A dear friend is visiting next week. She worked as a restaurant critic for Newsday (LI newspaper) for 25 years and now works as a restaurant consultant. I always try and find special dining venues for her visits. Nothing fancy, just great food. She loved Drew’s. She also enjoyed Clementines, and The River Cafe In Point. Thinking of Tallulahs in Asbury. Any suggestions?
Sandi
You seem to have accidentally posted your thread to the “Want a New Board” section of Site Discusssions.
Suggest you repost on whichever would be the appropriate regional board.
New to this, How do I find the regional board so I can post?
The whole thread is moved to NJ. No need to repost.
I think your friend would really enjoy Heirloom Kitchen in Old Bridge, NJ, run by Top Chef contestant David Viana.
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I second Heirloom Kitchen!
I also enjoy Grand Tavern - Neptune/Bradley Beach
and Pascal and Sabine Asbury Park.
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All great ideas but rather pricey. Maybe something more moderately priced?
Just checked menu at Grand Tavern. Not that pricey.
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Second Grand Tavern. Also recommend Trama’s Trattoria in West End of Long Branch and Nettie’s House of Spaghetti, Tinton Falls. It’s been years since I’ve dined there but others highly recommend Piccola Italia in Ocean. Porcini in Highlands is good and BYO.
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Grand Tavern was the first place I thought of as well. Heirloom Kitchen is a given–and a great experience; just note that they moved to a prix fixe-only format. I’M dying to get to Il Nido, which you can read more about here: Il Nido, Marlboro, NJ
I love Talulah’s, but I don’t know if it’s a ‘special dining venue’ and it’s also very loud.
Finally, I haven’t been yet, but a friend just recently mentioned he wants to try Harvest in Farmingdale; I didn’t see many mentions of it on the NJ board, but perhaps someone else can chime in about it?
Let us know where you end up!
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Couple more suggestions to the good ones you already have received:
- +1 more for Heirloom. Pricey but totally awesome.
- D’jeet in Shrewsbury (American with changing menu) - BYOB
- Semolina in Red Bank (handmade pasta/Italian) - BYOB
- Big Ed’s BBQ in Matawan/Old Bridge (all you can eat ribs) Full disclosure on this one. This is NOT fancy! This board has a few BBQ places that are favorites but this one is mine. - Full bar
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I was thrown out of here once…just sayin’…
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Obviously, we are going to need to know the story behind this!
Edit to add: was karaoke involved??
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lol…no, no Karaoke involved. Just a disagreement between two big men. lol
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Why not go back to Drew’s? Dollar for dollar, I don’t think you can beat that place.
Nicholas is top notch but not cheap.
I think one meal at Drew’s probably weighs more than 2 7 course meals at nicholas 
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I’ve had some good meals here too. In fact, I think if this spot was in rb it would blow the doors off quite a few places.
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We were at Grand Tavern on Saturday. Delicious as always. It’s one of our favorites.
@CurlzNJ We’ve been to Harvest a number of times. The first few were very good but later visits not so much. The menu is fairly limited. I get that it’s farm to table but there are a million ways to prepare chicken - why is it always the same? And they only have 1 dessert. The concept is good but not the execution.
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VERY good to know…thanks!
