An Beal Bocht Cafe

IRELAND 🇮🇪

Even on the outside, An Beal Bocht aims to cover every square inch with color and kitsch, revealing its overall friendliness with each frame, flower, flag, and can of baked beans. Taking a seat at the bar gives you the best midway vantage point into the operation, which spans into another dining room.

Not all of the kitsch is without function, a shelf above the bar acts as a British Isles market, with cans of those aforementioned baked beans, marmalade, Hartley's jam, and Irish peas. To conveniently satisfy curiosity about how often these items sell, a couple came in and purchased a bottle of HP Sauce.

Across the space and facing the bar is an entire wall of framed Irish men and women, newspaper cuts, and maps. If no one is occupying the tables nearby, it makes a fun time to look through them all. This wall also serves as the background for the almost daily live music that takes place here. Me and a small group of friends came to catch the weekly Irish traditional session on a Sunday, but the day after New York City's first real snow had left the musicians stranded in Ireland. Allegedly.

Instead the constant clinking of silverware and plates set the background to a few hours of good cheer. This is the type of place that bartenders know a lot of their customer's names and that general New York prickliness almost keeps itself outside the door. It opened in 1991 but the walls and faces would make you guess back even further. During those first years it was just a cafe, but the spirit and their goal of making this a space for artists to come together to experiment has stuck around.

Somewhere on one side of the Kingsbridge-Riverdale border, and up at least ten flights of urban stairs from the nearest subway, most first-timers not coming from their houses at this elevation will arrive will an appetite for some hearty Irish fare. While most of the menu reads like a typical bar menu, there is a small section of "Irish specialties" to check out.

On a trip to Ireland in 2003, I became well-versed with the magic of Irish curry. They eat it there late at night with chips (fries), like New Yorkers eat pizza and tacos. To be honest though, the Irish version of curry has no business with the name, but instead is a different beast. It is sweet first and foremost. You can take it here with chips or as a chicken curry ($15, above) entree. I recommend the former, as the chicken component of the entree is just a few hunks of dry breast. For the price, I found this plate's serving size very small.

Better is the shepherd's pie ($15, below), that classic Irish boat of ground meat, carrots and other vegetables, that gets topped with whipped potatoes and baked. It is really a cottage pie as it uses ground beef instead of lamb, but getting past that is not hard because they all are here on this side of the Atlantic.

Essential to any shepherd's pie experience is a healthy dip in HP sauce. Ask an Irishman what type of sauce this is, and they'll reply "brown" without further explanation necessary. The most prominent tastes come from the malt vinegar, but it is quite sweet as well.

After a few rounds of Guinness and a few hours passing, all feelings from here are good. It was not hard to imagine why the place had so many loyal customers.

🇮🇪 🇮🇪 🇮🇪
KINGSBRIDGE Bronx

445 West 238th Street

The Chipper Truck

IRELAND 🇮🇪

For the longest time, I have been sitting on a collection of ugly dark photos from Woodlawn Heights, taken after midnight when the Chipper Truck hits the street. When the Chipper recently showed up at Viva la Comida!, a Queens food and culture festival, I finally got a photo of it in the daylight. It's like catching a vampire roaming around during the day.

In its normal habitat on Katonah Avenue in the Bronx, this chip van sets up very late at night for the Irish community enjoying the plentiful local bars on the main strip of the neighborhood. You will not find it if you come before midnight.

The truck is run by a husband and wife team, her from Ireland and him from Mexico. Most nights you will find them both in the truck cooking and taking orders.

When I visit the Chipper Truck, I get chips. They also serve all range of greasy food that sounds great, but I make it here so rarely that I eat a plateful of chips smothered in gravy almost every time. A plate of large curry chips (below) sets you back $6 and is plenty to stave off that hangover tomorrow. Irish curry is entirely sweet and soaks into the chips perfectly. Make sure to grab a fork, because this is definitely not finger food.

They make the chips in a variety of ways, one of which is the popular taco chips ($7, below). Ground beef, shredded cheese, and Thousand Island dressing top this one, exactly what you put on your tacos, right?

Coleslaw chips ($4, below) and curry coleslaw chips ($6) are also available, if you would like a few vegetables on your plate. At any rate, it is great to get up here with a few friends so that you can sample a variety of chip plates.

I really love this place, and have no chance to get tired of it solely because of its elusiveness. It is definitely worth renting a car with friends and hanging out in Woodlawn for an evening. It is open seven days a week.

🇮🇪🇮🇪🇮🇪
WOODLAWN HEIGHTS Bronx

Katonah Avenue & 237th Street

I COULD USE YOUR HELP

Eat the World NYC is and always has been free. No advertisements block the content or pop over what you read. If this website has helped you explore your city and its wonderful cultures a little better and you have the means to contribute, please consider doing so. Eat the World NYC is a labor of love, but also takes a lot of money and time everyday to keep running.

You can Venmo me @JAREDCOHEE or click here to send PayPal donation, no account is necessary. Thank you!

Mary's Celtic Kitchen

IRELAND

You will not find a place in New York City that makes you feel closer to the Emerald Isle than Mary's, located in a distinctly Irish neighborhood in the far northern reaches of the Bronx. Woodlawn Heights is a place you will hear thick Irish accents and see almost all signage written in green. In the center of this is Mary Moylan, a chef originally from County Kilkenny. If you are not charmed by her friendliness and hospitality (not to mention her cooking), you simply have no soul!

Inside the small primarily takeout/delivery store you will find a couple handwritten chalkboards and seven stools lining a small counter for eating in. The phone rings pretty frequently with orders, and most people stop in to pick up their food and say hello to Mary, delivering gossip and updates on life along the way. She seems to know all of her customers well, and takes care of everything with a precision that revolves around love.

The sausage mash & beans ($8.50, below) is a good combination of flavors for a meal, found under the "traditional fare" section of the menu. We recommend staying on this side anyways, but the place does cater to the usual bar crowd with burgers and nachos and the like. The sausages are fried and retain their juiciness, and combined with the potatoes and a little Chef's Sauce, make for a delectable bite.

The shepherd's pie ($8.50, below), like most places in New York City is actually a cottage pie, made with ground beef and not lamb, but is distinct from your average Irish pub by a long shot. The ingredients are fresh and it is not over-salted like most. It is hard to get a sense of the enormity of this pie from the photo below, but it is far larger than the size of your face, and a smaller portion is available for $5.

A look inside the pie.

I could not help but order a Scotch egg ($2.50, below) from the refrigerated case. It appears as a nice fried globe, and when described as a boiled egg wrapped in sausage then fried, becomes something any meal should not be without. My companion for this meal giggled and proclaimed that this was the "first time a taste made me laugh."

Katonah Avenue and Woodlawn Heights in the Bronx spill a little over the northern border into Yonkers, and the whole neighborhood is an absolute gem. You can follow your meal at Mary's with a pint at one of many pubs that line the street, and if you happen to pull an all-nighter, wake up to an Irish breakfast at The Irish Coffee Shop.

WOODLAWN HEIGHTS Bronx
4330 Katonah Avenue

The Irish Coffee Shop

IRELAND

Researching McLean Avenue in Yonkers a few weeks ago turned up a photo on Forgotten NY of a small coffee shop. It turns out that this little place has grown up though, expanding to its current state above. The Irish communities of Woodlawn Heights in the northern Bronx and in bordering parts of Yonkers are thriving, and a much-needed hangover cure Irish breakfast was sought out on a recent weekend.

Upon entering the newly doubled space, you are greeted by a refrigerated case of all types of candy bars you might find on the Emerald Isle and its neighbor. The crests of all Ireland's counties adorn the walls, and a friendly staff takes your order and brings you coffee almost as quickly as you can sit down.

That Irish breakfast ($9.75, above) I mentioned is top notch, and full of grease to ward off that cloudiness in your head. It worked perfectly for me this day. It is also available in mini version for $7.95. You have the option of home fries or French fries, but be warned, they somehow run out of home fries by afternoon, as we had the last two portions at around 1pm on a Sunday.

The place has a menu with Irish staples for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, as well as their American diner equals. Later in the day I would be happy to try the chicken curry, fish & chips, and shepherd's pie.

As my stomach and grogginess were satisfied by the end of my second cup of coffee, a smile came across my face in the comfort of this place, and a U2 song came on over the radio.

YONKERS New York
946 McLean Avenue