Branded Saloon

Branded Saloon
603 Vanderbilt Ave
(between St Marks Ave & Bergen St)
Brooklyn, NY 11238
Neighborhood: Prospect Heights

When someone in the hospitality industry goes out of their way to tip 10%, you know your service is messed up.

Branded Saloon was not my first choice for restaurants to check out after my double shift ended at 11pm. Neither was it my second, third, nor fourth choice. (These honors would go to The Vanderbilt, Eton's Dumplings, Soda Bar, and Cornelius respectively). Like a booty call at two in the morning or a trip to Alphabet City 10 years ago, I simply hit up to the location that would give me the best chance of scoring.

With ravenous hunger setting in and expectations already low, I venture to Branded Saloon, the only place in Prospect Heights whose kitchen is open after 12am on weekdays.

The late night dinner started promising enough with a La Trappe Quadrupel, whose malty, toffee, and caramel notes were emblematic of this style of Belgian beer. Branded has a surprisingly decent beer selection by bottle; other highlights include Innis & Gunn, a mild ale from Scotland matured in oak casks, which give it a roasted, vanilla flavor very much to what you see in bourbon.

The burger took about 30 minutes to come out. While I patiently read my recent issue of Food & Wine Magazine, I mentally compiled the following service issues which played out like a bad Health Inspection examination.

- Order Belgian quadrupel; bartender does not offer glassware of any kind
- Burger took 30 minutes, despite my order being the only food order sent to the kitchen
- Bartender mentions burger will come out in 4 minutes after waiting at the bar for nearly 20 minutes; said burger takes 10 minutes to finally reach the table
- Requested side salad instead of fries with burger; order comes out with fries
- Failure by bartender to apologize for messing up order
- While order is outstanding, bartender spends time adjusting volume level and tracks of personal iPod list and ventures outside for 5 minute smoke break
- Bartender clears food from previous customer with hands into bus tray; proceeds to handle my plate from kitchen with cigarette-smoke laden hands without washing

I begrudgingly add an additional star due to the fact that the bartender offered a shot of Jameson while I was waiting; although I suspect that it was to get him lubricated rather than as a comp for how long the burger took to cook.

The Vanderbilt

The Vanderbilt
570 Vanderbilt Ave
(between Pacific St & Dean St)
Brooklyn, NY 11238

I don't dine in Brooklyn.

With the exception of Williamsburg (Roberta's, The Commodore, Pies n' Thighs) and Park Slope (Al di La), I consider my borough, as Gabrielle Hamilton would quip, "a minor league stretch" that simply disappoints culinarily.

I don't consider the farm-to-table restaurants that have sprouted up in Brooklyn legitimate concepts. To quote the man David Chang himself: "How else are you supposed to cook? You're supposed to get the best ingredients possible. Do you want a [expletive deleted] pat on the back?"

***Rant ended***

The Vanderbilt is one of the few restaurants that get a personal pat on the back. Started by "that dude who runs Saul," it's an American-style gastropub that's major-league with its execution.

Like a French brasserie, the meats, sausage, and charcuterie shine. The grilled merguez sausage was smoky and spicy, delightfully offset by the lactic tang of lemony raita. The butter-brushed, homemade pita that accompanied it provided a soft, pillowy cradle to slather the yogurt sauce and stray pieces of merguez that fell off my fork + knife. The German bratwurst was juicy and well-cooked; the meatiness complemented by acidic bite of fermented sauerkraut and horseradish dijon musatrd. The (rare) hamburger included a nice blend of funky dry-aged beef that went well with my equally funky Monk's Cafe Flemish Red Sour Ale. The only disappointment was the country pork pate: the lack of meatiness/smokiness was compounded by the small hunks of fat and tendon strewn throughout the meaty slab.

Where the Vanderbilt shines is the beer list. Personally selected by the head bartender, it includes an solid domestic draft and eccentric international bottle list. On draft are solid domestic selections available at any high-end craft beer establishment (Allagash, Dogfish Head, Pretty Things. The bottles are more interesting with international selections from Belgian brewery Van Steenberg (Piraat Ale, Monk's Cafe Flemmish Red Sour Ale) and other weird stuff from Germany (Schlenkerla Marzen Rauchbier) and Spain (Estrella Damn Inedit).

At least that dude from Saul is doing something right in Brooklyn.