New York Restaurants

Gonna be on the border of Bushwick and Williamsburg with the whole family in a couple of weeks. (East Williamsburg? Is that a thing?) Got any recommendations, besides Roberta's?

win son is slightly fancy but very good taiwanese

frost is excellent old school italian, almost as good a scene as nearby bamonte's but way more chill

Which stop are you near? If it's Graham there is the Bagel Store that has really excellent bagels. Their other location on Bedford is the one they usually showcase about the famous rainbow bagels but the Graham one has it as well. Those are fine (kind of sweet) but I usually prefer the french toast and bacon egg and cheese ones (the bacon egg and cheese is *in* the bagel). I used to bring them into work once a month and people went mad for them.

But if you are staying near Roberta's I would just eat there every day. I think they have a takeout window now too. Plus momo sushi beside it.

roberta's takeout is fantastic. they deliver too, if the roberta's experience seems to exhausting

closer to williamsburg proper, but i love okonomi on ainslie st for their set menu japanese breakfast/ lunch. you get fish, rice, soup and vegetables and it is simple but so good.

Anyone tried Bozu?

Bozu is our favorite restaurant in williamsburg. I am sure there is better japanese/pricier that has opened since but we used to go there once a week. I haven't been in awhile so I don't know if that's nostalgia that makes us like it so much.

This was the core stuff we galways got: Tofu salad, pork betty ( I would have to eat this all since my spouse doesn't eat meat), miso salmon, party bomb, yellowtail bomb, shiro bomb, stinky roll, white and red roll.

I think we'll be by ... the Montrose Ave stop of the L?

There's tons around, more near Bedford. It's a really good neighborhood for food. I do get DUMPLINGS! from Vanessa's on Bedford a lot. I could eat there every day. I am half taiwanese so I prefer the thick skin DUMPLINGS! and theirs are totally good and the food is really inexpensive. When my brothers' families came to visit and people were too tired, I would just get a ton of random food from there for all the kids. They still talk about Vanessa's.

the vanessa's on 14th is kinda near my office, i get takeout from there occasionally. love the sesame pancake sandwiches in particular.

t's kind of funny how all the Vanessa's have slightly different menus and prices.

We really enjoyed Win Son, thanks. It was only 5 minutes walk from where we were staying, and even though they said there was a 2-hour wait, they had take out at the bar, which only took 10 or 15 minutes, and allowed us to have an excellent cocktail while we waited.

Roberta's was really good, too, but really no different or any better than similar styled pizza places in Chicago. Juliana's, on the other hand, next to Grimaldi's and from the former matriarch of that family, I found a big disappointment.

Had good Israeli food elsewhere, and good Chinese, and excellent Korean in Brooklyn at Insa. Grossest food was probably the cookie dough scoops my kids got. Pasteurized or no, nobody needs a softball sized chunk of cookie dough. Barf.

Spent the last day visiting friends in Montclair, New Jersey by the way, which has a pretty vibrant suburban food scene. But my kids got to see Stephen Colbert driving around, and I learned that Richard Thompson and Patrick Wilson are both local residents. Oh, and both Warren and Dan Zanes from the Del Fuegos, a former drummer from Guided by Voices, Christian McBride, and the brother of Camilla Parker Bowles. The latter is apparently, and probably not surprisingly, some kind of dandy. But I bet he eats pretty well.

Did you get anything else besides pizza at Roberta's? I think Roberta's kind of were one of the first to make pizza like that with those combos of ingredients at the time ( just had to look up to see when they opened, 2008). Because yeah, I definitely see a lot more of that style everywhere else now. I miss their hot oil and olives.

Best sit down pizza I’ve had is Lucali but haven’t been in years.

For Israeli food I must plug my friends’ excellent (and now quite successful) cafe, Reunion.

(In Williamsburg)

I like Lucali a lot, I like the simplicity of their menu.

I think 60% of a pizza's favorability ranking is based on how hungry I am and who I am eating with.

Roberta's we also had ...'Nduja and grilled bread?

That style is just Neopolitan, no? Spacca Napoli in Chicago does the same style, and opened in 2006. When I looked up that info one of the first things I saw was a piece mentioning Roberta's, and saying, yeah, it's good, but we have pizza this good at home. Lucky both of us! There are a few more in that mode in this city.

I don't think they consider themselves neopolitan. Or at least not strict neopolitan. I remember their garden being a big talking point when their ingredients would come up. Even though I lived close by when they opened I didn't go for several/many years, even though my bread and chef friends often talked about it. It's so weird that I barely ate pizza like half the time I lived in NY.

Ha, I think most people just assume Chicago only has that casserole pizza. which I am kind of into sometimes.

Anyway, I shouldn't talk. I just ate supermarket brand pizza today for breakfast.

Roberta pizza is good but they’re I own for the other stuff as well/in addition to.

What crazy people think Chicago has only one type of pizza!? Chicago style is for tourists, or special occasions, like when you want to be very full or feel kinda cheese-sick.

Now I am looking up pizza wedding cakes.

Josh nice to hear you were in Montclair. Funny I knew Richard Thompson was playing there recently but didn’t realize he actually lived there.

Yeah, I guess he played a literary festival? I think he only recently moved there, or relatively recently. I knew he got divorced (again) not long ago, and he had been in Santa Monica for years. Anyway, Montclair was really nice! Sort of reminded me of where I grew up in SE PA.

BTW, the Chicago "style" (as such) is the so-called "party cut," which is a pie sliced into a bunch of small squares. It is to Chicago what a single large slice is to New York, just kind of the serving style. Though of course we have by the slice as well, just not in the NY "where to get the best slice" sense. I'm starting to see more Detroit style around, too (and saw some in New York, like at Emmy Squared). Detroit has slightly different cheese, I want to say, and a really crisp carmelized crust. And it's served square, too.

We've thought about Montclair a lot but my commute would kind of suck since I work in Westchester. I can't really justify moving to a suburb and working in another suburb far from that one.

What's worse, from what I understand vindictive Trump bullshit has lead to recalled funding for post-Sandy train fixes, so they are always canceling departures. So, for example, yesterday we were told to be sure to grab an earlier train from Penn Station, and indeed one or two of the later departures were cancelled. We asked our friends what that means, and they said basically you'd be stuck in Manhattan for at least another couple of hours.

Oh, and back to pizza, I guess strict Neapolitan DOC standards are what gives that type of pizza its trademark floppy crust. Roberta's specializes in what they've apparently termed "NEOpolitan," which sticks to many of the rules but messes with flour type and cooking time to give it a firmer crust.

Yeah, I googled that too and saw that weird article of nea vs NEO. I've been to Naples a couple of times just to eat pizza. Roberta's never struck me as that similar. I dunno. I like it a lot but I like most pizza. I would kill for some costco pizza right now.

PIZZA FITE

I am very particular though about crusts and bread. Like, I think Bien Cuit is super overrated. I don't get it. Every single thing I have ever gotten from there was burnt and dry. Which makes sense they got ahead of it and called it bien cuit.

I grew up in Southern Illinois. Most pizza we had was "party cut" and it was trash.

Some of the best pizza right now in NYC is Ops in Bushwick, which is similar to Roberta's but I think better. Very soft crust, but not soupy. Supposedly a very long fermentation.

Also, I will rep for Long Island "grandma style", which is like a thin-crust Sicilian with a chunky sauce and higher end cheese with a light hand. It is very good when done right.

Crappy place that used to be by me in Woodside introduced me to grandma slices that were so good. Cooked with onion that would caramelize on the bottom of the crust.

I will never pass up a grandma slice. Even though Casanova's in Greenpoint had a cheesy location, I really liked their grandma pies. Soooo garlicky. Also, Rosa's and that weird Astoria Pizza Factory did a good one (would get with meatballs).

Can recommend Llamita, a newish Peruvian spot in the Village (having dined there last night).

Their williamsburg restaurant Llama Inn is excellent as well.

rosa's grandma pie is all time.

went to roll-n-roaster in sheepshead bay this weekend, lives up to expectations. roast beef sandwiches terrific but the big surprise was the apple pie, far better than any fast food apple pie needs to be. great scene too.

brennan and carr is the next sheepshead bay excursion i think.

I just saw that Rosa's has a location in Williamsburg now too. I got some pizza from the astoria one recently, it was good, I don't think as good as my memory of the one on Fresh Pond.

No one associates New York, a city in the eastern United States, with good restaurants. That's beginning to change. https://t.co/WpPyyvqKHU

— L.A. Times Food (@latimesfood) April 1, 2019

Impressive, it's the rare April 1st reverse troll! That's a tough one to pull off.

fresh pond rosa's is my local rosa's. can also vouch for the chicken caesar salad slice.

anyone got ideas for good affordable sushi? i swore off low-tier bad neighborhood sushi but don't want to drop $500 at shuko or whatever.

Outside of going local, the places I went to the most were:
Bozu (wburg) I mention above in the thread what we would order
Kaoru (by the UN) insanely good/big chirashi bowls for $20-$25. They stop serving early though and turn into a hostess bar.
Jewel Bako (evillage) I haven't been in awhile, it's probably at the top price range for what you are looking for. The sushi/sashimi entrees are pretty decently priced for one michelin star.
I recently went to Hasaki in the evillage (vg, busy) and TsuruTonTan in Union Sq for udon but their sushi was pretty strong too (they have nice lunch specials).

i think you can slide in around ~$50 for lunch at sushi yasuda on a weekday

hate to say it but win son is p overpriced for what it is, i also instinctively distrust sino-restaurants where 90% of the clientele are not sino (see also birds of a feather, mala project)

I love Mala Project.

it's ok but you'd been able to get sichuan drypot for years prior in flushing, it's basically that but at 2x the price for the east village. i think there are more interesting places in the neighborhood (e.g. little tong noodle shop)

I go to the one in midtown for one of the lunch specials (usually the fish). Its a nice option to have, even though all the specials basically taste the same, so you have to space out visits.

Does anyone know anything about Chelsea Table and Stage? I had never heard of it before but may go see a show there. I'm guessing it's extremely new because I can't find any reviews of it, which is p much unheard of for NYC. Food menu looks kind of blah but the price iss pretty reasonable for a table right by the stage so I'll eat my boring $27 salmon and enjoy the show I guess. Just curious what the deal is with this place. Looks kind of like a jazz club vibe but not exclusive to jazz.

they look like they need some help with booking but glad to see any new club open!