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Momofuku Ssäm Bar (2006–2007)

Bond Girl

By Bond Girl
in New York: Dining

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kathryn

kathryn

Posted
Posted (edited)

Had another great dinner here last night:

Steamed buns

Benton's country ham

Honeycrisp apple kimchi -- JOWL. That is all.

Grilled sweetbreads -- a giant piece with lots of salt. I think I like the larger pieces as to maximize the contrast between crispy outside and sweet inside.

Spicy Pork Sausage and Rice Cakes, with thail chile, chinese broccoli, and fried shallots -- amazing, just a big pile of crumbled sausage and little bite size pieces of rice cakes. We basically licked the bowl clean. Note to future patrons: ask for a spoon. It was just past my level of spiciness tolerance but I couldn't stop eating it.

Amish Cheddar Shortcake -- I think they crisp it slightly in the oven now so the apple compote gets a little bit browned, a nice touch.

PB&J -- continues to be awesome. They have dialed down the saltiness of the saltine ice cream, which strengthens it in my book.

Also spotted belly ssam on the menu, now renamed, but hopefully the same as I had last week. Also a new spicy: spicy squid and shrimp stew with sweet potatoes. I wanted to try, but dearest boyfriend hates sweet potatoes. I have faith he will come around as he previously hated brussels sprouts pre-Ssam Bar.

The kitchen crew seems to have grown in number by leaps and bounds. We also witnessed 3 practically simultaneous Bo Ssams behind us. One of the servers mentioned that they'd done 4 the night before and 2 the night before that! Insanity, especially as the party directly behind us at the bar was trying to fit 12 people around the table. Plus, it was 7pm on a Sunday, cold as hell outside, but the place was packed.

Edited by kathryn (log)
"I'll put anything in my mouth twice." -- Ulterior Epicure
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mukki

mukki

Posted
Posted

Does anyone know roughly how the apple kimchi is made? I don't like eating plain apples, but I could have eaten a few apples worth of this dish, so it might be nice to try making at home. Are the apples simply brined for a few hours in a kimchi solution?

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Greystreet

Greystreet

Posted
Posted
Had another great dinner here last night:

Steamed buns

Benton's country ham

Honeycrisp apple kimchi -- JOWL. That is all.

Grilled sweetbreads -- a giant piece with lots of salt. I think I like the larger pieces as to maximize the contrast between crispy outside and sweet inside.

Spicy Pork Sausage and Rice Cakes, with thail chile, chinese broccoli, and fried shallots -- amazing, just a big pile of crumbled sausage and little bite size pieces of rice cakes. We basically licked the bowl clean. Note to future patrons: ask for a spoon. It was just past my level of spiciness tolerance but I couldn't stop eating it.

Amish Cheddar Shortcake -- I think they crisp it slightly in the oven now so the apple compote gets a little bit browned, a nice touch.

PB&J -- continues to be awesome. They have dialed down the saltiness of the saltine ice cream, which strengthens it in my book.

Also spotted belly ssam on the menu, now renamed, but hopefully the same as I had last week. Also a new spicy: spicy squid and shrimp stew with sweet potatoes. I wanted to try, but dearest boyfriend hates sweet potatoes. I have faith he will come around as he previously hated brussels sprouts pre-Ssam Bar.

The kitchen crew seems to have grown in number by leaps and bounds. We also witnessed 3 practically simultaneous Bo Ssams behind us. One of the servers mentioned that they'd done 4 the night before and 2 the night before that! Insanity, especially as the party directly behind us at the bar was trying to fit 12 people around the table. Plus, it was 7pm on a Sunday, cold as hell outside, but the place was packed.

Photos please...

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spaetzle_maker

spaetzle_maker

Posted
Posted (edited)

That squid and shrimp stew with sweet potatoes that Kathryn mentioned is wonderful. The seafood was perfectly tender and of excellent quality. The coconut milk base for the stew was mildly spiced, very soothing and comforting. The sweet potatoes were a wonderful element to the dish.

Incidentally, I noticed a recipe in Bon Appetit for January for a coconut stew containing potatoes. I had no idea that this was a popular combination. I may give this recipe a try next week...

Edited by spaetzle_maker (log)
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donbert

donbert

Posted
Posted (edited)
Does anyone know roughly how the apple kimchi is made? I don't like eating plain apples, but I could have eaten a few apples worth of this dish, so it might be nice to try making at home. Are the apples simply brined for a few hours in a kimchi solution?

The slices of apple are tossed in their kimchee puree that you get as a sauce on a number of their ssam dishes. I recall that they said after much experimentation they decided it worked best with a specific variety of apples but I forget which one, sorry.

The new mackerel dish with water spinach kimchee and asian pear is also amazing.

gallery_26869_3885_18105.jpg

Edited by donbert (log)
flickr
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spaetzle_maker

spaetzle_maker

Posted
Posted (edited)
Does anyone know roughly how the apple kimchi is made? I don't like eating plain apples, but I could have eaten a few apples worth of this dish, so it might be nice to try making at home. Are the apples simply brined for a few hours in a kimchi solution?

The slices of apple are tossed in their kimchee puree that you get as a sauce on a number of their ssam dishes. I recall that they said after much experimentation they decided it worked best with a specific variety of apples but I forget which one, sorry.

Sometimes the menu lists the apple variety that is used. Mukki, I'm going to Ssam Bar tonight, so I'll pay extra special attention and let you know.

Edited by spaetzle_maker (log)
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spaetzle_maker

spaetzle_maker

Posted
Posted

The new mackerel dish with water spinach kimchee and asian pear is also amazing.

gallery_26869_3885_18105.jpg

:wub:

I also enjoyed the mackerel dish - my only comment beyond that, is that the char on the mackerel has a very strong flavor, as does the kimchi. Both of these flavors are very enjoyable to me, but I thought they overwhelmed the flavor of the mackerel.

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BryanZ

BryanZ

Posted
Posted

mukki, I'm much the same way. Raw apples are the ONE food that I genuinely avoid eating. Nevertheless, the mere presence of the sauce, along with the other ingredients, makes the dish very enjoyable.

Honeycrisp apples awesome are were what MSB was using. Not sure if they still are because the season is largely over and they've been very difficult to find over the past few weeks. I use them in a lot of my own cooking but have found fuji apples to an acceptable substitute.

Bryan Zupon

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kathryn

kathryn

Posted
Posted (edited)

Tried the shrimp and squid stew last night. Probably the best-cooked shrimp and squid I've had in a while -- tender, sweet, and perfect. Yum. The pork belly ssam was far too much food but I wasn't going to let it go to waste! We ended up not ordering dessert, opting instead to go home and pass out. Perhaps pork buns AND the belly ssam was a bit much.

Noticed on the menu last night that for NYE the kitchen will be serving the regular menu but you have a choice of two tasting menus. One for $300 that includes tax, service, the champagne + unlimited beer/wine/sake with 11 courses. Another for $150 with beverage pairings that's seven courses. I'm guessing they didn't have many takers for the open bar/$300 party so they scaled it back.

Edited by kathryn (log)
"I'll put anything in my mouth twice." -- Ulterior Epicure
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gatilgan

gatilgan

Posted
Posted (edited)

As a non pork eater, do you guys think I have enough options to taste the Momofoku Ssam's food or my options would be very limited? Are there must to have non pork items that you would recommend from their lunch menu?

I just checked Momofoku's lunch and dinner menu and lunch menu seemed very limited. Can anyone confirm that this is the case?

Thanks in advance for everyone's feedback.

Edited by gatilgan (log)
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AvsKick21

AvsKick21

Posted
Posted

Don't go for lunch. As noted frequently in the past, the lunch menu is just the burrito ssams. They're fine, but not what the restaurant is acclaimed for. If you want to go, try to make time for it at dinner.

At dinner you can do very well without ordering pork, provided that you eat fish and other meat. I haven't looked at the online menu recently, but it I remember it being quite limited compared to what is actually on the menu at the restaurant. If I were going to have a non pork dinner I would get the raw scallops, the mushroom salad, the skate and the lamb shoulder, but I would guess that there are at least 7-10 other non-pork dishes there.

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Fat Guy

Fat Guy

Posted
Posted

My wife doesn't eat pork but eats most other stuff. We've been to both Momofukus several times and she's always dined very well. Not a problem at all.

Steven A. Shaw aka "Fat Guy"
Co-founder, Society for Culinary Arts & Letters, sshaw@egstaff.org
Proud signatory to the eG Ethics code
Director, New Media Studies, International Culinary Center (take my food-blogging course)

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kathryn

kathryn

Posted
Posted

Ditto -- if you don't eat pork, but eat seafood and other meats, you'll be fine.

You could get the scallops, crab claws (if they have them), spanish mackeral, brussels sprouts, fried skate, chicken ballotine, mushroom salad, hanger steak ssam, shrimp and squid stew, lamb shoulder, bread and butter, etc. and all of the desserts, of course.

"I'll put anything in my mouth twice." -- Ulterior Epicure
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spaetzle_maker

spaetzle_maker

Posted
Posted

Kathryn's right - there really are a lot of non-pork options on the menu. In addition, the oysters and the hamachi are delicious.

The whipped cream on the cheddar shortcake tastes a bit hammy - you may want to stay away from that one... But there are two other desserts - the peanut butter and jelly with saltine ice cream and a spicy chocolate crumb truffle/cake with banana. Very good.

You can eat a great dinner here without eating pork.

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oakapple

oakapple

Posted
Posted (edited)
#1 restaurant of of 2007 says Frank Bruni.

But, as Eater notes:

Bruni's bigger, less explicitly stated, point is that 2007 was dull. Ssam Bar is 2007-eligible on a technicality: the menu overhaul heard 'round the world happened days into 2007, a full three months after the restaurant opened.... With all due respect to sweet goodness that is Ssäm Bar, if better restaurants had opened in 2007, and a Best crutch was not needed, it would have been relegated to the ranks of 2006.

I would also note that, for all of his enthusiasm, Bruni rated Ssäm Bar at only two stars. He's not fibbing, though: no new restaurants in 2007 were awarded three or four stars, making Ssäm Bar, by his reckoning, the best of a dull lot.

Edited by oakapple (log)

Marc Shepherd

http://nyjournal.squarespace.com/

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