08.17.08
Posted in New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, NoHo, Spanish, rated 7 to 7.5, small plates at 06:10 by Dominique
45 Bond St. #A & Lafayette/Bowery, 212-529-8600
Great for: cheese, watching chefs, people on high-sodium diets
I confess to a weakness for this little neighborhood because of the hallucinatory metal sculpture/enclosure/fortification around the new apartment building they’ve just put up there. It looks a bit like a T-1000 that’s been shattered, flung on the wall and somehow suspended there. I enjoy looking at it because it’s simultaneously brilliant and stupid. I can never decide which. Kind of a Schrödinger’s Cat paradox involving my taste in architecture.
We started with the selection of three cheeses. The Monte Enebro goat cheese from Ávila was soft, reminiscent of bleu cheese, and I thought it actually pretty tasty. I found the La Serena, a sheep version from Extremadura, bitter and soft. I didn’t much like that one. The Idiazabal, ovine cheese from Pais Vasc, was firm, not too strong, and delicious. The cheeses come on a nice board with bread and aged jelly. Yeah, I thought that sounded gross too. I couldn’t force very much of the jelly down.
From the tapas section we tried the patates bravas with garlic and spicy sauce. The sauce reminded me of spicy mayonnaise at Japanese restaurants. The potatoes were a bit charred, and the dish is really big, so though I liked it at first, I got tired of it about halfway through. The bombas – chicken, pork and beef meatballs – were minced very finely with a hard potato-y shell outside. They were interesting and yummy but the meat had a disconcertingly soft texture, reminiscent of Gerber’s baby food, which eventually overpowered the taste of it. We didn’t finish this dish either.
Of the embotits (Spanish for charcuterie, I think) we tried the jamón serrano, which was delicious and not too salty. I don’t know why the pá amb tomàquet, toasted bread with tomato and garlic, is in the same category, but it was pretty good.
In the larger dishes (cuiina de Mercat) we went for the vedella amb escalivada, a grilled hanger steak with cheese on top and roasted vegetables. A little tough, it was somehow juicy and too salty at the same time. I was surprised at the large amount of meat; too much, in fact, although sliced into good sizes. The truita, a Spanish omelet with chorizo was also overly salted. I did like the tender egg and creamy cheesy sauce on top. The Maya shrimp with crispy garlic and pimenton were nice and big and a bit too salty as well.
Commodities Broker and I were not disappointed with Avinyo, a rosé cava. It was a lovely ruby color and the flavors balanced well. I was pleased with the service too. The waiters are really nice, more attentive to the level of our glasses than getting the food out – though that’s not such a bad thing. The kitchen forgot one of our dishes, which was fine since we found ourselves stuffed anyhow. There is a sexy wine area catwalk just begging to be used in a runway show or movie.
I thought they used the large space inefficiently – they could have fit a couple more tables – but the decor was nice. There are white tiles everywhere, which, fortunately for the noise level, are offset by all the unvarnished wood and brick. You can sit at an open kitchen area in the middle of the room and watch the chefs. You could also sit at the spacious bar and skip the food. I had a fairly good experience here, what with the nice service and the abundance of champagne, but basically everything from the kitchen was too salty. Have drinks here. Bond St. a few doors down is more reliable when it comes to food.
Rating: 7 / 10
Our cost: $260 (2 $55 bottles of rosé cava)
Noise level: not too bad
Chance of walking in: medium.
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05.03.08
Posted in Asian, Chinese, New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, NoHo, rated 9 to 10, small plates at 01:30 by Dominique
380 Lafayette & Great Jones St., 212-533-7000
Great for: best dim sum in the city (so far), sharing lots of food, taking sophisticated parents to lunch
Usually the Boyfriend complains if I try to drag him to dim sum, with good reason. New York has a big Chinatown and at least one Chinese restaurant on every block – I don’t get why the dim sum is so mediocre. Vancouver, Toronto and San Francisco are all better. (I know, I know, Flushing, but it’s over an hour away and outside Manhattan. I don’t like to spend my Sunday trying to avoid mystery puddles and creepy strangers in trains.) Though I haven’t tried every single place here, I’ve been to a good proportion of them, and this upmarket NoHo place beats the rest hands down.
I nearly had a fit when I saw fresh corn and egg soup with crabmeat on the menu. My favorite dish at my favorite restaurant when I was a little girl was a corn, shrimp and crab soup. This one wasn’t quite as mind-blowing, and the crab was actually lobster (no objection), but it was pretty darn good. It’s not like traditional soup filled with cornstarch; it was very clear, and grew on me as I got used to it. I liked the crunchiness of the corn as well. I wasn’t sure, but I thought the modern update of an old classic boded well for the dumplings we had coming. I also knew that Joe Ng, the executive chef, trained in Hong Kong, so I wasn’t terribly worried.
I was right to hope. All the dumplings had really thin skin, which is a sign of a chef who knows what s/he’s doing – it takes artistry to wrap everything up in a perfect little package without much doughy reinforcement. The steamed shrimp dumplings (har gow) were tender, scrumptious bundles of joy. The roast pork buns were small, fluffy and delicious; the crab and pork soup dumplings juicy and fantastic. Resign yourself to losing some soup from the first two despite your best efforts with the lovely soup spoons, as the dumplings are quite cozy in the bamboo steamer. The crispy shrimp and mango rolls with Dijon mayonnaise (a house specialty) were surprisingly good as well. I didn’t think I would like them but I totally did. The spicy sauce that automatically comes for the table, of soy, chili peppers, onions and scallions, was great too. Although you should not eat the chilies if you want to be able to close your mouth in the near future. Fortunately, I made that mistake at the end of the meal.
We were in raptures over the lobster tail tempura on a bed of roast shallots with mild wasabi mayonnaise and hoisin sauce. The claws were pretty good, while the tail was excellent. The Boyfriend loved the tail so much I let him have a bit of my half. It’s best when hot but still very good otherwise. The beef puff pastries and pork potstickers were great despite having some mushroom. The shrimp and snow pea dumplings that looked like small toad Pokémon were tastier than any little monster should be. The only dish we didn’t love was the crispy taro root shrimp “birds.” Each bird had a taro filament-wrapped shrimp and pork body with a funny bread head dipped in honey. Sadly, they had very noticeable mushrooms and I don’t care for taro so it wasn’t really my thing. But we’d had eight excellent plates out of nine and were stuffed too full of dumpling love to care.
Our flutes of Taittinger rosé champagne went surprisingly well with the dim sum. So did the courteous service – in Chinese restaurants I’m used to waiters who are overworked at best and more usually surly and incomprehensible (I speak Mandarin and they all seem more comfortable in Cantonese). Our waitress was absolutely lovely in looks and action. I liked the décor too, which was chinois without being tacky. The place is basically a French brasserie in layout and furniture, with Chinese floors and furnishings. It’s enormous and seems the type of place you could take your visiting parents. Not because it’s stuffy or boring, but because it’s sophisticated yet homey.
I was impressed with the extent of the dim sum selection. They had all the regular ones plus some fusion and high-end variations. The dishes are mainly four of each thing and come out in waves – you get as much as will fit on your table at one time. I thought the prices were pretty reasonable too. Of course it’s not as cheap as Chinatown, but $6 for most of the plates is not bad for such an upscale restaurant. (The price goes up to $8 at dinnertime.) I am so happy I finally found good dim sum in NYC. And I am delighted to take back my former disappointment that “there aren’t more chefs trying to do really good Chinese (not fusion) cuisine.” Chinatown Brasserie is a shining example of terrific, real Chinese food in an upscale setting. Thank you, Mr. Ng!
Rating: 9 / 10
Our cost: $210 (4 glasses of $19 Taittinger)
Noise level: loud-ish music, not too much noise from other tables
Chance of walking in: medium.
Two weeks later we came with four friends and shared the Peking duck as well as lots of dim sum, and the bill was about $35 per person (I think we ate less than last time, though). The duck was great and even our Hong Kong friend thought the dim sum was good. Must think of another occasion to go…
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04.15.08
Posted in Japanese, New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, NoHo, rated 8 to 8.5 at 15:47 by Dominique
6 Bond Street & Broadway/Lafayette, 212-777-2500
Great for: spicy crispy shrimp, sharing lots of dishes, reliably romantic dates, naughty cocktails downstairs, large parties
As I was thinking about the many visits I’ve made to this restaurant, I realized that I’ve been on four second dates here in two years. It’s always fun - not the most imaginative choice if you’re trying to impress a Manhattanite, but romantic without being over the top (and sometimes that’s better). Most importantly, the food never disappoints. This time it was me, the Boyfriend, his friends O & B visiting from London, and their friends D & K who live here. We sat in the round table upstairs by the hostess stand, which was nicely spacious for the six of us.
We got two orders of the spicy crispy shrimp with yuzu calamanci vinaigrette and chipotle aïoli, which I think is hands-down one of the best dishes in the entire city. The shrimp are medium size, fried in a very light tempura batter and drizzled with spicy mayo and chives. They are fluffy, juicy, crunchy, delicious pieces of heaven. I’d be quite happy to have a whole meal of just them. The crispy goat cheese crab cakes had a lovely crunchy pounded rice crust. The wagyu tataki brushed with truffle butter was great – the slices are lined up on a long narrow dish, seared just enough around the edges, and pleasingly soft in the middle. I liked as well the chewy soba nomi buckwheat risotto with sautéed shrimp, peekytoe crab and smoked trout butter, despite the mushrooms in it.
My entrée of NY strip with 18-year-old balsamic vinaigrette, shallots teriyaki and potato cubes was a bit chewy but yummy and made me happy. The Boyfriend’s rack of lamb with Asian pear and potatoes was also tasty. (We’d unwisely already had a lot of sushi that week and didn’t feel like any more.) Those are the only mains I can tell you about firsthand. By the time I was done with my dish, the others had already devoured theirs before I could remind them that they had to share with me so I could review them. They all said, “Delicious.”
The crème caramel with plum wine gelée and caramel sauce was great. It tasted like a better version of flan. The sake crème brûlée with yamamamo fruit and puff pastry was also excellent. We were also quite happy with the quality of the drinks. I liked the sweet saketini I started with, and we got through three bottles of sake #75. The service was good considering it was an extremely busy Friday. They were a bit slow with the drink refills but I’m sure that was partly to do with the small sake glasses and our large thirsts.
It’s a beautiful restaurant, with two floors for dining and a seductive basement lounge where you can also order food. The dim lighting is conducive to romance, and the chairs are really comfortable. Every time I come, the food is very good across the board, quite an accomplishment in a restaurant that’s been open for several years and does so many covers every night. I look forward to the next time I have the privilege of eating here.
Rating: 8 / 10
Our cost: $810 for 6 people (3 bottles of sake plus a few cocktails)
Noise level: noisy happy
Chance of walking in: low.
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