 I gotta get no cheese. That is going to be a very hot bite. You know that, right? Yes. The savouriness of this hot sauce is out of control at last. It's not because it's got Viagra in it. No, I don't do really safe and sound. Hey everyone, do you wanna know what are the most iconic New York restaurant chains? The ones that really define New York in its past and present, everything from a hundred years ago to 10 years ago, we're gonna go do it in this video. And our first spot is Cat's Deli. All right, so Cat's Deli actually has a history that stretches all the way back to 1888. So they do things very traditionally, but I would say it is an iconic chain. Like even if someone's visiting New York City for one or two days, I still tell them to go check out Cat's Deli. Now I will say this, I've been here before and you can get the regular pastrami or the corned beef or even the brisket on its regular rye with no other sauces, but I personally, I gotta get it with other accoutrements like mayo, maybe some lettuce, tomato, some cheese. I'm excited though. I would like mayo. The mayo's okay. Yeah, oh yeah, mayo's okay? The tomato. Not tomato. I'm not getting lettuce and tomato, I'm just getting mayo though. I need mayo and cheese. I'm gonna get, I gotta get no cheese. The cool thing here is you can actually sample the meat before you buy it. It's kind of like a gelato spot. I get a half-sake with an octopole. All right, so I got my order guys and I wanna be upfront. This is not the most traditional cat's order. I got club bread, which is the white bread, and I got mayo, but I think the mayo is crucial because I've been to cats before and I just got the mustard, but I always thought something was missing. Here you got your two types of pickles, your more pickly picklies, and then your, you know, more fresh pickles, and then you got your matzo ball, which is a traditional Jewish food. It's essentially like a big dense bread ball in chicken soup. And I'm actually gonna try all of this with smala after I take a bite without smala, of course, to be respectful. So guys, this is your cat's pastrami on club bread with mayo and mustard. This is just a half sandwich too. The mayo makes a difference. Oh yeah, I already know that cat's sandwich is delicious. All right, that goes without saying, but I really wanna know how our new chili oil smala is gonna taste on it because it kind of is inspired by the Italian and Chinese chili oil, has a little bit of Sichuan peppercorns for that numbing vibe, but also truffle inside as well. So I'm just gonna see how it goes on all these iconic New York foods, because, you know, it's also a product that we are selling right now, smala-sauce.com. Ooh, smala on cat's pastrami. I mean, honestly, the pastrami, it has a little bit of spice to it. Obviously the bark of the pastrami is peppery, and obviously the pastrami itself is very salty, but I think smala works great, and it really goes good pairing up with the mayo side, which the creaminess of the mayo kind of does tone down the smala, so it adds this nice kick, and this is like a Sichuan pastrami, and that's how it tastes like. Trying smala on the matzo ball. I know it goes great on carbs too, so I'm gonna really go on the matzo ball. The last one. Wow. All right, so overall, I had no expectation of how it was gonna taste on the pastrami and the matzo ball, because those are not usually dishes you would imagine. You would put chili oil on, but it really balances out with the mayo, and especially if there was cheese on this thing, it would have been amazing, and on the matzo ball, surprisingly, it went really well because this is a carb, so you know what, I'm just excited to try smala on other iconic New York foods. All right you guys, we're at the world famous Halal guys. They started with one cart on 53rd and 6th, and now they got 100 globally, with 400 in the works. You're looking at it right here. It started off being, I believe, chicken and lamb, but this is chicken and beef now, and of course, it's got a red sauce. We got the white sauce here, because the red sauce is gonna be smala. Yeah, be liberal with the guys. My goodness, I'm so excited to try this. Here we go. Halal guys with smala. It actually works really, really well because their regular hot sauce is so fiery. I still like that one too, but I'm telling you guys, anything that's white, whether it's talking about a noodle, a pasta, rice, a carb, smala works perfect on it. Yeah, here we go on the pita. This is like a perfect vehicle to deliver that, you know, the textures and the complexity of smala. You can really taste the truffle when it's on the pita. It really started like a national trend from just one card on 50, 36, because you gotta think about it. Now even bodegas carry it, and I don't remember them always having it before Halal guys blew up. Listen guys, like I said, anything white, whether we're talking about a car or even a cheese, we're gonna try it on this baklava cheesecake, but just, you know, just a part of it in case it doesn't work. I think it's gonna be okay though. I'm not saying it's gonna be a 10 out of 10, but, because ultimately the baklava cheesecake is still so sweet, it overpowers it, but it has a nice like, you know, almost like a spiced rum vibe to it. That's good, right? Okay, smala on the baklava cheesecake here at Halal guys, would I recommend it? I'll tell you this, it's interesting, and it might be worth sacrificing a corner for it. It's definitely not bad. Somebody's gonna like it. But like we said, smala, it's gonna work better on some things than other things. All right everybody, we're at Empanada Mama, and this is a new New York classic, because they have multiple locations down in New York. They started at one location, but they got really popular, and now they just got them all over the city. And I feel like empanadas are kind of like a pizza where it's just like a blank slate, because it's also kind of like a dumpling. In fact, now I think about it, it's kind of like a pizza dumpling because there's breading, but it's also shaped like a dumpling. Anyways, you can put anything you want inside. The reason why Empanada Mama is so popular is because they got flavors like bourbon chicken, the Viagra, mac and cheese. These are not traditional empanadas, but they are delicious. Look at that, bourbon chicken. Holy. All right guys, you guys know the deal. We're putting smala on everything. That's the theme of this video. Shout out to the sponsor, Smala. Bourbon chicken, if you haven't had it, it's delicious. It's like this style of grilled chicken that kind of comes from New Orleans. And anyway, let's go. All right, this one is the mac and cheese one, also a very popular one. As you can see, they are freshly fried. I like the fried flour ones. Oh, shoot. No idea. Okay, so this one has ham on it. Usually at Mama Empanada, you'd use the green sauce to agi, but you know, of course, we use in the red sauce. The smala. I love the x-y one. Again, smala prevails on anything cheese. Anything cheese or creamy. I'm telling you, it's 10 out of 10. Last but not least, you got one of their most famous flavors. It's the Viagra. And I'll tell you why. It's not because it's got Viagra in it, but it's got a lot of shrimp. And supposedly, I guess, you know, the full floor is you eat the seafood and the shrimp and it gives you that extra power when you need it, like Viagra. But anyways, this is one of my favorite. There's a seafood stew. It's got imitation crab meat, but real shrimp inside, real plump shrimp. Look at that. Wow. So this one was rather light in flavor. So the smala just kicks it up. Holy crap. Yeah, that is a good one. You can tell the way that mama's empanadas runs their business here, it's, they know, they're confident that empanadas are the next big thing. Obviously, there's a huge Latin population in New York, Caribbean population where they all eat empanadas. And honestly, I think it can be like another hot dog pizza type thing, just like the whole all-card chicken and rice is also in the Mount Rushmore of classic New York foods. Now the pastrami is too. I think empanadas are making their way up there, especially ones with the New York flavors, bacon, egg, cheese, you got Romeo and Juliet, Nutella, banana, you got pepperoni pizza, pernil, reggaeton flavors. I don't even know what those mean, but shout out to mama's empanada, man. Easy to hold like a big fried dunkling. Maybe that's why I'm liking it. All right, and just to show empanada mama, it's full respect. You gotta try something with the aji, but I'm gonna lace it. I'ma drizzle it with a little bit of smala. So it's aji and smala, ooh, ooh, ooh. Is this gonna be like the Los Tacos number one with the guac and the smala? That was crazy because it was like a whirlwind of flavors because you had kind of like the lime citrusy burst of the aji and then you had that kind of smooth umami spicy kick from the smala. Well, actually I would say that really worked well too. I was kind of impressed, man. Yo, if you have not had empanadas in New York, what are you doing? Next up on our iconic pizza crawl through New York City with smala, of course we got Prince Street pizza. Man, every weekend I see tons of tourists. The line is going down that way. It's really crazy. Now I'm not gonna lie, I didn't come to Prince Street for almost two years because there was some controversy online. I didn't like what happened. So that was my boycott, but I think they figured things out and the pizza's still kind of good. So what we got is the white slice and we got the spicy pep. This is probably the most famous right here, big slice. Guys, I already can tell you that it's a delicious slice on its own. So let me just go ahead and pour a smala on it. I mean that Prince Street, where you at? Double spicy, baby. Please see what comes. Ooh. Oh, you're in the cupcake place? Listen, this is a challenge to not make it fall. You got to change that thing. Be careful though, that is an extra kick, but that's delicious. I know I'm looking crazy right now. But I'll tell you, this smala on top of the spicy sauce already, it's kind of mixing in with the oils of the pepperoni. So it's almost like the pepperoni were made with smala, it's kind of delicious. With the smala on the spicy pep, I definitely give that like a 4.5 out of five. It really kicked it up perfectly. I know my mouth is looking crazy, but let me tell you this, it's not Prince Street unless your mouth is getting messy. To be honest, it's a messy pizza. It's very drippy, very saucy, but it's very delicious. And I love the bread, it's very fluffy, all right? Here, you got the white slice with fresh basil on it. And I love smala on white slices because it goes so well on cream, you know, Alfredo pasta, anything of that sort. So let's drizzle it on. Oh my gosh. Now I know what you're thinking. You're like, yo, Andrew, that's a lot of oil, but it's also a lot of flavor. This is gonna get messy again. Can I tell you that this is like a big delicious cheese stick right here? I don't really know what sauce there is, but man, that is a lot of great stretchy cheese. All right, I give the white slice with the smala four, four out of five. And I think it's only just because like, there was just so much cheese, so I had to put more smala, but the smala just embedded itself into this one so well. And again, guys, Prince Street had its controversy, you know, and again, but you know, people can move past things. It's still a good business. They really got known for popularizing this kind of Sicilian slice. I know some people call it a grandma slice. Some people with a slight different variation. I've called it a Detroit pizza, but you know, this is definitely what Prince Street is known for. But you know, I'll tell you this, man, smala even goes good on the edge of the bread. It's almost like you can just go on your breadsticks. I think that bite is delicious. All right guys, so for our next iconic New York food that we're gonna be trying with smala, I'm talking about Xi'an famous foods, man. They have so many locations in Manhattan, all over New York, all the different boroughs. They started in Queens, owned by one family, and they are known for their really thick hand-pulled noodles, guys, from Xi'an. I think I've heard both things. I've heard from students from Xi'an that they really like this. I've also heard some students say, oh, it's not as authentic, but overall, everybody loves it, man. And the flavors are great. I mean, look at this. You can get spicy cucumber, super spicy. You can get the roja moa here, which is kind of like, essentially, your Chinese hamburger. And what I love to see here is this little bit of onions. The purple onions, I like that. So we're gonna try it on smala. You see how the greens are sticking out? That's what I like to see, man. That's real Xi'an style. They got peppers in it, too. Now, it's already kind of spicy, but let's see how the smala kind of adds in with the Xi'an spices. So they definitely have their own chili oil in here already. Xi'an-famous foods with smala. This is like, like, the thick browns with the butter, very light, but that's the first one. Yeah, the smala did come through. I kind of tasted it first because I just poured it on. Yeah, a little bit more. Here we go. First of all, everybody, I want to give props because this is one of the top roja moas you can get in the city as far as the fattiness of the meat and then having real peppers inside. I'll say smala was a nice little addition. I tasted it slightly, obviously, because there are so much other spices going on, but I'm pretty glad, guys. Honestly, it's so far, even if the food is already spicy and has its spices, smala works still well on it. On to the next spot. All right, you guys, we are in front of the iconic Mr. Softy brand truck. This started in 1956. I got my man, Frankie, right here. He told me that I have to get the chocolate and vanilla twist with the cookie crumble on top. This is delicious, guys. I'm telling you, there's something about, there's something about this ice cream. How's that? How's that? How's that? How's that? How's that? How's that? How's that? I'm telling you, guys, the crispiness from the outside with the chocolate and vanilla twist, it's classic, but it's still got something a little elevated to it. Obviously, guys, putting smala on the iconic Mr. Softy ice cream is a little unconventional, but this is hot right now. It ain't bad, but people put a lot of gamma on it. You should try smala. Which one is it? Supreme? He would tell you what it is. All right, everybody, our next iconic New York spot is none other than Joe's Pizza. It's been around since 1975, started by a guy from Naples, Italy, and you know, they're famous really for their cold-burning ovens. Obviously, there was a whole controversy earlier this year about whether they're gonna do away with cold-burning ovens. Anyways, I think Joe's is safe. Yeah, and basically this is an iconic spot because everybody that visits New York City is always like, yo, I gotta try Joe's, I gotta try Joe's. Whether or not you think it's the best pizza, it is absolutely solid, and it's a well-oiled machine back there so everything always comes out hot. Here I have the Supreme. It's got onions, pep, and sausage. And yeah, that's it. And then you got the regular cheese, and then I really like to get this white spinach slice just because this is a slice you can't get anywhere else. Let me just go in on the cheese first. I know it's weird to say, but I would say their sauce is like juicy. Like, it almost does kind of taste very, very tomato-y, which is always distinctive. Try to fold this slice. Oh, it's heavy. It's heavy. It's got a lot of topping. That's why it's dripping in the middle. What I love about Joe's slices is just like, it attracts people from all over, all different walks of life. You can find them here as you've got kids. You've got different nationalities, ethnicities. Spinach one. Good. Underrated. Spinach on pizza does work. Now, how does it work with Smala, which is our very own chili oil? I'm very excited. One of my favorite things to put it on is pizza right now. Let's try it on the cheese slice. Drizzle a little bit there. Oh, wow. A lot of cheese. There it is. Smala on Joe's supreme slice. Mmm. Joe's white spinach slice. You can really see the little drips right there. Look, adds a little color to the slice. It's beautiful. So good. Smala on Joe's family. Smala on Joe's. That's a new classic right there. Coast number one right now. I'm here with my man, Paz. Thank you for doing this. And we're going to be trying Smala on these iconic tacos. Are you familiar with Los Tacos number one? I'm very familiar, big fan. This is my first time trying to crack this taco. I'm going to dive right into this thing. Long story short, guys. In 2013, 10 years ago, these guys had a vision. They just started with one in Chelsea Market and now it's blowing up. I wouldn't be surprised if they got 50 of these in the future. All right, for me, I think I got to start off with a classic autobotta right here. It's a nice healthy ghouse. It's healthy in mouth. Cheers, my friend. Cheers. On the autobotta, it went perfect because some people like the autobotta extra spicy anyway like a taquillera Ramirez. What'd you think of it on the cacti? This is fire. I think this taco already has a picture of the savoriness of this hot sauce is out of control, man. Do you think that Los Tacos number one is the best taco chain in New York City? I can't think of anything right now that would top that, so yeah. Do you have like an individual card or like taco truck that you like better? I used to live in Brooklyn, been up and down. Tried most of them. There's a truck in East Village right now and I think it's not there because there's construction on the street. That's on Avenue A and Second Street. When the construction is lifted, I'm sure it'll be back, but I don't know the name of the truck, but you'll find it most days, like on the weekends. Fire. That's just fire. All right, so for me, I got the carne asada and I got this little fried pepper here. Now this is like the Mexican fried pepper, but this really reminds me a lot of Sichuan fried peppers as well. I'm gonna eat just a tip. It's hot. Glad I got this guac though. It's a perfect carrier for the chili oil. Nice, healthy dose. I love pairing smala with something creamy. Mayo guac. It goes perfect. All right, here I got the pollo asada, grilled chicken, of course. And I'll tell you this, if you have, if you're questioning who lost tacos, number one, it's Tijuana style tacos. And I got friends from LA who said they're taco snobs and they came here and they still like it. Fresh made tortilla, handmade. They got corn and flour, delicious, stretchy. The food is always still, you know, juicy. So not saying there's not great taco carts out here, but I'm saying if you don't want to eat at the cart, this is it. Los tacos, numero uno. All right you guys, I'm souping up my quesadilla right here. I got this with the corn shell. I mean, I'm sorry, the corn tortilla. He told me that it's better that way. Of course, we're gonna soup it up with the smala. This is my very first time actually getting one here. Listen guys, a lot of people say that New York doesn't have good tacos, but I really think that that has outdated the past three years. You got birria, landia. I got so many different chains. Los tacos, numero one. I wouldn't be surprised if they have 50 of these up and down the East Coast pretty soon. Yo David, David Toss. That is going to be a very hot bite. You know that, right? Yes. It's going to be very hot, very spicy. Like I said guys, smala, it goes perfect on pork. I love smala on pork. Plus we got the guac as a carrier. Oh. All right everybody, I'm at Dim Sum Palace in Chinatown. It's 12 a.m. Here I have the Lao Sa Pao, aka the sweet salted egg yolk bun, aka lava bun. And I'm going to try it with smala. This is something that I don't know how it's going to taste because it's sweet and salty inside. And it's not usually something you would... Okay, a little lava-ish. Here we go. It's a little strike right there. That wasn't bad. I like trying smala on sweet things and dessert-like things because I always want to know how they do. And honestly, it's not bad. To get this level of food at 3 a.m. at night in Chinatown is pretty impressive now. I wish Chinatown still had the late night culture, obviously since COVID and everything, things have changed. So you know, a lot of spots aren't open, but this is probably one of four quality spots in Chinatown that are really open. So here we got the Sing Tao Tao, my fun. One thing I like about this dish and the way they cook it here, it's not too bright yellow. It's kind of got this brownish hue to it, which means like it's got a lot of that, like wok hay. Smala on the Singaporean, my fun. We've got the curry taste, the kick of the curry mixed in with the smala. Shout out to Dim Sum Palace. They also, I think, own another spot called Dim Sum Sam over by Madison Square Park and that has like a whole more Hong Kong vibe. But look, the Dim Sum's coming out, bam. And another thing I like about Dim Sum Palace is that they're doing things a little bit more modern. You know, they have your classics like pork sumai, but these are actually chicken and these are actually seafood. So I'm gonna try the chicken one first. None of this has pork. I still like the pork ones, but you know, sometimes I just go for the chicken. It's a nice white pepper mixed in with the smala. And by the way, even though I'm using smala on a lot of stuff, I do wanna acknowledge that Dim Sum Palace does have a very, very solid laju yao and it has the chilies inside. Obviously it's gonna be a little different. Let me just put a little bit, because I wanna shout them out. The difference between smala is that this has a lot of like kind of a beanie and a darker taste. And I guess you would say in a way tastes more traditionally Chinese, but smala cuts the difference between the Italian, Calabrian chili oil, of course, and that oil. Trafu umami on this one, both are good, but hey, this is a video about smala, so. All right, next up we got chicken shalom bao's, AKA soup dumplings. New York loves soup dumplings. They love the shalom bao, but also in New York, there's a lot of people who don't really eat a lot of pork. So of course, the chicken ones are very, very popular. Also, I'm not gonna lie. I think Trader Joe's chicken shalom bao's might've also helped popularize it. That's just a theory, oddly enough. But anyways, here I got the vinegar, with a little bit of ginger. Let me just dip it in, bathe it in there, yeah. Take a little bath. I'm gonna let the smala flow down the pleats of the dumpling. Just a little bit. Oh! Oh! The smala goes so well on dumplings that I mean, I don't even think you need the vinegar. I'm just gonna pour it in the top, let it flow down. The pleats of the dumpling, like a mountain range, like the lava flows down a volcano. And the reason why I put Dim Sum Palace in the new icons of New York City is because, honestly, this is a chain that you can only find in New York City. And it is open late, and it started in New York City. So that's why it's a new classic. All right, you guys, ever since 2001 in Madison Square Park, there is now 400 locations of Shake Chat globally. It is probably one of the biggest chains, if not the biggest fast food chain to ever emerge from New York City. And of course, we gotta try smala on it. Like we said, guys, we've got the iconic Shroom Shack right here, Shroom Burger. This is actually a fried portobello stuffed with cheese on top of their beef patty. So one of the most interesting things about Shake Shack's origin story is it was actually started by Danny Meyer, who's from 11 Madison Park. That is like probably one of the most famous sort of like fine dining restaurants you can emerge from that does like new American fusion foods. Man, look at that right there, guys. If you guys have seen Shake Shack's all across America, like we said, they really started expanding in 2015. So they really haven't probably been around more than like five years in your city. And their whole idea was to mix like fine dining thinking with like an old school New York burger. So let's try it with a little bit of smala. You need to put that tomato back. Man, pay attention to detail. They got matching tomatoes on both sides. Here we go. I'm gonna say that the smala pairs pretty well with this because the portobello is stuffed with so much cheese to give you like the cheesy vibe. Of course, there's mayonnaise in it, the own Shack sauce, as well as the sort of the creaminess from the fat of the beef. The smala has truffle mushroom in it, pairs really well with the portobello mushroom. That's mushroom on mushroom, umami on umami. Of course, we can't forget the bacon cheese fries. Over time, they've sort of added like avocado and bacon to the menu at Shake Shack. You know, more people, they want different things as the years go along. And yeah, let's get into this. Shake Shack's fries are always very debatable, sort of like in and outs because there's crinkle cut and then in and outs fries. Some people don't like those two. So I think it's interesting that the debate of the New York chain versus the Cali chain that's supposed to be have the best burger coast to coast, they both might have mid fries. I'm gonna settle it. I think the Shake Shack fries might have the in and out fries by a hair. By a hair because these taste like elevated school public lunch fries. Whereas I feel like the in and out ones, there's a better potato flavor, but it's kind of hit or miss. I'm gonna edge it barely to the Shake Shack crinkle cut. Burger wise though, I might go with in and out. Honestly guys, I thought it went good on the Shroom Shack burger, but it actually went great on these bacon cheese fries. I mean, I don't know, it's just simple. It's easy. It almost creates like a whole different vibe with the melted cheese. I'm sure they're using American. Man, that's a 10 out of 10. All right, everybody. We're here at one of the newest Seven Street Burger locations. Seven Street Burger has become a staple in New York City. The guys actually are from Jersey, but they are killing it. They are making the best smashed burger in the city for the price. I've small odd this up by the way already. So here you go, I'm splitting it. I might small out up some more though, hold on. And I even have the chopped cheese fries here. That's a new item. I've small odd that up. Small odd chili oil on the Seven Street single. I think small odd goes perfectly with the creamy kind of special sauce that they have. It's essentially Big Mac sauce, but it goes great with it. As you know, the chopped cheese is an iconic New York dish. And now Seven Street is doing their version with the fries. Beef all over, small odd on top. Let's go. More small odd for the kick. Oh man. It's amazing on the fries because once it hits the actual fry and the sauce, it all mixes in together. Obviously I did put a generous amount of small odd. I'm not gonna lie, but overall, man, it's good. Small odd with cream goes really well together.