Satisfying a Craving
On Monday, myself and several friends from work decided to try out a restaurant that I’ve been hoping to visit for quite some time now. L’Ecole is attached to the French Culinary Institute, a highly respected cooking school here in the city. Chefs training at the school spend time at the restaurant, learning on the job, but make no mistake, their skills are already quite formidable. In fact, I was told that a student chef by the name of Patrick Farrell was the person responsible for creating the entire prefix menu that we were served from

The Prefix
Dinner at L’Ecole was served from a four-course prefix menu with an appetizer, main course, sorbet and dessert, all for $40. I’d heard the portions were sizeable, so we all ordered different courses hoping to try a little of everything. I’m pleased to say, we weren’t disappointed.

Among the delicious creations we tried, the soup that was served as an appetizer was by far the most amazing dish. Complex, smooth, rich and delicious, the soup set off an explosion of flavor on my pallet that I won’t soon forget. The downside was that given how rich it was, the portion was perhaps a little too generous. Though we all shared, the people who ordered it has some trouble finish. This was actually true of many of the dishes, though I always say that its better to have too much than too little.

The other highlight in my mind was the duck, which was served in two parts: dark meat on the bone, and light meat breaded and filleted. Both were incredibly tender, and each portion had a distinct flavor which perfectly complimented the dish as a whole.

After the main course, a pallet cleansing sorbet of pomegranate and apple-cider was offered before dessert. By the time the creme broule, cheesecakes and fruit tarts came out, we delightfully full but just to taste the sweet things in front of us was well worth the effort.

The Atmosphere
The decor was simple but elegant, and the service was spectacular. We spent nearly two hours eating, drinking, laughing and never felt rushed or bored. This would be a perfect destination, methinks, for a nice but not totally over-the-top dinner date.

The Bottom Line
L’ecole was exceptional in all respects. I really can’t sing their praises enough. The service was impeccable and the food was five-star quality, while the price was quite modest considering the dining experience. I’ll definitely be back here again when they rotate the menu, which I’m told happens about once every six weeks as new chefs rotate in the kitchen. I suggest everyone give this place a try. I promise you’ll leave with a smile!

I Bleed Marinara
My love of Italian food came in large part from my mother’s cooking, which would seem only natural, IF my mother weren’t 100% Irish… But if you think that ever stopped her from making some world-class meatballs, sausage and pepper sandwiches, or chicken parm, you’d be sadly mistaken mister!

Anyway, since moving to New York City, I can’t get my mom’s amazing cooking too often, but a man still has needs! In my two years of city-dwelling, I have managed to find a few places that satisfy me, but since I live so close to Little Italy now, I decided that this weekend I would explore that neighborhood a bit further.

Just to add some background, Little Italy used to be a significant residential neighborhood for ethnic Italians, but it has lately been encroached upon by Chinatown to the point where it exists along only a few city blocks between Canal and Broome (according to gonyc.about.com).

Il Piccolo Bufalo
Despite the area’s diminishing size, there are still some gems worth visiting. In my humble opinion, Il Piccolo Buffalo is real diamond in the rough. Unlike several other Little Italy restaurants, the staff here is exceptionally friendly and helpful, and the food is excellent. I went there with a lady friend of mine on Saturday, and in this instance, I got a pizza called the Piccolo Diavolo, which is basically a good spicy sausage pizza with hot peppers and capicola. Delicious! And considering the portions and service, very reasonably priced!

Ferrara Bakery and Cafe
Afterwards, we decided to get some coffee, so we headed over to a fairly well-known Italian bakery nearby, called Ferrara. This place is pretty upscale as far as bakeries go. Marble floors, hardwood facades, and suited waiters and waitresses that could easily go serve a high society ball or wedding without a wardrobe change, all come together to make this place a very classy experience. The prices are reflective of this, of course, but once you get a table you can sit and enjoy coffee, dessert or a nightcap in peace and comfort. One thing they most definitely don’t do at Ferrara is rush you, so take your time and relax!

The Bottom Line
The bottom line for Little Italy, in my experience, is this: choose your battles. A lot of the shops and restaurants here have degenerated into tourist traps that get you in the door with sweet promises of authenticity and deliciousity that ultimately don’t hold up under even the most casual expectations. With a little trial and error, however, you’ll find that there are a few places worth visiting, and may find yourself coming back again and again!

My experience with House music is admittedly limited, but this past Saturday I was convinced to go see the stylings of DJ Hernan Cattaneo. We bought tickets online for the show for $30 which felt a little steep, but I was willing to give it a shot, so at 10pm we got in a cab and headed out.

The Mansion is a club in the Meat Packing district that we almost walked right by at first owing to a general lack of signage that I’ve come to expect of trendy Meat Packing clubs, but once we got inside we quickly realized how huge the place was. After dropping coats off upstairs, we descended down to the bar area. Actually, the first bar area was more like a very large anteroom, with the main club area lying deeper in.

After crossing a hallway flanked by flaming beds of stones, we were in the heart of the club. A large bar and a VIP area in front made up the main room, with an upstairs lounge circling the back of the club. Early on, I realized the bar was too expensive for my blood at $10 for a shot and $16 for mixed drink, so I determined it would be a sober evening. I did try ordering a glass of water, but it was crowded, so I waited for about 10 minutes to get a bartenders attention, only to wait another 10 minutes to get it after I’d ordered it, which made my already sober experience just that much more unpleasant.

Upstairs was muuuch better. It was less crowded and had a better view of the DJ booth giving us a good place to settle in and dance, which we did for five hours straight! The house DJ opened, and for the most part was pretty awesome, though unfortunately I don’t know his name. Hernan Cattaneo was also good, and the club’s special effects kicked into high gear for his performance with strobes, giant jets of fog, and dancing girls in their underwear. He did nearly make my ears bleed with about 2 minutes worth of straight feedback noise, but otherwise the entire show was spot-on.

The bottom line is that this club is way too expensive to go to unless you really love house music and a club scene with perhaps a touch of euro-flavor to it. The tickets weren’t cheap, the drinks were egregious, and the VIP area was bottle-service only with $1000 price tag attached. That being said, if you avoid the expenses and stick to the balcony area, you’ll be fine. I wouldn’t recommend this spot though, unless you have a very specific reason for going.

Koronet pizza isn’t the most famous, or even the best prepared pizza in the city, but it sure is the biggest! As anyone familiar with this unassuming pizzeria will attest, the major selling point for Koronet is it’s massive single slice. These things are enormous, easily equal to two slices of any lesser pie. whereas I can easily polish off half a pie from most of the other pizza places in NYC, one Koronet slice did the job for me. I really can’t stress this enough: Koronet slices are big!

The other important draw is the price. Where many places in the city charge upwards of $2 for a normal size slice these days, the doublesize Koronet slices are only $3. In my opinion, this makes them without question one of the best values to be had in the sprawling pizza community of New York.

Unfortunately, Koronet is not without its issues. Chief among them, from my perspective, is location. All the way up around 110th street, Koronet is a bit of a hike for many New Yorkers, especially if you’re from another borough. If you happen to be a student at Columbia, its just a short walk to Koronet’s pizza, but everyone else will just have to pile on to the 1 train and make the journey one stop at a time.

Koronet pizza is good, but not necessarily great. While it doesn’t pack the same complex, classic flavors of the city’s more iconic pizzerias, it does offer pizza by the oh so large slice making it perfect for the budget minded. The bottom line is this: if you’re looking for a lot of food at budget prices, make the trip. If you don’t live near 110th street and you aren’t necessarily in the mood for mind-bogglingly large pies, then Koronet is probably too far out of your way to be worth it. Instead, try a slice at Joe’s in the Village (review coming soon!) and give Koronet a shot next time you’re up in the 100’s.

For all my readers (I think there may have been five of you ;), who haven’t heard from me in a while, I have an update! I’m now living in TriBeCa!

Why TriBeCa? Well the reasoning is that while I don’t plan on actually doing much in this neighborhood, it’s a major confluence of subway lines that will give me easy access to both the east and west sides. For a young NYC adventurer, you couldn’t ask for much more in terms of location.

With that said, I’m starting the blog up again, and hopefully this time I won’t go dark for 6 months at a time

A few nights ago, I was treated to a somewhat alternative, but totally awesome night of entertainment by some of my business associates in the search engine industry: Scratching lessons at the Scratch DJ academy on 6th ave. Not your usual night on the town to say the least, this experience was both novel and educational.

We arrived around 7:00pm with a group of about 15 people (I assume that our friends rented out the space for a few hours to entertain us) and headed up to the second floor where the DJ academy is located. Inside, we were greeted warmly by our scratch sensei for the evening, Master Instructor J-Smoke, who introduced us to one of the vital pieces of equipment in the DJ industry, the turntable, as well as our TA’s, J-Smoke’s fellow DJ instructors at the academy.

Scratch 101
We each got to man our own turntable stations complete with a pair of turntables/records, speakers and a mixing board. Since I’m not amazingly sophisticated in the area of music, I’ll gloss over the minutiae of how these devices work and assume that most people understand the basic principal: the record spins, you push it forward and back to create the scratching effect. With about 10 minutes of basic instruction under our belts, we were all scratching up a storm!

Now I’ll be the first to admit that music is not my forte. I struggled to learn the recorder in middle school and I still struggle with music and instruments to this very day. That being said, scratching was really fun! It would probably take years to master, but getting started is relatively simple, and even if you’re pretty much tone deaf like I am, its still cool to scratch around. Sometimes you even get lucky and scratch up something that sounds good! I’m sure that people who have actual musical skills and talent would find this even more rewarding, but it just goes to show that even as a musical neophyte, you can still have fun!

DJ Names and the DJ Battle
After being shown several basic scratches, we were offered the opportunity to square off in a no-holds barred DJ battle to the death! Okay, no one actually died, but that’s not to say it wasn’t serious business! We had a few people with some actual experience, so in that sense there was no contest, but we all got to steal our nerves and get up front on the instructors turntables and try our newly acquired skills in front of all our friends. I’m pretty sure my 30 or so seconds came out as a discordant mess, but wha-wha-what’s a few errant beats among friends, right? Ultimately, almost everyone gave it a shot, and some were even pretty good, so we all had a great time watching and listening, and the winner actually got a Scratch Academy T-shirt. Pretty sweet, no?

Private Party
Since we were a private party, we got the big seminar room and instructors to ourselves, and after we finished, our benefactors passed around some cold beers and pizza, and we had an improvised dance party, compliments of J-Smoke. All in all, we were there for a good 3 hours, but I can’t offer any kind of value comparison since I was there as a guest of someone with an expense account. What I can tell you is that this was a great change of pace from the usual happy hour bar scene, and while I don’t have any grand aspirations that involve DJ names or mixing boards, I’d love to go back at some point, if only for the sheer novelty of it.

If you do, however, have a serious interest in becoming a DJ, the Scratch Academy offers courses from beginner to advanced levels, and also offers the use of its extensive equipment for training, practicing, and, I’m told, even production. So if you want to get your feet wet in the DJ world, this might not be a bad place to start. Until next time, keep those records turning!

Last weekend my brother was in town with his car, so of course I wanted to show him some of New York’s finest pizza’s, but I also wanted to catch a ride to a pizzeria that is otherwise a pain to get to by subway. We chose Di Fara Pizza at 1424 Avenue J here in Brooklyn, which has topped a good number of pizza rankings in the last several years, as anyone who’s seen their walls of collected magazine and paper articles can attest.

The critical thing to remember about this place is that it’s a little pizzeria that suddenly got big press coverage starting sometime in the last ten years or so, despite having been around for closer to forty. This had significant impact on our pizza eating experience, as I’ll explain below.

The Pizza: 8
If I’m not mistaken, this is one of the few top pizzeria’s in the city that doesn’t use a brick oven to make its pies. Trust me when I say that this is in no way a bad thing. The pizza was delicious and perhaps the best part is that you can see the chef, who’s been making pies here for decades, ply his craft. Every ingredient and topping is sliced fresh right in front of you, and added with care before the pie gets put in the oven. The result is a pie with a delicious thin layer of mozzarella baked evenly over hand-made sauce with a slight drizzling of olive oil and topped with a flavorful and aesthetically pleasing portion of basil. The one thing that detracted from this pizza slightly is actually the exact same problem that Lombardi’s pizza had: the crust was soggy in the middle despite being thin and expertly charred everywhere else. As before, I’m forced to dock a point from an otherwise incredible pie.

The Toppings: 7
The toppings were tasty and we could see that they were fresh, as they were added literally right in front of us, but they weren’t as ubiquitous as many that I’ve had recently, and just aren’t particularly transcendent enough to get past simply being “very good” in my book. Really nothing special if you’ve had some of the city’s top pies before.

Other: 2
I regret this, but the truth is that Di Fara Pizza is another instance of an excellent pizza marred by a frustrating eating experience. As I said earlier, the chef makes each pie fresh, right in front of you, which is great. The downside is, he makes everyone else’s pies fresh right in front of you too, and the novelty wears off quickly when you’ve got a dozen orders ahead of yours. The fact that the pizza oven itself can only hold 2 pies at a time doesn’t help move things along either. We went at lunch time, about 1pm, and all told, we waited about a half hour in the congested line that was jutting out the door when we got there, and perhaps another half hour after that to get our pie.

I’d been warned by several pizza critics that it might take a while to get the food at Di Fara, and that they don’t necessarily serve the pies in the order you arrived, but even knowing this, the reality is frustrating and tedious. The place is small and cramped, your standard hole-in-the-wall with seating for maybe 15 people at a stretch, which ordinarily would be okay for a pizzeria if you didn’t have to spend an hour there waiting before you even get your food. This singular annoyance detracted considerably from the experience.

The Bottom Line
Don’t go out of your way. The pizza is good, yes, but the location is remote to most NYC commuters unless you have a car, and even if you can get there easily, you may be having second thoughts after the long wait for your food. I think that if you arrive on a really off-time, like 11:30 in the morning or something, you might not have to wait, but even a few orders ahead of you can back up the entire line by maybe 10 minutes a piece, so budget your time accordingly.

Hard to imagine New York City without a pizza place on every block, isn’t it? But believe it or not, NYC was not always the bustling pizza metropolis we know and love today. In fact, it is widely believed that pizza surfaced on the streets of the big apple in the early 1900s, and if the legends are true, we have one pioneering pizzeria to thank for it: Lombardi’s.

Most New York Pizza enthusiasts will have heard the name Lombardi’s before, perhaps owing as much to it’s reputation for serving top quality pizza to this very day, as to its broad acknowledgment as being the first pie in the city. A few weeks ago, I decided that it was time to step beyond the vale at 32 Spring Street in Manhattan and find out what this famous slice of New York was really made of.

The Pizza: 8
The pizza at Lombardi’s was actually quite delicious, in keeping with it’s reputation. While I can’t vouch for what it may have tasted like in the paste, the current incarnation of Lombardi’s pizza was definitely one of the better pies in the city, but perhaps not quite a top tier competitor. The sauce was exceptional with a precise balance of basil working to compliment the tomato base. The cheese was Buffalo Mozzarella, as I’ve come to expect from many of the top pizza joints, but it was sliced thin and spread across the pie liberally, scoring some nice points over the competition. I docked some points for the crust however, because it was soggy and droopy in the middle. Once you eat past this, the crust is foldable, but the fold didn’t help me on those first few bites. Without consistently crunchy and foldable crust, I had to knock this pizza down to an 8 despite its otherwise near perfect design.

The Toppings: 9
The toppings were my usual, pepperoni and mushrooms, which always make a delightful combination. This occasion was no exception, and i was especially pleased with the quality of the mushrooms. If you’re a mushroom lover, you probably dig that slightly pungent flavor, and these mushrooms took their flavor to the next level. Absolutely fantastic! The pepperoni was also good, cooked to a nice crispiness as only the top pizzeria’s in the city can without drying it up.

Other: 6
Not unlike the digs at Patsy’s, this is a full blown restaurant with tables and a waiting staff. What was very different from Patsy’s was how packed it was. We dropped by around 6:15 and had to elbow our way to the hostess where we put our name down for a table with about a forty minute wait. This wasn’t honestly too surprising, given Lombardi’s reputation and the dinner hour rush, so we backtracked and waited in a nearby bar until we thought we could go back and claim the table. Incidentally, there is a bar at Lombardi’s that you can wait at, but it seemed cramped and crowded, so we didn’t make the attempt.

Once seated, the service was like clockwork, but definitely no frills to be had here. The place was far too crowded and the staff far too busy for anyone to fuss too much over any one table, and we were seated in the basement area with the wine along with several other parties, so it we didn’t see our waitress much anyway. Fortunately, we decided to keep it simple, and our pizza came in a timely fashion.

Price wasn’t any more of an obstacle than it is at any of the top pizza places, and the food is definitely worth the indulgence, but they aren’t cutting you any breaks, especially when payment is cash only. Overall I’m only giving this place a rating of 6 for the “other” category because of the combination of hectic dining and no credit cards.

The Bottom Line
Try it during off-hours and bring cash. While everything was good, it could have been so much better if we’d been able to sit at ground level without a wait. Take away the slightly hectic atmosphere and I’m sure that you’ll have a much better time here.

Since I haven’t posted in a while, here’s a quickie to wet your appetite as I dive into yet another round of pizza exploration. As I may have mentioned in the past, I’ve been using one very comprehensive list of top pizzeria’s in NYC in addition to my own research and questionares. This Pizza Bible, as I’ve come to know it, has led me to some of the best pies in the city, and now that I’ve finally found the online version, it’s time to share its knowledge and wisdom with all of you. So now, compliments of Time Out New York, I give you The Pizza Bible! May it lead you to the promised land as it has me.

If there is one thing I’ve learned about New Yorkers, its that they want to get the hell out of New York. Maybe not forever, but with sunny beaches just a couple of hours away in New Jersey and the Hamptons, who among us can resist the urge to pack up and roll out to the suburbs for a weekend or two? Not I of course!

Going Down
People often say that there’s nothing better than having a beach house, except for having a friend with one. In my case, it’s my uncle who resides on Long Beach Island in New Jersey who provided me with a much needed place to crash for the weekend. So I headed up to the bus station and grabbed a ticket. The bus ride is $31 round trip and takes about 1.5 hours each way, but to go the distance you really need a car. Fortunately I got picked up from the bus station by my uncle and an hour later we were on the Island!

Having Fun on the Island
There are lots of ways to have fun on LBI, but the most obvious one is right in the name, the beach. The island is approximately 18 miles long, and almost every inch of the sea side is covered in sandy beaches. Lifeguards supervise until 5pm and make you wear a beach badge, but after that, it’s all open sand and surf. So go ahead and play paddle ball, take a walk, or a little dip by moonlight if that’s your fancy.

There’s still more on the bay side, with sailing, motor-boating, water-skiing and jet-skiing available for rentals as short as an hour or as long as a full day if you’d like. I wouldn’t recommend bay side swimming however, as the beaches on this side of the island are sometimes slimy with silt and seaweed, and often host considerable numbers of horseshoe crabs.

If the water isn’t really your thing though, the island still has plenty to offer, including a cool little amusement park called Fantasy Island, complete with a giant ferris wheel, bumper cars, funnel cakes and an arcade with skiball (oh yes, it really is the Jersey Shore). Right next door to that is a giant waterslide and an 18 hole mini-golf course, one of many on the island.

How I Spent My Time
Drinking at the Sea Shell Hotel right on the beach, sunbathing and reading on the sea side sands, swimming in the still chilly coastal waters, eating pizza and assorted Italian meats and cheeses, playing shuffle board, and enjoying the company of a beautiful girl.

The Bottom Line
While this was perhaps my best weekend of the entire summer thus far, there are several key barriers to overcome in getting here. First, you need a car to get onto the island, and second, you need a place to stay, and with the booming tourist industry, this will be neither cheap, nor easy unless you already know someone with a place here. If you can manage the trip however, you won’t regret it. Go ahead and splurge (you’ll have to, since the island is somewhat expensive) and enjoy everything LBI has to offer, including great seafood, beaches, bars, and even some good old fashioned family fun.