newyorkeater

You don’t need a weatherman to tell you that it’s been hot in New York City.  For what seems like months (in fact, it’s been weeks), I’ve been shedding pounds of water weight just walking to and from work every day.  Dealing with hot weather really takes it out of me, so I’ve been working hard to make up for all those burned calories with some fantastic meals over the past few weeks.

Oriental Garden

Chloe had a performance in her 3rd show with TADA, a youth theater organization here in NYC, and it was a family affair.  Aunts, uncles and cousins showed up, in addition to the usual immediate family members, to see her big song and dance number (go and check out The Magic Pot to scout the young talent).  Afterwards, we had an enormous Chinese seafood feast, complete with razor clams, cherrystones, a whole fish, two kinds of fried rice, noodles, hot & sour soup, sauteed snow pea shoots, and these fantastic crabs (photo credit, J. Cho):

dell’anima

I had two solid lunches at this tiny Italian spot.  After trying it when it first opened, I had tried and failed to get in for dinner a few times and had mostly given up on ever eating here again.  But after a disappointing meal at sister restaurant L’Artusi, I really wanted to give this place another shot, to see if it was all I remembered it to be.  It was.

The first lunch, with Jared, was on the blisteringly hot Monday after July 4th.  We sat at the bar and opened the meal with a nice, cooling glass of white Lambrusco, recommended by Craig, our enthusiastic bartender.  Since it had been a couple of years since I’d been there last, I really wanted to try a variety of things on the menu.  Jared started with the avocado bruschetta, while I had the testa with pea tendrils, horseradish & mustard seed.  The testa was gelatinous and fatty.  I wished it were a little colder and the texture a bit more firm, but this was somewhat driven by the fact that I was still melting a little from the walk down to the restaurant from Chelsea.  Next we shared the arugula salad and the vongole with soppressata, garlic & fennel sofrit.  The vongole was not the most summery dish, but the broth was quite tasty and I enjoyed the dish very much.  I could definitely have this, a hunk of bread and a small salad for lunch or dinner on a regular basis.

At this point in the meal, Craig overheard us talking about foie gras, and asked, “Do you like foie gras?  You should try this,” pointing to an item on the menu:  a bruschetta of chicken liver topped with pancetta, then topped with foie gras.  A heart attack waiting to happen.  And then he brought us one to share.

This was definitely the highlight of the meal.  Each element could have stood on its own as a delicious bruschetta, and when combined, some magic happened — salty, sweet, creamy, rich, crunchy.  This is a must-try dish (apparently this was just a “taste” and when ordering it as a regular dish, you get several of these, so be prepared).

We closed the meal with the garganelli pasta with mushrooms and parsley.  This was a solid dish, and had it not followed all these other dishes and flavors, I think I would have appreciated it more.  But our ordering had been a little haphazard and I was quite full by the time it came out.

My second meal, with the very pregnant Leslie, was last week for a restaurant week lunch.   I have mixed feelings about restaurant week, and I generally tend to avoid these meals.  Many restaurants pre-make the dishes for the set menu, and it feels like diners don’t get the same level of care or attention, both in service and in food quality, that they do if ordering off of the a la carte menu.

The dell’anima lunch was an exception.  All of the menu items appear on the regular lunch menu, and they were prepared to order.  Service was friendly and gracious, and not at all concerned by the fact that we were taking our time ordering and eating.  While the menu comes with choices, we both got the same things: octopus appetizer served with rice beans & chorizo, tajarin pasta alla carbonora (mmm… egg yolk…) and some sort of caramel cake (I can’t remember this exactly) with sea salt gelato.  This more edited meal was definitely more successful as an overall dining experience than my previous visit.  The octopus was perfectly cooked, and the carbonara was very well balanced and tasty.  The dessert was a bit on the sweet side, but I did manage to eat the entire thing.

So thumbs up for dell’anima.  I think lunch is the way to go at this place, where it’s less packed, the service is relaxed and the food continues to maintain its high standards.

Terrior

As always, it’s the summer of riesling at Terrior wine bar.  I’ve gotten discouraged about going to the tiny East Village space, since it’s so small, and the long, communal table is configured in such a way that makes it difficult to get in and out.  Thankfully, a new, larger outpost opened recently in Tribeca.  I’ve now been twice and haven’t had to wait for a seat.  It’s a nice looking space with exposed brick and wine bottles lining the walls.  There’s an open kitchen at the back, a long bar, lots of little tables and a couple of communal tables at the back.  The brick and bottles do mean that the space can get loud, and a mid-week visit was definitely more manageable on the ears.

The menu is the same as in the EV, and they’re still serving some of my favorite meatballs in the city.  I got the arugula salad on both visits, and I wanted the dressing to be more viscous — it was a bit insipid to me.  But the pickle plate was remarkable (pickled ramps!), and the cheese selection is always reliable.  And then, of course, there’s the riesling, my favorite wine to drink in the summer.  I’m sure I’ll be back here a few more times before the summer is over.

Oriental Garden
14 Elizabeth Street (between Canal & Bayard)

dell’anima
38 8th Avenue (@ Jane St.)

Terrior
24 Harrison Street (between Hudson & Greenwich Sts.)

February came, and even though the days were noticeably longer, I felt the full weight of a long and snowy winter.  My seven or eight months of living frugally had finally caught up with me.  I needed some good food, and fast.  After what felt like a year of neglect, I started paying attention to new and new-to-me restaurants again.  So many new places to try!  Of course, The Dining Section foiled some plans with their reviews coming in just as I was planning to check out a new place (I was hoping before the crowds rolled in)–Maialino, Northern Spy Food Co. (I’ve been for lunch, but really wanted to try dinner.  Lunch was good.), Baohaus, to name a few.

The better option was to finally get to those places that have been open for a while that I still hadn’t tried.  I already told you about Keste (good) and L’Artusi (not so good).  But I wanted something NICER.  People tell me I’m fancy, and even though I think I’m not, I do enjoy a nice meal with good wine and excellent service every once in a while.  That’s not so wrong, is it?  Plus, it had been a while.  And I’d been so good.  And I hate winter.

Minetta Tavern
So when Christina, my sister, emailed and asked if I was available for an early dinner on a Thursday evening three weeks forward at Minetta Tavern, I said yes.  This was going to be a pricey affair, but I was up for it.  After all, didn’t Bruni say that steak for steak Minetta Tavern could out-steak all the top steakhouses in NYC?  Even though I tend to stay away from most other Keith McNally restaurants, this one I wanted to try.

Christina and I were joined by Janice, a friend of hers whom I had only met once before, but who proved to be a worthy dining companion.  She only had one thing on her “don’t eat” list: bone marrow and other gelatinous, fatty foods.  Fair enough.  We ordered everything to share and tried to pack in as much as we could. Here’s what we ordered:

Apps:

• Rabbit Rillette special, with house made pickles.  Spectacular. I could have this for lunch every day.
• Stuffed Squid with salt cod, piquillo peppers, olives, and preserved lemon.  I liked this but didn’t love it.
• Beet Salad.  I’m not remembering this dish, but I think it was fine.

Mains:

• Black Label Burger.  Wow. This aged beef burger had a funkiness to it that made it super tasty. Caramelized onions on top added sweetness. I’d definitely go back to eat this again.
• Duck Special. Duck two ways: sauteed breast and braised leg. Tasty. Christina and Janice loved it.  I think my taste buds were a little tired and I didn’t appreciate it as much.
• New York Strip. At $42 this was seriously disappointing.  They sliced it for us so we could share it more easily, and though it seemed properly rested, the texture was off.  It was too soft & mushy.  Flavor was just ok.  I did bring home the leftovers, and eaten cold, with some good bread, it made a nice lunch.

Sides:

• Pommes Anna.  YUM.
• Carrots.  Nice coating of butter.  Tasty.

We drank a St. Emillion, and for desert we had the chocolate souffle, which was exactly what it was supposed to be.

Colicchio & Sons
Although I had been feeling more spendy, I still wasn’t up for going all out in the dining room at this shmancy place in the old Craftsteak space.  Instead, I wanted to try the Tap Room, the bar area in the front serving a lot of beer and all their dishes out of the brick oven just off to the side. I had been reading about their Pizza Night on Sundays, and I wanted to see what was going on at this place.  Would the more affordable Tap Room become part of the regular Chelsea rotation? In a word, No.

I went with Leslie & Christian, and we were all unimpressed.  We shared the warm octopus and potato salad with paprika and capers to start.  It was a good dish: well balanced, nice flavors, but nothing to write home about.  For my main, I had roasted clams with shredded pork shoulder in a little broth.  The clams were fine. They were well cooked, and the pork had a good flavor, but the broth was almost inedibly salty. Leslie got a baked rigatoni with duck that tasted just like tuna casserole.  At $18, it felt a little dear for what it was. Christian got a braised rabbit that I didn’t try, and counterbalancing his tendency for hyperbole, I think it was fine.

We did get a Tom sighting.  He stopped to chat with Top Chef winner, Stephanie Izard, who was sitting at the table next to us.  (Speaking of minor celebs, we saw tennis player & commentator Jim Courier at Minetta. He looked happy to be recognized.)

I think Colicchio & Sons would have been less of a disappointment if the price points were lower.  The room is  fancy and the prices are reflective of that, but everything else, food, service, wine, were merely adequate.  Lift this menu out of this space and put it in a homey room in the East Village, reduce prices by 20%, and I think we would have been less disappointed.

It’s blizzarding outside as I write this, so winter soldiers on.  Hm… where to eat next?

Minetta Tavern
113 MacDougal Street  (betw. Bleecker & W. 3rd Street)

Colicchio & Sons
85 Tenth Avenue (at the corner of 15th Street)

I finally made it over to Keste Pizzeria to try their neopolitan style pizza.  The place was quiet (the night before the big snowstorm, so it seemed like people were staying home, even though the evening was relatively warm), and we were able to sit right away.  The staff were all Italian, affable and warm.  They also all had thick Italian accents that I found charming.

We tried three pizzas: funghi, capriciosa (ham, mushroom, olives, artichokes, tomato, pictured) and salsiccia e friarielli (sausage, brocolli rabe, smoked mozzarella).  The crust was very fluffy, and the toppings were fresh and well balanced.  All in all, a great pizza experience.  I’ll definitely go back.

Keste Pizza and Vino (map)
271 Bleeker Street between Cornelia & Jones Streets

I’ve been meaning to try the restaurant L’Artusi, owned by the same people as the always crowded dell’Anima, for a couple of months now. They take reservations, but every time I’ve tried to book, usually on the same day, they haven’t had any openings.  So when Sallie said she would be in town on her last trip to NYC from Seattle for a while (she’s pregnant and can no longer fly), I thought it was a great opportunity to book ahead and give it a shot. So it was the two of us, plus Leslie, on a cold, winter Monday for dinner.

The restaurant is located on West 10th Street behind a bit of scaffolding and a small door. Once inside, it opens up into a deep, rambling space.  It has all the current requisite pieces of a new restaurant: chef’s counter for dining? Check.  Cafe-like seating area in the bar space? Check. Large, open kitchen? Check. There’s also an upstairs that has a semi-private dining room at the back. The walls are black (or black-ish), and though they soften it with patterned upholstery in warm colors, the space more slick than neighborhoody.  While it doesn’t quite have the charm of dell’Anima, there’s still something friendly about it.  The staff were certainly all welcoming and gracious.

The menu itself is written in a somewhat non-standard way, which the information architect in me found interesting.  First, it’s turned on its side, so, Crudo, Verdura, Pasta, Secondi were written across the top as column headers, with the menu items listed beneath them in columns. The pastas were listed by noodle type, rather than by name (so rather than say Bucatini al’Amatriciana, it just says Bucatini, with the ingredients listed below it).  I found the whole thing interesting, if not entirely successful.

On to the food:  I started with the Chicories, a salad of chicory, radicchio and endive, with a parmesan anchovy dressing.  It was perfectly dressed, well seasoned and exactly what I had been craving.  (My efforts to eat locally mean I’m not eating much in the way of leafy greens these days. I think my body is craving vitamins.). Leslie and Sallie both got other salads, which I didn’t try, but they also enjoyed. So far so good.

We each got pastas for our main courses. I got the Bucatini. Mind you, I haven’t had amatriciana since I was in Rome in July, but I do know that there are decent ones to be had in NYC. It’s not the same, but it can satisfy the craving. This was perhaps one of the worst I’ve had. It was sauced with a very heavy hand, the noodles practically drowning in the chunks of pancetta and tomato. The pancetta was also overly caramelized, meaning it was burned. On top of that, the whole dish was overly salted, almost to the point of being inedible. Sallie got the pizzoccheri, which was baked in a heavy compilation of cheese and brussels sprouts. There could have been what was once a bechamel in there, but the whole thing was so dense it was hard to tell.  Leslie got a dish of farfalle with duck ragu. It was the best of the three, but it was only average. Both of their dishes were overly salty as well.

I know that in general the best chefs and staff in restaurants work Tuesday to Saturday, but whoever was working the pasta station at L’Artusi on Monday was inexcusably bad. The cold apps person did a fine job, as did our waiter (though there was something a little awkward about him). Although I feel no real inclination to go back to try it on another day, I can’t help but think the food has got to be better Tuesday to Saturday than what they served on Monday. But when there’s so much better Italian throughout the city, I’m not sure I’m going to give these guys another shot. I’d rather endure the lines at dell’Anima.

The bigger question for me is whether I should be eating out on Mondays at all? Maybe the next time I make dinner plans on a Monday evening I’ll just cook it myself.

L’Artusi Restaurant (map)
228 West 10th Street between Bleecker & Hudson Streets

I’m really more of a Mediterranean or Northeast Asian cuisine diner.  I love pizza and pasta, sushi and rice, noodles and offal.  I may very well be a product of my environment, where all this food has been popular and trendy for years and years, and where cheap, nonstop flights make it easy for me to travel abroad to try the real stuff.

But then the Schnitzel & Things guys came along (with another trend in NYC, the food truck), and I found myself eating a pounded, breaded and fried piece of meat for lunch every Wednesday, often with a side of potato salad.  Certainly this is because the food is fresh and tasty, the portions large enough to split between lunch AND dinner (and at $10 a bargain for two meals), and because I like the guys, who work hard, care about their craft and product and provide a great experience for their diners.

When a couple of weeks ago the guys had mechanical issues with their truck, I found myself without schnitzel on a Wednesday. Alas, I thought, I guess I can avoid eating a deep fried piece of meat for one week. But thankfully, I had a casual dinner planned with some old high school buddies, and Chris, who spent some of his childhood in Austria, suggested going to Blaue Gans in TriBeCa.  I’d heard of this place but had never been.  It’s in the old Le Zinc space, which was one of my favorite restaurant interiors in all of New York, its walls papered in museum exhibit posters (largely from the modern era, my favorite period).

It was a cold winter evening, and this Austrian food was the perfect meal for the weather.  Chris and I were joined by Erik and Rob, as well as Ricky who was visiting from San Francisco.  We ordered a Wurst plate to share, which came with 2 kinds of mustard, sauerkraut and freshly grated horseradish.  And then for my entree I had the Weiner Schnitzel, this time made with pork.  Here are the pics (Taken with iphone. Sorry):

The schnitzel was pounded VERY thinly and the breading was light and fluffy.  It came with a potato salad (which I was sort of hoping would be served warm, but it wasn’t) and a lingonberry sauce.  It hearty and satisfying, though I think the sausages really won the day for me.  I can’t remember what they were (combinations of beef, pork and veal), but they had great flavor and the mustards were superb.

The very next day, I found myself at yet another Austrian restaurant, Seasonal.  This place is located on 58th Street between 6th & 7th Avenues and has a hardly noticeable entry in the middle of the block.  Who knew it had a Michelin star? I was just having drinks and a little cheese (which was quite good), so I didn’t try the real food.  But the interior was modern and clean and the service friendly without being overbearing.  It’s definitely worth a revisit while the weather is cold.

So it looks like Austrian food has become part of my regular rotation.  I’m not sure how viable this will be after the season is over, though I do like a glass (or three) of chilled Gruner Veltliner when the weather gets warm.

Blaue Gans (map)
139 Duane Street between Church & West Broadway

Seasonal (map)
132 W. 58th Street between 6th & 7th Aves.