Brooklyn Diner
212 W. 57th Street, between 7th and Broadway
P: (212) 977-1957
www.brooklyndiner.com
Cuisine: Good ol’ fashioned AMERICAN food… (it’s a mix of everything that makes America a melting pot, though I saw no Asian dishes on the menu)
My picture doesn’t do the oddity that is Brooklyn Diner justice, because when I entered I’d framed the shot in my mind, but when I left, there were 3 businessmen standing exactly blocking my shot, so I went to the side to capture this one. Why an oddity? Because this diner- which is NOT in Brooklyn– looks exactly as in the picture, but is surrounded by tall office buildings. Yep, smack dab in the middle of a city block.
I’d passed by this place many times in high school and always wondered if it was any good; I think the prices always scared me away because each dish is around $15 or more, which was a lot of money back then. So last night, after freezing my butt off to trek to Lee’s Art Supplies (located next to Brooklyn Diner), I shrugged it off and went inside to sample some delights. I’d heard the food was good.
I glanced through the menu, but nothing stood out at me, so I asked the very friendly waitress for her suggestions. She immediately said, “The goulash is really, really good” but of course my response was “Uhh what’s goulash?” (I’ve heard of it before but never seen nor eaten it.) She explained that it was a braised meat with some veggies, served with noodle kugel, which she also described and I would have gotten until she said “with raisins”. I don’t like raisins in most of my food, and I think she saw my face, so she said she’d bring it with mashed potatoes.
This dish arrived steaming hot- the plate itself was hot to the touch- and I dug in eagerly, still cold from the outside wind. The meat was extremely tender, easily forked apart and melted in my mouth; the vegetables softer than I’d have cooked myself, but perfect in the stewy sauce. The mashed potatoes were really good too- I don’t even like scallions, but the scallions mixed throughout were super soft and went nicely with the creamy potatoes.
I spent most of the meal tasting the sauce and trying to determine what kinds of seasonings went into the dish, because normally you can kind of tell what’s going on, but I was totally stumped. I’ll have to look up a recipe later.
The restaurant itself had a homey smell to it- like the front of the menu says, it goes back to a time when cooking would fill the home with delicious smells that make you hungry. It looked like any regular diner, though. One of the downsides was- when it’s busy anyway, which it wasn’t last night- right when you walk in, there’s no hostess booth or area to stand really, so if you walked in while there was a group in front of you or with a group, it’d be very cramped until you were seated. But I sat near the door, and I didn’t feel any cold air when the door opened at all, which was nice.
One of the cute things was also at each booth (I’m guessing, they were in mine anyway) were little gold name tags, I would assume of people who had sat at these booths before. Will my name be up one day at this booth??? I didn’t really recognize the names, except Patty Lupone, Summer Phoenix.
I would recommend this place if you’re in the area and in the mood for some homestyle cooked food. It was very hearty, filling, and warming- I walked back out into the cold and felt a warmth in the center of my stomach from the food. Yes, I finished my entire plate (because I didn’t want to carry it, ok?!). And I ate alone, one of the very few times I’ve been able to deal with doing so (I learned how to at work because I sometimes eat lunch alone in the cafeteria when I don’t want to deal with people.) I mean, I had a book, but I was alone (with Samantha Sweeting.. haha props to whoever gets that reference without Googling it).
Yvo says: Yummy and not expensive. I had water, no dessert because I was stuffed although their desserts looked YUMMY, and my total with tip was $25, and that’s with a $5 tip for the really nice waitress.
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