By Caroline Grogan By Caroline Grogan | September 20, 2021 | Food & Drink,
Gotham Guide is a weekly list of new restaurants, special menus and pop-ups throughout New York City. Support local businesses and head out on a culinary adventure with our suggestions below.
Fall is officially in the air, and as the seasons change so do NYC’s restaurant offerings. This week sees the reopening of Venezuelan restaurant Casa Ora with a new tasting menu, the debut of Bandits’ brunch menu and new DIY delivery offerings from Temakase. Head over to Milu for a Mid-Autumn Festival feast and to Schaller & Weber’s Oktoberfest pop-up to celebrate the season.
See also: 5 Tips to Adopt a More Plant-Based Lifestyle From The Bizerkeley Vegan
Temakase
157 2nd Ave / Website
Omakase hand roll restaurant Temakase is the perfect destination for high quality sushi in the East Village that doesn’t break the bank. With a prime location featuring a chic sushi bar and sit-down restaurant, Temakase offers the freshest fish, crisp seaweed and warm rice meant to be consumed right away. New menu offerings include a wagyu handroll as well as two handroll delivery boxes. The standard DIY delivery box includes tuna, salmon, shrimp, yellowtail and spicy scallop while the high roller DIY box includes toro, lobster, ikura salmon, wagyu beef and uni.
Bandits
44 Bedford St / Website
Bandits, a 70’s-inspired watering hole from the team behind Borrachito and The Garret Bars, now offers a weekend brunch menu with elevated American diner classics and a to-die-for cocktail menu. Brunch food items include a BEC with maple pepper bacon on a brioche bun, vegan biscuit and gravy, Challah French toast with bourbon-infused maple syrup and huevos rancheros. The cocktail menu includes a Cappelletti spritz as well as four varieties of bloody marys. Stop by on Saturdays and Sundays from 12pm to 4pm to experience Bandits’ new brunch offerings.
Casa Ora
148 Meserole St / Website
Following their recent expansion and reopening, Brooklyn’s very own farm-to-table Venezuelan-American restaurant is now offering a limited-edition tasting menu in celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month. Casa Ora’s “Abuelita’s Tasting Menu” is a $65 per person, six course tasting menu offered from 9/15 to 10/15 in the restaurant’s cozy interior with velvet couches, Persian rugs and vintage art. The menu highlights Venezuelan favorites including heirloom tomato salad, summer ceviche, tender beef brisket and a passionfruit mousse for dessert.
Milu Mid-Autumn Festival
333 Park Ave S / Website
September 21st marks this year’s Mid-Autumn Festival, a holiday where family and friends gather to celebrate the full moon, give thanks for a bountiful harvest and spend time with one another. Milu, a casual Chinese restaurant located near Madison Square Park and inspired by Hong Kong-style cafes, is now offering a Mid-Autumn Festival Feast for one day only. The $188 menu includes Mandarin duck, sticky rice with mushroom and Chinese sausage, peppers and tofu with a cilantro yuzu sauce, a walnut pie with sesame and salted egg yolk and much more. The feast serves three to four people and is available for pickup at Milu from 2pm to 8pm on the 21st.
jcoco
In honor of Hunger Action Day on September 17th, jcoco, a women-powered confections company under the Seattle Chocolate Company umbrella, has released a limited-edition set of chocolate bars available through September 30th. The set includes three chocolate bars flavored edamame sea salt, cayenne veracruz orange and single varietal contamana cacao, with each flavor representing one of the three food banks that jcoco has partnered with to donate a portion of the proceeds. For each Hunger Action Day bar sold, jcoco will donate fresh servings of food to the Food Bank for New York City, San Francisco-Marin Food Bank and Northwest Harvest.
Schaller & Weber’s Oktoberfest Pop-Up
1652 2nd Ave / Website
With October right around the corner, Schaller & Weber’s newly-launched Oktoberfest is the perfect place to toast to the start of fall with beers on tap from Bavarian brewery Weihenstephan, the oldest brewery in the world. Until the end of October, seasonal restaurant Blume/Hutte will remain transformed into an Oktoberfest wonderland with an Austrian and German-inspired menu featuring dishes such as the classic jumbo pretzel, fried camembert with lingonberries, veal wiener schnitzel served with potato salad and crepes served with apricot jam. Look out for select nights featuring live Bavarian music.
Photography by: Bandit's
