We were in the Flatiron area running errands, and unfortunately the nearby S&P sandwich shop was closed for dinner. As we scoured for food, we did ultimately end up at this Tacos Güey place. I vaguely had remembered that this was a relatively new restaurant, so we opted to try it out. We were able to walk in on a Friday evening at 6:30 PM and find a pair of seats in the bar.
Nubeluz is a bar from Chef José Andrés located on the 50th floor of The Ritz-Carlton in Nomad with the intent to show visitors the NYC skyline. He has another recently opened restaurant, Zaytinya, on the first floor of this hotel. We were able to make reservations for 4:00 PM on a Sunday a few weeks in advanced. When you walk into the hotel, check in with the concierge who will swipe you up to the floor. When you arrive, you are greeted with the Nubeluz restaurant sign. When you turn right, the hosts will take you to your seating area.
Jua is one of those new-ish Korean restaurants that has received a number of praises from all sorts of diners. I was able to get a 2-seater a few days before Valentine’s Day on a Saturday evening. It did require me to sit and snipe on Resy, which fortunately was not as difficult as trying to get reservations at Don Angie. Jua is a restaurant by chef Hoyoung Kim, who was the former executive chef of Jungsik. It is a 7-course tasting menu ($135 per person) and utilizes a variety of wood-fire techniques.
On our Fridays, we typically plan a post-work dinner somewhere. Throughout the week, we eat at home a very basic chicken and vegetables dinner, and we use our end of weeks to eat out. This time around, my partner had picked Ilili because it had been on their list for quite some time. I looked online and noticed that they charge $50 if you cancel a reservation, so we decided to risk doing a walk-in right at 5:30 PM. It was not a problem.
Dessert bars are not a new thing in NYC, but finding a very good one can be difficult. This one comes from Chef Eunji Lee, who comes from renowned Jungsik. My partner did see the chef in the kitchen when we were there. We were able to make a reservation for this several weeks in advance surprisingly without any hassle. When you walk in, there is a floor level section and an upper level section.
Zaytinya is located right next to the N (yellow) line off 28th St inside of the luxurious Ritz-Carlton hotel on the first floor. This is another restaurant of José Andrés, and the menu has a lot of classical Turkish, Greek, and Lebanese influences. What was appealing to us was the menu had hummus, and the prices did not seem too expensive despite being inside a luxury hotel. When you enter the restaurant, it has a very open and modern Greek ambiance to it, similar to many other Greek restaurants in the city. However (in a good way), there were several things we immediately noticed that separate itself. We made a reservation for a Saturday at 3:30 PM for a late lunch.
I read about Oiji Mi somewhere, and my gourmand syndrome was kicking in since I felt like I haven’t been to a prix fixe upper end restaurant in a while. Oiji Mi is relatively new, and it comes from the owners of the original East Village’s Oiji. It offers creative contemporary Korean dining composed uniquely for NYC. I saw that they offer a 5 course tasting menu for $125 per person, and the menu looked quite interesting.
On this very humid Friday afternoon, I had to make my way into the Flatiron area to run some errands. This Korean restaurant was something that seemed appealing since we haven’t had Korean food in a while. Normally for decent Korean, you’d have to venture into midtown, but the menu looked pretty decent online. We were fortunate that that they still had the NY restaurant week menu which was quite alluring. It’s $39 for an “entree” choice (dolsot bibimbap, kimchi fried rice, or teriyaki chicken), appetizer (japchae or steamed/fried pork dumplings), and soup (pork kimchi or vegetarian doenjang). We thought it was going to be personal portions, but you can actually just order 1 set and share it. The portion size was surprisingly large.
Indoor dining finally opened again in NYC on September 30, 2020. There are those that feel it’s reckless in this COVID temperament, but we still decided to celebrate by booking an indoor reservation at Cote, a 1 Michelin Star Korean BBQ restaurant. Normally, this is difficult to get a reasonable time, so we were happy it was not too bad. Like all upscale restaurants, they take your temperature via the forehead, and each table is partitioned by a plastic partition. Aside from air conditioning, there’s no way for your aerosols to hit another table unless you tried to spit a few feet up. There’s more than enough space between booths, so it was very enjoyable.
Typically when we walk north on 6th ave towards Trader Joe’s for groceries, we stop by Cava across the street for a snack. We saw this seemingly new interesting restaurant opened with no one in it. The space is very bright, modern, and definitely has a Japanese cafe-chic vibe to it. This dry “ramen” place just opened along 6th Avenue between 20th and 21st Street.
This is another one of those “pick X of this and Y of that” type of restaurant except the theme here is Japanese.