La Petite Maison

Note: La Petite Maison closed in July 2012 after a brief, undistinguished run.

Did you ever get the sense that Sam Sifton, the New York Times critic, doesn’t like food? Perhaps that would explain why his columns waste anywhere from a third to half the space reviewing the guests, rather than the restaurant.

This was the case last week, when he awarded one star to La Petite Maison, the import from Nice that opened recently in the old townhouse (formerly owned by the Rockefellers) that was once home to Aquavit and Grayz.

The photo on the left headlined the review, suggesting that La Petite Maison is a big party that just happens to serve food. Perhaps that’s the case some evenings, but not last Thursday. Instead, we found a normal adult restaurant, doing brisk business, not unlike many successful places that get the benefit of a fair review without such a misleading photo.

Admittedly, the name’s a bit of a dodge. The bi-level house isn’t petite at all. It’s loud when full, and the tables are so tightly packed that you’ll need the agility of a belly dancer to make your way across the room. We had probably the best table in the house, a four-top in the corner, set for a couple: at least the sound came at us from two directions, rather than four.

The old Grayz décor, which will be missed by no one, was jettisoned in favor of a bright, modern-looking room with handsome, Warholesque artwork on the walls, and crisp, white tablecloths. It’s not for twentysomethings. Downtowners will despise the obvious midtown vibe, but it’s nice to see a new place that’s not a clone of ten others you’ve been to.

It is a clone of one particular place, La Petite Maison in Nice. Alain Allegretti, of the eponymous (and sadly closed) Allegretti, was brought in as consulting chef. The nature or duration of his duties is unclear, but the menu has very little of his influence. It’s mostly a carbon copy of what they serve at the mother ship. (A Provençal soup seems to be his main contribution.)

Sticker shock may be the initial reaction, with appetizers $9–22 and entrées $24–45. If you’re getting tired of the recent trend of “entrées for two,” you may be irritated that five out of fifteen entrées are in that format. There is also a separate section dedicated to truffles, wherein you can indulge your taste for truffled eggs ($45), truffled macaroni ($55), or a truffle sandwich ($85). Roasted shrimp at $42 may seem inexplicable, but you can also dine quite economically on Cesar [sic] salad for $13, or black tagliolini with shrimp and sea urchin for $24.

Indeed, more of the items are sensibly priced than not, when adjusted for midtown rents. Salade Niçoise ($15) and Zucchini Blossom Beignets ($15) were good recreations of familiar classics. Chateaubriand for two ($70) was arguably a bargain: it’s slightly better, but much more expensive at Keens ($106), and these days there aren’t many places that serve this old favorite at all. And Keens doesn’t include the wonderful side dish of mashed potatoes, which was as soft and creamy as any you’ll find.

We experienced none of the obnoxious upselling that Sam Sifton complained about. Nevertheless, there were some odd service lapses. Baguettes (very good) came in a paper bag, without butter or bread plates. The chateaubriand came with two sauces (unnanounced), which I took to be the traditional au poivre and Bearnaise. But they came in water glasses, without serving spoons: most odd. And for $70, you’d think they could actually serve the steak, rather than just dropping a skillet into the center of the table. Our server disappeared for long intervals. Apparently, they didn’t mind that we occupied our table for almost three hours.

The menu is a bit cheap-looking, and is written in slightly awkward English, but the receipt is in French. I have to assume that they intended to use French all along, and chickened out at the last minute. This strikes me as a misjudgment: those who patronize French restaurants usually want the real thing. Some diners might not know that courgette means zucchini (that’s what translations are for), but is Salade Niçoise so intimidating that it needs to be replaced with “Traditional salad of Nice”?

These may seem like small points, but this is, after all, a French restaurant, where dinner for two will exceed $100 a head, assuming you don’t drink water. The wine list isn’t long, but if it’s short on bargains, it’s well worth exploring. How many restaurants offer a 1998 Château Vannières, much less at $85?

La Petite Maison could do a better job of embracing and celebrating its Niçoise heritage. In a month or two, the party revelers that Sifton complained about will have moved on to the Next Big Thing, and we’ll be left with a comfortable, upscale French restaurant for midtown adults.

La Petite Maison (13–15 W. 54th Street between Fifth & Sixth Avenues, West Midtown)

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

Burger Joint at Le Parker Meridien

Is there a more incongruous restaurant than the Burger Joint at Le Parker Meridien? The rest of the hotel is midtown swanky, with its $18 cocktails, its $1,000 frittata, and a pretentious lobby sign leading to “Rue 56.”

Behind an unmarked velvet curtain is a real “joint,” decorated with movie posters that could’ve come from a dorm room, and graffiti on the walls that could’ve come from a bathroom stall. There’s nothing upscale about it at all, but people have been lining up for the burgers since it opened without ceremony in 2002.

If you didn’t know it was there, you’d wonder what could possibly be behind that curtain worth waiting for. “Wait,” they do. Even at 3:00 p.m. on a Sunday—surely the definition of slack time—there was a solid twenty-minute line, snaking through the hotel lobby. My friend and I ordered Old Cubans in the lounge, while waiting for the queue to subside. What’s all the fuss about?

For your trouble, you get a medium-thickness all-beef cheesburger for $7.35, with a satisfying crust and a smoky char-grilled flavor. Excellent fries are $3.67. A pickle the thickness of a baseball bat (OK, not quite) is $1.38. A fresh brownie that two can easily share is $2.30. And all of that, for two people, is not much more than Norma’s charges for an order of French Toast.

It takes them less time to make a burger & fries than it takes you to consume them, so the joint’s dozen-or-so tables are perpetually packed. My friend Kelly had the system down pat. One person stands in line for food; the other hovers by a table where it appears they’re nearly finished, ready to pounce as soon as the previous occupants vacate. That system worked fine in mid-afternoon, but at lunchtime, I have to assume that most people take their burgers elsewhere. (Kelly said they do not allow Burger Joint food in the Parker Meridien lobby.)

It’s a very good burger, especially at the price, and certainly an “only-in-New York” experience.

Burger Joint (119 W. 56th St. between Sixth & Seventh Avenues, West Midtown)

First Look: Social Eatz

Note: Social Eatz closed in March 2013. Another concept from the same chef is expected to replace it.

*

Social Eatz is the new restaurant from Top Chef alumnus Angelo Sosa. After coming within a whisper of winning Season 7, he came back for the current “All Stars” season, and was eliminated about two-thirds of the way through.

He has bounced around a bit. His last place, a sandwich shop called Xie Xie, lasted only a shade over a year, although a problem with air conditioning in the building—not any deficiency in Sosa’s food or its popularity—was the reason it closed.

The menu at Social Eatz is casual and inexpensive, with all of its various categories ending in a ‘z’, like “soup’z,” “salad’z,” “app’z,” “burger’z,” “taco’z,” and so forth. The most expensive item is $12—the Bibimbap (Korean for “mixed meal”) Burger. You’d have to try really hard to spend more than $25 a head.

Sosa has been giving out a lot of free food, especially at lunch time. Last Thursday, the restaurant’s first night officially open, they weren’t charging anyone. I think I was recognized, but the staff said that every meal was on the house.

The cuisine is somewhat difficult to classify, with a mixture of American and Asian influences, and yes, tacos. Culinary styles are cross-polinated in most of the dishes, an approach that could crash and burn if the spices get even slightly out of whack. I liked both items I tried, and I have to assume Sosa is really cooking here—at least for now—as I didn’t see him schmoozing in the dining room.

Hot Wings ($9) are glazed in a tamarind, garlic, shallot, plum sugar, and Japanese togaroshi sauce, the latter incorporating red chili, roasted orange peel, and black sesame. You can’t make out all of the individual flavors, but they work together brilliantly. In Korean Beef Tacos ($9), tender skirt steak is marinated in a sweet/savory sauce and served in a house-made soft tortilla with spicy bean sprout kimchee.

Service was very good, especially for a restaurant this inexpensive. The host checked my coat, and there were cloth napkins. Staff seemed to know the menu well. After I finished the wings, the server brought out a hot towel for me to wipe off the barbecue sauce. That’s not bad for a place where the food bill would have been $18. (Alcohol wasn’t available, as the liquor license hadn’t come through yet.)

I’m not sure why Sosa is content to do this kind of food, when he is clearly capable of much more. For now, this is the idiom in which he chooses to work. His brand of fusion cuisine won’t be to all tastes: to some, his palate may be too sweet, or not tart enough. But you’ve got to hand it to a guy who is serving food of this quality, in a decent-looking midtown space, for about $20 a head.

Social Eatz (232 E. 53rd Street between Second & Third Avenues, East Midtown)

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: **

Hotel Griffou

Note: This is a review under chef David Santos, who left the restaurant in August 2011. After chef shuffles too numerous to mention, the restaurant closed in August 2012.

*

If only the owners of Hotel Griffou had had the good sense to hire David Santos as chef from the get-go. Instead, they hired a journeyman best not named, who got zero-star reviews from both the Times and New York.

Those owners, veterans of sceney joints like Freemans, the Waverly Inn, and La Esquina, may have thought the scene would follow them there, never mind the food. It didn’t, and the restaurant got a re-boot.

Enter Santos, who was last seen marrying his Portuguese heritage to French technique at 5 & Diamond, where his cuisine was too challenging for the neighborhood. It fits right in at Hotel Griffou. The crowds, if not at capacity, are slowly catching on.

Too bad it’s almost impossible to get the critics to re-visit. They’d have to rename the restaurant for that. But if the critics ever do return, they’ll find an excellent menu completely changed from the one that got no stars in 2009.

Hotel Griffou isn’t a hotel at all. It’s named for a boarding house that occupied the site in the 1870s. It has had many other names since then, most recently Marylou’s. The place is laid out as a series of connected rooms, each decorated in a different theme: library, salon, bat cave (just kidding). They’re a bit kitschy, but cute all the same. There’s not another space quite like it.

The food is on the expensive side, with appetizers $11–18, entrées $24–45, or an $18 burger. Long-term success depends on attracting and retaining a clientele that recognizes the technique and craftsmanship in Santos’s dishes. This isn’t just a neighborhood canteen.

My friend Kelly had the fresh oysters off the specials list (above left), but I had to try the Tuna Bolognese ($14; above right), a stunning dish the food boards are in love with. A classic tagliatelle with Italian tomato sauce, and the added delight of shredded, high-grade tuna, it deserves all the accolades it can get.

The kitchen sent out an extra mid-course, a luscious Organic Poached Duck Egg with gnocchi and arugula pesto (normally $11; above left); and meaty, Seared Sea Scallops with roasted pineapple, jalapeño, and piquillo tempura (normally $16; above right).

Roast Suckling Pig ($30; above left) was a tender, hearty entrée, with its accompaniments of butternut squash, sunchokes, hazelnuts, and brandied plums. So-called Peking Style Duck ($32; above right) was mildly disappointing, as the presence of a token pancake wasn’t enough to remind me of that iconic dish. The duck itself was beautifully done, and gained nothing from the comparison to a preparation it doesn’t really resemble.

Of the desserts we tried (all $10), two very good ones balanced one dud. We enjoyed the Coconut Pineapple Chiboust with Spiced Rum Ice Cream (above left), and an extra one the kitchen sent out, the Chocolate Hazelnut Brioche Pudding with Hazelnut Anglaise and Tahitian vanilla Bean Ice Cream (above center). But a Poppyseed Soufflé (above right) was ruined by an inedible, sickly-sweet Limoncello Sorbet, and it was not a particularly good soufflé either.

We were known to the house, and received very good service, but I didn’t notice any difference at the other tables. The crowded bar was a completely different story. There, we struggled to get the bartender’s attention, and the $15 cocktails were just average.

If your perception of Hotel Griffou is colored by the early reviews of a chef no longer there, you should put them out of your mind. David Santos is now serving destination food, well worth the trouble of going out of your way to visit.

Hotel Griffou (21 W. 9th Street between Fifth & Sixth Avenues, Greenwich Village)