Brunch Spots We Love: ZUMA NYC
Zuma NYC * 261 Madison Avenue New York, New York 10016 * $$$
If you’re lucky, brunch reservations are the plans that get you through the week. There’s nothing like waking up on a Sunday morning feeling the motivation you may have been lacking towards the end of the week to head into the city and brunch so hard, because let’s face it, you had a rough few days and need to #TreatYoself! Now if only we could brunch just about every day of the week… 🙂
This particular Sunday morning my wonderful date and I hopped on the Metro North and walked down Madison Ave. You can tell that ZUMA NYC is a classy restaurant from its appearance on the outside. The external decor is subtle, dark hued and makes it difficult for pedestrians to take a peak in and see what they are missing out on. Once you’ve stepped inside, it is hard to escape the feeling that you’ve just walked in on an incredible meal and a warm, creative atmosphere.
The brunch menu comes with a fresh and delicious variety of options. There is the special menu that for a fixed price of $59, you can order a drink, an appetizer platter, an entree and dessert. And of course, you can take on the extra charge ($55) for unlimited drinks if you’re really looking to let loose.
To start, we tried the edamame, watercress and avocado salad with wasabi and cucumber, seasonal oysters, salmon sake, rock shrimp with lime and tofu, yaki and chicken skewers with baby leek. Oh yeah – we tried EVERYTHING. And instantly fell in love with the place.
We had a tough time deciding what we wanted for our main entrees. Eventually, I decided on the “tori no munaniku teriyaki” aka chicken breast teriyaki with shiitake and shiso – this is actually meant to be a sharing dish, but I was already starting to get full from the incredible appetizers (and I knew I’d dig into some of the sushi)! Ben decided on an option off the regular entree menu, the premium sushi “chef’s selection.” Which was just as pretty as it was delicious (see below.)
The platter above was hands down the best and most beautiful sushi I’ve ever eaten!
Chicken terayaki skewers were actually to-die-for. Juicy meat cooked to perfection and marinated in terayaki sauce made for the perfect dish. It was extremely hard for me to be nice and share this with Ben!
For dessert, we ordered the Zuma dessert platter (yes, to share). And were presented with this dreamy bowl above! Everything from fruit to macaroons to ice cream to cheesecake was included in this dream-come-true dessert. It’s a good thing I didn’t take an after picture, because there really wasn’t much left! x
Stay Classy! xx