Legend of the not-so Hidden Temple
and a Beef Fancy Dinner!
I hope everyone reading this took advantage of the False Spring day we had over the weekend. As soon as I saw that we were getting a day that was 60 and sunny I sprang into action. Lorenzo and I met up with some friends and visited the Queens Botanical Garden (it’s free during the winter) and the Queens Zoo. We enjoyed a fabulous Korean BBQ dinner in Flushing and then spent way too much money at the new Gatcha arcade in Tangram. It was a good day.
Here’s a fun fact for you - this will be my 93rd published post! As I approach post #100, I really want to invite others in to contribute. My goal has always been to use this newsletter to get folks involved in this community, whether that’s by learning about history, exploring new areas, or reading my shitty movie reviews. So for Issue #100 I’m taking the day off and handing BCLF over to you. If you have a story you want to share, I want to put it in BCLF. Here’s some of the stuff I’d love to hear about:
~ Cool businesses you like to support
~ Great food you've eaten
~ Ways you've volunteered
~ Hot takes on NYC architecture, policies, trends, etc
~ Unique experiences, fond memories
~ Movie reviews - what films do you love/hate/think are underrated?
~ Teach me something new or tell me your favorite thing you learned in BCLF
~ NYC inspired art - poetry, short stories, whatever!
~ Not in NYC? Tell me about your city or tell me about a time you visited NYC
Peep the form for more details and feel free to share that link with anyone you know who might want to submit something!
Potluck Club 133 Chrystie St, New York, NY 10002 Neighborhood: Nolita Cuisine: Cantonese-American Reservations: Recommended and easy to get, walk-ins sit at the bar Order: Endive Salad, S&P Chicken and Biscuits, Landlady mocktail
The latest Beef Fancy Dinner™ took us to Potluck Club, a Cantonese-American restaurant situated in the intersection of Chinatown, the Lower East Side and Little Italy. Chinatown has sort of been spilling over its borders for years now, both by including more Asian cuisines than just Chinese and by geographically expanding outside of its original boundaries; one of my favorite pho spots is actually situated squarely in Little Italy. Potluck Club is sort of a nod to this expansion as the owners all grew up in Chinatown but got a lot of their culinary and cultural experiences outside of those strict borders; they’re Chinese-American, not just Chinese and that’s am important distinction that shows up in the food they make. I’d been to Potluck Club shortly after they opened and loved it, so I was excited to go back with the gang in tow!
You eat with your eyes first and the decor of this place is honestly unmatched. You can tell that the owners put a lot of thought and care into making sure their passions and culture were well represented and I think they did a great job. The decor hits that classic Chinese banquet restaurant vibe while also adding in some contemporary flourishes of neon movie posters and snack food displays. If you’re an anxious person like me, I’d recommend grabbing a reservation before eating here (they’re not that hard to get anymore), but if you’re a person who lives your life a quarter mile at a time then you can go for a walk in and get a very cool seat at a sort-of chef’s counter at the back, separated from the kitchen only by a pane of glass.
The dinner menu isn’t too long and luckily most of the items on it are bangers. I got the Landlady n/a drink because I always fuck with salted plum and the strawberries provided a nice sweet balance to the saltiness. I could honestly throw these back all day and Beef and Lorenzo copied me and ordered some for themselves. For starters, we got the Pork and Chive Potstickers and the Endive Salad. You might be thinking “a $21 salad? seriously??” If you’ve been following Beef Fancy Dinners for a while now, you know that Beef and Lorenzo are big boys with big appetites and they were equally skeptical. However, the one thing I remembered from my previous visit was that this salad absolutely slapped and I wasn’t taking no for an answer. They agreed to balance it out with two dumpling orders.
Guys…they loved the salad and I think you will too! First off, endive is great; it’s always super crunchy and it comes in perfect little lettuce cup shapes that allow the dressing and other toppings to just pool within them. Second, the salad is covered in pecorino cheese and Lorenzo’s favorite way to eat vegetables is by covering them in copious amount of cheese. The bitterness of the endive is cooled off with the slight sweetness of the dragonfruit and oranges (this was Beef’s first encounter with dragonfruit, oh to be a naive little boy) and there was a creamy caesar-ish dressing tying everything together. The pistachios get a bit lost in the sauce tbh and I kinda wish this dish would remove them and be like $4 cheaper, but whatevs. Moral of the story: get the endive salad. Everyone also enjoyed the dumplings, but I think they really got most of their oomph from the sauce. I didn’t find the pork filling to be too savory or flavorful, but once you globbed the sweet soy chili crisp all over them they were delicious. I don’t say this lightly, but I think my homemade dumplings are better (come on over and let’s have a dumpling party).
For the mains, we got the Salt n Pepper Chicken with Scallion Biscuits, XO Fried Rice with Tea Egg, and Crispy Drunken Chicken with Shrimp Chips. I’m not much of a fried rice girlie, but Beef and Lorenzo said it was really good. There were lots of tiny shrimpies mixed in and the serving was actually pretty huge. The S&P Chicken was probably our favorite of the bunch. While the chicken didn’t have an overwhelming salt and pepper flavor to it, it was incredibly well seasoned and crispy AF. I enjoyed the biscuits, but I also love Popeye’s dry ass biscuits so my opinion here is skewed. The dish comes with a chili plum jam to help moisten those bad boys, but I kinda with there was a scallion butter or something to go with the biscuits because we really liked the jam with the chicken. I get that this is a play on chicken and biscuits/salt and pepper chicken, but both components of this dish felt a little too separate for me. Same goes for the Drunken Chicken and Shrimp Chips - both components were good, but they didn’t really work well together. I suggested that Beef and Lorenzo scoop the fried rice with the shrimp chips and that ended up being a really good use case for them.
Last time I was here, they had a pineapple soft serve on the menu for dessert, but it wasn’t offered anymore during this recent visit which was a bummer. While the lack of dessert was definitely disappointing, overall we thought the food was great. I was so surprised to read that Pete Wells only gave Potluck Club one star! I think creating any sort of menu that fuses multiple cuisines together is a tough task and while some of the dishes weren’t 100% successful there, the individual components were still really good. And that endive salad! Potluck Club is definitely a fun place to grab a bite and lucky for you, Soft Swerve is literally across the park for that after dinner dessert need. 🍦
The Potluck Club folks also just opened another restaurant nearby, Phoenix Palace. Their menu is a little more Chinese banquet/seafood focused so I’m not sure if I’ll be eating there (Lorenzo can’t eat shellfish 🥲), but if you do let me know how it is!
Temple of Dendur 1000 5th Ave, New York, NY 10028 The Met - Gallery 131 Neighborhood: Museum Mile, Upper East Side Admission: Pay-What-You-Wish for for NY state residents, $30 GA Hours: Everyday at 10am, closed Wednesdays
On a chilly but sunny day, Lorenzo and I decided to pop into The Met for a visit. It will never not be crazy to me that I’m a mere 45 min subway ride from one of the world’s largest art museums and that I can literally pay $1 to get in (pay-what-you-wish FTW). There are a few spots that I try to visit every time I’m there in addition to seeing something new; the Afrofuturism Room, Cleopatra’s Needle (technically outside The Met), the American Wing statues, and the Temple of Dendur are some of my favorites. Like Cleopatra’s Needle, the Temple of Dendur begs the question “how the heck did this get here?” Shipping a mummy or a statue over from Egypt is one thing, but this is a whole ass temple!
I guess we should start at the beginning-ish - 10BCE - that’s when this temple was built. It was erected while Egypt was under Caesar Augustus’ Roman rule after he defeated Cleopatra and Mark Antony (so post-Cleopatra’s Needle). Augustus wanted to ingratiate himself with his new Egyptian subjects so he figured what better way to do that then to build a nice lil temple for the homies! He built a few across Egypt and the Temple of Dendur was built in Nubia right on the bank of the Nile (this geography will be important later). This particular temple wasn’t built as a tomb like the pyramids, but rather as a physical monument to honor the gods. Dendur was dedicated to the Egyptian goddess Isis, but it also honored two local Nubian brothers: Pedesi and Pihor. Pedesi and Pihor were the sons of a local Nubian ruler who drowned in the Nile and were thus deified; this story is depicted in the hieroglyphs in the temple. In fact, there was a small chamber cut into the cliff behind the temple that may have been the location of their tomb, but apparently no one really knows for sure. So in commissioning this temple, Augustus showed that he was down with the old gods (Isis) and the local fellas (Pedesi and Pihor).
Remember when I said the geography of the temple would be important? Do you remember learning about the flooding of the Nile or did my school just have an abnormally long lesson about this? Every year the Nile would flood, which would make the land more fertile, agriculture, yada yada yada. Well even though Egyptians would celebrate during the annual flooding, it turns out it was kind of a pain in the ass. Predicting it wasn’t an exact science and the word “flood” generally has negative connotations for a reason; you can’t really control it. Eventually, Egypt built the Aswan High Dam in 1960 to help control the waters by creating the Lake Nasser reservoir. However in order to do that, they had to flood a bunch of stuff and that stuff included a lot of really old temples (kinda like how NYC flooded a bunch of towns upstate for our aqueduct). But like no big deal right, all of these temples that are used to being in the dry ass desert will be fine being underwater 9 months out of the year, right?
Actually no, it was very bad but Egypt didn’t have the funds to do anything about it so they were like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ The water absolutely wrecked all of the paint on these temples and threatened to basically disintegrate them. Eventually UNESCO stepped in and launched Operation International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia to relocate 22 monuments between 1960 and 1980. Fun fact: this process led to the creation of the World Heritage Convention in 1972, and thus the system of UNESCO World Heritage Sites - the mo’ you kno’! So at this point a bunch of countries banded together to donate money to get all of these buildings out of the water with the sneaky hopes that maybe they’d get to keep some of them because if the world loves anything, it’s plundering artifacts from Egypt. And Egypt did gift a bunch of temples to the highest bidders - The US, Spain, The Netherlands, and Italy. I don’t know how the other countries decided where to put their temples, but in the good ol’ US of A we had ourselves an old-fashioned Dendur Derby 🤠
Deadass though, a bunch of cities around the US all submitted arguments for why they should have the Temple of Dendur. Cairo, Illinois though they should have it because their name was Cairo, which everyone thought was a weak argument. It eventually came down to the Smithsonian in DC and The Met in NYC. The Smithsonian wanted to put the temple on the Potomac River to replicate its original spot along the Nile. The Met said “hold my beer” and promised to build a whole new temperature controlled wing that would house the temple safely inside, while allowing a huge amount of natural light to drape across it so that it would be just like it was still outside! Ultimately, the “safe inside” argument won and for the life of me I still can’t understand why we leave Cleopatra’s Needle outside but whatever. So the temple was literally taken apart brick by brick, loaded onto a boat, and shipped to the US.
In 1974, construction on the fancy new wing was under way and Italian stonemasons were called in to reassemble the temple according to grooves and markings on the stones and I assume these are the same kinds of people who do those 3D jigsaw puzzles. The Temple of Dendur opened to the public in 1978 alongside the Treasures of Tutankhamun show. Longtime BCLF readers may remember that this King Tut show was considered the “first museum blockbuster” show and while it was open The Met experienced a still unsolved Valentine’s Day Heist in another wing.
Part of what I love most about the Temple of Dendur is that you’re able to just get right up in it; you can walk around it and get a super close look at all of the hieroglyphs carved into the walls and pillars. And if you start looking closely, you’ll notice that there’s a ton of graffiti on this temple. And it’s not the modern Fart or Blob Dylan graffiti I’m used to seeing around Bushwick - this graffiti proves that hooligans liked carving “Leonoardo wuz here” way back in the 1800s.
Nowadays they would never let anyone defile the Temple of Dendur…oh wait they hold the Met Gala here? They let Justin Bieber perform here??And anyone can rent this place out for $40,000??? Ok that honestly sounds surprisingly affordable so please become a paid subscriber now so that I can host a BCLF party at the Temple of Dendur.
Very cool newsletter
is launching a 2025 NYC June Primary Bootcamp! Sachi’s goal is to help you level up your political knowledge and learn how to get involved in local politics. The bootcamp has tons of actions that’ll earn you points and, you guessed it, those points will get you prizes. I obviously signed up immediately and I hope you will too!Wonderville in Bushwick has some fun stuff coming up this weekend. On Sunday they’re showing a double feature of The Substance and Death Becomes Her (free to watch, but like buy a drink or something while you’re there). On Saturday you can compete or spectate their Smash Bash Super Smash Bros tournament - free to watch, $2 to enter. I got Kirby.
- did the math and figured out the best time to go to Comedy Cellar if you’re hoping to see a famous comedian! I definitely don’t take advantage of the NY comedy scene enough, mostly because I’m afraid whoever I see won’t be funny, so this is a game changer.
I have yet to try the Japanese-Italian fusion at Kimika and now might be the perfect time because they’re kicking off Guest Appreciation Month with a $50 three-course meal menu. My perfect meal? Kanpachi, brick chicken, all of the desserts.
Radio Bakery opened their second location in Prospect Heights this week! There was obviously a crazy line and I will obviously be visiting to try their location-specific mango matcha morning bun. The earl grey bun at their Greenpoint shop is amazing so I can’t even imagine how good this one will be.
If you’re feeling a little cheesy this week, stop by Studio 45 in Bushwick on Sunday for their Cheese Club. Their pricing runs from $40-50 and you’ll get to try 6 different cheeses with pairings while mingling with fellow cheese lovers.
Technically it’s always ice cream season for me, but I’m so happy that we’re finally approaching city-wide ice cream season! Screen Door is reopening on March 14 and Lady Moo Moo is reopening on April 5.
If you’re looking to refresh your wardrobe in time for ice cream season, pop by McCarren Park on March 16 for the Worn Not Torn Exchange Clothing Swap! Swapping is free and anything left over will be donated to local mutual aid groups.
The Met said “hold my beer” 💯 🤣