Where (and what) I ate during my NYC trip
Originally published at Scott Edelman. Please leave any comments there.
With my wife’s attendance at the New Jersey Romance Writers annual conference acting as the catalyst, she and I took an extended weekend trip that led us (but mostly me) into Manhattan, Brooklyn, and out onto Long Island for get-togethers with friends seen far too infrequently. And those reunions (of course) involved food.
Here’s what we ate and where we ate it along our journey.
Hometown Bar-B-Que
The first thing to pass our lips once we reached New York was BBQ from Hometown (which I first visited back in July), with a beef rib so amazing it remains one of my favorite bites of the year. New for me this time around was its pastrami bacon, which was sold out last visit. I could eat that all day.
Sushi Nakazawa
After that lunch of meat, meat, meat, dinner was about as opposite as could be-sushi at a restaurant run by Daisuke Nakazawa, who you may have already seen in the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi. That’s the final two pieces of my 21-piece omakase above-the egg sushi and conger eel. Dinner at Sushi Nakazawa (which I shared with my former Psychology Today boss Lori Antonacci) made me reexamine my feelings toward sushi … about which I’ll share in a future post.
Ainsworth Midtown
After dropping by the Hemingway exhibit at the Morgan Library Friday morning, I joined a foodie friend I’d originally met through Instagram at one of her favorite burger restaurants. It was the first time gastronomi and I met in the flesh. While we exchanged notes on our favorite meals past and our bucket list meals future, I ate a French Onion Burger (caramelized onions, crispy onion ring, melted gruyére, english muffin), which I needed to power me for my next endeavor-walking over the Williamsburg Bridge.
The Bagel Store
Even though I was headed for the second BBQ meal of the trip, I couldn’t resist stopping at a Williamsburg bagel shop the moment I saw this rainbow bagel in the window. Don’t worry-though it looks like Playdough, it has the smell and taste of a blueberry bagel. I didn’t dare eat it then, with the filling food to come, so saved it for the following day … when I learned, after trying to share crumbs with some pigeons, that the color confused them, and they didn’t see my offerings as food, snubbing them as they pecked wildly at anything else nearby. Only humans are silly enough to eat food which looks like that, I guess.
BrisketTown
After wandering Williamsburg to work up my appetite, I met Paul Witcover for BBQ. The brisket was excellent, with a strong peppery bark, and was the best of the four (yes, there are two more further below) briskets I had this trip. (Though Franklin BBQ in Austin remains the Platonic ideal for me as far as brisket is concerned.) Sadly, they were out of beans that night-I’d have liked to compare with Hometown’s, which remain the best beans I’ve ever eaten in a BBQ joint.
Russ & Daughters Cafe
Saturday began with brunch at Russ & Daughters Cafe, which had only opened in 2014, though its associated appetizing store has been around for a century. I split a board of Gaspe Nova smoked salmon, cream cheese, tomato, onions, and capers with Sean Redlitz. We also split an order of latke with (why not?) wild salmon roe and creme fraiche. Plus chopped liver with matzo and pickled red onion. Oh, and a Holland herring with chopped vidalia onions and cornichons. The only thing that kept us from ordering even more (because that’s how perfect it all was) was what we’d decided we had to do next …
Yonah Shimmel Knish Bakery
… which was walk a few blocks to a knishery which has been in business since 1910. Where we split a classic potato knish, of course. But that wasn’t the end of my food tourism with Sean. Because we still needed something sweet. Which led us to …
Dominique Ansel Kitchen
That’s right. Dominique Ansel Kitchen, the home of the cronut. No cronut for us though, not that we could have gotten one even if we’d wanted. Instead, we split this absolutely perfect blueberry laminated brioche with marscapone. As well as a pistachio lemon eclair and a few other goodies. I’d heard so much about Ansel I feared the pastries wouldn’t live up to their hype, but I’m happy to say … they did.
Mighty Quinn’s Barbecue
After walking three miles north to see Chip Kidd’s Batman exhibit at the Society of Illustrators, and then further north and over to the West Side for the comics exhibit at the New York Historical Society (a necessary hike if I wanted to walk off brunch and work up an appetite for the dinner to come, I joined Carol Pinchefsky and her husband at their favorite BBQ joint, where I had my third taste of brisket … the photo of which didn’t come out well, so you’ll have to settle for the ribs. While I enjoyed the meal (and certainly the company), the BBQ, even though it was above average, couldn’t meet the bar set by both Hometown and Delaney. Perfectly satisfactory in a pinch, but the trips to Red Hook or Williamsburg to reach those other BBQ establishments would be worth the effort.
Vittorio’s Restaurant and Wine Bar
Sunday, with the New Jersey Romance Writers Conference over, we headed out to Long Island for lunch with a woman we love, former Marvel Comics coworker Mirthful Marie Severin. We took her out for Italian (it’s always either Italian or Chinese with Marie), and as our usual Italian restaurant had gone out of business since our last visit, we tracked down another, which turned out to be very popular. The place was packed, and the food explained why. That’s my veal parmigiana above, which was one of the best I’ve had. And everything else was equally excellent, if I can judge by the way Marie polished off her blueberry cheesecake.
Jay and Lloyd’s Kosher Deli
Later that night, we had dinner with old friends at a Brooklyn deli we learned about from a Gothamist article, resulting in our only disappointing meal of the trip. The only thing I enjoyed were the baby knish above. The stuffed derma was so finely ground as to be almost a paste lacking in personality, the brisket had no oomph (suffering mightily in comparison to the brisket of the previous three days), and the rugelach were meh. It’s not that I don’t love deli-Ben’s is a great one I’ve been visiting quite often in recent years-but this paled by comparison, and was the only restaurant of the trip I wouldn’t revisit.
Clinton Station Diner
Monday morning, as we headed home, we stopped for breakfast at a New Jersey diner we always visit at least once during our trips to New York, often for a midnight snack to keep us alert on the way south. This time, because we’d realized we weren’t up to a long late drive, we stayed overnight nearby, and so were able to pop in for breakfast. Blueberry pancakes for me, and waffles and an egg for Irene. Everything diner food is supposed to be.
Allenberry Resort Inn
Our final foodie stop during the trip home was to pick up some sticky buns we first experienced during a wedding in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania. They’re excellent, and it was definitely worth veering from our route to pick up a box. We called first to make sure they were in stock, which is what I recommend you do as well before any detour.
After that, we headed straight home, with no further foodie happenings … which I hope doesn’t disappoint you. But don’t worry-there are more culinary experiences waiting in my future. Such as …
Tomorrow night, when I’ll have dinner with Vincent Price’s daughter!
Check back later to see how it turned out …