156 Ninth Avenue (between 19th and 20th Sts.) 212-620-4545 www.tipsyparson.com
Southern. Visit the Tipsy Parson website, and you will learn they’ve trademarked the term Belly-Filling Goodness. Good thing, because they could not be any more deserving of ownership. Their down home menu is dripping with a wealth of fabulous comfort food done up right. They could just serve corn dogs, but theirs are waygu beef, the dipping sauce champagne vinaigrette.
If hot dogs had an opposite it would probably be salad, and their Upstate Orchard incarnation is as incredible as those weenies on a stick. With honey crisp apples, nashi pears, celery root, walnuts, pickled radish, and apple cider vinaigrette, it’s a supreme union of texture and taste. I dare anyone to take a bite and not have the word fresh instantaneously spring to mind.
Their half rack of BBQ ribs (Carolina red vinegar sauce and shaved onions) takes “falling off the bone” from cliché to reality. It’s accompanied by corn bread and honey butter, the perfect pairing if ever there was one. I also experienced Aunt Linda’s Special Duck Fat Chicken-Fried Turkey Steak with buttermilk mashed potatoes and country gravy which is worth every syllable.
If you leave room for dessert, there are several tempting treats including the Grasshopper (mint mousse, chocolate streusel, chocolate cremeaux and whipped cream). Yes, it is as good as it sounds, even better if that’s possible. It would be bad manners not to mention the hospitality, the server so astonishingly warm and friendly, it’s like we knew each other forever. Please don’t wait that long to get there, y’all.