Passerine has debuted a tasting menu value trying out.
Illustration: Naomi Otsu
Welcome to Grub Avenue’s rundown of restaurant suggestions that goals to reply the endlessly recurring query: The place ought to we go? These are the spots that our meals crew thinks everybody ought to go to, for any motive (a brand new chef, the arrival of an thrilling dish, or perhaps there’s a gap that’s flown too far underneath the radar). This month: Danji returns, a wine bar is fascinating for a change, a curse could also be damaged, and extra.
Golden HOF and NY Kimchi (Midtown)
As a rule, steakhouses evolve solely begrudgingly; they’re solely often allowed to thaw. Custom isn’t a nasty factor, however neither is innovation. Have a look at Cote, which fused the steakhouse with Korean barbecue — a combo so seamless it made everybody marvel what took so lengthy. Now, the chef Sam Yoo, whose Golden Diner made him the Pancake King of Downtown, has launched his “Korean American steakhouse.” It’s one in every of two locations he’s opened close to Rockefeller Middle. There’s the street-level Golden HOF, a riff on the Korean pub, the place you possibly can submit up underneath the hanok ceiling with native workplace staff who excitedly exclaim “Naengmyun martini?” The music pumps, the Korean-fried rooster wings are silly crunchy, and the “Lychee-politan” is simply what it appears like. (Bar supervisor Sarah Ku’s menu has loads extra to love.) The steaks, in the meantime, are downstairs at NY Kimchi, named for the restaurant Yoo’s dad and mom ran on this area. The lighting is dimmer and the music mellower (Mulatu Astatke’s “Tezeta”), however the meals is flashy. Shrimp cocktail comes with a candy and spicy chojang that offers cocktail sauce a run for its cash. Crudos are seasoned à la basic Korean dishes, like scallop “bokkeum” with its gochugaru French dressing and lemon zest. A home salad with ginger–white miso dressing and japchae that’s smoky from the wok are good primers for the meat. Some are chophouse fashion (a dry-aged T-bone), others KKBQ (galbi). All include a diffusion of seven banchan, together with three varieties of kimchee and anchovies with peanuts. L.A. lamb chops nod to Eager’s mutton chop however are ready like L.A. kalbi and supercharged with perilla-soy dipping sauce. —Chris Crowley
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Cactus Wren (Decrease East Facet)
Cooks Samuel Clonts and Raymond Trinh’s menu at this follow-up to 63 Clinton solutions the query, What if a wine bar met a diner? Fried snacks like shrimp toast don’t veer too far into consolation meals, nor do surprisingly candy langoustine beignets. “Caviar service” takes the type of southwestern seven-layer bean dip (this can be a good factor) served with recent tortillas straight from an enormous fireplace close to the doorway. The fruits de mer plate consists of cooked oysters served with beef tallow and horseradish, whereas an in depth wine checklist skews lighter given the quantity of shellfish served. Even nonetheless, it’s doable to finish a meal right here with pizza, if the temper strikes — topped with rooster liver mousse, at that. —Zach Schiffman
Danji (Hell’s Kitchen)
After the Koreassaince of the previous couple of years, it may be simple to overlook how comparatively sparse the Korean-food panorama felt — at the very least exterior of the standard Ok-towns — when Danji first opened in an unassuming little area on West 52nd Avenue in 2010. Chef Hooni Kim gained the primary Michelin star for a Korean restaurant anyplace, however that bought misplaced within the shuffle a bit as new contenders adopted, and in 2023, a hearth in a neighboring constructing shut this restaurant’s doorways for almost two years. Now it’s again and, I’m completely happy to report, pretty much as good as ever. (Within the restaurant-challenged Theater District, it’s pretty much as good a pre- or post-curtain meal as any I do know.) Danji payments itself as “Korean tapas,” however regardless of a number of prospers borrowed from different cuisines — Kim’s pork-studded tteokbokki come topped with mascarpone — the chef is a classicist the place it counts. “You ordered my favourite dish on the menu,” a hostess whispered to me concerning the large iron cauldron of spicy soft-tofu stew, strewn with cod, shrimp, and massive rings of squid. The clouds of tofu half-dissolve within the pungent, saline broth with the type of layered depth of funk and taste that tastes — in one of the simplest ways — as if it had been cooking for on a regular basis the restaurant was closed. Welcome again. —Matthew Schneier
Crevette (West Village)
Seeing “10 Downing” might set off PTSD for the various restaurateurs who’ve tried, unsuccessfully, to construct longstanding companies inside this otherwise-seductive nook deal with. The newest to provide it a go are town’s greatest hope but: Patricia Howard and Ed Szymanski, an influence couple that has, within the early going, packed this eating room by doing all of the little stuff proper. A seafood-heavy menu gives a shocking quantity of selection (a bowl of butter beans with grilled squid, skewers of octopus in harissa, a filet of halibut with fennel: all beautiful). Service is heat and acquainted however not overbearing. The room is full however not suffocating. The décor is “European coastal” however not Epcot-y. It’s all kind of quiet and it’s all fairly good. Any operator will let you know a restaurant lives or dies by its regulars; Crevette is a spot that it will really feel like a present to settle in again and again. —Alan Sytsma
Passerine (Flatiron)
Though it opened in November, it wasn’t till mid-February that this restaurant launched a $135 tasting menu. The seven-course sequence, which can be supplied in a vegetarian model, has little overlap with the common dinner menu and is likely to be the perfect introduction to the boundless cooking of Chetan Shetty, who was most lately chef at Raina in D.C., and at Indian Accent previous to that. The meal kicks off with a tuile-thin tartlette of tuna tartare set with ginger gelée with a crunchy brunoise of pink onion tamed by a scoop of kaluga caviar. Subsequent comes a tackle prosciutto and melon during which cantaloupe balls and dabs of saffron yogurt are hidden beneath petals of endive with a pour of green-apple broth. It’s adopted by heat crab on a pile of snacky potato sticks sauced with a peppery foam, then cod in a creamy cilantro and tomatillo chutney. Breads seem on the finish, with flaky paratha accompanying rooster in a creamy chile masala, topped with a mixture of fried coriander, mustard, and anise seeds. Garlic-heavy naan arrives alongside a yielding piece of spiced quick rib surrounded by a mild and ethereal corn sauce. Dessert is chai ice cream buried in the course of a salty roasted pistachio cream and coated with a heady rosewater ice: a aromatic and memorable last chunk. —Tammie Teclemariam
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