Everyone loves August. It’s impossible not to. The same way I’m always down to watch those movies that are endlessly on TV like Any Given Sunday or Empire Records, I’m also always down for brunch at August. This little European bistro is perfectly located in the heart of all the good West Village action. The friendly space smells of firewood and has an awesome glass enclosed garden that gets tons of sun. August is really a better brunch/lunch spot than it is a dinner spot. The dinner entrees are never as exciting as the eggs, sandwiches and pizza you get during the daytime hours. Plus, the prices on the dinner menu are a little steep. One dinner option we do like, however, is the Sunday night “Pizza & Peronis” meal: one pizza and four Peronis for $25. Not necessarily the Gray’s Papaya recession special, but we back the idea and the pizza is really good. Speaking of pizza and beer, dudes, listen up – August is a great First/Early In The Game Date spot. Considering that her and her friends already love it, you’ll score extra points right off the bat by taking her to the location of her last Book Club meeting. Trust me; it’s a better option than the new Dos Caminos in the Meat Packing district.

Food Rundown:

Wood Oven Baked Eggs en Cocotte
The big ticket item here are baked eggs, cooked up in their own iron skillets. August divides up the different varieties by the European region they’re inspired by. You really can’t go wrong with ordering any of these, but our favorite is absolutely the Alsatian (bacon and onion with crème fraiche) with the Andalusian (chorizo and blistered peppers) coming in a close second.

Challah Bread French Toast
So good. If you’re big on challah bread French toast, definitely calorie splurge on this one. The key to making the outside so crisp is that they finish it in the oven.

Asparagus Mimosa
One of my favorite things to order here, the asparagus mimosa is on both the lunch and dinner menu. A breaded ball of fried egg that looks like a croquette served over a heap of cold asparagus stalks with dijon dressing. Full of bold flavors, but also crisp and refreshing.

Burger
The only thing fancy about this burger is the fried egg you can elect to place on top of it (which you should do, obviously – check the twitpic). This burger is a dead ringer for the one I’m going to make on the BBQ this weekend: ground chuck, lettuce, tomato, pickles and raw onions on a nice kaiser bun. High quality and straight forward. We dig this burger.

Grilled Chorizo Sandwich
For chorizo fans who like a little spice in their life, definitely check this sandwich out. Chorizo sausages served on a super soft bun with baby arugula, blistered peppers, and spicy smoked mayonnaise. Yes.

Years ago when I lived in the neighborhood, I wandered into this nondescript cheese shop and ordered a sandwich off the list. I quickly realized that what I held in my hand was a perfectly assembled fistful of cured meat, cheese and bread that would be the start of a long and fulfilling relationship with Lamazou. From that day forward, this place was a three day a week meal stop, and over the years I managed to eat my way through damn near everything in the deli case.

What you’ll find at Lamazou is not only an incredible selection of cheeses (there is a cheese cave in the basement), but also various high quality cured meats. Both selections are incredible in their own right, but the real magic comes when the two are combined to make bomb ass sandwiches. Aziz is always happy to recommend something from the menu, and he’ll also point you in the direction of what goodness in the cheese case is particularly off the hook…whether you ask or not. That’s exactly the kind of personality and passion that makes this place amazing. Also present are various imported snacks and candies from around the world that I can neither pronounce or identify, but they’re all interesting and tasty. Especially Taytos. Thanks England for giving me a way to order your potato chips without having to say the word “crisps”.

Food Rundown:

Milano
A simple and delicious sandwich of salami, turkey breast, and provolone. The genius comes from the mind blowing quality of each. Across the board, we recommend the crusty ciabatta as the vehicle.

Caprice de Lamazou
Perfect for the summer, this is a light and tasty sandwich with smoked salmon, lemon, capers and cornichons. As a matter of fact, we back anything on this menu with cornichons.

Italico
Similar to the Milano, but with a delicious mortadella.

Troubador
Imported chorizo and manchengo. We’re big fans of manchengo cheese, and well, Spain in general. One of our favorites.

Butterfly
A thick black pepper pate is spread on ciabatta with butter and those awesome cornichons. This is next level, and not something we could have in any regular rotation, but it’s good.

Soups
You can usually find two homemade soups at Lamazou daily. We love the potato leek. Honestly, they’re all pretty great, and you should ask about them.

Cranky observations aside, Rye is pretty great. The concept is definitely getting played out, but they did a good job with the place, and almost everything we ate was tasty and satisfying – particularly the sandwiches on the menu. The meatloaf sandwich is quickly becoming what the restaurant is known for, and the pork belly on a soft roll is like a big Americanized pork bun – fatter and cockier than it’s little Japanese cousin, and it loves freedom. Our only complaint is that the entrees can seem anti-climactic after the excellent starters and salads. Then again we probably shouldn’t have been eating sandwiches as starters in the first place.

Food Rundown:

Braised Short Rib Sandwich
Those are four words that we get fired up over. A beautiful soft bun with short rib, onion jam, and horseradish. Dense, sticky and amazing. This might be our favorite sandwich in the house.

Slow Cooked Pork Belly Sandwich
Another incredibly good sandwich. Fatty, crispy pork belly with cole slaw and a mustard sauce. The tangy mustard cuts the fat just enough. This will touch you in a way that few edible things can/should.

Meatloaf Sandwich
The celebrated star of the menu, this thing is messy, enormous, and delicious. Unless you are ravenously hungry, split it with someone – there’s a half pound of meatloaf in there.

Roasted Beet Salad
This was a really nice, fresh beet salad. That is, it was nice until my friend decided to tell me about some freak disease called pine mouth, at the exact moment that I was eating a pine nut from the plate. Google it.

Baked Ravioli
One huge ravioli in a bowl with some cheese and a mushroom broth. Skip this.

Colorado Leg of Lamb
It’s well known that pretty much everything from Colorado is awesome, so I was surprised to find this piece of meat a little tough. Hit the hangar steak instead.

Roasted All Natural Chicken
Places like this all seem to have a good roast chicken on the menu, and that’s true in this case as well. Honestly this could have been the best entree we ate at Rye.

What we have noticed though, is that a lack of variables consistently produces the same result…most of the restaurants that specialize in one thing earn high marks from us. The following evidence supports our hypothesis: Burger Joint, Luke’s Lobster, Bark Hot Dogs, Flex Mussels, Mercadito Cantina, and Caracas.

Another test of this theory brings us to The Meatball Shop, a restaurant on the Lower East Side operating with the sole purpose of turning out ridiculously good meatballs and presenting you a few options in which to consume them. There are meatball sandwiches, meatball sliders, meatballs in sauce, and meatballs on pasta. Other than a few sides and a nice wine list…that’s it. The result? We love it. A concept that could easily have been a divey storefront serving late night heroes is instead a wonderfully executed and surprisingly nice restaurant where you can enjoy a glass of wine while you get fatter by the meatball. The staff is friendly, it’s a lively atmosphere, and the food is solid. Another specialist restaurant beats our formula. Oh well. We suck at math anyway.

Food Rundown:

The Meatballs
We’ll kick this off by tackling the meatballs on their own. The pork is by far the best, followed by the beef and the lamb (if available). The chicken meatballs are unimpressive, and the salmon one freaked me out. They are all relatively light, though eat too many and you will feel it in your gut for a day at least (trust us). While nice on their own, these meatballs are best showcased in a sandwich, rather than simply in sauce or atop a bowl of pasta.

Meatball Hero
Served on a baguette with your choice of ball, sauce, cheese, and bread type. Our favorite is pork, spicy meat sauce, and provolone on whole wheat. Possibly the perfect meatball sandwich. The only knock we have is that we’d like some more kick from that spicy meat sauce.

Meatball Smash
Two meatballs served on a brioche bun. A bit smaller than the hero with the same options, and still very good. We prefer the hero to the smash simply because the baguette holds up a little better. This got soggy pretty quickly.

Sliders
A nice way to sample the goods, we absolutely love the special lamb meatball with mushroom sauce. The chicken with parmesan cream sauce was a let down. For $3 a pop, your money is better spent diving into a bigger sandwich. Get a hero.

Mashed Potatoes
Buttery, creamy mashed potatoes with bits of skin. Rich and perfect, just don’t fill up on it.

Ice Cream Sandwiches
Order one of these or risk wasting the best years of your life knowing only the Chipwhich.

We’re not shy about hopping on the bandwagon when something deserves it and fully expected to be front car on this trip. Unfortunately, despite repeat visits and plenty of chances the verdict is in; this sandwich is disgustingly overrated. The pork is less than plentiful and too dry, the bread nowhere near moist enough and way too thick. Sure, it’s reasonably tasty and for $9, it’s a bargain according to NYC standards, but the praise is completely unwarranted. The Porchetta sandwich ranked #1 in Time Out’s “Best Thing We Ate This Year” spread, while NY Mag can’t stop writing about Porchetta (they prominently featured it in the “Where To Eat 2009″ issue). The bottom line is that it’s just not all that. The hype on Porchetta is just that – hype!

Food Rundown:

Porchetta Sandwich:
See review above. Dry, bland, boring, small and completely overrated.

Crispy Potatoes and Burnt Ends
Porchetta does good work with their potatoes. If this is what was garnering all the praise, we’d be fine with it.

Food Rundown:

Two Egg Sandwich (Breakfast & Brunch)
A classic two egg sandwich, I recommend it on a croissant with ham. Very French, and very good.

Hummus Plate
Follow Me Caffe does a great hummus, and this is a large portion served with bread. What kind of bread depends on the day you are there … sometimes you’ll get strips of focaccia, sometimes a whole wheat toast. It would be better if they hooked up some vegetables with it as well.

Egg Salad Sandwich
A simple classic, this one is tasty and benefits from the addition of cornichons.

Aged Salami Sandwich
This is a Panini style sandwich with melted brie cheese and a black olive tapenade. One of my favorites, but beware, its salty.

Smoked Turkey and Smoked Gouda Sandwich
Another favorite, this has a carbonara mayo and roasted red peppers to balance out the smoked turkey and gouda.

Alaskan Wild Caught Salmon Salad
This is a great salad, really due to the fact that the salmon is always cooked and seasoned perfectly. The lemon dill vinaigrette and three pepper relish add nicely to the giant pile of greens.

Sauteed Spinach Crepe
Follow Me serves great crepes, and this one is my favorite. Spinach is mixed with goat chesse and mozzarella, then covered with a home made tomato sauce and rolled into the crepe. Light and delicious.