Duck confit tater tots from Red Rock Tap + Grill. (Photo by Susan Ericson. Click to enlarge)
By SUSAN ERICSON
Soul-satisfying soups, beefy burgers, crusty pizzas…
From a year’s worth of lunches good, bad and inedible, PieHole‘s What’s For Lunch? feature picks the Top 10 of 2016.
Click to restaurant names to see complete individual reviews.
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The open-face steak sandwich at Harry’s is served on slices of garlic bread. (Photo by Susan Ericson. Click to enlarge)
By SUSAN ERICSON
Dowdy decor was just one of the telling factors in the demise of Harry’s Lobster House in Sea Bright, and when it closed last January, and many thought that was the end of the institution that began 83 years earlier. And it was, sort of.
In its current, soft-opening phase, the restaurant now called simply “Harry’s” has been “reinvented” under new ownership, general manager Chris Christiano tells PieHole. But there are aspects here that haven’t changed at all.
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Premonitions of summer at Beach Burgers and Grille in Sea Bright. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
Thursday’s warm weather and bright sunshine found PieHole putting the top down on our convertible and heading east to the beach.
We poked around Sea Bright, a hive of reconstruction activity buzzing with backhoes and bulldozers. Strolling a sunny Ocean Avenue, we noticed the breeze carrying the perfume of the ocean and the warming sand, and decided on lunch at Beach Burgers and Grille, one of a handful of new businesses that set up shop in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.
PieHole recaps some of the better bar burger suggestions from our readers. (Photo by Jim Willis. Click to enlarge)
By JIM WILLIS
Last week’s What’s For Lunch featured the mighty Globe Burger. Our proposition that it may be the best burger in Red Bank naturally sparked some suggestions from PieHole readers about other great burgers on the Green.
PieHole takes in some March Madness at the Globe. (Photo by Jim Willis. Click to enlarge)
By JIM WILLIS
Ah, the Globe. Home to arguably the best burger in Red Bank and beyond. Moreover, you’ll almost certainly get to enjoy that burger without having to rub elbows at the bar with someone who’s just had his Maserati valet-parked on Broad Street, making the company as good as the food.
Mike Tierney and Michael Finehirsch are taking No Joe’s back to basics with not-so-basic pastry. (Photo by Jim Willis. Click to enlarge)
By JIM WILLIS
Calling his expansion into the burger business “the biggest business blunder” of his life, Mike Tierney is bringing No Joe’s Café in Red Bank back to its roots.
The owner of the pioneering Broad Street coffeehouse – which opened in depths of the ‘Dead Bank’ days of empty stores and a couple of years ago added ‘Beasty Burgers to the operation – says with burgers no longer in the picture, he wants No Joe’s to return to basics. He’s brought on pastry chef Michael Finehirsch to help him get there.
Tierney says coffee and pastries are a much better fit, and Finehirsch, who studied pastry in France and London and spent time at New York’s Daniel and Bouley before answering an ad from Tierney, is the guy to make it happen.
“We’re building what I like to call a French/American pastry shop,” Finehirsch tells redbangreen’s PieHole. ““If I had my own shop I’d want it to be something like this, so when I saw Mike’s ad we got together.”