. This is amazing juicy beef perfection, topped only with roquefort cheese, between two halves of a brioche bun. YUM. The Girl Who Ate Everything describes the shape of the burger as a puck, and she’s totally on point. Along with the burger is a huge mess of delicious “shoestring” fries seasoned with rosemary and salt. These bastards are hard to eat because they’re so thin when you grab a clump they start pointing in all sorts of directions that your mouth just can’t seem to handle.

Anyway, this burger is easily one of the best burgers I’ve had in NYC. The burger is just so juicy and delicious, the texture makes it so easy to eat. A giant bite into the burger – bun+cheese+beef is so fluent it’s as if you’re just experiencing all the burger has to offer – definitely an effortless chomp chomp. I could not get over how the taste of the roquefort cheese went perfectly with the burger. Cooked perfectly medium-rare, this burger is so good on its own I didn’t even bother dipping it in any ketchup. After choking down the burger and fries, I was sufficiently stuffed.

The Spotted Pig offered a special dessert item of rum raisin ice-cream and this ice cream was super rummy and super raisiny (who would have thought?). The serving is surprisingly large at two decent sized scoops – a nice follow-up to a great burger. $8 bucks on this killer, though.

So, all in all, the Spotted Pig is an awesome experience – my body is yearning for another burger at this exact moment. I recommend you go and get it if you can spare yourself the heartache of $17 dollars for a burger. Honestly, it’s worth it, and I know they’ve got me hooked and I’ll be back again.

After reading The Girl Who Ate Everything’s showdown of their burger vs. their (lunch-only) cubano, I know what I’ll be trying next time (although they upped the price from $15 to $17, arghhh!!!) As good as the burger was, I gotta be chowing down some pork at a place called the Spotted Pig. Next time!

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Saluggi’s – Amazing Homey Italian Food in Tribeca

While searching the web for Italian food in our area, Gao Di and I stumbled on the wonder that is Saluggi’s, a humble little restaurant in Tribeca right on Church Street just below Canal. The menu looked good so we decided to hobble on over to check the food out.

This place is amazing, it feels like a nice humble Italian restaurant you would eat at in the suburbs, and I mean that in a good way. Sometimes you need a place that makes you feel like you’re not in the city and this is definitely that.

Moving on to the good stuff – the food rocks. I got Saluggi’s Eggplant Rollatini (pictured above), which is a slight diversion from your average. This fried eggplant is rolled in ham, ricotta, topped with marina, and even comes with a large side plate of pasta. Holy shit, it is delicious!

Gao Di got the Classic Spaghetti & Meatballs. Now, it’s hard to go wrong with this meal, but Saluggi’s spaghetti & meatballs was ridiculously good – they KILLED it. These gigantic homemade meatballs were so tasty with a really nice marinara sauce.

This place reminds me of those small pizza & pasta places I used to go to as a kid, and I love it. We saw a table gnawing on some wings that looked real good. This is definitely the kind of place where I’d want to scarf down tons of wings and beer. Will have to come back and find out if the wings are any good!

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Fine & Raw Chocolate – Bonbon Bar!

Went to the Spring Handmade Cavalcade at Berry Park this past weekend and picked up a bar of chocolate at the Fine & Raw booth. Using fairtrade cacao and low heat techniques, Fine & Raw’s raw chocolate bars are some of the best chocolate I’ve ever had. Raw chocolate is actually supposed to be pretty good for you, with vitamin C, natural fiber, antioxidants, etc. that you lose when chocolate is actually roasted.

We got a bonbon bar, which is dark raw chocolate with a thin line of bonbon truffle in the center. This chocolate is seriously amazing and I recommend you go get some!

Fine & Raw

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Ben’s Braised Pork Belly Cooked in Duck Fat

Last night, my friend Ben Newland cooked an insane pork belly. Cured over the course of a few days and then cooked in lots and lots of duck fat for just about five hours. The results are amazing.

Ben also threw together a delicious cucumber salad, a perfect compliment to the pork. Gao Di and Alexa made delicious vietnamese spring rolls for starters. I made rice. How helpful. This pork is ridiculous, it is basically dripping in fat. Fatty pork is one of the best foods. Ever. More pictures are below for your eye feasting pleasure. This = pork porn. Maybe it’s time for some serious pork detox… just after I eat the last of the leftovers…

OH. MY. GOD. SO GOOD!!! YUMM!!!!!! Thanks, Ben! Now we gotta repeat procedure and make some home-made ramen!

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L’Ecole, French Culinary Institute Meal in Pictures

This is what a meal at the French Culinary Institute’s restaurant, L’Ecole, looks like.

Standouts: Pork belly appetizer was deliciously fatty. Lamb chop was amazing. Beer flight was a great run through different beer flavors.

For photos of the rest of the meal go through the jump… (more…)

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Aurora’s Brunch Special

The other weekend we had some beautiful weather and we decided to hit up Aurora in Williamsburg for brunch. I’d been to both Aurora’s locations before and the Williamsburg one is way better. Aurora in Williamsburg has a nice little semi-outdoor area which is perfect for a nice day. The Soho location is kinda kitschy.

Aurora offers a brunch special that includes a brunch entree with a coffee and a mimosa or bloody mary for an affordable $15 dollars and it’s worth it. I recall Aurora having some amazing sangria and it’s a shame they don’t have it as an option instead of a mimosa or bloody mary on that brunch menu.

This is the Confit d’Anatra, duck confit with bacon hash and poached eggs. It is ridiculously delicious! A hash of two great meats can only mean great things and Aurora does it up real good.

Gao Di got l’Ingles, two eggs any style (in this case fried) with applewood-smoked bacon, sausage, mushrooms, beans and roasted tomato. This bacon is so thick it’s like amazing slices of pork belly. A very savoury meal this one, succulent pork and sausage goes very nicely with all the extra fixin’s.

Mmm. That was a good brunch.

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MoMA’s Modern Bar Room

So the other day I went to see the Tim Burton exhibit at the MoMA but first, we ate at the Modern Bar Room to start things off. The Bar Room has a really nice ambiance – very well lit with a large glass wall facing out to the courtyard.

As you would expect, the food is pricy and the portions are minimal, but the food is really delicious. We had the White Mushroom Soup, which came with toasted chorizo ravioli for dipping. The soup had a really mushroomy flavor (you’d think that’d be an obvious thing for a mushroom soup, but I haven’t had a soup like this with such a strong mushroom flavor up until this point.) At $15 dollars, a small bowl of mushroom soup is a bit much, but hey, we’re at the MoMA right? What can you do. It did fall under the “One” category, which indicated an appetizer portion.

Next we got the Grilled Diver Scallops with roasted beets, Swiss chard and hazelnuts, which fell under the “Two” category, also an appetizer portion at $20 bucks. Maybe the category also represents the two scallops you get in this meal.

That plate is huge! And the meal is oh, so small. The scallops are really good and the sauce is amazing – it seems the sauce would be perfect for a regular meal or a dessert!

The last thing we had was the Duck Confit à l’orange with roasted brussels sprouts and fingerling potatoes. Under the “Third” category, this half-entrée was the most substantial portion coming in at the same price as the scallops, $20.

This duck confit was perfect. The meal was super succulent and went perfect with the brussels sprouts, potatoes and sauce. SO. SO. GOOOD!!!!

All in all, the Bar Room is a great eatery at a bit of a high expense (I am also cheap as hell), but the food is delicious if you want to indulge yourself a little bit while you’re at the MoMA. You’ll leave a bit hungry, though!

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Pies N’ Thighs – Williamsburg Soul Food

Fried chicken seems to be quite popular these days and Pies N’ Thighs just relocated to a spot more accessible to lazy hipsters at Driggs and South 4th st.

I managed to go with a group of 6 sometime shortly after their reopening and needless to say there was a pretty large line. We put our name down and noticed a nice little spot inside where we could escape waiting in the cold. About an hour passes and when we notice some unfamiliar faces getting seated, we ask how much longer the wait will be. It turns out they were only calling names outside (should have guessed), but we are quickly seated after this mishap.

Anyway, once we were sitting in our table looking at the wonderfully drawn menu we were pacified. The menu features “Box” specials all in the reasonable price range of $10. The general consensus was to get the Fried Chicken Box or the Carolina Pulled Pork Box.

The Fried Chicken Box comes with a biscuit and one side. Between us, everyone ended up with either the hushpuppies or mac & cheese as their sides. The mac is pretty good, nothing particularly amazing (although the tabasco sauce was a nice touch), but as always, it’s a great complement to fried chicken and rounds out a meal quite well. The hushpuppies were delicious, nice and crunchy and perfect with the tasty tartar sauce.  The biscuit was kind of disappointingly dry, I think I had better at Popeye’s. The fried chicken is always perfect comfort food and it’s really hard to mess it up. Pies N’ Thighs fried chicken is super good with a nice crispy skin.

This sloppy piece up there is the Carolina Pulled Pork. The pulled pork sandwich was good, maybe a little bit dry, but definitely tasty (and a little messy). The cheese grits were AWESOME. A nice bit of cheddar and tabasco. Look at them! Oh so cheesy.

When it came to ordering our pies our waitress gave us some recommendations, only for us to find out that they were all sold out of the most interesting ones! We ended up ordering what was left, Coconut Cream pie which was actually quite good, but I was blinded by the fact that I would’ve preferred to have tried some of the other ones. Oh well, there is always a day for fried chicken and pies, so I’m sure I’ll be back again.

Didn’t want to get too long-winded, but Pies N’ Thighs is good, and a great spot if you’re searching for soul food in Williamsburg, but if you’re really in the mood for the real deal, head over to Mitchell’s Soul Food in Park Slope/Prospect Heights for some of the best fried chicken you’ve ever had.

Pies N’ Thighs is located at 166 S 4th St and Driggs in Williamsburg

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Calexico Carne Asada – Soho Mexican Food Cart

There’s a lot of hype surrounding the Calexico Carne Asada and I’ve been meaning to go here for a while, but the cart in Soho is only open Monday through Friday, 11:30am to 4:30pm. Last week I finally had the opportunity to check out the Calexico Cart.

I love places with small menus and Calexico offers four different meals available in taco, burrito (or burrito bowl), or ‘rolled quesadilla’ format. We opted for Calexico’s namesake, the Carne Asada, in a burrito bowl and their special of the day, Chili Verde Pulled Pork in a burrito. The pulled pork burrito was tasty but a little uninteresting. The pulled pork seemed a little dry and plain but I will try the Chipotle Pork next time which looks a little more promising. Anyway, on to the real deal of awesomeness…

Calexico’s Carne Asada is sooooo good. Delicious perfectly grilled skirt steak is accompanied quite nicely by rice, beans, cheese, pico de gallo, and avocado crema (creamy guacamole). Squeeze that lime over the whole thing to complete the blast of flavor and Calexico definitely lives up to the hype. Look at that picture – YUM. I only wish they gave you utensils.

The Calexico Carne Asada cart can be found M-F during lunch hours at the corner of Wooster & Prince St.