Restaurant review, Banana Leaf: Here's Your Skanky Wallop.

Although it sounds like a pervert having his way with a shapely evergreen, the name refers to a shrub native to Southeast Asia, also known as pandanus. Ripped down the middle to release their savor, the long, shiny leaves tie up the fried chicken wings ($7.95) at Banana Leaf—a new restaurant in Sunset Park—imparting astringency and adding vanilla notes to the skin and flesh. Then there's petai, sometimes called stink bean, a bulbous legume about the size of a lima, with a firm-but-creamy texture and slightly obnoxious smell—much milder than a ginkgo nut stepped on in the street but in roughly the same vein. Enjoy it in a garlicky cook-up of shrimp, onions, and peppers in sambal petai ($12.95).

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