AlwaysInformed: KFC’s Double Down Has Arrived

Arthur Bovino — April 12, 2010

The new Double Down Sandwich at KFC.

The KFC Double Down is here, and yes, it’s a ridiculous sandwich. But at 10:13am, there was a suit in his mid-twenties in the Herald Square KFC who ordered two. Doubling-down the Double Down? It’s an idea that actually should have been applied to the filling between the chicken breasts, which as you’ve undoubtedly heard, have replaced the bun in this new fast food sandwich.

As it is with these things, the food and the picture don’t match. The fried chicken breasts are not as fried as advertised. Still, they’re moist, juicy, and spicy— leaving that peppery KFC taste on your tongue. There are two slices of cheese and two slices of bacon. This is a wipe-your-hands-on-your-jeans kind of sandwich, so it’s better to leave it in its paper slip while eating it, and probably to not put it down ‘til it’s done.

The verdict? Yes, you feel fat while eating it. But as out-there as the sandwich is supposed to be, it would have done better to go further. Each fried chicken breast (crisp on the edges, a softer fry elsewhere), is almost ¾ of an inch thick. That’s a lot of chicken— the bacon and cheese kind of get lost. KFC would do better to double the cheese and the bacon; more crunchy bacon, more gooey, drippy cheese coming out the sides of the fried chicken. If you’re going to go there, might as well really go there.

AlwaysStrong: Marshall’s Ice Cream Bar (Massapequa)

Arthur Bovino — April 02, 2010

Marshall’s Ice Cream Bar in Massapequa, Long Island.

Restaurant: Marshall’s Ice Cream Bar
Address: 4270 Merrick Road, Massapequa, NY 11758
Contact: (516) 798-9723
Hours: Daily, 10:30am-10:30pm.
Grade: A
Recommended Dishes: Pistachio Soft-Serve, Banana Cocolate Chip Ice Cream, Peanut Butter Fluff Ice Cream, Hot Fudge Sundae with Homemade Sprinkles.

All American Drive-In may be the more well-known 50’s style fast-food joint on Merrick Road in Massapequa, Long Island, but Marshall’s Ice Cream Bar next door precedes it by eleven years. Phillip Vultaggio opened it as a Carvel in 1952 on the edge of what was a golf course. In 2004 his daughter, Diane and her husband Jan Marshall, went private. “We were one of the longest running Carvels in the franchise at the time,” said their daughter, Iole Marshall.

Photographs at Marshall's Ice Cream Bar >>

AlwaysStrong: All American Drive-In (Massapequa)

Arthur Bovino — October 15, 2009

All American Drive-In, a classic fast-food joint on Merrick Road in Massapequa, Long Island.

Restaurant: All American Drive-In
Address: 4286 Merrick Road, Massapequa, NY 11758
Contact: (516) 798-9574
Hours: Mon-Sat, 10am-10pm; Sun, 11am-9:30pm.
Grade: B+
Recommended Dishes: Quarter Pounder with Cheese, Butterfly Shrimp, and Knish.

Ask someone on the South Shore of Long Island where to get a burger and they’ll ask if you’ve been to All American Drive-In. Like Bigelow’s in Rockville Center, and Bonanza in Oyster Bay, it’s a roadside institution— some Islanders have even called it their In-N-Out. These aren’t In-N-Out burgers, but they’re a fresh and tasty rite of passage.

Click here for more pictures of burgers at All American Drive-In. >>

AlwaysLearning: Coxinha

Arthur Bovino — September 08, 2009

Top, Coxinha & Guaraná soda from Barril Grill. Left, Barril Grill, 30-18 Broadway, Astoria. Right, Coxinha cross-section, New York Pão de Queijo, Astoria.

Sure there are Pastels and Bolinhos de Bacalhau but when you consider the Brazilian salgadhino that comes to mind most quickly after Pão de Queijo, it’s likely to be Coxinha (pronounced, Co-sheen-ya).

Where it’s from: Brazil.

What it is: At its most basic, coxinha is a croquette filled with minced chicken and seasonings. In Brazil, each coxinha is usually about two and a half to three inches long and about one and a half to two inches wide. It can be found in Brazil’s little corner coffee shops throughout the country. Where you find Pao de Queijo, you’ll most often also find coxinha. The word, ‘coxinha’ is said to actually mean ‘little chicken thigh”, and that’s supposedly what it originally contained. These days, the teardrop shape is said to be purposely reminiscent of this drumstick origin.

While it’s easily eaten on the go, coxinha is often consumed at the cafe counter where there’s usually a bottle of hot sauce. The top is torn or bitten off, and a dash of hot sauce is often used to spice it up as it’s eaten. The perfect coxinha resembles a misshapen arancine, and is similar in color. The outer shell should be crisp and delicate. Just underneath, a quarter-inch layer of batter and catupiry combines for a creamy effect, similar to a mashed potato paste. Finally, in the center, the minced chicken should be moist, flavorful and at least a little warm.

How it’s made: There are different preparations, but generally, chicken cooked with broth is then seasoned and minced, then enclosed in a wheat flour batter. Applications differ, but most recipes call for a Brazilian cream cheese called Catupiry. Some dictate that the cream cheese should be mixed with the chicken, some stipulate its inclusion with the batter, while others just note it should be present with the chicken when it’s battered and fried. This filling is then coated with batter and breadcrumbs, shaped to roughly resemble a drumstick, allowed to set and then fried.

Where to get it in New York: Coxinha in New York City tends to be much smaller on average than in Brazil but you can find it at several of the Brazilian restaurants in Midtown. Be careful, on occasion you’ll find a toothpick sticking out of the center. Whereas in Brazil you usually buy one individually (unless you’re hungry), here they’re served small and several to an order. Some restaurants serving them in Manhattan include Brazil Brazil Restaurant and Brazil Grill (787 8th Avenue). In Astoria, Rio Bonito and New York Pao de Queijo also sell decent renditions.

AlwaysWatching: Delonte West’s Kentucky Fried Rap

The Gluttoness — August 13, 2009

Delonte West, shooting guard for the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers, doing his Kentucky Fried Rap.

Delonte West is best known as a shooting guard for the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers. When he’s not hooping it up with LeBron, it appears Delonte is whooping it up in other ways—ways that lead to a ridiculous rap while waiting for a $47 order at Kentucky Fried Chicken. With an eighteen minute wait for his Original Recipe Combo it seems Delonte figured he’d create his own Sonic-style commercial..

In the video above, Delonte (wearing sunglasses) waxes poetic about his KFC order as well as his other favorite fast food joints. From the looks of this clip, the chicken isn’t the only thing that has been fried. To his defense, Delonte is coming off a tremendous performance in the 2009 playoffs, and he’s shown before that when it comes to food, dude means business. Let’s just hope he lays off the (hot) sauce when it comes time to step back on the court.

AlwaysInformed: Shangri-La Seating at Checkers (Brooklyn)

Josh Kaplan — July 22, 2009

Shangri-La seating at Checkers’ Court Street location

The burgeoning Checkers (view site) invasion spreading through the city (Bronx, Staten Island and Brooklyn) is scheduled to continue today in Manhattan with a one o’clock opening this afternoon of a Downtown location at 77 Chambers Street. It’s almost enough to make us forget the recently opened branch in the awkward railroad space on Court Street in Brooklyn. Love it or hate it, Checkers has been so packed on several visits that even getting inside is tricky. Since the opening more than a month ago, a craving for the signature Cajun Fries often can’t be satisfied without waiting on a line the length of the one for Disney’s Space Mountain. The cramped indoor space makes for a grim seating scenario.

There are three narrow booths to the left and ten stools lining a narrow counter to the right. Customers on either side are forced to fight for space against the crush of a noisy, irritable line four to five customers-wide knifing through the restaurant’s center.

Inconceivably, salvation from the buzz of a heavily-populated commercial block in downtown Brooklyn can be found to the right of the counter at the back where customers place their orders. A narrow, snaking corridor empties into an utterly vacant, lovely, walled-in back patio complete with shaded picnic tables. It makes for the perfect setting to enjoy a mediocre burger and awesome fries in peace.

HungryHamptons: Bobby’s Burger Palace (Lake Grove, NY)

Jeff Zalaznick — July 10, 2009

Bobby Flay’s Crunchburger (Double, American Cheese, Potato Chips)

It’s not well-known, but Bobby Flay has a tri-state burger chain called Bobby’s Burger Palace (site) with a menu inspired by his travels. All but two burgers are named for American cities or regions. His Long Island outpost is a ten minute detour off the Long Island Expressway in Lake Grove’s Smith Haven Mall. As at any fast food joint, you order at a counter, but here food is brought to you in the dining room.

There are four BBP outposts: Smith Haven Mall (Lake Grove, NY), Monmouth Mall (Eatontown, NJ), Bergen Town Center (Paramus, NJ), and at Mohegan Sun (Uncasville, CT).

Restaurant: Bobby’s Burger Palace (view site)
Address: 355 Smith Haven Mall, Lake Grove, NY, 11755-1201 (view map)
AlwaysHungry Grade: B+
AlwaysHungry Recommends: Crunchburger, Miami-style

Continue reading about Bobby's Burger Palace >>

AlwaysSnacking: Burger King Launches New Line of Snack Food

The Gluttoness — June 24, 2009

Being delayed at Jet Blue’s Terminal 5 at JFK wasn’t so awful. I grabbed a few Toro Rolls at Deep Blue Sushi and a Strawberry Frosted Donut from Dunkin’ Donuts to keep me satisfied until I could ravage my grandmother’s signature spread of bagels, varied smoked fishes and schmears. Being delayed on the way home at Ft. Lauderdale’s Hollywood International Airport wasn’t as luxurious (never flying Jet Blue again). Terminal F had one dining option, and having eaten a Cuban sandwich and Eggs Benedict at Jerry’s Famous Deli, an airport pulled pork sandwich just wasn’t in the cards. But I was hungry.

I grabbed some Welch’s Fruit Snacks then set out to find something salty. While perusing the snack food in the bookstore, I found two semi-nauseating sounding, yet curiosity-inducing, must-try snacks: Burger King Onion Rings and Burger King Fries with Ketchup. I’m an admitted lover of Funyuns, and I wondered if Burger King Onion Rings could trump one of my favorite treats. I was fairly confident they wouldn’t be horrible because BK’s onion rings are the reason I stop there before other fast food joints.

The prepackaged snack fries were like Burger King’s actual French fries, disappointing. But the Burger King Onion Rings were surprisingly satisfying. They’re bite-sized like the originals and crunchy with a rich onion taste, zesty seasoning, and a subtle hint of smokiness—as if they had actually been deep-fried in animal fat before packaging. I grabbed an extra bag and headed for the gate, much happier than I would have been with Jet Blue’s complimentary Terra Blue Potato Chips or cashews.

FirstLook: Aamchi Pao

Arthur Bovino — June 17, 2009

“There’s always a right time to reinvent yourself,” Chef Surbhi Sahni, told us recently at Aamchi Pao.

No, Chef Sahni isn’t leaving her post as Devi’s pastry chef. But she has joined Nandini Mukherjee as co-owner at the reincarnation of Mukherjee’s West Village restaurant of almost six years, the Indian Bread Co. As previously reported, the Stuffed Parathas and Naanwhichs (grilled Indian “panini”) are gone. There are still Kathi Rolls, but the Naan sandwiches have been replaced by “Pao,” renditions of Pav Bhaji, a Mumbai street food that is essentially an Indian Slider. The word “Pav,” in Marathi (the language of southwestern India), is said to come from Pão, the Portuguese word for bread.

Click here to read more about Aamchi Pao's Mumbai Sliders >>

AlwaysHungryNY: J.T. Pappy’s Termigator Hot Sauce

Arthur Bovino — May 21, 2009

It will be interesting to see what fast food product placements there are in Terminator Salvation’s 2018, post-apocalyptic vision of California. Indications are that director, McG (Joseph McGinty Nichol), has taken the project seriously, so while the resulting debris of Skynet’s attempt to annihilate humanity may include half-destroyed signs for 7-Eleven and Pizza Hut (rumored product placement partners), we’re guessing John Connor and the Resistance won’t be snacking on Twinkies and Tuscani Lasagna.

While it’s not a tie-in to the film, we recently discovered one chuckle-inducing, Terminator-themed food product: J.T. Pappy’s Termigator, a “Politically Incorrect Extra Hot Sauce“ in a 9 oz bottle ($3.95). The label pictures a pumped-up, toothy alligator resembling Arnold Schwarzenegger, wearing a leather vest and sunglasses, and sporting a crew cut. The claim on J.T. Pappy’s website challenges the Terminator’s superiority throughout the series:

Pappy always said, “Ain’t no tougher critter than a hungry gator!”

Somehow, we doubt anything vegetarian could take on a T-800 but we’ll give the sauce one thing: after an initial two seconds of sweetness, it has a pretty significant bite— enough to give a considerable tickle to the back of your throat. Austin Scorpio, a fan of the early movies and the sauce’s creator, said he was inspired to make the sauce during Arnold Schwarzenegger’s gubernatorial campaign (“politically incorrect” referring to his missteps and his marriage to Kennedy-clan member, Maria Shriver).

As it’s doubtful that Christian Bale or AH-nold (in his certain cameo) will say the classic catchphrase, we’ll leave you with J.T. Pappy’s version: “Sauce-A-La Vista, Baby!”

AlwaysHungryNY: Bouley Market’s Croque Monsieur

The Gluttoness — May 15, 2009

It’s early in the morning, you’re starving, and you want something substantial to eat on-the-go before you settle in at the office. It’s a toss up between your staple bagel and cream cheese or a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich to comfort you after last night’s extra drink. If you’re nearby Bouley Market in TriBeCa, you have the luxury of forgoing your usual breakfast for the sensational: a handheld Croque Monsieur. This hot ham and cheese sandwich is said to have been devised as a French fast food snack, but richer executions with Mornay or béchamel toppings have rendered the convenient, unwieldy. Bouley Market has reclaimed the portability and preserved the decadence.

Rather than coating the sandwich in sauce, two thick-cut slices of Bouley’s homemade white bread are soaked in béchamel and joined with a thin layer of ham between them. The soaking creates a consistency like moist, savory French Toast. While it’s cooked, the sandwich becomes covered in a bubbled, overflowing layer of melted Gruyère cheese. At room temperature, the congealed cheese coating reinforces the sandwich’s approximate English translation, “Mister Crunch.” Even without egg, it’s a great breakfast sandwich.

While eating a Croque Monsieur on the run may give you a stomach ache, the price won’t. It rings up at the register at a very reasonable $3.52.

AlwaysWatching: Popeye’s Minus The Chicken

The Gluttoness — April 29, 2009

Running out of fast food is no funny matter. We first realized how seriously some people take their McDonald’s when a woman called 911 over a Chicken McNuggets shortage. Well, yesterday, the angry masses in Rochester, NY, were fuming over a similar matter as shown in this video from the local ABC affiliate. Popeye’s, it seems, became a victim of the advertising for their special, 8 pieces for $4.99, and at more than one location. An automated machine informed angry customers that Popeye’s had closed for the day since they had no chicken left to serve. One customer called customer service, another complained about Popeye’s consistently meager supplies, and a particularly resourceful woman suggested that “they should have had a tractor-trailer out back with extra chicken on ice, you know?”

We’re not sure how well that would have worked, but we’re thinking maybe Popeye’s should have at least offered free biscuits as consolation prizes.

AlwaysHungryNY: “Gimme Back That Filet ‘o Fish”

March 30, 2009

It’s been a while since anyone on the Council enjoyed McDonald’s Filet ‘o Fish, but their latest ad campaign has us singing about this fried fish sandwich all day long. At one point, these wall-mounted fish were singing sensations in their own right, the stars of constantly running informercial blips. But, now the charismatic fish has moved up the food chain, hawking McDonald’s Filet ‘o Fish sandwich in this brand new commercial, pitifully begging the man in his garage to “gimme that fish.”

Traditionally, McDonald’s advertises their Filet ‘o Fish during Lent, and this year’s offbeat campaign features an awfully awkward situation set to an incredibly catchy techno beat. You can’t help but feel bad for the frightful fish, who makes his argument with:

“What if it were you hanging up on this wall?—If it were you in that sandwich you wouldn’t be laughing at all!”

Well the ad certainly has us all laughing at AlwaysHungryNY; it’s just not so funny when the entire office can’t stop singing the annoying ditty, in “fish” voices, no less.