The Best Thing I Ate Last Week Lucky for me, last week’s press junket for the season premiere of Bizarre Foods included lunch at Balthazar in New York City. Did I spring for the Plateau de Mer for one??? Yes, yes I did. This restaurant is one of my favorites in New York, serving French… Read More →
The Best Thing I Ate Last Week? Dinner at Upland in New York City. By Andrew Zimmern Justin Smillie’s Upland is as impressive a dining experience as New York offers. Here, serious food intersects with a rambunctious and spirited environment in a thoughtfully designed and beautifully lit space. Credit: Corry Arnold The five lettuce Caesar salad… Read More →
Honest Puerto Rican Food in the Bronx An international community of settlers, the Bronx celebrates diversity everywhere you look. Today, as immigrant success stories become the new norm, the borough is a far cry from the symbol of decay it represented a few decades ago. And with such a vibrant and constantly evolving immigrant community, it’s easy to stumble… Read More →
Mind-Bending Combinations of Flavors & Textures By Bob & Sue Now in expanded space off First Street in the East Village, Momofuku Ko has been one of New York City’s most challenging reservations for the past eight years. With a cook centric open kitchen where diners face each other at a U-shaped counter, Chef David… Read More →
The Best Thing I Ate Last Week By Andrew Zimmern When I was about to start recording The Moment podcast with my friend Brian Koppelman last week, he whipped out a box of The Doughnut Project doughnuts for me to try. TDP is a new shop in NYC, and the beet and ricotta donuts are insane, as… Read More →
Rustic Perfection Chef Jonathan Waxman’s 13-year-old West Village restaurant is as casual and gorgeous as he is… no joke. My pal of many decades is in his prime, swarthy, and greyed out like a sexy Gandalf. In fact, Waxman just won a Beard Award for Best Chef NYC thanks to his culinary wizardry—you see what… Read More →
If Queens, NY was its own city it could lay claim to being the greatest food city on Earth. As it stands now, it’s the largest of New York City’s five boroughs, has a population of almost 2.5 million residents, half of whom are foreign-born. Queens County itself is one of the top five most… Read More →
Beautiful Cuisine from the Italian Riviera By Bob & Sue As the sister restaurant of Michael White’s Marea, Ai Fiori has a Michelin star and an exciting Italian menu. We had a hard time choosing among the many interesting courses but started with the lobster veloute, the chilled corn soup with crab, and a crudo of fluke with American sturgeon… Read More →
Whole Animal Butchery Without the Self-Congratulatory B.S. Tom Mylan is a butcher. Not because it’s trending, but because no one else in his company wanted to do it. Seven years after launching Marlow & Sons’ local meat program, the largely self-taught meat man is running one of the best butcher shops—The Meat Hook—in New York,… Read More →
Eating Queens Queens-based food writer Joe DiStefano has been covering the borough’s ethnic food beat for more than a decade. When it comes to ethnic diversity, some estimates name Queens as number one in the world – it’s so rich that DiStefano has made exploring the borough his life’s work. He’s our go-to guide for… Read More →
Stellar Nepalese Cuisine Located inside the roti bakery Tawa Foods in Jackson Heights, Dhaulagiri Kitchen is a closet-sized eatery with only a half dozen seats, but it serves the best Nepalese food I’ve ever had. I’d put this family’s food up against any white-tablecloth restaurant in America, based on the astounding number of techniques and complex… Read More →
Obsessed with Entrepreneurship Jason Wang has brought renewed energy and killer business acumen to his father’s acclaimed Xi’an Famous Foods, a string of casual yet highly-regarded restaurants in NYC serving the authentic cuisine of China’s Shaanxi province. The family-run empire is a result of old world techniques (his father, David Shi, is an incredible chef who… Read More →
Inspired Cuisine From South of the Border Highly regarded for his avant garde desserts at modernist temples Alinea and wd~50, Alex Stupak surprised the culinary world when he opened a Mexican restaurant in 2010. Once the critics got over their bewilderment and tasted his creative take on this rich culinary tradition, most realized he’s just… Read More →
Masters of Xi’an Cuisine Jason Wang of Xi’an Famous Foods fame is a phenomenal young entrepreneur. The family-run Chinese food empire is a result of an amazing combination of old world techniques – David Shi, the father, is a great chef from China who opened the first Xi’an Famous Foods in the Flushing mall in… Read More →
Inspired Mexican Cuisine WD-50 alum and former modernist pastry chef Alex Stupak serves stunning Mexican-inspired cuisine at his acclaimed restaurants in New York City. At Empellón Cocina, the upscale sibling of his Greenwich Village taqueria, Stupak turns traditional Mexican cuisine on its ear, experimenting with flavors and textures while honoring its roots. The depth and breadth of… Read More →
Inspired Mexican Cuisine WD-50 alum and former modernist pastry chef Alex Stupak serves stunning Mexican-inspired cuisine at his acclaimed restaurants in New York City. At Empellón Cocina, the upscale sibling of his Greenwich Village taqueria, Stupak turns traditional Mexican cuisine on its ear, experimenting with flavors and textures while honoring its roots. The depth and breadth of… Read More →
In Celebration of Services for the UnderServed Last week, I had the pleasure of hosting the Inaugural Dinner for a Better New York, a benefit for Services for the UnderServed (SUS). I am thrilled to have had the opportunity to help pull together such a successful event. It speaks to the commitment of the amazing… Read More →
In Celebration of Services for the UnderServed Last week, I had the pleasure of hosting the Inaugural Dinner for a Better New York, a benefit for Services for the UnderServed (SUS). I am thrilled to have had the opportunity to help pull together such a successful event. It speaks to the commitment of the amazing… Read More →
True Thai Cuisine Andy Ricker’s obsession with Thai food was born out of a backpacking trip he took in the 80s, when he discovered that the gloppy noodles he’d been eating stateside were not representative of the diverse culinary traditions he found in Thailand. In 2005, Ricker opened his first restaurant in Portland, Pok Pok.… Read More →
True Thai Cuisine Andy Ricker’s obsession with Thai food was born out of a backpacking trip he took in the 80s, when he discovered that the gloppy noodles he’d been eating stateside were not representative of the diverse culinary traditions he found in Thailand. In 2005, Ricker opened his first restaurant in Portland, Pok Pok.… Read More →
Nothing but Noodles Portland chef Andy Ricker expanded his acclaimed Thai food empire to New York City last year with Pok Pok Ny and the noodle-centric Phat Thai, a pint-size spot on the Lower East Side with a stripped-down menu dedicated to pad Thai. This isn’t the popular noodle dish you’re used to eating in… Read More →
Nothing but Noodles Portland chef Andy Ricker expanded his acclaimed Thai food empire to New York City last year with Pok Pok Ny and the noodle-centric Phat Thai, a pint-size spot on the Lower East Side with a stripped-down menu dedicated to pad Thai. This isn’t the popular noodle dish you’re used to eating in… Read More →
A Timeless Neighborhood Eatery Chef/owner Jimmy Bradley opened The Red Cat 12 years ago,with a simple concept: a less is more approach to food, melding seasonal American ingredients with a bit of Parisian je ne sais quoi. On my last visit, over a plate of roasted tomatoes and striped bass, I realized I eat here nearly… Read More →
A Timeless Neighborhood Eatery Chef/owner Jimmy Bradley opened The Red Cat 12 years ago,with a simple concept: a less is more approach to food, melding seasonal American ingredients with a bit of Parisian je ne sais quoi. On my last visit, over a plate of roasted tomatoes and striped bass, I realized I eat here nearly… Read More →
West Coast Phenomena Moves East Danny Bowien is either the most innovative chef in the past decade or simply the ballsiest, taking the culinary world by storm with the bustling Mission Chinese Food. He focuses on fresh ingredients, relying on classic techniques to build complex stocks and sauces that are the backbone of his craft.… Read More →
West Coast Phenomena Moves East Danny Bowien is either the most innovative chef in the past decade or simply the ballsiest, taking the culinary world by storm with the bustling Mission Chinese Food. He focuses on fresh ingredients, relying on classic techniques to build complex stocks and sauces that are the backbone of his craft.… Read More →
Italian Indulgence Chef Michael White‘s seafood-centric Marea never disappoints. When the soulful Italian plates arrive at your table, you’d be hard pressed to imagine a born-and-bred Midwesterner behind the burner. Prior to his success with the Altamarea Italian restaurant empire, White honed his craft at Chicago’s Spiaggia and then in Italy at Ristorante San Domenico.… Read More →
Italian Indulgence Chef Michael White‘s seafood-centric Marea never disappoints. When the soulful Italian plates arrive at your table, you’d be hard pressed to imagine a born-and-bred Midwesterner behind the burner. Prior to his success with the Altamarea Italian restaurant empire, White honed his craft at Chicago’s Spiaggia and then in Italy at Ristorante San Domenico.… Read More →
Upper East Side Bistro By Bob & Sue James-Beard-winning Rising-Star Chef Gavin Kaysen (native Minnesotan) cooked a special seven-course meal for us (fellow Minnesotans) that included 1) cauliflower veloute with osetra caviar, 2) lobster with Thai flavors, mango, and lemongrass in a coconut broth, 3) black squid ink spaghetti with rock shrimp, razor clams, and… Read More →
Upper East Side Bistro By Bob & Sue James-Beard-winning Rising-Star Chef Gavin Kaysen (native Minnesotan) cooked a special seven-course meal for us (fellow Minnesotans) that included 1) cauliflower veloute with osetra caviar, 2) lobster with Thai flavors, mango, and lemongrass in a coconut broth, 3) black squid ink spaghetti with rock shrimp, razor clams, and… Read More →
