Halfsteak

Note: Halfsteak, along with is parent restaurant Craftsteak, closed in late 2009. A new restaurant from the same team, Colicchio & Sons, replaced it in early 2010.

*

Not a week goes by without further retrenchment in the restaurant industry. Even Tom Colicchio’s sainted Craft empire is hunkering down for a long recession. This week, the front room at Craftsteak rebranded itself “Halfsteak,” where every dish is under $15.

I’ve visited Craftsteak three times (1, 2, 3), but I’ve been wholly satisfied only once. To be fair, the first two visits were early on, before Colicchio fired the executive chef and bought new broiling equipment. But I continue to read mixed reports, suggesting a visit to Craftsteak is very much a crapshoot. It’s a tough value proposition for a place where almost all steaks are above $50.

I’m not visiting many steakhouses these days. Even if I was, I’d have to think twice before returning to Crafsteak. But the sub-$15 menu at Halfsteak has my attention. This is a place where one doesn’t mind just “dropping in.”

Halfsteak occupies the casual front dining room at Craftsteak. Everything is priced at odd multiples of a half-dollar. Snacks are $6½, salads $7½, small plates $9½, sandwiches $11½, “one-pots” $13½, desserts $4½, and the namesake halfsteak with fries is $14½. [Click on the menu for a larger image.]

The concept extends to cocktails ($7½), half pints of beer ($3½) and wines by the glass ($10½). Even the notoriously exorbitant wine list has been dialed down. There are twenty bottles on offer, all $55 or less (most under $50). The beers are thoughtful choices from small, artisanal producers; not Budweiser and Schlitz.

Craftsteak’s chef de cuisine is Shane McBride. As he did at his short-lived midtown chophouse 7Square, he isn’t afraid to challenge his audience. I am quite sure that fried tripe is not on this menu because there was overwhelming demand for it. Likewise brisket with sauerkraut or a duck confit omelet.

I wasn’t too hungry, so I ordered just two snacks ($6.50 ea.), the Smoked Chicken Wings with White BBQ Sauce (above left) and the Lamb Spare Ribs with Cucumber Raita (above right). The wings were wonderful, perfectly seasoned and slightly spicy. Where on earth did that white barbecue sauce come from? The lamb ribs were slightly dry and not quite warm enough. Total bill with two half-pints of beer: $20.

The restaurant’s two-star service model hasn’t changed. I almost laughed when I asked for a wet-nap to wash my hands after all that finger food, and they brought out a hot towel. Both the main dining room and the front room were doing a respectable business, but neither was full between 7 and 8pm on a Thursday evening.

The current recession has taken its sad toll on many restaurants, but among those that remain open there are many good deals to be had. Halfsteak is one of the best around.

“Halfsteak” (85 Tenth Avenue at 15th Street, Far West Chelsea)

The John Dory

 

Note: The John Dory closed in August 2009. A similar, but much more casual version of the concept, re-opened in 2010 in the Ace Hotel as the John Dory Oyster Bar.

*

Five years ago, The Spotted Pig was an overnight sensation in the West Village. If chef April Bloomfield and her partner Ken Friedman had followed the usual path, by now there’d be Pig clones all over town, and a couple more in Vegas and Atlantic City. But Bloomfield stayed focused on the Pig, which earned an improbable Michelin star and has held onto it for four years running.

Nothing lasts forever: Bloomfield and Friedman now have their second restaurant, The John Dory, which opened two weeks ago in Southwest Chelsea, on the same block as Del Posto and Craftsteak. (Del Posto’s Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich are investors in both the Spotted Pig and the John Dory.)

Friedman has an eye for witty design. At the Spotted Pig, the theme is “pig art.” Here, it’s “fish art,” and he arrays it even more deftly than at the earlier restaurant, from fish lures embedded in a countertop, to fish tiles in the floor. A large tropical fish tank stands sentry over the bar.

There are just two small dining rooms. The first one, with about eight tables, rests on a narrow elevated platform and offers a terrific view of the open kitchen. The second one is in a side room with a view of the fish tank. There is ample counter seating facing the kitchen.

Bloomfield has wisely kept the opening menu short and focused, with just seven appetizers ($14–20) and eight entrées ($24–35). There’s also a few raw bar choices and five crudi ($16–20). Side dishes ($8–10) are excellent, as they are at the Spotted Pig.

It was obvious that many of the patrons were friends of the management, but Bloomfield never once left the kitchen to schmooze (she left that to Friedman). We saw one critic in the house (GQ’s Alan Richman), and the staff seemed to think Frank Bruni was coming too, but we didn’t spot him.

We started with a cute amuse-bouche of arctic char pâté (above right) with chips for spreading. There should probably be a bit more, as it disappeared rather quickly.

Sardines “A La Plancha” (above left; $18) had a nice cruncy texture and were nicely seasoned with almonds, raisins and paprika. My girlfriend pronounced the Fish Soup (above right; $16) a success.

There is, of course, John Dory on the menu. On some nights, they seem to offer it for one, but when we visited it was available only for two ($50). Instead, I had the Whole Grilled Sea Bream (above left; $26), which was presented tableside and then filleted. This was a lovely preparation, with a rosemary-anchovy pesto on the skin. Pan-Roasted Cod (above right; $28) was just as good.

Sweet Potatoes (above left; $8) were dusted with bone marrow and served in hefty beefsteak slices. Our second side dish was much delayed, but I give the server credit for how she handled it. Instead of just leaving us staring at dirty dishes, she cleared the table and re-set it with fresh plates and flatware. Jensen’s Temptation (above right; $10) works perfectly well as a separate course, though it clearly wasn’t intended that way. It’s a Swedish preparation of scallopped potatoes, with onions, heavy cream, and an anchovy crust.

As we were leaving, it dawned on me that the coat-check attendant hadn’t given me a ticket. Despite that, she seemed to know who I was, and had my coat ready for me. It was just one of many points, both little and great, that made me feel like these people know how to run a restaurant. My girlfriend had the same thought: “They’re going to do just fine.”

The John Dory (85 Tenth Avenue between 15th & 16th Streets, Chelsea)

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

Craftsteak

Note: Craftsteak closed at the end of 2009. After modestly remodeling the space, the same team opened Colicchio & Sons in early 2010.

*

Craftsteak had a tough start, with most of the reviews citing the same peculiar flaw: the kitchen didn’t know how to cook a steak. With prices running about $10–20 per steak higher than the going rate in Manhattan, that wasn’t going to fly.

I visited Craftsteak 1.0 twice (here, here). Frankly, I might not have bothered to return after the first time, but I was so sure Tom Colicchio would right the ship that I figured it was worth another look. The second visit was, if anything, even worse than the first. I was still sure that Colicchio would fix it somehow, but I wasn’t going to rush back.

Tom Colicchio got busy. He fired his chef de cuisine, bought new kitchen equipment, and continued to tweak the menu. His efforts finally paid off with a rare re-review from Frank Bruni, elevating the restaurant to the two stars that I’m sure Colicchio intended it to have. More than a year after my last visit, I thought it was time to give Craftsteak another try.

Craftsteak 2.0 is much improved, though not without its flaws. The menu is still far too sprawling, with 20 different steaks and 35 side dishes. Ten of those steaks are variations on the New York Strip — corn-fed, grass-fed, or Wagyu; 10, 12 or 18 ounce; aged anywhere from 28 to 65 days. Who needs so many options?. Colicchio should offer New York Strip the two or three ways he thinks are best, and ditch the others.

 

The amuse-bouche was a bit of a dud: a thin pâté buried too deep in a cast-iron bowl, with just three skimpy crackers to mop it up with. Parker-house rolls were much more successful, and it was all we could do not to eat all six of them.

 

Our favorite steak is the ribeye: naturally, there are two versions: 14-ounce grass-fed ($55) or 18-ounce corn-fed ($52). We chose the latter, as it’s four ounces heavier and three dollars cheaper. And finally, Craftsteak served a steak for the gods: tender, beautifully charred, evenly marbled, full of mineral flavor. There was no need for four steak sauces: they were first-class, but why offer only two spoons?

Rounding it out was a plate of gnocchi ($11), soft, light and creamy enough to make you forget every other gnocchi you’ve ever had.

The dining room was full, but we had no trouble getting walk-in seating at the bar. The tables there are just as big, and it’s the same menu. Servers aren’t quite attentive enough. I would almost be tempted to award three stars for the food, if I did not suspect that a menu as vast as Craftsteak must have some duds, and perhaps we were just lucky enough not to order any of them. But on the strength of this visit, it appears that Craftsteak is finally delivering on its promise.

Craftsteak (85 Tenth Avenue at 15th Street, Far West Chelsea)

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

Hill Country

It’s rare that a restaurant opens in this town to instantaneous, unanimous acclaim. But that’s what happened to Hill Country, which opened this summer in Chelsea. It captures New York’s barbecue moment just about perfectly. Every reviewer has been smitten. Everyone. Including me.

I’m not a great barbecue conoisseur. I can’t tell you the differences between Memphis, Kansas City, and Texas barbecue. But I know what I love, and Hill Country is it. The meats are unsauced. What comes through is pure smokey flavor that lets the food speak for itself—or perhaps I should say “sing” for itself.

Though I can’t vouch for it, the barbecue style at Hill Country is supposed to be the spitting image of what you get in Lockhart, Texas. Service is bare-bones, but no one should care. When you come in, the host hands you a “meal ticket.” You carry a cafeteria tray to ordering stations—a counter for meats, another for side dishes, another for beverages. An attendant marks down what you’ve ordered. After the meal, you present your meal ticket to the cashier, who rings up the bill.

Meats come piled on a sheet of wax paper; side dishes come in cardboard cups. But if the service is nothing fancy, the servers clearly love what they’re doing. Their advice is both enthusiastic and reliable. At the bar, for instance, the bartender wisely steered us towards the moist brisket—the restaurant’s signature dish. At the meat counter the server dished out just the right amount of food for two people, when we were really unsure just how much we needed.

 

It’s hard to see from the photo, but this is really a lot of food. The moist brisket is hidden underneath two enormous beef ribs and a couple of jalapeno sausage. To the side is macaroni and cheese (upper right) and corn pudding (lower right). It was more than two hungry people could finish.

The brisket comes in two varieties: moist and lean, the former being a euphemism for fat. We love fatty meats, so we tried the moist brisket ($17.50/lb.), which was extraordinary. Beef ribs ($9/lb.) were wonderful too; more barbecue places should serve them. We were less impressed with the jalapeno sausage ($5.50 ea.), which seemed too dry when compared to the other things we tried.

There are several other meats available, incluidng spare ribs, pork chops, game hen, chicken, beef shoulder, and prime rib. We were full, so they’ll have to wait for another time. And rest assured, there will be another time.  The two side dishes we tried—mac & cheese and corn pudding ($4.50 ea.)—were terrific. I especially recommend the corn pudding, as it’s an unusual dish that few other barbecue places offer.

The food is the star at Hill Country, but the bar shouldn’t pass unnoticed. There’s a terrific selection of tequilas, and I even noticed a vodka from Iceland. The specialty drinks are wonderful, and reasonably priced (around $10 ea.).

One of them features a remarkably smooth vodka from Austin, TX. When I asked about it, the bartender gave me a bit of it on the side—yet another example of how the servers at Hill Country are truly enthusiastic about what they serve.

The space is large, with tables on two levels, and there is live music several nights a week. It’s not too far off the path of my commute home, and I could well imagine that it will be one of my regular haunts when I have a barbecue craving. In this town, you can’t do much better than Hill Country.

Hill Country (30 W. 26th Street between Sixth Avenue and Broadway, Chelsea)

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

Bette

 

Note: Bette closed in June 2008.

*

There is no particular reason to visit Bette. Proprietress Amy Sacco, who had made her name in the nightclub industry, tried to transfer her success to a restaurant, which she named after her mother—the name rhymes with “sweaty.”

That was two years ago, when Bette was a hot ticket. Today, you can get a table anytime you want. Bette’s proverbial fifteen minutes are up. We were half-an-hour late, but it might have been half-a-day. It really didn’t matter. On a Saturday night in August, we nearly had the place to ourselves. I suppose Amy and her friends had decamped  to the Hamptons.

In the New York Times, Frank Bruni awarded a remarkably generous one star, but he admitted it was mostly about the celebrity scene. “Bette clearly means to make a splash, its food isn’t remotely splashy.” He got that right.

The kitchen has gotten lazy in its old age. The whole menu was something like half-a-dozen appetizers and an equal number of entrées—all rather ordinary stuff. Frank Bruni found “a bevy of interesting selections” on the wine list, but that list has now shrunk to about two pages. For the record, we settled on a sangria-like rosé (label below), at a budget-friendly $30.

 
Asparagus salad (left); Pork chop (right)

An Asparagus Salad ($12) was totally forgettable, as was a Pork Chop ($26). My girlfriend had the same reaction to a Hamachi Ceviche ($16) and Short Ribs ($25). While all competently prepared and unobjectionable, nothing at Bette really rose above the ordinary.

The service hit two of my pet peeves. After we sat down, the server asked, “Will you be having bottled watered this evening?” It’s a minor point, but do they really think you’ll forget that tap water is an option?

Bread rolls had no doubt been baked the night before, but they were served without separate plates or knives. After the appetizer plates were cleared, the server had to come along and clear up all the crumbs. 

There was nothing particularly bad about Bette, but when you’re spending almost $120 for dinner (including tax, before tip), you want to taste at least something that goes beyond the ordinary, and Bette didn’t have it.

Bette (461 W. 23rd Street just east of Tenth Avenue, Chelsea)

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

Markt

 

There are 2,146 restaurants in the online Zagat Guide for New York. Just 18 of them (0.8%) are Belgian. But eleven of those are outposts of a bakery/sandwich place, Le Pain Quotidien. Another four are branches of Petite Abeille. That leaves just three non-chain Belgian restaurants in the Zagat guide. It is, in other words, not a commonly encountered cuisine in this town.

Markt, one of the city’s three non-chain Belgian restaurants, was a Meatpacking District pioneer, back when the Meatpacking District was still cool. The owners lost their lease and moved a short distance away, to a smaller place in Chelsea that has hosted several failed restaurants. Markt arrives with an already successful formula, so perhaps it will be here to stay.

The dinner menu—printed in French, Flemish, and English—includes soups ($7–10), appetizers ($8–24), pastas ($12–17), fish and seafood entrées ($18–36), meat entrées ($16–32), and half-a-dozen entrées with mussels ($16–18). Raw bar platters are available at $60 or $90. Many of the items are familiar French bistro fare, though the emphasis on mussels and beer is a distinctly Belgian touch.

My girlfriend and I are rather predictable: we see pâté on the menu, and we order it. The Country Pâté  ($10) comes with spicy Dijon mustard and red onion relish. It’s rich and hearty, not fancy or complex. We each ordered it, but the portion size turned out to be quite generous. Two people could easily have shared.

My girlfriend ordered the Steak Frites ($26), while I had the Red Snapper ($26), which came in a tomato-butter sauce. I thought the snapper was slightly more dry than it should be, but the sauce saved it from perdition, and in the end I was mostly satisfied.

Many of the dishes come with stoemp (pronounced “stomp”), a Belgian rendition of mashed potatoes, often puréed with vegetables and herbs—in this case basil. In the photo, it’s the big lump that looks like a green pear. I found it rather bland, but I don’t know if that’s my problem or the restaurant’s.

To drink, we ordered a perfectly acceptable bottle of 2002 Burgundy for $32. I have to applaud any restaurant that has a decent Pinot Noir at that price. Yet, I had an immediate twinge of regret, as the page-long list of beers—most of them seldom encountered in this country—should have commanded my attention. Oh well, it’s something to do next time.

The restaurant was not crowded at 6:30 p.m. on a Sunday evening, though I suspect they’re plenty busy on weekends. The server showed obvious impatience that we didn’t instantly know what we wanted to order. After we’d sent him away twice, he came back and said, “Well, what’ll it be?” At the end of the meal, after we declined to order dessert, it took all of about 30 seconds for him to plunk down a check, although we clearly had quite a bit of wine yet to finish.

Though it won’t win any awards for service, the hearty Belgian fare at moderate prices and top-notch beer menu will probably to make Markt a hit in its new location.

Markt (676 Sixth Avenue at 21st Street, Chelsea)

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

Klee Brasserie

 

Note: Klee Brasserie was supposed to have closed in July 2011, to make way for an Austrian wine tavern, or heuriger, operated by the same husband–wife team. Instead, they sold the restaurant and will be opening a new, currently unnamed project elsewhere.

*

Klee Brasserie (the first word is pronounced “Clay”) opened late last year in West Chelsea. Many of the dishes, like Chef and co-owner Daniel Angerer, hail from Austria. But Angerer has gotten around, working for Joël Robuchon, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, David Bouley, and others. The restaurant is not purely Austrian, but draws its influences from just about everywhere.

 

The interior make-over is lovely. If only the food were more appealing. Black Bean Soup ($8) was more like bean-flavored water: it had practically no texture, and was over-salted. Swordfish Steak ($26) was dominated by barbecue sauce. Good thing too, as the fish itself was both ropey and cold. The bed of spinach was the best thing about the dish, but you don’t pay $26 for spinach.

My girlfriend ordered the Lamb Shank ($23). She was surprised to find that it didn’t come with any shank. It seemed more like Lamb Osso Buco without the bone. That said, there was nothing else objectionable about it.

I didn’t note the description of the palate cleanser (pictured right, absurdly out-of-scale), but it was better than either of the dishes I paid for.

The wine list was a definite asset, with a nice list of half-bottles available. We didn’t want to drink much, so we had a nice half-bottle of Châteauneuf-du-Pape at just $27. The bread service was an asset too, with three warm home-made slices served on a warm stone, with a small jar of soft butter, probably also home-made.

Service was mostly okay, but we had a seriously annoying waiter. His leering comment as he dropped off the dessert menus, “Now, let me lead you into temptation,” was typical. It also took him something like ten minutes to uncork the wine, a task that I shouldn’t have thought was that difficult.

Klee hasn’t had many reviews. In a blog preview in the restaurant’s early days, Frank Bruni also found the swordfish cold, so apparently they haven’t solved that particular problem.

This was a restaurant I wanted to like, but it was merely humdrum.

Klee Brasserie (200 Ninth Avenue between 22nd & 23rd Streets, Chelsea)

Food: fair
Service: okay
Ambiance: good
Overall: fair

Dinner at Varietal

Note: A few weeks after our visit, Frank Bruni reviewed Varietal for the Times, awarding (without much enthusiasm) one star. Within days, executive chef Ed Witt was fired, and pastry chef Jordan Kahn announced that he was leaving to start another project in California. Wayne Nish (formerly of March) replaced both Witt and Kahn, but the restaurant was not able to survive, and has since closed.

*

We first visited Varietal for dessert about a month ago, having heard about pastry chef Jordan Kahn’s inventive creations. Kahn, who previously worked at The French Laundry and Per Se, is a major talent. We were smitten, and promised ourselves we’d return for a full meal.

Varietal is a restaurant that you desperately want to root for. It has no irritating vanities, such as an overwhelming décor, a globe-trotting absentee chef, or snooty staff who act like they’re doing you a favor. To the contrary, Varietal is an earnestly serious restaurant, with a service team who genuinely want you to be pleased. At least five different people, from the owner on down, asked us if we had enjoyed ourselves.

Alas, Ed Witt’s savory courses don’t live up to Kahn’s desserts. Indeed, the letdown is so great, that we struggle to imagine how it could have happened. Did we order the wrong things? Did we catch Witt’s kitchen on an off night? How can a restaurant so serious about its desserts fumble the rest of the cooking so badly?

The amuse bouche was a small spoonful of Cured Tasmanian Trout with fennel and olives. The olives were too dominant, completely obliterating the trout. At another table, my friend saw four diners grimace in unison as they tasted it.

Everything on the menu comes with a long list of ingredients, often with funky names, and usually at least one too many. We were both intrigued by Prawns with Chamomile Consommé, Baby Carrots, and Forbidden Rice. The dish consists of a few small bits of pre-sliced shrimp, flecks of rice, and a bland salty broth that could have come out of a soup can,  added tableside. The dish is entirely uninteresting. We had no idea what was “forbidden” about the rice. At $13, it was one of the lower-priced appetizers.

Entrees are expensive, with most over $30. My friend had the Roasted Pork & Cider-Tobacco Braised Pork Belly ($31), which read much better than it tasted. The roasted pork was like a dull sausage, while the pork belly was surrounded by an unpleasant layer of fat that hadn’t been fully rendered.

Duclair Duck ($34) was a bit more successful, with a deliciously crunchy exterior contrasting the tender meat. But Marcona almonds and baby turnips seemed utterly superfluous, and a small cylinder of “Medlar braised leg” (whatever that means) was far too dry. For that matter, what is “Duclair” duck?

That brought us to dessert, which seems to be the only attraction for which the restaurant can be seriously recommended. Whatever you order, it takes a while to arrive—the reason is abundantly obvious when you see the photos. They are works of art, and it seems almost a crime to bite into them. But they are just as much fun to eat, even if one cannot begin to figure out how they were made.

My friend had the Wolfberry (lime sabayon, tonka bean, broken macaroons, ketjap manis; $14) , which we had so much enjoyed when we had the dessert tasting a month ago.

I wanted to try something different, so I had Absinthe (liquid sable, black sesame, ricotta, sour apple sorbet; $12), another happy choice on a menu where one really cannot go wrong.

Service was generally excellent, with only a few minor lapses that are hardly worth mentioning. The staff dress in dark suits and ties, and comport themselves with all due seriousness. With only a little bit more polish, I could easily imagine awarding three stars for service, if only the food lived up to it.

The room might be accused of sterility, with the all-white walls adorned only with large photos of grapes. But the chandelier made of inverted wine glasses is a work of sheer genius. At the bar, there is a companion sculpture made of wine glasses tilted horozontally (not really clear in the photo below, despite my best efforts). 

You would expect a restaurant named Varietal to have a serious wine program. Indeed it does, although it may be far too over-priced for its own good. When we sat down, we were presented with a champagne menu, with no choices below $17. This seemed to us grossly excessive, when you consider that we had an excellent glass of sparkling wine last week at The Modern for just $15. The main wine list has some reasonably priced choices, along with some insanely excessive ones.

Varietal appears to be struggling. The dining room was only about half full, surely not a good sign on a Friday night. The front bar area seemed to be doing a brisk business, but it is not large enough to support the full restaurant. Most of the patrons were a lot younger than we are, and they probably won’t be choosing from the higher end of the wine list. In a dining room dominated by twenty-somethings, who will order the $500 bottle of dessert wine?

Four new reviews of Varietal are on the way. The coming week will see reviews from the New York Observer, New York Sun, and Adam Platt in New York. The owner told us that Frank Bruni has already visited three times, so his review is surely no more than a few weeks away. Varietal probably needs a couple of good reviews to pull in the crowds.

If Varietal survives, I suspect my friend and I will be back again for dessert. We would not be drawn back for a full meal unless future reviews suggest a considerable improvement over what we experienced. Jordan Kahn’s superlative desserts deserve to play on a stage with a much better supporting cast.

Varietal (138 W. 25th Street between 6th & 7th Avenues, Chelsea)

Food (savory): No stars
Food (dessert): ***
Service: **½
Ambiance: **
Overall: *

Varietal

Varietal has been open less than a month. Food blogger Augieland is already smitten, as are many of the eGullet community. The concept draws on several ideas at once, and it remains to be seen if they will gel. It is a wine bar, with some 70 selections by the glass. There are savory courses too, which have drawn mixed reviews so far.

But what has everyone raving are the inventive desserts of Jordan Kahn, who has stints at The French Laundry, Per Se, and Alinea on his resume. We dropped by at around 10:00 p.m. on a Saturday night after our dinner at Applewood, and were seated after about a ten-minute wait. The dining room was nearly full at that hour, although it had cleared out considerably by the time we left.

You’ll either love or hate the décor. The chandelier (pictured above), made from inverted wine glasses, is a work of genius. But the austerity of the stark white walls is relieved only by several undistinguished blow-up photos of grapes. The all-white theme is even more apparent in the front bar area, where there is another very clever sculpture made with wine glass stems.

We asked to share the four-course dessert tasting ($35). The server blundered, and we actually got two full orders of the dessert tasting. I did not realize this when the first course arrived—assuming that the kitchen had been considerate enough to divide the portions. But it was clear, both to us and our server, by the time the second course arrived, that we’d received twice the amount we wanted. To the restaurant’s credit, they continued with double orders of the third and fourth courses, but did not charge us for them.

The four-course dessert tasting is far more than most people will want. For the typical appetite, one portion to share is ample for a couple who have already had a full dinner. Indeed, any one of the courses would be nearly enough to be a dessert on its own. The desserts are of course enjoyable in their own right, but the artfulness of the platings almost makes you regret digging in. You just want to gaze at them, as you would paintings in a museum.

Most of the desserts have about half-a-dozen ingredients. I certainly can’t remember them all, though fortunately I think I’ve found descriptions on various Internet sites.

1) Sweet potato ice cream, yogurt, yuzu, picholine olive. The actual color was closer to orange than the photo shows. The olive was dried and shredded—you can see the crumbs at the back of the photo. An excellent starter.

2) Wolfberry puree, rigid lime sabayon, broken macaroons, tonka bean cream, soybean, ketjap manis. This was the most gorgeous of the four desserts, and probably the most successful.

3) This is the only dessert for which I cannot find a description, but we enjoyed it nearly as much as the wolfberry, above.

4) Chocolate Gel, Pear Sorbet, Mushroom Caramel, Brown Butter.We thought this one was a little too similar to the third dish. We particularly admired the cylinder of pear in the middle of the dish, which was the consistency of an egg yolk and “ran” with pear juice when punctured. But after that, we left the rest of the dish unfinished.

Although our server was no doubt chastised for sending a double order into the kitchen, she proved to be quite knowledgeable about the food, describing the complex dishes without a hitch. She recommended a lovely dessert wine to go with our tasting, which at $17 was neither the most nor the least expensive they had. The courses came out fairly slowly—no surprise there, given the complexity of the platings—but we were in no hurry.

A judgment on the savory menu must await a future visit, but for its desserts alone Varietal is a welcome addition to the restaurant landscape.

Varietal (138 West 25th Street between 6th & 7th Avenues, Chelsea)

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

Earth

Note: Earth closed in early 2009.

*

Earth NYC, a pan-Asian restaurant in far west Chelsea, hasn’t gotten much press. It opened eighteen months ago as a nightclub, and added a dinner menu about five months ago. Book at any time you want, and you get a 1,000-point bonus on OpenTable. At 8:00 p.m. last night, only a handful of tables were taken.

The menu covers a lot of ground—or tries to. Each item is labeled for its place of origin: Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, India. There are plenty of choices: seven soups & salads ($7–10), a dozen small plates ($9–21), seventeen large plates ($14–27), and seven kinds of bread, rice, and noodles ($4–16).

For a place designed primarily as a club, our expectations were low. The strong appetizers were therefore a pleasant surprise. I started with the very respectable Vegetable Dumplings ($9), which came with a side salad of shredded lettuce and carrots. My friend was equally impressed with Lamb Samosa ($9), three savory pastries stuffed with minced lamb. She was also quite pleased with the Chicken Chilli Basil ($14), but my Chicken Curry Ayam ($16) was mediocre. The chicken, which came in a soup bowl, was tough, over-cooked, and drowned in a dull curry broth.

The space is reasonably comfortable, with plenty of room between tables. The funky Asian soundtrack in the background is not oppressively loud. The decor? You will either love it or hate it, depending on your tolerance for lipstick red. I was reasonably impressed, but it won’t be to all tastes. A spectacular 30-foot wall of candles has potential, although they were not lit last night.

Service was at least competent, although our water glasses usually went a while without being refilled. A bread service would be helpful, given that both appetizers and entrées were a tad slow to come out.

I have a tough time getting a read on this place, given that one of the entrées and both appetizers were good, but the other entrée was not pleasant at all. As prices are modest, we certainly didn’t feel cheated. But with so many other intriguing restaurants to try, I probably won’t be rushing back to find out whether my dull curry was an anomaly.

Earth NYC (116A Tenth Avenue between 17th & 18th Streets, Chelsea)

Food: Satisfactory; possibly better
Service: Satisfactory
Ambiance: *
Overall: Satisfactory