02/01/22 11:38am
BBQ for the people as grilled and served by Francis Maling in Woodside, Queens.

The first time I ever savored the smoky sweet porcine marvel that is Filipino BBQ was at Ihawan in Woodside, in the shadow of the 7 train in the neighborhood known as Little Manila.

Last week I ventured out in the bitter cold to try some pinoy style grilling that’s as good as and perhaps even better than Ihawan’s. It was grilled on the street by Bad for Business Popups, brainchild of journeyman Chef Francis Maling. The street in question none other than Roosevelt Avenue hard by the 61st Woodside subway stop on the mighty International Express, aka the 7 train.

I’ve been meaning to try Francis’ BBQ for quite some time and I’m glad I finally made it. His pork BBQ is decidedly cheffed up, benefiting from a marinade in soy sauce, banana ketchup, and vinegar followed by a three-step process: an initial grilling, a quick steam in banana leaves, and a final kiss of the flames as he brushes on his homemade sauce. I didn’t try the chicken, but I’m sure it’s excellent. I did however grab a duo of ruddy hued hot dogs capped off with marshmallows, which Maling says is a nod to Filipino birthday parties for kids. The day’s special was his twist on Peruvian anticuchos, grilled beef heart in a bulgogi marinade.

Maling has been operating his fly by the seat of the pants popup since January of 2021. Much as I like to joke that his promotional strategy of announcing each popup a day or so beforehand via Instagram is the reason behind the name “Bad for Business Popups,” Maling said there is a deeper meaning coupled with a mission to build awareness for street vendors who can’t get licenses.“I came up with the name cos when it comes to business a lot of people look for profits before people [but] I’m trying to think about the community,” he said. “I’m trying to think about the safety of the workers, people’s livelihoods not just the money aspect of it.”

As I am writing this I received a notification on my phone that Maling’s little BBQ stand will be open today Feb. 1 from 1 p.m. until he runs out and Thursday from 1 p.m. This week’s special is a burger from Burger Machine, BBQ on Foccacia by @nextlevelpizza.

“It’s barbecue for the community,” Maling said. “This is essentially barbecue for Woodside, I grew up here.” Oh, and in case you are wondering Maling’s favorite Filipino BBQ is the O.G. Ihawan.

11/08/21 4:24pm
This Colombian style burger was not created by the Arepa Lady, but rather her daughter-in-law, Nelly.

Back when I first moved to Queens in the late 90s, The Arepa Lady—aka Maria Piedad Cano a former administrative judge from Medellin, Colombia, turned street food legend—served precisely two things from her cart outside a nightclub on Roosevelt Avenue. The first, arepa de queso was a puffy disc of corn flour sweet and gooey with crisped edges from a griddling in margarine and topped with salty quesito cheese. The second, arepa de choclo, was made from a sweeter corn enfolding cheese.

Both are equally delicious and both are still served at Areperia Arepa Lady, which her son Alejandro Osorio opened with her in 2014 to return the favor of his mother supporting him and his siblings through street food for decades.

“She’s old school,” Osorio says of his mother. “We can add new things, but we can’t mess with her recipes. Those things include arepas filled with shredded beef, the fried plantain sandwiches known as patacones, and most recently, a Colombian style hamburger.

Osorio’s wife, Nelly, who runs the Jackson Heights restaurant with him came up with the idea for the burger because many diners had been asking for a burger. For Colombians though the hamburger is quite a different animal than the somewhat austere version served at cookouts in America. In Colombia, the patty and the bun are a canvas for a carnival of fruity sauces, other meats, and other textures. Arepa Lady’s Colombian burger does not disappoint. It consists of a patty topped with American cheese; ham; and crisp fried bacon topped with a fistful of crunchy potato sticks, and finally crowned with a trio of sauces green garlic, pink sauce (a mixture of mayo and ketchup), and pineapple. (My waiter, Brandon, who hails from Cali told they are fond of the tart, sweet pineapple sauce in his hometown.) For an extra few dollars you can add shrimp, which I did.

Despite all those ingredients, this was no Frankenburger, but a seemingly restrained study in excess. (It was, however messy, and you may well want to remove bracelets and other jewelry to eat it.) All the flavors—juicy patty, salty ham, and smoky bacon—worked well together and the potato sticks and sauces completed the picture, though next time I’d skip the baby shrimp.

Dining across from me in the otherwise empty restaurant a maroon robed Tibetan monk and a young friend enjoyed some chicharron and an arepa. As I was leaving I almost told them they should try the burger next time.

“My Mom hasn’t tried it yet,” Osorio told me when I asked what the family matriarch thought of his wife’s creation.

Areperia Arepa Lady, 77-17 37th Ave., Jackson Heights, 917-745-1111

09/05/18 11:34am

Bellwether’s  patty melt is lovely, but it’s more of a cheeseburger.

Sometimes I wish my dear departed friend and meat maven Josh Ozersky was still with us. Partly so I could take him to dodgy Chinese restaurants, but mostly so I could ask him questions about burger lore, like the one in the headline.

I came to the patty melt late in life. I didn’t try one until my late forties. And I suppose that the one I tried, which I believe was at Tower Diner, formed my impression of what a proper patty melt should be. It was composed of a medium rare patty swaddled between two crisp pieces of rye bread along with melted Swiss and caramelized onions.

It was more of of a grilled cheese than a hamburger, and I have it on good authority that that’s how it should be. Most of all it was a messy sandwich oozing an amalgam of beef drippings and fat from the Swiss, what Ozersky would have lovely called “greeze.” (more…)

11/17/17 4:29pm

Best Thai dessert hamburger ever!

Khao Nom, the sweeter little sister of wildly popular Thai steam table specialist Khao Kang opened about a month ago with the promise of old school Thai desserts and a short menu of savory items, my favorite being the sticky sweet and spicy chan noodles with prawns. Until recently though, none of the desserts has knocked my socks off. Sure they were good, but nothing revelatory. Dessert epiphany finally dawned the other week when I spied a tiny cake with a golden top and a spongy bottom sandwiching a layer of creamy spheres. (more…)

05/23/17 9:28am

It’s almost as much fun to watch one being made as it is to eat one!

At first it looks like an egg sandwich, and it is in a way, but instead of American cheese or Cheddar, the omelet cradles a juicy ground beef patty. The Malaysian specialty is called a Ramly burger. The first time I had one was a decade ago at a Ramadan Bazaar held by the Ladies’ Association of the Permanent Mission of Malaysia in New York. For a while Zak Pelaccio’s Fatty Crab was serving up Ramly inspired Fatty Sliders. The juicy pork and beef numbers seasoned with Malaysian spices were quite tasty, but they lacked the eggy envelope and thus Ramlyness.  (more…)

06/24/16 12:28am

Was the Jackson Hole burger ever good?

Was the Jackson Hole burger ever good?

There are probably some hamburgers out there worth a 20-minute subway ride and a 20 minute walk involving traversing the BQE. Sadly the cheeseburger at Jackson Hole is not one of them. The loosely packed behemoth is steam griddled, that is to say cooked on a flat top under a dome. A burger should breath free—sputtering and sizzling on the flat top or under a salamander—not suffocate in its own fetid vapors.

Ordered medium rare it was a mushy flavorless gray travesty of a burger utterly devoid of a char. I found myself wishing Tommy DeVito would walk in and put two in the back of my head so that I didn’t have to finish thing.

I did not bother to ask what type of meat it was, it could have a blend of unicorn chuck and golden calf short rib for all I care, the cooking process would still turn it into drek. There’s only tasty steamed burger out there kids: White Castle.

All that said the decor can’t be beat. There’s a reason the folks behind Goodfellas used it in a scene, the exterior of the diner is iconic, all stainless and neon. It’s evokes a time that was simpler and also more glamorous. I’ll bet it was a time when people gave a shit about how their burger tasted.

Jackson Hole,  69-35 Astoria Blvd., Astoria, 718-204-7070

10/04/15 3:25am

BearCheeseBurger

PLEASE NOTE THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED

There’s a Queens-based chain called Bareburger whose menu complexity never ceases to vex. There are multiple meat choices: elk,bison,beef, duck, ostrich,wild boar, and turkey; multiple sauce choices, including curry ginger ketchup and horseradish remoulade; a greengrocer’s worth of vegetation to choose from; and even multiple bun choices: brioche, sprout bun, tapioca rice. You could also choose from the 14 remade combos. Just writing about all these choices has given me a headache!  The only choices one should have to make when ordering a burger are cooking temp and with or without cheese.

And then’s there Chef Natasha Pogrebinsky’s Bear, which has nothing to do with the aforementioned chain. It offers only one type of burger. It’s a cheeseburger that also goes by the nickname the Grizzly Burger. It consists of a loosely packed patty with a fringed, crispy bottom sitting atop some greenery. The top is mantled with American cheese and crowned with a slice of juicy tomato. The bun’s what Pogrebinsky calls a standard “backyard bun,” because after all who really wants to think about the bun when eating a burger, it should serve as a mere vehicle for its contents. (more…)

03/11/15 10:11am

MOMOBURGER

Behold the momo burger, a Tibetan-American mashup

Momo—juicy beef dumplings seasoned with ginger,onion, and special momo masala—are the national dish of Tibet. A Tibetan loves his momo as much an American loves his hamburger perhaps even more so. In no place in NewYork City is this more true than Jackson Heights. Momo are ubiquitous at the hood’s many Tibetan and Nepalese eateries. There are three food carts and a truck selling the dumplings and even an annual Momo Crawl founded by local tour guide Jeff Orlick. So it was only a matter of time before someone invented a momo burger. That time is now, and that someone is Lobsang Choephel, the chef of Little Tibet. (more…)

05/26/14 11:57am

Memorial Day marks the unofficial start of the summer grilling, sunning and sweating season. Around this time every year my thoughts turn to the fiery, smoky arts. Apparently Kingsford’s been giving some thought to sizzling burgers and steaks as well. The charcoal briquette giant released a campaign that manages to skewer both gas grilling and hyperconnected social media inanity. The very act of grilling—call it a backyard barbecue if you must I know I did growing up—is inherently social. So here’s what I’d like to know: What’s on your grill this summer? I’m kicking off the season on my buddy’s roof later today with some kickass pork neck as well as hot dogs and burgers, of course. How about you? And where do you weigh on the gas vs. charcoal debate? Tell me in the comments or hit me on the Twitter, @JoeDiStefano.

10/07/13 12:30pm

SPICYBURGER

Like a Big Mac, but much spicier and much, much more kosher.

The last time I ate a kosher burger was more than five years ago. It was such a disappointment I’ve given  little or no thought to repeating the experience. That is until I came across Burgers Plus out on Union Turnpike in the part of Flushing locals call Hillcrest. Still dubious I asked my pal Meir—my go-to guy for Israeli grub—about it. “It’s really good,” he enthused. “We should have lunch there.”

The menu at Burgers Plus lists four burgers, including a 220-gram lamb number ($10.95) that the grill man said was his favorite. In 2013 Burgers Plus seems to be the only the burger joint that has caught onto the metric system.  I followed Meir’s lead and ordered the 150 gram (5.2911-oz.) house spicy beef burger ($7.95). The burger is also available in a non-spicy version, given the option I always choose spicy. (more…)