NYC Tastes

The weather gods let the incredible sheets of rain stop for two glorious days of the Big Apple BBQ Block party.  I got there early with my Fast Pass for the best Pulled Pork sandwich I've ever eaten at Big Bob Gibson. Pitmaster Chris Lilly was on hand and the sandwich was just as incredible as I remembered... nice brunt ends and lots of saucy meat.  Then it was onto 17th Street for their smoky Baby Back Ribs. I had to take a break and do a little walk around the park to get some stomach room going...hey there's Ed Mitchell checking on his whole hog! I still wasn't ready for round two so I stopped into Eleven Madison's Kentucky Bourbon party and ordered an incredible Old Fashioned. Normally drinking an Old Fashioned at 11:45 in the morning would be crazy but it seemed totally appropriate on BBQ weekend. The band was fantastic.  I stayed for the whole set and finally felt ready for round two.  Over to Jim N' Nick's for some ...

We began our 2nd wedding anniversary this week with a few drinks over at Eleven Madison Park.  As I perused the beer list I almost went right past this beer.  I only knew of the Local 1 and 2 so when I saw the 11 I assumed it was a typo.  Lucky for me Mr. T looked it up and found out this is a special beer brewed just for the restaurant ...good thing I married this guy:) Brooklyn Brewery put their regular Local 2 beer into 20 year old Pappy Van Winkle Bourbon Barrels for 3 months, then re-fermented them with a little Champagne yeast.  The result is a truly wonderful beer with big flavors of vanilla and chestnut with a little boozy kick from the bourbon barrels.  Happy 2nd to us! Brooklyn Brewery Eleven Madison Park

Sometimes you just need a fancy cocktail at the end of a long day and what’s better than having one at Eleven Madison Park.  I stopped by the other day to try out the Hearts of Stone- Haitian Rum, Amontillado Sherry, Apricot Liquor, Allspice Dram, Cane Syrup and Lemon Juice.                                                                       This was a delightful cocktail- more on the sour side than sweet with one fabulous ice cube inside that barley melts so each and every last sip tastes as great as the first.  A gratis tray of honey roasted peanuts, green olives and homemade potato chips are a nice touch but looking over the g...

So this past Monday brought a slew of snow to the city and for the first time in 5 years I got a snow day!!!! No Work! Holy Cats I was so excited! The possibilities are endless on a snow day- there is so much I could do! I decided a good meal was in order. After doing some shopping in SOHO I decided to head over to the Cub Room and check out the place since it was supposedly under new management. As I was walking up to the restaurant I noticed a man outside scattering some salt on the sidewalk. I was almost to the door the man threw the salt directly at me!! WTF!!! I was so surprised I stumbled a little- I didn’t know what to do. I walked closer to the menus outside and stared intently at them waiting to see if he would apologize or even acknowledge me. He did nothing except to scatter more salt on the ground. He barely even gave me room to look at the outside menu. After feeling a little bit hurt by this man’s behavior and upon closer inspection of the completely deserted dining room ...

Restaurant Week! Yay!!!! I love this time of year when I have an excuse to take a half day of work or call in sick just to enjoy a wonderful lunch that I otherwise could not afford. This year it actually fell on Martin Luther King day so I had the whole day off to enjoy!! As usual I had forgotten to get reservations the day they went on opentable so I just had to cross my fingers and hope there would be a spot at the bar for lunch at Eleven Madison. I showed up about 5 minutes to 1:00 and luckily snagged the last table. I was meeting my friend Maria for lunch who had never been here before so I took a seat facing the bar so she could enjoy beautiful windows overlooking Madison Square Park and the gorgeous dining room. The snow had just started to fall and the view was particularly stunning that day. Once she arrived we had a quick discussion regarding the wine list and placed our order. As usual they started us with a choice of bread, olive baguette or French roll. I love their olive b...

This meal actually happened a couple weeks ago. I'm a little behind but it was so fatastic I needed to share it with the world:) In my previous post about Park Avenue Summer, I said it was the best Restaurant Week meal I had ever had. And it was...until two days later when I went to Eleven Madison Park and got my socks knocked off. Now I have been to Eleven Madison twice before for dinner, and while I enjoyed it, it never blew me away. I mean the crispy pork was always amazing of course, but that's all I really remember being fabulous. Well now I can say, Eleven Madison blew me away AND it was during restaurant week! It was the last day of restaurant week and Mr. T and I had the day off of work. We decided we would try to get in one more RW lunch. We started out by going to the Tavern room at Gramercy tavern. We walked up and were greeted by about 20 people crammed into the front room waiting for a seat. We turned around and headed straight for Eleven Madison. I was scared th...