Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan

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Brushstroke: Art on a Plate

In New York, the city that has pretty much seen it all, when one of the more intriguing restaurant concepts in recent memory finally opens its doors after three years in the works, important writing deadlines simply have to (temporarily) be damned.

After a long fascination with and love for Japanese food, David Bouley, the American restaurateur behind New York’s upscale French standard Bouley, finally dipped his spatula into the country’s culinary heritage in April, opening Brushstroke in TriBeCa, a collaboration with the Tsuji Culinary Institute in Osaka that was conceptualized as an homage to the cuisine. (The name is a nod to the artistry that goes into Japanese food presentation.)

We were curious to see what a French-inflected American chef and some of Japan’s best culinary instructors would cook up. So with great appetites, we closed our laptops and off we went …

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Snack Dragon: Toothsome Taco Truck Fare

One of the great things about this recent book busyness has been the nudge it’s given me to venture into unfamiliar territory.

While it’s true that I have managed to eat my way through impressive swaths of New York City in my eight years as a New Yorker, there are some rather untouched spots in in my eating landscape. Based purely on subway inconveniences (and my great sloth) the gastronomically rich far East Village, sadly, is one of them.

So when I recently found myself in that neighborhood, still coming down from the high of having just met and read with the lovely Gabrielle Hamilton, chef of Prune and author of “Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef,” at KGB Bar and completely ravenous from our joint reading from our food memoirs, the stomach, naturally, started calling.

“Mmm … Snack Dragon,” my friend Noa said, her eyes getting so large I instantly could envision them popping out of their sockets. When she started smacking her lips at the thought of the place, I knew we had to go.

Despite the raves that this little taco stand has gotten in the five years it’s been around, I’d never been there. From Noa’s look of utter shock, clearly, this was something that needed to be remedied. Pronto.

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Colonie: Style Over Substance

Saturday night in Brooklyn Heights and the unthinkable finally happened.

Striking up a conversation at the new restaurant Colonie with a group of people who were kitted out with the glaring symbols of current New York hipster-ness — the plaid shirt, the Bear-like beard, the professorial Mad Men-style glasses — we discovered that they were, as suspected, definitely not of the staid stroller-central that is Brooklyn Heights.

No, this group hailed from Williamsburg, home of the impossibly fashion-forward and often sneering of other lesser neighborhoods. Not only that, they had traveled to Brooklyn Heights because they had heard of Colonie and were curious to check it out — quite possibly marking the first time that a restaurant in my neighborhood has garnered the level of buzz to encourage this type of stunning reverse migration.

The anticipation of Colonie’s opening has been palpable for months. For starters, the restaurant smartly began generating chatter about its plans by raising more than $15,000 on Kickstarter last fall to obtain “sexy kitchen appliances, beautiful pendant lamps, and cool tiles for the wall.” By the time the restaurant finally removed the paper shrouding its glass doors in February, locals (and out of towners) began packing its sleek bar stools right away.

Would it live up to the hype? We were keen to find out …

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Jones Wood Foundry: Easy Peasy Comfort Food

It has been said that I am something of an Anglophile.

Which is probably unsurprising given that I grew up in Singapore, a former British colony that still prizes its high teas and bangers and mash despite having developed its own formidable — and unique — cuisine in the centuries since the Brits first landed.

So when I was dragged to the new Jones Wood Foundry on the Upper East Side recently — a little reluctantly, I have to admit, given its distance from where I live — things started looked better the moment menus appeared. Haddock and chips, hearty pork pie, steak and kidney pie and, of course, bangers and mash — this gastropub had it all.

A round of drinks was immediately ordered. Dinner was suddenly in the cards …

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Yemen Cuisine: A Lovely Taste of Yemen in Brooklyn

It’s highly likely that if you were to look up mentions of Yemen Cuisine online, you might just end up never going to this little Brooklyn eatery.

“This place is a total dump,” reads one Yelp review. “Dingy” and “food all over the table and floors” pop up in other accounts.

Many of the best meals I’ve had have taken place in locales of questionable hygiene, however.  In fact, in Singapore, where I’m originally from, if you’re dining at a hawker center (essentially an outdoor food court) the spiffier the place, the more you should be suspicious. Anyone who has to rely on such bells and whistles as unsticky seats and clean tables, after all, clearly is making up for his lackluster food.

So when a friend who’s an intrepid traveler and eater suggested meeting at Yemen Cuisine for lunch, I was undeterred …

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