Thursday Kitchen (New York, NY) – This was our last dinner in New York – and it was my favorite. The vibe was fun, the food was fantastic – and having one last meal with all of my friends was really nice.
My kewl Brooklyn friends had been talking about Thursday Kitchen all weekend, so I was definitely looking forward to it. They have good taste – I mean, obviously, they’re my friends. 😉 Originally, they had intended to go to this spot for brunch, but plans kept changing and it became dinner. Thursday Kitchen is in Greenwich Village and it’s an unassuming restaurant that serves “new” Korean – as they like to call it. The dishes are new twists on Korean food with French and Spanish influences.
They don’t take reservations and we were a group of 6, so we did have to put our name down and wait a bit – I think about 30 minutes. There are plenty of shops adjacent to the restaurant so you can stay occupied in the meantime.
Like a lot of New York spaces, it seems smaller on the inside but goes down further back into the building. I don’t have great pictures of the interior (also why my food photos aren’t ~perfect~) but it’s pretty minimal and dark at night with wood furnishings. The menus were super random in that they had covers of kids books on one side. I guess it plays into into this vibe that it’s a place for big/grown up kids.
This is their featured drink that they serve – adult Capri Suns! My friends ordered them in their various flavors – like strawberry, lychee, or lemon soju. I really liked the pouches and the lit up ice cubes! Gives me ideas for foodstyling, actually.
All of the dishes are small plates, so they’re meant to be shared with the table. We ordered a mix of things since a couple of us have dietary restrictions, so there was some meat and some vegetarian dishes. The Avocado was one of my favorites! It’s avocado served with greens vinaigrette, pickled radish, yuzu sour crème, and shichimi pepper. It’s such a light dish that surprisingly has a lot of flavor with the sauces and the pickled radishes. It also felt very fresh. I will admit I initially ordered it because I saw how pretty it looked on Instagram but the ingredients is what made me bite the bullet and order it.
The Steak was one dish I did not try, because it was served medium-rare, and my friends liked it that way. It had a soy-garlic glaze, feta grits, and sautéed kale. Though the sides sounded amazing, I just left it alone in case of cross-contamination, but they ate it up real quick, so it’s safe to say that it was tasty.
I know, this is a pretty basic dish to get at a restaurant that has so many creative options, but everyone loves fried chicken! Their Korean popcorn chicken is served with a sweet and spicy sauce and topped with black sesame crumbles. It’s a classic but they did it well – and it does have a good amount of spice! I liked it a lot!
I don’t know what it was about this macaroni and cheese, but I think it was one of the best I’ve ever had – and I’ve been to Homeroom. Their Truffle Mac and Cheese has manila clams, basil, fontina, gruyere, and mozzarella. It just had so much flavor thanks to that truffle oil and wasn’t overly cheesy (SOMEHOW). Idk man, we ate it up so quick.
We also ordered the Kimchi Paella, which had white tiger shrimp, mussels, saffron, caramelized kimchi, and parmigiana, resulting in a cheesier, risotto like texture. This was pretty good but there was one flavor that was a little off-putting to me – and it may have been the mussels since I’ve eaten everything else enough times. If you’re good with mussels, then I would recommend ordering this, it’s nice and filling, so it complements the lighter dishes.
This was a dish we ordered but it didn’t come on time with the others. We did ask them to bring it out since we had a vegetarian in our group. The Mapo Tofu also had green lentils, radish kimchi, fermented chili bean sauce, and house-made tortilla chips. I would have enjoyed this, but it was too spicy – in the sense that the heat overpowered all of the other flavors so I couldn’t taste anything else. I love spicy food, but not to the point where I can’t taste anything! Our vegetarian really enjoyed it, however.
And last but not least – dessert! I needed dessert after that last minute heat, and I had been contemplating ordering this all night. AND IT WAS WORTH IT. I mean, it’s two of my favorite things in one. This glorious dish you see above is Popcorn Ice Cream, and it’s essentially vanilla ice cream with caramelized popcorn and a salted caramel sauce. But somehow, the ice cream itself felt infused with a caramel popcorn flavor too! It was really good and a great palette cleanser after having so many flavors all night.
Thursday Kitchen is really worth visiting – especially if you’re in a group. There’s so many fun dishes to try, the ambiance inside is fun but casual, and the staff there is friendly too!
bay-food.com 