Boozey: Spuyten Duyvil

+ Great selection of beer, especially for Belgian bottles.
- No spirits.
+ Across the street from Fette Sau
+ One beer always in the room temp cask.
++ Great yard
- No tunes
- Williamsburg

Grubby: Denino's Pizza

This post is five weeks coming. Way back in April, our 5th Food Adventure took us to the supposedly delicious pizza haunts of Staten Island. Not so great. A beautiful ferry ride and a stop in a very "arousing " cavern of a bar redeemed our trip. Let me elaborate:

Sietsema obviously leads me to many spots described here. He likes Denino's. There are entire Chowhound postings on Staten Island pizza. So I thought we had to do it. Long story short - pretty good pie, but not nearly worth the ferry and bus I dragged folks on. If this was in your neighborhood, you'd probably get it regularly. But it's not worth a trip across Manhattan, let alone to Shaolin. Maybe if you had a car or something and were doing a big pizza tour. Anyways, I digress.

It's a soccer party pizza place. In fact, there were several tables of uniformed children chowing down. It could probably be transplanted to most anywhere in the country and would fit.

The pie: like I said, pretty good. I was expecting amazing, so maybe I'm being rash, but no one in our ten person troop was overwhelmed. I liked it - in fact I feel like I liked it more than everyone else. We got three pies: Buffalo chicken, the MOR (meatballs, onions and ricotta) and the Garbage (Pepperoni, Meatballs, Sausage, Mushrooms and Onions).
M.O.R :

Skeptic:

The M.O.R. was my fave - ricotta was the standout flavor here. Most others preferred the Garbage. The Buffalo Chicken would have benefited from a little crumbled Blue Cheese. Regular old thin crust, regular old sauce. What is with the hype? It's a serviceable, nay, pretty good spot. But superb? The "superior pie on the island"? Yeesh - I'll yank my collar there.

I think I'm just embarassed to have taken 10 people on a 90 min trip to the place.
Three slices:

Thank God, right down the street was the most excellent G-Spot bar. Child labor pouring drinks from handles of Captain Morgan. A pool table slanted towards one corner pocket - anywhere the ball was struck, it rolled back to the corner right! Gorgeous velvet Aztec landscapes. Good shit and cold Tecate.




Though it brings a vurp to my mouth, I will begrudgingly mention that I did take everyone to a second pizza spot, "Brother's", at the recommendation of Chowhound forums. Upon first bite, I deemed it "gas station pizza" and was ashamed. The crust came pre-made in plastic bags! I spent the rest of the time gratuitously apologizing to all and sundry. Here is sad Carina with something claimed to be "Cheese sticks" and Stan sucking on "part-skim cheese food":



As I mentioned, the ferry can be divine on a beautiful day:


Info: Way the fuck out on Staten Island. Get a car.

Boozey: Trophy Bar

I was going to wipe out the Boozey portion of this blog - I've got very little to say and, frankly, am completely uninspired by bars here. There is little point and I'm not going to take pictures and rate every fucking bar I walk into. It'd be like a punch to the nuts.

But...nonetheless, for the time being, I'm just going to make a small note of bars that are in some way reasonable, just so they are noted for any future need.

Trophy Bar:
We felt old there.
- Young people with hideous thrift store glasses frames everywhere.
+ Close to our place. Can walk home.
+ Cheap Beer/shot special
+ Good Tunes (garage dj last night)

Grubby: Baden Baden

Are you there, friends? I'm sorry y'all - I know I hurt you by not posting. But it hurt me too. It's both of our faults, really. I'm sorry baby. I promise, that's the old me. I've turned a corner. Come back to me. I'm still hungry and you are still bored - we can make this work.

After a whole freakin' month of not posting because of delicious trips to the Bay Area and New Orleans, I'm back. I won't be mean and tease you about the pulled meat and sliced meat and slow roasted meat and bbq meat I had. Instead, I'll give you fried meat that you can get right here in NY. I'm posting about a place we visited 2 months ago or so, but its still on my mind.

Stan took a few of us to the unmarked (at least in English) 2nd floor K-town joint Baden Baden. Their specialty: KFC, or, Korean Fried Chicken. Don't be looking for thick, greasy breading here or the dry hunks of flesh found in most fried chickens. This is juicy rotiserrie chicken that I'm guessing is flash-fried at the end leaving a dark, crisp yet thin skin. It is fine as Ginuwine. Squirt Sriracha all over to keep it real. And yes, those O-Rings were as good as they look.

It ain't just chicken either - they do much more. Pictured below is a sea snail salad with thick jalepeno slices and chilled vermicelli noodles. Fantastic. A soft tofu salad was also devoured quickly. More kimchi was needed - next time.


Info: Upstairs at 28 W 32nd.