Comments

  • Astoria doesn’t have any good pizza. We have Nicks and Dee’s.

    Posted by Anthony
    on May 16th, 2007 at 5:13 pm

  • No good pizza?! I thought they had a fairly significant Italian population over there.

    Posted by Steve
    on May 16th, 2007 at 5:16 pm

  • I wouldn’t mind Trattoria L’Incontro opening an outpost over here. I went there recently not expecting much, but the food was actually really good. It was really crowded, we had to wait way past our reservation time to be seated and the service was only ok, but the food won me over.

    Posted by DaveS
    on May 16th, 2007 at 5:31 pm

  • I recently moved from Astoria to FH (thank God) and can tell you Martha’s Bakery has a crappy track record. It started out strong in Astoria but then started selling items that weren’t fresh. It became disappointing and is now just a convenient alternative to a Starbucks. Don’t get those hopes up too high.

    Its true though, Astoria has much better food selections than FH. The pizza in Astoria isn’t that great unless you go to the no name Ditmars Brick Oven Pizza on Ditmars and 46th Street. That beats Nicks and Dees hands down. Tratorria L’Incontro is so not authentic and overrated. 718 is very good, but you’re deflated when you go there on a Friday night for a nice dinner and people start walking in with shorts and t-shirts. That’s so Astoria.

    Posted by Dudley
    on May 17th, 2007 at 8:34 am

  • Latin Cabana fills an unmet need in FH - inexpensive take-out - but Cuban food doesn’t satisfy the nutritional requirements I generally prefer (read: too fatty and greasy). I’ll try it soon enough but it won’t become a staple for me.

    In the end, I just can’t get too thrilled about the arrival of Martha’s. Its fine to have a second quality bakery (+ Bonnelle), but its not a place I’m going to frequent all that much. How many cupcakes can one eat?

    Forest Hills needs a quality bar and casual American bistro much, much more than it needs another bakery.

    Posted by David
    on May 17th, 2007 at 11:16 am

  • True, but baby steps, baby steps!

    Posted by Steve
    on May 17th, 2007 at 11:20 am

  • Nick’s and AJ’s are far too overrated. (Nick’s = brunt crust and fawning hipsters, AJ’s = acidic sauce and overpriced pies.) And Pizza Classico — a Bayside transplant located in the Stop and Shop shopping center on Union Turnpike — is just plain awful.

    Posted by Mary Jane
    on June 11th, 2007 at 10:21 pm

  • I actually had a very frustrating experience with them. I tried to call them up to get an idea of how long delivery takes and the woman who answered could not understand me. I finally get an answer after about 5 minutes of repeated questions, etc. I call back later and the phone was busy for 1/2 hour! When I finally got through, the food I wanted was out. I just hung up.

    If they can’t meet the demand, I don’t think this place will last. Frustrated potential customers like myself will just go to another place and let others know about the poor experience.

    Posted by Steve
    on June 19th, 2007 at 8:24 pm

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Thumbs up to the Astoria Invasion!

Posted by Steve on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007

As we all know, Austin Street’s shiny new Martha’s Country Bakery is an outpost of a popular Astoria joint, but I only recently learned that the four-week-old Latin Cabana Express — which I had thought was oddly named; why “Express”? — is actually from the people behind Astoria’s Latin Cabana. ‘Sfar as Manhattan-alternative Queens neighborhoods go, consensus says that Astoria has us beat on the food front, so for the record, I’m all for Astorian entrepreneurs heading east in droves. Let’s hope these two places are just the beginning of a larger trend. The early returns seem to be pointing to success for both, so if you’re smart, Astoria restaurateurs, you’ll know what to do.