Posted by Ed Levine, November 1, 2006 at 5:57 AM
Here's an interesting question for you. Is there such a thing as a four star bargain? We all know about the terrific informal eating bargains around the city and the entire country for that matter:
the Gray's Papaya Special; two slices of pizza made with mozzarella di bufala at DiFara's; the hot dogs topped with good french fries at Jim and Jude's in Chicago; the pork shoulder sandwich at Big Bob Gibson's in Decatur, Alabama; the all you can eat buffet (including his incomparable fried chicken) at Charles Southern Kitchen; the wonton soup at New Chao Chow, Chris Bianco's incomparable mozzarella, tomato, and basil sandwich at Pane Bianco in Phoenix, AZ. Oh, you get the idea. These are all dirt cheap eating experiences that come without any luxurious accoutrements: no friendly sommelier, no lavish flower arrangements, no plush chairs.
But is there such a thing as a four star bargain meal? One that comes with caring service, comfortable lux environs, and world-class food?
Continue reading »
Posted by Ed Levine, September 21, 2006 at 11:20 AM
Soup dumplings from Goodies
I have to say that I've been disappointed by my last few forays to Chinatown, both for dim sum and regular meals. That said, when I started to think about where I would send friends in Chinatown, I came up with a surprisingly long list:
New Chow Chao
Address: 111 Mott Street, New York, NY 10013 (b/n Canal and Hester; map)
Phone: 212-226-2590
Best wonton soup I've ever tasted and one of the great bargains of NY eating: $3.00 for a quart, a meal for two.
Chanoodle
Address: 79 Mulberry Street, New York, NY 10013 (b/n Bayard and Canal; map)
Phone: 212-349-1495
Lots of really fine cheap dishes, including great fried rice, fried fish and chicken, and a pork and clams dish that is scary good.
Big Wong
Address: 67 Mott Street, New York, NY 10013 (b/n Bayard and Canal; map)
Phone: 212-964-0540
Moist, meaty spare ribs that end up on my shirt as I wander around Chinatown.
Goodies
Address: 1 East Broadway, New York, NY 10038 (near Chatham Square; map)
Phone: 212-577-2922
Extraordinary soup dumplings, might be better than Joe's.
Great NY Noodletown
Address: 28 1/2 Bowery, New York, NY 10013 (near Bayard; map)
Phone: 212-349-0923
Salt-baked fish, wonton soup, and Chinese barbecue worth the wait (if it's not too long).
Posted by Ed Levine, September 18, 2006 at 7:27 AM
A number of ELE users commented, and rightly so, that all the places on my Best Italian restaurant list were all pretty damned pricey. So I thought I should take a stab at a list of potential top five neighborhood Italian restaurants. How do I define a neighborhood Italian restaurant?
A restaurant where you can eat two courses and a glass of wine and spend $25. Neighborhood restaurants that don't require as much of a financial commitment and advance planning. You might wait on line because in many cases these restaurants don't take reservations.
The trouble with most neighborhood Italian restaurants is that most often they serve food that is well-meaning but mediocre at best. That said, there are a number of wonderful neighborhood Italian restaurants sprinkled all over NY. The over-all experience at these neighborhood spots will not likely be as satisfying (service and space can often be lacking), but the food can be delicious.
Here is my list of contenders:
Anthony's: Park Slope
Bianca: Noho
Biricchino: Chelsea
Celeste: Upper West Side
Cono & Sons: Williamsburg
Da Andrea: West Village
Frankies 457 Spuntino: Carroll Gardens
Frankies Clinton St. Spuntino: Lower East Side
Franny's: Park Slope
Gennaro: Upper West Side
Il Bagatto: East Village
Inoteca: Lower East Side
Joe's of Avenue U: Gravesend, Brooklyn
Manducatis: Long Island City
Nick's: Upper East Side
Sapori D'Ischia: Woodside, Queens
Sette Medi: Morningside Heights
Tommaso's: Bensonhurst
Via Emilia: Flatiron District
Have I missed any?
Posted by Ed Levine, September 6, 2006 at 7:28 AM
Bouchon Bakery's bouchon, Shake Shack's cone, and Burgers and Cupcakes' mini-cupcake
So what can you buy for $2.00 or less that is good enough to tell your friends about, (not including pizza slices, which I'll deal with separately)?
My top 11 list (is that a baker's ten?) list, not in any particular order. Please pardon the lack of visuals and links. I'm totally crazed this morning.
Continue reading »
Posted by Ed Levine, September 5, 2006 at 10:19 AM
Tomorrow I'll be posting my favorite $2 foods. So get ready, as I think we're all going to be able to more than double our pleasure.
Here's a taste:
The Chocolate Bouchon at Bouchon Bakery: It may be small, but it's just about a perfect three bite chocolate treat.
Posted by Ed Levine, August 31, 2006 at 6:35 AM
Hot dogs at Gray's Papaya
Lately I've been pondering the question: How many delicious things can you buy for a dollar these days?
There are the dumpling places in Chinatown that offer five dumplings for a dollar. Over the weekend I went to a relatively new one near Hester Street, Prosperity Dumpling. They're not the greatest dumplings you've ever had, but hey, they cost twenty cents apiece. You can't even buy a pack of gum for that anymore.
Also in Chinatown there is Jumbo Hot Dog, a kiosk located on Canal Street just east of Bowery right where all the cheap buses leave for Boston and Washington. It is truly an oversized all beef, skinless hot dog. Cheap, yes. Filling, yes. Delicious, no.
I didn't search out a great pork bun, but I'm sure there are a couple to be had, and they most certainly would cost less than a dollar.
Probably the best thing I can think of that you can buy for a dollar in this town is a Gray's Papaya hot dog. 95 cents for a not jumbo at all hot dog with mustard and sauerkraut. I ask for it well-done, but they never listen to me. Unlike Jumbo Hot Dog in Chinatown, the Gray's dog has the natural casing that gives all great hot dogs their characteristic snap.
But that's not much of a list. I would like to come up with ten delicious things you can buy in New York for under a dollar. Can anybody help me out here?
Prosperity Dumpling
Address: 46 Eldridge Street, New York, NY 10002 (b/n Canal and Hester; map)
Phone: 212-343-0683
Jumbo Hot Dog
Address: Canal Street and Bowery (map)
Gray's Papaya
Address: 402 6th Avenue, New York, NY 10011 (near 8th; map)
539 8th Avenue, New York, NY 10018 (near West 37th; map)
2090 Broadway, New York, NY 10023 (b/n 71st and 72nd; map)
Phone: 212-260-3532, 212-904-1588, 212-799-0243
Posted by Ed Levine, July 25, 2006 at 3:48 PM
New York Magazine has just published its 101 Best Cheap Eats in NYC. Like NY Mag's Top 101 restaurants, it is a brilliant marketing move by Adam Moss & Co. Full disclosure: I know and like NY Mag cheap eats writers Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld. We frequently chat at parties, but have never broken bread together.
What I love about these kinds of lists are the arguments that inevitably ensue about who was left out and the rankings themselves. The rankings are totally arbitrary and are there solely to spark conversation. What regular folks can quarrel with is what places made the list and what places didn't. And that's where I have quite a few problems with Rob and Robin's list.
For example, how their list could be compiled without either Celeste or Bianca being on it is unfathomable to me. I have eaten at Celeste three times in the last month, and I defy anyone to tell me a better cheap Italian restaurant in NY. Entrees are $13-15 for cryin' out loud, as my dad would have said.
Let's move to Chinese food. Grand Szechuan Eastern is clearly one of the best Sichuan restaurants in this country, and yet it's nowhere to be found on NY Mag's list.
I'll have more to say in other posts, but I love these lists and being able to argue about them.
Posted by Ed Levine, July 9, 2006 at 6:41 AM
My friend Maurizio, who loves fine dining more than hot dogs (I forgive him), told me that recently he's been eating lunch twice a week at Jean-Georges. Now Maurizio is not a rich guy, nor does he have a lot of time on his hands. So what has possessed him to eat at one of NYC's great gastronomic temples so frequently? Jean-George's two-course $28 lunch.
Photo courtesy of Eater.curbed.com
$28 for two courses at Jean-Georges? That's the fine dining equivalent of the Gray's Papaya Special of two hot dogs and a medium drink for $2.75.
According to Maurizio for each course they give you a choice of six items from the dinner menu. And each additional course is $14.
So instead of fighting the crowds for the privilege of eating a limited choice Restaurant Week lunch ($24.07 for the next two weeks, and Jean-Georges is not participating) head over to Jean-Georges, where the real deal best bargain lunch is being offered.
Jean-George, 1 CPW (between 59th and 60th Sts.) 212-299-3900
Posted by Ed Levine, April 23, 2006 at 1:07 PM
Generic Japanese restaurants are ubiquitous in Manhattan, so when I discover one that is not generic and has a very fine $10 lunch it's worth mentioning.
Momoya (185 Seventh Avenue, at 21st St., 212-989-4466) has a ten dollar chicken teriyaki lunch that is a steal. It's served with the usual soup or salad, but the soup is a better than average miso soup, and the salad is comprised of greens that are not wilted or brown. The chicken teriyaki itself has crisp skin, moist chicken meat (even the white meat) and a clearly housemade, not excessively sweet, teriyaki sauce. For two bucks more you can get salmon teriyaki instead or for five bucks more you can get rib eye teriyaki.
For a more extensive review of Momoya check out Bruni's NY Times review.
Posted by Ed Levine, April 13, 2006 at 12:05 PM
I tucked the last bite of my $2.75 Bouchon Bakery sticky bun into my briefcase, where it was going to stay until I rendered my sticky bun verdict this morning. But I made the mistake of putting my case down late last night when I got home tired and bedraggled. In a flash our gluttonous beagle Brass pounced and ate the whole thing in a nanosecond. So the dog really did eat my homework. But I had already found out that the sticky bun in question is worth every penny and more. Before I dug into my purchase, an astute friend asked how much a cinnamon bun costs at a corporate cinnamon bun outpost like Cinnabon. So I called one of their NY stores and was told the regular cinnamon bun was $3.02 and the pecan caramel sticky bun was $3.78. These facts changed everything. After all, Cinnabon's goods are adequate at best. The icky white icing is sticky and grainy and overly sweet, and there's nothing inherently wonderful about the bun itself, which though moist, is characterless and clearly made of inferior raw materials. Now all of a sudden the Bouchon Bakery sticky bun is looking like a veritable bargain. One bite later the verdict is in. The BB Sticky Bun is astonishingly good. It's loaded with pecans, practically oozes butter, and the outer layer of the bun is as moist as its center. And it's a dollar cheaper than its Cinnabon counterpart. So not only is it not a rip-off, it's a bargain. Tomorrow I will report on my Bouchon Bakery cookie findings. They are making their own oreos.
Posted by Ed Levine, April 11, 2006 at 8:06 PM
I had a good ten dollar lunch at Ixta yesterday: Excellent chunky guacamole made with ripe avocados, served with greaseless homemade tortilla chips; a very tasty, well-seasoned black bean soup; and a fine if somewhat strange sandwich consisting of chorizo, smoked gouda and red onion on an all-American hamburger bun. Ixta, you might remember, was seminal New York Mexican chef and force of nature Zarela Martinez' second Gotham restaurant. She opened it a couple of years ago and just couldn't make a go of it in what was then a bit of restaurant no-man's land. So she sold it to her employees, who seem to be making a go of it. It helps that Park and Madison Avenue between 23rd and 29th Streets is clearly the next happening restaurant scene in the city. The recent openings of A Voce, Country and Urena are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Just today I heard that Zak Pelacio of Fatty Crab and 5 Ninth is opening a Malaysian restaurant in a new hotel in the neighborhood. Ixta is at 48 E. 29th Street, 212-683-4833. I won't rate it until I eat dinner there.
Posted by Ed Levine, March 24, 2006 at 12:45 PM
When I was growing up in deepest New York suburbia (Cedarhurst, LI), slices of pizza were fifteen cents. Forty years later you can pay up to $2.50 for a piece of 'za. So I was sent hurdling back to my youth when I passed a sign advertising 99 cent pizza. I couldn't pass up that kind of bargain. I ordered a slice, the Hispanic man behind the counter handed me a fresh, hot slice that needed no reheating. I took a bite. It was perfectly acceptable New York pizza, better than chain except Bertucci's. I started thinking about other food experiences across the country and what they cost. A meal at Masa in NYC costs $350 before drinks, tax and tip. That means for the same price you can get 350 slices of pizza at my new discovery. That means you can have a slice a day for for more than a year for what it ends up costing someone to eat at Masa. I then grabbed a flyer. The name of the place appears to be 99 cent Fresh Pizza. Now that's what I call great marketing, when the promise is in the name. 99 cent Fresh Pizza is at 569 Ninth Avenue (NW corner of 41st St.).
Posted by Ed Levine, March 23, 2006 at 12:46 PM
I may have already posted about this place, but I had another great ten dollar lunch at Peter Klein's pan-Asian storefront restaurant Chino's. Excellent crunchy fried tofu squares, a good enough Chinese chicken salad, meaty pork spare ribs in a sweet glaze, and a fine barbecued pork sandwich. And they even throw in a glass of iced tea. And hey, it's only ten bucks.
Chino's
Address: 173 3rd Avenue, New York, NY 10003 (map)
Phone: 212-598-1200
Website: chinosnyc.com
