Lowcountry

Note: Lowcountry closed. The space is now called Louro, under the same ownership, with chef David Santos.

*

Whenever there’s a chef change at a restaurant I’ve reviewed, I always make a note of it. I might not get around to a re-review, but at least it remains in the back of my mind.

I did make it back to Lowcountry, which has a new chef, Oliver Gift, as of January 2012. Much of the background of the restaurant remains the same, so I refer you to my October 2010 review for details.

The cuisine is still Southern U.S., but with more traditional menu headings: appetizers and mains, rather than the irritating “small” plates and “large.” Prices have crept up: whereas entrées were formerly $19–23, they’re now $19–30, with an average around $25. Some former apps are now served as larger and more expensive mains, but Lowcountry remains a low-to-mid-priced restaurant by today’s standards.

We thought the Lowcountry Sampler ($16; above) would be a good way to sample the appetizers. You get two bacon deviled eggs, two mini crab cakes, a bit of Benton’s country ham, and a scoop of leek dip with house-made chips. It is all unobjectionable, but equally unimpressive.

 

Last time, Shrimp & Grits with Andouille Sausage (above left) was a $14 appetizer; it’s now a $20 entrée. But what it seems to have gained is a bowl full of soupy grits that overwhelmed the shrimp and sausage.

Arctic Char ($24; above right) was considerably better, despite an overly precious plating that is really out of place for the restaurant. Char is a delicate fish, and the kitchen has mastered it, served on a bed of red quinoa.

In keeping with the Southern theme, there is an extensive bourbon list. We had a couple of bourbon-based cocktails that were strictly of the backyard barbecue variety, the sorts of unstudious drinks you wouldn’t mind if a buddy served them on the back porch.

The restaurant was not doing much business on a Sunday evening; I have no idea if that is typical. Service was fine, as you’d expect under those circumstances. The new chef has worked at some impressive places (Commerce, Blue Hill at Stone Barns), so I thought he might have plans to elevate the cuisine. He may yet, but so far that is not the case.

Lowcountry (142 W. 10th Street between 6th & 7th Avenues, West Village)

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

Wong

Note: Wong closed in July 2014. Nine months later, it re-opened with the somewhat unappetizing name Chomp Chomp, serving “Singaporean Hawker Food.” (Plans for a Vietnamese restaurant in the space called Vuong were abandoned.)

*

For all of my complaints about New York Times restaurant critics, I typically can’t make much use of their advice—even when they are right. By the time they get around to reviewing a place, there’s usually enough press that I have a pretty good sense of what is going on, even if I haven’t already been there myself (which I often have).

Wong was different. It was totally off my radar until Pete Wells gave it an enthusiastic two stars, three weeks ago. I went to the restaurant on his say-so, and ordered the dishes he recommended. I almost never do that.

Ya know what? He’s right. Wong is a great restaurant.

The chef, Simpson Wong, is Malaysian. His cuisine purports to be “Asian locavore,” although many of the dishes defy ready classification. Naan bread (left), served before the meal, seems to be the main nod to India; and I saw nothing Japanese.

The menus seem to be freshly printed, and the staff eagerly assure you that “97 percent” of the menu, including even the beers and wines, is sourced locally (and of course, sustainable, seasonal, yada yada yada). I have never visited Wong’s earlier restaurants—the now-closed Jefferson or the still-open Café Asean—so I have no basis for comparison.

There isn’t a huge selection, which for an Asian restaurant is unusual. I find it admirable that the chef focuses on a few things he does well. There are just eight appetizers ($9–15), eight rice dishes and entrées ($17–31), three sides ($6–7), and three desserts ($8–10).

About half the dishes are marked with a stylized “W”, indicating that they’re house specialities. This silly custom ought to be abandoned: either serve a dish proudly, or not at all.

Hakka Pork Belly ($13.50; above left) is as good a pork dish as you’ll find; it shares the plate with little tater tots made from taro root. Sea Scallops ($15; above right), as Wells noted, come with little deep-fried duck tongue fritters that steal the show.

Cha Ca La Wong ($17; above), Wells tells us, is a pun on a famous Hanoi restaurant, Cha Ca La Vong, where the only dish served consists of rice noodles and partly-cooked fish that you finish yourself at the table. The version here comes fully cooked in a sizzling cast-iron skillet; the fish is Hake, topped with tumeric (a kind of ginger), just slightly spicy.

Lobster Egg Foo Yong ($24; above) is a tour de force, not at all resembling the traditional dish that many Chinese restaurants serve. This winning combination of lobster claw, leeks, shrimp crumble, and two fried duck eggs, is an early candidate for dish of the year.

We don’t usually order dessert but had to try the Duck à la Plum ($9.50; above), with the incredible roast duck ice cream, plum sake, and a crispy tuile 5-spice cookie.

Wells complained about the minimal wine list, but the white wine we tried, a Rhone-inspired Patelin de Tablas Blanc, paired well with the food, and was reasonably priced, at $39. (The server called it a white Châteauneuf-du-Pape, which might be a stretch, though I see what he means.)

Crowds at Wong have picked up since the Wells review came out. It wasn’t quite full on a Thursday evening, but our reservation was fairly early. And yes, they do take reservations, a welcome rarity these days for restaurants of this kind.

Service, in fact, is a strength here, with plates and silverware promptly cleared and replaced after every course Chopsticks come in an attractive woven leather sleeve, and are better than the disposable kind most Asian restaurants give out. Staff understand the menu and give sensible ordering advice.

But there is nowhere to hang coats, and the space is not at all comfortable. We got a seat at the so-called “chef’s table” (really a bar) facing the open kitchen, which is preferable to the cramped and closely-spaced tables. Wherever you sit, you’ll be on a chair or a stool so diabolically uncomfortable that you’d think David Chang was an investor.

Despite that, Wong is one of the most original restaurants to have opened in New York in quite a while. I would suffer its uncomfortable stools to have more, please.

Wong (7 Cornelia Street near W. 4th Street, West Village)

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

Bigoli

Note: This is a review under chef Alex Stratta, who left the restaurant in March 2012 after Eater.com put the restaurant on “deathwatch.” In a rare admission, the owners actually thanked Eater for getting deathwatched: “It got our butts in gear and forced us to make changes more quickly.

But Deathwatch is not escaped so easily. The restaurant closed in October 2012.

*

Bigoli is the new Italian restaurant from Vegas transplant and Top Chef: Masters alum Alessandro (“Alex”) Stratta.

Stratta trained with Alain Ducasse and Daniel Boulud, and his first few restaurants were in the elaborate French mold: Mary Elaine’s at the Phoenician in Scottsdale, Renoir at the Mirage in Las Vegas, and Alex at the Wynn (since closed), which earned two Michelin stars. He followed that up with an Italian place, Stratta, also at the Wynn, with which he is no longer involved.

Bigoli is a serious, comfortable, and mostly enjoyable restaurant. It’s also a little disappointing.

Stratta told The Times that he “didn’t want to do fancy any more.” You can hardly blame him: the city’s critics are skeptical of fancy restaurants, and they usually hate imported chefs. A Michelin multi-star concept transplanted from Vegas would practically be begging to get panned, no matter how good it was.

But “unfancy” Italian is the most over-represented cuisine in New York City. Does Stratta have a point of view? The opening menu is completely anonymous. If I stripped off the logo and showed it to a dozen food-savvy New Yorkers, none would guess where it came from. No dish would leap off the page: “Oh my, who’s serving that?” You’ve seen it all before.

The only possibility Bigoli allows at the moment, is to prepare the food well, at a fair price, in a comfortable space. That it mostly does, but so do many of its competitors. Antipasti are $9–15, pastas $19–25, entrées $23–49. Except for the obligatory prime ribeye and rack of lamb, all the entres are under $30. A wood-burning oven features prominently in an open kitchen, but the current menu gives no indication of which dishes actually use that oven—not that this feature is at all unique these days.

The meal opens with a helping of thick bread, a pesto dipping sauce, and a selection of olives. A Burrata appetizer ($15; above right) was rather an odd grab bag, with a lonely eggplant crostino, a thin slice of prosciutto, and a few salad greens.

As my girlfriend noted, when you put Seared Sea Scallops ($28; above left) on the same plate with roasted cauliflower, pine nuts, raisins, and brown butter, good things are bound to happen. I could do without the schmear of what looks like baby food on the right side of the plate, but the taste I had of the scallops was excellent.

Braised meats are likewise sure-fire—here, Tuscan Veal ($26; above right) with tomatoes, Swiss chard and chickpeas.

The wine list is a starter set. The Torcicoda Primitivo 2004 seemed like a good buy at $50, but the server returned with a bottle of the 2009 and had no idea that it wasn’t what I ordered.

After I pointed this out, his absurd retort was: “Don’t worry. It’s fresher that way,” apparently unaware of the principle that older bottles are usually more desirable.

A manager appeared and offered to take the bottle back if I didn’t like it. It was decent enough for a 2009 (still priced at $50), and I kept it, though it’s not the bottle I would have chosen had it been listed as a 2009 on the printed list.

Aside from that, the service was friendly and attentive, but the food took quite a while to come out, even though it was not busy on a Wednesday evening. The restaurant is only a month old, and I suspect it will get better, but there is some work to do.

Bigoli occupies an historic townhouse on a West Village side street. Eater.com commenters hated the décor, but we rather liked it: I don’t think the photos do it justice. The banquettes are comfortable, and the tables don’t seem as tightly packed as they often are at such places.

The chef told The Times, “we’re coming here with an incredible level of humility. New Yorkers really know food but I’m hoping they’ll be kind and patient.” Unfortunately, New Yorkers aren’t known for patience. If Stratta has bigger and bolder ideas for the cuisine, I can’t imagine what he’s waiting for.

We found Bigoli comfortable and pleasant, and if the entrées weren’t especially memorable, they were at least well made. For that, I would go back again. But I think the chef needs to do more to make Bigoli stand out from the mine run of good Italian restaurants, of which the city has no shortage.

Bigoli (140 W. 13th Street between Sixth & Seventh Avenues, West Village)

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

Tertulia

The new Spanish restaurant Tertulia is this year’s “I-don’t-get-it” place. It isn’t bad: I visited three times, which I wouldn’t have done if I’d hated it. But I don’t understand the hype.

And hyped it is. Tertulia got an enthusiastic two stars in The Times, two-and-half in Bloomberg, three in New York, and four out of five in Time Out. Serious Eats was a notable dissenter: they rated it a B, and said, “We don’t get it.”

To be fair, I wasn’t taken with Boqueria, chef Seamus Mullen’s last place, which he left “amicably” last year. The two places are similar (same cuisine, casual vibe, reservations not taken, quite loud when full), so perhaps Mullen and I are just not on the same wavelength.

The printed menu changes frequently, and there seem to be announced specials every day. Most of the offerings are in two categories: breads, cheeses, and charcuterie ($5–20) and tapas ($6–16). There are usually two or three larger plates offered, for which prices can vary widely. A 40-day aged prime rib, shown on the website and mentioned in some reviews, was $72, but as of last Friday it was no longer on the menu.

Anyhow, the tapas are the core of a meal here, but very few of them pleased me. Either they were too bland, or too salty, or too greasy. A couple were pretty good, but Mullen’s batting average wasn’t high enough.

Tomates de Nuestro Mercado, a salad of heirloom tomatoes, melon, cucumbers, fresh cheese, and herbs (, $14; above left) was competent and forgettable. Spanish mackerel with Fabes beans ($12, above right) was so bland that it left no impression at all. Even the roasted and pickled peppers were unable to come to the rescue.

Cojonudo…Revisited ($5; above left) was a hit, and one of the better bargains on the menu. It’s just two bites of smoked pig cheek topped with a fried quail egg and pepper, but packed with all the flavor the first two dishes lacked.

Nuestras Patatas ($9; above right) ought to come with a warning: not to be ordered by one person. Crispy potatoes drizzled with Pimentó and garlic had a spicy kick, but you want at least two or three fellow-diners to share it.

Mullen touts Arroz a la Plancha ($16; above left) as a signature dish, but I hated it. The description (Calasparra rice, snails, wild mushrooms, celery, fennel, Ibérico ham) sounds promising , but it’s dominated by a torpedo of greasy brown rice that had none of the crisp char that you would expect from the plancha.

The flavors really pop out in the Ensalata de Otoño ($13; above right), with squash, kale, mushrooms, Idiazábal cheese, and mushroom vinaigrette. There is not a lot going on here, but it’s a successful dish.

The last item I tried was one of the large-format plates, the Fabada ($32; above left), a bean stew with pork belly, house-made morcilla and chorizo. The pork belly was crisped up nicely, and the chorizo had a strong, spicy kick. The morcilla, or blood sausage, seemed a bit too loose, and the Fabes beans still seemed bland to me, as they had the first time. The cold side of red cabbage that came with it (above right) did not add much.

The beverage program emphasizes sherries, ciders, and wine. There is no printed cocktail list, but the mixed drinks are good, if you ask for them. As I was alone, I didn’t have an opportunity to explore much of the wine list, but the Spanish ciders are worth a try. One one visit, I was served wine in a juice glass, which a Facebook friend said is common in Spain, but on another I was given a proper wine stem.

The dining room occupies a long, narrow space, with distressed brick walls, dark wood tables without tablecloths, and an open kitchen in the back. It is rather dark, and there are no windows, except at the front. Unlike Boqueria, Tertulia at least has real tables and seats with backs, though I didn’t get one: I sat at the bar three times. Last Friday night, there was a 10-minute wait for a bar stool at 6:00 p.m., with most tables taken. It was standing-room-only by 7:30.

That is the rhythm of dinner at Tertulia, three months in. Servers are friendly, knowledgeable, and good at multi-tasking, as they have to be in a place this busy. The cuisine here makes a nod at ambition. The menu seems to rely heavily on authentic ingredients, and the chef is not afraid to challenge his audience, but the ratio of hits to misses is not good enough.

Tertulia (359 Sixth Ave. between W. 4th St. & Washington Pl., West Village)

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

Fatty ’Cue (West Village)

Note: Fatty ’Cue (West Village) closed in May 2014. Fatty ’Cue (Williamsburg) and Fatty Crab (UWS) had closed previously, after founder Zak Pelaccio left the company. The West Village Fatty Crab is the only remaining member of the brood.

*

Zak Pelaccio’s brood of of Fatty Restaurants has now hit five with the arrival of a second Fatty ’Cue in the West Village, a slightly more upscale version of the the popular Williamsburg joint.

For the record, there are Fatty Crabs in the West Village, the Upper West Side, and on St. John, Virgin Islands; and also a chain of kiosks and food trucks called Fatty Snack. The new Fatty ’Cue was formerly the pop-up Fatty Johnson’s, and before that the unsuccessful Cabrito. Pelaccio calls the whole brood Fatty Crew.

If there’s a sense of monotony and a lack of range, it’s offset by Pelaccio’s uncanny sense for tailoring his restaurants to the neighborhoods they’re in. Pelaccio and his P.R. manager told Sam Sifton that this Fatty would offer “a slightly more grown-up menu and service style. . . .” Sifton added, “the seating will be comfortable and cozy, he said, and the room ‘will be quieter.’”

That’s all true. No one would call any Pelaccio restaurant formal, but the new Fatty ’Cue is more upscale than the UWS Fatty Crab, and considerably more grown-up than the original Fatty Crab or the Williamsburg ’Cue. It takes reservations and isn’t marred by the occasionally amateurish service that plagues the other locations.

At least, that’s my sense after two visits last week to a restaurant that is not yet a fortnight old. If they can keep it up, this could be the most enjoyable of the lot.

The cuisine is the same Southeast Asia-meets-barbecue theme of the Williamsburg restaurant, but there are very few dishes in common. The menu is in five sections, lightest to heaviest, though to call anything light here would be a bit of a joke. Plates range from $9 to $48, but most are under $20 and are suitable for sharing.

On my first visit, I ordered two dishes. This was the first time in my experience that a Fatty kitchen actually seemed to understand the concept of pacing a meal. Until now, Pelaccio’s restaurants were known for sending out food at the kitchen’s convenience, not the diner’s. Have they learned a lesson, or did I just get lucky?

I loved the Heirloom Tomato Salad ($13; above left) with pepper, fresh coriander, charcoal, and olive oil, resting in a pool of kimchi water. This is a typical late summer dish, but the spices and seasoning seemed just right. Heritage Pork Ribs ($12; above right) were juicy and enormous. One might complain at paying $6 a rib, but I couldn’t have eaten much more.

On my second visit, I ordered just one item: Deep-Fried Bacon ($18; above) with sweet and spicy salsa verde. It’s hard to come up with a bacon dish I don’t like, so bear that in mind when I tell you this one is excellent. The bacon is tender, with a crunchy crust from the fryer. Non-bacon addicts might be advised to share this one with a friend, but I was happy to eat it myself.

There’s a modest beer and wine selection, but I stuck with cocktails. The Chupacabra ($12;  tequila, chili-infused domaine de canton, fresh watermelon, lime) and the Smokin’ Bone ($13; bourbon, smoked pineapple, lime, chocolate bitters, tabasco) both pair well with the food. I’m especially fond of the latter.

I sat at the bar both times. On Wednesday at about 6:30 p.m., the restaurant wasn’t at all crowded. At the same time on Friday, I got the last free bar stool, and the hostess was quoting walk-in waits of an hour or more for tables. Service was the best I’ve had at any Fatty establishment. The bartenders were knowledgeable about the food and happy to explain the odd combinations of ingredients at length.

I don’t want to over-sell Fatty ’Cue, but in the early days it is the most enjoyable Fatty restaurant I’ve been to, with both food and service a cut above its brethren.

Fatty ’Cue (50 Carmine St. between Bedford & Bleecker Sts., West Village)

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

Left Bank

There is much to like about the new West Village restaurant, Left Bank. The menu is inexpensive and admirably brief: just five starters ($8–12), three pastas ($16–18), four entrées ($19–23), three sides ($7), and three desserts ($5–8).

But there is a distressing lack of focus in that menu: lamb tartare, chicken, gnocchi, cheese. Not much that gets the pulse racing. It’s hard to imagine a signature dish emerging from the tepid offerings the restaurant has opened with. The wine list is as brief and as timid as the menu, with about a dozen uninteresting bottles.

If “Left Bank” leads you to expect French cuisine, you would be wrong. I won’t bother you with the tortured justification for the name—something about the Bohemian reputation of the West Village (which isn’t really true anyway). A romantic twilight photo on the restaurant’s home page doesn’t resemble, in the least, the restaurant’s actual location, a cursed space that was most recently Braeburn. It hasn’t changed much, and it gets awfully loud when the dining room fills up—as it did on a recent Wednesday evening.

The owners, a couple of Red Cat/Mermaid Inn vets, ought to have known better than to choose such a frequently used name. Search for “Left Bank,” and you’re liable to find a restaurant in Buffalo, a restaurant on Second Avenue, or an apartment building in Chelsea, rather than this restaurant.

We shared a lamb tartare ($16; left), which was strewn rather lazily with leafy greens and strips of parmesan. I just barely detected the promised anchovy in the mix, but my girlfriend (who loves anchovies) couldn’t pick it up, so perhaps the balance needs to be adjusted.

She liked the Grilled Squid ($19; above left) a bit better than I did, but she noted that the beans and the tomatoes weren’t at a uniform temperature. I loved the Chicken ($21; above right), which was tender and garlicky, but the vegetables were unremarkable.

In a neighborhood that has bistro food on almost every block, I am not sure how Left Bank aspires to stand out from the crowd. The kitchen needs to pick up its game. Aside from the prices, several dollars per dish lower than comparable restaurants, Left Bank is awfully forgettable.

Left Bank (117 Perry Street at Greenwich Street, West Village)

Food: Satisfactory
Service: Good
Ambiance: Loud and Bare Bones
Overall: Satisfactory

Empellón

Allow me to set the scene. We’re eavesdroppers Chez Stupak. Alex worked formerly as pastry chef at Alinea, which was on its way to three Michelin stars, being named the #6 restaurant in the world (and #1 in the U.S.), and best Chicago restaurant ever. It hadn’t quite reached those accolades when Alex was there, but it was on the way.

Then Alex moved to WD~50, with another Michelin star, where he was acclaimed as a pastry genius fully worthy of accompanying chef Wylie Dufresne’s wacky but adorable cuisine with three New York Times stars.

We’re eavesdropping Chez Supak, as I say, and Alex says to his wife, Lauren Resler (herself a pastry chef, albeit not as well known), “Let’s open a taco place.” And you want to blow your cover, jump into the scene, and ask the Stupaks, “Srsly? What the Sam Hill are you doing?”

I do realize that investors might have doubts about savory dishes coming from a former pastry chef, especially after Sam Mason (another former WD~50 pastry chef) flamed out spectacularly at Tailor (a restaurant I liked, but not enough people did). As Stupak told Serious Eats:

“My resume really hurt me here,” he says; “People expected me to open a pastry restaurant, but the problem is, once people pigeonhole you, your creativity is severely restricted. People come for my pastry and expect certain things—like you’d expect pasta on an Italian menu—but with Mexican food, they have no expectations. I’m opening a Mexican restaurant because it’s the food I love to eat, and that’s it.”

But still. Why Mexican, and why tacos?

Fast forward about 18 months, and the idea has reached fruition at Empellón, a smallish West Village place at one of the city’s few intersections of two numbered streets, W. 4th and W. 10th.

The space is non-descript and sparsely decorated. Had Stupak chosen Portuguese cuisine, rather than Mexican, the same décor would have worked. The hard surfaces amplify noise, and the tables are close together.

“You’re not saying anything,” my companion observed.

“I’m just out of patience for shouting,” I replied. That was with the dining room doing brisk business on a Saturday evening, but not full by any means. Reservations have not been tough to come by.

Perhaps Stupak is finding that there aren’t enough folks who’ll pay $17 for three small tacos. The server recited a list of proper entrées: it sounded like there were at least four of them, but they went by too quickly. She implied that they’ll soon be on the printed menu, perhaps pushing the tacos to sharable appetizer status. Looks like a smart move.

The current list of appetizers (there are just a few) isn’t expensive, at $10–11 each, but those seeking a more substantial meal may, for now, be disappointed that the menu ends at tacos.

Meatballs ($10; above left) ride atop a crisp biscuit, with roasted tomato, chorizo, and chipotle. They’re a bit unexciting. Cheddar ($11; above right) comes in a sizzling skillet with bacon and huazontles (a Mexican herb), with warm tortillas on the side. We loved this dish and wished it were larger.

There are eight taco dishes, of which we tried two, both $17: Lamb Barbacoa (above left) and Shrimp (above right). Each was hearty and rich, but the shrimp, the spicier of the two, is the one I would order again.

Service is efficient, knowledgeable, and friendly. And to my delight, the restaurant takes reservations, unusual these days at a place this casual. Had it been strictly for walk-ins, I doubt Empellón would have had my business on a Saturday evening when I was coming from uptown, and wanted to know I had a place to eat.

Although we enjoyed our meal, the food strikes me as a work in progress. Empellón will be a much more compelling restaurant when regular entrées make it onto the menu, as they surely will.

Empellón (230 W. 4th Street at W. 10th Street, West Village)

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

Update: Fatty Crab

I had dinner with a friend on Sunday evening at the West Village Fatty Crab. I’ve written about both Manhattan Fatty Crabs before (here, here), and my opinion of the franchise remains the same: very good food, poor service.

It seems to me that at $111 for two people (before tax and tip), replacing silverware and plates between courses ought to be automatic, not something you have to ask for. And the least they could do is to reprint an outdated menu that is dog-eared from over-use.

That $111 bill, by the way, included a $40 bottle of Tempranillo that paired well with the food. But most of the wine selections were well above $50 a bottle.

What saves Fatty Crab, and the reason I would still go back if I’m in the neighborhood, is that the food remains complelling, even if overpriced: $13 for two small pork buns? $12 for a bowl of broccoli? A dish new to me was a wonderful deep fried whole striped bass ($24).

The restaurant was full on a Sunday evening, which means that Zak Pelaccio has no reason to change.

Fatty Crab (643 Hudson St., btwn Gansevoort & Horatio Sts., West Village)

Fedora

Gabriel Stulman hadn’t planned to open another restaurant so soon. After launching Joseph Leonard in late 2009 and Jeffrey’s Grocery in late 2010, he was in no rush to expand his empire. But when 90-year-old Fedora Donato decided to retire from the West Village space she’d occupied since 1952, Stulman felt he had to take it.

The new Fedora has very little in common with the old, but it was a shrewd move to keep the iconic name, as Keith McNally did at nearby Minetta Tavern. I’m not sure how much of the décor he kept, aside from the neon sign outdoors, but the renovation took more than half a year.

The deep, narrow space, as now re-decorated, features a long, pretty bar (which serves a full menu) on one side and and an odd assortment of tables—some wood, others marble; some square, others round—on the other.

Much like David Chang, Stulman has become a savant for the no-reservations movement, giving a variety of (usually self-serving) reasons why they aren’t taken at Joseph Leonard or Jeffrey’s. He’s changed his tune at Fedora, or perhaps is changing it daily. Less than a month ago, Adam Platt wrote in New York that reservations are taken only for parties of four or more. Currently, they’re taken for parties of two or more, but only on the same day.

I am actually surprised that he relented. I was seated without a reservation at 6:15 p.m. on a Friday evening, but the place was full shortly thereafter, and the hostess turned away a steady stream of walk-ins. There is very little waiting space when the bar is full, and perhaps he now takes reservations to avoid alienating his neighbors, who might be annoyed by a long queue on the formerly quiet street. Make no mistake: queue, they would. Fedora is as big a hit as all of Stulman’s other places.

The kitchen, no longer Italian, is run by Mehdi Brunet-Benkritly, an alumnus of the famed Montreal restaurant Au Pied de Cochon. (Another PdC vet runs the hit Long Island City diner, M. Wells.) The menu isn’t a knock-off of his old haunt at all: there isn’t a single foie gras dish, whereas Au Pied do Cochon serves it by the bucket. Appetizers are $9–14, entrés $20–28 (not counting the obligatory côte de boeuf for two, $85), side dishes $8.

I adored the Cured Spanish Mackerel ($12; above left), served on a bed of puréed avocado with crushed chips for textural contrast. But a fine Crisped Duck Leg (above right) was ruined in a heavy slurry of barbecue sauce, a misconceived dish if ever there was one, and at $22 it is not exactly a bargain for such a small portion. The conceit of serving every dish in a bowl, whether it’s suitable or not, is not exactly endearing.

The staff is friendly and well trained. It is surely not their fault that the bread service consisted of two meager slices smaller than the palm of my hand, with soft butter that you’re expected to spread with the same knife given out for the appetizer. The two-page wine list is international, and fairly priced by my reckoning (see Decanted for more). The server offered a taste before pouring a glass of a Chateau Smith, a courtesy many expensive restaurants shamefully omit.

For all its limitations, I was prepared to love Fedora. I had a terrific dish and a dud, and at this point I can’t say which one was the aberration.

Fedora (239 W. 4th Street near W. 10th Street, West Village)

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

Spasso

Note: Chef Craig Wallen left Spasso in February 2013. Ed Carew replaced him.

*

There’s a bit of Italian fatigue in the city right now, no question about it. Perhaps the glut of new high-end Italian places in late 2010 pushed Spasso, which opened Christmas week, right off the radar.

But on the strength of one visit, albeit solo, Spasso punches well above its weight class. All three of the items I tried resembled familiar dishes, but none were slavish copies of those found elsewhere. All were prepared with flair and technical precision.

This comes as no surprise, when you consider the talent behind Spasso. The chef, Craig Wallen, was previously chef de cuisine at Convivio and L’Impero, and worked at Gramercy Tavern and Lupa. The co-owner and partner, Bobby Werhane, was at Dell’anima, L’Artusi, and Choptank. That’s an impressive resume (ok, maybe not Choptank).

This food could have found a home at the Michelin-starred and recently closed Convivio, where Chris Cannon would have charged more, for portions half the size. Antipasti are $8–15, pastas $15–20, entrées $22–29, side dishes $8.

House-made Stracciatella ($9; left), or stretched mozzarella in olive oil, was like a cold cheese soup, with ribbons of cheese resembling tagliatelle. You spread it on the grilled bread provided, or just eat it with a fork, as if it were the pasta course.

Charred Octopus ($15; above left) was tender and smokey, and nicely complemented by cucumbers, yogurt, and mint. Beautiful orechiette ($19; above right) joined forces with rock shrimp and crab meat, with bread crumbs adding a satisfying crunch. It was a crime to leave half of it behind, but I’d overdone it on the first two courses.

Wines by the glass were a bargain too, with real choices having a few years of age on them, and none over $13.

The space is casual, but the tables have tablecloths, and the service is more polished than it needs to be. Most people seated at either of the two separate bars (one of them near an open kitchen), are there to eat, the places already set with that in mind. Even on a Sunday evening, the space was bustling.

There is much more to Spasso, but if the rest of the menu is as good as this, I can’t wait to try more of it.

Spasso (551 Hudson Street at Perry Street, West Village)

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