Bring your own bottle. The restaurant does not have a bar.
Don’t let the name fool you, La Chapinita offers a full Guatemalan menu. Order off the menu to get wonderful, fresh-cooked food at incredibly reasonable prices. Located where Papas Tomato Pies used to call home.
Roti comes from Trinidad: the cuisine of residents of South Asian descent. It refers to the bread, yes, but also the curried meal that comes with it (and often stuffed inside like a giant burrito).
Sometimes you want a basic Italian meal: tasty, not too expensive, not too fancy. Mamma Rosa’s, only a few minutes out of town on Klockner Road in Hamilton fills the need.
Gennaro’s is a nicely turned out pizzeria and Italian restaurant in a newish strip mall where Nottingham Way and Rt. 33 converge in Hamilton Square (about 7.5 miles from Trenton). If for some reason you find yourself there, seeking sustenance amidst the soul-numbing suburban sprawl, by all means stop in for a pie. It’s really quite good. Nice, thin, crisp crust. Tomato “sauce”. Good quality cheese and toppings.
La Villa is a nondescript pizza restaurant in Morrisville, just over the bridge from Trenton. In addition to conventional pizza and a host of Italian cooking, La Villa features a “Chambersburg Style Tomato Pie”. And darned if it isn’t.
Mariachi Grill (not to be confused with El Mariachi) serves Tres Leches, a fabulous dessert made from sponge cake and traditionally three different kinds of milk: whole, condensed, and evaporated (plus a whipped cream topping). It’s the best I’ve ever had. And I love Tres Leches. For me, there’s no more to be said.
This is the kind of restaurant you can take your mother to, and still get outstanding, home cooked Guatemalan food at unbelievably low prices.
El Chapin is a new Guatemalan restaurant at the corner of Cass and Lamberton Streets, within spitting distance of Waterfront Park. The specialty of the house is charcoal grilled rotisserie chicken, and it’s really, really, really good.
Let’s see….suprisingly good and varied Italian food. BYOB. Reasonably priced. It seems in our household, we end up going out to Villa Rosa as often as anyplace in the area.
Hong Kong Restaurant, located where Hamilton and S. Clinton intersect is probably the best, true Chinese take-out in town. This is a family-run restaurant, with an extensive menu cooked in front of you while you wait.
Everyone has a yearning for simple, cheap Chinese food from time to time, and you don’t want to have to drive to get it. In a town where there are some truly dreadful take out Chinese joints….listing a few that are pretty good is a useful service. Kam Buffet is a post millenium buffet joint, with a large dining room and a huge array of steam tables. The food is good, and management takes better care to keep it fresh and turning over quickly than many establishments of this type.
“It’s Nutts” is immediately adjacent to Washington Crossing State Park, and on the way to Baldpate Mountain. If you’re headed there, it’s a great place to pick up a well prepared, moderately priced meal (in an area that’s not known for bargains).
Let’s face it, there’s not a lot of great breakfast in Trenton. Sure there are some diners and other assorted options, but finding a place that goes beyond the breakfast basics (eggs, pancakes, omelettes, bacon) is rare. That’s what makes Cafe 72 unique. Despite it’s casual luncheonette atmosphere and bargain prices, it is aiming to higher culinary heights (if not always achieving them). What are we talking about? Think Belgian waffles filled with sun-dried figs and topped with blueberry chutney and cannoli cream, “cajun” shrimp and grits with onions and an egg, or portobello mushroom towers with sliced tomato, poached eggs, provolone, and basil hollandaise (pictured here). The menu is supplemented by a variety of specials; on a recent visit we sampled the fresh ricotta donuts with blueberry chutney (and boy were they fresh).
From the outside, Szechuan House looks like a pretty standard suburban Chinese restauarant, and at first glance, so does the menu. All of the standard Americanized items can be found. But look a little closer, and you’ll see a number of items that you never see on a “standard ” menu. Some frankly, sound pretty disgusting…but my rule is that if you don’t find at least a half dozen things that sound disgusting on a Chinese menu, you’re going to the wrong restaurant. As it turns out, there’s plenty on the menu that’s both authentic and delicious.
Mi Tierra is another of the many outstanding Guatemalan restaurants in the City of Trenton, serving its burgeoning Latino population. Mi Tierra stands apart because: 1) the food is well prepared, a notch better than typical and 2) the decor is better than most. While not fancy by any means, it’s a pleasant place to eat, and the service is friendly.
From the outside, Henry’s looks like an old-school luncheonette, which went out of fashion in the early 1960’s. However, peer through the window, and you see something’s up with the large, modern cooking area, and nicely stocked shelves. Then you realize all the packages have Polish labels, and you remember that you’re at the very epicenter of the Polish section of Trenton: European Bakery is next door, Cosmo Food Market is across the street, and Rozmaryn Restaurant is around the corner.
The food is classic eastern European fare with an emphasis on meat, potatoes, and cabbage, although chicken, fish, and a variety of vegetable dishes are also on the menu. Potato pancakes to die for. Portions are ample. Prices are reasonable.
Papa’s, founded in 1912 by the father-in-law, grandfather, and great-grandfather respectively of the current operators (Abie, Donnie, and Nick) making it the second oldest pizza joint in the country, and by another reckoning (continually operated by the founding family), Papa’s is the oldest in the country. Papa’s makes a proper Trenton tomato pie (it should, it virtually invented it). Unfortunately, moved to Robbinsville recently, so you’ll have to drive about 15 minutes to get there.
A very good Guatemalan joint on Olden, and one of the oldest. Always inexpensive, it’s now one of the cheapest. The archetypal Trenton dive is worth visiting if you’re nearby.
