West Village + TriBeCa – Page 6 – Writing With My Mouth Full

Bond St

6 Bond Street between Broadway and Lafayette
212/777.2500
$155 for two, with four drinks, with tip
♥ ♥

Several years ago, you would have caught a glimpse of Leonardo DiCaprio dining at Bond St. Today, the bouncer in all-black suit is still standing outside and all the beautiful people are still inside, but instead of Leo’s posse, you’ll see the suits and the loud groups of bankers eating on, most likely, company money. Ah, the life. We went one Wednesday night at 8:30pm without reservations. As soon as we asked for a spot for two, they led us to the sushi counter! Ah, the life of those without expense accounts!

It gets loud in Bond St but the energy is intoxicating. The sushi chefs scream a greeting when diners walk in and a goodbye when someone leaves. We opted for the sushi and sashimi omakase with a bonito-crusted scallop appetizer to start. From what I can remember, we had the pike eel, the otoro, the shrimp topped with caviar and the uni. While nothing is sublime that made me swoon and roll my eyes back, the fish is still sushi-grade. They still melt like butter and they still taste insanely fresh.

Several years ago, Leonardo DiCaprio switched to Moomba after he got tired of Bond St. For normal people like me, Bond St is still a pretty good Japanese place.

Province

305 Church Street corner of Walker
212/925.1205
$25 for two, with two drinks, without tip
â™¥ â™¥

Update, 2008: Province has closed

Oh, mantou, where have you been all these years? Mantou, the steamed bun mainstay of northern Chinese street food stalls is finally in TriBeCa. And I hope it stays because the neighborhood could use a practical place to eat where good food is served without the frills and the bill. A mantou sandwich is $3.75 and you can choose between bulgogi with kimchi, spicy pork, grilled chicken or braised pork shoulder with pickled radish. Each mantou is freshly-baked and grilled so the sesame seeds on top get toasted for a nice smoky taste. They’re dense but spongy; doughy but not heavy. If two mantous are not enough for you, the bowl of cold sesame noodles with tofu, eggs, carrots and cucumber in soy-ginger sauce is substantial for less than $7. It’s a refreshing summer lunch.

Province calls itself the Chinese Canteen and frankly, I like that name better. I would even call it the Asian Canteen because you can practically sandwich anything with mantou. Its simple unfinished decor reminds me of Momofuku Noodle Bar, only less pretentious and less crowded.

Babbo Ristorante e Enoteca

110 Waverly Place between MacDougal and Sixth
212/777.0303
about $900 for six, with a lot of drinks, with tip
â™¥ â™¥ â™¥ â™¥

For my annual pilgrimage, I was diligent and booked a table exactly thirty days from our dinner date to get a prime spot at 9pm for six people. It was to celebrate Cameron’s and Peter’s birthdays. I’d like to think that for friends, I’m extra thoughtful.

There is no need to explain why I’m giving Babbo yet another four. I’ll let these photos do their job:

There was also the marinated fresh sardines with caramelized fennel and lobster oil, the epic grilled octopus with “Borlotti Marinati” and spicy limoncello vinaigrette and the spaghettini with spicy budding chives, sweet garlic and a one-pound lobster, the unforgettable lamb’s brains, plus three other desserts and three bottles of a rosÃ© champagne and red wine. After four hours, we were way above our heads to even recall every detail. It was a very good night. I love me some Mario Batali.

The Little Owl

90 Bedford Street on the corner of Grove
212/741.4695
$100 for two, with two drinks, with tip
♥ ♥ ♥

We told ourselves we will find another place in the West Village if the wait for a table at The Little Owl was unbearable. Thankfully, we were seated right away when we walked in at 7pm because I would have missed the soft-shell crab and asparagus, the sardines with green beans and the hamachi with coleslaw. Match that with a bottle of chilled white wine and you wouldn’t have gone anywhere else either.

Flash-frying soft-shell crabs are hard because cooking them a second over will give you mushy but chewy meat. Here, they were just the right amount of crispiness. The beans balanced the saltiness of the sardines. I could have done without the coleslaw but I must say that the pink inside of the hamachi gave me joy together with the light onion rings.

What used to be Chez Michallet is now an even sweeter space with white-washed walls and chef Joey Campanaro behind the glass-covered kitchen. Sitting at the bar gave us a peek of the action in the tiny kitchen. Our server was very attentive and never let us see our wine glasses empty. Our orders were always split in two so there was no awkward sharing. It was almost ninety degrees outside but it felt very comfortable inside.

Blue Hill Restaurant

75 Washington Place between MacDougal and Sixth Avenue
212/539.1776
about $150 for two, with two drinks, without tip
♥ ♥

To welcome autumn, Nabi and I had dinner at Blue Hill in the West Village last night. It’s probably the first restaurant in the city that attempts to be an answer to Chez Panisse with all their locally-grown produce offered on the menu. Everything we ate reminded me of that day in Berkeley, but in a more intimate outdoor summer night setting.

So intimate in fact, that a gargantuan roach decided to drop on my bread plate in the middle of my admiring the Berkshire pork. Our very good-looking waiter happened to be right next to me attending to the other table when it happened and I managed to grab and dig my fingernails on his arm to muffle my scream. I stood up and walked away without knocking our wine glasses. Nabi said she watched the waiter gracefully, and quickly, cover the plate with a napkin and walk away with it.

The manager ran to our table after hearing about the incident. He was very thankful that I did not make a scene to scare the rest of the restaurant. They comped everything from our main course on: the soufflÃ©, an extra glass of white for Nabi, two glasses of dessert wine and a pot of mint tea. I think they should have comped the entire meal, but maybe the roach wasn’t large enough.

Sans the Kafka episode, the food was refreshingly divine. We started with the different kinds of tomatoes in watermelon, cucumber and basil jus. We also split the Maine crab salad. Nabi had the wild striped bass which was cooked perfectly. My pork came from a very happy pig indeed, its own juice sweet without help from any kind of sauce.

After an entire conversation that involved mastication and other big vocabulary words not roach-related, we walked out of the restaurant happy and content. Blue Hill remains as one of my favorite New York City restaurants, but I have to subtract two stars because of the roach. I like organic, but not that organic.