Food: ☆☆☆☆ ½
Service: ☆☆☆☆
Ambiance: ☆☆☆☆
Cost: $$$$
I recommend: Wild Mushroom Soup, Grilled Monkfish Medallions, Dark Chocolate Tart
Known for the best chocolate chip cookie in town, this cute little Lower East Side coffee haven is definitely worth stopping off at. The cookies are good – but not the best I’ve had. Their stuff is very fresh as all the baking is done on the premises.
Every cup of coffee is brewed fresh and it smells like heaven in here. The founder of The Roasting Plant has developed a unique system to deliver the freshest cup of coffee to every customer.
Here is an excerpt from their website which explains how it works:
“To accomplish this unique innovation, founder Mike Caswell spent six years testing and developing Roasting Plant Javabotô, a patented automation system that ensures maximum freshness and peak flavor. While roasting each type of bean, the system monitors crucial factors such as airflow, temperature, and humidity. Perfectly roasted beans then travel through vacuum tubes, untouched by human hands, until they’re ground and brewed to your specific order.”
Though the space is tiny, they are well equipped with little plug points for customers to sit with their laptops and a cup of coffee to work or play all day! Stop by for sure…if you are ever in the neighborhood!
Chef and owner of Mickey’s Place, Michio “Mickey” Moroi has been serving up great sushi for well over two decades now. Housed in a tiny spot, opposite the LIRR in Bayside, Queens, Mickey’s Place never fails to satisfy a craving for sushi.
It definitely beats all its competitors in and around Queens by serving really solid, good, Japanese food. Continue reading
Food: ☆☆☆☆
Service: ☆☆☆☆ ½
Ambiance: ☆☆☆
Cost: $$$
I recommend: Foie Gras, Fried Chicken, and Bread Pudding
The brothers Bromberg have created quite an empire with their brand of restaurants in New York City. It all began with Blue Ribbon in 1992.
Le Cordon Bleu trained, the brothers found early inspiration from their father and grandmother who loved food and travel. Continue reading
Mumbai was the birthplace of the extremely popular street snack known as a Frankie, which is somewhat like a kati roll. It is a chapatti roll with or without egg that has options of different filling such as mutton, potato, chicken, and so on. Continue reading
Who doesn’t like to have fun with their food?
Well that’s what Mamagoto, in Japanese literally means – “play with food”. Continue reading
The opulence of Vegas meets the pizzazz of Broadway – all with a Bollywood bent.
This is the stuff that the brand new entertainment destination called The Kingdom of Dreams in Gurgaon, India, is made off.
This theme-based complex, created by the Great Indian Nautanki Company, offers a fabulous place filled with delights, Indian style. Continue reading
The China Kitchen at the Hyatt Regency is one of my favorite restaurants in New Delhi. It is on my to-do list every single time I visit.
China Kitchen offers authentic tastes of the grace and subtlety of Chinese food. Continue reading
The Spice Route journeys from the Malabar Coast in Kerela, India to the ends of South East Asia touching on the tastes and flavors along the way.
Set in the gorgeous Imperial Hotel, the restaurant Spice Route has been designed by Rajeev Sethi. It was painstakingly created over a period of 7 years. Based on the principles of Feng –Sui, the space is filled with striking, intricate elements, antiques and details from all over South East Asia. The results are quite stunning and really worth experiencing.
Food: ☆☆☆ ½
Service: ☆☆☆
Ambiance: ☆☆☆
Cost: $$
I recommend: Warm Chocolate Bread Pudding with Bacon Custard Sauce
What happens when three ex-Le Cirque pastry chefs put their talents together?
Three words:Dessert Truck Works.
Continue reading
Food: ☆☆☆☆
Service: ☆☆☆
Ambiance: ☆
Cost: $
I recommend: Trini Tamarind, Pineapple Jerk, Ginger Buff, Spinach Bites, and Mango Salad
Ever wondered what happens when you truly pursue your passion and believe in your dreams. Meet Colette Burnett, the owner of the wildly popular Super Wings, to find out.
Continue reading
The Chocolate Room is the quintessential playground for a grown up chocoholic!
The minute you step into this chocolate boutique and dessert cafe, you start melting into a sensual state of comatose comfort that only chocolate can bring on. Continue reading
BaoHaus, is where owner Eddie Huang merges the age old Taiwanese street snack Gua Baowith the all natural, environmentally conscious spirit of today. Continue reading
MY RATINGS FOR THIS MEAL
Food: ☆☆☆
Service: ☆☆☆
Cost: $
I recommend: Falafel
And the winner of this years Vendy Awards is……….
Farez “Freddy” Zeideia’s – the King of Falafel and Shawarma.
I really do agree with the king of falafel part. Freddy fries up an unbeatable, oblong shaped falafel, which is absolutely delicious. Its crisp on the outside and the filling is perfectly spiced.
The best part is that you get to try a free falafel while you wait for your order to be cooked up.
Freddy’s halal cart serves up quite a variety of shawarma, falafel and chicken rice combinations.
I really liked the basmati rice that comes with their rice platters. It is very nicely flavored and the pickled turnips that they add to their salad really adds great bite.
All the people working at the King of Falafel and Shawarma cart are super friendly and even though it is a food cart, it has a nice homey, community feel to it.
So if you are in and around Astoria, do make sure that you go and pay homage to the king!
Here is some of what we ate:
As a foodie, I find the Lower East Side so charming. Quaint little food shops and restaurants are popping up all over the place and I for one just love to explore it all.
One of my most interesting recent finds was the Hester Street Fair located at Hester and Essex Street.
The Hester Street Fair is a brand new street fair, which is modeled on the Brooklyn Flea. At this hip little market one can find everything from macarons to men’s shirts!
The Cosmopolitan Club is one of the older clubs in Chennai city (formerly known as Madras). It was started in 1873 to cater to a European only, elite clientele.
Things have come a long way since then and it currently has a huge local membership. The Cosmopolitan Club is now rather run down, but in its hallways hang beautiful photographs that remind us of gorgeous Madras of the past. Continue reading
Aren’t Jamaicans the coolest people?
Just by walking into this funky restaurant – I feel like the stress of everyday life drops down a few notches. Step in and within minutes, you are sipping on some exotic cocktail and lilting to a rocking reggae beat. Ya mon!
Golden Dragon – the Chinese Restaurant at the Taj Coromandel Hotel has always been considered the crown jewels of the Chennai fine dining scene. It was one of the first Chinese restaurants, to introduce fine Sichuan cuisine, to the city.
It has reigned supreme in the promise of a terrific dinning experience all the way from its orange beaded curtain days in the seventies to the newly renovated space created recently. It reached it’s heights of popularity when Chef Hardy Cheung, who was considered one of the best Chinese Chefs in India, took its helm in the nineties. Continue reading
Got a craving for soup dumplings?
Let me offer you a fabulous alternative to Joe’s Shanghai… Continue reading