Wall Street Bathhouse is no doubt my favorite banya in the city, used to go regularly. It is definitely not luxurious but you’ll get a nice NY experience there. Love getting their borscht and pelmeni’s and in general, I think their food is more authentic and better than Veselka, which is good but not great.. I think it leans more on the tourist trap side. Veselka opened up a new location in Williamsburg fyi. Walked by it last weekend and it was not packed.
Side-note: right by the Veselka in Williamsburg there was a new spot called Johnny’s that has Chinese-Peruvian “Chifa” dishes. Sounds like a fun fusion and would be new to me. Also reminds me that there is Chifa in Eagle Rock that I still need to try out.
had takeout from johnny’s bout 2-3 weeks ago. decent pollo a la brasa w/ nice skin. the cost performance on a half chicken (kinda petite) with fried rice (bout $28 after everything w/ a cuppa salad) was…. not feeling great but that’s coming from expecting them cheaply slung bigguns. aji verde was a bit mild n flat for my tastes. can’t remember the fried rice. perhaps a better meal in person & rounded out with/ some other things. do wish them the best though. 2-3 customers at 6:30 on a friday.
also Gui steakhouse was mentioned by @js76wisco they also have a restaurant within Gui called Hwaro. Will probably receive a star if they opened up in time. Clearly, someone has invested a ton in chef Sungchul Shim
Lotta luxe ingredients, not a lot of personality according to my best bud who went this week. But feels in line with a lot of the other Korean tastings in NY post atomix (noksu, BOM)
was about to say the same. can’t tell the menus of these new nyc korean tasting menus apart at a glance. wish something like chae in cockatoo would pop up in the hudson valley if not the city… or perhaps an ernesto’s/zimmi’s/beba or even lei-like take on the food (though perhaps the cuisine is not so easy to adapt in that way). haven’t been to sunn’s but feel like it “cheats” a little too much for my tastes.
not so much a pre-judgement on sunn’s food but more about where i’d like to see korean food in nyc bravely go in terms of seldom-tried approaches. too many chefs i respect vouch for that place for me to doubt that its good. (its on my hit list!)
Totes! I like sunns a lot but it’s also just a good hang. Meju is probably my fav Korean tasting recently. @robert it’s a fun one and then there’s Raon which is mostly kimchi focused and I’m curious to try that joint
Not sure what you’re in search of, but Raines Law Room has a small food menu, there are a number of Irish pubs around there, and you won’t be very far from either Koreatown or Little India.
Finally also got ourselves to Tabetomo (just never wanted to wait in lines). As we walked over, the Sun Noodles truck was parked right there in front, which lowered our expectations lol. In all fairness, the noodles, both tonkatsu and tsukemen, were better than what Sun Noodles sells at supermarkets (which is very very good, better than a lot of ramen joints in the US)
The inherent style was a bit too oily for us (touted 60 day broth), but still good. A contender for best tsukemen in the city for sure.