Last of the Pork Roll-icans (Johnny's Grocery and Deli)
Johnny’s has been operating at the same location since the early 1970s. He makes the best Trenton Pork Roll sandwich in town.
[Full Review] Ratings:
Johnny’s has been operating at the same location since the early 1970s. He makes the best Trenton Pork Roll sandwich in town.
McCarter Theater is one of the finest regional theaters in the country (and has won the Tony award to prove it), producing plays ranging from classics to edgy new works (6 productions in 2015-16). The production quality is incredible, featuring some of the best professional directors, designers, and actors working in the US. Performances are … Continue reading Liberal Arts
Do you need a sign for your business? Or for your home? George is one of the few artisans around who can still hand paint an “old school” sign, or build one in 9-colors of LEDs, if that’s what you need. No job is too small, none too large: from $200 to $20,000 or more, George is your guy.
Philadelphia has its own, unique, and very rich theater scene. It’s an easy drive from Trenton (under 40 minutes door-to-door, usually). Yes, there are presentation houses that book current touring companies from Broadway shows (at near Broadway prices). But there are also many, many outstanding theater companies that produce their own stage plays using predominantly … Continue reading 98 Miles Off-Broadway
New conductor Dan Spalding has energized the orchestra and is creating truly interesting concerts at the lovely war memorial. Highly recommended.
Before there were supermarkets, before Whole Foods and Wegmans and Shop Right landed on Rt. 1 (like the Martian invaders of Orson and HG Wells’ combined imaginations), there was a Di Paola’s raising turkeys right outside of Trenton. It’s still there. No doubt, 60-odd years ago, the corner butcher in Trenton featured Di Paola’s turkeys. … Continue reading Fresh Clucked
Aurelio’s serves the best Latino cuisine in Princeton. There are something like half a dozen restaurants in Trenton that are as good or better, and at least 2 in Hamilton. Still, operating an inexpensive restaurant with good food in Princeton is no small feat, and if you like Aurelio’s, you owe it to yourself to start exploring Trenton restaurants as well.
Yes, it is (kind of) the Latino KFC. A “fast-food” chain that started in Guatemala, Pollo Campero operates one in Trenton. While originally focused on fried chicken, Campero now offers “Citrus Peruvian Grilled” Chicken as an alternative. And what an alternative! It comes PERFECTLY cooked: succulent and flavorful: without a doubt some of the best chicken we’ve ever had anywhere. Normally we don’t like to review chain stores; but when they can deliver something this good, we make an exception.
The Stony Brook Reserve is a 930 acre site in Pennington, about 25 minutes from Trenton. It provides 10 miles of hiking trails, is home to Honey Brook Organic Farms, and supports one of largest and most active Nature Centers in NJ. All of this is organized by the Stony Brook/Millstone Watershed Association, which claims … Continue reading Water Reserves
OK, I admit to loving dives. Especially ones like this where the sensibilities of the owner, even wacky ones, are plain to see. It reminds me of the places I used to eat growing up, from a time when most restaurants were owner operated, and McDonald’s were found only in California. In Manhattan, you might … Continue reading Squirreled Away
(Covid Update Dec 2021 – in business) Reggie Hallett, founder and head chef, is a man with a mission: “I am a firm believer that you should be able to have the option of great food while enjoying friends at a great local bar”. There’s plenty to suggest that he’s onto something: even on a … Continue reading Bar-B-Que Bar
Diner food, diner prices, better quality. Just across the bridge in Morrisville: open 7 days for breakfast and lunch (7-3).
Jim Hamilton, a Broadway set designer turned restaurateur, started Hamilton’s Grill (“HG”) more than 25 years ago. As you’d expect from a set designer, place and settings are impeccable. The restaurant is tucked away on a quiet alley. HG’s menu has been farm to table long before that term entered popular consciousness. The menu changes seasonally, and there are always a few specials. The food is simple, but exceptionally high quality and perfectly presented, featuring grilled seafood and meats. Unusually for a restaurant of this quality, it’s BYOB.
Located in a tiny strip mall just off Rt 206 in Hamilton, El Gallo Tropical serves up what is possibly the best Mexican food in the area. That’s saying a lot, as a host of good-to-superb Mexican dives have opened in the Greater Trenton area over the last few years. My friends from Cali to … Continue reading Southern Standoff
(Covid Update Dec 2021 – in business) Saluté is a pleasant, relatively small (60 seat) Italian restaurant in a nondescript strip mall in Morrisville. The aesthetic and menu are very much like a Chambersburg eatery from the 60s, though newly renovated. Faux stone panels and crystal light fixtures evoke a “rat pack” bachelor pad, as … Continue reading Ratpack Returns
A charming dive just south of the border with Trenton, Mexico Lindo is another worthy addition to the growing list of Mexican restaurants in town, serving up authentic, home-made specialties at prices that out-of-towners find astonishing.
DeLorenzo’s Tomato Pie (“DTP”) in Robbinsville is operated by the third generation of the same family as DeLorenzo’s Tomato Pie on Hudson Street, which closed in 2012 (when the second generation retired). Make no mistake, the pies in Robbinsville are really good. At the core of DeLorenzo’s excellence is its crust, as good as any we’ve sampled. It’s relatively thin, yet the undercarriage is crisp and stays crisp throughout the entire meal.
Carson Road Woods is a superb, 183 acre swathe of preserved farmland less than 15 minutes from downtown Trenton. Unlike many such preserves, the land has several miles of walking trails, and some stunning stands of trees. The preserve is a mix of woodlands and open fields, with mowed walk-ways along the margins. In a few places, trails are cut through stands of trees, including, notably, a stunningly beautiful stand of beech.
Updated December 2021 Chencha y Chole (“C y C”) opened in June of 2015 in a distinctive, triangular shaped storefront at the intersection of Cass and S. Broad. It has survived COVID and remains one of our favorites in town, with superb, homemade Mexican specialties. (Thanks to our friends at Roebling Lofts for sponsoring this … Continue reading Mountain out of a Mole de Pollo
Gravity Hill Farm is an immaculately managed, certified organic farm located in Titusville. Three days each week (Tu, Sa, Su) the farm organizes a market selling its own produce. Sundays it invites other local farms to join the sale: typically a local organic dairy farm that produces cheeses, and a second, local farm raising grass-fed beef and lamb. The quality is impeccable. Selection and variety is targeting chefs and foodies.
(Covid Update Dec 2021 – in business) Captain Paul’s proves that inventive entrepreneurs can make a go of even unlikely business concepts. Take the hot dog. Many spurn it as an overly processed, heavily salted, highly fatted anachronism. American cuisine at its worst. One of the culprits (though perhaps not the primary one) in a … Continue reading Man Bites Dog
Living in Trenton and there’s very few Greek restaurant around. Except Mikonos, which was recommended to me by a friend. I’ve now eaten most of the offerings on the menu, and while I have a few reservations, I’m happy to recommend it. It offers tasty, authentic cuisine Greek cooking that ranges from OK to sublime, depending on what you order.
(Covid Update Dec 2021 – in business) City Deli is a somewhat misleading name for a small restaurant near the statehouse that is serving up an ambitious, home-cooked, vegetarian-friendly menu. If you’re a carnivore, don’t let the veggie-friendly tag get in the way: you’ll find plenty to eat, too. Indeed the menu is astonishingly broad, … Continue reading Deli-cate Offerings
(Covid Update Dec 2021 – in business) Italian People’s Bakery (“IPB”) has been an institution in Chambersburg since Pasquale Gervasio opened a bake shop in 1936. The current location on Butler St is one of the few surviving hold-over businesses from Chambersburg’s Italian past, in part because the bakery services a local chain of suburban … Continue reading Power to the Peoples
The rechristened Broad Street Diner is a superb place to get breakfast. Frankly, I haven’t tried their dinner foods, but if it’s as good as their breakfasts, it will be great.
I passed the African Caribbean Market (“ACM”) for years before I stopped in. The issue for me (and I would venture for most readers of Hidden Trenton) is that neither West Indian nor west African cooking are on my culinary radar screen, so I have little reason to stop. Still, it’s a measure of the … Continue reading Ghana Get Me Some
City Beef is principally a wholesaler, serving restaurants in the City of Trenton and Mercer County at large. However, it is happy to sell retail, even in small quantities. Note that the provisions here are not the post-modern, chi-chi stuff. But if you’re on a budget, and are looking for conventional provisions of good quality at spectacular prices, this is the place to go.
Goat Hill Park was acquired in 2009 by the State of NJ, and is managed as a satellite park of Washington Crossing. It is potentially one of the most spectacular hiking destinations in central NJ, but budget and regulatory constraints have blocked the state from developing it. It’s a pity. Of course, if you’re willing to bushwhack, you can still go exploring.
Indian Hut is a slightly odd, new restaurant in a small retail strip just south of the Quakerbridge Mall in Lawrence. It offers a cake bakery (not Indian desserts, but western style cakes with butter-cream frosting) combined with a casual Indian Cafe serving an extensive Indian menu that includes chaat. The food is well prepared, and prices are reasonable.
To many, tomato pie is Trenton’s signature dish (sorry, Pork Roll fans). A thin, crisp crust, light cheese and crushed tomato. Deceptively difficult to make well. Transcendent when successful. Since some of the famous tomato pie establishments left town, we’ve been looking for a worthy successor in town. We’re excited to be able to report we’ve found one: Jerry’s on the 700 block of S. Broad. The owner, Luis, apprenticed at Papa’s and Two Brothers before taking over Jerry’s. Make sure you order your tomato pie directly from him.
The greater Trenton restaurant scene has been enriched by Asian immigrants, and Shanghai Bun is a great example: its head chef, Chung Hwang, was born in Taiwan to a Shanghainese father and ran a restaurant with him outside of DC for 15 years before moving to this area. Significantly, walk into Shanghai Bun at any … Continue reading Squeeze Bun
Mauceri’s is an “old line” Chambersburg pizza joint now under Latino management (as most are). In our limited sample, the pizza is pretty good… the ingredients taste fine but the crust is disappointing. But it’s not a place to make a special trip for. So why are we reviewing? In a word: pupusas! The chef is from El Salvador, the traditional home of these wonderful, stuffed tortillas, which may be the best in town.
New York is 1:10 on the NJ Transit express trains, which run frequently from the Trenton Transit Center. Instead of stressing with the traffic, and for less than it will cost you to pay for gas, tolls, and parking (in mid-town, anyway), you can relax while NJ Transit does all the work. And during rush … Continue reading Capital of the World!
The Laurie Chauncey Trail (“LCT”) is a gorgeous, 2 mile loop around the fringes of the ETS Campus. It stands next to the Ettl Farm Trail (“EFT”), a second loop, which adds some scenic variations and another mile or so of hiking. Both trails track along Stony Brook, a fairly considerable stream that drains much of Hopewell Township and Princeton before joining up with the Millstone in West Windsor. These trails are relatively flat with just enough undulation to be interesting.
(Covid Update Dec 2021 – in business) I’ve driven past Castillo’s for years. It looks like a classic neighborhood pizza joint, a survivor of the Italian Chambersburg. And at one level it is: the take-out menu is a six-panel tri-fold. Open it, and you think you’re reading every pizza parlor menu on the planet: pizza, … Continue reading Out of Focus
This is one of those unlikely Trenton places that serves great food from a hole in the wall. Literally. Justin’s Crab Shack serves fresh, fabulous home-made seafood (plus a selection of other foods suitable for carnivores and vegetarians) at the Regal I Bar on North Clinton Ave. You order in the back and eat in … Continue reading Crabs ‘n Coltrane
The new Trenton economy is on display at Fuente del Buen Gusto every day. Frankly, it’s not the best Guatemalan food in Trenton. Not that FdBG’s food is bad; it’s actually pretty good, but much of it is served off of a buffet, and it suffers a bit from sitting around. However, you won’t find many other places in town that are busier. The joint is usually packed with working men and women from the neighborhood. I suggest that anyone who wants to understand the new Trenton economy should show up here during the week just to check it out.
Bamboo Grill serves up, to my palate, the best West Indian food in town. And that’s saying something in Trenton, which has seen several good West Indian restaurants pop up in recent years.
El Potrillo (Spanish for a foal, or newborn horse) is a pleasant Mexican restaurant in the heart of Chambersburg. The food at El Potrillo is authentic, home-made Mexican. It’s not gourmet or even particularly subtle, but most of it is pretty tasty, and the portions are huge. Prices are competitive with other Trenton Latino joints, and cheap compared to anywhere else in the greater Mercer County area.
The Autovalet Car Wash is located in a converted trolley barn on Lalor Street, right off 129 near the southern border of Trenton. It happens to be one of the nicest car washes you’ll ever visit and provides a pleasant waiting room with a nicely executed historical exhibit about the structure. It also happens to … Continue reading The Trolley Barn