Nolita House

Hi, Evan here.  This post does not reflect a terribly recent eating adventure, but, still within our six-month trial of this whole thing.

Nolita House is a restaurant in, of course, NoLIta (North of Little Italy).  It's a small-ish place on Houston, with a lot of soul.  I feel compelled to write about this place, because it was one of the first places Spring and I went to together.  It was actually only our second real date, and I was super classy and spilled her sangria all over the table, and my shoes.  Yes, even back then I was amazingly smooth.  Anyway, we have been back there periodically, and went most recently about a month or so ago.

We've actually only had the brunch there, so we can't vouch for the lunch/dinner menu, but let me tell you - for what you pay, it's a great place.  They have your standard brunch dishes; eggs, french toast, eggs benedict, etc (you can look at their menu, here).  One of my favorite things about this place, is that during brunch hours, there's a bluegrass band playing -- you know, upright bass, some guitars and a banjo, singing songs about love and crocodiles and such.  Also, you get a free drink with your brunch order!

Up until our past visit to Nolita House, we've never had to wait.  Even this past time, they said twenty minutes, and we were called in under ten.  It's a tight fit, and sometimes the wait staff takes a bit of time bringing water and such, but in my opinion, the atmosphere and food make it easy to overlook any of its shortcomings.  I'd probably say it's one of my favorite egg dishes in nyc (I get the Florentine).

Not much to say about this one, except I think it's a gem.  I'd give it a 4 out of 5 (partially for sentimental reasons, but still the food is worth it).  Have a visit, listen to the music, enjoy some eggs and a free drink, and enjoy.

Nolita House

47 E Houston Street

New York, NY 10012

212-625-1712

Review: Peanut Butter & Co., NYC

Hi all, it's Evan.  I haven't actually contributed to this thing yet, other than accompanying Spring to the meals.  Anyone who knows me, knows it doesn't matter where we go, because I'll pretty much eat anything you put in front of me.  However, I've been able to try some really fun places through this adventure.  So, without further ado, Peanut Butter & Co.

I actually read about this place in one of Spring's magazines (Newsweek, New York, or something like that).  The article described a two-sided peanut butter jar, which makes it impossible to waste peanut butter, because you could open it from the other side and scoop it out (genius, in my eyes)!  The article also mentions that the company has a storefront that sells PBJ sandwiches.  Spring and I decide we would go when we got back from vacation, but, we made it happen tonight.  Like we have in the past, we dragged Whitney along with us (Hi, Whitney).

I'll start by saying that this is a restaurant that really makes you go nomnomnom (literally).  Peanut butter by itself is a food that crowds your mouth with sticky goodness, but add honey, bananas, and whole wheat bread, and it's even more so.  Spring and I ordered the Elvis and Cinnamon Raisin Swirl sandwiches, and split them.  The girl behind the counter who took our order seemed to have a PhD in peanut butter, so we took her advice in ordering these.  Whitney got something else, but I forget what at this point.

Spring and my sandwiches came out pretty quickly; 10 minutes later or so.  Whitney's... not so much.  Her's arrived only after she approached someone behind the counter, who apparently admitted to them forgetting about it.  I believe Spring said the guy was "too busy being fabulous" to make the sandwich.  He was something, that guy, but I don't know about fabulous.

Once we all had our sandwiches, we started eating.  I don't think either one of us finished the whole sandwich, though.  Not because they weren't good (they were!) but because it was just too much peanut buttery essence - although, it is a peanut butter shop, so that's assumed.

I had planned to give Peanut Butter & Co. 3 out of 4 stars, but Spring and I compromised to 2.75 stars out of 4.  The sandwiches were good (really good, in my opinion) but, if you screw up a PBJ, you should reconsider life.  The place was also pretty cheap, about $5 or $6 per sandwich.  That's pretty cheap for eating out in NYC, but again, for $5 you could buy an entire loaf of bread and multiple bottles of peanut butter.  Last, they forgot about Whitney's sandwich.  That would have been my sole reason for knocking the place down a star, but I can agree to the .25 knock further down.

In any case, check it out, it's a tasty place.

Peanut Butter & Co.

240 Sullivan Street

New York, NY 10012

(212) 677-3995

Review: Lookout Hill Smokehouse

Frequent NomNomNomNYC diner Whitney had seen reviews for a barbecue place in Park Slope that she was dying to check out. Ever since Evan started frequenting Hill Country, our safe restaurant, he is apparently a connoisseur on all things grilled, so he was up for this. And since it meant that I didn't have to scrounge up a meal in the kitchen, I was definitely game.

Ok, first off, this place needs to figure out what it wants to be. You walk in, and it looks like some crazy futuristic spa from Sweden or something. Very sleek, very modern, kind of luxe. And then taped to wall are some pieces of butcher paper with the market prices of meat handwritten on them. It just didn't match. And that bothered Evan a lot.

Secondly, we asked to sit outside. WTF is up with the outside seating? It's basically a long porch on the side of the building, with a single sided bench and table that looks out to people walking by, and you all have to sit side by side. You feel like sitting ducks, all in a row, totally on display for people smart enough to not eat here. Not good.

Thirdly.....this place only has barbecue if you don't know what good barbecue is. My brisket, while not the lean variety, was about a 1/3 fat, which is NOT the way it should be. It was also really soggy and made my stomach hurt. The sausage was not sausage. It was kielbasa....which is fine if you're dining at some fine Polish establishment, but not a barbecue place. The sides were all pretty eh and uninspiring, except for the halfway decent mashed yams and the deviled eggs.

Guys, I don't even know what else to say here. This place is just not good. If you want good barbecue, and for a much cheaper price!, go to Hill Country in Manhattan. Don't eat this garbage.

This place with the long ass name gets 1 out of 4 stars. It only gets that one star for a waitress who was fairly knowledgeable and the half decent sides. It also loses a half star for it's lame website, which is basically just a front for you to send them an email. If you go to it, write them and tell them they suck.

Lookout Hill Smokehouse
230 5th Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11215
718.399.2161

www.lookouthillsmokehouse.com

Review: Patois, Brooklyn

A couple of weekends ago, Evan, Suzannah, and I decide to make brunch plans. Suz is a die-hard Manhattanite, but every once in a while she can be convinced to take that smelly old public transportation out to visit us peasants in Brooklyn. I'd bookmarked a snazzy sounding place on Yelp that sounded promising for brunch. I polled the others and they said, sure, so Patois it was.

First off, the people at this place are the most forgiving EVER when it comes to reservations. Here's what happened:

Phone Call #1: In which I discovered that reservations can only be made for parties of four and above, but am helpfully told that if we come early, we'll be fine.

Email #1: In which I tell this to Evan and Suz, and Suz says she'll rope her roommate and another friend into coming.

Phone Call #2: In which I call Patois and make a reservation for five.

Email #2: In which Suz says no-go on party members 4 and 5, so we're back to 3.

Phone Call #3: In which I call and explain this to Patois, and the lovely lady on the other end says, don't worry about! They'll hold our reservation anyways.

Phone Call #4: In which Suz calls me five minutes before our reservation and says she's running late....30 minutes late.

So when Suz got there, they were quite lovely and sat us pretty quickly anyhow. So this place definitely gets points for being accommodating, even with difficult people like us. On to the food!

I am a sucker for freebies, and this place had a couple that were particularly noteworthy. Free unlimited Mimosas, and a free basket of breads and pastries that were to die for. The Mimosas were good, when we were able to flag the waitress down to refill our glasses. The bread basket never showed up! So I can't comment on that.

We all ordered typical brunch fare that was eh so-so. Not bad, not WOW GOOD, but passable. And that's all there really was to say. The menu for dinner looked VERY appealing there, so I'm sure we'll eventually go back and try that.

The place itself was very cute and homey-looking, and they seemed to have a nice garden in the back.

Patois gets 3 stars out of 4 stars. Mainly because they were so gosh-darn nice about all the confusion, and because it's fun to say the name. PAH-TWA! VOILA! PAMPLEMOUSSE!

Patois
255 Smith St
(between Degraw St & Douglass St)
Brooklyn, NY 11231
718.855.1535

Review: Risotteria, Manhattan

Fellow NomNomNomNYC reader, Eddie (hi Eddie!) invited Evan and I out for grub on Friday night. The only catch is, Eddie is allergic to everything. She's probably even allergic to you. But anyhow, she's got a favorite place that she goes to that serves up a gluten-free menu and since Evan and I are much more flexible in our dining habits, we went where she wanted. And this ended up being a good thing!

We went to Risotteria in the West Village, and man, it was pretty awesome. I had no clue was risotta was (soupy rice with stuff in it, like a savory rice pudding), and was honestly a bit skeptical as I eyed our neighbor's oatmeal-looking plate of it. But then the delicious breadsticks arrived and I was a-ok. We decided to go family-style and get three dishes and then just share them all, which I recommend. I got some sort of risotto with calmari in it, Evan's had green beans in it, and Eddie got a pizza with ham on it.

Readers, we couldn't finish our food. It was so good and so filling that there was enough of it left for Eddie to pack it up as leftovers and take home. There was tons of flavor in the food without being overwhelming, and it was easy to share. I imagine that this place is comfort food to the gluten-afflicted. The place has a fabulous selection of gluten-free wines and beers, and the Coca Cola comes in a little vintage glass bottle. We didn't try the desserts, but I'm sure that they're great as well.

The place was priced reasonably enough that you could come back as often as you'd like, and the staff working at the time was very sweet and helpful. They even pull the table out for you to sit down, which is nice because then you don't have to do that whole awkward squeezing-yourself-through-the-crack-in-the-tables things.

So Risotteria, you get 4 out of 4 stars, just because you were yummy. Good job!

Risotteria
270 Bleecker St
between Cornelia St & Morton St)
New York, NY 10014
212.924.6664

www.risotteria.com

Review: DuMont Burger, Brooklyn

Last Thursday (I KNOW, I KNOW, I'm so behind on this), Evan and I jointly came to the opinion that it would be a good night to eat out. Evan had to move his car anyhow, due to the lovely alternate-side parking in the neighborhood, so we decided to pick a locale elsewhere. Not really feeling like investigating a band spankin new restaurant, we went to an old fave, DuMont Burger in Williamsburg.

DuMont is this fancy French bistro sort of place right off the L Lorimer stop who apparently had these awesome burgers on their menu next to the duck confit. People kept coming in just for the burgers, so the fine people at DuMont opened a location just for them on Bedford Avenue. It's a teeny-tiny little place that they somehow manage to pack the people in by eliminating tables and chairs, and instead using small bartops and stools. The place is very warm and cozy and dimly lit. Sometimes you have to wait a long time for a table, but this time it was only about five minutes.

Everytime we go, we get the same thing. The mini burger (not so mini!), fries or a salad, and a beer. I was on that same train this time around, but Evan got the skirt steak sandwich. This place is like a fancier, more refined Shake Shack. The burgers and fries are equally delicious, but they have a more gourmet taste to them. The pickles are especially nice, with a very sweet yet tangy taste. I seem to remember the bartender telling us one time that they make the pickles themselves. I could be imagining that conversation, or I'm just super gullible, but there you have it.

So anyhow, the burger: Great. Evan's skirt steak: Pretty good as well. Whatever house dressing that comes on the salad: Light and very yummy. The beers: Always nice.

Short and sweet, the DuMont Burger is a consistently great place to go eat. 4 out of 4 stars, just because.

DuMont Burger
314 Bedford Ave
(Cross Street: Between S 1st Street and S 2nd Street)
Brooklyn, NY 11211
718.384.6128

http://dumontrestaurant.com/dburger.html

Top 5 Chain Places You Can't Find in NYC

All of this reviewing of NYC food makes me miss all those wonderfully crappy chain places down south that haven't quite made it north yet. Here's my Top 5.

5) Cracker Barrel. This one is really for Evan, who really really loves the place. These Southern cooking/general store hybrids can be found along major highways and interstates, ready to serve you up some fresh chicken fried steak, grits, and baked cinammon apples. While you wait for your food, you can play with the little pegboard games. After you're done eating, stop in the general store and buy yourself some religious paraphernalia and 10 cent candy sticks. The closest one we've found is in New Jersey, which we once went out of our way to visit on a road trip to Baltimore.

www.crackerbarrel.com

4) Chick-Fil-A. The creator of the chicken sandwich. I think that the pieces of chicken at this place are actually fried in crack, which is why they are so addictive. It's kind of cheating to put it on this list as a NYC location actually DOES exisit....but it's in an NYU dorm. To get to it, you must breeze in past the security guard and walk with a purpose into the dining hall, but only after you've glued a look of moneyed contempt on your place that says "My parents might pay for my tuition, apartment, and cocaine habit, but I can buy my own Chick-Fil-A, thankyouverymuch." The NYU place does in a pinch, but nothing beats a real brick and mortar freestanding location. Oh, and they're all closed on Sundays for religious reasons, so plan accordingly.

www.chick-fil-a.com

3) Whataburger. When Evan and I took an impromptu trip down to Texas last fall, I forced my vegetarian sister to drive us to the nearest Whataburger on the way home from the airport. Upon getting his burger and unwrapping it from the pleasant goldenrod colored paper, Evan exclaimed "THIS is a REGULAR SIZED burger?!" You see, the regular sized burger at Whataburger (which is pronounced "waterburger", by the way) is the size of a newborn child's head. It's the best fastfood hamburger known to man. Whataburger is also the home of the world's best breakfast food, the so-hot-you'll-blister-your-lip fried apple pie. This heavenly chain with the distinctive triangle-shaped building began in Corpus Christi and is open 24-hours, a fact that I frequently abused in college.

www.whataburger.com

2) Casa Ole. Say what you want, but the tex-mex at this delightfully crappy chain is better than ANY tex-mex that i've had in NYC. So what if it all tastes a bit microwaved? The mysterious green sauce that you get with the chips and salsa for free is the one thing that I MUST eat whenever I'm home, and where else can you get 99 cent margaritas every Tuesday? You could plausibly get a full dinner with two margaritas and still leave a nice tip for $10 at this place. It's also always either attached to a mall, or kind of hovering in the parking lot, so it's a nice break from shopping. I ate many a meal at Casa Ole in college and can still sing the theme song when prompted. In high school, my hooligan friends and I went at least once a month and lied and said it was someone's birthday, so that we could hear the birthday song about chimichangas and get the free trans fat cinammon and sugar chimichanga creation. I'm pretty sure they were on to us, but we never got turned down.

www.casaole.com

1) Sonic. Oh Sonic. You continue to tease me by running your advertisements nationally, despite the fact that you are nowhere near NYC. The burgers and fries at this drive-up establishment are quite tasty, but here are the three real reasons that people go to Sonic: Cheese-tots, Ched-R-Peppers, and the drinks. You could probably come up with a million different drink combos at this place, but I always order a cherry limeade slush. When we went on that trip to Texas, we were there for about three days, and visited Sonic twice. My small hometown had THREE Sonics, but the one by the mall was the best because the waitresses wore rollerskates to take your order, and then deliver it to your car. I really love this place.

www.sonicdrivein.com

Runner Ups:

Taco Bueno. Kind of like Taco Bell, but a bit fresher. The Mexi-Dips, oh my god.

Taco Cabana. Mexican fastfood, really only noteworthy because they sold booze and were open 24-hours.

Wienerschnitzel. Really cheap fantastic hot dog place. My dad and I like to go and get kraut dogs here.

Review: Junior's, Brooklyn

Today Evan declared, "Tonight is Date Night!" The place, Junior's in Brooklyn. Since I work in the armpit of NYC (Times Square), I'd been to the Manhattan location, but never the original. Evan, and his parents, and his grandparents, all spent lots of time at Junior's through the years, so we hopped on the Q, and away we went.

First off, I'm super impressed with the guys who seat you there. They've got one at the front door telling you where to go, another who asks you how many and then hands you off to another guy who walks you part of the way, and then hands you off to another who gets you to your table. It was like a wonderfully choreographed dance just to get you to sit down. Seriously, awesome. And no wait on a Saturday night! Double awesome.

Secondly, the menu at Junior's....awesomely overwhelming. After eating lots of homemade crap at home (and at the Wing Wagon) and feeling like a greasy pig, I'd decided that I need to get a salad or something remotely healthy. HA! That resolve quickly when out the window. Evan ordered the goulash with egg noodles (he'd been talking about this dish from the very moment we decided earlier in the day where we were going to eat) and a salad. I got a roasted half chicken, stuffed with rice, with some collard greens, baked potato, and a salad. We each got a couple of beers, which were fantastically priced at about $4 a pop. We decided right away that after we were done with our meals, we'd order a cheesecake.

Well folks, that slice of cheesecake never happened. We were STUFFED. After the delicious cornbread they give you, plus my meal (which was so giant I could only eat half of), I was not into dessert. Evan finished all of his meal and looked green in the face, but happy. Super fantastic awesome homecooked style food. The collard greens get a special mention because they were just that good. Steamed and fresh looking, not all gross and mashed like faux-southern restaurants usually do. My leftovers got packed up for dinner tomorrow, and it will honestly probably be able to feed both of us.

I really don't feel like I need to go into our experience at Junior's any more. The place is a legend. Everyone knows what it is. It's survived this long for a reason. So just go there! 4 out of 4 stars.

Junior's
386 Flatbush Avenue Extension at Dekalb Avenue
Brooklyn, New York 11201
718.852.5257

www.juniorscheesecake.com

Review: Wing Wagon, Brooklyn

The other night, I decided that I didn't feel like cooking. Evan's cooking knowledge begins and ends with eggs, so the only option for food was to go out. With no particular place in mind, we jumped in the car and headed up Flatbush Avenue. That's when we saw it.....THE WING WAGON.

I have been craving Buffalo wings for a while now, and beyond a failed trip to the massively overcrowded Croxley's in NYC, hadn't gotten to fulfill this craving. The Wing Wagon looks like your ordinary storefront to-go establishment. A variety of fried items are on the menu for you to choose from. We ordered a batch of 20 Buffalo wings (hot variety), a side of grilled veggies, some sweet potato fries, and a drink, all for about $20. We paid, and then went to sit down and wait. And wait. And wait. Maybe I'm just snotty, but I feel like if you're making people pay at a counter, you're a fast food establishment. And this food was definitely not fast. Also, this really obnoxious music was playing. It was like reggae music on speed. Seriously, it had beats and everything. If you were to dance to it, you'd basically have to quickly hop up and down super quickly while flailing your arms about.

When we finally got our food, we dug in for what was undoubtedly the messiest meal ever....but it was GOOD. The wings weren't super spicy, but just right. They were big enough that we weren't able to polish off the 20 between us. The sweet potato fries....perfection. Lightly salted. Great with ketchup. Best I've had in a while. The grilled veggies were also quite tasty...a nice quasi-healthy option for the place. And as a nice bonus, they give you some of those little wet napkin thingies and trust me, you need them. What a messy delicious meal.

A downside: I'm not sure the place is a fabulous eat-in establishment. There's a few sad looking little tables, but 95% of the other customers who came in took their grease and carbs and ran. They deliver, and we might just do that next time. There's really no dignified way to eat wings, so you might as well do it in the comfort of your own home.

Wing Wagon gets 3 out of 4 stars. It serves it's cheap comfort food purpose quite well, including the belly ache a couple of hours later.

Wing Wagon
351 Flatbush Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11238
718.398.0501

Review: Pacifico, Brooklyn

I feel like I need to explain to you guys why we haven't been eating out as much lately. We got a puppy around the same time this blog started, and that dog SUCKS THE ENERGY OUT OF US. Everything pretty much revolves around the schedule of the dog, at least until she's slightly better trained. That said, I told Evan that we NEEDED to go out and have a Date Night. No worrying about the dog. No eating in the apt. So I scoured my usual review website (www.yelp.com) and found a Mexican place not too far from our apartment that had decent to good reviews, and most importantly, had outdoor seating. Evan approved, and last night we hopped on over to Pacifico.

Just like with BBQ, I am a snob about Mexican food. Specifically Tex-Mex. Cali-Mex, ehhh, it's ok, but some good Tex-Mex makes Spring a happy camper every time. So we get there and it's a fairly big place with lots of indoor seating a nice-sized patio. The hostess tells us it'll be an hour wait, so we're like, ok that's fine. We settle down on a bench for a bit with the intention to wind down out there for a half hour, and then move into the bar for the second half hour. About 20 minutes into our wait, the hostess says there's a table open in the front room by the big open windows that we could have right then. Even though the goal was to eat outside, this was close enough, so we took it. By the way, the hostess was great. Tons of people were waiting, and she was totally efficient. A+ for the hostess.

Right off the bat, there were a few small problems with the drinks. I wanted a frozen margarita with salt and Evan wanted some Belgian beer. No frozens, and they stopped carrying that beer. Ok, that's fine, so I got one on the rocks with salt, and Evan settled for another beer. His beer was fine, and my margarita was decent to good, but they were VERY stingy with the salt. Worst salting job on the rim ever, like a handful of the little grains. Oh well.

The menu was interesting. It was like they were trying too hard to be creative. We ordered a small guacamole with chips to start, and it was actually very good. For dinner, I ordered beef-olive (what? I'd never heard of this before either...) enchiladas with a side of rice and beans, and Evan stuck with the tried and true beef fajitas. I asked our flighty hipster waiter what sort of sauce was on the enchiladas and he said red sauce. Ok, fine by me. So the food comes out and here's the first things I noticed.

1) The rice and beans were white rice and black beans. It was like being at Chipotle. Not Tex-Mex, and quite honestly, they weren't even very good.

2) The enchilada sauce must have been on the same strike that the salt was, because there was BARELY any sauce. Those suckers were pretty dried out.

3) Evan didn't get a "junk plate" with his fajitas. You know, that plate that comes with the sour cream, cheese, and all the veggie fixins. Instead, it looked like they'd just dumped a bunch pico de gallo on top of the meat, and Evan had to flag down a busser for some sour cream. No clue where our waiter was.

The only thing I semi-liked about the food was that it was greasy. I hate when you go to a Mexican place and the food is all pristine and healthy looking. I'm in the the camp that Mexican food should be greasy and wonderful and total comfort food. This food wasn't wonderful or comfortable, but it definitely had the grease.

When we finally got our bill, we noticed that the waiter had taken some liberties with billing us on stuff. We'd asked for the small guac and chips, and had been charged for the large one. He'd also overcharged us for the drinks. All in all it came to about $47. We didn't argue it because that would have meant flagging down our smug waiter, and that would have been difficult to impossible. Evan and I both agreed that while we left full and everything was decent, it probably wasn't worth a return trip. Unless we were just sitting on the patio eating guac and drinking.

Here's what I think is the difference between Cali-Mex and Tex-Mex. Cali-Mex is heavy on the fresh veggies, not so greasy. Tex-Mex is heavy on the cheese and sauce, grease galore. This place was such a mess because there were no fresh veggies to be seen, no sauce, yet tons of grease. What would you call this genre of Mexican food, then? I'm going to go with NY-Mex, because this seems to be how ALL NYC Mexican food is: Sub-Standard. Please feel free to recommend a place to me and proves me wrong.

Evan and I decided that this place was going to be a 2.5 out of 4. However, the more I think about my dried out enchiladas and the overcharging and the lack of salt, I'm going with a 2 out of 4 stars. Sorry Pacifico.

Pacifico
269 Pacific Street
Brooklyn, NY 11201
718.935.9090

Review: The Shake Shack, Manhattan

Evan and I are sitting around the Union Square dog run, watching our Chihuahua, Hazel, try to covertly sniff some butts, when Evan announces that he really wants a hamburger. We brainstorm a bit as to where we can get a burger in the city that will allow Hazel inside, when it hits me! We are a mere nine blocks from the mecca of burgers and outdoor seating, the Shake Shack! So the three of head north up to Madison Square Park.

The Shake Shack is notorious for the long lines of people waiting to buy up cheap delicious food. We get there and I estimate that it's only a 20-minute wait or so, and that was pretty accurate. We managed to snag a table under one of the giant wonderful outdoor heaters, and the Hazel-beast licked up crumbs off the ground for a bit until finally settling down for a nap in her carrier. I LOVE eating outside. The place gives you one of those awesome little buzzer thingies that vibrates when your food is ready, so that you can go and amass your collection of ketchup packets and napkins while your food is cooking. So after about 15 minutes of waiting with our buzzer, the thing finally went off and FINALLY we could eat.

We both got hamburgers (mine with cheese) and they were DELICIOUS. I think it's the best burger I've ever had. Evan says it's up there for him. It's the perfect size, not too big, not too small. Evan, who is in possession of a black hole for a stomach, says it could have been a bit bigger. The burgers come with lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, and onions, and it's all very fresh and crisp. No sad looking wilted lettuce in sight. We also ordered a side of fries, which were perfectly crisp and only slightly greasy.

But the main thing....if you're going to come to the Shake Shack, you've got to get a shake. We decided to split a chocolate shake, and it was divine! Neither of us really cares for milk chocolate, and we were in luck because the cocoa in this shake had a distinctly dark chocolate taste to it. Not disgustingly sweet, and the consistency of the thing was thick, but not too thick that you couldn't use a straw. A perfect milkshake.

With all of that food, plus a beer and a large soda, it all came to about $22 (super cheap for Manhattan-land). Dear readers, I have to admit.....it's going to be hard to not go to this place again for the experiment. As it's all outdoor seating, the place is only open when the temperature is bearable....and here we are, just hitting Spring. This place could be the true test! What do you think, should we make an allowance for the Shake Shack?

4 out of 4 stars. I love the Shake Shack.

The Shake Shack
Madison Square Park, 5th and 23rd
Manhattan
212.889.660

www.shakeshacknyc.com

Review: The Farm on Adderley, Brooklyn

Last night the boyfriend's parents and brother came over to celebrate some stuff and it was decided that instead of me laboring in the kitchen to produce something that probably wouldn't be very good, we'd head out and let someone else do the cooking. I'd found this place online called The Farm on Adderley that, despite the semi-pretentious name, had gotten some pretty great reviews. So we made a reservation, and then later we piled in the car (we're bad New Yorkers, always driving around) and headed over.

This place was really cute looking. It looks like it got lost somewhere between Park Slope and Manhattan and ended up in central Brooklyn. There's a couple of tables at the front with a very nice bar, and then it looked like the restaurant extended quite a ways back. They put the five of us at one of the round tables at the front next to a floor to ceiling window. Like climate controlled sidewalk seating! I started getting a feeling once I saw the menu.... Lots of stuff that I had no clue about what it was (all the funny sounding stuff was fish). A few basic things gussied up with some fresh herbs and rice and stuff, like chicken and steak. We ordered a couple of appetizers and settled back.

When the appetizers came out, that's when I knew it....this was FANCY PEOPLE FOOD! The type of food where the appetizer is barely ANYTHING and you're like, wait a minute! We ordered some artichokes and mozzarella and each arrived with sort of a piddly little amount of food on the plate. It was good, but still. When the entrees came, they were very pretty. The type of presentation where all of the food is piled on top of itself on a plate and some green stuff sprinkled on top. It was good too, but I always feel like a slob when I eat at places like that.

So about the food itself. It was good, but it wasn't fantastic. My chicken was extraordinarily chewy, yet well seasoned. Evan's brother got some sort of fettucini dish that looked like it had already started to congeal by the time it got to the table. Everything that we ordered was perfectly fine....but it wasn't super special. I will say that it all tasted very very fresh. I don't know where all the ingredients come from but I'd be willing to bet it's all locally grown.

The waitress was nice and pleasant enough, although I saw a quick glimmer of GET OUT PEASANTS! flash across her face when we asked her what char was (it's some sort of glacier fish or something, who knows). She and the bussers were very good about bringing stuff out quickly and keeping our table clear of dirty dishes. Good service goes a loooong way with me, so that was good. The boyfriend's folks picked up the bill so I don't know how much it was (thanks guys!). The entrees ranged from about $14 to $24.

I think that this place would be a good place to go to if you're in Brooklyn and you want to demonstrate what an in-the-know and hip, yet sensitive, Brooklyn dweller you are. I don't think I would come from another borough to eat here, unless I was just following the lead of someone else. It wouldn't be on the front of my brain or anything. The place was packed, so I guess it's fairly popular. Anyhow, check it out if you're in the area, I guess.

This place gets 3 out of 4 stars. They did everything right....but it was still just ok. Kind of like vanilla...it's good and all and always tastes nice and will do in a pinch but it's VANILLA, you know?

The Farm on Adderley
1108 Cortelyou Road
Brooklyn, NY 11218
718.287.3101

www.thefarmonadderley.com

Review: L&B Spumoni Gardens, Brooklyn

Tonight we drove out to God Knows Where in Brooklyn (near Brighton Beach? Coney Island? Bensonhurst? Somewhere out there!) to eat at the L&B Spumoni Gardens. I have to admit....in Texas, Italian food is not a big deal. Want some pasta? You go to the Olive Garden. I have no clue how to cook my own pasta sauce and always feel unique and cook-ish when I mix in some Italian seasoning into my Newman's Own tomato sauce. Evan had been to this place before and wanted to go back, so the two of us, plus Whitney, headed out.

GUYS, the food at this place, OH MY GOD. We knew it was a good sign when we showed up and there was a ton of people out front, and all of them seemed like locals. The place has what appeared to be three different attached buildings. One was the restaurant, one a sort of take-out place, and the other was just a window for pizza and ice cream. The sassy older hostess with the huge hair told us that it would be at least an hour, so we settled down outside to wait. An hour and a half later, we got in.

We were starving, so we attacked the bread basket, and then got a big bowl of the most perfect fried calamari ever and devoured that. I got the Chicken Cacciatore, Evan got the Eggplant Parmigiana, Whitney got the Chicken Marsala, and we were all pretty pleased with our meals. We also got a square of Sicilian pizza to try, and it was super tasty as well. The portions were so big that we easily have lunch for tomorrow, and all of our entrees were reasonably priced at about $13 each. Because we'd already stuffed ourselves like fat pigs we figured, why not go for broke!, and ordered the main dish, spumoni. A spumoni? A dish of spumoni? Whatever it's called, it's this tri-colored ice cream (maybe gelato? Clueless here!) and it was divine as well. So all in all, with all that food plus two beers and a soda, the bill came to about $75, which is NOT BAD considering the amazing food that we devoured. I've eaten food in Little Italy that cost more and wasn't anywhere near as fantastic as this place. And it was definitely better than the ole Olive Garden! Afterwards we came home and I immediately went into a food coma of joy on the floor.

So yes, I'd recommend this place to anyone wanting some real Italian food without all the snotty Manhattan attitude. I have no idea how long it would take to get there by train (I'm guessing a while) but it would be worth it!

This place ranks 3.75 stars out of 4. The reason I docked .25 is because Whitney asked repeatedly for a glass of water that never came, and some of the wording on the menu was a bit ambiguous.

L&B Spumoni Gardens
2725 86th Street
Brooklyn, NY 11223
718.449.6921

http://www.spumonigardens.com/

This is how we felt after eating there:

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The Safe Restaurant

Our safe restaurant will be.....drum roll please....HILL COUNTRY.

This place on 26th street in Manhattan serves bbq shipped in from my (Spring again, hi!!!!) home state, Texas. I've eaten many, many times at the original place, Kreuz, in Lockhart, TX. Hill Country has all the fixins I love, including some Bluebell ice cream and Big Red soda products. They also serve all the meat on butcher paper, the way it's meant to be served! If they could just get some Shiner beer, then it would be 100% authentic. As it is, I'd say it's about 98%. It loses another percentage point for me because at the real Kreuz, no bbq sauce is available. According to them, bbq done right doesn't need any sauce to fix it up. Hill Country has bbq sauce, which is actually quite good, but still.

So yes, visit Hill Country, and know that this former Texan gives it a whole hearted thumbs up.

http://www.hillcountryny.com/

But please don't order a salad only, like I saw some girl do today. COME ON.

How it Came About, and THE RULES

Hello, this is Spring. Not too long ago, I reallized that whenever my boyfriend, Evan, and I go out to eat, we always end up at the same ten or so places. Most of the time it's just out of laziness and convenience. However, we live in New York City, one of the most food-friendly cities in all the world. That's when the plan began....

For six months, we're going to attempt to eat at a different restaurant each time. This runs from April 1st to October 1st, unless we later decide to extend. We've set a few rules to help out:

1) We can have one "safe restaurant". We haven't picked it yet, but this will be the place we go to if we're feeling REALLY brain dead or need a place in a hurry.

2) Lunch places don't count. We both work in very tourist-heavy areas, so affordable lunch places are few and far between. If we try out a new place at lunch, that's fine! But the place is still considered "new" for dinner.

3) Overly specialty places (coffee shops, dessert places, Pommes Frites) don't count. Those places are like the accessories of the food world, and we're trying to keep this limited to the whole outfit!

4) All of our old stand-bys are temporarily considered "new" again. They go into the rotation as possibilities. However, unless we designate one as the "safe restaurant", and after we've gone to it once, it's outta there.

The main point of this blog is to document where we've been, as we both have pretty terrible memories. Neither of us is a foodie at all, and all reviews will be written from our basic non-culinary point of view. If we like the place, we'll tell you. If not, that too. If anyone out there ends of reading this little blog, I don't want it to be so frilly with the descriptions of the food that you still have no clue at the end if it's a good place or not.

Lastly, dear readers, suggestions are always welcome. Any restaurant, no matter how big small expensive cheap fancy hole-in-the-wall it is, is welcome for consideration. We're open to any place in all of New York City, and possibly Long Island and New Jersey (it had better be good, though, if you're going to send us out there!!!!).

Thanks for reading!