Korzo, South Slope

While walking down 5th avenue one day recently heading towards the Greenwood Cemetery, we got caught in a sudden rainstorm. We ducked into the Eastern European themed Korzo between 19th and 20th streets and cozied into the nook in the hall between the front bar area and the dining room with the piano in the back. (This is yet another of New York's 2-location chains, the other being at Tompkins Square Park in Manhattan.)

The decor here is cozy and the furnishings all have a real weight to them; it would be easy to imagine this place has been around for a few decades or more, rather than just a few years. The bartender who also waited on us was helpful and patient. It's tempting to make this into a regular weekly hangout.

Heavy furniture, medium beer

The cooler days and the rain made hot soup sound like a good idea, and the Soup du Jour was a hearty cream of red potato and dill soup with a spicy chili oil floated on top. Grilled house baked bread alongside it was perfect for sopping up the leftovers.

Creamy potato soup. And plenty of grilled bread.

Korzo practically makes it's own everything. Bread, mustard, pickles, (beet!) ketchup, noodles, cures it's own sausages. They even have their own beer in conjunction with Peak Organic Brewery out of Portland, Maine. Don't click if you're under 21. (The house beer is delicious, btw, and on another visit, when the $3 good cheap rotating draft was kicked, they served the house Korzo Ale for $3. It was a great all-night special. The beer menu is pretty solid, too, with most beers available by the pitcher or in 1 liter glasses too.)

The Hausbrau

We also tried the Slav burger and the Spicy Hungarian Goulash. The Goulash was a thick stew of beef brisket, paprika, and red pepper over what were described as "crispy" spatzle, but which actually turned out to be simply thick and delicious, if slightly soft spatzle. There were caramelized onions in here too somewhere, and a piece of home made Langoš (Hungarian flatbread) which was lighter and softer than a pita, and warm from the oven or pan or wherever it came from. Again, the assumption here is that you'll want to eat every last drop of food from your bowl. This assumption is accurate.

Goulash over Spatzle. And flatbread

The burgers here were called the best burger in NYC by the Village Voice last year. The patties and their respective toppings are wrapped in Langoš dough and deep fried. The Slav burger had slow cooked pork, house made sauerkraut, and Bryndza, a sheep-milk variation on Feta. The deep frying process leaves a delightfully golden and crispy outer pastry and a perfectly medium-rare patty. This burger is also ridiculously easy to hold with none of the messiness associated with most bar sandwiches. The Bryndza has enough bite to stay interesting over the rich combination of meats, and the sauerkraut is authentic, though in short supply in this dish. The accompanying fries were a combination of sweet potatoes and hand-cut chips, and both were tasty with the beet ketchup that came with them.

Korzo burer: The Slav

There are "jazz nights" on Tuesdays in the dining room, but there's a divider curtain which somehow keeps the sound from entering the bar area, so if you want to drink and don't like jazz, don't worry. And if you do like jazz, they've got a couple of regulars apparently who know their stuff. Two televisions do play some sports but with no volume, although you shouldn't worry that it's a super sporty crowd. And when the weather is nice, the front wall opens up to let the night breeze in. The menu is so full of delicious sounding meals that we want to go back again and again until we've tried them all. So far, everything we've had here has been as solid as the heavy antique furniture.

-SdJ

Quiet lunchtime in the rain.

Kahawa cafe, park slope

Kahawa just opened less than a week ago on 15th street and 5th avenue. It's a little coffee and pastry shop with a good selection of cold beverages too. A tiny little corner space, cute without trying too hard.

They use Illy coffee, which I haven't seen much of here in Park Slope, but the iced coffee is pretty flavorful. The staff is super friendly but you can tell they are still getting comfortable with the new space.

The pastry selection looks great, with lots of the things you expect to be able to order with a latte or cappuccino, but there are some happy extras like the homemade Twinkie-like-concoctions that come in different flavors like Red Velvet and Almond Cream. Red Velvet was really intensely red with cream cheese filling, while the almond cake was moist and marzipan-y with a lighter cream filling. Both were delicious, and everything was super affordable. Try this place before they start raising prices.

-SdJ

Sidecar, 5th Avenue

Sometimes I get the feeling that I've missed the heyday of Sidecar. I've read reviews that say the prices are too high now, they've increased while quality has decreased, that the food was better "back in the day" and so on. But whenever I go there, I'm more than satisfied.

Portions are plenty big, so if they were bigger once upon a time, I don't feel gypped. Prices can be a little high, but I think they're justified. $14 for a burger with fries is a big deal when you compare to a place like Sea Witch, but is, sadly, becoming de riguer. And $10-$12 mixed drinks would be unreasonable if they were your regular tourist bar creations, but when they're made with such finesse and usually with house made bitters, syrups, jams, and so forth, I'm happy to splurge.

Burger + Jalapenos

I've been to Sidecar for dinner on numerous occasions, but this time we came for lunch on a brunch menu day. We've come for more breakfasty fare before too, but sandwiches were in order on this visit. (Along with a couple of cocktails, since it was Sunday, after all.)

Pimm's Summer Cup

I started with the Pimm's Summer cup. Your usual Pimm's with the addition of muddled watermelon and mint, served in a frosty silver cup and garnished beautifully. (My one complaint here, as this is pure cocktail snobbishness, is the contrast between the artful drink-making and the ice-machine ice slivers. Having experienced the difference that hand-crushed ice or cubes and rocks carved from a big block can make in a drink, I get a little whistful when I'm served a perfect cocktail with less than perfect ice.) but I digress. This was pure summer in my mouth. A drink I could have reordered all day, and not too high proof to make that a bad idea.

Tomino

The other drink on the table was the Tomino. "very dry" according to the menu, this concoction was a pint glass(!) of gin with some coconut water and bitters. Deceptively smooth, but clearly designed to knock you down. Not sweet at all, despite the pink color.

BLT Extraordinaire

I ordered the BLT. Thick challa toast slathered in homemade sun-dried tomato mayo held lovely delicate Boston lettuce, and slices of real tomato-flavored tomato, which I almost forget exists these days. But the real star was the super-thick house-cured bacon. Darker and slightly less salty than your average/awesome breakfast meat, they cure all of their bacon (along with other meats) in the basement and you can taste the love. Home fries were perfectly crispy-crunchy outside and seasoned well with onions, sage and rosemary.

My lovely companda's burger came with Sidecar's perfect fries, (seriously perfect every time,) and was juicy and firm. Cooked pinkly medium, and topped with jalapeños and white American cheese (have I mentioned how weird it is to me that everyone uses orange American here? It's good to see the un-dyed variety.) The only less than impressive part was the sesame seeded bun, which was merely average.

Sidecar does run a little on the expensive side to warrant a daily visit, but the food is always so good, and the decor so inviting, that it can take a conscious effort to walk past this place some days. And if you always have, then maybe you should let your temptation lure you in for once.

-SdJ

The red tin ceiling

Rachel's, 5th avenue, Park Slope

We've ordered from Rachel's before. Giant burritos that were competent but more stomach than mind blowing. But the exterior screams so loudly for attention every time we walk by that we finally relented and walked in on an evening when a taco craving hit us.

Readers should know that we take tacos very seriously in the du Jour household. Even though they are a relatively recent invention in the history of Mexican cuisine, there are plenty of different interpretations. While we are by no means purists, insisting on only one proper way of preparing these perfect pairings of tortillas and toppings, we expect them to be two things: plentiful, and delicious. Like beers, they should never exist in the singular.

It was threatening to storm when we arrived, so when we were asked if we'd like to sit inside or out back, my first reaction was to choose an inside table. Once seated, however, we could see that the backyard "beach" is covered anyway. The overly Disney-fied Mayan statues made it seem like a great place to go H.A.M. on their basic but cheap margaritas, but since we were here to eat and not drink on this visit, inside was just fine. Lots of stuff on the walls (including a flame-painted hammerhead shark and swordfish,) gives this place a feeling of an Applebee's in a SoCal surf town.

Blind yet? No? Maybe there needs to be more lights and flags.

When we sat down, we were handed in order, chips and salsa, menus, and water. (the chips were thick and crunchy just the way i like. The salsa, however, was watery and tomato-y and not very flavorful at all. Wah wah.) The staff was speedy in getting us started, but subsequent refills of water required us to flag down people who were too busy walking past us to eat chips out of the big metal tub at the prep station or get back to their conversation about hitting the gym. You go, girl.

The specials menu had a dish of three soft double corn tortilla tacos with mesquite grilled pork, onions, cilantro, and salsa verde which caught my eye and my lovely companion went for something smaller-sounding: a cheese quesadilla with guacamole.

Half a quesadilla

The guacamole was really good. Lots of chunky Haas avocados, cilantro, lime... Not spicy but really fresh tasting. The quesadilla was actually pretty huge, using the largest flour tortilla they make, and full of really tasty cheese.

One and a half tacos

My tacos looked perfect, but at 3 for $14 I felt they were either too few or too small. I didn't taste any of the mesquite, or indeed any grill flavored at all in the pork, but it was juicy and tender with some nice spiciness.

After two experiences with this place, I think I'm going to put it in the category of drinking-places with food, rather than food-places with drinks. I may give them one more try to test the barbecue options, but ultimately the vibe is better suited for some margaritas with friends or some post-bar food if the kitchen is still open then. There's way better Mexican for cheaper in the neighborhood.

Food: 7/10
Value: 5/10
Ambiance: 8/10 if you're drinkin'
Service: 7/10

-SdJ

Poop Bags!

I hope you've seen this on 5th avenue...

-SdJ

Aarpan, Back in Brooklyn

Thank you for tolerating our diversion from the Park Slope neighborhood so soon into this blog's run. It won't happen often, I promise.

We're back now and I want to talk about Aarpan! Have you been to this relatively new Indian restaurant on 5th Ave? I've gone several times since we saw that they'd opened in May and my lovely companion and I have been suitably impressed every time. The restaurant never seems full, but since they offer free delivery and take every type of credit card, I imagine they're sending a lot of meals out the door. Good news for us! There's always a seat, and the back patio is super cute. (Just don't sit too close to the bug zapper.)

On our most recent visit, we had a concert to get to at the bandshell, so we arrived at 5 like a retired couple. (You'll have to forgive any spelling issues in this post, as I'm taking all of the food names directly from Aarpan's menu...) We had the usual papadums placed in front of us with Aarpan's three condiments. The lentil wafers were crispy with slightly blackened edges, and plenty of bitter caraway seeds inside. The green mint-coriander sauce is bright and fresh tasting every time, and the sticky tamarind sauce is better than most, but still not my thing. The standout, though, is the bright orange onion relish. It's so sweet and hot and spicy that I learned to love papadams for the first time because of it. 

My lovely companion ordered the Bihari Kabab. The lamb here is consistently tender, without the gristly fattiness we've found to be the norm at other Indian places here. Marinated in yoghurt and covered in spices before it's cooked on charcoal, it stays super moist and sizzling despite the high heat. The onions and peppers on the sizzling platter it was served on were average, but that lamb was so intensely flavorful... 

I decided to try the creatively named "Nonveg Thali" this time, which is hidden at the bottom of the "Briyani Pulao Rice" section of the menu for some reason. Mine came with a Tandoori Chicken Leg, Chicken Tika Masala, Saag Paneer, and Daal Makhnis. Rice and three Pooris were the starches. My waitress said that this was a dish for one, but I assure you that two people could comfortably enjoy the Thali. All of the food was amazing. The Saag was bright green with spinach still recognizable as a separate ingredient, and fresh soft Paneer. The lentils had a nice tooth and plenty of earthy spices, and the Tika Masala was flavorful without being spicy. My tandoori chicken was amazingly moist, and red almost all the way through to the bone from it's pepper spices, and the pooris were little crispy buttery clouds of flavor. I wish I'd had more bread instead of rice, but everything else was really superb. 

The rice here is good. It's not amazing though. This is a shame, because everything else is pretty spectacular so far. Especially the breads. I know a lot of people have probably ordered take-out and delivery here, but you are all missing out on the breads if you let them spend a moment wrapped in foil on the car ride home. Aarpan's Rotis, Parathas and Naans are so good you could seriously just eat a basket of bread and not feel like you missed out on much. They are just the right amount of chewy and crispy and buttery and soft and you kill all of the texture when they get wrapped in foil and allowed to steam in their own heat. If you must order delivery, here's a pro-tip: pre-heat your oven to 375 so when the driver gets there you can open the foil and put them in the oven uncovered for 5-10 minutes. they'll get a lot of the crisp back. 

Ok. Go. Eat.

-SdJ