House of Mac--Miami

786.636.6967

Bailed on a family adventure to take a lazy few days in Miami with the whole fam.  Let me tell you, a great move.  Miami is like if Venice and Summer in Williamsburg had a gay baby.  Loved it.

I know, I know, but House of Mac is in this neighborhood Wynwood, which is a bunch of low cement buildings with graffiti and design stores everywhere.  It really brought me back.  It also had a Mac and cheese joint that would put Dumont to shame (RIP Collin).  

Seriously, the Mac and Cheese offered something for everyone, was super tasty--delivered in cast iron pans-- and was pretty inexpensive.  Oddly, the whole shebang was app based, so we sort of ordered a la Shakeshack by a QR code, and then they ran the food out.  As we were there for lunch on a Thursday in the dead of February, the dude behind the counter was great answering questions so it could have been a disaster if I was six beers in.  But since I was with the wee ones and the ol' wifey wife--no big deal.

Definitely try the traditional, and the jerk.  

Word

Francie Williamsburg

 

718.218.7572

Holy Shit!

This place rules.  Where did it come from?  WTF? Went here with Glasserie Events as a thank you.  Man oh man, did they deliver.  I cannot gush about this place enough.

Food?  Exceptional.  Some odd ball stuff (sweet potato in puff pastry?) but we ordered the huge as steak and it came out with baby's breath and I nearly shit myself.  Fantastic wine, fantastic food, all of the staff was young and hip and beautiful, I mean, just top notch.

As an odd post script we then scuttled over to Diner and it was sad and dark and empty.  I remember a day when that place was the center of the universe, and now it seemed so ordinary and lifeless compared to where we'd just come.

Monkey Bar--Manhattan

212-404-0365

So in the same spirit as the Minetta Tavern, we went bougy pub grub..  Couples.  Boozy.  Pricey.   Holy bananas.  I have much more to say on this one.

The food was exceptional, however the portion sizes are enormous.  You can easily split an entree between two people.  The apetizers are also enormous. The cesary salad was an entree size, and the tar tar is too.  All of the food was great, there wasn't anything (save a single dessert) that disappointed.  

The drink service, however, was abysmal. There's nothing worse than piss poor drink service.  The explanation was even dumber.  Our incredibly chatty, gregarious waiter was all too eager to share that there's only a single bartender for the entire restaurant.  They have two seatings, 5 and 9 and all of the 5pm drink orders come in at the same time.  Given a stringent seating time, you think they would account fror that. Idiots!  Our solition was to order a cocktail the second our cocktail was delivered.  It seemed to work out after the first twenty minute wait. 

Nonetheless, eventually a fine time was had by all.  If coming here, order a cocktail and bottle of wine immediately, that should stay you over.

Minetta Tavern--Manhattan

(212) 475-3850

I'd surprisingly never heard of or been to this place before.  I went with the ol' wifey wife and the 2nd wife and her machismo companion for what has turned into an expensive and boozy routine.  This place was no different, in both its expense and booziness.  

The food?  Fantastic if a touch pricey.  We generally order most of the menu, and though my memory is a bit hazy I can tell you that I had a burger (world renowned--though I say Donahue's has it beat) and the Mrs had the mussels.  

A quick aside, I had exactly one dip of one french fry in the moules frites buttery goodness at the very tail end of our meal.  And it dripped right on my mother-fucking-Hermes tie!  Tie killer.  

Yakitori ToriShin--Manhattan

212-757-0108

Traditional Japanese restaurants all have a similar vibe.  I'm not sure why, but they all insist on the quaintness of Japan, the geisha-esque hospitality, Omotenashi.   It's humble, you know?   This place lived up to the billing in that department, provided it's the most notable Yakitori restaurant in the city.  Then they turn it all on their head with their wine list.  Mosel riesling, Opus One, Jack Daniels, a Westerner's liver's greatest hits.  Sort of blows the cover fore me.  For whatever that's worth we ended up with beer and saki, opting for a more traditional Japanese buzz.

The food?  No idea what I ate.  I mean I know the basic ingredients, pork, chicken, beef, etc...but it all came on little Japanese tapas plates and skewers.  It was like a dinner of Japanese canapés.  It was all tasty, if a touch expensive.   We got the 14 course tasting menu--so probably tried 50% of the menu and I think we ate everything and left satisfied.

For what its worth the restaurant spit us out on 9th avenue, which was awesome.  we ended up in an Irish bar that was a railroad apartment, it was maybe 15' wide, and drank Guinness and shot the shit. It felt like we were 20 again.  The beverage list of this place, made sense.

Estiatorios Milas--Manhattan

 646.907.1970

The ol' wifey wife and other wifey wife and her man piece and I meet up every once in a while, say about every eight months.  Other wifey wife loves to eat at new high-profile places as a sort of treat and to commemorate the length and depth of our collective relationship.  All that aside, we ended up here for that occasion, which to be honest is a huge departure from other haunts in the past (see Frenchette) as this place isn't that new nor that esteemed.  This place is NOT to be confused with the Estario Milos, the restaurant that is up town nearby Carnegie Hall.  Same ownership, seemingly, and I'm sure there's a huge back story that you can google yourself. We visited take two--bourgeois boogiloo.

I can say there aren't a ton of a la carte places in the city like this (see Gaonnuri), as most restaurants are street level, so out of the gate this restaurant offers something that is uniquely New York: a stunning high-rise view of the city, albeit mostly of the Hudson river.  It's also at the top of some outlandish luxury mall, so give yourself a minute or two to navigate the unnecessary homogeny that ha become luxury shopping in this day and age.  I mean, how many Hermes stores really need to exist in the city?

The food, traditionally greek, is heavily seafood based and solid but not remarkable. I'm not a Greek guy myself, but the ol' wifey wife is and she lapped it up.  So it's possible my ham-fisted incipient Wonderbread palate might have missed something.  They have a kitschy fish market right in the restaurant, and given it's not-so recent opening the place still has a newness to it that sort of elevates the game.  In normal fashion we ordered a ton of shit and shared it, nothing jumped out as to die for, though none of it was offensive.  It was sufficient fare that accented the stunning environment.  This is a good place to take out of town guests but I can't say I've got a hankering for anything I ate.

The Grille--Manhattan

 212.254.3000

It is a post Covid world, and the city is struggling.  This was clearly evident in the disappointing night at The Grille.  This isn't a Peter Lugar type disappointment, all of the ingredients were there but over all these guys were simply out of synch.  It's as though they expected everything will be okay, as they had the panache and confidence to deliver, but at the end of the day they simply didn't.

So let's start with the fact that we had a very, very early reservation.  530.  Not the end of the world, but clearly we were aware there was a table behind us.  Unfortunately, the staff didn't seem to realize that until well after the fact and sat us 30 minutes late.  It also took forever and a day to get my drink at the bar, but that didn't seem important at the time.

So we're now down 30 minutes, and clearly they didn't anticipate for us to order such a robust dinner--three appetizers and prime rib for all.  A bottle of white and red.  The first course came out okay but then they fucked up the wine, and served our wine about halfway through our entrée.  How was the food? Solid. But the timing fucked it all up.  We were eating prime rib with an Alcase.  And I don't think the poor timing was reserved for just us. The high rolling finance guys who rolled in a touch after us, had to sit and wait while they made Caesar salad table side.  Instead of serving that first, they served that last, forcing the other guests to be polite while one d-bag watched his salad tossed.

Anywho, they rushed us off the table and we had to eat dessert in the bar.  The cocktail waitress knew about as much as wine as I do, which is to say nothing but at least it's not my profession.   The GM eventually came over and apologized, he wanted to comp stuff but we refused. We spent at least $400 a head on this dinner.  Can't say I'd do the same again.