03/31/19 10:42am

Case of the Mondays answers the question ‘What if the Take 5 Bar were a pie’?

For a food writer who doesn’t specialize in sweets, I I’ve been on a bit of a sugar kick lately. I blame a certain highfalutin candy bar from Michael Mignano. My latest indulgence was a slice of heaven called Case of the Mondays from Daly Pie.

Meghan Daly’s shop is located in the faraway land of Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, but luckily for me it has had a popup in Long Island City for the past few months. I passed by a week or so ago to check out the goods, from the traditional like butter milk coconut and apple crisp to the newfangled like salty lime and the aforementioned Case of the Mondays, which consists of peanut butter custard sandwiched between a pretzel crust, a layer of Nutella and chocolate ganache. In lieu of whipped cream, there are potato chips. (more…)

12/07/15 1:45pm
Whether in Krakow or in Queens a donut is a pączki.

Whether in Krakow or in Queens a donut is a pączki by any other name.

Sometimes you just really need a donut. And not just any donut, but a puffy Polish pączki. Filled with jelly or cream they’re a common pre-Lenten treat. I’d be lying if I said pączki were on my mind Friday morning as my business partner and I drove around Glendale trying to find Finback Brewery.

Beer and ticket sales were our primary concern. We needed two kegs of beer and we needed them fast, for a festival the following day. This urgency didn’t keep us from stopping in our tracks when we saw a hand-written sign that read “Bake Sale.”
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09/04/14 2:03am
PPP2A

Photos: Wendy Wong

Pata Paplean is my favorite Thai bar in Elmhurst, but I never drink there. I eat there as often as possible. On weekend afternoons the funky joint named for a 900-pound gorilla serves the best street food style Thai noodle soups in Queens’ Little Bangkok. So when Cherry and Chompoothe gals behind the pork blood enriched kuay tiew nam tok moo—asked if I wanted to collaborate on a popup series with them, I immediately said yes. UPDATE: Tickets are now on sale here for the Oct. 18 Pata Paplean Popup!! (more…)

12/02/13 9:58am
MU-EXT

Bagelry by day, ramen-ya by night.

I live to discover the delicious in unexpected corners of Queens, whether it’s a Tibetan restaurant in the back of a cell phone store or a Malaysian joint in Flushing with a graveyard shift specializing in kari laksa. So when I heard about Mu Ramen, Joshua Smookler’s nighttime popup inside of a Long Island City bagel store, I was especially intrigued.

MUINTERIOR

The scene inside Mu Ramen on Saturday night.

So I set out for Bricktown Bagel & Café on a night that was indeed quite brick. Joining me on the frigid Saturday after Thanksgiving was my pal William who knows a thing or two about Japanese food. The first thing that surprised me was that Mu’s chef, Joshua Smookler, was Asian. What’s not so surprising about the Korean-American chef with the decidedly non-Korean name is that he has a monomaniacal fascination with ramen. (more…)