Location(s): 207 2nd Ave b/w 12th & 13th St (entrance is on 13th St)
Phone #: (212) 254 3500
Method(s): Eat In
Price Range: $$
Food: A
Value: A-
Service/Atmosphere: A
Overall Rating: A-
For my first ever bakery/dessert place review, I obviously had to give the honor to the great David Chang. His next location in line to receive a glowing review by me will be Momofuku Milk Bar. Much like Noodle Bar, I absolutely love this place. The fact that there is typically a long line doesn't bother me, because (unlike Artichoke), the workers are moving as fast as they possibly can and the reason for the line is that there are simply a lot of people trying to order stuff. The music blaring over the speakers is always awesome (in typical David Chang fashion), and the overall atmosphere is hoppin', but not too trendy. Most importantly, the food here is ridiculously good and the menu is constantly changing.
What I liked
If I was forced to choose to order only one item at Momofuku Milk (which would be torture), I would have to choose the Cookies ($1.85/1, $5/3, $10/6 and $20/12). They used to change up the flavors of the cookies pretty regularly, but it seems they have chosen their 4 varieties (at least for now). You truly can't go wrong, but in order of quality, here they are: Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow (it's sticky because of the marshmallow, and mixed with the cornflakes and chocolate it is amazing), Compost (pretzels, potato chips, coffee, oats, butterscotch, chocolate chips-as ridiculously good as it sounds), Blueberry Cream (dried blueberries and milk crumbs-very good) and Chocolate-Chocolate (stuffed with chocolate crumbs-very chocolately but not as unique as the others).
It is truly hard to rank the items at Milk Bar since they are all so very good, but again if I was being forced to rank, next up would have to be the pies ($5.25/slice or $44/pie). I have had the pleasure of tasting Candy Bar Pie (chocolate crust, caramel, peanut butter nougat and pretzels-amazing, tastes like Butterfinger filling in a pie), Crack Pie (toasted oat crust and gooey butter filling-as addictive as crack, not that I would know), Cinnamon Bun Pie (brown butter & cheesecake filling-actually tastes like cinnamon bun in a pie) and Grasshopper Pie (brownie & mint cheesecake filling and marshmallows in a graham crust).
They maintain 4 different flavors of Soft Serve ($4.15) at all times, which they vary every so often. The one flavor that I do not believe will be changing anytime soon is Cereal Milk. They have even copyrighted this name, which was a smart move by Chang. Just as it sounds, it tastes like the bottom of a cereal bowl that once had Frosted Flakes or some other sugary cereal in it. They recently changed out the other 3 flavors to Cinnamon Bun, Blueberry Muffin and Zucchini Bread. As you can see, Milk Bar doesn't have conventional soft serve flavors. Some flavors in the past I can remember include Cream Cheese Frosting, Red Velvet, Carrot Cake and Pistachio. Again, you truly can't go wrong with whatever flavor of soft serve you decide on (you can even have 1 free sample). My one gripe is that some of the flavors are occasionally somewhat salty, but this comes with the territory. If you are feeling ambitious, you can always order a Milkshake ($6), for which they ask you to choose one of that day's soft serve flavors and combine it with your choice of milk flavor. I had the Cereal Milk soft serve/Cereal Milk milkshake and it was tasty and filling.
Incredibly enough, you can order the famous Momofuku Pork Buns ($9/2) at Milk Bar, which are always a good appetizer for your dessert (if that makes any sense). The quality does not suffer just because you aren't at Ssam or Noodle; they are the same perfect Pork Buns. Don't worry, they keep Sarachi on the table.
In terms of the daily bread, for the first time I recently tried the Bagel Bomb ($6), which is an everything bagel style bun (no hole) with bacon-scallion cream cheese in the middle. Definitely unique to taste the bacon with the cream cheese, but a bit of a rip for $6 in my opinion. I also tried the Volcano ($9), which was a one-of-a-kind taste of potato gratin, pancetta, onions and gruyere cheese baked into dough. I couldn't have described this bread any better than Serious Eats does here.
Unfortunately, I haven't tried their famous breakfast sandwich or the other different breads they offer (variety changes daily), but I intend to try them soon and they always look good. I also haven't had the honor of purchasing their milk (it varies but they typically have cereal milk, fruity cereal, coffee milk or strawberry milk) by the 16 oz container ($5), but if you're into milk then this might be what you want to order as a side -- for cookie dunking purposes. The place is called Milk Bar, after all.
What Could Use Work
You guessed it, no complaints about the food. Only thing I can think of is that, as mentioned above, there typically is a line here, even on a weeknight at an obscure hour, but if you go during the day on a weekday you can probably avoid that fate. Like I said, when there is a wait it is warranted and typically moves quite fast.
Killed It!
I hadn't gotten around to ordering their famous cake by the slice by the time they stopped serving slices (they now serve cakes in their entirety only since they make them in Williamsburg). Thankfully, I recently had a friend's birthday come up so I had the opportunity to purchase an entire Chocolate Chip Cake ($38), which is made of passion fruit curd, chocolate crumbs and coffee butter-cream. These are super tall 6" cakes which serve 6-12 peeps and are like nothing you've ever tasted before in your life. Just try it next chance you get, that's all I can say.
Method(s): Eat In
Price Range: $$
Food: A
Value: A-
Service/Atmosphere: A
Overall Rating: A-
For my first ever bakery/dessert place review, I obviously had to give the honor to the great David Chang. His next location in line to receive a glowing review by me will be Momofuku Milk Bar. Much like Noodle Bar, I absolutely love this place. The fact that there is typically a long line doesn't bother me, because (unlike Artichoke), the workers are moving as fast as they possibly can and the reason for the line is that there are simply a lot of people trying to order stuff. The music blaring over the speakers is always awesome (in typical David Chang fashion), and the overall atmosphere is hoppin', but not too trendy. Most importantly, the food here is ridiculously good and the menu is constantly changing.
What I liked
If I was forced to choose to order only one item at Momofuku Milk (which would be torture), I would have to choose the Cookies ($1.85/1, $5/3, $10/6 and $20/12). They used to change up the flavors of the cookies pretty regularly, but it seems they have chosen their 4 varieties (at least for now). You truly can't go wrong, but in order of quality, here they are: Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow (it's sticky because of the marshmallow, and mixed with the cornflakes and chocolate it is amazing), Compost (pretzels, potato chips, coffee, oats, butterscotch, chocolate chips-as ridiculously good as it sounds), Blueberry Cream (dried blueberries and milk crumbs-very good) and Chocolate-Chocolate (stuffed with chocolate crumbs-very chocolately but not as unique as the others).
It is truly hard to rank the items at Milk Bar since they are all so very good, but again if I was being forced to rank, next up would have to be the pies ($5.25/slice or $44/pie). I have had the pleasure of tasting Candy Bar Pie (chocolate crust, caramel, peanut butter nougat and pretzels-amazing, tastes like Butterfinger filling in a pie), Crack Pie (toasted oat crust and gooey butter filling-as addictive as crack, not that I would know), Cinnamon Bun Pie (brown butter & cheesecake filling-actually tastes like cinnamon bun in a pie) and Grasshopper Pie (brownie & mint cheesecake filling and marshmallows in a graham crust).
They maintain 4 different flavors of Soft Serve ($4.15) at all times, which they vary every so often. The one flavor that I do not believe will be changing anytime soon is Cereal Milk. They have even copyrighted this name, which was a smart move by Chang. Just as it sounds, it tastes like the bottom of a cereal bowl that once had Frosted Flakes or some other sugary cereal in it. They recently changed out the other 3 flavors to Cinnamon Bun, Blueberry Muffin and Zucchini Bread. As you can see, Milk Bar doesn't have conventional soft serve flavors. Some flavors in the past I can remember include Cream Cheese Frosting, Red Velvet, Carrot Cake and Pistachio. Again, you truly can't go wrong with whatever flavor of soft serve you decide on (you can even have 1 free sample). My one gripe is that some of the flavors are occasionally somewhat salty, but this comes with the territory. If you are feeling ambitious, you can always order a Milkshake ($6), for which they ask you to choose one of that day's soft serve flavors and combine it with your choice of milk flavor. I had the Cereal Milk soft serve/Cereal Milk milkshake and it was tasty and filling.
Incredibly enough, you can order the famous Momofuku Pork Buns ($9/2) at Milk Bar, which are always a good appetizer for your dessert (if that makes any sense). The quality does not suffer just because you aren't at Ssam or Noodle; they are the same perfect Pork Buns. Don't worry, they keep Sarachi on the table.
In terms of the daily bread, for the first time I recently tried the Bagel Bomb ($6), which is an everything bagel style bun (no hole) with bacon-scallion cream cheese in the middle. Definitely unique to taste the bacon with the cream cheese, but a bit of a rip for $6 in my opinion. I also tried the Volcano ($9), which was a one-of-a-kind taste of potato gratin, pancetta, onions and gruyere cheese baked into dough. I couldn't have described this bread any better than Serious Eats does here.
Unfortunately, I haven't tried their famous breakfast sandwich or the other different breads they offer (variety changes daily), but I intend to try them soon and they always look good. I also haven't had the honor of purchasing their milk (it varies but they typically have cereal milk, fruity cereal, coffee milk or strawberry milk) by the 16 oz container ($5), but if you're into milk then this might be what you want to order as a side -- for cookie dunking purposes. The place is called Milk Bar, after all.
What Could Use Work
You guessed it, no complaints about the food. Only thing I can think of is that, as mentioned above, there typically is a line here, even on a weeknight at an obscure hour, but if you go during the day on a weekday you can probably avoid that fate. Like I said, when there is a wait it is warranted and typically moves quite fast.
Killed It!
I hadn't gotten around to ordering their famous cake by the slice by the time they stopped serving slices (they now serve cakes in their entirety only since they make them in Williamsburg). Thankfully, I recently had a friend's birthday come up so I had the opportunity to purchase an entire Chocolate Chip Cake ($38), which is made of passion fruit curd, chocolate crumbs and coffee butter-cream. These are super tall 6" cakes which serve 6-12 peeps and are like nothing you've ever tasted before in your life. Just try it next chance you get, that's all I can say.
No comments:
Post a Comment