Watawa Sushi: Raw Fish Never Tasted So Lifeless

If you like your sushi with an IKEA-tinged flair and lively waitstaff, then Ditmars' Watawa may be for you. The first thing that greets customers is the all-blond wood motif with splashes of orange strategically placed around the long, shotgun room. Admittedly, it's a bit dorm room-esque but if you want swashbuckling busboys and ornate decor, head to Trattoria across the street. You're here for minimalism and uncooked seafood so you'll be happy to know that the sushi bar is inviting and expansive.

Generally, the menu is heavy on the raw fish without skimping on the kitchen-prepared dishes. The teriyaki chicken and beef combo (Chilean sea bass also available) is passable but has a serious Aunt Jemima complex: overly syrupy consistency while the degree of sweetness is very cloying. The sushi doesn't fare much better. With lackluster tuna and respectable fluke, the main course is marginally more thrilling than a dental appointment. A dental appointment in which the receptionist treats you like a leper and the only magazines left are Highlights and Popular Mechanics.

All in all, the fish is an exercise in mediocrity while settling the bill is a saddening experience for anyone in the bottom three tax brackets. Overpriced and underwhelming, Watawa is a place of last resort for even the most ardent sushi lover. Do yourself a favor and let J.J.'s spoil your tastebuds for the foreseeable future.

INFO:
3310 Ditmars Blvd
(718) 545-9596

Trattoria L'incontro: Italian Fare, 007 Style

For as hard as Secret Service agents try to blend in, their coiled-up earpieces always dangle conspicuously from their lobes like faintly flesh colored tentacles. And so it is with the wait staff at 31st Street's Trattoria L'incontro: they're mic'ed up, at attention, and ready to serve- if not their country then at least their dining patrons.

The hallmark of a Trattoria L'incontro meal is the amount of time your table will spend arguing over every possible course combination as the exceedingly patient server humors even the most star-struck eaters. The specials are truly staggering, in both breadth and caliber, while the process of ordering is distilled down to an art. More aptly identified as tour guides, the waiters walk you through the intricacies of each dish with a flair for the dramatic that drives home the axiom that all waiters are just one big break away from acting stardom. The Fillete di Branzino elicits cries of superlative praise and will be picked clean in a matter of seconds. Small children should be held at bay lest they lose a digit. The gnocchi specials will make your heart race, especially with preparations like Rabbit Ragu. Be warned, however, that the gnocchi may be best eaten communally as its richness can rapidly spiral into a heavy stomach not primed for the main course(s). Another pasta dish that can't go without mention is the Mezza Luna: ravioli filled with pesto and marscapone cheese and suspended in a brandy, walnut, and asparagus sauce. Try not to lick the screen.

The Carne d'Agnello is a delectable lamb rack that arrives spice-rubbed and impossibly aromatic. For more meat, the Vitello al Limone is a veal dish infused with lemons and capers that won't have you wondering what other specials you could have had. Before you forget the other staple of Italian dining, the wine selection is quite extensive while the restaurant takes great care to imbue its interior with a seductive coziness that will ensure your meal lasts longer than a filibuster. Trattoria L'incontro tends to fill up quickly and there are often clusters of waiting parties littering the sidewalk trying not to drool on their shirts. Good luck and bring a bib!

INFO:
Trattoria L'incontro
2176 31st St.
(718) 721-3532
Official Website

Mezzo Mezzo: If You Can't Dip It or Spread It, Forget It

If the Greeks were a people accustomed to frigid temperatures, Mezzo Mezzo would be their ski lodge. Gargantuan swaths of dark wood abound in the Ditmars restaurant as light floods in from the floor to ceiling windows. Mezzo Mezzo's food, though not quite as impressive as its surroundings, can still be tasty nonetheless. Starting with a traditional mezze plate, it's hard not to notice the variety of hearty spreads and their ability to feed Michael Phelps for a week. Before filling up on appetizers, the salads are worth a look. Their size (large) and price (even larger) mean that, unless a friend helps you out, one salad will probably be the conclusion of your meal. This would be a shame as the saganaki is a delicious artery-clogger.

Unfortunately, the spanikopita is comprised more of phyllo-trapped air than spinach and cheese. The monster size dish appears to deflate the moment you raise a knife to its flaky shell and fails to impress even once your fork has delved into the morass. In terms of entrees, the Aegean Chicken is a tasty oven-kissed dish of eggplant, meat, feta, mozzarella, and marinara with rice. It's flavors mingle nicely during the slow-cooked preparation and you'll want to savor the memory as many of the other menu items are rather underwhelming. The Kota Souvlaki (chicken skewers) and roasted lamb certainly don't offend, but leave much to be desired.

Unfortunately, the wait staff likes to play hookie with the line cooks for twenty minutes before actually serving patrons. While they're quite pleasant once you've sent a carrier pigeon to place your order, the lack of attentiveness puts a real damper on the experience at Mezzo Mezzo. The prices are generally high while the food is hit or miss and it's clear that Mezzo Mezzo's strength lies in its spreadable appetizers and rustic atmosphere. In the final analysis, which should include a serving of their admittedly good baklava, Astoria is home to other Greek joints whose grub is equally good for less green.

INFO:
Mezzo Mezzo
31-29 Ditmars Blvd., near 33rd St.
(718) 278-0444

Bakeway NYC: Betty Crocker Would Be Jealous

Banana bread is a fickle thing and so often ends up too crumbly or flavorless.  Not so at Bakeway NYC where the fruity cake emerges from industrial size ovens like it was delivered from the Chiquita Banana girl herself.  Bakeway NYC has traditional cakes and pastries but likes to tweak the normal presentation: carrot cake is served either in pound cake form with no icing or in a bowl of carrot cake cubes floating in a parfait of buttercream icing.   One bite of their chocolate-infused delicacies will make you forget even the most arduous of days. Fighting couples are silenced over the tastiness of Bakeway NYC's apple tarts.  These people should win a Nobel Prize for their peacekeeping work. 

There's also all the usual coffee and beverage choices that accompany cafes, though the seating is somewhat limited.  However, the staff is gregarious and helpful while the decor is a warm wood motif.  Towards the end of the day, there is a hot food bar, though that is largely neglected by both staff and patrons.  For lunch, there is a selection of pre-made salads and yogurt options that never crest the $5 mark.  Beware the chocolate croissants if you ever want to see your feet again.

INFO:

Bakeway NYC

25-21 Broadway

718-545-2120

Seva: More Delectable Flavors Than Hindu Gods

With a revolving door of southeast Asian restaurants popping up around the city, another Indian joint is typically met with a wary sigh. It's true that eating out in New York requires a robust sense of skepticism and an iron gut, but diners that pass up a visit to Seva's out of the way storefront on 34th St. and 30th Avenue are missing out on a truly delicious experience. The site of a different Indian restaurant that has since met its demise, Seva's current incarnation of its native cuisine is lovingly crafted by the owner/chef/waiter. Exceedingly gracious and invested in his patrons' dining experiences, the chef's skill with seasoning is seen throughout the menu and smelled in the rich aromas that waft from its downstairs kitchen.

The green chile chicken is his own creation and strikes a creamy, pungent note with its kick of spice and, inexplicably, faint traces of Mexican mole. The chicken Korma is a beautifully prepared example of creative simplicity. Served in a humble bowl and a sprinkling of almond slivers on top, the dish is pared down and liberated from the heavy curry consistency that plagues most Korma attempts. Instead, only the most basic flavors remain but in concentrated form, like a distillation of cashew and coconut. Supple basmati rice accompanies all entrees and is served in abundance.

Seva's menu also caters to vegans and indicates which dishes qualify. In this vein, the butternut squash soup is tasty and brimming with a peppery jolt in every spoonful. The prices are truly low and make receiving the check a surprisingly painless affair. With a name meaning "an act of selfless service," Seva has done us all a favor by setting up shop in Astoria.

INFO:
Seva Indian Restaurant
30-07 34th St.
(718) 626.4440
Official Website

Cafe Bar: Set Aside an Afternoon

Some restaurants transport you with their aromas. Others strike a culinary chord to recreate an Old World atmosphere. Cafe Bar, with its expansive patio shrouded by striped awnings and an air of carefree abandon, does it effortlessly with its decor. The bistro nestled on the corner of 34th Avenue and 36th Street may be dressed like a west coast brunch spot but underneath its sleek, eclectic exterior lies an exceptional eatery in the heart of Astoria.

Barring a sleet-filled afternoon, Cafe Bar's outdoor seating is among the finest perches in the neighborhood. This is partly owing to the crowd: young, lively, mixed, and blessedly low on the track suit quotient. The other draw is the relative seclusion that Cafe Bar has carved out near Kaufman studios and next door to Site, a design store that's heavy on wit and low on price. The menus dwarf the average customer with their overgrown font and extra large girth. All the better to drool over, especially considering their weekday brunch for the professionally-blessed (self-employed) crowd. No matter what time you're rolling out of bed, the Four Grain pancakes are fantastic and taste more like fruit-infused pound cake than ordinary flapjacks. The choices range from banana walnut, mixed berry, and blueberry, to apple. The latter option arrives with two kinds of fruity butter and whole apple slices baked, sideways, into the pancake. Take a photo before diving in.

For more traditional fare, the English Breakfast is tasty chow. The whole grain English muffin is capped with perfectly poached eggs and is accompanied by surprisingly good baked beans and home fries. The grilled tomato is also included just to taunt you into licking the plate clean. The service is good, particularly in light of Cafe Bar's bustling clientele, and the prices are as easy to swallow as the tempting cocktails lining a quarter of the menu. Anyone with a sweet tooth should definitely venture a peak at the dessert offerings, so long as you have full dental benefits and nowhere to be for the next six hours.

INFO:
Cafe Bar
3290 36th St
(718) 204-5273
Official Website

Blackbird's: Voting With Your Tastebuds

If Blackbird's owner, Bobby, ran for president, his platform might go something like this: Just because you're at a bar, doesn't mean you have to scarf down pretzels that bring new meaning to the word "stale". Bars don't have to replicate mini-casinos with no windows, no light and an emphasis on making you forget if it's 5 a.m. or 5 p.m. Lastly, breakfast need not be relegated to the morning hours. Oh, and it's ok to play Sade once in a while.

Musical tastes aside, Blackbird's is an oasis of delectable food and soothing atmosphere for a growing number of neighborhood locals. Dinner under their roof gets better by the dish: Medallions of puff pastry arrive draped in a sumptuous brandy cream sauce flecked with generous cubes of chorizo and mushrooms. The dish delivers a nuanced flavor array that will have you eying inanimate objects to mop up the puddles of remaining sauce: bread, potatoes, napkins, anything porous enough to salvage the leftovers. If your next hankering is for red meat, look no further than the steak tidbits. They're served with au jus and the boulders of steak are cemented to garlic toast and blanketed in melted cheese. It's hearty, juicy, and will hit home the fact that Blackbird's chef was once at the helm of highly-regarded Manhattan restaurants. For the more seafood-inclined, the tilapia and shrimp are accompanied by very respectable fries and are battered to the perfect degree- satisfyingly crunchy without feeling like tempura. Another notable sauce arrives with the fish and its raspberry-vinegar origins come through very well with the mild taste of the tilapia.

The waitstaff is quite attentive and pleasant, if slightly wet behind the ears. That will change as Blackbird's becomes more established and, when compared to some of the European-style service (read: ignoring patrons) at other Astoria joints, this is nothing to complain about. The interior is a long sliver of a space off 30th Avenue and 41st St. whose beginnings were closely monitored by neighborhood foodies. With its gorgeous floor to ceiling (and basically wall-to-wall) windows, the space is full of light during the day and people watching opportunities at night regardless of where you pull up a seat. The prices are reasonable for a bar and impressively low when you consider how difficult it is to decide between The Borough (seasoned chicken delicately stuffed with ham and cheese) and the tempting-looking sliders. In that vein, Blackbird's is not content to let the El Rey Taco Truck and Sunwick monopolize all the late night munchies business. For the folks who believe breakfast should never be confined to blear-eyed mornings, the bar has a separate menu good until 2 am.  It features an egg sandwich that comes with a pint of beer for a mere seven bucks.  Blackbird's for President!

INFO:
Blackbird's
41-19 30th Ave
718-943-6899
Official Website

Zenon Taverna: Greek for "Inconsistent"

With a Bible-length menu, Zenon Taverna has volumes of dinner choices for Greek food enthusiasts and a separate, multi-paged menu devoted to daily specials. Starting off, you're confronted with an Everest-sized bread basket in what seems like a personal challenge from the chef. The pita is worth filling up on but the olive bread should be avoided- unless, of course, you order the Avgolemono. In that case, you'll need a continent-sized slab just to soak up the overpowering lemon concentrate in what should be a subtle soup that shares flavors between chicken, rice, egg and fresh lemon juice with none monopolizing your taste buds.

Recovery is on the way, however. The lamb meatballs are juicy and tender while the spices still let the meat's sweet fattiness shine through. Another flavorful variation, the Keftedes (Cyprus Meatball) are a tasty option for diners who ask only two things of their meat: that it be pork and fried. It's served with shredded potatoes and combines notes of mint, parsley, and onion to round out the taste. Both dishes are recommended in conjunction with the tzitiki, which is smooth-tasting with enough cucumber chunks to make it an appetizer and a half.

The interior is a curious mixture of stucco-walled Old World Charm and not-quite modern murals. Regardless, the owners did an admirable job with an admittedly awkward shotgun space and the restaurant emits a warmth that is sorely missing from much of the avenue. Cash only, Zenon Taverna's prices are slightly higher than some of Astoria's other Greek joints. Ultimately, you're paying for the privilege of taking 25 minutes to peruse the library of menu selections. The service is a bit slow but incredibly friendly with a owner-waiter tag team ready to wish you well as you amble out onto 31st Avenue, loosening your belt by a notch or two along the way. All in all, Zenon Taverna delivers some highlights that are worth revisiting but choosing among its vast variety can seem like Russian roulette. A warning to future gamblers: pick wrong and you may end up with a table full of inconsistent, middle-of-the-road dishes.

INFO:
Zenon Taverna
718-956-0133
34-10 31st Avenue
Official Website

Coming Soon

Formerly the site of an unremarkable Middle Eastern buffet joint, the under-construction Ocean Seafood has the potential to make its mark on Broadway's saturated strip between 35th and 36th Streets. With its spacious interior and front paneled windows, there may be an outdoor cafe in your future that serves more tilapia than tzatiki. With no plans to open soon (the interior looks like culinary crack den with kitchen equipment and industrial wiring scattered everywhere), chowing down on some de-scaled delicacies at Ocean Seafood may have to wait until winter.

Fatty's Cafe: Finally, Some Truth In Advertising

It's no surprise that a place called Fatty's Cafe would serve tasty, drool-inducing burgers, but its location is a bit unexpected at Crescent and Ditmars.   Adding to the mystery, "cafe" is a  bit of a misnomer as Fatty's does a brisk bar business as the night progresses and serves restaurant-worthy grub that would explain the occasional waiting crowd gathered on the sidewalk.  

The bar is always (wo)manned by an exceptionally friendly bartender who will chat you up while you drink down their popular mojitos.  The jalapeno turkey burger is a long-standing neighborhood favorite and there's speculation about whether the main ingredient might be Spanish Fly.  Either way, it's the best kind of culinary drug: delicious, seductive and addictive, with no jail time!   Think of Fatty's as the perfect hangover pit-stop: piles of empanadas, vats of chili and something called Goodles await your weary Sunday morning stomach and bleary eyes.  Also, the salads are a solid option for lighter fare with granny smith apples and almonds smothered in carrot-tahini dressing for the taking.

The interior can go from cozy to crowded quickly but if space is a problem, you can always head next door to Fatty's  sister storefront: Crescent and Vine.  A modest wine bar, it won't staunch your hunger for dinner but does serve a mean antipasto in an inviting setting. With food this delectable and prolonged over-indulgence so easy to pull off, there's a reason they didn't call it Chubby's Cafe.  

INFO:

2501 Ditmars Blvd (at Crescent)

Astoria, NY 11105

(718) 267-7071
Official Website

Sparrow: Will Have You Singing Its Praises

With its bordello-like wallpaper and crowd of regulars, Sparrow projects a slightly standoffish vibe that's promptly dispelled once you commandeer a bar stool. The scene is reminiscent of more out-of-the-way Brooklyn bars before that borough's great exodus of priced-out residents paved the way for young trust funders born in an era when Saved By the Bell was considered ironic.

The dinner menu far surpasses typical pub fare in both selection and quality. Exhibit A: The Bifteki comes as two sizable football-shaped portions of ground and marinated beef. With serious seasoning and a hearty yogurt-dill-cucumber dip, the Bifteki is nicely complimented by a heaping pile of herb fries that will have you shoveling them in by the fistful. The grilled cheese sandwich, famed among long-time Astoria residents, is nothing to laugh at with a mixture of quality ingredients and piping hot delivery. Most entrees ring up at a reasonable nine dollars and the service is good. Sparrow serves the kind of food that dinner companions will steal off your plate when you leave for the bathroom so you best hold it in or bid your herb fries goodbye.

Another reason to venture past Sparrow's matte-black door is, of course, the beer selection. You could throw a dart, blindfolded and tipsy, at a map of the world and there's a good chance it would land on a country whose beer is served at this bar. Japan, Jamaica, Italy, are just the beginning of a beer list that's rounded out by the brew titans of England, Germany and Belgium. Sparrow has also infused its wine list with enough flavor diversity to entice the causal guzzler.

INFO:
Sparrow Bar
24-01 29th St.
718-606-2260
Official Website