New restaurant reviews and takeaways from tequila day
Swoony's, Funzi's, Hop Lee, oh baby
For a while, my Substack draft was reloading over and over maniacally and I couldn’t figure out how to send this piece out so I stopped trying. Turns out I just needed to create a new draft. Embarrassing!
Now that my technical difficulties have been resolved, I am glad to announce that the long wait is over… here’s what Hannah is Eating these days.
Funzi’s Pizzeria (36 St Marks Pl)
I have had such a strange, animal hankering for pepperoni since September (iron deficiency?). Not middle-grade pepperoni, but the good stuff: crispy, sizzling hot little cups filled with oil. God answered my prayers late one evening when I happened across the new and redone St Marks Pizza, which calls itself Funzi’s and is serving up a fantastic pepperoni slice, plus an absolutely deranged burrata situation that takes inspiration from L’industrie. Love the flakes of almost-transparent cheese that get rained down on these slices right before they’re served.
I had to check in on what Portnoy thought about Funzi’s after all my Portnoy reporting (re-Portnoy-ing?), and I wasn’t disappointed — Portnoy does not disagree that this slice rocks. He rolled through to review it in August, and it so happened that he visited right after Kenji Alt; he calls the poor guy a “left-wing lunatic piece of shit” again and the video is mostly about that rather than the pizza. I hope Kenji is having a nice day, wherever he is.
Swoony’s (215 Columbia St)
Swoony’s is the newest venture by Salvatore Lamboglia, the chef at Cafe Spaghetti, and his first American restaurant. It opened on November 1st, and I was super hype to go on the second night of operations. Overall, I would honestly recommend Swoony’s over Cafe Spaghetti, which I know may be sacrilege to pasta-loving freaks. What can I say? We were very charmed; the room is elegant, the seating is comfortable, the place is buzzy, and, most importantly, the food is good. The burger is a can’t-miss — it’s got a weird, English muffin-esque bun, two patties, and is dressed with Thousand Island dressing. Exquisitely American, and I mean that in the best way. Nate ordered this chicken dish (good, but very olive-y so not my thing) and we shared some fantastic lamb meatballs and French toast for dessert. (I have a feeling that French toast may be coming back to menus this fall… watch this space.)
Hop Lee (16 Mott St)
I forced my friends to come here because I want to follow all of Pete Wells’s advice, especially when it comes with only one dollar sign attached. We went totally overboard — I think we got something like eight dishes for five people? — and had a raucous time. I'm super impressed that they seated a partial party with no reservation on a Saturday night at prime time. Hop Lee will definitely be a fallback option for large gatherings going forward. The winning dish of the night for me was definitely the duck, which is technically an appetizer but really pushes the boundaries of what classifies as an appetizer. Note that this place is cash-only and large-portioned.
Mei Lei Wah (62 Bayard St)
I have spent MONTHS scrolling past videos of people flexing their cheap-ass Chinatown grub crawls and grinding my teeth about it. Mei Lai Wah has been on my list since the first Reel (yes, I watch Reels, yikes), but there’s always a considerable line out the front door, and I don’t wait in line unless there’s a gun to my head so I haven’t ever caved. Luckily, this past Tuesday, I was stumbling around Chinatown killing time before my book club, and for the first time, there was no line in front of Mei Lai Wah.
I got a whole bunch of stuff, but honestly, you should skip the dumplings and stick to the basics here. The baked roast pork bun (above) is scrumptious — loads of fatty pork in there, with a sweet finish and luscious, fluffy dough encasing it. Get that and the “famous bun,” which has nothing inside it, just dough. It’s eerily similar to challah; very eggy, but a little sweeter. Your whole bill will be less than $5 and you will be very happy.
Adventures in tequila
In other news, I got invited to two ridiculously lovely tequila events last week, which happened to both fall on the same day and feature the same speaker: Jaime Salas, head of agave advocacy at Proximo Spirits.
Over the course of the day, I got to try 11 different varietals of tequila. (And yes, the day started at 2pm.) Six of the tequilas were different Cristalino brands. Cristalino is a tequila preparation that hit markets around 2011; it’s essentially an añejo, meaning that it’s aged for at least a year in oak barrels, but it doesn’t look old (read: amber-colored) because that color and woodsy flavor has been filtered with charcoal. I was super excited about getting a chance to compare and contrast Cristalinos after writing about Don Julio 70 Cristalino for Tasting Table. It turns out you really can taste the difference in age — and I’m now officially a Gran Centenario girl. Also, at the second event, I got seated with
, who writes one of my favorite newsletters and is absolutely lovely in person. It was all very Sex in the City.Anyway, that’s what’s up with me. Sending love.
Hannah