Edi & the Wolf

There are two paths for a second restaurant: give the public more of the same, or attract a new clientele by doing the opposite.

If chefs Eduard Frauneder and Wolfgang Ban wanted to create the opposite of their Michelin-starred Seäsonal in midtown, I have two words: Mission Accomplished. A more striking contrast than their new place, Edi & the Wolf, would be impossible to imagine.

I’m a huge fan of Seäsonal, one of the few upscale restaurants to have opened during the recession. The chefs either didn’t have PR, or didn’t know how to use it, and the place received scant critical notice. The food is excellent, but the space is somewhat cold and clinical. I wondered whether they’d join the list of not-from-here chefs that New Yorkers have chewed up and spit out.

Unlike Seäsonal, Edi & the Wolf—that’s the two chefs’ nicknames joined by an ampersand—creates the instant impression that it belongs here. The distressed farmhouse look and the long communal table are old ideas, but they don’t look at all hackneyed. The space is comfortable and inviting.

Despite the “I’ve-seen-this-before” esthetic, the décor is inspired by something not frequently encountered in the U.S., an Austrian Heuriger, or neighborhood tavern. A 40-foot rope salvaged from an old church has been turned into a chandelier; recycled military boots become flower vases; the wooden ceiling comes from an old barn.

The only resemblance to Seäsonal is the Austrian cuisine, which is rendered more simplistically and less expensively here. Appetizers—sorry, “Small Plates”—are $4–13; larger appetizers—sorry, “Shared Plates”—are $12–17; and entrées—sorry, ‘Schnitzel & Co.’—are $14–22.

If I sound annoyed . . . well, this is one East Village-ism I could have done without. The term “appetizer” never put any restaurant out of business. The term “Shared Plate” is misleading, given that the server suggested I order two of these for myself. I wondered if I could trust that advice, so I took a different path.

Cured Pork Belly ($9; above left) with horseradish, pearl onions, and quince was wonderful. If you think pork belly is over-used, you should order this dish, which is unlike any I’ve had in Manhattan, served cold light enough to be a salad.

Wiener Schnitzel ($19; above right) is offered with either veal or pork (I took the latter). It comes with the traditional accompaniments: potato salad, cucumber, and lingonberry jam. The breading is unheavy, and not at all greasy; the portion was ample, and more than I could finish.

The mostly-European wine list tilts towards whites, many of which are Austrian labels not often found in New York. Rieslings, for instance, pair well with most of the food here, even the meat dishes.

The restaurant was empty at 6:30 p.m. on a Friday evening, but by East Village standards the evening hadn’t begun; an hour later, the room was just beginning to fill up. I dined at the bar, where service was knowledgeable and attentive. It is hard to judge at this early date whether Edi & the Wolf will be a long-term hit, but right now it seems to fit right in.

Edi & the Wolf (102 Avenue C between 6th & 7th Streets, East Village)

Food: ★½
Service: ★
Ambiance: ★
Overall: ★

Seäsonal Restaurant & Weinbar

Note: Seäsonal closed at the end of 2014 after a six-year run. The chefs sold the lease to Maria Loi, the Greek chef, who will replace it with Loi Estiatorio.

*

It’s not easy for a restaurant to exceed expectations. Most new places are heavily over-promoted, establishing high hopes that few can hope to meet. Seäsonal Restaurant and Weinbar has the opposite problem. It has been open since December 2008, but among major publications only Crain’s gave it a full review (two stars from Bob Lape). The Times gave it the Dining Briefs treatment (mostly favorable, from Julia Moskin).

Seäsonal deserves far more attention than that. It serves modern Austrian cuisine, an under-represented genre in New York. With David Bouley’s Danube now closed, Kurt Gutenbrunner’s Wallsé is the only restaurant even close to comparable. We gave Wallsé three stars, and while we’re not yet prepared to bestow the same laurels on Seäsonal, we were certainly impressed.

The menu is mid-priced, with appetizers $9–18 (most $14 or less), entrées $21–32 (most $27 or less), side dishes $7, desserts $10. A seven-course tasting menu is $64. These prices are more than fair, given the quality of everything we tried.

As you’d expect for a wine bar, there’s an ample selection of wines by the glass. The bottle list is a bit more expensive than it ought to be, with few choices below $50. We settled on an Austrian Pinot Noir at $48, which was about the cheapest red wine available.

The minimalist décor looked more Scandinavian than Austrian to us, but we found it quiet and comfortable. On a Wednesday evening, the space was less than half full.

We started with a nice amuse-bouche of smoked duck (right). As I recall, there were two kinds of home-made bread, and two contrasting butters to go with it.

 

Cheese Ravioli ($12; above left) defied the Austrian food cliché: they were light as a feather, complemented with smoked mushrooms, baby spinach, and a harvest corn sauce. My friend was equally pleased with the Foie Gras Terrine ($18; above right), with a lingonberry-mandarin confit and toasted brioche on the side.

The entrées were terrific too: Pumpkin-Seed Crusted Black Sea Bass ($26; above left) with a butternut squash and black truffle sauce, and Duck Breast ($27; above right) with red cabbage and Schupfnudeln.

The meal ended with a small plate of petits-fours. Service lived up to the quality of the food. The bar tab was transferred to our table without our having to ask.

The restaurant’s location, in the middle of a quiet midtown street, does not work to its advantage. People need to know it’s there. I came in expecting a decent neighborhood place, but left with the idea that Seäsonal needs to be taken far more seriously.

Seäsonal (132 W. 58th Street between Sixth & Seventh Avenues, West Midtown)

Food: ★★
Service: ★★
Ambiance: ★★
Overall: ★★

Blaue Gans

This time last year, it looked like super-chef Kurt Gutenbrunner was veering dangerously close to over-exposure. Within three months, his two-restaurant empire (Wallsé, Cafe Sabarsky) doubled, opening THOR on the Lower East Side in September 2005 and Blaue Gans in TriBeCa in December.

Perhaps Gutenbrunner realized that he’d stretched himself too far. He pulled out of THOR—the restaurant least like the others—leaving himself with three unique but strongly related restaurants. At all of them, the focus is on Austrian food, a niche that Gutenbrunner has nearly to himself.

Blaue Gans (pronounced BLAU-uh gahnz), which means “Blue Goose,” is the most casual of Gutenbrunner’s trio of restaurants. It occupies a space that was once the restaurant Le Zinc, and Gutenbrunner made only minimal changes on taking it over. The walls are covered with vintage posters, most of which are unrelated to the Austrian theme. There are no table cloths, butter knives, or even bread plates to go with the excellent bread service. Servers, many of whom seem to be Austrian imports, tend to get stretched when the restaurant fills up—as it does, at least on a Friday night.

The surroundings at Blaue Gans may scream “casual,” but Gutenbrunner still takes his Austrian cuisine seriously. The chef himself was in the house on Friday night, which suggests he didn’t open Blaue Gans merely to make a quick buck. I suspect the restaurant may be his laboratory, with the more successful dishes graduating to his West Village flagship, Wallsé. (A short list of handwritten specials accompanied the main menu.) As far as I can tell, the Wiener Schnitzel you get at Blaue Gans is the same Wiener Schnitzel you get at Wallsé, except it costs $8 less.

Appetizers at Blaue Gans are $8–12, but there’s a separate menu category for sausages, which are $7–8. My friend and I tried the pork and beef sausage and the smoked pork sausage (both $8), served with sauerkraut and horseradish mustard. We thought the smoked pork sausage was a tad more interesting, but I would happily try either one again.

For the main course, my friend ordered the pork belly ($21), which must have been one of the largest helpings I have ever seen. I ordered the pork schnitzel ($22), which was wonderful—as Frank Bruni described it, “The meat had been dusted with flour and cooked with veal stock, cream, button mushrooms and bacon.”

Like everything else at Blaue Gans, the wine list has many reasonably-priced entries. We settled on a bottle of gewürztraminer at $36 that was more than satisfactory for our hearty, casual meal. The bill came to $103 with tax, before tip.

One positive development is that, as of January, Blaue Gans now takes reservations, a convenience much more helpful to those of us who want to make definite plans. And I am reasonably certain my future plans will include Blaue Gans again. As my friend put it, “I could eat like this every day.” Well, maybe not: the food here isn’t exactly lo-cal. But when you’re in the mood for a calorie splurge, it doesn’t get much more decadent than this.

Blaue Gans (139 Duane Street between West Broadway and Church Street, TriBeCa)

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

Wallsé

I visited Wallsé about a week ago for a special occasion. I’ve reviewed this restaurant twice before (here and here). My enthusiasm for it remains undimmed, so I’ll just get to the food recap.

The four of us chose the five-course tasting menu ($70). There were two choices for each course:

First course: foie gras terrine with plum compote; or cauliflower salad. My girlfriend and I both had the terrine. It’s hard to screw up foie gras—and the restaurant didn’t—but the silver dollar-sized portion was gone all too quickly.

Second course: spicy lobster soup with lobster ravioli; or sea scallop. The scallop, accompanied with glazed onions, was as tender and flavorful as one could want. The lobster soup, of which I tasted a bit, was an unusually spicy preparation, but I thought it worked well.

Third course: Wiener schnitzel with potato-cucumber salad and lingonberries; or fried sweetbread. I was the only one at my table with the guts to try the sweetbread. It was much larger than I remembered it in the past, and lightly breaded, to allow this juicy delicacy to speak for itself. I didn’t try any of the Wiener schnitzel, but everyone else at the table was pleased.

Fourth course: Kavalierspitz (beef shoulder) with creamed spinach, potato rösti and apple horseradish; or grilled venison loin with red cabbage, wild mushrooms and elderberry sauce. Once again, feeling adventurous, I took the road less traveled by—the kavalierspitz. While there was nothing wrong with this dish, frankly it was rather bland. After tasting a bit of the venison, I realized quite plainly that I’d made the inferior choice.

Dessert: Viennese iced coffee with vanilla ice cream and espresso sabayon; or grilled pineapple. Three of us chose the iced coffee. I thought it was just fine—the taste of iced coffee and espresso foam is pretty predictable—but my two companions considered it a dud. The grilled pineapple was also fairly uncomplicated, but I tasted several bites and found it a sweet treat.

Neither dessert option was as impressive as the rest of the meal, but the first four courses were up to Wallsé’s usual standard. I didn’t care much for the Kavalierspitz, but when you are being adventurous, you must be willing to accept some risk. Service was up to the usual standard, and we were quite happy with an Austrian white wine at around $50 a bottle.

Wallsé (344 W. 11th Street at Washington Street, West Village)

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

Wallsé Revisited

Note: Click here for a more recent review of Wallsé.

On Friday night, my friend and I went to Wallsé. Since my last visit, chef Kurt Gutenbrunner has opened two new restaurants — THOR and Blaue Gans — bringing his New York restaurant total to four. I had to wonder if the logistics of looking after four places would mean a reduction in quality at the flagship Wallsé, which now has a Michelin star to its name.

Well, there was no need to worry. Chef Gutenbrunner is still very much on top of his game. My friend and I both had the excellent foie gras terrine with gold leaf pears ($20). I had a salmon dish from the market menu ($32), while my friend had the classic Wiener Schnitzel ($30), both impeccably prepared.

When you’ve been in a few noisy restaurants, you appreciate a place like Wallsé where the surroundings are as rarefied as the food. We noted that service was always there when you needed it, but never intrusive. Wallsé is one of the city’s gems.

Wallsé (344 W. 11th Street at Washington Street, West Village)

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

THOR

Update: This is a review of THOR under Chef Kurt Gutenbrunner, who has since departed. As of 2008, THOR was on its fourth chef, with Jesi Solomon (a former sous chef at Stanton Social) having replaced Mark Spangenthal, who replaced Kevin Pomplun, who replaced Gutenbrunner. Later Update: THOR closed in May 2009. It was replaced by a new concept called Levant East.

*

THOR is short for The Hotel on Rivington. It’s also the name of the restaurant that occupies the ground floor of that hotel. I don’t know what possessed somebody to put a 21-story hotel on the Lower East Side, although it is surprisingly easy to reach (just 2 blocks from the F train’s Delancey St stop).

The building sticks out like a sore thumb in this trendy, but still gritty neighborhood of low-rise tenements. Who could be staying there? You get no immediate idea of the hotel clientele when you visit, because the entire ground floor seems to be occupied by the vast lounge and restaurant. Indeed, you wouldn’t even know that it is a hotel, except for the name. There is no check-in counter, bellhop, or concierge to give it away.

The host that greets you seems oh-so-annoyed to have landed in the maelstrom of a successful restaurant. You get the sense that he’d be happiner in a far less hectic profession. Just beyond his station, a capacious lounge area awaits, filled with beautiful young bodies sipping their drinks. Loud music thumps in the background. “This is very Lower East Side,” my friend remarked.

The seating area is just beyond the lounge, and it is not far enough. I have not seen a serious restaurant that goes to a more sustained effort to ensure that your ears will be battered and assaulted during your meal. THOR’s 21-foot ceiling offers plenty of hard surfaces for the sound to bounce off of, and the sound happily obliges. Your eardrums may need a medical checkup after the meal is over. The large tables (apparently the same ones you find at BLT Steak) offer plenty of room for the food, but to communicate you’ll have to shout.

If you survive the aural onslaught, you’ll be treated to some of the best and most creative food in New York. Of restaurants I’m familiar with, only nearby WD-50 offers a comparable exercise in culinary experimentation on this level. Practically every dish on THOR’s menu offers surprising combinations from superstar chef Kurt Gutenbrunner.

I had my doubts about THOR, because Gutenbruner is now on his fourth restaurant (with Wallsé, Café Sabarsky, and Blaue Gans also in his stable). Perhaps, like many a celebrity chef, he’s taken his eye off the ball. But Gutenbrunner is obviously as good a manager as he is a chef. THOR’s kitchen staff turns out his creations expertly, and the service (despite the din) is nearly perfect.

Gutenbrunner told Frank Bruni that “he considered Thor the culinary equivalent of a chance to move from orchestral music to rock ‘n’ roll.” You can see what he means. At his flagship Wallsé, the Austrian cuisine is excellent, but largely traditional. At THOR, he lets his wildest urges run wild, with spectacular results.

The menu is needlessly confusing. My friend, who hadn’t researched the restaurant in advance (and one shouldn’t have to), was initially baffled. In a preface, Gutenbrunner explains that there are plates of various sizes, allowing you to construct a tasting menu of your own design. But there is no indication of which plates are small, and which are large. Instead, the menu is in sections labeled “Cold Plates to Start,” “Warm Plates in the Middle,” “From the Market on the Side,” “Hot Plates” (a fish list and a meat list) and “Sweet to Finish.” Since when did the traditional captions — “Appetizers,” “Entrées,” “Side Dishes,” and “Desserts” — need to be replaced?

Anyhow, after all that my friend and I each ordered a “Warm Plate,” a side dish, a meat course, and a dessert. And we were transported. To start, my friend ordered the “Grilled shrimp skewers with green tomatoes, peppers and quark powder” ($14), and I the “Ravioli with farmers cheese, mint and hazelnut butter” ($13). My dish came with three ravioli, and they were wonderful; the ingredients worked marvelously together.

The side dishes are all $7. Many of them are traditional vegetable sides, but a terrific mushroom risotto is offered, which my friend and I both ordered. This is one of THOR’s better bargains, given the intensive labor required to make a risotto. It could have been an appetizer in itself, but it came out with the main courses.

I hardly ever order calves liver; indeed, I can remember ordering it only once before in my life. It wasn’t a bad experience, but calves liver is simply one of those dishes that you don’t want every day. “Glazed calves liver with apples and scallions” ($24) seemed too intriguing to pass up, and my willingness to take a chance paid off. If all calves liver dishes were this good, nobody would be ordering foie gras.

My friend had “Roasted rack of lamb with broccoli puree and 14K golden nugget potatoes” ($28), which offered two hefty chops, which she said were spectacular.

For dessert, I tried the pumpkin cheesecake with maple syrup ice cream ($9), which Frank Bruni had described as “a happy nose dive into the heart of autumn.” My friend ordered the petits-fours ($5), which come with what looks like a tube of toothpaste, but it actually contains hazelnut chocolate, which you squeeze into a small basin in the center of each cookie. WD-50’s Wylie Dufresne and Sam Mason would be kicking themselves, and wondering, “Why didn’t we think of that?”

The wine list is organized by region, but there is also a section labeled “Sommelier’s Discoveries,” featuring growers and/or regions that don’t get a lot of publicity. The friendly sommelier came over unbidden and made a wonderful suggestion from that section. It was a 2003 Blaufrankisch by Feiler-Artinger, from Burgenland, a region of eastern Austria. Better yet, I had requested a wine between $35-45, and it was $39. Sommeliers who don’t try to gouge every last dollar earn my everlasting respect. The restaurant uses stemless wine glasses from the Austrian firm Riedel. Somehow, you feel strange drinking wine from a stemless glass, although the Riedel catalog is in fact highly regarded, and pricey.

The individual dishes on the menu are all reasonably priced, but if you heed Gutenbrunner’s advice to construct a “tasting menu,” the bill can mount in a hurry. Our meal of an appetizer, side dish, main course, and dessert apiece, plus wine, was $192.56 (including tax and gratuity). Had we ordered cocktails, more tasting plates, or a different wine, it could easily have been a lot more. For cooking this good, we considered it money well spent.

THOR is full of contradictions. Kurt Gutenbrunner’s serious cuisine finds itself in a clubland setting designed for twenty-somethings who probably don’t realize how special it is. Many of those who would appreciate it are no doubt put off by the location, the clientele, or the noise. (We are in our forties, and seemed to be among the oldest people there.) But if you can put up with the racket, you’ll find that THOR is serving some of the finest food in the city.

THOR (107 Rivington Street, between Essex & Ludlow Streets, Lower East Side)

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

Return to Danube

Note: Danube closed on August 2, 2008. It re-opened in October as Secession, a French brasserie with Italian and Austrian influences. The pseudo-Klimt décor remained in place, but with a more casual vibe. Secession closed in May 2009 after receiving scathing reviews. The space is supposed to re-open as a Japanese restaurant, Brushstroke.

*

I visited Danube for the second time last night. (An account of my first visit is here.) It remains a wonderful restaurant for a special occasion. The Klimt-inspired décor is a gem, although it occurred to me that curtains in the main dining room would be an improvement. It almost spoils the atmosphere to look out the windows and see gloomy Hudson Street outside.

Although Danube is a beautiful room—arguably one of the city’s nicest (it shares the top Zagat rating of 28 for décor)—it is not a large space. As at many New York restaurants, you could easily reach out and touch your neighbors at adjoining tables. Luckily, the room is not loud. I don’t know if it’s because diners are speaking in hushed tones, or because the heavy carpeting and tapestries absorb the sound.

There are three à la carte menus at Danube: Austrian, Modern Eclectic, and the Chef’s Market Choice. Each has two or three appetizers and anywhere between two and five main courses. You are not required to order your entire meal from the same menu. Appetizers are $9-19, but most are under $15. Mains are $26-35.

I should note that Danube has what they describe as a “tasting menu” at $85 ($155 with paired wines), but it is actually a four-course prix fixe (appetizer, fish, meat, dessert), with two or three options for each course. Anyhow, that’s not what we had on this occasion.

It is remarkable that you can have a very respectable meal at this fine restaurant for $35 total (before tax, tip, and beverages), if you order at the bottom end of the appetizers and entrées. Finding an inexpensive wine at Danube is more of a challenge, as nearly all of the selections on the long list are over $60. We found a very respectable burgundy right at $60. I thought the staff left me to struggle over the decision for rather a long time. At a restaurant of this calibre, a sommelier should come over without being asked.

The wonderful amuse bouche was a small cube of smoked salmon, with creme fraiche, cucumber salad, and mustard seed. This was a variation on the same amuse that I was served the last time. The server who deposited it at our table had an extremely thick accent, and we had to ask for the description twice.

The bread service was disappointing. Several choices of rolls were offered, but both that I tried were unimpressive. At Outback Steakhouse, you get a wonderful loaf of warm, freshly-baked pumpernickle bread. Why is it that so many high-end restaurants are content to serve perfunctory dinner rolls that were baked hours ago?

The food was a happier experience. I ordered from the Modern Eclectic menu. The restaurant is rather long-winded in its descriptions. Per the website, the appetizer was described as “Freshly Harpooned Sashimi Quality Bluefin and Hamachi Tuna, Key Lime Pickled Onion, Pumpkin Seed Oil and Sesame Mustard Dressing” ($14). This was a wonderful dish, rich and flavorful.

When the appetizer is this good, sometimes the entrée is an anti-climax, but not here. I ordered “Chestnut Honey Glazed Long Island Duck Breast with Wild Mushrooms, Corn Purée and Seared Foie Gras” ($31). The duck was luscious, tender, and enveloped in fat, while the foie gras was pure heaven.

For the record, my friend ordered two of the Austrian specialties, an Austrian ravioli ($11) and the Wiener Schnitzel ($30). She was pleased with both.

The tasting menu shows an “Elderflower Gelée with Lemon Verbena Sorbet” as a pre-dessert, and I believe this is what we were served. This was a palate-cleanser, which prepared us for the “Original Viennese Apple Strudel, Crème Anglaise and Tahitian Vanilla Ice cream” ($10). I thought this was just okay; nothing wrong with it, but rather forgettable.

Service was generally smooth and polished. Early on, I felt that we were being slightly rushed through our meal. We started with cocktails. It seemed like only a few moments had gone by, and we were placing our order, receiving the amuse, and inspecting the wine—with our cocktail glasses still half full. Yet, it was over two hours before when we left, so things slowed down considerably later on. As we departed, the staff handed us a blue Bouley bag containing a wonderful lemon coffeecake, which we enjoyed for breakfast the next morning.

While no one would call Danube inexpensive, overall it is very fairly priced for what you are getting. The New York Times ratings have been bastardized in recent years, and three stars isn’t quite what it used to be. Danube has truly earned every one of its three stars.

When Michelin’s New York City guide came out in November, eight restaurants received one of the two highest ratings. Seven of those restaurants either have now, or have had very recently, four stars from the New York Times. Danube was the eighth. What this basically means is that Danube is, in at least one reasonable opinion, the best restaurant in the city that has never had four stars from the Times. There are a handful of other plausible candidates, but I’ve certainly no argument with Danube’s extra Michelin star. It is one of the city’s best fine dining experiences.

Danube (30 Hudson Street at Duane Street, TriBeCa)

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

Wallsé

Note: Click here for a more recent visit to Wallsé.

Last November, a friend and I went to Wallsé. It’s a beautiful restaurant that could pass for an art museum if it wasn’t serving such wonderful food. On a cold fall evening, Wallsé offers the perfect getaway from the elements.

To start, I had the Spätzle (a kind of Austrian pasta) with braised rabbit, wild mushrooms, Brussels sprouts, and tarragon ($15). Our server guided me to this, and he wasn’t mistaken: it was a wonderful dish. Both my friend and I were beguiled by the crispy cod strudel with a stew of carrots and ginger with black trumpet mushrooms ($27). Cod is the humblest of fishes. The highlight of the dish is the light, flakey, almost ethereal strudel crust that surrounds it.

I don’t normally have dessert, but who could resist when things were going so well? We shared the Quark “cheesecake” with chilled quince consommé and elderflower sorbet. The menu puts “cheesecake” in quotes because it’s made with a very light cheese, giving the cake a consistency just slightly more solid than whipped cream. The quince consommé came in a separate dish, and it almost seemed superfluous to the excellent cake. Perhaps combining the quince with the cake would produce an even more successful offering.

When Wallsé called to confirm our 6:00pm reservation, they asked if we wouldn’t mind showing up a little closer to 5:45. This happened to suit our plans, but I was mildly insulted by the suggestion. Although the request was phrased politely, the intent was obvious enough: “we’re trying to turn the table.” My feeling was that they offered a 6:00pm reservation, and they should stand by it: serving the next customer was their problem, not mine. Indeed, I was just faintly aware that the efficient service was perhaps too efficient (the appetizers arrived just moments after we ordered them).

None of this should take away from what Wallsé achieves, which is creative Austrian cuisine, prepared to near perfection. Appetizers are priced from $11-19, entrées from $26-35. All desserts are $9. We had a tough time deciding what to order, which may mean that we have to go back!

Wallsé (344 W. 11th Street at Washington Street, West Village)

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

Danube

Note: Click here for a more recent visit to Danube.

Last night, I had a wonderful dinner at Danube. A vendor was buying, and he asked if I had a favorite. I approach my restaurant life a little differently. An invitation to dinner is opportunity to try someplace I’ve never been. Danube came immediately to mind.

This is one of those restaurants that hardly ever attracts an unfavorable comment. It is almost universally adored, and for good reason. From its Klimmt-inspired décor to its impeccable service, everything at Danube is well thought out and smartly executed. Whether it’s a romantic occasion, a business dinner, or a birthday celebration, Danube delivers a memorable experience.

The amuse bouche was a tiny salmon square on a bed of avocado cream. To start, my dining companion and I both chose the what I called the double foie gras ($19), which came with a conventional seared Hudson Valley foie gras and an odd confection called “Crème Brûlée of Foie Gras with Harvest Corn Goulash.” If you love foie gras, then twice as much of it is heaven. My only complaint is that the crème brûlée was at an in-between temperature: it had been allowed to cool a bit too long.

I almost never order Wiener Schnitzel, but I figured that if any restaurant was going to make it memorable, Danube would. (I also concluded that if you’re at an Austrian-themed restaurant, you should try some Austrian food. My colleague concluded the same, and ordered the goulash.) The Wiener Schnitzel came with austrian crescent potatoes, cucumber salad, and a lingonberry sauce. I must say that I was initially underwhelmed, but the dish grew on me, and I was sad to take the last bite. The light breading was just perfectly fluffy, the veal succulent and tender. Still, part of me wondered if this really deserved to be a $30 entrée.

Desserts at Danube are mostly Austro-Germanic specialities, such as Caramel Strudel and Sacher Torte. I tried a pina colada ice cream dish, which is not shown on the restaurant’s website, and I can’t quite recall how it was put together. After this, a plate full of chocolates arrived, which I struggled (in vain) to resist.

Danube offers a vast array of menus. As at many uscale restaurants, the first page shows the tasting menu (five courses, $75; or, $135 with wine pairings). The nine-course degustation is $95. A four-course seasonal menu is $55. There are three à la carte sections of the menu: the Austrian specialties, “Modern Eclectic,” and the chef’s weekly market choices. Appetizers are $9-19; entrées are $26-35.

You’ll pay handsomely for your experience at Danube, but it is well worth it. A glance at the bill showed a bottom line of $270, which included more wine than was strictly necessary. But then, there’s no point in doing Danube half-way. Go and enjoy yourself.

Danube (30 Hudson Street at Duane Street, TriBeCa)