Mafia Food

Park Side, written in gold font, on a forest-green awning that wraps around an entire corner of a small tree-lined park a couple blocks from Flushing Meadows. The restaurant stands out of place in the overwhelmingly first-generation Latin American neighborhood, just as much as it stands out of time. Formally dressed valets wait on the curb, offering a hand to women stepping out of Porsche Cayennes and Cadillac Escalades. The light wood-lined walls and lantern lighting give the interior of the restaurant the feel of a beloved steakhouse in a midwestern town — somewhere hundred of miles away from places that cater to patrons who have vague, elitist creative-class jobs like ‘Product Designer’ and ‘Artistic Director’.