Easter Sunday at Quality Meats

My girlfriend, son, and I had Easter dinner at Quality Meats. This was our second visit—see earlier review—and cemented our view that Quality Meats is in the top echelon of New York steakhouses.

The most notable recent trend in Manhattan steakhouses—aside from the sheer quantity of them—is the rise of what I call “chick-friendly” steakhouses. It’s probably an unfair term, since plenty of women go to the standard Peter Luger-style steakhouses too. But at most of the classic steakhouses, the clientele is very obviously male-dominated. There are other stereotypes too, such as the wood paneling, unimaginative menu, and old-school waiters who seem almost bored.

Quality Meats, and others of its ilk, break this mold. They come across as fine-dining restaurants that happen to serve great steak, rather than as cookie-cutter steakhouses.

It would take a far more scientific study than I have time for to rate Quality Meats for the steaks alone, but they’re fairly close to the top of the heap, if not quite at the pinacle of it. There may be better classic steakhouses, but the supporting cast make Quality Meats a superior experience—from the excellent side dishes; to the homemade steak sauce, prepared tableside; and finally to the enjoyable AvroKO ambiance and first-rate service.

My girlfriend and I were both pleased with the 24 oz. bone-in rib steak ($44), which came with a foot-long rib bone still attached. The steak had the appropriate dry-aged taste, was done to the correct temperature, and was nicely marbled. My son did well by the 12 oz. filet mignon ($39).

We got the same side dishes as last time, the asparagus ($9) and the incredibly addictive crispy potatoes ($9), to which hot garlic butter was added tableside.

The wine list offers plenty to explore at reasonable prices. A Santa Duc Quatre Terres Côte du Rhône at $45 was a happy choice to go with what we had ordered.

For dessert, Quality Meats offers a great selection of ice creams ($6 for two scoops), so we all had that.

The restaurant did a brisk Easter business, but wasn’t full. Service was excellent, but for a repeat of the same upselling trick our server tried last time. We knew that steaks plus side dishes would be plenty, so we didn’t order appetizers. The server said, “Are you sure you don’t want appetizers? The steaks are going to take about 25 minutes.” Having been lured by this ruse last time, we politely declined. Sure enough, the wait for our steaks was more like 15 minutes.

There are plenty of great Manhattan steakhouses on my hit parade. If I’m just hungry for a steak, I walk in, order a slab of meat (with nothing else), and go home sated. But for a steakhouse that offers the whole package, Quality Meats may be the best of them all.

Quality Meats (57 West 58th St., east of Sixth Avenue, West Midtown)

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

Public

I first visited Public about three years ago, when it was still relatively new. My impression then was that the food didn’t quite live up to the high-concept ambiance. Last night, I decided to give it another try. My verdict remains the same: Public is more about the “scene” than it is about the food.

To be sure, it’s no mean feat to remain relevant three years later. That’s more than enough time for fickle diners to find a new favorite. Just as it always did, Public still seems to fill up, at least on weekends. We had no trouble getting a 7:15 p.m. reservation on Saturday night, but the next available was past 10:00 p.m. By the time we left, it seemed every inch of space was occupied.

Typical of restaurants in its genre, Public would not seat me until my dining companion had arrived—either a sensible strategy for managing tables in demand, or a cynical way to run up the bar tab. So I went to the bar, where I struggled to get a server’s attention. Once I did, I enjoyed both of the infused vodkas that I tried. Naturally, the tab wasn’t transferable to our table.

Public offers an Australian/New Zealand fusion menu that is really difficult to categorize.

Cured wild boar with Garrotxa cheese, marinated olives, caper berries and crostini

Cured wild boar ($13) sounded interesting, but was probably a waste of a good wild boar, as it didn’t taste particularly distinctive. With the cheese and crostini, it was at least a tasty snack. My girlfriend had the lentil salad, which was just fine, but didn’t launch any culinary fireworks.

Manuka braised lamb shank and truffled swede mash with watercress, poached pear and pickled onion salad

We both had the braised lamb shank ($25.50), which was satisfying comfort-food, though as my girlfriend pointed out, the degree of difficulty is low. It’s hard to screw up a braised meat. I thought that both the swede mash and accompanying salad were boring.

Service was inconsistent, and one server spilled wine on my shirt. The décor, a public library cum post office circa 1940s, is one of design firm AvroKO’s most stunning creations. The new-age sound track is too loud, and the exposed brick tends to amplify the sound.

You won’t eat badly at Public, but you won’t be wowed either. Perhaps the best bet is to come for a drink, admire the design, then try somewhere else for dinner.

Public (210 Elizabeth St. between Spring St. & Prince St., NoLIta)

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

Quality Meats

Quality Meats is a new entry in the sub-genre of luxury steakhouses, a niche occupied by itself, BLT Steak, BLT Prime, and Craftsteak. Characteristic of the category, the décor is significantly more upscale and chick-friendly than the typical steakhouse, the wine list more serious, the side dishes more carefully thought out, and the prices are several dollars more per entree than the already expensive standard set by NYC steakhouses.

My friend and I gave Quality Meats a try last night. We found it a tad superior to Craftsteak, although with a few reservations. The restaurant offers a 64 oz. double bone-in rib steak for two, for $110. We’re both fans of the ribeye, so we gave it a try. This was enormous, sliced tableside, with more of a “prime rib” taste than usual for a solo ribeye steak. We asked for a preparation between medium and medium rare, which the kitchen executed perfectly. We brought the ample leftovers home.

The amuse bouche was a deviled egg, which struck us as unusual at this type of restaurant, but the kitchen did a fine job with it. They also sent out freshly baked dinner rolls, which were sinfully good. For appetizers, my friend had a salad, while I ordered the bone marrow ($9), which was excellent. While we awaited our steak, a server came over and prepared a terrific home-made steak sauce tableside. I don’t normally use steak sauce, but for this I made an exception.

For side dishes, we ordered the crispy potatoes ($7), which came in a hot pan, over which garlic butter was poured at the table. The effect was upscale potato chips. An order of grilled asparagus ($8) was wonderful. To go along with this, I found a very reasonable pinot noir. The total for two, before tip, was $215, which for a meal of this quality in New York was quite reasonable.

If the story ended there, I’d give Quality Meats a solid three stars. But there were a number of glitches with the service. When we asked for the double ribeye, we initially did not want appetizers, as we knew we were in for something huge. Our server warned us that the ribeye would take 90 minutes to prepare, and asked if we wanted to reconsider the appetizers. We were baffled as to how a steak could take 90 minutes, but we took her word for it and ordered appetizers. In the meantime, our steak appeared 35–40 minutes later.

We would also like to have been told that the steak came with about a pound of mushrooms and glazed onions, in which case we wouldn’t have ordered two side dishes on top of that. Lastly, we were subjected to unctuous upselling at dessert time. We were full at that point, but the server tried to break our resistance: “Are you sure you don’t want any dessert? Perhaps an ice cream to share?” On an already expensive bill, this bordered on offensive. We held our ground, but it was annoying nonetheless.

For a restaurant of this size, the noise level was manageable. The AvroKO décor is spectacular, but the tables are small and close together. Indeed, there was not room on our table for everything we had ordered, and our server had to commandeer the next table over, which fortunately was not yet occupied. I don’t know what they would have done had it been a full house.

I’m sure I’ll be back to Quality Meats — a steakhouse this good deserves to be on everyone’s list. I sure hope they’ll get their service team knocked into better shape.

Quality Meats (57 W 58th Street, East of Sixth Avenue, West Midtown)

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

SAPA

Note: SAPA closed during the summer of 2008. The space re-opened as Nuela.

*

The restaurant SAPA’s blurb on the OpenTable website leads you to expect that shotgun wedding of culinary styles that is usually called “fusion”:

Sapa; it’s namesake, an incredibly picturesque village that lies on the Hoang Lien Son mountain range near the Chinese border in NW Vietnam, was built by the French in 1922. Sapa marries the two cuisines under one roof, but not on the plate. The food embodies modern interpretations of Vietnamese dishes with an emphasis on share styled plates as to conform to the Vietnamese style dining and the French cuisine expresses versions of classic bistro and brasserie dishes.

The menu has evidently undergone some refinement since Frank Bruni was there in January 2005. Its length so offended him that it became the theme of his review, “So Many Dishes! A Little Help, Please.” As presented last night, SAPA’s menu did not appear overly long, and some of the specific dishes mentioned in the review are now gone. The alleged French bistro/brasserie influence is largely a phantom. Actually, I had forgotten Bruni’s review entirely, but I was looking for a dining spot in Chelsea on a Sunday evening, and SAPA caught my eye.

The gorgeous AvroKo-designed space is modern, sleek, and sexy. You know you’re in for an Asian-themed eclectic menu when you find both chopsticks and Western utensils at the table. To start, I decided to try the Spicy Tuna Rolls ($10). There were two rolls, about three-inches long and as thick as a cigar, and they came with three dipping sauces. Perhaps “tangy” would have been a better name than “spicy,” but whatever the name they were very good.

I was even more impressed with Cod Roasted in Parchment ($32). You expect fish cooked in parchment to retain its moisture (as this one did), but you don’t expect the combination with porcini butter, roasted mushrooms, and pureed potato to deliver such an effective flavor punch. This was one of the more delightful fish preparations I’ve had in quite some time.

My friend had a duck salad ($12) and stir-fry chicken ($25), and she appeared to be equally satisfied. Service was friendly and efficient. The restaurant appeared to be doing a decent business for a Sunday night, although they were well under half full.

SAPA (43 W. 24th Street, east of Sixth Avenue, Chelsea)

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

Public

Note: For a more recent review of Public, click here.

Public is a double James Beard award winner for both restaurant design and restaurant graphics. The motif is that of a public library circa 1964. Who knew that card catalogs and leaded glass restroom doors would be modern chic? Even the menu comes on a clipboard that looks like it’s been pulled from manilla card stock.

Unfortunately, you can’t eat décor. When it comes to food, Public’s catalog entry is: almost, but not quite. My friend’s Grilled Mayan Prawns with asparagus were very good, but she thought the chef was too parsimonious with the ingredients, especially the asparagus. My sister-in-law’s Tasmanian Sea Trout was very good, but a tad too spicy. My brother’s Roast New Zealand Venison Loin was “very good, but not great,” for reasons he didn’t specify. My Roast Lamb Chump was stringy, and in fact not as good as the accompanying vegetables.

So we had a happy evening, for which we had no regrets, but no one in our party of four felt that the food quite lived up to the design. Luckily Public is very reasonably priced for a high-concept place, with mains in the $18-25 range. However, they do clean up on the appetizers (we weren’t that hungry, and didn’t order any), which are expensive compared to the rest of the menu at $8-19. Desserts are $8.50-$11.50; we shared two between us and were satisfied without being overwhelmed.

Public (210 Elizabeth St. between Spring St. & Prince St., NoLIta)

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