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UrbanSpace Vanderbilt: A new awesome food market near Grand Central Station

30 Sep

I have been a big fan of Chelsea Market for quite some time, especially because it’s a great collection of delicious things. Then when Gotham West Market came along, I was excited, because it took that to the next level by allowing a group to all get delicious things from different places and then meet in the middle to eat together.  We also took a quick walk through Hudson Market downtown, which seemed great. So when I saw that a new food market was opening near Grand Central Station (where I commute through every day) I was thrilled.

Welcome to my life, UrbanSpace Vanderbilt. (These are the same operators as the pop-up food spaces around town, such as Mad. Sq. Eats and Broadway Bites, which I blogged about before. AND they are going to be doing the new Anthony Bourdain Market which has to be the most anticipated opening of the next few years)

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Urbanspace has the communal tables (though far fewer than Gotham West… so I have a feeling this could get VERY crowded if you want to stay) as well as bars at a few of the stands around the space.

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There are so many great food selections to choose from, some of which are very familiar and some I had never heard of.

Dough:

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Redhook Lobster Pound:

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Toby’s Estate (coffee, including coffee milk shakes which were outstanding):

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AsiaDog (which also had awesome sounding juices):

 

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Maiden Lane:

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Bar Suzette (with crepes):

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Sips & Bites:

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Mimi’s Hummus:

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Hong Kong Street Cart:

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Delaney Chicken (from the famous Delaney Brisket world):

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Bangkok Bar:

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Roberta’s:

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No. 7 Veggie (from the No. 7 Subs guys):

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Sigmund’s Pretzels:

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Ovenly:

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And a few other places that looked great for picking up a bowl of deliciousness:

 

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We got some delicious items from Mayhem & Stout as well as Red Hook Lobster Pound:

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The short rib sandwich Mike got from Mayhem & Stout was very good.

Honestly, I wanted my lobster roll to be better.IMG_7921

I was disappointed that the entire bottom was lettuce with just a few pieces of so-so lobster on top. (Though I really think I should be banned from judging lobster in any way since I am completely convinced that lobster loses flavor when it crosses over the Maine state border)

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I also tried a truffle pretzel from Sigmund’s (no pictures because we ate it on the way to the theatre) and that coffee shake from Toby’s. Both were outstanding.

I’m very glad to have this place so close to my commuting hub and can’t wait to try more in the very near future.

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Upland

19 Feb

We are working on our pre-baby bucket list, and some of the list (who are we kidding??? MOST of the list) includes visiting restaurants that we have been meaning to go to for some time or new restaurants that are getting a lot of good press.

Upland was high on the list after hearing numerous great things. The only reservation I could find was for 5:30 on a Friday, but that worked out perfectly since we had tickets to see an Off Broadway Show later that eve.

Upland is a Stephen Starr restaurant (most famous for his hits in Philly) and is cheffed by Justin Smillie.

The entrance is a beautiful (and slightly eerie… kind of reminded me of organs in jars for some reason) set of shelves with preserved lemons in it.

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The inside echoes the nicely lit decor with the bar and more preserved lemons in the back.

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Here is the menu from the day we visited:

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We started with a lovely loaf of bread.

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We ordered the whole crispy mushroom, which was a hen of the wood mushroom with cloumage + herbs.  This was a beautiful hunk of fungi.  It was totally crisped and a really delicious mushroom on the inside.  But there was one thing that it unabashedly reminded Mike and me of… Pot.

This mushroom tasted like pot.

I don’t know if it was the earthiness or the smokiness, but I was a bit nervous we would leave hungrier than when we arrived.

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We also ordered the burrata with trout caviar, crispy leeks + arbequina olive oil.

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This was so fresh and so flavorful.  The caviar was salty, the burrata creamy, and the leeks crispy. Loved this dish.

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Our next dish was the slow roasted celeriac with black truffle butter and sea salt. See all those light colored shavings in the photo below? That’s truffle butter. And it was insanely good.  The celeriac was all the right richness and the truffle butter was an excellent compliment.

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We then tried the roasted short rib (for two) which, apparently, is one of Chef Smillie’s signature dishes.  It came with castelvetrano olives, walnuts, celery + horseradish.  I love short ribs so much that I actually chose this even though it came with the 2 things I don’t like (celery and horseradish).

This slab of meat was served trimmed from the bone (though still displayed with it) and was the size of a football.

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I enjoyed the meat very much, though I left the celery and horse radish for Mike. I was especially fond of the pairing with walnuts, which was unexpected. I haven’t had a slab of short rib this big, and I have to say I enjoy short ribs slow cooked and smaller, but I can see why this was a signature dish.  Very (black) peppery on top.

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For dessert, I was tempted by the pecan pie, which was delicious. It wasn’t too sweet and it held together perfectly.  A really great end to the meal.

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I was very impressed with Upland. Did I think it was the best restaurant opening of 2014… well… probably not. But it was very enjoyable and I would go back in a heartbeat.  I especially want to try the pastas.

Total Nom Points: 8 out of 10

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Kingside

3 Feb

We were trying to find a restaurant for a Friday night before a Broadway Show, and Mike mentioned that he had wanted to try Kingside in the Viceroy Hotel (57th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues).  It looked good from the outside, with a nicely lit sign and the black and white checkered floors that I’m a sucker for.

The menu looked pretty great, too.

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I absolutely love artichokes, and would probably call them one of my favorite foods.  So we had to get the crispy baby artichokes.  I was kind of shocked and appalled by the price: $20. But I went with it.

These were good, though a little greasy, and not great. Certainly not $20 great.  What are they thinking? Not everyone is an artichoke sucker like me!

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Mike chose the braised pork shank with roasted shallots, escarole and pork jus.  This should have been great. I mean… how can braised pork shank not be great? But it just wasn’t.  The meat was tasty but had very little flavoring besides the meat.  It felt a bit like a finely cooked piece of meat swimming in flavorless jus. How is pork jus flavorless? I’m still confused.

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We got a side of the brussels sprouts with mustard and black garlic.  These were also very ehh.  I LOVE black garlic and I would not have been able to identify that flavor anywhere in this dish. The sprouts were a bit soggy and while they looked like they had a char, they were really just kind of limp.

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And then I got the scallops (with butternut squash, bacon caponata, and brown butter)… good gracious the scallops.  I love scallops. I basically could eat a scallop in any form.  I don’t think I have EVER left a morsel of scallop on a plate in my history of eating scallops probably hundreds of times.  But this? This was awful. The scallops were so over-salted I could hardly eat them and wound up leaving an entire scallop on the plate. An atrocity. I ate the squash hash because it was okay and I didn’t want to starve, but I was seriously angry that someone could ruin a scallop.

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This was such a poor excuse for a restaurant. Someone took all the things that are trendy and good and then put a cook in there who had no idea how to execute on the food.  The concepts of all the dishes were fine, but whomever was behind that stove should be ashamed of themselves. I really have to hope they had an off night, but there is no excuse for ruining a perfectly good scallop.

Total Nom Points: 4 out of 10

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