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BPB New Times Best Of
Official Recommender: New Times' Best of Broward Palm Beach 2008
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Pomodoro
Fort Lauderdale, FLBest Pizza
Pomodoro probably has a range of delicious appetizers, pasta, and other entrees, but the moment you walk through the front door, the aroma of cooking dough will cast its spell and your eyes will dart to the portion of the menu marked "Pizza." The dough is tossed by a man of Mediterranean descent who eschews chit-chat to concentrate on his task, and the crust he creates strikes that perfect balance between soft and crispy. The sauce is lightly applied, with a subtle mix of spices and herbs. But the revelation is the freshness of the toppings: Vegetables with just-picked splendor; meats and cheeses whose rich flavors announce their having arrived from the deli, not the freezer. You wouldn't usually call a 12-inch pie a "personal pizza," but this isn't your usual pie, and here's betting you won't be toting leftovers.
Rachel's Adult Entertainment
West Palm Beach, FLBest Strip Joint (for the Guys to See Gals)
Anybody can see a stripper shake her rear for singles any night of the week without having to look too hard, but a great adult-entertainment experience means more than just a tight body on a shiny pole trying to make enough to pay off her student loans. It means fantastic-looking girls with pleasant attitudes, a nice environment, and good food. The discriminating patron is bored sifting through cheap buffets as a blond thrashes to Poison. Enter Rachel's: upscale stripping for upscale clientele with full nudity and fine food. They serve top-shelf champagnes and liquors as well as steaks, lobster, and caviar every day until 1:30 a.m. Starting at 1 a.m., you can order a hearty breakfast. They also offer free flu shots at the beginning of flu season. A strip club that cares about the community: Doesn't that just warm your cockles?
Eastside Bagel & Deli
Fort Lauderdale, FLBest Bagels
It's not just about the bagels. You want a place that evokes the old-time Lower East Side, with wise, gabby people exchanging gossip or leafing through the New York papers as they eat their bagels, typically with a schmear of cream cheese and a slice of nova. This brings us to East Side Bagel & Deli, a modest little restaurant in a commercial strip near the Galt Ocean Mile. The display case is always full of bagels, and they're just the right consistency (chewy, not bready or — heaven forbid — rock-like). There's lots of talk and a friendly staff to serve a full breakfast or lunch, or just your favorite round ones (sesame seed, poppy seed, egg, plain, you get the idea). New owner Kevin Spence says that, when it comes to bagels, he's got a tough, seasoned crowd, many of them from New York. "They know what they're eating," Spence says. And they come back for more. In fairness, most of East Side Deli's bagels are prepared at Bagelmania, where they know a thing or two about baking bagels. No, says Denise Jimenez, the Bagelmania boss' wife, it's not the water (the usual excuse for why you can't get a good bagel outside of New York). "You mix the dough, then you let it sit in the refrigerator for 24 hours," she says. "That's the secret. If you don't let it sit, it doesn't come out right."
Bagelmania
Lauderhill, FLBest Bagels
It's not just about the bagels. You want a place that evokes the old-time Lower East Side, with wise, gabby people exchanging gossip or leafing through the New York papers as they eat their bagels, typically with a schmear of cream cheese and a slice of nova. This brings us to East Side Bagel & Deli, a modest little restaurant in a commercial strip near the Galt Ocean Mile. The display case is always full of bagels, and they're just the right consistency (chewy, not bready or — heaven forbid — rock-like). There's lots of talk and a friendly staff to serve a full breakfast or lunch, or just your favorite round ones (sesame seed, poppy seed, egg, plain, you get the idea). New owner Kevin Spence says that, when it comes to bagels, he's got a tough, seasoned crowd, many of them from New York. "They know what they're eating," Spence says. And they come back for more. In fairness, most of East Side Deli's bagels are prepared at Bagelmania, where they know a thing or two about baking bagels. No, says Denise Jimenez, the Bagelmania boss' wife, it's not the water (the usual excuse for why you can't get a good bagel outside of New York). "You mix the dough, then you let it sit in the refrigerator for 24 hours," she says. "That's the secret. If you don't let it sit, it doesn't come out right."
China Dumpling Restaurant
Boynton Beach, FLBest Carry-Out Chinese
Let the gastronomic jetset bicker about which Chinatown restaurant serves the grossest whole flash-fried crabs, stinky tofu, 1,000-year-old eggs, or shark fin soup. When it comes to carry-out, you want your egg roll ($1.95). You want your fried rice ($4.50 small, $8.50 large). You want your string beans in garlic sauce ($10.95), your moo shu pork ($13.75), your beef chow fun ($13.95). Ten thousand New York Jews can't be wrong (even as they kvetch about the prices — $13.25 for Kung Pao chicken?): China Dumpling, now nearly a decade old, is ground zero for transplanted Brooklynites when it comes to Chinese food on Christmas Day and Easter Sunday. And it's first choice for local gentiles after they've had their fill of lambs and hams. For greasy, filling, steamy, soy-saturated fare; for that thoroughly Americanized and now classic mélange of canned bamboo shoots, baby corn cobs, cashews, sweet & sour everything, and fountains of duck sauce; for the subgum, the chop suey, and the General Tso; and for the eponymous dumplings (the dim sum basket is $13.95) — all of it best eaten planted on the couch with a Turner Classic broadcast of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane — China Dumpling nails it, right down to the fortune cookies. And forget it, they don't deliver. Dinner daily 3 to 10 p.m.
