Tag Archives: spanish food

Nolita/Soho, Non-Steakhouse Steaks, Restaurant Reviews, Rib Eye, Spanish

Tomino Taberna Gallega

May 27, 2023 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

First off, check out my Ride & Review video HERE:

My wife took me here for my birthday to try the Vaca Vieja (old dairy cow, popular in Spanish food). Here’s what we had:

Empanada with octopus and cheese inside. Really nice. The crust reminded me of pot pie dough.

Fried squid on a bed of fried zucchini. This was excellent!

Mussels with a pimento broth.

Wild mushrooms with sliced grapes and goat cheese. Totally unique and delicious.

As a mid-course we had this “Bomba Rice” with squid ink and squid, both on top and mixed into the rice. Amazing.

The steak was a cry-aged 38oz tomahawk for just $108. Crazy! This would be over $160 in a midtown steak joint.

It came with fries too, which were awesome.

The steak had both great flavor and great aroma, and was probably the best version of Vaca Vieja I’ve had so far.

I give this an 8/10 because it was slightly overcooked on the outside and slightly undercooked on the inside.

Dessert was a crepe filled with berry cream and served with yogurt ice cream. Really nice and refreshing.

I will definitely be back here again. I should note that they also have a great selection of Spanish imported beer.

TOMINO TABERNA GALLEGA
192 Grand St
New York, NY 10013

Lower East Side/Chinatown, Restaurant Reviews, Spanish

Ernesto’s

April 16, 2023 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

I finally made it over to Ernesto’s! I’m happy this place is really close to home. Check out my Ride & Review video HERE first, and then read on below.

Firstly, the cocktails here are excellent! A bit pricey at $18, but worth it for the skill and flavors.

We tried a bunch of starters. Everything was excellent, but the stand-outs were the croquettes, the squid, the anchovies and the tripe.

Potato Tortilla:

Croquette:

Asparagus Carbonara:

Fried Squid:

Anchovies:

Tripe:

They didn’t have the txuleta (vaca vieja) special on this trip, so we went with the rabbit rice and the blood sausage. Both were great, but we preferred the blood sausage out of the two. It was light and refreshing, which was a complete surprise to us. Blood sausage is usually so heavy!

For dessert we had flan and Basque style cheesecake. Between the two, the cheesecake was the winner.

I will definitely be back here to try the steak when they have it on special again.

ERNESTO’S
259 E Broadway
New York, NY 10002

Burgers, East Village, Fusion, Press Reviews, Restaurant Reviews, Spanish

Emilia by Nai

June 26, 2022 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Once again my friend Ruben absolutely nails it with his third restaurant, Emilia. Check out this quick video of some of the dishes we tried:

I can’t wait to go back and try more stuff. He is still in the process of perfecting the burger (he’s working on the bun), so I’ll definitely try that again.

Favorite items so far: artichoke with soy cured egg and crispy sunchokes, red snapper, and monkfish liver mousse.

EMILIA BY NAI
174 1st Ave.
New York, NY 10009

Chicago, Non-Steakhouse Steaks, Restaurant Reviews, Rib Eye, Spanish

Bazaar Meat by Jose Andres

June 3, 2022 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

This high end tapas restaurant serves some of the best Spanish food I’ve had outside of Spain. Jose Andres really deserves all the praise he gets.

We started with some nice cocktails, which, in hindsight, I wish we had at the bar downstairs (Bar Mar), instead of at our table.

In any case, great cocktails!

For the smaller bites we tried, the stars were Jose’s Tacos (jamon with nori taco shell and caviar), and the tartare in a fried shiso leaf.

The Philly cheesesteak bites were nice too.

For medium sized courses, we had the Spanish octopus and fideua (paella made with pasta instead of rice). That squid ink sauce was outstanding, and it might have been the best dish of the entire trip to Chicago.

For our main, we had the 32oz aged domestic wagyu “chuleton” rib eye. It was slightly overcooked on the edges, and for being something like 100+ days dry aged, I didn’t get much of that flavor. It was really tender and tasty though. 8/10.