La Superior

58. La Superior
295 Berry Street, Brooklyn



Just around the corner from Marlow & Sons, lies La Superior, a small restaurant offering affordable and unique Mexican cuisine including pig's feet tostadas and fresh made guacamole. The TONY item, however, was ezquites; corn kernels cooked with epazote leaves, served with fresh cheese, lime, and Mexican mayo ($4.00). Cheap, interesting and there's cheese. Sounded like a sure winner. Disclaimer: We got it to go, so your experience may differ. Unfortunately, here's what I think the recipe is: Open up a can of corn and pour it into a plastic cup. Top with a sprinkling of cheese and a dollop of spiced mayo and charge $4.00. Maybe I missed something, but I didn't get it. It's corn and it tastes good, but only to the extent that corn from a can tastes good. This dish left me more confused than any other TONY offering. What's the big deal here guys?

Evan's Creamery

57. Evan's Creamery Yogurt
Purchased at Marlow & Sons 81 Broadway, Brooklyn



I was already knee deep into Williamsburg when I got to Marlow & Sons, a fairly healthy walk from the nearest L train stop, and the opposite direction from my ultimate destination, so I was quite disappointed when I arrived at Marlow & Sons, only to find out that the lemon yogurt from the TONY list was sold out. Not ready to admit total defeat, I substituted the only available flavor, maple delight, and I was quite glad that I did. Disguised as any other cup of yogurt, Evan's Creamery offers a product that tastes like it came fresh, straight from the farm, and into a cup. Slightly lumpy, tart, sweet, and refreshing, its $2 price tag is certainly justified, especially when compared to greek style yogurts and come in at over $3. If I even find the lemon flavor, I'm definitely up for some Evan's Creamery yogurt.

Side View:


Top Shot:

Pacificana

56. Pacificana
813 55th Street, Brooklyn

After managing to convince my roommate to wake up in time for dim sum, we braved the 45 minute train ride, thinking of nothing else but trays and trays of carefully crafted shumai, pork and shrimp dumplings and whatever else looked remotely interesting that we could grab as it passed by our table. For the uninitiated, dim sum is not a spectator dining experience. Rather than simply placing an order from a menu, dishes are offered from carts that are pushed inbetween tables, in a seemingly chaotic yet well refined and deliberate dance. Turn your head, and you'll have to wait for that next plate of bean curd to come around. It takes a careful balance to dine successfully with dim sum. Act too aggressively and you'll be stuck with items you didn't want and that seemingly innocuous $3 plate adds up when you start moving into the double digits. Act too passively and you'll never even see what's coming.



We knew Pacificana would be crowded. Since its New York Times review in 2007, and certainly before that, Pacificana has been catering to those looking for one of the top dim sum restaurants. While dim sum is usually meant for larger parties and allows you to share more dishes, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I thought a party of two was perfect for us. First, we waited only about 15 minutes, and given the amount of people waiting with us, I imagine that some of those parties waited an eternity. Second, most of the plates have 2-4 pieces in them. Works for me.

The first server to catch our attention was clearly out to get us. She knew we didn't know what we were up against and we accepted her barrage of food like an unsuspecting tourist buys a cd off the street. Sure, I first felt like a sucker, but what a feast we had for only $2-5 per plate.

Bacon wrapped shrimp (more like shrimp toast than grilled shrimp) was crunchy, salty and fatty. Pork shumai melted in your mouth. Shrimp dumplings made with fresh seafood. Bean curd in a sweet brown sauce. Crisp jumbo shrimp topped with vegetables. Chicken feet. Yes, chicken feet. Gelatinous chicken feet. Not something I'd be quick to order again but definitely worth the novelty and it seemed to be a pretty popular dish. The only real miss was the seafood dumpling whose taste was a bit off.

Top (bacon wrapped shrimp); Left (shumai); Center (seafood dumplings); Right (shrimp dumplings):


Left (shrimp with vegetables); Right (Bean curd)


Chicken feet:


Chicken Feet close-up:


It's certainly not around the corner, but it's still easily accessible from the subway. Great food, awesome experience, just be prepared to wait. Interested in going?

Lucali

50. Lucali
575 Henry Street

Having been told that Lucali, a popular pizza joint in Cobble Hill, fills up rather quickly and that tables are hard to come by, I made sure to show up at 6pm, just when they open. What I hadn't realized is that people start to show up at 5pm and when I asked for a table for 5 people, I was told that they could do a table at 8:30. Two and a half hours?! I'll take mine to go, thank you.





A la TONY, we ordered one with pepperoni and hot peppers and after paying an absurd $32 for a pie that barely serves 3, we snagged an area around the corner to sample the famous pizza. Sure, it had fresh basil and a nicely burned crust but I'm not sure what the big deal is and could never imagine waiting so long for their pizza which isn't even in the same league as Artichoke. Patsy's, Grimaldi's, Lombardi's are all better options. Head around the corner to Ferdinando's for some panelle instead.

Clover Club

48. Clover Club
210 Smith Street (Cobble Hill, Brooklyn)

From the pictures on the website, I was somewhat concerned that a jeans and sneakers sporting group of six wasn’t going to be invited in. While our group sat around a leather couch, the room gave off an elegant library feel that made me want to talk in a British accent saying “Yes…indeed” as I held a cigar. Clover Club offers an extensive cocktail menu with plenty of seats at the bar, and though the atmosphere could be confused as being pretentious, the servers were welcoming. Yes, we went in the late afternoon, but that’s as good a time as any to sample the Harvest Punch, TONY item # 47 and grab some appetizers. Though we all knew that there was more food in store, the offerings sounded too good to pass up. Free-range chicken wings with Indian spices, mac & cheese with bacon, lamb burgers? Too tough to pass up.

Served in a large punch bowl with a block of ice in the center, the Harvest Punch bowl ($45) offered two ½ glasses per person. Made with apple cider, cognac, and rum, and topped with cinnamon and apple slices, the punch was sweet, with an apple cider finish that balanced the liquor perfectly. Like the hot buttered rum from Little Branch, I could be quite content to sit around for an afternoon with some friends and finish off a bowl… or two. The food which ranged in price from $9-13 was just as tasty. The wings were plump and flavorful though not spicy and served with a yogurt sauce. The mac & cheese was sharp, though not enough bacon, and the lamb burger was served with homemade potato chips fried in duck fat. Good food, good drinks, good atmosphere, good service, good company. Well worth trying out on a late weekend afternoon.

Harvest Punch Bowl:


Single Glass of Harvest Punch:


Indian Spiced Free-Range Chicken Wings:


Lamb Burger:


Mac & Cheese

Ferdinando's Focacceria

47. Ferdinando’s Focacceria
151 Union Street (Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn)

I know that when my friends and I go on food tours, we aren’t exactly what the restaurant owners want since we take up space and only order a couple of items. Knowing that we aren’t going to be the night’s biggest customer makes it all the more appreciated when servers and owners go out of their way to maintain the same level of service as if we just spent a fortune (I’m looking at you Café Katja and JoeDoe). To say that the owner of Ferdinando’s Focacceria was welcoming is an understatement. After explaining that we were there for the panelle (of course), he began telling us about how he moved from Sicily and engaged the group while we waited for our food to be ready.



Ferdinando’s Focacceria is another spot that makes the TONY list worth it. It’s a place I would never have traveled to but what they serve is worth going even further than the 45 minutes or so that it took us to get there. The panelle sandwich ($5) which is no small item, is made using deep-fried pancakes made with chickpea flour (panelle) topped with fresh ricotta cheese and served on a home-made toasted Italian roll. The crispy panelle acts as a perfect balance against the creamy richness of the ricotta while I could think of no better vehicle for transporting food to mouth than the soft, warm homemade bun. As if to show that Ferdinando’s is no one-hit-wonder, the potato croquettes ($5) were crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, with a likening to hash browns done wonderfully. Ferdinando’s offers an inexpensive, filling and delicious meal and I will certainly be coming back soon.

Petite Crevette

46. Petite Crevette
144 Union Street (Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn)





Crossing the overpass across the BQE, we were led onto a small, quaint block that housed two TONY spaces around the corner from each other, Petite Crevette and Ferdinando’s Focacceria (see the post on Fernando’s next week). Petite Crevette, meaning “little shrimp”, is, in fact, quite petite and with a party of six traveling around Brooklyn we asked for our selections to go so as not to crowd their space. The menu is hand-written on the wall just above the counter displaying fresh seafood. Though all of the selections sounded very enticing, we ordered the TONY-recommended corn and crab chowder ($8) and after finding some plastic spoons at a nearby bodega we were ready to sample. On a scale from Manhattan clam chowder to New England clam chowder, the soup was probably a 20/80 split as it was creamy but not as thick of a stock as New England clam chowder tends to be. Yes, it’s pretty much just corn chowder with pieces of crab in it and for $8 I would have liked some more fresh seafood, but it’s still a quality offering. Rich and creamy with a considerable amount of corn for texture and flavor, the soup is big enough to share and is probably too rich for one person to finish an entire serving anyway. With the entrée selections as compelling as they are, I could definitely see myself returning for some cioppino and another corn and crab chowder.

Cubana Cafe

45. Cubana Cafe
272 Smith Street (Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn)



Cubana Cafe was the first stop on a six-TONY-restaurant food tour of the Cobble Hill area. Traveling with a group of six enabled us to sample a wider variety of menu options at each of the locations. We ordered the sopa de mariscos from the TONY list, camarones de coco and a shrimp quesadilla (after all, we didn't really want to fill up on the first place on the tour).



The sopa de mariscos ($6.50) combines shrimp, mussels and calamari in a "spicy" tomato broth. Though it sounded like something that I would love, I found the broth to be pretty bland. Where was the spice? I can respect that for $6.50 there was a pretty generous serving of shellfish and plenty of soup, but even after the group had its fill there was still plenty left over, a rare sight if I'm at the table. Luckily the other shrimp dishes we ordered were much more enjoyable. The camarones de coco ($6 - shrimp coated in coconut and fried) were crispy and the mango relish served as a sweet and tangy compliment, though only three shrimp came to an order. At Cubana Cafe, the consensus favorite was the shrimp quesadilla ($8) made with avocado, tomato, chipotle salsa and served with a side of chickpea salad. Creamy, refreshing with added texture from the fresh seafood. While everyone was pretty disappointed with the sopa, the other menu items and dishes that we saw passing by looked great. I could definitely see myself coming back to try some of their $10 entrees and a mojito.

Sopa de Mariscos:


Camarones de Coco:


Shrimp Quesadila:

Posting on Slice

Last Friday I saw that Serious Eats blog Slice, which is dedicated to pizza, posted a link to AmuseMyBouche's post about Anthony's!

Anthony's

44. Anthony’s
426A 7th Avenue between 14th and 15th (Park Slope, Brooklyn)



I’ll admit it. I walked in here with my roommate and was incredibly skeptical. It didn’t have the hole-in-the-wall atmosphere you usually get when you have found a hidden gem, and wasn’t an upscale space where you know it is going to be good. Anthony’s felt like any random Southern Italian restaurant serving mediocre food and If it wasn’t on the TONY list, I would have walked right by it. However, after that first bite of the calzone, stuffed with fresh ricotta and anchovies, I was reminded why I had set out on the TONY quest in the first place, the search for amazing food at a great value. Anthony’s, I’m sorry I judged you so quickly.



The large calzone ($13) is definitely big enough to split and with additional ingredients priced at only $2, we opted for anchovies. What made the calzone really special was the crust, crispy with burn marks from the pizza oven, and firm enough to keep the overstuffed serving together, even after bludgeoning it with spoonfuls of tomato sauce. Creamy ricotta and an anchovy taste that permeated throughout make the calzone from Anthony’s a strong candidate for top 5 status as I near the half-century mark on the list. Worth the trip. Worth the money.

Blue Apron Foods

42-43. Blue Apron Foods
814 Union Street between 7th and 8th Avenues (Park Slope, Brooklyn)



Logistically, it’s great when one location offers two items from the TONY list. Located just around the corner of 7th avenue on Union Street, lies Blue Apron Foods, a small gourmet foods shop, offering everything from cheese to olive oil to chocolate to chorizo. After a quick browse around the store, I was guided to the two items on the list, Askinosie chocolate and palacio mild chorizo.





Askinosie chocolate, named after owner Shawn Askinosie, bills itself as the first small batch chocolate maker in the US to press their own cocoa and as the only maker of natural cocoa powder. After removing the biodegradable packaging which just felt a little pretentious, I was left with a chocolate bar with generally the same dimensions as your standard Hershey bar. The similarities stop there. The 70% dark chocolate bar has a deep flavor with earthy, fruity tastes mixed in. While I wanted to simply eat the entire bar at once, I couldn’t help but let each piece melt and enjoy the flavors just a bit longer. The 52% milk chocolate trades off the intensity of the chocolate for some more pronounced fruit flavors. Sure, for $7.50 I can’t imagine buying these often, but it’s certainly worth it for the chocolate fanatic in your life.





The Palacio mild chorizo at only $1.50 per piece is considerably easier on the wallet. While each sausage is only about 4” in length, it packs a smoky and spicy flavor into each bite and a few seconds in the microwave made the flavors come out even more. The only problem I had was that it was incredibly oily and slid across my plate which made slicing through the natural casing a fairly difficult task. If Blue Apron Foods wasn’t so far away, I could definitely see myself picking up a few pieces more often.

Beer Table

41. Beer Table
427B 7th Avenue between 14th and 15th (Park Slope, Brooklyn)



My first trip into Park Slope was for a friend’s Halloween Party last year and as I walked passed Beer Table, I noted to my girlfriend that I would want to come back to check it out. After its spot on the TONY list was revealed, my roommate and I headed down to Brooklyn to sample the 13th Century Grut Bier ($13) from their extensive list of bottles that start at $11 and go all the way up to $95, with draft selections rotating daily. On Tuesdays, Beer Table offers a 3-course menu that changes often for $25 with an optional beer pairing for an additional $15 and with only 24 cramped stools around 3 wooden countertop tables we were lucky to wait only a few minutes before being seated. The Grut Bier had pronounced ginger and rosemary flavors that made for a smooth and savory beverage. An order of pickled fennel gave us something crunchy and vinegary to enjoy with the beers. While it’s not the cheapest place, it’s certainly worth going to for a new beer or to try their Tuesday night dinners.



Text from the Grut Bier label:
"Before the German Purity Law "Reinheitegebot" of 1516, it was common practice to use any kind of different spices, herbs, fruits and other plants to provide balance to beer. Hops was not yet well known at this time. Grut Bier has roots in many cultures and each culture had its own "special ingredients": Egyptians, Native Americans, Arabian Tribes, Gualles, Germanic Tribes and the Vikings. This interpretation of traditional Grut Bier is spiced with bay leaves, ginger, caraway, anise, rosemary, and gentian. It is brewed with water, wheat and barley malt, pollinated wild hops and fermented using top fermenting yeast."