We Heart Astoria Food Talk, *New Year’s Day Edition*

Happy New Year Astoria!  We hope that everyone had a wonderful time celebrating last night, and that you had something tasty (and local) to eat.  We thought to start this year by recapping some of our most scrumptious moments of 2013.  There are so many to count of course, but these in particular stand out.  What are your most delicious moments of 2013?  Please chime in and let us know!

We brunched a lot, and enjoyed sharing some of those adventures with you, including at Rest-au-Rant, Mezze Place, the Queens Kickshaw and just some good ol’ fashioned brunch round-ups.

It was fun to see the BBQ scene really stepping up in Astoria and LIC last year through the work of The Strand, John Brown Smokehouse (and our friend Tyson Ho aka The Arrogant Swine), Butcher Bar, Ovelia and more!

The pizza scene in Astoria got even more exciting with newcomers such as Tufino’s and Milkflower, as well as amazing mainstays such as Sac’s, Rizzo’s, and Basil Brick Oven, which always over deliver.

We’re all big coffee fans on staff, and were therefore delighted to see local coffee purveyors step it up a notch such as Native Coffee Roasters, Astoria Coffee, Sweetleaf and as always, the Queens Kickshaw.

Sippin’ on delicious cocktails is always a highlight for us, with places such as Sweet Afton, Casa Enrique, The Shady Lady coming to mind, as well as local cocktail makers such as the Cocktail Crate, which created a big splash (pun intended).

Saving room for dessert is never hard for us, and we’ve loved tasting new sweets such as the butterscotch pecan cake at the Sage General Store, homemade donuts at Queens Comfort, the vanilla bean cheesecake at S. Prime Steakhouse, as well as old classics such as the heavenly Baby Jesus cake from Vesta, which never goes out of style.

We can’t wait to see what delights 2014 has in store, so bring it on, we say!