June 8, 2023

Spaghetti and meatballs

Manhattan

There’s not a whole lot of “fast casual” pasta to be found these days. But I lucked out randomly and found this place Call Me Pasta! deep in the Financial District, kinda near nothing in particular, just a counter with two seats and a kitchen mostly pushing takeout orders. It doesn’t seem to be a chain, it doesn’t seem to be connected to any other bigger entity; just a little place trying to be cute and modern, making homemade (!) pasta for damn-near Noodles & Co prices. And it’s good! Legit, really good spaghetti, clearly homemade, a nice sauce. The meatballs weren’t incredible, but they were certainly better than some generic frozen thing you might expect to get.

Call Me Pasta? Call me impressed!

June 8, 2023

Meatballs

Brooklyn

My New York meatball quest hasn’t been a prime concern by any means—the burger quest, pizza quest, Italian sandwich quest, and various other AAA level quests have taken priority over it. But when  I’ve checked into it recently, I’ve noticed Campania get mentioned a number of times as being a Best Meatball level meatball, particularly in the “Best of Brooklyn” uh, magazine vote? Which is lucky for me, because Campania is just down the road from me! A sit-down, nice but not that nice coal-fired pizza place with a pretty decent pasta menu as well. So I’d been itching to get there and see what these meatballs were about.

But then I was in Staten Island a while back, and saw not one but two other Campania locations, which really got me wondering what the deal was. Is this actually some chain? Is the Bay Ridge location even the original, or should I really be going to Staten Island for the real deal? Meanwhile! I saw the winners of Best of Brooklyn were announced, picked up a copy of the publication itself, and was dismayed to see how weirdly fake the whole thing is. Half these places are in Bay Ridge, how on earth are they getting voted “best” of anything? It’s sponsored by some bank, I have no idea what’s up with it. Just so weird. Like, Bay Ridge Pizza is unquestionably not the best pizza in Brooklyn.

But so anyway, I finally got to Campania. And, wow, y’know, these are some good meatballs. Much like my JG Melon post from last week, I can’t say there’s anything special about these meatballs. But they are ideal. They are exactly what you want when you order an Italian meatball. Best in the city? Uh, hmm, let me eat some more and I’ll get back to you.

May 31, 2023

Enchiladas, stuffed pepper

Brooklyn

Enchiladas: excellent but not photogenic. Stuffed peppers: photogenic but not excellent. View from the roof deck: excellent and photogenic.

May 30, 2023

Cardamom roll

Brooklyn

Cardamom rolls are the new cinnamon rolls in the bougie foodie (foodgie as I will hereby call it) corners of town. This is both an insult and a disgrace. And oops also delicious.

May 30, 2023

Cheeseburger

Manhattan

Finally, a burger that lives up to its Best Burger In The City hype.

There’s nothing notably unique about the JG Melon burger; it’s not made in a special way, it doesn’t feature any wild toppings, it’s not any more expensive than any other burger at any other pub in this part of town. It’s not smashed, it’s not butter crusted, it’s not a prime rib chuck mix. It’s a tavern burger with cheese and onion and pickles, and it’s damn near perfect.

May 22, 2023

Hot dog

Mamaroneck, NY

Off a quiet, unremarkable county road in Mamaroneck, about halfway from the Bronx to Connecticut, is a 100 year old hot dog stand housed in a beautiful old faux-Chinese pagoda. Why is it in a Chinese pagoda? I don’t know. But it’s surprisingly well constructed, actually some beautiful details and iron work for a place that just sells hot dogs and shakes. It’s on the national register of historic places!

And as far as these goofy old hot dog stands go, this was a good dog! Split and grilled flat, grilled bun, not bad!

May 8, 2023

Pizza

Brooklyn

Lucia Pizza of Avenue X, which you can tell by the fact that it’s on Avenue X (and even if you don’t live in Brooklyn, I imagine you can guess what the existence of an Avenue X entails, distance-wise) is in the middle of nowhere. Or rather, it’s in Sheepshead Bay. So, it’s a long way from anything. But it caught a little bit of buzz earlier this year when it was featured in the New Yorker, as one of a couple new pizza places with direct ties to Naples. I honestly don’t remember what exactly Lucia’s connection is—it seems very New York, other than the Napoli scarf hanging up in a corner—but I’ll take the magazine’s word for it. Point is it’s delicious authentic pizza. What’s wild to me is the location; it’s truly just, like, down there. People consider trips to Di Fara Pizza an adventure, and that’s on Avenue I! You’ve got another 3/4ths of an alphabet to get through!

But the pizza here is great. Really, if this place opened in [insert other fashionable Brooklyn neighborhood here], it would have lines out the door. The crust is super light, the sauce is tasty. Just a great slice. Here in another unfashionable south Brooklyn neighborhood, I don’t quite live “close” to it, but I at least live close enough that I feel like I can use Lucia as proof that, hey, there’s good things down here sometimes.

April 28, 2023

Chocolate Caramelia Triangle

Manhattan

I work pretty close to the Dominique Ansel Workshop, which is a little shop connected to Ansel’s commercial kitchen where they (I think?) sell some new experiments. There are no cronuts here, which is a bummer because I still haven’t had a legit Ansel cronut. But everything I’ve ever had here has been excellent. This one here, well, it’s a triangle. Like a croissanty triangle filled with a “caramelized chocolate” creme filling.

Look, I don’t know how much to say about it this, it’s a delicious sweet croissant filled with chocolate made by a world famous baker. Yeah, it’s fuckin good.

April 26, 2023

Meatloaf sandwich

Manhattan

Eisenberg’s closed, which is sad in theory, but not that sad, because honestly Eisenberg’s wasn’t all that great. We could still be sad if the classic old lunch-counter interior was gutted and turned into a fucking Sweetgreen or something, but in fact—thanks, oddly enough, to the guy who plays Cousin Greg on Succession—it was bought and saved by the owners of Court Street Grocers. Very little has changed except for the fact that the food is better, and there are a few very Brooklyny looking weirdos working behind the counter along with some holdover Eisenberg’s oldtimers. Honestly kind of a miracle considering how these things usually work out.

April 26, 2023

Pizza

New Haven, CT

Modern Apizza is one of the big-3 pizza (sorry, apizza) places in New Haven, along with Frank Pepe’s and Sally’s. It’s probably considered third of the three, but I’ve gotta say, this pizza was exactly as good as Sally’s was. And Sally’s was some of the best pizza I’ve ever had.