L'artussi--Manhattan

(212) 255-5757

I must be honest, I went here on the tail end of a hang over and the eve of a serious shomit (look that one up) attack so I don't know if I can be as objective as I normally am.

Here's what I jotted down: Olive Cake.  Get the fucking olive cake.  Skip dinner, skip drinks, have some of this olive cake.  This shit was so delectable I ate it with the mother fucking flu.

We had a bunch of other stuff, fish and scallops and ravioli and my wifey wife, (it was our second time out in months) had a total boner about. Evidently the food is pretty spectacular but I couldn't focus on that because I was trying to hair of the dog a flu--which is ill-advised to say the very least.  Anyway. Look for a second post on this one someday years from now.

Elm--Brooklyn

(718) 218-7500

Normally I would've been excited about the fact that there's a new place in brooklyn that isn't hipstered out and serves gourmet food sans burgers and mac and cheese.  But now that greater Williamsburg and even Greenpoint (Greenpoint, jeez) has become the second coming of SoHo I am no longer surprised.  Elm is the reincarnation of the unborn fetus that was the restaurant in the basement of the defunct Hotel Williamsburg. After shuttering and reopening as King and Grove, Chef Paul Liebraundt (Exec of a million different French Restaurants in the City, Corton being most recent) decided to slum it in New SoHo.  For the record, he is not fucking around.  Yup, beloved nine, we've upped the bar and the neighborhood that taught me how to be a man is now going to teach me how to be a snob.  Eat shit Upper Eastside!

After bagging a gala dinner in Park Slope wifey wife and I waited upstairs at the bar for seats in the restaurant bar.  The upstairs bar is everything I wish the Wythe was, that is, devoid of kids with their parent's credit cards.  Eventually, the host who introduced himself as manager, sommelier, and all things Corton--as he must have mentioned the fact that he worked there a dozen times--sat us while while pushing his wine selections in jokily oversized glasses.  We got to talking, and it took repeated shin kicking by the ol' wife to give me the hint that I was spending more time talking to this dude than eating the food.  For the record, I got the confession that the wine glasses were that way due to unforeseen breakage.  Eat shit sleek restaurant!

Iconman enough masturbatory shop talk, how was the food?  Good.  Food was good, portions were a bit small but that's what you get when you up the price.  The tar tar was nice, beet salad superb if you're into root vegetables.  Unfortunately, the rest of the place doesn't live up to the food, the bathrooms were a touch messy, the bartender kept forgetting our water, and there was this pushy manager with nothing better to do but brag about his ho-hum wine pairings.  Hey, that's what you get in Williamsburg these days: exquisite food served in a sold out, second-hand environment by a talented chef with a recognizable brand.  Eat shit Manhattan!