Nowon

Visit in case of tater tot emergency.

I’m having one of those weeks where it feels like the days are dragging on and on; it feels like it’s been at least a month since the last newsletter. There’s not much to report on my end… Viraj and I wandered into The Meat Hook yesterday evening, and now it’s Monday evening and the potatoes are boiling and there’s five spice and rainbow sausages—the latter is a little bit of every single one of their sausages—in my near future. As much as I love dining out, I’ve been discovering the joy of home cooked meals, and local stores like The Meat Hook make it just a little more exciting.

Speaking of meat and potatoes, thanks to health-conscious and Asian parents, my diet was decidedly anything but that growing up, specifically in the form of burgers and fries. I can’t remember when I finally had my first burger—probably at someone’s birthday party—but as far as I know I liked them just fine. Fries and other forms of potato, however, have taken an entire childhood for me to start liking. I never really liked fries, probably because most of the fries I was eating as a child were of the school cafeteria variety (mushy), but I have a faint memory of eating frozen tater tots at a friend’s house in middle school and thinking this has potential… and then I ate a million of them in the USC dining hall.

One Sunday during the football season, Viraj came home with exciting news: he had discovered what he claimed to be the best tater tots… possibly ever. A few weeks later, we were sitting at the outdoor high top tables at Nowon’s East Village location, a gochujang tequila cocktail in one hand and chopsticks deep into a bowl of their honey garlic butter extraordinary tots in the other hand. It was a chilly November evening, and while the heat lamps were turned all the way up the effect was that I was too cold and too hot in different parts of my body at the same time. But, then the tater tots were so perfect, sticky from the honey and then so crisp with that delicate outer shell and then finally well… potatoey.

The "big head" cocktail and honey garlic butter tots.

Nowon is probably most known for their burgers, and since becoming an adult, I’ve grown to love a good burger. (Sorry, mom.) Months later, we returned again for me to properly try them, splitting the legendary cheeseburger and dry aged steak burger, the only difference being a smashed double patty in the former and a dry aged single patty in the latter. My favorite part of their burgers is my favorite aspect of Nowon in general: the way they playfully infuse Korean flavors in American classics and sometimes vice versa. The kimchi special sauce and roasted kimchi are what really makes these burgers—as a pickle lover, a little more acidity never hurts. Viraj and I both think that the dry aged burger is better, but honestly, it’s up to personal preference. I don’t think it’s the best burger in New York, but then again I’m not sure what burger is. (Talk to me after I finally get into 4 Charles Prime Rib.)

Nowon usually serves their burgers cut in half, which means you could order multiple and split ‘em.

If it’s your first time at Nowon, definitely get a burger and tots, if only because that’s what people will ask you about if you mention that you went. But, the Nowon menu contains multitudes. After the tots, my favorite dish is the broccolini a la ‘caesar,’ which has the most insane black sesame caesar dressing and candied anchovies, my favorite snack when I’m in Taiwan. It’s cheesy and creamy and rich, but has the best depth of flavor of any dish I’ve had on the Nowon menu. The ‘chopped cheese’ rice cakes are a great example of Nowon’s fusion of Korean and American; while the flavors are fully American, tasting them in the context of Korean rice cakes is fun and thought-provoking. Oh and, don’t skip the black sesame crème brûlée.

Photos from a few different Nowon dinners... caesar on the left, assorted dishes in the middle and black sesame crème brûlée on the right.

I find myself usually starting with the atmosphere when describing a restaurant before getting into the food, because that’s what the experience of dining out actually feels like. But, Nowon is a unique case where I knew so much about the food (and had tasted it in the form of delivery) prior to even being able to picture the exterior of the place. And while the food is great for takeout, eating at Nowon, with the music bumping and the bathroom disco ball spinning, is the dinner out with friends and the night out after all in one.

Bite it!

Sometimes it’s unexpectedly hard to book a reservation on Resy, but I’ve always had success walking in.