E to the M to the Panada

it's not your typical valentine's dinner, although james and i are one of the many people in america to recognize that the valentine's day is just another hallmark holiday. nevertheless, you've got to eat, right?

you might recall our fascination of empanadas from the post about ricardo steak house. i think i went as far as to quote james in saying, "wish i could sit in front of the tv eating these empanadas all day."

we were spending the day in the city and while walking cross town, we came across a place called empanada joe's on 6th avenue between 20th and 21st. at first, it looked like it was a chain place, including the decor and the menu style. i still wasn't sure until i checked out the website and saw that this was the only location in manhattan (i like it even more for this reason).

earlier that day, i was reading portions of this book, "eat this not that" and it was all about fast food joints and what you should be eating on their menu instead of another item. i contemplated buying it for 5 seconds, but then realized that spending $19.99 on the book is probably not worth it, being that i don't go to those places often enough for me to worry about it.

however, i bring the book up because empanada joe's, or m-joe's as they call it, made it a point to have posters (and on their website), comparing their empanadas to fast foods ("150 calories!" as compared to the 350 calories+ items that they compared it to).

that's all well and good, but when you get 3 empanada plus two sides meal that james and i each got (oh yeah, did i mention that we got 2 sweet dessert type empanadas?)- those calories sure do add up! i am not knocking their marketing scheme, being that people have the choice to eat one, or in our case, james and i chose to go the gluton route and eat 3 plus the dessert empanadas.

so the both of use got the same empanadas:

grande cheesesteak

rojo pulled pork

argentine beef

and shared the sweet empanadas:

cha cha chocolate and banana

big cinnamon apple

the sides aren't really worth mentioning, but they had pretty good sauces (bbq, chipotle mayo).

the other really clever part that i appreciated was that the empanadas were "labeled" on the corners, by having little initials baked into the dough part so you knew which one was which. i thought that was pretty cool. it was a pretty good bang for your buck (the 3 empanada + 2 sides + drink was $9.95, which made me a really cheap valentine's day date). however, next time around, i would probably skip the sides and the soda, and just get a truckload of empandas by the dozen or something.

while not as good as the angus empanadas at ricardo's, empanada joe's is definitely a repeat restaurant, and a good place if you just want a quick bite. a pleasant surprise in that part of manhattan (i have no idea what neighborhood that is considered) and i'm sure it'll do well for all those E to the M to the Panada lovers...