Near where we live, they semi-opened this restaurant on Jackson Blvd at the start of the pandemic only to shut it down pretty quickly. We’ve walked by here several dozen times, and it was never really opened until the last 6 months. Reading online, it seemed they had to change their menu several times for adjustments for some reason, and the menu itself initially seemed basic and not overly attractive. It felt they were trying really hard to attract a brunch crowd, so we have not been enthusiastic about trying.

We were on our way to get some delicious Popeyes chicken on the 7 train, and little and behold, the 7 trains were running express from Queensboro towards Flushing and were running local heading towards Manhattan. Normally the 7 runs local both ways, but they were doing track work, and it wasn’t quite clear. The next stop after Queensboro was 61st Woodside, which basically skipped our desired stop by 3 stops.

In the city, there are not too many Afghan restaurants to choose from. I’ve only had Afghani food once in my life in NorCal, and it didn’t ever make me yearn for it. However, I thought the menu looked enticing since we were looking for hummus and kabobs around Long Island City. This restaurant is located on the busy Vernon Blvd, which is becoming a happening street for this area. This location of Sami’s Kabob is their second location, whereas their first location is in Astoria.

This restaurant is sandwiched at the cusp of Sunnyside between a AYCE Korean BBQ restaurant and a newly opened Sonic fast food joint. The menu looks pretty traditional Korean, and it’s always nice to try these types of restaurants in different neighborhoods. This one is rarely as busy as its next door neighbors, but I had some expectations of how this would turn out. When we arrived at 5:30 PM on a Friday evening, we were the only patrons in the restaurant.

Flushing is the NYC mecca for Chinese food. It’s at the end of the 7 train line heading east, and it takes about 40 minutes from Manhattan on weekends. Many restaurants and stalls only accept cash, so it’s quite different than being in Manhattan or Long Island City. My partner had a friend that wanted to meet in Flushing to try out Korean BBQ. I thought there would be several near Main Street, but it seems all the decent Korean BBQ places are least a mile east of the Main street subway station.

This area of Astoria is not in the heart where Ditmars and Broadway are, but rather on the cusp. There are a lot of different restaurants around that are not overly busy, so it’s easy to get a seat on most nights. We decided to stop by this new-ish BBQ restaurant on our way to the market. Pig Beach actually has alternative locations in Miami and in Brooklyn, and it has its own unique BBQ zest to its mix.

All you can eat (AYCE) Korean BBQ places are pretty sparse the closer you get to Manhattan. If you did find one, the quality is kind of questionable compared to the a’la carte places. We discovered this restaurant a few months back when we went to the Popeyes next door. It hadn’t opened yet, but there seems to be a few restaurants next to it that are opening in the very near future.

We walked by this restaurant one evening as we were walking back, and I was reminded that this was something I wanted to try. At a quick glance, the interior seemed pretty spacious, and I always go back and forth on whether we can go here. My partner is never fanatical about noodles, but luckily this restaurant has other things such as dim sum and cold cut appetizers. This restaurant opened last year during the pandemic in October and seemed to have a pretty steady flow of repeat customers.

This is located right next to the water near restaurants like Maiella and American Brass. Whenever we try walk-in, they always tells us it’s an hour wait even when there’s no one outside. Since we didn’t have anything else close by that we wanted to try, we were able to book a reservation for an early Saturday dinner again. Ambiance For some reason this restaurant is very popular with a large latin clientele.

Partners Coffee was formerly known as Toby’s Estate coffee. When I first moved to NYC many years ago to Williamsburg, I’ve always felt they had my preferred coffee beans and coffee. The general atmosphere probably falls a little under “hipster” coffee, but it’s quite delicious. I have always tried to visit other coffee shops in NYC for their coffee and beans, but I’ve always fallen back to this. In some locations, they have brewing classes and a roaster, but because this one in Long Island City is much smaller, it’s just a straight up coffee cafe.