Tertulia Review: On guilt and eating at Tertulia
Recently I tortured Steph into watching Game of Thrones with me. There’s dragon eggs in that show, and I’ve previously told many of my friends that zombies are more believable than vampires. And I think that rule applies to dragons as well. You can sell me on The Walking Dead, but Game of Thrones… how the hell do you end up with dragons?! Watching television in America is like the national past-time, sorry to baseball. But this day in age, I don’t think it’s possible to really watch television guilt free unless you’re a baller. What’s strange is that ballers probably don’t watch that much tv shows. Now if you’re reading this, I don’t know what industry in which your ply your craft, but suppose you a writer… I mean, there’s not going to be some new revolutionary shit out every year on how to construct a sentence. But in programming? The way they wrote a popular site like Amazon in 2005 looks nothing like the code behind Amazon in 2008 and looks way different in 2012. For those who aren’t versed in web development that might seem absurd, but it’s completely true. Imagine if they rewrote Shakespeare every three to five years. Or if you’re a doctor. There might be new advances in medicine but a human body doesn’t fucking change. I’ll tell you now that Twitter and Foursquare are two of the most popular sites out there, and their codebase looks nothing alike. They don’t even code in the same language. So how is a web developer supposed to watch a show on a Saturday night and be like, “well I ain’t able to work at a facebook, foursquare, or a twitter cuz unless I’m learning that shit instead of watching TV, all that shit is passing me by.” I don’t feel that tinge of guilt when I eat, except when paying the bill. See that’s the other half of not being a baller. You eat and it’s like, “Fuck I wish it was a little bit more affordable and I don’t mean by like a dollar or two. I mean by like ten or fifteen dollars.” That’s kind of how I felt about Tertulia. Great food. Nice atmosphere. There was even a couple next to us that looked like they were in NYU and he looked about ready to finger her under the table. Kids. Fucking disgusting.
The fried peppers at Tertulia are very delicious. It’s a great starter because it’s nice to munch on while you wait for some of the other tapas to arrive. The peppers I think are shishito peppers, and they vary in spiciness. 80% of the plate is mild, maybe one or two is spicy enough to cause your eyes of widen like wiley coyote whenever he ate a dynamite, but still manageable. What’s up with this dish that got me? I think this dish was like $8 bucks pre-tax. So with tax and tip that’s like $9.50 for a plate of fried peppers. Going by the 30/30/30 rule of cost/space/labor, you could buy the peppers at the market for probably $2.50 and fry it up for $0.50. Too bad when you eat it at home there’s no ambiance.
We also got some serrano ham. I know Seamus Mullen and the folks at Tertulia is known for awesome iberico ham. But the fuck yo, I feel guilty about watching Game of Thrones. You think Imma spend on ham? I can’t get paid, how the fuck am I gonna buy dead pig legs? Anyway, serrano ham is plenty good in my opinion, especially for those of us who grew up on Oscar Meyer. I think this was like $14 pre-tax? I mean yea, do the math. This is delicious. This is not McDonald’s.
You can also get some croquettas. Man I think these were $8 or $9, which meant each ball was almost $3. They’re filled with a bechemel sauce and some pork thing. Shit. I don’t even know if my own balls are worth $3 a piece. But there I am, eating some cream filled balls for $3 a piece. Again, delicious with a crunchy exterior. This is something I recommend.
The last thing we got was the salted cod. This was around $13 or $14 dollars and offered the best value out of the things that we ate at Tertulia. It was more substantial and filling. It even came with two little eggs on top, which you can mix with the salted cod and then rub it on some toast. I could eat this all day and never complain about the price. You can’t really get full on this dish alone, which you know poses a huge contrast between what the average American can eat to be full, versus what the average New Yorker spends. Chili’s still advertises that shared appetizer and two entrees for $20. That’s fucking unbelievable. I know the argument if you’re a fuckwad like Ruhlman is to eat less, but it’s kinda a slap in the face to people who enjoy Chili’s or Applebees and like to enjoy going out once in a while. What? They should enjoy their lives less on the account that the insular foodie community shun their eating habits? I know everyone who reads a food blog just loves local farming and yea, I got nothing against that. But a billion people go to bed hungry world wide, so maybe genetically modified seeds that’s planted in large quantities doesn’t really hurt the world as much as elitists like to believe. In the end, there’s way more hungry people dying than farmers dying. Sorry to say, but that’s a fucking fact.
We wake up, go to bed, try to make the most of our lives or lie to ourselves make sure it is so. Of course there’s insecurities about our self worth and our futures, especially in this economy. Maybe Tertulia is one of the ten best restaurants to open in 2011, and I will say it’s not too shabby. But it’s not changing the landscape of dining in New York City. It’s not introducing delicious food at a radically different pricing level for those who want to enjoy what they can in this economy. It’s doing nothing to affect the guilt I feel each day, but hey it’s a decent spot every now and then. I guess that’s not too bad, but I’ll start watching another show soon, and something else is going to piss me off.
Tertulia359 6th Ave.New York, NY 10012646-559-9909
Posted by Danny on January 18, 2012 at 5:35 am
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