Delancey: LA Restaurant Review

At this point on our journey of discovering the best food in LA, we’ve gone a bit out of order, but bear with us. This was the first time that we went somewhere “on our list” that left us disappointed with the overall experience. With that being said, I wouldn’t call it a bad dinner, there were just a lot of areas for improvement…a lot.

(Note: We would like to apologize for the poor quality of the photos. Even though we brought the good camera, as we mention soon, the lighting quickly went from bad to awful, so we had a hard time capturing the food.)

Apr032018

D’s Dubai Sauce

Obviously, when we say that we’re only going to eat at restaurants once a week that are “on our list” we don’t fully expect that to happen. As a result, when we might go out for a business lunch with a third party, we’ll lean towards places we haven’t been because we love discovering new spots. That led me to D’s Dubai Sauce.

I’m not completely sold on D’s Dubai Sauce, but intrigued enough by my first experience to be willing to try it again. We live a few blocks away, so it’s convenient, but growing up in the NYC area created higher standards based on the stand at 53rd and 6th. Still, they don’t claim to be just “chicken and rice” so let’s talk about what they do well.

They really do excel when it comes to flavor development, especially in their sauces. Their white sauce has this very unexpected tang to it which breaks through the overwhelming richness. The green sauce is even brighter with significant heat from the jalapeno and lots of acidity. I didn’t brave the extremely hot red sauce this time around.

Jan302018

Sqirl: LA Restaurant Review

Recently, we launched one of our most exciting projects of the year: LA’s Must-Visit Restaurants of 2018. What does this mean exactly and why is it so exciting? Well…it means instead of ordering Indian for the fifth week in a row, we are going to try new places! Each week, from this list that you’ll find in the post linked above, we are going to try a highly-rated (from someone or another) restaurant in Los Angeles and then tell you, our beloved readers, about it! Our first stop in this epic adventure was Sqirl, a “contemporary breakfast and lunch” as they word it.

It was rather a chance occasion that we did this; my brother’s girlfriend’s cousin (I know, it’s a mouthful) was in town and they were all going to breakfast at Sqirl. We got an invite and said, why not! Sqirl is just on the border of Silver Lake and East Hollywood and boy do you notice. No parking and plenty of hipsters abound! We parked a few blocks away and hiked down one of Silver Lake’s many mountain-like hills to a little cafe. The cafe is “hip” with plenty of hipsters both in line and cooking, serving, and/or cashiering. If you don’t know the exact address, you’ll find Sqirl by the at-least 15-person wait line (and that’s if you’re lucky and/or smart and go at 8:30am) outside. The format of food-getting is wait in a line to get to the counter, order your food, and hope for a table. Like I said, it’s a little place, so there aren’t many of them. The smartest thing to do is split your party into table-grabbers and food-orderers.

Jan262018

The SEVEN Secrets about Thai Food!

Full Disclosure: we’re not Thai. Our 21&Me/Ancestry.com DNA tests and family trees show zero traces of any Asian heritage, but we do love their food! We love it so much, that we were willing to shell out top dollar to go on a “secret” food-tour of LA’s (Hollywood’s) Thai Town led by one of the world’s leading ambassadors for Thai cuisine, Jet Tila.

If you watch Food Network, you know who Jet is. If you love cooking Asian food at home, you might be aware that he had one of the top-selling cookbooks of the year. (We have our signed copy of 101 Asian Dishes You Need to Cook Before You Die on our coffee table.) What you might not know about Jet is the fact that he is the United States’ Official Food Ambassador to Thailand, and a member of the Thai family that opened the first Thai restaurants in the US. So, Jet is legit.

Hungry & Jet

Jan242018

The Impossible Burger

Intriguing. When you think about it, that isn’t a word that you would normally associate with food. You might think, ‘wow, this is intriguing’ at first, but after some thought, you’d find a better-suited word. Sometimes for better and often for worse, we have a tendency to give more credit than is due when it comes to food. Just think about the hysteria that erupts when well-known foods (such as poke and ramen) are brought to areas where the population aren’t familiar with them. Hysteria.

Then, there are the few times that you really are truly intrigued by what you’re eating. The thought of it is so complex, so mesmerizing that you can’t help but learn more about it. And no, we’re not talking about a sushirito here (aka a sushi burrito) or any other nonsensical scheme to be different, cool, or earn money fast–we’re talking about the true gems out there.

Dec152017

Non-Spoiler Review of Star Wars: The Last Jedi

Wow. What a night. I’ll (try to) keep this short and sweet. Have no fear–there will be no spoilers here. First of all, we are lucky enough to live in Hollywood and we were able to walk to the “strip” where the premiere was happening. We saw the movie at Disney’s El Capitan theatre–an intricate, marvelous set up. There were people everywhere, the streets were blocked off, there was a 20 foot AT-AT and other amazing props. The hype and energy were tangible. I dressed up as Rey for the premiere and I’m so glad I did–I got lots of comments on my costume and some people even wanted photos with me! Anyhow, there is nothing like seeing a Star Wars movie on opening night–the energy is fantastic, palpable, and contagious. You know everyone is a huge Star Wars fan and dressing up like Rey does not make you a nerd in this crowd.

Anyhow, let’s get to the good stuff. Here is my review of Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

Dec092017

The Best Pizza on Earth is No More

As Hungry prepares for yet another trip back east, the preparation comes with the painful awareness that one of his favorite places in the whole world of food will not be there. Tony’s Pizza, née Tony’s Italian Kitchen, was a local favorite in Midland Park (Hungry’s hometown). In such a densely populated part of Northern New Jersey, the level of pizza competition easily rivaled that of any part of New York City, some would even daresay Arthur Ave. While residents of Bergen County would be split between Kinchley’s thin crust, Nelly’s wide selection, and Brother’s stellar toppings, Hungry knew at an early age that Tony’s was his favorite, by far.

Sep032017

The Greatest Movies of All Time

A few weeks ago, we wrapped up our Top 10 Greatest Movies of All Time. We treated this exercise the same as our 25 Greatest Video Games Ever Countdown, which allowed everyone involved to determine their own guidelines for their list. If you’ve been following and reading the captions each week, you’ll notice that some lists spanned over the lifetime of a writer, while others were based just in their childhood. It is intriguing to say that least.

We decided once again to compile the lists and create our consensus Top 5 Movies of All Time. There were much fewer similarities this time around. The only movies repeated on two lists were Blade Runner, Beauty and the Beast, The Dark Knight, The Fifth Element, The Lion King and Life Aquatic. The only movie that made three lists was The Empire Strikes Back. Star Wars films had five mentions while Lord of the Rings filmed only had two. Other series were even less represented, which speaks volumes about the numbers of films that exist and the diversity in our writers.

Image source

Aug132017

#1 Greatest Movie of All Time

Wow…the one movie to beat them all…#1! It’s been many weeks and a few months getting here, with scrambled last-minute entries from our incredible braintrust to doing our best to put into words why these movies mean so much to us. Why we chose these ten above the hundreds of thousands of movies that are out there. It’s big stuff here, ladies and gents. Have no clue what I’m talking about? The Top 10 Greatest Movies of All Time list of course! If you’re behind, check out the others here–#2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, and #10.

Drum roll, please… I would now like to present #1 of the Top 10 Movies of All Time!

Kai – “Memento”

Image source

Jul162017

#4 Greatest Movie of All Time

Here we are…#4 greatest movie of all time on our Top 10 Movies of All Time list! We’re getting into the good ones now, the ones that mean the most. The title may be a little misleading…these aren’t necessarily the greatest movies of all time, but they’re the ones our Braintrust loves the most. Each braintrustee has their own criteria, it may have to do with the characters, storyline, soundtracks, acclaim, and/or nostalgia. A little late to our movie countdown? Have no fear. If you missed the others, here are #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, and #10.