Vandal — Hazzardous Material (girl)

It's a Friday night in the Lower East Side. For anyone who know what the LES looks like on the weekend's knows what I am talking about when I say it was a scene. I felt like I was in the twilight zone. There was so many Eastern European women, one could've thought they were in the USSR. If you weren't speaking Russian, you were gay or black. It was very random crowd to say the very least.

I was with two of the gays and a pseudo straight model. It was Men's Fashion Week an all. It was only fitting to have a model with us. We had a 9:15 PM reservation and showed up closer to 9:40 PM. They gave us this pager circa '97 and told us it would buzz when our table was ready. "WTF! Are you at TGIFridays?" - was my internal dialogue. Seriously! A fucking giant ass pager! Granted this place is huge but there is a thing called technology and texting when your table is ready. This pager thing was a mind fuck!

We walked over to the bar, which was pack but we found a spot to get up to order drinks from. Since there was 4 of us, we decided to just get a bottle of bubbles to start. Why not right? Los ordered a bottle of the Billecart-Salmon Rose. The poured the glasses and put the bottle in front of us very lackadaisical like. We had to ask for a bucket to keep it in. Fucking amateur hour. We just bought a $175 bottle of champagne dip shit, show some respect for the bottle and us! Gees! We realized that this point what level of service we were going to get.

We were seated around 10 PM in a prime people watching spot. However, the people watching was more bizarre than entertaining. Like Harlem meets St. Petersburg. The fashions weren't even that great. I am sorry, I was not about to wear heels knowing I was going to be walking around a lot. These girls in the micro minis and faux Herve Ledger banded dresses...ladies its 30 degrees outside! In the restroom, you have me wearing a tight Pink Floyd "Dark Side of the Moon" t-shirt that is tucked into black wide leg trousers and my laced up boots standing next to a wafer thin Serbian girl in a beige bat-wing micro mini dress and her tan patent leather heels. You couldn't tell where her legs ended and her feet started. Horrible! Hot beige mess!

Upon sitting down, we ordered a few things right off the bat as we were all famished. The Juicy Lucy sliders, sea bass tacos and the pressed New York style pretzel along with a bottle of Meursault. The waitress, who was lovely, jotted everything down and went to put everything in the POS. Our food arrived shortly after but still no wine. She came back and said she had been informed that they didn't have this bottle. We asked if the Somm had suggested anything else in replacement. She kind of looked stunned that we would ask that questions. She simply replied, "no." So we went ahead and ordered another bottle that was half the price. She was like, "okay, which bottle?" We pointed it out to her and she had to write it down! Granted this girl is probably 22/23 years old and obviously doesn't know a lot about wine but if you have a wine list that is only 4 pages....you NEED to know this! You look like a fucking joke otherwise!

We ordered the rest of our menu and the wine came out shortly there after. The first course of sliders, tacos and pretzel was hands down the best thing we ate the entire night. The Juicy Lucy's that are served in a bamboo steam box tower thing is cute, creative and knee bucklingly delicious! Like sex in the mouth good! The pickle that is on the bottle of the was bright, crisp and full of flavor. Everything anyone wants from a cheeseburger and the only reason why I would go back ever again. The pretzel tartare is a very creative way of doing steak tartare. However, I dont see steak tartare as a "street food."

Onward to our next course which included Banh Mi, Red Snapper Toastadas, Thai Papaya Salad, Peruvian Ceviche and Crispy Bao Buns. None of these dishes are seriously anything to write about. The Banh Mi was made with an arepa as the bread. Which isnt a Banh Mi! It's actually an insult to the Banh Mi in my opinion. The Red Snapper Toastadas was drenched in lime that's all you can taste. The Thai Papaya Salad, again not a "street food," was basic and nothing to write home about. Lemongrass toasted peanuts. Please! That sounds so contrived and borderline offensive. The Bao Buns were bland, flavorless. The brisket tasted like it was leftovers from the previous week's Sabbath. The ceviche was strictly red onion and leche de tigre. That is all you could taste.

Dessert wasn't anything special either. We got their version of a s'more. The only thing that I actually enjoyed was the graham cracker ice cream. That was delicious and spot on. The marshmallow fluff shit they put on top of dry semi sweet chocolate ganache was horrible. I would've preferred a Honey Maid Graham Cracker with 2 squares of Hersey's Milk chocolate and a melted marshmallow for a 1/4 of the price any day of the week!

Presentation was spot on with all of the dishes along with the concept. However, the flavors missed the mark by a long shot. I think this place is suppose to be for those people who don't know or appreciate food and just want to be in a cool environment. Which is exactly what Tao Restaurants are good for. However, for someone that actually wants to get really well, you can skip this place and go to Uncle Boon's around the corner. They have a cool space and delicious food! If you have to go here, just get multiple orders of the Juicy Lucy and you will be happy!

Overall Rating:

Environment: Trendy

Noise Level: 8/10

Food: Mediocre

Good For: Large groups, being up in the scene and for people in their 20's or having a midlife crisis