Restaurant Review: La Lotteria

Details: Located at 29 7th Ave S, New York, NY 10014. The official site is www.laloterianyc.com/

Often times when I visit a Mexican restaurants that isn’t low-end or extremely high-end, I feel ripped off. Tacos are either overpriced, undersized, or both. It’s just a taco, one of the simplest, cheapest to make foods on the planet. When you start charging over three dollars for a taco or if you start shrinking them to teeny tiny serving sizes, you are generally fucking up tacos. The tacos at La Lotteria, though overpriced by this measure, are still better than most (maybe all) other middle range Mexican restaurants I’ve had in Manhattan.

Restaurant Review: Peacefood Cafe

Details: Located at 460 Amsterdam Ave, New York, NY 10024. The official site is peacefoodcafe.com

This is a gluten free, vegan place. I’m not vegan nor do I give a shit about gluten.

The decor was nice. The service was nice. The food was horrendous. I had the seitan avocado sandwich… to my great regret. It cost around ten dollars. My vegan friends really enjoyed their food.

Overall, I don’t like vegan places and I did not like this place.

Score: 3/10

Restaurant Review: Gazala’s

Details: Located at 709 9th Ave, New York, NY 10019. I couldn’t find an official site, but here’s the yelp page: https://www.yelp.com/biz/gazalas-new-york-23

Gazala’s is a Mediterranean/Middle Eastern restaurant near Times Square. They’ve got hummus, babaganoush, kebabs, etc.

It’s a small space of about twenty seats. There is only one waitress. They don’t have their liquor license, but you can bring your own alcohol and there is a surprisingly convenient liquor store across the street I think.

We ordered the appetizer platter for about $30. It came with four kinds of dips that came from their cold appetizer section. Think tahini, hummus, something else I can’t recall and some kind of tangy cheese dip. It also came with a few of their hot appetizers. These were fried items that had four pieces per item. The platter serves four and I do not recommend you get it if you have more than four people.

I also ordered the Moshakal platter for about $20. It’s a plate of grilled lamb, chicken, and kofta, with a small salad and rice. It was really good, especially the lamb.

Overall, a good place to get this type of food.

Score: 6.5/10

Restaurant Review: Sazon (NYC)

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

Score: 3.5/10

Seems like a better place for drinks than dinner. Unfortunately, I came here for dinner.

We had the ropa vieja (shredded beef stew) and the churrasco (skirt steak). We saw a lot of people order the pernil. The food was just ok.

Music was way too loud. There was a party downstairs.

Probably never coming back and wouldn’t recommend to friends. Might be a good place just for drinks though.

Restaurant Review: Ruth’s Chris Steak House (51st Street, NYC)

Ruth’s Chris is a chain of upscale steak houses with locations all around the country. I went to the one on 51st Street in Manhattan for restaurant week.

We all ordered the Prix Fixe menu, which comes with a salad or chicken andoullie gumbo, a 6 oz steak (or stuffed chicken or salmon, but of course we got steak at a steak house) with a side of creamed spinach or mashed potatoes, and bread pudding for dessert.

The food here is a little better than what you would find at an Outback Steak House or a Texas Roadhouse. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t amazing.

Service was great and our waiter was thoughtful.

The interior was nice. I like the hotel-like comforting, dimly lit, wood panels look.

Would I eat here again? Probably not. The only reason I would come here is if I had a desperate craving for steak and this was the only convenient option.

Score: 5.8/10

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