54-46, that's my number: the Queens thread

also it's 5 minutes from the strip of amazing indian places on hillside ave in floral park.

I can't usually afford it, and maybe not the most kid-friendly, but my favorite place to eat around there is Il Toscana by the Douglaston LIRR. Their Napoleon is insanely good.

nick's pizza + eddie's sweet shop is a devastating combo

I'm kind of down on Eddie's Sweet Shop tbh. Ice cream is too sweet and service is too slow so that it arrives melting.

Prefer Portofino to Nick's, though it's a different animal and disappointed the last couple of times I went there.
Eddie's more about the ambience than food. That whole strip on Metropolitan can be like entering a timewarp with the Norman Rockwell vibes. Cinemart might be my favorite movie theater in NYC.

my wife's grandmother used to take her to see movies there long ago

gonna investigate portofinos. haven't done too much queens exploring lately, ridgewood is very cozy in wintertime, but i did take my 2-year-old on her first flushing main street trip the other week. usually i would rather die than pay for parking but i caved and valet'd at the sheraton on 39th ave. it was 6 bucks for a couple of hours, 100% worth it cause it spits you out in a weird mall and then right into the maelstrom. she had a blast. steam rice roll, jian bing, some weird cold noodle dishes in the new world mall, cheese tea, egg tarts. queens is good.

Kpop star hair is cool spot

Good to know about Sheraton. I always used to drive but at some point it became impossible and we’d always wonder why we didn’t just take the 7. When I meet some friends there for dinner, usually fu run, they park at target.

I probably have more live for Astoria now than I dis when I write that. I still def prefer sunnyside/Woodside for any number of reasons but Astoria really does have a lot bringing us there, especially Ample Hills I guess.

Is ample hills a bar?

No, I’ve cream. First one was in prospect heights then Gowanus.

One bar I wanted to check out is Let Love Inn, from the people behind Mars.

Deflatormouse who are you? Is there actually another ilxor here in Forest Hills?

I’ve never set foot in portofino - its 80s mob hit atmosphere has always put me off going in.

I will say that both Gloria and Rosalias are very solid slice places

FWIW I ate at Cafe Henri in LIC for the first time tonight and thought it was excellent.

I don't know how I feel about Astoria. It's fine. It's definitely eurotrash and all my older neighbors are alcoholics. Like, public, yelling at their family alcoholics. The guy across the street from me kept inviting me to check out his tiki bar in his backyard. One guy, who has super long monologues on the street every morning, is a total mashup of Richard Kind and the The Critic. The key foods on the other side of Steinway has insane deals on random stuff sometimes. I do like the smell of shisha the whiffs into my apartment every so often. Anyway, I have been on the fence about moving to Sunnyside/Woodside, JH, Sunset Park (prolly unlikely since I like being closer to the airports) or just getting out of nyc completely next year.

uh next year, meaning this year, I guess. I need to figure it out by this summer.

Anybody have a fucking stoop, let’s get some 40s and some skoal

Portofino is the best pizza in Forest Hills if you live there or happen to be there for something else but not worth the trip from Ridgewood IMHO. Mentioned it b/c it's basically on the same block as Nick's. There are way better pizza/Italian spots between Ridgewood and Forest Hills.

Xpost 80's mob atmosphere is a big plus for me actually. I live in Morningside Heights now but have lived in several Queens neighborhoods including Forest Hills and Astoria.

QNZ is my favorite borough by a mile.

I really loved living in brooklyn, but I prefer current Queens over current Brooklyn by a lot.

^this

Kind of excited at the prospect that, um, “we” will win this Grammy tomorrow, but now starting to worry that it will bring a fresh influx of Brooklyn hipsters.

j/k about this last part, hate when people say things like that

What is the grammy thing? I was a little worried that that show Sunnyside (which I am just aware that it exists and nothing else) was going to ruin Sunnyside before I could find a place there.

Terraza Big Band was nominated, as was another band that is playing at Terraza tonight

I think bigger artists than that have already put queens “on the map”

Edith Bunker

the bridge is over

I mean for contemporary Jazz nerds, however many hundreds there may be, not for pop music fans, sorry.

you should totally check let love inn dan, my band played there a few months ago and it is just a very cool dank pit with good drinks

also qed is around the corner, i’ve got nothing but good things to say about that place

i love astoria and will never deny its eurotrashness. part of the charm imo

Really I’m surprised you guys didn’t mention The Beatles at Shea Stadium.

Or The Replacements at Forest Hills.

you are near the park right? xpost
that area is so nice.

You’ve had birthdays before and lots of kids have had them as well, don’t see why you have to make a big deal about this one.

you are near the park right? xpost
that area is so nice.

― Yerac, Saturday, January 25, 2020 8:50 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah right off of 21st and astoria blvd. i do not recommend living off of 21st street but i still love it

(the reason i don’t recommend it is the volume of traffic whipping by at all hours)

Have you been to Roti Boti? I always wondered about it. We are like polar opposites because I am 38th st and Astoria blvd.

Latin Jazz from Queens? That’s nothing new. I seem to recall a little ditty about the Mama Pajama that made a bit of a splash.

d'mouse, how do you like morningside heights? I sometimes think about inwood but then I start thinking about the hudson valley and have to pull back.

I took over my dad's rent-stabilized lease in Morningside when he passed away, so that was the draw and that's what's holding me here. It's not the worst place I've lived, Riverside Park is nice and the old buildings make it feel more opulent than it probably is. Columbia's footprint is always growing and can feel invasive. And I think it's a very different experience if you're a student, or affiliated with one of the schools.

I don't really go out in the immediate area much. The best thing about living here is probably the convenience of the transit. Not just within the city, but proximity to Penn, Port Authority and Metro North Harlem stations open up all kinds of fun day trips.
The worst thing about living here is not having anywhere to go out to in the immediate area, without having to deal with the transit system.

There's a lot more going on in Astoria, and fewer people breathing down your neck. Inwood is completely different, of course.

Actually, i'm not sure that's the worst thing. It's the noisiest place i've ever lived, even by NYC standards. Grocery shopping is a competitive sport even by NYC standards, etc etc...

Terraza Big Band lost out to Brian Lynch, so Tom & Jerry are safe.

KABUL KEBAB HOUSE OMG

I have thoughtfully used the past week to get over you confusing me typing "we" meaning "people who hang out at Terraza 7" with "we, the entire past and present population of the Borough of Queens." Enjoy your kebab.

KABUL KEBAB HOUSE OMG

see this is the thread content i crave. details please.

had an excellent lunch at you garden xiao long bao in bayside yesterday after a midwinter queens county farm museum trip. a really beautiful colorful and tasty steamer of soup DUMPLINGS!, salty tofu pudding, fried bean gluten, soybeans and pickled cabbage. nothing was like the BEST but all very very good. the decor is bananas and the service was amazing and really toddler-accommodating. i'm already figuring to go back with a larger group and multiple kids. also enough food for the 3 of us with leftovers for dinner last night and lunch today was $40 lol

(also sweet tofu pudding, a sweet sticky rice roll, and some pan fried DUMPLINGS!, just to drive home that sweet outer outer borough pricing.)

We got takeout although it looked like a nice enough place to sit and eat. We ordered three dishes for our family and walked out with what felt like 25 lbs of food (tbf, a LOT of it was rice). Lamb Kebab - very good meat with a really nice, slightly charred outside, beef kofte (forgot the afghan word for it) for the kids was also tasty, dishes have the option of "green rice" which is a wonderful jasmine rice made with dill and lima beans, not quite like anything I've had in adjacent cuisines. Spinach was amazing also with just a hint of heat from hot peppers. Really want to try the Mantoo (beef DUMPLINGS!) next time.

awesome. i think i've only had afghan food at khyber pass on st marks place

went on a big central asian kick a couple years ago, the most memorable thing/place was a samsa from tandir rokhat, a tajik place on coney island ave in sheepshead bay

I've been meaning to try a few of the central asian places close to me -- we did Cheburechnaya a few years back and were pretty disappointed, but I've heard good things about Khazan Mangal (Uzbeki) and Marani (Georgian). Marani is closed until sundown on Saturday so it's hard to get there for kid-time dinner.

marani is the place with meat up top and dairy downstairs right? been meaning to head over there.

i may have posted before about taste of samarkand on woodhaven blvd in rego park, very good uzbek spot. haven't been in a few years but the lagman was notable and the vibe was extremely good queens

Has anyone eaten at Soleluna in Sunnyside? Trying to find a place to make a reservation for 10 people and that seems like one of the few well-reviewed options right now.

I went there dozens of times when I lived a few blocks away. it's a great atmosphere, the owner is usually around, the food is pretty good.

any sense of whether it's vegan friendly at all? (the two vegans in our party add another challenge)

you probably don't want to go into the city but john's on 12th st in the EV has a whole red sauce vegan menu, and is big enough for groups and is an extremely classic place