BryanZ

See, this is actually one thing that bothers me to no end. Some say a huge part of modern cooking is, by and large, about controlling how water behaves. I think this is a noble goal. Runny sauces hurt a plate's appearance. They can and should be avoided. If you're going to have a sauce that's not precisely applied to the plate do it tableside.

What else would you recommend? It's quite a large menu, and I confess my knowledge of Indian cuisine lacks woefully behind my knowledge of other Asian cuisines.

So, Bouley, I'm of two minds on you. On the one hand, a very good restaurant and a great value at lunch. On the other, not as good as I would've hoped. Unfortunately, the restaurant can't match the creativity at Corton, the elegance at EMP or the technical precision at Per Se. It's a clear step down from these restaurants based on what's on the plate. The closest analogs for me are Daniel and Picholine. While the room is certainly ornate--that's an understatement--the feeling of luxury, real or not, one gets at Daniel seems more complete. Furthermore, just as I prefer the style of cooking at Picholine to that at Daniel, the same preference holds when comparing Picholine to Bouley. As Bruni and others have written, Bouley serves meals heavy on the silky and supple textures. This in itself doesn't bother me as much as others. What I found lacking in today's meal, however, was the lightness that perhaps made Bouley's food feel dated in today big-flavor-loving culinary world but also made it unique. Where was the Return from Chiang Mai? A version of the phyllo crusted shrimp with ocean herbal broth remains on the a la carte menu but has no spiritual successor on the new tasting menu. Still, one can't ignore that $48 for a five-course tasting menu at this level is a fantastic deal. Neither JG, nor EMP, nor any of the lunch mainstays can match that. I hope the price doesn't go up, though my instincts tell me otherwise. One also has choices at each course save the pre-dessert, so I was effectively able to try double the number of dishes with my sister, my dining companion this afternoon. Kudos to the kitchen for that. Here's a copy of the menu. It's roughly accurate, though the menu we were presented with today had a couple small changes. Anyway...who's ready for some bad iPhone pictures? In the absence of high-quality photojournalism surrounding this restaurant I thought I might as well contribute to the mediocrity. Cauliflower foam, trout roe, 25 year vinegar This amuse was perhaps my favorite dish. Really light and elegant, but not boring to eat thanks to the sweet-sour of the vinegar and the salinity of the roe. This was served before we had even ordered, however, as if it was a canape. A small point, but I'm particular about this kind of thing. Bread comes in two services, a finer point I liked. First, two warm rolls, an apple one and one with provençal herbs. Later, a selection of about five sliced varieties is offered. The service was fine, but somehow a bit mechanical. I've had less than stellar service experiences at many of the city's top restaurants but you can often tell when they're having a bad day or, at the least, pick out the captains and backwaiters who are really engaging with their guests. Not so much the case here. Also, the staff, surprisingly, felt stretched thin. It was close to full but not crushingly so and it wasn't as easy as I would've liked to get a server's attention. The pacing of the meal was a bit uneven too. All in, just under two hours sounds about right, but some courses were pushed out quickly while there was about a 20 minute wait between desserts. The first courses were very different. One was all about lightness. The other was super rich. The oyster/scallop was one of the more interesting dishes of the meal, but I was distracted by a strong, though not necessarily unpleasant, methol-soapy note. The porcini flan is more crab than flan. A seriously tasty dish if not the prettiest. The hit of truffle and dashi when the dish is uncovered is quite pleasant. We really liked this start to the meal. Oysters Missing the center of the plate? Really? Porcini flan Next was fish, a definite step down. Both dishes lacked a certain vibrancy or brightness. Some fish, some sauce, nothing offensive but pretty forgettable too. I was searching out the onions in the borscht sauce with the monkfish for that allium hit. This dish was also quite undersalted. The skate was better--the preparation was different than the one listed on the menu above--with celery root and a vaguely acidic hazelnut vinaigrette of sorts. I thought both plates were rather drab looking. Monkfish Skate Things thankfully got much better with the main courses. Both were a bit old school but really delicious. The chicken was described as "braised." Umm, if sous vide is braising then I suppose that's accurate. It was amazingly tender and well balanced. A bit more interesting, though not necessarily tastier, was the duck breast with truffle honey. The snow peas with ginger dressing were a nice foil to the protein. Chicken Duck The pre-dessert is similar to a signature dish at Gramercy Tavern. I must say I like the Gramercy Tavern version more. Bruni waxed poetic about this Bouley dish, but it felt a bit clunky to me. The quenelles they scoop here are, across the board, huge, too big even. Pre-dessert We opted out of the chocolate dessert and requested a different fruit one instead. We were served a pineapple carpaccio--not sure how this was cooked, if at all--with lime sorbet and muscat grapes. Simple, maybe overly so, but refreshing. The snowball is a cool dessert. The ten fruit sorbet didn't have any single discernible flavor but tasted different, to an extent. The main thing here is the variety of textures. We were also comped a rather large creme brulee. Not sure if all the tables get this. It was a nice gesture but there was a lot of food. Desserts After the main desserts there were a couple tiered trays of mignardises. They were fine though not particularly elegant or abundant. We were given a lemon cake on the way out. It seems like the restaurant is really going through the motions--perhaps checking off boxes is a better cliched simile--to be a top-notch restaurant. It's clearly a strong three-star establishment and might even garner two from the Michelin guide, but it seemed a bit lacking in passion or soul to me. In fact, I'd even hazard that while the experience is objectively stronger overall, something was lost in the transition from old space to new.

I don't feel like the egg caviar is worth the supplement, but then again I'm more price sensitive than some. When I'm getting a cheap lunch, I want it to be a cheap lunch, you know. The scallop dish is a classic, yes, but I have a couple issues with it actually. If it carries a supplement, again, I wouldn't get it. Not worth it. Secondly, it's likely you've had a dish a lot like it before. Sure, one could argue the JG pretty much put this flavor combination on the map, but, to me, it's over done. Furthermore, I've found the execution of this dish to be sloppy. The scallop is neither delicately cooked nor do they put a hard sear on it. In my mind, go one or the other. Also, the saucing is sloppily applied to the plate. Probably this is on purpose, but aesthetically I don't think it's a great looking dish. The tuna ribbons, another classic, but similar, again, to other things you may have had. It's totally delicious, but the arctic char (I think that's the fish) raw preparation, with the trout roe and lemon, while perhaps not as fundamentally tasty is a hell of a lot more interesting to eat, to me.

I guess I'm skeptical (not that I have any real reason to be). I've liked Bouley more than most for quite a few years. It was one of my formative fine-dining experiences back in the Bakery days. There's something that's nagging me such that I think everyone is missing out on the finer points of the experience and isn't reporting back accordingly. Of course, this isn't the case and all this is the product of some delusion I'm holding. Really, I need to go and realize there really is that little to talk about. Nice, overly ornate room, good but unspectacular food, not too expensive but cheap by any means either.

I think sethd is referring to madai, a type of fish. The asparagus with morels is such a classic. Of JG, yes, but, like, of all time, too. I'm going for their el cheapo dinner menu on Thursday this week. Will be interesting to see if they put a springy dish on the menu. Am really looking forward to spring produce.

It's funny that even Bruni acknowledges the lack of coverage this restaurant has gotten since opening. With that said, even after his review I can't say I got all that much out of it. OK, the desserts seem an unexpected bright spot. The egg-serrano dish is a good one. And... The review even felt a bit short to me. I still want to go. In fact, I have a reservation for lunch tomorrow I made without even knowing Bruni was going to file today. But, like, is there that little to say?

John Dory, Allegretti, Boqueria, Txikito, Co., any of the big box eateries over on 10th (Craftsteak, Del Posto). There are a lot of options.

If you read the past few pages of the old thread you'll see a few dishes come up over and over and over and over. Get those. They're classics for a reason.

Could be that becuase the menu is relatively speaking so cheap they don't want to pay the OT commission?

Oh the lengths I go to. A bit more research reveals that some restaurants have both spicy-savory and sweet versions. For instance, Yeah Shanghai. This Shang version was obviously on the savory side. I swear, I don't make all this stuff up.

A cross between the two? I know I've had eight treasure rice like what I described at Shanghaiese restaurants in the city.

I've had eight treasure rice, or at least that's what it's been called, in a number of traditional Chinese restaurants. Usually it's dark brown and is full of dried meats, nuts, and other items. The same could generally be said of the rice here. The restaurant is actually hard for me to take seriously given the look and attitude of the space and staff. Give me a more understated experience with more refined, pared down food and I'd be happier.

The above post refers to An Choi.

I walked into Damon: Frugal Friday this evening shortly before 7 pm expecting the worst. Indeed, my expectations were well placed and we were greeted with an hour and fifteen minute wait time. No thank you. Shang was my back up plan, so further downtown we went. I had called earlier in the day to confirm that the Starving Artist $35 prix fixe would be available until 7:30 in the main dining room. The hostess assured me this was the case. We arrived at Shang, and wow, what a weird entrance. Those steps are like crazy imposing. But I'm quite spry and made it upstairs to check in with the hostess. We were a party of three walk-ins in a restaurant that doesn't really have a nice spot for such parties. Perhaps predictably we were given a pretty rough table at the very entrance to the dining room. Whatever. The design of the restaurant is kind of weird to me. Minus the groan-inducing soundtrack and all black-attired servers, the center of the room is nothing but huge booths. Even when the restaurant's perimeter is filled with tables of two and four, the space still feels kind of empty. Only one of the six or so massive booths was occupied when we left shortly after 8:30. Anyway, naturally we were told the prix fixe menu wasn't available past 7 pm; it was by this point about 7:10. I said I was told otherwise that same day by the hostess, and my server actually gave me attitude about having to check with the kitchen about it. Weird. I will say minus this one server's apparently short temper the food runners were all friendly did their jobs efficiently. Chef Lee was in the house. The food was actually pretty good. There's all this trendy farm-to-table food out there that's about taking a few great ingredient and treating them simply. A noble goal. This restaurant does no such thing. As others have noted, it's almost as if Chef Lee doesn't know when to stop. Sometimes the effect is something that tastes good even when it probably shouldn't. Other times you wish one component was left off the dish. This isn't "clean" food, rather it feels very manipulated and contrived, though not necessarily in an unpleasant way. The best I can say is that no one is serving food like this, or hasn't at this level of ambition since perhaps the mid-1990s when fusion was en vogue. You can take that as you will. The Singapore Slaw is a pretty cool dish. The textures really make it. I'm not going to wax poetic and say it's the best, most creative salad I've ever had, but it's an interesting plate of food. While each bite is a bit different too much gets wearing. Among the other apps we had the taro beef puffs were like total comfort food. Think Japanese curry bun meets croquette, or perhaps in this case, korroke. This dish, while not particularly refined, worked for me on that Mom's home-cooking level. Next came a round of bigger dishes to include the jerk chicken, the steak, the turnip cake with eggplant, and the scallop with chorizo and eight treasure rice. All these dishes worked for me except for perhaps the last. I was debating between this scallop dish and the pork belly and concede that the latter would probably have been the safer, tastier option. Still, I wanted to try one "interesting" fusion dish and this one called out to me. The scallop, rice, and chorizo were fine if a bit mushy throughout. It was this tomato-chile sauce that came on the side that really marred the dish, however. Again, scallop et al. alone is an acceptable updated take on a classic dim sum dish. The sauce somehow evoked the Mediterranean and just didn't work for me. The steak was pretty inoffensive. Some butter, some nuts, some citrus-soy dipping sauce. A small portion, but we had enough food. The chicken was a pretty interesting fusion dish of the most global order. A nice sweet heat from the combination of tropical fruit and scotch bonnet peppers, some chopped peppers, all sauteed together in a rather thick sauce. This shouldn't have worked, but it did. The most successful dish to me, however was the turnip cake. Mushrooms and a dashi-esque broth brought the umami while the unlikely combination of soft turnip cake and soft eggplant worked. Again, two items I frequently see in Chinese cuisine, just not seen together. Dessert was a step down. There was a creme caramel--serviceable custard, a slightly thin caramel--topped with some sweet red rice. Not my style, but I generally don't like Asian desserts. We went to Otto afterward to remedy this situation right away. All in all, highs and lows. We spent just shy of $60/person after tax and tip with two glasses of wine and a coffee. Not a ton, but I'm not rushing back because of the value proposition. The food is interesting, I can't take that away. But there were some duds, too. I also wish the restaurant wouldn't be so faux-hip. They're trying so hard that it's almost laughable. The last restaurant I was in that was in the same ballpark was Merkato 55 shortly after it opened. That restaurant's food had its interesting merits but there was too much inconsistency across the board for the restaurant to really establish itself. I would like to see Chef Lee's cuisine more focused and in a more serious setting.

If you're one or two, don't worry about it. Find a seat at the bar and you're better of for it. If you want a table, especially at PDT you'll need to call exactly at 3 pm the day you want to go. It can be quite frustrating. I think D&Co. makes about the tastiest drinks in the city. I'd skip out on Apotheke. Style over substance by most reports. Don't totally neglect the restaurant bars if you're trying to save some money as there are some decent deals out there. For instance, Elettaria has a good happy hour deal, and Allen and Delancey does half-priced cocktails on Tuesdays. No reservations for these bars obviously. Keep in mind that these restaurant bars, depending on who is working, can be more variable in quality especially if they're busy. Case in point, A&D's Tuesday night deal gets pretty mobbed and the bartenders I've seen there don't put as much care into the drinks as their program deserves. Even Tailor, whose drinks are totally delicious, sometimes serves a drink that's not cold enough or sloppily made.

On Orchard, just below Broome, a couple doors down from Little Giant. This place is still in soft opening, but they're serving most of the menu. I've been on a Vietnamese kick of late and must say I liked this place quite a bit. Yes, it's more expensive, but the quality is quite good. Sure, it's close to Chinatown but also a few blocks away are sandwiches at Katz's for twice as much. I guess it's all relative. I managed to eat both an entire banh mi and a full bowl of pho. Both were very tasty. I chose the cold cut banh mi--the pig and grilled pork ones were sold out--and appreciated the variety of textures amongst the meats. Some cartilage-y bits were actually welcome. I just wish the sandwiches had slightly higher meat-to-veg ratio. I realize this might not be traditional, but I thought the pickled veg overwhelmed the meat in more than a few bites. I confess I did miss some of the unctuous paté flavors in the old Ssam bar banh mi. The pho was really satisfying. Maybe the broth was a bit greasy, but not in an offensive way. Mainly, it's just rich and nicely balanced. There's no relying on extraneous spices or excess salt in creating a mouth-filling broth. The beef too was nicely done. Very tender and beefy, as if it had been braised. The ingredient quality shone here. Meatballs were no better than others I've had, and I missed the tendon and tripe bits. Noodles were fine, but a bit mushy. All in all, this was a bowl of noodles I might consider in place of a bowl of good ramen from Ippudo and its kin. All in, $21 for a meal that could've fed two. Not bad at all. Right now, more parties than not seemed to be friends of the house. Still, it's worth stopping in at.

I was at Supertaste this weekend. Dumplings were pretty good, fish balls rather weak. The soup was fine, but I was expecting better. The noodles are nice a bouncy but the broth was just fine. Some of the toppings could've been better too. Not bad, but I'm not rushing back either.

Went back to Sunday Supper this week, this time with a bunch of friends from college who happened to be in the city for a little reunion of sorts. The night before I'd taken some of the more adventurous eaters on a progressive supper through Chinatown. For our big meal on Sunday I wanted something that would allow everyone to find something they would happily eat. I won't comment on the wines my dining partners brought. It's a testament to the professionalism of the staff that they iced and served them with such aplomb. On my previous visit I brought in some pretty decent bottles. This time, yeah, not so much. The same wine captain from my last visit oversaw our table and my friends were impressed by his level of service. I thought the oysters were even better this time around, but maybe this was just because I was looking forward to them. The pizza got a bit too charred on the crust in a few instances, but this wasn't really a huge distraction. Some members of my party didn't eat mushrooms and they graciously served some slices without. Many bowls of salad were consumed. Everyone liked their food, clean plates all around. I was the only one to order the skillet special, blanquette de veau on this evening. It was good--I had two portions--but not quite as good as the jambalaya. Whereas the latter was spicy and bold, this was more creamy and understated. Not the biggest portion of veal, but two plates more than made up for that. I also got to try the steaks on the menu. There was a tenderloin with a $5 supplement and the regular sirloin with an $8 supplement. Both steaks were good, I'll grant them that, but not worth the surcharge for me. Then again, I dry age for weeks at home and prefer my steaks to those at most steakhouses. Those who ordered the steaks really enjoyed them. Dessert was a hit, especially the strawberries. Because we were a large party a 20% gratuity was automatically included. No complaints at all there. All in, just shy of $50/person after the supplements and such. More than fair for all that food.

This is interesting. Perhaps a way to get more people in the door and seemingly in line with their rumored attempts to play with pricing given the economy and all. This seems very similar to the bar dining area at Guy Savoy in Las Vegas. One can order signature dishes in small portions along with glasses of wine and champagne without having to go all in for the tasting menu.

I think I started a thread on it. If you care to, you might cross-post there too. It's pretty solid, but I wasn't blown away. It's been several months since my one visit, however.

They're pretty welcoming and chill over there. Technically they only have the license for beer and wine to be consumed on the premises, but I've been known to imbibe in other beverages with my cigar. Don't expect much, it's just plastic cups for the $8/person BYO fee but, again, it's pretty chill. I actually don't love their cigars if I'm going to be honest. They're good but not spectacular. If you've got something special for the occasion bring them and they charge a $10 cutting fee.

On the topic of cigar lounges you might try Velvet Cigar Lounge. It's right in the EV and small enough that you could probably rent out the space for your party for a few hours. Very chill spot.

No. 7 7 Greene Ave., Brooklyn After a couple recent shows at BAM over the past few weeks I've stopped in here twice, once for a quick drink and again for dinner. This is a cozy, unpretentious space. The bar area is a bit cramped as there's no other foyer for people to wait, but if you can grab a seat in the little lounge area by the windows I'm sure that'd be a nice place to have a round or two. The menu itself is almost frustratingly short, but the items I tried on it were all really enjoyable. This is obviously a kitchen that's resource-constrained and I certainly wouldn't travel to eat here, but it's definitely worth the walk of a few blocks. Early PR tried to play up some bizzaro Korean-Eastern European fusion or some such. Yeah, not really. There are Korean influences though, mainly in the form of various pickled items. Off the bar menu, available in the dining room also, I tried the braised pork tacos with kimchi and the fried fish sandwich. Tacos were simple but totally delicious. Fish sandwich was nice, too, but the tartar sauce had an interesting herbal note I couldn't quite place. Both plates were less than $10. On the dinner menu I tried the fried broccoli with a salad of bitter greens and grapefruit and the roasted chicken with beans and Brussels sprouts. Fried broccoli was pretty awesome in an updated-comfort food kind of way. A huge piece of broccoli, like 1/3 of a head, just dipped in batter and fried until crisp. Nicely offset by the bitter and acidic salad. Chicken was pretty aggressive on the thyme but otherwise a nice dish. A bone out, skin on thigh is rolled around the breast into a nice roulade. This was served atop some rich beans and lightly browned sprouts. We cleaned all our plates. I think four out of the five mains are $19 or less. There's a beef tenderloin dish at $24. We didn't drink but those four plates of food split between two people came out to just shy of $30 after tax and tip. Very reasonable I thought. Service was fine. Generally the servers get the job done with minimal issue. The food came out very quickly, which wasn't a problem for us since it was late in the evening and we were starving, but it wasn't exactly the leisurely pace one might want if on a date or catching up with friends. I liked the place though. I'd go back after I try out a couple other spots in the area I've been meaning to get to.

I was very skeptical, but I really liked it. Again, not my "style" per se, but it's tasty comfort food, at least what I had, and a great value for the price.