Asty Time Restaurant Facebook photo
Asty Acosta, owner of Asty Time Restaurant, which serves Dominican cuisine, tells Metro Times that some Dominican major league baseball players -- Toronto has six -- come to his Southwest Detroit restaurant when they come to play at Comerica Park.
"Why they do so is no mystery," writes Metro Times food critic Tom Perkins.
Perkins describes the tasty dishes served at 7340 McGraw Ave.:
The best dishes at Asty are those that get the sofrito treatment. Sofrito is a slurry of aromatics that's the base of much of Caribbean cooking, and the Dominican Republic is no different. Asty's variation is comprised of sauteed garlic, onions, bell peppers, celery, oregano, green onions, cilantro, lime, and small amount of soy sauce.
It's behind the deep flavor in the carne de res guisada, a dish of stewed beef that soaks in a small puddle sofrito sauce and falls apart with the slightest nudge from your fork. Sofrito also drives the camarones a la diabla, a piquant and spicy dish of shrimp in a tangle of sauteed bell pepper and onion with heat-radiating cayenne.
The intense fried pork chops — chuleta fritos — are marinated in sofrito and lemon, and the salty, moist meat arrives next to a mound of rice and fresh pinto beans. Apply citrus liberally. Likewise, the baked chicken — pollo al al horno — is half of a baked bird that's worked sofrito and Goya seasoning, which arrives next to steamed broccoli and carrots.
