The Tater Tot crawl

     A few weeks ago I went on a Tater Tot Crawl.  What's that? So I basically go around the city and try different restaurants that serve tater tots.  My mom found the crawl on a website, The Huffington Post. There are 11 places on the website but we only went to three of them because of time and we couldn't eat that much.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/03/tater-tots-new-york-city_n_6912968.html

Click on that link to visit the site.  I recommend it.

     Anyway the 1st place we went to is The Melt Shop.  On the one of the sides there is black boards with cheese related things drawn on it.  Here you can get sandwiches, salads, and tater tots.  The employees had funny cheese puns on the back of their shirts.  They're really cheesy, huh get it.  Some of the puns were "Girl you lookin Gouda" and "Give me all ya Cheddar".  
https://www.meltshop.com

     We got their loaded tots.  They were like heaven.  So it's tater tots with parm. cheese bits, melted cheese, Jalapenos (which I avoid, I don't like spiciness), and bacon.  It was awesome with the random bits of crunchy bacon.

   The Whiskey Tavern is next on the list. They have a bar on one side.  Opposite of the bar are these cool tables that are chess board sized tables that just stick out of the wall.  It's near all the kinds of court houses in the city.  I made a joke that the judges and the lawyers come here to eat.
http://whiskeytavernnyc.com

   We got the Pizza tots.  They're tater tots covered in pizza sauce and melted cheese.  I like them but they were a little weird in the way the sauce had made them wet.  We also ordered the pork tacos.  They were delicious. 

   The last place was Criff Dogs.  You had to walk downstairs into a basement to get to this restaurant.  It was very small and very popular.  There was a bar across one side with stools.  There were two arcade games you could play and one arcade game made into a table.
http://www.crifdogs.com

     We got the chili cheese taters.  They are tater tots covered in chili and cheese. They were a tiny bit spicy.  I loved them.

     So I really like the three places.  They all have really cool websites that you will want to check out.  I want to go back to try their other foods.  I again really recommend doing the crawl.  It's really fun and you get some exercise and you explore the city.

   
    

Dobbs Dawg House

   

     Yesterday on my birthday (I turned 11), me and my family went to Dobbs Dawg House on 25 Cedar St, Dobbs Ferry.  Inside you will see a big T.V. and a counter where you order.  The seating is bar styled, with counters instead of tables and high spinning chairs.  

     The menu has crazy toppings.  You want cream cheese on your hotdog?  You can get it. Wanna get some peanut butter on your dog. You can here!  On the menu, on the side opposite of the build your own dawg, there is the specialty dawgs.  Which includes but is not limited to: the Reuben dawg, the Pizza dawg, and the Toe nail dawg.  Just kidding on that last one.  I asked them how they come up with their specialty dawgs. The answer is: they take what foods they like and they put them on a hot dog.  They also have a "dawg of the month".  If that dawg is popular then they might add it to their menu. They started with 12 specialty dawgs.  Then they add dawgs in groups of 3 because the specialty dawgs are in 3 columns.  Now there are 48 of them!!!!  They said the most popular one is the Mac Attack (has mac and cheese and crispy bacon).
      
       I got 2 dawgs.  The 1st one I got was custom made.  I call it the Awesome Dawg.  The toppings are divided into categories: sauces/ cheeses, crunchy, veggies/ fruit, and then you have deluxe toppings and premium toppings (like a fried egg).  It started as a normal dog with the standard ketchup, relish but then we get into the crazy toppings like BBQ sauce, cheese sauce cheddar cheese bits crunched Doritos, and bits of bacon.  Sounds awesome right.  It was so tasty.  The Doritos add a very nice touch. For dessert I got the Dessert dawg.  It may sound gross but it was delicious.  It was a plain dawg with chocolate sauce, crushed nuts, and peanut butter.  The chocolate sauce gave it a sweet taste while the dawg gave it that savory taste.  The nuts made the dawg crunchy and the peanut butter gave it that feeling when the peanut butter sticks to the back of your teeth. 

   My mom got the Hawaiian Dawg which has: bacon, teriyaki glaze, pineapple & scallion and the Boston Dawg which has: brown mustard, crispy bacon, baked beans & diced onions.

My dad got the Sushi dawg which has: ginger soy mayo, wasabi cream, seaweed salad, pickled ginger & sesame seeds,
and the Slaw dawg which has:

yellow mustard, chili, coleslaw & diced onions.

     My sister got a S'mores dawg which has: chocolate sauce, marshmallows & graham cracker crumbs.

     Instead of french fries this place has tots- Tater Tots, and a lot of types.  Me and my family got the General Tots.  It was a lot of tater tots 

under lots of baked beans, bacon,  and 
cheddar cheese.  I didn't try them but I bet they
were good! The one I did try was the Dawg Bowl
Tots.  They are just like the General Tots, but instead of baked beans it was Mac and Cheese.

     The place has its own contest.  The rules are you must eat all the dawgs in your column with no modifications and must be eaten in the order listed.  To find your column you have to roll a dice.  36 people have tried but only 1 of them has succeeded. 

    So if you are a hot dog lover or a really hungry person in or near Dobbs Ferry (I say that because they make their hotdogs fast- I got my custom one in like 5 minutes), you should really check this place out.                  

     

Havana Cafe

  

Yesterday me and my family went to an awesome restaurant called Havana Cafe.  It is located on 3151 East Tremont Avenue Bronx, NY 10461.  When you first walk in you can hear loud Cuban music. You will see the bar which is next to the door.  You should also see the brick pillars.  For light there were chandeliers hanging from the wooden ceiling.  On the corners there are T.Vs.  On most of the walls there were murals.  We were there from 5:30-7:00 and at these hours it was busy. It seems like a very popular restaurant! I remember a guy walking around and balancing a lot of cups.  That was cool.

  Let's talk about the food.  We got 3 appetizers.  We got Mofongo, which is green plantations with smoked bacon and jumbo shrimp on top. I didn't taste the bacon.  My mom loved it though.  She said she tasted nothing but bacon.

The other appetizer are Empanadas, which are little turnovers or as I like to call it little pockets of food.  The Empanadas were assorted or mixed up.  One of them had chicken which was yummy.  The other one had beef which was exquisite. 

  
  The final appetizer was Pastelons.  Picture a shepherd's pie made with food like plantains, olives, raisins and instead of mashed potatoes on top it is melted cheese.  In the Pastelons there is ground beef. It tasted great! 

  We got two dishes as a main course.  We got Chorzizo pizza which was impeccable.  It was a bit spicy with the chorizo on top.  It was bit spicier than your average pepperoni pizza, which it what I liked about it. 

 We also ordered Ropa vieja.  This is one of the national dishes of Cuba.  It looks like pulled pork, but it's beef.  It was luscious.  The funny thing about the dish is that when translated it means old clothes.  Maybe because the dish looks like a pile of old and torn clothes! 

  For desert we got a flan.    The flan came with strawberries and whipped cream.  

 This restaurant is great!  You should check it out.  Check out their website first to look at the menu.  Their website is: www.bronxhavanacafe.com