Free Williamsburg

The Williamsburg Brooklyn-based culture guide to New York and beyond.

Acapulco

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A wonderful, atmospheric Mexican diner at the end of Manhattan Avenue in Greenpoint. Start with the fresh tortilla chips and guacamole and move on to the Carnitas (roasted pork) or Chorizo (spicy sausage) Tacos. Portions are huge, so be sure not to over-order. One bite and you’ll be transported to a bustling counter joint in Mexico City. The Tortas — the Mexican version of a sandwich – are stellar as well. It doesn’t get any more authentic than Acapulco.

Featured Reviews

  • The enormous signboard menu behind the counter carries both Mexican and American basics from soft tacos to tuna melts with fries. A few surprises include tacos cecina, a sort of Spanish beef jerky with cilantro, onions and white sauce in a soft corn tortilla, and the Crunch French Toast made with thick fluffy slices of challah dredged in batter and coated in crushed corn flakes. The food’s not San Diego quality, but nothing comes out too badly and it’s all exceedingly cheap.

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Amarin Cafe

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Amarin is our go-to Thai joint for a reliably good meal. We’re never blown away, but the food is satisfying when we’re looking for affordable Thai cuisine. We like their Chicken Masaman Curry and their Pad Thai, but everything is done well. The dining room is unremarkable, but comfortable and rarely crowded which is a huge plus. One word of caution: when they say spicy, they mean SPICY. Be sure to order mild or medium unless you can handle it.

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  • This no-frills Thai spot by McCarren Park promises flavorful fare at a low price. It’s great for such standbys are pad thai, curry, and satay, but also be sure to check out some of their house specials– the basil shrimp sauteed in onion, pepper, and chili sauce is on point. It’s cash only, but they offer free BYOB.

  • If you’re seeking refuge from the wave of glammy Thai spots to hit Williamsburg in recent years, head north, to where the only frills are the local artwork on otherwise bare green walls. All the brilliance here goes into the food: A pair of golden, crisp crab cakes are first good, then great when dunked in rich, coconutty peanut sauce. Basil chicken, ordered medium spiced, is quite hot; shrimp with asparagus is scattered with nicely crunchy cashews.

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Arepera Guacuco

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The arepas are divine in this family-run restaurant. We like the pork, but vegetarians will be happy too. The Vegetariana is a corn arepa filled with cheeses, plantains, avocado, and tomato.

Featured Reviews

  • It’s easy to forget Bushwick’s Latin American influence when surrounded by yoga studios and artisanal coffee shops. But if you want food that speaks to the neighborhood’s history, head to Arepera Guacuco, a lively, family-run Venezuelan restaurant serving food so fresh and flavorful you’ll think you’ve just traveled to South America — all without leaving Brooklyn. You’re here for the arepas, of course, which are small patties made from ground corn and stuffed with fillings like sweet plantains, black beans, and different kinds of meat. The dish dates back to the indigenous people of Venezuela, and even though Arepera Guacuco hasn’t been around for decades, the arepas don’t taste like some Bushwick-ified, ready-for-Instagram take on the traditional — these are real arepas.

  • Like Le Garage, Arepera Guacuco is an intergenerational affair. This time it was the son, Leonard Molina, who convinced his mother, Carmen, to move from Margarita Island, off the coast of Venezuela, to New York and to bring her traditional recipes along. Among them is the arepa pabellón, an old chestnut of Venezuelan cooking; here the pabellón has reached ideal form, the crust crunchy, the beef inside soft, the plantains sweet, and the beans touched by vinegar. The arepas are served fast and fresh at the crowded and slightly chaotic restaurant, but the rest of the menu – including B-sides like pabellón oriental, in which fish stands for beef, and a grilled garlicky king fish — is worth exploration too.

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The Commodore

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The Commodore is the place to go when you’re itching for a campy frozen drink, in a retro setting, with some damn good food to boot. The dive feels like a bar you’d find in Milwaukee in the 70s and once you order a Frozen Pina Colada with Ameretto Float you’ll be transported to that very era. People love The Commodore for its Chicken Sandwich – and with good reason since its made by the same people responsible for Pies n’ Thighs. The menu also features nachos, a burger, and many more artery-clogging delicacies. It’s a great bar so, sure, it gets crowded, but don’t let that keep you away.

Featured Reviews

  • It “looks and acts like a dive bar”, but this Williamsburg standby houses “some of the finest fried chicken and biscuits” going, along with other “revisited” Southern fare and “fabulous cocktails”; its “’70s den” look-alike digs are predictably “packed on weekends”, and the “order-your-food-at-the-bar system isn’t ideal”, but “super-cheap” tabs and an overall “chill vibe” go a long way.

  • First came the gastropub, an import from Britain featuring upmarket pub grub in an ale-drinking setting. Now, welcome the gastrodive, which further blurs the lines between restaurant and bar. The Commodore in Williamsburg, with its old arcade games, Schlitz in a can and stereo pumping out the Knight Rider theme song, offers the city’s best cheap-ass bar eats, served in a seedy venue where folks come to get blotto. The short menu—with descriptions as curt as the service you’ll encounter while ordering your food from the bartender—reads like a classic collection of fryolator junk. But the “hot fish” sandwich, for one, is a fresh, flaky, cayenne-rubbed catfish fillet poking out of both sides of a butter-griddled sesame-seed roll

  • The food is the work of Stephen Tanner, a native of Albany, Ga., who spent much of the last decade working in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, restaurants known for straightforward fare and strong flavors: Diner, Egg, Pies ‘n’ Thighs. Mr. Tanner is talented, but the food at the Commodore shouldn’t be cross-examined too closely. It’s mostly fried, or in a bun, or both. Ingredients are repeated. So are seasonings. So what? The Dead Kennedys never needed more than three chords.

  • In case you aren’t already familiar, The Commodore is a Williamsburg restaurant by Pies ‘n’ Thighs alum Stephen Tanner, and it’s bad for you. Bad because merely looking at the food here will jack up your cholesterol thirty points, and worse because everything is so good that you’ll crave it all the time. Eventually you too will be cutting imaginary deals with your organs to justify frequent visits.

Getting There

The Drift

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A stylized dive in Greenpoint (in the former home of Boulevard Tavern) from the same people behind Williamsburg’s popular bar, The Commodore. There are a handful of booths and a long bar with an assortment of taxidermied critters on the wall, lending the place an off-kilter atmosphere. Pretty solid pub grub is available such as The Hangry Man (a Chopped Rib sandwich) and smaller bites including Chips with Onion dip and Deviled Eggs. There’s a small courtyard that’s open when the weather is warm.

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    • Featured Reviews

    • Brief cocktail menus forgo the team’s signature illustrations, although at this point, you’d have to have taken residence under a rock not to recognize The Commodore (a frozen, pineapple and cherry-speared piña colada with an amaretto float), or even the Orange Julio, an equally frosty El Cortez creation of gin and juice, elderflower and aperol. Neither Stephen Tanner nor Dennis Spina had a hand in the food offerings, but Alabama’s Mamie-Claire Cornelius seems to suit the style just fine. Embracing the exuberant, company-wide white trash tradition of pork boats and taco bowls, she’s devised a familiar, southern-leaning lineup of boiled peanuts and pimento cheese plates, and chopped rib, smoked chicken or mushroom sandwiches with mustard, all devoid of elevated, consciously clever chef embellishments. There may be smoked vidalias in the onion dip, but it’s a bit player next to mountains of Lay’s aggressively salted wavy chips.

    • Giving a swanky-looking redo to the former home of Greenpoint’s Boulevard Tavern, complete with tufted leather banquettes and barstools, this hangout from the Commodore and El Cortez team keeps the menu simple, with Southern-accented food like boiled peanuts, a smoked chicken sandwich and banana pudding.

    • Chris Young and the crew behind Williamsburg favorite the Commodore have a knack for opening bars that are fun and well-executed — just silly enough to never be too serious. They brought that to Bushwick with El Cortez a couple years ago, where you can make a meal out of taco salad and piña coladas, and now they’ve opened the Drift on the Greenpoint border. If El Cortez is Commodore on spring break in Mexico, then the Drift feels like what would happen if you moved it upstate or to Vermont. It’s appropriately cozy, with taxidermied animals, wood walls that wouldn’t be out of place in a ski lodge, leather booths, and a couple arcade games.

    • Occupying the former Boulevard Tavern, which closed in 2015, the Drift sits on a grimy strip of Robert Moses brutalism with six lanes of traffic and the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway churning overhead. Once inside, the two-room, 750-square-foot rectangle is pleasantly schlocky, with retro signs for Schaefer and Busch Bavarian beer, snowshoe lamps and a backlit picture of a serene mountain lake. Patrons on high-backed chairs unsheathe boiled peanuts at the bar or cluster around aluminum empties in padded banquettes.

    • a homey spot serving breezy cocktails and Southern-style food. Frozen drinks like The Commodore — essentially a piña colada — and the gin-and-Aperol Orange Julio gesture to warmer climates (and the owners’ nearby venues), while cans of Modelo are a reminder that simplest is often best. Tufted leather chairs, wooden walls, and taxidermied animals give The Drift a lodge-like feel and set the scene for comfort first-plates like boiled peanuts, a South Carolina-style chopped ribbed sandwich, and pimento on Saltines.

    Getting There

    Karczma

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    Of the handful of Polish restaurants in Greenpoint, Karczma is our favorite. The waitstaff all dress in traditional polish outfits — cheesy but fun — and a handful of polish beers are on tap. The menu consists of hearty Polish classics like pierogis, kielbasa, stuffed cabbage, blintzes, and potato pancakes. A good choice would be to start with the White Borscht soup served in bread and then move on to the Plate of Polish Specialties – which is great to share. Nothing will blow you away, but pair the ambiance with a few Hofbrau Dunkels and you’re in for a good time.

    Featured Reviews

    • Hearty offerings may include peasant-style lard mixed with bacon and spices, or a plate of Polish specialties piled high with pierogies (three varieties, steamed or fried, topped with sliced onions and butter), kielbasa, potato pancakes, hunter’s stew, and stuffed cabbage. Grilled plates can be prepared for two or three, while others, like the roasted hocks in beer, could easily feed an army. The quaint, farmhouse-inspired interior is efficiently staffed with smiling servers in floral skirts and embroidered vests.

    • Karczma’s wooden decor and waitresses in Polish folk dresses lend an Epcot-like sheen to the space, but beneath the wagon-wheel chandeliers, you’ll find some of the best authentic Polish food in town: standards like crisp, hubcap-size potato pancakes; stuffed cabbage topped with tomato sauce; and, every few weeks, more obscure offerings like sauerkraut soup and fried veal liver with apples and onions.

    Getting There

    La Superior

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    One of several fantastic Mexican spots in North Brooklyn, La Superior’s focus is on affordable “Street Style” food — the simple, delicious type you’d find at a cart in Mexico City or SoCal. Start with the Chips and Guacomole (duh!) and one of their Quesadillas, a deep fried tortilla filled with an assortment of choices including steak, chicken, or poblano peppers and cheese. The tacos are simple, as they should be, and our favorite is the Chorizo. If you’re feeling more experimental, try the spicy Lengua Taco (beef tongue). The space is small and there’s typically a wait, but La Superior’s strong margaritas will help to ease the pain.

    Featured Reviews

    • Williamsburg is now loaded with pricey new culinary hot spots [but] there will always be a need for Cheap Eats in this part of town, and La Superior has been feeding hungry hipsters and getting them ass drunk ever since they settled on Bedford Street, just a few years after the Dutch showed up. La Superior is a down-and-dirty Mexican taqueria, and it’s a cool one at that. This restaurant has always reminded us of a Williamsburg version of Café Habana, but with slightly less awesome food.

    • The half-moon-shaped “street style” quesadillas are a world apart from the typical gringoized versions; the masa crescents are small but substantial, stuffed with things like stewed chicken or poblano peppers and cheese. Tacos, served singly on mini corn tortillas for $2.50 a pop, are a handy way to round out your order. Try the chipotle-spiced shrimp or the lengua, diced bits of beef tongue with cilantro and onions.

    • … La Superior isn’t much to look at. This small restaurant in South Williamsburg emulates a small-town Mexican taqueria, but it reminded my friend of Southern California. A coat of red paint, a row of dim filament bulbs, and a scattering of posters for Mexploitation films with titles like “El Mal” and “Hijos de Tigre” pass for décor. Four well-worn wooden skateboards propped up alongside the service counter contribute to the Angeleno effect. A room that looks so nonchalantly slapped together doesn’t happen by accident, but you can never quite catch the signs of effort.

    • This comfortably dive bar-ish eatery’s plating up Mexican street/diner food like tacos (carnitas, pollo, hongos, etc), Torta Ahogada (sourdough stuffed w/ pork confit and beans), and Pollo Encacahuatado (chicken in mole peanut sauce). For the next few mon

    Getting There

    Mable’s Smokehouse

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    Married couple Jeff Lutonsky and his wife Meghan Love opened Mable’s in 2011. They’re from Kentucky and Oklahoma, respectively, and their BBQ-country roots are on full display at their honkytonk smokehouse. We recommend the fantastic Sliced Brisket, though the Pulled Pork is a close runner-up. Vegetarians have an option too — there’s a tasty Vegetarian Sloppy Joe on the menu. Other than the fabulous kale, the sides are unimpressive, but do the trick. Mable’s is perfect on those nights when you want a no-frills meal and a strong drink in a comfortable environment. Sure, we love Williamsburg’s other BBQ staple Fette Sau as well, but the prices are better and the experience is less ‘precious’ at Mable’s.

    Featured Reviews

    • we really just like Mable’s for it’s sheer simplicity. This is quality BBQ, and the restaurant could fly just as easily in Austin as it does in our burgeoning BBQ town of Williamsburg. The menu is small and familiar – in some ways the antithesis to the nearby hipster mecca Fette Sau – but everything tastes exactly like you hope it’s going to.

    • The smoked meats and sandwiches are slathered in a sweet sauce that obscured the meaty, smoky taste of the meat. I have been to a few barbecue joints in Tulsa, and they too emphasized the sauce, way more than central Texas barbecue joints do. The best thing we ate was the cubed barbecue brisket sandwich ($9.95), made with the fatty end of the brisket. Served on a hamburger bun, the brisket was tender, moist, and smoky, although it could have done with less sauce.

    • The very limited menu, featuring just three meats and a handful of sides, includes Texas-style moist, fatty brisket—beautifully smoky and exceptionally tender—dry rubbed in copious black pepper before being left to cook for 12 hours in a Southern Pride smoker. The pork ribs, from the Oklahoma side of the border, are just as succulent, with a great caramel char around the edges from a pass on the grill after they emerge from the smoker. Only the Kentucky-style pulled pork shoulder disappoints, the mushy meat doused in too much of that secret-recipe sauce.

    Getting There

    The Meatball Shop

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    It’s just what it sounds like: a restaurant that serves a variety of meatballs. Spicy Pork, Chicken, Beef, and Veggie are all available with a variety of sauces including marina, meat and Parmesan cream. Four meatballs are served per order with foccacia on the side. The space is comfortable and unassuming and plenty of sides are available (spaghetti, steamed broccoli, and salads to name a few) to accompany your order. If you’re feeling hungry, heroes and sliders are also on the menu. The Meatball Shop is not the type of place you plan your night around, but if you’re craving meatballs head here immediately.

    Featured Reviews

    • “Meatballs rule” at these sandwich shops slinging “reliable” “mix-and-match” balls (meat, chicken, veggie) paired with “lots” of sauces, plus “snappy cocktails”, “nice beers on tap” and “sinful” ice cream sandwiches; “millennials” and the stroller set keep things “boisterous”, but at least tabs are “gentle.”

    • counter-service operation with a build-your-own-meal menu, featuring five kinds of two-ounce, house-ground balls (plus a weekly special), various sauces, and a range of options (slider flights, heroes, pastas, and sides). As befits Holzman, a chef who’s worked at San Francisco’s Campton Place and SPQR (whose sister restaurant, A16, is known for its Meatball Mondays, incidentally), ingredients are well sourced, including beef from Creekstone Farms and prosciutto from La Quercia. The look is Old New York, with reclaimed wood and antique milk bottles. For dessert, Chernow’s wife makes ice cream sandwiches. The cumulative effect: a retro vibe for a thoroughly modern meatball.

    Getting There

    Pies ‘n’ Thighs

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    A popular South Williamsburg restaurant with a crowd-pleasing menu of Southern comfort staples. The fried chicken is the standout, though the catfish is a close runner-up. Vegetarians will be happy too with a sampling of sides and salads. Pies ‘n’ Thighs is especially popular for brunch — chicken ‘n’ waffles anyone? — and serves breakfast during the week. Top it all off with a slice of Bourbon Pecan Pie and all is well with the world.

    Featured Reviews

    • The food, not the venue, is clearly the draw. While the down-and-dirty Southern fare—honest, cheap and often delicious—is certainly in line with Brooklyn’s all-American moment, it’s an audacious departure from the borough’s judiciously sourced, seasonally orthodox, self-righteously ethical ethos.

    • “Naps are required” after visiting this “popular” Williamsburg storefront for “perfectly fried” chicken, “fantastic” homemade pies and other Southern “comfort food”; the “down-and-dirty” digs are “a tight squeeze” and “service can lag”, so be ready for a “long wait on weekends.”

    • Pies ‘n’ Thighs is Williamsburg’s premier outpost for fried chicken, with Southern comfort favorites that will easily make you forget you’re sitting in a shabby space under the Williamsburg Bridge. Enjoy expertly fried birds and dough (the old-fashioned doughnuts are big in both size and flavor), and flaky, house-baked biscuits. There are chicken buckets reserved for take-out, but no matter if you stay or go, complete the experience with a side trio of smoked pork collards, burnt end baked beans, and mac & cheese.

    Getting There