Top 5 Hottest Restaurants To Check Out In NYC This Month

Before it’s too late, secure your reservations at these highly coveted NYC restaurants using Velocity, a dining app that curates a treasure-chest of world’s finest venues and enables seamless dining experience for customers by allowing them to discover new restaurants, make reservations, and pay for their meals.

1. Bowery Meat Company

Steakhouse with classic cuts in modern preparations plus pasta and more in a retro-styled setting.

2. Lure Fish Bar

Upscale seafood restaurant famous for its luxurious, yachtlike interior and hopping bar scene.

3. Cosme

Mexican shareable plates made with local ingredients, tequila + mezcal in sleek digs with a big bar.

4. Charlie Bird

Noah Fecks / NOAH FECKS

Hip, bi-level spot with Italian-accented American fare, a broad wine list, and art featuring boomboxes.

5. Blue Hill

New American cuisine created with locally sourced, seasonal ingredients served at a townhouse-set spot.

A Delicious Affair: VIPS, Korea's No. 1 Steakhouse

I am going to start a new "column" in my blog: A Delicious Affair! The series will chronicle some of the highlights of Korean cuisine...that is, yummy restaurants in this wonderful country that I visit during my stay here this summer. The first restaurant to be featured is VIPS, Korea's No. 1 Steakhouse (or so they say_. Ironically, when Mom and I visited VIPS this afternoon, we didn't order steak. Instead we took advantage of its healthy, fresh all-you-can-eat salad bar.

Now, let's make it clear that I absolutely detest buffet because I always end up with an awful stomachache. Besides, the quality of food at buffets are typically inferior to that at regular restaurants. Nonetheless, VIPS is known for its fresh food and I've always wanted to come here again since my first visit in 2009.

Because Mom and I had to come up to Seoul for a doctor's visit, we decided to eat lunch at VIPS. This is the entrance to the restaurant. We walked from the hospital to VIPS because the traffic was awful and we figured it'd be almost as fast to walk than take the bus.

This was our first dish. As you can see, it's very green (spinach, broccoli, smoked salmon, mango, and, of course, my favorite food of all time, SQUASH!

The salad bar & buffet line was well-kept and fresh.

Dessert time! I loved the frozen yogurt (plain and green tea), but the cake pieces were unfortunately very dry.

This reminded me of Annenberg and how often it used to serve squash. Bahahaha

French fries covered in some sweet sugary syrup. I was confused whether to eat it for dessert or with a meal. Definitely got the sweet and salty going on.

This was a delicious concoction of tofu, greens, Korean radish, and fish roe. Yum :)

Tomato & Cream sauce pasta that we ordered. The waitress cooked it behind the counter in the kitchen and brought them to our table. The pasta sauce was a bit spicy, while the cream sauce was a bit too...creamy. We only had a few bites of the pasta because we were full, and Mom talked about how she felt awful wasting food when there are people in North Korea starving. This discussion got us talking about how Kim Jong Il is a horrible, selfish leader.


VIPS (Very Important People's Society), Korea's No. 1 Steakhouse. I would highly recommend its salad bar. Yummy in my tummy! :)