Tag Archives: strip steak

Cornelius

Cornelius is a new French and American style joint in Grand Central. My wife and I came in to give it a try, as the menu looked pretty incredible.

We started with some cocktails, all of which were killer. My favorites were the Sazerac (not pictured) and the caviar martini. If you have some time before you start to eat, grab the espresso old fashioned. That also works well with dessert too though.

We started with this foie gras terrine, which wasn’t on the menu. This is basically delicious meat butter, and it would also pair well with their cheese plate. We had that for dessert.

Next up was the beef tartare. This is made from hand cut prime tenderloin, but the bump of caviar is extra/not standard. I really loved this, and it’s definitely large enough to eat as a main course.

We shared this beautiful 28oz, 30-day dry aged NY strip/shell steak on the bone.

The sauce is a velvety and mild Hollandaise, and draped over the bone is a nice portion of sautéed broccoli rabe. On top, shaved Perigord black truffle. 9/10 – very tender, well rested, and great aged flavor coming through on that evenly browned crust.

Of course we didn’t stop there. These two dishes were both beautiful and well executed, but the winner of the night goes to the duck leg confit. The lamb collops of tenderloin were perfect, it’s just that the duck was masterfully prepared, The meat was so tender and well seasoned/balanced. And with a huge bed of lentils underneath, it was filling as well. Make sure you order that!

For dessert, along with the cheese plate up above, we had these incredible dolce de leche donuts. WOW! I was actually shoving some of the currant jelly into the hole to make them even more decadent.

This place is crazy good, and I really can’t wait to go back to try the chateaubriand for two and a few other items that look great.

CORNELIUS
89 East 42nd Street
New York, NY 10017

Hotel Chantelle

The Pulsd deal for Hotel Chantelle is pretty good. You get two cocktails, two apps, two entrees, and a shared dessert for $69.

The cocktails are tasty and colorful.

The apps we selected were the steak tartare and the charred octopus. Both were incredible, and I’d go back again for these any day.

The entrees, however, fell a bit short. My strip steak was definitely not a center cut, which is totally fine – they’re using it for the Pulsd deal diners. Be minfdul of connective tissue At $31 regular price, this really is a pair price though. The pepper chimi was unique, and it was cooked properly and had a nice flavor to it. 6/10.

The seafood paella was simultaneously undercooked and wet/soggy. Bad combo! The seafood itself was nice though.

For dessert, a lemon cream tart of sorts. The shell tasted like greasy tortilla and was tough to bite/chew, but the filling was awesome.

All in, not a bad meal, thanks to the saving grace of the apps. I’d come back here for apps and cocktails on the rooftop again for sure. It’s beautiful up there, and even the bar downstairs is cool. I’d skip the entrees though.

HOTEL CHANTELLE
92 Ludlow St
New York, NY 10002

Gemma

I finally got to try some of the food at Gemma in the Bowery Hotel. Started with a delicious orecchiette pasta with broccoli rabe pesto and sweet Italian sausage.

Next up: beautiful burger with broiled cheddar on top.

My favorite dish was the Cornish hen. So flavorful!

And a really nicely cooked center cut New York strip steak.

We finished off with some pistachio cream cannoli.

Really great meal!

GEMMA
335 Bowery
New York, NY 10003

Wildair

I popped into this joint with some friends mainly to try a domestic wagyu strip they recently put on the menu, but everything we had here was great. This place serves up smaller bites and tapas style dishes. Some of the highlights were the prawns, the potato cake with uni on top, the beef tartare and the stuffed chicken wings.

The star of the show was 24oz of 9/10 deliciousness. The “thrice cooked chips” that came with it were absolutely perfect.

The au poivre sauce really wasn’t needed, but both that and the roasted garlic really made the flavors pop.

For dessert, the mille feuille with cinnamon brown sugar cream was the big winner, but the mousse with granita and meringue was a nice way to cleanse the palate at the end of the meal.

WILDAIR
142 Orchard St
New York, NY 10002

Strip Steak Bundle

This item has been very popular in the shop lately. It’s just 5lbs of beautiful USDA choice strip steaks for $100. Free shipping, FedEx two-day. These are basically a replacement for the Piedmontese steaks, since we ran out. Get on it!

My Book is Now Available!

BUY IT NOW ON AMAZON!

That’s right you meat eating sons of bitches, I’ve written a book!

The Beef Bible: A Carnivore’s Compendium is a collection of articles, musings, and beef information that every steak lover should have at his or her fingertips. Inside my meat manifesto, you’ll learn all there is to know about the beef biz; from breeding to butchery, from calving to carving.

The Kindle edition is just $4.99. But here’s a money saving tip: Kindle is FREE as an app on your phone, and you should be able to borrow my book from the Kindle owners lending library for FREE as well, once you install the app! It can also be shared with you through the lending library by others who have purchased it. So you don’t even have to pay the measly $4.99 if you don’t want to drop a crisp Lincoln to support my sorry ass.

But in the rare case that you do want to support my sorry ass with a cash purchase, there’s a fuckin’ paperback version as well, and it won’t cost much more than a crisp Hamilton! It’s available on Amazon for just $11.99:

That’s my “proof” editing copy with the annoying “not for resale” ribbon across the front. Yours will be much prettier. And that’s Benjamin Franklin in the back, from the mini-series John Adams. Damn that’s a lot of founding fathers mentioned in one post, for no reason at all really!

Those of you who follow along here … “religiously” … will recognize some content, but everything has been updated and improved for the book. The Kindle version has full color photos for your phone and/or tablet displays, while the paperback is in regular old black and white, save for the cover art. A color print job would’ve meant me charging upwards of like $25 to even make a penny on the sale. Absurd! At that price, just go out and buy the fucking steak instead of reading about it.

In any case, I hope you savages read what I have to say, and continue to worship alongside me at the Holy Altar of Beef!!!

BUY IT NOW ON AMAZON!

The Family Value Pack

Good morning, Meat Minions!

I hope you are all surviving the madness of Covid-19. I know that grocery stores have become pretty thread-bare lately, especially in the meat department. I figured this was a good time to let you know about the Family Value Pack that I have in the shop.

Here’s what you get for $119:

  • 4 10oz NY Strip Steaks
  • 8 Half-Pound Burgers
  • 4lbs of Boneless/Skinless Chicken Breasts

CLICK HERE to order, and stay safe out there you fuckin’ animals!

Yours in Beef,

Johnny Prime

NOW OPEN: My Butcher Shop

WWW.JOHNNYPRIMEMEATS.COM

The time has finally come for me to start slinging meat as opposed to just crushing it.

Over the last six years I’ve really fine-tuned my taste for high quality beef. I can almost pick out flavor notes like those freaks who test milk and wine, only I do it with beef. Blue cheese “funk” here, aroma of hazel nuts there, earthy mushrooms over yonder. You get the idea.

Writing restaurant reviews lead to writing recipes, and striving to replicate the steakhouse experience in my kitchen – even to the point of dry-aging beef at home.

My concern and respect for this amazing protein also fostered a desire to learn about the entire beef life cycle: from cow/calf operations to stockers and backgrounders; from corn farms to grazing ranches; from forage to feed; from fabrication floor to front of the case, and all the way back to the restaurant again. Start to finish. No stone left unturned. I’ve even addressed various nutritional and environmental concerns.

I’ve become an expert on steak. But photographing, eating and writing about beef was no longer satisfying me. It seemed that I hit a wall and was spinning my wheels. I wasn’t fulfilling the goals I had for this website. Or maybe my goals changed, because now I feel the need to offer these meaty experiences to you, rather than just tell you about them. I’m still going to review restaurants, highlight products and write informative articles about beef. But now there’s got to be more than just those things.

That’s why I’ve decided to open an online butcher shop. I’ve been working with an extremely high end “middle meats” company that has the resources and connections to buy out massive stocks of incredible prime, American Wagyu and even Japanese Kobe beef. They’ve got a multi-million dollar state of the art facility in the Bronx’s famous Hunt’s Point Cooperative Market with a crazy dry-aging room, a huge blast freezer and all the support they need from an incredibly skilled team of butchers.

All my steaks are cut to order, and can be fully customized. They’re individually vacuum sealed, wrapped in butcher paper and signed by a butcher before being shipped to you. Shipping, by the way, will be free and arrive at your door just 2-days after the order is cut.

I’m really excited about this. I’ve hand selected every cut that I’m offering, and I’ve even cooked up and tasted everything to verify that it’s something I’d want on my own plate. If you tend to agree with me on my steak review opinions, then you’re in good hands with anything you order from my butcher shop. You won’t be disappointed. Johnny Prime Meats will impress you.

My plan is to stock a few items that will always be available. For example, the best steak I’ve ever eaten is the American Wagyu strip.

I’ll be offering that all the time, along with a few prime dry-aged rib eye options and a prime dry-aged porterhouse.

But the bonus is that I’ll also be showcasing some rare and unique proteins that have limited supply and quantity. For example, I’ve got my hands on some really sweet dry-aged Duroc pork rib chops right now, as well as some dry-aged tenderloin tails for the grill. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll try to locate some dry-aged veal, American Wagyu hanger steaks, or lamb bacon.

And speaking of bacon, you’ll be able to add a pound of thick cut bacon to any order for just $10 at checkout. Because what steak meal at home is complete without that steakhouse style slab of thick cut bacon?

I hope you guys are interested. Check out the shop. Browse the offerings. And keep your eyes on my meat!

Red Hook Tavern

Red Hook Tavern is the recently opened endeavor of famed BBQ pit master Billy Durney, of Hometown BBQ. After mastering regional BBQ, he decided to take on the iconic old school NYC tavern style joint – typically featuring dimly lit wood grain interiors, a great selection of beer, wine and cocktails, a champion burger and a beefy chop or two. Think Minetta Tavern, Chumley’s or even McSorley’s. The outside even kinda pays tribute to Minetta Tavern. Similar font, coloring and shades drawn:

So did Durney achieve that iconic goal? In short, yes. There are some BIG hits here, but there are also some misses as well. Let me get into it so you know what to get and what to avoid.

We shared four starters among four people. We ordered the corn and nduja salad with radicchio cups, the wedge salad with bacon, the chicken liver pate, and the charcuterie board.

The corn and nduja was good, but it wasn’t as spicy as I had expected. In addition, the radicchio cups added a little too much bitterness into the dish. Maybe swapping out for some Bibb would be better.

The big hit for me among the starters was the wedge salad. It comes with a nicely cooked slab of Nueske’s bacon, and a surprisingly fresh pop of dill throughout. This is definitely big enough to share, so get this and share with another.

The charcuterie board was delicious, featuring lomo (my favorite – dry cured pork loin), salami and venison salami, along with a nice fresh slaw to cut the fat. I just wish there was more of everything.

The chicken liver pate was smooth, creamy and delicious. I could have easily crushed this by myself, which is what I recommend that you do. The only issue with that was that the toast was very dry and brittle. That bread needs an upgrade.

We shared four different entrees. We did the pan roasted half chicken, the 45-day dry aged strip steak, the grilled head-on spot prawns and, of course, the burger (we did two of those).

The prawns were overcooked, unfortunately, and that delicious chili, lemon and garlic sauce didn’t really get into the flesh, rendering them kind of bland unless you really dragged them through the sauce. The heads were delicious though. They come three to an order, but the waiter Ryan was awesome and asked if we wanted four pieces so that we could all get one. That’s the kind of service people will remember. Bravo, Ryan.

The Pat LaFrieda steak was very tender, nicely cooked, and had a great crust on it.

The addition of that finishing salt was essential, because it was otherwise just kind of bland in flavor. It didn’t have much punch or character to it, and certainly not much dry-aged flavor. 7/10.

One good thing about the steak is that for $49 it also comes with creamed spinach. I really liked this spinach. Finely chopped, not too creamy.

The chicken was better than both of the above entree items. It came with mashed potatoes and gravy, which was a nice touch, for just $28. The meat was juicy and tender, and the skin was crisp and well-seasoned. Get this!

But the star of the meal was this incredible burger.

Look at how perfectly cooked it is inside:

It comes with three perfectly crisped and seasoned potato wedges, and a half-sour pickle spear.

If you’re not into onions, you can remove yours from the bottom (the burger comes out sitting on top of an onion core slice). I generally don’t love raw onion on my burger, but this onion is somewhat steamed and softened, that way you don’t get that insane vaporous bite that destroys your mouth for two days. It also catches any juices that come out of the burger, making it a perfect flavor sponge that protects the bottom bun from sogging up.

It may look simple and pedestrian, but the bun is brought in fresh from a special bakery; the patty is a great mix of lean and fatty beef cuts that sport a really nice dry-aged flavor; the cheese is perfectly melted down the sides of the burger to create a lovely drape of full coverage – you never want for that melty American goodness; and the maillard sear on the outside even has a nice crunch to it for some texture. What a masterpiece. This might be a new favorite, especially at $22. While I generally prefer fries, the wedges were definitely good. I kinda wanted a couple more though.

The prices here aren’t too bad either.

I highly recommend this place. It’s tough to get a reservation, but if you get there early (or late, for that matter) you can probably score a seat at the bar pretty quickly.

RED HOOK TAVERN
329 Van Brunt St
Brooklyn, NY 11231

Wayla

After seeing some pics that my buddy posted on Instagram from this place, I had to give it a try.

My wife and I started with a bunch of appetizers. We tried a trio of meaty Thai dips that came with an assortment of veggies, some pork meatballs wrapped in fried noodles, and a pork jowl salad. Everything was great here, but from those three, if I had to choose, the pork jowls were my favorite. We destroyed all of it though.

Next up was the crab fried rice.

Wow. They dropped about $25 worth of steakhouse quality lump crab meat right on top of this delicious and light-yet-flavorful fried rice. Awesome. This is a must if you are looking for a “starch.”

Then we had the Thai style fried chicken.

I was blown away by this. The flavors, the crispy skin, the juicy-ness.. It was all just working. Get this! It was my favorite dish of the night.

And of course I had to try the strip steak with tamarind sauce.

This came out on a hot skillet and the aroma was nuts.

For $34 this is a steal of a value, and it was tender as hell – cooked perfectly to medium rare. I must admit, I was expecting a shitty experience here. I was dead wrong. Later I learned that this meat is from Strassburger, so it should have been no surprise that it was tender and delicious. 8/10.

For dessert we had a nice fruit plate and a big scoop of coconut pandan ice cream.

Great way to end a great meal. I definitely recommend this place. Go give it a shot!

WAYLA
100 Forsyth St
New York NY 10002