During a recent stay at the Hudson Hotel in New York City I paid a visit to the in-house bar/restaurant, the Hudson Common. The dark wood paneling and oversized teak armchairs were intimidating but I found some comfort in their quirky courtyard highlighted by a towering brick facade and Alice in Wonderland inspired furnishings. As a first introduction to rooftop bars (or quasi-rooftop courtyards) I could have done much worse.
The Hudson Commons offers Thrice Cooked Fries as a shareable appetizer. I can’t prove that they were fried three times because I wasn’t present for the entire process, but I will say that they retained their crunch for the entire ten minutes I snacked on them. They easily held up against the cheese-whiz consistency of the Velveeta ranch dip. If you doubled them up you could probably lay mortar.
The color was a mottled gold to yellow (Trump tan yellow?) with flecks of toasted beige skin. They were lightly salted, slightly oily, and the right amount of starchy. The truffle mayo was at the maximum level of runnyness to still be serviceable, and I could see it ruining a good pair of trousers some day. The ranch tasted fine but wasn’t anything to boast about (let alone charge $2 for). They had ketchup available, I should have used it. The Velveeta ranch was both cheaper and more interesting than the truffle mayo but I could see it being a non-starter for those that are against obviously processed foods.
Once upon a time these fries were prepared with duck fat and some additional high-end add-ons. That would have been more exciting for me, but I understand that restaurants need to simplify their menus, or maybe they just wanted to keep it a vegetarian option. Either way, the thrice fried fries were very tasty and warrant an 7.7 out of 10 on my rating scale.
I read on their website that it’ll be a slightly different experience in the future with the addition of Umami Burger being introduced into the space. They already had burgers and fries on the menu, so I’m curious to see how this vision will change the final product.
Catalog:
Sampled June 2017
The Sodafry 