Night of the cookers

767 Fulton Street

Brooklyn, NY 11217-1610

Friday 20 , 2011

I went with a date to the Night Of The Cookers. I have never heard of it before, but then again, I'm rarely in Brooklyn. My date said he's a frequent guest there and he loves it, so I was amped and ready to go. We arrived for dinner at 8:00pm. From the name, I was expecting a hole in the wall because a lot of neighborhood places have good food and atmosphere, but are holes in the wall. This restaurant was different. It had a live jazz band, a lounge, a party room and, of course, a dining area. The band and bar, were at the front door, where some patrons were watching the basketball game. As with most local places, the atmosphere was very relaxed. It felt like you could go there with a date, for a party or to chat with your friends.

We sat in the dining area and ordered dinner and drinks. I had the pan-fried catfish with macaroni and cheese and potato salad.

My date had fried chicken, steamed spinach, mashed potatoes and gravy. Overall my meal was good, however, the macaroni and cheese was a little weird. It seemed as if it had been baked and then rebaked a few times. It had so much cheese and other stuff in it that you couldn't taste the traditional macaroni and cheese flavors. For heavens sake, it came in a large square block. The potato salad was weird only because there were large, crunchy chunks of celery, red onion and scallions in it, which took away from the underlying flavor. Why was that done? I don't know. I do know that the restaurant was trying to be a trendy eatery in Brooklyn, which is known for its outdoor cafes, ethnic foods and culture. These two dishes, however were not good examples of that trendy culture that people have come to expect from Brooklyn restaurants.  People will go anywhere if the food is good!

Meanwhile our waitress was very sweet and helpful. She took time with us, checked on us and was attentive. For dessert, I ordered the carrot cake. When it came, it was warm. Now why would carrot cake come warm? It was warm enough for the icing to start melting. Maybe, the cake was frozen (no biggie). Perhaps, they didn't have time to thaw my piece, which means that people don't order carrot cake that often. They should have thawed the whole cake for service. Warm cake was very interesting, but all in all the flavor was good.

After dessert we were able to stay as long as we liked and not feel rushed to leave. There weren't any annoying staff members cleaning up around us and obsessively asking if we were done. The staff was attentive, but left us alone. I guess they learned that there's a fine line between being annoying and kicking us out and, silently nudging us out the door. Either way I would go back. Its a place where everybody knows your name, with decent food, a live band and they're awfully glad you came! What more could you ask for?

Here is my rating: 1-5
Food: 3
Atmosphere: 5
Service: 5
Drinks: 5
Cleanliness: 5
Price: Reasonable