Return to Cookshop

There are many restaurants in New York that I want to try, so a restaurant has to be pretty damned good for me to rush back. If it is merely good, I move on to the next destination. After my girlfriend and I had paid a first visit, Cookshop had made it into that rare pantheon of places we felt we had to rush back to.

Alas, early promise wasn’t fulfilled. On our second visit, my friend ordered a “humanely-raised” veal chop. We supposed that meant that the young animal received plenty of coddling in its short life, but in the end they still slaughtered it anyway. All of that made no difference. The chop was inexpertly cooked, lacking any char or texture on its outer surface.

I ordered the suckling pig, another animal that had died young. Its final stop before my plate was a rotisserie, which is perhaps a gimmick to persuade the diner that he is getting something special, but in the end it was just bland. I had a far superior version of the same dish a few days later at the TriBeCa restaurant Dominic.

So our enthusiasm for Cookshop has dimmed somewhat. We’ll probably give it one more try one of these days, but this time we won’t be rushing back.

Cookshop (156 Tenth Avenue at 20th Street, West Chelsea)

Food: *
Service: *
Ambiance: *½
Overall: *