New York: Once More in Eataly - Day 4

Been somewhat busy with work but finally got time to finish the last post of my trip to NY during this past St. Patrick's weekend!

On the last day, we decided to walk around Central Park and others wanted to meet up with a few friends.  Before we split off, we decided to stop by Eataly once more and grab some food from one of the eateries inside!


La Pizza & Pasta (Eataly)
200 5th Ave
Flatiron
New York, NY 10010
eatalyny.com

La Pizza & Pasta.

Part of the menu.

Pizza oven imported from Italy!

EVOO + balsamic is a must.

Rustic artisan bread.

La Pizza Margherita!  Mozarrella, tomato sauce, Parmigiano Reggiano & basil.

Awesome fresh mozza and super crispy crust.

There was only ONE basil haha. Sorta ridiculous to have only ONE basil leaf on the pizza :P

Neopolitan pizza done right and the fresh mozzarella is great with the sauce.

My Tagliatelle al Ragu di Manzo.  Housemade pasta with braised short rib ragu. Savory with tender short trib. A little salty.

Short rib hiding underneath!

Ben's Pasta al Forno al Ragu.  Lasagna with Italian ragu. Probably my favorite. I'm a sucker for lasagna.

Ahrhan's Pasta al Forno al Pesto.  Lasagna with pesto & bechamel sauce. Nice pesto sauce.

Audrey's Pappardelle.  Housemade pasta with chicken in tomato sauce & basil. It's not on the menu but as a special of the day.

Diana's Pansotti di Ricotta e Spinachi.  Housemade pasta with local ricotta, spinach, lemon butter & pistachio. Sounds sorta heavy but it's actually pretty refreshing thanks to the lemon.


I wanted something sweet afterwards so headed off to the gelato section.  Decided on the Espresso Gelato, and wow it packs a punch!

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Afterwards, we took the subway and headed towards Times Square and Central Park, and after a looong walk, headed towards Shake Shack for our meal before our flight!

Shake Shack

366 Columbus Ave

Between 77th St & 78th St

Upper West Side

New York, NY 10024

shakeshack.com

After hanging out at Central Park for a bit, decided to end our trip with some good ol' American food from Shake Shack!  Went to the Upper West Side location.


Shack Shack Burger with Fries.


Just as good as I remembered it, but still, In-N-Out takes the crown!


Crispy fries!


Decided to try a "concrete" this time.  "Concrete" is essentially their term for frozen custard that is blended with toppings!  Went for the Natural History "Crunch-stellation" which has Vanilla custard, malt, Valrhona chocolate crunchies, and chocolate toffee.  Creamy and sweet.


The tables there are made from recycled bowling lanes!  I thought that was pretty cool.

And with the end of that meal, we walked back towards our hotel to grab our bags for our trip back to LA. Always feel a little sad at the end of a trip, but this was definitely one of those trips that I can say we tried to do as much as we can for a "long weekend!"  Till next time, NYC.

A little bonus:

There was a food truck serving Taiwanese-style bento!  Didn't get to try it... wonder how it tastes?

Los Angeles: LA Taco Adventures at Kogi, Flying Pig, Pinches & King Taco!

HAH! I'm back bitches. Honestly, I wasn't planning on updating this blog till my next Asia trip since this blog so far has been about food in Asia when I was studying abroad or traveling, but a lot of my friends have started blogs and I figured... since I'm the original out of them, I gotta step my game up! Plus, now I'm based in LA so might as well get it going. Regardless, I'm gonna start with a LA staple, tacos!!

2 weekends ago, a few friends (Diana & Mikol) and I decided to go on this search for tacos around LA. Props to them for deciding on which spots to stop. Our trip that specific night took us from Venice to Sunset on Hollywood to East LA. I think the odometer read 80 something miles at the end of the night. Nevertheless, it was some crazy fooding haha.

Kogi (stop 1)

So one of the Kogi trucks was at The Brig in Venice Beach that night so that's where our search for tacos began. Not really the traditional Mexican tacos, but I had to have Kogi so we incorporated that haha. It's actually a good thing too cause it turned out there were 4-5 different food trucks there that night! (more on that later)

When I order, I usually like to order Kogi's special of the night cause it's usually something you can't find at their dine-in lounge (Alibi), and it is something different.

The taco trucks next to The Brig. There's a few others too, but there's Kogi!

Their special of the night! Shredded chicken mulita with their salsa roja. Seriously, the salsa makes this a must get. Actually, anything of theirs with salsa roja is bomb.

Spicy Pork Taco. My favorite taco from Kogi. The flavors are much more intense than short ribs, chicken, and tofu.

Diana & Mikol's order of tofu and spicy pork taco. Supposedly they updated their tofu taco but I still find it a little bland. Good option if you're going light though or vegetarian!

The Flying Pig (stop 2)

This was honestly a pleasant surprise since they were at The Brig as well. We all heard from a friend how much she loved the truck so we decided to try it out ourselves.

The truck.

Tamarind Duck Taco & Braised Pork Belly Bun.

So the duck taco was essentially asian roast duck or peking duck. then they sprinkled almonds and added a pickled beet salad. They also added a mardarin orange on top to simulate the taste of the orange dipping sauces most chinese restaurants give you. Such an interesting way of deconstructing each ingredient of a traditional peking duck and then putting them together for different textures. The tamarind also added a sweetness.

The pork belly was essentially taiwanese "guabao" and they played around with it. The pork belly even tastes the same. they added marinated onions and cucumber instead of the traditional pickled vegetables and crumbled peanuts.

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so we wanted to go to kogi and that night they were at venice beach. but when we got there we found out that the trucks like to gather all in one place. didnt try the other two in the picture though.

Pinches (stop 3)
8200 W Sunset Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90046

Our 3rd stop took us over 40 minutes to get there from Venice Beach, the famous Pinches on Sunset.

Pinches, right in the heart of Sunset Blvd.

Mr. al Pastor & Mr. Carne Asada. Of course one of my basis for judging tacos is how tasty their al pastor and carne asada is. Their al pastor is pretty weak in my opinion but their carne asada was like biting into steak nuggets. Pretty awesome.

Mexican Coke! Made with real cane sugar. Absolutely love it!

Also at Pinches, they have this cactus taco. Cactus was... interesting. Tasted a bit like mild bell peppers with not much bite to it. Kinda like.. jelly but not as soft hahah. I would try cactus again, but maybe used differently in a dish hahah.

The also had this guava flan, that didn't have much guava flavor to it at all. It tasted like.. a really really sweet & creamy flan.

King Taco (Stop 4)
4504 E 3rd St
Los Angeles, CA 90022

King Taco, a LA staple.

Al Pastor with Salsa Roja. I absoutely love their salsa roja. Intense flavors and spiciness. Also love their al pastor the best. It did feel like they skimped on the meat though haha.

Mikol's favorite cabeza. I'm not a really big fan of cabeza because I think it's too fatty but the salsa verde definitely cuts into the oiliness.

I think by the end of the night I had about 6-8 tacos from eating my own and sampling Diana and Mikol's haha. More tacos to come!