Deal Of The Century

So, hold on a second. You go into the bar. Not just during happy hour, or only on certain days of the week, but any time on any day. (I was there at around 11pm on a Tuesday.) You order a drink. Not just expensive drinks, or special drinks, or skunked kegs that they're trying to get rid of, but any drink. (I had a draft Yuengling for $4; most drafts were $5 and a couple were $6, and most bottles were $4 or $5. Nobody I was with had liquor, but I would guess it would be comparably reasonably priced.) The bartender hands you your drink, and with it you get a ticket. It's just a standard red ticket, but it may as well be golden.

Because, you see, at Lulu's (formerly known as the Alligator Lounge, at the corner of Greenpoint Avenue and Franklin Street a block West of the G train at Greenpoint Avenue), with each drink you buy, you get a ticket redeemable for a free personal pizza that's made to order.

Let me repeat that. Buy a drink, get a free personal pizza. How awesome is that?

And the pizza is actually pretty good. Made fresh when you order it, not frozen and heated in a microwave or something. You can add toppings for $1 each if you want; they had about four meat toppings, four vegetarian meat substitutes, and ten or twelve veggies. Here's mine, with pepperoni and mushrooms:



(Sorry it's a camera phone picture and not better quality.)

But I mean... even if it weren't great pizza, it's included for free with something you were buying anyway. This is just incredible, if you ask me. I'd keep going on about it, but I think it's pretty obvious by now how I feel.

By the way, tip the guy who's making the pizza. Totally worth it.

Damn You, Trader Joe

Tonight I went to Trader Joe's to buy two things. Two.

I needed a box of cereal and a quart of yogurt. I waited until around 9:30 to head over to TJ's because if I try to go there when I'm on my way home from work (generally in the 7:00-8:00 range), it's always packed and you can easily spend half an hour waiting in line. On the other hand, if it's closer to closing time, the line is shorter and I can get in, grab what I need, and head out.

Well, so much for that. Yogurt is right by the checkout lines, so I went to pick up cereal first. On my way from the door to the cereal, I passed by bread, and the loaf of bread I have in the freezer is down to two slices, so I decided to grab a fresh loaf of whole wheat bread ($2.49) because I'll probably need it sooner or later. Then cereal. I grabbed a box of maple pecan clusters ($3.99), which was what I planned to get in the first place, and as long as I was in the cereal aisle, I picked up a box of golden flax cereal ($2.49) because hey, it's not perishable and I'll eat it eventually. I was all set to head over to the dairy case and pick up my yogurt, but then I realized I was almost out of granola to mix in with the yogurt, so I picked up a fresh bag of three berry granola ($3.29) for when I run out; it was right there next to the cereal.

So then, I could've just walked to the end of that aisle to the dairy case, gotten my yogurt, gotten in line, and that would've been the end of it. Instead, I decided to make a quick trip around the store and see if I saw anything I wanted. And that was where it really went awry. Walking out of the cereal aisle the way I came, I saw a box of whole grain cereal bars with apple ($1.69) that seemed like they'd be good to have on hand. In the next aisle, I decided I needed fresh jars of peanut butter ($2.99) and jelly ($3.49) because that's one of the things the bread was for in the first place. Then I figured maybe I should balance the grainy things I'd bought out with some fruit, and on the way over to the fruit aisle I grabbed a bag of reduced-salt roasted cashews ($5.49) because the bag I have is almost empty. In the fruit aisle, I only picked up one grapefruit ($0.89) because once I was there I remembered that I had done my fruit shopping yesterday. But they also have meat near the fruit, and I picked up a package of boneless skinless chicken breasts ($7.09) for dinner for the next few nights.)

Leaving the meat section, I saw the canned foods aisle, and of course Trader Joe's excels at canned food, so that required a stroll. I picked up a can of chili ($1.99) and a carton of red pepper and tomato soup ($2.79), because it's always nice to have something on hand that's easy to heat up and eat. At the end of that aisle, I figured I probably had enough, and wandered back up the frozen foods aisle towards the dairy case, and while I was going through there a box of ice cream sandwiches ($3.69), and while I should know better, they called my name like a grail-shaped beacon (Bad, bad Zoot! Bad, naughty Zoot!) and into the basket they went. At that point, I was up to where I needed to be, so I got in line, grabbed the yogurt ($2.99), and checked out.

So I meant to spend $6.98, and instead Trader Joe got himself $45.36 of my dinero. Damn you, Trader Joe.

Mother's Day Brunch: Dessert

As I mentioned at the end of my post about Mothers Day Brunch at No. 7, later on that same day the family had ourselves some dessert. (In between, we stopped back at my apartment so that my sister and I could help our mother learn how to use her new iPhone; our father really hit a home run with that Mothers Day gift.) We took a walk down to Blue Marble Ice Cream at their location on Court Street in Cobble Hill, not far from my apartment. Earlier that week, while picking up dinner at Nectar (right next door to Blue Marble), I noticed a line out the door around 9pm on a weekday evening, and decided it was high time to give the new scoop shop (formerly the home of a Tasti D-Lite) a try.

Because it was mid-afternoon on a cool day, there wasn't a line, just one family that had already received their ice cream occupying the one table inside the small store front. My brother-in-law and I both ordered small cups of their blackberries and cream ice cream, which was excellent. Very creamy, very fruity. (All the ice cream was very creamy, not too airy.) I didn't actually even finish mine (maybe because of the big brunch we'd had a few hours earlier), and took the extra home to eat after dinner. The guest of honor (i.e., Mom) ordered a small cup of banana chip, which had a great ripe banana flavor, and just a sprinkling of small chocolate chips mixed in. My father ordered... gosh, I can't actually remember. A small cup of ice cream, but what flavor? Caramel chip, maybe? I'm sure he enjoyed it, in any case. My sister opted to go against the grain and have a brownie, then trade some of the brownie for tastes of everyone's ice cream. (We're very good at trading tastes of everyone's food in my family.) She chose the Sweet and Salty Brownie, made with caramel and fleur de sel, which (true to their locally-sourced ethos) Blue Marble gets from Baked in Red Hook. The texture was very rich, almost fudge-like; the caramel and salt flavors were subdued enough that I might not have noticed them if I weren't aware that they were there.

All in all, the dessert was very good, and I definitely endorse Blue Marble as an option after you've had a meal near one of their locations. (They're also in Boerum Hill on Atlantic Avenue between Bond and Nevins, and in Prospect Heights on Underhill Avenue between Sterling and St. John's right near Grand Army Plaza, as well as at the Brooklyn Flea.) Not sure I'd necessarily go too far out of my way to eat there; nothing against them, of course, there's just so many good dessert options in the city. Based on the brownie, I'd also recommend checking out Baked in Red Hook at Van Brunt and Dikeman, not too far from the Fairway and the IKEA.

One more note: be forewarned, it's not cheap ice cream. The small cups were (I can't precisely remember) either $3.75 or $3.95, and the Brownie was, I think, about $3, so for the five of us it came to around $20. If you want better value for your ice cream dollar, you can't go wrong at TJ's.

I Told You So

Food Wars and I were right: Duff's has the best wings in Buffalo.

Want proof? That's where the President goes.

Ah man, now I want to eat wings.

Brunch At No. 7

(I apologize in advance for the lack of pictures in this post; I completely forgot to take any of the food.)

For Mothers Day this year, my sister suggested that the family should have brunch somewhere in Brooklyn, since we've already sampled a good number of the places in Hoboken, where she and my brother-in-law live. Always cognizant of an opportunity to let my borough of residence make a good impression, I suggested No. 7 in Fort Greene, which has received some excellent reviews since opening a little over a year ago, including (perhaps most notably) being named one of 2009's Top Ten Best New Restaurants In America by Bon Appetit Magazine.

We arrived for our 11:00 reservation to a crowd waiting both inside and outside the restaurant; they apparently open for brunch at 11, so nobody had been seated yet, but once they had begun seating parties, we were quickly shown to our table. The interior is lovely; it has a retro-country look with a tiled floor and antique mirrors and a marble-top bar, and towards the back of the restaurant, where we were seated, there are skylights and windows to let in natural light. Everyone who worked there was very friendly; full marks for service.

When we sat down, we were greeted with a plate of bite-sized raspberry cakes, one for each of us, as a Mothers Day special; they were good enough that my father asked for more of them, but they didn't have enough, so he ordered a very tasty cherry-cheese pastry-type-thing for us to share. (I can't remember exactly what it was called.) My father and I both had bloody marys, which were pretty good, though I thought there was a little too much going on in them (two sticks of celery, a toothpick with two olives, a wedge of lemon, a wedge of lime, and a straw). My mother and my sister both had lemon lavender spritzers, which they enjoyed.

We also shared, among the five of us, an order of tater tots and an order of corned beef hash. The tater tots were good, but, I mean, they were tater tots. The zesty dipping sauce they were served with was nice, but I preferred them with the (house-made, I assume) hot sauce that was on the table. The corned beef hash was a whole other animal; not like what I've seen elsewhere, the corned beef was shredded into pieces that were maybe a little smaller than what I'd call bite-sized, and was mixed with zucchini and yellow squash and onions, rather than potatoes like expected. I think we all agreed that it was very good.

No. 7 appears to do the "deconstructed" thing with their food. When our main orders came out, my mother observed that they must have a whole lot of the little ramekins that the side ingredients all come in. For example, my scrambled eggs (perfectly cooked in my opinion, though I prefer scrambled eggs a bit less well-done than some people do) arrived in a medium-sized bowl on a large plate, with three freshly-made tortillas (about the size of my closed fist), and separate smaller bowls with sliced fontina cheese, rhubarb pico de gallo, and curried crema (sort of a crème fraîche; the curry flavor was so understated that I couldn't even remember what it was seasoned with at the time). All the ingredients worked well together; like the tots, I thought the eggs were excellent with some hot sauce added.

As for the rest of the family, my mother and brother-in-law both ordered yellow squash grits, which were served with spring vegetables (a mix that included broccoli, I'm not sure what else), swiss cheese (they both agreed that cheddar would've been a better match), fried hominy, and a poached egg (also served in one of the ramekins, and with only the white showing at first; my mother forgot that it was an egg and put her fork into it thinking it was sour cream, and was quite surprised when egg yolk started leaking out). My father ordered the french toast (which seemed to be made from corn bread, quite an interesting choice) with passion fruit syrup, hummus (another interesting combination), and coconut chantilly. Finally, my sister ordered the waffle, which had the most traditional accompaniments of any of our dishes: almonds, banana butter, and real maple syrup.

Though some of the combinations were odd, we all agreed that everything we ate was very good. I'm definitely hoping to go back for dinner sometime, and I highly recommend it if you're in the area, or even if you aren't but you're looking for someplace new to try in the city. It's pretty much right above the Lafayette Avenue station on the C train, and a quick walk from the Fulton Street stop on the G train, or the big 2/3/4/5/B/D/M/N/Q/R Atlantic-Pacific LIRR Flatbush Avenue complex.


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Soon to come... a short addendum about yesterday's dessert.

Cinco de Mayo, Dos Mil Diez

Tengo una gran idea: voy a escribir este entrada de "Josh Eats" en español. Las señoras Gerson y Gordon (mis profesoras de español en mi colegio) estarían muy orgullosas!

El miércoles pasado, fui a Chelsea Piers con algunos amigos de mi equipo de softbol de este verano para practicar al bateo. Por supuesto, porque estaba el Cinco de Mayo, después fuimos a un restaurante Mexicano cerca de Chelsea Piers para comer y (claro que sí) beber. Porque es lo más cerca que encontremos, fuimos a Tequila Chito's en el calle veinte y tercero entre las avenidas octava y novena. Porque estaba el Cinco de Mayo, el restaurante estaba muy lleno de gente, pero no esperábamos mucho tiempo antes de recibir una mesa.

Desafortunadamente, la primera mesa que recibimos estaba muy cerca de los altavozes, y la música estaba muy fuerte. Pedimos y recibimos otra mesa más lejos de los altavozes, y después pedimos unas bebidas. Unos minutos más tarde, recibimos las bebidas (una cerveza para Janssen, y algunas margaritas para mí y Emily y Tom), y también ordenemos nuestra comida. Si las margaritas no fueron las mejores de todas las margaritas que he bebido en mi vida, tampoco no fueron las peores.

Emily disfruta su margarita:


Tom bebe delicadamente:


A Janssen le gusta el olor de su cerveza:


Algunos minutos más tarde, recibimos nuestra comida. Estaba bastante bien, pero pedimos salsa caliente y el camarero no lo nos traí, hasta que lo pedimos otra vez mientras estábamos pidiendo mas bebidas, y cuando finalmente lo recibimos, casi hemos acabado de comer. Pero, entonces, nos traí más bebidas que no hemos pedido, y estábamos muy feliz.

Emily disfruta ambos margaritas al mismo tiempo:


Más tarde, nuestra amiga Nicole llegué, y traí pastelillos pequeños de Baked By Melissa:


Y, claro, también disfrute una margarita en su cumpleaños:


En totalidad, fue una buena noche, pero yo no volvería al mismo restaurante a menos que estaría muy cerca de lo.

(Renuncia: No he hablado ni escrito en el español en algunos años, y tal vez hay faltas en este entrada. Discúlpame.)

The Deceptively-Labeled Frito-Lay Truck

Like I mentioned when I wrote about the chicken and rice carts at 53rd and 6th a few weeks ago, I have a preferred street-meat truck near my office that I'll visit typically once a week, though occasionally more. It's the one parked on Cedar Street just east of Broadway, right next to the HSBC. Normally, I can actually see it out my office window, but naturally the day that I'm writing about it is the day that it isn't there. In lieu of that, here's a previous photo out my office window, with the truck in the top left:



And, in fact, it's also visible in Google Street View:


View Larger Map

Anyway... why was I writing about this? Ah, right, because it's almost lunchtime, and I'm hungry, and I was thinking about going there today. And then I remembered that a couple of weeks ago I had snapped this dynamite photo (with my camera, even!) of food I'd bought there for the purpose of sharing it, and I wanted to pass it along:



How delicious does that look? Lamb and rice, white sauce, hot sauce, lettuce and tomato, grilled carrot and onion and pepper and eggplant, usually a couple of spicy banana peppers. $5! With a 20-ounce Snapple and a grilled pita on the side for scooping, $7! I think I decided what I want for lunch...

I now present to you...

The Jerseyest ("Jersiest"?) wine in the history of wine:



Seen, naturally, at a liquor store in Jersey.

If this isn't consumed in mass quantities during the next season of Jersey Shore, I will be sorely disappointed.