gastropoda/trails

The seriously good, again: Recipe, where my consort and I stopped in for a real lunch to fortify us before a picnic dinner in Riverside Park and where the best thing besides the food was the manager acting as if he didn’t recognize me after my overstaying at dinner. We ate the usual main courses — outstanding skirt steak with chimichurri and roasted potatoes etc. for me, roasted hen with farro etc. for him — after the bitter-sweet salad with grilled pancetta, walnuts and Parmesan and the beet salad with goat cheese and pecans. It’s the best lunch deal in town: $11.95. And would be worth it at twice that. 452 Amsterdam Avenue near 82d Street, 212 501 7755.

As usual, I went bitching and whining to Buffalo and am now here to half-argue, again, that it’s the most overlooked destination in New York State, and not only when it comes to eating and drinking. If only someone would realize Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s fantasy of a high-speed rail line from here, half the hipsters in Williamsburg would be settling down in great houses with access to music, art, parks and, especially, food. Already the city is allowing urban gardens to be planted on abandoned lots, and those are becoming tourist attractions — while we were checking out the hoop house on Wilson Street on Saturday, a car inched by with other sightseers, who could very well have been former residents of that block. Detroit gets all the buzz on the Re-Greening of Urban America, but Buffalo never fell as far. And it has richer history; the beautifully designed new park at the Erie Canal terminus explains the earlier parts artfully.

We always start with a stop at Premier, the food shop and wine megastore very near the boyhood home. Eons before Holy Foods tried to skirt NYS law on separation of booze and food at the dread TWC, this place knew you could provide almost one-stop shopping with separate entrances — so you enter on the left to buy kitchenware and gifties and cheeses and everything else edible, then you check out and can walk right into the wine store, which is nearly overwhelming. Premier carries labels I have never seen in Manhattan, and definitely at prices you won’t see here.

Our first meal was a hookup with Bob’s aunt, uncle and cousin-in-from-Spokane at a quintessential Buffalo family restaurant, Marotto’s. Like so many QBFRs, it looks like nothing special from the street, aside from the neon TRIPE sign in the window, but the chef is dead-serious about his food. Of course many jokes were made about that tripe, so Bob ordered it and most of us tasted it, and I could see why it’s in the window; it was surprisingly tender, and really enriched the superb red sauce with it. It would be amazing over pasta.

As usual with QBFRs, salad came with the meal, except with my choice, the special fish fry — a Friday tradition we have somehow never tried in 27 years of eating there. I got two huge slabs of haddock, but the batter they were fried in was nearly burned; luckily, the macaroni salad and coleslaw were above average, and the day’s potatoes were over-the-top rich and creamy. Rick said the problem was that the batter should have been made with beer, which would have lightened it, but I had another suspicion. The broiled haddock was $5 more, so draw your own conclusions.

We had lunch at the Lake Effect Diner, despite the awful Fieri connection, because I kept reading that the owners, the Curtin family, are so into local ingredients now. Unfortunately, my getting swept up in the hype enticed Bob to order a beef on weck, only to finish the gray meat on soggy bun with tame horseradish and ask: “Why do I never remember these are never very good?” My pulled-pork sandwich, though, was surprisingly great, the meat smoked seven hours and nicely sauced, enough so that the processed American “cheese” in the bun was imperceptible aside from its color. And the poppy seed-flecked coleslaw, which the waitress had warned us off, was outstanding, crisp and not overly mayonnaised. We all shared the special “carrot gazpacho,” which was more like a mise en place for minestrone with a shitload of Tabasco. (The diner itself, moved to Buffalo from Pennsylvania, looked medium-cool, but the bathroom was more like a truck stop’s. Yikes.)

Between meals, we checked out the little farmers’ market in Kenmore, near the boyhood home, then the one on Elmwood, which was New York quality with New York prices. White Cow Dairy was the only stand to get us to open a wallet, with its France-level yogurt in glass jars in unorthodox flavors (like rhubarb), its fascinating lemon drink (made with whey and maple syrup) and its spiel (soon to expand to what sounded like a Chelsea Market North).

Our last overindulgence was at Hutch’s, after getting screwed at The Stillwater trying to use the $75 gift certificate we had given the I-LE last March, and after trying to figure out what in holy hell had inspired us to buy it. We left a message to reserve and heard nothing back so proceeded downtown, only to be informed the kitchen was closed until after Labor Day. If we had been alone, we would have stayed to drink the bar dry, because I kinda doubt the place is gonna last long enough to redeem that certificate.

Too late I remembered Seabar as a backup, so we headed to nearby Hutch’s, where we’ve happily eaten before. Good Chilean sauvignon blanc and Argentinean malbec for $7 a glass changed our moods fast. And I can forgive the otherwise world-class waiter less for screwing up my order than for referring to me as “the young lady” who might be persuaded to share her good portobello fries — when they have to lie, you know you look old.

The beet salad with heirloom tomato, blue cheese and walnuts was impressive, as was the watermelon gazpacho we started with. I didn’t try the I-LE’s calf’s liver, but it was sliced thin, grilled rather than fried and pretty effectively camouflaged under crisp bacon strips and caramelized onions alongside superb mashed potatoes. Bob had the special soft-shell crabs, which were almost whales but perfectly fried and laid onto a super-rich sauce, with a side plate of green beans and potatoes. Three were way too many, though. Rather than my ordering the excellent crab cake appetizer for $15, we should have paid the $3 charge to have the kitchen split his entrée to share. And I’m writing that just so I hope I remember next time.

As always, we left the I-LE’s refrigerator crammed with kitty bags when we happily flew home. You will never stagger out of a Buffalo restaurant hungry.

Premier, 3465 Delaware Avenue, Kenmore.

Marotto’s, 3365 Delaware Avenue, Kenmore, 716 873 0551.

Lake Effect Diner, 3165 Main Street, 716 833 1952.

Hutch’s, 1375 Delaware Avenue near Gates Circle, 716 885 0074.

The good, even though: Recipe, twice. The first time it was four of us, early, and we dutifully got into the Epago program, sharing the macaroni and cheese with corn, peas and bacon as an appetizer (good, not great) and a nice panna cotta for dessert, plus one bottle of wine, and happily going on our way. As always, the main courses were superb, both my halibut and The Consort’s huge pork chop. All in all, a perfect evening. So great that I came home and reserved for two nights later with a new guy in town, one who doesn’t understand that you only rent a table in this town, especially in a tiny, very good restaurant. Food and service were again superb (I had the duck, we shared a crab cake), but we were having such a great time discussing the sorry state of the world and America’s sorry part in it that we kept ordering more wine until finally the host had to come by and tell us people had been waiting 15 minutes for our table. Or, here’s the check and what’s your hurry? It was rather mortifying, even under Bob’s name. WIGB? Only for lunch for a while, I guess. It is the best restaurant in the neighborhood at that price point. 452 Amsterdam near 82d Street, 212 501 7755.

The improved: Cafe Luxembourg, where we met friends for an early dinner on Saturday and reveled in the best part of Manhattan in August — no assholes. Only afterward did they confess that they had preferred Compass because they had had rushed and un-fun experiences here. But this great waiter let us take our very long sweet time talking before ordering, so we could enjoy the great room and the mellow noise level. I never think of the food as brilliant, but my hanger steak was beautifully cooked and well matched with bearnaise, broccoli rabe and potatoes “confit,” and Bob’s good branzino came with baby leeks and a very spicy tomato compote. Dr. Bugs seemed happy with his lobster roll (we were with his fries), while Lady Bugs’s corn ravioli with truffles could have used more of the former. I also tasted the shared chocolate-coconut terrine, which was like stacked Almond Joys but better than that sounds. But the best thing that landed on the table was the mango gazpacho, tomato-free and very lively with cilantro oil. The food was so much better than I remembered that I actually tracked down the waiter to ask if the chef was new, and he seemed taken aback. WIGB? Absolutely. Not many places in this town are that reliable. 200 West 70th Street, 212 873 7411.

The right place on the right night: The Corner, the latest incarnation at 93d and  Columbus, where we recharged our batteries the night we got home from Istanbul and then remembered to meet up with a young friend reeling from a sting by a Portuguese man o’war on her vacation in North Carolina. I thought she would get into the three-for-$10 
“steak” sliders at happy hour at the bar, but she landed first and chose a sidewalk table; luckily her favorite things were available there, too (although they were pretty overcooked). I had the quite respectable gazpacho, a huge bowlful, while Bob ordered the crab cakes again. The salad with cheese and almonds that I had liked the first time must have needed dressing not on the side, though, because Pam didn’t seem to attack it with gusto. WIGB? Totally. It’s close by, the setting’s great and the food hasn’t disappointed. 680 Columbus Avenue, 212 280 4103.

The wrong place on the right night: Jimmy’s No. 43 in the East Village, where I have always wanted to go but where the food was too small-plates for the occasion, which was a chance to reconnect with a photographer friend in from New Hope who’s spending more time in front of the camera than behind it these days. He was happy with the amazing beer selection, we less so with the wines served in Chimay goblets (message: don’t go to a beer specialist for anything else). But I should have understood the food would come out as the cook got it together, and that portions would be tres petite. We shared the good fried sausage slices with mustard and the shisito peppers, then one Bob had the bratwurst sandwich and the other, not sure why, “The Piggery salami,” which was seriously good but decidedly dainty. I usually drag our friend to more high-end places than he would like, but I think I aimed too low this time. WIGB? Sure, if I were in the neighborhood, after a movie and looking for something little in a convivial room. And had cash on me. 43 East Seventh Street, 212 982 3006.

The pretty good: Landmarc in Tribeca, where we wound up after the W debacle and after passing by and up Plein Sud because the menu posted outside looked (to Bob) too familiar and (to me) as if you could already see the cheap paper it was cheaply printed on crumbling after the place went under. (I hope I’m wrong; someone big liked it fine.) We got a window table downstairs and soon had an outstanding fontina and mushroom flatbread topped with arugula and crispy prosciutto in front of us, then half-bottles of white and red ($20 and $18 together seem like a deal compared with either a bottle or by the glass most places). My chopped salad was enhanced by hearts of palm, and his skirt steak with chimichurri sauce was flavorful if fibrous and came with decent fries. Service was great, view was good. And the four salty caramels with the check didn’t hurt. WIGB? Absolutely. 179 West Broadway near Franklin, 212 343 3883.

The pretty bad: RedBowl in Williamsburg, which we staggered into after a superb party nearby in a loft apartment with a backstage view of the Nas/Damian Marley concert against the Manhattan skyline and after our rube-like reconnaissance of the blocks around it. The basil pancake was surprisingly satisfying, but we made the mistake of listening to the distracted waiter about which of the duck main courses was best. The Cr should have been followed by ’appy rather than ’ispy; the $16 half-bird was really desiccated, even before it was blanketed in flour-tortilla-like pancakes with tired scallion shreds and sweet sauce. Usually one duck item on the menu is a warning. Now I know six are an Orange Level alert. Wine was $6 a glass, though, and the clean bathroom was very welcome before the ride home.

The bad except for the food: Toloache off Times Square, where we reflexively headed for a snack and glass of wine after the surprisingly good “Kids Are All Right” on 42d Street and where our punishment was dismissive service and delayed food. It wasn’t even full when we said we were two, but the hostess shunted us to the bar, which would have been fine if the bartender had not been in major hose-down mode, busier cleaning than tending to our order. While I sat watching the oven and what went into and came out of it. Only when Bob asked for a second glass did he check, and when the waiter sheepishly brought out the two plates, we both asked: How long was it sitting in the kitchen? He didn’t answer, and it was still warm enough not to send back, but still. The huitlacoche was as good as it always is, and the “costilla” with steak and chipotle BBQ sauce even better. But it was not a $60-plus-tip experience. WIGB? J’doubt it. Lots of new places are opening around there.

The we-put-the-din-in-dinner: Motorino in the East Village, where, luckily again, someone else was paying and where I left wondering how the waiters retain their sanity, let alone their hearing. We split the excellent “fire-roasted” mortadella with cherry tomatoes, basil, olives and pecorino, and it was about six universes away from the fried bologna I was envisioning (although the only way to eat bologna is fried, and fried crisp), then a pizza margherita and a special pizza with prosciutto and, if I remember right, burrata. I will never warm to wine in tumblers. Although now I wonder if those aren’t meant to be emptied and used as ear trumpets.

The seriously good: Recipe, again, where my consort and I headed shortly after he landed from his latest time-zone abuse, 10 days in North Carolina after at least that long in Istanbul and before that Phnom Penh and Ukraine. Our apartment is not only too hot to cook in, with half the windows plywooded over, but it always helps to reconnect on neutral ground. The great lunch prices also made it worth the short walk: $11.95 for my grilled calamari with two kinds of beans and cascading flavor, and a slab of sliced steak with potatoes, broccoli and green beans plus exceptional chimichurri (not just parsley and garlic but fresh oregano, cilantro, green peppers, celery and jalapeño Tabasco, the chef said when he stepped out of the kitchen and Bob grilled him). Bob scored just as well, with a little Nicoise-esque salad (olives, hard-cooked eggs, green beans, anchovies) followed by the roasted half-chicken with grain salad mixed with carrots and asparagus. WIGB? Anytime. Can’t believe it’s even in our neighborhood and not over in a certain borough. 452 Amsterdam Avenue near 82d Street, 212 501 7755.

The not bad: Mermaid Oyster Bar in the West Village, where three of us headed after the well-made but depressing “Restrepo” at Angelika on Saturday night and where we were lucky enough to snare the last bar table rather than wait two hours. The place was mobbed, but the staff was rolling with it — our glasses were kept filled with a Provencal rosé, and the busboy was quick to remove extra plates from the overcrowded table. Our food came too fast; my fries and the oysters in my otherwise fine $16 po’ boy could have been crisper. But everything tasted great (I didn’t try Pam’s fluke seviche with its “three-crab” sauce or Bob’s two kinds of raw oysters; Roy Blount Jr. and his “like swallowing a large baby” keep me away from those guys). The $20 crab cake was a big, meaty one with good tartar sauce, “whale” fries (potato slices), coleslaw and lettuce. WIGB? Probably, but only with a reservation. And an understanding that the huge markups on the wine underwrite the very affordable food. 79 MacDougal Street just above Houston, 212 260 0100.

The geographically correct: Canteen 82, where a friend in the neighborhood lured me on the one-week anniversary of my return to this tiny town from the mega-city on the Bosphorus. She loves it; other friends who live relatively close by love it. And it’s certainly better than any of the other dreary “Chinese” restaurants that don’t require braving the subway on a 95-degree Saturday. But the soup dumplings were underwhelming, and the Peking duck buns full of too-sweet meat (yes, she was right: ordering them was a mistake, but I was glad we didn’t get a dozen of the dumplings). The scallion pancake was crisp enough, and the green salad was a deal, for $6, with lots of vegetables and a paving of avocado slices over the top. But the service was ridiculously inattentive in a nearly empty room. And that breakfast/brunch menu of Western standards made me wonder if any kitchen could juggle hollandaise and special orders of slivered ginger without losing its way. WIGB? Probably. It is convenient, and Bob needs to taste for himself. But while it seemed like a deal, our lunch at Recipe was 35 times more satisfying for about the same amount of money. 467 Columbus near 82d Street, 212 595 4300.

The oops, I forgot: Stone Rose at JFK, where I ducked in to top off my tank after skipping lunch before getting trapped in the absurdly long security line at Delta (a whole fucking hour). I figured if I ate before boarding, I could sleep straight through to Istanbul, and that was exactly how it almost worked out, except the cheesy “steak flatbread” with pico de gallo seemed to expand in my stomach like a Houlihan’s special. Also, too, the portion was T.G.I.Friday’s outsized, and I ingested only a little and still suffered. I figured I would at least get a decent glass of wine from Rande’s cellars, but they were out of the NZ SV and I had to settle for chardonnay. WIGB? If I stupidly ever fly Delta ever again? All I can say is I was disappointed on heading to the gate to see I had missed a Chili’s. . . .

Exactly a week after I got home, I met a friend for lunch who said her 20-something son had suffered terrible food in Istanbul and been harassed the whole time. Where did he stay? Near the Blue Mosque and the other ancient attractions. Thank allah the workshop my consort was teaching had lodged him over the Galata Bridge, in Beyoglu, in a business/boutique hotel, the Richmond, where everyone had warned we would be so isolated. Let’s start with the huge breakfast buffet: Eggs and potatoes and toast for timid travelers plus the real local deal, too: half a dozen kinds of cheese, meats (anything but pork), cucumbers and tomatoes, olives, jams and honeys, yogurts and fresh and cooked fruits. The best part: a Nescafe machine that turned out perfect coffee on all but one morning, when it needed its white balance adjusted. The second-best part: the view, over city and water.

But this was location, location: We were right at the funicular end of Istiklal Cadessi, the  main boulevard in that district, with shops and restaurants directly on it and alleys lined with endless sidewalk cafes branching off it. Down the center, the “nostalgia tram” ran, loaded with passengers in daylight but towing a music car at night (usually with some band blasting “Ride, Sally, Ride”).

All my meals fascinated me, but the worst transpired where we also had one of our best: Refik, right near the hotel. Bob and I stumbled in on Saturday at lunchtime when it wasn’t open and they said we could have any of the mezes in the display case, but after we’d decided on three they decided we could have fish, too. So we tasted our way around bland eggplant puree, intense roasted eggplant with tomatoes, onions and peppers, plus strong anchovies rolled around olives, all with grilled bread, and then split the good fried red mullet and the swordfish kebabs with bay leaves and charred lemon. It was expensive (70TL?), but the hospitality (and jazzy WC) lured me back a couple of nights later on my own. What a difference a lack of consort makes. The same waiter/manager could not have been more dismissive; a couple who came in after me got a better table, faster water/raki (with ice, no less) and a display of mezes to choose from. I picked from the menu, and the bread in the basket for my broad bean purée was all heels. Ungrilled.

Also disappointing was the wildly recommended Ozkonak in Cinagir, what Bob described as the SoHo of Istanbul. But I have only myself to blame; it’s an old-line place where you go to the steam table and choose what you want, and I was hot, fried and confused and pointed at stuffed zucchini and then braised artichoke hearts, since I’d seen them being tidily trimmed in the markets. Suffice it to say that this is too often what you get when you order Turkish in NYC. All the staff, though, could not have been nicer.

Heeding Istanbul Eats, I made my way to sleek-and-modern Antiochia another night, and what I’ll remember as much as the food was how mellow the waiter was as a hammering rainstorm set in after most of us patrons had chosen sidewalk tables. He just kept calmly and methodically dragging out umbrellas and adjusting them, so while the American woman with a book seated next to me fled inside, I could stay and share my beef kebabs with a very charming cat who politely stood up to tap me on my elbow to beg for more. An outstanding walnut-tomato-pomegranate spread, though, was the best part of my dinner.

Just as good were the two very spicy mezes, one with peppers and walnuts and the other with peppers and tomatoes, at Sofyali, a few barfronts down from Kefit Fail. The waiter’s hand kind of shook “are you sure?” as he transferred the small trays to our table, but we are salsa-conditioned. Three of us also split a grilled sea bass that was fine until the local fixer who had stopped by our table noted that cheaper fish prices on a menu indicated farmed V wild. As I always say, you are what you eat really makes a difference with the chicken of the sea; it tastes like the grain it’s fed. Funnier still was the special salad of the day, which turned out to be arugula, tomatoes and grated cheese plus . . . corn. Houlihan’s, Istanbul-style.

And I thought the cuisine was settling into the coherence the night three cabs’ worth of us headed to the ferry to Uskudar, on the Asian side, for dinner at Ismet Baba, right on the Bosphorus. The food unloaded onto our table, chosen by the fixer, looked familiar: melon and white cheese; smoked/cured fish with slices of raw onion; eggplant purée; roasted eggplant with tomatoes and hot peppers; sea beans with garlic; yogurt with scallions; fried calamari with ricotta-like cheese for dipping; famous fried liver; slices of a phyllo roll filled with potatoes and dill. The main course was swordfish as we’d had it at Refik, with the addition of grilled tomatoes, and dessert was a huge array of fruit with helveh. It seemed like a classic meal.

But then one of the founders of Istanbul Eats took me to lunch in a Kurdish market and I realized I knew nothing. Here we shared chunks of lamb hacked off a whole animal that had been roasted in a charcoal pit; the bits were mounded over a flatbread that soaked up the amazing fat. Lamb sickens me, but I was actually bummed he ordered only a half-portion; I could have eaten double. To accommodate me, he also had chosen chicken and rice in a pastry crust with currants and almonds and steamed patties with kibbeh inside that were equally dazzling. I also got to experience the salty yogurt drink ayran the right, messy way, from a huge copper mug with a ladle.

Given how good that meal was, I took his and his co-blogger’s advice on their site about Zubeyrir, which was the perfect ending. Bob and I sat alongside the charcoal grill and took so many photos of our food the chef insisted on taking one of us. For some reason, the headwaiter insisted I taste everything we chose from the meze tray before he turned it over to us for good, but the gigante beans were as good as the yogurt-cucumber-tomato-spread and warm eggplant purée and spinach with garlic; the regular flatbread was excellent, too, but then he brought a sort of Turkish tortilla, baked with herbs,  crackly and crunchy. I had a hard time ceding most of the grilled lamb ribs with their amazing fat and a spicy mixed-mince kebab that came with a fascinating parsley-onion salad dusted with sumac. All that went well with a good bottle of Kavaklidere red. And I would have felt bad that we were just hitting our eating stride, but we had one last breakfast to look forward to. . .

Ozkonak, Akarsu Caddesi No. 60, Cihangir
Sofyali, Sofyali Sofak No. 9, Beyoglu
Siirt Seref Buryan Kebap Salonu, Itfaiye Cadessi No. 4, Fatih, serefburyan.com
Antiochia, Minare Sokak, Asmalimesict, antiochiaconcept.com
Ismet Baba, Carsi Caddesi No. 1, ismetbaba.com.tr
Zubeyrir Ocakbasi, Istiklal Caddesi Bekar Sokak No. 28, zubeyirocakbasi.com

We also had mind-changing baklava, two kinds made with pistachios and one with walnuts, at Develi (“since 1912”), outside the Spice Bazaar. I tried two other places that did nothing to convert me to the stuff. We had the best plums of either of our lives from a roadside gardener on Buyukada Island. I got to taste 14 cheeses at the great little Antre shop in Cihangir and several more while walking through markets. We both developed a taste for simit, the sesame-encrusted rounds of bread that are indescribable; they were great whether straight off a vendor’s head near the Spice Bazaar, fresh from a wood-burning oven in a bakery or slightly humidified on the ferry. And I’m here to say Turkish delight could be addictive. It’s not quite Istanbul Chuckles; the flavors — saffron or rose or mastic — elevate it. Finally, Bob warned me off Turkish coffee but hooked me on Turkish tea, served in a special small glass and meant to be sweetened; I preferred it plain. For some reason, though, it always made me want to nod off. The last time I had that reaction was in another city where we felt like ghosts — Turin — and it happened every time I had a chocolate-coffee bicerin.

I had a lot of time by myself while Bob was preoccupied with his students, so I invested it in serious research, investigating “rose wine,” as the waiters called it. The House Cafe had a pleasant balcony and charged 12 Turkish lira for a big glass of fine Lal, from Kavaklidere, apparently the dominant producer in Anatolia. At the sleek cafe in the wonderful Pera Museum with its spirit-lifting Botero exhibit, I tried two other producers’ over two days for only 10 TL a pour and got amazing pistachios to go with them. And one afternoon I invested an hour tasting four different rosés at Sensus, a wine cellar with a cheese counter. I’m not sure how any of them would stack up against something from Languedoc or Provence, but they were beyond impressive there. I see Astor carries some of them in New York, and they’re much cheaper than they were in the restaurants.

The pleasant: Trestle on Tenth in Chelsea, where I wound up with a friend up from Bethesda after waiting too long to reserve on a Saturday night and getting shut out of my first through tenth choices. We were warned a big wedding party was in the garden but took a table there and soon surmised they must have been Swiss, because they never got rowdy, so we could talk easily. And it really was a great setting, so I’m not going to feel too bad about my $22 dish, which smelled a little high — monkfish with calamari, tired clams and Swiss chard in smoked lobster broth. Gary was happier with his halibut with asparagus, mushrooms and ramps, very simply done, and with his pork shoulder crepinette as an appetizer. I did like the bread. And the ethereal waiter. And the way the busboy handled dropping a butter knife into my quarter-full wineglass: Not only did he not shatter it, he immediately offered to bring a fresh one, so after we finished the bottle the waiter split a glass for us. WIGB? Probably, mostly for the atmosphere — the food is beyond reasonable, but the wine list is kinda crazy; our $43 gruner might have been the cheapest bottle. 242 Tenth Avenue at 24th Street, 212 645 5659.

The sorta good: Tarallucci et Vino near Union Square, where a friend and I on our once-a-year coffee date retreated after getting a good look at the pastries on display at Joe the Art of Cart. We sat in the din outside, where it was apparently too easy for the staff to forget all about us; we saw the waiter twice in nearly two hours. (Which comes first? The crappy tip or the crappy treatment of women?) And while my cappuccino was Italy-class, the cornetto was mostly gloppy “cream.” WIGB? Probably. There really aren’t many great alternatives around there. 15 East 18th Street, 212 228 5400.

The excellent: Recipe, where I wound up with my consort just back from the Ukraine when neither of us could face either a long subway ride to Vinegar Hill House or $40 entrees on our own island. As before, the food, service, place outperformed, and not just for the neighborhood. The heirloom tomato salad was the weakest link, but we knew that on ordering it as a special because it’s too early even for regular tomatoes from close by. But my wintry-sounding, spring-tasting duck breast with wild rice, turnips and baby corn combined quality meat with precision cooking and a sublime sauce, while Bob’s sea bass special may have been better than anything we’ve eaten at Bouley Upstairs (it came with white and green asparagus, fingerling potatoes and a corn emulsion). We also split a chocolate-caramel tart topped with pine nuts and sea salt, plus a bottle of decent French chardonnay and got away for $112 before the tip. WIGB? Early and often. 452 Amsterdam Avenue near 82d Street, 212 501 7755.