In Flatbush: highly recommend Sofreh Cafe. Go on the weekend for their special donuts, but don’t limit yourself to sweets there, the savory food is also excellent.
Saregama - We’ll mostly be traveling by bus, with trains and Uber as a backup.
I just ran across a NYC place with Uzbek hot dogs, which are different from any other hot dogs I’ve had and very good.
This place, Lavash Uz N1 is in Gravesend.
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Thanks, Hot Potato House looks very interesting.
It’s a family favorite of one of my friends from the former CCCP, and we have lunch there whenever we do a Brighton Beach shopping trip. Obviously, if you go, get something that involves potato. The green borsch is also really good.
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Saregama, thanks for this. We’ve been to Ba Xuyen and Industry City.
A Turkish or central Asian crawl sounds really good.
Mig - Thanks, we had an excellent meal at Sofreh, the main restaurant, a couple of years ago.
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Thanks for the heads up on the Barbados Festival. I don’t have any restaurants listed for Canarsie; do you have any suggestions (although we’ll probably just eat the Festival food).
Bong reservations look pretty hopeless. They’re still in soft opening and completely sold out for this coming weekend.
I’d be very much up for a return trip to Laghman Express. Our lunch there last year with Jen and Jim Kalb was a real highlight of the summer.
I’ll review my Canarsie intel, but the pickings are probably still slim. You might do better to take a different route back toward your digs, perhaps making another stop along the way.
I’d seen that Bong is already sold out for the coming weekend. I don’t know when reservations drop, but I’ll have a look on Sunday.
If you propose a lunchtime date for Laghman Express, you shouldn’t have trouble getting takers, myself included. Decent weather, for walking along Ave. U, will be a throw of the dice.
I hope to try an Uzbek hot dog, too.
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Falafel Tanami is moving a couple of blocks up to east 19 in about two weeks. I was just there yesterday.
And speaking of yesterday, consider Mtskheta Cafe for Georgian
Both Claro and Cotra are great, tho I liked Claro a bit more when they short rib cam part of a trio that included an amazing steak.
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I think I didn’t post about most of the restaurants where we ate last year. Here is a quick hit summary of where we ate in July of 2024 and two trips in January 2025.
OKAY
Tawa Roti Dhaulagiri Food - Nepalese, Jackson - I probably shouldn’t include this since all they had left was stale sel roti, which is not a fair basis for judging their food.
GOOD
Arth Alsaeedah Restaurant - Yemeni - Little Yemen/Bronxdale - dessert only
Crabby Shack - American seafood, Crown Heights
Fishmarket II - Malaysian, East Village
Goodnight Sonny - American/continental, East Village
Island Rib House - American, Crown Heights
VERY GOOD
Ayat - Palestinian, Bay Ridge - This popular restaurant has opened an overflow facility across the street, which we were shunted to. The food did not live up to the hype at the satellite location, and I didn’t appreciate the intrusion of politics on the menu (they had an appetizers page titled “From the River to the Sea”)
Metropolitan Museum Cafeteria - miscellany, Upper East Side
Los Tacos No. 1 - Mexican, Tribeca
Mercado Little Spain - Spanish, Hudson Yards
Puff’s Patties - Jamaican, Crown Heights
Royal Bakery - Trinidadian, Crown Heights
Pat La Frieda Meats - American, Time Out food hall Dumbo
Souvlaki GR - Greek, Lower East Side
Tacos el Bronco - Mexican, Sunset Park
Ruta Oaxaca - Mexican, Astoria
EXCELLENT
Awang Kitchen - Indonesian, Elmhurst
Bar Primi - Italian, East Village
Bhanchha Ghar - Nepali, Jackson Heights
Bunny - German, Turkish - Bed-Stuy
Defonte’s - American sandwiches, Red Hook
Great NY Noodletown - Chinese, Chinatown
Holiday Inn Express - free breakfast, Chelsea
Hyderabai Zaiqa - Indian, Upper West Side
Izzy’s Brooklyn Smokehouse - kosher barbecue, Crown Heights
Jalopy Tavern - American - Columbia Street Waterfront District/Carroll Gardens
Johnny’s Reef - American fried seafood, City Island
La Ñapa - Venezuelan, pan-Latin, Crown Heights
Marseille - French-Mediterranean, Hell’s Kitchen/Theater District
Spice Brothers - shawarma, falafel, Middle Eastern, East Village
Taqueria Coatzingo - Mexican, Jackson Heights
Taqueria Downtown - Mexican, Jersey City
Trinidad Golden Place - Trinidadian, Crown Heights
Uotora - sushi, Japanese - Crown Heights
Urgut Osh Markazi - Uzbek, Kensington
OUTSTANDING
Bark BBQ - American barbecue, TimeOut food hall, Dumbo
Ba Xuyen - Vietnamese banh mi, Sunset Park
Corima - Mexican, Lower East Side/Chinatown
Daphne’s - Italian, Bed-Stuy
La Vara - Spanish, continental, Cobble Hill
Laghman Express - Uzbek, central Asian, Bensonhurst (now a second location in Sheepshead Bay/Homecrest)
Lechonera la Piraña - Puerto Rican, Melrose
Okiburu House of Tsukemen - Japanese, tsukemen, Lower East Side
Russ & Daughters - Appetizing, breakfast, Lower East Side
St. Julivert Fisherie - seafood, Cobble Hill
Taqueria Ramirez - tacos, Mexican, Greenpoint
Tongs NYC truck, - bhel puri, Bangladeshi, Jackson Heights
Trad Room - sushi, Japanese, Bed-Stuy
Txikito - Basque, Chelsea
Some guy on a Crown Heights street corner selling jerk chicken
AS GOOD AS I’VE EVER HAD
Razza - pizza, Jersey City
Theodora - seafood, dry-aged fish - Fort Greene
As always, the grades are meant to reflect only one specific meal; restaurants do vary
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You may have eaten out in NYC this year more than many of us probably have 
Linking your earlier comments
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“You may have eaten out in NYC this year more than many of us probably have”
Yes, retirement is wonderful, I highly recommend it.
Though there are downsides. The memory tends to go. I had no memory at all that I had posted a similar message earlier.
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I had planned to post about Uzbek hot dogs from Uzbekistan for months, but I finally got around to it (it’s the last post in this thread).
As far as a day for Laghman Express is concerned, we’re retired with a ton of flexibility (except for the 18th -21st), so it probably makes sense for people who have a schedule to suggest a date.
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A very humid day to wait outside for a table at Cafe Hong Kong, but once we got inside, all was well. The five of us (@Ike, @Saregama, @FlemSnopes +1, and me) shared a lunch of soft-shell crabs (small, but well-seasoned and cleanly fried), buffalo carp (pleasant texture, a bit bland and bony), lobster with ginger and scallion (very good), e-fu noodles with mushrooms (needed more mushrooms!) and mixed vegetables with lotus root (almost bizarrely excellent - I don’t think I’ve ever had better yellow pepper, or even thought to rank the various yellow peppers I’ve had).
I’m a little confused by what I guess is the restaurant’s ethos. I didn’t notice anyone being particularly rigid.
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That all looks delicious!
It was very good!
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Sorry to have missed it! Their lobster used to be 2 for $25 and they were happy to prepare each one differently. I’d have had a hard time not ordering the salt and pepper or Peking pork chops.
Sigh, so much to eat, so little time.
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I think it was $38.
$38 for 2?
I think it’s more than one but less than two. I’m trying to count parts in the picture I took!
