In September, the restaurant Parkside Meadow opened its doors for service at the northeast corner of Russell Street and Parkside Avenue in North Buffalo. The restaurant occupies a painstakingly renovated property that previously housed the Park Meadow, a onetime bar and neighborhood institution that in its later stages of operation was infamous for the raucous behavior of its largely college-age patrons. That particular iteration of 2 Russell Street shuttered years ago, and aside from a likeness in name, Parkside Meadow bears no resemblance to its notorious predecessor. But that doesn’t mean Parkside Meadow pays no heed to the deep roots…
Author: Caitlin Hartney
Crush Juicery opened for service recently inside the quick-service Elmwood Village restaurant Newbury Street Cafe—known for its health-conscious build-your-own salad, quinoa bowl, brown rice bowl, soup, and burrito menu. The addition of Crush Juicery expands the restaurant’s beverage repertoire to include cold-pressed and made-to-order juices, dairy-free and yogurt-based smoothies, and classic coffee drinks by way of a newly installed, full-service Public Espresso coffee bar. Ingredients at Crush Juicery, which run the gamut from apples and bananas to bee pollen and coconut meat, abide by the non-GMO guideline that has been Newbury Street’s calling card since it opened. Flavor combinations, which number in the dozens,…
Superior to McDonald’s. More inspired than Five Guys. Designed to accommodate carnivores, pescetarians, the allergen-averse, and vegetarians with a single menu. (Look! At the corner of Elmwood and Bidwell! It was a Zetti’s! Then it was vacant! Now it’s Hero Burgers!) Yes, it’s Hero Burgers. An alien chain from another country that came to Buffalo offering a fast-food option far beyond those of American mega chains. Hero Burgers! What else can change the course of a former pizza place, satiate hearty Buffalo appetites swiftly and with all-natural ingredients, and who, disguised as a mild-mannered burger joint, fights a never-ending battle…
According to the Buffalo News, we have entered an era of new-school cuisine characterized by a certain cadre of Western New York chefs’ dedication to devising sometimes-offbeat dishes from the ingredients available exclusively to our area. It’s an era we should all be pleased to bear witness to. But in our excitement for the changing culinary landscape, let us not forget the pleasures of old-school Buffalo cuisine, defined by me as approachable ingredients of good quality, but without pedigree, prepared simply at fair prices. When done poorly, it’s a travesty, but that’s true of food in general. When it’s done…
White Cow Dairy’s fermented whey beverages have been written about by the New York Times, NPR, and Serious Eats, and yet they have managed to fly under the radar in Western New York. Which is a shame considering that White Cow Dairy, which gets its milk from Blue Hill Farm in East Otto, New York, about 45 miles outside of Buffalo, may be the only business in the country producing a product of this nature for retail sale. (A cursory Google search suggests it is.) Whey is the acidic, cloudy liquid that collects at the top of yogurt containers, and…
Last Thursday, I peaked at 6:40 a.m. No, that is not a euphemism, but a reference to the literal high point of my day—a confluence of exercise-induced euphoria, physical exhaustion, and a pervasive sense of accomplishment that stayed with me long after the first two wore off. The cause of said pre-dawn apex? Knowing (and feeling in my sweat-drenched quads, glutes, and abs) that I gave it my all at spin class. But this was not just any spin class. I have taken “regular” spin at various gyms over the years to no such effect. This was a 60-minute RevRide,…
Word to the wise: when your bartender and the farmer who grew your dinner are one in the same, you’re probably in for a treat. At least that was my experience recently at Black Sheep, where the bar setup and menu structure are conducive to snacking and plate sharing. After a quick perusal of the printed specials, which read like an ode to localism, a friend and I settled first on the carrots, identified as hailing from Golden Hour Farm in North Collins. “Those are my carrots,” our bartender Kelly reported proudly but demurely. “I grew them.” Turns out, Kelly…
I went to Nickel City Cheese & Mercantile a few days ago intending to sample some of the shop’s lunch fare. Many times before then, I had walked past the small Elmwood shop on my way home from work, tempted by a curbside sandwich board advertising its sweet and savory prepared foods but thwarted in my attempts to visit by bad timing. Either the store was about to close (6 p.m., Monday through Saturday) or I wasn’t particularly hungry—a phenomenon that has been known to happen, albeit rarely. Sure, I had been before to buy cheese and provisions, like Rancho Gordo beans.…
I don’t think I am going out on much of a limb when I say that Jon Karel makes the finest cocktails in town. And at Buffalo Proper—if you’re lucky/savvy enough to avoid the late-night throngs—he has created the kind of bar that makes you want to cozy up and throw back a few. The problem is, “a few” at Buffalo Proper packs a punch, and my only major qualm with the place when it opened last year was a dearth of noshable food. When you serve cocktails as strong as they come at Proper, you need to offer something…