Revamped Sheepshead Bay TGI Fridays Back in Business

by Elizabeth Nelson

The famous TGI Fridays potato skins.

          How much potato can cling to a potato skin before it crosses the line from potato skin to actual baked potato? What exactly is a unique cheese flavor? And do I really want every day to feel like Friday?

          These are the questions I found myself asking at the grand re-opening party for TGI Fridays in Sheepshead Bay Monday night. The place had been closed well over a year, mopping up after three feet of water slammed in from Hurricane Sandy. Sitting right on the harbor, next to the bay’s lighthouse, TGI Fridays was one of the hardest-hit businesses in a neighborhood devastated by the storm.

          After a major renovation, they’re finally back in business, with a fresh look and a new menu -- and the place was packed. Booths, tables and bar were crowded with couples and families happily scarfing down Loaded Potato Skins, Thai Pork Tacos and platters of Jack Daniel’s Ribs. Bartenders tossed drinks at each other across the bar and servers busted out dance moves between taking orders.

Watch out for flying beers.

          I’d never been to this TGI Fridays before Hurricane Sandy. In fact, I’d never been to a TGI Fridays anywhere, ever. So when Brian Gies, their head marketing honcho in from Dallas for the occasion, told me the upgraded menu’s fried mozzarella sticks had a new “unique cheese flavor” I was left to wonder what they tasted like before.

          The new menu, as per Gies and his marketing team, also features “all natural chicken.” I asked whether this meant it was organic. “No, just all natural. There’s nothing artificial in it,” he said. Okay. Also new: the steaks are fresh, not frozen, and the potato skins have “a more potato-y bite.”

          That’s what I get for talking to marketing executive and not a chef. But marketing folks were out in force and I didn’t spot a chef anywhere.

          The potato skins were, however, very potato-y, smothered in bacon, scallions and cheese. (Cheese-flavored cheese.) I wished the sour cream had been less of a drizzle and more of a smother, but one look at the calorie count ever-so-helpfully provided on the menu (1,430 per serving) and I was glad for the sour cream stinginess.

          I did not sample Gies’s favorite menu item, the Oreo Madness (a giant ice cream sandwich covered in Ghirardelli chocolate sauce, 500 calories), preferring to spend my calories on a 280-calorie margarita (it was Cinco de Mayo, after all) and a mojito laced with strawberries and raspberries (210 calories). Okay, and a flatbread pizza (stopped keeping track of calorie counts). And an ahi tuna crisp topped with a jalapeno (spicy!). Oh, and a slider (who cares, anymore?). I stopped when the zipper on my skirt threatened to give.

          Gazing out the big plate glass windows at the sun setting over the water, I shivered. It must have been terrifying when the water rose during Hurricane Sandy. TGI Fridays did a fantastic job rebuilding. I’m glad they’re up and running again. But to tell you the truth, Friday was never my favorite day of the week.

TGI Fridays, 3181 Harkness Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11235, (718) 934-5700. Open 11 am to 1 am daily.