The Stanton Social

What We Ate:

French Onion Soup Dumplings: 5 out of 5 stars

Red Snapper Tacos: 5 out of 5 stars

Hand Pulled Chicken Arepas: 6 out of 5 (no typo)

Nori Spiced Tuna Tartare Roll: 4.75 out of 5

The Youtube channel Chow first introduced me to The Stanton Social, and after learning that the bald judge on Food Network's show "Chopped" named Chris Santos owned the eatery, it was a must-go.  It was the most up-scale place that we would go, but going in athletic shorts and a polo, or sear-sucker shorts and a t-shirt as we did, is not highly suggested.  Because of this, they put us in a booth invisible from the street, but we were content with being seated no matter the location.  We were culinarily introduced to the restaurant with the water, which was the best water that has ever grazed my palette.  It may have been the heat, and I know humans cannot taste water, but this bottled water was crisp, clean, and possibly mixed up with the Holy Water from the church down the street.  But I digress... As I mentioned before, Chow did a spotlight on The Stanton Social, specifically French Onion Soup Dumplings, which turned out to be my favorite dish that we ordered.  Apparently after introducing these gems to New York, many places have tried to duplicate the dumplings but none have succeeded in doing so.  The dumplings are served in an escargot dish, six count, and are topped with gruyere and speared with a crouton to complete the new spin on a classic dish.  The presentation is stunning, one of the best I have seen in my short culinary career, and the flavor completely lives up to these high expectations.  Best-case scenario, you pop the dumpling on your plate before you indulge to release some steam, but I suggest you pop the whole thing in your mouth to savor all of its contents and not let any of the juices escape.  The soup inside is ridiculously flavorful, its components being complexly meaty and sweet broth and tender, translucent onions.  I have tried many french onion soups, but this one was the most flavorful of all of them.  The gruyere was not as gooey as I would have liked, but I guess they let it cool so we would not burn ourselves even more.  One difference between regular french onion soup and this one was that the crouton was suspended above it, so it did not lose any of its crunch which was nice. The one thing that made no impression on us was the dumpling dough itself, which may be good considering it is a rendition of a soup.  If you are ever in northern China Town and have some money to spend on delicious tapas style dishes, I urge you to check out The Stanton Social.

-Alec

Wow, where to start? We each had to decide which dish to review, and I felt confident that I would be nowhere close to doing any of these dishes justice with my blogging. Entering Stanton Social in our street clothes at first made me feel a little bit bum-ish, however when they decided to seat us out of view of the passersby I felt somewhat more comfortable. We knew that we were in for a more expensive meal judging by the upscale atmosphere of this renowned restaurant, but after the first few bites we were willing to pay any amount for more and more. We unanimously decided on the Red Snapper Tacos, the Chicken Arepas, and the French Onion Soup Dumplings. However after these three bite-sized yet flavorful-as-an-entire-buffet meals, we picked a fourth dish, the Nori Spiced Tuna Tartare Roll. I'm going to talk about the Arepas. This was my first encounter with this dish and my oh my it was a splendid encounter. The hand pulled chicken seasoned with a heavenly blend of spices and was served on top of the nice chewy dough. Topped off with a small slice of jalepeño pepper and cheese, these Arepas offered a plethora of flavors for my inexperienced pallet that was difficult to fully comprehend. This dish could not be outdone by any other in our trip and deservedly earned a 6 out of 5 stars. Stanton Social as a whole was by far my favorite spot in terms of flavor and presentation, and I highly highly highly recommend it to anyone (dressed in casual business attire please) looking for a knockout meal. 

-Jack

I knew The Stanton Social would be a pricey dinner and after enjoying the last bite, we all wished we had more money to spend.  The two dishes I will review our the red snapper fish tacos and the nori spiced tuna tartare roll.  I love red snapper, and these tacos perfectly utilized the fish.  It was sweet inside a crunchy corn shell, which gave great texture to the soft ingredients.  The tacos had creamy avocado and spicy mango.  These two ingredients were creamy and sweet, but I was expecting them to have a slightly firmer consistency.  This was one of my favorite dishes of the trip, I just wish there were a few more to eat.  We ordered the nori spiced tuna roll wanting more food to taste after the first three plates.  The presentation was great with small shredded nori covering the plate.  The fine tuna tartare had a strong spice that was not overpowering.  While I really like this dish, it was not my favorite of the meal.  That said, anything we ate at The Stanton Social was among some of the best food we tried on the trip.  If you are in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, make sure to visit The Stanton Social.

-Nate