Novitá

I must have walked by Novitá dozens of times, over the years, but it never actually registered until after Sam Sifton upgraded it to two stars in February (it previously had one from Ruth Reichl). The city is full of places like that — decent neighborhood restaurants that get zero media coverage, that you walk by on the way to someplace else without a second thought.

Sifton’s argument for awarding two stars was exceptionally weak — by which I mean that, even taking him at his word, it made little sense. Pasta is “excellent . . . a rejoinder to low expectations.” “[T]he plates are food, not art,” the chef makes a great prosciutto with melon, and “Main courses are less successful.”

It is, in other words, one of a hundred mostly interchangeable Italian restaurants in our fair city.

 

Gramigna alla carbonara ($14.50; above left), a concoction of macaroni with eggs, pecorino romano, guanciale and black pepper, was probably the best thing we tried, lustily flavored and amply portioned. Eggplant Parmigiana ($15; above right) was just fine, but it is fine at lots of other places.

 

The kitchen did well by a whole Branzino ($29; above left). Very few restaurants serve a pounded Veal Chop ($29; above right) on the bone, but one couldn’t avoid thinking that it was a preparation designed to bury mediocre product in a blaze of cheese and tomato.

On OpenTable, Novità is flagged as “romantic,” and that’s a mistake. The room is attractive, but it is too crowded, the tables too tightly packed, the service too impersonal. At prime times, you’ll feel like you’re dining in front of an audience: there is no waiting space for unseated parties, so they just line the edge of the room until a table frees up.

The restaurant was full on a Thursday evening, probably not due to Sifton’s review, but simply because the neighborhood is glad to have it. The waiter recites a long list of specials, which irritates the neophyte, but if you’re a regular it means there is always something new to try. Though not exactly inexpensive, it’s a fair deal given the size of the portions; the food, if unoriginal and unspectacular, is a step up from generic sidewalk Italian.

Novitá (102 E. 22nd Street, east of Park Avenue, Gramercy)

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

The Burger at Beacon

The folks at Eater.com asked me to submit a favorite restaurant for their late-summer feature, “You May Also Enjoy.” The premise is, “a favorite, somewhat oddball restaurant, bar, or place of note that perhaps exists mostly off the radar.”

A few places came to mind, but I thought I should have a recent data point before recommending anything. A couple of others we need not name flunked the test, and that brought me back to Beacon.

Yes, Beacon—nearly as far off the radar as you can get, but consistently dependable (previous posts here & here). I don’t think Beacon is in any danger of closing, but it does run more specials than most places, and I have never seen its large dining room full. It has received little press since William Grimes awarded two stars eleven years ago.

I came with no fixed idea about what to order, but when the host said that a burger, fries, and two drinks were just twenty bucks at the bar during happy hour, my mind was made up. You get a thick, perfectly-cooked rare burger, and the fries are spot-on. It’s not a LaFreida designer blend, but a rock-solid option, especially at the price.

The bar layout is a bit irritating. The little lamps every few feet are cute, until you realize they are permanently attached, and you cannot move them out of your way. Service was a bit slow.

The menu still emphasizes—as it always did—the kitchen’s wood-burning oven. Unless I am mistaken, the steakhouse theme has been somewhat deemphasized in favor of a more well-rounded modern American cuisine. Beacon was never a pure steakhouse, but I recall more beef on the menu than there is now.

Beacon remains what it was before, a very good midtown restaurant you can always depend on.

Beacon (25 W. 56th Street between Fifth & Sixth Avenues, West Midtown)

Breakfast at the Lambs Club

 

Geoffrey Zakarian has been quiet for the past year or two, ever since his three-star restaurants, Town and Country, imploded under the weight of mismanagement and a poor economy. Now he’s back at The Lambs Club, a fine-dining restaurant in the new Chatwal Hotel on 44th Street.

A chef with Zakarian’s resume shouldn’t have to prove himself. He rose through a long line of serious restaurants where excellence couldn’t be hedged or faked. But the rapidity of his demise at Town and Country, and the decline of those places long before that, raises difficult questions. Does he still have fire in the belly, or is this just another consulting contract? Opening in a hotel is usually good insurance against failure, but the last two places were in hotels too.

The Lambs Club—named for a famous theatrical club that formerly occupied the space—is not yet open for dinner. As I happened to have business in the area, I dropped in for breakfast. The dining room is comfortable, decked out in lipstick red furniture and dark wood paneling. There is an 18th-century fireplace, though it appears to be re-configured with a gas burner.

 

Breakfast has nothing to do with dinner, but this was a very good meal, and not as ridiculously over-priced as hotel food sometimes can be. That said, it wasn’t cheap either. I loved a nectarine smoothie ($9) and an egg sandwich ($13) with bacon, cheddar, and tomato confit.

Will this be the place where Geoffrey Zakarian retakes his place on the culinary stage, or will dinner just be a succession of better-than-average hotel dishes? We’ll find out in a few weeks.

The Lambs Club (130 W. 44th St. between Sixth & Seventh Avenues, West Midtown)