Back in 2018, I wrote, “The food was surprisingly good, and it’s not pricey at all. They give you free sides of rice and beans, so no worries about ordering that.” Now that I am working out of Midtown and fairly close to some of these Brazilian restaurants, I’ve been curious to try some of them again especially after the pandemic. I don’t recall the decor being as “fancy” before, but the menu looked more refined and sophisticated in a good way.

Good XLB. Was flavorful, BUT the price is pretty expensive for what you get. The dessert XLB filled with nutella/banana was gimmicky but tasted good.

Where to start with this. I loathe cash only places considering the price of this is not exactly cheap. The U & I bowl was really good but not for +$20. The bowl was rather small although the ingredients were pretty fresh. The flying pig bowl was the biggest disappointment I’ve had. The broth was just OK. It’s subtly different than the normal tonkatsu style broth. I also opted for an ounce of the jamon iberico.

The clams were OK. The Nola clams were better than the casino. The casino was so oversalted by the bacon such that you couldn’t taste the clams at all. The shrimp beignets were forgotten. The most memorable items were the crawfish dip and the cornbread. The crawfish dip was really good and had a lot of flavor to it. The cornbread was super buttery and was nice as well.

We ordered a slew of appetizers. The drink fir trade. The blood sausage, bread, and chicken liver mousse was just OK. There wasn’t much memorable about it. The iberico katsu sandwich was surprisingly very good, and I could probably eat a handful of these easy. The main course, cote de boeuf, was pretty good. I actually did not care too much about the sauces, but the quality of the meat was pretty good and tender.

The lomo saltado was ok. The sauces cost 60 cents extra.

This place was really good for Thai food. Would love to come back again for their Tom Yum noodle soup and their soft shell crab special. Price was not expensive at all either.

This was in a small mall, and it was pretty good. We got the eclairs and apple flan.

This place is CASH ONLY. The chocolate fondu was good, but the cheese that we got was just ok. The meat quality was pretty good with the wine broth.

The pho was ok, and so was the dried vermicelli. It’s a bit expensive for what you get, but also not bad. I probably would still prefer to go to other Vietnamese places, though good Vietnamese places are hard to find in Manhattan. The decor is nice, but food wise - if anyone likes this place, I don’t trust their palette.