Ken and I live very close to Penelope but have never eaten at the very popular Murray Hill restaurant. We finally woke up early enough to walk over there and put our names down for brunch. Some friends call it their neighborhood restaurant and it looks like there’s always a long wait to get in (we waited about 30 minutes on Sunday morning). The restaurant is just like Bubby’s in Tribeca (farm-fresh foods, baked goods, specialty cocktails, long waits and lots of young families) but the food is not as good. Their prices and service, however, definitely beat Bubby’s.
We both ordered the $14.95 brunch special – one entree + mimosa or coffee/tea and orange juice. I ordered the Nutella French toast with fresh fruit:
And Ken ordered the Sam I Am – scrambled eggs with asparagus and feta cheese with seven grain bread and homemade French fries:
The food came out very quickly but was not hot at all. Also, the French toast was a little too tough and the Nutella was very unevenly distributed on the three pieces of French bread. Ken’s scrambled eggs were okay – the eggs were mixed with asparagus but the feta cheese was crumbled on top after the eggs were lukewarm so the feta didn’t melt on the eggs at all. The addition of feta on the eggs also brought the temperature down and it almost tasted like they were stale eggs with cold feta.
The coffee and juice were standard, the service was very nice after we sat down and the prices were pretty standard for brunch in the area. The food from the kitchen doesn’t really live up to all the hype.
On Thursday night, John Brady and I met up for dinner before going out with some friends from my office. John was in town for training and we realized that we hadn’t seen each other in over a year! We were roommates in college (with our other friend, Angie) and we’re all spread out now (John lives in Florida and Angie lives in Illinois). It was really great catching up with John and we had a good time at Marlow and Sons as well.
I suggested going to Marlow and Sons because we were meeting up with my coworkers at Fatty ‘Cue afterwards for an event. We just wanted to grab a quick bite to eat and some drinks so I suggested we order some appetizers. We initially sat at the bar and I saw someone eating the beef tartare and I saw chicken liver pate on the menu and I really can’t resist chicken liver pate, so we ordered a plate of pate as well.
Our beef tartare:
And our chicken liver pate:
The beef tartare was very fresh, although I was a little disappointed with our serving size. On the other hand, the chicken liver pate was a huge portion with lots of toasted French bread that was incredibly creamy and delicious. John isn’t a huge fan of chicken liver pate (which I found out later) but he really enjoyed the pate from Marlow and Sons. My friend Aaron gets chicken liver pate from Marlow and Sons once every two weeks because his wife works at their corporate office above the restaurant. She usually stops by Marlow and Daughters on her way home and picks up some fresh chicken liver pate to bring home to him (I’m quite jealous).
John and I also liked the cocktails we ordered (I had a tequila-based cocktail that was very spicy and John ordered another one of their specialty concoctions). It’s definitely a fun restaurant that has great food as well.
On Sunday, I had the opportunity to have brunch with some of my friends from Pittsburgh. I grew up with these girls (I’ve known Julia and Liz since we were in kindergarten) and it was so great seeing them. The last time I visited Pittsburgh was in 2002 (to watch them graduate) and I haven’t seen Rachel or Meaza since their high school graduation.
Meaza lives in San Francisco with Julia and me, Rachel and Liz all live in New York. We used to all be really close and it was so great to catch up with all of my friends at the brunch Meaza organized when she was in town. Kittichai has an unlimited mimosas brunch that is really reasonable – $25 gets you an entree and free drinks for two hours. I opted out because I spent the previous night drinking way too much at my birthday celebration but Rachel, Meaza and Liz all decided to go for it. You can order a lychee mimosa, bloody mary, or blood orange bellini and any type of entree – they all started with bellinis while we decided what we wanted to order.
Rachel ordered the French toast with fresh fruit and lemongrass:
Meaza ordered the keffir lime pancakes:
Liz ordered the shrimp pad thai:
And Julia and I ordered omelettes with potatoes (the most American brunch item available):
The food was pretty good for brunch and the prices (whether you were doing the unlimited drink deal or not) were surprisingly decent. We all enjoyed our food but I loved catching up the most. The girls (Julia, me, Rachel, Meaza and Liz):
I have to go back to Pittsburgh to see how it’s changed since I last visited (and to visit Mad Mex!)
Over the weekend, Ken and I went on a double date with our friends, Hughie and Hana. They recently got engaged and are also moving in together so we decided to catch up with a fun dinner at Spina in Alphabet City.
Spina makes their own pastas at the back of the restaurant and they also have a great wine list. I purchased some packages for a set menu – each couple ordered two appetizers, two pastas, two desserts and one bottle of wine.
The server came by and brought us tomato sauce with olive oil as well as ricotta infused with truffle oil:
Both sauces went well with the foccaccia bread that was passed around the table.
For appetizers, I started with the caprese salad with grilled eggplant:
The fresh basil and the soft pillows of mozzarella made the salad a good choice to start off my dinner. I didn’t want to get anything hot because I figured the pasta would be pretty heavy, so this was a good start.
Ken and Hughie started out with the meatball tasting:
Hana ordered the prawns with shaved fennel:
For my main course, I ordered the agnolotti stuffed with confit duck legs and artichokes:
Hana ordered the squid ink pasta with clams and mussels:
Hughie ordered the orecchiette pasta with fresh snow peas:
And Ken ordered my favorite pasta – the gnocchi with pork, veal and beef ragu:
The pastas were all really delicious (although my first ravioli was a little undercooked). The sauce in Ken’s order reminded me of the pasta at Marea and luckily, Ken liked my pasta more because I was definitely a bigger fan of his.
For dessert, we ordered a bunch of stuff and shared – Hana ordered the gelato:
Hughie and Ken ordered the tiramisu:
And I ordered something that reminded me of a frozen key lime pie:
The meal was really good, although we were limited to two types of wines (one white and one red). The restaurant is definitely a nice place to go on a date but it’s a little out of the way for me. I’d love to try some of their other dishes (they have quite a lot of different types of fish that all looked great!)
After my mom helped me move, we went out to dinner at a restaurant she visited earlier in the week. On Wednesday, she went to the Arthur Avenue location of an Italian restaurant, Zero Otto Nove; I’ve been meaning to go to Arthur Avenue on a Friday night for dinner, but it takes way too long to get up there so I’m glad Zero Otto Nove opened up shop in Flatiron (which is much more manageable!) The restaurant opened up less than a month ago very close to my office:
My mom raved about the pizza at the Arthur Avenue location but couldn’t remember the name of the restaurant she visited with Herta. When we were trying to find a restaurant for dinner, she said she wanted pizza again so I figured it would be the perfect opportunity to check out Zero Otto Nove in the Flatiron area. When we arrived, she told me it was the same restaurant and was surprised that I found another outpost closer to us!
We started off with a bread basket and olive oil:
For appetizers, I ordered the octopus with tomatoes and white beans:
The octopus was very tender and the portion was really quite large. It’s actually the most tender octopus I’ve ever had and I’d definitely order it as an entree if it were an option.
Ken ordered the arugula salad with Parmesan cheese:
The arugula salad had a lemon dressing; the dressing must have used a lemon concentrate because it was super tart!
For my entrée, I ordered the fettuccine special with soft shell crabs and grape tomatoes:
Ken ordered the rigatoni with meatballs:
And my mom ordered the pizza with eggplant, ham and lots of cheese:
Ken’s pasta was very hearty because it was baked with cheese but my pasta was surprisingly light; it was tossed with grape tomatoes and olive oil and didn’t have much of a sauce. My mom’s pizza was really delicious; my mom usually doesn’t eat the crust of her pizza but liked the dough so much that she ate all of it!
I definitely want to stop by again for lunch (it’s so close to our office that we can definitely go there for group lunches in the future!)
