Inoteca

One of my favorite joints for sharing plates, Inoteca can be busy busy busy on any given night for dinner. And for good reason, the food's fun, different, and creative. We tried 3 types of bruschettas, from top left goes gorgonzola cheese with grapes, white bean puree, and ricotta with marinara. White bean was the least favorite as it's not very flavorful compared to the other cheesy two.

DIY -  brush olive oil onto baguette sliced diagonally, bake till crispy, then spread with crap loads of spreadable cheese, kosher salt, fresh cracked pepper and your favorite toppings. I always love the sweet n salty combo, try fig with ricotta!

Another excellent selection was their bresola panini - bresola (aged dried beef), arugula, pears and parmesan. If you like prosciutto, you definitely need to try bresola, less layers of fat and hint of sweetness from the salty beef, not from the pears I swear.

Polenta with cabbage, cauliflower, raisins - not the most exciting dish...rather boring actually. Polenta was grilled till it's crispy on the outside and soft inside, but lacked flavor. Sorry chef, needed salt and for $15, I could have bought 10 boxes of polenta and a head of cabbage and made this shit my damn self.

Polpette - aka giant meatballs, were unfortunately also a big miss. It tasted like nothing but ground beef with shitloads of peppers. To give them the benefit of the doubt, it was winter and tomatoes are not in season...but season this shit then, man! It is what it is, protein + fat and a waste of calories. And for $12 for 3 balls, you're better off ordering another panini.

Then there's the truffled egg toast - good yes, but eh. 
Giant Texas style thick cut toast slathered with butter, topped with egg, cracked pepper and truffle oil on a bed of asparagus. You can definitely smell and taste the truffle oil, but still nothing to go coocoo for cocoa puffs over. 

DIY - if you wanna impress someone or fake it that you spent a shitloads of $$ on truffles, just get a bottle of the oil and add a dash (DASH ONLY, any more and your shit will taste bitter) to toast, pasta, risotto, etc. 

The most memorable dish actually was the one I have no photo of: salad. Gawd how I love vegetables, it was shaved radiccio, endive, toasted pistachio and gorgonzola dressing but what made the dish so wonderful were the shaved butternut squash. SHAVED, I know I know, it's not that hard to shave squash, but WHY have I never thought about shaving squash and tossing it my salads? I don't know, but that shit is wonderful and complimented the salty, sweet, crunchy salad perfectly. 

Another no fail dessert - affogato. Literally just a scoop of vanilla ice cream with a shot of hot espresso poured on top. It's good, but how can you go wrong with caffeine over ice cream. The hot n cold combo is always amazing. We tried another dessert that was some pumpkin custard and tasted NOTHING like pumpkin. We thought they accidentally gave us a creme brulee, but the waiter was like "no, that's it, the pumpkin custard" and we ate that shit, we were thinking they must have ran out of pumpkin too...skip the dessert calories, nothing special here

FYI - if you're itching for a panini and the wait's insane, head a few stores down to Bruschetteria. Super cute, comfy, muuuch cheaper spot with awesome paninis.

Inoteca

Neighborhood: Lower East Side 98 Rivington Street x Ludlow  

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Salt Bar

What do you do on a cooold stormy winter late Sunday night? Go out for beer to get warm of course! Salt Bar is now one of my favorite spots for bar bites and beer. Very rustic casual atmosphere with alternative/jazzy music and dim candlelight setting. One long wood communal table and more seats along the windows and wall. Only one chef and one bartender, so I can imagine service will be much slower on warmer nights or weekends.

VERY cheesy beet dish, as you can tell, but at least they don't skimp on blue cheese! Pretty regular combo of blue cheese, orange and beets, very simply dressed ~$8

Devils on Horseback! (Bacon wrapped dates) ~$10 My new addiction, so far I've tried here, Alta, and Boqueria and so far this beats the other two. Maybe it's the balsamic glaze swimming underneath or maybe it's the perfectly cooked bacon wrapped around a juicy plump date... how can you NOT enjoy this? As a matter of fact, how can you not enjoy anything wrapped in bacon? Whoever invented this is a total genius, or maybe a total stoner craving something salty, then something sweet. But that's what makes this so perfect, it has all the tastes and textures in one perfect bite picked up with a tiny toothpick. Sweet yet salty, chewy yet crunchy...ahh devils are heaven

The flatbread was also very tasty ~$10 (+/- a dolla, I forget). We tried the one with proscuitto, sliced figs, and some kind of cheese (I also forget, probably drunk from half a beer by this time) But totally solid and good portion to share, compared to the other teeny tiny dishes. They only offer two varieties of flatbreads, but I recall the other sounded amazing too.


DIY - Devils on Horseback calls for 3 ingredients (4 if you want to stuff it with cheese, highly recommended). Just cut a piece of bacon in thirds, wrap it around a pitted date (stuffed with goat cheese is awesome), stick a toothpick in it and bake till bacon is done. To make the glaze, simmer balsamic vinegar, SIMMER DAMN YOU, NOT BOIL, patience is key...until it reduces to a heavy thick syrup and wah-la...spoon a quarter size amount onto plate and top with the devils...enjoy in your heaven.

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