Dinosaur BBQ

March 29, 2015 Johnny Prime 1 Comment

Dinosaur BBQ is a cool meat lover’s spot up in Harlem near the Hudson River. It’s been killing it up there for years now, but I finally got the chance to try it out.

Inside the warehouse/parking garage-esque space there’s a huge bar with a nice selection of brews.

Me and two buddies went with the bucket of cheap shit: six hipster beers for $16.

Then we split the “Family Stylin’ Meal,” which comes with chicken (far left), brisket (top right), pulled pork (bottom right), and ribs (center) with corn bread (bottom) and three sides.

As you can see they even sprinkled some pickles and jalapeños on the sauced items (brisket and pork):

We went with fries, baked beans and mac & cheese for the sides:

The dark meat chicken was excellent, but I felt the breast meat was a little dry. Both the brisket and pulled pork were great. Smoky, sweet, spicy and delicious, especially with the jalapeños and pickles in each bite. The big star(s) for me though were the ribs. They were perfect. As for the sides: the fries needed seasoning, the beans were good – not too soupy and with a good kick, and the mac and cheese was both creamy and crunchy with perfectly cooked pasta. It’s just too bad I didn’t have my good camera with me, because these photos all suck.

Photos from another trip:

Appetizer sampler – boiled shrimp (spicy and tasty), fried green tomatoes (crunchy and tangy), wings (awesome BBQ wings), deviled eggs (creamy and delicious):

Choose Three with BBQ chicken, St Louis ribs, and sausage, with mac & cheese and salt potatoes:

Full rack of ribs with BBQ fried rice and fries:

DINOSAUR BAR-B-QUE
700 W 125th St
New York, NY 10027

Burgers, Midtown West, Pub Food, Restaurant Reviews

Judge Roy Bean Public House

March 27, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

I heard the burger was good here, and I had been in for drinks in the past… so I went in for some food with a buddy of mine. The place has a cool namesake, after a crazy old judge from way back in US history who used to do some outlandish shit in his courtroom. You can read it on their website or Wikipedia. I ain’t going into it here.

With no happy hour specials for drinks, I stuck to the cheap shit ($4).

I ordered the burger with American, but they didn’t have American, so I picked pepper jack. They offer this puppy for $10 during lunch hours (with fries AND a beer included), so I was a little bummed that there wasn’t at least a happy hour deal for drinks. This is $14:

It wasn’t bad. It wasn’t great either. It was mediocre pub food. The meat was cooked nicely, but the bun was a little weak:

Fries were decent. Crispy and well seasoned.

I mocked my friend for getting another chicken sandwich. This is the same guy that I routinely blast for ordering turkey burgers and grilled chicken sandwiches at bars. There are few things that standard bars can do well (outside of the gastro-pubs): they are burgers, wings and a variety of fried appetizer shit. I wasn’t surprised that his sandwich was way under par. It had a small smear of guacamole on it (instead of sliced avocados), a small, thin chicken breast, and the single slice of bacon was cold and limp, contrary to his asking for it well done and crispy. Oh well. Lesson learned – stop ordering bitch food at manly bars.

JUDGE ROY BEAN PUBLIC HOUSE
38 W. 56th St.
New York, NY 10019

Lower East Side/Chinatown, Ramen

Ochado

March 27, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

I stopped into this ramen joint for a quick bite after a sub-par burger. Since they were out of Orion (one of my favorite Japanese beers), we tried this fucker from NJ. Pretty good – a mild stout.

My buddy ordered some chicken wings, which were nicely crisped and garnished with fried garlic and shallots. Very nice.

I went with the “Prawn Mee” ramen, which is a non-traditional bowl but the menu descritpion sold me on this over the porky miso varietal. It was good. It had a great spicy kick to a broth that was clearly steeped in shrimp shell stock goodness.

The egg was perfectly cooked, and all the shrimp within were similarly perfect. I didn’t love the way the scallions were shredded, but I swept those aside easily so they didn’t get tangled up in the noodles.

Overall I enjoyed it, so I will probably be back to try the miso ramen.

OCHADO
76 Orchard St
New York, NY 10002

African/Middle Eastern, East Village, Restaurant Reviews

Halal Guys

March 26, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

This review is for take-out from The Halal Guys’ new brick and mortar location, down near 14th Street and 2nd Avenue.

I ordered the chicken and rice on the advice of my expert friend. He was going to tell me to get the mixed (lamb and chicken), but told me to keep it real on this first visit. His suggestion was great. The smell was amazing in the cab ride home, and with a midnight buzz going, I was salivating and eager to dive into this bitch.

The chicken was flavorful and spicy, the lettuce was cool and crisp, and the rice was supple and textured. The sauces were both great, though I wasn’t a fan of the hot sauce as much as the white sauce. Perfect late night grub. I’ll definitely brave the lines in midtown during work, now that I know this place serves up some legit food.

HALAL GUYS
307 E. 14th St.
Manhattan, NY 10019

Burgers, Italian, Midtown West, Non-Steakhouse Steaks, Other Cuts, Press Reviews, Restaurant Reviews

Circo

March 25, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Circo is a circus themed restaurant in midtown.

I’d heard they served up a good burger. After scanning the menu there were a few other things that I wanted to try as well, like the braised beef cheek and sun dried tomato octopus. And that’s exactly what I tried.

Oh shit, wait… that’s not the sun dried octopus. That’s some awesome octopus statue. Here’s the sun dried tomato octopus:

It was definitely tasty and cooked correctly. Meaty and fulfilling, like Lexington Steele, I would imagine. I just didn’t get an incredible amount of sun dried tomato flavor.

I tried a bite of my friend’s order, which was the braised beef cheek. It was delicious, and if I go back, I’ll definitely be ordering that. It was big, saucy and tender. Since I didn’t grab a photo of that, I will give you a photo of this Moretti beer that I drank:

Okay so on to my burger. At $24 I was expecting a bit more from this, but it was pretty good. It came with cheddar cheese and grilled onions.

Instead of grilled onions, maybe fried onions would work better, to give it a little bit of texture. It did come with onion rings, which were mighty crisp, so I suppose one could stack this fucker up even higher to get that needed crunch. In any case the lettuce was fresh and crispy (romaine).

The toppings were neatly placed on the side, which included two slices of red onion, some romaine lettuce, two slices of tomato and a pair of gherkins. I think slices of actual pickle would have been the better bet, but hey. The bun was good. Not potato, but strong enough to take some abuse. The patty was cooked nicely. I think it just needed a little salt.

The fries were super crispy. Almost too crispy at times, as were the two onion rings, but I did enjoy them.

UPDATE 3/1/17

I came back here for a press dinner and tried a bunch of stuff.

Shrimp croquettes were amazing. Soft, savory, filled with seafoody greatness.

Pizzas are very thin and crisp. If that is your style, then you are very happy ordering these babies.

Nothing beats a plate of meat.

Far be it for me to say something nice about a salad, but this Caesar was excellent.

Mixed seafood plate:

The big stars of the show, though, were these pasta dishes. Bolognese, carbonara, confit duck ragu and clams.

Of these, I think the pappardelle with duck confit and the chitarra carbonara were the best.

Oh and some sage ravioli too – these were tasty.

Circo is also rolling out some cheese wheel cacio e pepe pastas in the coming weeks, so be on the lookout for shit like this:

A buddy of mine tried the skirt steak. It was cooked nicely, seasoned well and had a good crisp on the outside. However it was served too cold. I give it a 7/10.

I shared a 30oz, 28-day dry aged Creekstone Farms t-bone steak with another friend. We ordered medium rare but it came out medium well to fully well done.

There was very little crust on this, although it was seasoned correctly. I was able to taste that dry-aged goodness here and there, but ultimately they ruined the steak, as the over-cooking rendered the texture dry and grainy. Another pair ordered the steak too, and it was also overcooked – just not as egregiously as ours. 5/10.

Another friend tried the lamb chops. These were tasty as well, but also similarly overcooked, unfortunately.

I guess the kitchen needs a little refresher on how to properly cook red meat proteins. But those pasta dishes are amazing.

On the side, we tried creamed spinach, asparagus, mushrooms and potatoes. All were good.

Dessert was nice too. Cannolis, bread pudding, apple tart and bombolini. Also all good.

CIRCO
120 W. 55th St.
New York, NY 10019

Brooklyn, Ramen

Ramen Yebisu

March 23, 2015 Johnny Prime 4 Comments

My wife and I came here with another couple that lives nearby. I read good things about the miso ramen so I was psyched for it.

We started with a round of Orion beers. Love this shit:

We had a couple of apps too. The pork buns were pretty good, but the meat was more of the stewed variety as opposed to the grilled style. They were self-assembly:

The gyoza were good too. They were nice and crispy fried flat, and served with black garlic and scallions:

Okay so on to the good shit. I had the miso ramen with extra sliced pork and a soft boiled egg. The ramen was thick and rich, with hints of seafood flavor. The noodles were wavy egg noodles, by Sun, and perfectly cooked. The scallions weren’t overpowering wither, which I was happy about. Meat quality was pretty good for the most part. I typically don’t love miso ramen but this place was legit.

My wife tried the house special “Yebisu Ramen,” which they only serve 10 times per day. It’s a seafood based broth, thin and clear. This is a light soup but really deep in flavor. You can tell they simmered that broth in crab shells and seafood husks for a long time. It’s topped with all sorts of goodies like mussels, scallops, shrimp and crab legs. This is a big winner.

Biggest loser of the night? THIS GUY:

RAMEN YEBISU
126 N 6th St
Brooklyn, NY 11211

Recipes

Sous Vide Filet Mignon

March 20, 2015 Johnny Prime 10 Comments

This is one of the simplest things to make, now that I have a sous vide machine at home. I honestly don’t think I will ever order a filet mignon out at a restaurant ever again, because this shit comes out so fucking perfect at home.

The only catch here: you need a sous vide machine (the vacuum sealer and Searzall are optional). They can be pricey, but if you have the balls, you can make one yourself like a real man (or have your cousin make you one, like I did) for a quarter of the cost of a store-bought machine.

Step 1: Buy filets

Step 2: Season filets however the fuck you want. I used salt, pepper, garlic powder, garlic oil and crushed red pepper.

Step 3: Place filets into vacuum seal bag and seal it the fuck up, with some butter and herbs inside (thyme and rosemary are always nice).

If you’re a poor bastard and can’t afford a vacuum sealer, you can use ziplock bags. Place your meat into the bag and begin to submerge the bag into the water bath. Once you are all the way close to the zipper, zip it shut. The water surrounding the outside of the bag will push out all the air from inside – poor man’s vacuum sealer. If you do this, you may want to put a smooth, clean rock in there too, just for good measure, to keep the meat from floating.

Step 4: Set your temperature to however the fuck you like your steak cooked. I put mine at 138º F for a nice medium rare / medium. I’m dealing with grocery store meat here, people. Don’t give me any bullshit about that being too well done.

Step 5: Wait. About an hour or two. Don’t panic, assholes! You can’t overcook your steak in a sous vide bath. That’s the whole point of it!

Step 6: Remove your steak from the water bath and re-season it a bit, if so desired.

Step 7: SEAR THE FUCK OUT OF IT. I used a Searzall, because I am a fucking badass with a massive bag dangling in the area between my asshole and my dick shaft. Listen to that fucking sizzle just before I flip it over:

But you can easily just toss this baby into a real hot cast iron pan with some more butter and herbs to get that brown and crispy coating. That’s how my cousin does it – see his results below:

As for mine? Check it out below… Seared to a fucking crisp on the outside, and pink as a snatch inside:

Step 8: Pour yourself a hefty glass of Scotch whisky.

The ice sphere is so much cooler than the ice cube. The ice cube is such a square.

Step 9: Drink it, then refill it, and then EAT while you drink that second glass of Scotch. Here: watch me devour one of the filets in under two minutes and then lick the damn plate.

Step 10: Jerk the fuck off and brag about how awesome you are, which I clearly did in the video above, shit the booze out of your system, and then fall asleep drunk and naked in the bathroom.

Feel free to use any cut that you want for this. I recently did the same thing with some Mosner grass-fed rib eyes, with some added duck fat to round them out. See below for the setup and results:

Commentary, Education

DIY Sous Vide & The Searzall

March 20, 2015 Johnny Prime 2 Comments

Recently my cousin sent me a text message with some pretty alarming and exciting photos and videos.

Yeah, that’s right… the motherfucker made his own sous vide machine, cooked up some filets to medium rare, and then seared them the fuck off in a cast iron skillet to get some texture on the edges.

What exactly is a sous vide machine, for you non-food nerds? The words translated from French mean “under vacuum.” It is essentially a hot tub for meat. How it works: you place vacuum sealed meats into the water bath and leave them there until the meat comes up to the proper temperature, which is set and regulated with a water heater and temperature controller. You can’t overcook the meat! You get perfect medium rare shit every time, evenly cooked through and through.

As you can imagine, I was flipping out at what my cousin had achieved. I browsed some DIY sous vide instructional websites a few years back when I was living in a house on Long Island, but it seemed like a ton of effort. I thought to myself, “I’ll just get a real-deal machine someday.” But once I saw these things from my cousin, I knew it was time to pull the trigger.

Lucky for me, my cousin is super handy and craftsmanlike when it comes to stuff like this, and he has access to a bunch of great tools like dremels and drill presses.

A flurry of texts immediately ensued. It’d be fun to build one together, I thought. THIS LINK is the instructional we worked from. My cousin ordered a bunch of the materials online…

I pulled my cooler out of the closet, which would serve as the main cooking vessel or “hot tub” (and it saved me some bucks for not having to buy a plastic tub).

and I ordered a vacuum sealer via Amazon Prime…

I also nabbed a blow torch, a can of propane, and a Searzall, because I want to flame that shit sometimes instead of finishing in a pan. Plus, this works great if I ever do fish – the skin… oh maaaaan it gets crispy…

I sent the dimensions of my cooler lid area to my cousin:

He used this to figure out how to cut the plexi down to size to serve as the top portion that suspends the water heater in position. He also built the temperature control housing, and wired the power supply for the temperature control unit and heater probe (thermometer).

I was initially concerned that the hinged top of my cooler wouldn’t close properly with the plexi in place. It turns out that closing the top tight isn’t too big of a problem when you’re using a nicely insulated vessel like a cooler. Also, we dropped the plexi to a lower lip within the cooler, so the thing closes nicely now:

Then you suction this to one of the walls. Essentially this is a water circulator. It keeps the water swirling around so that there are no warm or cold spots within the bath, which makes for a nice even cooking temperature.

BOOM! I can’t wait to fire this fucker up. I’m going to pick up some fish and beef right the fuck now.

Flash Deals, Other Cuts, Rib Eye, Steakhouse Reviews, Upper West Side

Talia’s Steakhouse & Bar

March 20, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Recently I picked up a Groupon for this joint when they offered a pretty sweet deal: One app, two entrees/steaks, and two sides for something like $65. I figured that was a steal at more than half off the face value of the menu items. The place is Kosher, so I went with a buddy of mine who keeps to the old ways.

Talia’s has a very neighborhood, home style feel to it. Lots of regulars come in, and they even have live music on many nights during the week.

I had read online that some people didn’t like the service in here, but our waitress was friendly and accommodating, as were the people at the host and reservation table. I guess there’s a lesson here: never trust the morons on Yelp.

So on to the meat and potatoes (literally)…

The table bread here was really unique. This fluffy, semi-flat, naan-like bread had a half-sweet flavor quality to it, but that “butter” you see on the right was incredible. It’s not butter, by the way, because butter is dairy, and, in Kosher cuisine, dairy can not be mixed with the beef. Anyway it was salty, herby, really smooth and spreadable. Perhaps based from olive oil? I was devouring this shit:

You can even see the little oven thing where they make and heat the bread as you walk into the entrance door. It takes up some real estate at the end of the bar:

Next was the app: we went with the hummus and mushrooms dish. This came with more of the aforementioned bread. The flavor was excellent on this. The hummus was smooth and the mushroom and onion mix on top reminded me of gravy. If this was slathered onto some fried chicken, you’d think you were eating a middle eastern or Mediterranean southern fusion dish. It may look like vomit, but I assure you it tasted great. Both of us kist kept going back into this for more. But beware – it is very filling:

I ordered the grilled prime rib for one (16oz). It came out on a sizzling hot cast iron plate and smelled delicious. The meat was cooked slightly above how I like it (medium instead of medium rare), but that’s probably due to the residual heat of the cast iron plate. As you can see below, it came to me pretty correct in terms of temperature. The only down side was that it was slightly gamey.

It came with a choice of sides. I went with salad since we were already getting other sides with the Groupon meal. This was a basic mixed greens type of thing. Nothing too fancy or anything, and it definitely fits with the neighborhood, home-style, mom & pop type of restaurant feel.

My buddy got the butcher’s steak, which is a hanger. It was cooked to his liking at medium, had a great charred crust on the outside. I felt it just lacked a little bit of salt in terms of seasoning. His dish came with sautéed kale, which neither of us liked as much as the spinach (below). Something was missing on that – perhaps it needed some pepper or salt.

The spinach was a basic garlic and oil sautee. Pretty solid:

And the fries were golden and crisp. Nicely done:

Overall this place was actually pretty good given the limited menu options for a non-Kosher guy like me. I was happily surprised, as I was expecting the worst based on some of the reviews out there. I was satisfied and felt like I got my money’s worth. While it’s difficult for me to fit this into the standard steakhouse review format, I will give it a shot below.

Talia’s overall score: 58

Flavor: 6 – see notes above.

Choice of Cuts & Quality Available: 6 – basically, we are working with only rib cuts, a hanger, and some form of knock-off tenderloin, since Kosher butchery requirements make it very difficult to extract the filet without running afoul of the system. There is no strip either.

Portion Size & Plating: 5 – basic plating with smaller than usual portions, but this is a low key, neighborhood family type of joint. I wasn’t expecting 24oz rib eyes.

Price: 7 – fair prices given the Groupon. Otherwise it may seem a bit overpriced. However they run the special quite often, so keep an eye out for that if you are considering this joint. You get a lot of food for that Groupon meal.

Bar: 5 – there are only about three or four spots at the bar.

Specials & Other Meats: 7 – there was definitely an entire page of special menu items and even cocktails. As far as other meats go, there was definitely a selection for those not wanting beef (lamb, chicken, etc).

Apps, Sides & Desserts: 6 – a good showing, but nothing to really go bonkers about. The hummus was nice though.

Seafood Selection: 2 – There’s only two salmon dishes, so it’s sort of a weak showing. However, certain items that you typically find in steakhouses, like shellfish, are not Kosher, so they can’t be on the menu.

Service: 8 – Service was good. I don’t know what all the Yelping was about. We enjoyed our meal, the people were nice and we felt warmly welcomed. There are no waiters sitting around preparing themselves to swap your fork out or fold your napkin when you get up, but the water glass was always full, and we never felt like we were waiting around for service. Everything was as it should have been.

Ambiance: 6 – It was crowded, which is not a bad thing, but the tables were a little cramped. Since this is a local neighborhood joint, you are not going to get the crazy, opulent steakhouse vibe like you would down in Tribeca or midtown.

TALIA’S STEAKHOUSE
668 Amsterdam Ave.
New York, NY 10025

Midtown West, Other, Restaurant Reviews

Vive La Crepe

March 18, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

UPDATE – THIS JOINT IS NOW CLOSED!

This little crepe spot just opened around the corner from my place, on 7th Avenue at 58th Street. They serve both sweet and savory crepes, with stuff that’s suitable for everything from breakfast to lunch to dessert.

My wife and I came for the dessert varietals. I got a butter and sugar crepe with bananas, and my wife got dolce de leche with strawberries and raspberries.