After having a terrible experience at Better Burger, I was hesitant to try New York Burger Company; I didn’t want to be disappointed with another burger place in my neighborhood. On Saturday, after a full day of running around, Chris and I decided to check out New York Burger Co. because we were in the mood for burgers and didn’t feel like schlepping uptown to JG Melon. The windows facing the street have a ton of awards for best cheeseburger, best onion rings, etc., so we figured it couldn’t be that bad (boy were we wrong). I ordered a cheeseburger with cheddar cheese:

First of all, does that even look appetizing? At all? No. Didn’t think so. My burger was slightly ORANGE on the inside AND it was INCREDIBLY dry. The cheese tasted disgusting and greasy (similar to Better Burger’s).

Chris ordered the “Dallas Burger,” which is a burger with Monterey jack cheese, sauteed onions, and barbecue sauce:

Equally disgusting…we couldn’t even FINISH our burgers. There was no juice in the meat and truthfully, it didn’t even TASTE like a burger. We also ordered a chocolate shake and fries:

Let me start with the fries. Truthfully, they weren’t ABSOLUTELY terrible. They were sort of like the fries you buy in amusement parks; greasy and slightly soggy, but not bad (especially compared to the shake and burgers). Not too bad, especially since we had 10 different dipping sauces for them. The chocolate shake, on the other hand, was the grossest chocolate shake I’ve ever tried. It was supposed to be made with ice cream and chocolate sauce - it tasted like it was made with Nesquick powder, milk, and ice cubes.

The best part of the meal was returning the “chocolate shake” - I told the cashier that it was the absolute worst shake I’d EVER tried in my life and that it was pretty terrible that the restaurant was passing it off as a chocolate shake. I will absolutely NEVER go back and I’d probably only recommend the place to my sworn enemies.

Ronnybrook Farm’s Milk Bar is quickly becoming one of my favorite brunch spots in the city. Their service is fast, the waiters are (sometimes) friendly, and the food is delicious. Chris and I initially went to Milk Bar for some vanilla ice cream (after spending a night watching those Chevy commercials of the guy making a vanilla sundae with hot fudge and whipped cream), but we were pleasantly surprised when we realized they served actual food as well. Earlier in the day we had some chicken noodle soup, but we decided to have another breakfast before enjoying our sundaes.

On the weekends, Milk Bar serves their eggs all day (which is what we were in the mood for - yay!). We decided to just order the egg in the hole and share it since we had soup a couple hours before and weren’t that hungry:

The egg in the hole is served on rye toast with Grafton cheddar cheese, two slices of applewood bacon, and a side of potatoes. The cheese, egg, meat, and bread combination was a treat and we were still hungry afterwards, so we decided to order macaroni and cheese as well:

I don’t think I’ve ever had a cheesier mac and cheese - it was just layers and layers of gooey cheese mixed with macaroni noodles. The rye bread also tasted really good when I dipped it into the mac and cheese (because mac and cheese alone doesn’t have enough carbs).

After our satisfying lunch, we ordered a hazelnut sundae (they ran out of vanilla!!!):

Whole hazelnuts, ice cream that’s not too sweet, tons of fudge and whipped cream. We devoured the entire thing (and licked the cup afterwards!).

We are so obsessed with Milk Bar that we’ve been back a couple more times since (the other time we went on a weekday afternoon and they weren’t serving eggs). One of the servers has a scowl tattooed on her face, but the other servers are all friendly. Portions are large and everything is under $10, so you can try a bunch of items if you’re in the mood.

Seating is limited to a couple of stools, but the general feel of the restaurant is very warm and welcoming:

You can also pick up yogurt, ice cream, or milk to bring home with you. Try their creamline milk - it’s the closest thing you can get to milk straight from the cow:

The chocolate milk is also supposedly delicious, but I didn’t have any room left in my stomach to sample anything else.

How to get to Milk Bar:

Ronnybrook Farm’s Milk Bar
75 9th Avenue between 15th and 16th
New York, NY 10011
212-255-7990

After David and I found our new apartment, we were wandering around Chelsea and wanted to get a quick bite to eat. David suggested Qdoba, but I’m not a big fan (I like Chipotle more), so we decided to try Better Burger. I walk by the place a lot, but have never stopped by because Chris said he didn’t like the place. Since Chris wasn’t with us, David and I stopped by and ordered cheeseburgers and fries:

Better Burger has antibiotic, hormone, and nitrate free meat, organic fries, and organic buns. My cheeseburger might have been healthy compared to a McDonald’s burger, but it lacked any taste and was extremely greasy:

A “healthy” burger shouldn’t lack all kinds of taste, SHOULD IT?! Better Burger’s meat was dry and their cheese was greasy; there were more condiments than anything else on the burger. I ordered a value meal that also came with fries:

The fries are supposedly more “airy” than other places, but I found them to be really stale and tasteless.

If you’re in the mood for a burger around the Chelsea area, skip Better Burger and go to Corner Bistro instead.

As a kid living in the midwest, the closest I ever got to Eleni’s cookies was a Dean and Deluca catalog. Moving to New York allowed me to finally see the cookies IRL (sensory overload!):

Eleni’s has the most beautifully decorated sugar cookies and it makes me act like a fat kid in a candy store. The store is all white with countertops of packaged sugar cookies and Godiva chocolates. For Easter, they turned Christmas trees upside down, hung them from the ceiling, and placed egg-shaped sugar cookies all over the tree:

After a lazy Saturday afternoon strolling around Chelsea market, I walked into Eleni’s and found out that everything behind their counter was HALF OFF. Yes, you read that correctly - an hour before they close, all of the cookies, cupcakes, and other sweets are 50% off, forcing you to purchase twice as much. I bought a chocolate chip cookie, a penguin sugar cookie, and this pink cupcake with sprinkles:

Proudly displaying my purchase:

To tell you the truth, the cupcake wasn’t that great. The icing wasn’t sweet enough and tasted too buttery and thick. Also, the actual cupcake was a little stale (probably because it had been sitting outside the entire day). The cookies, on the other hand, were incredibly good and I licked the bag afterwards to make sure I got all of the crumbs. I kept the penguin cookie overnight for a Sunday morning treat and ate the penguin body part by body part giving myself a little party in my mouth. I’ll definitely be back for the cookies, but not the cupcakes - I’d rather go to Billy’s!

How to get to Eleni’s:

Eleni’s
75 9th Avenue between 15th and 16th
New York, NY 10011
212-255-7990

Today, I went to Chelsea Market (my new favorite hangout) to pick up some skate for dinner. While I was there, I was tempted to stop by Milk Bar to have some ice cream and an egg in the hole, but I remembered Milk Bar only serves their egg dishes for breakfast during the weekdays (they’re served all day on the weekends, if you’re interested). Instead of waiting until the weekend, I decided to buy the ingredients to make the dish myself. I asked the guys at the counter of Milk Bar if they knew where they got their bacon and cheese, but they told me their meat and cheese came from a store in Brooklyn that only sells wholesale.

Since I wasn’t getting very far on my egg in the hole adventure, I decided to pick up a loaf of whole wheat bread from Amy’s (they were sold out of rye bread!!) and improvise. On my way out, Adam Roberts, the host of The FN dish (and author of The Amateur Gourmet), stopped me in the street to chat with Robin Miller, host of Quick Fix Meals with Robin Miller. We started talking about making eggs in the hole and Robin gave me some tips (I’ve never made one before, but it seemed like an easy task). After chatting with Robin and Adam, I stopped by Murray’s cheeses for some cheese and bacon (Grafton cheddar and applewood bacon). Here are all of the ingredients:

Any type of bread will do, but I really like the taste of rye with this dish. Since rye wasn’t available, the next option for me was whole wheat (just as tasty and it has more of a bite than white bread). I originally bought some turkey bacon, but when I was at Murray’s, I saw Niman Ranch applewood bacon without nitrates or nitrites, so I picked it up as a special treat (at $10 for 9 slices, it’s expensive!). You can use turkey bacon (or regular bacon) if you can’t find applewood. Grafton cheddar is aged for a year and I think it’s sharper than other cheddars. If you can’t find Grafton, try using a sharp cheddar instead. You’ll also need eggs (organic are the best but any egg will do) and butter.

Step 1:

After you assemble all of your materials, slice a piece of bread (about 3/4 inch thick) and use a cup to cut a hole in the center of the slice. Robin Miller uses a biscuit cutter to make the hole, but I have no biscuit cutter and have no intention of buying one anytime soon. You can use a cookie cutter to make cool designs if you have them. After I made the hole in the bread, I toasted it and spread butter on both sides.

Step 2:

Bacon on the skillet - I don’t use extra butter or oil because there’s so much fat already (but you’re welcome to do so if you’d like).

Step 3:

Place the bacon on paper towels to get rid of excess oil. There should be a little puddle of oil in the pan - don’t pour that down the kitchen sink!! Put it in a container and throw it out in the garbage (otherwise the fat will congeal and it’ll be a huge mess). It’s okay to let the bacon cool because we’ll be putting it on the egg in the hole and throwing it in the oven.

Step 4:

Crack the egg and place it in the pan with the bread. There might be some leakage of the egg white, but it’s okay!!

Step 5:

I like a runny yolk so I didn’t flip over the toast, but if you have children, it’s a good idea to cook the egg all the way through. After the egg is cooked for about 2 minutes (you’ll notice that the egg white is cooked through on the bottom), put a piece of cheddar on top and add the bacon as well.

Step 6:

Throw the skillet into the oven (I set it on broil). I let it go in for about 3 minutes, but it depends on your oven (just watch to make sure the cheese melts).

Step 7:

Out of the oven!

Step 8:

Gooey egg yolk!

Success!

If I were to make it again (and I will be making it again in the morning), I’d make sure cheese covered all of the bread (healthy, I know). Also, I’d add another piece of bacon.

I hope you enjoyed my egg in the hole tutorial - I’m going to try taping some of them for a youtube/vimeo show soon and I’ll post them here once I finish. Let me know if you try making eggs in the hole and whether or not it was a success!