3D’s Place

I don’t get out to Brooklyn that often, buy when I do, one of my favorite things to look for is goat.

Stewed, curried, goat. I’m a goat-crazy fool. I can’t quite say “I’ve never met a goat I didn’t like,” but that statement isn’t too far from the truth. If you’re among those reading this right now who are incredulous as to my goat love, that’s probably because you haven’t had it. Goat rules. I might even encourage you to Vote Goat. By the way, don’t click that link unless you want to be singing a really dumb song in your hear every time you hear the word goat from now until you die. It’s catchy and goddamned annoying.

Goat is definitely the one thing that I’ve had this year that I’m most happy I learned to love. I don’t think I’ve ever seen goat in any grocery store in this country, then again, I’ve never looked for it. Probably not going to go to the Whole Foods on Houston to see if they have it, but I think I might try my hand at a curry goat recipe sometime soon. It’s gotta be cheap to make… I think that’s one of the hallmarks of West Indian food – cheap as shit and made in a Showtime Rotisserie.

When I saw the Sorrel and Mauby Drinks, you know I had to try them:

Sorrel and Mauby drink (after doing a bit of research) seem like they’re uniquely Caribbean. They’re both bitter. Sorrel tastes like a sour loganberry drink (WOOT WOOT Buffalo in da HOUSE!) with a hint of Doctor Pepper. Anyone know where I can find some good Loganberry drink in the city? I haven’t had it in probably fifteen years. It was much better over ice with sparkling water and a hint of lemon, of course, that’s probably the WASP in me talking.

Mauby is literally as bitter as a motherfucker. Literally. You ever met a motherfucker who wasn’t bitter? Case in point. From WiseGeek:

The drink or syrup for the drink is made by boiling buckthorn bark with sugar and a variety of spices. In looking at individual recipes on how people make mauby, you’ll note spices and flavorings vary exceedingly. Cinnamon is usually included, but then the drink flavoring diverges according to recipe. Some people add cloves, anise, vanilla extract, or cola flavoring. Many suggest you must add Angostura bitters, which helps to balance out the bitter aftertaste.

There was no cola flavoring, no anise, maybe some vanilla, but I couldn’t tell over the bitter motherfuckingness. It took me three days to drink this whole bottle. Mauby tastes like golden listerine mixed with honey and campari. This is probably my best description of a food ever. This Mauby drink tasted exactly like those three things. If you bought those three things, mixed them together and took all the alcohol out, you’d have Mauby. Can you tell how impressed I am with myself?

DO NOT BUY THIS BEEF PATTY. It’s so bad, it’s not worth writing abo

See what I did there? Feel free to ROFLPIMP

Here’s the Jerk Chicken:

You can tell it’s good jerk chicken by the spine in the picture. Truthfully, Jerk is not just breasts, wings, thighs, and drumsticks. It’s just about the whole bird. Jerk is kind of a set it and forget it as well – brush the jerk sauce on the bird, leave it in the smoker for a few hours, pull it out and then chop the chicken up willy-nilly. There doesn’t seem to be a rhyme or reason to the chopping when we talk about these kinds of dishes.

This jerk was a little more rubbery than I wanted it. I like a crispier skin on my bird, and jerk often doesn’t deliver that, making up for it with the oils in the skin more thoroughly permeating the chicken. The flavor on this was solid, but the skin was a bit flabby.

Here’s the Curry Goat:

I mean, it’s “Curried Goat,” but who the heck says that. Too much effort to make that “d” sound at the end of the word. When you think of it, there’s something cool about the creole dialect. It basically goes under the assumption that if you can pretty much understand what it means, then it’s a word. Sarah Palin would fit right in down there. Catch one of the many flights to new york from the islands, land at JFK, and you might not even know you’d left if you got off this subway stop.

The goat was too bony. Not the good bones with the tasty marrow inside – the too thin bones with no marrow. I wanted more goat. They were very nice when I asked for more of the goat sauce on the rice, though. I got a heaping helping of goat on top of what I’d expected to get. The hospitality here is pretty fantastic, and I was a total bitch with my order. I tend to be a bit presumptuous in expecting excellent service.

People think I expect to be treated different than other customers, I don’t think that’s true, I feel I just have a higher level of expectation for each restaurant I visit than other customers. For example, when I asked when the jerk would be ready, they told me 12:30. When I came back at 12:30, they said 1:00. When I came back at 1:00, they said 1:15. I said “listen whoever you think you are, we’re not on island time here. I don’t want to be told to come back here a second earlier then my jerk is ready, so you tell me when it’s absolutely, positively, without-a-doubt going to be ready.” She said 1:30 and it was ready at 1:35. WTF.

At least the goat was decent. Could have used a bit more goat meat, but otherwise, not too bad.

My quest for awesome curried goat in Brooklyn continues.

3D’s Place
771 Washington Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 10305
(718) 623-2310