I just had these for breakfast. Seriously (link). That wasn’t gonna stop me from killing another half-sour.

You absolutely must expand this picture in a new window. Look at that golden-brownness on these babies. And the krinkle-cut? I feel that the krinkle-cut is the least appreciated version of the french fried potato. Even the processed ones are pretty solid, but these, these are full-on whole potato krinkle-cuts. I don’t think I’ve ever seen these before. How do they even make these? I asked for mayo with mine (as I do with all my fries) and ate too much of them.

Nice and vinegary, not too much mayo, ultra crispy lettuce. This was my second cole slaw of 93 Plates and I don’t know why I didn’t have more. I used to be a cole slaw snob, only liking my mom’s slaw, but I think that was just because my mom said she didn’t like any cole slaw other than her own. I stretched my wings and now regularly order cole slaw out and enjoy many different kinds of slaws.

The tagline is “Not all skyscrapers are made of glass and steel.”

This thing is a fookin’ moonstah! I took a side angle shot so you get the idea of what’s going on here (pic). I just left NYC to clean up a few items in Baltimore and I almost schlepped my 75 pound suitcase up there to pick one of these bad boys up for the ride home. Look at that gorgeousness!

It’s impossible to eat with your hands, splitting one would probably be sufficient, but then you wouldn’t have leftovers, which is what you will want to have when you leave here. If you’re thinking that you couldn’t finish even half of that sandwich, I have a recommendation for you (click here).

Pastrami; 100% to frickin’ die for – Corned Beef: Awesome, but the next time I am here, I will just get a whole pastrami.

I told him he should have gotten a pastrami sandwich! I had a few bites of his sandwich but didn’t really spend too much time on it. I knew what was good here. This sandwich was still good, and it’s got about two pounds of beef in there, but come on, when you come to Carnegie Deli, you get Pastrami.

The one thing that neither of us knew about before the man who sat down with us ordered it was the Celery Soda. The order seemed to have a swagger to it, so we knew we had to try it. The sandwiches were wrapped up and the cheesecake had been ordered, but we needed to try it – we ordered a can and shared it. David called it the anti-coke. It was sweet and salty – I can see how they go together, and I’ll be sure to order it the next time I get a pastrami sandwich.

DO NOT MISS the cheesecake. Save room. Definitely one of my top ten dessert items of 93 Plates. I love cheesecake, I don’t think I had any legit, NYC cheesecake anywhere else on the trip, and this was a fitting end to the journey (well, pretty much). Even the cheesecake is ginormous here. I guess everything is bigger at the Carnegie Deli.

Butter and Jam, Butter and Jam, I’m a little lad who loves Butter and Jam!

I think I am going to be the little lad for halloween next year. You could probably pull this off as a sick St. Patty’s Day costume as well, seeing as he’s wearing green (it is forest green, but who’s counting?).

Anyway, picture of Butter and Jam – hope you like it.

Here’s why this cherry walnut muffin was better than any cherry walnut muffin you’ve ever had – the walnuts were soaked until moist before being put in the muffin batter, so they weren’t hard and crunchy, but they were still firm. Damn, that’s a good muffin!

OMFG – this is a scone that I actually liked. I think Sarah secretly wanted to convert me to scone appreciation, because I was definitely not a scone lover at Café Grumpy (link). Get that weak dry scone stuff outta here – Melissa ain’t serving up no substandard scones here. Seriously, unlike any scone I’ve tasted. Even scones my mom makes come out dry sometimes (Sorry mom! You know I love you! And Michelle said the apricot cookies you made were excellent!).

Crispy on the outside, moist and soft on the inside, and (wait for it … wait for it …) perfect with a little butter and jam. OK, that will clear it up – the seventh and final P-Bomb of the trip goes to TBSP.

Both the girls loved this the most. Tart and tangy manchego cheese, a pleasantly runny egg, thick bacon, and a well-made pico de gallo accompanying it really brought it all to a fitting conclusion of deliciousness.

Look at these Goddamned beautiful french fries. I swear, I should really tag my flickr photos. They’re frickin’ gorgeous. See how far I’ve come as a photographer? Look at this post (link). Those were my favorite fries of the journey.

Now with these, I took them from the table, brought them to a window, used a napkin to reflect the light back onto them from the other side … I’ve really evolved.

This was my favorite. I was looking forward to this because I had The Fancy at Mike and Patty’s (link) with the avocado and eggs integrated together. It came on a baguette from Balthazar with some red pepper aoli. I must say, this one was legit.

It came with those green as hell pickles that you get at Katz’s … I love these things. I found out that they’re Called Guss’ Pickles (site). I don’t know how old Guss does it, but he sure makes a mean pickle. And those tomatoes? Fuggedaboutit.

The burger had grilled red onion on it – a really nice touch. I forget the kind of cheese that was on here, but it looks to me like cheddar. It was a grass-fed Angus beef burger. I need to do some side by side burger testing because I don’t think I can tell the difference between grass-fed and non. It was a great burger; again – the bacon – awesomeness.

Dessert for breakfast? Come on; I think you know me by now.

The blondie was super-caramelly, the white chocolate chunks inside were huge. I’ll rock this à la mode the next I come in.

Dessert winner. Those gigantic nonpareil-like things on the top gave it a very pleasing crunch. Writing ‘gigantic nonpareil’ makes me think I may have been deprived of some nonpareil diameter as I grew up. Melissa didn’t seem to make such a big deal out of how huge they were, but they were larger than any I’d seen. I need to broaden my nonpareil repertoire. I digress – the cream cheese frosting was fantastic as well. Just a damn good cupcake.

Lawrence and I disagreed on eating this one with or without the crackers. The regular white crackers were just OK, but the black sesame crackers gave it a sweetness I liked. You could really taste the coconut milk in this one. Super creamy. If you could find a way to make this at home, it would be a pretty impressive appetizer.

I tried it with just the sauce and wasn’t psyched. Then, I tried it with the sauce, the scallions, the cilantro, and the mint, and I loved it. I have been telling people that I don’t know how to order (I now exclusively ask for omakase anything if it’s an option, even sometimes when it’s not) and reflecting on this, I don’t even know how to eat.

Super crunchy, like the chicken at Mad For Chicken (link). Look at those things; they even look crispy. Those were oats on the outside of the fish cakes, and yes, the consistency was ike a rice krispy (I wonder if the proper spelling is ‘krispie’?) This one takes my favorite dish of round one.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, five courses, three items each, thai food heaven.

This one was like a salty bulgogi. I hit this one harder than Lawrence; he was psyched for the Chocolate Spare Ribs. I mean, come on. You’re not actually reading this sentence, you’re scrolling down to find the Chocolate Spare Ribs.

Nope, keep scrolling.

This was actually quite interesting. The cashews gave it a pleasing crunch and the microgreens, a distinct tartness. I don’t know what banana blossoms are, but I want to have them fried.

Lawrence had heard about these things before we got here and he was psyched. When I looked at the menu, I was psyched. When we saw them come out, we were psyched. When we finally tasted them, we were, well … we were kinda meh. It’s an interesting concept, but I didn’t know what was supposed to be happening here. They left us asking why. Here’s the thing, they were still very good, the ribs themselves were fantastic, I just didn’t know what they were going for other than putting chocolate on pork.

My favorite dish. Nice crispness on the fish, sweet chili, red curry, shallot and garlic sauce with the clincher; palm sugar. I wish I’d gotten more of the dish in here – the fish just looked super cool. The outside was sweet and crispy and the fish was extra juicy and tender. I don’t remember what Lawrence’s favorite was, but I think this was pretty high on his list, too.

Basil, onion, chicken stock, lemongrass, and kaffir lime – what a great combo. They knew this from a long time ago .. say, 3,000 years back. I really think southeast asian cuisine is the best in the world because of its roots and complexities. The only cuisine that comes close is French. Feel free to debate me on this. I don’t think this molecular gastronomy thing is a fad.

I was suprised – this dish was one of my favorites in China and it was actually better than I remembered. How is that? No frickin’ clue.

The home stretch – these last three finished us off for the main course. I know you can’t see it in this picture, but it really looked dry, and then it came through with the succulence. Again, the coconut milk really set this one off.

We were just confused by this one. The green curry was awesome, the short rib was awesome, but the combo didn’t work for us.

And our dinner comes to a close with something healthy. Two vegetable plates, I loved them both (vegetable jones). Look at how bright those colors are! Those are some fresh snow peas.

I just compared the fried banana things at Bogota Bistro (link) to the ones at Sanford’s (link), but we have a new winner. The desserts here were amazing. The burnt honey ice cream was something else, and obviously, those banana things were crispy as hell on the outside.

Finally, a flourless chocolate cake that made me say “wow.” You know what I was thinking when I saw this on the menu, but it was a whole different animal entirely. You can see the banana leaf in the picture; that was holding the chocolate cake, steaming it. I was overwhelmed; how can the rest of the flourless chocolate cakes be so blah and this steamed one be the bomb. It didn’t make sense, but I devoured it. Lawrence shared my sentiments.

When this clam chowder was the first thing on the table, I thought to myself, “Come on, Marc. What are you doing?” When I saw it, I asked for some garnishes before our waiter left the table.

Ahh, that’s better. Florie was amused by this and took a picture of me styling my food (pic). I’m getting to be a bit of a snob about the way my food looks, especially in the morning. The light is always the best at breakfast, and to waste it is just a sin. There was no way I was letting them get away with sullying this excellent chowder with that horrible initial picture.

Yes, the chowder was glorious. It had more thick, smoky bacon in it than clams, but I wasn’t complaining about that. We did have a conversation after about how it didn’t mention the bacon in the clam chowder, but I guess if you’re a vegetarian, you’d ask this kind of thing. Which of us gentile omnivores doesn’t like a little surprise bacon in their soup? I can’t name one.

Yeah, dog. Three mimosas for $12. Frexinet is just terrible on its own, but the dryness works very well in a mimosa. I guess they knew this already.

Florie said “carbs, meat, and more carbs or meat, carbs and more meat? I think it’s too early in the day for this.” Not for me, honey. The allure of ordering a sloppy joe dog and mac and cheese dog was too much for me to pass up.

I ended up grabbing some of the sloppy joe sauce and putting it on the ditch dog. For future reference, this is how to order your hot dogs at ditch plains. Two half-ditch/half-sloppy dogs. For proper flavor amalgamation, ask them to combine the mac and cheese and sloppy sauce before they lay the mixture on.

Big, thick bacon, a crispy, buttery bun, gooey gruyere. The home fries here weer pretty wonderful as well. Great caramelization, still crispy at the end of the meal, and a few pieces had a nice char that gave them a homier taste.

These were the standouts for me. They were the perfect size and lighter than any other pancake I’d had on the project. The maple syrup was hot, and the pancakes were just a tad crisp on the outside. I would have eaten a stack of 27 of these bad boys if given the opportunity. I rarely write my notes in all caps, but the notes on the pancakes here start with EXCELLENT!

We wanted dessert (obviously) but just asked our server to surprise us. The s’mores came wrapped in tinfoil (pic). A far cry from the presentation of the clam chowder, these were excellent and harkened that trip east our owner was going for. Any time you get a chance to eat a s’more, you better eat that thing, and why not share an order for your brunchy dessert here? Great execution.

You know those crumbles on the ice cream cakes you get at carvel? The chocolate ones that have kind of a crunchy/chewyness to them? The cookie was made of a million of those little crumbles packed together.

These guys are great at social media. They harness foursquare, have a great grasp of twitter (link to their account), and are all about their community. I can’t say enough about how much of a pleasure it was to work with everyone here.

So they gave us this first dish and it was a sampler platter of a bunch of different apps. I don’t remember which apps they were, but I’m reading the menu right now and I can’t even begin to figure out what they were. Part of this project demands that I don’t have specials (because I want to help advertise something that’s going to be on the menu for a while) and that I get things as they are meant to look (for photography). Our first plate violated both of these, and I let our waitress know what I needed for the rest of the meal and we were good.

Two things stood out about this plate: the thick, fresh tortilla and the succulent, garlicky shrimp. I know they could probably bring you both of these things if you asked for them, so if you want this, that’s how you describe it to them. I just wanted to note that the tortilla is one of the better tortillas I’ve had in the United States. If they don’t make them at the bistro, I want to know where I can get these things.

Obviously this wasn’t the sexiest looking thing on the menu, but it was pretty tasty. it was a spicy chicken and plantain mash served with the aji that Jonny loved so much. I probably ate half of this guy because it came with my second favorite condiment, sour cream (#1 – mayo, obviously). I slathered that stuff all over it and went to town the entire time our appetizers were on the table.

When I was in Panama, the place that I stayed in Playa Lajas was owned by some Colombians. They made some mean fried whole fish. I had it for three days straight. The hammock I slept on was $4, the snapper was $7 and beers were $1. I more than survived on $20 a day down there.

That was probably my favorite dish of my Central American excursion, so the snapper at Bogota Bistro had a lot to live up to. The couple and I talked about how memories of situations clouded how fantastic the taste actually was, and that might have been the case. It was unlikely that the fish here was going to come close, and it didn’t. It was the only disappointing point of the meal, but there were unrealistic expectations placed on this plate, so that was assumed before even ordering.

Chicharrones is a severely underutilized dish. Consistency (both definitions of consistency apply) is definitely the culprit when talking about why it hasn’t really caught on in mainstream American cuisine. First of all, when you look at Chicharrones in a Cuchifrito, you aren’t going to be able to tell how well it is cooked, Depending on the piece the chef serves you, you might get this uber-hard stuff that’s terrible or the juicy, crispy stuff that you love, or the whole batch may be too hard for you, who knows? You can’t tell by looking.

Either way, they do theirs right over here – exactly the crispiness you expect out of a good Chicharrone (can I say that? Is there a singular?). I am at my mom’s house right now (she’s vegetarian) and I haven’t had pork in almost two weeks. Writing this post is getting me hungry for some pig.

The steak, rare and peppery – the egg on top complemented the plantains with the runny yolk. The red beans that came along with it were awesome – tasted just like some that I’d remembered fondly from Nicaragua (spicy with a nice pork flavor). It came with an avocado as well; I would have loved to wrap the whole platter up in a soft taco shell and devoured it. Bandeja Paisa means “Colombian Platter.” It came with the Chicharrones.

Strong to quite strong. This was one of the stars of the meal for me. I could eat fried yuca day and night, but this had a lightness to it I’d not tasted in my other fried yuca experiences. The best I’ve had for sure.

There was nothing that could prepare us for the flan. You could have told us that it was a bit firmer than regular flan, but that wouldn’t have done it. It was like a hard custard. I asked Eddy, our impresario, what the deal was, and he let me know that the cuisine they served was unapologetically Colombian. That’s something you can be proud of as an employee of an establishment. This was a good dessert, and we ate most of it, but it wasn’t your momma’s flan (unless your momma is from rural Colombia).

I gotta tell Gus over at Sanford’s (link) that this is the way to do fried bananas. His were good, but these were better. Whole bananas, light and crispy, sweet with just a hint of salt. These things are what you should get for dessert.

Wood Fired Pizza Oven

Michael’s brother Frank showed us around the kitchen, which isn’t at all detached from the restaurant. The Salted Cod says, “The wood fired oven gives the crust a nice, crispy, slightly charred flavor” (link). While I can’t say I agree with their next statement, “This is the only way too cook a pizza,” (case in point – Grimaldi’s COAL-Fired pizza, link), I can agree that the base of the oven should be made from stone and flavor should be imparted by what is burning; not gas.

Margherita Classica

The pizza is made with “herbs and vegetables grown in the restaurant’s greenhouse” (link). I couldn’t really put it much better than, “The light crust that was crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. Plus, the crust had great hole structure – it was cooked all the way through,” (link). I don’t really know what hole structure is, but I could venture a guess that it means when the bubble expands inside the crust, the outside doesn’t get black before the inside is cooked all the way through. The Margherita absolutely poops on Motorino’s similar offering. Why does Adam Kuban have such a hard-on for that place? Has he forgotten how “Fucking Awesome” (link) Fornino is?

Calabrese

“Ottima Pizza, atmosfera tranquilla. Un piccolo ristorante, un’atmosfera tranquilla e un pizza veramente buona, da complimenti” (link) My thoughts exactly. The Calabrese was tomato, mozzarella, sopressata, and piccante. You could tell that was some expensive meat on that pizza; it was well-cured. This was Jeff’s favorite.

Funghi Misti

“While biting into my first slice, I was totally … attacked by truffle oil, but I easily surrended” (link). I was considering giving Andy (link) a call because we were so pumped for the truffles on this one. This was my favorite; mozzarella, wild mushrooms of the season (I forget which they were). There was another pizza at the bottom of the list that we hesitated to order; the Tartufo. I just read Tien Ho’s take on it; “One of them was the truffle pizza, which usually runs $35/45 a pie – and there were at least 20 of those made. That was one of my favorites” (link, pic). Dammit! Look at those truffles! We should have had this one! I’ll be back, Michael. Mark my words … I’ll be back.

Gorgonzola Pizza

“I have dreams about the sharp tang of Fornino’s Gorgonzola pie. Caramelized onions lend this gem a sweet finish that’s well paired with a sparkling bottle of Peroni,” (link). Don’t forget the rosemary, Chris – and you could taste every ingredient. It was as close to a dessert pizza as you could get.

Liege with Nutella

This one is the soft and chewy waffle and it was my favorite. It was either because I’d never had a waffle like this before or the two tablespoons of Nutella slathered on this bad mother. Not taking anything away from this awesome waffle, but you could put Nutella on white rice and it would probably be the best white rice I’d ever had. I’m a huge fan. My ex is super into this stuff and has enlightened me to the differences between the American version and the European. Yes, there are differences.

Brussels Style with Whipped Cream

This was my second breakfast Brussels style waffle in as many days. I gotta hand it to the Waffle truck in this showdown (throwdown? link) it was much lighter, more crispy. They have one with strawberries and chocolate they call the WMD. I can’t see WMD and not think of Bodie from the wire explaining the new moniker.

Got them WMDs!

It may not mass-destruct your ass, but this waffle will do a pretty good number on your taste buds. Next time I come here, I’ll be getting a Liege style WMD with Nutella instead of chocolate sauce.

Brussels Style with Bacon

There’s a secret to the bacon waffle. The guys at the truck told me and made me turn my camera off, but I don’t remember what it was. All my attempts at bacon waffles will fall short of this gorgeousness from now on. I don’t think we did any of these with syrup and they didn’t seem to need it.