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| Pacific Rim: Bao 111's spice-rimmed
house cocktail. (Photo by Kenneth Chen) |
Bao
111
111 Avenue C
212-254-7773
Don’t let the gangly young models and their scruffy escorts
deter you. Even these diet-dazed divas can’t resist what emerges
from chef Michael Huynh’s Vietnamese kitchen: Exceedingly
fresh, Hulk-size summer rolls ($7). Plump chicken wings that come
with a Scotch-bonnet dipping sauce that elicits a warning from the
waiter ($7). And grilled short ribs skewered onto lemongrass stalks
($11)—a highbrow steak-on-a-stick that may make you wonder
whether Jean-Georges has a moonlighting gig. Fusiony entrées
creep past the $20 barrier, but the noodle and “traditional
style” portions of the menu fall well beneath the mark (try
the sputtering ironpot chicken, $14). And save room for sublime
desserts like black-sticky-rice pudding, just like the models do.
Khao Homm
39-28 61st Street, Woodside
718-205-0080
Off-the-menu orders stymie some kitchens, but not this
ultra-accommodating, multitalented Thai one. We asked
for deep-fried-catfish salad, and the chef complied,
topping shredded lettuce with gossamer-crisp fish,
julienned papaya, roasted cashews, and a
sweet-and-sour dressing we wanted to lap up. Instead,
we turned our attention to the exquisitely curried chu
chee salmon ($12) and pad kee mao ($6), seductively
soft broad noodles permeated with chili and basil.
It’s not only the food and gracious service that
have earned this yearling a loyal Thai
clientele—the karaoke machine packs ’em
in, too.
Kuma Inn
113 Ludlow Street
212-353-8866
New York–Born King Phojanakong’s
“Asian tapas” menu seamlessly fuses the
cooking of his Filipino mother and his Thai father
with a bunch of tricks he learned under the tutelage
of David Bouley and Daniel Boulud, among others. Mom
and Pop’s influence shows in wonderful dishes
like chicken adobo, Chinese sausage with Thai chili
sauce, and simple garlic-fried rice. The novel
Japanese-Austrian fusion of pan-fried pork tonkatsu
sliced into delicate strips and layered over a
watercress salad, on the other hand, owes its rich
(and decidedly un-Japaneselike) butteriness to the
chef’s schnitzel days at Danube. This is
beautifully presented, exceptionally fresh, highly
imaginative food at bargain-basement prices (from
$2.50 to $10). A great sake list and the cool
second-floor hideaway location make it a real find.
Lozoo
140 West Houston Street
646-602-8888
A fountain gurgles in the back room, the banquettes
are sexily backlit, and a hip clientele convenes in
the lounge to sip exotic neon cocktails. Despite all
that, the kitchen is serious, the menu exciting, and
the chef imported straight from Shanghai. Lozoo rebels
against aesthetic and culinary stereotypes alike: The
look is more Soho than Chinatown, and the kitchen
bravely eschews soup dumplings for less familiar
aspects of refined Shanghai cuisine. Deep-fried
escargot are sheathed in crispy tofu skin ($8);
lettuce leaves make crunchy wrappers for delicate
minced bass, pine nuts, and pomelo ($8); and spears of
garlicky eggplant and molded sticky rice are almost
indistinguishable until the first surprising bite
($15).
Mooncake Foods
28 Watts Street
212-219-8888
Two couples joined by marriage—plus a restless
mother-in-law who can’t stay out of the
kitchen—give this comfy Pan-Asian canteen a
conspicuous family feel. With its retro-diner
décor, off-the-beaten-track address, and
$4–$8 price range, it’s a Soho anomaly
where everything is made with care and served with a
welcoming smile. It’s also a wellspring of
savory sandwiches, salads, and snacks like springy
wontons stuffed with snow-pea greens, sweetly spiced
chicken wings, and delicate, exceedingly fresh
jícama-stuffed spring rolls.
O Mai
158 Ninth Avenue, near 19th Street
212-633-0550
The sleek successor to Nam in Tribeca shares its
precursor’s understatedly stylish aesthetic, not
to mention most of its menu. It’s possible to
find cheaper Vietnamese food, but none sparked with
such consistently fresh, clean flavors and served in
such casually chic environs. We seldom pass up the
lemongrass-crusted tofu ($4), but the diced monkfish
and peanuts on a rice cracker ($8) and the five-spiced
baby back ribs ($8) are both eminently worthwhile. The
skill of the kitchen is most apparent in the selection
of rolls, noticeably lighter and more delicate than
most of the rice-paper-wrapped competition.
Rice Avenue
72-19 Roosevelt Avenue, Jackson Heights
718-803-9001
A funny thing happened when we visited this
anomalously slick Thai joint in Jackson Heights, a
distant (but recognizably related) cousin of
Manhattan’s Spice chainlet. When the solicitous
waiter asked how we wanted our food, we said
“spicy,” with the usual resigned
skepticism, and we got spicy: tear-duct-activatingly,
nose-clearingly, cheek-flushingly spicy. But tingly
lips didn’t stop us from plowing through pungent
pork larb ($6), fiery green-curry fried rice ($6), and
deliciously crisp, fatty duck in basil sauce ($12).
Hurts so good, indeed.
Sichuan Dynasty
135-32 40th Road, Flushing
718-961-7500
The gap in our Sichuan-craving appetite left by the
recent closing of Spicy & Tasty has been handily
filled by this equally fiery six-month-old Sichuan
kitchen, where the $16.95 “family dinner”
buys three choices from a 59-item menu—plenty
for two to share, with leftovers. Pick and choose from
the familiar (an estimable kung pao chicken) and the
obscure (kidney with sesame oil), and splurge on the
à la carte double-cooked pork ($9.95). And the
setting, with its glossy Marimekko-ish tabletops,
comfortable booths, and mezzanine bar stocked with
California wines, is a natty notch above the profuse
competition.
Taste Good II
53 Bayard Street
212-513-0818
The last time we visited Taste Good, the Malaysian
restaurant in Elmhurst, we left disappointed, thinking
that perhaps they should change the name to something
less ambitious, like Taste Okay. Maybe it was an off
night for the kitchen or our taste buds, because with
the opening of a new Chinatown branch, that name seems
charmingly inadequate. If the owners knew how rare it
is to find food this vibrantly full-flavored—as
exemplified in dishes like tender beef rendang (get it
with springy noodles and a side of greens, $4.95), a
sizzling platter of ethereally light and fluffy
house-made tofu with its delectable
ground-pork-and-vegetable gravy ($7.99), and roti
telur, a delicate egg-filled Indian pancake to dip in
lip-smacking curry ($3.25)—they’d come up
with a boastful new name, raise the prices, and open a
Park Avenue South location.
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| Flip For It: You're in charge of
dinner at 36 Bar and Barbecue. (Photo by Kenneth Chen) |
36
Bar and Barbecue
5 West 36th Street
212-239-5000
After dining at this modern, industrial-chic Korean barbecue house,
you’ll emerge smelling as pungently smoky as your dinner.
Considering the caliber of black-Angus beef and topnotch seafood
that you grill on copper screens over built-in table charcoal pits
($17–$19), that’s not necessarily a bad thing (unless
you’re dating a vegetarian). A contemporary, accessible alternative
to the sometimes insular traditional Korean restaurants that populate
this neighborhood, 36 is aggressively helpful: Servers mind your
bulgogi, lest the sweetly savory marinated beef start to burn, and
demonstrate proper sauce-slathering and lettuce-leaf-wrapping technique.
Other attractions: nouvelle appetizers like eel tortilla pizza ($9)
and a soju bar upstairs.
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