A week in NY

[kathryn]

Alfama is reopening after being closed for 2 years. Check out the menu here and see if it has the dishes you are looking for:

http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/16/alfama-returns-in-midtown/

[eternal]

Might be a little too fancy for what we're thinking but interesting. Thanks for the link.

I got in late last night. Just here for a couple days this week. I really wanted Ramen so searched on yelp based on my location at the Westin on 43rd and 8th and ended up walking to Totto Ramen on 52nd and 9th. Oh man, it was so damn good. I really wish we had real ramen bars in Seattle. I've been to momofuku, rai rai ken, setagaya and various others but this ramen was the best I've ever had - including multiple times in Japan. I highly recommend it.

[kathryn]

IIRC many ramen-o-philes generally hold Ippudo as best in town, with Totto being very close behind.

[eternal]

I've been in NY since Tuesday so I thought I'd give an update.

We arrived Tuesday night to find that our room had a water problem and there were no rooms left at the Ace. We had booked a large room for 6 nights but ended up spending the first night in a small room at the doubletree down the street. It wasn't a great start but the Ace more than made up for it by picking up our bags the next day (while we were both at work), comping us two nights at the Ace, getting us a reservation at Breslin for that night, leaving a bottle of wine and nuts in our room with a handwritten note and buying my wife and colleagues a round of drinks during dinner. They really were super nice and the room itself is big, modern and very comfortable (includes a guitar). I highly recommend it.

So Wednesday night we ate at the Breslin. Everything was good. The lamb burgers was delicious as always as was the black bass, cooked with the scales on. The scotch egg, soft-shell crab were good as well. All in all, it is a very good place, but I think I've done it enough and don't need to keep going back. On to better things.

Thursday night we ate at Union Square Cafe. This was a bit of a last minute choice. It was getting close to 10pm and we were in the area. I'd eaten here once before and while it really isn't my favorite style of atmosphere (a bit too formal), the food was perfect. Tonight was no different. Service was great and our pasta and asparagus salad were both delicious but the smoked steak was awesome. My wife commented that it was the best steak she's ever had. I wouldn't go that far, but the 45 minutes of smoking really adds to the overall bbq flavor. I think they must cook it sous-vide as well because the band of medium-rare redness in the steak was almost all the way to the edges. Delicious.

I was walking to Szechuan gourmet on Friday when I passed Lan Sheng Szechuan on the same street. I quickly pulled up yelp and debated between the two, deciding to go to Lan Sheng based on specific recommendations of it over SG. It was excellent. I had the dan dan noodles and the cumin lamb. I love dan dan noodles. So simple. So delicious. The lamb reminded me of SPicy and Tasty - something I hadn't tasted in years. It is close to the office too so double-score.

Last night we went to Aldea. The cocktail menu was very interesting and while discussing options, the bartender told me about a drink he makes with Aperol and a chocolate (cocoa nib)-infused gin that he makes himself. I signed on and wasn't disappointed. It was not sweet. Instead it was similar to a campari but with a definite chocolate bite to it. I now want to go home and infuse some gin at home.

We sat at the bar overlooking the kitchen. many things on the menu sounded great. We ordered two sardine toasts to begin. They were great (though they should be for $11 each). One sardine was draped on a salted brioche toast, topped with the big orange caviar along with a few sprouts. Very tasty.

Unfortunately, the rest of the savory part of the meal was less ideal. The rice dish they are famous for was very good and comforting. The veal was less so. Boring. Bland. The same could be said for the white asparagus that while large and one of the most beautiful plates I've ever seen, was not very tasty. Everything need a lot of salt and while I hoped to be reminded of spargel in Germany, I had no such luck. Same could be said for whatever else came at the same time - which I don't even remember today.

Dessert was probably the best part of the meal. The sonhos and bread pudding thing we got were both delicious and made up some for the lackluster mains. It was a fairly disappointing meal all in all and I would not go back. You are clearly paying for the space and the beauty but I'm just not as much interested in that stuff as I am in the taste of the food. I would go home and remake the rice and the sardine dish but everything else just felt lacking...

We ate a ton at a bat mitzvah today but will probably head to Xi'an famous food for noodles later and tomorrow I think we'll hit Havana Cafe and if lucky, maybe a stop t Casa Mono, which still might be my favorite restaurant in the city.

[LPShanet]

IIRC many ramen-o-philes generally hold Ippudo as best in town, with Totto being very close behind.

I'd concur. Ippudo is still the gold standard these days. With Totto and Hide Chan being in the conversation.

[Katie Meadow]

A week in New York seems like a good topic, so I will just add MY week in

ny to this thread. When I travel I'm inclined to eat out once a day, and scrounge or even skip a meal for the remainder. Besides, I'm visiting my 93

year old mother who isn't really into destination dining, doesn't have a

huge appetite and needs to have an excuse besides food to go anywhere outside her own neighborhood. I have to plan our meals carefully around activities, and there's typically only one window a day.

Monday: Matinee movie Cave of Forgotten Dreams at the IFC. Only a few short

blocks from there is Buvette, good according to recent reviews. We got there early so we had almost the pick of the seats. One problem: most table seats have no backs, so we opted for backed stools at the marble bar. Fortunately we got the corner seats toward the front--very nice. We got sloshed (I know I'm a cheap date, but these drinks were substantial). If you like your martini with more than a rinse of vermouth, speak up. I had a rye Manhattan that was excellent. Due to space limitations, the bar is stocked with one type of gin and one type of rye, etc. Everything was delicious. Can't remember my app, but it was great, and then I had rabbit in some kind of

mustardy sauce, very tasty. Dessert, though called a Tarte Tatin, was really just an apple tart. I can bake a better Tatin.

Tuesday: After seeing the miniatures show at the MAD we ate a late lunch

at their restaurant, Robert. My mother reserved a window table, so you

can't ask for a better view. Truth to tell, it made me a bit queasy if I

lookeddown. I had a crispy-skin sea bass served with a pancake-like

bed of grated potato and fennel. The pancake was crispy on the outside

and creamy but still toothy inside, and fish was tender and plentiful.

Really good. My mother had steak frites, which was cooked exactly as she

ordered it. The frites were disappointing.

Wednesday: We were invited out with a friend of my mother's for

dinner at Blue Smoke. She and her friend always get the Memphis style, I ordered the Kansas. Mine were fattier and more succulent, both were good. Also liked very much the sweet potato fries, although they aren't technically fries, but they were yummy. I ordered the collards, and they weren't bad, but too salty, which is typical. Actually all the food at Blue Smoke seemed pretty salty to me.

Thursday: My mother had a doctor's appnt and wanted to go to the

Marimekko store, both on the upper east side. We decided to try Lukes

Lobster for a late lunch. She insisted she knew exactly where it was, so

I didn't bother to take the address. Mistake. Lesson learned: don't ask anyone for direx who doesn't have a smartphone. Okay, so the lobster roll was very good. Lots of large chunks of lobster, tender, toasted buttered bun

and thankfully very little mayo, the way I like it: not lobster salad

roll, lobster roll. My mother thought the lobster could have been

tastier, but it was fresh and with good texture, and the price is right

with a drink and good chips.

Friday: I met an old high school friend for a walk from her place in Chelsea to Chinatown and ended up at Xi'an on Bayard. Loved the dumbwaiter, loved the waiter, loved the noodles. Ultimate comfort food. We did not have anything with a lamb's face.

Saturday: We had tix to "Through a Glass Darkly" at the NY Theater workshop (really great!) so I figured my big Momofuku Noodle moment had finally come. We arrived as the doors opened. What a scene. Is it always like this or more so on the weekend? Within 15 minutes it was packed, with people waiting outside. The asparagus was dynamite, and I loved my pork belly bun. My mother I think was sort of horrified at the amount of fat in the bun, but I thought it was ethereal. We had a noodle dish that was also very good, and a so-so snap pea salad. The noise level was just too much for my mother, so we didn't linger.

Sunday: My brother came to town and the three of us had a very sentimental meal at Mezzogiorno. No one ever mentions this place, but my family has been going there for many years, and it's been consistently excellent and always a lovely experience. My mother has a thing for a Sardinian white wine they always have, and it was a perfect on a warm night. My mother had a big plate of prosciutto and figs and other things, which she loved. My brother and I shared an artichoke app and the tuna carpaccio, both fantastic. Then we both had soft-shell crabs: small crabs but three of them per plate, and succulent as can be. We were both in heaven. My mother had vitello tonnato (sp?) which she liked, but it doesn't appeal to me. I think she's eaten most everything on their menu. Dessert lived up to the rest of the meal. My mother had zabaglione that was excellent, and my brother and I both had the blood orange sorbet. Three large scoops each served with a frozen mint leaf (yum!) and it was terrific. Just a snarky aside to Chez Panisse Cafe: your sorbet desserts are stingy. Mezzogiorno is not cheap; definitely the priciest meal of the week, but then we did eat a lot of food.

Monday: I always fly out of NY in the later afternoon or evening, and my tradition for the day is not negotiable. I always have a chicken and rice plate (white and red sauce of course) from my favorite truck on 53rd and 6th, luckily just four blocks from my mother's apt. Never disappoints, and enough food so that I can pack the leftovers for my dinner on the plane.

Since my trips to NY are typically a week, I would love to hear what others do for a week in the city.

PS don't ask what happened to the line width in the first few paragraphs, but I haven't a clue how to correct it.