Upper East Side – Writing With My Mouth Full

Tanoshi Sushi

1372 York Avenue between East 73rd and 74th Streets
$100 each for 5 people, omakase with 3 shared appetizers, with tip; BYOB
646/727.9056
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You know when a restaurant review comes out and it fucks it up for everyone else? This is it.

Tsuki

1410 First Avenue between 74th and 75th Streets
212/517.6860
$105 for two, with drinks, with tip
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I have to be honest with you here: I’m not one hundred per cent sure I was at Tsuki. I’m pretty sure it was Tsuki because it’s one of the restaurants I have noted on my iPhone, but I have so many pending reviews I think I might have some of them mixed up. It wasn’t that the food was forgettable–as far as omakase sushi goes that won’t break the bank, the selection was pretty fresh and pretty good. There was nothing stunning about the interior because there was hardly any decor, and really, only this photo survived that night:

I’m a little embarrassed that I’m showing my age here, but I’ve racked my brain and I still can’t confirm that it’s Tsuki I’m supposed to be reviewing. Help me out and I’ll edit later, but let me continue and tell you about the place anyway.

We walked in around 930pm on a weeknight. Everyone else decided to stay indoors because it was cold out, but we were hungry after attending a retail store party with free sparkling wine. There were already two couples and a single diner sitting at the short bar, and because we always prefer to sit by the chef, we waited for our turn to sit there. Everyone left at the same time and we were able to move after only ten minutes. For the rest of the night, there were only three people with us inside: the chef, who also doubled as the dishwasher; the waitress, who could have been the chef’s wife and who also answered the phone; and a white guy in chef’s whites who returned from a food delivery but settled behind the bar after he had removed his coat.

It certainly looked like a family business with, perhaps, the white guy as an apprentice, but they seemed like they needed an extra hand or two to make things run smoothly. We ordered our sushi piece by piece from the chef because he looked like he couldn’t handle more than two orders at once. He fulfilled orders that were called in and he ran back and forth from the kitchen to get clean serving plates. Meanwhile, the waitress picked up the phone, cleared the tables and packed deliveries while also refilling our water glasses.

It took us two hours to go through a dozen sushi pieces each but we killed time by drinking Sapporo and cold sake. Although some of them fell apart while I tried to eat them, the restaurant had a varied selection that included hokigai, or red clam. The mackerel was great and the uni was fresh. After a while, eating there felt like we were in the Japanese couple’s dining room: we waited to be served; they waited for our feedback. We spoke in hushed tones and bowed every time plates were exchanged. We were comfortable and an inconvenience at the same time, staying after every guest had already left. I’m not sure if the frail couple reminded me of my parents but I felt very melancholy the whole time I was there; watching them work so hard to keep the night, and their business, alive. Sadness and sushi don’t make a good combination and maybe that’s why I’ve blocked the restaurant name out of my head.

Crave Ceviche Bar

946 2nd Avenue between 50th and 51st Streets
212/355.6565
about $120 for two, with five drinks, with tip
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Depending on whom you ask, ceviche may have originated from Peru or Ecuador. Wherever your allegiance lies, it’s seafood marinated in a citrus-based concoction to “cook” the meat without heat. Crave Ceviche Bar doesn’t want you to forget what they’re trying to serve you–everything is creatively “ceviche’d”. I had fun determining which taste originated from where.

The Kona Kampachi, my new favorite fish from Hawaii, was marinated in pressed lemons and tomato paste. The chorizo happily melded with the natural sweetness of the kampachi. The puré of artichokes and red peppers balanced everything out. Spain, right?

I loved the salmon tartare in yuzu and huckleberry. A mess of galangal, capers and white truffle essence may sound confusing but for some reason works here. I couldn’t miss its Asian-flavor galore. Throw in the oven-roasted tomatoes and cauliflowers and you have yourself some old Italian influence. We enjoyed the black cod sashimi with roasted beets and crispy latke ceviche’d in apple cider vinegar and yellow bean apple purée. It could be your next Hanukkah special! I found the spicy yellow fin tuna the most simple, but at least the yuca made it somewhat exciting.

In a more hushed setting, restaurants like Le Bernardin have thrived in the New York City scene for years. Maybe it is Eric Ripert’s footsteps that Crave Ceviche Bar is following. They have a raw section on the menu, as well as “cured but cooked” and also traditional dishes using shrimps, lamb loin and Peking duck in the same vein that their midtown counterpart has “almost raw”, “barely touched” and “lightly cooked” selections.

Each dish will set you back at least $14 with the most expensive topping at $28. Add the cocktails the cute bartender mixes behind their newly-licensed bar and you’re looking for a $120 bill for two. After a couple of hours, we were tipsy and out of cash but still hungry. I can’t explain how we ended up at a Japanese bar for a pitcher of Sapporo draft and a big bowl of pork belly soup afterwards, but Crave Ceviche Bar definitely made us crave some more.

Ada

208 East 58th Street between Second and Third Avenues
212/371.6060
about $60 for two, without drinks, with tip
â™¥

It was a new craving. It had to be Indian food but without the heavy curry sauce. It had to be seafood. Because I remember having such a seafood meal at Rasa the last time I was in London, it had to be cooked Keralan style.

On the map, Kerala is on the Malabar coast of India. Historically, they have traded spices with all the merchants of the world. I had a difficult time finding Keralan cuisine in Manhattan, and because I had no means to head over to New Jersey the same night–where they say the good Keralan restaurants are–I ended up at Ada on the east side after finding one seafood dish that involved Kerala on the menu.

The fish came in a thick orange sauce. I had to scrape it off to make sure there is fish under all of it. When I tasted the fish, it was bland. The lemon rice was more flavorful, so I ate an entire bowl to compensate. The goat sausages were better and disappeared easily with the mint-flavored nan.

I’m not quite sure why Ada was empty on a Friday night. The hushed tone made us uncomfortable. The waiters hovered at the bar, perhaps itchy to close for the night. Back in 2001, William Grimes of The New York Times gave Ada two stars, so I was betting my Friday night on that one seafood Keralan dish. Unfortunately, times have changed since then. I’m off to New Jersey to find a better one.

Daniel

60 East 65th Street between Madison and Park
212/288.0033
discounted for about $200 for two, with matching wine, without tip
â™¥ â™¥ â™¥ â™¥

Daniel is one of Daniel Boulud’s New York City restaurants and has been rated by Michelin and The New York Times with four stars more than once. It’s that kind of restaurant with those kind of people–my boyfriend and I needed a big event to have an excuse to eat there. The best we could do was to celebrate finishing his first year of medical school.

A few weeks before our date, I met chef Alex Lee to interview him for an online magazine, generationrice. We talked about his becoming-a-chef story and his history with Daniel Boulud. We were also given a tour of the Daniel kitchens. It now counts as one of my most amazing experiences in New York City. He let us in before dinner time and we saw the production kitchen, the coffee kitchen, the French and the American kitchens, plus the dessert room where we tasted chocolates on layers and layers of trays made in-house.

All that only added to our actual dining experience. We returned a few weeks later for dinner and chef Alex Lee did not forget us. Our waiter kept serving us complementary dishes from downstairs even though we’d already ordered our appetizers and main dishes. Wine was brought out to match each course, and in between meals, there were cheeses, soups and chocolates.

We were just delirious with the whole experience. When the bill was put on our table three hours later, we could have detached our arms and legs or promised to sell my future children to pay for it, but it also noted that 70 per cent of it was already covered.

You see? It’s all about who you know!