Best Grilled Sandwich in Brooklyn!

We've all been to BBQ contests and there are plenty of contests for baked goods of all sorts, but have you ever been to a "Best Grilled Sandwich" contest?  You may have since this years will be the third annual but if you haven't you can this Saturday 3pm at The Amazing Garden (Carroll and Columbia).  It's $15 to get in and all revenue will go to beautify the garden.  Competitors this year are Lauren Rauh of Iris Cafe, Josh Kaplan of Dassara, and Morgan Jarrett of Nightingale 9.  Hosting the event is Dan Pashman.  Come out and you be the judge!

Our Night at Dassara.

Here's a short review of Dassara.   Mmmmmm.  The food is delicious and the atmosphere is nice and laid back.  The best part was that on a weekend night, though the place was pretty busy, we didn't have to wait long for a table at all.  The photos above are of an eggplant and nori dish and their fried chicken steamed buns and the one below is called Deli Ramen, which has smoked pastrami from Mile End and matzoh balls.  Sorry but we couldn't help but take a couple of nibbles before taking these pics.  It's lucky we even captured these before devouring them, though.  Our cream puff we had for dessert wasn't so lucky.

Dassara Review.

We blogged about Dassara just prior to it's opening and shortly afterwards before we had heard any buzz about it's success.  Well, reviews are in!  One big one at least.  TimeOut New York featured the ramen joint in this weeks magazine and gave it four stars!  For those of you who don't read TimeOut, they don't give out their stars willy nilly so that's a really good review.  As you can see the matzoh ball ramen with smoked meat from Mile End above, which was taken by TimeOut, looks amazingly delicious and worthy of all of those stars! Good ramen. Check. Now we just need an awesome upscale Chinese restaurant.

Dassara Hot Opening

Last week Dassara, the new Japanese noodle place on Smith Street, was featured in TimeOut Magazine's "Hot Opening" section.  And it is, indeed, a hot opening.  As we passed by the restaurant this past weekend the dining room was busy at a very early dinner hour and people kept stopping in to check out the menu.  The main photo in TimeOut was of their "Deli Ramen", which is a chicken broth base with matzoh balls and Mile End smoked meat.  Another noodle dish they have on the menu that is just as unique has clams and salted chilis.  Those and a mushroom ramen are actually the only three ramen dishes they have for now.  The menu is their soft opening menu  and has a handful of "not ramen" selections also, including fried chicken buns, broiled oysters with miso-glazed bacon, and a tomato salad also with miso-glazed bacon.  Sounds mmmmm.  We can't wait to try it.  If you have let us know how it was!