e a t e r y R O W

FIREBIRD

365 West 46th Street

New York, NY 10036

(212) 586-0244

I had heard about FireBird being the place to go for Russian cuisine. Set in a Czarist, palatial townhouse in Hells Kitchen, it was the home to various movie scenes, and with the Rents and I recently living it up with the Post-soviet party that is Nasha Rasha in Flatiron, we felt like it would bookend the experience. The thing is, Nasha Rasha was fun. FireBird was depressing.

FireBird sits on 46th Street's "Restaurant Row" and despite the thousands of people walking, eating, taking photos, and screaming at the top of their lungs over the honking taxis and construction crews, FireBird was deserted. I knew it was more expensive than its neighbors, but still. When I got there at 7pm, there were maybe five tables occupied. The restaurant is three stories tall. If it weren't for the Russian pop music, you could hear a pin drop. 

Unfortunately, for me, the sound of that pin was muffled when a somewhat inebriated Russian lady led me to the bar to wait. I arrived a half hour early and had planned to read and sip infused vodka. FireBird does boast about its vodka menu, after all. Reading was difficult with the constant conversation from the next seat. "Try the honey vodka! Best in the city!" And I did. And it was fine. A little too sweet for me, but I nodded and smiled. Then, between the occasional phone call she would receive, I got to hear about all of the great celebrities who showed up to eat here. So and so, and that guy, and a rapper and the chick from Star Wars. My poor book never had a chance. 

When the fam finally did arrive and we finally were seated, despite the empty dining room, we got placed at an enormous table right next to a couple out on a date. "I can't hear anything you're saying, Jon," DudeMan barked across the table. "But I heard all about this guy's trip to Europe!" I cringed. The acoustics were terrible, the table was ludicrously large for us, and I know that the poor slob on his date had to have heard that.

My family is slow-going with menus. I'll admit it. We have an unwritten rule that no one orders the same thing that anyone else orders. This way we can try as much of the food as possible. So after the waiter made three trips to the table to take our order, and we hadn't so much as picked out a wine, he got a little on edge. "Okay, it's just that some of the dishes take a while to make and the kitchen closes at 9." I looked at my watch. It was 8. The kitchen closes at 9? What kitchen in New York closes before double digit hours? I'd never heard of such a thing. But no wonder the place was a ghost town. We must have missed high tide when they stopped competing with the early bird special at Cosmo's Diner. So far, literally nothing had gone well. My only hope was that the food would be so fantastic as to make up for it all.

This was not to be. My appetizer was the Braised Pickled Pork Belly, pork belly with fois gras and cilantro and citrus chutney over a sweet wine glaze. While I liked it by and large, no one else at the table did. I think that they should have. The pork was a little tough, admittedly, but on the whole I think it worked. Bro ordered the Venigret, a cold dish of beets, potato, cabbage, and carrots which tasted like a generic beet salad. It hardly tasted bad but it also hardly tasted period. Dudeman ordered the Olivier, a mixture of cubed kielbasa, peas, potato, carrots, and sliced quail eggs in a saffron mayonnaise with toast. It looked like cole slaw. His first words were, "where's the kielbasa?" It's in there, Padre. Just go a-hunting. Little cubes of kielbasa were eventually found and DudeMan thusly did rejoice. Actually, it wasn't terrible, but as we passed the plates around the table, no one was wowed, either. Shrink tried the Pelmini, a lamb dumpling dish in a mushroom broth. This was pretty good, but the dumplings (there were two about the size o golf balls) were very dense. You'd need a knife to cut through them. It's a shame because otherwise it was quite enjoyable. 

For Dinner, Dudeman ordered the Razryshennty Pike (pictured above). Pike, a subtle white fillet fish, served with spinach, capers, tomato, potato and an olive vinaigrette. The rest of the table found it too bland, but I think that this might have been the best main course of the evening. The fish was tender and flaky and paired very well with its bitter and sweet accompaniments. It wasn't drowned in sauce like Shrink's Beef Stroganoff, a dish that's the exact opposite of subtle. Beef cubes and noodles in a thick sauce made from sour cream, veal broth, mushrooms, and onion. It's like being hit in the face with a bus filled with flavor. The thing is, I've had better beef stroganoff. The beef was too tough and the noodles had been cooked for too long. As a result, the starches glued them together like glue, and they fought to be separated. I have also had better Chicken Kiev, my choice of entree. In this case, the chicken, which is typically filled with butter so that, when cut, it's like slicing through a jugular filled with liquid cholesterol. This time, it was just a scratch. And there was spinach in there. Like the stroganoff, it was fine, but I'd had better for less money. And I got more vegetables. Bro ordered what he considered to be the best dish of the night and what I considered to be the worst: the Narli Shashlik, a lamb kabob with vegetables and rice. It clearly comes from that time when the Russian empire included various Arabian cultures and it probably could have been a very tasty dish if only the lamb was more tender. Instead there was all the delicious flavor of lamb, with all the jaw-killing texture of biting through a Pink Pearl eraser.

Dudeman and I skipped dessert and stuck with coffees. Bro asked if they had any tea. The waiter said yes, and disappeared without offering any further description. He reappeared with a fancy pewter and glass teacup filled with tea. "That's Lipton," he said. He also ordered the Yablochnaya Baba, an apple pound cake, which was very very dry. Shrink ordered the Lavender Chocolate Creme Brulee, which was fine, but too sweet for my taste. She liked it though.

Our whole meal (four appetizers, four entrees, two desserts, two cocktails, a bottle of wine, a tea and two coffees, plus tax and tip) came in at just shy of $350. Two of those meals, inclusive of the desserts were from FireBird's $45 prix-fixe menu.

[ Copyright eateryROW 2012 ]

The U.S. Open Food Tasting Preview

2012

Once again, the eateryROW team has been asked to take a look into the world of the US Open. But, since we don't care about sports, we had to ask, what does John McEnroe eat when he's hungry? What does David Burke cook when McEnroe calls him at two in the morning? These were the questions we needed to know and I was asked to find out. Therefore, I did what I do best: I sent a couple of girls in my place to flirt and smile and eat and have a good time with people who, I'm sure, wouldn't give me the time of day.

They said that the drinks were fantastic; the sushi was so fresh that the girls were pretty sure it was still alive in the kitchen; the steak was perfect. The girls said that the mahi mahi was just okay and that the salad was simply salad, but the burrata caused orgasms. So, in the end, everyone left having had a great time and great food. And who doesn't enjoy a good orgasm?

NOR EAST CLAM SHACK

at the Grey Lady (formerly the Down East Clam Shack)

77 Delancey Street

New York, NY 10002

(646) 580-5239

The Nor East Clam shack is a tiny little place on Delancey with a half dozen seats at the counter and a menu small enough that you could write it on the palm of your hand. It's the annex of the Grey Lady, right next door, which is a full on seafood restaurant. But for a casual quick lunch, hit up the Shack. They just opened a few days ago so are still ironing out some issues that they have (like not yet having a website), but it's worth going anyway.

 

Bro and I stepped in for lunch the other day and took two seats at the counter. The (very chatty) cook/server/only-guy-who-works-there says that he expects outdoor seating to come soon and maybe some beers, too. That would be nice. There's something about a hoppy beer that goes so well with New England food. Come fall, expect chowder and bisque to be on the menu, but, for now, it's sandwiches and a raw bar with clams and oysters. Bro ordered the Classic Maine Lobster Roll, which was made fresh in front of us and, while good by any measure, didn't break any new ground, was a little small and for $18 you're better off going to Luke's. My choice was the Downeast Fish Sandwich, a deep fried, beer battered piece of fish (I want to say cod) that was so good, I almost cried. Fresh from the oil it still wasn't greasy in the slightest. The beer batter was smooth, not gloppy and didn't overwhelm the fish, but rather instead helped it along. The fish, meanwhile, while just a simple white filet was butter-tender. With lettuce, tomato, onion, and a dab of tartar sauce, it's such a simple thing, but so good. At $12 it's slightly pricier than the Filet-O-Fish at McDonald's, but for the best fish sandwich I've ever had, hands down, it's worth the money. I want another one just typing this sentence.

It takes about ten minutes to make your sandwiches, so this isn't fast food. But, if you find yourself with a few minutes to get lunch, and maybe want something with a little more character, or just like raw bars, then definitely head here. I'm more than absolutely returning and might try the clam sandwich. After all, they have "clam shack" in the name.

Two sandwiches with chips, two drinks, tax and tip came to a not terribly cheap, but entirely worth it $45.

[ Copyright eateryROW 2012 ]

EISENBERG'S SANDWICH SHOP

174 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10010

(212) 675-5096

There are times when you find some sort of solace in eating a lunch that time traveled from 1981 onto your plate and Eisenberg's is where you'd go when seeking that solace. It's usually loud, crowded, slightly dingy, and definitely old. Cramped with red vinyl stools and small rickety Formica-topped tables, it's a diner straight out of the French Connection.

A recent trip to the 2nd Avenue Deli proved that NY delis, in the traditional sense, are far from cheap. Eisenberg's bucks the trend. Lunch here shouldn't pass $20, though while you'll still leave full, you probably won't need doggy bags for the remaining three-quarters of your sandwich. A handful of meals here have left me with a sense that Eisenberg's will never be the 2nd Avenue Deli or Katz's, but it won't be going away anytime soon either.

First, the soups. What is it with NY delis and borscht? The only way I'd eat borscht is if my great Aunt made it, and only then because she'd insist that it was an old country recipe that her mother gave her. Not because it tasted good. I'd eat it out of guilt is what I'm saying. So I tried the Chicken Noodle Soup and the Matzo Ball Soup. By the way, the only difference between the two is that the matzo ball soup has a big matzo ball in it. So consider it one soup, basically. Good, but a wee bit salty. The matzo ball was firm without being a brick and the egg noodles were nice and teeny. They didn't go berserk adding a million vegetables. They kept it relatively vitamin free, like any NY noodle soup should be. Noodles, spice, some white-meat chicken, and a wayward carrot and piece of celery that got lost on the way to the pot pie.

Once upon a time (last year) NY Magazine named Eisenberg's Tuna Melt the best tuna melt in New York City. Maybe they were in a different New York City. It wasn't bad but it wasn't any better than I could make at home and it wasn't anything I'd order again. On the other hand, I've also ordered their Grilled Cheese Sandwich with bacon and tomato, which was heaven. You can't get that at the 2nd Avenue Deli, I can promise you. Naturally, I also ordered a Roast Beef Sandwich. Tasty and filling, but not filed seventy-five feet high. It's a more normal size for human consumption. Their Cheeseburger was a cheeseburger and their French Fries are the big thick steak fry kind that I prefer, but you might like the crispier small type. And don't forget to order an Egg Creme for chrissake!

The service at Eisenberg's varies depending on whether you get a table or sit at the counter. If you sit at the counter, expect it to be spotty. The chefs run around taking orders from everyone in the restaurant. On more than one occasion I thought I was being completely ignored only to have my food appear in front of me as if by magic. Other times I was actually being ignored. The waitresses were very nice and you can basically sit here all day if you wanted to (I blueprinted a bathroom I was renovating).

As I said, if you enter with a twenty, you'll leave with change. Sandwiches are almost all under $10. My most recent meal was a diet 7up, a side of fries, and the awesome grilled cheese sandwich that you should be eating right now. Total with tip was $16.

[ Copyright eateryROW 2012 ]