02.27.09
Posted in Italian, New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, Upper East Side, rated 7 to 7.5 at 03:43 by Dominique
1748 1st Ave. & 90th/91st St., 212-828-5810
Great for: specials, opera with your dinner
The Boyfriend’s father Mr. G took us out to dinner again, this time on the upper east side. It’s an adorable little place, and the specials are definitely the way to go if you find yourself in the “wilds” above 80th Street.
B and I got the pasta specials to start, his in entrée size and mine in appetizer. His risotto with saffron, shrimp and calamari was great and creamy. The squid was a little rubbery but otherwise it was a lovely dish. My spaghetti with sea scallops fra diavolo had yummy sauce and soft likeable tomatoes but I thought the scallops might have been a bit off. Mr. G was unmoved by his good, not excellent, artichoke soup. He said it didn’t taste much of artichoke and wasn’t cream-based.
All our entrées came with broccoli and creamy fine-ground mashed potatoes that I liked a lot. B’s salmon special with mustard was the best of the three main dishes. The large, flaky, tender filet came with lots of sauce, which was not too sharp and had just enough mustard flavor. My saltimbocca veal with crisp prosciutto, breading and spinach was pretty good. The prosciutto was a little too salty but the dish as a whole was quite decent. On the other hand, Mr. G said his homemade scarpariella (chicken) on the bone was better than their just-all-right version.
We liked the strawberry shortcake with lots of whipped cream and powdered sugar, as well as the bottle of Montepulciano d’Abruzzo CaDonini for $23. B rated it a 6.8 and I agreed. It was kind of the waiter to steer us to that instead of the $38 bottle we were initially considering. We were a bit puzzled by the regular coffee that they poured from a carafe as people do at home – it tasted fine, in any case. The nice waiter managed not to hover though he didn’t have much to do. Overall, it’s a quaint, cute little resto. And if you pay cash they’ll give you ten percent off.
Rating: 7 / 10
Our cost: $195 (3 people, $23 bottle of wine, 1 dessert, 2 coffees)
Noise level: loud opera but it’s nice
Chance of walking in: good. Although it was a horrid, cold, rainy Wednesday night.
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05.30.08
Posted in Latin, New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, Upper East Side, rated 7 to 7.5 at 06:04 by Dominique
1022A Lexington Ave. & 73rd St., 212-879-6190
Great for: sharing lots of appetizers, wonderful cocktails, drunken shopping after dinner
My friend L invited me to girls’ night with her friends J and S, and I like her so much I actually went all the way uptown to see her. With four hot women at one table, our poor waiter had difficulty concentrating on his job, especially since he could hear our raunchy conversation – we had an early reservation and the restaurant was pretty quiet. When I lived uptown for four years I had this place on my list and never visited; now that I live 80 blocks south I finally managed to come here.
L and J went a little crazy ordering apps. We ended up with six for the four of us. I’m glad there were two tuna tartars with foie gras, cachaça-molasses reduction and sesame seeds. They were pretty good, and an interesting choice to pair the foie gras with tuna. They have a lot in common – both fatty, creamy and with guilt to go around. I found the molasses sauce far too sweet, though. I like my candy to stay in the candy aisle. The warm fresh calamari salad with cherry tomatoes, arugula, parsley, garlic and lemon-lime juices was too frightening to eat. I bravely tried a leftover tentacle, because the rest of the bits looked disturbingly like mini octopi. In the chef’s defense, it was soft with a tastily burnt sauce and tender spinach. In my defense, I just read a book about how intelligent, agile and sensitive the octopus is.
The girls liked the Paulistana salad of baked tomatoes on the vine, mozzarella di bufalo, butter head lettuce, balsamic caramel dressing and crispy chopped garlic on top. (I don’t eat whole tomatoes, so I can only take their word for it.) The dish is exactly as described – the tomatoes are somehow still on the vine though a bit cooked. I can heartily recommend the very soft cheese and greens. I saved our two favorite starters for last. The carne seca, which was seasoned shredded beef, garlic persillade, cherry tomatoes and onions with manioc fries was just terrific. The fries were a bit bland, but what did we care with a whole pepper-shaped pot full of yummy, salty, spicy corned beef-looking stuff to attend to. I must confess to polishing off this one (there were only a few shards left, really, I swear). The bacalhau brandade, which was salty cod purée, black beans broth, crispy collard greens and bone marrow was also so good we couldn’t stop eating it. The fish was creamy and flaky while the collard’s crispiness invited overeating.
L and I went for the Friday special of moqueca, a stew with cod, one enormous shrimp, coconut and dende oil. It was tasty and a bit spicy. I liked it despite the coconut. However, the fish and shrimp were a little undercooked. I couldn’t finish my dish for that reason, afraid I would pay for it later. I contented myself with sauce on a tiny bit of the accompanying white rice. J’s steamed fresh herbs-encrusted salmon with baby vegetables in papillotte (a little parchment pouch), ginger, parsley butter, roasted apples and spicy sauce was terrific. The fish was not only tender, it somehow tasted a bit creamy as well. S had the roasted organic Cornish hen with fig juice, sautéed baby vegetables and yam purée. The chicken was a good texture, but really difficult to cut with all those bones in the way. She had the waiter do it. The fig juice was a crazy and bad choice on the chef’s part.
We very much enjoyed our strawberry sake caipirinhas. I also branched out to the equally delicious Dona Flor cocktail, which was, according to my notes, “Whoo! Drunky drunky yummy with a kick.” It’s definitely only for the members of your party who can hold their alcohol. Combining 42 Below honey vodka, triple sec, Chambord, simple syrup, passion fruit purée and fresh strawberries is pretty lethal.
Our waiter was just lovely. He cut up S’s food, advised us, and offered his extracurricular services when he heard some of us were looking for boyfriends. Also super cool: the black paper in the bathrooms. Because a restaurant named after a happy Brazilian-French clown needs dark goth toilet paper, obviously. Additionally, there was a store in the corner before the stairs. In case you’ve forgotten your bikini or some other tropical article of clothing, you can get it right there. They must have so many drunken purchases.
I’d like to, but I can’t say the food was really worth the effort. I’d come back this far uptown if someone got me the carne seca, bacalhau brandade, salmon and the $200 dress I was eyeing on the mannequin. And of course, several special cocktails.
Rating: 7 / 10
Our cost: $370 (4 people, 2.5 cocktails each, 6 apps)
Noise level: quiet when it’s early
Chance of walking in: medium.
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04.18.08
Posted in French, Haute Cuisine, New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, Upper East Side, rated 9 to 10 at 17:45 by Dominique
20 E. 76th St. & Madison/5th Ave., 212-772-2600
Great for: exquisite food, speculating about strangers, impressing a date, lovely service, oenophiles
We heard about the Zagat Presents special prix-fixe menu to celebrate new top chef Gavin Kaysen and thought it’d be a great opportunity to finally eat here. I lived quite close by for years and never managed to go, and now that I live very far downtown I regret not doing so when I had the chance. At the entrance we divested ourselves of coats and bags in a tiny anteroom which probably gets crowded at the end of the night. Then we lifted a curtain into the magical wonderland – I mean, main dining room. It looks magical to me because of all the flowers and how beautifully it’s decorated.
We may have been the youngest patrons in the whole place – everyone else looked middle-aged, old or heavily Botoxed. It was surprisingly lively, considering. They brought us two amuse-bouches as soon as we said OK to the prix-fixe and no to the 27-page wine list. There was a bite of potato salad on a radish slice in a flat-bottomed soup spoon, and a fried ball of risotto and black truffle, both of which were great. I think there was some black truffle emphasis to the menu as well, as you will shortly see. (I may not have remembered every bit of the dinner correctly – unfortunately my BlackBerry lost my notes so I’m doing it from memory and the regular Café Boulud menu, which is slightly different.)
We were offered five kinds of bread when we had our first course, the kampachi sashimi with butternut squash purée, daikon radish and ponzu vinaigrette. Kampachi is a yummy Hawaiian yellowtail. I liked how the squash made it look as though the fish had dabs of spicy mayo and then it wasn’t spicy. It probably wasn’t that easy to make, but seemed very simple and wonderful when we ate it, which is the best way to be.
Next we were blessed with the “biscuit and gravy.” It was a quail egg atop a pork sausage-and-black truffle patty resting on a buttermilk biscuit on a bed of creamed spinach. It was even more wonderful than it sounds. The little egg was poached perfectly, so that the yolk was hot but still runny. The sausage was obviously the kind that you might actually want to watch being made – no filler parts here. Everything just went together scrumptiously. The hardest part was trying to get a bit of everything in each bite without eating it with my fingers.
Our main course was wine-braised short ribs accompanied by green beans, a baby carrot and celery root purée. The Boyfriend thought the ribs were a bit fatty but I reminded him that they are supposed to be very fatty and these were actually doing quite well on the heart attack scale. Mine just had one thin layer of fat, which was easily scraped away. The sauce was excellent, so much so that I ate all my beans – a rare occurrence for me. The entire dish went together so well.
Our dessert was almond and Darjeeling tea wafers with sorbet on the side, topped by what I can only describe as a slender sprig of chocolate. Between the deliciously crunchy wafers there was a layer each of almond and Darjeeling mousse. The plating was so beautiful I wanted to take a picture, but Boyfriend told me I’d look like a loser with the camera out. And soon I was too busy trying to wolf down the scrumptiousness in a ladylike manner to care.
I can’t say enough about the service here. It was quiet, friendly, unobtrusive, dexterous… definitely one of my top 5 experiences. Everyone, from the coat check girl to the busboy, was unfailingly kind and attentive. I love when restaurants create an atmosphere of privacy yet make sure we have everything we need. So despite it being very much not our scene, and way too far uptown, we loved it and I want to go back soon.
Rating: 9.5 / 10
Our cost: $260 ($75 half-bottle of Bollinger to celebrate our anniversary a little more)
Noise level: pretty noisy considering half the women couldn’t move their faces, but we easily had a quiet conversation
Chance of walking in: low.
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02.15.08
Posted in American, New York City Neighborhoods, New York City Reviews, Upper East Side, rated 4 to 5.5, seafood at 19:46 by Dominique
1341 3rd Ave. & 76th/77th St., 212-988-9200
Great for: bread, pineapple juice, watching Upper East Side bitches (I used to be one so I can call them that)
I used to live in the 70s on the UES, which was cool because I had a large rent-stabilized apartment, but sucked in almost all other ways. One of the few saving graces was the plethora of restaurants I could choose from that were within a 10-block radius. Sushi of Gari, Sushi Seki, Hacienda de Argentina, Daniel… Atlantic Grill was one of the few that I hadn’t tried. For some reason the Boyfriend and I decided to have brunch uptown, and I remembered that I’d always wanted to go here.
We had high hopes for the place, since Boyfriend likes its sister B.R. Guest places Dos Caminos and Vento, I like Blue Water Grill and Isabella’s, and we both loved Primehouse. We were sorely disappointed. The only good thing we had was the crab cake appetizer, which came with corn salsa and whole grain mustard remoulade. The Boyfriend’s lobster bisque was not good, we couldn’t taste the lobster, and the only yummy part was the crab profiteroles on top. Some might call the flavoring delicate – we called it blah. It was a very 4 out of 10 soup.
For a main I ordered the seafood Cobb salad with scallop, shrimp, crab, bacon and asparagus but no avocado or tomato. They brought the tomatoes anyhow, and the dressing was too citrusy. I am not a seafood expert but I didn’t feel that the shellfish tasted as plump and fresh as it should have – it certainly hadn’t gone bad, I’m not saying that at all, but everything was a little too cold and didn’t have that crisp texture that I find in the freshest seafood. Maybe it had been frozen? Anyway, the best part was the bacon. I always finish the seafood in whatever I’m eating, a holdover from when my parents would make me eat my meals in the most economically efficient way, but I didn’t finish it here.
The Boyfriend’s shrimp and scallop skewers were way too citrusy and the seafood, again, was not very good quality. We said, only half-jokingly, that his pineapple juice tasted better. We are really puzzled as to why this place is packed all the time when everything we had was so mediocre. It’s a lovely-looking restaurant, for sure, and the waiters are quite nice, but the food was really not very good, especially at such sophisticated prices. $25 for two skewers of crappy seafood? No thank you.
Now, in Atlantic Grill’s defense, we went back for dinner one time when we were going to a concert at the 92nd Street Y and the Boyfriend craved shrimp cocktail. This time was a bit better. The yellowtail and salmon tartare appetizer I got was pretty good. Our pound of shrimp was somewhat bland, though, with the same probably-frozen texture, and we didn’t like the sauces except for the standard cocktail sauce. Everything seems to just be varying levels of bland. No matter how much Boyfriend wants shrimp, we are not coming here again.
Rating: 4 / 10
Our cost: $80
Noise level: fine
Chance of walking in: low
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