@SteveR Did you go to Grappa during the brief period it was open? I thought the place was fantastic. I got to know the owner a little as we went so often. One night after we finished dinner he came to our table with a bottle of grappa. He told me that I was going to learn how to appreciate it as I had always declined before. Got a nice lesson in something that I thought tasted like gasoline initially.
Neither my wife nor I recall Grappa. Where was it?
steve, wasn’t morrocan star right on the corner of Atlantic and court? I recall the door faced the corner?
Nope. Couple of doors in on Atlantic.
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before the bakery was italian, it was Polish, amazing rugelach. guessing you never ordered a fish sandwich at the market or the tempura veggies. the lines at Oriole belie your opinion of the chicken.
my little pizzeria had one of the best calzones in NYC but they sold and now the calzones are nothing special. Black seed was well after my time.
when we first moved to the area there were 6-8 Middle Eastern restaurants clustered around atlantic competing with each other, it was fantastic.
Basically, my take on Court St between Atlantic and Montague is that you’re correct that it’s a sad strip while BKeats is correct that it hasn’t gone downhill to get that way. Queen is the only real loss.
Atlantic Ave is a different story. My mother, who lived in Bklyn just about all of her 85 years, was fond of saying “the stores on Kings Highway aren’t what they used to be” (she said that for every neighborhood that she knew in Bklyn). I’m now old enough to appreciate that statement, as I have fond memories of the past myself & change creates challenges as well as opportunity. However, as much as Atlantic Ave has changed, there’s no doubt that it is, once again vibrant, with good places to eat up and down the strip. Yes, I miss the Middle Eastern places, including the great downstairs bakery, and I miss La Mancha, Acadia Parish, Waterfront Ale House as well. They were our hangouts and places to see/talk to other neighborhood residents. But Boutros, Table 87, Colonie, LI Bar, Chez Moi, Al Badawi, and a host of others are similar draws for a new generation of area residents and park goers. It’s not your old neighborhood, as you’ve been gone for quite a while, but in my opinion, on the whole, it’s actually livelier and more attractive. Same goes for Court St. and Smith St from Atlantic all the way to 9th Street. (and, yes, Buttermilk Channel’s fried chicken is bland). My 2cents.
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Can you do Myrtle Avenue next?
It was at the corner of Court and State. Where the bank is now. For the brief period it was there, it out drew Queen. First time I met parmesan frico was there.
One of my neighbors owns a commercial real estate firm. She had told me that the rents on that stretch of Court above Atlantic are high. Makes it tough on independent restaurants that need more than a tiny space. There seems to a a very high turnover rate on the street.
Maybe, but my opinion is more that it indicated how bad the other options were at the time. Back then when we wanted good dining, we left the neighborhood. BH really sucked in terms of food in the 90s. Very little that you would choose to go to if you didn’t live there.
Shelsky’s really holds that hold neighborhood together.
Huh… so Grappa was where Oriol (no e at the end) was? I gotta admit that I have no memory of it whatsoever. As for Bklyn Hts, there was really no reason to have good dinner restaurants here, since so much of the neighborhood were quick lunch spots for the courts, Jehovah Witnesses who hardly patronized local businesses & those that ate at the Hts Casino. We too ate mostly in Manhattan, but we always loved Henry’s End. In the early days, Capulet, Aesops Table (above Lassen & Hennigs) and the Montague St Saloon were fine as well. And Heights Seagrill (where Noodle Pudding is now) was owned by a Henry’s End partner and had a great seafood buffet on Sundays. That’s 2 more of my cents.
(and, no Matt… I don’t do Myrtle)
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We liked the waterfall middle eastern restaurant for their giant veg platters, was it mustouche for middle Eastern pizza, still love Damascus bakery, Clark st diner was reliable, there was a bar in the bottom of St. George towers that had good wings for ten cents(!) on I dunno maybe Tuesdays and Grimaldis before it it was discovered was amazing.
True, but one of the joys of being a foodie is that while It’s easy to find good food in Michelin starred restaurants, it’s much harder to find good fried whiting sandwiches on white bread in an unremarkable fish market cause you’re going to eat a lot of bad food on the way.
*whole
I miss the Ferrybank restaurant. Do you remember it? @SteveR you must know the place. It was where I first had ‘barbecue’ ribs.
Yep. It’s where Grimaldi’s is now. Only Black owned business in the area. Very good.
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fried whiting…we had a couple of places in our nabe on flatbush havenue that made good fried whiting and also chicken gizzards…plexiglass guards of course in the 80s. Pickings were slim except for these and a couple of good dominicans AND at least one good bistro at any given time (though they did not last long, sadly - Park Slope folks went to Manhattan for “good” dinners rather than to nice restaurants situated on Flatbush Ave.
Clark St Diner is still reliable & it delivers. The bar/restaurant on the corner of Clark & Hicks is now my Physical Therapy place (Spear) and the Eastern Athletic Club next door is now gone. Its where I met Ginny (I tell people that I picked her up at a bar - it was the juice bar inside the health club - she hates when I do that).
as you know, I played coed volleyball at Eastern Athletic and I’ll just say yours wasn’t the only relationship that started at that juice bar.
also, I’d be remiss in not admitting that although those 10-cent wings were great, I came to the conclusion they were changing the fryer oil once every six months or so cause I always, always felt sick the next day. but still, 10 cent wings, how could I not order 20 
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SAAR
Another day, another disappointing indian meal in nyc. Sigh.
I had friends in town who wanted to eat Indian food (why, I always wonder, I never suggest it among the many ideas I provide).
I proposed Baazi and Saar, heavily leaning in the direction of Baazi, but Saar was close to their hotel and the online reviews are stellar, so that’s where we ended up.
The kababs are praised (and I love kababs) so we chose the lasooni chicken kababs and the Saar lamb kababs (which were described to me as galauti kabab).
We also ordered the lamb kofta, the Cochin pepper chicken, and the Goat biryani. The server suggested we skip the kofta because it would be too similar to the lamb kabab (what? Why did I even listen).
The chicken kababs were well-flavored but over cooked. The lamb kababs were under-seasoned and definitely NOT galauti (that’s a melt-in-your mouth kabab, these were tough patties, and for some mysterious reason 1 of the 3 was half the size of the other 2 — see pic).
The naan was very good.
The chicken was… odd. With a name like Cochin pepper chicken I fully expected a South Indian flavor profile. What arrived was a standard North Indian tomato-onion gravy with the only nod to south India being two small rolled dosas and a dab of chutney alongside. Utterly bizarre.
The biryani was flavored fine, but not a repeat. At least they didn’t have the fake drama of a dough lid over curry + rice. It was very dry, which remains a mystery of most New York biryanis. Served with burrani raita — yogurt with dried mint.
Maybe I chose wrong with the chicken, but I expected a lot better of the kababs and the biryani given the chef (who was parked in the back).
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Our last Saar meal was our last. No longer a fan.
We recently had good kebabs and an excellent meal overall at Empyrean just across the river in Hoboken. Very typical NY/Indian menu except for some items I dont see too often like Momos which were better than any Momos Ive had in any Tibetan
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