New York City Eats

I really enjoyed my week's holiday in New York, and as one might expect the food played a large part in that. Rather than do loads of blog posts (I really can't be arsed nowadays) here's a round-up of some of my favourite eats in the Big Apple.

The dimly-lit dining room at Minetta Tavern, while terrible for food photography, is one of the most buzzy, atmospheric ones I've eaten in. And I've eaten in a lot. I kicked off with a generous portion of roasted bone marrow served with shallot confit and baguette soldiers while my friend went with roast baby beets. Both got the thumbs up. For mains, we both ordered the legendary Black Label burger. Made with prime cuts of dry-aged beef, topped with caramelized onions and served in a sesame-topped brioche bun, this was without doubt the best burger I've ever eaten. Oh, and the big mountain of fries were bloody amazing, too. Overall, Minetta Tavern was probably my favourite out of all the restaurants I visited in New York. This begs the question whether Keith McNally opened the wrong restaurant in London.



Minetta Tavern, 113 MacDougal St (btwn Bleecker & 3rd St), Greenwich Village, New York, NY 10012
(Tel: +1-212-475-3850)

Kesté Pizza & Vino serves pizza the Neapolitan way with a wood-fired brick oven taking pride of place at the back of the shop. My diavola pizza was pretty much perfect with its blistered chewy crust and quality toppings of homemade mozzarella, spicy soppressata and fresh basil. My friend enjoyed his pistacchio a salsiccia pizza with its subtle pistachio pesto topping and moreish sausage meat. As the name of the restaurant suggests wine is of equal importance to the pizza and this is reflected by the excellent wine list. Along with Biang! and the Minetta Tavern, this small pizzeria is on my A-list of New York eateries.



Kesté Pizza & Vino, 271 Bleecker St (btwn Cornelia & Jones St), West Village, New York, NY 10014
(Tel: +1-212-243-1500)

Choosing where to eat in Manhattan's Chinatown is a risky business. One false move and you could end up in a tourist trap. So I was thankful that I had some local knowledge to fall back on in the form of coolcookstyle's recommendation of Shanghai Café Deluxe. Being a caff specialising in Shanghainese food, both 小籠包 xiao long bao (soup-filled pork dumplings) as well as the less well known 生煎包 sheng jian bao (pan-fried soup-filled pork buns) were ordered. Of the two I preferred the latter; I think this might be to do with the fact that sheng jian bao, with their juicy pork filling and crispy bottoms, are nigh on impossible to find in London. Incidentally, these two dishes are listed on the English language-menu as steamed tiny buns with pork and fried tiny buns with pork.



Shanghai Café Deluxe, 100 Mott St (btwn Canal & Hester St), Chinatown, New York, NY 10013
(Tel: +1-212-966-3988)

Fette Sau may not be the best barbecue joint in New York (the twitterverse told me as much) but it is ideally located to kick off an afternoon out in Williamsburg. I know sod-all about proper American barbecue and have precious little experience of it. So for what it's worth, I thought the pulled pork shoulder, beef short rib and beef brisket were decent enough but that the pork ribs and pork sausages were better. I liked the casual fun vibe of this converted auto repair shop so it was a shame that our lunch was slightly spoiled by rude and inattentive bar service (by the way, the food counter service was just fine).



Fette Sau, 354 Metropolitan Ave (btwn Havemeyer & Roebling), Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY 11211
(Tel: +1-718-963-3404)

I'm pleased to report that there were no such service fails at the excellent Black Brick. Some haters may dwell on the overtly hipster interior design, but quite frankly who cares when the coffee is so damn good. The barista's attention-to-detail was a sight to behold and he also found time to have a friendly chat whilst making my brew. This coffee shop is an ideal pit-stop when strolling along Bedford Avenue, the main drag in Williamsburg. All power to hipsters!



Black Brick, 300 Bedford Ave (btwn Grand & S 1st St), Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY 11211
(Tel: +1-718-384-0075)

Tribeca Grill may no longer be the place to be seen, but I enjoyed my Sunday brunch at this glamorous restaurant famous for being part-owned by Robert De Niro (I had a good look around but Bobby was nowhere to be seen). I adored my jumbo lump crab cake, which as promised had jumbo lumps of sweet white crabmeat. This was perfectly paired with chipotle roasted corn and cilantro avocado mousse. My mate enjoyed his scrambled eggs, country gravy & buttermilk biscuit so much, he didn't offer me any. And do remember to order the basket of bread & pastries if only for the amazing banana bread. This was a fine last meal before heading off to the airport.



Tribeca Grill, 375 Greenwich St (btwn Franklin & North Moore St), Tribeca, New York, NY 10013
(Tel: +1-212-941-3900)

To conclude my round-up, here are a few places where I enjoyed drinks and snacks. Eataly, Mario Batali's gastro-shrine to all things Italian, has no less than seven restaurants. Being a sunny day I popped up to the rooftop beer garden, Birreria, and enjoyed a fine platter of salumi. To top-up my Britisher points I spent an enjoyable Friday night at April Bloomfield's gastropub, The Spotted Pig. Next time I'll save some space to eat more than just my share of pork rillette and some shoestring fries. Happy Hour is a great time of the day to take a breather from sightseeing whilst plotting where to go out at night. I found this was best done over drinks, some truffle fries and half a dozen littleneck clams from the raw bar at McCoy in Greenwich Village.



Birreria @ Eataly, 200 5th Ave (btwn 23rd & 24th St), Flatiron District, New York, NY 10010
(Tel: +1-212-937-8910)



The Spotted Pig, 314 W 11th St (at Greenwich St), West Village, New York, NY 10014
(Tel: +1-212-620-0393)



McCoy, 89 MacDougal St (at Bleecker St), Greenwich Village, New York, NY 10012
(Tel: +1-212-460-0900)

Biang! A Gem In New York's Other Chinatown

Strictly speaking, Flushing in Queens isn't New York's other Chinatown, as the Big Apple boasts no less than seven Chinatowns. That said, those-in-the-know consider Flushing to be the one with the best food. Which is why we headed out there to try Biang!, the first proper sit-down restaurant from the highly regarded Xi'an Famous Foods stable.

Being a contrary sod, my first impressions were that the restaurant was too trendy; you know what I mean, exposed brickwork and filament lamps. It felt a bit out of place alongside the more utilitarian feel of Flushing Main St. However, this inverted snobbery soon evaporated when I saw the menu, which majors in the cuisine of Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi province in northwest China. This style of food, whilst undeniably Chinese, has Middle Eastern influences given the city's location on the Silk Road.

The main calling card of Biang! is biang-biang noodles from which the restaurant takes its name (biang being the sound made when the noodle dough is thwacked against the work surface). These broad hand-torn noodles are served with a number of toppings at this restaurant. We went for the stewed oxtail biang-biang noodles (腊汁牛尾biang-biang面 $7.50) and spicy & tingly beef biang-biang noodles (麻辣牛肉biang-biang面 $7.00). Soup noodle versions of most biang-biang dishes are also available but we stuck with the dry versions given the scorching weather and greater difficulty in sharing soup noodles.

Both bowls of noodles were superb, as the gravy from the stew clung on to the chewy broad hand-torn noodles. My favourite was the oxtail with its warming flavours from star anise, cloves, cassia bark and dried citrus peel. In contrast, my friend preferred the beef with its punch from the Sichuan peppercorns and chilli.

Another famous Shaanxi dish is roujiamo (肉夹馍), which can be found on the menu in English as stewed pork burgers (腊汁猪肉夹白吉馍 $5.00/2pcs). These flatbread sandwiches with stewed belly pork filling were very moreish. I was particularly impressed with the quality of the flatbread that I thought superior to the ones I've tried in China.

We also ordered spicy cumin lamb skewers (孜然羊肉串 $4.50/3 pcs with extra skewers for $1.50 each). These were swiftly eaten when despatched from the charcoal grill. I liked the juicy lamb skewers but I thought the chilli somewhat overshadowed the cumin. But really, that's not a big deal. There are other skewers on offer including esoteric body parts and organs as well as more prosaic offerings such as chicken.

A quick mention, too, for the drinks list; my beer-loving friend was impressed that it included some American craft beers in addition to better known Chinese and international branded beers. Incidentally, wine is not served but you can bring-your-own for corkage of $8/bottle. Overall the bill for the two of us came to a bargainous $45 including a round of beers and a generous tip for our cheery and exceedingly helpful server.

Biang! is a restaurant I would certainly return to if I ever went back to New York. Its menu is really interesting and ideally I would've corralled a bigger group to give it a good going over. Some might be put off by its location in Flushing, but the No. 7 subway train only takes half an hour from Grand Central Terminal, which is no time at all to travel for great food. But if you can't be bothered to go to Flushing then there are three branches of Biang's sister operation Xi'an Famous Foods in Manhattan, which serves a similar menu albeit in less comfortable surroundings.



Biang! 41-10 Main St, Flushing, Queens, NY 11355 (Tel: +1-718-888-7713)
Nearest station: Flushing Main St

PS: Click here to read about the Shaanxi food I ate in Beijing and here about where to find it in London. And this post by Hollow Legs may be of interest if you fancy having a crack at making biang-biang noodles.

Din Tai Fung in Tokyo & Hong Kong

What with my track record, I know you're not going to believe me when I say I didn't mean to visit Din Tai Fung (鼎泰豐) three times in eight days in two different cities. But I did. First up was a solo visit to the Takashimaya Times Square branch in Tokyo. This was followed with a couple of visits to the Causeway Bay branch in Hong Kong, where I had one meal with a colleague and another one with family.

Three kinds of seafood XLB

Pork & scallop XLB

Naturally, as with any trip to Din Tai Fung, I decided to check out the signature soup-filled xiao long bao (小籠包). I've probably banged on about these far too much over the years and the classic pork xlb in Tokyo didn't disappoint. I also ordered a steamer of three kinds of seafood xiao long bao (海鮮三種小籠包). Of these, my favourite was the pork & scallop with the pork & crab a close second, but I wasn't overly keen on the pork & sea urchin, as the sea urchin was a bit overpowering.

Pork & black truffle XLB

Angled luffa & shrimp XLB

Over in Hong Kong, I thought the classic pork xlb and pork & crab xlb were better than in Tokyo but of these were eclipsed by the sublime pork & black truffle xlb (黑松露小籠包), where the rich truffle filling was out of this world. I also enjoyed the unusual angled luffa & shrimp xlb (絲瓜蝦仁小籠包) – this is a little different with its clean tasting, refreshing filling of silk gourd (aka angled luffa).

Of the other dishes in Tokyo, I was a bit disappointed with the steamed chicken soup (原盅鮮雞湯). In other branches of Din Tai Fung I've been to, this soup has been outstanding, but the version here was lacking flavour and a bit oily to boot. And the shrimp fried rice (蝦仁蛋炒飯) was decidedly lacklustre, too. I mean, just look at the photo of the version in Tokyo on the left compared to the one in Hong Kong on the right. Rather bizarrely, the fried rice came with a konbu seaweed soup, which is a Japanese, not Chinese, affectation. That and the use of local vinegar rather than Chinkiang vinegar also grated.

So while the signature xiao long bao were excellent in Tokyo, the support acts were the weakest I've come across in any branch of Din Tai Fung I've visited. However, this is all relative, and the positives far outweigh the negatives. In particular, I was very impressed by the service. Having sensed my total lack of Japanese language skills, a Mandarin-speaking waitress from Taiwan was assigned to look after me. My Mandarin is pretty shoddy, but it was a nice gesture nonetheless.

Any lingering disappointment from my visit to the Tokyo branch was soon eradicated in Hong Kong. To be precise, it was a cold noodle salad, bizarrely described in English as garlic pork green bean fettuccine (蒜泥粉皮肉), which restored my faith in Din Tai Fung. I just loved this winning combination of soft pork slices, crunchy cucumber slithers and wobbly broad fen-pei noodles in a garlicky soy vinegar dressing.

We also tried the fried shrimp & pork potstickers (肉蝦仁煎餃) for the first time, which were, as is the fashion nowadays, served upturned stuck onto a fried dumpling pastry sheet. This is a bit gimmicky in my opinion, but it did spark off a conversation of how they were constructed. These were good, but there are probably other things I'd order off the menu first.

Stuff like the open-topped shrimp & pork shao mai (蝦仁燒賣) and the various wonton dishes are higher up in the pecking order in my opinion. Of the wonton dishes I preferred the spicy shrimp & pork (紅油抄手), which had a real kick, to the ones in special sauce (乾拌菜肉餛飩). Memo to Din Tai Fung management, I wouldn't use the term 'special sauce' should you decide to open in Britain.

There was other stuff, but I thought I'd go over to one of my dining companions to give his opinion. After all, he's not some dilettante blogger, but someone who's worked in kitchens most of his life and really knows his stuff. I am of course talking about Pa Noodles, and his comments over the course of the meal have been translated from Cantonese into italics:

How meticulous, there's a guy weighing out dumpling dough in the kitchen. The dumplings here really are quite exceptional; this is a PROPER restaurant, they don't take short cuts. Mind you, they could've been a bit more generous with the crab in the pork & crab XLB. My favourite? Probably the wontons in spicy sauce; the sauce has a proper kick. The pork chop with soup noodles (油炸排骨湯麵) is good, too – nice tender meat with good 5-spice flavour. But the rice, the fried rice, it wasn't fluffy enough, a bit too hard. But anyway, I like it here. Is there one of these in London? It'd make a fortune there.

A fair assessment by Pa Noodles, although I think he was a tad harsh about the rice! My mum liked Din Tai Fung too, although she didn't really rave about it. The thing is she's rarely effusive about food that isn't Cantonese. And my colleague liked it so much he's planning to visit the branch in his hometown of Sydney. Me? I've been to the Causeway Bay branch in Hong Kong four times now, and I love it. If only they could open one in London – I know it's a forlorn hope, but here's the link to my petition anyway.

It's Not Tapas

Imagine for one moment a turd; not a pleasant image, I know. Imagine that this turd is then cut up into little bite-sized pieces before being artfully arranged in the middle of a small plate. There are some people who will tell you that this is tapas. It's not: it's shit on a plate.

With apologies to Jorge Valdano for bastardising his famous 'shit on a stick' rant.

Dim Sum, Noodles & Dinner @ A Wong

Quail egg croquette

Best new Chinese restaurant opening in recent memory or a case of the emperor's new clothes? While most reviews of A Wong have been praiseworthy, some have been a bit negative. I guess that's the risk one takes when diverging from more tried-and-trusted Chinese restaurant formulae. And it's the risk taking approach that appealed to me when I visited A Wong twice within the space of a few days. Twice? Give me a break, I had to check out both lunch AND dinner menus. For lunch I decided to go for a familiar combination of dim sum and noodles. As the dim sum is sold by piece (from £1.30 each) this enabled me, as a solo diner, to explore more of the menu than I might otherwise have done.

Xiao long bao

My favourite was a pair of soup-filled xiao long bao – one a Shanghai-style pork dumpling, the other a Yunnan mushroom, pork and truffle one. I liked both although I would've preferred the vinegar and ginger on the side rather than mixed in with the soup inside the former. It's not Din Tai Fung, but you're not going to find many better examples of XLB in London. Less enjoyable was the much written-about clear shrimp dumpling with citrus foam; it was a decent enough example of a har gau but the citrus foam didn't really do anything for me. And nor did the pork crackling atop a perfectly adequate open-topped pork and prawn dumpling aka siu mai.

Baked cha siu bao

The baked roasted pork bun with a sugared coating is a copy of Tim Ho Wan's famous baked cha siu bao. While it isn't as good as the original from Hong Kong, I enjoyed this crispy-topped bun although I would've favoured a sweeter filling. I also liked the quail egg croquette puff with its nicely runny yolk and crispy shell. However, I would've ditched one of the conflicting accompaniments of 'seaweed' and a ginger-dip. Sometimes less is more.

Crossing the bridge noodles

The only real disappointment of lunch was the Kunming 'crossing the bridge' noodles, a dish where ham, quail egg, preserved veg, fresh veg and rice noodles are served on a separate plate ready to be 'cooked' in the broth. Compared to traditional versions I've sampled in China, there were a few toppings missing, but I could forgive them that if the dish delivered. It didn't. The main problem was the temperature of the broth, which wasn't hot enough to cook the pak choi. And while I wasn't impressed by this dish, I was impressed by my server who listened to my comments and promised to pass on my feedback to the chef.

Dong Po pork

French beans with pork

Onto dinner, and I'm afraid to report that it was, on the whole, a tad disappointing, as most dishes were far too aggressively salty. So much so any citrus flavour in the beef with dried orange peel and chilli was drowned out. The Dong Po slow braised pork belly wasn't tender enough and it lacked the sweet and comforting aromatic notes that define this dish. It was just too salty. As were the twin offerings from Sichuan of dry fried French beans with pork and Sichuanese aubergine – the pork in the former was the saltiest thing we ate all night.

Steamed sea bass

The only respite from the salt assault was the two fish dishes: steamed wild sea bass with Jinhua ham and five-spice and chilli smoked cod cheeks. These were the undoubtedly highlights of dinner, in particular the perfectly steamed portion of sea bass, which was nicely complemented by the Jinhua ham. The cod cheeks were a joy, because it had been seasoned with a light hand.

The fact the mains were so disappointing was a shame, as before that, the pickles, peanuts in sweetened black vinegar and pickled cucumber kicked off the meal well. And the dim sum basket was none too shabby although a couple of our party (from Suzhou and Shanghai) who know a thing or two about xiao long bao were less than enamoured with these soup-filled dumplings. Yet again, the inclusion of the vinegar and ginger inside the dumpling proved controversial, as they felt that the sweetness of the meat was drowned out by the vinegar.

Tobacco smoked banana etc

Rather bizarrely it was the desserts that rescued the dinner from disappointment. We shared all four of the desserts on the menu: Beijing yoghurt with chilli barbecued pineapple; tobacco smoked banana, nut crumble, chocolate, soy caramel; snow ball merengue, lychee granite, mango puree and lime sorbet; and lastly, coconut ice cream with glutinous rice dumpling. The favourite was deemed to be the banana and chocolate dessert with its contrast in textures and flavour while I also found the refreshing lychee granita to be very good. If I could, I would just come here to eat dessert, which was amongst the best I've sampled in any restaurant, not just Chinese, in a long, long time.

When asked after dinner what we thought, we let our server know that we thought many of the dishes were just too salty. She said that she would let the chef know, and again it's good to see that this restaurant accepts feedback in a non-defensive manner. On the whole I thought A Wong was reasonable value with my solo lunch clocking in at £22 including tea and service whilst dinner cost £32/head including wine and service.

I'm not quite sure what to make of A Wong. Minor quibbles aside, I enjoyed the dim sum and would like to return to explore the rest of the relatively short selection over lunch. But then again, the noodles didn't quite cut it and dinner was somewhat spoiled, not by any degree of experimentation, but by over-aggressive saltiness. There was redemption in the desserts but that's not a good enough reason to return for dinner any time soon.



A Wong, 70 Wilton Road, London. SW1V 1DE (Tel: 020-7828-8931)
Nearest station: Victoria