Zeebo's opens in Long Beach with must-try french fries
French fries are a multiday process at Zeebo's in Long Beach. Credit: Newsday/Andi Berlin
Long Island's best french fries might just be coming from a new hidden kitchen on the second floor of a brewery in Long Beach. They're definitely the best I've had on Long Island. But are they technically even french fries when each piece is practically the size of a small potato?
These questions are for the linguists and the philosophers — but for now, I'm calling them french fries and saying you should drop everything and find them. The fries of note are at Bright Eye Beer Co., where a team of tattooed pop-up chefs are making Netflix-worthy bar food daily. Zeebo's is a partnership between chef-brothers Sam and Zach Rabiner, who were born in Long Beach and started the pop-up thing back in 2020 out of their parents' house. More recently, they've putt on multicourse Mexican dinners at the tiny cafe Blacksmith's Breads, but have been building out the Bright Eye Beer Co. space since 2024, Sam Rabiner said.
.
The top-floor restaurant, which opened in December, still feels rather loose and word-of-mouth. On a recent evening, it was hard to know it was even there, thanks to minimal signage aside from a paper menu with four items scattered around a hand drawing of a skeleton. Brewery-goers can sit at the bar downstairs and order the fries, wings and smashburgers to be brought down from upstairs.
A cheeseburger with pepper sauce and fries at Zeebo's pop-up at Bright Eye Beer Co. in Long Beach. Credit: Yvonne Albinowski
But the dining space is where the real show is. The small room has an urban art gallery vibe and is dominated by a high-ceilinged, open kitchen where you can watch the cooks. The menu changes daily, and often features some legit-looking Northern Mexican burritos with flour tortillas that are sourced direct from "a wizard named Pablo" in the Mexican state of Sonora, Rabiner said. They also do elaborate pop-up dinners for private parties.
Available that evening: Buffalo wings from organic farm-raised chicken, cooked just right with crispy skin and juicy meat, dipped in a generous bowl of chunky blue cheese dressing. A smashburger ($14) with tangy pepper relish had a crispy sear on the edges on the meat. Great, but it was dwarfed by the plate of massive fries.
Rabiner said they're a nod to the English pub fries that they've tried at New York City restaurants like Lord’s and Rolo's. In a move reminiscent of "Jiro Dreams of Sushi," he hired a cook who works specifically on the fries. Steve Salerno is there five days a week, seven hours a day, going through 350 pounds of potatoes a week. The key to the glorious crust is to boil the potatoes until the outer layer gets a fuzzy texture, because this creates more exposed space, which leads to a craggier, crispier fry.
"He's constantly giving them love and respect," Rabiner said, describing the process that can take a whole day. "Peel, soak, cut, another soak, boil, chill, low temperature fry, freeze, then fry for service."
This arduous technique results in fat wedges of different sizes that are soft on the inside, yet shatteringly crunchy on the outside. Each hunk has a nice crust of flaky salt, which keeps the blood pumping. They're dipped in ketchup, malt vinegar, and if that's not decadent enough, mayo.
Zeebo's, at Bright Eye. Beer Co, 50 W. Park Ave., Long Beach, 516-543-5736, instagram.com/zeebos. Open 5 to 9:30 p.m. Wednesday through Friday, 2 to 7 p.m. Saturday and noon to 3 p.m. Sunday.
Andi Berlin is from Arizona and does not know where she is going. But when she gets there, she’ll find something beautiful and delicious that the world needs to taste.
