NYC Tastes

We had a brief glimpse of Spring this weekend.  Saturday temperatures stretched all the way to 78 degrees with bright rays of sun bringing some life to this cold, dreary April.  Mr. T and I used it as an excuse to sit outside at one of our old favorites Zum Schneider. White Asparagus was on the specials menu that afternoon.  We both fell in love with this veggie on our first trip to Munich years ago.  It has a much milder flavor than green asparagus, with a thick, crisp exterior that's wrapped in ham and served alongside boiled potatoes and a thick, creamy hollandaise sauce. Paired with some Helles Lagers and that bright beautiful sunshine; this was the perfect way to welcome in Spring (if only for a few hours).   Zum Schneider 107 Avenue C at 7th Street New York, NY 10009

Mr. T and I celebrated Easter at Zum Schneider last week.  This was an annual tradition of ours for years so it was nice to finally get back.  There's an Easter Egg hunt inside for the kids, traditional German music playing overhead and awesome Easter menu specials like Baked Honey Glazed Ham and Roasted Lamb Shank in red wine sauce with green beans and gratin potatoes. I always feel like I'm back at Mid-Evil Times eating this massive platter of meat.  We could have split this dish and been fine but we were so excited to finally be back we had to order our old favorites. Zum easily makes the best Potato Pancakes in the city; fried to a crisp golden brown served with applesauce and greens tossed with their delicious house lemon honey dressing. And of course leaving a German restaurant without ordering a Brat and two enormous beers would just be wrong.   The weather was so nice we even got to sit outside for a few hours.  Mr. T had just gotten over his su...

After our fabulous meal at Jungsik the night before it was time to party it up for the actual birthday with friends.  We started out with a couple beers at McSorleys. Then over to Bobwhite Counter for their amazing Fried Chicken. With a couple of sides including Mac and Cheese Some creamy Cheddar Grits And then topped it all off across the street with some beers at Zum Schneider. You would think this would be enough celebration but we still had one more night to go. Bobwhitecounter

Mr. T and I enjoyed our Easter brunch at Zum Schneider so much last year we’ve decided to make it an annual tradition. It was especially gorgeous this Easter Sunday and we soaked in the rays along our walk down to Alphabet City. After a quick stop at Venerio’s for some Easter Egg bread and mini desserts we were ready for some beers! Zum switched up their beer list and now offers four different Hofbräuhaus Traunstein beers. We both started with the Helles and perused their specials menu. Just like last year Zum had a special Easter Ham and Easter Lamb dish. Since we got the lamb last year we decided to try the ham this year instead. Easter Ham!! Nice thick slabs of succulent ham were covered in light mustard gravy with a heaping side of mashed potatoes. This dish was right up my alley. I loved the crispy skin on the outer edge of the ham and the gravy was especially delicious. It came with a side of greens beans that were tasty but not as crispy and delicious as I remember l...

I love Easter Sunday. Growing up it was always such a fun day filled with Easter egg hunts, good food and lots of family. Unfortunately Mr. T and I were all alone this year but we still wanted to do something a little special so walked down to Zum Schneider for a lovely Easter Brunch Zum was in the festive spirit with Easter Egg trees on the bar, Easter candy stashed in the potted trees and Easter Egg baskets on each table. We ordered up a couple tasty liters of beer and then perused their specials menu for the day. They were doing two Easter dishes for the holiday- one ham and one lamb. I was conflicted. I grew up having ham on Easter but in my older years I’ve been gravitating to the lamb on Easter. It was a tough choice. After much heming and hawing from me (and frustrated hungry aggravation from Mr. T) we settled on splitting the Easter Lamb. Zum Schneider has never been known to give anything smaller than a massive portion of food and this Easter dish was no dif...

Oktoberfest is back and fully in swing around the German spots in the city. I spent some time celebrating at Zum Schneider the other day with some liters of Spatan and a giant pretzel. This picture doesn't do justice for the mammoth snack specimen. It was easily the size of my head..and I have a big head! If your looking to celebrate Zum will be having their live Oompah bands playing the Monday,Tuesday night this week and Saturday and Sunday afternoon. It gets packed so show up early or be prepared to wait. The lederhosen is optional :)

Saturday I awoke to my birthday and I was actually feeling pretty good. I haven’t had many good birthdays the past few years but I was really feeling positive and free today. My parents were visiting, I had just gotten engaged, it was a good start to a new year. I have been dying to go eat at Locanda Verde for weeks now. Pictures of the food are pretty much all over the Internet and every single dish makes me want to lick my computer screen! I was lucky enough to score a brunch reservation on my birthday so my parents picked me up and off we headed down to Tribeca. Okay I’m not going to get into the all of the details of what happened next because it would take about an hour. Here’s a short outline: my father jumped out of the car to look for a bathroom because we were stuck on the West Side Highway, I took over driving for 2 blocks and got hit by a huge moving truck, the police were called and Mr. T searched the city for my father who had left without the cell phone, I misse...

So I did finally get to try the White Asparagus at Zum Schenider last weekend. It came wrapped up in some Ham with some boiled Potatoes. The dish was pretty good but look at how tiny the stalks were! I was expecting some of the big guys like we had in Munich. I guess we can't get those shipped in here. However all of the other food we had was awesome and Zum Schneider continues to be my favorite place in the city to chill with some big beers and while away the night. God I love that place!

These are from the past week and really don't deserve a whole post on their own so I thought I would just kind of throw them together. First up some french fries from Zum Schneider. I've written a zillion times how much I love everything about Zum Schneider- the beers, potato pancakes, atmosphere and now the french fries. Long, skinny and perfectly crisped, these are great beer drinking snackers. If you like McDonald's fries (and who doesn't) you will love these. A treat that didn't quite make the cut is the Triple Berry Kit Kat. I was grocery shopping at New Kam Man in Chinatown when this bright shiny box jumped out at me. Triple Berry Kit Kat!! I had to try it out. The box was unfortunately the best part. This Kit Kat was sickeningly sweet and tasted a lot like strawberry Nesquik. It had a horrible artificial taste I just couldn't get past. Too bad because the packaging is so fun. Last but not least Donburiya. Mr. T and I had lunch together in midtown and I or...

I know I've talked about going to Zum Schneider a lot in previous posts but I've never actually taken any pictures of the food! Well finally I have! With Oktoberfest being over Mr Trekker & I decided that we would have no trouble getting a table at Zum Schneider last Saturday night so we took our time. We walked around the East Village a little, did some shopping and even stopped into Nolita House for a quick drink. Finally around 7:00 we decided to head over. Walking up to the place we could already see a crowd of people standing outside. We could not believe how packed it was! Luckily most of the people waiting were larger parties and we were able to snag the last table for two outside. I prefer the inside and the ruckus and commotion that comes with it much better, but we were starving so we took what we could get. Zum Schneider is your typical beer garden with a ton of great German beers that come in 3 sizes small, regular and large. Of course being that we love b...