Restaurant Review: Singas Famous Pizza

Details: Located around New York City, though not in Manhattan. The official site is http://www.singaspizzas.com/

Singas Pizza is a pizzeria that specializes in making ten inch pies that are made when you order. They don’t sell pizza by the slice. They also have sandwiches, pasta, and chicken wings, but it’s the pizza that you should get here.

They have a variety of toppings, pretty much everything you can get at most pizzerias in this price range. Pizza pies generally price from around seven to over ten dollars depending on what toppings you get. As for the chicken wings, pasta, and sandwiches, everything goes into the pizza oven for cooking and prices at around

The pies are good. There’s nothing unique about their recipe, but there’s something delicious about a freshly made pie versus a reheated slice. Additionally, the pizza pans they use to bake the pizza almost always guarantees a crispy pizza, which is nice. The sandwiches, pasta, and chicken wings are okay. I’ve tried them all and they weren’t great. If you feel like gambling, then you should those items. Otherwise, I’d just get the pizza.

Overall, a good place for pizza. It’s a nice to get a freshly made pizza once in a while versus the individual, reheated slices that you normally find in this city. The only downside is that you have to order a whole ten inch pie — which isn’t overly big — if you want try this pizza out.

Score: 6.8/10

Restaurant Review: Mu Ramen

Details: Located at 1209 Jackson Ave, Long Island City, NY 11101.Official site is http://ramennyc.wixsite.com/popup

Warning: this place only takes cash. They have an ATM on the premises for this purpose. They also don’t take reservations.

Had the hankering again for ramen so I looked up Mu Ramen. I think this place is run by a couple and that they both work in the restaurant. The wife handles the front of the house while the husband handles the back.

First thing you notice is the space. It’s got one room with at most about twenty seats. There is a bar with around five seats and a long table in the middle which seats the rest of the patrons. It’s got a kind of communal feeling, so be prepared to be in other people’s faces.

I ordered the Shoyu ramen (clear duck based ramen with shoyu, spinach, menma, and nevi). It was extremely oily, but tasty. The primary thing about the food here is that it is on the more expensive side compared to other ramen places. They have a bunch of interesting looking side dishes that I did not partake in. Again, it’s pricey and when I go to a ramen place, I want ramen. I don’t care to pay an unknown amount for a bowl of sushi or fifteen dollars for two chicken wings, even if you put a little foie gras in them. If I wanted sushi I’d go to a sushi place and if I wanted foie gras I’d go to a french restaurant.

Service was very friendly.

Score: 5.6/10 Okay place, but I wouldn’t recommend this place for ramen. If you feel like throwing money away and getting sushi, ramen, and foie gras stuffed chicken wings, then you should come here. If you wanted a bowl of ramen that you felt was worth the price in comparison to other, comparable ramen places, then go somewhere else.

Restaurant Review: Buffalo Wild Wings

Details: Located at 737 Merrick Ave., Westbury, NY 11590, among other locations. Official site is http://www.buffalowildwings.com/

Buffalo Wild Wings is a chain of restaurants that serve American bar food (burgers, nachos, chicken wings, etc.), alcohol (beer), and sports. There are primarily three main reasons that, despite the low quality of food here, I am continually enticed to visit.

First and foremost, I am greatly drawn to Buffalo Wild Wings because of its Tuesday deal. On Tuesday, buffalo wings are half off. They used to count individual pieces, but now they do it by weight. It works out to sort of the same. What is noteworthy though, is that most people who come to Buffalo Wild Wings have the same idea as I do. Tuesdays are packed and chaotic. There is almost always a line of high school kids in Buffalo Wild Wings on a Tuesday. Additionally, the kind of person who works at Buffalo Wild Wings is usually a grade student or someone else who doesn’t really care about the job or service, likely because they pay them shit. It just leads to one big cluster fuck where everything on a Tuesday takes extra long and you wait hours for a table and some chicken wings.

I will say that the one thing that elevates Buffalo Wild Wings above other chicken wing places is that they have a large number of sauces to choose from, which is actually the second thing that draws me here. I love their sauces. The chicken wings may not be the best I’ve ever had, but I do love me some cheap wings covered in Parmesan garlic sauce.

The third thing isn’t really something that draws me, but will likely be attractive to other people and that is the ridiculous number of flat screen televisions installed in each franchisees restaurant. You literally cannot turn your head without facing a wall of t.v.’s with every conceivable sports channel playing at the same time. If you like sports, wings, and beer, then Buffalo Wild Wings may be an attractive place to hang out and watch a game.

Score: 5.1/10 Quality of food is generally tied with Applebee’s, but frying up some frozen wings and dousing them in sauce doesn’t require the best quality of chicken you can possibly find. I’ve had other things, like nachos, mozzarella sticks, burgers and sandwiches and I can honestly say that they are not worth talking about. The only reasons you should consider coming here is for chicken wings in a variety of sauces, sports, and beer.

Restaurant Review: Tanner Smith’s (55th Street, NYC)

Tanner Smith’s is a relatively new bar that opened this year. I came here for drinks after work.

First is the appearance. It’s a nice looking bar and I really like the classical look.

Like many bars, they have a variety of “special drinks,” which are really just your average drinks with their slightly different twist on them. Had some beers; they have all your standard brands. Also tried the Winona. It’s their twist on the old fashioned and I really liked it. It came in a bottle and there was some instruction on how to drink it. I just emptied the bottle into the iced glass. It had a smoky taste which differentiated it from other old fashioned’s I’ve had before.

Other people ordered dirty martinis and the Mayor Gaynor’s Tippler (their version of a Manhattan). I was told they were both good.

We ordered a lot of food; the Thai deviled eggs on curried toast, house prepared beef jerky, the everything pretzel, the buffalo chicken spring rolls, the chicken wings (Asian sesame sauce), some beef burgers, tacos pequenos and a flat bread pizza.

Everything was really good. The Thai deviled eggs were really small. Tacos were ordinary. The chicken wings with asian sesame sauce were amazing and came with a cucumber salad. Burgers and pizza were fine.

I don’t know if it was because they were new, but the service wasn’t fantastic. People were nice, they just weren’t that reliable.

Score: 7.5/10 Really like this place. It’s got a nice vibe and the people coming here were fun. Drinks were great and I really liked my Winona. Chicken wings were also great. I heard that the Sriracha Honey flavored wings were also good. Looking forward to coming here again.

Official site: http://www.tannersmiths.com/