Hi, I'm Natalie,
and today we're here in Bushwick, Brooklyn,
to check out Newyorktitlan.
I've been to Newyorktitlan before,
their tres leches pancakes are incredible,
and when I heard that they were making
beer- and grasshopper-flavored pancakes,
I knew that I had to go check them out.
Going in, I had no idea what to expect.
Beer in pancakes?
I wasn't sure how those flavors were gonna work together,
but I was super curious to find out.
So let's go see how they're made.
Newyorktitlan has been serving up Mexican food
with a modern twist in Bushwick since 2016.
The restaurant offers a full brunch menu
stacked with everything from eggs benedict to tacos,
but the most notable dishes on the menu
are its adventurous pancake flavors.
Julio Jiménez is the brains behind the inventive flavors.
The chef and restaurant owner
credits his Mexican upbringing,
along with his time living in New York,
with helping him come up with Newyorktitlan's unique menu.
Julio Jiménez: Half of my life, I lived it in Mexico.
I'm 32 years old.
I was around 17 when I came to New York.
Many of these things you will see in the menu,
you will see on the pancakes,
are half of my life living in Mexico
and half of my life living in New York.
Natalie Fennell: While these beer pancakes were available
in early spring, 2019,
Julio is constantly coming up with different flavors
and changing up the menu.
Some previous flavors include grasshopper and popcorn
and smoked bacon with oak-infused ice cream.
Julio: I could change my mind an hour from now
and a week from now,
because that's kinda like the inspiration come from.
I could go to bed and dream about
what I'm gonna do in the morning,
and next thing that I'm doing is just, like,
coming down here and trying to just make it happen.
Natalie: But how exactly did he come up with the idea
for beer pancakes?
Julio: As a Mexican, I would say
I'm a fan of beer, you know?
But I wasn't introduced to this kind of
different type of brewing beers.
A friend of mine said, "You know what,
why you don't try this white ale?
It's delicious, it's very wheat-flavor forward,
and it has the orange wedge citrusy."
And many years after that moment happened,
that memory came to my mind.
And I decided to marry those flavors together
and create the beer pancakes.
Natalie: Julio adds whipped egg whites
to give the pancakes an extra light and fluffy texture.
The pancakes are then topped with a beer sherbet
and an IPA syrup.
Finally, it was the moment we've all been waiting for.
Are beer and pancakes truly a match made in heaven?
It tastes like beer.
But it, like, also tastes like pancakes.
It really has, like, the consistency of cake,
like, good, moist cake.
I mean, it kind of makes it taste like bread.
Because beer and bread are made of the same things.
Sweet beer bread cake
with ice cream.
I think these pancakes really accurately depict
the taste of beer,
because it is kind of like that hearty sort of bread taste
but the coolness of the ice cream,
and the fluffiness and lightness of the pancakes
make them refreshing, like a glass of beer.
Julio: Coming to Newyorktitlan,
you will find it more than a Mexican place.
It's my soul, it's me giving this to you.
I'm not giving you used Mexican food,
I'm giving you my childhood.
I'm giving you things that I grew up eating in Mexico.
So I wouldn't say that it's just Mexican food,
I would say that you could find Mexican food
anywhere in New York,
but the way I'm presenting it to you,
it's very special to me.
Natalie: I was the person who was going to breakfast,
and was not getting pancakes,
'cause I'm, like, not a pancake person.
But these pancakes make me a pancake person.