When one of your great Cali friends blows into town and asks to get lunch, you quickly assess the day’s responsibilities. When he follows up with “let’s go to Miss Lily’s,” your assessing turns into reprioritizing and dashing out of the door.
Shoutout to J. Kevin Swain, my Los Angeles brother-from-another, for always bringing a good time wherever he lands. His quick invitation and plan had me and our friend Angie en route to the Via pick up location quickly and a pleasant WBGO radio ride downtown to Miss Lily’s 7A (@MissLilysChat, 109 Avenue A, 212-812-1482, www.misslilys.com).
We squeezed into a booth and quickly ordered some cool cocktails to bring our body temperatures down to a reasonable level on that hot day. I immediately eyed the Dark & Stormy made with Kelvin’s Natural Slushie and rum floater. Angie tried the frozen Ting margarita and Kevin had to get the Rude Boy of sorell, ginger and Appleton’s rum. We rinsed and repeated on that a few times.
The heat really tamped down our appetites so we stuck to appetizers…all of the appetizers…and split a sandwich and salad. However, the heat did not stop us from going in on their fresh desserts.
We started with the marinated and grilled jerk wings. Kevin and Angie ate the lion’s share; they were too smoky for my palette. The next round was the codfish fritters with curry dipping sauce, ackee hummus with roti bread and hot pepper shrimp. I adored the fritters and the uniquely light hummus.
We split the crispy fish sandwich with homemade coco bread, escovitch and scotch bonnet mayo and arugula salad with spicy cashews, goat cheese, dates, bacon and red wine vinaigrette. Although a little clunky and messy, that sandwich has great flavor.
Kevin’s friend popped in toward the latter part of our meal. He tore into his Jamaican patty melt of house-blend patty with caramelized onion, Gruyere and burger sauce on marbled rye. That could get me on another day in the fall.
We tried to leave without eating dessert, but Miss Lily’s banana pudding and moist coconut rum cake were soon hovering over our table. I didn’t want to, but three Dark & Stormys weakened my deflector shields. Eye-rolling nirvana ensued.
Until we reeee-wind Miss Lily’s…
Happy eating and thanks for reading!
Kysha Harris is a food writer and editor, culinary producer, consultant and owner of SCHOP!, a personalized food service in NYC for more than 15 years. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram, @SCHOPgirl, on Facebook, /SCHOPnyc, and her blog, www.talkingSCHOP.wordpress.com. Questions? Comments? Requests? Feedback? Invitations! Email AmNewsFOOD at AmNewsFOOD@SCHOPnyc.com. Follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @NYAmNewsFOOD and tag us with #SoAmNewsFOOD with your food finds!