el quinto pino + craftbar

usually i stay away from restaurant reviews because they're so subjective. i like my food a little more salty than most, love anything cured, and am a sucker for a jelly doughnut. grace loves things i would never order (scallops, for one), and i'm not a savvy enough eater to judge high quality no matter my preference. i'll always prefer in-n-out over this place, for example. but once in a while i come across a dish really extraordinary and immediately i know i've found something that transcends my biased palate. this was the case recently with the two items below:

spanish chicharrón at el qunito pino
i can describe it no better than this flickr description of "bag o' bacon." warm, melty fat sandwiched by salty, crunchy skin; it must be what angels eat to watch movies. because only in heaven could you eat this and not immediately fear for your shortened life expectancy. okay, maybe you'd expect me to like this, but trust me, like doesn't even start to cover how i feel about these friends.

house-made ravioli, goat cheese, medjool dates,
hen of the woods at craft bar
there is no meat in this dish, and i still ordered it, which is usually a sign something might be extremely good. (oh, hen of the woods are mushrooms! confusing, right?) while looking at the menu i kept thinking "goat cheese + mushrooms= good, goat cheese + dates= good, mushrooms + dates= yuck, what is going on here?!?" i am happy to report that what is going on is great. the sweetness of the dates plays off the earthy flavor of the mushrooms, and the goat cheese ties it all together with tang. friendly for vegetarians and meat-eaters alike.

hill country

hill country is justin timberlake's new bbq place in new york city, and that alone is enough to make one duly wary. a celebrity restaurant plus regional food? remember britney's failed NYLA? however, miraculously, hill country has been getting really good reviews on the chowhound boards so my friends and i planned a trip. i think some of us were secretly hoping to see JT too.


no JT, but the food was good. the beef and pork ribs were moist and falling-off-the-bone tender. the brisket came in two varieties: moist and lean, both of which were moist and flavorful. the lean variety didn't have the ribbons of fat though. the bbq sauce, which i learned later on was taboo, was a good balance of tomato sweetness and vinegar. the sides were good too, but not as good as the meat. the baked beans were just okay, but the mac and cheese was rightfully rich and gooey.



i think we all agreed we'd go back if it weren't for the high prices. the ordering process is complicated; you order your items from different stations and they put a sticker on your card. at the end, you show your card to tally up the bill. i inadvertently spent $31 dollars on dinner, partially because it was hard to tell how much things were going to cost before they were weighed and stickered. next time, i will be more cautious about asking the price beforehand. everyone can still learn how to manage their money better...!

momofuku ko

food blogging is back in full force- i know you were tired of all that money stuffs. i've been cooking up a storm lately as well as doing my part to revitalize the economy by eating out.

despite the fact that it's only april, i already know my dinner at momofuku ko will go down as the dinner of the year. it might even take the cake for best dinner ever, at least until someone takes me to per se. (any takers?)

if you haven't already read tina's whole review, read it here. she has amazing pictures, and grace didn't get some shots of my favorite dishes, like the fluke sashimi and the prettier, more sophisticated twin of mcdonalds' apple pie, accented by red miso paste.

after reading how hard it was to get reservations at momofuku ko, i consider myself to be unduly blessed at being able to dash off a quick email to tina in response to her chowhound post in order to secure a seat. poor frank bruni.


in our party of 4, there were varying permutations of agreement on favorites. i loved the deep fried braised short ribs, but tina didn't. grace adored the pineapple sorbet and i thought it was just okay. but i think we all agreed on this dish.


coddled egg with soubise onions, sweet potato vinegar, hackleback caviar, potato chips, chervil

i know it sounds complicated, and possibly incongruous, but it was lovely. the golden savory yolk, salty caviar and crispy potato chips all worked together, none overpowering the other.

we had 11 courses in all; each of them memorable. it was a surprise of an evening and as i walked out of the restaurant feeling stuffed and content, i was reminded of the immense luck that went into getting this reservation. a great reason to be browsing the internets while at work...

franny's

amazingly, down the block from my apartment just happens to be one of the best casual places to eat in all of new york. and i'm not alone in this assessment either. in the past month, i've been to franny's three times and each time the menu was almost entirely different, due to their commitment to farm-fresh produce, but it was consistently very thoughtful and delicious.

while it is billed as an upscale pizza place, i don't often order pizza. it is good pizza, of course, but nyc has lots of great pizza to offer and i'd rather go to a place like grimaldi's or difara's if i want the real pizza experience. also, i'm not a huge pizza fan. what is really remarkable about franny's are the smaller appetizer dishes, which are unique and inspiring.

recent dishes i've ordered: (just paraphrasing here- the menu sounds much fancier)

salad of bitter greens with an anchovy vinaigrette
potato croquettes (the server explained that they looked like dunkin' donuts' munchkins!)
beets with peppers, walnuts and cheese (which i'm attempting to re-create at home)
coddled egg on crostino with bottarga (bottarga is dried fish roe shavings)
homemade pancetta on crostino with french butter
vanilla panna cotta with saba (like an italian flan)

yes, all of it was lovely, even the salad. i'm not a fan of bitter foods, so i was surprised when i liked this. the only downside to franny's is that it is a little expensive for my budget- around $30 per person for a meal.

last time i was there was on a six-person excursion (as the party liked to call it) and we had a hell of a time figuring out the bill. below was our attempt. one of the worst feelings is going out to dinner with friends and feeling like you paid more than you should have. this elaborate tally, however dorky, ensured that no one had to feel cheated.

Franny's

modern beat

it is restaurant week here in nyc and that can mean one of two things:

1. delicious, quality, fancy food at a fraction of the cost

2. bad, boring, overpriced food that still isn’t worth it

blue ribbon brasserie is a great example of the second; only three options on a three course menu, so i had no choice but to get the exact same meal as my dining partner- which, all those serious eaters out there know, is a cardinal sin of eating out. furthermore, the three options were about the most boring and bland things i've had in a while- caesar salad, roast chicken and chocolate cake. i know, i know, it is my fault for going to a place that prides itself on "home-cooking" for restaurant week when i could have made a better version of that meal at home.

well, i learned my lesson because after that fiasco my taste in restaurant week has improved. now the first restaurant on my list is always the modern, which is the apex of restaurant week hospitality. first of all, there are at least six (SIX!) choices for each of the courses. second, they are taken from the regular menu, not created cheaply to serve the hungry hoi polloi that only eat out at fancy places during restaurant week. and third, they don't give you the regular menu and force you to offer the inevitability embarrassing "ummm, excuse me, i'm here for restaurant week" request- no they just hand you one menu- the ultimate in restaurant democratization.

if all that weren't enough, the food is good. really good. like seriously-i-would-actually pay-the-regular-prices-if-i-could-afford-them good. i had sweetbreads, which is the culinary euphemism for the thymus gland of a calf and something that would usually totally gross me out (i'm not that squeamish, but anything that needs repeated soakings to drain the blood out of it, i'm not totally stoked about). however, paired with my mushroom gnocchi, they were the perfect (albeit spongy) complement to the rich pillowy gnocchi. the artic char tartare was a nice departure from the requisite tuna tartare, and although it could have used one more squeeze of lemon, was very fresh, light and satisfying. the desserts were even better. grace had the weirdly incongruous sounding salted caramel parfait with coconut tapioca and mango sorbet, which was the surprise winner of the night, and i had what was essentially a nutella napoleon, but was called a "hazelnut dacquoise", which obviously made it taste better. it was a lovely, luxurious meal all for under $40- always a winner in my book.


the one downside, which actually turned out great, was that the reservations were at nine thirty. this meant quite a lot of time to kill in midtown. if you don't have money, or like to drink, this basically is a recipe for disaster, until i realized that the NYPL (god bless it!) had a kerouac exhibit up with the original scroll of "on the road". i'm not sure if i should be ashamed or not, but "on the road" was my favorite book in high school and still ranks up there for me as meaningful literature. as i was walking around the exhibit, seeing all the original photos of which i had postcard facsimiles up in my high school locker, i just kept thinking how incredibly exited my 15 yr old self would have been. she probably would have found a way to thwart the over-zealous guard who kicked us out 10 minutes before the posted closing time so he could go have a smoke. she probably would have tried to camp out overnight in the room, actually, like a mixed-up files of mrs. basil e. frankweiler for teenagers. now, the beats are at best only marginally part of my life, but it was nice to revisit those feelings I had of camaraderie with this motley, desperate crew. it reminded me what a long, long way i've come. and coming home to a house full of crazy kittens who apparently forgot how to use the litter box reminded me how much further i have to go.

The Modern

Kerouac Exhibit at the NYPL