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Pizza Plus

Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 by virginia

The latest delivery place on our pizza quest was Pizza Plus on 9th Ave. They left some delivery menus in the mail room of our apartment building and it looked like they had a lot of different options so we decided to give it a shot. We actually liked our pizza order so much the first time that we ordered from them again later in the week. Both times we placed an order online through their website, which also included 20% off coupon codes – that’s always a plus. The first time we ordered, our food arrived in a decent amount of time and the cheese pizza looked pretty promising.

Cheese pizza

The crust was thin and there was good cheese coverage on the slice. The cheese was flecked with oregano, giving it a bit more flavor and a fresher taste. The sauce wasn’t overly sweet or overpowering.

Lots of seasoning and herbs in the sauce and on the cheese

The crust was nicely browned and somewhat crispy, though the pizza was slightly cold when it arrived so it was a bit chewier than I would have preferred. Overall it wasn’t too bad, but it would have been much better had it been served hot.

Underside shot

We also got an order of garlic knots, which were big and puffy but didn’t have enough garlic flavor or seasoning. They were quite bland and very uninteresting.

Bland garlic knots

Deviating from the norm, we got an order of buffalo wings. I wasn’t expecting too much out of buffalo wings from a pizza place, but these weren’t terrible. They were decently meaty and covered in a vinegary hot sauce. Again, these would have been better had they been served hot, as they would up being chewy rather than crispy.

Buffalo wings

Last but not least, we got an order of french fries. These were on the thicker end of the fry spectrum but they were fried to a well done, so they weren’t too soft or soggy in the middle. They weren’t too greasy, and for delivery fries, they weren’t bad.

Decent french fries

Overall we were pretty pleased with our first order from Pizza Plus, so we decided to give them another shot in the same week, hoping that we had finally found our go-to delivery pizza place. Again we ordered online, but this time, our food took forever to come. After waiting for almost an hour, we decided to call them up and see what was going on, as they’re not located too far from our apartment. They told us that the delivery had left already, so we waited a bit more.

After another while, we got a phone call from the delivery man saying that he couldn’t find our apartment, and that he was on 58th St. and 6th Ave. Umm, that is nowhere near our apartment. We live pretty much a straight shot down 9th Ave. from where Pizza Plus is located. How in the world did the delivery guy end up on 6th Ave.?? This time it wasn’t my fault, as we had definitely put in the right address.

Needless to say, when our pizza finally showed up, it was ice cold. If I thought the pizza wasn’t hot enough the first time, the second time it might as well have been sitting in the fridge for a few hours. Don’t get me wrong, I love cold pizza as much as the next person, but I like hot pizza better. And when I order a fresh pizza from somewhere, I expect it to be served hot.

Cold and stiff pizza

The crust was hard, and the cheese had congealed into one solid mass. We ended up putting slices into the oven to reheat, which only meant that our dinner was delayed even more.

Cold and congealed cheese on top

The chicken parm hero we ordered was also stone cold, and into the oven it went as well. Even after reheating, it was pretty bad. The chicken had been chopped into smaller pieces, and they were hard and dry. The cheese on top was clumpy, and it just wasn’t a good sandwich overall.

Disappointingly bad chicken parm hero

The fries were the same kind as the first time, but they also needed reheating in the oven as they were ice cold and hard.

Cold fries

We were extremely unhappy the second time around, as we just couldn’t understand how they messed up our order. We don’t live so far from the restaurant, and they should have looked up our address if they weren’t sure where it was, even though they found us just fine the first time. How the delivery man ended up on 6th Ave. is just mind boggling to me. They ruined our dinner and didn’t even attempt to make amends in any way. That’s just service I can’t condone, and sadly, I don’t think we’ll be ordering from them again. Even though the pizza had such potential, it’s never delivered to us hot, and at that point, it’s just not worth it. And so, the quest continues.

Pizza Plus
642 9th Ave. at 45th St.
New York, NY

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Delivery Doesn’t Do Hanci Turkish Cuisine Justice

Sunday, March 14th, 2010 by virginia

Josh and I really enjoyed the meal that we had at Hanci Turkish Cuisine and decided to get a delivery order from there one rainy night when we were too lazy to venture out of our apartment. We decided to get a few appetizers and split an entree of the mixed grill, since last time we had ordered too much food. We both remembered how much we loved their freshly baked, crispy and chewy Turkish bread, so when we placed the order on Seamlessweb, we wrote in the special instructions section, “Please bring us extra bread, we love it!”

Our order arrived quickly but sadly, they failed to bring us the extra bread we requested. Instead, we got three measly little pieces, not even a basket’s worth if we had eaten at the restaurant. I guess that’s what we get for being lazy? The bread was delicious as always but the three pieces weren’t nearly enough to use on the portion of cacik we ordered, a yogurt based dip.

Delicious Turkish bread but a meager portion

Cacik is yogurt mixed with chopped cucumbers and seasoned with garlic and dill. It’s similar to tzatziki sauce from Greek restaurants, but Hanci’s version was much milder in flavor. There were lots of small cubes of cucumber but I wish they were more heavy handed with the garlic and dill, as it was kind of bland. It did go well with the mixed grill we ordered, but we ended up putting in a lot of salt to coax out some more of the flavor.

Cacik - yogurt with cucumber, garlic, and dill

We also got an order of sigara boregi, which is fried phyllo dough cigars filled with feta cheese and topped with parsley and dill. The fried phyllo dough suffered a bit from delivery, as it steamed in the container and got a bit soggy, but flavor wise it was quite delicious. The salty feta paired well with the fresh herbs, and though the phyllo was soft, it wasn’t too greasy and was still somewhat flaky.

Sigara boregi - phyllo dough cigars filled with feta cheese

Our last appetizer was piyaz, which is a salad made with white beans, onions, parsley, tomato, and olives. It was dressed with a tangy vinaigrette, and I loved the bite that I got from the slices of fresh red onion. It was a refreshing and flavorful dish but it also needed some salt to boost up the flavor a bit.

Piyaz - white bean salad with onion, parsley, tomato, and olives

For our entree, we split an order of the mixed grill, which was a dish that we had ordered when we went to the restaurant the first time. The mixed grill features lamb sis kebab, chicken tavuk sis, lamb kofte, and chicken adana. All the meats are served over rice pilaf and a side of mixed vegetables. It’s a generous portion of food, though I favored the lamb sis kebab and the chicken tavuk sis, which are just grilled cubes of lamb and chicken. Both the kofte and the adana lacked seasoning and flavor, although all the meats were nicely cooked and very tender.

Mixed grill over rice pilaf with mixed vegetables

I have to admit that we were a bit disappointed with our delivery order from Hanci. We enjoyed our meal at the restaurant much more, and perhaps the food just suffered a bit from being taken out. I did think that a lot of our food lacked basic seasoning though, such as salt, and was much blander than I had remembered. We were also disappointed that they didn’t bring us extra bread, or even a normal sized portion of the bread, as we had ordered several appetizers that needed the bread to pair with. I don’t know if they just didn’t see our special instruction or if they chose to ignore it, but after the hospitality we received while we were there, we were a bit surprised that they weren’t more accommodating. I understand that the bread they offer free at the restaurant costs them money to produce, and I would have paid for extra bread if that was an option, but it wasn’t. In general, I think their food is best enjoyed at the restaurant, when it can come out hot and fresh, and you can have all the delicious Turkish bread that you want.

Hanci Turkish Cuisine
854 10th Ave. between 56th and 57th St.
New York, NY

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Great Service and Great Food at Nook

Saturday, March 13th, 2010 by virginia

In my first post about Nook, I mentioned that we hadn’t been there in years because the service was bad, but after a long hiatus, Josh and I went to brunch and thought both the service and the food were fantastic. We decided to go back there for dinner to see if the service was consistently much improved, or if our brunch experience was merely a fluke. Even though it was quite late for dinner when we arrived, the tiny restaurant was completely full, probably because it was Saturday night. The hostess/waitress told us the wait would be about half an hour and suggested we go across the street to a bar, saying she would call us when a table was available. Since neither of us were starving, and there really is nowhere to wait in the restaurant, it seemed like a good solution so that’s exactly what we did.

We headed across the street to The Snug, which, like Nook, is aptly named. It’s a long narrow bar with limited seating but we managed to snag a small table all the way in the back. Josh got a beer and we chatted for a while. After half an hour, no call. We had left Josh’s phone on the table so that we would see it ring, in case we couldn’t hear it in the noisy bar. Forty-five minutes later, still nothing. At this point we were getting a little peeved, and after almost an hour we decided cross back over to the restaurant and see what the situation was. As soon as we walked in, we saw an empty two top right by the door, and were a bit miffed that we hadn’t received a call.

The waitress came over to us and said she was wondering what happened to us because she called us twice and left a message when we didn’t answer. She then offered us the empty two top and said we could sit right away if we wanted. Josh and I looked at each other, perplexed, because we definitely didn’t see or hear the phone ringing, but we shrugged it off, gave her the benefit of the doubt, and sat down for dinner. Indeed, halfway through the meal, Josh got the beep that he had two missed calls and a voicemail from the waitress telling us that our table was ready. So she really was telling the truth, and we blame AT&T for our frustrations.

We were glad we stayed because not only was the waitress very gracious about the whole mix up, the food was great as well. She opened up our bottle of wine right away (the restaurant is a BYO) and brought us glasses as well as a basket of the same kind of bread that we received at brunch, a rustic and crusty sourdough.

Basket of rustic bread

We ordered two appetizers that we had remembered enjoying the very first time we ate at the restaurant in 2006. First was a tuna tartare served with avocado and flavored with soy and ginger. The tuna was very fresh and nicely cut into small cubes, which I like better than the mashed up tuna that we sometimes receive from other restaurants. The tuna paired perfectly with the creamy avocado, and the whole dish was well seasoned and very flavorful.

Tuna tartare

The second appetizer was mushroom cigars, which was filo dough wrapped around a filling of ground mushrooms, goat cheese, sage, and truffle oil. The pastry was lightly browned and perfectly flaky while the filling was really delicious. I love mushrooms, I love goat cheese, and I love truffle oil. The three together were simply divine. We only wished that the portion was larger, as it’s really only one small cigar cut in half. Josh and I just couldn’t get enough of it.

Mushroom cigars

For our main courses we also opted to order dishes that we’ve tried previously, and both were just as good as we had remembered. The first was tuscan chicken, which features a large boneless chicken breast stuffed with spinach and ricotta, topped with a light parmesan sauce. The chicken was tender and juicy, not at all dried out, and the filling was nicely seasoned and garlicky. The parmesan sauce bound everything together, and it was a very homey and comforting dish. The chicken came with a side salad that was tossed with a tasty vinaigrette, and it was supposed to come with chive mash potatoes but I requested the rosemary fries instead, which they gladly accommodated. The fries were slightly limp but well seasoned, and we could really taste the pleasant rosemary flavor.

Tuscan chicken

Our other entree was the Thai marinated grilled rack of lamb. The serving came with four perfectly grilled chops that were tender, juicy, and flavorful. The Thai marinade was slightly sweet, which worked well with the slightly bitter braised cabbage that came on the side. There were also chive mashed potatoes that came with the dish, which was why I had requested the fries with the chicken dish instead. Despite the casual presentation, the food was well prepared and the flavors were very refined.

Thai marinated grilled rack of lamb

Josh and I weren’t in a rush and were lingering over our meal, finishing up our wine and debating dessert when we got a call from his parents who happened to be in the city that night for a party. It turned out that they were just around the corner from where we were, so they met us at the restaurant for dessert. Our waitress had no problem letting us move over to an empty four top, and we ordered a round of coffee drinks. Unfortunately, the coffee was terrible. The espresso was weak, as was the cappuccino. Both Josh and his mom ordered extra shots of espresso to try and bolster their drinks, but even those were super weak.

Fortunately dessert was much better. Lloyd ordered the cheese and fruit plate, which turned out to be quite a large serving of assorted cheeses (I’m not a cheese person so I only recognized brie but there were others) and various fruits, including grapes, blackberries, and slices of apples, pears, and strawberries. There was plenty to share, and the waitress brought extra bread to pair with the cheeses.

Cheese and fruit plate

We also got a slice of the apple pie, which was served warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. The pie was more like a cobbler, with tasty, buttery, crumbly bits on top, but it was no less delicious. It wasn’t overly sweet or too cinnamony, and we all enjoyed it immensely.

Apple pie with vanilla ice cream

I have to say, I’m thrilled that the service at Nook truly has improved, as we now have a neighborhood spot that serves up good food at reasonable prices, and is a BYO to boot. Nook really is teeny tiny though so it does get a bit cramped inside, but I find the atmosphere to be homey and welcoming. If you want to dine during pre-theater or prime hours, however, it’s probably best to make a reservation. While the menu hasn’t changed all that much since the first time we were there in 2006, it’s nice to know that we have a place that we can rely on, where the dishes are familiar, tasty, and always well prepared. We’ll be back, and often, I hope.

Nook
746 9th Ave. between 50th and 51st St.
New York, NY

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Pre-Theater Dining at Carmine’s

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010 by virginia

One of my favorite pre-theater destinations is Carmine’s in midtown. I’ve written about the uptown location before, and the midtown location seems even busier but still serves up the same great food. One night before going to see Hair the Musical, we managed to get an early dinner reservation for a large group of people. As usual, I stuffed myself silly with delicious wedges of tomato focaccia, which I’ve dubbed “pizza bread.” I even requested a basket of just focaccia (both the tomato and the onion), since there are never enough pieces of them in the regular mixed bread basket.

Basket of focaccia bread

We started off our dinner with two salads that were simply ginormous. The first was the Carmine’s salad, which is kind of like an antipasto salad. There are cubes of ham, salami, and provolone mixed throughout a huge pile of lettuce. There are also sun dried tomatoes, roasted red peppers, red onion, and olives on top, and the entire thing is tossed with a tangy Italian dressing.

Carmine's salad

We also ordered the special salad of the day, which was mesclun greens tossed with a tasty balsamic vinagrette and topped with cranberries, walnuts, and goat cheese. Both of the salads were very different but equally delicious.

Special salad with mesclun greens in a balsamic vinaigrette

We also ordered some hot appetizers to start. First was fried calamari that was lightly breaded and fried to a beautiful golden brown. The calamari was crispy on the outside, tender and not too chewy in the middle, and great for dunking into the tangy and sweet marinara sauce.

Fried calamari with marinara sauce

Last but definitely not least was my favorite appetizer, the stuffed artichoke. This is the artichoke that I keep trying to replicate at home, and although I’ve come close, it’s not quite there yet. This artichoke is garlicky, lemony, and very addictive. Part of the appeal is that I love the process of eating artichokes – dipping the leaves in the yummy sauce, scooping up some bread crumbs, and eating it all together. After peeling off layers and layers of leaves, getting rid of the spiny choke, you finally get down to the creamy heart. It’s a lot of work but also a lot of good eating along the way.

Amazing stuffed artichoke

For our entrees, we got an order of spaghetti with white clam sauce. As you can see in the picture, there are tons of clams on the spaghetti, as well as many cloves of garlic. This is definitely a dish for garlic lovers, as the flavor permeates throughout. The spaghetti was perfectly al dente, and this is always one of my favorite dishes.

Garlicky spaghetti with white clam sauce

The lasagna, like everything else, is a huge portion, and is basically a brick of pasta layered with lots of meat, cheese, and sauce. While it still tastes good, I miss the browned bubbly cheese layer on top, and it does get a bit messy to eat. It tends to fall apart when you try to cut pieces from it, and the proportion of pasta to sauce and cheese kind of gets thrown off. Personally, I prefer the other pasta dishes offered at Carmine’s.

Brick of lasagna

We also got veal parmesan, which was pounded thin and breaded. There’s a good layer of cheese on top but I wish that they had browned it more. It’s still quite tasty though, and the meat is always tender and perfectly cooked.

Veal parmesan

Our last entree was chicken scarpariello, which is one of our favorites so we always get two orders, as everyone wants multiple pieces of chicken. I think they deep fry the pieces, as it’s always crispy on the outside and moist and juicy in the middle. The chicken is covered in a lemony, garlicky sauce that is flavored with rosemary. It’s different from other versions of scarpariello, which usually feature sausage and peppers, but I vastly prefer this version.

Chicken scarpariello

We also got a side dish of escarole, which is sauteed with garlic in oil. Squeeze some lemon over the top and it’s refreshing, a good complement to all the rich, saucy food that we eat.

Sauteed escarole

Even after all the food and several magnums of Carmine’s house wine, we still saved some room for dessert. We got the massive Titanic, which is basically a chocolate brownie covered in scoops of vanilla and chocolate ice cream, paired with bananas, and covered in whipped cream, strawberries, nuts, and chocolate sauce. Like all the food at Carmine’s, it’s over the top but delicious.

The Titanic

Despite all the signs that point to a cheesy tourist destination, Carmine’s is, in my opinion, one of the best Italian restaurants in the city. It never ceases to amaze me how much food the restaurant churns out every day, and all the dishes we get are consistently well prepared. It’s hearty, homey, comforting red sauce Italian food, and lots of it. The value is good, and it’s a great place for accommodating large groups. The midtown location really gets hopping during pre-theater hours but service was great. Our water glasses always stayed filled and a server was always nearby to comply with any of our requests. When the waiter brought one of our magnums of wine, he accidentally spilled a bit from the full bottle and immediately went to fetch us a new one, even though the amount spilled was negligible compared to the size of the bottle. It’s little things like that which make you realize that they do care about service, despite the fact that they would probably still be packed every night even with lousy service. That’s what makes the experience so great every time, and I’m always happy to go back again and again.

Carmine’s (multiple locations)
200 West 44th St. between 7th and 8th Ave.
New York, NY

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Pasta with Pink Vodka Sauce and Chicken

Thursday, February 4th, 2010 by virginia

As I’ve mentioned before, when Josh is away for work, I tend to get lazy and end up eating leftovers or slices of pizza from our failed pizza quest that we have stashed in our freezer. I don’t like to eat by myself so when I’m alone, I don’t really think too much about what I’m eating. One night, however, after a particularly long stretch of business trips for him, I couldn’t stand eating any more freezer burned pizza so I rooted around our fridge and pantry to see what ingredients we had on hand. I finally settled on making pasta with pink vodka sauce and chicken. It’s quick and easy to make, tasty, and one of my favorite comfort foods.

As with most of my cooking, I don’t really follow any particular recipe to the letter. To start, I prepped my ingredients by mincing a few cloves of garlic, washing off a stalk of fresh basil leaves from my surprisingly still thriving basil plant, and cubing up two boneless chicken breasts into bite size pieces. That’s basically all the grunt work that you need to do for this dish. Also, make sure you put a pot of water on to boil right away, so that you can put the pasta in just before the sauce is finished and your boiling water will be waiting for you, instead of the other way around.

All the sauce ingredients prepped and ready to go

To cook the chicken, I heated up olive oil in a large and deep sautee pan with about a third of the minced garlic and tossed in the pieces of chicken. Make sure to season the chicken liberally with salt and pepper. When the pieces are almost cooked through, I pulled them off and moved them into a bowl. It’s ok if they’re still slightly underdone, as they’ll be added into the sauce later and cooked through some more.

Cook the chicken first, then set aside in a bowl

Using the same pan, heat up some more olive oil on medium heat and throw in the rest of the garlic. Add a pinch or two of red pepper flakes, depending on whether you want the dish to be spicy (or you can leave that out altogether). After the garlic is just starting to brown, add a 28 oz can of crushed tomatoes and cook until simmering. Season the tomato sauce to taste with salt/pepper/thyme. When the sauce starts to bubble a little, pull the pan off the flame and carefully add in one cup of vodka. Place the pan back on the stove and mix the vodka around in the sauce, letting it bubble away. I threw the chicken back into the sauce at this point, and started cooking the pasta in the boiling water as well.

Simmering the tomato sauce with vodka

Cook the sauce long enough so that the flavor of the vodka stays but the bite of the alcohol is dissipated. At this point, cut the basil into small strips and add it into the sauce, then pour in one cup of heavy cream. Stir the sauce until the cream is combined, and the sauce takes on a nice pink hue. I let that reduce a bit so the sauce is rich and creamy, but not super thick. Take the time to taste the sauce and season it one more time.

Add the heavy cream and reduce until the sauce is rich and slightly thicker

Drain the pasta and toss it directly into the sauce (this is why I use a large and deep sautee pan for the sauce). I used rotini this time, but my preference is farfalle. Basically any shape of pasta that has a few grooves is fine (so not spaghetti or linguini), as they help the sauce cling better. I tossed everything together to incorporate the sauce and disperse the chicken pieces evenly throughout.

Add in the cooked pasta and toss everything together

Finally, I scooped out a portion into a bowl and topped it with a sprinkling of grated parmesan cheese. Yum!

Pasta with pink vodka sauce and chicken, topped with grated parmesan cheese

Like I’ve said, I don’t really measure things out when I cook so none of the ingredients have exact measurements. If you like garlic, add more garlic. If you don’t like the flavor of vodka, use less. If you like the sauce to be thicker and richer, use more heavy cream. It’s a pretty basic “recipe” and can be altered at any point to suit your own taste. As for me, I had a big pot of rich and comforting pasta to last me the week, and it was much better than eating freezer burned pizza.

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Pio Pio

Monday, November 16th, 2009 by virginia

DSCN2080

As I mentioned earlier in my post about our trip to the Galapagos, Peru is still at the top of our “must visit before kids” list. Seeing Macchu Picchu will have to wait until next year at least, but in the meantime, we were happy to be able to try some Peruvian cuisine when Josh’s parents suggested we go to Pio Pio for Sunday night dinner.

We headed to the Upper West Side branch of the restaurant, and it was a good thing we called for a reservation because the place was packed, and there were nine of us altogether. The music they were playing was loud and upbeat, which made the atmosphere seem very festive. Our table wasn’t quite ready yet when we arrived so we squeezed ourselves by the small bar area and ordered a pitcher of sangria to start. The sangria is pretty decent, not awesome, but also a bit dangerous because it’s sweet and goes down like juice.

Pitcher of sangria

Sweet and fruity pitcher of sangria

I don’t think I’ve eaten Peruvian cuisine before, but I knew we had to get some ceviche since that’s a notoriously Peruvian dish. We chose the Cebiche Mixto, which was chunks of fish, shrimp, octopus, calamari, and scallops marinated in lime juice and mixed with red onion, cilantro, and hot peppers. It was a very refreshing dish, as the seafood was tangy with a nice little kick from the hot pepper. The scallops were my favorite part – fresh, tender, and tasty.

Cebiche mixto

Cebiche mixto

We ordered two Matador combos, which came with avocado salads to start. The avocado was properly ripe and fresh but I thought the salad was a bit boring overall. The ceviche was a much better starter.

Avocado salad

Avocado salad

The Matador combos also included chicken pio, which is a whole marinated chicken in a Peruvian sauce. One order of the chicken is pretty large and can feed about four people. It was tender and juicy on the inside and a little crispy on the outside. The meat was well seasoned and I enjoyed it a lot.

Crispy and juicy pieces of chicken

Crispy and juicy pieces of chicken

The combos also came with rice and beans, tostones, and salchipapas. The rice and beans were just eh. The beans didn’t have enough seasoning and they just tasted bland.

Rice and beans

Rice and beans

The tostones were superb. Big pieces of plantain were pressed flat and fried to a nice crisp. They came with a container of garlic sauce on the side to dip with, and you know how much I love garlic sauce with tostones.

Tostones with garlic sauce

Tostones with garlic sauce

I didn’t know what salchipapas were but when they arrived, I was so excited because I’ve seen pictures of them on other blogs. Salchipapas are basically French fries topped with slices of hot dogs. I love French fries, and I love hot dogs. Put them together – wow! My new favorite side dish! The hot dogs were cooked after they had been sliced so they were a little crispy on the edges and just worked so well with the thick cut French fries. Even without ketchup, I ate almost an entire plate of this by myself.

Salchipapas

Salchipapas

In addition to the Matador combos, we got a large order of the Jalea, which is a fried seafood platter. The large order really is large but the seafood is really heavily breaded. I identified pieces of calamari and fish, but after a while everything just sort of got clumped together and it was hard to tell exactly what you were eating. There was a little bit of onion and tomato salsa sprinkled on top of the platter, but otherwise, the seafood was under seasoned and lacked pizzazz. It definitely needed some sort of dipping sauce, or extra lime to squirt on top. I was pretty disappointed with this dish and wouldn’t order it again.

Another disappointment was the Arroz Chaufa, which was Peruvian style Chinese fried rice. We opted for the beef, and it was mixed with eggs, onions, and soy sauce. However, this dish also lacked seasoning and just tasted heavy and oily. I can make better fried rice at home.

Beef fried rice

Beef fried rice

The Camarones Cuzco were sautéed garlic shrimp on top of yellow rice. This was also an unmemorable dish. The shrimp were fine, if a bit lacking in flavor, and the rice was nothing special.

Camarones

Camarones Cuzco

I did like our side order of maduros though. The sweet plantains were thick cut and fried so that they had a nice texture but weren’t too greasy or starchy.

Maduros

Maduros

We were pretty stuffed after all that food so we decided to split one dessert, a slice of tres leches cake. Some people also ordered coffee or espresso, which really confused the waitstaff for some reason. Josh wanted an espresso, and they kept bringing a regular coffee. Someone else wanted decaf, and they also kept bringing a regular coffee. It was really kind of laughable, they just kept bringing out the same cups of coffee over and over, until we got fed up and just took whatever they were offering. Josh thinks he wound up with a cup of decaf coffee, or else it was the worst regular coffee he has ever drank. It definitely was not worth the aggravation.

Tres leches cake

Tres leches cake

The tres leches cake was ok. I’ve only had it once before so I don’t really have a basis of comparison. The cake itself is a bit dry, but the milk that they soak it in makes it wet. So it tastes kind of like a sweet gritty wet cake to me. I think I’ll pass on it next time.

Overall I thought the food at Pio Pio hit some pretty high highs and some pretty low lows. Service, however, was not so great. In addition to the coffee issues, we had placed two orders of the Matador Combo but they only brought out one order, so some of us had to wait an extra half hour to get a piece of chicken. It also threw of the timing of the meal a bit. I ended up eating more of the Jalea than I wanted to, only because I was hungry while waiting for the rest of the chicken and the sides to arrive. And by the time they arrived, I was pretty full yet unsatisfied. I kind of felt like the only time they really paid attention to us was to constantly refill our sangria glasses so that we would have to keep ordering more pitchers.

Negatives aside, I really did enjoy the chicken, and the ceviche. I’d go back there just for these items. The side dishes were also really good, except for the rice and beans. The combos are pretty decent deals if you’re splitting with a lot of people. Otherwise, I might just order a pio chicken a la carte and then cherry pick my favorite sides, like the salchipapas and the tostones. Just make sure that if you do go with a big group to make a reservation. It was late on a Sunday night and the restaurant was still hopping when we left.

Pio Pio (multiple locations)
702 Amsterdam Ave. at 94th St.
New York, NY

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