Where to Eat in Brooklyn This Week

By Brooklyn Magazine

Keeping up with the culinary action in Brooklyn is almost futile. Even with our help, there aren’t nearly enough meals or minutes in the day to hit them all, which is why we’ve been trying something new these last few weeks, sending some suggested destinations directly to your inbox, so you always know where to eat, no matter which corner of Kings County you might be exploring. 

This week, we’re blessed to have discovered yet another potent preparation of oxtail, an ingredient as sacred in this borough as it is malleable in its countless renditions. That’s, in large part, thanks to the punched-up rendang we encountered at Kelang, a new Malaysian spot in Greenpoint, from the team behind Sunset Park’s hit Hainanese Chicken House, where smoked and shredded bits of the precious Caribbean protein give new depth and regional roots to a fiery Southeast Asian recipe. Equally unconventional (and every bit as gratifying) were Bar Madonna’s oxtail croquettes with blood orange marmaletta, a quiet, proudly blasphemous rendition on the small plates menu when the Williamsburg bar opened last year that could easily be eaten by the dozen. And for the purists, the oxtail sandwich from Coco Bred, a recent addition to the Smorgasburg roster, is about as classic as they come. It was one of our favorite dishes (with or without oxtail) of the year.

See where you can get each of them (and so, so much more) below, and check back for a new batch of recommendations every Monday.

Photo by Scott Lynch

At Kelang, Malaysian Specialties Hit The Table With a Brooklyn Accent

Chris Low, the co-owner and executive chef of Greenpoint’s remarkable new Malaysian spot Kelang, wasn’t supposed to get involved with his family’s restaurant business. He helped out, of course, when his parents and sister Rebecca were opening Hainanese Chicken House in Sunset Park a couple of years ago, but Low is a filmmaker by trade, and this was his father’s dream, not his.

But when the Malaysian, hawker-style dishes at Chicken House earned the place several rave reviews, the family’s modest counter-service spot became a surprise hit, and the once-reluctant Low found himself wanting more. “Based on the setup there, and the neighborhood, I felt like we couldn’t really dive into all the stupid things I wanted to do,” Low told Brooklyn Magazine. “So we decided to expand, and do something new. I’m still working in film, still shooting, but I figured, why not? Why not explore this restaurant thing further? We deserve to see what we can do.”

What Low and his family can do, apparently, is turn an abandoned medical office on prime Manhattan Avenue into a rollicking, full-service restaurant called Kelang, named for the small city in Malaysia where their parents are from and featuring a full menu of regional specialties, many of which hit the table with a bit of a Brooklyn accent. “I grew up in Brooklyn,” said Low. “Flatbush, Ditmas Park, Park Slope… and I went to school in Canarsie. So we ate a lot of Caribbean food. A lot of Haitian and Jamaican, which makes its way into the food here at Kelang.”

Photo by Scott Lynch

Creative Cocktails and a Smashed Meatball Parm Star at Bar Madonna in Williamsburg 

Bar Madonna, a viby new cocktail spot and restaurant that opened a couple of weeks ago in Williamsburg, took some twists and turns on its way to transforming the old Taqueria Diana Cantina space on Metropolitan Avenue.

Food- and drinks-wise, the team at Bar Madonna, which include Eric Madonna, Ray Rando, beverage director Rob Crowe and chef Rob Zwirz, joined forces for this venture after working together in various iterations at places like Carbone, the Modern, Lupa, Bar Americano and Marc Forgione’s One Fifth. Given the emphasis on booze here, and the playful, “Italian-American inspired” food menu, these are solid credentials.

But Bar Madonna has other strands in its creative DNA as well. Eric Madonna (naming the place after him was kind of an inside joke) is also a record producer, and he spent a big chunk of his 20s touring the world as a warm-up DJ for rapper and Brooklyn native Kota the Friend. He told Brooklyn Magazine that he plans on making music a big part of the party here.

And the look of the place literally comes from a painting by streetwear and couture fashion designer KidSuper, another buddy of Madonna’s who happens to operate a massive warehouse, studio and retail outlet around the corner on Roebling Street. Also: the share plates are designed with KidSuper originals, portraits commissioned by the team of their loved ones.

Photo by Scott Lynch

The Very Best Meals We Ate in 2025

Back before 2025’s glorious, glorious summer even started, the good folks at Smorgasburg invited us to their Red Hook headquarters to check out the season’s new vendors, and the food at Jamaican native Jaime Randle’s first-ever food business, Coco Bred, absolutely blew me away. Especially her oxtail sandwich, which is essentially just a bowl of rich, fiery stew stuffed inside a triangle of sweet, pillowy coco bread—a perfect, portable meal. Randle has since set up shop at the Barclays Center during Liberty games and is currently slinging her stuff at the Union Square Holiday Market in Manhattan.